Disclaimer: Believe it or not, I didn't make enough money over the summer to buy anything. So they're still not mine. However, Christmas is coming…

Author's Abbreviated Foreword: I don't know what's up with the website but it keeps stripping my mental punctuation (the conversations with Katie and her voice) so I'm going to try a colon and semicolon :; around mental conversations. Please pardon my formatting.

Trapped As A Mary Sue II

Chapter Four

As they rode forward the day was overcast. Low grey clouds came over the Wold. A mist shrouded the sun. Ever nearer the tree-clad slopes of Fangorn loomed, slowly darkling as the sun went west. They saw no sign of any trail to right or left, but here and there they passed single Orcs, fallen in their tracks as they ran, with grey-feathered arrows sticking in back or throat.

"Eeww," Katie muttered. "Now that I know the Rohirrim are on our side, I'm really glad they didn't mistake us for enemies."

:;Well, your eyes are kind of close together:; her voice put in.

Katie managed to ignore it as Brian urged the horse past a particularly gruesome specimen. :;Maybe I could do that to Meriweather:; she said to her voice.

:;Yeah, or maybe she could do that to you:; the voice returned. :;Don't give her any ideas.:;

At last as the afternoon was waning they came to the eaves of the forest, and in an open glade among the first trees they found the place of the great burning: the ashes were still hot and smoking. Katie tried not to gag at the stench as the group pulled up and the Three Hunters dismounted. Fortunately, there wasn't much left of the despoiled band of creatures to identify in the smoking heap.

Beside it was a great pile of helms and mail, cloven shields, and broken swords, bows and darts and other gear of war. Upon a stake in the middle was set a great goblin head; upon its shattered helm the white badge could still be seen. Further away, not far from the river, where it came streaming out from the edge of the wood, there was a mound. It was newly raised: the raw earth was covered with fresh-cut turves: about it were planted fifteen spears.

"The only tomb a Rider of Rohan receives," Brain told Katie when she asked. "They defend this land on all sides from so many foes and that is all that can be done for them."

"A soldier's death," Katie said softly. She gazed at Brian's profile from where she sat behind him on their horse. The kind of death Brian himself could have someday in service to the Navy. She had always been proud of her boyfriend for wanting to defend their country; suddenly, on the plains of Rohan in a situation she had never thought possible, it took on a whole new meaning.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Brian suddenly dismounted and offered her a hand down. Katie slid stiffly from the saddle and promptly collapsed in a heap next to the horse, who had the grace not to step on her.

Katie's vision hazed for a moment as she tried to get her legs once again to speak with her brain. As circulation slowly returned to her thighs, she managed to struggle into a sitting position in the yellow, scratchy grass. The evening seemed to be getting warmer and she watched Aragorn and his companions search far and wide about the field of battle. The light, however, was against them. Evening soon drew down, dim and misty. By nightfall, they had discovered no trace of Merry and Pippin.

"They went into the forest," Brian whispered, his gaze focused on the low, dark boughs of Fangorn. The mist seemed to dance in strange shapes between the trunks as the evening deepened.

"We can do no more," Gimli was saying sadly.

"They can't just give up!" Katie exclaimed. Legolas' head turned at that, but he made no comment and Katie shut her mouth.

Gimli continued, indicating he had not heard Katie. "I would guess that the burned bones of the hobbits are now mingled with the Orcs'. It will be hard news for Frodo, if he lives to hear it; and hard too for the old hobbit who waits in Rivendell. Elrond was against their coming."

"Yeah, well, Elrond's sons were all for knocking me off," Katie muttered savagely. "The branches never fall far from the tree." Brian was ready for another corrective poke in her ribs, but thought better of it at the last moment.

"The counsel of Gandalf was not founded on foreknowledge of safety, for himself or for others," Aragorn was saying. "There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even though the end may be dark. But I shall not depart from this place yet. In any case we must here await the morning-light."

"Here? As in, here here?" Katie cast a furtive glance at the smoking remains of the orcs. The smell was enough to turn anyone's stomach; hers was beginning to do cartwheels complete with round-offs. A gymnast's dream.

"Let us go a little farther from this place," Gimli said. "I like not the thought of the dead lingering."

"For once, I agree," Brian said quietly. Katie got up slowly, tottered a little as she struggled for balance, and waited for various and sundry parts of her body to cooperate with the demand that she move elsewhere. Her stomach was very queasy, but she pushed the feeling down.

"I am so ready for a vacation," she said to Brian as he began to lead the horse in the direction Aragorn was going.

"We don't get vacations while we're saving the world," he replied. "We get up early, eat bad food, use up all our energy fighting enemies that outnumber us, and grab a catnap instead of sleep."

"Do shut up," Katie returned in a fake British accent. "We've made it this far."

"Well, you have at least." Brian's smiled ironically. "I don't know if we'll make it out of this."

Katie sighed as she pulled Boromir's cloak off. It was simply too warm to wander around with the heavy thing on. Maybe the fresh air would help her stomach feel better. She draped it over the horse's saddle. "At least we can be assured that Meriweather's author will see that her characters end up in one piece by the end of this."

Brian stopped. He stared at her for a moment in the dusk. "You don't mean that."

"Think about it," Katie replied. "She has a vested interest in making sure we don't get killed. It's unpleasant to be a part of her plot, I grant you that, but at least it's safer."

"No, it's only safer as long as she decides she has a use for us. Once she gets sick of writing, either of us could die," Brian countered.

Suddenly the words of Katie's voice came back to her: 'What's it to her if you die at the end?' A cold chill made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. She shivered.

"Yeah, that to me is even worse," Brian said, turning his steps toward the camp the Three Hunters had chosen. He picketed the horse and unloaded the supplies Aragorn had given him to carry.

"I didn't think of it that way…the author really wants Aragorn and Meriweather together. But that doesn't say anything about you. I'm sorry, thinking like that was selfish," Katie apologized.

Brian shrugged. "Hey, someone's got to think for you."

She laughed suddenly and aimed a swat in his direction, but Brian was too fast. He grinned a trifle impudently. "You're lucky you're cute," Katie said, taking her cloak and blanket from him.

A little way beyond the battle-field they made their camp under a spreading tree: it looked like a chestnut, and yet it still bore many broad leaves of a former year, like dry hands with long splayed fingers; they rattled mournfully in the night-breeze.

Katie eyed the tree suspiciously. It didn't look like an Ent, but then she'd never seen an Ent before anyway.

"Let us light a fire," Gimli said. "I care no longer for the danger. Let the Orcs come as thick as summer-moths round a candle!"

That image was enough to make Katie sit down hard in the grass. She realized she was staring open-mouthed at the Dwarf who hadn't noticed her shock.

"If those unhappy hobbits are astray in the woods, it might draw them hither," said Legolas.

"I can see tomorrow's Middle-Earth headline: 'Orcs Attack Pyros,'" Katie whispered to Brian, who settled beside her.

"And it might draw other things, neither Orc nor Hobbit," said Aragorn. "We are near to the mountain-marches of the traitor Saruman. Also we are on the very edge of Fangorn, and it is perilous to touch the trees of that wood, it is said."

"Yeah, you might get flattened," Brian muttered under his breath.

Gimli answered Aragorn. "But the Rohirrim made a great burning here yesterday, and they felled trees for the fire, as can be seen. Yet they passed the night after safely here, when their labour was ended."

:;Oh yes, and if everyone were to jump off of the Bridge of Khazad-dûm, would you follow them:; the voice asked snidely. Katie couldn't help snickering. It kept her mind off of the fact that her stomach was considering revisiting the lembas she'd eaten earlier in the day.

"They were many," said Aragorn, "and they do not heed the wrath of Fangorn, for they come here seldom, and they do not go under the trees. But our paths are likely to lead us in to the very forest itself. So have a care! Cut no living wood!"

"There is no need," said Gimli. "The Riders have left chip and bough enough, and there is dead wood lying in plenty." With that, he wandered off into the darkness.

"Wait, why is he building a fire in the first place?" Katie demanded quietly to Brian. "Are we finally admitting to being afraid of the dark?"

"Katie, it's freezing," Brian answered as if his girlfriend were slightly dense. "I've got Aragorn's cloak and a blanket and I'm still cold."

Katie was dressed only in Sam's shirt and Aragorn's leggings. She glanced at Legolas and Aragorn. The Elf held the folds of his cloak tight about him as he stood alone in the open, looking towards the profound shadow of the wood, leaning forward as one who listens to voices calling from a distance. Aragorn was wrapped in his blanket and sat silent with his back to the great tree, deep in thought. "Oh. I hadn't noticed. I'm not all that cold. You can borrow my blanket if you want."

Brian looked at her for a moment, as if to determine if she were serious. Then he shrugged and added her blanket to his. "If you get cold, tell me."

Gimli returned shortly with a large armload of wood. When the Dwarf had a small bright blaze going, the five companions drew close to it and sat together, shrouding the light with their hooded forms.

Legolas looked up at the boughs of the tree reaching out above them. "Look!" he said. "The tree is glad of the fire!"

:;Who ever heard of a tree being happy about fire:; Katie thought to herself.

:;Well, Hexis was pretty happy about it when he tried to take over Ferngully:; her voice put in unhelpfully.

:;Hexis wasn't a tree, he was locked inside a tree. Will you stop trying to make crossovers inside my head? It's not as if there aren't enough people in here without your help:; Katie retorted. She was now looking at the tree; Aragorn had moved slightly away from the trunk and they all were staring upward.

It may have been that the dancing shadows tricked their eyes, but certainly to each of the companions the boughs appeared to be bending this way and that so as to come above the flames, while the upper branches were stooping down; the brown leaves now stood out stiff, and rubbed together like many cold cracked hands taking comfort in the warmth.

"That's…kinda scary," Katie whispered aloud. There was a silence, for suddenly the dark and unknown forest, so near at hand, made itself felt as a great brooding presence, full of secret purpose.

Legolas spoke; Katie and Brian jumped. "Celeborn warned us not to go far into Fangorn," he said. "Do you know why, Aragorn? What are the fables of the forest that Boromir had heard?"

Aragorn sat back against the trunk of the tree once more. "I have heard many tales in Gondor and elsewhere," he said, "but if it were not for the words of Celeborn I should deem them only fables that Men have made as true knowledge fades. I had thought of asking you what was the truth of the matter. And if an Elf of the wood does not know, how shall a Man answer?"

"What did Celeborn say to them?" Katie asked Brian. "I think I missed that part, courtesy of Meriweather." Brian made a shushing gesture as Legolas answered.

"You have journeyed further than I," said Legolas. "I have heard nothing of this in my own land, save only songs that tell how the Onodrim, that Men call Ents, dwelt there long ago; for Fangorn is old, old even as the Elves would reckon it."

:;So much for the 'wisest and fairest of all beings.':;

:;Haven't I told you to shut up lately? Shut up.:;

The heat of the flames was making Katie feel far warmer than she needed. Small beads of sweat began to gather on her forehead, and she wiped them away. The nauseated feeling in her stomach had not abated, but she was certain that if she went to sleep it would go away. She let Aragorn and the others carry on as she lay down on Boromir's cloak and stared into the fire, waiting for sleep to come. The flickering flames grew hazy in her vision as she watched them.

Distantly, as if miles away the four men drew lots for the watches. Perhaps Katie should have been vaguely surprised that Brian had volunteered to watch, but her mind had wandered into the fire, her thoughts weaving with the fingers of flame. She was aware of nothing else as she drifted away…

Shapes. There were shadowy shapes moving in the forest beyond Legolas' slumbering form. Katie could see them through the flames. They were the massive, hulking forms of Uruk-Hai. They were so numerous that Katie couldn't count them; she sat up quickly and nearly threw up.

"Well, father, what can we do for you?" said Aragorn, leaping to his feet. Katie started at his sudden movement; Brian also rose slowly and stood silently, gazing at the bent figure of an old man at the edge of the firelight. She blinked; where had he come from?

"Come and be warm, if you are cold!" Aragorn strode forward, but the old man was gone. There was no trace of him to be found near at hand, and they did not dare to wander far. The moon had set and the night was very dark.

Katie let her head drop into her hands. She was shaking. There weren't any Uruk-Hai forms in the trees; had she been dreaming? The old man…she knew it had to be Gandalf. But maybe in this storyline things had changed. Perhaps it was Saruman with a band of Uruks.

Suddenly Legolas gave a cry. "The horses! The horses!"

The horses were gone. They had dragged their pickets and disappeared. For some time the five companions were still and silent, troubled by this new stroke of ill fortune. They were under the eaves of Fangorn, and endless leagues lay between them and the Men of Rohan, their only friends in this wide and dangerous land. As they stood, it seemed to them that they heard, far off in the night, the sound of horses whinnying and neighing. Then all was quiet again, except for the cold rustle of the wind.

Katie continued to stare at the dark trees on the edge of Fangorn, to ensure that she really had not seen anything. It must have been a dream.

"Are you all right?" Brian asked quietly, sitting down again. He looked in the direction Katie was staring, but saw nothing.

"Yeah, great. Just great. I think I had a waking nightmare." Katie laughed a little, but it sounded small.

"Well, you look horrible."

Katie punched Brian in the arm. "Thanks. Knew I could count on you to be honest." She looked across the fire to the other three companions. They were conversing about the loss of the horses and likely would not hear the outworlders. "I thought I saw something in the forest, that's all."

"What, Gandalf? That's who the old man was," Brian said.

"No, something else…" A sudden look crossed Brian's face. He seemed to pale in the firelight. "What?"

"He's afraid. He's really afraid." Brian spoke slowly, eyes focused on nothing.

Katie blinked. She didn't understand. "Who's afraid?"

"Temnaur, I can hear him. He's begging for his life." Brian looked around. There was nothing, no danger in the area. "I don't know why, I don't understand."

"Ah!" Katie pressed her hands to her temples. A burning presence, rage like she had never felt before filled her mind. Screaming, yelling anger. "She's angry. Meriweather's author is angry!"

Brian also had a pained expression on his face. "I hear her. I've never before, but I know it's her."

"She wants the story back. She wants it badly." The wound in her side seemed to flare and the world suddenly hazed out of focus.

Both of them were now drawing stares from their three companions from across the fire, but neither noticed.

"She can't! She can't just take control back." Brian paused, searching for confirmation in Katie's face. "Can she?"

"I don't know. She's never done this before. She's never been so furious." The author's feelings struck again and again against her mind, trying to loosen Katie's grip on consciousness. Black spots appeared before her eyes.

Her hand went to her side. A black stain was spreading across the fabric of Sam's shirt. "No, oh no, not now. Aragorn!" She had known that not all was right with her injury. Like an idiot Katie had assumed that several days of straight running was the only reason she was in pain. Forget pride, bad things were going to happen if she couldn't stay conscious.

The Ranger was at her side in the time it took him to find his herb satchel. "Poison," was the only thing Aragorn said.

"She wants the story back. Only now she's angry; she means to do something terrible. I'm sorry, I didn't think the wound was as bad." Katie was aware that she was babbling, but she was trying to keep a hold on reality. Yet the poison's effects already had too much of a head start.

"Fight it! Katie, fight it!" Brian's voice came from far away. :;He's scared because Temnaur's scared:; she thought distantly.

:;Any guesses as to who the author's mad at:; her voice asked. :;I'll give you three.:;

Fade.

"No, let him go! He hasn't done anything, let him go!" The words came from her mouth, with her voice, but Katie hadn't been the one uttering them.

She forced her mind to surface from where it had been drifting in the land of oblivion. Katie felt horribly weak and feverish. She couldn't remember what had happened when she had reached in-between. Maybe it had had something to do with a neuralizer. So much for not crossing anything over.

Katie focused on the scene before her and would have screamed if she'd been able. Meriweather was being restrained by two disproportionately hulking Uruks. That seemed to indicate that she'd been captured. Worse still was the figure of Temnaur, who had been divested of his green outer robe and was being whipped. His white shirt hung in tatters from bloody shoulders and his green leggings were torn and stained as if he had been dragged along the ground.

The young wizard's battered features suggested that Katie had come to only partway through his torture session. Her voice had been right; the author was after Temnaur. The Uruk scourge fell repeatedly upon his bent shoulders and each stroke elicited a noise of suffering from Temnaur. How much Brian actually felt, Katie didn't know.

:;Hold on! Brian, don't let it get to you. Please, please…:; She knew he was behind those eyes, the green eyes of a character that was doomed. The author's template for Temnaur must have angered her in some way. How far would she go?

Suddenly the lead Uruk dropped the scourge and hauled Temnaur to his feet. The young man wove unsteadily for a moment before falling back to his knees. The Uruk grabbed a fistful of hair (Temnaur's hair was longer than Brian's) and jerked him upright. Temnaur groaned at the abuse, but he remained standing.

Meriweather was still struggling with hear captors, but very ineffectually. They were in a forest, presumably Fangorn. Was that what she had seen? The author's intention of using Uruk-hai to punish her characters?

"Now you run, little wizard," the Uruk leader snarled. "Run and my boys will enjoy chasing you." When Temnaur didn't move, one of the lesser Uruks fired a crossbow bolt at the wizard's feet. Temnaur spun and ran, fleeing for his life. He ran deeper into Fangorn, dodging behind trees and shrubs, anything that would give him cover.

The Uruk leader roared a laugh that made Katie's blood run cold. "After him, boys! The one that brings me his pretty pale scalp gets to play with the wench." And he pointed at Meriweather. Katie's heart dropped like the Tower of Terror. They were going to kill Temnaur!

"Brian!" The cry escaped before Meriweather could stop it. She also failed to stop the mad lunge that Katie managed to make out of the grip of the Uruks on either side of her. Katie made it all of three feet before Meriweather reasserted control and she fell flat on her front, landing on a network of roots that made her poisoned wound erupt into fiery agony all over again.

The Uruk-hai hauled her back to her feet. Katie railed against the mental barriers Meriweather had erected around her. No two-bit Mary Sue author was going to do away with Brian! There had to be a way to stop her!

Her mad train of thought was interrupted by the sound of silence, followed by the meaty thud of an arrow meeting flesh and the sound of someone gasping for air that would no longer come to them. Then followed more silence.

And then the cheering began. Rough Uruk-hai voices carried through the trees and Katie heard the sound of fists beating on armor in celebration.

It was over. She sagged mentally. She hadn't gotten to say goodbye. She never would.

:;No, that can't be it! There must be something else! That author didn't own Brian; she can't kill him! Voice, talk to me! This can't be the end:; Katie begged her mental companion to deny what she had just seen and heard.

A string of Uruk-hai stampeded back from within the depths of the forest. One of them held a bloody piece of flesh. Meriweather actually gagged.

Katie receded. She wasn't going to involve herself anymore. She pulled her consciousness away from her senses and left Meriweather's author to do her worst. She didn't have to watch.

"Katie!" She started, then tuned herself into reality once more. It couldn't have been…

:;Brian:; She would have shrieked if she could. There he was, staring Meriweather straight in the eye, Navy uniform, military haircut and all. And yet he seemed insubstantial. Katie realized that she could see right through him. Hope suddenly returned and she cheered inwardly.

"It's over for me. That stupid author killed Temnaur, and I'm free. I don't want you to worry. Even if she goes after you or anybody else she drags in, once she cuts her character's thread of life, we're not affected anymore." Brian's face was alight with relief. "No matter what happens, hang in there, okay? She can't do anything to you short of sending you home."

:;If I could do anything right now, I'd kiss you:; Katie thought happily. A burden lifted from her shoulders, and she felt as if she could fly. Well, hadn't she been trapped inside Meriweather.

"Look, I've got to go." Brian stepped backwards, almost reluctantly. Over his shoulder a new kind of portal was forming, one meant only for him. Katie made out the interior of a barracks building. "I'll tell you family not to worry about you." He stepped through. "I love you." Then he was gone.

Long after the portal had vanished, Katie remained alert in Meriweather's mind, ready to take action. This war was so not over.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Lord of the Rings. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1954. Pages 429-433.

Author's Abbreviated Note: Merry Christmas, everyone. Key