Then
Emery can't remember a time she's ever been so terrified. Well, that's not true. But there's a very different kind of fear when you're afraid for yourself versus afraid for others. And she is very, very afraid for the others.
They were playing in the meadow. They should've gone back home at sundown, as Dolin suggested. But in their youthful ignorance, they stayed out. And during their game of hide and seek, one by one they were all caught by a very dangerous seeker. One by one, they were all shoved into a ditch, easily ten feet deep, to await being eaten by the two trolls that now sit laughing and discussing how to cook their catch.
Tari sits with little Gimli in her lap, both of them sniffling and crying. Flika, Melmor, Fili, and Kili are quietly trying to figure out how to escape. Dolit sits against the wall in shock, staring at his brother's body. Dolin's neck was broken when they were thrown in the pit, he died quickly. Emery worries he may be the lucky one of the group.
"Now don't get any ideas, it were me what caught 'em, it'll be me what decides how they're cooked," says the troll with the deeper voice. Bert, she heard the other one call him. The other one is Gary. A fresh wave of sobs comes from Gimli, and Tari speaks up softly from the corner.
"What about Lassie?" The older children turn towards Tari in confusion. "Lassie can climb in dirt better than we can, if we can get her high enough she could get out and get help." After a moment, they turn to look at Emery. She's conflicted. She doesn't want to leave them, but it's a chance. A slim chance, but a chance. Her boys can see it in her eyes, and Fili steps beside her. They're almost the same height, now.
"You can do it," he tells her with his hands in the fur of her neck. "You can get away. You go, you get the grown-ups, and you show them where we are." His determined face is difficult to argue with. If he was trying to give her courage, it worked. She nods slowly.
Dolit finally comes out of his shock and suggests they turn themselves into a staircase. It's confusing, but it works. She climbs over their shoulders and out of the ditch. After looking back at them for what she desperately hopes won't be the last time, she takes off.
Her lungs are burning by the time she reaches the gates to Ered Luin. It's unusually noisy for this time of night. She scratches and howls at the gate, praying that they recognize her and open the doors. When they finally do, she zips past. She ignores the shouting and runs. Strangely, the noise isn't coming from crowds like she thought, but guards. They're running around searching for something or someone. She ignores them, she's searching as well. After several minutes, she finds who she's looking for, just inside the entrance to the mountain.
Thorin and Dwalin are wearing poorly-concealed expressions of worry as they talk to a guard. She barks to get their attention as she approaches. They turn towards her, and for a brief moment there's relief on their faces before they realize she's alone. She skids to a stop in front of them, panting heavily, but she doesn't rest. She keeps barking and turning her head back to the gate.
"Woah lass, slow down, we cannot understand you when you're frantic," says Dwalin firmly. She pauses, takes a few deep gulps of air, and stares up at him, willing him to understand. He may not be able to read her as well as the boys, but he knows fear when he sees it. "We've been looking for the youngins for hours, do you know where they are?" She nods. "Are they in danger?" She nods again. Thorin, who's been watching, barks orders to the guards. As they fall into formation, Thorin puts his hand on her head and looks at her with barely-contained panic.
"Lead us to them," he says. She immediately turns around and takes off the way she came, keeping in mind to not run so fast that they fall behind. Thankfully, she doesn't have to slow down a great deal. Dwarves are fast sprinters, especially when fueled by the urge to protect, and nothing sparks that urge more than the idea of children in danger.
After what feels like forever, they approach the trolls' camp. For a single moment, she feels relief. Then a chorus of screaming children pierces the air and a fresh wave of terror surges through her. When she and the dwarves break through the trees, they find one of the trolls, Bert, gripping Flika and preparing to bite off her head. The surprise appearance of the dwarves causes him to drop her, but not before squeezing. It happens in slow motion. His fist tightens, and Flika's face becomes one of shock and pain as a horrible crackling sound reaches Emery's ears. She falls to the ground when his hand opens. In her peripheral she sees the troll running away, but her focus is on the girl he just dropped. She comes to a stop at her side. Her eyes are wide and her mouth is open and trembling as blood trails from it and her nose. Her torso and arms are a broken mess. A whimper escapes Emery and Flika's eyes find hers. Fear is the last thing to pass through her eyes before the light leaves them and her attempts to breathe cease.
Whimpers come and won't stop as she cries. Feeling the strength leaving her legs, she lies beside Flika's broken body. She doesn't know how long she's there before she hears an anguished cry, and Melmor falls to his knees on her other side. He pulls his One into his arms and holds her, rocking back and forth and wailing. They shouldn't see this... She weakly gets to her feet and looks for the other children. Between Flika and the pit is the giant body of a dead troll, and she finds the children just outside the pit, so at least the troll is blocking their view. Dwalin has an iron grip on his living son and they're both weeping. Gimli and Tari are firmly held in Thorin's arms. Fili and Kili are clinging to their uncle's legs, until they see her.
"Lassie!" they both cry and run to her. They wrap their arms around her neck and bury their faces in her fur as they sob. Her legs fail her again and she falls to the ground with them still clinging to her. Thorin's face is turned toward the sound of Melmor's wailing in fear of what it means.
Thorin made sure the children didn't see. But Emery's ears heard his sobs, muffled as though he were covering his mouth to keep himself quiet. Worse than the sounds he made and nearly as heartbreaking as the ones that came from Melmor were Dis's cries and moans and wails as she saw her daughter's broken body. Balin made sure the children weren't present for that.
Emery hates funerals. She hates being forced to sit quietly as everyone else's grief compounds her own. She hates looking at the bodies. She hates being forced to acknowledge that the dead aren't coming back. Whether they happen in Texas or in Ered Luin, despite the differences in ceremony, funerals are the same. Whether they're for a parent, a sister, or a friend, they're the same. This is the first time she's mourned a friend. The second time she's mourned a sister. She hates it.
It's beautiful. There are candles of mourners everywhere, for both Flika and Dolin. They're buried in elaborately-carved tombs deep in the mountain. There are haunting songs and appropriately bland foods. It's beautiful. And she hates it.
Now
Emery's mind briefly wanders to thoughts of Melmor. He was silent and cold as stone during the funeral. He left the Blue Mountains the next day, and no one's heard from him since.
Ooh, that's hot, that's hot, that's hot!" Nori's voice brings her back to the present. She can't see him. She can't see anyone. The trolls stuffed her head and all into a sack and tied the opening closed. It's very uncomfortable. She's much larger than any of the dwarves and barely fits into the sack, even with her body bent and contorted. How unfortunate the attack didn't work. It really was quite impressive, a testament to the effectiveness of the dish game. If only Bilbo had also learned to play that game, he might not have gotten caught.
"You alright in there?" Kili says from somewhere to her right. She whines and huffs in response. "I know I know, silly question." He's silent for a minute, and from the smell, she guesses Flika is occupying his thoughts as much as her own. "Am I going mad, or is that the same troll that...that..." He doesn't finish the question. He doesn't need to. She couldn't believe it either when she first saw him. And in the dark of the sack, there's little to distract her eyes from the sight of him squeezing the life out of Flika. She whimpers softly.
"Don't bother cookin' 'em," comes the voice of the youngest troll, "let's just sit on 'em, and squash 'em into jelly!"
"They should be sautéed," suggests Bert, "and grilled, with a sprinkle of sage."
"Oh, that does sound quite nice."
"Nevermind the seasoning, we ain't got all night," interrupts the third troll. "Dawn ain't far away, let's get a move on. I don't fancy being turned to stone." Emery feels Bilbo go still beside her and hears his breath catch. That didn't take long.
"Wait!" he shouts. "You are making a terrible mistake!"
"You can't reason with them, they're half-wits!" says Dori from the spit over the fire.
"Half-wits?" says Bofur. "What does that make us?"
"I meant with the uh, with the-with the seasoning," says Bilbo as he gets to his feet and hops forward. She wishes she could see that, it sounds like it looks amusing.
"What about the seasoning?" says Bert curiously.
"Well, have you smelt them?" Bilbo asks with his most convincingly disgusted voice. "You're gonna need something stronger than sage before you plate this lot up." A cry of outrage emerges from several of the dwarves. Except Fili. From the sound of it, his mouth is occupied trying to untie the sack with his teeth.
"Wot do you know about cooking dwarf?" demands another troll, William, she thinks his name is.
"Shut up," says Bert, "let the, uh, flurgaburburahobbit talk."
"Uh, uh, the-the-the secret to cooking dwarf is, um..." Bilbo stammers, trying to come up with something.
"Yes?" Bert says eagerly. "Come on!"
"Yes, I'm telling you," says Bilbo. "The secret is...to...skin them first!" If she could thwack Bilbo upside the head, she would. As clever as his idea is to play for time, his suggestion just put their companions in very immediate danger. Understandably, there's another uproar as they furiously yell at the hobbit.
"Tom, get me filleting knife," Bert tells the youngest troll. There's some more yelling, then William voices his annoyance.
"Wot a load of wubbish!" he says. "I've eaten plenty with their skins on! Scuff 'em I say, boots and all!" Hang on, isn't this where Gandalf makes it to the camp? I should've heard him by now...
"'e's right," says Tom, "nothing wrong with a bit of raw dwarf!" He snatches Bombur from the ground and dangles him over his mouth. "Nice and crunchy." Another round of shouts erupts, this time in fear, Bofur and Bifur's voices being the loudest.
"Not-not that one! He-he's infected!" yells Bilbo hurriedly. Tom turns to him in confusion as "You wot?" comes from William. "He's got worms in his...tubes!" Tom yells in disgust and drops Bombur like a hot potato. Right on top of Kili, who groans at the sudden weight. "I-In fact, they all have. They're infested with parasites, it's a terrible business. I wouldn't risk it, I really wouldn't." Emery would love to chuckle, but it's getting a bit hard to breathe as contorted as she is. Unfortunately, the dwarves still haven't caught on.
"Parasites, did he say parasites?" asks Oin.
"We don't have parasites!" says Kili indignantly, and Emery rolls her eyes. "You have parasites!" A firm kick from Thorin silences him and the others. She feels a few heads turn towards him, then back at the trolls.
"I've got parasites as big as my arm!" says Oin.
"Mine are the biggest parasites!" Kili jumps in. "I've got huge parasites!" Why must the males of every race make everything into a contest of size?
"We're riddled!" chimes in Ori from the spit, followed by Dori's agreement, "Yes, we are!" Emery hears Kili shout suddenly before a very large hand grabs the end of her sack and yanks her into the air, causing her to yelp in surprise. Fili abandons the attempt to untie his sack as his voice joins his brother's in shouting at the troll to put her down. The hole in the top gets ripped open and the troll grabs her round the middle and roughly pulls her out of the bag.
"This one ain't dwarf, it should be fine to eat," says Bert as he holds her up. "Jelly does sound good." Breathing becomes difficult and then impossible as he squeezes. There's still shouting, with Bilbo's voice in the mix - probably trying to continue his bluff - but she can no longer make anything out. Her blood is pounding in her ears and her eyes are beginning to bug out.
Is this what Fllika experienced? she wonders. A sudden sharp pain accompanies a crack as a rib cracks. Transform! The voice of Aulë shocks her. What?! But what about - You can't save anyone if you're dead! Do it, NOW! The rib snaps and breaks, forcing a breathless yelp out of her, and she concedes. She pulls the first form she can to mind, and quicker than ever before, she changes from a great wolf into a dam. Now considerably smaller, she slips out of the troll's grip.