A totally expected journey

Stories in the night

Laura's POV
For the most part of the day I spent my time annoying Thorin. Asking him pointless questions, stating the obvious. It was bloody amusing. I could see him slowly ticking away.
"So Thorin," I didn't get any further.
"We camp here for the night," he called. I got off my horse and looked around. Shania was helping with the horses, Dansoa was talking to Balin about something and Abi was talking Bilbo and Bofur. I walked over to the munchkins.
"Hello munchkin," I say.
"Hello tall one," she replied. Thorin walked by still annoyed as ever.
"Did you do that?" She asks.
"Do what, I have no idea what you're talking about," I said with fiend innocence. She raised an eyebrow at me.
"Sure sure, Bilbo, it would probably be best if we stay out of Thorin's way, the idiot got him mad and you probably don't want to get injured," she said glaring at me. I smiled.
"Yeah that's probably best," I agreed.
After all the jobs around camp that needed to be done before dinner were done we sat down. I watched the dinner cook practically drooling. Hey I hadn't had anything since lunch. Soon Bofur and Bombur were done with their marvellous creation and I was first in line to eat. I got my food sat down and started to shovel the stew into my mouth. The others chuckled at my enthusiasm. After a moment I looked around. This campsite looked familiar. Then it hit me. We were at the place in the movie where Fíli and Kíli scare Bilbo and Balin tells the story of the battle for Moria. I looked over at the others. I saw that Abi kept looking over at the two young Durin son. So she's figured it out. I glanced over to Shania. From the way she was watching Bilbo I guess she had figured it out too. I looked at Dansoa. Didn't really expect her to know what was going on anyway. She was new to the fandom. The sun sunk down bellow the horizon and I waited for the fun to begin.
I'd almost fallen asleep when I saw Bilbo stand up. I smiled quietly as he went to feed his pony. It was quite comical that over the last few days he went from hating having to ride a pony to feeding it secretly at night. The moment of tranquility was suddenly snatched away as a howl was heard. Bilbo looked up.
"What was that?"
"Orks," Kíli said ominously.
"Orks?" Bilbo hurried back to the camp
"Throat cutters,there'll be dozens of them out there, the low lands are crawling with them," Fíli continued.

"They strike in the wee small hours when everyone's asleep. Quick and quiet, no screams, just lots of blood," Kíli finished. Bilbo turned and looked out into the night while Fíli and Kíli started to chuckle. Here it comes.

"You think that's funny? You think a night raid by Orks is a joke?" Thorin asked.

"We didn't mean anything by it," Kíli said.

"No you didn't, you know nothing of the world," We watched Thorin walk away and I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes as he walked to the cliff and looked over the valley below. It was just too damn cheesy. I was brought out of my internal sniggering by Balin.
"Don't mind him laddie, Thorin has more cause than most to hate Orks," I noticed a few of the Dwarves stirring. It's like they know when a good story will be told and they don't want to miss it. Balin continued.
"After the dragon took the mountain, king Thro tried to reclaim the ancient dwarf kingdom of Moria. But our enemy had got there first. Moria had been taken by legions of Orks, lead by the most vile of all there race, Azog, the defiler. The giant Gundaban Ork had sworn to wipe out the line of Durin. He began by beheading the king. Thrain, Thorin's father was driven mad by grief. He went missing. Taken prisoner or killed, we did not know. We were leaderless. Defeat and death were upon us. That is when I saw him. A young Dwarf prince, facing down the pale Ork. He stood alone against this terrible foe. His armour rent, wielding nothing but an oaken branch as a shield. Azog the defiler learnt that day, that the line of Durin will not be so easily broken. Our forces rallied and drove the Orks back. Our enemy had been defeated. But there was feast, nor song that night. For our dead were beyond the count of grief. We few had survived. And I thought to myself then, there is one I could follow, there is one I could call king," as Balin finished his story we all looked at Thorin.
"And the pale Ork? What happened to him?" Bilbo asked.

"He slunk back into the hole whence he came, that filth died of his wounds long age," I looked up at Gandalf. His eyes flickered between me and Balin. We all knew that sentence wasn't true. But we couldn't find the right words to say it without being thought that it was some kind of sick joke. So I just looked away and stayed silent. He'll find out on his own soon enough. No need to set his mind worrying.