PART ONE: ANACHRONISM

Chapter XLVII: Party It Up Hobbit Style

This Skip falls into the category of should-have-been-fun-but-the-circumstances-ruined it. Firstly, I'm pretty sure I scarred Trainer Mike for life, and the poor man really didn't deserve that. Secondly, I had been in the middle of working out, which meant I was sweaty, tired, and gross. And thirdly, I Skipped in my gym clothes, which consisted of black Nike shorts, a purple sports bra and white sneakers. And that's about it.

As you can imagine, the people of Middle Earth were not fans of that outfit.

The first thing I noticed was the music. The tune was upbeat and cheerful, the kind of lighthearted music that made you want to dance. (Well, maybe not make you want to dance, but you get the point.)

Then, slowly, I realized that I was standing in the middle of a party. The sky was dark, but candles and lanterns lit the grassy pavilion with a warm, yellow light. Hobbits of all ages were chatting, dancing, eating, listening, and smiling. The party was so alive, and so content. Some hobbit children were sitting on the ground, listening excitedly as an elderly hobbit told them stories with wild hand gestures. Some hobbit men were chugging down ales as though their lives depended on it. One accidentally spat up his drink all over a pretty waitress and his friends guffawed at the sight while the hobbit blushed and apologized repeatedly. The band had struck up a quicker tune, the flutist tapping his foot in time to the beat. The hobbits dancing twirled faster and stomped their feet enthusiastically. Spectators clapped their hands, cheering the couples on. A firework exploded—brilliant silver against the black sky. The hobbits laughed as fluttering lights fell down, disappearing just above their heads. And amidst all the short hobbits, there was a tall man with a grizzled, gray beard and a pointy hat.

"Gandalf!" I cried.

The hobbits eyed me suspiciously. Can't say I blame them. Hobbits don't like unusual things, and since, um, I was a foot taller than them and dressed in gym clothes with my stomach exposed, I don't think they liked me very much…

Trying my best to ignore the stares and glares, I made my way through the crowd of hobbits and until I reached the wizard's side. I grinned up at him. "Gandalf, I haven't seen you in ages."

He paused when he noticed my outfit, then he sighed and said, "You do have a habit of turning up in the most inappropriate way."

I grinned. "I take it you're happy to see me too."

"There are simply some aspects of people that you cannot change," said Gandalf. "It is what makes people so interesting."

My eyes narrowed. "Is that a good or a bad thing?"

"Ana," said Gandalf, "you require a change of clothes."

I glanced down at my sports bra. "And perhaps a bath too."

Gandalf found a pretty hobbit woman with curly, blonde locks and a warm smile. She introduced herself as Rosie Cotton before bringing me back to her family's hobbit hole where I was permitted to have a quick bath and change into what clothes they could find for me. All I have to say is: thank God, I'm short. If I had been a normal-sized human female, nothing in Hobbiton would have fit me, but I was just small enough that I could pass off wearing one of Rosie's dresses, and it only looked a little bit awkward on me with the skirt falling just past my knees and the fabric being tight around my shoulders.

"You are the strangest girl I have seen," said Rosie, smiling at the sight of me wearing the too-small, dark blue dress. She sat in a rocking chair, next to an empty fireplace, with a pink and green patchwork quilt over her lap.

"I get that a lot," I said, placing my sweaty gym clothes next to the fireplace. I had refused to part with my tennis shoes, because they were expensive, and I didn't want to accidentally Skip without them. I stared forlornly at my Nike shorts and groaned. "I'm going to leave without these, I know it. Damn it. Nike shorts are expensive."

"Nike shorts?" repeated Rosie her brows knitted together with confusion.

"Those," I said, pointing to my clothes.

Rosie frowned. "They are rather, uh, indecent."

"I hear that a lot," I said. "But trust me, I have shown up in Middle Earth with even less clothing than that."

"No…" Rosie gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "You have not, tell me you have not."

"I have." I grinned at her. "Swimsuits in my world nowadays consist of a little top to cover the chest and a little bottom to cover the…" I glanced at Rosie and decided politeness was best. "To cover down there.

"No," said Rosie. "You are joking."

"Nope." I was having fun with this now. "And I've Skipped to Middle Earth in just that. My friends just about had a heart attack when they came across me in the river. And, of course, there was the time I Skipped naked."

"Naked?"

"It's a funny story," I said. "But no worries, I'm now friends with the guy who arrested me. He was reluctant at first, you know, to be friends, but after we drank together a few times and had a heart-to-heart talk, he came around. I'm telling you, drunk bonding sessions are the way to make friends. Actually, you would know since you're a barmaid."

At first, Rosie looked mortified, like she might reprimand me for running about Middle Earth in the nude, but then, she smiled softly, showing off her perfect dimples. "Ana, you are adorable."

It took me a second to register what she had just said. Then, a wide smile spread across my face. "You're adorable too. I wish you could be a part of the Fellowship so we could hang out on the road all the time, or I wish I could Skip to Hobbiton more often. I spend too much time with elves and not enough time with hobbits. It's tragic, really."

"Elves?" Rosie's eyes widened. "You seem to have lived the most fascinating life."

"Well…" I shrugged. "I guess that's one way to put it."

"Though," said Rosie, "it may be best not to talk about elves and Skipping too much here. The folks in Hobbiton do not like disturbers of the peace."

Unfortunately, the words "disturber of the peace" fit me only all too well. Rosie and I stayed in her sitting room a little longer, talking about her job as a barmaid and how much she enjoyed chatting with the locals about their ordinary lives. The most scandalous thing, she said, was when Farmer Bunce accidentally shorted Mister Boffin on the number of potatoes. The feud between the two lasted three months with each family in the Shire taking sides. Finally, one of the Tooks came down to Hobbiton and sorted the matter out. It turned out that Farmer Bunce had poor counting skills and had been too embarrassed to admit it.

After story time had ended, we returned to the party. We had taken two steps into the pavilion when a hobbit with curly black hair whipped Rosie up into a dance. She was a whirlwind of skirts and smiles. I was glad she was having fun—Rosie was a nice hobbit who definitely deserved to have fun—but it meant that I was left standing alone on the edge of the dance floor, receiving odd glances from the hobbits.

Eventually, after another hobbit asked Rosie for a dance, I gave up on waiting and made my way through the crowd towards the bar that had been set up by the owners of the Green Dragon. Several wooden tables had been moved out into the pavilion and kegs of ale had been placed on top of them. The hobbits who were of age were lined up, eagerly anticipating full mugs of the frothing drink. Soon enough, I had my own pint of ale, which I cheerfully worked my way through.

"Is this your first time tasting the famous Green Dragon's ale?" someone asked.

"It's pretty good," I said, staring at the brown liquid that sloshed around in my mug. "But I prefer Gondor's drinks. You'd be surprised how good their ales are."

"Gondor?" he asked.

Looking up from my drink, I turned to see what hobbit had plucked up the courage and had enough curiosity to start a conversation with me. I saw big blue eyes and curly brown hair.

"Frodo," I said.

Frodo blinked, quite taken aback. "Have I met you before?"

"Er…" I didn't think telling him that we'd meet in the future was the best introduction, so I said, "…Bilbo has told me so much about you!"

"Did he?" Frodo seemed slightly pleased by this and slightly confused. "I have not seen you in Bag End before."

"I, um, come and go at the strangest times."

Frodo's eyes narrowed. He looked over me, taking in my wavy, blonde hair, my wide, blue eyes, my small stature (tall to him, I suppose), my too-short dress, and my tennis shoes.

"Are you…" Frodo hesitated. "Are you Ana?"

I almost dropped my ale. The mug slipped through my fingers and I managed to catch it, but not before it dumped a good amount of ale down Frodo's shirt.

"Oh frig," I said. "That's not supposed to happen. I probably just destroyed someone's future with that."

Frodo frowned. "I am not sure I follow your meaning."

"Never mind." I licked the ale spilling over the side of my mug. When I noticed that Frodo was looking at me oddly, I stopped and grinned. "I'm Ana, though. I'm surprised Bilbo told you about me."

"He likes to tell stories about his adventures."

I laughed. "Good old, Bilbo. What does he say about me?"

Frodo pursed his lips as he tried to recall. "He says that you often appear out of thin air and begin to cry and hug everyone, professing love for the Company."

I wasn't sure if I should be flattered or insulted by that description. "Well, yeah, I do that a lot, I guess…is that really the only thing he remembers about me?"

"He talks about you during the Battle of Five Armies and Thorin's—"

"All right. We're stopping there." Panic washed over me, and I waved a hand in front of Frodo's face to cut him off. I remembered Bilbo mentioning something about Thorin's fate as well, at the Council of Elrond. Whatever it was, I didn't want to hear it. I didn't want to know. I could still see Boromir's face as the first arrow struck him.

And it didn't help that Frodo was looking at me with such pity in his eyes. "Bilbo said that you and Thorin were close."

I didn't want to talk about that. I didn't want to know Thorin's fate, and I didn't want to discuss my relationship with Thorin. Desperately searching for a change in topic, I glanced around the pavilion. "Man, I haven't seen Bilbo in so long! What's that guy up to? He must be a wrinkly, old coot now. I need to give him a hug and tell him happy birthday…" I trailed off. "Oh, right. It's your birthday too, Frodo. You're what? Thirty-three now?"

Frodo blinked. "Yes, I have finally come of age."

"Wow, hobbits come of age late," I said. "In my world, humans come of age at eighteen. Though we can't drink at twenty-one, which makes no sense, because we have to pay taxes but we can't drink ourselves silly after crying and struggling over all that paperwork."

"Yes," murmured Frodo. He hesitated and then asked, "How did you know it was my birthday?

I caught sight of Frodo's confused expression and grinned. I was about to spring some lie about Bilbo telling me that, but my smile faded when I started to recall Frodo's comments at the Inn of the Prancing Pony. He'd said our first meeting at been at this birthday party. Which, from Frodo's perspective, was true. I'd pushed my questions to the back of my mind, preferring not too question, but now they were all racing forward again. Frodo had been aware of this meeting before I'd experienced it. In my seventeen years of Skipping, that had never happened before. Were the Skips malfunctioning?

"What's going on here…?" I murmured only half-realizing that Frodo was standing in front of me, puzzled by my sudden silence.

"Ana?" asked Frodo.

"Never mind," I said. "Explaining will just make your head hurt. Just know that I'm going to be very confused the next time you meet me. Unless that changes too. I didn't know anymore. Perhaps I would never know. The fate of Atanalcar loomed over me like a shadow, perhaps no matter how hard I tried, I would never be able to avoid that fate.

Frodo stared at me for a moment. He must have seen something—confusion, frustration, a hint of sorrow—in my face, because gently, he said, "Bilbo also said you helped him immensely during his time with the Company."

I blinked. "What?"

"When he first joined the Company, Bilbo felt like an outcast. After all, they were proud dwarves on a quest to reclaim their homeland, and he was a hobbit who did not wish to leave his comfortable armchair." The faintest smile flickered across Frodo's face. "Bilbo always said that you coming and going with a smile on your face helped him feel at ease on the road. He did not feel so out of place…especially since your oddities were an experience he could discuss with the dwarves. Bilbo always said he never expressed his gratitude to you properly…" Frodo trailed off when he saw the expression on my face. "Ana?"

"What is with you hobbits?" I asked, trying to gulp back the tears that threatened to spill." First Rosie Cotton and now you and Bilbo—you all are just too nice to me. I totally get why Gandalf adores hobbits so much, and Gandalf and I are not usually people who understand one another."

Frodo stared at me. "Are you all right, Ana?"

"Yes…" I grinned. "I'm just really, really, really, really, really happy."

"Why are you standing still?" cried a familiar voice. I turned just in time to see Rosie making her way through the crowd towards me. Her face was flushed from dancing, but she was wearing a broad smile and bouncing on the balls of her feet. She caught my arm by the wrist and said, "You are not allowed to pass on the dancing, Ana."

"Wait!" I cried as she pulled me into the ring of dancing hobbits. "This is a bad idea!"

"Nonsense!" Rose laughed. "It is a merry time."

It was not merry. In fact, it ranks number nine on the list of the scariest things I have done to date. You know me, coordination is not my strong point. Having to put my feet in the right place at the right time and move my body in rhythm to a beat and do something with my hands—it was all way too confusing for me.

And then, to make matters worse, the hobbits all knew the folk dance. They were prancing around, performing the same moves and stepping in time to the song. Compare that to was me who didn't know what was going on. There was some clapping and some stomping and some twirling. And then this hobbit moved here and this hobbit moved there and someone pushed to me to the other side of the ring because I didn't know where to go. The music changed and the hobbits moved into couples, spinning and waltzing around the dancing floor. One tall hobbit with curly, ginger hair grabbed my hands and pulled me into the twirling dance. I shrieked, and he let go of me, shocked. If I hadn't been having such a rough time of it, I would have felt sorry for the hobbit—after all, he was making an effort to include me, which was more than most.

I escaped the dance floor as quickly as I could, trying to avoid being swept up into another awkward, bumbling dance. Music rang through the pavilion as the hobbits laughed and cheered with fireworks booming in the distance. My head was still spinning from the folk dance, and by accident, I backed into a hobbit.

I leapt away from him. "Sorry!"

"Watch it!" he barked.

My eyes narrowed. His tone grated me the wrong way. "Did your mother ever teach you manners?"

The hobbit glowered up at me, his brown eyes sharp. "You can—"

I never learned the ending to that insult, since at that moment, I Skipped.

I found myself face to face with a black shadow. No, not a shadow. A hooded figure, huge and clad only in billowing, black robes.

The sight of him was enough to send chills down my spine. I backed away, stumbling on the uneven, stone ground. My breaths came in quick gasps. The atmosphere had changed so rapidly. One moment, I was in the middle of a celebration, the next I was standing in the ruins of the Watchtower of Amon Sûl.

It was the middle of the night. I stood on a cracked stone floor surrounded by broken pillars and a starless, pitch-black sky. The watchtower, I realized, was on a hill overlooking a rough landscape. The only light was that of the crescent moon, which dimly illuminated the shadowed figures that surrounded me. There was not just one cloaked figure, but several all dressed in the same black robes and holding long, thin blades.

I raised my hands in surrender. "Hey now, there's no need for this."

The hooded figures gave no signs that they had even heard me speak. The metal of their blades glinted in the pale moonlight.

I knew what they were. It took me a moment before I recognized their hoods and the foul air that clung to them. I had seen them before but never so closely. They were the nazgûl, the ringwraiths, and if I was on a watchtower, it meant that this was Weathertop, the place where Frodo was stabbed.

Backing away, I glanced over my shoulder to see four hobbits standing behind me. Frodo stood in the middle, clutching his little blade between his trembling hands. On Frodo's right was Sam, who couldn't even hold his sword properly, he was shaking so much. Merry was beside Sam, his face white. Pippin was on the other side of Frodo. He hadn't even drawn his sword. All four of them were staring at me. They did not seem capable of speech right then, their mouths fumbling over soundless words.

"Ana," said Frodo, managing to regain some kind of sense, "what are you doing here?"

At this point, Pippin realized that he hadn't drawn his sword. And, after glancing at all his armed companions, he quickly copied them. His hands were trembling violently.

I sighed and, completely forgetting about the ringwraiths for a moment, said, "Frodo, you would think that by now we would have some kind of understanding. I come and go at really random times."

Frodo frowned. "Well, yes, but you have exceedingly terrible timing."

"Yeah, I can't help that."

"Ana," cried Merry, "look out!"

He grabbed my arm, spinning me around just in time to see the long, thin blade slicing through the air—aimed for my neck. I screamed and stumbled backwards, narrowly avoiding the knife. I tripped over a piece of debris and fell onto the cracked stone floor. My hands smashed against the ground. Pain shot through my arms, prickling and stinging.

"No!" shrieked Pippin.

The nazgûl stepped forward to strike. I scampered across the ground, crawling towards the hobbits.

The sword came down again.

I couldn't crawl away fast enough, so there was only once other choice. I had to fight. I rolled onto my back and thrust my legs into the air. My right foot came in contact with the shadow's hand. He dropped the sword, and it clattered on the stone floor.

"Ah-ha!" I cried, leaping to my feet. "I did something! Did you see that? I actually did something!"

"Ana," cried Frodo, "do not celebrate—run!"

Another nazgûl, taller than the others, stepped forward.

"I got this," I said. "I have the Sword Brea—"

I froze. My hand touched bare calf, but instead of my usual leather boots, I felt smooth skin. Oh frig. I was wearing tennis shoes. I didn't have the Sword Breaker with me. I'd Skipped in my gym clothes and changed into hobbit clothes, which meant that the Sword Breaker was in my gym bag, sealed away in locker 243. I was weaponless. Oh frig. Now what was I going to do?

"Run!" Merry took a step forward, his dagger raised.

Frig. Oh frig. Oh frig. I was rooted to the spot, unable to move as the shadows drew closer. The nearest ringwraith lifted his sword.

"Run!" cried Merry. "Flee!"

The shadow swung his sword.

Sam grabbed my arm and we both fell backwards, slamming into the hard floor. By some miracle, I was still alive. I gasped for breath. "That was a close one."

Merry and Pippin both sprung forward, their daggers raised, trying to defend Sam and me from the ringwraiths. The sound of metal meeting metal rang across the hill. One of the ringwraiths struck Pippin across the cheek with his iron-gloved hand, and Pippin crumpled to the ground. Merry stumbled and dropped his knife.

My heart was hammering in my chest. Aragorn was supposed to show up. I knew this story, Frodo had told it to me before, and I watched mutely as the ringwraiths raised their daggers over the hobbits. Frodo was supposed to put on the Ring, then he would be stabbed and Aragorn would show up to chase away thing ringwraiths. That was how it was supposed to go down.

Suddenly, the nazgûl reared backwards as if they'd been struck by something. Their hoods turned and their attention was captured on something unseen behind us. I twisted around, searching for Frodo, but the oldest hobbit was nowhere to be seen.

The tallest of the nazgûl stepped forward, his cold knife sending shivers down my spine. He drew back his sword and plunged it into the air in front of him.

A shrill scream, filled with agony, filled Weathertop.

"What happened?" asked Sam. "Where is Mister Frodo?"

I knew what had to happen and what would happen, but still, as Frodo took off the Ring and appeared on the ground beneath the ringwraith, the Morgul-blade still buried in his chest, my stomach twisted and I wondered if Frodo would really survive this.

Out of the corner of my vision, there was a flash of orange, and I saw Aragorn, still in his rough Dúnedain attire, emerged from between to worn, stone pillars. He swung his sword, and one of the ringwraiths screeched in agony.

It was okay, I had to remind myself. This was what was meant to happen.

"Sam, Ana, look out!" cried Merry.

One of the ringwraiths had turned away from Frodo and was staring at Sam and me. Still holding my wrist, Sam scurried backwards, trying to get away before the next swing of the sword. I tried to flee as well, but my legs wouldn't move fast enough. For a second, I thought I was going to die. The ringwraith tried to drive the Morgul-blade through my neck.

He tried.

I Skipped before the sword could make contact. I'm pro like that.