Bree, that's where people think I'm from. The truth is I was born far from here.

My family had always been skilled with his hands where wood was involved & had moved to Dale, an odd place still ravaged by the time when the dwarves in the mountain had attracted the attention of a fire breathing dragon. Those dwarves, one of whom was clean shaven & very slight that they called a halfling were responsible for hundreds of deaths if not thousands. Anyway the skills of the family were put to good use in the rebuilding of the place. It was shortly after the master of lake town succumbed to dragon sickness that dad "EarlG" was born eventually marrying a merchants daughter who had come up from Bree.

Over the years the family business had to change & they began producing toys & trinkets like those Dale of old had been famed for, they were especially renowned for carved love spoons of all things. It was these my parents were transporting to Bree when the wagon train was attacked by brigands. It's a fair old trek from Dale to Bree and although tales of orc & goblin incursion from Angmar were rife the wagon master, a bombastic dwarf, assured everyone that he & his fellows were up to the task of defending them. That's why my beautiful mother (not that I can remember more than a soft voice, soft breast & total contentment) was slain.

Dad brought me back to Bree, a broken man, his hands, crippled during the attack lost their magic. He tried his best for me & I was apprenticed out to a tailor & also worked as a labourer for a smith by the West gate, so at least we had a small income. Eventually things took their toll and dad died in the justly named area of town called beggars alley. It was in that alley I found good friends who taught my fingers new skills. I found I could be just as dextrous with my hands as my father had been, except with mine I tried to balance out the possessions of have & have nots!

I've met a few of the halflings or "Hobbits" as they like to call themself, they hail from a place called the "Shire" to the West of Bree. Can't really say that I trust them, as like the dwarves, they're often in their cups. Talkative too, when they're not eating, not good for a man of my profession.

I've taken up with a scholastic type (we're apparently cousins or something) who's been regaling me with epic stories of heroes (a total romantic, he wears an eye patch and talks pirate), but a good sort, who'd help me bury a body if needed. We're squatting in a place owned by a dwarven friend of his, which initially caused some friction as I blame all Dwarves for mum's death, it was only the presence of an elf of all things that made me agree to stay. Who'd have thought it an Elf & a Dwarf under the same roof.

With this enforced air of respectability I've now found it necessary to forgo my trade within the walls of Bree. Trestlebridge however is a place I'm not known, might even try my hand in the East. Gondor, Rohan, who know's I might even make it back to the ancestral home in Dale.

Well that’s been a telling couple of weeks. Ended up in Forochel of all places, it’s cold & then some up there, made the misties feel like a summer paradise. Job I signed on for went pair shaped, looked good until I got there. It was an “excavation” up in Evendim, just a bunch of no talent thugs tomb robbing. Decided to throw in my lot with the locals to safeguard some of the places. Don’t like tombs being disturbed for the wrong reasons, an enemy you can kill, but a ghost’ll just haunt you into your grave!