Disclaimer: I only own Danielle. Middle Earth and everything else in it belongs to J.R.R. Tolkien.
She came to a stop and shielded her face against the light, even shutting her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again she found eight sets of eyes, scattered around the rocks outside the exit, staring at her.
Danielle's elation was cut short. These people, most of them considerably shorter than the average human, were looking at her suspiciously.
"Who are you?" asked one of them, stepping forward. He, and all those with him in fact, had the worn look of someone who had been out in the wilderness for quite some time. They were dressed in strange clothes, reminiscent of medieval times and adorned with knives and swords. Some of them wore armor, and one appeared to have a quiver full of arrows. What had she gotten herself into?
The man who had addressed Danielle again stepped cautiously closer. He had brown hair that fell to his shoulders and a gentle voice, but her eyes were caught on the sword that hung at his hip.
She took a step back and searched his face for any sign of threat. Though she saw none, she wasn't sure if she could trust her judgment. She now felt a boulder against her back, and upon resting her hands upon it found large stones resting on its surface. She grasped one tightly, prepared to throw it if the need arose.
The man halted and held up his hands. "I mean you no harm," he said.
"Do you?" Danielle asked apprehensively. What kind of man walked around fully armed, and with swords and knives of all things rather than modern weapons? "Can you say the same for everyone?"
One of them, a shorter, stouter man with a fiery red beard chuckled. "Aye," he said. "Of all the creatures around here, you will find that we are the least of your worries."
"How did you come here?" the one with the brown hair asked, his eyes assessing Danielle and her clothes.
"I don't know..." her voice trailed off, her guard temporarily lowered as she considered what had happened.
"You do not know?" asked a man with dirty-blond hair. There was a challenge in his voice. Danielle's fingers once again tightened on her rock. "You just happened to wander into Moria?"
"I'm sorry, where?" She had never heard of Moria. How far was she, exactly, from home? She thought back to the demon, and hoped this was some crazy, stupid dream. Danielle had never been a lucid dreamer, though, and the last who-knows-how-many hours had felt all too real. This was not possible.
Danielle rose a hand to her forehead and sat on the boulder behind her. She kept a close watch on the men before her, but for the time being they didn't seem to be an immediate threat, and her head was starting to swim.
"Moria. Of the Misty Mountains."
"What?" Panic bubbled up inside Danielle. It was another name she had never heard before.
The man with the short blond hair rose his arms in frustration, and the man with the brown hair spoke up again. "Peace, Boromir," he said. He turned to Danielle and asked gently, once again, "Miss, how did you come to be here?"
"I really don't know. I woke up somewhere in there," she said with a gesture towards the mountain behind her, "and have been trying to find my way out since. I saw the light from your torches."
"How long have you been inside?"
She shrugged and shook her head, uncertain. "Most of a day, maybe."
The man paused and fished something out from his belt. Danielle's hand did not loosen on the rock, but she found herself more curious than afraid. He pulled out a leather pouch, a bottle, and tossed it to her.
"It is only water," he said when she examined it in her hands.
She was eager as she pulled the lid off and brought it to her dry lips. Nothing had ever been so welcome. She drank half of the bottle's contents before it occurred to her that she shouldn't drink all his water. Danielle paused and looked up, but the man nodded. "Go on. We have more."
Danielle drained the last drop as her eyes scanned the men about her once again. Some of the shorter ones had clearly decided that she was not a threat, and they now sat with their head in their hands. When she finished, she tossed the bottle back to the man with the brown hair.
"Well then," he said as he slipped it back away. "From whence do you hail?"
"Um." Danielle was momentarily caught off guard by the formality of his speech. "Boston, Massachusetts." When no one seemed to recognize the label, she added, "The United States of America?"
"This is ludicrous!" Boromir approached the man with the brown hair. "We cannot sit around and ponder who this woman is. This place is going to be filled with orcs. Soon."
"He is right, Aragorn," said the one with long blond hair and pointy ears. "We need to leave."
"Wait!" Danielle said, suddenly desperate. "You're not going to leave me here?" She had no way of knowing what an orc was, but if it was anything like what she saw in Moria, she had no interest in learning.
"Nay, miss," Aragorn said and shook his head. "You will not be safe here. We need to reach cover by nightfall. And then maybe we can come to understand who you are."
Aragorn walked to one of the shorter men and helped him up. "On your feet, Sam," he said. One of the others had wandered a few yards off, with his back to the rest of the group. Danielle doubted he'd heard anything that had just happened. When he turned to join the group she could see he'd been crying. Tears ran down his face, clearing away the grime that dusted it. The man who had fallen was clearly close to these men.
"Can we be certain this woman is lost as she claims to be?" Boromir asked openly, not trying to hide his doubts. "Rather than a spy in the very form that would harbor sympathy from a group of gentlemen?"
"I don't have the faintest idea what you all are talking about, so I don't know how the hell I could be a spy," Danielle said, speaking up. Her goal was nothing more than to prove that she was no threat. "You can search me if you want, I don't have any weapons so I doubt I could exactly hurt any of you if I tried." She was aware that she was putting herself in a very bad position if these men were not the type who would help her, but she had nothing else to lose.
"I do not believe her to be a threat to us," Aragorn said, and then turned to scrutinize her face. "She truly appears to have no memory of how she came here."
Boromir relented, though he did not seem entirely appeased. Regardless, the decision seemed to have been made. Danielle would join them. She felt the slightest hesitation before she followed their ranks away from the gateway to Moria. She would have felt more at ease if there had been at least one other girl in their company, but she was not in a position to be picky. She knew these men might be her only chance, and so she walked after them.
The trek for the rest of the day was silent. Everyone appeared to be deep in thought after the fall of the man in grey. Danielle tried to remember the name she'd heard. Gandalf? She didn't ask for confirmation, though. The pain around her seemed too strong.
Danielle wanted to ask, even beg for a chance to rest. She'd been walking all day already, but she had to trust their judgment when they said that they didn't want to be around when the orcs came out. So she pushed on.
Only an hour after they had set off, her stomach started churning. She had been focused on survival in the caves and so had felt no hunger, but now that the immediate danger was gone her body complained at the lack of food. It rumbled, but she tried to muffle the sound with a hand to her stomach. The man with the long, blond hair looked back at this and waited for her to catch up. As she drew closer, she found that he held something out to her. An apple and a bit of bread.
Danielle sighed, grateful. "Thank you," she said, taking them. "What is your name?"
"Legolas, miss."
"Danielle."
"We should find more to eat once we reach Lothlorien, I expect," he said, "but this should suit you for now."
With a bit of food to fill her stomach, she was able to keep up with the rest of the group. They reached the cover of trees by dusk. The leaves were a spectacular golden shade, and Danielle felt a serenity she hadn't felt all day wash over her as she crossed some unknown border. Clearly, however, not everyone felt the same sense of ease.
"Stay close young hobbits," said the short, bearded man. "They say a sorceress lives in these woods. An elf witch of terrible power. All who look upon her fall under her spell and are never seen again."
"A sorceress?" Danielle asked, worried. She wouldn't have believed him were it not for what she'd already seen that day. Surely if there were demonic, burning creatures, there could be witches, too.
"Aye, lassie! Well, here's one dwarf she won't ensnare so easily. I have the eyes of a hawk and the ears of a fox!"
Suddenly, the company came face-to-face with a line of arrows. They surrounded each one of them, held at the ready. Danielle instinctively backed away, only to find that there were more behind her, too.
"The dwarf breathes so loud, we could have shot him in the dark," said a man who stepped forward, and Danielle noticed that he had blond hair and pointy ears like Legolas. "Come with us."
The armed men led Danielle and the rest of her group further into the woods. Boromir and the red-headed man looked wary, but the others looked less concerned. Danielle bent down to one of the shorter, brown-haired men-a hobbit?-who walked beside her, to whisper to him as they delved in deeper. "What are these people?" she asked, wondering about their ears. They had a different air about them than the rest of my company, save Legolas. Now that she was surrounded by other pointy-eared men, she noticed it in Legolas as well. They felt wise and majestic. Danielle felt suddenly inferior in their presence.
"We are elves, miss," spoke one. Her face went red, having thought she'd been quiet enough not to be overheard. "Just like your friend, Legolas."
"I'm sorry," she said, compelled to apologise, "I don't understand..." and her voice faltered.
"You are not of this realm," he noted. "This I know. Hopefully we can find answers with this meeting."
The eyes of the rest of her company fell to Danielle now. The elf had confirmed her story as well as her fears. She was a mystery to all, including herself.
She kept her mouth shut for the rest of the walk. At one point they rested, and Legolas and Aragorn broke off to speak with the elf she learned to be named Haldir. The rest of the group sat around, while Danielle fought the urge to sleep. She settled, instead, for sitting against a tree.
"Are you okay, miss?" asked one of the hobbits.
"I'm fine," she said. "Just tired."
"No worries!" The hobbit took a seat on the ground next to her. "Aragorn and Legolas will sort this out. Aragorn is very familiar with the elves. And Legolas-well, he is an elf. You wait, I bet we'll also get some supper soon!"
Danielle smiled at the hobbit's enthusiasm. He was very friendly-it was the friendliest interaction she'd had so far. "What is your name?"
"Peregrin Took," he said proudly. "But you can call me Pippin."
"Pippin," I said. "My name is Danielle."
"Oh! Well, Danielle, this fellow is Frodo, and Sam, and over there is Merry," he said as he pointed everyone out. Such strange names... except for Sam, of course. She would have no problem remembering that one.
"Who is the man with the red beard?" she asked.
"That? That's Gimli."
Gimli had joined Aragorn and the elves, but he seemed to be on the verge of causing a scene. Aragorn turned to him and seemed to scold him for something he'd said.
"And then that is Boromir?" she asked, pointing to the man with the short blond hair. He approached Frodo to speak to him.
"Yes, it is."
Before she could ask anything else, Haldir approached them. "We will continue on. The Lady is expecting you."
A/N: That's it for the second chapter! I may not post tomorrow because I want the chance to add on to what I've already written as well, rather than only edit what I already have. We'll see.
Reviews are greatly appreciated :)