The howls of Wargs echoed over the trees.
"Out of the frying pan..." Thorin said exasperated.
"...and into the fire! Run! RUN!" Gandalf finished. Everyone scrambled down the hill. The earth was trembling with the oncoming wargs. They kept running until they could go no further. They were trapped.
"Up into the trees, all of you! Come on, climb! Bilbo, climb!" Valaira quickly helped as many of the dwarves she could climb up into the trees. "Bilbo, hurry." She shouted before quickly climbing up a tree. She reached for her bow only to find it wasn't there. She must have lost it in the goblin caves. She swore under her breath.
The hairy beasts were seen running through the trees below, several tried climbing up. Then Thorin saw him.
"Azog?!" Thorin couldn't believe his eyes.
"Do you smell it? The scent of fear? I remember your father reeked of it, Thorin son of Thrain."
"It cannot be." How did he survive his wounds? After all this time, he was still alive.
Gandalf had the idea to light the trees' pinecones on fire and chuck them at their enemies below. Valaira lit some for the dwarves in her own tree. The end result was a fiery mess of confusion to the wargs below.
To make matters worse, the trees started to fall with all the extra weight on their branches. As they fell, whoever was on that tree jumped to the next. This domino effect led to everyone being on the same tree on the edge of the cliff. And it fell too. Fortunately for everyone on it, the roots had grown deep and kept the rest of it from falling off the cliff.
"The dwarf is mine. Kill the rest."
Thorin rose to his feet and marched his way off the horizontal tree toward the white orc.
"Thorin! Nooo!"
Valaira, as well as everyone else, were clinging to the branches for their lives. The dwarf king had been knocked off his feet by the leaping warg and its rider. As soon as he stood back up, he was thrown, down hard by the swinging battle mace hit he took to the chest. In a second the white warg was closing its jaws around Thorin's torso. Valaira pulled herself up as quickly as she could, and rushed toward Thorin. But Bilbo has been much lower on the tree and far ahead of her.
While still in its jaws, Thorin took a swing at the warg's head with his sword, causing the warg to whip Thorin out of its mouth and thrown him yards away.
"Bring me the Dwarf's head." An orc drew his sword and walked toward the helpless dwarf. He took his position as executioner and aimed for the dwarf's neck, only to be tackled aside as he was about to land the killing blow. By Bilbo Baggins of all people. The elf jumped through fire to get to Thorins side as Bilbo stabbed the executioner threw the chest, killing him and saving Thorin's life. Valaira had made it to Thorin and stood protectively in front of him, Staring Azog in the face.
"Kill them."
Dwarves had made it off the tree, the others were still hanging on for dear life, and starting to fight off the orcs and wargs.
Then a familiar sound reached the elf's ears. The eagles have arrived. The enormous birds swooped down and collected the outnumbered dwarves, taking out a handful of orcs and wargs while they were at it. Valaira recognized Gwaihir, Lord of the Eagles, and he was flying towards her. She met his gaze and shook her head. The elf would not be leaving with the others. She pointed toward Thorin, telling Gwaihir to take him instead. The Eagle hovered in front of her, flapping his wings to keep him in the air, asking her if she was certain this is what she wanted. She held her ground and continued to move towards Thorin. If an Eagle could shrug his shoulders, he would have now. The Eagle Lord flapped his mighty wings harder to gain more altitude and fly towards the dwarf king to carefully curl his claws around Thorins unconscious body.
The rest of the company was now safe from the Orcs. Except for Valaira.
Azog howled in outrage. "The dwarf got away because of you, you filthy elf." He growled.
Without warning, something struck the back of the elf's head, knocking her out.
"Thorin!" Fili saw the unmoving form of his uncle hanging from the Eagles' claws.
"Thorin! Thorin."
"The Halfling?"
"It's all right. Bilbo is here. He's quite safe."
"You! What were you doing? You nearly got yourself killed! Did I not say that you would be a burden? That you would not survive in the wild and that you had no place amongst us?"
"I've never been so wrong in all my life!"
"I am sorry I doubted you."
"No, I would have doubted me too. I'm not a hero or a warrior...not even a burglar."
"Is that what I think it is?
"Erebor—The Lonely Mountain. The last of the great dwarf kingdoms of Middle-earth."
"Our home."
"A raven! The birds are returning to the mountain."
"That, my dear Oin, is a thrush."
"But we'll take it as a sign - a good omen."
"You're right. I do believe the worst is behind us."
"Where's the Valaira?" Gandalf questioned. Thorin looked for the only feminine face. He only found grim, dirty ones. No one answered. Gandalf scanned the area too.
"No one saw what happened to her?"
"I saw an Eagle flying towards her. I thought she was with us." Bilbo spoke up.
"I saw her wave the eagle to get you first, Uncle," Kili mentioned.
"I saw that too." Fili Added.
Thorin gulped down some mixed feelings.
She was still up there? The wizard looked to the cliff where they had been rescued. They all saw the Smoke was still rising from the trees. "We must keep moving." Gandalf had a feeling the elf knew what she was doing.
Several of the dwarves looked back at the smoke-filled sky with worried expressions, including Thorin. If they tried to go back to her, it would take days to even reach the cliff again.
Valaira was violently awakened by Azogs claw-arm digging into the skin of her cheek,drawing blood. "She's awake." An Orc spoke in the dark tongue. The remaining orcs gathered. Azog removed his claw and dug his boot into her chest. She was pinned to the earth, if the white orc pushed any harder with his foot, she was sure he would break her sternum and then everything else it was protecting. She reached for her sword to find that it was gone. She turned her head to see it lying a few yards away, the firelight reflecting off of it. It was of no consequence though. He looked back up at Azog.
"Not worth the trouble, elf." Azog caught her gaze. "Your time is about to end." Azog unsheathed a curved, black, dagger but, the white orc had failed to notice the elf's eyes. Her silver irises were moving, like clouds and darkening. Two wargs suddenly attacked their riders the next second. Azogs gaze was torn from hers as The orc's heads were engulfed by the mouths of the wargs and were ripped off. Valaira used this distraction to twist the orc's heavy foot unbalancing him and she rolled out from under him as he was forced to take a step back and she plucked her sword from the earth.
"Witch!" Azog stomped his enormous foot down on her ankle before she could reach her weapon. She was lucky the bones didn't snap at the force. Valaira tried pulling her leg out from underneath his weight but he was too heavy. The white orc swung the dagger down, aiming for her belly. The dagger missed its original target when she rolled as much as she could and was sliced through the skin and muscle of Valaira's thigh. She wanted to scream but would not give the orc that pleasure.
Valaira used his awkward stance over her to trip him up and send him to the floor on his stomach. Azog yelled for help, only one came. The others were being torn to pieces by the wargs. Valaira quickly yanked the black weapon out of her thigh and through it into the chest of the orc coming to his master's aid. She need not worry about them for now. Wargs are aggressive creatures at heart. She simply put the image of feasting upon their riders' flesh in their minds and they took care of the rest.
Valaira quickly glanced down to assess her injury. All she could see was blood. She could feel the wetness dripping down her leg and soaking her leggings.
But now Azog was bringing himself to his feet and her sword was still out of reach. Valaira stood weaponless, but her irises were spinning even faster and becoming darker.
"You should have killed me when I was unconscious. It was your only chance." Azog laughed at the absurdity of her claim and swung his arm back to deliver a fatal blow. But his arm stopped in mid-swing. His eyes turned wide at the invisible force, stopping all of his movements.
"What is this magic?" Against his will, Azog walked backward into a tree. Eyes wide in shock.
"Now, you will tell me what you are doing here." The elfs mastery of the black language freezes Azogs words momentarily.
"You will get nothing from me, elf."
Valairas now completely black eyes pierced the white orcs. "We shall see." Her whisper echoed through the forest.
Along with the screams of Azog.
AN: This is not beta'd. The only person who reads it is me, myself, and I. I don't know if you guys are liking it, and/ or if I should continue, without your input. :/ Please review!