"How do you think the others are doing? Bofur and Fili and Elya and Kili?" Bilbo asked. "I hope his injury is getting better."
"Fine, they are all together. Most likely tied at the hip, as usual." Thorin grunted tiredly, thinking of his youngest nephews and their mysterious gifted girl. Bilbo laughed and left him standing there, returning to the fire for a hot beverage.
"That's a sweet couple if I've ever seen one." Balin cheerfully offered him a cup of tea, courtesy of Dori. "Married by next winter if I have my guess." Thorin snorted.
"I cannot condone tying a prince with a girl with no name, skill, or family. She has no means to defend herself, and she has little in the way of qualities a dwarf council would approve." Thorin sighed, rubbing his face, eyes turned towards Esgaroth and Laketown, where he knew his nephews as well as the girl and Bofur were kept safe from the dragon's wrath.
"Elya's not a fighter, no." Balin thoughtfully said. He looked into Thorin's eyes, serious. "She's never been one. She doesn't have to be. She's oblivious, and frail, she forgets herself, and would prefer easier work than what we give her." Thorin grunted, finding all of that true.
"But," Balin amended with a pointed glance, "She is not weak-willed. She has always remained hearty and kind, and tries her best to live up to our expectations, usually exceeding them, might I add." The old dwarf raised an eyebrow. "And besides, you don't see Kili flourish half as well as when he has her in his arms. Do you not remember the goblin tunnels? Mirkwood? The lad turns into a dwarrow I would be happy to name shield brother when he has her to protect."
Thorin rolled his eyes slightly. "That is not the only thing to base a marriage on, especially a dwarven one. You know our loves are intense."
"Aye." Balin raised both eyebrows. "But do you not also see Elya when she's with him? She blooms like an especially rare flower whenever he's nearby, and she encourages him in a way that reaches him like none other has before. They are each other's Ones, no mistake."
Thorin growled, sick of talking about this. He was still undecided, as he had always just left the softer side of ruling to Dis, who took care of the wedding approvals and courting trials. Marriage and love were long extended things with many steps, arguments, tests, and troublesome rules that Elya and Kili had basically skipped entirely.
"You cannot ignore it." Balin reminded him, as he turned to leave and watch the door for any change, "And if you refuse to give him the respect and attention he deserves, you will lose him." With that ominous, and slightly baffling sentence, Balin turned away and went to stand with Bilbo. Thorin grunted, frowning, wondering why Balin thought he didn't give Kili the same respect and attention that he gave Fili, that he gave all under his command.
The matter was dropped and forgotten in the wake of Durin's day and then after that there was little time to consider Kili and Elya's love life in the wake of dragonfire and terror.
Meanwhile, in Laketown, Elya and Kili were indeed nearby one another, though not in the best of spirits.
"There is a song in my soul, Kili," she whispered, tears dotting her eyes, "and it says nothing good for us or our friends."
"How do you mean?" Kili frowned, sweaty and pale, his eyes glazed slightly and looking like he didn't even see her. He had worsened, so much so that she feared for his life. He had no colour, and indeed, lay there sweating in his suffering. All this from a tiny little arrow head.
"Oh misty eye of the mountain. I see fire. High on the mountain. I see fire. Desolation comes upon the sky." She brokenly recited, the flaring in her heart made worse when the dwarf grit his teeth and shuddered on the bed, nearly throwing off Fili's hands which pressed him down. She sucked back her tears, and rushed to help, Oin hurriedly mixing something in a bowl to at least ease the pain.
Kili cried out, huffing and sputtering, he turned almost violently into Elya's lap when she sat next to him, hands cool on his cheeks and neck. "Elya, sing me a song. A nice one. Hushabye." He panted, trembling and gripping at Fili's arm and Bard's bed spread. She exchanged worried and fearful looks with Fili, as Kili's temperature continued to climb. Any worse and he'll be boiling his brain out his ears.
"Sure, Kili, anything." Elya whispered, swallowing and glancing around. Sigrid and Tilda were watching with blatant concern, the elder's arms around the little one's shoulders.
"He always liked this song, he wanted to hear it again since Rivendell." Fili whispered to her, quiet enough that he didn't distract them.
"A gentle breeze," she started, her voice dry and unused. Clearing her throat pushed away most of the fear and terror that gripped her so tightly, and she sang again with stronger force, capturing Kili's attention. "From Hushabye Mountain, blows softly, over Lullaby bay." Kili's consciousness seemed to come back into his eyes, and the hold Fili and Oin had on him weakened as his struggles ceased, mesmerized.
"-" Elya was about to continue when there was a creak, a snap, and then orcs started pouring into Bard's home. Terrified, Elya screamed and grasped for anything to knock away the ugly face that now snarled at her. Kili kicked viciously as best he could at an orc who had dropped right at his feet.
"Down!" Elya hollered, lunging for Tilda and Sigrid, and knocking away the orc that was threatening them. It turned its attention to her.
"Elya!" Fili yelled, but he was overtaken by another orc.
It was a rush of fear and swords in a too small place, and now and then Elya felt a push from a dwarven hand. Kili getting her out of the way, Oin moving her further, Fili getting her down when she needed to duck. She still caught the frying pan Sigrid tossed at her, Tilda getting a good shot in with a plate before retreating under the table. Bain was a good lad as well, reacting fast and viciously with a bench and a particularly vicious looking cooking knife. And then she noticed long blonde hair, and then orcs were dying left and right.
And red hair. "Tauriel!" She cried in relief, banging one of Bard's pots so hard on the head of an orc that the pan dented and became useless. If the situation had been anything other than what it was, Elya would have hugged the elf woman.
After the arrival of the elves, the fight was over rather quickly, and Legolas glanced at them all once before rushing out, calling for Tauriel to come.
She started for the door, but was stopped by Kili's cry of agony, collapsed where he was on the floorboards.
Elya sobbed, running to him and finding him hotter than before, the injury on his leg black and oozing. Her hands shook, too much was happening.
"We're losing him!" Oin stressed to them all, looking at Tauriel who wore an expression of deep conflict. Elya couldn't care anymore, wrapping her arms around Kili's head, she pressed her lips to his forehead and rocked him, fighting the way he flailed.
Kili cried out again, and Elya vaguely heard Bofur's voice, and then Tauriel was ordering him up on the table. Elya didn't bother wiping her tears as she held Kili's head steady for the men to get him up. She looked up at the elf maiden, desperate for any sort of comfort, and must have looked so pitiful that Tauriel reached for her cheek.
"Hush now, friend." Tauriel said, rushing to crush the athelas plant between her hands, "I will save him." And she started to chant in her beautiful language, shoving the whole of the plant into Kili's leg without even a warning. Kili screamed so loud Elya was shocked the neighbors hadn't come running, and she practically laid on him to keep him still.
"Come on Kili," Elya whispered through her tears, knowing the dwarf was too far away to hear her, writhing and twisting as he was. They all held him down, Tilda and Sigrid too, the brave girls. And slowly, the tension left Kili's body, his eye opened and he stared in undiluted shock and awe at Tauriel.
Oin too was watching her, listening with his horn, a look of distinct amazement on his face.
When she finished chanting, Tauriel released Kili's wound and almost stumbled, falling back. Fili jumped forward to put a hand on her back, staring between her and Kili, who was blinking his way back to the real world.
"Elya?" He rasped, turning his head to look for her. She collapsed on him, gasping out her gratitude and relief.
"You great, lumbering, stupid, fool of a dwarf, damn it, Kili, I love you, you, you terrible, awful, stupid fuc-" Elya sobbed, cut off by his sudden kiss, hand tight and strong in her braided hair.
"Well, seems he's much better now." Bofur commented dryly, but not without great relief.
Elya broke from Kili, still wanting to rant at him but just happy that he was alive and smiling at her, tired. She stroked his face, urging him to close his eyes and get some rest. He did, sighing at the lack of pain, only that of the normal wound hurting him now instead of the feeling of his blood boiling under his skin.
"Tauriel." Elya swallowed her tears, wiping them and standing tall, "I owe you everything, anything you want." Elya looked up to the elf's soft smiling eyes before giving a shaky laugh, rushing the woman and wrapping her arms around her middle.
Elya rested her head against the elf's breast, holding her tight and smiling when she brought her own arms around Elya's shoulders.
"It was in my power to do so, I require nothing from you." Tauriel said, gentle. Elya drew back to look up at her.
"Still." she said, exhaustion settling into her limbs. What a wild night. "If ever you need something, I will provide. You are my friend."
"As you say, friend." Tauriel put her hand to her chest and bowed her head, the elf version of the embrace Elya had just given her. Elya beamed, before moving to hug all the rest.
Fili kissed her forehead, and then bowed to Tauriel, offering her his service in payment for Kili's life.
Elya turned to Sigrid and Tilda, who were still shaken by the appearance of the orcs and then elves and then this sudden quiet after such a battle in their own home. Elya hugged Tilda, who hid her face in her chest, and took hold of Sigrid's hand.
"You two did well, your father will be proud." Elya smiled, before pausing. "After he's worried of course, and mostly likely smacked us around for putting you in danger." Sigrid gave a shaky laugh and Elya felt calmed that she wasn't too frightened. Hardy children, these.
"Miss Elya?" Bain said a little shakily from the window, "What was that song you were singing, just now? Not the lullaby, but the, the fire one?" He seemed preoccupied with staring at something, staring towards the mountain.
Elya froze, holding Tilda tight. The girl looked up at both Bain and she, eyebrows furrowed in worry.
"What is it?" the girl asked, "What do you see Bain?"
"Fire." He swallowed. "In the mountain."
There was a rush to the window, and indeed, there was a bright golden light being emitted from the base of the Lonely Mountain. Elya licked her lips, hand suddenly taken by Bofur, who watched her with worry, waiting, she realized.
"Oh misty eye of the mountain, below." She sang quietly, Kili sitting up behind her with his brother's help, Tauriel not too far from him, eyes distant and old. The spot of light in the mountain did look something like an eye of a great monster bent on destruction, lumbering tall and silent in the night.
"Keep careful watch of my brother's souls,
And should the sky be filled with, fire and smoke,"
Elya took a deep breath, the words to a song she never remembered learning rising out of her like truth on great wings.
"Keep watching over Durin's sons."
The dwarves were silenced, and Elya felt a strange power in her chest, forcing the words from her. She didn't want to sing anymore, but that seemed irrelevant to whatever was pushing the song into her soul. The mountain gleamed in the night, and with the way they were all looking at her, Elya thought her companions were beginning to understand what was going to happen, the anticipation high on the air.
"If this is to end in fire,
Then we should all burn together
Watch the flames climb high
Into the night-"
Elya's voice rose, growing with strength, because she could see it, could see the great drake in her mind waking and stretching his neck out, teeth sharp and heart burning.
"I see fire inside the mountain,
I see fire burning the trees,
I see fire hollowing souls,
I see fire, blood in the breeze," Elya wavered, mind suddenly open to the truth, to their fates. She nearly slumped, but Bofur clutched her tighter, and she could feel eyes on her form from all sides, could recognize Kili's burning worry. But she had to finish, she had to...
"And as the sky is falling down,
It crashed into this lonely town,
And with the shadow upon the ground…"
There was a distant roar, a thundering shake, and everyone trembled, turning to the window, where the glowing golden light seemed to rise and fall, seemed to swell in the distance. A great flickering shape burst from it, climbing high into the night sky, and Elya sought to find her voice and finish,
"I hear my people screaming out...
Desolation comes upon the sky."
There was a beat of silence, eyes flickering between her and the mountain, and into the sky, everyone looking to each other for hope, disbelieving.
"The dragon is awake. And he's coming." Tauriel said, hand clutching her dagger. "We must leave, quickly. Quickly!" she urged, and everyone burst into motion, Kili shaking off Fili's efforts to help him rise.
Elya stood stock still for a second, horrified at herself for knowing that song, for not thinking of it sooner, and now her friends, this town, they were all in danger.
"Come on, Elya, love." Bofur said, his eyes frightened but his voice was comforting as he could make it. He took her elbow, urging her onward, and Elya shuddered her way out of her own despair.
"Please, please save us." Elya couldn't help whispering, not knowing who she was talking to. "Please, oh please." She got to Kili, who put her under his arm as he was wont to do, and she helped him climb the steps down to where Bard's small row boat sat bobbing in the water.
Smaug roared, and fell like devastation onto the wooden town built so precariously on the lake.
Elya couldn't breathe, the scene of death, destruction, and flame burning through her mind made her listless to all else. Eyes wide with panic, Elya was deaf and blind, drowning, drowning, even amid the great swoops and roars of an attacking, enraged dragon. Her dream came back to her, and she could see this great eye watching her, sapping her of strength.
"Elya!" "Elya!"
Elya gasped in pain, recoiling at a hard head butt, blinking the blackness from her eyes.
Kili's gaze was dark and angry, the lingering exhaustion and pain from the arrow made his face pale and pinched, and his hair hung limp and lank. He pushed her hard against the side of the boat when the dragon swooped low over the town, streaming fire everywhere he went.
The other occupants of the boat were ignored for the moment, as Elya was completely captivated by the way Kili was glaring at her.
He put his mouth next to her ear, hands gripping incredibly tight, tight enough to hurt on her arm and her neck. "You're mine and I'm yours." He growled, teeth almost at her ear.
"What?" Elya gasped, unable to process.
"You're mine, and I'm yours," he bit out, "and nothing's going to take that away, not even an oversized lizard! You hear me?"
Elya nodded, her bout of doubt and fear abated for now. "I hear you."
"Now come on!" He pushed an oar into her hand. Elya took a deep breath and set about getting her side of the boat moving. Tilda and Sigrid held each other tightly just in front of her, with Bain just in front of them.
"Da!" He suddenly screamed, pointing to the top of the bell tower. Elya gasped at finding Bard standing tall upon it, firing arrows at the dragon as he swooped by and over. It was in vain however, as no arrow could pierce the hide.
The boat nearly upset when Bain launched himself up and out of it, gripping tight to a hook pulley and swinging himself away. His sisters cried out for him and Tauriel halted Bofur's attempts to run after him.
"We cannot go back!"
"But it's Bain!" Tilda sobbed.
Elya swallowed and reached over to grip the girls' hands. "He's gone to help your father. Remember, the black arrow? All we can do now is get out of their way. Come on." She handed Sigrid her brother's oar, and they were off again.
The town burned all around them, people ran screaming back and forth, but their boat had no room for another. Somebody burst out of a top story window, screaming and on fire, and fell with a splash to the water. Elya didn't look as they passed.
Their boat was nearly tipped once again when a large, treasure filled scow rammed into their side.
"Get out of the way!" a rough man's voice cried, one of the towns guardsmen. It was the Master's boat, Alfrid and he ignoring the desperate cries of their people around them.
"Disgusting." Elya muttered, watching how the gold fell over the sides just to sink to the bottom of the lake.
"Greed and avarice." Fili snarled uncharacteristically, blue eyes glinting cold and frost like in the fiery atmosphere.
As they drew away from the burning town, Elya felt her heart rend at the looks of fear and grief on Sigrid and Tilda's faces. Not only was their home burning, all their worldly items, but also their father faced down the dragon himself, their brother too right there in the centre of the flames.
The night grew colder the further away they went, but they all had their eyes on the town, on the way the dragon swooped and eventually landed, his voice booming unintelligibly over the waves. Elya was shocked by the size of him, by his rage.
And he was staring at the half-destroyed bell tower, where Elya could only guess that Bard and Bain were facing him down. The dragon spoke, but it was so dark and heavy that Elya shook to hear it, ears shuttering at the sound.
It was Fili who saw the flash of the arrow, and Smaug started to stumble, his cry echoing over the lake and up against the mountain sides.
"Has he, have they?" Elya gasped, clutching Kili's arm around her middle.
"He has!" Kili cried, as they watched the dragon fight to claw his way into the air, getting as high as the clouds before he stilled and his fire dimmed in his chest.
Smaug fell, crashing into the remains of the town and causing a great wave to ripple out. Their boat was rocked with it, but it didn't stop Bofur and Fili from cheering, or from Sigrid and Tilda laughing in relief. Kili turned to Elya and wrapped her up, kissing her fiercely on the mouth. Elya could only hold on, squeezing him back and feeling how their smiles crashed together through the kiss. Fili cheered again, wolf whistling at them, and Kili drew back to tackle him, as much as one could tackle in a boat.
"Your Da did it, he did it!" Elya squealed, seizing the girls in her arms. She grinned at the dwarves, at Tauriel, at Kili, who was triumphantly hugging his brother, crowing.
"The dragon is dead." Tauriel sighed, and they continued to float towards the shore where a few campfires had sprung up, the remnants of Laketown, the survivors.
"I hope Da and Bain are okay." Tilda whispered into the night, shivering into her shawl.
"They are." Kili said, confidently. He continued rowing, but glanced back at them, somehow seeming like a pillar of strength even through the mist and the cold.
"We will reach the shore in less than a half hour." Tauriel patted Sigrid's shoulder, a little awkwardly but with all the grace of elf kind. Everyone took a turn at the paddles, pushing their boat slowly through the water following the few other boats that had managed to escape.
Dawn was soon approaching, and they reached the shore just as the sun began to peak its way beyond the ridge.
The people of Laketown were grieving and yet made quick work of building up camp, fires keeping a huddle of people warm, small children covered in soot and dried tear tracks. Old women shivered and shuddered, holding tight to their living children. There were cries of grief and hurt, terror and pain, and Elya shuddered inside to think that they had brought this down upon them.
She shared a pained grimace with Kili, who seemed suddenly beaten down by the destruction their quest had wrought on a people who didn't deserve any more hardship.
"I must leave you, now." Tauriel told them, as Tilda and Sigrid disappeared in their people's crowd searching for the men of their family. Elya wanted to go see too if they were alright, but Fili and Bofur and Oin were itching to get to Erebor and see if their company had survived.
"So soon?" Elya said, frowning but holding one of Tauriel's hands.
"Legolas will not wait long." The red haired elf turned and looked outwards, to something neither Kili nor Elya could see.
"As you wish." Kili sighed. "Thank you for saving my life." He deliberated while the women hugged, Elya squeezing Tauriel's middle tightly.
"Here," Kili handed her something. Fili called for them both, the other dwarves heaving the boat back into the water. It was the stone he had borne from his mother, which had the runes for RETURN inscribed on its side. "That's a promise from you now, for us to see you again." Kili half-smiled at Tauriel, who seemed surprised yet touched.
"Goodbye, mellon." Tauriel nodded her head, then loped off with the stone clutched tightly to her breast.
"She's a good friend." Elya whispered as they helped the boat into the water, "I hope she fares well."
"Most likely better than us." Kili tried to smile at her, but worry and fear made his expression tight. Exhaustion ran in great circles under his eyes and Elya felt deeply for him, knowing she probably looked just as drowned.
Then, they were floating back out into the lake, heading now towards the great peak of Erebor and keaving behind the remnants of Laketown's people.
