Disclaimer: I don't own any familiar characters, and or anything pertaining to the world of the Hobbit. All, but my ocs, are owned by J.R.R Tolkien

Chapter 16

You're on your own kid

The ach of metal first rose Claudia from her dissociated state. Rubbing her palms into her dry eyes, she wondered how long she had been staring at the wall in front of her. Time eluded her from the moment Arone had thrown her into the guest room, the sharp click of a lock behind him. She swallowed the dry lump in her throat, she should drink some water but the simple act of moving seemed an impossible feat. Snuggling into her blanket, she refused to return to her reality. She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on her breath. Reaching out into the void, she hoped to find Thallion but was met with silence.

A click came from her door before it swung open, and three identically dressed handmaids walked in. Claudia did not rise from the beds, instead watching as the handmaids set about their work.

The first of the veiled faces laid a mourning dress on the cabinet to the right of her room. Another setting down a tray of warm mead. The last drained the tub in the corner of the room, and freshen it with steaming water. None looked in Claudia's direction. During their first visit, Claudia had tried to engage with the handmaids, asking them questions about the mountain and its leader. She soon learned she would've had a better time getting answers from the mountain itself than those dwarrowdams.

Finishing the last of their business, the dwarrowdams quietly cleared the room. Claudia sprung from the bed as the last veil left her sight. Grabbing a brass utensil from the tray, Claudia flung the dress over the loveseat, and with her good shoulder, she pushed the cabinet aside to reveal the rows of stretches that vandalized the walls. Using the dull utensil to add another mark on the wall. Her finger traced the mark, cleaning the dust that gathered on in the deep stretch. It was the twenty-eighth stretch she had made to mark the twenty-eighth meal they provided her. The twenty-eight meals helped her count the fourteen days she had been locked in this room.

Claudia took a step back admiring her work, a crippling sadness seeping through her looking at the rows and rows of lines. Fourteen days and she hadn't heard a word from or about her company. She had begged the handmaids, pounded her door, and pleaded with the Valar for some answers, but nothing came. They could be dead for all she knew. Arone had fulfilled his promise and given her the antidote but refused to produce any proof that Theo had been afforded the same.

Failure, failure, failure… The words chanted in her head over and over again. Her palm stroked her collarbone, trying to rub out a worry that festered in her chest. Had she been smarter, quicker, and stronger maybe she could have avoided Arone, the masks, and the fall of her family's rule? By Aule's beard, her family was being lured into a trap and she had nothing to stop them. Claudia fell back into the cushions of the loveseat, allowing herself to feel the moment of free falling.

In the weeks in captivity, her pain had eased but hadn't fully released her. Arone had allowed a healer to come to see her every couple of days, ensuring that his leverage against her parents wouldn't die in the middle of the night from a fever or bleeding beneath her skin. When the healer pulled away the bandages to bathe Claudia had studied the grueling scars that began to show through the reddling sensitive skin. The arrow pierced through her back and broke the skin of her stomach, leaving trails of burned scars from the strange power it had emitted. The first time after the healer had banged her back up, she had cried for hours over the scar.

As she lay out on the seat the beaded dress fell over her body and then slumped to the floor. The beads hit the stone like heavy rainfall. She wanted to watch the black fabric turn to ashes. She wasn't a doll for him to play dress up with. She scowled down at the dress thinking of the ways she could tear it apart when she noticed a folded white piece of paper. Pushing herself up by her forearm, she reached down to grab the paper. She unfolded the small square, finding a simple scribbled note inside:

When the time comes run to your right

-A friend

Claudia furrowed her brow reading the note again. She searched the dress for any other notes but found nothing. Her hand crushed the paper, the healer would be in any second and she had no doubt that his loyalty was to Lord Arone. Though she had no idea what the note meant, it was her sign that something was happening. Claudia took the paper and stuck it under the scolding water for a moment before flattening it to the back of the cabinet. It had been the same trick she used as a kid when she was angry at Rowan and tore out one of the pages of her books but wanted no evidence to lead back to her. Moving the cabinet back into place, Claudia sat on the bed waiting for the healer to arrive.

When he came he was followed by one of the handmaids who informed Claudia that Lord Arone wished to dine with her that night. Claudia didn't fight, the note had found her for a reason. After bathing she allowed the healer to go about his business, finishing dressing her wounds before the handmaid slipped her into the dress. A guard waited at the door to escort her to Arone. Her legs stretched as they walked, not having moved properly for the first time in weeks.

They walked for a time down the familiar path they had taken two weeks previous, straight to the same halls Claudia had been separated from her company. The table that stood in the center of the feasting room was now empty – each chair carefully pushed in except for the head one. Lord Arone was hunched over with Throne looking over his shoulder. A few of the familiar dwarf lords stood behind them whispering to each other, their eyes darting to her figure.

One of the lowly lords – graying and round – approached her. His meaty finger trapped around her elbow dragging her to Arone's side. Golden eyes glittered up at her, he straightened from the book he seemed so consumed with.

"Lady Claudia, I hope you've found your stay suitable." He said with a twisted grin.

Claudia spit, the clear liquid running down his sickly-colored skin. Throne rushed at her, a dagger pulled from his belt.

"How dare you, bitch." The blade was held to her, panicked heat radiated from the sharp edge that pierced through the top layer of the neck's skin.

Claudia held her ground, exhaling a shallow breath through flared nostrils. Throne was just as ugly as the day she first met him. His corrupted heart did nothing for his looks.

"Do it, you coward." She whispered, her heart thundering in her chest.

Throne's lip pursed, he flinched forward as if his body might betray him and pulled the knife across her throat.

"Throne!" Arone snapped behind them.

She managed a small smile feeling the ghost of the blade tingling against her throat. Throne's eyes never leave her, stalking back to his father's side like a dog called back to its owner.

Arone threw the handkerchief he had used to clean his face at one of the dwarf lords, who scrambled to catch it before it touched the ground.

"Don't tell me, you've lost all your manners after I stripped your title away." His words hung over her.

"You don't have the power." Claudia snarled.

Arone ran his hand along his jaw, he turned his back to her. "I will soon enough. Bring him in."

The round dwarf that had met her at the stairs waddled to one of the columns disappearing into the shadows. Claudia marked the towering figure before they even touched the light. Surrounded by four metal-covered guards, Glorfindel emerged from the dark, his hands locked together with metal cuffs at his front. It was silly really to believe that these guards could do anything to hold him back, let alone hurt him. But this thought did not stop Claudia from taking him in, her eyes clawing over every inch of him to ensure he was untouched.

Glorfindel mirrored her concern, his eyes flashing to her side silently asking if she was alright. Her hand covered the bandage that lay beneath her clothes, giving him a small nod of reassurance that she was indeed fine.

"So nice of you to join us, elf." His hand opened toward Claudia, "see I keep my promises. Lady Claudia has remained in one piece."

Glorfindel said nothing, his gaze stayed on Claudia.

"Are cin negr-?" He asked in sindarin.

Her jaw twitched, her tongue itching as she gathered the translation in her mind. "Baw, are i post okaui?"

He nodded assuring her that everyone was okay. "Tríw, but anxious na hear o cin."

Relief flooded through her, and everyone was fine.

"I hate to break up the reunion but we have matters to attend," Arone growled, grabbing a hold of Claudia.

Throne reached flipping through the brittle pages of the book. His movement caught Glorfindel's attention, and at the sight of the book, he surged forward.

"Where did you get this from?" His voice was tight.

The lines of his were hard and gave the slight reveal of his true age. His hand hovered over the leather cover of the book.

Arone held her face between his fingers crushing her cheeks together. His nails pierced her skin. He smiled as rivers of her blood dripped down his hand. Only inches from his face, Claudia saw a dark flicker behind his eyes. If she had not been so close she might have missed the crimson serpent curling around his iris.

"You elves always think you know exactly what's going on. Did you think Ered Luin knew of a wizard passing through these lands, burning everything in sight? That we did not hear the whispers of the death and destruction it has brought to the men and the elves. I have been shown the future," Arone hissed, "and the rule of elves is over. It is the dawning of a new age."

There was pity in Glorfindel's eyes as he looked upon the dwarf lord. " You have been led astray-"

Glorfindel took a step toward, holding his chained hands out to the dwarf. But Arone's grip on Claudia only tightened at his movements. The aching of her bones sounded in her ears, she couldn't hold back a whimper on her lips. A sudden pressure ignited the skin of her throat. It registered with Claudia, after a moment, that Arone was holding a blade to her neck. Her hands flew to his arm trying to pull him away from her.

"Get off me!" Claudia snarled, struggling against him, but the edge of the tip of the blade broke the first layer of skin.

"Read it," Arone threatened.

Glorfindel lowered his hands turning to Throne, who held the book out to him.

"Mín baur cín help na get trí i lhun mountains nin ass" Claudia spat at Glorfindel, who looked at her astonished that she could still hold a grudge against him even when her life was being threatened.

"Im'm going na get ammen ed- -o hi" Glorfindel tried to assure her.

Claudia couldn't help but laugh at the whole situation. This was the very reason Elrond had wanted her on this quest in the first place, to be a diplomat on their behalf to the blue mountains. And that had failed because Glorfindel didn't listen to them. Glorfindel who had been so flippant throughout since she had met, believed she would be so blinded by his beauty and demeanor that she would follow his lead. Now he was promising to save them as if he hadn't been the whole who led them there.

With a knife to the throat, blood trickling down the steel, she stared at Glorfindel in the eyes and said the only words that came to her mind.

"Fuck you."

Green eyes were on full display as they looked up from the book at Claudia. They only lasted there a second before Throne shoved him from behind. His gaze lingered on her before lowering to the book.

"What you have in your possession is the Book of Light. Written by Penlod in the century before Gondolin fell, it for-" his words faltered as he flipped through the pages.

"It is a detailed description of Gondolin's founding, the rise of Morgoth, and the plans to get citizens out of the city in the case of Morgoth's attack. There is nothing in these pages that you need."

"We both know that isn't true, now is it elf?" Arone countered. "There is a ledger in the back, outlining the last great treasures of Gondolin and where each would be held in case Morgoth reached your precious city."

"If you know what's in the book, why do you need me to read it?" Glorfindel questioned.

"There is a dagger that lies within the bones of your city. A dagger that will be key to unlocking a great power. That book has the last dagger's last whereabouts, now read."

"The wizard, he gave you the book." Claudia pieced together, her fingernail digging into Arone's clothed arm.

"He promised me the throne if we found the location of the dagger," his voice faltered for a second as if the fog of his mind cleared temporarily.

"The throne is not yours to take."

"It will be-"

Before he could finish his threat a sudden force knocked them to the ground. There was a popping in her chest as her shoulders folded in on her. There was a thundering pounding in her head, her eyes burned with a green smoke rolling through the room. The muted figures of dwarves stumbled through the dense fog reaching around aimlessly. Placing her palms out in front of her, pushing herself up off the ground. Her arms trembled under the weight of her body. A hand touched her shoulder helping her to her feet.

"Are you alright?" Glorfindel asked behind her.

Magdalen whirled around, her eyes roaming his face and body for any marks or scars before she reminded herself that she was mad at him.

"What do you think?" She spat, trying to assess the area around them.

A voice roared in the distance commanding someone to find them. Claudia reached out, instinctively, grabbing Glorfindel's arm. Right. Right. Right. The word screamed in her mind over and over again. Her feet ran before her thoughts could catch up.

"Where are you going?" Glorfindel demanded but followed Claudia nevertheless.

"I don't know," Claudia muttered to herself.

About to take off blindly, Glorfindel pulled back for only a second.

"What!" He exclaimed, snatching the book from the table.

With a swift nod, she took off to her right through the smoke and passed the disordered dwarves. Her fingers pressed into Glorfindel's hand, keeping a tight grip on the elf. Finding the stone archways of the room the smoke had not yet seeped into its borders. Archways were a safe haven from the smoke, she realized and gave them a direct path to the stairs. Whoever sent the notes was truly an ally.

"Do you remember the way back to the others?" Claudia asked, finally letting go of Glorfindel as they ran out of the great hall.

"Yes, but I'm not sure how to get out of the dungeons." He answered truthfully, a tight edge to his voice.

"We'll figure it out."

Claudia gestured for him to lead the way.

Her body heated with pain pulsing and pinching. Glorfindel led them down halls and stairways with a set determination on his face, Claudia would not disturb him at this moment. Not to whine about the fact that her stomach may fall out of her body at any moment.

"To the West Hall now!" A voice commanded following the clamoring of footsteps.

With a forceful push, Glorfindel steered them down a smaller hall -the servant wing that allowed for the staff to move about the Abyst mostly unseen. Glancing behind Claudia watched a dozen guards swept by, their weapons ready for battle. From the doors of the hall, several servants merged half awake and still dressed in their night clothes. Their lids still heavy with sleep didn't seem to take notice of the elf or blood-covered woman. If they did they didn't have the courage to ask what such an odd pair were doing or where they were heading. Finding the spiral steps that led to the North Wing, the pair ran.

Claudia was much shorter than Glorfindel's long stature, and her legs reached their limit trying to keep up with his stride. Her eyes shifted to the empty stone stairway, the alarm siren still screaming in the background though slightly muted by the thick stone. In her steps, she saw the blood that spotted the silk fabric of her clothes. A dry lump formed in her throat, her hand fluttering as panic set in. Her head swam as she tried to piece together what had happened. The face in the fore lingered in Claudia's mind.

Her thoughts were disrupted when an explosive was sent hurtling toward the wall. The air from lungs disappeared all at once as she fell to her knees, her hands coming to her throat scratching for a single breath. The rumble settled and the glow of blue came from the dust. Glorfindel was on his feet in seconds, movements were more like a dance. With effortless grace, the warrior dodged one of the guards' attacks.

Glorfindel, still holding to the book for dear life, lunged forward taking on the other dwarves. Claudia stuck to the wall, trying to keep her breath even. Another explosion of sound came from her right, as a dwarf fell at her feet. The dwarf Glorfindel had thrown, groaning, turned on their side two eyes from beneath the steel mask racked up Claudia's bloodied figure. Catching the sword that laid unclaimed between them, Claudia and the dwarf lunged at the same time.

The metal of the guard's armor dug into Claudia's skin. Her hands pressed against their arms, trying to pin down any movement. Hands squeezed her elbows and biceps, the press building on her bones. Kicking against the body, Claudia scooted herself closer to the sword. A hand found her unbound hair and pulled as hard as they could. But Claudia already had a grip on the hilt. Turning around Claudia smashed the blunt end of into the helmet, denying it. She did again, and then again. She kept doing it until someone tore her off the limp guard.

"He is out, Claudia. Focus on me." She saw no longer red, but green.

From the fog of anger, she found the green eyes of Glorfindel, his blonde hair splattered on his worn wool tunic. Pursing her lips, Claudia gave him a small nod in thanks. His eyes shifted behind her where the guard sat unconscious against the wall. Walking over to the body, he bent down plucking the ring of keys off his belt. Without a word he slipped his hand over her hand and led her way.

The temperature dropped deeper into the mountain they went. The sound of familiar voices bouncing off the stone walls.

"What is going on?"

"What did you do with Glorfindel?"

"I swear to Mahal I will strangle you when I get my hands on you," Theo exclaimed in khuduzel.

Claudia allowed her feet to run faster hearing her cousin. But before she could reach the final descent to their cells, she was pulled into the shadows of another. Fingers wrapped around her wound and an arm wound around her shoulder pulling her into the tight confinements of the prison. Pressed against Glorfindel's chest she was ready to scold him for the sudden movement but the clattering of metal raced past them as two guards raced up the stairs. Silent beats followed in the moments after, the rapid rise and fall of his chest against her were the only things keeping her tethered to that moment.

There was a vibration between their laced fingers. He was trembling, she realized. Glorfindel, the warrior of legends, the last remaining member of the house of the golden flower, the man's light who had been so bright that Valar could not deny him life again, was trembling under her touch. He withdrew his hand from her touch, pushing distance between them as he scanned down the stairs. Claudia would have thought she imagined it all if it were not for the flexing of his hand.

"Claudia!" Theo jumped from his cot racing toward the bars.

Claudia smiled tears burning her eyes waiting as Glorfindel unlocked his cell before heading down the rows where the others were held. Theo surged forward wrapping his arms around Claudia and lifting her in the air effortlessly. Setting her down he scanned her body.

"Are you alright?"

"Are you?" She countered before throwing her arms around Dag and Alma as they approached. Dag squeezed her back.

"We haven't heard anything in nearly two weeks. I would have thought they would have left you to die if Theo hadn't gotten the antidote." Alma sighed in relief, stepping out of Claudia's hold.

"I will tell you all about when we are out of this mountain."

"And how exactly do we get out of here?" Enna spoke, giving Claudia's shoulder a tight squeeze as she approached.

Claudia smiled at the she-elf, not realizing how relieved she was seeing her. It was the same relief seeing Theo, a familia urge to know she was safe in the chaos. Tapping her hand she looked to the others, who she realized was looking to her for answers.

"I think I can help with that part." A voice called from above them.

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