THE SPIDERS AFLAME
It was a group of large and ugly spiders with long, hairy and prickly legs, grotesque fangs with sleazy voices that could crack the toughest glass and make the strongest shiver in their own skin. In the time Jeanne was away, they managed to wrap up all the Dwarves in thick webbing and hung them up as storage for wood. They hissed and crawled around their web around the Dwarves and debated in which one they should suck the life out of first, unbeknownst to them of the burning amber eyes that pierced through the thick leaves of Mirkwood. Jeanne wasn't far behind and used the darkness to her advantage to sneak around the spiders. They didn't seem much interested in anything else but their meal, but luckily they haven't eaten anyone yet, though it was a matter of time before they did. She narrowed her eyes that burned with fire and clenched her staff tightly in her hand until her skin turned white with the pressure.
A sneaky voice caught Jeanne attention and she found a lone spider dragging a web sack to its home. This sack was quite small compared to the rest of them so Jeanne knew it was Bilbo inside. She moved around in the shadows and inched closer and closer to the spider that went unknown to her presence. She drew out her sword as the spider leaned down close to Bilbo, flexing its hairy legs like it was going to bite him when a white-hot sword came out of nowhere and stabbed the creature right through its face. It convulsed a bit but didn't utter a sound as it quickly died. The spider fell off of Bilbo's body and curled its legs inwards before Jeanne finally emerged from the shrubs with a sword burning hot in her hands.
Jeanne quickly kneeled down beside Bilbo and began to rip the webbing off him just as he started to come-to. Bilbo jolted awake and desperately grabbed ahold of Jeanne while she calmed him down. "Shh~ shh~ It's alright. I got you. I'm here." she whispered in a gentle voice.
Bilbo had to take another minute to calm himself down and realize what happened. "There was...was...spiders! H-Huge ones, and Thorin...he...he was looking for you and began to panic when he couldn't see you anymore."
Jeanne furrowed her brow at that and felt a strange confusion in her heart. It sped up for some reason and clenched up like someone was squeezing it. It was similar to that strange feeling of excitement but still so very different. She wasn't excited. She was worried, but those words caused a smile to crept to her red lips. "He was?" Her voice creaked and she forced the smile off his face. "Quickly. We have to get out of sight from the spiders. now!" Jeanne hissed and began to pull Bilbo back into the darkness before the others could notice. She wrapped her arms around Bilbo and whispered into his ear. "Can you stay hidden for me? I can get rid of the spiders but you have to free everyone else after I do so. Can you do that?"
Bilbo sucked in a deep breath and nodded quickly. "Hide until they're dead. Got it. Totally got it." Of course, he was more than willing to go with this plan until a thought came to mind. "Are you sure you'll be alright though?"
Jeanne nodded and got up, folding her hood over her hair. "Of course I will. Just...stay here and, uh, think of a name for your sword, I guess."
Bilbo frowned. "A name for my sword?" He looked down at his weapon and pulled it out as Jeanne disappeared into the darkness. "Name...the name of my sword. Name...the name, Hame, Came, Same, Cain," Bilbo frowned. "No. That's already been used. Uh...Change, Stane, Sting." Hold on...that one actually didn't sound that bad. "Sting..." He mumbled and stared at his reflection in the sword. "Sting, huh? That's a good name."
The large and hideous spiders hissed in whispering tongue to each other while surrounding one of the Dwarves that was tightly wrapped up in webbing. It was Bombur and was still very much aware and panicking. He managed to kick one of the spiders but that only seemed to excite them even more.
"Ahh! The meat's alive and kicking!"
"Kill them! Kill them now. Let us feast." They began to change as the slowly enclose in on the poor Dwarf who let out muffled screams. "Feast! Feast! Feast!"
There was a loud snapping noise alerting the spiders and drew their attention away from the Dwarf in the nick of time.
"What is that? What is that? What is that?" They hissed and looked up the treeline and saw Jeanne standing above them on a branch, her face and hair obscured by her hood. "Ohh! It's another one! Big feast! Big feast! Nice and juicy!"
Jeanne saw that their fangs were practically watering with hunger. They began to crawl after her through the mass webbing. She turned around and jumped back down to the forest floor and took off through the darkness with the group of spiders hunting her down.
"Feast! Feast! Feast! After it!" They chanted and ran past Bilbo who waited patiently for all of them to be lead away.
Bilbo finally let out a breath once the danger was about gone, though he was still worried about Jeanne. He hoped she could take care of the spiders because he really didn't think he would be much help to her.
He got back on topic and climbed up the trees to where the company was still strung up and cocooned in webbing. Bilbo took his newly named sword, Sting, and started to cut all the Dwarves out of the trees. They all began to wiggle themselves out of the thick webbing and help each other.
Thorin yanked all the webbing off him and looked around desperately. "Bilbo!" He called up to the Hobbit still in the trees. "Where's Jeanne? Have you seen her?"
"Jeanne?" Bilbo looked up and stared into the thick woods and expected to see nothing because of the darkness and shady trees, but very faintly, he saw flashes of orange flames and the groaning and shrieking pains of spiders
"It hurts and it burns!" He heard one of the spiders shout before there was another flash of orange before darkness swallowed everything up.
Bilbo pointed ahead of himself. "She drew the spiders away so I could get you down! I think...I think she's still fighting them."
Thorin felt all the air get punched out of his lungs and he struggled to even get his words out. "Jeanne..."
Jeanne's body leaped in the air and flipped over the large body of the spider before suddenly stabbing her burning sword into its abdomen. The creature shrieked and jerked her around like a bear as the fire from her sword burned and boiled his insides.
"It hurts! It hurts!"
Jeanne jumped off the spider just as it curled up and died. She looked over her shoulder at the last two spiders that cursed her while hissing venom out from its fangs. It dropped on the ground and began to sizzle at their legs.
"Kill it! Kill it! We do not need to have a feast with it! Kill it!"
She took one quick look to her staff that was stabbed in the ground and back at the spiders who stood in her way and charged. She ran forward and suddenly dropped to her knees and skidded right under its body before it could stab its legs into her. She leaped back up to her feet and ran for her staff.
"Where did it go? Where did it go!" It hissed and tried to turn its body around.
Jeanne's eyes began to glow amber and her veins turned gray the moment her fingers curled around her staff. It suddenly began to morph its shape and the unbloomed end of her staff suddenly began to split open very slightly. Sire flushed out from the cracks and ignited the end like a flaming flower from hell.
She swung it around like a mace and smashed the flaming ball right into the spiders face. Its gross and squishy eyeballs popped out of its head and flopped to the ground, dead. Jeanne quickly reversed her sword grip and let the blade face the ground and suddenly rammed it upwards in the neck of the unwelcoming spider that was trying to sneak up behind her. It twitched a bit with its long legs jolting above her head like it was going to strike down. The life faded from its eyes and its body fell limp against the ground.
The staff tapped twice against the dirt and the fires from the inside were sealed up and the unbloomed flower went back to its normal shape. Jeanne took in a deep breath and looked around at the damage she done. A couple of fried spiders, one bludgeoned spider, and two stabbed spiders. She counted all them out and was left with five bodies. Something wasn't right though. The group was too small for such a large web. There had to be more, just where though?
"Jeanne!" She could recognize Thorin's low and intimidating voice anywhere since it had the strange ability to make her heart speed up.
Her lips twitched upwards and she took in a deep breath. "Thorin!" Jeanne shouted back through the darkness where no such light could pierce through.
Thorin and the rest of his company stopped where they stood. They looked around at all angles but it sounded like the voice came from all directions. They can't pinpoint where she was at all in these woods full of illusion and false hope swarming in darkness. They couldn't find Jeanne, and that thought alone was making Thorin's stomach turn. He promised not only Gandalf but himself that he would look after Jeanne and never let her out of his sight. But she was lost now in the kind of woods that was always working against you.
"Jeanne!' his voice howled through the shrubs but he heard nothing back.
Bilbo went on ahead where he last saw Jeanne but they haven't heard back from their burglar either. It wasn't just those two who were lost, it was their own company. There was no way out and the creaking sound of new spiders was getting closer.
Thorin looked up and saw a large body of a spider land before them and hissed loudly. Above them though, a blonde Elf leaped across the treetops and swung down from the siders web. He slid under its legs, killing it before facing down the Dwarves with his bow and arrow raised to the company.
"Do not think I won't kill you, Dwarf," he hissed. The Elf was of average height and like all his kin, he was quite handsome too. He had long blonde hair and piercing blue eyes that could chill everyone to the bone. His tone was just as menacing though because he was serious. "It would be my pleasure."
The company looked around and noticed that they were outnumbered by other Elves who waited in the shadows with their arrowheads raised to their faces.
Perhaps...it was a good thing that Jeanne and Bilbo weren't here right now.
Bilbo huffed with himself and began to double back to where he last saw the company after a fruitless search for Jeanne when all of a sudden he was pulled from behind. his mouth was covered and he was pressed up against a tree and face down their lost scarlet wizard, Jeanne. She quietly placed her finger to her lips and removed her hand. They peaked out from behind the tree and saw in the distance, their company being surrounded and searched by the Elves.
"Are we going to do anything?" Bilbo whispered.
Jeanne shook her head. "No,' she said. "We need them to get out of Mirkwood. Afterward, we'll break Thorin and the rest out of their holds. Just stay hidden for now and we'll think of a plan on the way."
Bilbo nodded and they silently watched as their friends were taken away by the Elves. Jeanne frowned to herself though and had a hard time thinking up a plan that would work with where they are being taken.
"Legolas Greenleaf..." she mumbled in Elvish. "If you're here, then that means they're taking them back to...King Thranduil." Jeanne swallowed hard.
Author's Note:
Did any of you notice my Cain reference from my Genesis series? Haha.
And I do hope I did alright with Jeanne's mini fight scene with the spiders and describing the change in her staff when she grabbed it. I always wanted her to wield a flaming staff-like mace and beat the crap out of people. I was planning on doing it in the third installment but... I guess not everything goes as planned.
Anyway...I'm tired as hell because I just got back by my nightshift at work that lasted from 2:00 am to 10:20 am. Sorry if you find any mistakes because I felt like I was kinda in a funk when writing and editing it (Which I probably shouldn't do when tired). Hell, I'll go back and edit better when I wake up but I guess this is good enough for now.
See you all next week!
