Oh my god...another weekend update?! Haha, enjoy. ;)
Sigrid screamed and hurried to close the door. The orc I had stabbed fell, but another dropped from above and thrust a sword into the doorway. We had been followed, and our enemy had finally caught up with us.
The shrieks alerted everyone that we were under attack.
The back door of the house was suddenly knocked off it's hinges and a towering orc entered Bard's home. Oin threw an array of pots and pans at the brute. Another orc dropped from the ceiling, leaving a hole in the roof.
I spun around, weapon raised. Adrenaline spilt into my veins, making more and more chills run through my body, mixing with my fever. Sigrid and I pushed ourselves up against the front door, throwing our combined weight against it in effort to force it closed.
The door swung open powerfully. I was flung into the floor and Sigrid lost her balance, ultimately tripping and falling over one of the benches by the table.
More orcs dropped from the ceiling and Bard's kitchen looked more like a battle ground than a kitchen. Tilda shrieked and flung a nearby bowl at an orc. Sigrid hid under the table, dragging Tilda down there with her.
Fili slammed himself straight into an orc, effectively knocking it off balance and managing to stab it in the side.
I rose from the floor, my head spinning, my body still shivering. An orc popped up from the entrance to the toiler beneath the house that we had used yesterday and I quickly swiped my blade across his throat, heard his body fall against the docks and splash into the water. I slammed the door shut and quickly shoved a splintered beam through the ringbolt lock it had.
I moved around the kitchen, blocking swords and swiping at whatever exposed flesh I saw.
The table was knocked over, leaving poor Sigrid and Tilda exposed. I hurried to their side, grabbing Tilda's hand. "C'mon, we need to get you out of here!" I yelled above the noise. I managed to get the girls to their feet, as Oin and Fili fought off the oncoming orcs. We made for the front door. An orc stepped into our path and I prepared to kill it, when suddenly there was the flash of a knife and fiery auburn hair.
I stopped my blade into time to avoid stabbing the rescuer. "Tauriel?!" I yelled.
"Rue?" She appeared surprised to see me a Laketown home as well. The moment of surprise was a brief one however. More orcs entered the home and soon neither of us had a second to question why the other was there. Sigrid and Tilda ran and hid again. I ducked out of the way of one orc's sword and stabbed another in the leg. My stomach did not appreciate the high amounts of adrenaline and constant turning about and quick movements.
I pushed my bodily discomfort aside and sank my blade deeply into the side of an orc, pulling the weapon back covered in deep red.
I saw from the corner of my eye another figure drop from the roof, but it was not an orc. It was a blonde elf. Legolas, the prince of Mirkwood.
He may have been my enemy yesterday, but tonight I was happy to see him.
Tauriel moved fluidly around the mess, her blade like an extension of her body. I tried to move around as nicely, but my body protested. I heard Kili in the nearby room. Kili! We had left him alone while trying to protect the girls!
I rushed over to the side room he was in, but an orc stepped in front. I crossed our blades, blocking him. Kili, despite the fever, managed to pull himself from the bed.
I backed away from the orc and went to stab him, and was startled when two blades, one of which was not my own, entered his chest. Legolas stood by me, his own sword in the orc's heart.
Our eyes locked for a second, and he was surprised to find me as well. Not to mention he was probably angry with me for insulting his father and disregarding his forest. He turned his back to me and gracefully cut across the chest of another orc.
Well, as long as he was killing our common enemy I wouldn't bear him any ill tidings.
Tauriel made to stab an orc standing in the threshold of the side room. Kili reached him first, impaling him in the back. The orc fell, and Kili stumbled and collapsed over a step, falling onto his injured leg and jarring it aggressively. He yelled out in what was no doubt agonizing pain.
The two elven warriors killed the last few orcs. "Kili!" Fili ran to his brothers side.
"There are others." Legolas stated, already exiting the house after them. "Tauriel, come." Tauriel turned to go with him.
"We're losing him." Oin said, hovering over Kili.
Tauriel glanced over Kili. She looked torn. Again she turned to go and leave with the Mirkwood prince. I was frozen still between the elf and the dwarves. "Kili…" I breathed, my heart caught in my throat. Kili was dying.
"Tauriel!" I turned to the elf before she left. She looked at me, and although she was a soldier and not a healer I trusted she knew something of wounds and fevers from battles. "Do you know how to save him?!" I asked, desperately. "Can you try to save him?!"
"I have nothing that can heal him." She replied.
"Tauriel, please!" I demanded. Kili groaned on the floor. "He will die if you don't do something!"
Tauriel seemed to frown sadly at this. Bofur suddenly appeared, colliding into her. "Bofur!" I called. "Did you find it?" I ran outside.
Bofur was climbing back to his feet. "What are you doing?" He asked of Tauriel. The elf maid was holding a silvery green plant with white flowers. Atheleas.
"I'm going to save him." Tauriel breathed.
"You will?" I asked.
"Boil water." She told me, already serious and stepping into the role of the elven healer.
"Already have some boiled." I nodded. I burst into the kitchen and poured steaming water into a bowl. Tauriel joined me and began to carefully steep the Atheleas.
"Get him on the table." Oin said. Kili was lifted, and it must have been awful on his leg. The dwarves planted him down on the table.
Kili was practically delirious now, his fever and the agony of his arrow wound too much for him.
"Hold him down." Tauriel said.
I rushed to Kili's side with Oin and Bofur and Fili and tried to keep him lying flat on the table. Such was a difficult task. You wouldn't have thought a dwarf that was as ill as Kili would have such strength in him still. He certainly put up quite the fight. It was like he was still trying to fight off orcs. "Sigrid!" I called her over.
Sigrid joined us. "Tilda!" Tilda came over as well, the two of them holding down one of Kili's legs. Fili and I were pinning down a shoulder each.
Tauriel stood by us, collecting a handful of Atheleas and began a slow healing chant in elvish. She crushed the leaves between her palms and then pressed the green and silver herb onto Kili's leg. It must have burned against his skin, because Kili let out another cry of agony. Tauriel continued her chant, firmly pressing the Atheleas against his wound. I continued to pin Kili down, feeling as though I was made of ice.
Kili settled finally, looking over at Tauriel. His breathing calmed and soon his head fell back and he blacked out. This was a good thing as he was finally out of pain, and we did not have to hold him down anymore. Tauriel spoke her chant and applied more Atheleas. The whole healing ritual was repeated by her three times, until she judged that his wound was finally better.
Oin watched the whole process with wide eyes. Elvish healing really was a sight to behold. Fili looked rather calm now, his brother in good hands at last. Bofur was beaming ear to ear.
I felt sick. Awful sick. Nausea flared and I rushed down to the toilet. Thus began a long and painful fit of coughing. Liquid leaked from my mouth, but it did not taste of bile. I gently touched my lips and was shocked to find them colored scarlet. I had coughed out blood.
Which was certainly not the symptom of any fever I had experienced in my life. Not to mention definitely not good. My body shivered and my forehead burned. "Tauriel…" I called from below the house.
The trap door to the dock and toilet opened and Tauriel's voice floated down. "Yes, Rue?"
"Do you know what happened to Kili?" I asked, my voice shaking with chills now that I was in the cool evening air.
"He was struck with a poisoned arrow." Tauriel answered. "Legolas and I learned of that before we went to hunt down the orcs."
"Oh no…" I groaned.
"Rue?" Tauriel climbed down. "Rue!" She saw me and ran to my side.
"There was an arrow in my barrel…" I tried to explain. Tauriel looked like nothing but a wave of red hair. "I had to get it out, and the string I…" Another, smaller hail of coughing erupted from my mouth.
"Into the house." Tauriel urged me. "Now."
I climbed slowly back up. Kili was sleeping on the table, Sigrid placing a pillow of walnuts beneath his head. Tauriel burst up, quicker than I. She touched my hands. "You've gone cold." She said.
"What's the matter?" Oin asked, stepping over to me. He touched my forehead. "Lass, you're burning up!" He touched my forearm. "And you're as cold as ice everywhere else."
The room spun, all bright light and too many people near me. "I…the arrow…" I coughed out.
"She's been poisoned." Tauriel replied for me. "Also by a Morgul arrow."
"Is she going to be alright?" Fili asked the elf.
Tauriel nodded. "Bring out blankets. We'll need to get her warm again." She stoked more Atheleas into a cup.
Sigrid and Tilda ran to get them.
I felt exhausted now. Tauriel looked up from her herb and over to Fili who was standing next to me. "You might want to lay her down Master Dwarf." She said. "It's likely she may-"
I fainted.
/
He had managed to catch her before she hit her head against the floor. He held her up like he had that one day at Beorn's house, when she'd tripped out of the bath.
"Faint." The elf maiden finished, rushing over. "Rue…" The elf, Tauriel, gently urged her awake. Rue opened her eyes, tired and confused.
"Yes?" She said softly. She blinked, her eyelids heavy, nearly blacking out again.
"Oi, stay awake." Fili jostled her in his arms, snapping her back awake. "Stay awake Rue."
"Drink this." Tauriel ordered, not taking no for an answer and spilling the contents of the teacup down Rue's throat. Rue obediently swallowed. Bard's daughters came rushing back down the stairs, blankets in hand.
"Wrap her up." Tauriel said. "Try to keep her warm."
Rue was placed in the bed in the side room and Kili remained on the kitchen table. She had fallen asleep again. Fili watched as Sigrid and Tilda laid a thick quilt over her. The breath had froze in his chest when she fell. One moment she'd been standing and the next she collapsed. Poisoned…somehow, despite her bumps and bruises she'd received over the journey Fili had never quite imagined something this threatening would have happened to her. Those previous injuries had been realitively minor ones. And most had been only accidents and quickly healed. This…to see a bloody red stain against the corner of her lips, hear Tauriel speak of poisoned arrows and then see her fall to the ground…
The next hour or so was spent in great concern for him. He paced between Kili and Rue. Tauriel was stitching up Kili's leg and properly cleaning it. Kili had started to sweat, a good sign that his fever had broke.
When he wasn't watching over his brother he was holding Rue. Everyone had taken to holding her up against then, almost like she was a small child, hoping that the heat of another body would warm her up. They rotated between themselves, Oin, then Sigrid and Tilda, then Bofur, then himself.
He sat there at the side of the bed now, Rue leaning against his chest, curled up beneath her quilt.
He glanced out the doorway and over into the kitchen at his brother. Kili stirred as Tauriel nicely bandaged his leg.
"Tauriel…" He said, his voice was quiet.
Tauriel noticed that he had awakened some and smiled down at him. "Lie still."
"No, you cannot be her." Kili continued, his mind still confused in the fading of his fever. "She is far away. She… she is far, far away from me. She walks in starlight, in another world." He sighed. "It was only a dream." Kili paused, as though in thought. "Do you think she could have loved me?" He asked.
Tauriel looked as though she didn't know how to respond. Kili reached out his hand for hers, and then Tauriel gently placed her fingertips among his.
What was his brother thinking? Yes Tauriel was lovely, and she had saved his life a few times by now. He was especially thankful for that. But…she was one of the elves. And not just any elf, but an elf of Mirkwood. Thorin was sure to hate the idea of it all.
He was lost in thought, wondering about his brother's feelings toward the elf maid when he felt someone tugging softly at his mustache. He looked down into the quietly smiling face of Rue.
"How come whenever something happens to me, it is always you who is at my bedside when I wake up?" She asked.
He smiled, happy to see she was doing better. Then frowned at her. "How exactly did you get poisoned?" He asked seriously.
"There was an arrow in my barrel and I had to use my teeth to untie the bindings." Rue answered.
"Are you mad?" Fili replied. "Those were Morgul arrows, you should have known better."
Rue frowned a little back at him. "Well, it would have been doubly bad if I had been stabbed in the stomach by it. And I've never had the pleasure of tasting Morgul poison before." She tucked the blanket around her more. "How's Kili?"
"Look into the kitchen and see for yourself." Fili replied.
Rue tilted her head over and peered at Tauriel and Kili brushing hands. "Well, he certainly looks like he is doing fine now."
Fili nodded. "Uncle won't care for it." He said.
"Your uncle won't have to know." Rue replied. She touched her forehead lightly. "It feels like my fever broke."
"You're getting warmer too." Fili said. "Good thing, last time I held you like this you were still cold to the touch."
"I wondered why I was in your lap like this." Rue pondered aloud, smirking at him. "I must have startled you all quite a lot."
"You did." Fili nodded. "You fainted at the drop of a hat and I nearly forgot to breathe. Everyone was quite concerned after that."
"I did? Faint?"
"You can't remember?"
"Well, it felt like I had fallen or something, but everything was rather hazy by that point." Rue said. "I remember feeling sick in my stomach and running down to the toilet and coughing up blood. That much is still clear." Rue thought for a second. "Tauriel came down to me, and knew something was wrong. She must have made me climb back into the house. Everything got rather confusing after that. Everyone crowded around me and I felt tired and dizzy." She touched the back of her head. "Did I hit my head hard when I fell or anything?"
"I caught you before you hit the floor." Fili said.
"Thank you." Rue replied quietly.
The house shook again, and there was more rumbling from the mountain. "Good thing I was left behind." Rue muttered.
Fili didn't want to think of that situation. He had never heard of Kingsfoil growing inside Erebor. And the home of a dragon was no place to fall sick and faint."Rest up." He said to Rue. "The mountain's become more turbulent in the last hour. Something's happening."
"We'll have to get off this lake." Rue responded. She sighed. "I hope the others are alright."
"I'm sure they'll be fine." Fili said. They had all made it thus far in one piece had they not? Surely they'd be able to get inside the mountain, and manage to defeat Smaug.
"Ahh." Oin appeared in the doorway. "You're up again. Good, good."
"I'm too stubborn to be beat down yet." Rue smiled at the healer.
"Like a December forge." Fili agreed.
The healer came over and grabbed Rue's hands. "Speaking over December forges, you're still a little cold. I'll see if I can get some tea for you." Oin nodded. "Keep her warm Fili."
Rue wrapped the quilt tightly around her body. "Rest." Fili told her again. "We're safe for now." He held her closer, and she grew warmer against him.
/
I pressed my head down closer to Fili's chest. We were safe for now. The orcs had fled. The dragon was under a mountain. Kili was healing, and he was with Tauriel.
I was safe, and warm in Fili's hold.
The whole situation was oddly calm and pleasant. I was strangely happy.
Here I was, not traveling, not fighting, not running off into the horizon toward some goal. Things I had always done in my life, and quite constantly in the past two years.
I smiled against Fili's heart, hearing it beat within his chest, steady and strong. For a moment I closed my eyes, and it was suddenly like nothing else around me was happening. Bard's kitchen wasn't full of dust and still in some disorder. A dragon wasn't smiting a mountain. Everyone I knew and loved was out of danger as far as I knew.
There was only me. Breathing and alive and happy.
Right beside Fili.
The only sound drumming in my head his heartbeat and his even breathing.
The only thing to be felt his arms around my shoulders keeping me close to him.
I felt like I was home.
The thought startled me at first, but sank comfortably into me. I felt happy here. Like I belonged here. Just like this, in this moment.
And I wouldn't mind, in fact I would rather love it, if this moment could go on forever.
Forever. I wanted the rest of my life to feel like this moment.
And then it hit me.
It felt like I had been thrown against the ground, like a building had fallen on top of me. My whole mind burst at the thought of it and then everything snapped itself into order, making everything understood and I knew. I knew beyond doubt and with every feeling inside me.
I gazed up into Fili's face from my place against him.
The realization hit me, quick and hot and powerful, like a blaze of fire from the sky.
I loved him.
How's that for an epiphany?!
