I do not own this; I only own Lupa and the Sizaan Elves.
It was getting to be late evening, so the dwarves set up camp by the abandoned barn house on Thorin's orders, despite Gandalf's warnings that they should move on. He told them that a farmer and his family had been living there not too long ago. Judging by the state of disrepair the house was in, they had not left willingly.
Lupa, of course, was nowhere to be found. When Bilbo asked Gandalf about it, he had advised the hobbit not to worry about her. Bilbo had been somewhat disgruntled, as that was not the answer to the question he had asked. He considered asking again, but Gandalf had wondered off to talk with Thorin.
"Are you sure it would not be wiser to move on and make for the Hidden Valley?" Gandalf questioned Thorin. "If there is something in the area that frightened Lupa, I do not think it would be wise to stay for long."
Thorin was still refusing to listen. "I refuse to seek help from elves, Gandalf. Where was the fabled Elven help when a dragon attacked Erebor, when Orcs took over Moria, when many of my kin lay dying on the field?!"
"Lupa is an elf. She would gladly help you."
"A woman raised by wolves, Gandalf? I do not care what weapons she carries; she is still a woman. A woman should stay at home and allow herself to be protected, Gandalf, not running off by herself!"
Gandalf was well and truly fed up now. Turning away from Thorin, he stormed off into the forest. Bilbo, still concerned about Lupa and not particularly wanting another member of the current company missing, called after him.
"Gandalf? Where are you going?"
He heard an answer from the retreating figure. "To a place where I may think, Master Baggins, without the foolery of dwarves getting in the way!" then Gandalf disappeared entirely, leaving an angry Thorin, a miffed Bilbo, and a confused everyone else.
Meanwhile, Lupa was following the scent of troll. She thought it might be mountain troll, but she had only heard of those ones; her experience was limited to normal trolls, if there was such a thing. But these ones were bigger than the ones she had faced, judging by both their smell and the tracks they left behind. They had hit the farmhouse, from the looks of it, and taken the family. If she focused, she could make out about something like four different smells: the farmer himself, a wife, and two children, both boys. Come to think of it, all the trolls were male too, and likely three of them. She would have to hope that Gandalf had steered the rest of the company away from camping at that spot, ideal as it might be.
These trolls had come a long way. There were many scents mixed into their own, scents that, going by what she had smelled earlier, had no business being on anything that would normally live nearby. If only her nose was better, more like an actual wolf's! Ah well. At least she could smell, unlike many of those who had been taken in by various kinds of birds. But enough of that.
Finally she heard them. She ought to have heard them earlier, but these ones were actually being moderately quiet. She wouldn't have thought it possible. At least she had found their camp. Now she could go warn Gandalf and the dwarves to make sure no matter what that they stayed out of the area. But wait… oh, curse it all! that was the dratted hobbit, wasn't it!?
Bilbo was silently fuming as he crept towards the trolls. Hoot like both a barn owl and a brown owl?! He didn't know how to hoot like either of those! And, of course, as soon as he turned around, those two were gone! Confusicate and confound them all!
Gandalf had been quietly stewing in the bushes for some time now. He had been pacing, contemplating the pigheadedness of dwarves in general and Thorin in particular. On well. He like ought to go back to them and make sure nothing was happening; even with Thorin there, he didn't trust them to not make a huge mess. And, judging by the farmhouse, there were trolls in the area. He hoped Lupa was alright. Of course, that was before she dropped out of the tree tops and landed right in front of him, startling him a bit.
"Lupa!" he exclaimed. "Are you alright?" She snorted, a scowl on her face.
"I'm fine. Those idiots likely aren't, though. Bilbo found the trolls' camp, and the rest are likely to follow, if this is anything like the Barrow Downs." Gandalf had told her how he had had to stop the other Dwarves from following her in.
He sighed. "Well, I suppose we should go back to them, then." He motioned for her to lead the way back.
When they got to the troll camp, all the dwarves had been captured and tied up, and several of them were tied to a spit so as to be roasted over the fire. Gandalf and Lupa were crouched in the bushes, watching the proceedings. Gandalf made a move to get up so as to help the Dwarves and Hobbit, but Lupa grabbed him by the arm.
"Wait!" she growled at him, a glint in her eyes. "I want to see what they do! Maybe they can even get out by themselves!" Gandalf settled down, although he stayed ready to run out and take care of the trolls.
Only Bilbo had the sense to play for time. He claimed that all the dwarves were infested by parasites. It was a fairly good idea, Lupa supposed, but at this rate the trolls would be long gone by dawn, and take all the Dwarves with them. Muttering to herself in her head, she crept around to the other side, then into the forest. The trolls were startled by the sudden howl of a wolf.
"Eh, wot's that?" asked Bert, seemingly the cook. "Hey, William, you should go check that out. Sounds like a wolf."
Tom said, "Ah sure could fancy a bit of wolf, should add a good spot 'o flavor to the soup."
"You go check it out then, Tom! I don' want to!" said William. The wolf howl sounded again, making the dwarves shiver.
"Well, neither do I! Bert, you go get it!"
"I'M the one cookin' the soup, you idiot!"
"Fine! We'll just leave it. It's almost dawn anyway, let's just cook this Dwarves and be done with it!" Gandalf could swear he heard an annoyed huff in his head.
Suddenly a blur lept from the trees, jumped onto Tom's back, and stabbed him with a knife before jumping back to the safety of the trees. Tom clapped a hand to the afflicted spot and yelped. "Ow, Bert, wha'ed you go and do that for?!"
"I didn' do anything, you big fool! Prob'ly just got bit by a bug!" The blur, almost certainly Lupa, now did the same to Bert.
"Ouch! Tom, I said I didn' do anything! You didn' have to pinch me!" Gandalf saw dawn creeping along the horizon. Slowly he started creeping along to a large rock that stood at the edge of the clearing, blocking the light from shining through.
The blur attacked William now. "Hey, who just did that?!"
"I didn' do it," Bert said slowly, as if piecing bits together in his mind.
"I sure didn' do it, neither," agreed Tom.
"If neither of you, didn' then who did?!" raged William. "I bet it was both of yez!"
By this point, Bert had had enough. "Enough, the both of yez! It's nearly dawn! Let's jus' grab these Dwarves and get back to the cave!" He reached over to pick several of them up.
It was then that Gandalf appeared on the rock, robes flying around him. Lupa sighed from where she was watching; the Stormcrow always did like drama.
"Oi, who's that?" asked Tom.
"Can we eat him?" William wondered.
"May the Dawn take you!" Gandalf shouted. He raised his staff and brought in down on the rock he was standing on, splitting it in two, letting light shine through the cloven halves, illuminating the trolls. They shrieked in pain and rage, and started to writhe around. Slowly their movements ceased, leaving behind only lumps of stone.
Lupa, a bit skeptical of them being dead, crept over to one and slapped it. Besides her suddenly cradling her hand, nothing happened. Convinced of their demise, she stood and trotted over to the dwarves lying tied up on the ground, pulling out a knife as she went. She was muttering curses under her breath, getting louder as she got closer. "IDIOT dwarves, don't they know better than to mess with trolls?! Trin'gah rot their flesh and break their bones! Do they know NOTHING? Obviously! May Gwinu peck the eyes from their skulls!" Now she was slashing away at the ropes holding the dwarves, freeing them one by one. "By Kilopi, may their hair grow blue and fall from their heads!"
Once all the dwarves were free, Lupa went back to the campsite with several of the other dwarves to help carry what was left of their supplies back and to lead the ponies over. She was still muttering. Meanwhile, Thorin had walked over to talk to Gandalf. He was scowling.
"Where did you go, if I may ask so bluntly?" he ground out.
"To look ahead," was Gandalf's reply.
"And what brought you back?"
"Looking back," was Gandalf's offhand answer. He was examining the troll statues. "These trolls must have come down from the Ettenmoors." He looked uneasy.
"Surely they must have a cave nearby, if they were from so far away," Thorin mused.
It was just at that moment that Lupa and the rest of the company appeared again. Lupa nodded.
"Ja. That way." She pointed away from them, a grimace on her face.
"How do you know?!" Thorin demanded of her, suspicious. She grimaced.
"I can cursed smell it, whelp."
They went quickly to the cave, following Lupa's lead. Kili, curious about her strong sense of smell, asked her about it. She snorted.
"Please, you think I would have survived thirteen years of living with wolves, let alone one month, if I didn't have senses like them? It's an… ancient… magic tied to us as a people, that grants us much of the senses of the animals that… adopted us. Those raised by birds? They have next to no sense of smell. How I envy them," she muttered as they came across the cave. It stank, even to the Dwarves' noses. Bilbo could only imagine what it was like for her. Oddly enough, she didn't seem too affected by it, only as much as they were. She saw him looking at her and guessed his thoughts.
"What? I've found worse things. There was a pool that had gone bad, and for some reason the deer couldn't smell it. They must have died pretty quick after drinking it; their carcasses had fallen in the water and rotted, and reeked when I found them." She didn't seem to notice Bilbo's rather nauseated look.
The dwarves seemed to have find a rather nice haul. Gandalf and Thorin had new swords, and Gandalf had found a dagger that worked as a sword for Bilbo. Lupa had gone in, but not seen anything of interest.
They were preparing to leave when a rustling started in the bush. All of them, save the Hobbit, drew whatever weapons they carried with them and held them ready. Suddenly, words could be made out from whatever the thing doing the rustling was shouting.
"Thieves! Fire! Murder!"
I swear this chapter hates me. The first way it told me to write it, Lupa was captured by the trolls and got several ribs cracked. Then the story was all like, "no, I don't want it to go that way. Do it this way!" Hence, you got this. But it's all mutual, because I in turn hate this chapter. May it rot in Mordor.
Look, I know it's not the best. I will try to go in later and make it better.
You may have noticed in the first chapter that Lupa had a bow; she doesn't anymore, because I changed it. I thought it would just make her way over powered, what with the skills she already has. XP
Hopefully next time, we can make it to Rivendell.
Thanks to all those who have followed and/or favorited!
Twillin out!
