Apologies: I don't know why the damned thing won't load right but everything is at the side now..soooo….it looks odd. I hate it when things aren't symmetrical.

Disclaimer: If I owned anything remotely interesting related to Tolkien or his world, would I really be here writing fan fiction? No, I'd be raking in the dough. So you can assume that I own nothing other than my dog-eared copies of the Silmarillion, the Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and The Unfinished Tales.

author's little yellow sticky post-it note: The Spider House Rules are rules set down by my husband for "our" (and when I say our, I mean all the Loyal Legolas Lovers of the world) Legolas.

The Tolkien Conspiracy

or

The Spider House Rules

A prologue of sorts

If I'm lucky and feel like doing something, I'll wake up around noon. The only thing that disturbs me between 5 am and 2 pm is the kiss my husband gives me before he leaves for work (which isn't disturbing) and the lady down the street who is always letting her dog out and then loosing him. His name is Sam and every morning I hear her calling for him and it sends me into pleasant dreams of cute little hobbits. Yes sleeping when others have to go to work is a favorite hobby of mine. When you're American, and you live in England, you can't drive or work so there's just not much to do. Usually I spend my time, after I wake, on the internet , talking to the insane mob of people who, like myself, have nothing else to do on a Wednesday at 3 in the afternoon. Everyday seemed the same. Wake up, sometime around 2, play around on the computer, read some inspiring tales of the Legolas-flavored variety till Chris (the hubby) got home, watch some Simpsons, have supper, go to sleep, and repeat the same process the next day. Nothing interesting happened. Not that it was bad, mind you. It was all...predictable. Nice, warm and predictable. But HE was not predicted. Thinking back on it, I should have known. There were so many odd things happening, I should have known. First was the hose turning on by itself incident.

"Strange, that." I thought at the time. "Perhaps we are haunted. That would at least give our house some character."

Chris took care of it. I didn't even bother getting up to see what had happened. I heard him mutter something from the backyard and then come back in with a smile on his face.

"Must've turned on by itself." He said. "Probably ghosts." He added sarcastically.

"Sarcastic smartass. " I thought. I tend to believe in everything paranormal. I suppose that more logical people might think me a bit odd. I think Chris usually just humors my fascination with it. I didn't give it another thought afterwards.

Then there was the kitten. She kept bolting out the door every time it was opened. She wasn't normally like that. She liked going outside like all cats but she actually climbed out the bedroom window and jumped to the ground from the second story window to get out.

"Maybe she's sleeping around. She's got a boyfriend." Had been Chris's explanation for it.

"Perhaps she and Sam the dog from down the street are having secret affair." I had thought, thinking of the strange lady calling for her dog.

To add to that, the backyard light was constantly being left on. I didn't like that. I preferred that, if there was someone lurking in our backyard, that I not see their face through the window. Therefore, I prefer the backyard light left off. But of late, every time I looked out there, I could see the trees behind our house swaying. No, I didn't like it. There was a small patch of woods behind our yard and I always thought about how easy it would be for someone to hide in them and come running out to attack you when you were off your guard. If that had happened, if I had looked up and saw someone there whilst I stood in front of the sink, contemplating washing up, I figured the attacker wouldn't have enough time to attack me, my heart would surely stop and I'd be dead before he even had time to take a step toward the door. Turns out I was wrong about that.

Perhaps I am a coward. In fact, most likely I am. I often read stories, or watch movie where someone has to do something where they are expected to die. Some grave quest to save some maiden from a dragon or go to war to fight for their cause. I have thought to myself, on many occasions, whether I would have been able to stand up and face certain death. The answer is always the same. No. I am a coward. I couldn't punch myself out of a wet bag, much less take on the evilness of Voldemort or go into space to fight the Cardassians. Hell, the sight of anything with more legs than my kitten sends me into shock. Perhaps that was why Chris chose the Spider House to hide him in.

The Spider House is just one of the two sheds we have in our backyard. There is the Snail House, which houses many snails, which incidentally do not bother me and the Spider House which hosts a great number of a rather large and ugly breed of spiders. I hate spiders. My dad does too so I figure it runs in the family. The mere sight of one, even if it's 20 feet away, sends me screaming and locking myself in the bathroom. Generally, if I could help it, I wouldn't go within 5 feet of the Spider House. It is right next to the path though so on occasion I do walk by it. But every time I have to pass it (usually to find the kitten who always seems to be drawn to it), I run by quickly and always feel itchy afterwards as if one of the spiders was on me-which, needless to say, is NOT a nice feeling. The Spider House was a perfect place to keep something...or someone hidden from me.

Chris is a software engineer. He does stuff for the government and...whoever else. You know, "Them Who Must Not Be Named". He had to be checked by the Ministry of Defense and made sure he wasn't a terrorist and what not. It all seemed very "James Bond" to me. Anyway, what he actually worked on was basically a mystery to me and even if he could've told me, it would be about computers and I'd still have no idea what he was talking about. Still, it brought home the bacon so I was happy enough about it. I hadn't realized that his work was going to have such an impact on our lives.