[Child of the 7th Age]

Child looked about her at the incredibly bleak and miserable landscape. Birdie and Sind were glaring at her with absolute fury.

Child felt even smaller than the 3 feet which she normally occupied on the face of the earth.

How in the blazes had this happened? They were all supposed to come through together!!!?? She remembered Veritas screaming something about a false Fangorn Forest and Frodo screaming about Mordor.

From the looks about her, she could not see any trees so she could only assume this was not Fangorn, whatever the old laptop had originally told Veritas. She felt like someone who had signed up for a very strange tour of Middle-earth. Oh, yeah, if it was Monday, it must be Mordor!!

Just great. Birdie would never let her live this down, and she doubted she would ever even be allowed to touch the laptop, or for that matter any computer again for the rest of her life (er, her death).

Actually, though, it didn't seem to be Mordor per se. It was just outside Mordor. She looked up to see in the distance the large gates which, she knew, had been locked against Frodo and Sam. That's when they had backtracked to come up through the path of Cirith Ungol and Shelob's lair.

Well, at least the three of them knew enough not to make that mistake.

"Let's see, now" she thought. We do have certain advantages. Surely there was no Sauron. He is long gone."

" I think so anyway, she mused."

She asked Birdie to scramble up to the top of the hill and let her sit on her topmost branch to take a look at everything. Rose's army of orcs and nasty humans were making formations on the distant hills to the east. And even more distant, she thought she saw two solitary figures, linked arm in arm, struggling up one of the most distant hills which were covered in ash. Behind them struggled a strange figure that looked like a cross between a hobbit and a large frog.

"Birdie, er, you wouldn't happen to know what age this is, would you? There's some very strange and distant figures struggling through the depths of Mordor which look suspiciously like two characters we know and love on the Downs. Actually, it kind of looks like my third cousin Frodo Baggins and his good friend Sam, the faithful spirit. Plus there's a strange creature struggling along in back of them."

Child declined to say who that might be, as some things are best left unsaid. "I think we should definitely head in the opposite direction."

"Birdland, do you think you could change back into that bird thing you are and maybe fly us out of here, back towards Fangorn?"

Child secretly wished she could have started her annual spring diet a bit earlier. Birdland did not look as big as one of the great eagles, and Child plus Sind were one big load. Still, it would be better than nothing, and they had to get out of here.

Just then, Child looked out and, to her utter amazement, saw a band of humans coming towards them. These particular humans did not look as nasty as the ones marching with the Orcs. In fact, these humans almost looked familiar.

Oh my, could it be? Child wondered. The one human being in the whole earth whom I would actually like to meet. For at the front of the band stood a gallant figure who looked exactly like Faramir......