Fuin got up at his usual time. He did the routine he always does before he travels. Mundane things like going to the restroom to take care of the morning things, checking for clothes and weapons, and making sure his mask is secure and saddling up his horse. Even though he mainly likes traveling on foot. By the time he was done Thorin had already awaken and was getting the others up. They both nodded towards each other. Fuin moved to help him and soon all Dwarves and the Wizard were up and ready to go.
As they went they started to bet on if Bilbo will show or not. Fuin ended up betting.
"Wait! Wait!" They heard someone shout. Some dwarves call 'Woah!' and stop their ponies. Bilbo catches up to them and hands Balin the contract. "I signed it!"
Balin takes the contract and inspects it with a pocket glass. He then smiles at Bilbo.
"Everything appears to be in order. Welcome, Master Baggins, to the company of Thorin Oakenshield." Balin says. The dwarves cheer. Fuin notices Thorin not looking too impressed.
"Give him a pony." Thorin says with a scowl.
"No, no, no, no, that that won't be necessary, thank you, but I I'm sure I can keep up on foot. I I I've done my fair share of walking holidays, you know. I even got as far as Frogmorton once WAGH!" Fili and Kili ended up going up behind Bilbo and putting him on a pony. Fuin lets out a small chuckle as he sees Bilbo riding a pony and looking quite terrified. The pony neighs and tosses its head, making him quite uncomfortable… He also sees how he is holding the reigns and sighs then goes back and helping him.
"Hold the reigns closer towards your waist not over your head. And don't squeeze the pony he's more likely to throw you off like that." Fuin instructs him. Bilbo nods in thanks to him. Fuin goes back to riding in front of Gandalf.
"Come on, Nori, pay up. Go on." Oin says, wanting his pay for the bet. Nori tosses a sack of money to Oin. Sacks of money begin passing between the dwarves.
"Hey, hey, hey!" Oin says gleefully. Some of the dwarves laugh.
"What's that about?" Bilbo asked as Fuin caught his money pouch.
"Oh, they took wagers on whether or not you'd turn up. Most of them bet that you wouldn't." Gandalf says
"What did you think?" Bilbo asked Gandalf.
"Hmmm." Gandalf says as he catches a sack of money tossed to him and puts it in his bag. "My dear fellow, I never doubted you for a second." After a while of riding Bilbo sneezes loudly.
"Ohh. All this horse hair, I'm having a reaction." Bilbo complains as he searches his pockets for a handkerchief. He is unable to find it, and he looks up. "No, no, wait, wait, stop! Stop! We have to turn around." Bilbo says suddenly. The entire company comes to a halt, and the dwarves start objecting and asking what the problem is.
"What on earth is the matter?" Gandalf asks exasperated.
"I forgot my handkerchief." Bilbo says seriously. Bofur tears a strip of cloth from his clothing and tosses it to Bilbo.
"Here! Use this." Bofur says. Bilbo catches the rag and looks at it in disgust. The dwarves laugh and begin to continue their journey.
"Move on." Thorin says over the laughter of the other dwarves.
"You'll have to manage without pocket-handkerchiefs and a good many other things, Bilbo Baggins, before we reach our journey's end. You were born to the rolling hills and little rivers of the Shire, but home is now behind you; the world is ahead." Gandalf tells Bilbo as they continue forward.
TIME SKIP :)
Fuin finally gets tired of wearing his mask and takes it off for a bit, knowing he can trust the group that he travels with. The Company is surprised at first but considering they don't know his name they left him alone to set up his stuff as they do theirs. The company has camped for the night near the edge of a cliff. As Gloin sleeps, tiny flying insects get sucked into his mouth every time he inhales, and they are expelled when he exhales. Bilbo watches in disgust, then finally gets up and walks around. Most of the dwarves are asleep; Gandalf, Fili, and Kili are awake. Bilbo walks over to his pony and gives her an apple, after checking to see that no one is looking. Fuin of course catches him even though he himself is half asleep.
"Hello, girl. That's a good girl. It's our little secret, Myrtle; you must tell no one. sh, sh" Bilbo tells his pony as he pets her. Bilbo hears a scream in the night air and becomes worried. He runs over to Fili and Kili. "What was that?" He asks timidly.
"Orcs." Kili says as another scream is heard. Thorin and Fuin jerks awake upon hearing the word 'Orcs.'
"Orcs?" Bilbo asks looking around.
"Throat cutters. There'll be dozens of them out there. The lowlands are crawling with them." Fili says.
"They strike in the wee small hours, when everyone's asleep. Quick and quiet; no screams, just lots of blood." Kili continues for his brother. Bilbo looks away in fright; Fili and Kili look at each other and begin laughing.
"You think that's funny? You think a night raid by orcs is a joke?" Fuin and Thorin say simultaneously.
"We didn't mean anything by it." Kili says, intimidated by his uncle and the assassin of their group.
"No, you didn't. You know nothing of the world." Thorin says as he and Fuin walks off, Thorin to the edge of the cliff and Fuin to a particularly tall rock and they both look out over the valley. Balin walks up to Fili and Kili.
"Don't mind him, laddie. Thorin has more cause than most to hate orcs. After the dragon took the Lonely Mountain, King Thror tried to reclaim the ancient dwarf kingdom of Moria. But our enemy had got there first." Balin started the story.
{Flashback: The Battle of Azanulbizar Balin's POV}
Thousands of dwarves and orcs fight in front of the gates of Moria. We see Thorin, Thror, Thrain, Balin, and Dwalin fighting fiercely. A massive, pale, orc wipes out many dwarves with his mace, then engages King Thror. "Moria had been taken by legions of Orcs lead by the most vile of all their race: Azog, the Defiler. The giant Gundabad Orc had sworn to wipe out the line of Durin. He began by beheading the King." Azog, having defeated King Thror, holds up his beheaded head as he roars; he then flings the head, which bounces and rolls to Thorin's feet. "Thrain, Thorin's father, was driven mad by grief. He went missing, taken prisoner or killed, we did not know. We were leaderless. Defeat and death were upon us." the orcs have overpowered the dwarves, and the dwarves flee for their lives. "That is when I saw him: a young dwarf prince facing down the Pale Orc." Thorin faces Azog; Azog swings his mace and knocks away first Thorin's shield, then his sword. Thorin falls down an embankment and lands on the ground. "He stood alone against this terrible foe, his armor rent…wielding nothing but an oaken branch as a shield" Azog leaps to smash Thorin, but Thorin, grabbing an oaken branch lying on the round, manages to roll away in time. Azog continues wielding his mace against Thorin, who is still on the ground, but Thorin blocks his mace with the oaken branch, which he uses as a shield. As Azog swings one last time, Thorin, grabbing a sword lying nearby, cuts off Azog's left arm, his mace arm, from below the elbow. Azog clutches the stump of his arm as he howls in pain. "Azog, the Defiler, learned that day that the line of Durin would not be so easily broken." Azog is rushed into Moria by other orcs. Thorin rallies the dwarves to battle. They stop fleeing and return to battle, fighting ferociously. The dwarves now seem to have the advantage. "Our forces rallied and drove the orcs back. Our enemy had been defeated. But there was no feast, no song, that night, for our dead were beyond the count of grief. We few had survived." The battlefield is covered in the corpses of dwarves and orcs; the surviving dwarves weep with one another over their loss. A younger Balin and Dwalin hug and put their foreheads together as they weep. Balin, still weeping, looks up and sees Thorin framed in the sunlight, holding his oaken branch. "And I thought to myself then, there is one who I could follow. There is one I could call King."
{End of flashback}
Thorin turns away from the view beyond the cliff and looks towards Fuin the entire Company is awake and standing in awe, staring at Thorin. Thorin walks towards Fuin.
"But the pale orc? What happened to him?" Bilbo asks no one in particular.
"He slunk back into the hole whence he came. That filth died of his wounds long ago." Thorin replies before he turns to Fuin. "Why did you react so strongly to what my nephews said?" Thorin asks a little curiously.
Fuin sighs and looks towards Gandalf. After Gandalf nods he lets out another sigh. "I was born long ago in the First Age to the race of the Dínen." Saying the name given to his race long after its fall. Many of the company let out gasps, knowing where part of this story is going. Fuin gave them a nod before he continued. "The name Fuin was given to me by my mother and father. Being their eldest and only son, they doted on me. Making sure I had everything, never needed anything, and the likes. The only thing was it wasn't only them, as they were the rulers King Ellis and Queen Verena, they had everyone else to help them." Fuin paused remembering his mother and father and everything they did as a family. "As the years went by and I grew the problems also grew. The kind parents that I knew grew distant and spent more time in the office and left me to care for things in the kingdom as the war grew outside the forests of Dumorn. The day of the fall, I was to lead a portion of the troops no battle. The Battle of the Last Alliance to be precise. Sauron was afraid of us because of our skill, so he tried to eliminate his biggest threat. I was just getting ready when I noticed that the forest was brighter than normal." Fuin pauses for a few to gather his thoughts, as he hasn't thought about the fall for a long time. "So, naturally, I go out to investigate. The whole forest was aflame, orcs raiding the kingdom slaughtering everyone in sight. I joined my father and fought against the orcs with the soldiers. Our own resistance wasn't enough. Dumorn was falling and Father wanted to make sure the last of the Dínen had a chance to have a legacy and sent me away. Ever since then I have walked around Arda under the alibis Skull, the name given to me because of my mask, killing orcs and wrongdoers." Fuin completed the story with everyone watching him. All of them were giving him looks of respect. After that, everyone but Fili and Kili went back to sleep.
Time Skip ^_^
The Company rides their ponies through a muddy forest as it rains. They all look cold, wet, and miserable. Besides Fuin, he is used to harsh weather. Fuin isn't paying much attention to the conversations around him, just his surroundings. "Well, that would be Radagast, the Brown." Fuin hears Gandalf say when he tunes back in.
"Is he a great Wizard or is he...more like you?" Bilbo asks curiously. Gandalf looks slightly offended, to which Fuin snorts at and gets a glare for.
"I think he's a very great wizard, in his own way. He's a gentle soul who prefers the company of animals to others. He keeps a watchful eye over the vast forest lands to the East, and a good thing too, for always Evil will look to find a foothold in this world." Gandalf says in response. Not long after he says that the Company arrives at an old, abandoned farmhouse that is in ruins. Fuin can tell these were recent and close to Rivendell, maybe a half an hour run away. He remembers where this farmhouse when the weather got a bit too harsh for him he stayed with the residents.
"We'll camp here for the night. Fili, Kili, look after the ponies. Make sure you stay with them." Thorin states.
"A farmer and his family used to live here." Fuin says zoned out as Gandalf approached Thorin.
"Oin, Gloin." Thorin says ignoring Fuin's statement.
"Aye?" Gloin hums.
"Get a fire going." Thorin demands.
"Right you are." Gloin says with a nod.
"I think it would be wiser to move on. We could make for the Hidden Valley." Gandalf says.
"I have told you already, I will not go near that place." Thorin says. Fuin tunes out the rest of the conversation knowing it is going to become an argument. The next time Fuin looks up is as Gandalf stomps off angrily, leaving the Company. Then he tunes back out only concentrating on eating, that was until Fili and Kili ran into camp out of breath.
Word Count: 2277