Hello dear readers. Here's the next chapter for you. As always, enjoy and please review. I really like the feedback.
Chapter 8
Reckless
It should not have come as a surprise to me to find my companions either on a spit over the fire or tied up in sacks thrown in a heap on the ground, and it wasn't. Maybe I had been hoping for another outcome, but I had not been expecting it.
The real question was: what to do next? If the story was right, then everything would work itself out in the end without my interference. Deep down I knew that it would. Probably. It was that small chance that maybe this would not turn out as fine as I hoped that urged me into staying, even though it was not clear to me yet what I had to do, that was if I had to do anything at all.
And so I waited…
Thorin
This had been a bad idea.
It was a bit of a shame that this thought only occurred to Thorin when he had already been tied up, put into a sack, waiting to be cooked by the very monsters that troublesome woman had warned him about. But he was trying not to think about that at the moment. If he would get out of this alive, then doubtlessly she would rub it in until he had to admit that she had spoken the truth.
But the survival part of that scenario didn't seem all that likely now. He was pretty sure those trolls were about to cook them all, he had no idea where Gandalf was and he himself had been the one to order Kate to remain in the camp. There would be no help coming and he wasn't in the position to do anything useful at all.
He didn't think he had ever been so helpless in his entire life. Even when Smaug had taken Erebor, he had a sword in his hand. Now his sword lay on the big pile of weapons on the other side of the fire.
No, this was definitely the worst luck he had ever had. A small voice in the back of his head wondered what Kate's book would have to say on the matter. If that wasn't proving how desperate things were, he wouldn't know what would. For the past weeks he had carefully avoided thinking about that book, afraid of its contents. Hoping to avoid it from coming true he had forced it to the back of his mind.
But of course it would choose this very moment to get into his head again. Stranger than that even, he welcomed it, because Kate had never mentioned that the trolls were going to eat them. In fact he recalled her saying something along the lines of seeing them all after dawn.
Dawn, of course. It couldn't be too far off now, if he had reckoned right. The storytelling at the campfire must have gone on until well after midnight and since it wouldn't be too long before summer would arrive, the days were long. Dusk came late and dawn came early. If only they could stall for more time… But since he had actually no idea how to do that, they were back at square one.
But he was Thorin Oakenshield and he would not go down without a fight. It was below him. There had to be something he could do.
He hadn't even finished that thought when he saw it: a pair of eyes looking into the trolls' camp from a safe hiding place. They were taking in the situation, studying every detail with an intense stare. At first he had no idea who that person was. None of his men was unaccounted for and as far as he knew there weren't many people traveling the wild besides them, except maybe a few rangers, but they usually stayed away from trolls. It was just his company that was stupid enough to literally run into those monsters.
Then he saw the fire reflected on a mass of reddish brown curls as the person they belonged to shifted and he knew her: Kate. He shouldn't be surprised to find that she had once again completely disregarded his orders and had followed them. But part of him, and he was as of yet unsure as to how big that part actually was, was idiotically glad to learn of her presence here.
She glanced in his direction and caught his gaze. For a moment she seemed panicked, but then she crawled a little forward so he could see the rest of her face. Unfortunately, if the trolls turned around, they would be seeing her as well. She was painfully exposed and clearly totally unaware of it.
The question as to what she had to do was clear as daylight on her face. Thorin didn't have much of an idea either, so he settled for a mouthed: 'Get here.' The order was strengthened by some movements of his head – the only part of his body that he was currently able to move – as he first looked at her and then jerked his head backward, the equivalent of beckoning someone closer with their finger.
The puzzled look on her face told him she had no clue as to what in Durin's name he was trying to convey. 'What. The. Hell?' she mouthed back at him. His lip-reading wasn't spectacular, but he had come to know her favourite phrases quite well and he had the added bonus of knowing exactly what the look on her face meant.
So he repeated the gesture, taking care that none of the trolls saw it, and repeated, slowly this time: 'Get. Here.'
This time she did understand. It didn't mean that she was happy about it, though. Her eyes were full of disbelief first, but when she realised that he meant it, they turned rather angry. She mouthed something at him, what exactly he could not see, because it was both too fast and too long. Thorin imagined it to be something like 'Are you trying to get me killed?' or, slightly more probable, 'Are you out of your bloody mind?' though.
'Get. Here,' he repeated.
She threw him another incredulous look. 'How?'
This long distance communication was far less reliable than Thorin would have liked. But then, so was Kate's help. He had witnessed her fighting lessons and he wasn't convinced she could even harm someone when she tried, let alone take on three monstrous mountain trolls. But right now, the human woman was also the only option they had and he wasn't too proud to go ahead and take the offered help. Beggars can't be choosers after all.
He made a motion that meant go round the camp by that way and stay out of sight, but since that wasn't going to do the job all on its own he added an 'Go. Round.' for good measure.
This time he did catch the answer. 'You. Have. Got. To. Be. Joking.'
No, I'm not. Now get a move on. Of course she would never understand it when he said that. Talking in one word sentences seemed to be the only way to get a message across at the moment. 'Get. Here,' he repeated once more. He was all too aware that his men, the men he was personally responsible for, were being roasted on a spit as they were talking. Kate was being obstructive and uncooperative. Thorin had known for a while that she cared nothing about them, him least of all, but he didn't think she could leave them at the trolls' mercy either. Her very being her proved that.
The look in her eyes told her she wished him a slow and painful death, but she began to make her way to him nonetheless, using the bushes for cover. The trolls were too busy arguing about the best ways to cook dwarf and were therefore too preoccupied to notice the small human woman sneaking around their camp. And his own companions were too preoccupied by their horrible situation to have even noticed the arrival of the fifteenth company member.
It was for the first time that Thorin started to feel something that approached respect for her. Kate had not lied to them when she had said she knew how to survive in the wild. She was quiet, quick and took care to avoid snapping twigs as she moved. In this situation the dwarf king didn't think the trolls would hear her, but it was wise to be careful.
'What on earth did you think you're doing?' came a low hiss from his left.
'I could ask the same of you.' He turned his head in her direction, glancing back at his captors every few seconds. He lay some small distance away from the rest of the group, far enough it would seem not to distract them from their loud protests and vain attempts to wriggle free.
She huffed. 'You didn't think I could actually sit there and warm my feet by the fire knowing you lot were about to be turned into trolls' dinner, did you?'
As a matter of fact he would not have put it past her. 'Didn't you say something about seeing us all after dawn?' he demanded, not responding to her question.
She raised her eyebrows. 'Now don't tell me you suddenly believe me.'
He fixed her with his sternest glare.
'Fine,' she muttered. 'According to both versions of the tale Gandalf should be here in time. Right now the events seem to be following the movie. So if Bilbo can keep them talking, we should be all right.'
His mind effortlessly registered the most important word in that speech. 'Should?' he hissed. 'Aren't you sure?'
'No, I'm not,' she admitted, not meeting his eyes. 'Remember that night at the cliff, when we had that massive fight?' He nodded – how could he forget? – and she went on: 'You were meant to strut back into the camp after Balin's tale, but you didn't. I don't think the real events always follow the story, not to the letter anyway.'
This didn't do anything to improve his mood, or their chances for that matter, at all. 'Do you mean we could get eaten before help arrives?'
Kate's lips were only a thin, disapproving line as she shot him a dark look. 'What does that make of me, I wonder?' she said under her breath. She continued, a little louder: 'What would you have me do then?'
Thorin risked another glance at the trolls, but they were still not looking at them. Quite frankly, he didn't have much of a plan. There was one slowly forming in the back of his mind, but time was running out. As much as he hated this, he might be dependent on Kate's help and maybe even her knowledge. 'Should I not be asking you that question?' The words had left his mouth before he had really thought about them.
Her eyebrows shot up again. 'Are you asking me to use my knowledge of the story?'
'Yes,' he hissed back at her. He hated to say the word, but he'd be damned if he let his pride get in the way of their rescue. He was responsible for this company and their lives were worth more than his pride. He would swallow it if there was any chance of this woman and her book getting them out of here.
Kate thought about that for a second and then nodded. 'Right. Bilbo!'
The call was hushed as to not alert the trolls, but the hobbit had heard her. He looked up and a relieved look appeared in his eyes.
'Kate!' That was definitely too loud. The other dwarves in the heap now also turned to look at her.
The woman put a finger against her lips, telling them to be silent. Thorin more or less told them the same thing by sending them a glare that might have killed them on the spot if looks had that power.
'It's all right,' Kate told them. 'I'm going to try and get you out, but I need you, Bilbo, to distract those ugly bastards over there for a while.'
Bilbo shot her a quizzical look. 'How do I do that?'
Kate's face looked like she wished him a slow and painful death. 'Think of something,' she snapped. 'Keep them busy about the best ways to cook a dwarf. That'll keep that lot interested.' She shot him another irritated look. 'Oh, and the secret to cooking dwarf is to eat them hairless. Tell them the hair makes the danger of choking all that much greater. It would be a great idea to shave them first.'
Mr Baggins looked positively scared out of his mind, but at least he got up and hopped over into the line of sight of the trolls.
Thorin turned his back on Kate. 'Cut the sack open from behind,' he instructed her. That way the trolls wouldn't notice that something was amiss right away, even if they did look at them. What's more was that his body shielded Kate from sight. Those beasts wouldn't know she was there.
'Will do,' she replied. For once she apparently didn't feel the need to argue and for that he was glad. Now that they had a huge crisis to face they seemed to have some kind of truce, but Thorin had no illusions about the length of it. As soon as they were out of danger, they would continue as before, because nothing had really changed between them.
Thorin could feel her carefully cutting open the sack from behind and he tried not to think about the fact that her knife was awfully close to his neck right now. It was not that he really believed her capable of murdering him, but things were bad enough between them for him not to be comfortable with her holding a knife so close to his person.
To distract himself, he asked her a question. 'Why is the secret to cooking dwarf to shave them?' he demanded. He didn't think she was trying to humiliate them all, not really. She would be unaware of their customs, wouldn't know that being hairless was rather shameful for one of their race. That was what he thought at least. Still, he couldn't help but feel a little suspicious about it.
Kate was working her way down the length of his back now. 'It sounded like a better idea than what Bilbo came up with in the story,' she answered. 'He thought that skinning the lot of you was the best way. I thought I'd better provide him with a less harmful alternative.'
The sack was cut open down to his waist now, and since he was sitting, she could go no further. So, she moved the knife. First he had no idea where it had gone, but then he felt the cold steel at his wrists. 'What are you doing, woman?' he growled.
The reply was a snort, followed by the cutting of the bonds around his wrists. 'Murdering you in cold blood,' came the sarcastic spoken reply. 'With a bit of luck Bilbo can convince them of the shaving plan,' she added as an afterthought.
Thorin, now getting out of the sack as inconspicuously as he could, turned to face her, a frown in his forehead. 'Why would you want that?' he questioned. Could it be that she had somehow learned how humiliating that could be? He had believed that she had at least started to take some liking to the rest of the company, even if she hated him, but it would seem that he had been wrong about that.
A smirk graced her features and she shrugged. 'Well, to shave them, they need to remove them,' a head gesture in the direction of the fire and the spit above it, 'from the spit first. Who knows, they may even need to untie them.' If she had heard Thorin's wariness at all, she didn't show it.
Grudgingly he had to admit that her plan was not as ridiculous or stupid as he had first thought. If she had been any other than who she was, he might even have told her so, might even have admired her for thinking up the plan that might just save them all. Because, to be quite honest, he was not going to let it all come down to whether or not Gandalf would show up in time. Kate seemed to think that he would, but Thorin Oakenshield had not stayed alive as long as he had by being a fool. Her certainty was nothing but a mask. She wasn't so sure of her precious story as she would like to make him believe.
And neither was he. Dawn was still an hour away, at the very least, and all of them could be dead by then if they didn't do something about it. They might still die, no matter what, but he would go down fighting.
Kate cut open the sack of the dwarf nearest to them, which happened to be Balin. She then turned back to Thorin. 'What now?' she hissed.
Thorin glanced around. Mr Baggins was keeping the trolls occupied by his not too bad explanation as to why it would be a bad idea to eat dwarves with hair, but the dwarf king had no doubt that would not be sufficient for long.
An idea crept to the forefront of his mind…
Kate
This was a bad idea. Kate had known that from the very beginning, yet here she was, sneaking past some giant trolls in order to get her hands on the company's weapons. Thorin was right behind her, covering her back. Or that was what she liked to think anyway. Maybe it was her front that needed covering and was he using her as some kind of shield.
No matter which way you looked at it, she felt painfully exposed. A big part of her was already wishing she had just stayed in the camp, waiting for dawn to arrive. The prospect started to look more tempting with each passing second.
But then, leaving now was no longer an option. She had lost that possibility when she had left camp, against Thorin's orders. And of course it had only gotten worse since then. Releasing Thorin and giving her knife to the others so they could get away too, that had not been so bad. It was Thorin's idea of what should happen next that was the problem.
'You are insane,' she hissed at him for the umpteenth time in ten minutes. They were sneaking around the camp as she said this.
He met her glare with perfect icy indifference. 'I will not wait for a wizard who might not even show up,' he told her. 'Or do you now suggest I leave my men at the mercy of these monsters?'
It was more of a challenge than a real question and her impulsive side couldn't help but respond to it. 'Of course not!' she snapped, a little too loud perhaps.
In this case she really meant it, but this side of her had gotten her into trouble more than once. It was her flaw, she knew it, one that might well prove fatal one day. Once a challenge was put to her, she couldn't refuse, eager, almost desperate, to prove that she could keep up with the best of them. Thorin might as well have been suggesting she'd dance the tango in front of those trolls to distract them and she'd have agreed to do it. She would have regretted it the next second, but that was not the point. Fortunately for her, that was a part of her character he had not yet discovered.
'I'm not as heartless as you make me out to be,' she added in an angry whisper.
He at least had the decency to look a little ashamed, if only a little. It was apparently a part of the Oakenshield code not to show too much emotion. The man was a riddle wrapped up in a mystery, almost impossible to read. The only thing that was clear was that he absolutely loathed her. And part of her didn't understand his behaviour. Unreadable though he might be, one thing had been a constant thing these last few weeks: his complete and utter dislike of her. But now he behaved as if he suddenly thought she could be a valuable addition to the party. There was a kind of unspoken truce between them for the moment. No doubt he would go back to conveniently loathing her as soon as the crisis was over.
'I still think you're insane,' she told him for good measure.
Thorin's brilliant plan, if brilliant was the word that could be used for such a suicidal scheme, was to get their hands on some weapons, then get two ponies and ride them as far away from this wretched camp, leading the trolls on a merry hunt, while their companions freed themselves in their absence.
In Kate's opinion there was a number of things terribly wrong with this plan. First, the trolls might not fall for it or they might simply think Thorin and Kate didn't really matter, second, there was just no way their ponies could outrun these creatures and three, they needed to get to the ponies first without being seen. All in all, Kate thought the plan more than a little reckless. She hadn't taken Thorin for a reckless fool. But then he had given himself and his men up for the life of a hobbit he didn't even care about and, what's more, he was planning on taking a huge mountain back from a fire-breathing, almost invincible monster with a company of fifteen persons, half of them not even warriors. Maybe she should not be so quick to dismiss the thought.
'Can't we just not go to the weapons first?' she pleaded. The pile was far too close to the monsters' cooking fire for her liking.
He fixed her with a stern glare. 'I do not have my sword,' he pointed out.
She snorted. 'Then take mine,' she snapped irritably.
'That's my spare sword,' he informed her.
'Then take it,' she insisted. 'I'm no good with it anyway.'
The expression on his face told her he wholeheartedly agreed with that statement. But he surprised her by shaking his head. 'I will not leave you defenceless.' The tone told her that this was one of those things that was non-negotiable. 'Stay here. I will go alone.'
With that he left her at the tree they had been hiding behind for the last half-minute, sneaking to the pile on his own. He left her with a lot of questions. Kate had known he could behave like a gentleman if he felt like it, but now was not exactly the time to be noble. And if he was insisting on being noble, then why to her? They had done nothing but fight for the last few weeks, all but biting each other's heads off. A mystery he was indeed.
Her attention focused on Bilbo, who was keeping the trolls busy still. It would have been comical to see him, tied up in a sack to his neck, all but lecturing trolls on their cooking skills, if this situation had not been so serious.
One of the trolls obviously wasn't buying it. 'What do you know about cooking dwarf?' he demanded.
Fortunately his friend, if trolls were capable of forming bonds of friendship, interrupted and requested Bilbo to go on, promoting him to the number one on Kate's list of which troll was the most stupid.
'You can't reason with them!' Dori shouted from his uncomfortable spot over the fire. 'They're halfwits!' That seemed a bit exaggerated to Kate. As far as she knew they didn't have any wits to begin with, let alone that they should be in the possession of as much as half a wit.
Bilbo now looked a bit nervous, but he went on regardless. 'The secret to cooking dwarf is…' He seemed to have forgotten what they had agreed upon.
If you tell them to skin the dwarves, then I'll swear to God I'll put you on that spit myself first chance I get, she thought.
'Yes? Come on!' one of the trolls urged him impatiently. He leaned over, his face less than a metre away from Bilbo's, making the hobbit even more jumpy than he already was.
'I was getting there,' the hobbit managed to say, looking like he would like to do nothing more than to run for the hills without a second thought. The only thing holding him back probably was the sack. 'The secret to cooking dwarf is to shave them first!'
'At least the hobbit does as he is told,' a soft voice remarked behind her in a very patronising tone.
'Thorin!' That was definitely far too loud, but the protests the dwarves made to that suggestion drowned out her surprised shout. 'Stop doing that!' she added with a glare that had scared even her brother into shutting up. 'You'll scare me to death.'
The dwarf king was wholly unimpressed. 'That'll save the trolls the trouble.'
She was about to hit him, shout at him or do something else equally stupid when she realised that he had in fact been joking. Kate knew some warriors felt better if they joked whilst being in a dangerous situation, but she of course had no experience with that whatsoever. Right now, she found it strangely reassuring.
As long there's humour, there's hope, she told herself, managing a wry smile. 'Very funny,' she commented. 'Let's get this show on the road, shall we?' The sooner this was over, the better she would feel. Why, oh why had she not just trusted in the story and Gandalf?
But she knew that the story was next to no use in this case. Dawn wasn't even close yet, as it had been in the story. They would need something more than Bilbo's half coherent chatter to keep the trolls from cooking and eating every single one of them.
Thorin looked slightly puzzled at the unfamiliar expression, but he seemed to understand the general idea of it and that was what counted. He beckoned to the ponies he had already freed while she was keeping an eye on the burglar and she followed him, even as common sense argued the wisdom of that decision. And it would be right to do so, she knew that. Even her most reckless part shied away from doing something this rash.
But there was really no other choice. Somehow she was unable to sit back and do nothing while the others were still in danger. That had become clear the moment she had defied Thorin and had gone after the company she now, against her will, was a part of.
'Bugger those dwarves,' she muttered, not for the first time that night, as she climbed on the pony.
'Ready?' Thorin asked. He was still his usual charming nothing-can-ever-affect-me-self, sitting on his pony as if he was King under the bloody Mountain already.
'If you are,' she shot back with more certainty than she actually felt. If I die in this, I'll haunt him for eternity, she vowed.
The best way to pull this off was to not think about this. Just pretend it's all a dream and that you'll wake up at the campfire or, better still, home if this goes belly-up. It was a kind of escapism, and in her opinion therefore equal to cowardice, but at the moment she could not have cared less. It was her way of dealing with this living nightmare and heaven knew she was in need of that.
She didn't know why she was even doing this. She wasn't some kind of bloody action heroine. She was useless in a fight, more likely to hurt herself or the pony than the actual target, her horse-riding skills were too few to even mention and she didn't feel very courageous either. But yet here she was, about to pretend she was an action heroine side by side with the person she hated most. Well, not most; her father had the dubious honour of claiming that spot.
The pony was unsaddled and there were no reins for her to hold onto. So she buried her fingers in the animal's mane, determined not to let go of them. She knew she was in danger of falling off, but she blocked that thought out as well. It really wouldn't do to get a full-blown panic attack now.
Lives depend on this, she told herself sternly. So stop being such a cry baby here.
That realisation helped a little. The plan was still reckless, stupid and downright suicidal, but it helped to know that lives depended on it. It also made her realise she had been acting rather selfishly, whereas Thorin was being the noble self-sacrificing king. That made her look even worse.
'Let's do this,' she said. 'On the count of three?'
The dwarf nodded. 'One…'
'Two…' She allowed herself to believe that the slight tremor in her voice was only because of the night's chill.
'Three!'
And the adrenaline kicked in. Kate could feel her heart pounding in her ears, making the rest of the noises sound like coming from a radio on a very low battery, as she galloped into the camp, straight past the trolls. 'Hey, ugly bastards!' she heard herself yell. 'Want to bet you can't catch me?'
Next to her Thorin was bellowing some kind of battle cry in his own language and then they were out of the camp. Kate had no idea why she was shouting insult at hungry trolls, or where on earth she had found the courage to do so. She decided on blaming the adrenaline.
That seemed to be the culprit for a lot of things she had no other way of explaining for. She felt ridiculously alive and, probably wrongfully, invincible. The thrill of outwitting a bunch of trolls somehow felt completely brilliant, and not dangerous at all.
The pony didn't seem to share her optimistic attitude. It ran as fast as its legs could carry it, as did Thorin's pony. The dwarf himself seemed perfectly composed. The only hint that this was not just another day's march for him was the concentrated look in his eyes and the frown in his forehead.
Then she heard it: the footsteps. Her newfound courage left her the second she realised that they were far too close and far too heavy to be anything else than the trolls. And there were more than one of them, she was almost sure of that. The forest was being torn apart behind them. She could hear trees being broken as if they were nothing more than dry twigs.
The thrill made way for pure unadulterated terror. 'Faster!' she screamed.
The pony had no problem whatsoever with complying with that demand. The ears of the animal were lying flat against its skull and Kate could see the white of its eyes. A sideward glance learned her that Thorin wasn't as calm as he had been, although his expression could better be described as ice-cold hatred than fear. There must be something in the Oakenshield code about not showing fear, because there was just no way he was not just as scared as she was.
While this chase had been the whole point of this scheme, now that it was succeeding Kate found herself wishing she had never agreed to it. She leaned over the neck over her pony, almost willing it to run just a little faster. The trolls were closing in on them if the sound of breaking trees was any indication. She didn't think she had ever been so afraid in her life. It froze her into place, effectively preventing her from doing anything apart from clinging to her pony for dear life.
And then the pony was gone. One second she was on its back, racing for safety, and the next she was suddenly hovering in mid-air, the only thing preventing her from falling on the ground, that was suddenly several meters below her, a pair of thick fingers, attached to one monstrous troll that looked at her like she was his next meal.
From Kate's notes: Oh, crap!
And on that happy note I'm going to leave you for now. Next chapter should be up next week and of course there's going to be more trolls then.
I really hope this thing worked out, because most of this wasn't planned originally. Please review to let me know what you thought? Love it, hate it?
