Author's Note: I return! Only for three chapters, but I'm back, finally!

Chapter 30-The Ashes of Laketown

The night was clear and cool, but a strange sense of foreboding hung over the lake. As he sat by his brother's side, Fili felt it settle over him like a mist. Why was he so worried? Kili was alive, and nothing had happened—nothing more than a slight tremor, and that had been hours ago. His kin were capable. They would not let themselves be killed.

Tauriel entered, her face serious. There was a sound like that of wind rushing over the roof, and Fili felt a sudden pang of fear.

"The dragon," she said.

"The dragon?"

"He is here."

"Smaug is here?" Fili couldn't keep the fear from his voice. "He's attacking us?" His kin, what had happened to them? They had failed to kill the beast. Had the beast killed them? All of them? Or were some still alive in the mountain?

Karra.

What had happened to her?

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The company sat huddled together on a small platform overlooking Laketown, watching in agonizing silence as the dragon approached its prey. Karra sat with her back to the wall, not wanting to look, not wanting to see the destruction before her. They had angered the dragon, and they had sent him to Laketown. Fili, Kili, Bofur, Oin, all of the people of Laketown, they would all die because of them.

Karra felt herself shaking. When the dragon was finished with Laketown, would he come back for them? Would he kill them all too? She would rather die now than sit here, with this awful agony of anticipation hanging over her.

She felt a hand on her shoulder. "It's alright, lass," Balin said, but his voice shook. Karra looked at him and bit her lip. She wanted to stand up now and not be such a wimp, to look out over Laketown with the others. But instead she just slumped back against the wall, her heart pounding in her ears.

The minutes passed like hours and Karra felt as if she were counting each second as it ticked by. She tried to stand once. Her knees shook so much she found herself sitting again. With every passing second, the horrible images her mind conjured up became more real, more vivid, and she thought more and more of Fili. She just wanted to close her eyes and be out of this misery. More than anything, she just wanted Fili back.

She never knew how long they sat there in silence, a tense silence laced with sadness and fear, watching, or not daring to watch, as the dragon rained fire on Laketown. It could have been hours, it could have been minutes. A tremor ran through the stone on which Karra sat, and she jumped, snapped out of her thoughts.

"What was that?" she blurted out.

"The dragon," Bilbo said, dazed. Karra got slowly to her feet and finally managed to make herself peer over the wall.

She saw nothing, nothing but the outline of a ruined Laketown in the distance.

"It's dead!" Bilbo cried. "Smaug is dead!"

There was a moment of shocked silence as the dwarves looked at each other, and then back at the silhouette of Laketown.

The dragon was dead.

Karra felt her heartbeat slow to a somewhat normal pace, and she let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding. Smaug was dead. They didn't have to worry any more. A bird flew past them, and she watched it wing its way towards the mountain. Slowly, the dwarves began to laugh, and to rejoice at the death of their enemy, but Karra couldn't find more than a little smile in her. She was glad, of course she was. But the exhaustion of the night before and the persistent worry of today weighed on her mind, and she knew she would never have peace until she knew that the missing members of their company were safe.

Gradually, the company began to make its way back into Erebor. For a time they just milled about, laughing, remembering, examining the kingdom that was now theirs, and theirs alone. But as the sun rose and sheds its rays through the broken front gate, they began to think of food, and beds. Karra would much rather have set up her bedroll right there and slept, but the others wanted to go deeper into the mountain, so she followed them as they turned away from the front gate and into a tunnel.

It began to grow dark as they made their way further into Erebor. Though some light still filtered in, Thorin drew a torch from his pack, and striking a match on the wall, lit it, leading them ahead.

Karra couldn't help admiring how epic he looked holding a flaming torch.

They couldn't have gone far, but to a tired and hungry Karra, it seemed hours. Soon she began to lag behind, and she was relieved to see that she wasn't the only one. She found herself walking beside Bilbo. They walked in silence for a bit.

"Don't you think," he finally said, "that should get that…uhh, taken care of?" He pointed to her arm as he spoke, and for the first time all night, she remembered the pain of the burn. She winced and leaned against the wall for a moment. "Sorry," Bilbo murmured.

"No, it's fine," she said. "I needed to pay some attention to it anyway."

Ahead of them, they saw the last of the dwarves disappear into the darkness of the tunnel. They looked at each other, and began to run. Rounding a corner, they stood at the back of the company, which had stopped at the entrance of a large room filled mostly with shadow.

"The throne room," Thorin said, and his voice echoed slightly around the huge chamber. He swept the torch in front of him and touched it to the wall. A flame sprung up, and from it, another light was lit, and another, and another, until a ring of torches burned around the room. Karra looked around her in awe. Though dust covered everything, and some signs of the dragon's destruction remained even here, this huge chamber seemed to hold echoes of Erebor's former glory, and Karra understood why the dwarves loved their home with such fierce love. Had her father ever walked here?

"This," said Thorin, stepping forward to the great throne, "is the throne my grandfather sat upon as King Under the Mountain." He paused, and turned to the others, moving his torch in a large, sweeping motion. "A throne I intend to claim." His voice held a ring of triumph. He looked so grand, standing there by the old, broken throne, that Karra felt as if she should bow. And yet, as he said the words, there was a strange light in his eyes, and Karra felt as if she should back away, and flee.

They stayed only a little while in the throne room, talking in hushed voices, remembering and reminiscing. Some remembered this throne when Thror had sat upon it, and Karra lingered in the background of their conversations, listening to their fond memories. Soon Thorin led them from the room, saying they should find the houses of the dwarves, and set up residence.

Even in her state of near-exhaustion, the trip didn't seem nearly as long. Soon they found themselves entering the houses of the dwarves. Or rather, the mansions of the dwarves. They stretched upwards and downwards with no end to them as far as Karra could see. Dust covered everything, and the eerie silence of hundreds of years hung over them. But the laughter of the dwarves soon began to break that silence as they explored, and rummaged through old treasures.

"There now, lassie," Balin said as he finished wrapping her burned arm in a bandage and some salve he had pulled from his pack. "That should do for now." Karra gave a weak smile in thanks, and ran her fingers through the burned tatters of what was once her sleeve, wishing she had another dress.

"If only we had Oin with us, he'd fix you up nicely," Balin said. "But this'll have to do." Karra looked away, standing and turning from the room.

"I think I'll go see what everybody's doing," she said. At the mention of Oin, the anxious worries began to fill her mind again, and the other dwarves seemed to have a sufficient distraction, rummaging as they were through a chest filled with every conceivable thing.

"Here, Karra." Gloin spoke up as Karra entered. "This should fit you." He held up a dress, and Karra stopped, staring at it for a moment. It was a dark brown, with gold accents embroidered on the sleeves and around the waist. The skirt flowed outwards in a whirl of skillfully made rich brown cloth, with the same gold accents swirling around the bottom.

Karra loved it.

"Thank you!" she cried, and glanced around the room, strewn with everything she could imagine, from clothes to old cooking utensils. "You're really finding lots of treasure here, aren't you?" With a grin, she took the dress from the dwarf and ran off, soon finding an empty room to change in.

She dress fit perfectly, and was quite comfortable. It was obviously made by and for dwarves; the workmanship was flawless and it fit her perfectly. She had such a time finding clothes that fit her at home…on earth. Home? This was home, this wonderful huge kingdom full of treasure and halls upon halls to explore and clothes that fit her perfectly.

She emerged into the room full of dwarves once more, her old, burned dress hanging over her arm. Her old dwarf boots stood out now, tattered and muddy, and her short hair stuck out in all directions. Well, there was really nothing she could do about that. But something in the corner caught her eye, and she ran forward, making her way through the dwarves, who were scattered here and there across the room. A pair of shoes sat by yet another old chest, and she picked them up, turning them over, examining them. Finally, she slipped her old dwarf boots off, and, one by one, slipped the new shoes on.

They fit, and they fit wonderfully at that. She twirled around, giggling. She would never have believed a pair of shoes and a dress could have made her this happy. "I feel like such a girly girl," she laughed.

"What's that, lassie?" Gloin said, looking her way.

"Nothing," she mumbled, a slight flush rising in her cheeks.

Before the afternoon was out, they had begun already to set up their living quarters in one room or another. Karra found a bedroom a ways away from the others and promptly claimed it was her own. It had once been richly furnished, but most of furnishings were gone now, destroyed or rotted away, save only for a dresser and a bed in one corner, which, thankfully, still had a mattress.

And it was a mess.

Dust covered everything, and some of the rotting and tattered remains of the old furnishings still cluttered up the room. Karra threw herself into the work of cleaning it, determined not to rest until she had dusted everything from top to bottom and organized her things.

Anything to keep her mind away from things she would rather not think of.

After what could have been hours, she plopped down onto her bed, looking around. There were still some cobwebs in the corners, and dust still covered the ceiling, but she was satisfied. She leaned her head against the wall, and a wave of exhaustion swept over her. She hadn't slept for…well, she didn't know how long. She had spent the entire night running from a dragon—a dragon that was now dead. How could so much happen in twenty four hours?

The worry still hung over her mind like a cloud. The people of Laketown—Fili. She forced the thoughts to the back of her mind and lay down, pulling her covers over her.

She didn't know how long she slept. It must have been hours, for when she woke, it was eerily silent. She slipped her feet from the bed and stood, peering this way and that. There was no sun or moon in these halls, but it felt like night. She stepped out into the hallway. The torches still burned, but she saw no one.

She tiptoed down the hallway, her steps echoing off the stone walls. She couldn't seem to shake the feeling that, at any moment, some creature of the dark caves could jump out and attack her. Around a corner, she saw a large room, filled with piles of gold and treasure.

He stood at the far corner of the room. He wore the royal robes of a dwarven king, and a crown sat on his head. She just stared at this stranger for a moment without recognition.

It was Thorin.

Of course, it was Thorin. Why hadn't she recognized him? He looked up, and she saw his face. His eyes still held that strange glint, and she felt a sudden and inexplicable fear as they swept across the room. What if he saw her? Would he be angry? Why should he be angry? This was her home too.

She fled.

She fled through halls and chambers with no sense of direction. She fled for what seemed both hours and minutes, and finally, she turned a corner, and she found herself standing before the broken gates of Erebor, looking out into the night, for it was night. The stars shone over the lake in the distance, over the ruins of Laketown. Karra searched them for any sign of life, though she knew she would never find any from this distance.

Those ruins in the distance could hold the ashes of her friends.

She swallowed. Why had she been dumb enough to come out here and stare at Laketown? She had worked all afternoon in a feverish frenzy to keep the thoughts and worries away. And now here she was, staring at the desolation of Smaug. She could have stayed with Fili.

He could be dead. She could have died with him. All those months together, all the hardships and the dangers. She couldn't let the horrible finality of it settled in her mind. She couldn't give in to her grief, she couldn't let it consume her, standing here, staring at Laketown. She could never go back, back to earth. It was no longer her home. But she couldn't stay here, forced to live out her life regretting what could have been—with Fili. As she stood there, unable to think, feel, unable to cry, something drifted towards her and landed on the palm of her hand.

A piece of ash.

She just stared at it for a moment, numbly.

Ash.

She clenched her hand around it, and suddenly, without warning, the tears came. Swallowing back sobs, she threw the piece of ash as far as she could, but it hovered in the air, and came to land at her feet. She kicked at it, and ran, back into Erebor, back through the broken entrance, into the tunnels, away from Laketown and that horrible piece of ash.

She stumbled through tunnels upon tunnels, going nowhere. Finally, she stopped, and fell against a wall, sliding to the ground. She heard a footstep and looked up to see Balin.

"You…you're up too," she choked out.

Balin smiled. "What's wrong, lass?"

"Fili," she sobbed. Balin sat beside her and slipped his arm around her shoulder. "Laketown," she said. She buried her head in the older dwarf's shoulder, and the sobs came, uncontrolled.

"It's alright, lassie. You can cry." Balin hugged her closer. He didn't try to comfort her with meaningless words, didn't try to reassure her that they were alive, he just sat there, his arm around her shoulders, his silent presence comforting her more than any talk. She let herself cry into his shoulder, the hovering anxiousness of the last day and night finding solace in tears. Slowly, her sobs lessened, and soon she sat silently, her eyes still stinging from tears.

"Do you think they're alive?" she finally managed to say.

Balin smiled, a sad smile, and yet oddly a comforting one. "I can't say," he said. "They're capable. I know they are. But Karra…" He smoothed a piece of disheveled hair from her face. "If they…if they don't return, know this. You have a home with us, always. Always remember that you have a home here, for as long as you live." He squeezed her shoulders and she leaned her head on his.

"Thanks," she murmured.

Nothing to say here. I'm just glad I'm back. Review?