Chapter Four

Trolo Sackville

Peg had been over a lot of Middle-Earth, or so he thought. But he didn't know the north as well as the west. He had a third cousin who lived in Moria, but he rarely visited him. It was said that the Balrog who lived nearby wasn't very kindly to visitors.

He wondered if he should head that way now. It was somewhere. And not Isengard. There were many orcs on the road to Isengard, and if the Witch-King were to descend again, he might kill more of them.

There were always more orcs, in the Witch-King's view.

But then, of course, there was Khamûl, the Witch-King's lieutenant, at Dol-Guldur. Peg wasn't so very eager to meet him. But he could stay away from Mirkwood easily enough. He would keep well to the west of it.

The world was brilliant outside Mordor, in the brightness of the early afternoon sun. Pegrun was running fast, and was already due north of the Dead Marshes, which he had carefully bypassed. He passed many companies of orcs at a distance, but none of them paid him any more attention than to look at him through a telescope. They were used to runners, and Peg was obviously an orc.

By evening Peg was feeling safer. The sun was going down beyond Mordor, and he had entered Emyn Muil. The crags stretched up around him and he felt their safety. He had always been comfortable among rocks, where a small creature like him could easily slide into a crevice and go unseen.

He sat down as the sun sank and thought about his stomach for the second time that day. He hadn't had breakfast or lunch and there seemed no chance of supper – but oh, well. He was used to short rations. It was part of orc life. He sat on a rock and looked back the way he had come.

Then he felt the ring in his ear. It was warm and smooth. How very nice of Lord Sauron – or his Mouth, whichever it had been – to send the Witch-King to kill him for it. He hadn't meant to take it, really. He just hadn't meant to take it back, which was almost the same thing, but which he conveniently forgot.

Besides, why should Sauron have it? It was his, he had found it, nice pretty ring. Nasty Lord Sauron to send –

Peg stifled a scream and dove behind a boulder. He had distinctly heard it – the pound of hoof beats – and there, very clearly, coming through the Emyn Muil, was a large, dark figure crouching over a horse.

Nazgûl! But it didn't look like the Witch-King. No, it wasn't. It was one of the others. Peg wasn't quite relieved by this realisation. Any Nazgûl was a bad Nazgûl. And this was definitely looking for him. Peg could feel it. He crouched behind his boulder and shivered uncontrollably.

The rider came closer, very slowly and deliberately, leaning to left and right, looking for him. It was within metres now, facing him. He dared not look at it, for fear he would suddenly see it leap forward, with its great fearsome sword flashing. He staid frozen to his place with his eyes screwed shut.

He heard the horse beside him, heard it snort, and tried to hold in the scream that bubbled to his throat. But he couldn't, it erupted against his will and echoed into the night.

'Aaaaaaaaah!'

The horse jumped. The rider jumped, and he too let forth a howl. And suddenly they were both gone, galloping away in terror between the hills. Peg watched them go and drew a sigh of relief. That had been close!

He moved on. He didn't need to sleep, and he could see well in the dark. Besides, sleep would only make him think of what he could be eating, and there would be nothing to eat for a long time yet.

Night wore on. Birds of darkness whistled in the rocks. An animal with glowing eyes slunk across his path once or twice, but he did not molest them. They walked in silence and in secret and they were dangerous.

He went on over the rocks and around the rocks and between the rocks and occasionally under them. And the world was dark and the sky was black and only a single faint star glowed anywhere, and it was far away.

He was alone. In the vast space that now lay around him - the barren Brown Lands to the north, the empty plain of the Dagorlad to the east, or the wide grassy void of the Eastemnet to the west – there was no one who even cared he existed. Except perhaps that Nazgûl, and Peg would rather be without that.

Nobody. Nobody but a single orc, who was suddenly being pursued by screaming Black Riders because he had happened to find a circle of gold.

He sniffed, and stuck his chest out. No big deal. Life. Orc-life.

He ran.

And ran.

And the night went on.

An owl hooted.

He left the Emyn Muil and entered the Brown Lands. He was now going due north on the east bank of the Anduin, and he could always hear the river running beside him. It at least seemed like some sort of company. But he could not see it and it murmured to itself as if it, too, couldn't care less about a small orc with a snub nose who was running for his life.

His chest hurt terribly, but he ignored it. It was strange, that such a heavy blow had not killed him. He was a very little orc, and he had never been struck in that way before. It really should have gone deeper. But perhaps it was because he was so small and bounced so well that he escaped. Nazgûls were blind as bats, but if he had been under the Witch-King's nose, he probably would have been noticed.

Pad, pad, pad, pad, went his orc-feet on the dry, bare ground of the Brown Lands. Ripple, ripple, went the waters of the Anduin.

And there was a glow on the horizon and the dawn came up.

Slowly the sun stretched itself and decided to wake, and suddenly it had leaped up into the sky and filled all the barren brown world with morning light. Peg looked around, but there wasn't much to see. Only the blankness of the Brown Lands on every side.

But no! Peg looked carefully and saw, a good ways away, a curl of smoke rising out of the waste. It was a very small curl of smoke, but he could already catch on the air the scent of something cooking and – what was that? Another scent, one he had never smelled before and couldn't quite understand.

But it there was something to eat he might as well get closer. He turned a little to his right and ran towards the smoke.

He was now in the South Undeep, still on the east bank of Anduin, but he hadn't seen a living creature all morning. The world he had entered was an empty one where no one dwelt and few travelled. That was almost a good thing for him, but he wondered if the shape he could now make out hunched over a fire was at all friendly. He slowed and approached cautiously.

There was absolutely no cover, and he should have been easily detected if the creature by the fire had not been turned away from him. It was a small creature, smaller than a man, with a lot of curly hair on top of its head and two enormous hairy feet, which it had tucked under itself. It was stirring a pot over the fire and singing to itself.

'Lololololoooooooo! La la-laaaaaah, la la laah, lol, lala.'

'Well,' thought Peg to himself. 'This is something. I wonder if it is one of those bobbits? And I wonder if it is quite safe?'

He reached for his sword, just to feel it was there, but as he did so his armour clanked. The creature by the fire, which was very close now, did a sudden flip over the flames and faced Peg with a cry, a gleaming blade suddenly in his hand.

'Our hero, with a cry of Stand Down, jumped to face the intruder!' cried the creature.

'Oh,' cried Peg, and fell back.

'Orc! Our hero cried,' said the creature. 'State your intentions, whether good or ill? Speak, or I eviscerate.'

Peg turned and was about to make a dash for it, when the creature called after him.

'As the visitor made an attempt to flee, our hero cried after it. Hold! I mean no harm! '

His voice was less threatening now. Indeed, it began to sound rather small and cheerful.

Peg turned back. He and the other creature faced each other.

'You are an orc?' said the strange one with big feet, looking up and down him. 'You are awfully short.'

Peg nodded. 'Are you a bobbit?'

'Hobbit, last I checked,' said the other. He flopped to the ground and began stirring his pot again. 'Whence come you?'

'Mordor.'

'Fascinating. Where are you going?'

'Moria, I suppose. I don't really know.'

The hobbit beckoned him closer, and Peg drew near hesitantly. Suddenly he found a wooden dish sailing through the air at him. He caught it and surveyed it with confusion.

'Sit down,' said the hobbit. 'And let us sup. With which statement our hero dished out his newest creation.'

'What is it?' asked Peg, eyeing the brown matter which the hobbit had given him.

'The roots of Brown Land grass,' shrugged the hobbit. 'Whatever I could find.'

'Will it kill me?' asked Peg. The hobbit looked indignant. Then he began eating himself.

'Maybe,' he said. 'Although I pride myself on the ability to make anything out of anything.'

Peg ate.

'Our hero then began to ply the small orc with questions,' said the hobbit. 'Why are you going to Moria?'

'I have a relative there,' said Peg. 'But I really don't know where else to go.'

'Why go anywhere?' asked the hobbit. 'Why not just wander, like me?'

'Well, I would,' said Peg. 'Except that there's a Nazgûl chasing me. Several of them, for all I know.'

The hobbit clicked his tongue. 'Inconvenient.'

'Do you just wander?' asked Peg.

'Yes,' said the hobbit. 'Have been wandering for years. It's all I ever want to do. I've been as far as the sea of Rhûn in the east and as far as the Blue Mountains in the west. There is much more to see, however. I still haven't seen Mordor. Tell me what it's like?'

'Black,' said Peg, slowly. 'And – brown.'

'Hmm,' said the hobbit. 'Well, someday. Tell me, have you a name?'

'Pegrun.'

'I am Trolo, Trolo Sackville, of Michel Delving, Westfarthing, Shire, and more recently of the Wide, Wide World. And you are Pegrun of Mordor. Surely you don't really want to go to Moria? Boring old place, really. Been there myself and didn't like it much. Have some more stew.'

'I don't really want to go,' said Peg. 'But where else? I mean, they're still chasing me.'

'The Nazgûl?' asked Trolo. 'What are they after you for?'

'Um,' said Peg.

'That's all right,' said Trolo. 'They're after me, too. I had one come by asking me the way to the Shire and I told him to go due south. He didn't like that. He tried to stab me but I fought him off. So you see I'm not very scared of them. Why don't we go off into the sunset together? I mean, you know, the two of us could get along all right, what with you looking like a bad guy and me looking like a good guy – no offence. I'm always having to fight orcs off. Maybe you could talk to them. Parley, and all that.'

'Well,' said Peg. 'Maybe. Where are you going?'

'Everywhere,' said Trolo. 'But currently I'm on my way north towards the Grey Mountains to see what's over there.'

'I've always wanted to go all the way north,' admitted Peg.

'See!' said Trolo. 'We'll go together! What say you?'

'All right,' said Peg.

'Our hero and his new companion shook on it,' said Trolo, 'and put out their fire. Are you a fast traveller, Mr Pegrun Orc? Because I am.'

'Oh, very fast,' said Peg.

Trolo was packing up. He wiped his pot with dried grass, and slung it on his pack, which he then slipped onto his back. It was a large pack for a small hobbit.

'Shall I carry something?' suggested Peg.

'No, no,' said Trolo. 'I wouldn't let anyone else carry my book for the world. I'm writing a book, you see, and I don't want any of the pages lost. Our hero started forward northwards with his companion by his side.'

'How many pages have you got?' asked Peg.

'Forty thousand, two hundred and fifty-seven,' said Trolo. 'Only the last one is only half-full. I will fill it up tonight. I always stop at night and write my adventures of the day. Unless it's something very exciting, and then I write it while it's happening, so as not to miss a detail.'

They went walking northwards. Trolo was a very good walker, and didn't slow Peg down much. Besides, all of a sudden Peg didn't really care where he was going, so there was no point hurrying to get there. And if the Nazgûl caught them up, this small hobbit hero would fight him off.

What a funny race these hobbits were!

Very odd.