Thank you very much for your reviews! Don't worry about George he'll be fine. He's better off than Sydney, and yes, Eomér will eventually enter this story.It is after all labeled under his name right?) I hope you enjoy this chapter and please bear in mind that English is not my first written language and that I'm working without a Beta. Enjoy!

Chapter 2

Sydney was washed up on land by the now calmer current. A wave took hold of her and toppled her onto her back, making her cough up some water.

Gasping for breath she closed her eyes and tried to calm down.

She was still quite weary from her rough acquaintance with the river and lay back down, letting her surroundings spin around for another few seconds.

After recovering from the dizziness she sat up.

Right in front of her was a lake.

There was a lake in front of her. There weren't any lakes marked on her map the last time she checked it.

She felt a headache coming and decided to dismiss that thought for a while. She'd rather get her clothes dry first and find a place to sleep. The sun was past noon already and she wasn't going to risk straying around too far and get herself more lost than she already was.

She took off her pants and jacket and spread them out on a big rock.

While she was lying beside her clothes reality suddenly caught up with her.

"George?"

Clearing her throat and trying to find her voice she tried again.

Nothing.

She started to tremble before losing control and started to sob.

Where was she? Images shot through her head as she started to remember what happened to her.

This was all too much for her. She needed her dog, something, someone.

Pulling herself together she started to gaze around. There was a dense forest around the lake, a forest she'd never seen in her life. The trees were taller than usual and there wasn't any path that led to the lake, nor river. Behind the forest on the other side of the lake, a chain of mountains stretched into the distance.

How the heck did she get here if there wasn't any river that flushed her here? Her headache was inevitable now and she started to panic. Did Matt follow her? What if he jumped in after her, bringing her here to drown? Did that make sense?

Not waiting for him to pop out all of a sudden she decided to climb a tree and hide. Making up her mind that she'd sleep up there as well just to be safe she turned around and tackled a rather large oak tree.

To her surprise she caught a glance of something that seemed to have some sort of plateau quite high above.

Determined, she started to climb it. But that wasn't as easy as she suspected. She kept sliding down, scarping her hands.

"Shit" she mumbled. Time was getting short and she needed to get up there. Going through her pockets, she found her knife.

She used it to get a better grip on the wood while climbing the broad tree. It was difficult and she used all the strength she could muster before she finally was able to grab onto a branch.

"Please," she whispered "Don't snap."

She was quite a bit above ground already and she wouldn't be able to get back up if she'd fall.

Luckily the branches seemed to hold her and when she reached the platform, she collapsed and gasped for breath.

By now she wasn't sure how far up she was, but as she glanced down, she knew that her next task was to get down there again unharmed tomorrow.

Rolling over she examined the platform. The wood was entirely different than any normal oak tree wood. The boards were not polished or all to smooth at all, but there was some sort of perfection to it. Everything was adjusted to each other almost perfectly and on the other side she recognised something carved into the boards.

She crawled over there and ran her fingers over the runes. She never ever saw anything like them. Maybe they were some sort of secret alphabet some kids carved into the wood, while playing here.

But what kind of kids were able to get up here in the first place, and how would they have been able to get down again?

She noticed that now very familiar headache step in and groaned.

She tried to make herself comfortable and kept close to the tree trunk.

She would climb the mountains tomorrow to figure out where she was. Maybe she'd spot a village.

Laying back down onto the rock she tried to sleep for a while. After all, who knew if she would be able to catch some sleep at all tonight?

Trying to relax, Sydney watched the sky grow dark and looked forward to the first few stars to appear.

But it didn't take much longer until she fell asleep.

Sydney was awakened by barking and howling. Her stomach dropped as she started to tremble.

There were wolves in this forest.

She wasn't going to look down, no, that would definitely not calm her down.

Instead she gazed up at the sky and looked for some familiar constellations. The little dipper, or maybe the big bear.

But to her amazement she couldn't find neither. Nothing. No polar star or anything that looked familiar to her moderate knowledge of astronomy.

"Great. This is getting more comforting by the minute." She sighed as she tried to regain sleep after her being woken up.

The next morning Sydney woke up by the rumble of her stomach.

All of her muscles were aching and she was reminded of her tree climb.

She crawled towards the edge to gaze down and decide whether she would prefer to die of hunger, or of falling forty feet to the ground. - Tough choice, she thought sarcastically.

She turned around to grab her jacket but instead was scared out of her wits and tumbled over backwards, over the edge.

Screaming she tried to grab hold on one of the branches but instead grasped a hand. The same hand that belonged to the stranger who was sitting right behind her.

Struggling she tried to free herself but then decided it might not be that wise, and let herself be pulled up again.

As soon as she was safe again she scrambled to her jacket and pulled out her knife, which looked quite scrawny after it was used so roughly yesterday.

Not really caring she turned around again and pointed it at her attacker.

He was gone.

"You must be kidding me." She gasped for breath still quite taken aback by it all.

Where did he go to? She wasn't dreaming.

"Hello! Show yourself you creep!"

Regretting those last words she backed up to the tree again. But instead of meeting the hard feel of wood, she bumped up against something softer.

She caught her breath. He was directly behind her again. Not daring to move this time she tried to control her trembling.

Seconds passed by and none of them moved.

It was all too much for Sydney as she started to sob. "Please…I beg you don't hurt me."

He placed his hand on her shoulder catching her by surprise so she reflectively lashed out with her other hand, injuring both him and part of her shoulder.

Seconds later she found herself disarmed and bound.

The man in front of her seemed to be cursing in a funny language while he examined his bruised hand. She had gotten him pretty bad she thought proudly.

Two sky-blue eyes were blazing her angrily while bandaging his hand. He had long blond hair which was kept back by two subtle braids on either side of his temple.

His pale skin and rather fragile looking appearance was rather deceiving as well, she thought bitterly. This guy was strong. And he was armed too. She couldn't keep her gaze from occasionally drifting to two long daggers he kept at his side. She wouldn't stand a chance with her silly little knife.

Studying him further she discovered a brooch at the nape of his neck. It was designed after a leaf and shone without attracting much attention. The brooch held together a grey cloak that hid a bow and a casket full of arrows.

Yep, she was definitely in advantage.

"Who are you?" she asked nonchalantly.

The man didn't answer. Instead he kept tending his hand and going through a small sort of bag.

It was then that his hair showed her the prominent structure of his ears. Elfish ears!

She gasped at her discovery making him spin towards her waiting for yet another attack of hers.

This was definitely not normal and she was slowly seriously doubting him being human after all.

He approached her now and started to cut her clothing. Was he going to rape her now?

What was going on? Tears were silently slithering down her face when he stopped.

"I need to clean your wound."

She nodded silently and let him continue to cut off a piece from her shirt. Then, carefully lifting the injured area on her shoulder, he cut open there as well.

Sydney clenched her teeth together as he started to dab her wound with some sort of remedy he used on himself earlier. She would just have to trust him.

After he finished she caught his eye, and muttered a lame "Thank you."

He merely nodded and sat back down opposite her.

After staring at each other what seemed like ages he asked "Where do you hail from?"

"Excuse me?" Sydney wasn't sure what to make of this unusual request.

The man patiently repeated his question.

"If you mean where I come from, I'm from Europe."

He looked confused, eyebrows drawn together. "I have never heard of that place. Where in Middle Earth is it?"

-Middle Earth? What was he talking about? Middle Earth did not exist.

"I think you're mistaken. Europe is not in Middle Earth. Middle Earth does not exist, sir."

The elf, Sydney was quite sure of now given the unusual request about the nonexistent country, looked at her suspiciously.

"You wear unusual clothing. I have never seen anything like it before."

"Well so do you thank you very much. I don't recall leggings being the latest fashion for men Robin Hood." Sydney replied quite offended.

She looked down at her jeans and Timbs. There definitely was nothing wrong with what she was wearing. Her shirt and sweater were perfectly fine as well.

He looked confused "Who is this Robin Hood you speak of?"

Syd rolled her eyes "Never mind."

Once again silence set in.

"So what are you going to do with me now? Kill me? Please go ahead it's not like I'm going to escape anytime soon and I sure as hell won't be missed when I'm gone. That enough information?" she snapped. Part of her really didn't care anymore, but she tried the old reverse psychology trick. Apart from that she'd much rather be dead than return to her former life and it didn't look like he was going to let her go, after how she reacted when he touched her the first time.

"It is not my choice for you to live. This is the land of Rohan and King Eomér shall decide what the future shall bring for you." He answered. And with that he picked her up and placed her over his shoulders slowly moving towards a big branch.

She started laughing. Eomér? What was this fruitcake blabbing on about? These were all fictional people and locations. She'd read the Lord of the Rings a long time ago and loved it. But this? This was a bad joke and she was eager to find out who was playing it on her.

But before she was able to protest they were already descending the big oak tree.