One Geek to Rule Them All

The Bridge and the Trolls

At the end of the fifth day the ground began once more to rise slowly out of the wide shallow valley into which they had descended. Aragorn now turned their course again north-eastwards, and on the sixth day they reached the top of a long slow-climbing slope, and saw far ahead a huddle of wooded hills. Away below them they could see the Road sweeping round the feet of the hills; and to their right a grey river gleamed pale in the thin sunshine. In the distance they glimpsed yet another river in a stony valley half-veiled in mist.

"I am afraid we must go back to the Road here for awhile," said Aragorn. "We have now come to the River Hoarwell, that the Elves call Mitheithel. It flows down out of the Ettenmoors, the troll-fells north of Rivendell, and joins the Loudwater away in the South. Some call it the Grey-flood after that. It is a great water before it finds the sea. There is no way over it below its sources in the Ettenmoors, except by the Last Bridge on which the Road crosses."

"What is that other river we can see far away there?" Merry asked.

"That is Loudwater, the Bruinen of Rivendell," Aragorn replied. "The Road runs along the edge of the hills for many miles from the Bridge to the  Ford of Bruinen. But I have not yet thought how we shall cross the water. One river at a time! We shall be fortunate indeed if we do not find the Last Bridge held against us."

Next day, early in the morning, they came down again to the borders of the Road. Sam and Aragorn went forward, but they found no sign of any travelers or riders. Here under the shadow of the hills there had been some rain. Aragorn judged that it had fallen two days before, and had washed away all footprints. No horseman had passed since then, as far as he could see.

They hurried along with all the speed they could make, and after a mile or two they saw the Last Bridge ahead, at the bottom of a short steep slope. They dreaded to see black figures waiting there, but saw none. Aragorn made them all take cover in a thicket at the side of the Road, while he went forward to explore.

Before long he came hurrying  back. "I can see no sign of the enemy," he said, "and I wonder very much what that means. But I have found something very strange."

He  held out his hand, and showed a single pale-green jewel. "I found it in the mud in the middle of the bridge. It is a beryl, an elf-stone." Devin and Kitty glanced at each other, eyes widening slightly. "Whether it was set there, or let fall by chance, I cannot say; but it brings hope to me. I will take it as a sign that we may pass the Bridge; beyond that I dare not keep to the Road, without some clearer token."

At once they went out again, in pairs, to make sure they could pass as quickly and quietly as possible. Naturally Sam went first, leading Frodo on the pony, followed by Merry and Pippin.

"Hey, Devin," Kitty whispered while they waited their turn for Aragorn to wave them across. "That light-green crystal you always wear around your neck... didn't you say before that it was some kind of beryl, too?"

"Yeah," Devin replied, nodding, as they quickly and carefully scampered across the open road and made for the bridge. "At least that's what my mom said when she gave it to me. She found it near the site of one of her last digs."

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"asked Kitty.

"That it's actually an elf-stone that somehow fell through a crack between our two universes, and it's probably the reason why we ended up here after falling into a river that runs through one of the few primordial forests still left in one of the oldest parts of the world?" Devin suggested.

"See, this is why we're friends," Kitty told her with a wide grin.

They crossed the Bridge in safety, hearing no sound but the water swirling against its three great arches. A mile further on they came to a narrow ravine that led away northwards through the steep lands on the left of the Road. Here Aragorn turned aside, and soon they were lost in a somber country of dark trees winding among the feet of sullen hills.