While the wizards held counsel, Lori bumped shoulders with Bofur, letting him know that she was stepping out for a minute. "Nature calls. I'll be right back."
"Stay close. Who knows when they'll be done." He said, never taking his eyes off the quiet conversation between the two Maiar.
She made her way to a little stream, no more than 20 meters from the company and squatted behind the bushes to do her business and change her bindings from the monthly bleed. She washed them in the shallow stream and bound them on the straps of her backpack so they could dry. Finishing up, she headed back and found Bofur again.
"So… What does Olara-Hâz… What was it again?" She sat next to him and crossed her legs.
"Olara-Hâzkal?" Bofur asked sideways.
"Yes. What does it mean?" She was curious what her new nickname would tell about her. Or in truth, what it would say about what Bofur thought of her.
"Oh no, lass." He chuckled. "We agreed that I'd tell you when you beat Nori in combat. That hasn't happened yet, to my knowledge." He smirked at her, earning a glare.
"You and I both know that'll never happen, Bofur. He's got ages of experience on me, not to mention strength and weapons expertise."
"Then use what you have against him. What do you have that he doesn't, hmm?"
Lori thought for a moment. "What..? I don't know… What do you mean? I don't have anything in combat he doesn't…" Her puzzled expression caused Bofur to chuckle again and smoke on his pipe for a bit.
"Really? You make fire with your mind, expel water with a thought, and the sway of your hips has every available dwarf in the company sneaking peaks at you when you're not looking. Nothing, you say? Huh…"
Stubbornly refusing to acknowledge his last comment, even though her cheeks scorched hotly, she punched him in the shoulder. "You want me to cheat? Use magic to win a fight?"
"Ah, but there is the heart of it, isn't it? It is a fight, and under real circumstances, the wager is most likely your life. There is no cheating, lass. Only survival." He became serious and looked at her with a caring and somewhat fearful stare. "You must take care of your own safety first and foremost, promise me that. No matter the cost."
She smiled and patted his arm. "I promise, my friend. I will do my best to not get killed."
"Good," he took another puff of smoke. "We wouldn't want some folks around here to start missing those lovely curves." His cheeky grin was all but hidden behind his beard and his pipe, but the jibe hit home anyway, and Lori reddened further at the same time as reaching for her magic to throw him off the cliff and down on his arse at Bilbo's feet. She giggled loudly as he jumped up and brushed himself off as if the action had been entirely deliberate.
Bofur glared at her shortly before his features softened and he shrugged. "I guess I asked for that…"
Suddenly, Lori heard guttural snorting and ruffling of the brush from where she had just visited the stream. A loud growl followed by a howl from a throat that was twisted by pain and hate. It sounded somewhat akin to a wolf's, but the tones where off and sent shivers down her spine by the deep sense of wrong that emanated from it.
The thud of paws from heavy animals came swiftly closer as Bilbo and Bofur discussed what animal had made the howl. Lori drew her sai and crouched into a defensive stance as she looked around wildly in the general direction of the stream.
A few meters to her left, a giant twisted dog-like monster reared its head and sniffed in the air. It turned its light-reflecting eyes on her and sneered in pure menace, but snapped back towards Thorin before launching down the cliff to attack him. Further to its left was another beast who followed its alpha's actions to charge the leader of the group. My blood. They tracked my blood! Lori realized and blanched.
The first warg, for wargs they were, was swiftly cut down by Thorin's new blade, but the elvish sword got stuck in the bone. Thorin didn't know it would slice through the sinewy flesh like a hot knife through butter, so he struck with too much force and rendered himself momentarily defenseless.
Lori's panicked and guilty thoughts had her frozen in place until she saw Thorin in immediate danger when the second warg leapt for him. They are tracking us, trapping us, and going for the king. They are after Thorin. THORIN! "Look out!" She screamed as the second warg jumped for him.
An arrow from Kili hit the beast in the same moment that a concentrated kinetic force knocked the monstrous beast to the ground. Dwalin leapt on it and crushed the skull with his mattock before it could move again.
Thorin yanked his sword free. "Warg scouts! Which means an orc pack is not far behind." He scanned the cliffs and lingered for a moment when he found Lori, making sure she was unharmed.
She lowered her eyes and reddened in shame that it was her doing, that had lead the enemy to them. Her blood had led a clear trail right to their whereabouts, and even if she hadn't known they were being followed, she should never have been so careless.
Thorin didn't know her thoughts and frowned in confusion when she looked guilt-ridden. What could she possibly have to feel guilty about? If not for her spell, he would probably have been severely maimed before Kili's arrows and Dwalin's mattock could have ended the beast.
His thoughts were interrupted by Gandalf who demanded to know who he had betrayed their quest to. The thought alone was absurd, but when his denial was challenged once more, a deep, righteous anger flared in him at the accusation. As if he would ever risk the lives of his company, his nephews, by gossiping to outsiders. It was against everything he was as a dwarf, and he raised his voice sharply in reply to the grey wizard. "No one, I swear! What in Durin's name is going on?" He demanded.
"You are being hunted." Gandalf finally informed him in a tired voice.
Lori locked eyes with Gandalf for a brief moment, silently asking him if she should come forward and confess of her mistake, but he minutely shook his head at her. Whether he meant that now was not the time, or if she wasn't to blame, she was unsure. There was little doubt in her mind that he knew she had attracted their scent. There was little the wizard didn't know, but it was safe to say that she wasn't the reason they'd been after them in the first place, at least.
A second later, Ori ran over the hill at full speed, and headed straight for Thorin to tell him that the ponies had bolted, and that they now had no means of escape from the orcs that were surely coming.
Lori sat back on her haunches in shock. Hopscotch had abandoned her? He just left? But he had been her pony for so long, her friend in fact, and she'd taken such good care to keep him happy and healthy. What could she have done wrong to make his bond with her so apparently fragile that a bit of danger would cause him to leave her side this easily? Why would he leave? In all her years, she never expected to feel such pain at the abandonment from an animal.
But he was her friend… Wasn't he? Friends weren't supposed to leave each other in time of need. Even if he was a pony, shouldn't he feel more loyalty towards her than that?
Suddenly, in the midst of her confusion the coo-coo raggedy-man of a brown wizard whooshed out of the clearing on his rabbit sleigh, whooping and hollering for whoever might be looking for them to follow him. And judging by the howls and barks that followed him, he was successful in drawing their attention. Listening to the sheer number of foul voices of animals and orcs on the air made shivers run down her spine. The lunatic was done for if they ever caught him.
She sent up a silent prayer that he wouldn't be caught, as they began running and hiding frantically to avoid being detected by the quickly growing pack of warg riders.
Within minutes, the constant shifts between running for their lives to not get detected and holding their breaths in hiding, while Radagast zipped about on the heath with the ever multiplying orc pack on his tail, had every dwarf, hobbit and wizard panting and wild-eyed with desperation and sweating in their armor.
Finally, when they heard him disappear into the distance and they caught a respite for a brief moment, one of the orcs picked up Lori's scent once again and broke away from its party to pursue it. Everyone froze when they heard the beast sniffing and snorting atop of the cliff they were hiding behind, and Lori felt her heart sink at the thought that they might yet again be in mortal peril, because now they knew her smell.
When Thorin gave the silent order for Kili to take the enemy down with his bow, Lori almost intervened. She couldn't possibly let Kili stand alone against a foe that she had been stupid enough to reveal them to, but she also couldn't make noise to voice her protests. She quickly unsheathed two of her largest knives and took a ready stance to defend her friend when he made his move.
Kili was an excellent shot, one of the best she had seen in a long time, but this shot was one he missed catastrophically to the detriment of them all. The warg took it in the shoulder with a great snarl and faltered in its step before starting to tumble down. The nasty creature on its back lifted a horn to his lips, but thankfully Kili's second arrow struck truer and hit the orc in the shoulder, making him drop the instrument.
It was all for naught, though, for the following cacophony of noise was piercing in the still air, and even though Bifur, Dwalin, Thorin and Kili were swift and lethal, there was no doubt that the rest of the pack would have heard the dying beasts' screeches.
Gandalf looked almost panicked as he listened for more enemies, and when he heard them, his order to run was a frightened roar. "Move. Run!"
Once more the flight over the plain was in a dead run, but this time there was no stopping and hiding. Now, they were running with all of their might, knowing full well that if they were caught, their lives would be forfeit. Thorin tried desperately to come up with a solution that wouldn't lead them all to their deaths, as was his responsibility as leader.
Gods, if his company died under his command not even half way to the Lonely Mountain, his forbearers would never let him into their halls in the afterlife. Or worse, if either Fili or Kili were to perish and he had to face his sister, Dis, with the news of their death, he would long wish for death before it would be granted to him.
But there was no high ground they could defend themselves from, and there were no bottle-neck passages that would protect them from the superior numbers and strength of their enemy. Their greatest hope lay in a couple of protruding rocks, that might provide a smidgen of cover, but it was a vain hope at best.
When they came to a halt, Kili and Fili let him know that they were surrounded and that more warg riders were coming. "Kili! Shoot them!" He shouted. It might be the difference between defeat and victory to take out as many as they could before the skirmish started. Kili shot a few orcs with his straight, yellow fledged arrows, and even Ori attempted to aid their cause with his meager sling shot, but to no avail.
"Hold your ground!" Thorin ordered. This was where they would take as many of the fiends with them to their graves as they could.
Lori waited until two of the wargs were close enough to smell, which was not as close as you might think, before she whipped out a throwing knife and downed an orc. Alas, the warg still kept coming and apparently had felt some loyalty to its master, for now it sneered and snarled at her in putrid hate.
The next knife saw the inside of its skull and put the hatred to rest.
Thorin saw her proficient display with knives and was thoroughly impressed. He'd heard from his nephews how she had held her ground against the wolves, but part of him had believed them to embellish the story in favor of their new friend. What he saw now put his doubts to rest.
He felt a strange swell in his chest as he watched her and frowned at the feeling. He didn't understand what it meant or of what it was born. It was an almost uncomfortable concoction of pride, excitement, fear for her safety, and attraction. The ever present increasingly powerful attraction that had him on edge and pulled his insides with longing even when his conscious mind attempted to obliterate the notion by cold logic.
He suddenly realized that the threat they were all under included Lori, and that if they were defeated, she too would die. The thought was unbearable to him, and with a heavy heart he decided that he would lay down his life in protection of her. They would have to kill him before he let them touch a hair on her dirty, tousled blonde head.
He was about to move to her when the wizard popped out of a rock and yelled at them to follow him. Truth be told, Thorin was rather apprehensive about following Gandalf blindly, because when he had asked him earlier where he was leading them, he had merely looked uncomfortable and failed to answer. The two of them had had the conversation before, and it was clear that Gandalf was partial to enter the domain of the elves, even though Thorin had made no qualms about expressing his distaste for the treacherous beings.
Still, the opportunity to abandon their current precarious position was a welcome one, and he breathed a sigh of relief that Dwalin had been mistaken in his assessment of the wizard's cowardice.
"Come on, move!" Thorin jumped up on the rock that revealed a steep entrance into the ground. "Quickly, all of you!"
He stood watch as his men jumped down the uneven slope, one by one. Gandalf stood at the bottom, counting as they came down. When Lori was almost at the passage, the first warg had reached them and without a moment's hesitation, Thorin whirled her behind his back whilst chopping down the beast with his sword hand.
Lori lost her footing at his sudden movement, knelt to her right knee, and In doing so she saw two more riders approaching Kili faster at the sight of their quarry disappearing. She dispatched one with a toss of a knife, And just as the last one reached Kili to fall upon him in a frenzy of piercing teeth and claws, she caught it in the shoulder with another blade, making it slide to their feet in an ungraceful tumble.
Only a second passed before Thorin felled the beast and rider. He gave Kili a scathing look for falling behind, that had his nephew ducking his head in apology. Getting carried away and losing sight of his fellow fighters could get him killed, and Thorin knew for a fact that Kili had been made aware of this before. By himself, no less.
Thorin helped Lori up and wrapped his arms tightly around her before jumping into the hole, not failing to notice that she held on to him for dear life and that her gasping breath on his neck made the small hairs stand on edge pleasantly.
They landed in a thud on the cave floor, Thorin's arms underneath Lori's head and back, and the rest of him pressing down on her. Lori had her arms trapped under his and when she moved her legs she found out that Thorin lay firmly between them. The pressure felt safe, protective, and though they were separated by many layers of wool and leather, she felt warmth radiating between them, cocooning her and heating her from within.
She was hidden from view by his mane of hair, which had fallen to cover both their faces in the landing. His musky scent mingled with her more floral one and even though both of them had layers of dirt and a full day's sweat on them, she couldn't help but to inhale slowly and deeply of the intoxicating aroma.
Thorin met her half-lidded eyes in surprise and she knew instantly that she'd been caught sniffing him when his frame hardened against her in what she believed to be awkward tension. The motion made her keenly aware of the compromising situation they were in, as well as the fact that his heavily muscled form was fitted perfectly against her soft core.
"Are you hurt?" He whispered in an uncommonly husky voice that ghosted over her skin. the deep bass sent pleasant warmth through her that landed firmly in the pit of her stomach.
Lori drew in a sharp breath at the pleasure and her eyes widened in mortification when Thorin tried to ease her breathing by placing his weight further down, on her lower body and quickly awakening womanhood. This only increased pressure between them, and by then Thorin was also feeling the bracing effect of their close contact. He did his best to ignore it, hoping that she would be too inexperienced to notice his body's reactions.
"Lori?" He asked again. "Can you breathe?"
"Yes," she whispered, her lips so close to his that he could almost taste the sweet air on them. "I can breathe."
"Are you hurt?" He tried to pull out the arm that was caught under her back carefully to test if it caused her any pain.
"No." Her eyes smiled gently at his careful movements as she realized what he was doing. "You protected me well."
His features relaxed and he gave her a small nod as he pulled his arm free. When he raised himself up on it, Lori had to close her eyes and grit her teeth to not exclaim at the friction of his groin on hers. As soon as he lifted the rest of himself to sit back on his haunches, she closed her knees and sat up to hug them. His heat was suddenly sorely missed from her body, even though it had only been there for a moment.
"I am sorry," Thorin frowned at her vulnerable body language. "I didn't mean to cause you discomfort."
Lori looked at him in confusion. "Not at all, Thorin. If not for you I would have been far worse off from that fall. Like I said; You protected me well, and I thank you."
At that very moment there was a clear sound of a horn from the plain above them, and every set of eyes peered at the bright opening in fresh trepidation. There was great commotion and they heard several of their enemies scream in pain before one of the hideous orcs fell down the slope, dead from an elvish arrow in his blackened heart.
Suddenly Lori knew where they were. The hidden passage to Rivendell, and Gandalf had led them straight there. Her shocked eyes stared at him in betrayal. If the elves saw her, they would surely give away information that she had yet to share with the company, and the outcome would be disastrous. Not to mention that Thorin had given specific instructions that he would not willingly set foot there, and the wizard had gone directly against them.
When Gandalf smugly agreed to follow the pathway, all Lori could do was scowl at him for his deception and hope that things would go quietly and smoothly once she met with her old friends, the elves of Imladris.
..o00Ô00o..
Not the best chapter ever, but it had to be done in order to get to the next part.
Review, lovely readers. I never, ever fail to appreciate the hell out of it! You are all amazing, and without your constant support, this chapter would have killed me for sure. I owe you one!