Something in the Night

Chapter Nineteen

The corridor just outside the infirmary was narrow and quiet, the only light coming from the torches flickering overhead. Thorin leaned against the wall opposite the main doorway, scowling at how easily Narnerra pushed him out of her way and ordered him from the infirmary.

"Thorin? What happened?" Dís hurried toward him, the beads in her beard and long braids clacking loudly. "Are you injured? You'e covered in blood!"

He looked down at the dark rust-colored marks streaking along the front of his henley. His hands were bloodstained as well, with those same rust-colored streaks along the backs of them. "I'm fine, Dís."

That didn't stop his sister from grabbing his hands, one at a time, to examine them, then she leaned in toward him. "Are you certain? Whose blood is this, then?"

He jerked away from her. "Leave off. I have no injuries and the blood is not mine. It's Nina's and it's because she once more jumped between me and a weapon."

"Nina?" Dís' forehead wrinkled as she stepped back. "Who is Nina?"

"She..." He didn't know quite how to explain Nina at all. Especially when Dís offered up that all-knowing looked he'd seen far too often from their mother when he was a boy. And like their mother, she had the ability to see through most, if not all, of any lies he might try to get away with.

"Thorin? Your mystery mercenary?"

"We crossed paths on the road just outside Rivendell. She happened upon me and Dwalin just before an orc pack did and she traveled with us from Rivendell to Mirkwood, where we parted ways."

Dís arched one delicate ebony brow. "Parted ways?"

He hesitated. He certainly couldn't very well tell her they harbored a possible assassin in Erebor. Although, if he was completely honest with himself, he felt no threat from Nina. He'd never felt a threat from her. As she'd pointed out back in Mirkwood, they'd been alone—and he'd been very vulnerable—more than once and yet, she never made move to harm him.

"Parted ways," he said with a resolute bob of his head. "I saw her last eve when I was in Dale. She works at a tavern there and she'd seen the orc pack—"

"A second orc pack?"

"A scouting party, actually." He frowned at her. "Why the look?"

"Are you seriously that dense, Thorin?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"This girl—of Man, I assume— just happened to be near you when an orc pack attacked not once, but twice? You don't find that odd?"

"If it were anyone else, I might," he admitted. "But, I've traveled with Nina and had no trouble."

"Is that so?"

He thought back to the orc pack beyond Mirkwood's borders, but still nodded. "It is, yes. Dís, Azog put a price on my head, back when I first began the quest to retake this mountain. His death did not cancel it. I've no doubt there will be other encounters with filth determined to collect on it."

"A price—Thorin, do you mean to tell me that you left here last eve—in the dead of night, I'll add—by yourself knowing you've a blasted price on your head? Have you gone completely mad?"

He narrowed his eyes at her. "I'll pretend you did not just ask me that, little sister, for where I go and how I go is none of your concern."

"Thorin, you are not simply Oakenshield any longer. Need I remind you that you are, in fact, the king, and as such, you really should not be traipsing about without at least one guard?"