CHAPTER 9

'Thieves, fire, murder!' The words punctuated the arrival of the most eccentrically filthy individual I think I'd ever seen. I actually gasped. The guy had bird poo dribbling down the side of his head, and a rabbit-drawn sleigh. This is it, I thought. Too much weed, now I'm having a drug-induced psychosis.

He came to a halt in the middle of our group, leering suspiciously. Gandalf had lowered his staff ages ago, so the rest of the company had relaxed their battle stances too. I looked bewilderedly at Fili, who looked exactly how I felt.

'Radagast!' Gandalf cried. 'Radagast the Brown!' He seemed relieved. I also felt relieved, that I wasn't going crazy.

I relaxed against a gigantic boulder and watched them talk. It was truly impressive to see the guy pull a stick insect out of his mouth. Magic! Gandalf never bothered with doing entertaining things like that. Boring old coot. They snuck off a little ways to have a little wizard-to-wizard chat.

I stayed silent and vigilant while the others talked and joked. Even the sight of Fili, looking glorious with his relaxed pose and sword dangling at his side, couldn't shake the feeling.

It happened in front of me, seemingly in slow motion. An enormous ugly wolf-looking creature with too many teeth for its head growled from above us, lunging down into the gully. While Thorin was busily decapitating it, another appeared. Kili drew an arrow and let it fly right past Thorin, embedding itself in the beast's head.

My heart exploded with the adrenaline. Gandalf and Radagast came running. I thought, though, that none of us would die here, that this was the beginning of the story. I smiled to myself, boldly walking up to Radagast and whispering 'mate, you got anything good?'

He looked a bit shocked, admittedly, but giggled quietly to me and passed me a small leather pouch that he drew from his robes. I nodded in thanks and slipped it into my trouser pocket. Thank Mahal for people who are quick on the uptake.

I was brought back to the issue at hand by a fantastic squelching sound as Thorin pulled his sword out of the creature's flesh. 'Warg scouts!' He growled frantically, 'which means an orc pack is not far behind.'

Shit-a-brick. We're in for it.

Gandalf and Thorin proceeded to have a very unhelpful argument about Thorin's loose tongue. I'd started to panic when Ori announced that the ponies had bolted, but Radagast came to the rescue with 'I'll draw them off.'

Gandy wasn't convinced. I didn't like this angry bastard of a wizard. 'These are Gundabad wargs. They will outrun you!'

'These, are Rhosgobel rabbits. I'd like to see them try.'

Best comeback ever. I made a mental note to offer Gandalf a bit of Mary-Jane when I next got the chance. Old Toby was clearly not cutting the mustard.

The company took off across a wide yellow plain littered with rocky outcropping. I was packed lightly compared to the others, but being a woman, tired quicker. Soon I was panting. Bugger it all… now Fili has to see me looking all asthmatic and hopeless. Never mind that the weakest is always the one that gets eaten first.

We hid behind boulders as the howling pack came thundering past. During the pauses I gratefully sucked in as many breaths of air as possible, oddly pleased to see that mine was not the only heaving chest. I don't know how far we'd run, it felt like quite a few miles.

We all remained huddled in the sheltered face of one boulder, as we heard a warg above us, atop the rock. I saw Thorin nod to Kili once, and the latter silently drawing an arrow, and stringing the bow. The arrow only managed to wound this one, and its rider angrily jumped off and stormed at us, weapon raised. The orc was no match for the warriors in the company, but the ruckus had clearly been heard by the rest of the pack, who came running with howling and heavy footfalls.

Not again! We took off, in the opposite direction, Gandalf yelling for us to stick together. We stopped at another boulder formation, Fili pushing me toward the rocks as he and Kili flanked the group, weapons ready. There were wargs and orcs in every direction I looked. We were well and truly fucked.

'There's more coming!' Kili shouted.

'Kili, shoot them.' Thorin commanded. And Kili fired arrow after arrow, as quick and as accurate as I'd seen the elf guy in Lord of the Rings do it.

Fili yelled, 'we're surrounded!'

My eyes darted back to the rest of the group. 'Where's Gandalf?' Dori asked.

'He's abandoned us!' Dwalin snarled again. Dwalin doesn't ever talk, he just snarls, even when he's paying compliments.

I'd not even had time to think why the wandering wizard would abandon us now. It seemed illogical when he'd done a whole lot of work to put this quest together.

He popped up from behind a rock. 'This way, you fools!'

Thorin grabbed a handful of me and threw me down a hole. The rest of the company came sliding in after me, one by one. I sighed with relief when Fili and Kili came crashing down too also unhurt. I stayed half hidden in the gloom, trying to be as small as possible, afraid of what would happen next.

'Where's Bonnie?' Fili asked frantically, walking through the group.

'She's here, and she's safe.' Gandalf said, his voice much calmer than I'd heard it all day. He gestured to me, huddled on the ground.

Thorin was glaring at his nephew, who saw me, nodded, took a deep breath and sheathed his sword. Distraction. Thorin's voice rang inside my head.

There was a brief commotion above us, and a dead orc came tumbling into the hole, landing a few feet from me. I hadn't seen one close up. Fuck, it was ugly. And smelly, like worse than melaena smelly. I recoiled, bumping into Nori.

Thorin yanked the arrow out of its chest, studied the tip for a second, before spitting out 'elves' and throwing the arrow to the ground.

Elves? I'd thought. Cool.

We followed the path, nestled deep within the rock, occasionally needing to turn onto my side to fit through. Poor Bombur had to be pushed from behind and pulled from the front to get him through the thin bits. I could hear waterfalls in the distance. I felt calm, and full of light. We rounded a corner and there it was.

I gasped, grabbing onto Bilbo's hand, who squeezed my hand back, equally as stunned as I was.

'The Valley of Imladris. In the common tongue it's known by another name.'

'Rivendell.' Bilbo answered, awe-struck, from next to me.

The valley was the most beautiful place I'd ever seen, nestled into the stone of the valley, bathed in sunlight and surrounded by waterfalls and the lushest of rainforest. There was magic in the air, here. I didn't even notice Thorin and Gandalf arguing (again), but was surprised to hear Thorin refer to the elves as 'our enemy'. I felt confused. Weren't they part of the good guys in Lord of the Rings?

As we hiked down into the valley, Bilbo and I kept smiling at each other, not quite believing that we were here. I also felt relieved, knowing that we'd have a safe place to stay tonight.