The girls emerged at the top of the stairs breathless.
“Should we just knock?” Lily asked, in between sniffles.
The door to Dumbledore’s office was closed unlike the last time they had been there.
“Why not?” said Taryn, and Ophelia hit the door three times in response to this.
“Just a moment,” came an odd voice from behind the door.
They heard a bunch of shuffling and a couple of loud “oomphs.” Then the door opened.
Boats, planes, and birds all made of multi-colored smoke, burst out of the portal. Lily ran from the wisps of winged creatures and cowered in a corner whimpering something about, “evil birdies.” Gabby noticed her friend’s distress and ran to Lily’s aid, brandishing Sting. Suddenly a tall bearded man came out of the door and approached Lily.
Gabby, thinking his intentions were sinister, tackled him and put Sting to his throat.
“This is Sting!” She said menacingly. “You’ve seen it before, haven’t you…Gandalf!”
She shouted this last word, surprised to see her old friend from middle-earth.
“Gandalf?” the man groaned confusedly, trying unsuccessfully to wriggle out of Gabby’s grasp. “Oh, yes, that’s what you used to call me, Gandalf the Grey, that was my name. Well, I am Gandalf the White.”
Gabby sheathed Sting and gave Gandalf a big hug.
“It’s so great to see that you’ve been reincarnated! I was really sad when you died,” Gabby said, tearing at the thought.
On her last trip to middle-earth, Gabby had been present when Gandalf tripped on his ridiculously long robes and fell into a blazing inferno. She had had to comfort Frodo for over an hour before he stopped trying to go back and save Gandalf.
Gandalf patted Gabby absently and stumbled off toward Lily again.
“Sorry if our smoke shapes alarmed you my dear child,” Gandalf eloquently said as he handed Lily a small parcel. “To make amends.”
Then with a wink at Lily he was gone. The girls then entered Dumbledore’s office to find the headmaster in a very sad state.
It seemed that he and Gandalf had been blowing smoke shapes with the famous middle-earth pipe-weed. He was an extremely high wizard. But, though his self-control was lacking, he still seemed to have his mind.
“This could be good,” pronounced Taryn. “We can get any information we want out of him and he’ll never remember what he told us!”
“Oooh,” said Gabby, “let me go first!”
Without the go ahead from the two balanced members of her group, Gabby turned to Dumbledore and demanded to know why snooze buttons on alarm clocks went off in nine-minute intervals.
Taryn rolled her eyes and pushed Gabby aside before Dumbledore had a chance to think out what Gabby had said. “Ophelia, since we seem to be the only people in the room who aren’t off their rockers can you write Dumbledore a note explaining V.L.’s plan, while I question him?” she asked.
Ophelia nodded and sat down to write a letter.
“Are we really here as exchange students?” Taryn asked.
“No!” Dumbledore snorted, then erupted into gales of laughter.
“Then why are we here?” she prodded.
“Protection...” he spat out before falling onto the floor in fits of hysteria.
“From who? Voldeliana?” Taryn asked beginning to feel as if she were finally getting somewhere.
At the mention of the dreaded name Dumbledore seemed to sober up a bit. He stopped guffawing and picked himself up, giggling and drooling slightly.
“There are many bad people in this world,” Dumbledore said, looking sadly at the girls. “Your parents have played a part in putting these people’s friends in prison. I am afraid you will never be safe.”
The moments of sanity wore off and soon Dumbledore was rolling around on the floor again.
“Be very careful!” he chortled after them as they left, more confused than when they had come.
-------------------- Weeks went by with no new occurrences, and the four girls soon became so wrapped up in their lives as Hogwarts students that their fear of Voldeliana’s eminent attack was pushed to the back of their minds. Before they knew it was Thanksgiving.
Since this holiday was not celebrated in England the girls decided to organize their own celebration. They decided that since all of their friends in America were getting a four-day weekend they should too. So, they locked themselves up in their personal dormitory and went to work transforming it into a Holiday Haven.
Taryn spent all of Thursday morning charming the dust in the air to make it look like snowflakes. By lunchtime it looked like a blizzard was swirling through the room and Taryn was forced to stop when Lily complained that her mullet was starting to droop. Lily had been busy transfiguring beds into tables and all of the girls’ trunks into benches that could be sat upon. This only took her a couple of minutes, but she got so carried away with her wand that she spent the next hour transfiguring the spiders that never ceased to stream through the crack in the window into hundreds of Legolas’s. Ophelia, who had been against missing classes just to transform their room into a jumble of holiday spirit, looked up from her potions homework only when a Legolas grabbed it from her.
“There is a fell voice on the air!” it exclaimed.
Ophelia sighed and listened. Indeed something was making a horrible racket. She sifted through the dry snow collecting about the room until she got fed up with it, pulled out her wand, and shouted, “tout le neige! Wingardium Leviosa!” All the snow zoomed to the ceiling and stayed there. Immediately the source of the horrible noise appeared. Lily was leading no less than one hundred and fifty Legolas’s in singing The Star Spangled Banner.
Ophelia, who was most able in potions, but handy in any subject, returned all of the Legolas’s back into spiders with a flick of her wand and returned to her homework. Lily screamed, jumped on the transfigured bed and turned the huge wriggling mass of spiders into four vegetable-filled cornucopias, to use as centerpieces for the tables.
Gabby had been sent to raid the kitchens four hours earlier and had not yet returned. This probably had something to do with the fact that Fred and George Weasley were her guides.
An hour after the spider event Gabby returned flanked by each member of her Weasley Harem and a new redhead that the other girls had at the Slytherin table a couple of times during meals. All of them were weighed down with an armload of delicious looking food. They dumped their burdens on the table and sat down on the benches.
“When do we start eating? I’m starved!” exclaimed Gabby.
“When all our honored guests get here,” Taryn replied. “Where did Ophelia go?”
Sometime during the past fifteen minutes, Ophelia had mysteriously disappeared.
“Oh, no!” Gabby and Lily cried together, breaking down into fits of tears. “Voldeliana’s captured her.”
“I think not,” said Taryn, “If we weren’t skipping classes then we would be in International Wizarding Studies right now. I’ll bet a galleon that’s where Ophelia has skipped off to.”
The two distraught girls realized the truth of this at once but continued to force tears to fall from their eyes, seeing as they were being comforted immensely. Lily was wrapped tightly in the arms of Legolas and Hotex, who was staring a bit loathingly at the graceful charismatic elf. Gabby meanwhile could not be seen as she was buried under the embraces of the five redheaded boys. Together all of their hair looked like a nice bonfire, so it was no wonder that when Harry Potter came in to attend the feast he looked stupidly at the group hug and said, “Ron! Your head’s on fire!!!” He then threw a pitcher of water on top of the group.
Gabby was a little upset at first but then each scrawny member of the Weasley family decided it would be best to take off their wet shirts and let them dry. She fell in a dead faint on the floor at the “glorious” sight before her.
Harry had become a part of the large group that had begun to follow the girls around school. They had made sure that this happened so they could keep and eye on him. So far he had only been his normal, slightly dim self, no signs of an evil sorceress messing with his mind.
After another half an hour all of the guests had arrived and it was time to sit at the tables. The girls all wanted to sit together so Taryn performed a simple charm to connect all of the tables into one huge table. Each girl had a side to herself, where she sat with her British friends. Gabby’s side was overflowing. She had Percy, Fred, George, Ron, the new redhead (a cousin of the Weasley Family named Gud Lukin Weasley—he was german--), Harry, and a Frodo that had been transfigured so quickly by Lily that it still had the brass knobs of its former shape running down its chest. On Taryn’s side was Oliver. She didn’t feel the need to invite more. Oliver was the only man on earth that she had eyes for. Lily’s side was also overflowing. Lily was seated in the middle with Hotex on one side a Legolas on the other and lining the rest of the table were repetitions of that all too familiar face.
Ophelia had also only invited one other person, but they were not alone on her side of the table. Professor Leopold had come at her bidding but on Ophelia’s other side was Draco Malfoy and his two henchmen, playing footsie under the table. Word had leaked out about a party in the exchange students’ room and Draco, suffering from some sort of unexplainable dimensia that Ophelia loved him as much as he loved her, had just figured that he was invited and showed up. Ophelia couldn’t find it in herself to be rude so she merely concentrated on her conversation with “Hugh” as she now called him.
The dinner went on peacefully, and shortly after the pumpkin pies had been finished by the two love-struck first years the guests began to leave. Soon everyone but Harry had gone. Harry was talking to Gabby about magical scars. Harry proudly lifted up his bangs and showed her the famous Voldemort predicting bolt of lightening. She in turn took the shoe and sock off her left foot and displayed her own lightening bolt scar.
“Mine predicts the weather!” she scoffed.
“Wicked,” Harry said jealously.
Gabby decided to do something then that was partly intelligent but mostly dumb. She began to fill Harry in on what Voldeliana had told them. Just as she was getting to Harry’s role in the plot, a severe pain began to throb in her foot, spreading all the way up to her elbow, the blue spot began to grow and pulsate. Gabby dropped to the ground, writhing on the floor; tears of pain issuing from her eyes. She did not scream, though. She could stand a little pain. Through the blindness of the throbbing she forced herself onto her feet.
“Voldeliana’s sending a huge storm,” Gabby managed to moan before her eyes rolled up into her head and she collapsed in a heap on the floor. Lily ran to Gabby’s aid and began trying to revive her.
“Wow,” Taryn said, truly worried, “This must be a bad one. Usually Gabby just curls up into the fetal position in bed and takes a few ‘happy pills’ when it’s going to rain.”
Ophelia had run to the window and looked out. The sky was a beautiful blue and not a cloud was to be seen. Inside, though, a fierce wind was beginning to blow. The temperature dropped to below freezing and sleet began pouring from the stone ceiling. Thunder crashed and Harry ran out the door. The girls tried to get out after him, dragging Gabby along, but the door was iced shut before they could manage it.
“What are we going to do?” Ophelia screamed, starting to panic.
“I don’t know,” Taryn said, trying to keep her head.
Suddenly an evil cackle sounded, causing the quickly forming icicles to detach from the ceiling and begin to bombard the girls. Lily transfigured a chair into a small shelter and placed it over Gabby to protect her from the barrage of razor sharp ice. Gabby was safe. Taryn was not so lucky, a very sharp icicle crashed from the ceiling stabbing her in the left shoulder. A searing pain spread throughout her whole body. The icicles weren’t made of frozen water, they were frozen spider venom and it was quickly pulling Taryn into shadow.
“Can you do something?” Lily screamed to Ophelia as she darted the onslaught of ice with elvish agility.
“This is beyond my skill to heal,” she replied, busting a matrix-like move as an icicle came horizontally zooming at her. “This requires elvish medicine.”
The two conscious girls then set about breaking all of the protective spells that encircled the school and, as the icicles grazed their exposed skin, they illegally apparated to middle-earth, where they all landed, unconscious, on the front doorstep of the House of Elrond.
-------------------------- Taryn’s vision and memory were foggy when she woke up a week later.
She blinked several times, trying to clear the fog covering her eyes. Soon she could see clearly enough, though she still had no idea where she was. She glanced around and saw Lily and Ophelia asleep in chairs next to the huge white bed she was lying in. On the other side of the room the wall opened up to reveal a balcony that stood looking out upon…
“Rivendell!” Taryn exclaimed. She tried to roll onto her side for a better view, but a wave of excruciating pain prevented her. Along with the pain came a flow of memory. Images of sleet falling from stone, a panicking Ophelia, an unconscious Gabby and icicles falling, all floated through her mind. But what had happened afterwards? She couldn’t remember.
Jostled by Taryn’s cry, Ophelia groggily opened her eyes. After staring at the bed for a couple of minutes she finally realized what she was seeing. She jabbed Lily in the side. Lily in turn jumped and fell out of her chair. After picking herself up she glanced at the bed. When she saw that Taryn was awake she shouted excitedly, ran towards her, tripped over her own feet and went sliding under the bed.
“Taryn you’re awake,” Ophelia said, happily as Lily crawled back out, picking dust bunnies from her silky, pink elven dress. “We were so worried. Not even Lord Elrond was sure if you were going to make it or not.”
“Yes, you human girls have shown extraordinary resilience,” said Lord Elrond, flowing into the room in his elven “robes”(They looked like a dress to the girls but he maintained that they were very manly robes). “Those spider venom icicles would have skewered a wild boar, not to mention slaughtered any normal person. You seem to have a special sort of magic around you.”
Taryn noted all of this on her mental notepad, but wasn’t paying much attention. She was too busy staring at the supposedly immortal elf’s receding hairline.
“Sir,” she said, “if you’re immortal why are you losing your hair?”
“Because I am Elrond half-elven. My father was Nicolas Flamel, a wizard. Therefore I have reached the ripe old age of 3777 and am consequently beginning to go bald,” Elrond replied indignantly.
Taryn nodded, it made sense, but she giggled slightly at the thought of a bald elf.
Suddenly something occurred to Taryn. Gabby wasn’t there. Last time she had seen Gabby, she had been lying unconscious on the floor with spider venom seeping into her robes.
“Wh..where’s Gabby,” she stuttered, carefully watching the expressions on Lily and Ophelia’s faces. They glanced at each other. “What’s wrong?”
“Gabby is still unconscious,” Lily said, simply, staring at the ground.
“Well, is she going to be okay or what?” Taryn demanded to know, raising herself gingerly on her good arm. No one answered. “Holy shnikeez! Will someone tell me what’s going on!”
“We do not yet know the extent of the damage that has been caused to Gabby,” Elrond said. “Voldeliana hit her the hardest, Lily and Ophelia had a few infected scratches, but they woke up shortly after they arrived. Your wound was serious and you will never fully recover, but since it was a visible wound we were able to bring you back relatively quickly. But Gabby’s wounds are not visible. It seems Voldeliana attacked her heart and soul, leaving wounds that even the most trainèd eye cannot see. Now you must tell me this. How did she acquire that fearful scar?”
The girls all replied that they did not know.
“But we all have similar ones,” pointed out Lily. “They all predict different things.”
Lily pointed to a scar above her left eyebrow and explained how it pained her whenever a big change was going to occur. Ophelia nodded and pointed out a large scar on her lower left calf.
“It seems to burn whenever people are running at me or throwing things,” she explained. “It’s especially perceptive when the objects are ball-shaped.”
Taryn continued, pointing to her kneecap “My scar hurts when it feels the approach of fire or angry people. I suppose it is pretty strange that we all have psychic scars.”
“It is indeed strange,” Elrond muttered. “Scars like these do not form from ordinary cuts and scrapes.”
With these vague words Elrond glided from the room, his “robes” flowing behind him.
“I don’t know about you guys but this freakin’ me out,” Taryn said, groaning as she lowered herself back onto the bed.
“I think our parents and Dumbledore are keeping something from us,” mused Ophelia, lost in thought somewhere.
“I can’t take this anymore!” Lily quite literally screamed. “I need a vacation from all this confusion and evil!”
“Let’s stay here then, until the Chrimbo Hols are over,” Taryn said, using one of the British terminologies she had picked up from Oliver. “We should be mostly safe here. Well, except for the whole Sauron and Saruman trying to destroy the world of man thing.”
“Didn’t anyone tell you?” Lily asked stupidly.
“Um… You do realize that until an hour ago, she has been unconscious since we left top-earth?” Ophelia reminded as gently as she could.
“Oh, yeah,” Lily blushed. “Well, anyway, You remember that ring we always made fun of Frodo for wearing. Well, it turns out that that ring contained enough power to control the universe! It was Sauron’s and in order to keep him from getting it back, Frodo destroyed it. Risking his life for the betterment of others’, how heroic,” Lily sighed.
“It’s a good thing Gabby’s unconscious. If she heard you swooning over Frodo like that she’d probably kill you,” Ophelia warned. “Anyway, Sauron’s source of power was destroyed, so, consequently, he was too. Saruman was left without his master and reduced to vermin. He now roams around with his slimy companion, Wormtongue. The fellowship that was formed to help Frodo destroy the ring arrived back here yesterday. Well, some of them did.”
“Yeah, Gandalf, Merry, Pippin, Frodo, and Sam got here yesterday,” Lily sulked. “Legolas and Gimli decided to go traveling as soon as the shadow departed. They won’t be here for another week and a half at least.”
“Merry?” Taryn quipped, blushing. Oliver may have been the only man on earth that she loved, but middle-earth had another thing to catch her eyes, a young hobbit named Meriadoc Brandybuck. He was one of Frodo’s best friends and a clever lad, not to mention nice looking.
As if summoned by pronouncement of his name, Merry entered the room. He hadn’t seen Taryn since before he had fled the Shire with Frodo and they had a lot of catching up to do.
Ophelia and Lily took this as their cue to leave. They walked down an outdoor path chatting about what had happened to them while Taryn and Gabby were both battling shadow. Then they skipped off in separate directions to visit with new friends.
Lily headed into the elf-laden woods behind the house of Elrond. There she met with an entire troupe of young-looking elf lads. They took her into their midst and listened intently as she entertained them with stories of her life in their native tongue.
Ophelia, meanwhile, headed down to visit with someone she had happened upon in the gardens two days before. She made her way through overflowing flowerbeds to a quaint gardener cottage and knocked softly on the door. It opened to reveal nine sinister figures in black cloaks. Ophelia grinned at the sight and waved to a wraith in the back. He slowly clanked towards the doorway, his sword clanging threateningly at his side. He took Ophelia’s arm and gently led her into the gardens with his metal-gloved hand.
As they walked through the lane of rose bushes, he whipped out a dagger and quickly cut off 12 red roses. He then removed all of the thorns so as not to mar his dear Ophelia’s hands.
“Thank you,” Ophelia said, batting her eyelashes as he handed the roses to her. As soon as they out of sight of the house, the ringwraith reached up to pull off his hood. As the black fabric fell back the visage of Professor Hugh Leopold appeared.
As it turned out he was subbing for one of the dreaded nine, who had gone to visit his family during the Chrimbo Hols.
So, Ophelia and Hugh had come to an understanding and now proudly walked hand in metal hand, throughout the grounds of Rivendell.
The ringwraiths had been hired as gardeners there, since Sauron was destroyed and their lives of evil servitude, utterly spent.
Meanwhile, back at the house of Elrond, Gabby lay still on a white bed. Her pale face a grave contrast to her flaming red hair. Next to her bed a very distraught hobbit sat with his head in his hands.
Frodo had not left Gabby’s side since he had arrived to discover his true love’s predicament. He had already lost his precious ring. He was not sure he would be able to go on if he lost Gabby too.
Never had he seen her silent for so long. He was growing mad with worry.
The door opened and someone began to walk into the room. Frodo jumped up, grabbed Sting from Gabby’s side and tackled the intruder.
“You shall not pass!” he screamed in his little hobbit voice. “Oh, Pippin. Sorry.”
Frodo got off his cousin and helped him up.
“Frodo, methinks you need to take a break,” Pippin explained. “I’ll watch Gabby for a bit.”
Frodo, after a quarter of an hour of prodding, finally agreed to go to his room for some rest. He trusted Pippin and knew the chances of Gabby waking in his absence were very slim. He forlornly made his way to his room next door and fitfully fell asleep for the first time in two days.
Pippin gladly closed the door behind Frodo and slowly took a seat on the bed, stroking Gabby’s soft hand with his travel-worn one. He and Gabby were great friends and he was just as worried about her as Frodo.
--------------------- Dinner that night was a festive occasion. Taryn was able to leave her bed (she was a very fast healer). Merry escorted her to the grand hall and sat down next to her after helping her into her seat. Shortly thereafter, Lily, Ophelia, Gandalf, Sam, and Elrond joined them.
Lily squealed happily when she saw Taryn and would have given her a very painful hug if Merry had not put out a hand and a sword to stop her. Taryn was still very weak, but she had refused to stay in bed another moment.
It was a rule in Elrond’s house that serious matters were never discussed around the dinner table, they did not aid digestion. So, the conversation was very light and the dinner was a pleasant affair.
--------------------- Two weeks of Christmas vacation progressed in this manner. Every day Taryn continued to grow stronger until the pain in her shoulder was for the most part gone. She would soon find that she had developed a new intuitive scar that foretold the appearance of spiders.
Gabby continued unconscious in her room with both Frodo and Pippin at her side. Elrond came every morning in hopes of finding her condition changed, but it never did. It neither worsened nor improved. Not the slightest difference in her features ever showed. Elrond was so confused that finally he called in his mommy for help.
All of the house was there to welcome Galadriel’s arrival. She snottily flowed past the assembled crowd and into Gabby’s room. She placed her huge hand over Gabby’s face and muttered some things in elvish. As she spoke she began to squeeze Gabby’s head.
“Stop it!” Lily shouted. Ophelia grabbed her as she tried to rush at the elf-queen and gave her the look.
“But she’s going to pop Gabby’s head like a zit!” Lily whispered loudly.
Ophelia smiled at Gabby’s naiveté. “It’s elven magic, remember? She’s pouring some of herself into Gabby.”
Lily nodded and continued to watch.
After a half an hour of muttering, Gabby’s right index finger twitched. It was the first movement she had made in three and a half weeks. Galadriel removed her hand, satisfied.
“She will never fully recover,” she said, seriously. “She will wake in her own due time. With my help she has vanquished the shadow within her, but scraps will always float within her heart and soul. She will be greatly changed when she chooses to wake.”
“We have to return to Hogwarts in one week, will she be fit to go by then?” Taryn asked carefully.
“Even the wisest cannot tell,” Galadriel said, then swept out of the room.
All of the elves left to see her off, leaving the girls and the hobbits alone in the room. For an hour they watched Gabby for some visible sign of improvement, but the only thing they saw was the continual spasms of her right index finger.
“I’m going out for some air,” said Lily, who was a very sensitive person. The suspense was wearing her down and she couldn’t take it anymore without screaming. The others all understood and nodded their assent.
As Lily was walking down the front steps a glorious image appeared prancing up the stairs at her. It was the real Legolas, streaming up the staircase with elvish grace, intently to see her.
“You’re back!” Lily gasped, as her emotional cap exploded and tears of excitement and worry flowed down her face.
“Your hair,” Legolas said, warily eyeing the mullet as he embraced her and gently kissed her cheek.
“Do you like it?” Lily asked, her eyes still full of tears.
Legolas, not having the heart to express his true opinion, just nodded, smiled, and changed the subject. “How long have you been in middle-earth? Had I known you were here I would not have dawdled so long as I toured Fangorn with Gimli.”
“We’ve been here for about three and a half weeks,” Lily said. “I have missed you, but your cousins were very kind to me.”
“Yes, last time I was here I showed them that moving image on parchment that you presented me with. My poor cousin Andrololos fell out of his tree,” Legolas laughed softly.
Lily and Legolas linked arms and walked through the woods discussing all that had past. Legolas listened intently as Lily told of Voldeliana and her attacks, and about Taryn’s injury and Gabby’s unconscious state. Legolas ran his fingers through Lily’s hair as she spoke, trying to comfort her. By the time they returned to the house, enough elvish magic had flowed through his fingers to return Lily’s hair to its former pre-mullet state.
Before they entered the house to sit watch over Gabby Legolas got down onto one knee and looked intently into Lily’s eyes.
“If by my life or death I can protect you and your friends, I will,” he offered earnestly. “You have my bow.”
Lily threw her arms around him laughing and crying at the same time. After the embrace they walked into the sick room.
There was a strange commotion going on when they arrived. Lily soon realized what it was. Gabby’s head was moving and strange sounds were coming from her lips.
“What’s going on?” Lily asked hopefully.
“She’s making a bunch of funny noises,” Frodo said, as he rushed forward to hold Gabby’s hand.
“Duh,” Lily said.
“We think she’s trying to wake up,” Taryn explained.
Suddenly Legolas began to laugh in his Legolas way.
“What?” Lily asked, a little taken aback that he could laugh at a time like this.
“She’s speaking elvish, don’t you hear it?” Legolas replied.
“Those aren’t any elvish words I know,” she said, as Gabby mumbled, “*Llie n’vanima ar’ lle atara lanneina.”
“I never taught you those words,” he chuckled. “We elves have been trying to erase them from our language for centuries. Now only the royal elves know them. Looks like my dear aunt poured a little of her royal blood into Gabby.”
“What’s she saying?” Lily inquired, always eager to learn new elvish words.
“I cannot say.”
“*Amin feuya ten’ lle!” Gabby shouted, suddenly, her eyes popping open.
“Gabby!” everyone exclaimed together, rushing to crowd around the bed.
“*Kela!” she screamed, not recognizing the faces of the friends that surrounded her.
The friends looked confusedly at each other, until Legolas explained that she had told them to go away. They backed off and discussed what to do. Soon everyone but the girls left the room.
“Lily, you know the most elvish, speak to her,” commanded Taryn.
“*Nae saian luume’,” Lily said, the words flowing silkily with a perfect elvish accent.
“*’Quel amrun,” Gabby replied, still eyeing the girls warily.
“*Uuma dela,” Lily said, trying to assuage her fears. Then switching to English, “Do you understand me, Gabby?”
Hearing her name pronounced brought Gabby back to reality. She blinked a few times and seeing her friends around her tried to sit up, her strength failed her and she lay still.
“What happened? Where am I?” Gabby asked. “Why can’t I move my leg?”
The girls were just excited to hear her speaking English. They piled on the huge bed and hugged her. Taryn then took command and the rest of the girls fell silent as Taryn explained to Gabby what had happened. Gabby was shocked that she had missed almost all of her Christmas Holidays and their vacation to middle-earth.
The three girls spent the next three hours telling Gabby about everything that had happened.
“Lily?” Ophelia said, finally getting a good look at her for the first time since she had reentered the room. “What happened to your mullet?”
“What?” Lily shrieked, running to the mirror that hung on the wall. “Lost!!! My mullet is lost!!!”
“*Lle naa vanima,” Gabby said. “I mean you’re still pretty. Hey, I didn’t know I could speak fluent elvish.”
“Part of Galadriel has been put into you. You are now part elf. You will discover that you can now do many things you never could before,” Ophelia said. Ophelia had studied medicines of all sorts as part of her potions training, she especially loved all of the intricacies of elvish medicine.
Taryn meanwhile was in the corner trying to convince Lily that she really was much prettier without a mullet. Lily however was inconsolable.
“Lily,” Taryn said decisively, removing her comforting arm and standing up. “To tell the truth, I always hated your mullet. No one liked it and now that it’s gone I don’t have to stop myself from laughing every time I see you!”
Lily was shocked at Taryn’s outburst. She immediately stopped crying and thought about it. Taryn was right, mullets were ugly, incredibly funny but ugly, she also looked back on how it had felt to have one. She couldn’t do anything with her hair. It had been impossible to have her Legolas’s braid it. She admitted her wrongs and rejoined the group on the bed.
“Maybe we should invite the guys in again,” Taryn suggested, a sparkle in her eye, now that her worrying over Gabby could end.
She got up, opened the door and stumbled back in fear. A ringwraith flowed into the room. Gabby shrieked and tried to move, but her legs still were not in working order. She froze as the wraith advanced on her, her eyes rolled up. She on the point of passing out again when the wraith reached into his cloak and pulled out…a dozen lavender roses.
“So nice to see you’re well again,” Professor Leopold said, pulling off his hood.
The girls all heaved a sigh of relief.
“Th…thank you,” Gabby stuttered, trying to recover as her heart continued to beat rapidly inside her chest.
Ophelia smiled at how wonderfully kind Hugh was and ran to his side to tell him so. The rest of the guys flowed in behind him. The hobbits all ran to the bed and hugged her.
“Frodo! Pippin! Merry! Sam!” Gabby cried, recognizing her favorite middle-earthlings. They hugged again. Frodo kept his seat on the pillow by her head, but the rest of the hobbits climbed off. Sam and Pippin stayed nearby, but Merry went over to Taryn and took her hand.
Legolas entered the room followed by Elrond and Gandalf.
“Nice ears,” Legolas commented, studying Gabby’s appearance before going over to Lily.
Gabby reached up to touch her ears. They had gone slightly pointy. She couldn’t decide at that point in time whether that was a good or a bad thing.
“*Ed’ I’ear ar’ elenea! I have almost elf ears!” she exclaimed.
Elrond advanced on the bed, “My dear you are looking quite better. Have you noticed anything majorly wrong?”
“I can’t move my left leg,” Gabby pointed out.
“That was the main point of the attack, it will take longer for that shadow to ebb away.”
Gandalf came forward, he said nothing but handed Gabby a package much like the one he had given Lily two months earlier. She ripped off the paper to find, pipeweed.
“Gee, thanks,” Gabby said forcing a smile to her face.
“Best weed in the Southfarthing,” Gandalf replied.
A sort of party then began in the spacious room. Some of the elves came out of their trees and began singing. They had recently discovered that their spiteful rhyming songs weren’t very popular, and had
gone for the punk rock sounds instead.
“Wait, is that Sum 41?” Taryn asked. “I didn’t know they were elvish!”
Everyone began head banging. It was pretty funny to watch Gandalf with his long beard whipping everyone around him.
Gabby lay in bed, thinking to herself. Frodo, happy for the first time in weeks had fallen asleep beside her. Halfway through the very promising party, her friends approached her again.
“Why so quiet? This is an awesome soirée!” Lily exclaimed, busting a move. “Come on we’ll carry you to the dance floor.”
“That’s okay,” Gabby calmly shrugged. “I’m fine just watching and thinking.”
Her friends glanced at each other in amazement. The old Gabby had never been able to resist a good crowd surf or any opportunity to show off her lack of dancing skills.
“Are you sure?” Taryn asked doubtfully, hoping that this was a temporary side effect of Gabby’s injury that would wear off soon.
“Yes, I’m fine. Go, have a good time. There are some things I need to sort out in my mind,” Gabby explained.
“What’s wrong?” Ophelia asked, concerned at her friend’s lack of liveliness.
“My inner eye is clouded,” Gabby said.
“Ours are too,” Taryn put off lightly. “I’ll bet it’s just because we’re in middle-earth.”
“Right,” Gabby mumbled, doubts still flowing through her mind. Before becoming an exchange student Gabby had visited middle-earth and Frodo at least once a month. Sometimes with her friends or family and sometimes alone. Never during any of her other trips had her inner eye been clouded, not even when Sauron’s shadow reigned.
“We’re going to have to start calling you nonGabby,” Ophelia put in, trying to lighten the mood and dispel her own doubts. Gabby just smiled sort of sadly and motioned for them to rejoin the party. With one last rejected offer to carry Gabby to join the newly formed moshpit the girls left.
Gabby was left alone to think about what all of this meant. A clouded inner eye meant uncertainty. If all of the girls’ inner eyes were clouded that meant all of their futures were uncertain.
Gabby mused over this as the wild party carried on around her. Soon she tired and fell into the first shadowless sleep she’d had in three and a half weeks.
--------------------- The last week went quickly by. Gabby was able to get up after a few days and hobble around using one of Gandalf’s spare staffs. It was a little inconvenient because every time she slipped the staff sent off a show of fire works and everyone came running to her aid whether she wanted them or not.
Lily spent the remainder of her week up in a tree with Legolas, pleading with him to teach her the royal elven words that Gabby now knew, but also refused to tell her. Between that, braiding lessons, and archery lessons the week flew by for her.
Taryn and Merry spent their last week together in Taryn’s sitting room, doing an assortment of things. Taryn had noticed that Merry had a little bit of magical ability and was trying to teach him a spell or two. In turn Merry was helping Taryn do her Astronomy lessons, seeing as stargazing was a favorite pastime in the Shire.
Ophelia on the other hand was really looking forward to their return to Hogwarts. She was impatient to discover what had happened while they were gone, and an imminent separation from her beloved was not facing her. Hugh would be their escort back to Hogwarts so that they would be able to enter their world legally.
Elrond had sent a letter to Dumbledore explaining what had happened. Ophelia only hoped that their attack had been the last. It also worried her that Harry was alone without their supervision. The future of almost everyone rested on the back of that wimpy little boy. Voldeliana would have no problem pulling him under her power while they were gone.
Finally the week ended and it was time to depart. The four girls and professor Leopold crowded around a moldy old sock, each warily touching a finger to it. They were to leave at precisely 11 o’clock, it was now 10:58 and none of their beloveds were there to see them off. Suddenly from over the incline emerged three hobbits and an elf, all with traveling gear.
“We’ve discussed it,” Frodo announced, smiling. “We’re all coming with you to protect you from the evil that lies in wait for you on the other side. Sam will stay behind with Bill.”
The girls smiled happily and moved to allow room for the guys around the smelly sock.. 11 o’clock came and the sock pulled them all from the beautiful forest at Rivendell and placed them in a heap on the outskirts of the forbidden forest at Hogwarts.
They all got up and dusted themselves off. Gabby, who couldn’t get up by herself, was surprised when she looked up to find that she was being helped to her feet not by Frodo, but his human counterpart, Elijah Wood. She looked at the rest of the middle-earthlings and saw that they too had been transformed in order to look as inconspicuous as possible. Instead of Legolas, Merry and Pippin, there stood Orlando Bloom, Dominic Monaghan, and Billy Boyd.
After they had all assembled themselves, Professor Leopold dashingly led the way to the front door of the castle, with Gabby bringing up the rear, slowly limping along with Gandalf’s old staff, leaning on Elijah for support.
He waited until the group was assembled on the doorstep, then Hugh flung open the doors. The girls gasped, and Gabby’s already weak legs gave away as she screamed, “*Ta naa neuma!” and falling into Elijah's arms, once again lost consciousness.
Footnotes
- *Llie n'vanima ar' lle atara lanneina- You're ugly and your mother dresses you funny.
- *Amin feuya ten' lle-
- *Kela- Go away
- *Nae Saian luume-
- *'Quel amrun- Good morning
- *Uuma dela- Don;t Worry
- *Lle naa vanima- you're beautiful
- *Ed l'ear ar' elenea-
