A Better Place - The Hobbit Fanfiction

Twentieth Entry - The March

I woke the next morning with a fever, as I’d expected. Someone had laid a damp, cool cloth across the back of my neck and others over the undamaged places of my back to help with the glowing cinders I held trapped under my skin. I also woke to arguing. Tauriel and Nesetha were standing several feet away from me and debating in quick voices, Tauriel’s resigned, Nesetha’s insistent. I craned to see them better, uncurling one hand to prop myself up as Nesetha gestured sharply toward me and at the same moment noticed that I was awake.

She swept to my side and looked over my back, peeling away the warming cloths and replacing them with fresh, cool ones. She was still speaking but since Tauriel would translate I was still watching her. Tauriel hadn’t moved.

“She asks how you are feeling,” she said quietly, frowning toward Nesetha’s table, which had several packed satchels lined up on it, to my bafflement.

“Well enough,” I replied. “Feverish, aches, and some expected pains.” I winced as Nesetha touched a few raw spots. “What are you arguing about?”

Tauriel turned to face me, and there was a conflict in her eyes. “Smaug is dead. We are marching to the mountain.”

My heart flinched with a mixture of relief and surprise. “The dwarves killed the dragon?”

“No, a man of Lake Town.”

“Why are you going to Erebor?”

“Now that the mountain is accessible again Thranduil intends to reclaim the gems the dwarves stole from him.” She blinked at my face of astonishment and added the reason for her and Nesetha’s confrontation. “You are coming as well.”

I beamed at first—I would see the dwarves again after all. But I knew this king would not bring me to reunite me with a people he detested. “Why?” I asked as my joy dimmed.

“Your association to the dwarves may provide some insight on how to regain his property without undue effort.”

My heart plunged. “Tauriel, I’ve told him everything I know that could possibly be of use.”

Her green eyes were clear of distinct emotions now. She was hiding them from me. “You may be able to reason with them.”

I gazed up at her, openmouthed. “Thorin and I never got along! Why would he listen to a child he often disagreed with?”

Nesetha made some irritable remark and I spun about to look over my shoulder at her in shock. This was as close to cutting as her sweet voice had ever ventured.

“Can you march, Mabyn?” Tauriel asked me, neither translating nor responding to the healer.

Since I was certain it was either march or be carried I nodded. “I would not be left behind regardless of what anyone says.”

A touch of wry amusement colored her face. “You would follow us?” Clearly she doubted my ability to evade whatever guards they would have left me here with.

“You haven’t seen me yet when I’m decided,” I told her solemnly.

“I hope you are decided in attending us all the way to the mountain,” she solemnly replied, and I realized she was afraid I would die on the journey.

I lifted my chin and said, “I am.”

She nodded. “Nesetha is coming as well. I have already packed for you. I will return for you in half an hour.”

After Tauriel left Nesetha had me sit up so she could spread the back of my tunic for me and add fresh bandages for me to sport. That first day we had gone through a lot of debate on what I should wear with this injury—front-tying meant I could do it myself but I also exposed more when having my back examined. Back-tying was the opposite. Ties themselves were less uncomfortable if I bumped them but buttons allowed the tunic to be parted instead of painstakingly unlaced. Back buttons, it was.