Chapter Text
If you had asked me in the summer of 2023, freshly unemployed and watching the world rapidly devolve into an on-fire trashcan, if I would like to leave it all behind and live my life out in Middle Earth, my answer would have been an emphatic “fuck yes.”
That answer would have been informed by my firm and not irrational belief that Middle Earth wasn’t real; it was kind of the whole selling point.
Unfortunately, the creepy lady at the Ren Faire was probably related to a car salesman aside from being a trickster god, because she failed to mention several issues with the product she was selling me.
I don’t think I’m explaining this properly.
Let’s start over, and this time, let me try to put my thoughts in some order. The first thing, I suppose, is my name, though I’m unlikely to hear it spoken ever again. It was Cassandra, or Cassie, and good riddance. Who the hell names their daughter after a prophet cursed to be disbelieved by everyone? Two classics nerds, that’s who.
I was something of a nerd myself, but in an act of teenage rebellion like the world had never seen before, somewhere around the age of ten or eleven I had decided I would be a nerd about the Middle Ages; a period of history my parents considered to be something like the puberty of humankind: an embarrassing but necessary step in one’s development, and something no one needed to talk about once it was over.
Like I’ve said, it was the summer of ’23 and—in true nerd fashion—I was attending a Faire. It was my first real bit of fun since Covid, I had dramatically quit my job two days ago, and I was determined to get drunk. The people selling homemade mead were most encouraging of my goal.
Only problem was, it was hot as fuck and I was dressed in full costume, so I began to overheat long before I felt any other effects from the alcohol. I had to say a mournful goodbye to the mead and take a walk along the stands to cool myself down. I wandered for a few minutes, most probably looking like a dog with its tongue lolling out in the heat, until I came to a stand selling jewelry.
The pieces were all handmade and a purchase I probably couldn’t justify until I found something steady again. But the seller, an old woman with a worrisome twinkle in her eye, didn’t pressure me to take anything and just let me window-shop for a bit.
“That’s beautiful,” I said, eyeing a leather pendant to which a dark grey stone was attached, tied in a complicated knot. I didn’t know enough about rocks (gems, my more passionate friends might say) to judge its value, but I knew I liked the look of it, clear and dark at once.
“It is a good piece,” she said in a tone only old people were capable of—making it sound like they were imparting profound wisdom on you even with the most mundane statements. “But you mustn’t take it until you’re ready.”
I smiled. “Oh? Ready for what?”
“Your adventure, of course,” she replied.
Yes, I know. This was not so much alarming—I thought at the time—as it was corny. But Ren Faires drew odd people, and that was why I liked them. I figured she was just too deep into character, and I saw no harm in playing along.
And… well, I really shouldn’t take it, but there was something to the thought. A new chapter of my life starting, and something to commemorate it with.
To hell with it, I thought, and said, “I’m quite ready.”
And I wanted this adventure that I thought wasn’t real; I wanted it more than anything in the world.
The woman’s eyes became brighter, and instead of naming the price, which I was rather sure would dwindle my spirits, she reached and wrapped the pendant round my neck.
As she did so, the world tilted. I thought for a moment I’d had an episode of anemia; my vision went spotty and everything seemed to sway, a faint ringing in my ears. Then hearing and sight came back to me, and everything around me was new.
I was standing in the middle of a shadowed street—when had it gotten so dark?—and I was looking at a big inscription over a door reading “THE PRANCING PONY.”
I blinked in astonishment. “What the fuck?”
Perhaps the alcohol had hit me harder than I’d thought. At that moment, it was not unthinkable to me that someone had recreated the sign for the iconic inn in my favorite book series. I figured I’d wandered off to some corner of the faire I hadn’t noticed before, and lost track of time for a while.
It wasn’t a very good explanation.
As I stood there confounded, four very short men approached the inn and observed it as I was doing. They were in costume just like I was. Only, I could tell even in the dark, of much better quality.
“We surely aren’t going to stay here for the night, are we, sir?” one of them said with a great deal of anguish. “If there are hobbit-folk in these pans, why don’t we look for some that would be willing to take us in? It would be more homelike.”
“What’s wrong with the inn?” another responded. “Tom Bombadil recommended it. I expect it’s homelike enough inside.”
Cosplayers? An acting troupe? I was sure these lines were lifted word for word from The Lord of the Rings. I hadn’t heard of anyone putting on a play like that before, even at a faire. I wondered what would happen if I followed them inside.
Much would have turned out differently if I hadn’t given in to my curiosity.
The innkeeper, who introduced himself as Barliman Butterbur—of course he did, and he looked the part too—appeared to have his hands full. He accommodated the party of four first, and sighed in great relief when I told him, with some confusion, that I was only after a drink in the common room and not lodgings for the night. Part of the play? Or was overnight stay at the faire actually possible? Who had even organised all this?
By now you might be laughing at the depth of my denial. My only defence is that people refuse to believe perfectly plausible things all the time—what was happening to me was actually impossible.
I drank my beer (stronger than I expected) and continued to observe the four “hobbits”. I wasn’t the only one. The innkeeper paid them special attention, and many of the other “guests” would sneak glances at them, including a man sitting in a far corner, a long hood falling over his eyes.
They’d picked a really good actor for Aragorn, I thought. All that weird loner energy, with just a hint of something more underneath. And never mind how incredible the set for the inn was, or the background actors muttering about the unrest in Bree. Putting on an open production like that, such a mind-blowingly interactive experience… Why on earth hadn’t this been advertised on the faire’s program?
But the sensation was as eerie as it was exciting. Everything was playing out to unnerving perfection. “Frodo” went over to speak with “Strider” in the corner, meanwhile “Pippin” was cheerfully narrating the tale of Bilbo’s disappearance. Some of the looks the hobbits were receiving seemed too intense for comfort now.
I clung to my ridiculous theory.
Yet when Frodo moved to stand and divert attention from Pippin, my eyes snapped to his hand, fiddling with something in his pocket. A dog barked outside—dogs were not permitted at the faire—and suddenly I was gripped by a fear I couldn’t explain or describe.
All I knew was I couldn’t see this play out.
Before Frodo could do so, I stole his idea and jumped on a table.
“People of Bree!” I shouted. My legs shook. “What a cheery night, yet I’ve not heard one song! Why do you not sing?”
Maybe I really was drunk. But if this was an acting troupe, and it had to be, this would be the point where they would have to kick me out for disrupting their play. Instead, the crowd turned to me with the genuine confusion of a tight-knit community confronted with a cheerful, inebriated stranger.
“You sing! You sing!” some voices cajoled.
Holy fucking shit. This had to be—a prank, or else someone had slipped something in my mead earlier and I was tripping balls.
I still had to come up with a song. A song that the people of fucking Bree, in fucking Middle Earth, could listen to and understand, so probably not Ed Sheeran.
Luckily, I was a Middle Ages nerd.
After a long beat of silence, and the crowd’s laughter at my flustering, I opened my mouth.
Bring us in no brown bread, for that is made of bran,
Nor bring us in no white bread, there therein is no game;
But bring us in good ale
Bring us in no beef, for there is many bones,
But bring us in good ale, for that goes down at once;
And bring us in good ale
Bring us in no bacon, for that is passing fat,
But bring us in good ale, and give us enough of that;
And bring us in good ale
Bring us in no mutton, for that is often lean,
Nor bring us in no tripes, for they be seldom clean;
And bring us in good ale
Bring us in no eggs, for there are many shells,
But bring us in good ale, and give us nothing else;
And bring us in good ale
Bring us in no butter, for therein are many hairs,
Nor bring us in no pig’s flesh, for that will make us boars;
And bring us in good ale
Bring us in no capon’s flesh, for that is often dear,
Nor bring us in no duck’s flesh, for they slobber in the mere;
And bring us in good ale
To my surprise, my spontaneous performance was met with good-natured applause. I didn’t have a great singing voice, but I could keep to a simple tune, and that combined with the exaltation of drink seemed enough to garner the approval of the people of Bree. I bowed politely but declined to repeat my song, with some excuse about wanting to hear the songs of the Bree-folk. My request was granted, and a few Men and Hobbits began singing together a familiar tune.
I hopped off the table in a daze. Somebody was trying to talk to me; I had no idea what they were saying.
Okay, so no acting troupe. Time for a new theory: I was hallucinating. Troubling, in a sense, but also reassuring. It meant nothing I did mattered. Whatever was happening to my brain, it could have come up with something a lot worse than getting me to play-act my favorite story in the world.
Next to me a Bree native was still speaking. I ignored him, since I was fairly sure he was not a real person. I was more interested in Frodo Baggins, ring-bearer, making his way over to Pippin and scolding him in a whisper. How strange it was to see them before my eyes, these unlikely heroes a strange professor who loved fairytales and languages had made up.
Suddenly a new voice came from so near me that I jolted in alarm. “I’ve heard many songs from all four corners of the world,” was saying Aragorn son of Arathorn, because my delicate psyche had finally collapsed under the stress of living under capitalism, apparently, “but this one is not known to me.”
I opened my mouth and tried to think of something clever and appropriate to say, but the weight of every page I had turned—every time my eyes had scanned across the letters of his name—sat heavy on my throat and I could not speak.
He stood in front of me. Aragorn; Strider. A man in weather-worn clothes and a face drawn with worries, unkempt and wild. He looked little like what I pictured when I thought of the future king of Gondor. But he looked real.
I felt almost the same abrupt fear as when I’d realised Frodo was about to put on the Ring. Doom, my mind whispered insistently. Doom doom doom.
Fortunately, I had long years of practice not listening to my mind.
“I must be from the fifth then,” I said, and if my voice came out a thin kettle-whistle at least I managed to speak. “I’d offer to write it down, but it’s not very good.”
It was a meaningless answer, but he didn’t press, only considered me for long enough to make me nervous. Hallucination or no, I really didn’t want to be mistaken for a servant of Sauron. I also preferably didn’t want Sauron to exist, but that was a problem for later.
“I don’t believe old Barliman introduced you.”
I couldn’t very well go by my real name here. I tried to stall. “Nor you, if I’m not mistaken.”
“I am called Strider,” said he, and waited in pointed silence for my own response.
I had little time to think as I tried to employ all my knowledge of the naming customs of a world that didn’t exist. All that came to me, in that long stupefying moment, was the throwaway name of my character when I’d played Lord of the Rings Online. I wasn’t even sure I’d used proper Sindarin naming convention for it—
“I’m Lîneth,” I said. And since I had no brighter ideas, I decided to risk butchering Sindarin some more. “Im am cín mellon.”
If my ‘knowledge’ of the elvish speech surprised him, he didn’t show it. “Mae govannen,” he returned in an undertone. And continuing in Sindarin that I had to fight to understand, “We need to talk.”
I glanced nervously around the common room. We were not hidden from sight, but neither were people observing us. The occasional glance, no more than Strider would usually garner, I supposed.
But I noticed the four hobbits—no, three, Merry had gone outside earlier—had disappeared.
“Shouldn’t you be talking to your other friends right now?” I murmured.
“We might have a quiet word all together.” An odd smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “I would not dare request you speak with a ruffian like me alone.”
“No, you’re right. One ruffian and four scatter-brained trouble magnets I also don’t know is much more reassuring,” I said without thinking.
Still, that didn’t sound like he thought I was a spy of the Enemy. He wouldn’t let me near the hobbits if he did. Or… maybe he simply knew he could deal with me before I could do them any harm, or he suspected we were all spies, and intended to play us against each other.
Either way, I didn’t see how I could get out of it now that I had so cleverly stuck my nose in business that wasn’t mine. So I nodded and followed after him without much hope that I could alleviate his suspicions better in private. What was I going to say? I’m not evil, but I’m pretty sure I’m a lunatic, because none of you people are supposed to exist?
Thankfully, my interrogation wasn’t immediate. Strider turned to the hobbits first, trying to persuade them to take him as a guide. The exchanges went much as I remembered them, but, I thought, he was even more guarded about revealing who he was or how much he knew. Conversation skirted around the Ring and the Wraiths, but neither were named.
“And who is your companion?” Frodo asked after much back and forth. “Are we to take her along as well, or you alone?”
Strider glanced at me but volunteered no introduction; he was waiting to see what I’d say, how much I’d give away.
Very well, then. If he got to be so dark and enigmatic, so did I.
“Oh, I don’t think I can in good conscience offer myself as a guide,” I said airily. “Terrible sense of orientation, you see. But I’m heading for Rivendell as well, and if you should invite me, I would gladly go with you. I swear that as long as we’re travelling together, I’ll look after you as best as I can. Lîneth; at your service.”
“Frodo Baggins; at yours and your family’s,” Frodo murmured almost reflexively.
“With your leave, Mr. Frodo,” Sam piped up, “I’d say no to both. This Strider here, he warns and he says take care; and I say yes to that, and let’s begin with him. He comes out of the Wild, and I never heard no good of such folk. He knows something, that’s plain, and more than I like; but it’s no reason why we should let him go leading us out into some dark place far from help, as he puts it.”
He then turned to me.
“As for this mistress Lîneth, she comes with him, so it’s not awful strange to think that they’re in league. We don’t know her dealings, nor what she has to do with us neither. And even my Gaffer wouldn’t credit it, that out of simple luck we came here just in time to meet somebody who also goes to see the Elves.”
He was perfectly right; but I felt an absurd amount of defensiveness, and not all for myself.
“I don’t come and go with anyone, master Gamgee,” I answered slowly. “I only met Strider today—out of luck, as you say, or perhaps for some reason I don’t understand, we were all meant to be here together. But the truth is I’m lost, and have little hope of reaching my destination by myself; this is why I ask for his company and yours. Because I am scared, Sam, of the darkness and the wilderness. And I am scared of the Riders.”
I turned to Frodo, his eyes troubled.
“They would have come for you,” I said. “If I had not intervened before, I’m afraid you’d only be serving the will of the thing you carry. It would have taken advantage of the attention on you to create some mischief.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Frodo said stifly.
“Everybody in this room knows what I mean, even if you don’t fully understand it yet. Believe it or not, I’m not asking to come along for my pleasure.”
“No, I don’t suppose anyone would,” Frodo said with great reluctance.
Before more could be said, Butterbur crashed the party. I sank back into my chair and tried not to melt in panic at the sudden, uncomfortable realisation that I was fighting for the privilege to travel with a group that would draw the Ringwraiths to them like moths.
It was my only recourse. The more time that passed here the less I could bring myself to believe that my subconscious was able to recreate the book word for word, all the while making adjustments for me to fit in.
If this was, somehow, real—and if there was any safety to be had for me in a place like this, it would be in the House of Elrond. If anybody might know what had happened to me or what I was meant to do, it would be him.
I only half-listened to poor Barliman explain the sorry saga of Gandalf’s letter, forgotten under an avalanche of other responsibilities. Anyway, I knew what was going to happen; Frodo and Pippin’s wariness towards Strider eased, after reading it, but Sam remained on guard and questioned his identity.
“You are a stout fellow,” Strider said to that, “but I am afraid my only answer to you, Sam Gamgee, is this. If I had killed the real Strider, I could kill you. And I should have killed you already without so much talk. If I was after the Ring, I could have it—NOW!”
None of this was real, I told myself, and even if it was, Aragorn was the good guy. But the change in his tone, the sudden and forceful naming of the Ring, the silence that fell… It was difficult not to be frightened. This was neither Strider the Ranger nor the Aragorn I knew from the books; it was, I thought, the Heir of Isildur as great and terrible as he could have been.
The hobbits were faring no better, all of us waiting with bated breath for his next move. Frodo’s right hand hovered over his pocket. But then Aragorn’s stormy expression cleared.
“But I am the real Strider, fortunately,” he said with a gentleness antithetical to the hidden power he had with so little effort displayed. “I am Aragorn son of Arathorn; and if by life or death I can save you, I will.”
Frodo’s relief was palpable. He confessed he had wanted to believe Aragorn from the start, and the group thawed to him a little more. Even dear old Sam put his doubts aside for the time being.
Even after Strider had been named their guide, however, I remained a problematic element. I spoke little as the hobbits debated how best to deal with me; I had in all honesty little to say in my own favor.
Finally Frodo asked me, “How much do you know of my business, really? You allude and you hint, and nothing that has transpired here seems to shock you. Yet you will not explain what your involvement is.”
“My involvement was none until I saw master Peregrin about to recount the story of your uncle Bilbo’s disappearance and decided to stop him,” I told him. “But I know enough about the Enemy and the Ring to realise it’s not in my interest, or the interest of any of the free folk of Middle-Earth, for it to fall into his hands. As for the rest, I have more questions than answers— and those I can only hope to find in Rivendell.”
Troubled, Frodo turned to Aragorn. “I would hear your counsel on this. I don’t know, but the two of you give me almost the same feeling. She disquiets me, as you did.”
“And your caution was no false friend,” Aragorn said. “The traps of Sauron are many and carefully laid. But I will tell you what I told you before: it is one thing to be cautious and another to be hesitant.”
The idea that I could be any danger to them was so absurd that I couldn’t help laughing aloud.
“Forgive me, but carefully laid?” I said in my defence. “What’s careful about dropping into your path a girl who makes a fool of herself singing drinking songs and can’t even explain why she’s here? If I were setting a trap, I should hope to come up with a more believable lie, at least.”
“You needn’t be the one setting the trap to be part of it,” he countered. But to the hobbits, he said with some reluctance, “Well, I don’t see what other option we have. Spies and busybodies who will sell news of you are in no short supply here; if miss Lineth is indeed a servant of the Enemy, I fear her purpose is different. She might be able to do just as much—or more—harm if left to her own devices than she could travelling with us.”
Another disbelieving chortle escaped me. I could not wrap my mind around the idea of being seen as dangerous. It died down, however, as it dawned on me that the most efficient way to deal with the problem I posed would be to kill me. They wouldn’t, of course—they were my childhood heroes for a reason, right?—but it was disconcerting to realise how totally dependent on their kindness I was.
I supposed I was disconcerting to them as well.
“If I’m to be a wasp in the room,” I said with what good humor I could muster, “I promise to be a good one, and stay within sight at all times.”