You truly are the most astonishingly beautiful hobbit I’ve ever seen,” he said, and Tamsyn froze.

“Hobbit??”

“Um, yes?” he said, and Tamsyn looked down at herself in panic. Her suit had disappeared and been replaced by a straight dress in a rustic homespun fabric of a drab, brownish grey. Her hair still looked the same, she established when she grabbed a handful and held it up in front of her face, but when she scrabbled up and caught a glimpse of her feet, her legs immediately lost their strength again. She thudded back down hard and grabbed her left leg, yanking her foot up to her eyes.

It was bare, large and very, very hairy.

She checked her other foot as well, hoping against all laws of probability that it would be different, and groaned in consternation when it looked the same as the left one.

“This can’t be true!” she wailed, scrambling to get up again. “I’m a hobbit!

Erica Dakin