Part 2: Chapter 10: The Wind was on the Withered Heath
She wanted him to be there, her hand with his. She called him lead escort. And he liked it.
She shivered as she saw their hands––she felt his caress.
That was beyond the bounds of close friends.
She did not object, no. Instead she settled there.
And so did he.
What was the task of lead escort in the mind of Sona, Ē'ze? Thorin wondered briefly, a short smile playing on the edge of his lips, a smile he did not let show. At the very least it meant he would find her a seat next to him at breakfast.
And being as they were here for now, it would surely involve other tasks as well.
Now his hand held still as he led them to the massive wood-hewn table being set for breakfast by the Company. Still, not for shame. He felt none. He kept still so he could feel her and sense how much she liked it. In this moment he had no doubt she accepted him beyond the kindness of simple friendship––Dennar––
––this was extra––
Perhaps when he let go the sentiment would be lost to him. Perhaps he would think his way out, a pity. Now he did not care. Now he took the moment for his own, together, with her.
His close friend.
Thorin chose the far end and sat next to her so she should have no other to contend with.
She would make her own way, and he would help see to it.
Balin observed, brows pointed in thought.
Was that rebuke? I dare you say it. Thorin glared back with the faintest edge of smile on his lips. I am her lead escort –– 'Dennar,' he signed the single word and Balin couldn't help but shrug and smile.
Good. What his Advisor thought now, or anyone else besides Sona, did not concern him, however bothered he felt about the whole matter at hand. And Sona herself had called him Dennar. The thought almost made him warm inside, except for the company of their Host, the Bear Man, Beorn. His presence only made Thorin hot, hot with annoyance that anyone would dare pursue Sona under his own watch, to see his One contended for, and in the contender's house.
"Can I help with anything?" Sona asked the Bear Man as the others took their seats along the table being set by Ori and Dori while Bombur carried over various platters of food balanced with delicate ease.
"No, Honey,"
Honey? Wh–? That–– Did the cursed Bear Man just call Sona HONEY?
The Bear Man nearly purred his satisfaction, as if he tasted honey. Blast it.
"I have many helping paws."
I bet you do.
Honey. Thorin loved honey. He swallowed his anger as best he could. That was not her name, and the endearment–– she allowed it? Certainly she didn't introduce herself as Honey. He flatly just knew she would not. Sona would tell the Bear Man her name, so why wouldn't he use it? And how could the Bear Man presume?
How had it come to this? He looked away, around the room, at his Company, Bombur back at the heath, beyond, the goats and some chickens and farther back a few sheep, Sasha and the gold Dog circled in play… Bees everywhere. Bees. Did something happen at the hives?
None of it made sense. Thorin looked back at Sona, and waited, confused. It hurt, and he wasn't sure from what. He felt restless, wishing he could sleep: but sleep, it held its own dangers.
And it occurred to him, just as he felt the prick of Honey dig ever deeper, she ignored it. It was almost as if she hadn't heard the Bear Man.
Thorin knew better. He frowned deeper, both bothered by the Bear Man's presumption, and the fact that Sona made no corrective response.
He knew the feeling being on the receiving end of Sona's ire, and the idea of seeing her aiming that ire at the Bear Man filled him with uncomfortable excitement.
Yet he had to admit, her lack of response was no sign of approval.
In fact, one could think she was quite the Diplomat.
He swallowed again, anger curling, without a fix, fully aware he had no say in how she took the Bear Man's new … form of address for his Ē'ze.
Thorin let out a quiet exhale, wondering how the next hour would go, much less the remaining day.
"And you are my guest," the Bear Man finished, still pouring milk in Sona's large tankard, a gift, he explained, from his small herd of Cows. He poured slowly, taking his time, hovering near her, his guest.
Sona. Honey!?
Ē'ze––
––Biriz Akmâth.
The rest of them, to this Bear Man, existed to wait upon Sona. Not a bad thing, Thorin happily considered, but a thing these Dwarves did only with her allowance: she did not like being served.
Thorin smiled to himself, the leader of her Escort, she called him. Dennar. Indeed.
"And you are the one they call 'Oakenshield'." The Bear Man, so it seems, had heard of him.
Thorin, jarred from his thought, nodded slightly, wondering how much the Bear Man knew about him, and from where, as the Bear Man moved off, filling other mugs with milk. He did not have time to think before the Bear Man asked his next question. "Why is Azog the Defiler hunting you?"
Thorin's heart took a jolt––
––The arm. Only that was gone. Thorin saw Azog in his memory of recently, recalling in the haze of anger and fire, the Pale Orc standing high on the White Warg: there'd been a trident embedded in his flesh where his arm had once been––
––Would have done more good to kill him when the chance had been his. Why had he not thrust again at Azanulbizar? Thorin stalled in the battle haze, so shocked that he'd managed to best his foe. His body failed to move before a horde of Orcs pulled Azog away and out of sight, back into the darkness of Moria where Thorin imagined he had died.
He had not died.
Lu lu lu––
––And he was near.
Sona kept her brows in a knot, and though she seemed fully concentrated on her breakfast with her eyes, she still did not touch it.
"You know of Azog. How?" Thorin asked his own question. His eyes gravitated to the manacle fixed to Beorn's arm. He surveyed the scars around it, spreading all over his body, some scars intentionally drawn for pain, others self inflicted, as though he fought so hard he nearly tore himself apart escaping. And yet the manacle remained.
"My People were the first to live in the Mountains, before the Orcs came down from the North." The Bear Man glared, inwardly now, as if none of them were there. "The Defiler killed most of my family." He stared away, heaved the jug of milk, and gestured toward the manacle still fest on his wrist.
Thorin had the sudden urge to remove it.
Beorn continued, eyes on the metal, "But some he enslaved; not for work, you understand––"
Lu lu lu––
Hold––
––too soon,
wait, listen.
"––but for sport. Caging Skin Changers and torturing them seemed to amuse him."
Beorn put the jug on the table and began pacing slowly behind them.
Thorin's fists clenched as he glanced off, eyes combing over his Company, Fíli and Kíli stared back at him, both too pale with knowing.
Still none of them had any idea, not as much as this Bear Man who had lived confined by Azog, and then lived to escape his fate.
Thorin briefly wondered if the Bear Man would allow them to remove the manacle when Sona abruptly pushed her plate forward. Talk of forced servitude and torture for sport dampened more than her appetite: she looked pale, slightly green with upset.
Thorin caught her with his eyes, where she hovered briefly, smiling that smile as if it were nothing, he wished they could stay in that space. And then she angled her face back to their host, as if concern for her was beside the point.
All things considered, Thorin understood, though he disagreed.
She was never beside the point.
He wished she would keep her appetite, build strength.
She needed it.
They were all going to need their strengths.
And with that, Thorin made a point of not answering the opening question, why Azog the Defiler hunted them. And thankfully the Bear Man did not ask him again.
Instead Beorn meandered on with his memories of times when there were more of his own kind. He was the last.
Sona took a second shove at her plate. Too much talk of violence.
Thorin caught her eye, but she only shook her head and continued listening, plate neglected.
"Honey––" The Bear Man went on––
––quit with the honey––
"––tells me you were escorting her home––"
––She should be home––
"––I assume you need to be there––wherever that may be––"
––Not your business, Bear Man.
"––before the last days of Autumn, and the weather turns too foul for travel."
"Before Durin's Day, yes," Tharkûn replied instantly, as if staving off Thorin's possible preferred choice of words.
"You are running out of time," only now did the Bear Man focus on the Thief's full plate of food.
Tharkûn nodded firmly, "which is why we must go through Mirkwood."
The Greenwood no more––
"A darkness lies upon that forest––fell things creep beneath those trees. There is an alliance between the Orcs of Moria and the Necromancer in Dol Guldur––"
Azog––
––And the one who seeks the Ring––
"I would not venture there, except in great need," the Bear Man finished.
Thorin's eyes rested on Sona, safe next to him. The fire blazed, yet a chill crept deep through his bones.
"We will take the Elven Road, that path is still safe." Tharkûn seemed sure.
Thorin frowned, uncertain.
"Safe?" the Bear Man asked back, sharing Thorin's doubt. "The Wood Elves of Mirkwood are not like their Kin. They are less wise and more dangerous."
Aye, a fact they agreed upon––Thorin could vouch personally after Imladris; Lord Elrond had been fully unlike the Greenwood Elf, who had never honored their alliance nor aided Thorin's people when they lost their home, both slights too sharp to ignore.
Thorin preferred traveling North of the Elven Path, but time required a certain risk, a confidence that the Elf kept that path safe for travelers.
And then the little Bean was under the table, just in front of Sona's feet, making himself known so she would lift him to her, and that she did quite happily, and there the Dog settled into her lap, her hands over his ears, a sweet furry distraction from the vile conversation at hand.
"But it matters not," The Bear Man wasn't finished.
"What do you mean," Thorin asked, jerked from softer thoughts.
"These lands are crawling with Orcs––"
––Azog and his––
"––their numbers are growing and you are on foot. You will never reach the forest alive."
––Nothing like the bluntness of the Bear Man––
Sona froze.
Thorin felt a shift in the seat beneath him, though nothing moved. He was left with only difficult choices. He looked into the eyes of the Bear Man, who returned his gaze with a face lacking all affection while full of disdain––a look Thorin was accustomed to from strangers.
Thorin looked back at him, fairly unaffected by it.
He was tired.
And yet he was irked by the Bear Man's demeanor hurled toward him.
For what? Beyond that Beorn had a craving for honey? And Sona traveled with Thorin?
Thorin glanced at Sona, who was not only still, but stiff now.
"I don't like Dwarves––"
––Do tell.
"They're greedy and blind." And with that he picked up a white Mouse that had been helping herself to Dwalin's plate. After a bit, the Warrior set her aside, and that is when the Bear Man noticed her––"Blind to the lives of those they deem lesser than their own."
Thorin kept his eyes open, as was his practiced response to remarks such as these.
Sona's hands froze once more, the stiffness channeling an anger Thorin found pleasant to observe, although he wasn't quite sure exactly why. Her fingers gentled over the Dog's ear, the soft fur, and he wondered what it felt like––
––her fingers––
––the fur.
He'd never seen a Dog like that. He blinked again––
––So tired.
"But Orcs I hate more." Beorn released the Mouse on the chess game.
And Thorin looked back at Sona: she was full of an angry posture now––though he was fairly certain the Bear Man wouldn't notice––Thorin rested looking there.
Suddenly her eyes widened, and he followed them briefly to the Bear Man's, to find him with a gaping smile––almost leering––
––so blatantly attempting to claim her.
Fool Bear Man.
She did not encourage him, and nor did she wish to be claimed.
"What do you need, Honey?"
Stop it with the honey.
Sona blinked and shot Thorin a look of utter panic.
Why? No, no, he nodded for her to go ahead and answer the Bear Man, certainly she knew their needs.
"Well, if it's not too much trouble––"
"It is not." Bear Man circled the long table, continuing to serve his milk to the hungry Company, all watching on.
"––then I think we should stay here for at least a week––"
Wait, what?
Here? No. Not here. With this Bear Man working on you––But where then? Where better? There was no better. This was it.
"––if not more, while injuries heal––"
––that wasn't quite what I'd been thinking––
"I'm still not a hundred percent––" Sona added.
What? Thorin frowned, looking her over for anything they may have missed in addition to the too many injuries she'd already sustained––
"I could use the rest, even if you are all ready to move."
Thorin felt the soreness in his body raise objections, in spite of his concerns.
"Plus," she added, "by cutting through Mirkwood we'll save time, so long as we avoid any DooShee Elves."
Thorin remembered, and suppressed his sudden mirth at her joke. Sweet Thief cracking jabs again. She is feeling better.
"And for that we'll need Ponies and fresh supplies."
The Bear Man had finished his circle of the table, and he starred down at Sona, just beside her, just in front of Thorin. Sona was again petting the ears of the little Bean.
She flashed one of her most charm-filled smiles up at Beorn––
––Mahal––
––Breathe. Just breathe––
Not like one of her smiles for him––
Ē'ze––
––Biriz Akmâth––
––Here she bore the mask of Diplomat, on behalf of Thorin and the Company.
"Besides, I can't leave Peanut yet. I'm only just getting to know him."
––Aye, the Bean.
"It will be as you say," the Bear Man rumbled low, almost purring.
They would have aide.
And yet with that the Bear Man's big hand came down across Sona's shoulder, to the head of the small Dog, where he encompassed her hand in a patting motion––
––taking her hand? Taking––
But she did not take hand in return, not like she willingly took Thorin's so many times.
And still, Thorin shut his eyes, wishing there were boulders over his heart.
"I will never deny you anything that is in my power to give."
Laying it on a bit thick, aren't you, Bear Man?
The Thief recoiled, toward Thorin, and the moment with their overbearing Host was thankfully broken.
Thorin wondered what it all meant, suddenly confused while at the same time a bit more assured.
He had no cause for assurance.
He wanted to hit something.
As the table dispersed, he motioned Dwalin to meet him outside.
/T\oSo/T\oDo/T\
Khuzdûl:
Dennar – Supreme Guide
A/N: I am back, working to be here a while, grateful that for now my block has eased and I'm on a good roll.
Big big thanks to Jenny-Wren28 for her recent forays in our AU. With the Happy Holidays tale she recently posted in addendum to "On The Road To Find Out," I warmed back in. YAY! And with that lovely project, and following on here, Jenny-Wren28's helped me get this story rolling once more. Thank you, Buhel.
E