Homeward Bound Part One: An Unexpected Journey

Chapter Thirteen

She didn't know how long she sat there. Something inside her had shut down, numbness spread through her body. Her mind felt sluggish as though just waking from a deep sleep.

Overhead, the clouds parted and moonlight cast a silver glow over the landscape. Around her the grass was crushed, bent from the passing feet of her friends.

Bilba's friends. She had few friends in the Shire she realized with a start, why had she never noticed that before? There was Seth and Priscilla, hopefully Fram but, beyond that, she couldn't really name anyone she'd count a friend. She could remember having plenty of friends as a child, running through the meadows, searching through fields in massive games of hide and seek, camping at night under the stars.

When had she lost them? When had she become so accepting of being alone?

Cold crept along her skin, a light breeze adding to the chill but she barely registered it.

A depression next to her leg caught her attention and she held out a hand to it, fingertips brushing against the smooth, bent blades of grass. It was where Kili had knelt, she thought. There was no warmth to the area, no evidence he'd been there other than the broken blades.

She wanted him to come BACK.

She wanted all of them to come back.

The break in the clouds vanished and darkness returned. The impression melted into it.

A roar broke out and her head snapped up.

Mother.

Father.

Bungo.

Atherton.

His parents, whose names were shamefully lost to her even then.

Shouting, unintelligible, but the panic unmistakable.

Trolls had taken everything from her.

They were about to take even more.

Another shout, and this time there was no mistake. Fili screaming his brother's name, the terror in his voice lancing straight through her.

"KILI!!"

Her mother's screams. In all the languages she spoke none possessed the words to properly convey that pain.

"BUNGO!!"

Something inside her burst.

Molten hatred, thick and cloying, ran through her nerves, whited out her vision, created a loud roaring in her ears. Her breathing increased and the temperature around her seemed to rise.

She HATED those foul Trolls. Their continued existence was intolerable, it could not be borne.

Her family was gone but Fili and Kili, Thorin, all the others WEREN'T. They were ALIVE, right that very second, breathing, THERE.

She would be damned if the Trolls took even a

SINGLE.

ONE.

Bilba set the bowls down and stood up.

Her sword was back at the campsite, she had no time to go back and get it.

She clenched her jaw; teeth grinding so hard together a headache bloomed behind her eyes.

She walked forward, her feet carrying her down the hill, her mind almost in a fog of near blind rage.