Chapter Summary: The Troll chapter! I mixed in a bit of book with movie and my own special twist. Hope you like it!
It went without saying that Hobbits are not made to go on adventures. Maybe they once were, when they lived closer to the mountains and were a wondering people but now they most certainly are not meant for it. Bilbo huffs, his stomach is hurting from the lack of seven meals a day and the long sessions of writing. He can just hear Otho's sarcastic but worried nagging in his head.
"That's what you get you Took. Rushing off without thinking, without packing…."
He even hears the part that Lobelia would say with a gleeful laugh because she is sadistic at times.
"And without your hankie."
Yes he had not thought this through, he barely remembered to leave a note to let his cousin know where he went. Around him the land offers him comfort and he's glad that he at least has that. The trees are singing happily, the week worth of rain made them very happy, while the grass moaned playfully about the fact the pony's were trotting and eating it. The Dwarrows aren't the nicest but he understands. He's not only an outsider but he's strange even for his own people.
They've stopped for the day, even though Gandalf hadn't been too pleased with it yelling and storming off. The trees hadn't been too impressed with it. Calling it a tantrum and shaking their leaves at the wizard. One had even raised it's roots to trip the gray wizard which made him snort. The trees weren't too impressed with Thorin though either, didn't like him at all would be a better way of putting it.
"Bilbo? What's got you smiling like a loon?"
Bilbo jumps, he hadn't Bofur come up. He smiles slightly but doesn't say anything. Hearing the land talk isn't something Hobbits can do. Oh yes they have a deep connection to it, they know when it has magic or is sick but they can't hear it like he can. He can only imagine what the Dwarrows would think if they knew.
"Just thinking," he says and Bofur grins.
"Mind sharing? Can alway use new material."
Bilbo chuckles and he follows Bofur to where his family is. Bombur is preparing the food for diner. Quickly he recalls a funny memory.
"Once when I was a small faunt a few friends and I went camping. It rained, nothing like the past week but hard enough to make four faunts miserable. We were hungry and cold but we didn't want to go home. So my cousin Otho, being the oldest, declared that he would find us shelter and food. He comes back covered in scratches and carrying mushrooms and a few other plants. Apparently he found a place that would have been good if it wasn't already occupied and some food…. Only the plants he had thought were edible was Poison Ivy."
Bofur chuckles and winces at the same time.
"Needless to say we crept home with our tails between our legs. The combined lectures of sneaking out, being out after dark in the forest and then playing with fauna we couldn't see was worth seeing Otho walk around for a few days covered in his mother's' pink itching remedy."
Those close enough to hear his tale laugh softly and feeling brave he starts off on another one of the funnier tales of his childhood. This goes on until it's dark and the food is being passed around. The look on Ori's face as he listened helped Bilbo ignore the glare he received from Thorin. Bofur taps his shoulder.
"Take these to the boys?"
He takes the bowls with a grin and nods his head. As he leaves the campsite he notices how quiet the forest is. When the Dwarrows are all together it is hard to hear the land but this is different. The trees are mourning, the grass is scared and the very ground itself is groaning. He's already pensive as he walks up to the troublesome duo and the intense gaze they are gifting the ponies just amps it up.
"What's the matter?" he asks softly. The boys jump and exchange a glance he's seen his Took and Brandybuck cousins give each other when they try to figure out a way to get out of trouble.
"We're supposed to be looking out for the ponies..."
"Only we've encountered a slight problem."
"We had sixteen..."
"Now there's fourteen."
Bilbo resists the urge to smack them both on the back of their heads as they talk as twins do. He gazes at the ponies, Daisy and Bungo are gone. It had taken him a while to get used to a pony having his fathers name too. He opens his mouth to scold the boys when the trees cry out their warning and he pulls the both down, the bushes growing to cover them. The looks on Fili and Kili's faces would have made him smile if a TROLL hadn't walked past him with two of their ponies tucked under it's giant arms. How on earth had he, had they not heard it walking about!? As soon as the troll is gone the bushes recede and Bilbo stands up to follow the troll. It had Myrtle! His Myrtle, the only pony he had gotten attached to. The boys follow him quietly and they come to the edge of the troll's camp, to find that there are three trolls. Bilbo gulps, his determination to save Myrtle damping slightly. The boys put their hands on his shoulders.
"You could easily get them free."
"What!"
"They're big and stupid and you're small and smart plus you have that cool plant thing."
"We'd be right here behind you!"
"And if you do get in trouble just hoot twice like a barn owl and once like a screech owl."
And they push him out, happily taking the bowls from his hands. If he wasn't so glad that they, as the youngest of the company even if Ori looks younger, weren't going to be charging ahead he would have turn around to give them a piece of his mind. Hooting like an owl indeed! Instead he slowly creeps up to the pin holding the ponies. While he may not be made to adventure he had lived through the Fell Winter and knew it was always best to keep a knife on hand however his poor knife couldn't do anything to the thick ropes tying the pin shut. Looking up at the trolls he grimaces at the conversation and the terrible lack of good table manners, the mutton and the soup just smelled terrible and it's just plain gross to wipe one's nose on their sleeve. Mustering up his courage, courage that had been sleeping since his mother had died in her sleep some years ago, he sneaks up to a very sneezing sounding troll to take the large knife tucked in his belt.
Unfortunately for Bilbo, trolls have a magic of their own that manifests on their purses and the other belongings on their belt. So when he finally got the knife unhooked the purse spoke startling him and gaining the trolls attention.
"'Ere, 'oo are you?" it squeaked right before he was grabbed. And just because his luck seemed to have soured the troll sneezed once it had him up to eye level. The trees winced in sympathy as Bilbo makes a gagging sound.
"Blimey, Bert, look what I've copped!" the troll, William not that Bilbo knew or cared, exclaimed. The other two trolls lean in to look at Bilbo.
"What is it?" Bert mutters poking Bilbo in the stomach. Bilbo grunts.
"A bit of this and a bit of that," he wheezes and the trolls frown.
"Can we eat him?" William asks and Bert tilts his head.
"He's not even a mouth full."
"Maybe there are more of 'im. Well are there?" Tom, the last troll asks gruffly.
"Lots but at the same time none at all," Bilbo says trying to stall for time.
"What's tha mean?"
And before Bilbo can come up with a plan Kili rushes in. If he wasn't held up my a bruising hand he would have smacked his own forehead.
"Drop him."
The aftermath of that is painful and Bilbo would really like to forget it ever happened. Having his arms be nearly ripped off and so sure that Thorin would let the trolls do it was on the very top of his 'Never again' list as is being stuffed into sacks.
"We should just eat them raw," Tom says glancing up at the sky.
"Nonsense," says Bert, the apparent cook as he twists the spit that holds many of the Dwarrows "We're roasting them."
"How about squashing them into jam for toast?" William asks like a puppy. Bert smacks him upside his head and William pouts.
"Just saying they'd make a good breakfast…."
"I wish we had some sage…."
"Sage and breakfast won't be a problem if we don't urry up," Tom grumbles and Bilbo has an idea. Not the greatest but it gets them distracted as does the voice that helps him out. After the trolls are turned to stone and Gandalf, the voice who helped his ploy, helps gets them out of the sacks and off the spit he wants to collapse. Thorin stalks up to Gandalf.
"Where were you?"
"Looking ahead."
"Why'd you come back?"
"Looking behind."
The trees mutter at the childish reply and tell Bilbo that he went to the Elves, to Rivendell and that he sound something and that is why it took even longer.
"And it's a good thing I did. Bilbo may have been helping you but a certain someone…" Gandalf trails off and out steps a sheepish looking blond Dwarf. He's handsome, Bilbo admits not as handsome as a certain grumpy and unreachable king but still handsome. He shares feature with Thorin and Fili, even has Kili's nose but his blue eyes are cloudy. Thorin groans, startling Bilbo who has never heard Thorin be anything but majestic.
"Frerin!"
"Alright who helped?"
"Ulmo made it rain!"
"Wow, Tulkas just toss me under the stampede," Ulmo grumps glaring at Tulkas who looks unrepentant "Besides Thorin was supposed to be kingly and offer Bilbo his extra oilskin but the prat was well.. a prat."
"Who helped Frenin get to them safely? Oromë? Irmo?"
"Not us!"
"Nessa?"
"What? He was very sad that he was left behind! I like him. He's sweet and likes to dance. Besides Thorin taught him well! He doesn't need his sight."
"Not to mention you thought his teasing flirting was cute," Vána whispers playfully.
