Chapter Twenty-Six

Leave me Empty, Leave me Numb

Steal Away my Heart and Sun

Bilbo woke with a sharp hiss of pain as something hard and solid collided with her back, effectively winding her.

"Wake up! Wake up little Halfling wench!" another swift kick to her back caused her to let out another hiss of pain and for Frodo to let out a small squeal of fright.

"I'm awake. Stop it. I'm awake." She sat up despite the protesting pain in her back and glared up at the dwarf who had kicked her awake.

He sneered down at her before sizing her arm and dragged her – and Frodo who was clutching to her tightly – to where Bovin was standing, barking harsh orders in Khuzdul.

Bilbo picked up a few words, but nothing that would paint her a clear picture as to what was happening.

She noticed that the rest of her family were not being dragged after her and Frodo, instead they were being forced to go in a completely opposite direction.

Her stomach churned in fear as to what might happen.

"What's going on?" She snapped at Bovin once she and Frodo had been brought before him, "What's happening?"

"A change of plans." Bovin replied simply, a nasty grin appearing beneath his heavy black beard.

Bilbo felt cold sweat trickle down her spine.

"What kind of changes?"

"We've noticed that we are falling behind schedule with the current pace we're moving at, so we've thought of a change of action that will keep everyone happy and us on schedule."

"By everyone you mean yourselves." Bilbo snapped.

"Why, of course," Bovin replied silkily as he smirked down at her.

"What are these changes of plans that will keep everyone – and by everyone you mean yourselves – happy and on schedule?" Bilbo demanded, her arms wrapping themselves tightly around Frodo, her eyes no longer looking up at Bovin's smirking face but rather at a dwarf who was standing nearby. Her eyes focused upon his waist were a little blade hung from his belt. Just a little closer…

"Separation." Bovin stated with a smug air about him, "We'll move faster and you might behave yourself more if we get a little separation between you and your brat."

Bilbo felt her heart stop at his words.

No, no, they couldn't! They wouldn't.

She hugged Frodo closer to her, her eyes darting between Bovin and Sting. Just a little closer…

Her frighten look seemed to please Bovin for his smirk only grew wider as he moved closer to them. Bilbo took a several steps back, Frodo hugged to her side, his face pressed against her chest.

"I'm warning you." She hated how weak and squeaky her voice sounded. She tried to make herself stand up straighter and appear warrior-like but she was so tired and weak from travelling in such rough conditions that she could barely muster a stern grimace.

Bovin let out a bark of laughter.

"Oh wench, what could you possibly do to us?" his smirk quickly turned into a look of surprise when he suddenly had an elven letter opener stuck under his nose.

"Why you little…" the dwarf Bilbo had just stolen Sting from started to snarl as he made to grab her only to stumble backwards clutching bloody fingers or rather the bloody stumps of his fingers.

Bilbo felt her stomach flip as she stared from the dwarf's bloody stumps to his severed fingers lying on the rocking mountain path.

Oh… dear… She hadn't meant to do that! Cut him. Yes, to make him back off, but cut several of his fingers off? Eh, not quite. She was going to pay for this now.

"You truly love making things difficult for yourself don't you, wench?" Bovin stated and Bilbo was surprised to see that he was laughing, even though it wasn't a particularly nice laugh as he shoved the yelping and cursing dwarf back, snapping at him in Khuzdul to get a grip on himself.

"Let us go." She wouldn't beg, even now she refused to beg for their release, she would stand tall – as tall as a hobbit could stand – and straight, she would not, no she refused to kneel before these evil creatures and beg.

Frodo clutched to her side even more tightly as Bovin beared down upon, causing for Bilbo to lift Sting – its blade still dripping with the dwarf blood – and stuck it under Bovin's chin, bringing him up short.

"Let us go or you'll be losing more than a couple of fingers." She growled.

"So much fire." Bovin replied with a silky smile, his eyes looking her up and down in an admiring fashion, "So soft in appearance but filled with a flame that burns brighter than even dragon's fire. I can see now what he saw in you to make him forget his royal ways, to forget the disgrace and shame you would bring him with the mongrel growing in your belly."

Bilbo forced herself not to flinch at his words, even though each one struck her like a physical blow.

"It doesn't hurt that you are such a pretty little thing, in your own queer little way. A pretty little plaything." He let out a harsh but amused chuckle, "For what more could you have possibly have been to him? For him to toss you aside without out so much as a backwards glance, to never come looking for you after his Kingdom was restored to its former glory. Do you think he would have kept you little Halfling? If he had known of the bastard whelp you have clutching to your side? Maybe he would have. The whelp, I mean. But you? I can't imagine what he might have done with you. Turn you out into harsh, cold world? Or kept you locked away, hidden from all eyes, dark in a dungeon, deep within the mountain, far from the Sun and green earth that you love so. Or maybe he would have done neither. Maybe he would have shoved a sword through your belly the moment he learnt of the whelp." He smirked as she gasped out loud at the horrific images his words were causing to appear within her mind.

Thorin at his most terrible, his face twisted with unprecedented rage as he thrust Orcrist straight into the swell of her belly, the swell that contained the life of their child. Their child… Frodo.

"No." She whispered fighting back bitter tears, "no, he wouldn't. He would never do that! And if he tried, I would never have let him. I would never have let him or anyone harm my child."

"How far," Bovin smirked and Bilbo swallowed thickly, "how far would you go to protect your child?"

"I would die for him." She said as she met Bovin straight in the eye, "I thought that that would have been obvious by now."

He nodded his head as he stroked his beard.

"That it has, that it has. That is why separation has come to our minds."

"No, please…" she started but he waved her off.

"Your desire to escape is of course fuelled by your desire to protect your child and family and possibly yourself. Your escape attempts – along with your father's inability to move very fast or any given day – has slowed us down considerably, so a solution to our problem has been thought up. We separate you from your child."

"How will that help?" Bilbo cried as she clutched Frodo to her with one arm and held Sting underneath Bovin's nose with the other, "If you do that I will be only become even more determined to escape. In fact by separating me from my child you will only be helping my escape as I will have nothing tying me back to you."

"Ah, but if we separate you from your child and family, how will you know where they are? How will you know how to find them?"

Bilbo felt her heart drop down to her toes.

"I will find them." She whispered threw gritted teeth.

"Will you though?"

She glared up at him, hating him with every fibre of her body.

She tightened her grip on Sting, wishing she could simply drive her little blade straight through Bovin's smug smile.

"I will, just watch me. And then I will make you wish you had never stepped foot in my hobbit hole. That you had never entered the Shire at all! I told you before that I have powerful friends Bovin and I'm sure, once I tell them what you have done, they will be only too happy to help me make you pay." She snarled and for a moment she felt powerful, felt in control as she watched his smirk slip for the first time and for a moment, he looked afraid. But only for a moment as the next she was being seized from behind, Sting wrestled from her grasp. But she cared not for the loss of her little blade but rather for her child who was wretched from her side.

"MAMA!"

"No! Give him back! Give him back!" She didn't care that she was screaming, begging, as she struggled against the arms that held her.

"Give him back! Please! Give him back!" She struggled and fought, biting, scratching and kicking as she watched her son being pulled away from her, away from her and to where the rest of her family were being ushered down another path in the mountain. They were looking back at her in horror and confusion.

"Please." She looked at Bovin, her eyes begging, "please, I won't run, I won't fight, I'll obey everything you say but don't take him from me, please."

The dwarf let out a bark of laughter before yelling out a few more commands as his party broke into two.

Bilbo felt tears roll down her cheeks as she watched her child fight and scream as he was dragged away from her. Her only consolation was that Radin was with him and after a few moments had swung her screaming child into his arms and held him close as her lad kept on crying out for her.

"MAMA!"

Words by now had all but failed her and all she could do was kneel – her captors had sensed that her fight and fire had all but left her and so had let her be – and sob heart-wrenching sobs.

"Up you get Miss Baggins," she wasn't sure how long she had sat there when she felt large, kind hands lift her up and that she was suddenly being carried as if she was a small child again.

"Ranon?"

"Yes, miss." She nodded numbly, her tears had all dried up and her throat and chest hurt from her sobs but otherwise she was numb, numb to everything. She didn't bother opening her eyes as she lay her head against the boy's wide, hard shoulder.

"I'm never going to see them again, am I? My child or family?" She felt the boy hesitated as they continued to move.

"I-I don't know, miss."

"That's a no, isn't it?" she whispered through white lips, "I thought as much, feared as much. Will they be killed? My family, I mean?"

"No, I don't- don't believe so. My brother, he wouldn't allow it."

"But you will allow for me to die?" she asked with a humourless laugh.

She felt the boy stiffen and felt immediately sorry for speaking such harsh words.

"I'm sorry, forgive me." she paused as she took a deep breath, "why haven't you gone with your brother" and my child was left unspoken between them.

"Bovin wouldn't – he didn't allow for it. Radin, he almost didn't go until he heard that you and your lad would be separated, he thought it best if he went." Bilbo gave a tiny nod of her head, she appreciated that.

"When you see him again, thank him for me. But may I ask where they are being taken?" please, don't let it be a worse place than whenever I am being taken, please Mahal, I beg of you.

Ranon hesitated again before speaking in a low tone, for her ears only.

"S'pose no harm in telling you, not now. Erebor, is where you lad and family are being taken, to be bargain with the King with."

"Oh." Was all Bilbo could think to say before all of her strength left her and she fell into a numb slumber.

Erebor, her son was being taken to Erebor. Oh Thorin, be kind, be gentle, please look at Frodo, not as the bastard son of the burglar who betrayed you but as the son you always wanted from the woman who loves you more than life itself.

Kili, Ori, Bifur and Bofur protect my child. You all promised that you would. If Thorin refuses to see him or acknowledge him, one of you… no Bofur take him, raise him as your own. I know you will, you love him like he's your own son; I know that you will raise him well, if Thorin fails to accept him.

Much confused was to be had that night when camp was called and the hobbit wench was placed down from Ranon's shoulders and on to a blanket. Many dwarves muttered under their breaths at the wench's queer smile as she slept. None could wake her from her slumber and no shaking could remove the smile from her lips.

"Leave her be." Bovin snorted, "the wench will wake when she wakes. And she can go hungry for all the trouble she has caused us too."

So she and her queer smile were left alone, for the dwarves to ponder and not understand. And none of them would until it was too late.

Author's Note: This chapter was incredibly hard to write and the first few drafts, it was very, very dark. A bit too dark really, which is how (and why) I ended up with this final draft.
Bovin's is an arse in this chapter, but what I had him be the first couple of drafts was simply evil and as I've said before I have no interest in having a Ramsey Snow in this fic. Not, of course, that I had him do anything that that bloody Ramsey does in the books and TV show - no I could never write someone that evil, never in my life, not without feeling like a seriously sick and twisted individual. Honestly I don't know how G.R. doesn't feel sick writing about the things Ramsey does. It just... it's too revolting and horrible and way, way evil. It's just... Ramsey needs to die... horribly! - but he was still pretty evil in this chapter originally. So I decided to scrap it - this was the chapter that really made me realise that I was taking Bovin down the road that I didn't at all like and I gave him his complete rewrite (such an oh so fun process. Scraping a character and then rewriting them, though 'he's basically the same as he was but just less... Ramsey like) and decided that watching GOT while writing this was a very bad idea.
If anyone is curious about how this chapter was originally meant to be like, let me know and I'll give you a run down of it.
If I get enough people asking, I'll do up a brief summary of the first draft and post it at the end of the next chapter.

Anyway, so Frodo (and the others) have be separated from Bilbo and are now on their way to Erebor. We're going to be staying with Frodo for quite awhile because I've found I quite enjoy writing for the little rascal and he is, by far, one of the easier characters in this fanfic to write for. He and Bilbo, I just seem to be able to click with, it's fantastic. So yes, we're going to be inside his head for quite sometime, with maybe a couple of visits into Radin's head because I love the big lug.

I'm still writing chapter 30 *pulls face and groans* and am stuck with writing for Thorin who is by far one of the hardest characters to write for - once again, it's all Bovin's fault! Because everything that goes wrong with this fic these days is Bovin's fault whether he's present/mention or not, it's his fault!

Alright, so I'm going to shut up now, because I'm rambling... again - Gods help when I finally get around to writing my own books, I'll have an author's note at the end (or beginning) of every bloody chapter.
I just like to share and explain the processes and developments I go through while writing this fanfic. I know a few readers find my notes amusing, which in turn amuses me. I in turn love reading other author's notes, especially when they're talking about the development of a chapter or even the story...

And I could ramble on for another couple of paragraphs, lol, but I will leave you good people in peace. Until next chapter, all of you keep safe, I hope you enjoyed this new instalment to the story and please, if you have a moment, check out the new picture the very talented and kind artist Shivi has drawn for this fanfic. Her art is gorgeous! You can find her and her art on Archive of Our Own. So please check it out and leave her a comment.
Thanks for reading. Bye for now!