Fredegar had drawn their first watch. The Ruffian’s firelight glinting in his eyes well matched his mood. Fatty Bolger felt fierce.

He was pondering it as he sat there, watching the brutes that had hurt his father, that were hurting the Shire. For the first time in his life he felt more his mother’s son than his father’s. For the first time he felt more an adventurous Took than a staid Bolger. Even when he ran for help as the Black Riders stormed Crickhollow, he had been a terrified Bolger running almost without thought for where he was headed. But since then shame had been creeping up on him. Frodo, Pippin and Sam had seen the Black Riders. They had felt the dread surrounding them like a thick fog, yet still they went on. Freddie had thought long about his cousins and friend. As the Ruffians came into the Shire, as Lotho Pimple twisted the Shire until it was becoming unrecognizable, Freddie realized he was probably the only hobbit in the Shire who truly understood that things were darker, deeper, more treacherous than they seemed.

That something good had happened recently, there could be no denying. That spring had come, that the darkness had begun to lift there was no doubt. But the darkness was returning. This time Fredegar Bolger would do his best to act and think as the half-Took he was.

"Wake up, Ron."

"Huh?" Ron was louder than he should have been, Freddie quickly covered Ronoldo’s nose and mouth with his hand before leaning over him protectively.

"Ya hear somethin’, Anthul?" one of the Men said.

Freddie moved his hand off his cousin’s nose as he whispered into Ron’s ear, "Quiet, they heard you."

The two Ruffians stood still listening hard to the noises of the night. "Naw. Don’t hear nothin’. Let’s get this stuff cleared out ‘fore we gets left behind." They turned back to their work without a second look into the woods.

Freddie and Ron both exhaled with relief. "They’re packing up, moving on. We need to be ready to follow." Fredegar whispered. The hobbits quickly gathered up their few things, water bottles and blankets they had gathered from the Ruffians. Soon they were once again trudging along, out of sight, after the caravan of wagons.

So it went for a couple of days. The Men and Hobbit Sherriffs moving north at night along the Whitfurrows-Scary Road.

They were heading to a most unusual part of the Shire: The Hills of Scary. There were mines in and around the Hills where they ended near the town of Brockenborings at their western end. Ancient quarries, turf and vines rounding out and concealing their edges lay near the eastern end of the Hills. Both were full of history, some of it unpleasant in nature.

The Hills of Scary along with the town of Scary were so called because the area had an evil feel about it. The quarries that lay to the west of a curve in The Brandywine River and in the eastern end of the Hills were not of hobbit making. Men from times long past had obtained limestone for the building of their cities and fortresses from these quarries. Good and evil alike came to take the stone from the earth. Battles raged, armies flowed like so much rain water through the fields and hills of Suza, death and destruction often to be found in their wake. Cities and fortifications were damaged, more of the stone was needed. Fights were waged over who had the rights to the quarries. Men slaughtered one another, the bodies of the dead and those not dead were thrown to the bottom of the quarries, lose rock was cast down upon them. More Men came and walked upon the rubble grave that now made up the quarry’s floor to harvest more stone. Evil grew in the northern realm, causing a race of small stature beings to run in fear, some to the south, some to the west. Those who went west settled to the east of a large river, settling as they had before amongst Men. Yet again the evil crept near to them and they moved one more time, putting the river between themselves and the evil. The King gave to them the land of Suza, which the Hobbits named the Shire. The Hobbits spread throughout their new realm, but never too closely to the quarries that lay silently between the river and the hills.

Not long after hobbits had settled the area, gold was found in the western end of the range of hills they now called "Scary". Gold. Even the usually contented hobbits were not untouched by its lure. They dug as only hobbits (and perhaps Dwarves) can. Soon there were tunnels everywhere in the area, the coal that shared the ground with the gold was piled without care, marring the countryside. Finally wagons were loaded and the journey taken to the assayer in Bree.

The loads were dumped into ravines between Bree and the Shire. Hobbits driving empty wagons arrived home to face, with shame, their parents, wives and children. They had been laughed out of the tavern where the assayer did his work behind a counter in a corner.

"Iron pyrite, my good hobbits," the man behind the counter had declared.

"Fools Gold!!" the Big Folk and Little Folk of Bree howled.

"We knew they was a right bunch of fools, movin’ off west o’ here as they did."

"Ought’ve stayed put right here, they ought’ve."

"Well, we’ll all be knowin’ ta trust no Shire Gold!"

For a long while there was little movement of goods betwixt the Shire and Bree, or Staddle for that matter. "Useless as Shire Gold" was an oft heard expression. The land round about The Hills of Scary had lied to the Shire hobbits, brought shame down upon them, and it had cut deeply indeed. Though the towns of Brockenborings, Scary and Quarry remained, they were never very large communities. The hobbits decided to make use of the coal they had dug up. They used up the many piles they had made then dug for the coal itself, reopening only those mines that had bountiful layers of it. The many abandoned gold mines left the area with an empty, dangerous feel to it.

On the third night the caravan of farm wagons turned to the east. All lanterns were blown out as they began following a road that was barely two ruts cutting through the vegetation. Freddie and Ron stopped, staring first at the wagons then at each other.

"You don’t think they are . . ." Ron swallowed hard.

"The quarries? Do I think they are headed to the quarries?" Fredegar felt chilled to his bones. He slowly nodded his head as his gaze followed the passing wagons. "Think about it, Ronnie. Where else could they hide stuff knowing none of us would nose about looking for it?" Beside him, Ronoldo nodded. "We have to, Ron . . . we have to follow them." Again Ron Bolger nodded his head. He never had imagined that he and his cousin Fatty would ever end up doing anything such as this. Spending several weary days chasing Ruffians and wagons all to end up heading for the only evil place in the Shire.

Before the dawn, the wagons slowed to a halt in a copse of trees edged with long grasses. In the distance, the smoking chimneys of hobbit holes could be seen by the growing light, sticking up from small hillocks. This was the tiny village of Quarry. A few families of hobbits, now rather thoroughly intermixed and inbred, had for generations uncounted loved cutting stone. They were Harfoot Hobbits as were most of the hobbits of the Shire but stories were told that these had intermarried with Dwarves in days long past. It was even rumored that some of them had soft downy traces of facial hair. Whatever the truth was, the rest of the Shire hobbits really didn’t care. There were instances when hobbits did like to use stone, not bricks or tile, for various items in their homes and businesses: door-sills, the counters in pastry kitchens, foundations for buildings in areas where the ground was marshy, grave markers, and the occasional memorial monument. The hobbits of Quarry were the sole suppliers of stone. A goodly distance from the ancient quarries left behind by Men, there was another large outcropping of limestone which the Cutter, Splitter, Carver, Stonee and Quarie families harvested.

Talk in the Stoney Way Tavern fell quiet that day at luncheon time as two unfamiliar hobbits came through the door. The two looked around only enough to spy the bar, then headed straight to it. They ordered ales, four large bowls of mutton stew, bread, and two kinds of cheese before asking where there might be an empty table. One was pointed out to them, they went to their seats and began quietly talking to each other. Eventually, the conversations of the locals picked back up, the conversation of the strangers quieted as they listened in.

"So, yourself was speakin’ on ‘bout ghosties, Toby."

"Aye. Let myself be seein’. Ah, yes! They’s been lightin’ their ghostie lights agin. I started to seein’ ‘em blinkin’ agin through trees what grow ‘twixt here ‘n there nigh on three weeks past." Toby Stonee leaned in as he lowered his voice, well, lowered it to his own ears, he was still rather loud in everyone else’s. "Mind ya well, naught will be seein’ heel nor toe o’ myself nigh to them ghostie lights. No nearer than the crest o’ myself’s hill. Needs we naught but ourselves own quarry. I’ll no be goin’ after ghostie stone and naught should yourselves be, either."

There was much nodding and mumbling of approval at old Toby’s assessment of the situation. The two strangers finished their meal in silence before unobtrusively leaving the tavern.

They made their way back to the trees that hid the group of wagons from the view of the citizens of Quarry. Fredegar and Ronoldo sat down with a few low stones between them and the Ruffians.

"That, my dear Ron, was a most profitable luncheon," Freddie sighed as he patted his stomach.

"Yes. It seems like ages since I ate my fill." They sat quietly for a few moments. "Did you notice, Fredegar? Did you stop to think about it? They had ale, cousin."

"Yes, I noticed and thought about it both. Ale and an open inn with no shortage of food. No rules were posted on the doors, either."

"All that and the Ruffians passing within a few miles of their village. How do you figure it, Freddie?"

Freddie closed his eyes as he leaned back against one of the rocks that shielded them from the Men’s encampment. Ron waited patiently, his cousin usually closed his eyes when giving serious thought to a matter.

"They do not wish to rouse those hobbits’ curiosity," Freddie said as he reopened his eyes. "If Lotho’s Men do anything out of the ordinary, there is no guaranty the hobbits from Quarry will stay away from the other quarry, the ancient quarry. They can’t afford to have that happen. Lotho’s thugs need to keep their hiding place a secret and what better way to do that than to leave the nearest hobbits alone while keeping them afraid of ghosts."

Ron nodded. "And in the meantime, what do we do?"

"When the Ruffians move, we move, until we find out exactly where our food and goods are going. Then like the fog in the morning, we’ll fade away and head for home." Fredegar looked to the south. "We have a lot of work to do when we get back."