a bit of cuteness, a bit of angst - but of course, there is also action. Hope you guys enjoy. ;)

All rights go to JRR Tolkien and Peter Jackson; however, everything you don't recognise belongs to me.

Bilbo almost let the key fall off the edge of the cliff, which would have been a disaster, because he had just found the keyhole, and Fheon had just succeeded in coaxing Thorin back into his own good graces.

But thankfully, the Dwarf King's reflexes were—because of the emotional beating he had just taken—sharper than ever. The heel of his boot was able to press down on the key's lace before it fell off. With a sparkle in his eye, he picked it up and slowly inserted it into the newly-revealed keyhole. His large hand shook as he twisted the key, and then a soft click sounded from behind the stone wall. Behind her, the dwarves shifted on their feet. Thorin placed his hands onto the wall, and, for a moment, his arms shook from the exertion. But then the outlines of a rectangular door appeared from the rock; dust particles fell to the ground as the framework revealed itself. The door swung open to bare a narrow hallway that led into the mountain.

For a while, everyone was quiet, seeming to hold their breath. Fheon surely was; somewhat unconsciously, her thoughts returned to her brother, who was waiting for her in Lake-town. She wished he could be there with them, silently rejoicing at the fact that their journey was coming to a close. Yet it was not finished quite yet.

"Erebor," Thorin whispered. He was facing away from the Company, but his sheer disbelief could be discerned from the slight trembling of his fingers.

Balin broke away from the Company in short, slow steps, to stand by Thorin. A strangled mutter escaped his mouth. "Thorin…" The dark-haired king turned and placed a hand on the older dwarf's shoulder, and during that brief moment, Fheon was able to see that his eyes were brimming with unshed tears.

He stepped into the tunnel, his hands travelling to the smooth stone walls within. "I know these walls…" he murmured in a shaky voice. "These halls… This stone…" Walking deeper into the passageway, now, he practically hugged the rock as he turned and looked to Balin. "You remember it, Balin—chambers filled with golden light."

"I remember," said Balin. Fheon gave him a subtle, sideways glance and saw wet stains trailing down his grimy cheeks.

One by one, the dwarves entered the tunnel. An awed silence hovered around them. Fheon thought that perhaps, for some of them, it was the first time they had ever laid eyes on the insides of Erebor. She decided to trail behind them and enter the mountain last, with Bilbo, for it was a much bigger deal for the dwarves of the Company. So for minutes on end, she allowed the dwarves to stay in their serene stillness.

Thorin whirled around and placed his tear-filled gaze on Fheon. She met his eyes easily, offering a small twitch-up of her lips. Suddenly, he strode forward from his place by the stone staircase deep within the tunnel, stood in front of Fheon for a brief moment and simply looked at her, before encasing her within his arms in a tight embrace.

She lost her composure for a few seconds. Unconsciously, her body hummed against the warmth of his hold. And then slowly, ever so slowly, she wrapped her arms around him as well and gave his back a few languid strokes, before pulling away. When she did, she forced a sterner expression onto her face, but not without empathy. A single tear had strayed from his eye and disappeared within his beard.

He ignored it, saying, "Without you stopping me and getting me back to my senses, I fear I would never have come back… No, I don't think I would have. You gave me back my courage. Words cannot express my gratitude for you, Fheon."

"I suppose the hug was enough, don't you think?" she replied in a soft voice, eliciting a wide (but somewhat sheepish) smile. "I am your scout, Thorin. It's my job to keep you in check and make sure you don't die. And I'm afraid if you had turned your back on your quest, you would have lived your years in misery—a fate worse than death, if I say so myself."

"Nevertheless, you have my thanks."

Muttering into his ear, she said, "You owe me."

He cast at her a knowing glance. "I do."

She allowed another smile before Gloin's voice disrupted the silence. "Herein lies the Seventh Kingdom of Durin's Folk," he said, wide-eyed, reading the runes on the far wall above the doorway, "May the Heart of the Mountain unite all dwarves in defense of this home."

"The Throne of the King," Balin explained to Bilbo, referring to the engraved illustration of a throne.

The hobbit made a noise of understanding from the back of his throat and then pointed at the jewel-shaped symbol above the throne. "And what's that above it?"

"The Arkenstone," Balin replied in a grim tone.

"Arkenstone," Bilbo repeated, nodding his head. "And what's that again?"

Thorin stepped away from Fheon, and she surprised herself when a pang of disappointment ran through her. She shook away the feeling as the King said, "That, Master Burglar, is why you are here."

The dwarves turned their expectant gazes to the hobbit as Thorin nodded to Balin. The older dwarf returned the gesture before placing his arm around Bilbo's shoulders and leading him deeper down the tunnel, ahead of Thorin and the others. His lips moved quickly as he muttered into the hobbit's ear, no doubt explaining his situation and what he was supposed to do. And because the dwarves stayed where they were, so did Fheon, though her eyes followed the two beings that wandered into the mountain; several seconds afterwards, they disappeared from her line of sight.

Her gut wrenched in worry for her hobbit companion, but she was in no position to stop him. The quest needed to be completed.

Soon afterwards, the dwarves receded to sit on the boulders on the crag outside, for their feet ached too much to hold up their heavy, armored bodies any longer. Fheon sat with her legs dangling from the cliff-face, her eyes scanning the horizon—how far they had come, and how close Lake-town seemed when looking in a bird's eye view. It was colder, where they were, but the clothes the Master had "kindly" provided were thick enough to keep them warm. Fheon removed her bow, quiver, and cloak from her shoulders—folding the cloak—and laid them on the ground beside her.

Her eyes stayed glued to the far-away city of Esgaroth, silhouetted beneath the thick mist. She wondered what Elijah might have been doing at that moment, while she was sitting on one of the many cliff-faces of Erebor. There were no forests for him to hunt in. He could be taking a nap; or eating warm, seasoned, home-cooked food; or speaking with Kili and, perhaps, even tending to his injury at the same time. Fheon smiled at the possibility of him taking a bath in the small, fish-smelling lavatory of Bard's house.

For half an hour or so, she let her mind wander, as well as her eyes. Behind her, the dwarves were doing no different. Sometimes, they were able to latch onto a conversation. But none it ended happily, or with a laugh, for they knew the troubles Bilbo could be going through as they sat in peace. Their hearts went out to their ally, who was putting himself in great danger for the redemption of a race that was not his own.

"If he does fail," she heard one of the dwarves say, "it would be a most fulsome death." The thought made her frown.

A memory, from the night before, emerged. It was of her asking Thorin for a promise—a promise that they would be able to kill dragon Smaug before it flew out of the mountain to rein havoc on the city of Lake-town. But then he did not promise her anything, except for the unsaid fact that they would do everything they could. It did not relieve her in the slightest, for she knew that Bilbo could be fried to a crisp at any given moment; and that Smaug could kill them all with a single swipe of his claw, and that her brother was in Esgaroth, the town that Smaug would no doubt destroy in his rage.

There was a possibility that he would not wake, and that Bilbo would come out of the mountain in one piece, with the Arkenstone. But even Fheon knew enough not to fool herself with such a fantasy. It was a most unlikely possibility.

By that time, her mouth already felt like sandpaper. She quenched her thirst with a few gulps of her now-warm, mixed-with-chamomile water. It helped, but not much. She licked her lips twice, then thrice, to find that the skin had turned dry and was peeling. And so she resisted the urge to peel it, for that would only make it worse. Sighing inwardly, she borrowed a whetstone from Dori and attended to her new sword. When she had first received it, she had noticed that the blade was quite dull—or, at least, duller than she wanted. She ran the whetstone down the length of the blade, and then pulling it away and returning to the top, and then repeating the process, with one side and then the other. However, she was careful with her movements, not wanting to drop either her sword or the whetstone down the cliff, for it would take a long while to retrieve. Even then, the sword would be too damaged to use. It was her only sword.

While she sharpened the blade, the dwarves started humming an unfamiliar tune. Their deep voices resonated within their throats, and it occurred to Fheon that she had never heard any of them sing such a sad melody before.

There were no words to the song. Or, if there were, then none of them sung it. But the air of their ballad alone sent shivers down her spine. An old memory emerged from the deepest parts of her mind, consisting of her and her mother, Mina. They were surrounded by trees as they knelt by a flowing stream of gurgling water. The riverbed could be seen through the clear surface. Mina held her bucket beneath the surface and let the water flow into it. Fheon, as a child, only followed suit, for she had not known how to do what properly. As they were walking back to the village, Mina started humming a melody very similar to what the dwarves were humming—but perhaps more melancholic, if that was possible.

The song came to a close, and Fheon came to her senses. She had not noticed that she had closed her eyes until she opened them. Her vision was blurred with tears, and she quickly blinked them away. She rubbed her nose with the back of her hand to remove any moisture that could have appeared there, and sniffed once to clear her sinuses.

The dwarves went silent, save for the two familiar voices of Thorin and Balin as they conversed amongst themselves. It seemed to be a very serious topic, but they were too far, and their voices too low, for Fheon to make out any coherent sentence. Her mind wandered again, and it went on like this for perhaps an hour; until such a time that Bombur decided to distribute legs of the two wild turkeys they had caught earlier that day, to satisfy, even for a bit, their noisy stomachs. No disturbance had come from the mountain yet, and Fheon held onto the hope that Bilbo's feet were as light and quick as his wit.

When she finished the turkey leg, she took a single gulp of water from her canteen and chewed on a mint leaf. She offered the herbs to the dwarves, and they agreed, some more reluctant than others. Thorin's fingers brushed against her palm as he took his share, and she met his eyes for a long moment before turning away and returning to her spot on the edge of the crag. His gaze did not linger for long, which she was both thankful and disillusioned for.

"What are you thinking about?"

Startled at the sudden presence behind her, a look of surprise crossed Fheon's face and she flinched slightly; however, she was quick to mask her emotions with her usual, cool passiveness. "A good night's sleep," she easily lied. "A large jug of cool, fresh water and a plate of roasted pig—to share, of course."

A grunt of agreement came from Thorin, who was the one who had asked, and he came to stand beside her. He did not sit, as she was, and some part of her wished that he wouldn't… the other part wished that he would.

"A whole boar would be better," he suggested softly.

Fheon only half-smiled in reply. By then, her thoughts had been reeled back in, as if the sudden company forced her to focus. It had never been like that before. She thought quickly, to change the subject into something more urgent, and finally said, "What do you think's happening in there right now?"

The King sighed. "It has been quiet so far, which is a good thing. Bilbo continues to look for the Arkenstone and will not stop until he does."

"What if the dragon wakes up?"

When her inquiry was only met by silence, she raised her head to look at Thorin. He would not meet her eyes. He had a determined expression on his face, but also had thin mask of cold indifference. "He will find it," he said, his voice almost a whisper.

Frowning, Fheon opened her mouth to say more, but was interrupted by a deafening bellow that echoed from within the tunnels. A second later, the ground shook, and the vibrations continued until at least five seconds. Fheon had to dig her poorly-cut nails into the dirt to keep from falling off the edge of the cliff, and even then, she almost did, if Thorin had not laid his hand on her shoulder and pulled her back. She did not know whether he had been careful not to grab her left shoulder, or if it was just a reflex of his and he had no idea exactly which shoulder he wanted to touch.

She shook her head to exterminate the foolish, careless thoughts, and returned her attention to their current situation. Glancing about, she took in the wide-eyed looks on the dwarves' faces, and felt her heartbeat quicken.

"Was that an earthquake?" said Dori in a quiet voice.

"That, my lad, was a dragon," Balin replied in grimness.

Fheon pulled herself to her feet and quickly clasped her cloak back onto her back. "Bilbo's woken him?" she said, to which Balin nodded once. Her thoughts flew by in a rapid pace. "Well, come on, we have to help him—"

"Give him more time," Thorin interrupted, and she bristled slightly.

"Time to do what?" Balin retorted. "To be killed?"

The King Under the Mountain then turned to look at the old dwarf, and his eyes were accusing. "You're afraid," he muttered with a hint of anger in his tone.

"Yes, I'm afraid," Balin bit back in kind, pointing at Thorin. "I fear for you. A sickness lies upon that treasure hoard—a sickness which drove your grandfather mad!"

"I am not my grandfather."

"You are not yourself. The Thorin I know would not hesitate to go in there—"

"I will not risk this quest for the life of one… burglar."

Hearing him force the word through his teeth surprised Fheon. Warily, she inched away from him and closer to the entrance, where an unnatural heat was emanating from, and no doubt heating the stone walls. A bead of sweat rolled down the side of her face.

"Bilbo," said Balin. "His name is Bilbo."

Thorin's form stiffened visibly. When he did not speak immediately, she took the chance. "I've heard enough," she quickly said. "Either you're coming with me, or you're not."

Not waiting for a reply, she whirled around and rushed down the stone staircase. As she had expected, the temperature within the tunnels was almost unbearable. But she forged onward and was thankful that there were not many twists and turns, unlike the Kingdom of Mirkwood. That had been a panicked nightmare for her. She kept her footfalls light and her breathing quiet. Slowly, she unsheathed her sword. And then unexpectedly, a voice deeper than Thorin's was echoing down the hall, loud enough to make her flinch.

"My teeth are swords… My claws are spears… My wings are a hurricane!"

With each statement, dust fell from the ceiling as the ground shook. And because nobody else was inside the mountain aside from her, Bilbo, and Smaug—and that was definitely not Bilbo's voice—Fheon cursed under her breath and muttered to herself, "Bloody hell, I didn't know dragons could talk."

"What did you say?" Smaug suddenly hissed, and she froze on the spot—pressed against the wall and holding her breath. How could he have known where she was? Was he just to the side, where there were no walls to cover her and where the path ended? With a start, her head snapped to the side, only to find nothing there. Only the mounds of gold and jewels and high pillars that she refused to gawk at.

She took slow, deep breaths and forced her heartbeat to slow down. As she started suspecting that it was indeed her Smaug had been talking to, a familiar, male voice echoed throughout the chamber.

"I was just saying your reputation precedes you," said Bilbo, "O Smaug the Tyrannical. Truly. You have no equal on this earth."

Gathering her courage, Fheon ran with light feet to the pillar across from her, in the middle of the hall. It was thick enough to keep her hidden, and it seemed that Bilbo had Smaug distracted enough.

"I am almost tempted to let you take it," said Smaug. "If only to see Oakenshield suffer, watch it destroy him, watch it corrupt his heart and drive him mad."

Holding her breath, Fheon poked the side of her head out from the corner of the pillar. She found Bilbo standing in the middle of a sea of gold, with the Arkenstone only five feet away. Smaug stood right in front of him—facing Fheon. Her breath hitched in her throat and she retracted immediately.

Smaug continued, "But I think not. I think our little game ends here. So tell me, thief: how do you choose to die?"

A loud raspy sound reached Fheon's ears, and she, frowning in confusion and heightened concern, was just about to peek out from the pillar again—perhaps to see if Bilbo had been eaten by the dragon—when a deafening roar sounded all across the chamber. Warmth enveloped her in less than two seconds. The stone against her spine heated at a fast rate. She leapt to the side, landing in a partly kneeling position, and ran for the far wall immediately. The sound of coins clinking together and against stone followed her. In her haste, she nearly gained a concussion from hitting her head against the rock of the far wall. It was, however, not enough to disrupt her attention from the hobbit that had suddenly appeared in front of her.

She jumped back in surprise, but was in enough control of herself to bite back a scream. Her eyes moved to gaze at the ring between Bilbo's fingers and she snatched it out of his hold. "What is this?" she snapped, though not in anger. "Is this what's been keeping you invisible?"

"We don't have time!" he replied. "Look, I'll explain everything—"

"That's what you said before!"

"—when we're in a much safer situation. Now, we have to go!"

She regarded him for a brief moment before nodding and handing him back the peculiar object, quickly sheathing her sword as well. "You're right… come on." She turned to lead him back the way she had come, but a torrent of fire erupted from that hallway just as she was doing so. In the blink of an eye, she redirected them and soon they were running with the treasure chamber to their left. Bilbo, though with shorter legs, was sprinting just as fast as her. They ignored the quaking beneath their feet, which was an indication of both Smaug's trailing-after-them and their equal determination to stay alive.

Fheon turned a sharp corner, having to give Bilbo's sleeve a hard tug, practically tearing his shirt, as he did not have his eyes on the same direction. A flight of stairs came into view and the two of them nimbly thundered up the steps. Once they reached the top, they were met with the sight of Thorin with his sword at hand.

"You're alive," he exclaimed.

"Not for much longer," said Bilbo, panting heavily.

"Did you find the Arkenstone?"

"The dragon's coming—"

"The Arkenstone."

Bilbo's urgent stare turned into one of disbelief. He blinked once, then twice. And all the while, Thorin's eyes remained distant and far-away—desperate.

"Did you find it?" he repeated. The wide-eyed, pleading look on his face made it hard for Fheon to just push him into the entrance he was blocking them from.

"We have to get out," said Bilbo. He was about to slip past him and to the tunnels that would lead them onto the cliff-top again, when Thorin placed his sword between Bilbo and the entrance. Slowly, he turned the blade until the sharp side was facing the hobbit.

"Thorin?" Bilbo managed, taking a step back as Thorin stepped forward. "Thorin!"

Fheon snapped herself out of her stupor and pushed Bilbo to stand behind her with her left hand. With the other, she unsheathed her sword and let the dull length of it touch Thorin's. "Have you gone mad?" she hissed, which was both a question and a warning.

His eyes remained cold, his stance hostile. He took another step towards them and Fheon pushed his blade away with her own. He retaliated with a yell and a swing of his blade, aiming for her neck. Pain flared up her shoulder as she pushed Bilbo back farther. She gritted her teeth and ducked, dodging Thorin's blow. She brought her sword arm up and their blades met with a loud clang.

She parried his downward strike and, likewise, attacked his legs. She had hoped to swipe him off his feet and knock him out, so that they could just drag him out the mountain, but he was quicker than she'd anticipated. At the same time, a sudden glimmer shined at her eye, followed by a movement to their right. Her attention was caught.

Thorin then jumped and landed right smack on the base of her blade. The temper of the sword had no doubt been ruined, but she did not let go of it. She remained crouched as she glared up at him. His eyes were even steelier than before, though his expression had turned smug. Fheon kept his gaze for a moment longer before flicking her eyes to the right, and letting them stay there. Thorin soon looked to where both she and Bilbo were looking, and they beheld the giant fire-drake that was Smaug.

He stood, crouched low, only a few meters away from where they were, amidst the thousands of piles of gold and jewels. Even from afar, his eyes shone like live embers—though Fheon was sure that once he opened his maw, his breath would very much be the same hue.

REVIEWSSSS PLEASE! :D (Also, please wish me luck. Volleyball championships are coming soon and we're going up against the reigning champs. I'm nervous. :( LORD GRANT ME STRENGTH-)