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I haven't updated in FOREVER, and I feel terrible about that. No warnings in this one, just a chill filler chapter.

As we hurried along the pathways, I wiped my cheeks to make sure all tear marks were cleaned off my face. Fili slowed his pace a little so he was shoulder to shoulder with me and kept glancing me as I wiped my cheeks.
"What?" I raised an eyebrow to him, and he looked away quickly before returning his eyes to me and glancing at my back. I understood what bothered him and I sighed deeply.
"They are just scars. Because of them, I might never be absolutely free of Kenneth but I can get pretty darn close to it, especially now that I'm here and he's nowhere near. It's all in the past, and I will move on." I don't know, who I was trying to convince more, myself or him, but he seemed to relax slightly. There was a short silence after my words before Fili spoke.
"You know that none of us will ever hurt you?" I gave him a small smile and nodded.
"Of course. I learned that early in the journey already." It was true. After the sword incident, Thorin had promised me that no one would hurt me as long as I was with the company. The statement didn't last very long but he promised nonetheless. It was actually the first moment I had with Thorin which he didn't completely despise me in.

We came into a sliding stop to a place where multiple corridors led to different directions.
"Which one we take?" Kili asked, and I looked around. They all seemed identical to me, and the brothers were looking just as educated as I was, so I closed my eyes.
"Bea?" Fili asked, and I shushed him. After a while of pondering, I pointed to a corridor on the far right.
"That one." We took off again, and Kili glanced over his shoulder at me.
"How did you know it was this one?" I smirked.
"My psychic powers," I noted and tapped my temple, and Fili next to me let out a laugh.
"You heard them, didn't you?" Kili huffed while I giggled and we walked to the hallway,
"Let's not keep your uncle waiting any longer." We hurried along the path and finally found the platform the others were standing on and looking around the vast piles of gold.

"We must find the Arkenstone. It's the most important jewel in this mountain and I want it found." Thorin was giving us a pep talk of shorts. It had been going for a few moments now, and it was all the same, how the Arkenstone was important and yadda yadda. He had said it with like five different ways, and I was getting (surprise surprise) annoyed and I decided to open my mouth.
"Why don't we actually start searching so we can get to sleep today?" Thorin turned to me with a sour look, and I just rolled my eyes.
"Get searching then. Remember, the Arkenstone is a big, white and round jewel and the heirloom-" I cut him off.
"Of the king, yeah. You've only said it like ten times already." I pushed past the dwarves and walked to the gold, looking around for a "good" spot to search. Not that I would actually search anything, as Bilbo already had the bloody stone. I would just shift through the gold and wonder all the beautiful things I found.

After a while of rummaging through the precious metals, I had found a beautiful bracelet and a cute tiara to match, but I had laid them on a step of the stairs and just kept searching. In truth, I just pushed aside some jewels and shuffled around with my hands to seem like I was actually doing something. A song had been playing in my head for a while now, ever since we had stepped into the mountain. I felt like it was made to tell about Erebor, and the more I thought about it, the more I wondered how much it actually reminded me of the day that Smaug took the mountain. I started to hum it softly, to keep myself entertained as I shifted around the vast mountains of gold and gems.

Fili's POV

We had been searching for the Arkenstone for almost all night now and no one had found it. We were all hungry and tired, but none of us wanted to give up searching, especially after Thorin had ordered that we would not rest until it was found. I felt sleep tug at my eyelids, but I forced myself to keep them open and I glanced around. Balin was holding his back with a pained expression, the crouched position wasn't the best for the back and Balin wasn't exactly young anymore. Kili kept yawning, and Bea seemed like she could barely keep herself standing up. She stood tilted, and I knew she was trying to keep the weight off her injured leg. A loud thud caught my attention and I turned around.

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