"Kili, shoot them!" Fili shouted, but his brother needed no encouragement.

The first wolf fell with an arrow in its chest. Kili's second shot found the eye of another, but for each wolf that fell and did not get up, another arrived to take its place. They appeared from the thick dark night that lay behind the leader, and each howled as it trotted out to join the attack. The deaths of their pack-mates did not seem to affect these wolves as it would a natural animal, but that was little consolation to the dwarves; natural or not, they came into the circle of firelight and their red eyes focused on the company with a hungry determination.

In fact, the wolves came on so steadily, that the dwarves were hard-pressed to keep up with them. Kili shot his arrows as quickly as he drew them, and each arrow killed another wolf that came within the line of their watch-fires, but one he missed and it darted between the fires to snap at Fili's arm.

Fili pulled back in time to save his flesh, but the wolf's jaws closed upon the sleeve of his coat. With the sword in his free hand, he cut its throat, but the jaws were clamped tight and he had to pry them apart with a knife from his belt.

Not far from him, at the other side of the camp, Betta had pulled the largest burning branch that she could find out from one of the fires. When a wolf nosed its way between the fires to her left and growled at her, she swung the branch into the animal's face. It yelped and fell back, shaking sparks from its eyes. At least so far the animals seemed to be deterred by the fire, and they retreated, but not for long.

While the wolves hung back, Kili shot two more with his arrows, and Fili killed another with a knife thrown from his arm, but more wolves continued to appear. They came in ones and twos, stepping over the bodies of their pack-mates and the small shape of the leader could still be seen, sitting patiently between the hills and looking on without a sound. In the flickering firelight, Fili thought that he saw the animal wag its tail as if this were a game to be played and not a battle between life and death.

"What do these damned creatures wait for!?" Kili cried as he drew his sword and cut the throat of a wolf that came too close for bowshot. "Why don't they attack all at once and get it over with!?"

"There are enough of them," Fili said, "and they do not seem to care how many we kill. The night is young, and I have little hope that the daylight will scatter them… if we live long enough to see it. They will wait until our arrows are spent and our fires fail."

"They will not have long to wait for that," Kili said, eyeing the fires dubiously. It was not yet midnight, and they might burn their baggage and spare clothes as well as the wood, but even that would win them at most another hour before death. "What arrows do you have, Betta?" he asked, not turning to look for her. "Mine here are nearly spent."

"I have many, but they are among the baggage," she said, holding out her burning branch. The wolf that she had scorched still growled at her from beyond the fire, and she was not eager to turn her back on it to go in search of arrows.

"Get them," Fili told her. "I will guard your back."

She glanced at him, and there was doubt in her eyes. He knew that she doubted him, but she did as he asked. Kili moved to the east side of the camp which was closest to the lead wolf, and Fili covered their western flank. The line of the firebreak was too long for two dwarves to cover easily, but they had little choice in the matter.

The remaining wolves were trotting back and forth beyond the fire, and Kili shot another that strayed too close. A second that crept unseen along his left side did not make it past Fili's sharp blades that flashed and cut the air like lightening. The pack had not attempted the steep rise behind the camp, but with each pass they made before the fires, they trotted higher and farther up the northern hill, testing the limits of the dwarves' defenses. Kili killed two more than came around the back of the hill, but he had only three arrows left in his quiver and did not dare to waste them on an easy shot, not when Fili was using his blades so well against them.

Betta searched among the baggage; she knew where Kili kept his spare arrows. She opened his pack first and retrieved the bundle, untying the string with shaking fingers. Almost as soon as she had unwrapped them, Fili snatched them up in one hand and dropped them into the quiver on his brother's back with a well-practiced turn. He swung back again to slice open the exposed belly of a wolf that leaped over the fire toward Betta.

It landed beside her where she knelt in the snow, spilling its innards in red and yellow, and its teeth gnashed together as it struggled to reach, injured as it was. She used her knife to cut its throat and kill it, but she looked around at their besieged camp and knew that the battle was lost. There were too many wolves and too few dwarves. At least a dozen of the animals lay scattered and slain, but a dozen more waited beyond the firebreak, a seemingly unending supply.

Betta picked up her bow and pulled the belt of her quiver over her head and shoulder so that the arrows lay at her side within easy reach. There was little that she could do that the better weapons of Fili and Kili could not, but Kili's bow was too large and would sooner break her small arrows than fire them. Betta had no sword to make bloody, but she refused to die while she had arrows left unspent.

"What do they wait for!?" Kili shouted again, his voice growing desperate as yet another wolf fell to his arrow and was immediately replaced by two more.

Fili did not answer his brother. He thrust his left sword into the chest of one wolf and with the pommel of his right sword broke the skull of another as it nipped at his outstretched leg. His arms ached and the smoke from the fire burning upon wet snow was blurring his sight, but he could not take a moment to rest. There were too many wolves and too many directions from which they might spring upon him or his brother.

He searched for some means of defense, but there was no cover in this open space, no trees to climb or precariously perched boulder that might be sent crashing down into the midst of the pack. Without ponies, they could not ride to freedom, and if they fled on foot they would be easily picked off by the faster four-legged devils. There were no dwarves or even elves in this land, no hidden army to ride out to their rescue, and as Fili accepted this, he knew that they had no hope. The fire might burn for an hour more, but sooner than the flames went out, they would burn too low to be a deterrent to any animal, wolf or rabbit.

There was a brief pause in the attack of the wolves, and Fili looked at his brother sadly. He saw that Kili's arm was trembling with the effort of bending his bow again and again – but still Kili continued to put arrow to string. He would never see any end but victory. Kili fought on and did not hesitate. He did not wonder which of their company would be the first to fall to the wolves, leaving the others to defend a broken body.

But Kili would not be the one their uncle blamed when they did not return to Ered Luin. No messenger would arrive to tell Thorin that his nephews had died bravely in battle. Their bodies would lie open on the ground for scavengers, not enclosed in royal tombs of stone.

Fili looked over his shoulder and saw behind them near the rise of the hill, that Betta stood with her own small bow in her hand, but the arrow she held hung loose from her fingers. She was looking at the fire and the foes that surrounded them, and when she looked at Fili, he saw in her eyes that she, too, knew the battle was already lost. She had no more hope than he had that they would survive the night.

Not knowing why he did it, Fili lowered his sword and took a step towards her. He opened his mouth to speak, to say some comforting word before they were past all words.

"Fili, get down!"

Fili dropped to his knees and ducked his head just in time. Three of the wolves had climbed the steep ridge behind their camp. Creeping through the darkest shadows, they had not been seen until they leaped down into the camp from above. One sailed over Fili's head just as he ducked and then fell to the ground, dead with Kili's arrow in its throat.

There was no time to celebrate the near-miss. A second wolf leapt down between the brothers. Fili rose to his feet, cutting left and right with both swords and a burning anger in his heart. If Kili would not give up, then neither would Fili, not until death itself came between them.

Blade met fur and flesh and cut through bone. Kili shot down the third wolf from above and, falling, it landed among their baggage. Betta stumbled aside and out of the way just before it would have landed on her. She shook her head, dazed and, like Fili, shaking off the part of her that had given up while there was still life left in her. With her bow and arrow in one hand, she took up the burning branch again and swung it at the wolves to beat them back so that Kili could continue to shoot the others.

Fili cut a wolf's throat and, as he turned, he looked beyond the firebreak and saw the lead wolf finally stand up from its place between the hills. As if it were the sign that they had waited for, every wolf that was still beyond the firebreak rushed the camp. More leaped down from the hill above them and fell, heedless of the steep drop. Fili's swords sang as they cut the air and the enemy, but try as he might, he could not carve a path to his brother's side. The smoke was thick, and he could no longer see Betta through the melee. Her burning branch lay smoldering in the snow. He could only hope that she had not yet fallen.

The lead wolf crouched down, and now it leaped high over the fires and the fighting, dying bodies of its pack. It leaped up high and came down upon Kili like a bolt from the sky.

Fili cried out, but he was too far away. His brother could not hear him over the noise of the growling and snapping wolves. Kili's back was to the danger, and he did not have time to raise his arrow or turn before it had come down upon him. He fell under the weight of the wolf and was crushed.

"Kili!" Fili shouted, certain that he had just seen his brother killed.

At the same moment that his brother was struck down, Fili heard the twang of a bow and a sharp cry of pain, Betta's cry. He turned, expecting to find that she, too, had fallen under the fangs of a wolf, but she was still alive and crouched down against the north wall of the hill, bent down on one knee and holding her right arm. There was pain on her face but no wolves were near her.

There were no wolves to be seen anywhere in the camp, Fili realized.

He turned back to his brother and saw Kili lying under the body of the lead wolf, but it seemed to have shrunk in size. It was now no larger than one of the wild dogs that prowled the sparse woods near Ered Luin. Fili approached it warily and saw one of Betta's crooked arrows shot through its eye so deep that only the tail end of the feathers stuck out.

The hills around their camp were silent, and the only wolf dead or alive was the body of the leader cast over Kili's still form. The bodies of the wolves that they had slain had vanished and Kili's arrows lay scattered over the snow that had been churned up by a great battle, but there was no enemy to be seen.

Kili groaned, and Fili dropped his swords to run to his brother's side. With a cry of grief, he heaved the wolf's body off of him and pulled Kili onto his back. He touched his brother's cheek, pushing dark hair back from his pale and bloodless face. Fili wiped the tears from his eyes and put his ear to his brother's lips, but he felt no breath and heard no sound.

"Kili! Brother, wake up! For Durin's sake, say something to me. Kili!"

And so ends my first attempt at writing a real action sequence. Hope you enjoyed :-)

-Paint