Exhales…
This chapter is a bit of a doozy. I did quite a lot to rework it from the original and things… got dark, to say the least. I don't think I took things too far but if anyone is uncomfortable with, checks notes, the torture of goblins then it may be worth skipping this one.
I hope you enjoy and I would LOVE to know what you guys thought of it! Should the spirit move you to share a comment, please feel free. I try my best to respond to all or most of them so I do read them.
As always, thank you to my beta, RivvyElf over at Ao3, for all of their AMAZING work and support with this fic. They really take my work and polish it beautifully. I can't thank them enough!
One quick housekeeping note: I am thinking about moving my posting day up a day to Wednesday. My personal life has gotten a touch hectic (I'm up for a promotion and that may make my free time a bit shorter.) and I want my every other Thursday to be committed to writing and I can do small batches of edits throughout the weeks after.
Now, on to the show! Please enjoy!
All the best!
Kim
"FIGHT!"
Brili sprung to her feet and reached for any sword she could handle. The one she wrapped her hands around was not the sword she'd taken from the garrison; this one's hilt was broken in, and the leather was softer. Still, she didn't have time to search for her blade. With a weapon in hand, she grabbed her belt from the ground and hastily wrapped it around her waist, tying it messily into place.
The rest of the company was still lying on the ground.
"You heard the wizard," she called out to them, eyes narrowing on which goblin she would kill first. "Fight!"
Brili lunged for the goblin that had "searched" her, the one with the lazy eye. She'd not forgotten which body parts he'd managed to touch, and she would make him pay dearly for such transgressions. She leaped over Bombur's stomach in one fluid jump and launched toward her prey.
The moment her hands gripped its throat, the goblin began squealing in her grip. Maintaining firm pressure on the throat, she slammed the goblin to the ground and trapped its frail body under her knees. She applied pressure steadily until she felt a crack where she would have expected the rib cage to be. The creature beneath began to screech under the shock of a broken rib. Brili pried the goblin's arm out, stretching the limb and pinning its elbow to the ground.
She cleaved off the goblin's hand.
As her victim's cries intensified, the sound grating her ears, Brili wasted no time in removing the other hand. She forced the beast's bleeding stump into its mouth, grinning as she watched the goblin choke on its blood. Brili felt the goblin buck with the force of its retching. She couldn't decide which would be better: watching it drown like this or killing it quickly.
A pair of arms circled her shoulders and lifted her off the goblin.
She roared as she was dragged away from her kill by Fili, who hurriedly nudged her forward towards Kili. Flanked by her older brothers, she was ushered towards the rest of the company. Kili's hand gripped hers uncomfortably tight, probably because her hand was slick with goblin blood. When she turned her head over her shoulder to look at her abandoned victim, Fili shoved her forcefully.
"Don't look back," he urged. "I'll get you out of here. Promise."
I don't need you to do anything for me. Ever again.
There were more goblins on the narrow pathway ahead. Hundreds of them were filling up the empty spaces cleared by the company. For every goblin slain, five more took its place. Not bothering to hide her efforts, she wrenched her slippery hand from Kili's hold and charged forward to attack two goblins headed toward Dwalin's back. Grabbing a knife from her belt, she made quick work of stabbing the small cretins.
Sneering, she kicked them off the ledge—such nasty, foul creatures.
Her work allowed Dwalin to organize the company long enough to clear a path. Once the way forward was clear, Brili charged. It wasn't hard for her to end up separated from the group again. Her heart pounded. Every action she took was purposeful, designed to conserve energy. In front of her were two smaller goblins. She could hear their feet padding on wooden planks as the bridge they were on swayed lightly.
The hunt was on.
These two were underfed, arguably starved. Too easy to take down. Moving quickly, Brili pulled a pair of twin blades from the small of her back. Good size and weight to them for the job at hand… She crouched low, waiting for the goblins to charge towards her. Once they were close enough, she used the energy from her crouch to launch herself forward, slicing their necks as she passed. Their blood sprayed across her face.
The inferno blazing in her chest was not quelled even as she advanced on another cluster of goblins.
The buzzing in her ears had begun to drown out the squalling goblins around her. Her mind was starting to blur the line between friend and foe. Her mind was only drawing one distinction; things within her blade's reach and things that were not. She dismembered limbs and stabbed spines just so that she could watch her victims rendered helpless. At that moment, as she stabbed another goblin trying to sneak up behind her. She felt like she could be swallowed whole by an infinite void of electric energy under her skin and screaming goblins. It wouldn't be so bad… She might enjoy it.
Killing no longer became a matter of survival; Brili wanted to do it.
And if anyone noticed the number of casualties she'd racked up, they didn't say anything. Gandalf, who kept stealing glances in her direction every so often, led the group down several narrow passageways. The goblins continued to attack randomly, but there seemed to be more trailing behind the company than in front. Taking out the ones chasing them would surely be much more entertaining. Or, even better, she could find the king. Now, that would be a kill worth boasting over.
Find the king, remove its head, and present it to Lord Elrond.
Yeah, she loved that idea. She tucked her knives back into their holds and replaced them with the sword she'd picked up off the ground, its scabbard dangling precariously by her front.
"Brili!" Brili's musing was interrupted by Fili reaching out to grab her. "Come on!"
She dodged past him; reflexes sharpened under her years of training in Rivendell. "Where is he?"
Fili didn't answer her immediately as he was busy beheading a goblin trying to leap on Ori. "Where is who?"
Before she could clarify, something large burst from the floor in front of the company. Dori and Gloin doubled back, almost landing on their backsides. Chunks of wooden planks blew past Brili's face, one landing in a lesser goblin's eye. The goblin king crawled up the bridge, blocking the company's path.
She licked her lips, the blood from her lip mixing with her spit. The coppery taste mixing on her tongue was sweeter than any wine.
"You thought you could escape me?" The massive goblin swung out with his bone-decorated club, Gandalf just barely dodging it. "What are you going to do now, Wizard?"
Brili's snarl was similar to that of a rabid dog as she lunged forward, ready to strike.
Only for Dwalin to grip her tightly around the waist. Instinctively, Brili swung her sword out in retaliation. The warrior, no stranger to combat, ducked in time to save his arm from being mauled, but Brili did manage to leave a fine line on his bicep. Immediately, her attention shifted to Dwalin, and she adjusted her grip on her sword, intending to impale him. How dare he try and step between her and—
The goblin king cried out in pain behind her. Brili turned around in time to watch Gandalf swing out with his sword and drag it through the goblin king's belly and then, once felled, across its throat.
That's my kill!
Brili very nearly attacked Gandalf, the wizard who had saved her life. So blinded by the dark lust of battle, she almost turned on someone she admired and respected. It was nearly a moment that she would never be able to take back. Fortunately for Brili and Gandalf, the bridge beneath their feet gave way and plunged the entire company further into the darkness of the tunnels. The bridge they had been standing on cushioned some of the fall.
Upon landing, she rolled with the momentum of her body to lessen the impact. As she stilled, heart pounding and blood thrumming, she listened intently to the sounds around her. The other dwarves groaned, aches and pains sure to be felt on the morrow. Brili was sure she would also have some of her own to contend with. That thought was distant, though, not strong enough to hold weight over her longing to continue fighting. How far had they fallen?
And could she climb back up to continue killing goblins?
"Are you—"
Brili turned towards the voice beside her, teeth bared, hand reaching for a weapon. Gandalf's outstretched hand recoiled the moment he made eye contact with her. Again, Brili's intent was to kill Gandalf. She was furious that the wizard had come between her and the Goblin King's head. She ignored a loud crash behind her and the dwarves groaning in protest. Instead, she moved with steady footsteps toward Gandalf.
What would his head be worth? He should have known better than to stand between her and her kill…
The wizard's expression was grim as he backed away from her.
"Gandalf!"
Kili's shout shifted Brili's focus again. Following his voice was the goblins' distant howling, all descending on the group and their now-dead ruler.
"There's too many! We can't fight them!"
Speak for yourself, coward.
"Only one thing will save us: daylight! Come on!"
Brili made a mental note that the wizard was retreating. She could deal with him later. She'd clear out this goblin nest, take down the meddlesome wizard, and then—
And then…
Funny, she couldn't remember what she was fighting so hard to accomplish… But there had to be some reason she wanted these goblins to suffer. She wouldn't be doing this for nothing… Would she? Confused, she stared up at the approaching horde. She knew she wanted to kill them… But for her life, she couldn't understand why that was.
"ARE YOU MAD?!" Thorin's deep voice bellowed next to her ear before he looped one arm around her waist and hoisted her over his shoulder.
Her hand reached for her belt, but something stopped her from grabbing her weapon and stabbing him, despite the fact that she no longer recognized her uncle.
She was carried like cargo into the fading daylight out of the mountain and through a thicket of trees. Thorin's grip was sure, and Brili was not released until the company had escaped danger. When she was put down, she was dropped haphazardly by the trunk of a large pine. Brili buried her hands in the grass, gripping fistfuls of it to try and calm a blaze of emotion that she did not understand. Her heart was thudding wildly in her chest, her breath coming out in gasps.
Looking at her surroundings wasn't helping that situation; she hardly recognized any of the faces around her. She recognized them but couldn't name them, like passing an acquaintance in a crowd.
The only thing she recognized was that she wanted to go back home.
~o~
Five years ago…
Fili's fist hovered over his mother's receiving room door, his eyes roaming over the ornate carvings—a bear flanked by intricately detailed pine trees—adorning the dark wood. It wasn't naturally dark; skilled artisans had stained it to achieve the rich brown color. He was putting off the inevitable, just standing there with his hand in the air, waiting to knock. Mother was going to be furious with him.
"Look after your brother and sister, now, my crown."
How many times had she ordered him to care for his siblings? How long had it taken for that request to become second nature? Fili was not inclined to admit this to anyone besides his mother and Uncle Thorin—especially not Kili—but he had actually felt relieved when his uncle began to plan for Brili to be wed. It would lessen some of the overbearing responsibility weighing on his shoulders for several decades. Brili would have someone else to look after her before long.
Well, she would… If he could find her.
He swallowed nervously, throat dry. His mother had ordered him to hunt Brili down when the maids sent to prepare her for lunch with Bofur announced that she was not in her room that morning. Fili had been searching the entire castle and the grounds surrounding their mountain all day. And, once Thorin had eked a stammered confession about a secret door from Kili after finding a discarded iron key, the evidence seemed to point in one very uncomfortable direction: Brili must have run away.
Surely, Thorin and the search party he was rounding up would handle the matter quickly. Brili had all the survival skills of a house pet; he doubted she would be gone long. Still, someone had to update Dis… and, unfortunately, it seemed this task fell on Fili's shoulders. Again, Fili reminded himself, she was going to be livid. His mother was already ill-tempered regarding Brili's behavior as of late.
Best to get it over with…
Sucking in a deep breath, he rapped politely on the door. From inside the receiving room, he could hear his mother's firm but polite order to one of her handmaidens to let him in. He counted the number of heeled steps on the floorboards, twelve in total. He heard the latch go before the handle turned. His mother was allowed to have her doors locked, presumably because she had no intentions of barring herself inside as Brili had done. Fiery red hair streaked with white at the temples greeted him before the handmaiden rose from a low curtesy to greet him.
"My Prince," she murmured.
"Ruta?" Dis called out. Fili could see his mother's expression in her vanity mirror, stern and, frankly, foreboding. That expression eased as she locked eyes with him in the mirror. "Ah, Fili! Come in, my treasure, come in!"
His mother rose with a sweeping rustle of her skirts. She dismissed her handmaid without a word needing to be uttered, a wave of her hand sufficient enough to put Ruta back to her duties of tidying the room. Fili grimaced as his mother looped an arm through his and ushered him into the recesses of her receiving room. A few short steps later, he was practically dropped into a velvet armchair.
"I'm so sorry for troubling you with your sister this morning," his mother cooed as she smoothed out the wrinkles in her gown. "I hope she wasn't too much of a hassle."
Her facade of cheery conversation would have fooled almost anyone but Fili. She was still simmering with anger underneath the surface.
Fili cleared his throat. "Mum, I—"
She cut him off. "I just don't know what's gotten into her. I understand the marriage being a surprise. Really, I do. But popping off like this will do her no good. Is she in her room? I'll be having a long discussion with her once we are done—"
"Mum, she's gone," Fili forced out.
His mother blinked at him once, twice, her lips pursing as if he'd asked her to solve a riddle. "Gone where, dear?"
"I… don't know…" he answered.
"Then how do you know she's gone?"
Fili avoided his mother's sharp gaze as he quietly explained his findings from that day: the fruitless search, the key thrown in the tall grass, and Kili confessing to showing Brili a hidden exit out of the mountain years prior. The more he spoke, the lighter he felt. This wasn't his fault. His mother would find no reason to be angry with him.
After all, how could she?
Just as he told her Thorin was assembling a search party, Dis raised a hand to silence him. "Do you mean to tell me that my daughter has… run away?"
Fili faltered. "We believe so."
"How could you let this happen?" she asked softly, her whiskers trembling slightly as she spoke.
"Me?" Defensiveness wasn't a trait he was keen on, but it hardly seemed fair that he was being blamed for this. "I've done nothing! She's the one that's—"
His head swiveled as his mother slapped his cheek, stinging pain ringing louder than the crack of her strike. Behind him, Ruta, the handmaiden, gasped and cried out for Dis to control herself. Fili didn't move, though, save raising his hand to touch the remaining warm spot.
First Brili and now his mother. What was with the women in his life slapping him like this lately?
"You're supposed to look out for them!" Dis scolded, her voice wavering. "Brili is your sister, Fili, and now she's is gone!"
"Didn't you hear me?" he asked bitterly. "Uncle Thorin is setting up a search party. She'll be home by morning, damnit!"
"And if she's not?"
Then it's hardly my problem.
Biting the inside of his cheek, Fili ground out, "If she's not back by morning, I'll take Kili out and look myself."
"Now." His mother's tone brokered no room to argue.
"What?"
"You will go now."
He sniffed to hide his distaste over the order. "Fine."
The legs of the armchair groaned as he pushed himself out of his seat with more force than necessary. Just beneath the stomping, he could hear his mother let out a feeble sniffle. He heard Ruta bustle across the room as he slammed the door.
Fuck, part of him hoped that Brili didn't find her way back home; it would be one less thing for him to worry about.
~o~
Fili kept his eyes trained on Brili, huddled in a tight ball at the base of the tree Uncle Thorin had left her. Her eyes were darting across the clearing, flitting over the rest of the company's faces. Her hands were clawing into the grass and pulling it out in clumps, her breathing erratic. Something was wrong with her, and to make matters worse, Bilbo was lost.
There wasn't much he could do about Bilbo, so he decided that trying to figure out what was wrong with his sister might be a better use of his time.
"Hey, Bri?" he called out softly, both hands raised as he took three steps toward her.
She snapped to attention, not because he had said her name but because he had moved closer. Brili's hands trembled as she brandished one of her knives before her, uncurling herself from the little ball she'd been in. The crazed look on her face took Fili aback; her eyes held no recognition for him.
"Get away from me," she hissed, the whisper barely heard over the others arguing. "Take another step, and I'll kill you."
Kili shifted behind him, and Fili held a hand out to ward him off. Getting the other sibling involved would be nothing but trouble. This didn't look like anger on her part. It looked like madness. But that couldn't be right… Could it? Vaguely, a lesson from his childhood began to skim the surface of his memory. Hadn't Balin once discussed battle madness as one of the aftermaths of the Battle of Moria?
He needed to get Balin. He'd know what to do.
But before he could do that, the howls of wargs signaled a more immediate and pressing danger.
~o~
The overwhelming aroma of smoke and tree sap tugged at the corners of Brili's consciousness.
Fire crackled and sizzled around her. She wasn't exactly sure how she'd managed to find herself stuck in this tree with a bunch of dwarves. The last several minutes were all a strange blur. There were wargs, wargs that she very much wanted to kill, retreating away from the flames.
Ah, yes, the wargs had been chasing her… Them? It seems that she was surrounded by dwarves… How bothersome…
Frowning, eyes roving over the scene below her as her feet dangled from her perch on a tree branch, Brili tried to conjure up even a vague understanding of her situation. How had she gone from trying to hunt down a massive goblin to retreating into a tree from a group of orcs? Why did she have almost no memory of this? And why was everything on fire?
Before she could think, her eyes locked on one of the orcs; its presence commanded her attention. It had one arm, a metal hook used as a macabre prosthetic, skin so pale that it glowed in the moonlight, and scars covering almost every inch of its body. Now, that would be a kill worth bringing home to Rivendell.
Oh! Rivendell! She must be on one of Aragorn's exercises! But… why wasn't he with her? Her mentor would never send her off into orc territory without him there to back her up—
That doesn't sound good…
With a loud groan, the tree that she'd sought refuge in began to tilt. Sneering, Brili clenched the branch she was straddling so she wound up dangling upside down. The others sharing this tree with her were not so prepared, some calling out for help. Brili ignored them.
"Hey! Hold on!"
Brili's brow quirked as she turned towards the dwarf speaking to her. He was young, at least younger than most of the dwarves here, with dark hair falling into his face. Just looking at him caused a pit of anger in her stomach.
"Don't worry, sister," he said with a lopsided grin. "I've gotten us out of worse scrapes than this one, right?"
Sister?
When she did not react to his pronouncement that she was somehow related to him, the dwarf looked put out. "Brili?"
He must be confused.
Still hanging upside down, she shrugged off the unexplainable and redirected her attention to the orc, currently the largest threat in the vicinity. He was moving now, attacking one of the other dwarves Brili had found herself surrounded by. Only this one… she recognized him… almost.
It didn't matter who the dwarf was. That was her kill. She'd already had one kill taken from her. Allowing another would be a dishonor.
She shifted her weight to swing herself upright, wrapped her arms around the branch, and began crawling towards the trunk. Once back on her feet, she kept her stance low until she got to the roots of the uprooted tree. She kept her eyes on the pale orc the entire time, assessing his every move. His focus was elsewhere, Brili not even registering as a threat.
At least not yet.
I'll show him…
He was dangerous. As much as Brili would have liked to kill this orc slowly and make it suffer under her grasp, it would have been a bad idea. This one was more of a quick kill… Get it over and done with before he could strike back. Allowing that battle to drag on would only invite her demise. Yeah, she'd kill that one quickly—no time to savor it as much as she'd like to.
A cry stopped her.
Despite the heat from the flames around her, her blood ran cold. She knew that voice… Somewhere inside of her, she longed to follow that voice to the edge of the earth… Blinking past the smoke and the flame, she watched Thorin tossed carelessly onto his back onto a flat stone. A few paces away from him was an orc, not the one she was interested in killing, brandishing a knife.
UNCLE!
That one word set her off sprinting toward the rescue. She'd never get there in time, though, and there was too much smoke for her to throw one of her knives. If she missed, it could be fatal for Thorin. And for the first time all day, her instincts were screaming at her not to kill but to protect.
"We've got to help," a hurried voice said shakily beside her.
Her head whipped towards the voice. Bilbo had joined her ranks. Thinking as quickly as she could, a few mental calculations running through her mind, she adjusted her pace to match the hobbit's.
That'll do…
When they were close enough, she grabbed him by the back of his well-worn corduroy vest and flung him into the orc that was about to behead her uncle. He landed with a satisfying thump as she skidded to a halt in front of Thorin. Her eyes locked with the pale orc, both communicating their intent without sharing a sound. Staring her foe down, she pulled out her pair of knives from the small of her back.
He was the real threat. He'd kill her and the hobbit if she wasn't careful. Failure was not an option with this enemy.
"B… Brili?" The voice behind her was weak, exhausted. Thorin would be of no help in this fight.
"Shut up," she warned her eyes not straying from her target. "You, hobbit, still alive?"
Bilbo scrambled to his feet and joined her in front of Thorin. She briefly regarded how he held his sword; sloppy, Aragorn would disapprove. You don't tell that to your backup, though. In front of her, three wargs carrying orcs stalked forward.
Agog the Defiler hung back, smugness on his moonlit face.
Shit. He did that on purpose. How dare he refuse to face her like a warrior. Brili took a firm step forward, distancing herself from Bilbo.
"Stay with him. I'll handle this," she told him confidently.
Never mind that she could barely hope to take out even one alone…
Before she could move, a group of dwarves intervened. For a moment, she was stunned. She'd nearly forgotten how many dwarves there were, much less expecting so many to assist. Grinning, Brili joined them.
She found an orc to attack and circled him and his warg. In her mind, she tried to devise a tactic to surprise Azog. He was still not even paying her any heed. Her pride was surely on the line now.
Brili's preoccupation ended up spelling trouble for her. The warg she was stalking around shifted suddenly, forcing her to slide beneath it. Desperate to fell even one enemy, she rammed her blade into the warg's belly and sliced cleanly through its stomach. It tumbled to the ground with a final bray and pinned Brili's leg under its weight. Brili let out a frustrated scream as she was trapped.
That scream died in her throat as the orc that the warg had been carrying emerged from behind it, knife raised and ready to strike.
"NO! Brili!"
Fili?
He was too far away to reach her… Shit. Brili glared at her soon-to-be attacker. She refused to allow fear to show. She would wear her pride even in death…
The orc raised his cleaver, and Brili cringed. So much for courage…
"NOT MY SISTER!"
An arrow whizzed and thunked into the orc's eye. Brili blinked, eyes widening as she recognized the fletching. Hawk feathers…
Kili…
A mattock rocked through the air before ramming into the orc's torso, knocking it to the ground. Even though the orc was dead, Bofur swung at it again.
His expression was murderous as he hollered, "THAT'S MY WIFE, YOU GIT!"
A pair of tattooed hands gripped her shoulders before she could register that statement. Dwalin dragged her from underneath the dead warg. "On your feet, soldier. We're getting out of here!"
Dwalin hoisted her onto her feet and shook her shoulders to steady her before pointing over her shoulder. Her eyes tore away from Bofur, following Dwalin's finger towards the sky. Hovering feet above them were several giant eagles. Some were grabbing orcs and tossing them off the edge of the cliff face. Others were fanning flames and chasing off the wargs. The ones that concerned Brili the most, though, were the ones that were snatching up the dwarves. They'd picked up the ones that had stayed in the tree and were now gathering the other company members.
"No, no," she protested. "I'm not going to—"
Dwalin shuffled her closer to the cliff's edge. "If you don't, you'll be stranded in enemy territory."
A fair point.
Before Brili could argue that she could somehow take down a pack of orcs, Dwalin shoved her off the side of the cliff. As she dropped, she watched him dive off the side as well. As much as she wanted to scream, she could not… Her lungs felt like they'd been locked, unable to draw in or release.
She landed with a thump onto something warm. Her fingertips brushed against something soft. A sharp whistle beneath her clued her in that she'd landed on one of the eagle's back. She shifted onto her belly, balled her hand into a fist, and pounded on the giant bird's back. Fortunately, she had the foresight to recognize that trying to stab it would likely result in her death. That still didn't stop her from trying to communicate her desire to turn around.
How far from home was she now?
"Take me back!" Brili begged, her voice lost to the wind whipping her face. "Please, I… I need to go home!"
Her pleas went unanswered. They flew over rivers and mountains large enough to cause the Blue Mountains envy. The verdant fields of Middle Earth rushed beneath them. Brili would have found the sight beautiful had she not spent the better part of the day battling against her maddened mind. Now, with the heat of battle far behind her and growing ever more distant her madness—and the burning fury that came with it—gave way to exhaustion.
She stopped struggling and rested her cheek against the soft feathers of her eagle, a tired whoosh of air escaping her.
When they landed, rather, when Brili was unceremoniously tipped off of her eagle, she tumbled to the ground. After that respite was given, she couldn't summon the strength to try and find her feet. She was bloodied, injured, and unable to stop the quaking in her limbs. The sounds of the battle in the goblin tunnels still reverberated in her ears, drowning out the sounds around her.
And the call to get back to Rivendell was so strong it felt like a compass tugging at her soul.
A warm hand brushed her shoulder, and Brili reeled back, flinging herself backward against a nearby boulder. One leg was bunched, her foot ready to strike out. The dwarf that had touched her, the one with lighter hair, recoiled the moment he locked eyes with her.
"Who are you?" she hissed.