AN: Since this sprung from a writing prompt for my Fiction Writing class in college I don't really know how regular updates will be. My teacher told me to take inspiration from the classic and create something new or at the very least alter it in some way so that I wasn't simply retelling a story everyone knew already. Writing this is more for fun/practice, so I can't even guarantee anything productive will actually come out of this. But here's to hoping, right? As stated in the summary this fic will remain mostly OC-centric with mentions and possibly a few appearances of canonical characters if I can pull it off without butchering either them or the plot. Again this is not beta'd. WARNING: Possible mentions of same-sex relationships in future chapters, will let you guys know if and when they come up in the fic.

Disclaimer: All Lord of the Rings characters, settings and lore belong to J.R.R. Tolkien

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Chapter One: You don't have to see to believe

Dakota knew that she was in trouble when she couldn't get the ring back off her finger, not even running her hand under the cool water of the mermaid fountain in the central courtyard could get the golden band to budge. She knew she shouldn't have tried on some random ring she found at the carnival in the park but it was too late now. It wasn't even that pretty, just a simple golden band with no dedications or fancy jewels studded along its width, just smooth pale yellow...and now she owed the 'antique' vendor 25 dollars for the blasted thing.

So focused on her predicament she didn't take notice of subtle changes in her surroundings. Colors took on deeper more vibrant hues, strangers looking just a touch more mysterious and interesting. The very air humming with something, something new yet so very old, waiting to be acknowledged, to be felt and seen. But Dakota was lost to the bigger world, seeing nothing on the walk back to her dad's house, not even the peculiar raven that stalked her steps or sat in the tree outside her bedroom window.

xXx

The very next day at school, she showed her friend Jackie, who knew her way around jewerly and would hopefully be able to help get the ring off. Again, never taking note of the subtle changes in her environment or her silent watcher.

"Oh, where did you get that?" Jackie asked, taking a bite of her sandwich.

"A ring I stupidly put on at the carnival last night. You wouldn't happen to know a trick or two on how to get it off would you?"

"Depends on how badly stuck. Worst comes to worst we may have to cut it off."

Fiddling with the ring, I wanted to be happy that she would be able to help, but the more I played with the thing, the stronger the urge to suddenly keep it was. Wait, where did that come from?

"Earth to Dakota. Come in Dakota," said Jackie as she waved a hand in front of the brunette's face.

"Sorry." I said, having to think on her question before coming up with something reasonable to say. "No, if cutting it off is the only option left then I would rather just keep it. I did end up paying 25 dollars for it because I stupidly put it on, instead of just window shopping."

"True. Let me see your hand, your finger might just be swollen."

Frowning, I stared down at her outstretched hands, overcome with the need to keep the ring close and not let anyone else touch it, ever. But that was silly, it wasn't like Jackie was going to steal it from me if she managed to get it off...right? Shaking my head, I quickly placed my right hand in her's before I could change my mind.

Jackie hands were gentle but cool, even if it felt weird to have the blonde examining her hand like it was a specimen to be carefully diced. She even tried to tug it off, gently of course, but even though it seemed to spin just fine around the width of the finger, when she tried to get it to slide off it simply wouldn't budge past the knuckle.

"For such an ordinary thing, it sure is pretty." Jackie said, twisting the ring around Dakota's finger again as if to find some hidden detail she had missed the last five or six times she had spun it. "But…"

"Yes?" Dakota said, taking her hand back.

"Well, call me crazy but it kind of reminds me of an old book series, you know the one about the One Ring? Even though Frodo never got it stuck on his finger..."

"The what? Wait a minute, you're not talking those elf books you loved so much in high school, right? There's no way that fairy-tale crap could exist."

"Lord of the Rings is NOT a fairy tale, it's an elaborate fantasy full of adventure and the kinship of unlikely heroes. If you would just read it, you would know."

"No thanks. I have better things to do with my time." Said Dakota, returning to her own ham sandwich.

"One of these days you're going to wish you read more than just re-hashed history, you never know what kind of useful information 'fantasy' books could give you." Jackie said, managing to get the last word in before heading off to her next class.

xXx

All throughout the day, Jessie's words played through her head over and over again. It didn't help that as she was going between classes, she noticed little things that seemed off. Like the girl in her Statistics 101 class who she could have sworn had pointy ears, or how her Western History professor who had always been on the short and stocky side, with the awesome viking beard, today looked like he could wield a war hammer with little effort instead of like he lived in a library all his life like he normally did. She thought she was seeing things and losing her mind or that there was something in the air, because seeing things that hinted at something more, something dare she say...magical, simply couldn't exist. They just couldn't. She could barely focus in any of her classes. In biology she almost ended up squirting her lab partner with smelly frog juice.

So after her last class, Dakota raced home, barely managing to have the sense of mind to stow her bags on the rack by the door like she normally did and then she made her way down the hall to her dad's office. Noticing he wasn't in, she flicked on the light and made a bee-line for the bookshelf. Glancing over the tomes of Physiology and Anatomy, passed the mass assortment of Doctor's Journals, she managed to find what she was looking for-his collection of fiction. Where low and behold were where his paperback copies of all three of The Lord of the Rings books, there was even a book called The Hobbit sitting next to them, but it wasn't what she was looking for. So focused on the books she never noticed that her father had entered the room behind her.

"Find what you were looking for Dakota?" He said.

Dakota let out a yelp and jumped what felt like three feet in the air, almost dropping said books in the process. Spinning around she faced her father, but was unable to actually meet his gaze. Blast it all, she felt like a kid caught with their hand in the stereotypical cookie jar!

"Y-yes"

"And you couldn't ask me to borrow…" he paused to see which books she had taken off the shelf, raising a brow at the titles, "-Lord of the Rings. I thought you didn't like those books?"

"I don't...but it was something Jessie had said. Maybe I should give them a try before I judge them."

"Okay...but why now? This isn't like you, is there something going on Dakota?"

Said girl shifted in her spot, should she tell him that she was going off on a limb and believing her friend, who thinks that the ring stuck on her finger was some all powerful ring from a fantasy novel? For that matter, would he even believe her if she did tell him? Well there was only one way to find out.

"IgotaringstuckonmyfingerandJackiethinksitmightbesomethingliketheonering"

Arthur blinked, trying to process the spew of words that just came out of his daughter's mouth like someone had hit the fast-forward button by accident. "Slow down, and take a breath. Now what did you say?"

Taking a deep breath, Dakota steadied herself, her already embarrassing flush darkening at having to repeat what she was sure was utter nonsense. "When I went to the carnival they were holding at the park last night, there was a vendor there who claimed to sell antiques and I was looking for something to get for your birthday next week… Anyways I distracted by some of the jewelry the lady was selling and I picked up this thing," she said holding up her hand with the ring on it for him to see. "Now I can't get it off and I've been seeing weird things at school, and now I'm actually thinking that Jackie was right and that there is something up with this ring and-"

"And you think it may be the One Ring? Dakota dear, the One Ring was destroyed in Mount Doom."

"But that didn't actually happen."

"Ah but as you know, every story including so-called 'fairy tales' are based on a grain of truth." Arthur shot back.

Dakota scowled, she hated when her dad used logic against her. "But everyone knows magic isn't real."

"Okay. Say you had a time machine and went back to say the fifteenth century and introduced a farmer to the wonderful invention of the match or better yet the lighter. Tell me, what would happen in this scenario?"

Not even having to think about the answer she responded with, "they would burn you at the stake for being a witch."

"Okay, but why?"

"Because… Because they would think the lighter was magic."

"Yes. To you and I, a lighter is just a tool, something that is so common that we dismiss it's ingenuity. To the fifteenth century farmer who only knows fire in the forms of a hearth or a torch to light the night, such advanced technology would appear as magic."

"Sooo, what you're saying is that magic is real?"

"Not exactly, just that it's always good philosophy to keep an open mind. Not everything that is real can be seen, and not everything that you see is real."

"I… I need time to process this."

"Take your time dear." He smiled.

"See you at dinner" She said absently not even realizing she was still clutching the Lord of the Rings to her chest. Making her way out of the office and up to her room on autopilot, her mind still whirling with the bombshell of logic he had used to shatter everything she had thought she knew about their world. It struck her as she thought about everything that had happened up until this moment, that if today was just a glimpse at what was really going on, then she was woefully ill equipped to deal with this new reality. But accepting the fact that this was indeed bigger than her only opened up the floor to a whole new slew of questions. Like was it fate that she put the ring on? Magic had to be the reason that the blasted thing wouldn't come off, but why her? Was the source of the ring's magic something she should be concerned with? Was it cursed? Did she now have to set out on a quest like in the books to get it removed or have some sort of wish granted? She didn't know and it terrified her. Glaring down at the ring she swore that she would get to the bottom of this, she had to, she wasn't going to live the rest of her life always asking 'what if'.