"What do you mean I'm in Middle Earth?" Shayla cried out loudly, her voice rising in fear. Amelia looked at her with a worried expression on her face and held a hand out towards her. In response to her movements, Shayla stumbled back suddenly and moved against the wall closest to the door she had come through.

"Shayla, please calm do-"

"No, no, no.. You.. You are crazy, you're all crazy.." Shayla's breathing was beginning to come in short and shallow, her voice quivering. She couldn't believe this; she couldn't believe that she had somehow come across so many complete nutters.

"I know what you're feeling. I know exactly what you're going through." Amelia stopped approaching Shayla and dropped her hands to her side. In the light, Shayla could see the unrestricted emotion that filled the eyes and features of Amelia. There was fear there, tempered with some empathy, but there was something there more prominent that anything else.

Sadness.

The surprise of her emotion caused Shayla to stop inching towards the door, almost frozen in place. She couldn't divert her frightened gaze from the woman with bright green eyes that watched Shayla with such incredible sentiment that made something within her stir.

"How do you know what I'm feeling?" Shayla spoke barely above a whisper. The girl had never been more scared or confused in her life, and she didn't know why she was here as opposed to being in a hospital with Riley.

"Listen, I will answer any question you have, but right now I can't. I have to save your friend. Can you trust me enough to do that?" Amelia's voice was pleading, and Shayla turned her gaze back to an almost lifeless Riley. Her face was pale, sweat causing the blonde hair to stick at her face and drip down her neck.

Shayla looked up from Riley's face to find Kili standing in the doorway with a bundle of towels within his grasp as he watched Shayla closely. All hints of playfulness were gone, and he looked older than what he had seemed to be.

There were no words, though as soon as Shayla nodded her head, Amelia moved back to Riley.

From then on, Shayla could do nothing but stand aside and let Kili and Amelia work. It hurt more than anything to move into a far corner while she let two strangers take care of her best friend, but even that didn't come close to what came next.

The door suddenly opened and an influx of people moved into the lounge room. Shayla stayed in the shadows, watching in a fearful paralysis as she looked over the new faces. She recognised Dwalin and Gimli, though they moved out as soon as they had come in; Dwalin with a hard expression on his face, and Gimli with a somewhat curious and concerned look on his.

Two new men stayed in the room however, and it was the older one that moved straight to Amelia's side as she examined the wound and carefully cleaned around the edges.

"We must make a salve to apply once we have washed the wound. Lady Amelia, gather double the usual yarrow, wild indigo and peppermint we mix in our disinfectant salve. Quickly." The woman nodded at the old man's words, and she quickly moved through an open door behind the couch. Kili stayed next to Riley, wiping her forehead with a damp cloth as her lips moved slightly.

Shayla moved even further into the corner by the fireplace with tears welling in her eyes once more, as she watched the other man kneel down beside Kili.

It was too much for her to handle.

"What happened, Kili?" The man said lowly, his deep voice the only sound filling the air besides an almost inaudible whimper from Riley. Long blonde hair fell past his shoulders with several thick braids punctuating his locks; he was dressed in some form of medieval armour, with a breast plate and chainmail covering his shoulders.

"We should discuss this once Oin and Amelia have healed Miss Riley." Kili's voice was strained, though he looked to the man with an indecipherable expression on his face. Shayla felt completely and utterly useless; not only could she not help Riley, but she didn't understand the double-edged words spoken all around her. It was as though she were being left out of a discussion that she couldn't help but feel involved her somehow.

As if her thoughts could be read, the man's eyes travelled to the shadows where Shayla was hiding, his blue eyes piercing her own dark ones. Just as he opened his mouth to speak once more, Amelia walked hurriedly into the room with a wooden bowl in hand.

"We will have to hold her down while we apply the salve." And with those few words, Amelia bent down and began to rub the strange paste onto Riley's wound. There was barely a seconds notice as Riley's eyes shot open wide with fear and pain, before a scream filled the air.

Shayla gasped at the sudden sound, but the writhing and continual screeching of her friend as Oin held her down and Amelia lathered the wound in salve was the most horrible thing Shayla had ever had to endure in her life.

A loud sob escaped her lips as she wrapped her arms around herself in a feeble attempt to shield herself from the sight. Riley thrashed more violently than before, and the blonde haired man had to help the one called Oin in holding her arms and legs down. Her own legs felt as though they were about to give way.

Shayla was so fixated on her friend that she didn't even realise that Kili had left his position from beside Riley to move to her.

"Miss Shayla, perhaps you should sit.." His voice still lacked the cheeky humour she had noted when they had first stumbled across the men. She couldn't answer though, and the tears had finally begun to pool over down her cheeks.

Her whole body ached, and her mind was a muddle. Everything that had happened within the past few days begun to blur into one, until she wasn't sure what was reality and what had been a crazy, imaginative dream. A pressure was pressing down upon every inch of her body, until her head started to hurt and vision begun to haze, causing an inability to see the person in front of her.

She couldn't even hear the deep words spoken close by before the world turned upside down and rendered her vision and consciousness useless.

Many hours had passed between both Shayla and Riley succumbing to unconsciousness, their bodies unable to continue to function through the pain and fatigue that both of them had encountered. It was in the late evening of the following day that an aching Shayla finally began to awake from sleep.

The first thing she heard was voices in another room. They were muted, but she could hear the stress evident in the tones of those who spoke.

"There has to be a reason." A female voice spoke with almost annoyance. Shayla's mind was much too foggy to realise that she had heard the woman before.

"It is too dangerous. The paths south have become treacherous; even the roads to the Blue Mountains and Iron Hills are becoming a hazard for our most skilled warriors." That was a man speaking, his deep voice filled with a tired defeat.

"They deserve to understand why it is they have been brought to Middle Earth." There was a deep-voiced sigh, then a pause.

"You of all people know how important this could be, Fili. Josh and I made it through worse than Trolls, Orcs and Goblins if I remember correctly."

"Oh, and what was that if I may ask?" The tone of his voice had changed; it became almost close to younger and cheekier than before, though there was still a slight edge heard.

"Thirteen hairy Dwarves. I could handle three horrid trolls before I could handle a single stubborn Dwarf." The playfulness in the woman's voice was reciprocated by a husky laugh from the man.

Shayla rolled onto her side with much difficulty, opening her eyes and attempting to discern her surroundings.

She was in a dark room that was only lit by a single candle burning on a far table. The orange light showed to her that she was not the only one in the room.

"Riley?" Shayla whispered weakly as her eyes fell on the bed on the other side of the small space. Within a bundle of dark sheets, the light blonde of Riley's hair could be seen above anything else. The lack of response from the older woman caused Shayla attempt to sit upright, yet her body protested significantly and a loud gasp escaped her lips.

Shayla collapsed back onto the bed, breathing heavily. Despite her above average level of fitness, the exertion of everything that had happened to her was beyond her capacity to handle.

Only seconds had passed when a creaking sounded from behind the head of Shayla's bed; looking up through the firelight and with a stiff neck, she recognised exactly who had entered the room before they spoke.

"I apologise for intruding Miss Shayla.. I heard you cry out, and feared something had happened." Kili glanced at Riley almost sheepishly as the weight of his words dawned upon Shayla.

"What have you done to her? Is Riley going to be alright?" Shayla's panic again took control of her common sense, and she tried to sit up in the bed once more.

"What do you think you're doing?" Kili cried out in a hushed whisper, moving his hand quickly to Shayla's shoulder in an attempt to push her back onto the bed. The girl couldn't even fight against his strength, but she did not concede in getting answers.

"Please, tell me if she is going to be alright!" Shayla shot, her voice quivering. If the candlelight was not so dim, she would have believed that she saw something akin to pity or deep concern in his eyes. After several moments of hesitation, he responded.

"Her wound was deep and in the stages of serious infection. Oin and Amelia have worked restlessly through the night to provide her the best ointments and care, yet we shall not know for some days, until the fever departs. However, there is no promise that will happen."

Shayla's lungs felt as though they were collapsing inside of her chest. The turmoil of the past several days crashed down upon her, many times greater than she had ever felt.

Was her best friend going to die?

First of all, I apologise thoroughly for my lack of updates over the past month! I am in the final weeks of uni, frantically trying to finish assignments and study for exams, plus I've had family and friends visit, have been planning for my 21st next month and also working on cosplays for the Supanova Convention and my trip to New Zealand in a few weeks. Everything has been so hectic and I haven't put much thought into this story unfortunately.

It also looks like I'm not going to be able to update until the new year, and I am so sorry for this! In saying this, however, once I come back after Christmas I will be in writing mode once more as I have two months off from uni!

If you've read this far, thanks for sticking with me! Please let me know if there are any inconsistencies in this chapter- while short, it was a little difficult to get back into the characters mind after having a bit of a break.

Thanks so much again, and I will be back soon.

Krysta xx