CHAPTER 12
I followed the shivering company into the cave. It was dark, cold, and smelled dank. Worse- Thorin forbade us from making a fire. Great, I survived the stone giant battle only to get sick and die, brilliant! So, tired and freezing, I fished some dry clothes and a blanket from my bag (which fortunately was thick enough to not let everything get soaked), and silently held up the blanket for Hannah to dress behind, who extended the courtesy after she was done. We might not get along anymore, but a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do, you know?
By Thorin's command we were to leave at first light, and not wait for Gandalf, about which a few people were unhappy. Bofur took the first watch and we, exhausted, finally got some rest.
I was awoken from my sleep by soft voices, coming from near the entrance to the cave. It was obviously Bofur, conversing with... Bilbo? I did not open my eyes or betray in any way that I was not asleep, but strained my hearing.
"Thorin said I should never have come, and he was right. I'm not a Took, I'm a Baggins. I don't know what I was thinking. I should never have run out my door." Oh, Bilbo, that's not true at all. God, he sounded like he was going to cry.
"You're homesick; I understand."
"No, you don't, you don't understand! None of you do - you're dwarves. You're used to - to this life, to living on the road, never settling in one place, not belonging anywhere." Ouch. That made me think of Hannah and I. Will we ever get home? Or will we keep wondering like the dwarves?
"I'm sorry, I didn't..." Bilbo cleared his throat, regretting his words. After a pause, Bofur softly answered.
"No, you're right. We don't belong anywhere. I wish you all the luck in the world, I really do." So Bilbo was leaving. I worried about his safety on the trip home, but I really shouldn't have. "What's that?"
Noises echoed through the stone under us, making me rise up, quickly grabbing and strapping up my things (I forgot the blanket in my haste, but I really didn't care at that moment).
"Wake up. Wake up!" Before anyone could do much else, the floor disappeared from under our feet. Did I mention I was afraid of falling?
"AAAAHHHHHH!" The next moments were filled with screaming, sliding, falling and crashing into walls and dwarves. Finally, we fell onto one another (thankfully the humans fell onto the much sturdier dwarves and not the other way around). I clutched my head for a second, having hit it on a wall while sliding. Yay concussions!
I didn't even have time to look around before a bunch of icky stinky tiny creatures rushed upon us from all sides, tearing our stuff out of our hands, their sticky hands ripping off our weapons from us. Thankfully, they couldn't figure out the straps of my pack, so I was left with it on. The gross bastards dragged and pushed us further down a path, in a stinky wave of ickyness. God, they were icky. Some of us tried fighting them, but with the sheer number of them it proved not possible.
After quite a long and stinky walk we were forced to stand before the biggest, fattest, grossest fucktard I have ever seen. My eyes were watering, and I'm not even going to speak of my nose. The smaller bastards were gross; a sickly pale yellowish brown color with all kinds of sores all over their tiny gross bodies, but this huge fuck was unbelievably fat, covered with sores and an odd patch of hair or two, with a skin/fat bag for a beard and a crown on his head. Our weapons were tossed into a pile before us (dumb move on their part) and the fat bastard spoke.
"Who would be so bold as to come armed into my kingdom? Spies? Thieves? Assassins?!"
"Dwarves, Your Malevolence." The whole 'not noticing human females in a dwarf group' has become a pattern. Though I guess we were dressed like them and our hair was braided like theirs.
"Dwarves?"
"We found them on the front porch." I knew that cave was too good to be true, even if it wasn't that great in the first place.
"Well don't just stand there; search them! Every crack, every crevice!" Oh fuck no. The fuglies started grabbing us as soon as I started hitting them in the face, loudly protesting, but unfortunately they still managed to finally get my pack off, getting a few inappropriate grabs in the process. Behind me I heard the same thing happen to Hannah. This also unfortunately meant they recognize us as not dwarf males. We were pushed a bit forward by some fuglies, two of which were still holding my arms in case I started hitting again, while the fugly that talked with the fat bastard spoke again.
"These two are human! Females, oh Great One..." He grinned. That does not sound in any way good or appropriate.
"Humans traveling with dwarves! What are you doing in these parts? Speak!" All of us stayed silent, a couple glancing around to make sure others do so.
"Well then, if they will not talk, we'll make them squawk! Bring out the Mangler! Bring out the Bone Breaker! Start with the women." He pointed at us. I was getting ready to jump into a fight again, when a voice bellowed from behind us.
"WAIT." Thorin calmly pushed himself in front of us, his steely gaze locking with the fat bastards.
"Well, well, well, look who it is. Thorin, son of Thrain, son of Thror; King under the Mountain." The Giant Fugly bowed exaggeratedly to Thorin. The smaller fuglies cackled quietly at the sight. "Oh, but I'm forgetting, you don't have a mountain. And you're not a king. Which makes you nobody, really." Thorin did not portray his frustration, standing as calm as ever. "I know someone who would pay a pretty price for your head. Just the head, nothing attached. Perhaps you know of whom I speak, an old enemy of yours. A Pale Orc astride a White Warg." This had finally broken Thorin's cool facade.
"Azog the Defiler was destroyed. He was slain in battle long ago." He practically growled out.
"So you think his defiling days are done, do you?" The bastard crooned, leaning closer to Thorin, casting a not so subtle glance Hannah and I's way. Ewwww. Then, giggling, he turned to a tiny fugly sitting in a basket (seriously?) and holding some kind of writing tools. "Send word to the Pale Orc; tell him I have found his prize." The tiny bitch wrote something down, pulled a lever, and cackling rode his basket down into the tunnels.
The next half an hour or so (no idea really) was spent trying to wriggle out of the goblins (as I was informed by Nori while I screamed profanities) hold, unsuccessfully. It was made worse by the singing of the Goblin King about our oncoming torture. It really wasn't as bad as it could have been, at least, not until one goblin decided to be nosy and unsheathed Thorin's sword from its scabbard.
"I know that sword!" Screamed the Fugly King, all the goblins going nuts and freaking out. "It is the Goblin-Cleaver, the Biter, the blade that sliced a thousand necks!" Then they decided they got bored of waiting for their torture machines and started hitting us with chains, punching and biting and scratching at us. The men tried to cover Hannah and I as much as they could but the goblins still got a couple of good hits in, one chain managed to get me in the exact same spot I hit my head, making my vision swim.
"Slash them! Beat them! Kill them! Kill them all! Cut off his head!" Just as a bigger goblin got a jump on me and wrapped its sticky icky hands around my neck and I heard Agne's scream among all the other shouts a massive explosion of bright light threw everyone onto the ground. For a couple of moments I couldn't see or hear anything. Slowly, I rose up from the ground, kicking the twitching fugly off of me.
"Take up arms." That voice! My head shot up, vision still swimming. "Fight. Fight!" That made us act.
Everyone jumped up off the ground with renewed energy. Gandalf's return was unexpected but very, very fortunate. We quickly kicked and punched goblins out of our way, grabbing our weapons and remaining packs off of the ground as fast as we could. Goblins rushed at Gandalf, who sliced them with his long sword.
"He wields the Foe-Hammer, the Beater, bright as daylight!" At this point the fat bastard was just like a sports commentator.
The battle raged on. I sliced, kicked, deflected, dodged, rammed, hit, deflected, slashed, barely having time to notice what was going on around me. Thorin got rid of the giant fugly by pushing him off of the ledge of the platform we were on, and soon their numbers were small enough for us to maneuver around.
"Follow me. Quick! Run!" We hurried after Gandalf, leaving the platform riddled with goblin corpses. Running down the handrail less bridges I really tried not to think about falling and just about putting one foot in front of the other.
We ran and ran, but the goblins caught up to us eventually. Fighting while running was a lot harder than when standing still. We hat to think up things on the spot, like cutting off certain ropes and using ladders as shields. Worst was when we had to jump on a swinging bridge. Best when Gandalf used a giant boulder to crush oncoming goblins, kinda like Indiana Jones. We ran and ran, fighting, when suddenly the Great Fugly jumped through the plank path scaring most of us half to death. We obviously stopped, and goblins once again surrounded us.
"You thought you could escape me?" He swung his staff around, making Gandalf jump back and almost fall, only to be pushed back up by Nori and Ori. "What are you going to do now, wizard?" The fugly mocked.
Gandalf simply leaped forward and struck the goblin in the eye with his staff, causing it to scream an odd "ow" and clutch its face, then the wizard sliced through the fat bastards belly, making it drop to its knees.
"That'll do it." The Goblin King nodded a final time, before his neck was slashed by the Foe-Hammer. Unfortunately the fall of the Fat Goblin disturbed the little bridge we stood on too much, and it started crumbling around us. We only had time to look at each others faces once, before we all plunged into the darkness below.
"AAAHHH!" Screaming and falling, again. This time, though, we were clutching onto the remains of the bridge, riding it along the edge of the cliff like a surfboard. Certain obstacles in the way slowed us down considerably, and just when I thought we would go splat, we slowed down to a complete stop right next to the ground. I jumped out of the rubble quickly, dragging Hannah, who was clutching onto me for the ride, along, and stood nearby, breathing heavily.
"Well, that could've been worse." As soon as Bofur uttered those words, the corpse of the Goblin King fell right on top of the rubble, crushing the remaining company underneath it. I admit it, I laughed as hard as I could at that moment. "You've got to be joking!" Dwalin's strained voice made me laugh even harder.
As the dwarves dragged themselves out from under the dead king, Kili noticed the oncoming army of goblins.
"Gandalf!"
"There's too many, we can't fight them!" Dwalin shouted, helping the others.
"Only one thing will save us: daylight! Come on! Here, on your feet!" We grabbed the ones still not standing and started to run again. Fuck, if we survive this we'll be fit as hell!
We ran down rows upon rows of tunnels, screeches of goblins echoing behind us, forcing us to pump our legs faster. Finally seeing light at the end of a tunnel was like a dream come true (or I died of a heart attack while running).
The first breath of fresh air hit my lungs like a punch. Daylight stung my eyes, but with the new flow of oxygen we ran even faster down the mountain. Unfortunately, it seemed while only daylight could save us, it was already close to sundown. Still, after a couple more minutes of running, we allowed ourselves a minute of rest to count heads.
"Five, six, seven, eight...Bifur, Bombur...that's ten...Fili, Kili, Alice, Hannah, that's fourteen...and Bofur- that makes fifteen. Where's Bilbo? Where is our hobbit? Where is our Hobbit?!" Gandalf's counting made us notice the lack of Bilbo in the company. Damn it all, I completely forgot to check on him! Please don't tell me we lost him!
"Curse the halfling, now he's lost?!" Hey!
"Anyone of us could've gotten lost in there, Dwalin!" My angry tone was an obvious warning.
"I thought he was with Dori!"
"Don't blame me!"
"Well, where did you last see him?"
"I think I saw him slip away, when they first corralled us." We all stared at Nori.
"What happened exactly? Tell me!"
"I'll tell you what happened." Damn it, Thorin do not start this again. "Master Baggins saw his chance and took it! He's thought of nothing but his soft bed and warm hearth ever since he stepped out of his door!"
"Bilbo would never leave us in danger and you know it, Thorin! What the hell is your problem with him anyway?! He's probably still in there; I'm going back for him."
"He is long gone, Alice!" I turned to him angrily, about to start arguing again, when a voice stopped me.
"No, he isn't." For fucks sake that took a load off of my shoulders. The damn hobbit appeared from friggin nowhere.
"Bilbo!" I grinned at him.
"Bilbo Baggins! I've never been so glad to see anyone in my life!" Gandalf smiled as wide as he could, stepping towards the hobbit, who strode into the makeshift circle we stood in.
"Bilbo, we'd given you up!"
"How on earth did you get past the goblins?!"
"How, indeed."
Awkward silence and a couple of shifty glances from Bilbo made me raise my eyebrows.
"Well, what does it matter? He's back!" Gandalf saved the hobbit from answering the question.
"It matters!" Or maybe not. "I want to know: why did you come back?" Thorin if you start arguing again I will ground you. Or ask Gandalf to ground you. Bilbo paused a bit before answering.
"Look, I know you doubt me, I know you always have. And you're right, I often think of Bag End. I miss my books, and my armchair, and my garden. See, that's where I belong. That's home. And that's why I came back, cause you don't have one. A home. It was taken from you." Somehow I knew that he wasn't just talking to the dwarves this time. "But I will help you take it back if I can."
After Bilbo's speech, everyone was silent, but most, including myself, smiled at the hobbit. I doubt I'll ever meet someone as nice as him.
The peaceful moment was shattered when howls of wargs pierced the silence. Everyone immediately grabbed onto our weapons, preparing to run again. God this was tedious.
"Out of the frying pan..."
"...and into the fire! Run! RUN!"
