Chapter summary: Just what the title says
So began some of the scariest and strangest days of Bilbo's life, for Bilbo suddenly remembered that he had come on this journey to burgle the hoarded treasure of a dragon! It was not that he had forgotten, exactly, but that the business of getting to the mountain had been so arduous that it had rather put the dragon mainly out of his mind. And perhaps there was a part of him that had never really believed there was a dragon to be found, or if one such did exist, that it would be no more fearsome than the paper creatures every hobbit child owned. But here they were, in the great mountain itself, and Thorin took it on himself to remind Bilbo — at quite a length — that this was in fact precisely the reason for which he had come along, and they would all be most grateful if he would get on with it, please and thank you very much.
Well, Bilbo was more than a little cross at Thorin for his lofty manner, and also more than a little afraid of the great Smaug. But while it is fair to say that the Bilbo Baggins who set out from Bag-End nearly six months prior would have squeaked and quite possibly so much as fainted upon the realization that he was actually meant to confront a dragon (and would certainly not have taken a step inside the mountain, no matter what paper he had put his hand to), this Bilbo Baggins had jousted with trolls and goblins and elves, and had won a riddle contest with a horrible little creature who lived all in shadow, and traveled with a dagger on his belt. And this very changed hobbit was determined to meet his obligations, and so he set off quite bravely into the cavern where lived the dragon Smaug, while the rest of the Company politely wished him well and stayed quite safely outside the mountain.
It was very fortunate indeed that the great dragon Smaug was asleep, or else Bilbo might never have made it back from that very terrifying trip. But asleep Smaug was, and quite soundly too, so he did nothing but huff and snore when Bilbo, having grown quite bold in those months of adventure, thieved a goblet and stole away with it back into the tunnel where dwarves awaited him. Easy it may sound to escape a slumbering beast, but it nonetheless took all of Bilbo's courage, for a sleeping dragon may still waken, and even the quietest of hobbits might make a noise when walking amidst mounds of slippery, noisy coins. But luck was with Bilbo and he escaped quite unburnt back to the tunnel where the dwarves awaited him.
The Company was delighted that Bilbo had retrieved this token, and they spent a happy little while passing it from hand to hand, exclaiming at its beauty, and waxing long and poetic about the remaining treasure they were about to reclaim. Bilbo they could not praise enough, and Bofur began right then and there to pen a new song in his honor.
Well, the dwarves were delighted, but Smaug was not, for upon awakening he could tell right away that a thief had taken a piece of his treasure. And he became enraged and flew out from his nest for the first time in many years, muttering and cursing under his great fiery breath. That night and all the next day were terrifying indeed, for though they managed to stay safely hidden from Smaug that night, they had now lost their one advantage, for Smaug was awake and knew they were there, and this calamity the ungrateful dwarves laid squarely at Bilbo's hairy feet.
This put Bilbo in a very foul temper indeed, and in the heat of the moment it is possible he let slip some language that would have had his mother boxing his ears, if she had heard it, but many months spent on the road with dwarves had lowered Bilbo's inhibitions to no small degree. "You ought to have brought five hundred burglars," he grumbled irritably later, "not one. I should want hundreds of years to bring it all up, if I was fifty times as big, and Smaug as tame as a rabbit."
He was sitting with Kili as far away from the others as he could, for he felt he could not stand even one more disapproving look from the dwarves, but Kili would certainly never look at him in such a manner. "You will forgive me for saying so, I hope," Bilbo said, when Kili did not comment on the appropriate number of burglars for toting away mountains of gold, "but it does not seem very wise to have come all this way without a single idea for how to dispose of the dragon waiting for you at the end of the road!" Secretly, Bilbo suspected that the dwarves had been hoping to arrive at Erebor and find the dragon already dead, with naught to do but stroll in and reclaim the mountain and treasure both. ("Not such a race of thinkers as hobbits, indeed!" Bilbo thought irritably, though he could not honestly admit to being very surprised, as it seemed in retrospect that this entire journey had been undertaken on nothing more than hopeful spirits.)
"I don't think," Kili said, "that they had ever really considered exactly what we should do when we got here." Bilbo knew that by "they," Kili meant "Thorin," but of course the young dwarf would never disparage his shemor so directly. "But they will not give up now, when we are so close."
"So close to being fried dragon treat!" Bilbo muttered, quite sourly, and he spent the rest of the night muttering similarly irritable thoughts under his breath, until eventually he fell into an uneasy sleep and dreamt dreams in which the Company were tied up to be roasted over the trolls' cookfire, with Smaug himself companionably supplying the flames.
The next day, Bilbo crept down again to Smaug's lair in hopes of spotting some weakness, safe in the knowledge that he could not be seen whilst wearing his magic ring. But Smaug needed not to see him to know he was there and spoke to him directly. Perhaps it should have been strange to Bilbo to meet a dragon that spoke Common, but it was no less strange than finding a magic ring that granted invisibility or meeting a man who could be a bear when he wanted. And so Bilbo spoke to Smaug, and it was a very peculiar conversation indeed. Bilbo was twice as bold as he had ever been in his life, and told a great many fibs, and in the end nearly had all his hair burnt off by dragonfire, but he escaped safely and scuttled back to the dwarves as quickly as he could, his stout hobbit heart jumping with fear at what he had heard.
Meanwhile, Smaug was infuriated that he had not been able to burn the miserable little thief to cinders, and flew from his lair again, breathing fire and hissing angrily. This time he would not be satisfied with scorching the grass and shrubs around his mountain! This time, someone would pay for having dared to take what belong to the great Smaug!
"He thinks we are from Lake-Town!" Bilbo cried, trembling with fear. "For he knows the smell of dwarves, and knows that none live between Esgaroth and the Lonely Mountain! And he has smelt our ponies, and the packs of men are upon them! He is off to set upon them!"
There was much grumbling among the dwarves then, for it seemed that Bilbo was proposing that they somehow stop the dragon — which he was — and they still had not the slightest idea how to do that.
"We cannot stop a dragon from doing what dragons do," Thorin said gruffly.
"Oh, so says the great Thorin Oakenshield," Bilbo said, quite crossly. "You were happy enough to take help from the men of Lake-Town when you needed it. Shall you now let them burn to cinders? That is a fine payback indeed!"
Thorin frowned, for no dwarvish member of the Company would dare to speak to him thusly; in fact, he had not been spoken to in such a manner since his sister died, and their mother before her. But Bilbo had proved his worth many times over, and so Thorin forgave him the impertinence. "I would take any suggestion you have," he said politely, "as to how we might stop him."
"Of course, leave it all to me again!" Bilbo snapped. He was tired to death of dwarves in general, and Thorin in particular. This made him rather more Tookish than he would have been in any other circumstance, and he did not think before he next spoke. "Very well, I shall take care of it myself!" Then before anyone could stop him, he ran out of the tunnel and onto the mountain where he shouted at Smaug, as loudly as he could, "Ha! You great thundering lizard! If you go to Lake-Town, I shall stay here and burgle all your treasure away, see if I don't!"
Well, although Smaug was already a mile away, dragon hearing is better than the hearing of almost any other creature under the sun, and this got his attention for certain! So he made a huge, wide turn in the air, and changed his course back to his mountain, where he had every intention of finding the nasty thieving creature and burning him to cinders before he could lay a single grimy finger on even one more piece of gold.
The dwarves all stood in the mouth of the tunnel gaping at Bilbo. "Mr. Baggins," Fili said, quite carefully, as if Bilbo was perhaps just a bit insane, "is your plan that we should all be incinerated, and thus save the town with our deaths?"
"That is a plan," Bilbo said, "but it is not my plan! I have no wish to be incinerated, thank you very much! No indeed!" And then he told them what he had seen with his keen eyes during that very singular conversation amidst the piles of gold, that the great fire-drake had a bare patch upon his chest, where no scales lay at all, and where a skilled archer might shoot an arrow right into the dragon's heart.
At this, all eyes in the Company turned slowly to Kili, who paled and took a step backwards. "You cannot trust this to me," he said, eyes wide. "You know you cannot."
The Ur cousins nodded their heads in complete agreement, and Dwalin looked no more agreeable, but Bilbo was quite firm. "You are the best archer in the Company," he said, in a tone that brooked not an ounce of disagreement. "I have seen you hit a much smaller target with ease. And you have the bow that Regrin crafted, that came to you twice, and for what reason could that have been but that you should do something great and terrible with it?"
"But a shot like that," Kili said, "would require luck." He was quite horribly pale, for in his heart he really did believe that he was cursed and had naught but ill luck, and who could blame him, when no one had ever told him differently in all his life but for the very most recent months?
Bilbo was so angry, he stamped his foot. "None of that!" he said, quite forgetting his intention to desist from commenting on khazd khuv if not asked. "It will take skill, and that you have plenty of; if you take the shot and make it, then I say you will have proven you have both skill and luck! And if you take the shot and miss, then we shall all be cinders and ash, and none will be left to crow that he knew better."
Then they heard the flap of the dragon's wings, and there was no more time to argue. Fili grabbed Kili's pack and dug in it frantically, pulling out the bow. "Take the shot!" he said desperately. And Thorin stood beside him, and in his hands he held a quiver of arrows, and he nodded his agreement. "It is as Mr. Baggins said. You are the most skilled archer among us. Use the bow and save us all."
Kili swallowed and his hands trembled, but he could not refuse his shemor, and in another instant Smaug would be upon them and their lives forfeit. Kili took the bow and unfolded it as swiftly as he could and slung the quiver across his back, stepping hesitantly to the entrance of the cave. The dragon's roar of rage was loud and terrifying, and flames licked the ground outside, but Kili stood tall and steady, and when he nocked the arrow in the bow, his hands had stopped shaking; not the slightest tremor in them could be seen.
They all held their breath then, for Kili stood so still and silent, no one dared to make the slightest noise to disturb his concentration. And then the dragon came around again and exposed his great breast, and Kili's arrow flew strong and true and pierced the very spot where no scales grew, and sank in, arrowhead, shaft, feathers and all. Smaug shrieked and twisted and breathed hot flame that scoured the mountainside, but Kili was already safely back in the tunnel and was not burned.
Away Smaug flew, dying and desperate, but he could not escape the arrow in his breast that had been shot from the bow of Regrin, which was Nashak Durin and crafted in the days of old for that greatest of kings and his heirs. Whether there was magic or not in that bow, no one could say, but with hardly a whisper, Kili's arrow pierced Smaug's black heart and stopped its beating. Smaug fell to the ground halfway between the mountain and Lake-Town, and breathed no more.
Up on the mountain, the dwarves cheered and shouted and clapped Kili on the back, and Bilbo too, and for that day, at least, there was no talk of curses or bad luck or anything but the great victory they had scored over the dragon.
Now was a time for celebration indeed. The dwarves were merrier than even the merriest hobbits, and that was very merry indeed. They were filled with the kind of giddy joy that only arises when one has managed to pull off a feat that was impossible by any logical reckoning, and now were running through the tunnels laughing and shrieking in quite boyish abandon. "We did it, Mr. Baggins!" Fili said, pounding him so furiously on the back that Bilbo was sure he would be black and blue come morning. "Thanks to you, we have done it!"
Bilbo rather thought that he had done it, and Kili too, for most of the rest of the dwarves had not in his estimation done very much at all except trudge along and get taken prisoner occasionally. But of course he kept that to himself, for they were a good Company and good company besides, and he did not begrudge them their enthusiasm now that the home that was for so long lost to them was reclaimed.
Thorin drew near to where Bilbo was walking with Kili by his side. The young dwarf had not said a word since he had slain the dragon, but held on tight to the wondrous bow. Every once in a while, he would stop in his paces and shake his head rather violently as if waking himself from a dream, and more than once Bilbo saw his lips move, though he uttered no words that Bilbo could hear.
"Kili," Thorin said, clapping him gently on the shoulder. "Well done. Very well done."
Kili nodded distractedly. "Thank you, shemor."
Thorin frowned and seemed on the verge of correcting him, but did not. Instead he kept pace with the two of them for a few moments, eyes focused on the dwarves who ran up ahead but seeming to see something else entirely. "She would have been proud," he finally said, very quietly, then gave Kili another small pat on the shoulder before jogging away to catch up to the rest.
Kili stopped in his tracks and stood stock still, blinking hard. Bilbo thought of saying something, but could not think of anything to say that seemed the least appropriate to the circumstance, especially when he was not certain exactly what the circumstance was, only that it seemed very significant. He was saved from his dilemma, for just then the dwarves' exultant shouts rose to a new volume and took on a new character; such a hue and cry Bilbo had never heard! They had entered the great cavern of the dragon!
Bard? Bard who?
Believe it or not, I did not write the bow of Regrin into the story for the sole purpose of having Kili shoot Smaug with it. I just wanted to give him something special of his own. But then, well, it seemed that if Kili had the bow, he kind of had to use it to kill Smaug.
Anyway, into the mountain we go! Onward!
Thanks as always to my beta SapphireMusings and my DH for reading; thanks too to all who take the time to drop me an encouraging comment! And apologies if I owe you a comment in reply. I am behind, I know, but I thought I'd better post this and get to replying later, rather than the other way around.
