The Half Breed Ranger

Chapter 15: Beorn's

Cold.

Thats all Amanda could feel as she moved. Her hearing was muffled with the sound of rushing water. Her eyes were closed shrouding her in complete darkness.

"Amanda." A whispered voice called to her quietly. She knew the voice all to well.

'Kili?' Amanda tried to call it but it was only a thought instead.

" Amanda?" Another voice called.

'Bilbo?' Amanda thought.

"Amanda!" She know only too welcome whos tlow voice that was.

'Thorin?' She thought. Why is she hearing their voices?

Amanda had fell from the cliff top before the arrivel of the eagels. When she feel she had landed into a wide deep river. She drifted on her back along the surface of the river for a day before she washed up onto the shore of pebbles. As she lay there in the setting sun, a pair of heavy boots crunched the pebbles. The owner made his way over to Amanda and growled lowly before bending down.

" Dwarf." He growled lowly before he caught eye of her ears. He used a single large finger to push aside her hair and look at them.

" Elf?" He asked curiously.

" Interesting." He growled as he picked the limp body of Amanda up and into his large arms. She was just bigger than a new born baby in his arms. He walked back to his house with Amanda limp in his strong arms.

*2 Days later*

"Come on, lads!" A voice called as Amanda lay upon a bed. She could hear them but she herself was unable to move for do anything.

"What is that?" She knew the voices talking. Amanda knew them but could not put their sounds to names or faces

"That is our host." Another lower voice called. No doubt he was an old fellow.

"His name is Beorn, he's a skin-changer. Sometimes he's a huge black bear, sometimes he's a great strong man. The bear is unpredictable, but the man can be reasoned with. However, he is not over fond of dwarves." His voice sounded again. Amanda knew his voice but she was unable to identify who it belongs to.

"Alright now, get some sleep all of you. You'll be safe here tonight. I hope." He said again before all fell into a deep silence. Amanda lay in the bed and before she knew it, warmth was seeping into her motionless body as the sun rose up.

"So you are the one they call Oakenshield. Tell me, why is Azog the Defiler hunting you?" Beorn asked lowly.

'Oakenshield?' Amanda thought. She knew of only one person in all of middle earth with that name.

"You know of Azog? How?" Thorin asked him. Beorn growled slightly.

"My people were the first to live in the mountains, before the Orcs came down from the north. The Defiler killed most of my family, but some he enslaved. Not for work, you understand, but for sport. Caging skin-changers and torturing them seemed to amuse him." Beorn growled thinking back to the times of old.

"There are others like you?" Bilbo asked surprised he had never heard of them before.

"Once there were many." Beorn asked as he poured milk into large tankerds.

"And now?" Bilbo asked confused to why he had used past tense.

"Now there's only one." Beorn said saddly, Bilbo felt guilty at bring up this memory. Fili sat not too his brother who had not uttered a word since Amanda's death. Everyone has tried to cheer him up, but everything failed. Thorin could hear him weeping at night when everyone is sleeping.

" Kili, walk with me." Thorin ordered his nephew not giving him room to reject the offer. Kili stood and followed his uncle as the eyes of the company watched them. They walked out the house and through Beorn's garden side by side.

" How are you fairing?" Thorin asked him. Kili stopped and looked at him with determination in his eyes.

" I want to know uncle. Why, when she looked at you; did she back away from me?" Kili asked hi, as he sighed heavily. No one knew about their deal. It was for them and only them. But Thorin now thought, Kili deserved to know.

" She did not want to break you heart." Thorin told him looking to the ground feeling guilty.

" What?" Kili asked confused. Thorin turned his back to his nephew unable to even look at him for guilt.

" Back in Bag-end, we made a deal." Thorin began as Kili stayed quiet.

" She would help us reclaim Erebor and kill Smaug. Once all is done she..." Thorin stopped unable to tell his sisters son, who he often thought of as his own.

" Uncle?" Kili asked knowing he was not going to like what is about to be told.

" She would disappear from our lives. We would neither hear nor see her again." Thorin told him. Silence rippled in the air.

" What did she ask for in return?" Kili asked in a whimper closed his eyes with his fists clenched.

" Nothing. She asked for nothing in return. Only that she can see us back within the walls of the mountain." Thorin told him. Thorin now wished he had never made the deal with her, he had grown to view the ranger as his own daughter.

" How? How could you agree to such terms? Did you not think about how this would sit with the company? How it would rip us apart when she left at the end?" Kili asked disappointed by his uncles actions.

" I understand now, why she stepped away from me. Amanda honours her deals to the end. She knew that we could never be together so she pulled away from me. That was one of the last interactions I had with her! And she fell! She died to keep me alive!" Kili cried breaking down. All the anger and sorrow he has withheld the past few days broke and poured out. Thorin turned and watched as Kili fell to his knees and held his head in his hands. Thorin sank to his knees and held his sisters son as his wept over the loss of his lover. Back inside the house as Kili broke down, Beorn turned and faced Gandalf. The others had left the two in peace.

" I have someone, a female within my house. I found her on the shores of the river not to far from here. She is mortally wounded and I suspect she will not last to long without your help." Beorn said as he lead the wizard through his house.

" Really? I hope I can be of help then." Gandalf said having no idea he meant it was Amanda.

" She is a curious one indeed." Beorn told him as he put a hand on the handle of the door.

" Indeed? How so?" Gandalf asked him wondering what he meant. Beorn opened the door and Gandalf looked in.

" See for yourself." He told the wizard as Gandalf walked in slowly, eyeing the figure in the bed.

" It cannot be..." Gandalf said as he stopped at the side of the bed. His eyes watching the pale female below him, she was but barely breathing as her pale face looked slightly pain.

" You know her?" Beorn asked a little surprised.

" Yes, she is part of this company..." Gandalf told him.

" What is her name?" Beorn asked as he stepped up to the other side of the bed.

" Amanda. She is a Ranger." Gandalf said to Beorn.