Chapter 4
The escape plan worked perfectly, for everyone except Crystal and me, that is. We have absolutely the worst luck ever. But, I'm jumping ahead of myself a little bit. So, there I was talking to Crystal and the Thorin LARPer in the cell, with Tauriel telling Kili that it was the Feast of Starlight, aka the night the dwarves escaped the Woodland realm, and realizing that this was our only chance to escape with them.
"Fine. As soon as we make it to the lake, you will tell us all you know about our quest. Including how you could possibly know of Bilbo's powers of invisibility." Thorin looked at us expectantly. I sighed and nodded, seeing Crystal do the same.
"But, I can't just stay here all night, can I? I mean, won't it be odd if I'm here longer than a few minutes? After all, I'm not the one locked up."
Thorin thought for a moment before answering. "The change of guards takes place in half an hour and the feast has only just begun. Surely Bilbo will wait until it is well under way before breaking us out. Go and come back in two hours. I'm sure your friend here will not let us leave without you." He glared at Crystal, who was, by the way, still covered in dry blood and smelling pretty rank. She shrugged and gave him a half smile.
"Still, it's not really fair that you got to bathe and I didn't. All because I had to save that one guy's life. Haven't these guys ever heard of CPR? Seriously?"
"I don't think so, Chanders. I think these people are so far into character that they wouldn't stop even if World War III broke out around them."
"World War III?" I had forgotten Thorin was there for a moment. Oh well.
"It's just a saying. Not important." My stomach rumbled again. "Man, I'm hungry. I'm gonna go see if I can find anything to eat while we wait. You want me to bring you something, Chanders?"
"Only if they have dessert. We were just fed like an hour ago, so I'm not really hungry. It actually wasn't that bad, but I really want something sweet. Or coffee. See if they have coffee."
"Okay. I'll look. Well, see ya in a bit." I waved, smiled at Thorin's seemingly ever-present glare, and carefully made my way back to the hallway where I had met the singing guard earlier. Now, where did he say the dining halls were? Oh yeah.
I found my way to the dining halls and sighed in relief when I saw that neither Legolas nor Thranduil were present. This hall was apparently only used by the "common" elves. Of course, everyone was way more graceful that I could ever hope to be. I am super clumsy. Unless I'm doing martial arts, anyway. For some reason, the only grace I have comes out when I practice my Kyokushinkai moves. And it had been a few years since I had a decent dojo to practice at, so I hadn't really kept up with it.
The smell of wonderfulness in the form of food reminded me why I had come. Man, I was so easily distracted. It was a wonder I even managed to get a BS, let alone my PhD. Thank Heaven for patient professors. See? I did it again. Easily distracted.
The elven guard I had seen earlier saw me from the table he had been sitting at with several other elves and waved me over. At least someone wanted to be nice to me. I sat down next to him and one of his friends pushed a plate of food in front of me. There was what looked like roasted chicken and vegetables steamed and dripping with butter and a warm soft roll. Not at all what I would have expected. The shock must have shown on my face (like every other tiny little emotion I feel does) because one of the guards laughed.
"What were you expecting? The best food goes to the king and his party above. This is the servants' dining hall."
I shook my head fervently. "No, this is amazing! I'm just really hungry, that's all."
The guard that had given me directions early smiled, "Well, not that long ago you told me that you weren't hungry at all."
"Well, I lied."
"I see that."
"Sorry."
He smiled again. "No need to apologize. I understand. You are in an unfamiliar place and you do not know whom to trust."
I didn't say anything to that. He had no idea just how right he was.
"My name is Indógos Ondonae. Would you do me the honor of giving me your name?" That was it. This elf was a player. Well, he could sweet talk all he wanted, he wasn't getting anything out of me. I was a high security bank vault. Impenetrable.
"Robin." Well, I had to answer with something, didn't I?
"A strange name. Robin. Is that not the human name for a certain small red breasted bird?"
"Yes." Why did he care? Surely they named elves after birds sometimes? Right? "But, as a person's name it means 'shining star' or 'bright fame'."
"Truly?"
I nodded.
"Then you have a wonderful name. Most are not so fortunate as you." Meaning he didn't want to tell me what his name meant because it was probably something silly, like 'snores while sleeping' or 'hairy one'. Not that he was hairy. He wasn't. Elves are never hairy. But his brown hair was a little thicker than some of the others'. And it was really long and shiny and pretty. No, I was not admiring his hair. Just noticing it. There's nothing wrong with that.
I started in on my food. I was truly famished and the food tasted wonderful. Half way through my second plate, I remembered to breathe. And realized I was being stared at. What? Had they never seen a human eat before?
"You chew quite loudly." The elf sitting across from me looked rather amused. He was a jerk.
"And you eat quickly." Indógos chuckled at me. And I thought he was my friend. Traitor.
"Habit. When I was in high school, they only gave us thirty minutes for lunch and I always spent like twenty-five of that in line trying to get food. So I never had more than like five or ten minutes to eat. And I wanted time to talk to my friends. So I learned to eat fast."
"High school?"
"What? Did you guys never go to high school?"
"I have never heard of such a thing. Is it very prestigious where you come from?" Of course he's never heard of it. He probably spent his entire life LARPing. Maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. It sounded less stressful.
"Hardly. Nearly everybody graduates from high school. It's going to college that's prestigious." I frowned. "But, I guess that's not really the case, now. So many people have graduated from college that that's no longer a guarantee that you'll find a job. It depends on what you study."
"From your tone, I take it you graduated from this college. What did you study?"
"Mathematics."
"Really? And are you still studying mathematics?"
"Yeah. I really want to teach at the university level. That takes a lot of study and dedication." Look at me, making myself look better that I really am. I was barely able to make myself focus enough to do all of my homework. I'm actually pretty surprised I made it through undergrad, much less grad school. They were probably hurting for students the year I got accepted.
"So –"
"Is there any coffee?" I didn't really mean to interrupt, but I had covertly checked my phone and it was getting closer to the designated meeting time.
"Coffee? I do not know of this coffee. What is it?"
"Um. It's a really bitter drink that wakes you up and smells amazing. You put milk and sugar, or creamer and sugar, in it to make it taste better, but some people just drink it black."
Indógos looked like he had more questions to ask, but decided against it. "We do not have any coffee, but we do have wine. For you, it would have to be well watered. But, it would not wake you up. Quite the opposite, actually." He chuckled again. Was he offering to try to get me drunk? I had never been drunk before (surprising, I know), and I didn't think that this was a good time for the first time. So, I told him that I was really tired and just wanted to go to bed. And, just like the creeper I was beginning to suspect that he was, he watched me the entire time I was walking towards the exit.
Luckily, he didn't follow me out. I glanced around and then stole a peek at my phone to check the time. I still had fifteen minutes to get down to the cells, and I wanted to grab my backpack, so I headed back up to my room (and I only got lost twice, yay me). Since I knew we were going to be getting wet, I dug around in my backpack until I found what looked like a giant, high quality zip lock bag that said it was guaranteed to be water proof. In went my cell phone, the hand crank cell phone charger, and anything else that would not handle massive amounts of water well. Surprisingly, it fit. Barely. And it made repacking easier, since most of the little stuff was stuck together now. Maybe I should have just stuck everything in this to begin with. I zipped the pack up and reached for my pocket to check my cell phone until I remembered that it was in my bag and I now had no way to tell if I was late or not. Darn.
Well, there was nothing for it, but to head down anyway, late or not. Surely, they wouldn't leave without me. Crystal wouldn't let them. And she could be very stubborn. Very stubborn.
I remembered my way down to the cells better this time, although I did get lost once and nearly crashed Thranduil's party (what a tragedy). I'm glad I figured out where I was before I walked into his dining hall. I probably would have been shot on sight.
Anyway, I made good time. The LARPer playing Bilbo (completely visible, by the way) was just unlocking Thorin's (and Crystal's) cell. Thorin glanced at me as I ran up, lost my balance, and nearly fell into the river. I'm more than a little clumsy remember?
"Ah. Good. You are right on time. Let us leave this place." He started off towards the dining halls, the rest of the dwarves following him. I shook my head as Bilbo tried to get the dwarves' attention.
"No. This way. There's another way out."
A wave of confusion spread throughout the company until Thorin gave a mighty 'HUSH' and held his fist aloft.
"Bilbo, lead the way."
Bilbo nodded and took off in the other direction. Crystal and I shared an amused look and followed as quickly as we could without stumbling over the dwarves' feet. They had big feet for such little people.
We made it to the storeroom without incident. It was far emptier than I remembered from the movie. Where were the guard and his friend? As soon as we entered fully, my eyes were drawn to the large stack of barrels lying on their sides and piled in a pyramid shape on what looked like wood flooring. Even on closer examination, it was hard to see that they were actually on a trap door. I had just started inspecting the lever to release the door when the sound of a door opening from down the hall froze everyone where they stood.
"Where is the way out, Master Burglar?"
"In the barrels. Quickly please."
This roused complaints from the rest of the company.
"Please, just trust me."
Thorin thought for a moment. "Do as he says." And all at once the dwarves scrambled for barrels. Crystal and I were left with two at the very bottom of the pyramid and on the end closest to where we entered. That meant we would be some of the last to roll off the ramp. I shared a half-frightened half-excited glance with Crystal before Bilbo pulled the lever and told everyone to hold their breath. The next thing I knew, there was a shock of freezing water and I gasped. Water streamed into my lungs and sent me into a fit of coughing and retching as my barrel resurfaced.
The dwarves made a barricade with their barrels by holding onto the rocks all around us to keep from being pulled downstream by the fast current while we waited for Bilbo.
"Are you okay?" Crystal gave me a worried look as I continued to hack my lungs out.
"Sure…sure. I'm…fine." What a liar, I am. My lungs felt like they were on fire. But, I didn't think I would have any permanent damage. She opened her mouth to say something else just as the trap door/ramp opened again to let Bilbo come sliding into the water. As it closed, I caught sight of Tauriel and several other elves chasing after him.
"Well done, Master Baggins." Thorin gave Bilbo a half smile and pushed off into the current. It was really dark in the tunnel we were in. The only light came from a few random crystals that shown with a pale luminescence and barely gave us enough light to see each other's faces. And, aside from the rushing of the river, it was quiet. The tunnel was also a lot longer than it seemed in the movie. We flowed along for a good five minutes before we caught the first glimpse of sunlight ahead. As we neared the tunnel's mouth, I noticed a path running on both sides along the river. The elves were probably running down these paths towards us at that very moment. With bows and arrows. And swords. Not a pleasant thought.
Just before the waterfall marking the exit, and as I was looking back to see our pursuers, there was a loud CRACK and my barrel stopped cold. I was stuck between two rocks. Like really stuck. I pushed on the rock closest to the path and had just managed to move like an inch away when another barrel crashed into mine with such force that both of them stuck fast and would not give way no matter how hard I pushed.
Crystal stuck her head out of the barrel that had just doomed our escape. "What happened?"
"We're stuck. That's what happened." The last of the barrels carrying the dwarves had just gone over the waterfall and the elves were surely not far behind. But, we couldn't just give up. "Let's see if we can free ourselves." I tried to climb out of the barrel and, believe me, it's a lot harder than it looks. First off, if I held onto the edges of the barrel, I kept getting splinters. But, the rocks were too slippery to hold onto.
As I tried in vain to get out of that confounded barrel, a company of elves led by Tauriel and Legolas showed up. Of course Legolas stopped in front of me and waved the rest of the company onward.
"Well, I see your escape attempt worked perfectly." He laughed at my glare and left us there, as if we were not worth locking up because there was no way we could escape. This was so annoying. Why? Why me? Why did the plan work for everyone else, but not me? Well, and Crystal. She was stuck with me. It looked like we'd be spending more quality time with the elves.
Stupid river. Stupid current. Stupid barrels. UGH.
A/N: Sorry this took so long for me to post. The first two weeks of school have been mayhem! I'll try to do better in the future. Anyway, thanks so much to all my followers, reviewers, and readers! You guys are the best!