Chapter 7
"Miss Emilia," Gandalf greeted her. "How are you feeling?" He asked her. They were in the library of House of Elrond.
"I´m fine, thank you Gandalf," she answered. She looked around with big eyes. "This is the most beautiful library I´ve ever come across. And I´ve seen plenty of them." Lord Elrond smiled.
"Thank you, Miss Emilia Taylor," Lord Elrond said. Emilia then spotted the Elf Lord. "I heard you did some extraordinary magic out there."
"She did," Gandalf said. "I said she is powerful."
"Oh, no Gandalf. I´m not," she said. "I had to do something, beside, if it wasn´t for Fíli dragging me back. I would have passed out there. And you had to carry me all the way here." Gandalf chuckled.
"I´m not sure if I would be the one who carried you here, Miss Emilia," Gandalf said. Emilia looked at him confused, but just shook it off.
"You have a powerful talent, Miss Emilia," Lord Elrond said. He studied her. "Few has ever had that power, now it is only one in this world."
"What do you mean, Lord Elrond?" She asked.
"The Keeper of the Elements, have you heard of them?" The Lord asked. She shook her head. "They are the once who can summon all five Elements, and use them." He turned and walked few steps away from them. "Of course, they borrow the help of the Elements, in exchange for the Keeper´s energy." The Elf turned to her. "You are the Keeper of the Elements, Miss Emilia." She looked at him as he´d gone mad.
"Me?" She asked. The Lord nodded. She laughed nervously. "No, no, no. I´m—N—" She had no idea what to say. "I´m just a witch."
"You are," the Lord said. "And by learning how to become one, you learned how to control the Elements."
"I can´t control all of them. I couldn´t control the thorn bushes out there." She pointed out of the House of Elrond, thinking she pointed where they came from. Even though she pointed towards north.
"How many witches in your world can control the Elements by their thoughts?" Lord Elrond asked. Emilia thought of it. She sighed, knowing he had right. "I can help you control the Elements, if you want, while you stay here. Just for few hours, I have other things to handle."
"You would do that?" Emilia asked. Lord Elrond nodded with a smile. "I would be forever grateful, Lord Elrond. But are you sure you got the right person?" She asked. "I mean… I´m just a simple human being." The Lord and the wizard both chuckled. Emilia had no idea what they thought was funny, so she decided to smile along.
xXx
"The Dwarves, master… We lost them. Ambushed by Elvish filth, we were-" The Orc got interrupted by its master.
"I don´t want excuses," the master said on the Black Speech. The master turned and looked at the small being who dared come to the Weathertop with such ill news. "I want the head of the Dwarf King!"
"We were outnumbered," the Orc said. He and his companion had just survived the attack from the Elves. "There was nothing we could do. I barely escaped with my life." The master had walked over to him, reaching his claw to the Orc.
"Far better you had paid with it," the master said. The Master picks up the Orc and throws him to the Wargs. "The Dwarf-scum will show themselves soon enough."
"M-Master…" The other Orc said. The Master looked at the Orc under his command. "It was something else too." The Master waited impatient for him to continue. "A magic girl." The Master wasn´t very interested until he said it. "A sorcerer, with great magic. She made thorn bushes come up from the earth." The fear in its eyes showed that he spoke the truth. The Master turned and walked up few steps.
"Send out word, I want the girl alive, the rest it is a price on their heads!" The Master shouts out the orders.
xXx
Emilia sighed as she lay down on one of the Dwarven blankets. She was tired, exhausted actually. "Are you all right, lass?" Balin asked her.
"Yeah, why?" She asked. She was on her stomach and looked at Balin.
"You´re on Dwalin´s blanket, and you look tired," Balin said. Emilia rolled off when he said it.
"Dwalin?" She asked.
"You said something?" Dwalin asked, coming up to the Dwarven camp. Emilia sat up next to the blanket.
"Nope, nothing," she said. Too afraid saying she almost could fall asleep on his bed. She moved away a bit and took up her Book of Shadow. She looked up at the two brothers of Fundin. They were talking low to each other and Dwalin chuckled and looked at the girl. "You really do tell everything to your brother, do you not Balin?" She asked.
"Where have you been all day?" Fíli asked. She looked over at him and his brother. Kili lay on his back, tossing a stone up in the air.
"Well, Lord Elrond told me I´m Keeper of the Elements." The Dwarves stopped talking and looked at her. "All right, all right. No need to look at me like that."
"What´s that?" Ori asked her.
"I can control the Elements with my thoughts" she said. "That is how I got the thorn bushes to rise. So Lord Elrond have been kind to me and helped me control the magic." She stood up. "Can´t say it helped much, for I still suck at it," she said frustrated.
"Not everything is easy, Miss Emilia," Balin said. "It takes time. Practice makes perfect." She sighed in frustration. They all heard a familiar meow. Fíli and Kili looked at each other worried. Kili tossed his rock up in the air again, by only having Nana jump right into it and into her owner´s arms. The small rock landed before Emilia´s feet. She picked it up. It had some Dwarven writing on it.
"What´s this?" She asked Kili who came up to her.
"Oh, it´s nothing," he said almost shyly. She gave it back to him without question. "It´s a promise to my mother that is all." She nodded and pets Nana. Kili looked at Nana, she hissed at his look.
"Nana! Be nice for once," Emilia snapped at her.
"Finally you take our side," Kili said. Emilia chuckled and took her cat closer to her face, and snuggled into it.
"Maybe, I won´t stop her if she decided to attack you." Kili rolled his eyes.
"Of course you won´t." They both chuckled. Emilia saw Bilbo talking with Lord Elrond at one of the balconies.
"Excuse me," Emilia said and walked up to them. Lord Elrond was already gone by the time she got there. "Bilbo." He turned at her voice and smiled widely.
"Emilia! How lovely it is to see you," he said. "I see you found your cat." She dropped Nana on the floor and gave Bilbo a hug. "Oh, Emilia, something wrong?"
"Hm? No, no. I just haven´t seen you since yesterday. How do you think of Rivendell?" She asked. They both leaned on the ledge.
"It is beautiful here. Lord Elrond offered me to stay here if I want," the Hobbit said. She looked at him. "Of course after this adventure. How are you feeling?"
"I´m fine, thank you for asking. How you seen Thorin somewhere?" She asked him.
"I´m not sure, but he was looking for you too. You´ve been gone a long time today." She looked at him when he said the Dwarf has looked for her. It went quiet, she hated it. "I think he likes you." Bilbo did not look at her when he said it. She looked at him serious. "And can I be bold to say that I think you feel the same?"
"Can I tell Thorin what you just said to me?" She asked him. Bilbo looked at her afraid. She gave him a teasing smile, he then laughed. "You´re wrong. He doesn´t like me and I don´t like him either." Bilbo smiled, not meeting her look. "Bilbo, has anyone said anything?" She asked. Bilbo turned and walked away from her, humming on a song meanwhile. "Bloody hell, he´s like the Dwarves."
"Who´s like the Dwarves?" Thorin said from the side. Emilia startled by the sudden voice. "Did not mean to startle you, Miss Taylor." She looked at him.
"It´s all right. Did you hear what Bilbo and I said?" She asked him worried. Thorin approached her with his hands behind his back.
"No, not until the last sentence," he said. "Should I be worried?" Emilia smiled.
"No, no," she said. She leaned on the ledge of the balcony. "You were looking for me?" Thorin met her eyes.
"Just wondering where you were, you´ve been gone a long time," the Dwarf said. Emilia did not say anything to it. "What happened to your sister?" He asked her. She looked at him nervous. "I see how you tell about her, you admire her, but something did happen to her." She turned from him, not wanting to talk about it. She gave in.
"She died in a drowning accident," she finally said. "We were both stuck under the water, she got me free, but… I got up and she was still down there." Thorin saw she got smaller in her shoulders. He stood beside her. "It had gone two weeks when I got here. Only two weeks, and every night at Midnight I tried to summon her back. Of course it didn´t work."
"You mean that you could had saved her?" Thorin asked. She looked at him surprised. "I had a brother too. He died in battle."
"Oh, I´m so sorry, I did not know."
"How could you know? I don´t like to talk about it." Emilia smiled, he was not the only one. Emilia and Thorin enjoyed the silence, the company of each other while they looked out in Rivendell. Emilia thought then, Thorin might not be so bad after all.