Misty Mountains

Chapter Five: The Fire

Arnial rode the horse towards the orc with her blade at the ready, he had his warg turned to the side ready to take the impact of her attack. But at the last second she pulled her mount to the side rushing past the orc and warg who was taken unaware. She knew that after he had blown the horn that  his pack of warg riders would be upon them soon and she would be outnumbered by them. If she could lose them in the trees of her people then she would stand a chance of outrunning them completely.

She heard the howls of the wargs as they regrouoped and began the hunt. As she rode further into the woods she heard something that made her blood run cold. Further ahead of her in the trees she could hear the howls of a second warg pack, the howls continued as they began to fan out circling her in the trees. They were still to far off from her to see in the darkness but she knew they had an idea of where she was in the woods.

As Arnial turned the horse to try retracing her path a bit she could see a faint glow where she had been. At first she believed them to be torches that they had lit to making searching for her easier but as she watched the glow began to spread not become seperate orbs of light.

They had set the forest on fire around her. As she turned she began to search to see how far they had pressed the flames and only one path lay before her with no glow of fire, the second warg pack.

Arnial knew of only one other way she might could avoid them and turned the horse back down the path, there was a river she hoped she could wade across to the other side providing the fire was this side of the water.

With the rains that had passed through their lands recently she knew the river would be flowing heavily she just hoped the current wasn't to strong for her horse.

The further she went the thicker the smoke became and her mount began to fight all progress closer to the flames. It came to a point where the horse was screaming it's protest and trying to take lead to run towards the warg packs she could hear tracking them further into the flames.

Arnial slung herself out of the saddle and turned the reins loose letting her mount bolt back the way they had come. She could only hope the scent of the horse backtracking would delay the orcs from finding her till she could get safely across the river.

She turned back towards the river, one hand resting on her sword and the other pressing a cloth over her nose so she could breath somewhat clean air. She pressed on getting to the riverbank.

As she got out of the treeline her heart sank, the flames were on both side and the river was raging. Even with a mount to aid her she would be swept by the current and pulled under.

The heat from the flames was becoming greater as it pressed in around her and in the bronzed armor she was becoming overheated. She began to cough at the smoke starting to thicken around her, it burned her eyes making them water to where it was hard to see beyond a blurr. Arnial walked towards the waters edge planning to dip the cloth into the water to tie around her face.

As she approached she heard one of the trees make a loud pop and burning it began to topple downwards crashing part way across the river it's trunk still partly on fire.

As she coughed and batted the sparks from the fallen tree away from her she became aware of a growling behind her that was growing louder by the second.

She knew the warg packs had found her.

*******

Bilbo rode alongside Thorin, Dwalin, Kili, Balin, and the elves leaving Erebor in search of the elf woman that had quietly slipped out of Erebor. He knew that he had encouraged Thorin to rethink his decision and was glad the dwarf had but as they left the gates he couldn't help but wish he had done so sooner.