"She has been feeling it for awhile now—that sense of awakening. There is a gentle rage simmering inside her, and it is getting stronger by the day. She will hold it close to her—she will nurture it and let it grow. She won't let anyone take it away from her. It is her rocket fuel and finally, she is going places. She can feel it down to her very core—this is her time. She will not only climb mountains—she will move them too."
Lang Leav / Her Time
"She licks blood off her fingers, and she looks like divine absolution. Careful, Meleager; this is your sport but she is not playing a game.
Do not think you are safe because you love her.
Do not think she will not stain her mouth red with your blood too."
M.C. / Atalanta
The village was still quiet when she awoke, the world soft and reticent, perched on the edge of the promise of dawn.
At first, she almost hesitated to rise, her fingers curling reluctantly around the thin grey sheets that covered her body. But staying, she reminded herself, would make her departure no easier. Better to be gone without broaching the painful prospect of goodbye. They would understand. They always do.
Motion filled the small room the young woman inhabited as she fluttered to and fro, gathering up belongings, brushing away crumbs. The bed was made, the curtains drawn back, and the sturdy table cleared. Her hands went to her boots, nimbly rethreading and lacing leather through well-worn eyelets.
Gathering her pack up in her arms, she shrugged it up over her shoulders and left her antechamber for a larger room in the house. A sigh of relief left her lips as she realized that there was, in fact, no one up already to anticipate her departure.
Her feet hit the ground outside of the building, and dawn's rose red fingers appeared to stretch over the horizon. Within minutes she was at the stables, mounting her horse and looking forlornly over the small settlement—the land she had always called home. In a few hours, she knew, the village would be filled with a gentle buzz of activity. Women and children would mill about, readying themselves for the day. From their homes the men would emerge, their hands calloused from hard work and their skin darkened under the scrutiny of the sun. Her sister would move to her place near the markets, working her apprenticeship as a young healer.
A small smile graced the woman's face, and with a loud whoop she was off, her back to her home and her eyes on the expansive earth that lay before her.
Many miles away, a very confused and very conflicted grey wizard was sitting and smoking his pipe. His eyes were bright as he observed his host, a very proud and very prestigious dwarf who was known to his people as the son of Thráin, son of Thrór, and King under the Mountain. Gandalf, however, simply called him Thorin.
While the wizard sat, his companion stood, and both were in the engaged in a potentially pernicious conversation.
"-my people," Thorin was saying, "the mountain belongs to my people. And as their leader—their king—it is only right that I should be the one to lead them back to it."
"Indeed it would seem so," Gandalf half-murmured, his tone thoughtful. "Tell me Thorin, have you yet pursued this legacy? Has anyone tried to go back to the mountain?"
The dwarf shook his head. "No. They all greatly fear the dragon."
"Do you?"
He hesitated, clasping his hands behind him and taking a breath. "I am no fool, Gandalf, I know what that beast is capable of."
"Capable or not, some say that Smaug is dead—for sixty years he has not made himself known. They claim that the treasure likely remains in the mountain unclaimed."
"Then they are fools, all of them. You know as well as I; the dragon sits and he waits. No amount of time or depth of greed will draw him forth from his horde."
Gandalf blew a careful smoke ring, and took a moment to gather his thoughts. Thorin was right, of course. The great wyrm would bide his time until someone—or, as the wizard feared, something—would come to disturb him.
A pause and the mage opened his mouth to speak, "Have you spoken with Dain yet?"
"I am in the midst of asking him for aid."
"And?"
"He remains noncommittal…" Thorin conceded. "I fear he intends to drag it out until it is no longer an issue." He hesitated. "My cousin is an honest dwarf at heart, but he wants the mountain and it's bounty as much as the next dwarf. I do not think he is willing to risk his soldiers or his pride to see me become king."
Gandalf stood abruptly. "Then it is settled."
"Settled?"
"We will not have an army, but a small company," said Gandalf, "I always believed in my heart that such would be the case, but now I am certain. Gather your men, Thorin. Gather all who are most loyal to you, and bring them in two weeks to the Prancing Pony in Bree."
"Have we not already said that such a quest would be foolish?"
"I am afraid, dear Thorin, that we have no choice," Gandalf admitted, sighing. "You are a strong and brave dwarf, I have no doubt in your capabilities. Now, good day to you Thorin."
And with that he was on his feet, staff in hand as he made his way from the room. The wizard was surprised when he found he was not followed by his dwarven friend (dwarves, after all, took great pride in their chivalrous natures, normally taking any opportunity to escort or entertain). All the same, as Gandalf made his way down the brilliant hallways of Ered Luin, he could not stop thinking about Thorin or the dwarves of Erebor.
As Thorin spoke, it had become very clear that his heart was hot and heavy with burden, brooding over his wrongs, the wrongs of his people, and the loss of the treasure of his forefathers. The stories he had told of the dwarves great resilience were all at once inspiring and disheartening to the wizard; he hurt for the hearts of Durin's folk, and yet he could not help but feel a spark of hope. Perhaps killing Smaug would not be as impossible as it seemed…
The days passed in earnest, and she bided her time in the plains on the western side of the misty mountains. The orcs, it would seem, were becoming more and more restless. They now dared to come down from the mountains, creeping closer and closer to Rivendell's borders. However, it was not because of this that she found herself gravitating towards the great Elven city.
A gentle elf they'd found lying on the edge of the wood, sporting a pained expression and a gaping wound in her side. Her horse already lay dead many yards away, much of its flesh torn away by the savage hands of what they knew had been goblins.
Leaving the two other rangers she'd travelled with behind, she entered Rivendell, her voice carrying loud and clear through the city as she called for aid. The injured elf was lifted carefully from the ranger's side on her horse and whisked away into the healer's halls. The young human left her horse to the stables and marched through the gardens towards the heart of Rivendell, intending to inform one of Elrond's advisors of the incident. Instead, she was greeted by Lord Elrond himself, just having come from one of his great Convenings.
A she elf and a wizened white wizard stood at his side, the three of them talking congenially as they made their way off of an elegant dais and onto one of the many paths through Rivendell's gardens. They paused in their meandering (and she certainly did too) when they stumbled upon the young Dúnedain, her expression clear but her eyes somewhat troubled as she inclined her head carefully to the party.
"My Lord Elrond."
He returned the gesture. "My lady."
"I apologize for interrupting your procession—I'd meant to tell one of your advisors but I couldn't find any of them before I-," she cleared her throat. "A young elf was found injured near the Great East Road on the outskirts of the Forest of Rivendell. I brought her as soon as I could to your healers, but I fear for her sake and for the sake of others."
"You believe this to be the work of orcs?" Elrond echoed, almost incredulously. Lady Galadriel, the beautiful she-elf among their company, gave their wizard companion a significant look.
With a brief nod, the young woman reached to a small pouch at her hip and produced what would appear to be a small ear. Elrond blinked, then blinked again, and realized that no, it was, in fact, a shriveled, distinctly orcish ear.
"It would seem as though our she-elf did not go down without a fight," the ranger said, her lips quirked into a slight grin.
Elrond was too preoccupied with the dismemberment to register her words, and he carefully plucked the mottled ear from her outstretched palm, turning it over in his hand.
"The orcs have grown bold," he stated, his features darkening. "Coming down from the mountain, plaguing our borders."
"A great darkness rises in the east," said Lady Galadriel. "Did Gandalf not warn us?"
"Gandalf knows not of what he speaks," the white wizard retorted. "I will not allow our actions to be based off of the foolish mutterings of an old wizard."
"Perhaps you should," Elrond said as he returned the ear to the young woman's hand with a slight grimace. She imperceptibly scoffed as he wiped his hand gingerly on his coats. Elves.
The wizard bristled at the Elf Lord's words. "And support his foolish notion to reclaim that mountain and vanquish the dragon? I thought you were above such folly."
"And I believed a wizard to be above speaking to his host in such a way," the young woman interjected, her eyes challenging.
Saruman opened his mouth to reply, but Elrond shot a warning look in his direction before he returned his gaze to the human in front of them. "You are dismissed, Lady Kimsy," he said, but it was not hard to detect the smile playing across his lips.
Once more she inclined her head respectfully and then took her leave, Saruman's eyes following her as she went.
The white wizard lingered in Rivendell.
When asked the reasons for his extended duration there, he would merely reply that he had unfinished business and give whoever had inquired a cryptic stare. Elrond himself remained ignorant of what, exactly, the wizard's unfinished business was, though he did not press. Curunír was welcome to come and go as he pleased in the Elf Lord's halls.
Saruman himself did not exactly know what kept him there, and perhaps, he thought, it was nothing more than mere superstition.
Still…
His eyes were, almost always, inexplicably drawn back to the girl—the young ranger. Not an odd sight in the slightest; the Dúnedain, men and women, frequented the city of Rivendell. In fact there was nothing at all particularly remarkable about her.
And yet he could not stop his gaze from creeping back.
On the third day of his extended stay, Saruman made the mistake of broaching the topic with Elrond while they lunched together. It was hard to miss the look of bewilderment he gave the wizard upon asking who, exactly, the young woman was.
"The human woman who had little tact?" Elrond echoed, chuckling around the words as he said them.
Saruman nodded, nod seeing the humor in his statement. "Well yes, that's what I said wasn't it?"
"Lady Kimsy is both a woman of great character and tact," Elrond said. "I do not know her personally, but from the interaction I have shared I have easily been able to tell as much."
The wizard steepled his fingers, his eyes intently focused on the young woman across the room. She sat with two rangers and a group of elves, seemingly at ease as she laughed at a comment one of the elf maidens had made.
"And when does she leave?"
"I am afraid I don't know," Elrond replied. "Perceivably as soon as the elf she and her companions rescued recovers, which will be soon. In fact, I believe I already heard tell of preparations being made for their small party to leave on the morrow." There was a brief moment of silence, thick and sticky between them, and then, "Why, may I ask, are you so interested in this ranger? Surely she is of little importance?"
Saruman opened his mouth to respond, closed it, and opened it again. But before he could formulate a feasible response, the two members of the White Council were interrupted by a courier. A letter, small, stained, and utterly unimpressive was pressed in the wizard's ancient hands, and he excused himself.
With the reverence of a priest, Saruman peeled open the parchment and allowed his eyes to quickly scan the document. A party of thirteen… set to leave within the week… with no permission from the council, my lord…
And like that Saruman knew what he needed to do. Within the pages of the paper, he had found an answer to his prayers.
A/N: So I am REALLY excited to start rolling this story out, and I'm really hoping that you all will really enjoy it as much as I do. R&R, and let me know if you would like me to continue this story (obviously I will be, but trust me when I say that the moral support is a HUGE boost).
And before you ask NO my name is NOT Kimsy/Kimsvy/Kimsey or any other variant. I have always loved the name and it's meaning, which is why I chose it as my user, and I have long been intending to use it as a name of a character in LOTR (which I wrote a shoddy fanfic of years ago, which has long been scrapped and buried deep down in the box of things that we will never speak of). But I am very happy to finally have a character to use this name on (sort of a self fulfilling prophecy), and I can't wait for you to get to know her too!
A brief bit of clarification about this story, in case you are curious:
A majority will be written from the third person POV (if not all), though I will be skipping to focus on character to character as opposed to an all-encompassing third person omniscient. If you don't know what I'm talking about then please ignore this writer's ramblings haha!
This is not a story of a girl falling into middle earth (even though I assure you I have no qualms with fanfics such as those, I just decided I didn't want to go with that).
This is not the story of a Mary-Sue. I assure you, our lovely Kimsy has many flaws, and I've already been toying with the idea of using her as a bit of an antagonist in various portions of this book, which I think would actually be quite interesting.
Yes, she will be joining the party of dwarves (plus our beloved hobbit Bilbo) on their way to Erebor, which you'll see within the next two chapters.
And yes, she will (at this point I'm about 80% sure on this one) have a relationship with Thorin (wonderful pains that they both are).
I hope you all enjoy this story!
