Chapter IV: Not the Best Time!

A/N: And here we are in Goblin Town! Not the best place for any member of the Company of Thorin Oakenshield be they elf, dwarf, or hobbit. Again, thanks go to Blondiezhere for her help! Enjoy the chapter, SSD!

Italics are thoughts and/or visions, bold is elvish, bolded italics will be Black Speech. Since I cannot find a Black Speech dictionary, Russian will be its stand in. The reason why the Black speech is sometimes not in the Russian is that Ashara and her grandfather can understand it. And as for what happens in the first scene, I believe Elrond understands it (and likely speaks it, but chooses not to) but that was how the vision plays out.

There was fire in both the trees and on the ground. A hobbit and an elf stood before a pale orc on a white warg: Azog the Defiler.

The elf (What was Ashara doing near Azog?) snarled in the Black Speech "I challenge you for the right to kill Thorin Oakenshield"

Azog grinned at the challenge. Before anything else happened, a beam of bright light burst from the sword.

Elrond was quite used to getting the occasional vision. He'd had very bad feelings about his granddaughter traveling through the High Pass. He hoped Gandalf got back to the Company quickly. And it seemed that there had been a purpose to teaching the Black Speech to Ashara after all.

"Haru, have you gone mad?" A familiar voice asked. Elrond looked up to see his grandson Erudan burst into his office with the letter that Ashara had left him.

"Your sister asked me the very same question before she left, Erudan," he replied before saying, "Sit down. I will explain everything."

"Oh it better be good, sending Ashara off with a pack of dwarves," the starlight haired young elf growled as he sat down.

Meanwhile, deep under the Misty Mountains...

Just when I thought that things could not get any worse, they did, Ashara thought as the Company was shoved along by Goblins.

Fili and Kili were in front and back of her. The Company still had their weapons, but would do them all very little good as they were vastly outnumbered.

Soon they were all in front of what was likely the Goblin King. The other goblins who'd been shoving them along stripped them of all visible weapons. Ashara smirked a bit when her hidden daggers went unnoticed by the frisking and upon exchanging a look with Fili, his daggers had gone unnoticed as well.

"Who would be so bold as to come armed into my kingdom? Spies? Thieves? ASSASSINS?" The Goblin King's voice rose with each query.

"Dwarves and an elf, your malevolence."

"Dwarves and an elf?"

"Found them on the front porch," a goblin replied gleefully.

At that, the Goblin King ordered, "Well don't just stand there search them!"

The goblins went over the entire company again. They found nothing new on me, Ashara thought happily.

"What are you doing in these parts," they were asked by the Goblin King.

Wisely, the Company kept their mouths shut.

"Speak!" the Goblin King snarled. Silence still reigned.

"Very well. If they will not talk, then we'll make them squawk!" the disgusting Goblin King cackled before calling out, "Bring up the Mangler! Bring up the Bone Breaker!"

Turning back towards the Company he said, "Start with the youngest... And the she-elf!"

Before any of the goblins could move towards either her or Ori, Thorin shouted "WAIT!"

While she was grateful that she wouldn't be tortured for the moment, Ashara still thought, "YOU IDIOT!" Before leaving, her grandfather had warned her that the goblins were highly likely in league with the orc pack that had chased the Company on their way to Rivendell.

"Well, well, well! Look who it is! Thorin, Son of Thrain, Son of Thror, King Under the Mountain!" The Goblin King sneered, mocking clear in his tone before going on with, "Oh but I'm forgetting you don't have a mountain and you're not a king. Which makes you nobody really," he cackled.

More a king than you will ever be, Ashara mentally snarled, surprised at the thought.

"I know someone who would pay a pretty price for your head. Just the head. Nothing attached. Perhaps you know of whom I speak: A pale orc, astride a white warg."

That certainly got all of the Company's attention.

"Azog the Defiler was destroyed. He was slain in battle long ago," Thorin countered back.

"So you think his defiling days are done do you?" The Goblin King turned to a smaller goblin and ordered, "Send word to the Pale Orc, tell him I have his prize!"

Things went from bad to worse after that message was sent. Even though it had kept she and Ori from being tortured, Thorin revealing himself to an ally of Azog the Defiler had not been one of his best ideas.

Ashara muttered, "Min ranta beren, neled rantali nûph!"

Fili, Kili, and Balin looked up at her use of her mother tongue. Thorin asked, "What did you say?"

"You do not need to know the specifics. Just a comment on the mess we're all in. Nothing directed at you," Ashara muttered.

"So much for elven courtesy, speak words everyone can understand," Thorin snarled.

Balin got the nasty feeling that yet another spat was brewing, so he edged his way towards the pair. The she-elf shot back, Well, I haven't had to deal with dwarves until recently now have I?"

He got to them finally and hissed, "Now is not the best time for one of your two's spats!"

There had been more than few such spats since Ashara joined the Company, which had led to yet another betting pool, which had been started by Bofur, surrounding Thorin and Ashara as to whether they'd wind up kissing or killing one each other. The smart money was on them murdering each other.

Balin wasn't so sure. He hadn't made up his mind yet on the matter. So far, he'd stayed out of it.

The Goblin King had unfortunately noticed what was going on, since he crowed out: "Take a look at this, lads! A lover's quarrel between an elf and a dwarf. Never thought I'd live to see the day *that* happened!"

Balin notice that the pair in questions faces seemed to be a bit pinker than normal, likely from embarrassment.

Before the Goblin King could make another remark about the spat, goblins began shrieking in fear and the sound of at least two swords falling to the ground. The Goblin King staggered backwards to his throne shouting, "I know those swords! The Goblin Cleaver and it's mate! Biter and Blinder!"

The goblins began hitting the Company with whatever they had on hand.

It took several goblins to bring Thorin down. Once that happened the Goblin ordered "CUT OFF HIS HEAD!"

Before the knife was even swung, a blast of pure energy knocked everyone down onto the floor of the platform.

Or onto each other, Thorin thought as he felt the weight on his chest. It would figure that it was the elf on top of him.

As she started to pull herself up a bit, Thorin got a good look at her eyes for the first time. The color was like autumn leaves.

Their faces were close enough to kiss, if that was something he wanted.

Where did THAT come from?

She too seemed to be studying him a bit before coming back to senses and rolled off him.

A familiar voice cut through the air, "Take up arms! Fight! FIGHT!"

Thorin put his strange musings from his mind as there was a greater issue at hand: Getting everyone out of Goblin Town in one piece.

Getting into Goblin Town, though it had been on accident, had been easy.

It's a prison. The problem is never getting in, the problems will come when you want to get out! That was something that Ashara remembered Aedric's father Rurik telling her when he returned to Rivendell after escaping from a Haradrim prison.

Lightbringer seemed almost alive in her hands and was glowing bright white as she cut through goblins with ease.

She had completely forgotten about her landing onto Thorin after Gandalf's magic blast as she dodged arrows.

Ashara looked up for a moment as she saw goblins about to swing on ropes to fight them.

"CUT THE ROPES!" Thorin shouted. Ashara cut into the support for the structure the goblins were swinging towards. Those goblins were tangled up and out of the fight.

As he cut and hacked his way through goblins Thorin noticed that Orcrist was glowing a bright blue like Bilbo's shortsword had before falling into Goblin Town. Lightbringer on the other hand, glowed white as the elf cut her way through her fair share of goblins.

After the swinging bridge and leaving behind one group of goblins, a new one took up the chasing of the Company.

Gandalf got a bit ahead of the rest of the Company, and caused a boulder to fall before them to clear the way, and it served its purpose well, crushing every goblin in it's path. As they rounded the corner, there were no goblins in front of them.

Too easy, Thorin thought as they came up to the bridge and began to cross it.

Sure enough the Goblin King popped up through the rickety bridge.

"You thought that you could escape me," he asked before swinging what amounted to his scepter, landing a glancing blow on Gandalf.

The king sneered, "What are you going to do now, wizard?"

Gandalf proceeded to poke the Goblin King in the eye with his staff, then slash him across his distended gut, causing him to fall to his knees saying, "That'll do it". The wizard dealt the death blow by slicing his throat.

When the corpse fell on the bridge, the supports began to crack from the new weight, then gave way. The Company slid down the rocks into the abyss.

The fall was far from smooth, crashing into either side of the abyss at regular intervals before sliding to a stop at the bottom.

Ashara, in a bit of a daze, noticed that someone was on top of her.

The first thing she noticed was a pair of only too familiar blue eyes. Thorin seemed just as shocked as she was at the awkward landing.

For a lot longer than she was willing to admit to, Ashara got a really good look at Thorin's icy blue eyes.

Having to give herself a mental slap for the second time in Goblin Town, she growled, "Get. Off!"

Ashara in her haste to get up, kneed Thorin in the groin, prompting the dwarf king to gag behind a rock once they got away from one another.

Kili yelled, "GANDALF!"

All of the members of the Company looked up at that and saw that an even larger horde of goblins was descending on them.

"There's too many we can't fight them," Dwalin said as he helped Nori to his feet.

"Only one thing can save us: Daylight. Here, on your feet!" Gandalf replied as he helped Dori and Balin to their feet. As soon as each member was on their feet, they hurtled themselves down the corridor, towards the light.

Once they were all out in the open, in a clearing, Gandalf started counting who was there. As Thorin ran past him with his nephews close behind him, the wizard noticed that Thorin was running strangely.

It was only then that it was realized that Bilbo had been missing the entire time.

Gandalf asked, clearly frantic, "Where's Bilbo? Where is our Hobbit?"

"Curse that Halfling! Now he's lost. I thought he was with Dori," Gloin muttered.

"Don't blame me," Dori shot back.

"Where did you last see him?" Gandalf queried.

"I think I saw him slip away when they first collared us," Nori answered.

"What happened exactly? Tell me!" Gandalf said.

Thorin spoke before anyone else, saying, "I'll tell you what happened: Master Baggins saw his chance and he took it. He's thought of nothing but his soft bed and his warm hearth since he first stepped out his door. We will not be seeing our hobbit again. He is long gone."

"No he isn't."

Gandalf looked up with a smile as he saw the formerly missing hobbit come into view.

"Bilbo Baggins! I have never been so glad to see anyone in my life!"

"How on Earth did you get past the goblins," Fili asked, disbelief clear in his tone.

"How indeed," Dwalin also wondered, suspicion was clear in his tone.

"Well what does it matter, he's back." The wizard was trying to diffuse the tension.

"It matters," Thorin said as he took a step closer to Bilbo, "I want to know."

Bilbo took a deep breath before saying, "Look, I know you doubt me. I know you always have. And you're right, I often think of Bag-End. I miss my books. And my arm chair. See that's where I belong. That's home. And that's why I came back because... You don't have one. A home. It was taken from you. But I will help you take it back if I can."

Thorin looked almost guilty. It looked like he was about to apologize when a howl tore through the early evening.

Ashara snarled, "PUITHO!"

"Out of the frying pan..." Thorin looked around for the source of the howl.

Gandalf finshed the saying, "And into the fire. Run. RUN!"

Ashara was running with the others when she heard an orc shout, "Run them down, tear them to pieces!"

Several wargs were barreling down the hill right at them. The Company managed to kill them quickly. Even Bilbo felled a warg, though he looked shocked by the fact that it actually worked.

When they ran ahead, it became quickly apparent that the Company had been trapped between a warg pack and a very long drop.

Barring a miracle from Manwë, we're not just in trouble, we're dead where we stand, Ashara thought as Gandalf shouted, "Up into the trees! All of you! Bilbo come on, hurry!"

While Ashara and the dwarves got into the trees with alacrity, Bilbo's short sword was good and stuck in the body of the warg. He barely got up in time to avoid the wargs, and was in the same tree as Fili and Kili.

They saw the leader of the orc pack edge his mount forward. There was only one pale orc, with eyes like that, and rode a white warg.

Azog sniffed the air theatrically before saying, "Do you smell it? The scent of fear? I remember your father reeked of it, Thorin son of Thrain."

"It cannot be," Thorin said, clearly shocked and devastated.

Azog pointed his mace at Thorin, "That one is mine. Kill the rest!" The rest of the riderless wargs bounded towards the trees.

Now the Company became intimately acquainted with just how high wargs could jump. They were also biting off every branch they could reach.

"Drink their blood!" Azog called out.

With the relentlessness of the wargs attacking the trees, they began to lean and fall causing the Company members to jump through them to the last one where Gandalf was located right at edge of the cliff.

Once she got as situated as possible on the tree, a burning pinecone was dropped into Ashara's hands courtesy of Gandalf who was distributing them amongst the other Company members. They all began pelting the wargs with them along with starting a massive fire.

When most of the riderless wargs bolted Ashara joined in the cheering. Their joy however was to be short lived. The tree they were all on, was starting to tip over the cliff itself. Ashara was particularly pleased that she was on one of the lower sets of branches. Bilbo and Thorin were nearby.

She looked in Gandalf's direction when Dori called out "Mr. Gandalf!" He was barely holding onto his branch and Ori was holding onto his brother's boots.

They nearly fell, but Gandalf used his staff to catch them. Even he could only do so much.

Ashara was helping Bilbo improve his grip on his branch when she saw movement out of the corner of her eye.

Thorin was going for Azog.

Idiot! Azog has the high ground! she thought to herself.

Perhaps it would work. But Ashara wouldn't bet any kind of...

Azog on his mount knocked Thorin to the ground. This wasn't likely to end well for the dwarf king.

Thorin tried to get up, but was knocked in the chest with Azog's mace.

Ashara saw Bilbo stand up and make his way forward. She went with him.

"You go for Thorin, I'll come from the side. They'd see me coming, but not you."

She started to sneak around to where she wouldn't be seen. Ashara was still able to see what was going on. It seemed that Azog's warg had picked Thorin up in it's jaws and tossed him.

Her sharp ears picked up, "Bring me the dwarf's head."

Thorin it seemed was still barely conscious and was trying to grab Orcrist which was just out of his reach.

The orc placed it's sword at Thorin's neck. Just as he was about to swing, Bilbo barreled right into the orc, knocking the sword out it's hands and the orc onto the ground. The hobbit began stabbing the orc about his chest and neck.

Well done, Bilbo! Ashara grinned as she slunk closer, but she could tell that Thorin had finally slipped into unconsciousness.

Oh no you don't!

Ashara started crawling on the ground to avoid being seen by the orcs. Bilbo was standing between them and Thorin's body (he wasn't dead yet!).

Azog and what remained his pack crept forward at the white orc's order, "Kill him."

At that she grabbed Orcrist and drew Lightbringer as she stood up snarling in the Black Speech, "YA prizyvayu vas za pravo ubit' Torina Okenshil'da!"

Before Azog could do anything more than growl, the dwarves had flanked the orc pack. Ashara sprung into action, the swords seeming to come alive in her hands as they cut into both wargs and orcs with ease, glowing blue and white.

All of the sudden, Ashara heard the piercing cry of an eagle. She looked up and saw that they were both picking up the dwarves and throwing the orcs and wargs all around and away.

After Bilbo was picked up, she jumped off the cliff and landed on the back of an eagle. The Company flew away as Azog roared in anger.

Ashara really didn't like flying. Though it was preferable to being killed by orcs. Looking down made her want to vomit.

Just when she thought she could not stand it anymore, the Eagles began flying low enough for everyone to get off onto the rock of the Carrock.

Before she could move her feet, Gandalf was already checking on Thorin. And was likely using some magic to get him back up on his feet.

Whatever the wizard had done, it worked, because she heard a familiar voice murmur, "The Halfling?"

"It's alright. Bilbo is here, and he's quite safe," Gandalf replied.

Thorin got to his feet, with some help from Dwalin and Kili. It looked like he wanted to tear Bilbo a new bodily orifice. Gandalf watched warily.

"YOU! What were you doing? You nearly got yourself killed! Did I not say that you would be a burden? That you would not survive in the wild? That you had no place amongst us," Thorin growled.

Then the dwarf king did something she did not expect and said, "I have never been so wrong in all my life." At that he hugged Bilbo.

It's about damn time, Ashara thought as she smiled at Thorin finally lightening up on Bilbo.

"I'm sorry I doubted you," Thorin apologized as he stepped away.

"No, I would have doubted me too. I'm not a hero or a warrior," Bilbo flicked a glance at Gandalf, "Not even a burglar."

They all watched the Eagles fly off. It was a sight. Ashara was still pleased to be back on her own two feet, thank you very much.

"Where's Orcrist?" Kili asked. Thorin had moved his hand to grab it to come up empty.

"I believe I have something that belongs to you," Ashara said as she moved forward before she handed Orcrist back to Thorin.

Their eyes met and he nodded his thanks. That would have to do for now.

"Is that what I think it is," Bilbo asked looking off into the distance.

Gandalf spoke first, "Erebor. The Lonely Mountain. The last of the great Dwarf Kingdoms of Middle Earth."

"Our Home," Thorin replied with a tired smile on his face.

As a bird flew by them chirping, Oin called out, "A raven! The birds are returning to the mountain!"

Gandalf replied, "That my dear Oin, is a thrush."

"But we'll take it as a sign. A good omen" Thorin replied.

"You're right. I do believe the worst is behind us," Bilbo replied.

As they made their way down the Carrock, Bilbo asked, "Ashara, what did you say to Azog in that language?"

"You would be happier not knowing. And it isn't worth repeating at the present time," Ashara replied.

"And if I asked you," Thorin said as he came level with the elf.

"I would give you the same answer. I might share at a later time, but for the moment, do not ask me what I said to Azog!"

I don't think you'd like it.

A/N 2: That took a bit longer than I would have liked it to. But the chapter got longer as well. Looking forward to seeing what you all think!

Now for the translations. Some of these are repeats, and one of them I got from the story The Hidden Heir. I will not be giving the translation for that word, but I think it can be guessed... ;)

Haru-grandfather

"YA prizyvayu vas za pravo ubit' Torina Okenshil'da!"- "I challenge you for the right to kill Thorin Oakenshield!" I don't think Thorin would like that very much if he knew? What do you all think?

Puitho- I'm sure you all can guess...

Casting choices:

Ashara- Rhona Mitra as she was in Underworld Rise of the Lycans, except with hazel-gold eyes.

Erudan- Harry Lloyd as he was in Game of Thrones. Though he won't be mad!