(A/N-start)
Happy Presidents' Day to all my readers who got this day off! To everyone else and those previously mentioned, I hope you enjoy the chapter.
As usual, I don't own Prototype, or anything written by Tolkien. If I did, I would be writing full time, rather than waiting for a macro to finish working.
Enjoy the chapter!
(A/N-end)
Ch 9- Arrival
"Now... There is only one."
Gandalf tapped his pipe with a finger. Ever since he had known Beorn, the man had been very... Ominous.
"You need to reach the mountain before the last days of autum." It wasn't a question- Beorn had helped several handfuls of fleeing dwarves, and knew about the task.
That was one of the many reasons that he had led the Dwarves this way after all. That, and the fact that the werebear hated the spawn of Morgoth with a passion. "Before Durin's day falls, yes."
"You are running out of time."
"Which is why we must go through Mirkwood."
"A darkness lied upon that forest... Worst still may lay beyond..." The large man's voice grew cautious. "I would not pass through there without great need." He leaned back on the stool, and a surprise number of cracks echoed off him. "I have heard that the Orcs of Moria have an alliance with the Necromancer of Dulgol Dur... But with Mirkwood as it is, I do not know which is worse."
"We will take the elven road- that path is still safe." Galdalf stated with more certainty than may be warranted.
"It is well traveled, that is true." Beorn's gaze was riveted to Thorin. "The wood-elves of Mirkwood are not like their kin. They are less wise... And more dangerous." He looked at Gandalf, then back to Thorin. "But it matters not."
"What do you mean?" Thorin demanded.
"These lands are crawling with Orcs... But Dale is held sway by the King Under the Mountain." Beorn stood up, picked up something, and tossed it to Thorin, who caught it reflexively.
It was a perfectly hexagonal golden coin, stamped with dwarven runes.
"Where did you get this." Whispered Thorin.
"I did say the path through Mirkwood is well-traveled." Beorn gestured towards a window. "Many traders pass by here- they buy honey from me, as well as seeds for their farms. In turn, I use the coin to purchase anything I don't have or cannot make- such as metal carving knives."
"But... Smaug is still alive?" Filli's voice wavered as he put down the large mug he had been drinking from. "Why would a dragon let any treasure be used for anything outside its hoard?"
Beorn shrugged. "The minds of dragons are beyond mine. But there is also this..." He picked a small jar off a shelf, and the company could tell right away that it wasn't one he had made. Too small, and smooth- it was barely bigger around than one of his hands. "They call these 'medi-sin' seeds. They are supposed to keep for years if not planted, and if I was feeling sick, the merchant told I should swallow one. It might make me feel more sick, but after a few days I would feel much better. These ones are for fevers, and have saved two kids already."
Gandalf's eyebrows rose. "Works on men and goats?" The wizard leaned forwards. "Do you mind if I-"
"I was hoping you would look at them." The huge man dropped the closed pot into Gandalf's waiting hand. He turned back to the dwarves. "As for your quest..." The werebear nodded to Thorin. "I think it will be easier than you believe."
"Why?"Asked Bilbo.
"The King has been sending scouts out to look for dwarves." Beorn rumbled. "Many have passed by my post, and the dragon is offering a reward for any who deliver the dwarves to him alive, unspoiled, and lucid." Large fingers delicately lifted down a price of vellum, with, written with unusually regular letters, was what could only be a job posting.
Bilbo, who couldn't read Dwarvish, piped up at this point. "What does it say?"
"It states that any Dwarf that is brought to meet the king is guaranteed safe passage through King Smaug's territories." Balin swallowed- territories? "And that anyone who escorts said dwarf or dwarves, and presents them to the King alive, unharmed, and lucid, will be given a reward of three golden coins or more." The dwarf's eyebrows had ascended to his receding hairline. "It is signed 'dictated by the authority of General Bard of Dale, as decreed by King Smaug."
"I will escort you to the trading point." Beorn said with not a little finality. "There, you may find easier passage through Mirkwood- but be warned. The road is guarded by both elves and... Something else." He looked like he was trying to find the right for it. "No matter on what it is called, but know this- do no harm to anything while on the road, lest /she/ appear."
"She?" Asked Bilbo.
"I will not say her name." Beorn loomed. "I do not like dwarves. They are greedy... And blind to the lives they deem lesser than their own.
The large man went to leave the room. "Eat. Tomorrow your quest continues." He grinned. "After that, I will leave to hunt some Orcs."
The resulting silence was particularly ominous.
The next morning was distinctly odd for Bilbo and company.
Beorn had, as promised, escorted them to his little trading post at the entrance to Mirkwood on several ponies, which he had then sent back to his house.
The trading post was a shed that was filled with simple jars, with a small sign on the door. The sign stated, in common, 'I will be back on:' with another board with a date on it. For all its size, it wouldn't have been out of place in the Shire.
Gandalf had spent the night glaring at the tiny pot, and had, with Beorn's permission that morning, sent a small bird with one of the seeds in its beak to... Someone else. Neither Bilbo or the dwarves managed to get anything out of him on the why or wherefor of this act, merely that he needed to do it.
They just chalked it up to another odd thing about wizards.
The entrance to Mirkwood was clean and well kept- but with an uneasy Wizard, rest of the Company was uneasy.
The elf that had been stationed there didn't exactly react to their presence, as he (or she, as it was hard to tell the gender of an elf in full armor) didn't even blink when he saw the troop waiting there.
Soon, however, a cart came down the well-trodden road, piled high with fruit and vegetables, heading towards the entrance.
"Ho there my good man!" Shouted Gandalf. "Wherefor are you bound?"
The man slowed his horses, and they could see that he had many, many different types of vegetables and fruit on his cart. "I be bund fur 'dat town of Dale. Yurself?"
"I, and my companions, are heading to Dale as well."
Several dwarves quickly hushed Thorin.
"Might we ride along with you?"
The man looked at the dwarves, then back at his cart. "Ye may hold unto the slats- but na' sit." He said sternly. "This is freshest from mine village, to take to 'da newest market in Dale... And it needn't be spoiled from crushing!"
Gandalf tapped his pipe. "I see. May we then accompany you, and hang our heavy packs upon your cart instead?"
"The oldest of you may sit with me, if youn need then." The man seemed pleased with that. "Stories of distant lands be hard to come by on ones own- even well-told hogwash."
Gandalf chuckled as he carefully lifted himself onto the bench seat, and looped a pack over a protruding slat. "Well said my friend. Óin! Balin! Come sit with me! Let us regale this man with tales of your adventures!"
After a few minutes, the company, and amused farmer, resumed their journey into the woods.
A journey that, in another time and place, might have taken the company a day or more ended up taking only a few hours. The forest path was bright and clear, although with a distinct lack of birdsong to be heard it was slightly odd to the ears of the Hobbit, but he was light enough too that a long belt from one of the dwarves was enough, when tied right, for him to have a sling to sit in.
Of course, that meant when the elves appeared out of the forest, Bilbo was caught completely by surprise- along with everyone else except for the wizard.
The company had not been imprisoned, or attacked by the elves- rather, they, and the grocer who had been gracious enough to give them a lift, had been escorted quickly, to the hall of the king of Mirkwood himself.
"King Thranduil, it is a pleasure to see you again." Gandalf stated as he walked towards the throne, and briefly nodded to the elvenking.
"Mithrandir." Thranduil acknowledged. "It has been too long, as always. But what brings you to my forest- with a cask of dwarves in tow, and... What is that?" He nodded at Bilbo.
"That is a hobbit!" Stated the diminutive figure defiantly. "And I have a name."
"Quite." Deadpanned Thranduil. He refocused on Thorin. "And you I have heard of from captured Orcs- Thorin Oakensheild."
"It's pronounced 'Oakenshield'." Supplied Balin.
"Really?" Thranduil raised a delicate eyebrow. "I would have sworn it was Oakensheild. At any rate, I have heard of you. The Pale Orc is offering a bounty for your capture- and Smaug wishes to see you as well."
The elves around them suddenly drew weapons, and had the dangerous bits pointed at exposed parts on the dwarves.
Thranduil turned away from the company for a moment, and extracted a large piece of vellum from a slit in his throne. Then, with the air of someone who was enjoying this way more than he probably should be, the elvenking unrolled the scroll and began to speak.
"I will spare you the diplomatic language this is coated in." He sounded gleeful. "But, in effect, Smaug the Calamity, King Under the Mountain of Erebor and the surrounding plains, has stated that, in the event that a scion of the old Royal line of Dwarves may be found, that any item of jewelry or weapon within his hoard may be exchanged for the dwarf in question in reward."
The scroll was languidly rolled up.
"I happen to want something from that hoard- something that is mine and is sitting within the hoard even now." The king's smile had no warmth in it. "Therefor, I will provide an escort- and accompany you into an audience with the king himself."
There was silence for a minute, before Gandalf dropped his pipe, and swung his staff, which was now blazing with light towards the king, who didn't even flinch- although the glamour on the left side of his face evaporated, showing the scarred flesh beneath.
"Who are you?!" Snapped the wizard. "The Thranduil I knew would never side with a dragon in any matter!"
"Before a month ago I had never been thrown around my own throne room by a witch and her pet!" The elf's single working eye was filled with annoyance. "Now stop wasting your power Mithrandir- we can both feel it. I am no darker than I was when you met me."
Gandalf doused the light, and sagged, looking as ancient and weary as the beard implied. "So... You are just going to let the dragon kill us all?"
The elvenking sighed. "Mithrandir, I think you are missing a major piece of news here. I do not wish to see you dead. The dwarves perhaps, as they are a generally uncouth and disgusting people, but even that I expect no to see." He clapped a hand on the wizard's shoulder. "Be strong my old friend- things have changed around the Lonely Mountain."
Dale was a bustling city these days.
It had been a month and a half since the citizens of Laketown had relocated, and in that time they had changed the appearance of the city immensely. Though Bilbo didn't know that specifically, he had heard, from the Dwarves, that Dale had been a forsaken ruin.
It obviously wasn't.
The streets were clean, the overgrowth had been pruned, and everywhere there were plants of all colors and shapes. Many of these were fruiting despite the chill, and there was the sounds of children playing even as the delegation of elves marched into town.
In the central square, next to a fountain, there was a raised platform where a woman wearing fine chain mail over a dress addressed a crowd of men, women, and children on the use of numbers.
"Remember, every time we reach another 'ten', we count up on the next number in the sequence." She erased a few things with a damp cloth off the massive piece of slate erected behind her stage, and began writing on it with a piece of some small, white stone. "Zero -which means 'no count'-, One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine- then a one and a zero for ten. Two and zero for twenty or two tens, on and on until... When?"
One of the members of her audience, a small boy with messy hair, raised a hand. "We pass-ed nine tens, up to ten tens?"
The teacher smiled and nodded. "Yes, but it can go higher. You can count higher than all the stars and all the people and ants and creatures and grains of sand everywhere in all creation just by adding more 'zeroes' onto the end of a number." She drew a symbol that looked like a sideways 'eight' symbol. "This is 'infinity'. Imagine as big a number as you can, and this is always larger. You cannot reach it, because it is always bigger than any other infinity."
A member of her audience actually passed out after hearing that- and several members of the Company had their minds reeling just from that sentence.
One of the elves, walked up to the stage, and approached the teacher.
"I need to talk with this elf, but can someone please awaken Lief there?" She leaned over, whispered with the elf for a minute or so, then turned to address one of the children in the front row. "Tilda, will you please get your father? He should be in the storeroom. Take the nearest Silence. Tell him the elven delegation is here."
A large group of young children stood up, stepping off what to Bilbo looked like a pile of furs, that, upon being released from the clutches of the toddlers and small children, suddenly spouted eyes.
Dozens of eyes.
"Valar preserve us..." Breathed Gandalf. "That's not a creature I have ever seen before..."
The creature stretched, six feline legs extending out as it rolled over, a long, sinuous body unfurling as it stood up. It's face was hairless, and distinctly unnaturally shaped, with six large horns revealing themselves as its hair shivered in a strange ripple, smoothing out until it looked as a leek as a fast hunting dog. Moving carefully, eyes along its limbs and flanks opening and closing o keep an eye on the children around it, even as it slithered through the crowd smoothly to lower its head in front of Tilda.
For her part, the girl never blinked, but hopped onto the seat formed by its odd horns without pause.
Then it moved, going from perfectly still to a ridiculous speed between two buildings. With barely a sound other than Tilda's "Whee!" of joy as it sped out of sight, leaving the elven contingent gaping in shock.
"What was that?!" Exclaimed Bilbo, unable to take the weirdness any longer.
Surprisingly, Thranduil answered him. "A Silence- one of many. They can look like trees, and you may see some planted around the city... But other than that? All is know is that they serve Her."
The company could hear the capital 'H'.
"If the king allows, we will continue with the lesson?" Asked the teacher onstage.
The elvenking nodded.
"Thank you, your highness." She turned back to the assembled crowd. "Next, is 'addition'. This is where we take two or more numbers, and put them together to make a larger number."
The lecture continued for a few more minutes, covering addition, subtraction, and multiplication- a concept that had Bilbo's head spinning, as it was introduced as 'addition but faster'- before the teacher stopped talking.
He looked up, and saw, sitting on one of the rooftops, a Silence with a black-plate-armored knight sitting on it. Dishearteningly, every single rooftop around them also had a Silence on it as well- watching and waiting.
Two other Silences shot into the square, one carrying Tilda, who was grinning and red-faced, presumably from the speed, while. The other was carrying a man in full armor, seemingly retrofitted from dwarven to human scale.
"Be told," stated the armored human, "that King Smaug has been alerted of your presence, and has arranged for an audience upon his doorstep. Please mount on a Silence if you haven't a steed upon which to ride."
There was a blur of black, and suddenly there were Silences everywhere, each one presenting a seat to every single member of the Elven contingent save King Thranduil, who was seated upon his magnificent fifteen-point buck.
"May we refuse to ride?" Gandalf seemed unsettled. "I don't wish to ride to meet a king upon steeds he has provided that I have never seen."
"No." That proclamation echoed from the black-armored knight on the rooftop as her (for her voice sounded distinctly female) steed leapt, landing in a clear place on the square without even a whisper, all of its eyes focusing on different members of the contingent. "Smaug despises to be kept waiting if expediency is an option- but don't be afraid. My Silences are friendly, and only violent if provoked."
Bilbo jumped as he was gently nudged from behind, and whirled around, only to come face-to-face with one of the creatures.
It gave him recognizable puppy-dog eyes as it looked up at the hobbit, even as it's neck was on the ground from it's attempt to look cute.
Said hobbit rolled his eyes, sighed, and scratched under the jaw of what was obviously a large meat-eater... Which purred like an earthquakes as the eyes on its head closed, obviously enjoying the feeling.
Tilda dismounted her steed even as the children rushed the Silence, pouncing on it and cuddling every part of it. The Silence, to its credit, slowly laid down, to let itself get pet and cuddled by the young multitude.
As they rode at a gallop (or gentle lope, depending on the steed), Bilbo was surprised by the smooth ride, and was about to comment on it before the female knight spoke.
"Elvenking, how's your hunting been?"
Said king bristled, even as she laughed, and her steed shot ahead, speeding up to the point where it was practically flying over the grass..
Bilbo decided not to comment.
Smaug's doorstep was... Not what any of them expected.
There was a wide pressed-dirt path leading from Dale to Erebor, but on either sides of it were farms. Small houses, timber and temporary, edged the massive fields, most of them covered in clover. On the fields of clover, herds of various animals grazed- cows, sheep, small herds of horses, and goats. Goats outnumbered pretty much everything else.
The hills themselves had been flattened like stairs, allowing for more and more farmland to be laid out around them, even as the path moved over hills and around craigs. The pressed dirt path soon gave way to an odd, blackened material, which the elvenking gracefully retrieved a shard of before handing to Gandalf, who was glaring even more after examining the piece.
A quarter-mile from the door, the ground became a single, continuous slab of the material... And upon that slab, with several attendants, and sitting on a plated stack of shields that sprawled half-in and half-out of Erebor itself, lay Smaug.
He was gesturing with a claw when needed, and, using the other, drawing various symbols on a large expanse of fine wet sand on his right as his attendants brought various matters to his attention.
As they approached, the delegation, and company, began to feel cowed. Smaug was huge. That statement didn't even really do it justice- he was titanic. A single claw was longer than a man, and the scales were thick and broad as the shields he laid upon. At the moment, his attention was focused on what one of the attendants was telling and showing him.
"The third expedition returned a few hours ago, milord." The attendant didn't squeak at all- an impressive feat, but somewhat overshadowed by the fact that he looked completely at ease.
"Already?" Rumbled Smaug. His free claw tapped on a thick shield, piercing it causally. "It has only been a day at most. What did they find?"
"More skeletons, of course, but also a large area filled with ingots of various metals- before the cave-in." The attendant held up a scroll, and Smaug leaned down to scrutinize it, his massive eye twitching as he looked over it. "We expect that one-half of the seventeenth sub-level is buried or blocked off- which matches what we have seen from the fifteenth and sixteenth sub-levels."
"Any news from the fourth and fifth teams?" Smaug deftly began pressing his claw into the sand at specific angles, forming letters in the large area with surprising speed.
"I took the liberty of using the third team as runners, and they found that sublevels eighteen and nineteen don't have any continuation of the collapse."
Smaug nodded, and focused on the attendant, who's knees wavered for a moment. "Good work. I expect a progress report tomorrow from the other teams- use the third team as runners to relay messages. My domain must be mapped."
"Very good milord." The attendant bowed, and retreated.
The armored man rode ahead a bit of the delegation, and, after dismounting his steed, bowed to the dragon. "My lord, the elven delegation and some dwarves have arrived."
The grin of a dragon unsettles most people in the same way that seeing a laughing snake or giggling crocodile does. It just looks wrong to a mammal. "Indeed?" The burning gaze swept over the assembly, coming to rest on a few individuals before moving on- mainly Thorin, the elvenking, Gandalf, and surprisingly Bilbo. The huge reptilian face focused upon the knight, and he nodded at the man. "Well done Bard. Bring them forward- they should have an audience now."
Ch 9 end
I hope that none of you are disappointed by the lack of bloodshed in this chapter. I know that violence isn't an answer, but is a question: and the answer is 'yes'.
Anyway, please review. I love to read where you guys think things are going to go for this story, and I only plan for another couple chapters.
Oh, and if anyone knows how to get in contact with Troy Hurtubise, the inventor and creator of the Grizzy powered armor suit, I would appreciate if if you could PM me.
Take it easy!
