This is the prologue to a girl-falls-into-Middle-Earth story I'm writing. I'm trying to make it as un-cliched as possible, and as well-written and interesting as I can, so I won't be updating this until a good chunk more of it is written. Still, any feedback or constructive criticism on the prologue would be welcome! Let me know if there's an audience for this, and if you want to know what happens next!
Also, this story will attempt to subvert some of the common stereotypes that go hand-in-hand with this kind of fic. That's not to say those stereotypes can't be done well, or can't be enjoyable—I happen to like a lot of them! But I'm going to try not to feature them here. So if, at any point, you think you know where this story is going to go...I can almost guarantee you'll be wrong. I really hope you like this story, and don't forget to let me know what you think!
My greatest adventure didn't begin until I was twenty-four years old. That is the story I'll be recounting here, to the best of my ability.
However, I've had dealings with magic from a very young age—even if no one ever believed me.
My name is Beatrice Smith, and this is my story, which all began with the Ent-wives.
Prologue
I bit back a scream of excitement as I breathed in the smell of pine trees and fresh mountain air.
I could still hardly believe it. My family and I were on a summer camping trip in Alpine National Park, in Montana. That's right, Montana. My eight-year-old brain could barely comprehend how far we were from our home in Texas, and I was so excited I felt ready to burst.
Groaning with impatience, I tapped my plastic water canteen against my leg as I waited for my parents to finish getting ready for our big hike.
"Come on, Daddy," I exclaimed, stamping my light-up Wonder Woman tennis shoes on the gravel. "Let's go already!"
My dad frowned. "Just a sec, honey," he said. "I'll need to speak to one of the park rangers about our guided hike this afternoon. Think you can wait here for a few minutes? Your mom'll be back from the car in a bit."
"Of course I can, Daddy. I'm not a baby," I retorted. It was true—I was eight now, and desperate to prove to my parents how mature I was. Camping in a national park was the perfect opportunity. I straightened my shoulders, adjusting my over-large backpack, filled with camping supplies and Junior National Park Ranger pamphlets.
My dad smiled down at me. "Thanks a lot, Bee. Just stay here outside the visitor's center, and I'll be right back."
"Okay." I watched my dad jog off and wave down a park ranger. Shrugging, I turned away to observe some of the other tourists.
There were lots of families, like mine, and huge groups of tourists from other countries. Many were just from other states like us, but others had accents or spoke languages I had never heard of before. It was fascinating. Absently, I wandered away from the visitor's center entrance as I watched them all.
"Hey, so I picked you these flowers." I turned as I heard a man—British, maybe?—clearly just back from a hike, brandishing a handful of ragged wildflowers at his girlfriend.
"Aw, baby, you shouldn't have, they're so pretty!"
My jaw clenched. Oh, no, they didn't. I scowled, putting my eight-year-old hands on my hips as I marched up to the pair of them.
"You really shouldn't have, you know," I scolded the man, who raised an eyebrow at me over his too-big sunglasses. "It's illegal to pick the flowers here, the national park ranger said so."
The man scoffed, while the woman just chuckled. "Well, aren't you a cutie?" she asked, bending to ruffle my hair.
I stepped back, glaring up at them. "I mean it. It's bad for the environment!" I protested. "It takes years for the plants to grow back here! Didn't you read the exhibits in the…"
But the couple had already started walking away, the woman pressing the wildflowers to her nose and sniffing deeply.
"…in the visitor's center?" I finished lamely. Those meanies. I was trying to be mature and grown-up, but I guess it hadn't worked too well.
"Hey, look! Who knew chipmunks liked Doritos, huh?"
"Dude, that is hilarious!"
What? My hands balled into fists, as I whirled around, following the voices farther away through the entrance to one of the hiking paths.
"You're feeding the wildlife?" I exclaimed, facing down a group of teenagers huddled around a chipmunk at a fork in the trail. "You're feeding them Doritos?"
"Uh…yeah," one of the girls said, looking annoyed. "It's cute. So?"
I marched up to them, folding my arms angrily. "If you keep doing that, they'll die in the winter because they won't be able to find food for themselves!"
"Ugh…look, just calm down, kid," a boy snapped, clutching the bag of Doritos to his chest protectively. "Why don't you go back and find your mommy and daddy?"
I glared at him, tears welling in my eyes as I tried to find the words to properly express the depths of his crime.
The chipmunk, however, seemed to have gotten impatient with his feeders, and leapt onto the boy's chest, scrabbling for the Doritos bag.
"Ah! Ew, get it off me!" the boy screamed, dropping the bag and jumping back.
He and his friends panicked as they tried to shoo the chipmunk away, some of them using words I knew my parents wouldn't approve of as they pushed and yelled at each other.
In the resulting scuffle, I saw the chipmunk dart away from them, scrabbling and stumbling on the gravel pathway before disappearing into the trees.
"You hurt him!" I shrieked at the teenagers, before dashing off the path in pursuit. I had to find the chipmunk and make sure it was okay, I just had to, I thought as I pushed past tree branches and stumbled over roots and shrubs, scanning the ground for signs of the poor thing.
I gulped nervously as I ran. I was breaking the rules now, just like those horrible teenagers and that annoying couple near the visitor's center. Tourists weren't supposed to leave the path—they could crush the native plant life, create litter, run into wolves or grizzly bears…
My pace slowed as I thought about that. I paused, suddenly wondering how far I'd run. I looked around.
I was lost.
Thoughts of the chipmunk flew from my mind as I spun around, looking desperately for signs of civilization.
"Hello?" I yelled. My voice was muffled against the trees, which were thicker here than they had been by the trail. I must've run farther than I thought. "Mom? Dad?"
The sound of snapping twigs and rustling leaves made me jump—but there was no one around me.
I couldn't even remember which way I'd been running. Picking a direction at random, I set off, tears stinging in my eyes as I thought about hungry wolves and bears and what would happen when my parents found out I'd left the visitor's center. I'd never be a junior parks ranger now; I'd broken the rules and left the path—
"Ow!" An acorn had fallen on my head, and I paused to at the branches above me. "You mean trees!"
As if in response, the trees around me shook violently, and I threw my hands up to protect myself as a shower of pinecones and needles rained down onto my head. "Ow!"
That was weird, I thought angrily. The branches continued to shake and wave around me. It must be really windy up above me, I decided. There was certainly no wind down on the ground where I was.
I wiped at my nose, trying to stay calm as I went. So far nothing looked familiar—the trees were denser here than they'd been before. In fact, it was getting hard to walk without tripping over a root or running into a branch. Was I going in the wrong direction? I hesitated now, and turned around to start going the other way again.
But no, that couldn't be right! The trees behind me were so thick now that there was practically no room for me to walk between their trunks. But I had just been walking there, hadn't I?
"What's going on?" I said tearfully, jumping again at the sound of snapping twigs, louder this time. A low, earthy sort of groaning rose up around me—it seemed to be coming from everywhere at once, and I crouched low to the ground, huddling over my red backpack. "Hello?"
The trees were moving, I realized.
I could see it now—the trunks were inching towards me, their branches bending low over me and blocking out the sunlight, and the groaning sound was getting louder. I burst into tears.
"Stop it!" I cried, burying my face in my arms. "You're scaring me!"
The groaning paused for a long moment, then changed somehow—it was more creaking and crackling, and—and—was it a voice?
"Hello?" I said again.
This time I recognized words in the strange groaning sounds. "You were looking for her," it said slowly.
Fearfully, I opened my eyes and looked up to see one of the trees—was it a tree? It looked so strange now—right in front of me, one of its long branches extending down near my face. I flinched, until I looked closer. Balancing on the branch's leaves was the chipmunk I'd been following.
"You were looking for her," the voice said again—the words were unbearably low, plodding, creaking. It took me a long moment to realize it was the tree that had spoken.
"You're a talking tree," I whispered. I was stunned.
"I am no tree…just as you are no chipmunk, búrarum," the tree croaked, and I looked up and saw a face in the trunk—the strangest face I had ever seen. It looked like an ogre from one of my fairy tale books, maybe, or something a caveman might have carved onto a stone.
The branch reaching down towards me, I realized, was more like an arm—a second arm was clutched around the creature's body, and the tree stump was divided in two, like a pair of scraggly legs. The tree's branches were thick with yellow apples, which ringed its face almost like a mane of wild hair.
"What...what are you, then?" I said hoarsely. "I don't believe in trolls, you know."
"Trolls!" The creature repeated, straightening suddenly, and one of the trees behind me creaked violently as a shower of acorns hailed down onto my head. At the sudden movement, the chipmunk scurried up the creature's arm and out of sight. "Brm hoom, there are no trolls here. Only Men. No elves...no dwarves..."
"I know that," I interrupted defensively. "They don't exist."
"...no wizards...and no Ents," the thing continued as if I hadn't spoken, bending down until its strange head was only feet from mine. "I am an Ent-wife."
"What's an Ent-wife?"
The Ent-wife shook her craggly head. I saw the chipmunk scurrying about between the branches around her face. "Ent the earthborn, old as mountains, that is how the list went. Have you not learned such a list yourself?"
"No."
"Búrarum, it is a list for all the living creatures of the world. Eldest of all, the elf-children; Dwarf the delver, dark are his houses; Ent the earthborn, old as mountains; Man the mortal, master of horses...ah, but here, Man is master of much more than that, hmm..."
I stared at the Ent-wife. "But elves and dwarves don't exist. Don't try to trick me. I'm not a baby, I know they're made up!"
The Ent-wife seemed to glare down at me. "You are very hasty, hmm brr-hoom...and you are quite right, in fact...Here, there are only Men…only Men, and beasts, and me, Ent-wife."
"Are…are you all Ent-wives?" I asked, looking around at the wild trees surrounding me.
The creature straightened up sadly. "I am the last Ent-wife," she said, ever so slowly. "I have awoken many of these trees as much as I am able...alas, búrarum, there is no magic to be found in this strange world."
"I know that too," I interrupted again. "Magic isn't real. I even..." My eyes darted back and forth conspiratorially. "I even know Santa Claus isn't real."
"Where I am from, young human...magic is in everything. And even there, the Ents' power wanes," she said. "And here? I grow weary...day by day...I have become too tree-ish, brm hoom-hmm...I have stopped traversing these woods, as I once did. I prefer to remain here...rooted by the little streams, growing my apples...and watching over the creatures...of this...strange...land..."
As she spoke, her voice began to trail off, the words becoming harder to decipher amongst the groaning and creaking, until her last sentence was swallowed up by a gust of wind in a boom-hoom sound.
"Hello?" I called, afraid. "Hello? Ent-wife?"
A long moment passed in silence. Suddenly, the Ent-wife shook her head, as though waking up from a deep sleep. "You are still here, young human. Hoom-boom...a strange being you are, indeed...though your people are cruel, brm, hoom, and care not for woods golden and green...They have killed my sisters, hmm...and I am the last, now, to hold the ancient memories of Middle Earth..."
"What are you talking about?" I interrupted, confused, but desperate to hear the Ent-wife say more.
"Ah, not so hasty, now, bar-hoom," she said, with a great creaking sigh as though she were about to fall asleep.
"I'm sorry," I said, before I remembered my southern manners. "Uh...I mean, I'm sorry, ma'am."
The Ent-wife gave a soft laugh, and did not speak for a long moment. I waited, staring at her. "When winter comes, and singing ends...when darkness falls at last..." I blinked, suddenly realizing that the Ent-wife was singing, as soft as rustling leaves.
The Ent-wife's voice was so quiet I could barely hear the words, and she paused for several minutes between lines, as though she'd forgotten how they went. "When broken is the barren bough, and light and labor past...I'll look for thee, and wait for thee, until we meet again...together we will take the road beneath the bitter rain."
"That was real pretty," I said politely. The words had made me shudder, and now my voice sounded too loud and harsh against the tree trunks in the forest.
"Búrarum...There are more lines than that...and yet I cannot remember them," the Ent-wife admitted, her voice slower and softer than ever. "I am tired...I am old, now...older than Elves, and wizards...rivers, and mountains. I confess...I have forgotten them all. Even the face of my dear Fangorn...never to meet again...Yes, brm...hoom...I am ready to sleep...and I doubt...I...shall...wake..."
The creature's head bowed low. Her mossy eyes creaked shut.
"Wait!" I cried. "What do you mean?" She didn't answer. "Hello?" I yelled. "Please, wake up! I'm still lost!"
Several minutes passed, and finally, with a creak of her head, the Ent-wife opened her eyes again and looked down at me. "Hoom brm-hmm, your people are up that way," she croaked, pointing one of its branch-fingers behind me. The chipmunk scurried down its arm and stopped at the tip of the Ent-wife's hand, staring at me. Its nose twitched, and I giggled.
"Your friend here is unharmed," the Ent-wife added slowly. "You were good to care for her...I do not remember, yet I feel...that my kind would have been fond of you...brm-hoom...You would have...been named...tree-friend...if my kind...were still...in...bloom." Her branches seemed to wilt, and her lichen-green eyes slipped shut. "Búrarum, now...I shall sleep...Yes, I yield...at last...and I say...his…land...is...best."
The Ent-wife fell silent again, and I stared at her, willing her to wake up again. "Ent-wife?" I asked. "Ent-wife! Hello? Wait!"
Five long minutes passed in silence, and I didn't move a muscle.
Finally, creakily, the Ent-wife's eyes opened one last time.
"What's your name?" I asked desperately.
The Ent-wife gave a weary laugh, or maybe it was just the wind rustling in her leaves. "...Always...so hasty...young...one..." she whispered. Her voice sounded far away. "But I fear...I...do not...now...re...mem...bú...ra...rum..."
Her eyes slipped shut, and I knew, somehow, that they would not open again.
"Ent-wife? Wait! Ent-wife!" I cried.
The only reply I received was a gusty sort of sigh, the wind rippling through her branches. Already she looked less like a troll, and more like an ordinary tree. Her legs looked more like an ordinary trunk, her face was blending in to the rough bark, and it was hard to imagine that the apples in her branches had ever resembled a head of hair.
Suddenly realizing how cold I was, I turned back the way the creature had pointed. "Thank you, Ent-wife," I said. She didn't answer. I hurried away, my eyes full of tears.
I wept as I walked, my hands balled into fists against my eyes, although I couldn't put into words what was wrong.
I followed the path that the Ent-wife had pointed out for me, and before long I was back on the trail where the teenagers had been feeding the wildlife. Thankfully, they were nowhere to be seen now.
I ran back to the entrance of the visitor's center, my canteen swinging wildly on my backpack strap, and suddenly I was enveloped in a hug.
"Bee! There you are, thank goodness, we were so worried!" My mom looked frantic. "Where were you? Oh, we found her, dear!" she called over her shoulder, and I saw my dad talking to one of the park rangers worriedly.
"She's here? Oh thank goodness—"
Another hug. "I'm sorry," I managed to say, before the lecturing began.
"What were you thinking—?"
"—and we were only gone for a minute!"
"What if something had happened-?"
"You know better than to—"
I couldn't let them continue—I had too many questions. "What are Ent-wives?" I demanded.
My parents looked stunned. "Wh—what?"
"Ent-wives!" I exclaimed. "I saw one. In the forest. It helped me find my way home."
My dad pressed a hand against his forehead. "Not now, Bee—"
"I mean it! I saw one, and she was so sad and sleepy and she had apples in her hair—"
"Bee!" my mom snapped. "That is enough. We had a hike planned for this afternoon, and now I'm not sure if that's the best idea."
I gaped in horror, sobering up at once. "No! I'll be good! I promise! I'm sorry I ran off, really. I'll be good. Let's go on the hike. Please!"
My parents finally conceded, and the rest of the day passed as normally as ever. Despite my best searching, I didn't see a single tree behaving unusually. Everything seemed perfectly ordinary. The majestic beauty of the national park seemed dull, somehow...dimmer than before, and I couldn't help but burst into tears at dinner, even though I knew the Ent-wife wasn't dead, not really. But she wasn't an Ent-wife anymore...that much I knew, even though I didn't think I understood what an Ent-wife was in the first place.
Even back at home, everything was normal. No one I talked to had ever seen or heard of talking trees, and I never saw another one. Maybe the Ent-wife had been right—she was the only one left. That thought always made me sad.
My parents were quick to dismiss the encounter as an eight-year-old's invention, and, reluctant though I was to admit it, over the years I finally came to agree with them.
By the time I was an adult, I had accepted that my meeting with the last Ent-wife was nothing more than a faded daydream.
After all, even the creature from my daydream had agreed: magic wasn't real here, and neither was Santa Claus, or elves, or dwarves, or wizards...or even Ent-wives.