A/N: Thanks for all the follows, faves, and reviews! :)
Disclaimer: I do NOT own the Hobbit and write this work on fanfiction for pleasure not profit.
"To dare is to lose one's footing momentarily. Not to dare is to lose oneself."
-Soren Kierkegaard
They looked on the light in the distance for a few minutes before Nori said, "We should go see if they are friendly."
"I don't think we should. This far into the Lone Lands?" Dwalin disagreed, fingering his axe, his face pulled down in a frown.
"We are hardly going to do much better here. What's the harm in looking?" Ori asked, wringing his damp clothes in his hands, mournfully staring at the puddle that grew larger at his feet.
"None at all, unless that's the fire of an orc pack." Dori grumbled darkly.
"And what are the chances of that?" Kili scoffed and Fili nodded in agreement with his brother.
More of the dwarves chimed in then, arguing back and forth whether to go check out the light in the distance or not. There wasn't much rest to be had, and if they were friendly, what was the harm?
"You've been awful quiet. What do you think lady?" asked Bofur turning to Holly.
She looked away from the interested gazes and thought quickly, "I think that it's worth a look. Although I have a bad feeling in general about this place." She said slowly, rubbing her hands up and down her chilled arms.
"Hm." He adjusted his sodden hat thoughtfully but said no more to her. Around them the argument continued.
"These parts aren't well known-"
"But there are fifteen of us."
"And where has the wizard gone off too?"
This question was asked several times. With much disgruntlement. The rain, which had not stopped, became heavier and Gloin threw down his fire making tools in disgust while Oin also huffed and sat back on his heels and rubbed his forehead in frustration.
"Isn't this why we brought a burglar in the first place?" Gloin asked irritably.
Bilbo looked embarrassed by the sudden attention upon him but he agreed, "I'll be a lot happier for a warm fire and I'm more than willing to go take a look. Anything is better than standing around in the cold and muck." He too was wet and cold and missing his hobbit hole very much.
"It is clearly not going to get any better for us this night. So we'll go look. Cautiously!" Thorin cut in decisively. There was a little more grumbling, but generally the group was happy to be doing something other than standing around and being miserable.
"You stay near the back." Thorin commanded Holly as he passed her on his way to his pony.
She bit her tongue to keep from replying, and forced herself to move. All around her the dwarves were quickly making ready to go. She was so nervous that her feet felt like lead, but nobody seemed to notice her dawdling as she took Clara's reins and led her after the group.
She hugged the pony's neck briefly for comfort. The smell of wet horse wasn't pleasant, but it was at least familiar. The poor pony didn't seem any happier than she was about being made to move. Holly walked beside her, not wanting to burden the pony any more.
The light could be seen flickering up the hill and through some trees. It might have been in her mind, but it looked more ruddy red and foreboding than welcoming. The climb in the dark and downpour was not pleasant, and Holly soon found herself struggling to keep moving as her feet slipped and slid over wet gravel and mud. A heaviness grew in her stomach with every step. She absolutely did not want to get any nearer than she had to. She already felt nauseous.
There was plenty of stumbling and cursing ahead of her. For there was no proper path and it was pitch black. Rivulets of water rushed down and ensured that nobody had dry feet. The darkness closed around her unpleasantly and she had to several times maneuver around rocks or bushes she nearly ran into.
The dwarves were not a quiet lot. Swearing and grumbling as they went and stumbling just as much as Holly was. Bilbo was just ahead of her and mumbling about, "All this dwarvish racket!" which made Holly crack a slight smile to herself.
Before too long, the light had grown closer and now was gleaming red through the trees not too far ahead. Thorin called Bilbo to the front and Holly halted next to Clara, keeping an arm on the weary pony's neck.
It was then that she realized she didn't have to linger there, she could retreat safely while they dealt with the trolls. It was so dark she could barely see her hand in front of her face and the rain was coming down hard enough to make a godawful racket that would surely cover any noises she might make stumbling in the dark. She could tie up Clara and slip off without anyone likely noticing.
And do what? She thought bitterly, but her fumbling fingers were already working on tying Clara alongside several other ponies. The dwarves were huddled at the front of the group and she couldn't make out what was being said, but it seemed they had forgotten all about her presence for now.
Maybe she could sneak around the other side and wait for Gandalf?
However before she could put her (admittedly weak) plan into action, a great rumbling crash made her startle badly. It was followed by a strange series of thumps and shouts in the distance. Holly unconsciously backed further away from the racket, and as she did so, she lost her footing on the slick ground and fell.
Suddenly the ground went rushing past her as she slid back down the hill, tumbling and jolting against what felt like every rock, root, and shrub the area had to offer. Her head was smacked not once but three times, causing her to see stars as she scrabbled frantically in the muddy ground to gain purchase. Her hands finally found a root only for it to tear cruelly into her palms as she managed to stop her descent.
Tears sprung immediately to her eyes as her body let her know the pain it was in. She lay there for several minutes sobbing while her head spun, her body ached, and her hands throbbed. Getting a hold of herself wasn't easy. Every time she managed to calm down her fears a little she froze up and started crying hysterically again as the thought of trolls possibly tearing through the undergrowth in search of her popped into her head.
She clapped her smarting hand over her mouth in an effort to muffle the noise. "I'm okay." She whimpered to herself, "You're fine g-girl. Get ahold f y-y-yourself. They'd already b-be here if they were c-coming after you."
Slowly she managed to calm her breathing and slow her rapidly beating heart. Sitting up made her so dizzy that she immediately threw up. She groaned and held her head in her hands, the bitter taste lingering in her mouth.
She couldn't see a thing when she finally looked up. She shakily got to her feet and nearly fell again. Streams of water ran down the hill all around her, splattering her with mud and pebbles. She could make out the base of a tree above her and realized she'd fallen down between a great tangle of roots.
The red light from earlier was nowhere to be seen.
Surely she couldn't have fallen that far though? Holly tried craning her head back but could see nothing. Her ears were filled with the sound of rain and the rushing of water. She moved a few steps carefully back but still could make out nothing beyond vague dark shapes.
She swallowed down the rising panic and took a couple deep breaths. This was...almost better. The choice of what to do with the trolls had been entirely taken out of her hands by her ill-timed misstep. She could now sneak back up and have a very good reason for hanging back. She may not be able to see her hand in front of her face, but well she did know that they'd been climbing up.
She shivered involuntarily. No, she didn't want to encounter the trolls, but neither did she want to abandon everyone. She tried to examine the damage to her hands, but couldn't make out much. She winced as her fingers made contact with shredded skin on one palm. She ached all over but didn't seem to be worse off than that.
"You're okay." She muttered again, then started to agonizingly climb back up the hill in the dark. She was forced to skirt around the roots of the tree until her hands encounter only dirt, though on a steep incline.
Her progress was impeded once again by her inability to see, but she kept pushing onward and upwards in the hope she'd catch sight of the firelight again and be able to get back on track. She had to detour around several large boulders, each time, much to her growing anxiety, moving more towards the left than she thought she ought to have been moving. She tried moving more right, but wasn't sure if that helped.
It wasn't until she met a sheer rock face that she could feel no top of that she realized she was well and truly lost.
Thorin was growing worried.
The halfling had been gone for some time when they'd heard an awful ruckus and he'd sent several more of their group to investigate. Then another four. Now that had been some time ago and only a quarter of the group remained.
He thought to try and sneak up on the fire, a growing warning in his heart that some kind of mischief was afoot. The plan was quietly given to the rest of his kin and they snuck forward as quietly as they could through the trees.
The sight that met them was a dismaying one indeed. A large fire, and a pile of suspiciously dwarf shaped wriggling sacks with boots sticking out of them to one side. He let his hand stray to his weapon and stepped forward, "What's this? Who has been knocking my people about?!" He called, hoping one of them would answer.
"Trolls!" Came the halfling's voice in warning. Thorin spared not another second and went for a big flaming branch he saw half lying in the fire. He whirled around just in time to dodge the grasping hands of a particularly nasty looking specimen and stabbed him in the eye with the brand.
The troll cried out in pain and swiped blindly at Thorin, but tripped and went down on the ground, cursing and rubbing his eye, missing the dwarf entirely.
The rest of the unbound dwarves sprung into the fray as the troll howled and two more of the beasts lumbered out of the trees with sacks in their hands. One of them kicked the embers of the fire at Thorin, who cursed as he swung the branch again and knocked some teeth out of the monster's head with a satisfactory crunch.
The fact that the trolls were obviously trying to capture them was not at all reassuring. It meant that it was easier to get hits on on them, and less injury was done to his kin, but it boded ill for them if they were to fail in driving them off. One troll would have been enough of a challenge, to the whole group working all together. Three trolls with only a handful of dwarves left to fight was poor odds indeed.
The second troll was now howling and clutching his face as Dwalin and Nori began laying into him with their weapons. The halfling was sent flying into the air by a mighty kick from the creature and struck a tree on the other side of the clearing.
Thorin dropped the branch then and went for his blade, but before he could draw it a nasty smelly sack was pulled over his head from behind, causing him to fumble and drop the weapon He snarled and thrashed as he was lifted in the air struggling and received a two fearsome blows to the head and stomach for his trouble, causing him to go lax as the breath was driven from him.
Sturdy rope trussed him good and tight and it wasn't too long before the sounds of his fighting brethren petered out and he heard more cursing and swearing. At least he had seen nobody had been too grievously hurt or killed.
It was only as he was tossed onto what felt like a pile of his kin and the trolls started discussing how best to cook the lot of them that he realized with growing horror that he had no idea where Holly was.
Holly had no idea where she was.
She tried to strain for any sounds but could hear nothing. The rain was starting to slow down and now was a slow monotonous drizzle.
It was still as dark as ever and Holly walked along the rock wall for several minutes, this time heading back towards her right as she had detoured so much to the left.
She had climbed quite a bit higher than she suspected she had fallen. Trees rose all around her and blocked her view but still she kept moving, hoping to see or hear something.
How much time had passed, she couldn't be sure. Eventually she sat down against a tree in despair and cried again.
The rain finally ceased as she sat crying. Her cramps were bothering her again, since it must have been hours since she last took some medicine for them. She was cold, wet, hungry, utterly lost and miserable. She huddled there for well over an hour, going back and forth on whether she should continue to look for her companions or just stay put.
In the end, no matter how desperate she was, she simply couldn't stomach being a damsel in distress. At the very least she wanted to make an effort to save herself. She got to her feet again, and wiped her eyes on the back of her hand. After all she knew that the company would be okay in the end, but her fate was unknown. Better to try, in her opinion, than not try at all.
Holly made a decision to head back down, knowing that going up hadn't worked. At worst, she'd be down in the valley again and could wait until daylight when she would have a better chance of finding her way back.
Holly had just resigned herself to shivering the rest of the night in the dark when she realized the sky had begun to lighten just a little bit. Her heart lightened as she walked down the hill, weaving around the trees.
A hazy spot in the air before her caused her a moment of brief confusion until a breath of wind blew the scent of smoke into her face. She couldn't help it; she laughed out loud in sheer relief. She hurried, racing towards the fire as the sunlight broke the first cold rays of light over the wet forest. She heard a great roar, like thunder, just as the clearing came into view.
She halted, frozen in amazement as...as what had to be the trolls cried out in pain and started to turn grey and stiff, as the rays of the morning sun swiftly turned them into stone.
She'd never seen anything more magical. The small tricks Gandalf had displayed were nothing compared to three creatures, grotesque and twisted, turning into inanimate hulks of rock. Holly felt a sliver of ice roll down her spine as one of trolls caught sight of her, it's squinty eyes narrowed in anger and fear.
She forgot to be afraid, and instead watched the wizard lean wearily on his staff on top of a huge rock that had obviously been split in two. "Gandalf!" She cried, relief lacing her tone. He turned around to see her on the rose behind him.
"Holly!" He called.
She met him at the base as he climbed down the rock and he looked her over with a critical eye. "Seems like there is more than one tale to tell of this past night." He remarked. Holly nodded breathlessly, "Later. We have to go free the rest of them." Her eyes had just fallen on the sacks that held the dwarves, who were squirming and calling out asking what had happened.
"We're here!" She called out, tripping a bit as she hurried over, "Hold your horses, we'll get you all free in a moment!" She turned to the first sack and looked helplessly at the tight knots. She tried to get them loose, but hissed at the rough fibers hurt her hands. The wriggling didn't help either.
"Hold still!" She snapped, poking the dwarf. She took the knife from her belt and started sawing at the knot. Gandalf was helping poor Bilbo out of a bunch of thorn bushes behind her. Together the two started working on the ropes binding the others.
The rope wasn't the best and it soon came away in her hands. She then pulled the nasty sack off and met a pair of intense blue grey eyes and an intimidating frown.
As their eyes met she felt a flash of surprise and then immediate chagrin. Her hands, which had been helping remove the sack, paused in their work as she blushed bright red. Of all the luck, she had scolded and poked the leader of their company.
"Ah. I hope you're alright." She pulled the sack off all the way and then offered a hand to help him off. He ignored it and got to his feet. Then suddenly his hand flashed out and turned her hand over at the wrist.
She winced at the sight. Her hands were cut up pretty badly and there was dirt ingrained in the cuts. She had been ignoring the throbbing until he had brought her attention back to it. His fingers were coarse and rough on her skin as he examined the cuts. She felt the heat in her face grow.
Then he dropped it and grunted, looking up at her, he made eye contact again and she was struck by the weight of his gaze "Get Oin to look at that." he ordered.
"S-Sure." She said, pulling her hand out of his. Then she turned away to hide her face from his gaze. She then set to work on freeing the others.
Holly got Kili and then Bombur free (the latter of whom had the most rope and the toughest knots). By that point the rest of them had gotten all the others free and Oin was checking everyone over for injuries. The worst were Bilbo and herself, but there were plenty of scratches and bruises to go around.
After Thorin was satisfied everyone was in good enough condition, he turned to Gandalf and Bilbo. "Now then, I'm not sure what all has occurred and I think now is the time to fill in the missing parts."
Holly listened with half an ear as Bilbo, with embarrassment in his voice, told them his plan to try picking the troll's pockets.
Oin was busy cleaning and bandaging Holly's hands, which had her cursing under her breath as quietly as she could, but when he poured some wine over her hands tears sprung to her eyes, "Motherfucker!" she gasped. The old healer startled, his hands pausing in removing grit from the cuts as he looked up at her in bemusement.
"Oh please just hurry up." Holly begged with her teeth clenched. "Sorry for swearing but I wasn't expecting it to hurt that badly.
"Quite all right." he replied, then when he had finished the first hand he placed the wine bag in it, "Might as well take a nip. These will be bothering you for a few days at least."
She took a swig of the acidic wine, then another, and another as he continued to clean the dirt from her palms. Her head was pleasantly fuzzy by the time he used the last of the wine to wash her other hand. This time she managed not to swear, though she did flinch.
"And what of you, lady?" Ori asked Holly as Bilbo finished his account.
Holly blushed. Thorin once again turned his enigmatic eyes on her where she sat next to Oin. "Yes. Where were you?" Dori asked suspiciously, catching the other's' attention.
"I fell." Holly said, plucking at her dirty shirt and holding up her wrapped hands. Bofur came over and patted her shoulder sympathetically.
"Fell?" Fili asked.
Holly hugged her torso. "I slipped. I was towards the back of the group and it was so dark. I don't know how far I fell but it knocked me about and I spent all night trying to find my way back because I was worried about you." Here she paused, and met Thorin's gaze head on, "It wasn't til morning when I saw the smoke from the fire and managed to find you all again." She finished steadily.
No more questions were asked, for everyone could see that she had had a rough night.
The woman looked a fright, and there were new bruises along her jaw and scattered across her arms. She was covered in mud and forest debris. Her hair was a tangled mess and it made him feel uncomfortable as he looked upon her. He was filled with the vague need to fix it so she didn't look quite so disheveled.
It was obvious something ill had befallen her as it had them, though he was relieved and glad that the trolls had not come across her and she had been spared their evil talk.
She was looking at the now turned-to-stone hulks with trepidation and not a little fear. Both hands had bandages tied about them, and she limped a little on one side.
He had worried all night long whether she had managed to be smart and stayed hidden. He'd hoped that was the case while he lay trussed up like a chicken and listened to the trolls debating how to cook all of them. He had known she wasn't among them because they made no mention of cooking a woman.
However he was dismayed that she had apparently been hurt and in pain. He couldn't in good conscience scold her, though he wished he could. It would have been better had she stayed put until they could find her.
He sighed and rubbed his brow tiredly. "There must be a hoard nearby. We should go look for it. We can take the food and ale here to replenish what we've lost." He said to Balin and Gandalf.
"Oh, I have found a key here! Perhaps it may help?" Bilbo held up the item in question, a heavy stone thing, "I think it fell out of that one's pocket in the fight." He pointed at one of the trolls.
"You could've mentioned that earlier." Gloin grumbled, stroking his beard.
A few notes on the chapter:
Poor Holly had quite a night! But then, so did everyone else so I think it's just fair that she get roughed up too.
