HOBBIT X OC - Elastic Heart

Chapter 11 ~ Escaping Mirkwood

After a few hours I hear Bofur say, "I'll wager the sun's on the rise. It must be nearly dawn."

"We're never going to reach the mountain, are we?" Ori says disappointment filling his voice.

"Not stuck in here, you're not!" I hear a familiar voice and jumping up run to the cell door where Bilbo suddenly appears, holding up the ring of keys. Thorin and the other dwarves jump up in surprise as Balin exclaims, "Bilbo!"

As the dwarves cry out in surprise, Bilbo shushes them. "Shhh! There are guards nearby!" Bilbo unlocks Thorin's cell and lets him out. He then proceeds to let all the dwarves and myself out of our various cells, and we chuckle gleefully at our good fortune. Some of the dwarves start walking in a certain direction. I hear a Dwarf say, "The stairs. You first. Ori!" before Bilbo suddenly says, "Not that way, down here. Follow me."

Bilbo proceeds to lead us through the Woodland Realm. We sneak through its halls until we find ourselves in the wine cellar. The elves there are sound asleep around a table, with several empty bottles of wine in front of them. Bilbo leads us further in as he says, "This way."

"I don't believe it; we're in the cellars!" Kili exclaims and suddenly the dwarves start getting mad at Bilbo.

"You were supposed to be leading us out, not further in!" Bofur says and I am about to stick up for Bilbo when he says, "I know what I'm doing!"

"Shhh!"

"This way." We sneak into a large room, in which several barrels are stacked sideways down the middle of the room. All the barrels have one end open. "Everyone, climb into the barrels, quickly!" Bilbo says and I raise an eyebrow at him.

"Are you mad?! They'll find us!" Dwalin cries out as he and the rest argue against using the barrels.

"No, no, they won't, I promise you. Please, please, you MUST trust me!" Bilbo begs and I watch as the dwarves mill around, as they try to decide. Suddenly Thorin says, "Do as he says!"

Each of the dwarves climbs into a barrel and I stand there worried that I wouldn't fit. Bilbo walks along, counting to make sure all the dwarves have been accounted for. "Come on Randir," Bilbo says as he points to one of the last barrels. I stare at it for a moment before climbing inside.

"What do we do now?" Bofur says as we all stick our heads out of our barrels and watch Bilbo as he walks toward a lever in the ground and says, "Hold your breath."

"Hold my breath? What do you mean?" Bofur asks when suddenly Bilbo pulls the lever, and the part of the floor that the barrels were on tilts downward into an opening; the barrels roll out the opening and fall several feet into a river that runs beneath the Woodland Realm. The dwarves yell as they fall, and the barrels make loud thumping noises. The elves sleeping around the table stir and begin to wake up. Bilbo triumphantly looks around, then realizes that he forgot to get out himself, and that the trap door has closed.

"Where's Bilbo?" Thorin asks as we all wait just below the opening.

"He's still up there." I say as I prop myself up on my knees. Suddenly the roof opens up and Bilbo falls into the river, yelling. He surfaces and grabs onto Nori's barrel.

"Well done, Master Baggins." Thorin says to him and Bilbo, half drowned, waves his hand in thanks and manages to splutter out, "Go." "Come on, let's go." Thorin says and we begin to paddle with our hands as the river pulls our barrels along. We emerge into the sunlight, and Thorin sees a waterfall right in front of us. "Hold on!" Thorin calls out to us all and I grip tightly to the rim of my barrel.

The dwarves, Bilbo, myself, and the barrels plunge through the rapids, then float swiftly down the raging river. Suddenly I hear a horn sound as we see a guard-post built above the river. The heavily armored elves standing guard there hear the horn and come to attention; one of them pulls a lever, causing a heavy metal sluice gate to block the river. We in our barrels come to a stop at the gate, unable to float further. "No!" Thorin cries out angrily.