A/n I don't own middle earth, or the French and German languages, and as you'll see, I don't speak them very well either. I just thought it would help me with my revision to write something in French where I was actually interested in what I was saying. I haven't included accents though because it takes soooo long, and I'd probably get them wrong anyway. Hope you like!

The repeating of the words and waving of the spears wasn't doing anything for Jake. He took French and German at school, but if you weren't saying what you did last weekend or something, then it was all Greek to him. When they finally realised he didn't understand they switched to some other gibberish he didn't understand either. All he knew was that it was different gibberish from before.

He certainly understood the spears though. They were herding him into the town, one on either side. He saw more men as he passed the gates, but not many. They were all weather beaten, with beards and manes of unkempt hair, as though they had been sleeping rough lately. What he might look like, he considered, if he had spent six months in the wilderness, rather than about six hours. They were talking amongst themselves, glaring at him suspiciously, nursing mugs of ale or beer, by the looks of it. They were dressed exactly as the gate men had been, in dirty amour, with old tunics on and cloaks. No adidas or Reebok rip offs here then. He doubted they'd ever seen anything like what he was wearing before, and he was beginning to feel very exposed and strange among them, even though his own mind had created them.

Jake had to keep reminding himself that it was all in his mind, so detailed were the houses, right down to the nails in the wooden houses and the splinters on the top of the palisades. On his way up the hill, they passed horses and people, seemingly in equal number. The horses were being taken to a pen at the foot of the slope, where there was still pasture, in contrast to the shorter grasses that bordered the track they walked on. The women were all shrouded in cloaks against the stiff wind, but their faces were exposed, and looked almost as weather beaten as the men. They all seemed to be in want of a comb and their reddish gold locks were tangled. He glimpsed occasional brooches and necklaces, but for the majority they were a plain people, hugely different from the bling culture he'd come from.

He could feel the tiredness in his muscles, as they cooled down, and the spear poking into his back did not help matters. If he had hoped to be met with hot food and drink, he was disappointed. Eventually, he was shoved up some steps, finally stone rather than dirt track, the herded suspiciously through a side door into a narrow, shadowy room which smelt, as far as he could tell, of stale beer and horses. He presumed it was the guards room, and this was confirmed when he was confronted by a row of cloaks and bits of armour, with one man pulling on what looked to be a combination of unsewn cloth and boot. The man stared at Jake, exclaiming at his strange clothes, which set up a short guttural conversation between the three men.

He had by this time been jostled to a corner, though a spear was still pointed at his midriff. After the men had finished their argument, which the boot man seemed to have lost, he stepped forward, and spoke in extremely oddly accented German,

"Ich…ich spreche…ich spreche eine kleine common." He was trying very hard to remember his words and Jake suspected his German was probably marginally better.

"Ich bin Jake. Ich…uh…ich wohne im England…uh…ich bin wo?" the man stared back at him and recognised the problem he always had with languages; he might me able to ask questions, like 'Please could I have three kilos of apples?', but he would never be able to understand what they replied.

Darn! Why hadn't he tried harder in German class? He tried again, "Du bist qui?" no that was wrong- that was a mix of French and German. He was about to try a third time, but then he noticed the affect his last word had had on the men. They were staring at him in surprise, if possible even greater surprise than they had at first sighting him. One of the men who had brought him seemed to utter something between a shout of shock and a curse at his companions, and Jake suddenly found the spear pressed a great deal closer to his chest, then the other two soldiers grabbed his arms and hoisted him almost off his feet, dragging him out of the musty room into the cold air, down the steps and around the side of the rocky plateau on which the main thatched building was set. He caught a fleeting glimpse of the view he was stunned to think he had spent the day running over, but then they were beside a door set into the rocky shelf. One guard banging on it with his gloved hand until it was opened by another guard, pale from, Jake suspected, far too little sunlight. He gaped at Jake as well but after one of his captors sneered out something in their throaty tongue he quickly moved aside to allow them to walk in front of him, his lamp the only light in the tunnel.

Without warning, the pale sentry commanded them to stop, inching along the wall between the other men and fumbling for a lock. He laughed when he looked inside and Jake heard a curse from within, angry and powerful in such small confines. Almost before he had time to notice the tensing of the men on wither side of him, Jake was thrust inside the cell, and the door was slammed shut leaving them in total darkness as he heard the key being turned in the heavy lock and the bolt being slammed across as footsteps retreated their owners seemingly arguing heatedly.

Only when the sounds died away, and even the echoes in his mind had played themselves out, did the other occupant of the cell speak. Unfortunately, he spoke in the same gibberish as the guards, though his voice was fractionally deeper and seemed to resonate more strongly, though that could have been an effect of the solid rock that enclosed them.

Eager at least to hear something that he vaguely understood he tried out the same question he had asked the sentry.

"Ich bin Jake, Ich wohne im Barnet. Ich bin wo?" There was a swift movement from across the room, and Jake knew the language had surprised his cell mate, however he replied in what Jake could only assume was fluent 'common'

Unfortunately, although his companion seemed to have picked up on Jake's rather desperate tone and his own voice was quieter and less commanding, Jake's own German was not equal to his, and he kicked himself again for not paying attention to Frau Schmidt.

"Wo?" he said weakly.

"Med-u-seld" the man enunciated each syllable slowly and clearly, as though to a child. Just his luck that he had ended up in a culture where they spoke the language he was worst at. He was better in French, but he certainly didn't want to try that again after the last time had brought him to this dark hole.

However, his companion was less ready to give up. He began trying out what Jake could only guess was the same simple sentence in all the languages he knew, his voice going from guttural to clear cut, to fluid, before finally Jake almost fell over in surprise, for he began to speak French.

"Je suis Eomer, le fils d'Eomund. Vous etez en Rohan." (I am Eomer, son of Eomund) He was just about to move on again, either that or give up, for his grunts of frustration grew worse with every failed language, but Jake quickly intercepted him.

"Je m'appelle Jake. Vous parlez francais?" (I am called Jake. Do you speak French?)

"Je parle elvish." (i speak elvish) His voice seemed hesitant with this language, and Jake was concentrating too hard too register until a moment or too later that he had referred to French as Elvish. Elvish; that meant elf language. That was ridiculous.

"Elves n'existent pas!" (Elves don't exist) He couldn't help himself exclaiming, hoping the verb was the same, as evidently it was, for the man laughed.

"Mais vous parlez le langue d'elves; ils doivent exister, n'est pas?" (But if you're speaking their language they must exist musn't they)

Great; now the guy was laughing at him while they discussed creatures from a fairytale, short things with pointed ears.

"Dans mon monde, ils n'existent pas." (In my world they don't exist)

"Votre monde!" (Your world?) it didn't sound like a question, more an incredulous exclamation. He muttered in his own language again, and Jake noted the change in tone; he was angry again and it seemed that he was now partially implicated as the cause.

"Est-ce que tu est fou?" (are you mad?) startled, Jake leaned back against the wall, his head knocking painfully against the stone. He swore, and shut his eyes, not that it made much difference in the pitch black darkness. Now the man thought he was crazy. He gave up, as he stared at the insides of his own eyelids, cold seeping through his trousers from the cold floor underneath, and his shirt growing damp from the patches of moss that seemed to carbuncle the walls. He was resigned; there was no point in even attempting anything else when he was this tired, hungry, and cold. Perhaps he was mad. It certainly wasn't a normal thing to do; imagining a village from olden times where there all spoke German, and he was thrown into a dungeon for speaking French.

Please review, with a cherry on top. Will bake cyber cookies for nice reviewers using flames. 

French translated roughly in italics as requested thanks to the reviewers.