Chapter 2

To Lori's immense relief, it wasn't long before they reached the shelter Strider had mentioned. At first, she thought it was just a snow-covered mound, until he led her around to the other side and she noticed a small entrance near the base. Strider crouched down and crawled inside, and Lori tucked her injured arm against her chest and followed him.

It was just as cold inside, but…cozy. Her fingers brushed something soft on the floor, and she realized the interior of the shelter had been lined with animal skins. One of the skins was attached to a small wooden peg above the entrance to keep it covered. There was a small, unlit campfire in the center of the circular space, and an opening in the roof to let the smoke out.

Involuntarily, she gave a full-body shiver and drew her legs up to her chest, tucking one hand behind her knee to try and warm up her numb fingers. Her sneakers were caked with snow, and she tried to wiggle her toes, hoping none of them were frostbitten.

Strider had taken out two stones from somewhere on his person and was busy striking them together above the pile of wood. After a moment, his efforts produced a thin stream of smoke, and he blew on it gently until a small flame blossomed from the wood. He leaned back and took his cloak off, and that was when Lori noticed the sword strapped to his hip.

"What is that?" she asked, her voice sounding uncomfortably loud in the enclosed space. She would have been less weirded out by a pistol or even a hunting rifle, but who the fuck carried around a sword?

Strider followed her gaze, then looked back at her, seeming unperturbed. "It is for my protection. These lands can be dangerous."

"Protection from what?"

He reached for a bag tucked away in one corner of the shelter and began rummaging through it. "Wolves. The occasional bear. Bandits. Orcs rarely come this far north, but it is better to be prepared than not."

Orcs? Is that some kind of animal, or… Lori bit her lip, debating whether or not she should ask, but before she could make a decision, Strider held out a prompting hand.

"Let me see your arm."

Lori scooted closer to him. The shelter was already beginning to warm up, and she angled herself closer to the fire. He held her wrist in one hand and rolled up her sleeve with the other. His touch was gentle, but she still hissed through her teeth as the pain in her arm flared up.

"How did this happen?" He began feeling along her arm more thoroughly, applying gentle pressure with two fingers.

"I fell down." She grunted and nearly pulled her arm away when he touched a particularly painful spot. "I-I think I hit a rock, or something."

"How far did you fall?"

"Um…" She swallowed. It didn't seem like a great idea to tell him about the train or the afterlife or anything else that would make him think she was crazy—even if she was already having similar thoughts about him.

But even if he did carry a sword and seemed to be living in a different millennia, she wasn't exactly afraid of him. He'd saved her from freezing to death and offered to check on her arm, and more than that, he gave off the feeling of someone who was trustworthy. Strange, but trustworthy.

"I don't know how far," she said. "I guess I'm surprised I didn't break anything else."

Strider nodded, his gaze focused on her arm. "Can you make a fist?"

Her fingers shook slightly, and she had to clench her jaw against the pain, but she was able to curl her fingers like he'd asked.

He nodded, seemingly satisfied, and carefully let go of her arm. "I do not believe the injury is severe. With some weeks of rest, it should heal fully."

"Thanks." She scooted back so she could lean against the wall and rested her arm in her lap. "Are you a doctor?"

"Not by trade, but my foster father taught me the skills of a healer."

Healer. She tucked the word away for future use. "So…what do you do out here?"

"I'm a Ranger." Thankfully, he didn't seem annoyed by her questions. "I keep these lands and their people safe, and serve as a guide to those who need it."

He'd mentioned wolves earlier, and bandits, along with a word she didn't recognize. She wondered how dangerous this place actually was, but before she could ask, Strider had asked a question of his own.

"And what are you doing in these woods?"

Lori bit the inside of her cheek. She didn't know how to answer that without revealing the insanity she'd gone through in the past hour. She shook her head, her skin tingling under his intense gaze, and finally managed, "I don't know." She decided to go for a half-truth. "I don't really remember how I got here."

His gaze fell to the fire, which had begun to die down. He took a loose branch and prodded some more kindling into the flame. "You should get some rest. It will help your arm heal."

She let out a small, involuntary sigh of relief. At least he wasn't pressing her for the whole truth. She curled up on her side, tucking her uninjured arm beneath her head, and watched orange wisps of flame blacken the wood.

At some point, she must have stopped shivering and fallen asleep. When she came to, her arm still throbbed, but she wasn't quite as cold. There was a large piece of cloth covering her body, the edge of it brushing her cheek. It smelled of sweat and rainwater, and she realized it was Strider's cloak.

Gingerly, she pushed herself into a sitting position, grimacing as the cloak fell from her shoulder and exposed her to the cold air. The fire had died down to embers, and the shelter was empty. White light was pouring in from the opening at the top, but she couldn't tell if it was the same day or the next.

A familiar scent reached her nose, sweet and metallic—blood. Her stomach dropped.

She took a deep breath through her nose to calm herself down. It didn't have to mean someone was hurt. If she jumped to conclusions, she would only get herself more worked up. Lori coaxed her stiff muscles to move and scooted to the entrance of the shelter with the cloak wrapped around her shoulders. She pulled back the fur and crawled outside.

Strider was squatting a few feet away. The snow in front of him was stained red, and piled together were several red, gooey lumps. Lori realized what she was looking at and her hand flew to her mouth.

"Oh my god."

At the sound of her voice, Strider looked up. There was a piece of bloody meat in his hand, which looked to be about the size of a rabbit.

"Is everything all right?"

Lori swallowed and averted her gaze from the mess. Butchering animals like that was normal for some people, especially if they were living in the wild like Strider.

"I'm fine. I-I'm gonna wait inside."

She retreated into the warmth of the shelter and tucked her knees against her chest. Against her will, a lump appeared in her throat. Everything—the cold, the smell of blood, falling asleep and waking up—it was only making the reality of her situation more undeniable. Being here was real. The train and the strange man had been real.

And that meant that she had died.

Tears pricked her eyes, and she took several slow breaths to calm herself down. She raised her cold fingertips and pressed them to her bottom eyelids. Strider could come inside at any moment, and he'd already caught her crying once.

Her eyes were dry and she'd managed to compose herself by the time he came back into the shelter. He was carrying about a dozen sticks and a bundle wrapped in cloth, and she gathered from the smell that the rabbit meat was probably in there.

Strider took out a knife and began stripping the bark from the wood with efficient movements, flicking the pieces into the fire. He was entirely focused on his work, his gaze calm and pensive. Lori wrapped her good arm around her legs and watched him, the rhythmic motion of the knife calming her nerves a little. There had been times when she'd fantasized about running off into the woods, just to leave behind all the stress of work and family and everything else. But at the end of the day, it had always stayed a fantasy.

Within minutes, the fire was crackling and filling the shelter with heat, and Strider was constructing a small spit from the stripped branches to cook the chopped bits of rabbit meat. As the scent of cooking meat mingled with the warmth in the shelter, Lori could feel her stomach grumbling. She wasn't sure when she had last eaten, but the smell of food had awoken a gnawing hunger in her gut.

"Where did you learn how to build a fire and cook animals?" she asked, partly to distract herself from her hunger. "Did your foster father teach you that, too?"

"Some of it I learned when I lived with him." Strider had turned his attention to the widest and longest stick in his collection, and began stripping the bark from it. "I learned more when I joined the Rangers."

So his foster father wasn't one of the Rangers. It felt like placing two puzzle pieces down on a wide, blank canvas, but she would take anything she could get when it came to figuring out where the hell she'd ended up.

"How many other Rangers are there?" she asked.

"Our numbers have dwindled in recent years." Strider set down his knife and motioned for her to come closer. "We should put your arm in a splint."

Deciding not to dwell on the non-answer to her question, Lori moved next to him and held out her arm. As she did, she remembered the cloak draped around her shoulders. "Um, did you want your cloak back?"

"Keep it for now." Strider placed the piece of wood against her forearm, where it extended from her wrist to her elbow. He retrieved a roll of bandages from his pack and used it to tie the makeshift splint to her arm. "You are not dressed for the winter, and you carry no supplies with you."

"Yeah." Lori hissed through her teeth as her arm twinged, and fought the instinct to pull it back. "I, um…"

Strider secured the bandage just above her wrist. The bindings were tight but not uncomfortably so. Lori cradled her arm in her lap, her heart fluttering uncomfortably.

"I followed your trail to its origin while I was out hunting," Strider continued. There was no accusation in his voice, but he didn't seem quite as ready to drop the subject now.

He knew—he'd seen the mark in the snow, the proof that she'd literally fallen out of nowhere. Discomfort grew tight in her throat, and she bit the inside of her cheek to ground herself.

"I don't know what happened," she managed, focusing her gaze on the furs covering the floor. "If I told you what I did know, I don't think you would believe me."

"I have seen many things in my life that would defy the limits of belief."

She finally met his eyes. She didn't know if he was talking about a double rainbow or something genuinely unbelievable, but she had the same strange sense as when she'd first met him—that he was much older than he looked.

Fuck it. If he didn't believe her, that was fair, and at least she wouldn't seem suspicious by avoiding the topic. But if there was a chance he could help her, she would have to take it.

Lori took a deep breath. "I woke up on a train."

"A caravan?"

She opened her mouth to correct him, then stopped. If he didn't know what a train was, she wasn't about to try and explain it to him. "Yeah. Something like a caravan. I-I didn't know where it was headed, because all I could see outside was fog. And I was alone, except for this man." The crackling of the fire faded as the memory resurfaced in her mind. "Something about him felt…not quite human. I don't know how to explain it. And he told me…"

Her voice wavered, and she let out a short, frustrated breath through her nose. Strider nodded for her to go on, his gaze thoughtful. Suddenly, Lori didn't know what scared her more—the thought that he wouldn't believe her, or that he would.

"He told me I was dead," she forced out. "He told me that I'd died, and that I was being taken to the afterlife. When I heard that, I just…" She shook her head. "I don't know. I panicked. I ran out the door and jumped off the train, but instead of hitting the ground, I just kept falling. That was when I landed in the snow." She made a vague gesture, as if to say, And the rest is history.

Strider leaned over to take the meat off the fire, and Lori blinked. She wasn't on that train anymore, or falling through nothingness. Something about the feel of the fur beneath her and the smell of hot food was comforting. It was easier to accept that this part of things was real.

She bit her lip and waited for Strider to say something.

Wordlessly, he handed her one of the makeshift meat skewers. Hungry as she was, anxiety had extinguished her hunger for the moment. She blew on her food, then held it over her lap on the pretense of waiting it to cool off.

Strider didn't touch his own food, either. After gazing into the fire for a long moment, he asked, "How did you die?"

"I don't know." She twisted the thin stick between her fingers. "The man told me the last year of my memories had been taken away. Something about my death being traumatic." Her nerves came to a boil, and she continued, "I-I know this sounds insane. I would love to know what's actually going on, but I just—" She cut herself off as her voice cracked again.

"I believe you," Strider said, and the words nearly made her burst into tears.

Get a hold of yourself. Lori bit off one of the chunks of meat, and it burned her tongue. She chewed it as quickly as possible, and a burst of relief filled her stomach from even the small piece of food.

"I do not fully understand what happened to you," he continued. "But I know others who might. Once this valley is clear, I will take you to someone who may be able to help you."

"Okay." For the first time since all of this had started, some of the tension in her body loosened. There was still a chance she could find a way out of this.

That was the last thought she was able to string together for a few minutes as she focused her attention entirely on devouring the rest of the meat. She was beginning to regret the burned patch on her tongue, and tried to eat more carefully, but the last of the rabbit was gone before she knew it. The meat had been unseasoned, slightly charred on one side, and was somehow the best goddamn thing she'd ever tasted.

Strider finished his meal and grabbed a small metal cup from his pack, then disappeared outside. When he came back, the cup was packed with snow, and he placed over the fire.

Watching steam begin to rise from the cup made her remember why they were stuck here in the first place. Lori moved back against the shelter wall, the food in her stomach making her a little sleepy, and asked, "When do you think the snow will melt? I mean, out there. Not in here."

"It is hard to say." Strider tossed his wooden meat skewer into the fire. "We are nearing the end of winter, but the snows here tend to linger longer than most."

So that meant it had to be February or March, now. Lori frowned. She could have sworn it was November when…whenever she'd last been able to remember anything. She was only supposed to be missing a year of her memories, though. Had the man on the train just rounded down or something?

"Where do you hail from?" Strider asked, breaking her out of her thoughts. "Originally."

Lori almost smiled. She'd been asked that question enough times, though she guessed he didn't mean it in the way most white guys did. "I'm from Long Island," she said.

His brow furrowed. "Cair Andros?"

"No. It's right next to New York City." When he still looked confused, she added, "In the United States."

"I've never heard of those places."

She pressed her lips together. Maybe she was being presumptuous, but she thought the majority of English speakers would know about New York, at the very least. "Do you have a map of this area?"

"No, but there are plenty in Rivendell. Hopefully you will be able to find the answers you seek there."

Rivendell. Another name she didn't recognize. Lori lowered her gaze, her earlier relief evaporating. She had to go through with it, had to find out where she'd ended up and why.

But even more terrifying than not knowing was the thought that she wouldn't like the answers she found.

The next morning, Lori woke before Strider did. He was lying on his side, one hand on his sword, which was resting on the furs next to him. She stared at it for a long moment, wondering how often he actually had to use it.

As quietly as she could, she bundled the cloak around herself and crept out of the shelter. A blistering wind met her, and she winced and hunched her shoulders. The bloodied snow from the rabbit and its innards had been scooped away, and she wondered if Strider had done that for her sake or for some other reason.

It took some trudging to get to a relatively sheltered place where she could relieve herself. The snow began to seep into her sneakers and the bottom part of her jeans, and she couldn't stop the full-body shiver that wracked her limbs. She'd been wanting to get out and stretch her legs, but now all she wanted to do was crawl back into the warmth of the shelter.

Even so, she stood for a moment and watched the forest. The shelter was situated at the base of a cliff face, and small mounds of snow were clinging to the crags of the rock. The pines were all crowned in white, the drifts at their base curving like a calm sea frozen in time. All of it was untouched except for the barest traces of small animal tracks.

Strider was awake when she returned to the shelter, and he fixed her with a questioning gaze as she settled down in her usual spot.

"I was just walking around a little," she said. "Taking care of…you know. Business."

That answer seemed to satisfy him, and he set his sword aside next to the rest of his supplies. "You have not given me your name yet."

"Oh. I guess it must have slipped my mind. I'm Lori."

"Lori," he repeated, as if testing out the syllables.

"Yeah," she continued, because it suddenly felt like there was a silence she had to fill. "My real name is Dolores, but that kind of makes me sound like an old woman, so I have everyone call me Lori."

"And would you take the name Dolores when you become an old woman?"

She blinked. That was the first time someone had asked her something like that. "I don't know. I guess I don't think about growing old that often." She lowered her gaze. I guess I didn't, in the end.

"What was it like, your home?" he asked. "Long Island?"

"It was nice. Really crowded and busy, but you could always find a nice place to eat or something interesting to do. I liked it there." She let out a long sigh through her nose. She was already talking about it in the past tense. In an attempt to change the subject, she asked, "What about you? What was it like where you grew up?"

"I was raised in Rivendell. It is the last refuge of the elves that once lived in these lands. It is quiet, but peaceful. It…" He trailed off as he noticed her smiling.

"Elves?" He had to be pulling her leg. "What do you mean, elves?"

Strider looked completely serious as he said, "I assume you have not met one before."

"Uh, no. They're not…real." Her smile wavered as he continued to hold a straight face.

"I assure you they are," he said, as confidently as if she'd said that pigeons were a government conspiracy. "You will see for yourself when we reach Rivendell."

Lori drew the cloak tighter around herself and decided not to argue. She didn't want to think that the man who held her life in his hands was completely delusional. But she didn't want to think either that he was right, and that they really would find elves whenever they reached Rivendell.

"This is all foreign to you," Strider said, making her look up. "I can see that much. But perhaps you were meant to come here."

"You mean it was fate?" she asked, and he nodded.

Fate and elves. Tomorrow we'll be talking about dragons.

She settled back with a sigh. It hadn't been fate, but her own stupidity that had caused her to leap off that train. If she hadn't, maybe she would be sitting in a much warmer afterlife with both arms intact.

Whatever came next, it was nothing but her own fault.

This chapter was pretty fun to write. I just put Lori and Aragorn in the shelter and let them do their own thing, which makes me optimistic about their interactions in the future. Always a good sign when characters can write their own dialogue. (Wow, I sound like a crazy person. I've been stuck inside for too long.)

Also, I'm a loser nerd and spent a long time debating whether or not Aragorn would know the word "doctor" because it was used back in the 13th century which is technically medieval but it doesn't quite "sound" medieval (like how Tiffany was a name in the Middle Ages but if you named a character that you would get punched in the face). Eventually decided fuck it, hobbits have clocks, Aragorn knows the word doctor.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and keep an eye out for the next one!