The figure in the dusty cloak, eyes wide with anxiety beneath a tangle of dark curls, is Polo Hammidge, a simple farmer who had never ventured beyond the edges of the Chetwood. His calloused bare feet, used only to soft earth, now trod upon the unforgiving, shadowed ground of the forest depths, a place whispered to be the haunt of beasts and worse things. In his small hand, he gripped the hilt of a thin, elegant blade he had found half-buried near his stolen sheep pen—a weapon far older and more lethal than his rusty pruning shears. He was acutely aware of the weight of the makeshift weapon, a constant reminder that he was no hero, merely a fearful hobbit forced into the darkness to protect what was left of his quiet life.
He had followed the tracks himself when the lazy Shirriffs failed him, driven by a fear that had hardened into a desperate sort of courage. Every snapping twig made him jump, every distant howl sent a chill down his spine, but he pushed on, the glint of the elven-steel offering a small, cold comfort in the gloom. He was searching for proof of the monsters that took his flock, an ordinary man on an extraordinary journey, hoping only to survive long enough to bring the truth back to Bree and clear the name of his wrongly accused neighbor, Tomlan.
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