The Mines of Moria (from Aragorn's perspective)

When we came to the Gate of Moria we had a little hiccup when Gandalf did not know what to say to the Dwarf-Door to open it, but finally, after some kicking of the door and cursing, Gandalf figured out that the words in Elvish that read: “Speak, friend, and enter.” This just meant that you had to speak friend and you can enter, Dwarfs and their riddles.

As we were entering the gate the black ominous water started to rise and before we knew it a tentacle of some type came and grabbed Frodo’s leg and pulled him away form the gate and started to fling him around. It took us a little while to realise the full scale of the situation, but Sam, so loyal as he is, sprang forward right away and started to swing his sword at the beast. I then came in and started to cut some of the tentacles off of that squid-like creature and I think we hurt him so badly he simply just let go of Frodo. Legolas then came and flung some arrows into his face and eyes and we went off running into the mine while rocks were coming down and we got trapped in the mine. There was no going back then.

After a few brief rests we went on in the dark with Gandalf leading us with his staff of light into the dark of the mines. I have been keeping an eye on Frodo our whole journey together and I have always been impressed by his bravery and resilience to the power of the all mighty Ring. All this time together with Frodo I have learned to know what he is thinking or when he is scared or paranoid, and this was one of those times when I felt that we should keep an extra eye on these dark halls that night.

PLUNK! When we heard this everyone turned around and looked at Pippin who was standing at the well, “Fool of a Took!” growled Gandalf when Pippin, just out of curiosity dropped a stone into the well to see how far it went down. After several hours of walking in the dark I felt like I was going blind because I could not see a thing. We heard a lot of weird sounds when we were resting and walking but they never got to the point where I was really concerned.

We then came into a room and there was something in the middle of the room, it read: Balin Son Of Fundin Lord Of Moria. It was a tomb for Balin, Gimli’s friend. We sat and grieved for a while and then we heard drums coming towards us…

Written by Ryan Miranda