The land that lay to the north of the town of Bree was very strange land. It was filled with many small, isolated villages hemmed by two large forests, one to the north, and one to the south. Those who dwelt there were suspicious folk, for they had kept to themselves since the fall of Arnor, and so on the rare occasion that men did venture that way, they were met with cold, hard stares, and were all but chased out of the villages. As the years had rolled by, visitors got rarer and rarer, for tales spread about the very distrustful and queer people that lived there, and men avoided venturing past the dark forest that lay to the North of Bree. In time, the true name of that land was forgotten, and it simply became known as the Segregated Land.

The lack of travelers in these lands resulted in few being aware of the strange (or, stranger than usual) goings on inside its borders. Orcs began appearing in abundance in the Year 3001 of the Third age, and continued to scour the lands for a number of years afterwards, attacking villages, killing their inhabitants, and torturing and killing their children. While the Rangers of the North defended the villages as best they could, often preventing many an attack before it reached a village, they were not welcomed by the folk of the Segregated Lands. Though they never did anything but help, they were cast out of the villages like the Orcs as soon as the fight was over. Thus, it was with some relief that the Rangers withdrew from the lands after the Year 3007, as the Orcs began to lose interest in the villages they had been attacking for six years, and the villages were happy to settle back into their millennia old routine of isolation.

But it is during that dark time that this story begins, in the summer of the year 3004. It begins in the forest to the north of Bree – an old forest known as the Border Forest, for it separates Bree and the surrounding country from the Segregated Lands. It begins with a company of Orcs, and a young injured child with the fate of the Middle Earth resting on her shoulders…

AN. The 'Segregated Lands' are completely made up. They are my own creation, made to suit my own needs.

On the other hand, I do understand that this is very short - it is just necessary to set up the background for the story.

I am updating with the first chapter later today.

Please R&R :)

-Optigirl101