Chapter Thirty-five: Why Giant Spiders?
Bella followed her brother, trying to stay in his steps as they climbed higher and higher. She paused a moment, sucking in deep breaths of stale, stuffy air. "How much farther do you think?" she asked.
"Not too much farther," Bilbo answered. "I can almost see the sky."
Bella scrambled after him, anxious to breathe fresh air and see sunlight. Her skin crawled with the remnants of spiderwebs her hands and feet had landed in on their climb up. Her shins were scratched up from the rough bark the one or two times she'd slipped. She was jerked from her disgusted thoughts by her brother's amazed laughter.
"Bells! You gotta see this!" he called.
His use of her childhood nickname urged her up the last couple of feet. Balancing beside him, she broke through the thick canopy. For the briefest moment, her eyes slid shut, embracing the clear air and relishing the cool breeze that teased her hair. It felt as though it had been years since she could breathe properly.
Then she opened her eyes to brilliant sunlight and dozens if not hundreds of black butterflies. She laughed as the many wings fluttered about them, some turning a deep, indigo-blue when the sun hit them just so. "It's so beautiful!" Green leaves were just starting to get their autumn colors along their edges. Late summer blue sky covered them as the sun gently warmed her as a chilled breeze blew.
"Look over there," he pointed out ahead of them. "That must be Long Lake, and . . . there's Esgaroth."
A sheet of water like shimmering glass could be seen like a wide ribbon before them. The town was to their right. (South wasn't it?) But from what Bella could see of it, it was a pile of sundried driftwood.
Bilbo shouted down the tree. "We can see a lake. We're almost there!"
Bella turned to their left, pushing aside a branch. "Erebor," she whispered before she turned, shouting, "I see the Lonely Mountain! I can see it!"
A breath of quiet. "Did you hear?" Bilbo called down again. "Hello!"
Something jabbed the back of Bella's neck. She slapped at it. She froze as she found nothing there. A thrill of panic hit her just as her world rocked beneath her.
"Bella!"
Her brother's shout and protective arms caught her, leaving her gasping. "Something's wrong," she said as the sensation of dizziness and a painful sting muted into the background. She growled. "Those protective idiots must have figured that something was wrong and sent us up here to keep us out of the way. I'm torn between grateful and miffed."
"Well, we'd best get down there and check on them," Bilbo said.
"I just might smack them on the principal of the thing, provided they offer a good enough explanation," Bella said as they started the climb down.
"And I may just thank them for keeping you out of trouble," Bilbo returned. Then, he paused, looking through the leafy branches. "I-I think I see something," he muttered.
Bella crouched from her position higher on the trunk so that she was almost level with him. Whatever it was certainly was making a racket, clanking branches together. "What is it?"
"I'm not sure," he said, shifting forward.
"Bilbo, look-!"
"Ah!" He fell, having leaned too far.
Bella scrambled down after him as he crashed against at least two branches and fell through remnants of huge spider webs. "Bilbo!"
He finally caught his hand round a branch. "Oh, come on. Don't tell me that Lady Luck has left us again."
"It could be argued that she left us at the river considering Thorin," Bella said, breathing out with relief. "Just give me a moment, and I'll get you back over here." He was currently a good two or three feet from the trunk. But surely there was a branch or something.
"Bella."
She froze at the dead calm in his voice.
"I see it now," he said as he switched his hold from his right hand to his left. He reached for his right vest pocket. "I need you to catch something and put it on immediately."
"What?!" Bella demanded, her face twisting in confusion. "What are you talking about? You have to tell me what the danger is so I can take care of it."
"I can't let it see you," Bilbo said.
The words barely left his mouth when a monster lunged at him. Bella pressed a hand to her mouth to muffle her scream as Bilbo barely avoided the beady eyes and pincher mandibles of a giant spider. Her heart stopped as Bilbo fell again. Breathing heavily with panic, she scrambled down as he landed on a giant spiderweb. Fortunately, it was stronger than the others and caught him. Unfortunately, the web was too sticky for him to break free.
"Get away!" Bilbo shouted as the spider descended upon him as though he was a bug. "Get away!"
Bella ducked behind a thick branch with a sob. She pressed both hands to her mouth as she heard the wet, sticky sound of the spider entrapping her brother in the webbing. She sobbed as her brother cried out in his struggles before he fell silent. She cursed herself for not acting as the spider finished wrapping her brother in its silk.
She forced herself to take deep breaths, trembling as she fought to release them slowly. She needed a clear head. This must have been the fate of the dwarves, her One. They would not go unavenged.
It took all Bella's knowledge of hobbits' natural hiding abilities to follow the spider unseen. It turned her stomach to walk through webbing and see what could only be the remains of past unfortunate travelers.
Thankfully, now that she was somewhat calmed, she realized that she still vaguely felt the pinch in her neck from the spider bite Fili must have gotten. And based on what Fili, Kili, and Bilbo had told her concerning the events leading to their reunion at Beorn's, this meant he was still alive. She could only pray that this meant the others and her brother were still alive as well.
There had been a point that she considered a time of madness when she picked up a book on spiders. While she could tell the difference between venomous and nonvenomous spiders afterward it had made her skin crawl with phantom spiders for weeks afterward. But most important at the moment, was that she had learned some spiders merely drugged their prey. So she hoped that her phantom sensations from Fili meant these oversized arachnids were of that variety.
Finally, the spider reached its nest, dragging Bilbo's cocoon across a branch. Spiders further in appeared to be tying up the last of several bundles.
Bella pulled herself up onto the branch the spider was dragging her brother on. She froze as the spider paused and turned around. Fear seized her as the spider inspected her brother's unconscious form. She slowly and as silently as possible drew Amralime from its sheath. If that spider thought it could steal a snack from her brother—
She jumped as an elvish blade struck the underside of the spider. The creature screamed horribly as the so-called letter opener pressed further in until the beast was thrown off.
Bella scurried forward as Bilbo sat up, ripping at his confinements. She helped as best she could before he grabbed her upper arm, swiftly and silently moving the both of them behind a wide stump.
"I thought I told you to get away," he whispered in Sindarin.
"Did you really think I would?" she returned.
He gave side-nod with a shrug. "Fair point." He looked round their hiding place. "Far too many spiders, but it appears that they have our entire Company."
"Doesn't it just make you feel like a bug?" Bella muttered, glancing at her sword. Whatever these monsters were, it hadn't triggered the glowing.
"Oh, yes. I'll certainly pity those poor things after this," he said. "Thoroughly cleaning Bag End from top to bottom upon return and all spiders are killed. But first, we have a mission to focus on."
"Right," Bella said. She peeked around her side. "We can't possibly take them all at once on our own."
"That's why I'll draw them off," Bilbo said.
She stared at her brother in disbelief. "Bilbo, you are not a wizard with a Rhosgobel rabbit drawn sled," she said. "Those monsters will literally eat you alive."
"Not if they can't see me," he said. He pulled out a plain, gold ring from his right vest pocket and slipped it on his finger.
Bella gasped as her brother completely disappeared. "Bi-Bilbo?" She jolted as her searching hand was caught by one as cold as ice.
"I'm still here, Rosa," Bilbo said reassuringly. But his voice sounded so far away.
"You-you're ice cold," she whispered, unable to keep the tremor from her voice. "What sorcery is this?"
"It's how I escaped the goblin tunnels," he answered. "I'll explain everything once I return from getting these spiders away. Stay here until they're gone." There was a pause that was filled only with the hissing of spiders. "I have to go now. I will be back, I promise."
Bella only nodded, settling further into the middle of her cover. Then she flinched as she sensed something creeping behind her. "Bil?" If she wasn't so frightened, she would curse the tremble in that single word. Then she felt a cold breeze passing her just before a spider screamed behind her. With a squeak, she curled in on herself, peeking out just enough to see the loathsome beast curl up before tumbling to its death.
"Sting," Bilbo muttered from thin air. "That's a good name. Sting."
"Bilbo?"
"I'll explain later. I think I got their attention. I just need to lead them away from you and the others."
Uncurling, she saw some branches sway as though someone leaped from one to the next.
Then from down below she heard her brother's voice singing.
"Old fat spider spinning in a tree!
Old fat spider can't see me!
Attercop! Attercop!
Won't you stop,
Stop your spinning and look for me?
Old Tomnoddy, all big body,
Old Tomnoddy can't spy me!
Attercop! Attercop!
Down you drop!
You'll never catch me up your tree!"
Honestly, it was more sing-song than any real tune. But it was doing the job of distracting the spiders and drawing them away. With the spiders gone from the dwarves, Bella slunk over to them as Bilbo's voice drifted away.
"Lazy Lob and crazy Cob
are weaving webs to wind me,
I am far more sweet than other meat,
but still they cannot find me!
Here am I, naughty little fly;
you are fat and lazy.
You cannot trap me, though you try,
in your cobwebs crazy."
Bella was sure that they would laugh at that tune someday. But at the moment, her brother was being chased by an entire herd . . . flock? . . . nest? . . . of giant spiders. She could only pray to Eru and the Valar that nothing happened to him as he played "live bait." She hurried to the bundles, only to yelp when a lone spider popped up near a particularly rotund cocoon.
The beast started to poke at the cocoon, hissing and squealing.
"You keep your disgusting feet off him!" Bella shouted. She slashed its bulbous hindquarters before throwing a slender knife into one of its eight eyes. It reared up in a scream, giving her a perfect opportunity to slice its underside where it was thinnest. A final squeal and it curled up to fall to its death. Bella breathed heavily.
It took a moment to realize that her shortness of breath wasn't just from facing an overgrown house pest. Fili must be having trouble breathing. Well, it most definitely wouldn't do to have a breathing impediment in this situation. She started walking among the swinging and weakly struggling cocoons. "Fili!"
"Bella! Here!"
She scurried to one of the wriggling lumps, relieved that her half of the shared symptoms ceased. "Hold still, I'm going to cut an airhole."
Fili stopped moving, but it was clear that he was having difficulty breathing.
She took the smallest and sharpest of her blades and carefully cut around where she could see his face. In the end, it was more ripping the webbing away than any actual cutting.
His face was bright red from hanging upside down. His eyes were glazed from the remnants of the spider venom. "Bella," he gasped.
"Sh, give me a moment and we'll set you right," she said. She managed to cut enough webbing away so that his arms were free, allowing him to catch the branch when Bella tugged the webbing down enough. Assured that he had a firm hold, she sliced the support silk allowing Fili to freely take an upright position.
Safely on the branch, Fili started helping her get the rest of the webbing off.
"So," she asked as they worked, "whose idea was it to send Bilbo and me up while you baker's dozen faced these monsters?"
"May depend on how much trouble he would be in," Fili answered.
"Only a light cuff to the back of his head just for the principle of the thing," Bella said.
"Kili," he said.
A nearby cocoon protested.
Bella chuckled as she moved to free who she assumed to be her future brother-in-law as Fili continued.
"He thought he'd seen something following us, and he wanted to make sure both of you were out of harm's way since the lighting was working against you."
"Hm, I guess I'll allow that," she said, managing to free Kili's head.
The brunet winced from his upside down position. "Does this mean I'm safe?" he asked.
"As I said, 'for the principle of the thing,'" she said. She lightly cuffed him before saying, "But thanks for watching out for us."
Kili gave her a crooked smile, an amusing thing considering his predicament.
"Alright, Fili, if you can remain balanced, how 'bout you help me get your brother free," Bella said.
Fili joined her and helped her finish freeing Kili.
By the time, Bilbo returned from leading the spiders on a "merry chase," the three of them had managed to free half the Company. Bombur was on the ground recovering with Bofur beside him. Thorin and Balin were nursing headaches. Bilbo helped in the freeing of the Ri brothers, Bifur, Oin, Gloin, and Dwalin. All through the rescue operation and even as they safely made it back down to the forest floor, Bella saw Fili grow increasingly irritated.
"What's the matter?" she asked once everyone was safely on solid ground.
Fili scowled, pointing at his beard. "I can't get the webs off."
Bella now noticed that a good bit of the webbing in his beard was the horrifically sticky variety.
"It'd take a miracle to wash that out, laddie," Balin said.
"We'll have to cut it," Thorin said with a chagrined wince. The other dwarves shared Thorin's sentiment.
"But I was finally getting a good length to it," Fili protested.
"You had no reason to complain before," Kili grumbled, pointedly rubbing his scruff.
"So, who's going to do it?" Bilbo asked.
Thorin shook his head. "My head is killing me. It would be better that he be completely shaved if I even attempted it."
Kili opened his mouth.
"No, Kee," Fili said. "I love you and trust you with my life, but you are not coming near my face with a sharp object."
Bella sheathed her sword and dug into her pack to retrieve her trimming scissors. Yes, she had meant to keep Bilbo's hair trimmed a proper hobbit length during any adventures. No, they hadn't been able to do that. As soon as they left Mirkwood, she would make sure to grab her brother to do just that. The hair on top was about to get into his eyes, and the hair at the nape of his neck was brushing his shoulders. But nothing she could do about her brother's hair now. But she could help Fili.
"I'll do it," she said. "As his One, I believe I would be allowed, at least in a pinch."
Balin nodded. "Aye, that's true. And, I'm sure if needed, we can keep this event only within the Company, for form's sake."
The rest of the dwarves nodded their ascent as Bella sat Fili down and started trimming his web-infested beard. She did the best she could to leave as much of his beard intact as possible while cutting away the sticky silk. Possibly a quarter hour later, she trimmed the last of the stickiness off. Unfortunately, this left Fili's beard a jagged mess. So locating the shortest sections, she trimmed the rest to most evenly and naturally match. Once finished, his beard was about the same length as it was the night Fili first stood upon her home's stoop.
Fili had sat with his eyes shut, rigid and subtly cringing through the entire process, his cheeks dusted pink with shame. As Bella stepped back, he opened a single eye. "How bad?" he asked.
"I don't think that any other dwarf would actually notice, if that's what you're getting at," she answered, packing her scissors away again.
"She did good, Fee," Kili said, crouching close to inspect it. "I don't think even Ama would notice."
"If she was looking for something wrong, she might," Thorin said. "Your mother has an eagle's eye when it comes to your wellbeing. But she would admit that considering the circumstances, it's an admirable job."
Fili released a breath, releasing his tension. "Thank you, Amralime," he said.
"You're welcome, Fangon-nen," Bella said. She touched her forehead to his.
Fili's eyes lit up with surprise before tilting his head to her in return.
Was this really the first time she had initiated their special touch of affection? If so, then it was definitely because it had been too long since Fili had done so.
"The spiders are returning!" Bilbo shouted.
Bella scrambled to put her pack back on as Fili rushed up and drew his swords. Before she could draw her own swords, Bilbo was at her side, dead serious.
He held up the plain gold ring. "Wear this. It'll make me feel better if those beasts can't see you."
Ice shot down her spine at the sight of that ring. "Bilbo, there's something not right with that ring," she said. "I can't wear it, and you shouldn't be wearing it either."
"It's how I escaped the Goblin Tunnels," he said.
She furrowed her brow. "But you said—"
"I know what I said," Bilbo snapped. "Just put it on."
"I can't! There's something dark about it," she protested. "It needs to be destroyed, not used!"
Red, intense anger flashed through his eyes. But only for the merest second. In fact, later she would wonder if she actually saw it since it was so unlike her brother to get that angry, especially at her. But she had no time to ponder it because the spiders were now upon them.
Bella stared up at the eight-legged beasts. She jolted when Bilbo caught her hand.
"I can't let them get you," he said. Then he shoved the ring on her finger.
She gasped, stumbling back. It felt as though she had dropped into a frozen lake in the middle of winter. She fell to the forest floor as everything drifted and floated about her like a dense yet wispy grey fog. She hugged herself, trying to reorient herself as shadows and spiders swarmed around her. She covered her ears as high, scratchy, evil voices flooded her ears in time with the spiders' hissings. She fought a scream as Black Speech whispered menacingly in her mind.
"Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul, ash nazg thrakatulûk, agh burzum ishi krimpatul."
Bilbo shoved aside the guilt of not giving his sister proper warning before putting the ring on her finger. But he couldn't leave her exposed to the spiders. He also shoved away the shot of anger her words had triggered and the nagging feeling that the ring was . . . protesting being given to Bella. At least Bella was safe now. The spiders couldn't see her and so she was safe. The realm of the ring was a bit disorienting the very first time entering it, but he knew she would recover her wits and would soon be dancing among the spiders and making them pay.
He leaped into the fray, memories of the spiders' cries echoing in his ears as he fought.
"It stings! Where is it? Where is it?!"
"Fat and juicy! Feast! Feast!"
"It's alive and kicking. Feast!"
Bilbo attacked each spider he could reach. He darted in and out among them, slicing legs and stabbing undersides. It was an intense several minutes before there was a break in them.
"Run!" Thorin shouted.
Gloin charged through an opening in the webs, followed close behind by the others. Bilbo stayed near Fili and Kili, the both of them being among the last to leave and Thorin being the very last. They ran through the woods and spiderwebs.
Bilbo started to worry as he noticed that some of the dwarves were still suffering from the spider venom. Being short on food is ailment enough. To essentially be poisoned on top of that is a dangerous combination. He only vaguely noticed how Fili was racing through the other dwarves, head darting about in a searching manner. He didn't realize that Kili had dropped behind him until he half-tripped over his own feet.
He nearly toppled to the forest floor when the rest of the Company slid to a halt. A spider had managed to get ahead of them and was cutting off their escape. Bilbo heaved for breaths, only now starting to realize that even he was suffering some lingering effects of the spider's bite. He readied himself for more battle when an almost musical "shing!" rang through the air.
Bilbo looked up high in the trees to see a silver-haired elf fly through the trees. The elf slid down a spider's silk, slaying the beast in midair before using his falling momentum to send him sliding along the ground to slice the beast standing before the dwarves. But before Bilbo could sag in relief, the elf leaped upright, an arrow on his string and pointing directly at Fili's forehead at the front of the group. The clearing rang with the scrapping of arrows sliding across bows as at least a dozen elves surrounded them.
"Do not think I won't kill you, dwarf," the first elf said. "It would be my pleasure."
Author's Note: And there we are. Hopefully not from the frying pan into the fire, but certainly more trouble.
Special call out to Mims who reviewed and said she caught the modified Princess Bride reference I dropped in my last two notes. Thank you for the review, even as a guest. I loved hearing from you. :-)
On the chapter itself, again, I blended what I could of the book and films, from the colors of the butterflies to making sure that Bilbo's taunting little song was included. Now, I know that at this time, most if not all the characters simply brush Bilbo's ring off as an invisibility ring. But I felt it couldn't be ignored, and Bella is an intelligent lass and perceptive. Am I saying that women have better intuition concerning such things? Maybe. But also, no guarantee how things would have come about if more women were included. Or, nothing changes simply because as of the original writing, even Tolkien hadn't been aware of what Bilbo had found in the Goblin Tunnels.
For those who don't know what Bella heard within the ring, I may leave that a mystery. Partly because it's not one hundred percent relevant to the current story, and partly I'm preparing to publish this at an insane hour and I don't have the energy to doublecheck the exact translation. Anyone desperate to know can ask in the little review box and provided you aren't a guest, I can message you the translation. Should be able to answer at a more reasonable hour.
Bonus callouts to those who make a guess as to who the elf is. I don't care if it's a guess or you have seen the movies and know that way. (Am I desperate for reviews? Only because it makes me smile, occasionally giggle, and I love being able to interact with those who enjoy my story enough to still be reading after all this time.) Also, any theories as to what will happen? Unlike originally, Bilbo is in plain sight. Might this change things? Might it not? What are your thoughts? If I don't catch you through reviews, I'll get ya next year.