"There is an inn, a merry old inn
beneath an old grey hill,
And there they brew a beer so brown
That the Man in the Moon himself came down
one night to drink his fill."
-J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
Chapter 5: Nursery Rhymes and Troubling Times
I made it to Bree just as the sun was setting and the rain starting, and made a pathetic enough figure at the gate that the keeper let me through and directed me to The Prancing Pony. I stood there, dripping on the welcome mat, wondering if the gold Tom had shoved at me would hold up under nosy small town scrutiny. It was all I had, in any case, and would have to do. I wasn't going to spend the night on the street.
The innkeeper found me there after a minute or so. Butterbur, I seemed to remember his name was. Barliman was the name he gave me, before offering me food and ale and asking with a cough if I could pay.
Cautiously, I showed him the gold, wishing I knew how to count it.
Barliman looked at me pityingly and showed me to a table in a corner. A moment later, he had slipped a mug into my hand and vanished into the crowd. I was left to wonder how such a kind creature had survived in business this long.
He checked up on me several times, and I went through a couple of beers before finally ordering whatever he recommended. When he came back with bread, cheese, vegetables, and a fish fry that outdid any I had ever had, I explained that I would need a room.
He had one left.
I felt a prickling along my spine, like the wight's fingers from earlier that morning. One room left…a busy night at the inn in Bree…I clutched my forehead, trying to remember. I had loved The Lord of the Rings as a kid, why had I gone so long without reading it?
The answer to that was a simple one: I'd gone a long while without reading. Beer, bonfires, best friends, they were my leisure now. I hadn't read anything not assigned by a teacher for a good five years, and I was surprised to realize I missed it.
Wrapped up in sobering thoughts about my own life, I didn't notice them come in at first. I was taking a sip of my ale – a long one – and nearly spat it back out when I saw them over the edge of my mug. Four hobbits, looking worse for the wear, and the center of attention in a room full of traveling folk.
Hobbits didn't travel. This was the first fact to solidify itself solidly in my mind. Hobbits liked their homes and their gardens. Hobbits were, in fact, a lot like me. And four hobbits traveling out of the Shire had only happened once, in my recollection…
As the crowd became more absorbed in their stories, one of the hobbits, with darker hair than the rest and astonishing blue eyes, slipped away from the others to join a crusty looking man at a table in the corner.
My heart sank into my sneakers, and I took another gulp of ale. I remembered this. I remembered…
Remembered Pippin was about to give something away. In the corner, Frodo was looking alarmed, and Strider was watching the situation intensely, but neither were moving. Neither were singing…
As I jumped up onto my own table, feeling my face redden and my courage lesson, it was Aunt Scilla's voice, drawn from the depths of a childhood I couldn't remember, that I heard. The tune hadn't been in the books I'd read, but I knew it as certainly as I knew the scars on my knees and the ache in my heart. Aunt Scilla had sung this song to me when I was a baby.
Aunt Scilla had known this song.
There is an inn, a merry old inn
beneath an old grey hill,
And there they brew a beer so brown
That the Man in the Moon himself came down
one night to drink his fill.
The ostler has a tipsy cat
that plays a five-stringed fiddle;
And up and down he runs his bow,
Now squeaking high, now purring low,
now sawing in the middle.
The landlord keeps a little dog
that is mighty fond of jokes;
When there's good cheer among the guests,
He cocks an ear at all the jests
and laughs until he chokes.
They also keep a hornéd cow
as proud as any queen;
But music turns her head like ale,
And makes her wave her tufted tail
and dance upon the green.
And O! the rows of silver dishes
and the store of silver spoons!
For Sunday there's a special pair,
And these they polish up with care
on Saturday afternoons.
The Man in the Moon was drinking deep,
and the cat began to wail;
A dish and a spoon on the table danced,
The cow in the garden madly pranced,
and the little dog chased his tail.
The Man in the Moon took another mug,
and rolled beneath his chair;
And there he dozed and dreamed of ale,
Till in the sky the stars were pale,
and dawn was in the air.
Then the ostler said to his tipsy cat:
"The white horses of the Moon,
They neigh and champ their silver bits;
But their master's been and drowned his wits,
and the Sun'll be rising soon!"
So the cat on his fiddle played hey-diddle-diddle,
a jig that would wake the dead:
He squeaked and sawed and quickened the tune,
While the landlord shook the Man in the Moon:
"It's after three!" he said.
They rolled the Man slowly up the hill
and bundled him into the Moon,
While his horses galloped up in rear,
And the cow came capering like a deer,
and a dish ran up with the spoon.
Now quicker the fiddle went deedle-dum-diddle;
the dog began to roar,
The cow and the horses stood on their heads;
The guests all bounded from their beds
and danced upon the floor.
With a ping and a pang the fiddle-strings broke!
the cow jumped over the Moon,
And the little dog laughed to see such fun,
And the Saturday dish went off at a run
with the silver Sunday spoon.
The round Moon rolled behind the hill,
as the Sun raised up her head.
She hardly believed her fiery eyes;
For though it was day, to her suprise
they all went back to bed.
"Sorry," I said when I'd finished, looking at Frodo. "A song out of the Shire, right? I heard it when I was a child."
"Ye-yes," he stammered. "But you haven't got the tune quite right."
"Then show us how it's really done, Mr. Underhill!" shouted one of the other guests. An ale was shoved at Frodo, and another at myself, and Frodo stood up on his own table to begin Bilbo's rendition of the song.
I sat down with a sigh and a heavy heart, knowing the danger hadn't passed. A little encouragement was all Frodo needed. In the spirit of the room and the drink he'd just had, he acted out the song, with little leaps and bounds and a final crash into the middle of the guests – and into oblivion.
I met Strider's piercing gaze after it happened, just to make sure we were on the same page, and after Frodo's awkward recovery, I followed them to their rooms. Taking my cue from Strider, I shut the door and waited, my back against it, for the hobbits to notice us. They did, with a little start from Pippin and a suspicious glare from the sandy-haired one I guessed must be Sam.
I shall not go over all they said that night, as everyone already knows it. I think there were bits missing, but I can't be sure. I was in shock, and the door behind me was the only thing supporting me, until Merry came bursting through, followed by another hobbit, and I was shoved further into the shadows.
They had sorted out their travel plans and sleeping arrangements, as well as the sleeping arrangements for the dummies, before anyone noticed me.
Nob shut the door behind him, and Strider, who had been staring me down for several minutes, spoke:
"Now, who are you? And what are we to do with you?"
I attempted, foolishly, to shrink further into the wall behind me. "I…My name is Raelyn, and…and I'm also traveling to Rivendell."
"Hmph," said Sam. "You've been awfully quiet there, minding your own business this whole time. Coming along to spy, are you?"
"Don't be ridiculous," I said. "I…okay, I can see how this looks suspicious, but I really am traveling to Rivendell…on business of my own! Though I…though I admit I do know about yours." I looked at Frodo.
"And you expect us just to take you with us?" he demanded. "How did you know Bilbo's song?"
"I heard it as a child."
"Yes, you said that, but I can't remember him ever singing it for the Big Folk."
"But she's not one of your Big Folk," Strider said shrewdly. "Not the ones you are familiar with, at any rate. Come into the light, Lady."
I did as I was told, wondering if I should tell them everything or if I should just wake up. How could I wake up? Throw myself on the fire?
Strider was speaking again. "Where are you from?"
"I…I don't think you would know the place."
"Hmm. Why are you journeying to Rivendell?"
"I'm hoping I might find some answers there."
"Answers to what?"
"How I got here, and what happened to my aunt."
"Your aunt?" Pippin asked. "Was she an Elf?"
"No," said Strider quietly, "she was Queen Scilla of Dale, wife of King Bard, Seer of Rivendell, Heroine of the Battle of Five Armies, and long time friend and correspondent of Frodo's cousin, Bilbo."
I don't know who was more shocked, Frodo, the other hobbits, or me. I gaped at Strider, feeling a sting in my eyes as the rest of my face seemed to melt and crumble.
"You knew my aunt?" My voice cracked around the question.
"Yes, though not as well as some."
"She was…she was…"
Strider thoughtfully pulled a chair in front of the fire and guided me into it. "What do you know?" he asked when I was seated.
"Nothing," I admitted. "She disappeared when I was only a year old. I was going through her things...and then I was here. Bombadil said I should go to Rivendell. I didn't…I didn't know you would be journeying at the same time."
"But you knew we would be traveling there. You have your aunt's Sight?"
"I...It's a little more complicated than that."
"I remember your aunt," Frodo said, coming to stand by me. "She came to Bag End once, with Gandalf, and she and Bilbo spent hours locked away together, writing a history, he told me."
"She…she was a queen?" I tried grasping what Strider had said, but I couldn't. My aunt, my absent aunt…a queen? What had she left for? A fairy tale?
"She married King Bard upon her return to Middle Earth," Strider continued, "but she also spent much of her time writing and working with Mr. Baggins. She was a great friend to Gandalf and the Elves."
The rest of this was too ludicrous to grasp, so I asked, "'Was'?"
"I'm afraid she has been dead for many years."
I hadn't though it possible to grieve for someone you've never known, but I felt like someone had thrown a brick into my chest. I clutched at myself, knowing as I did that it wasn't my aunt that I grieved for, but the loss of the last connection to my mother. The mystery was solved, but it could do my shattered family no good.
"We never knew where she went," I said aloud, knowing, as I did, that I truly was in Middle Earth. That Aunt Scilla had left us to live in a fairy story, to marry a king, to make friends with Elves.
What was it my mother had said? That something had happened before she left? Had she been to Middle Earth already? Did she just have to go back?
"I think I still need to go to Rivendell," I told Strider.
"Yes," he said. "I think that wise. Come with us, lend us your Sight along the road, and perhaps we will not go astray."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that, if you are indeed Scilla's kin, I take your coming to be a good omen."