Walking In Starlight

25

Bilbo quietly walks through a large doorway and finds himself in a massive hall,

"Hello?" Bilbo whispered out loud

He knocks quietly on the wall beside him, but the sound is intensified loudly as it echoes and bounces off the walls, and he jumps and presses himself against the wall in shock. Seeing no reaction to the noise, he walks out into the hall on an elevated walkway,

"You’re not at home" he whispered to himself "not at home. Good. Good, good, good"

Bilbo, at the top of a staircase, suddenly stops walking and his mouth hangs open in shock, seeing mountains of gold, jewels, weapons, cups, and all sorts of treasure piled dozens of feet high all throughout the immensely massive hall. He climbs down the stairs and carefully begins to walk atop the treasure, trying to be quiet, but the coins and jewels beneath his feet make a lot of noise. He pokes around, looking for the Arkenstone, finding a large white jewel and examines hit,

"What’s that?" He asked himself

He shakes the jewel and continues examining it, deciding that it’s not the Arkenstone, he carelessly throws it aside, then jumps when it clatters and makes a lot of noise,

"Sushh, sushh" he whispered frantically continuing to look around "Arkenstone, Arkenstone . . . a large, white jewel. Very helpful."

He is surrounded by so much treasure that it would be impossible for him to find one particular jewel out of all of it. Bilbo climbs up a mountain of gold, picking up a golden cup, and this action starts a small avalanche of coins. Bilbo looks up and sees the coins falling away to reveal Smaug’s eye, which is shut, causing the Hobbit to jump behind a stone pillar in fright. All is silent, and it seems like Smaug is still asleep, but Smaug snorts suddenly, and the treasure around his nose falls away, revealing it. Bilbo, panting, slowly tries to make his way down the pile of gold, but stops short when he realizes that Smaug’s body is buried in a large circle around where he is standing. The gold all along Smaug’s body begins to ripple as he awakens.

Bilbo takes a few steps, then pauses and kneels as Smaug begins to raise his head, his eye still closed, but as Smaug opens his eye, Bilbo runs and dives behind a pile of gold. As Smaug’s eye looks around, Bilbo reaches into his pocket and pulls out the ring, looking at it for several seconds, then looks up as Smaug begins to raise his head. He puts the ring on, and becomes invisible, Smaug raises his head and sniffs the air,

"Well, thief, I smell you" Smaug said "I hear your breath. I feel your air. Where are you?"

As Smaug says this, he moves his head back and forth around the place where Bilbo is invisibly standing, and Bilbo has to duck to avoid being knocked over. Bilbo panics and runs down the mountain of treasure, even though he is invisible, Smaug can see where he is going because of the coins he’s dislodging with his feet while running. Smaug follows rapidly. Bilbo ducks behind a stone outcropping as Smaug continues searching,

"Come now, don’t be shy" Smaug said "step into the light. Mmm, there is something about you, something you carry. Something made of gold, but far more . . . preciousssss"

While saying this, Smaug’s head is right in front of Bilbo’s hiding place, and as Smaug says “Precious,” the word reverberates in Bilbo’s head over and over and he strains in mental pain. A flaming eye bursts into his vision, and he yanks the ring off, becoming visible to Smaug,

"There you are, thief in the shadows" Smaug said

"I did not come to steal from you, O Smaug the Unassessably Wealthy" Bilbo said "I merely wanted to gaze upon your magnificence, to see if you really were as great as the old tales say. I did not believe them"