Homeward Bound Part One: An Unexpected Journey

Chapter Forty-Two

Bilba watched Smaug.

He returned the favor. He was curled in a tight coil with his tail wrapped around his head and over his snout. His breathing looked to be somewhat labored, not that she was an expert on what normal breathing was for a dragon, but not nearly enough to suggest he planned to drop dead any time soon.

It had gotten boring an hour ago but she couldn't bring herself to look away for fear it would rapidly get un-boring. It was like standing on ice that had started cracking under her feet. As long as she stayed put she'd be fine, but the second she started to move she risked dying horribly.

Her stomach twisted and she put a hand on it, massaging lightly. The nausea plaguing her since Mirkwood had lessened but hadn't subsided completely. It had been a long time since she'd had any of Oin's herbs and her stomach was beginning to protest the loss.

She could feel the press of Kili beside her but he was just as mesmerized, his eyes fixed on the dragon. Bilba had been startled, and shamefully relieved, to see Kili when Smaug brought her back to the Treasury. The dragon had put him up on a collapsed pillar where he couldn't get down. Bilba had been tossed unceremoniously on a pile of gold and Kili had hit the ground next to her an instant later.

After that the dragon proceeded to destroy a pillar in front of the Treasury door, solidly blocking it behind a mound of rubble.

A look in the other direction had revealed the not-as-secret-as-some-might-claim door had also been sealed off.

Meaning they were sealed off.

Inside the Treasury.

With a dragon.

Who had promptly curled into a ball and proceeded to try and stare them to death.

Given the fear coursing through her and the way she couldn't seem to stop shaking, he might just succeed.

She hadn't had a chance to see the damage to his eye after Kili shot him but she had a clear view now. It was a yellowish, white color with the center a mess of black and red where the arrows had gone in. Dark green-black liquid seeped out almost continually and the flesh around it was puffed and swollen.

The skin around the eye had also drained of color. Smaug was a deep red brown but around the injury the color had leached out, turning a sickly, mottled, pale color.

A color, she noted, that was spreading.

Over the last two hours it had widened until over half his head had lost the bright luster of health and now held the dull pallor of illness.

"You don't look so good."

The words slipped out unbidden and Bilba felt Kili stiffen next to her. As she did her own mind informed her that, yes, her mouth had indeed shot off without her permission and it had done so before Kili had.

Meaning she was more of a reckless idiot than he was.

Clearly this was Thorin's influence.

The dragon shifted languidly. "If I could I would claw these wretched arrows out and drive them into you one by one and let your companion listen to you die."

Bilba's mouth opened again. "Why don't you then? I'll rip them out for you if you want."

"Bilba," Kili hissed next to her. "Could you please not antagonize the dragon?"

Bilba rolled her eyes at him and lowered her own voice to a matching hiss. "I'm pretty sure we moved well past antagonizing him when we shot him in the eye!"