"Please remember –all of you- that the name of Baggins must NOT be mentioned. I am Mr. Underhill, if ant name must be given" Said Frodo to Merry, Pippin and Sam.
Suddenly, from the scrub nearby, came a voice.
"Well, Mr. Underhill, I advise you to be more quiet when you talk like you don't want to be heard."
The four Hobbits jumped and saw a girl come out from behind the wild scrub. She had very short brown hair, and a light long fridge coming down past her huge brown eyes. She was not slim, but not fat, either. She was wearing a long grey shirt that came down to her lower thighs, brown pants and an old rope around her waist.
Frodo instantly took out his sword and pointed at the girl.
"Who are you?" He asked.
"I'm…erm…well, I don't actually remember, you see." She said with a pleading smile.
Frodo raised his eyebrow.
"I'm telling you! I sort of just woke up here this morning and I didn't know were I was and I can't remember who I am! I think I bumped my head though…" She rubbed the top of her head. "Any way, you guys were talking of an Inn? I'm pretty hungry. Mind if I come along?"
Frodo bit his lip. What now, Mr. Underhill? Asked a voice in his head.
"Are you quite sure you don't remember who you are?" He asked the girl.
The girl nodded her head.
"Very well." Sighed Frodo. "I guess we can take you to Bree, and then we shall just see what happens.
It was quite dark when the four Hobbits and the girl came to the Greenway-Crossing and drew near the village. They came to the West-gate and found it shut, but at the door of the lodge beyond it, there was a man sitting. He jumped up and fetched a lantern and looked over the gate at them in surprise.
"What to you want, and where do you come from?" He asked gruffly.
"We are making fir the inn here." Said Frodo.
"Hobbits! Four Hobbits and a child! What may your names and business be?" Said the man.
"Our names and business is our own, and this does not seem a good place to discuss them." Said Frodo.
Suddenly there was a shrill scream. The four hobbits turned around and saw, on the floor, the girl rolling about and shouting at some thing they could not see. It seemed to Frodo that she was fighting with some one invisible.
The man stood up and hurried over, but did not dare approach the girl, for she was kicking and throwing her fists about.
Then suddenly she stoped, and lay flat on her back, staring up into the clear sky, breathing quickly, for she was out of breath.
Merry and Frodo came down to her and helped her sit up. She looked at them with terror in her eyes, and then it passed, and she collapsed, unconscious.
The man came over and picked her up. "Come on, now, I'll take you to the Prancing Pony. The innkeeper will be able to heal her." And he led the four Hobbits down through the roads, until they came to an Inn.
They opened the door to find a bright place, full of laughter and noise.
A short fat man with an apron on came bustling out of one door, holding a tray laden with full mugs.
"What happened?" He asked the moment he saw the girl in the mans arms.
"She had some sort of fit. She came with this lot, Butterbur." The man said, jerking his head to the Hobbits.
"Ah, well, she is very young. I'll put her in with the Hobbits, if they are staying. I wouldn't want to leave her alone, during the night.
"Yes, we are staying." Said Frodo.
"Right." Said Butterbur. "Bring the girl up with me. Nob!"
A Hobbit rushed into the room. "Yes, sir?" He said.
"Nob, go make five cups of hot tea and biscuits, and some cakes and soup…and bring them up to the second Hobbit room! Quick, off you go! Now, lets see what we can do for this young girl"
~
Frodo looked up from the letter and then at the girl, lying on the couch, her eyes half opened.
"I do not want to leave her, though." He said to Strider.
"Oh, she will have to come." Said Strider. "She has heard all and she is young and secrets slip out of young ones unintendedly."
"Very well." Said Frodo. "I do trust her. She seems so innocent and too young for an enemy."
"Do not worry about that." Said Strider. "There is a great reason why I want her to come along, for at least part of the journey."
And he went over to the couch and patted the girl softly. She awoke fully and turned to sit up.
"Listen, child." Said Strider. "What is your name?"
"I don't know!" Cried the girl. "I have no name! No!" She screamed in terror and collapsed again.
Strider frowned in concern and turned her lifeless body over. He found a thin chain on her neck and on the chain was a ring.
"See this?" He said to the Hobbits. "It is one of the nine rings. I do not know how she got it, and I think that she does not come from Middle-Earth…or over the sea, for that matter. This ring is making her be like this."
"What about the invisible person she was fighting, before?" Asked Pippin.
"Once again, I am only guessing. I think she was fighting the shadow of the Nuzgul. This ring must be destroyed, before she, too, becomes a wraith."