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Story - The Last Day in the Life of Horace Bunce

posted Sep 26, 2019, 8:10 AM by Peppy Bristlebrush   [ updated Sep 26, 2019, 8:18 AM ]
By Acorne Oakley 

T'day I'm gonna tell all of you what might just be....

The Last Day in the Life of Horace Bunce

An arrow wisked past his head...
He grabbed a handful of mane and swung onto the back of the tall one 's horse...
this was not his faithful pony, Mirabella
but then all animals followed his requests
for he was the first hobbit to become a Lore-master.

No time to dwell on his past achievements at present...
Horace had to get the message thru to the Rangers...

Goblins had come back into the Shire!

He thought briefly of going to the Bounders
but wondered if any of them would be awake .....
or sober

No Horace decided he had to make it to the Rangers
and let them know they were needed in the north of the Shire..
as soon as they could get there

In its panic the horse stumbled into a rabbit hole in the tall grass,
but Horace leaned close and whispered words of encouragement into its ear
then the horse leaped forward and sped off into the night.

Good thing!
The night grew darker as Horace raced thru the fields taking every shortcut he knew to bring the Rangers back quickly

From out of the darkness , Horace saw the glint of a blade
One of the goblins had almost caught up with him!
He urged the horse onward......
when suddenly he slipped from the saddle and drew his mighty sword

"YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" he roared

Horace slashed out at the goblin and knocked him off the frightened horse he had stolen
then raised his sword again.....and...

rolled over off his bed and looked up to see the familar roof of his family's barn
there before his eyes was...
not the warm eyes of Ol' Lilac ..his favorite cow....

As the goblin came closer it cackled....
Its eyes glowed an eerie red...
every step closer it took to Horace seemed like a threat to the young hobbit 's life

then Horace's mum called out...
"Horace!  Come on in for first supper!"

His head turned in the direction of his mum's voice...
but so did the goblin's!

As the goblin sprinted toward their cozy burrow ..
something clicked inside of Horace and he raced after the goblin
" Mum!  GOBLIN!"  he shouted.

His mum came to the door expecting this was more of Horace's imagination
and saw a goblin runnin toward her with a dagger drawn
She screamed and fell back inside their burrow ...
just as the goblin came in behind her

Horace came right behind him with his 'mighty sword'
actually a solid branch from one of the nearby Shire oaks
which came down on the goblin's head before he could get close to Horace's mum

The goblin turned glaring at Horace and charged back toward him
but Horace's mum had jumped to her feet & grabbed the frying pan from the stove
She sent it crashing down on the goblin's head ...
and he fell bleeding to the floor

A friendly bounder recruit heard the commotion and ran into the burrow
and leaped on the goblin who was now in no shape to resist...
so the bounder took him off half-conscious and bleeding to the office of the Watch and locked him up

Horace and his mum hugged and praised each other for how brave they both were

so...    this was not the last day of Horace after all

--the end--