Blue swords|| Legolas

18

Luin eventually found the dwarves down in the dungeons. The dungeons were in a massive cavern beneath the palace made out of the trunks of huge trees. The steps and cells were all carved out of wood above the earth. When Luin got there, Bilbo was in the process of unlocking them them all with the keys he had taken off of a slumbering guard. Half of the company were already out and hanging around as they waited for the last of them to be freed. They all cried out with joy as they spotted Luin running down the steps. The strength had returned to his legs and Luin took the steps two at a time.

"Luin!", Kili, Fili and Ori all cheered.

"Did you get my message?" Luin asked Bilbo. The hobbit nodded.

"Yeah, a voice in my head telling me how to get into Mirkwood and the directions to the dungeons was definitely easy to miss", he snarked, seeming slightly grumpy. Luin smiled and ruffled his curly hair, glad that the spell had worked. He had been unsure since it was a rather complicated spell. The hobbit relaxed and smiled back. "Thank you. I had been stuck sneaking around the lower city of a whole day before you helped me".

The click to Thorin's cell sounded and the door swung open. The dark haired dwarf stepped out and patted Bilbo on the shoulder. He nodded at Luin to convey his gratitude. Luin nodded back, exhaustion written on his face.

"What did you do?" Balin asked. "We could hear your song from down here, what happened to the elves?" The old dwarf pointed towards the prone snoring figure of a guard on the ground some distance away.

"I just sent them to sleep. We've got half an hour before the castle wakes so we'd better move quickly", Luin looked around. "Bilbo, do you know a way to get out of here?"

"Yeah", Bilbo waved towards the lower levels. He began running downstairs. "It's this way, come on".

Luin stopped at the slumbering guard. The elf had a small blade strapped to his belt, visible in the torch light. Quickly, he slipped it out of its sheath. He snuck the small blade into his boots before following after the others. It always paid to have multiple weapons and something told Luin that he would need it. Just in case.

The hobbit lead them all down into the stone cellars of the castle through twisting tunnels and corridors. Huge caves of rock buried underground. They all crept as quickly and quietly as possible as Bilbo headed into the wine cellar, passing several snoring guards and castle servants as they went. Although the spell should hold out, no one wanted to accidentally wake them and raise the alarm. The wine cellar was filled head to toe with massive barrels of wine, each about the size of Bilbo. It was lit by the flickering flames of torches along the earth walls. Luin spotted the slumbering forms of three elves at a table. From the empty bottles, it was obvious that they had been drinking before Luin's music had put them to sleep. He doubted they would be waking up anytime soon even if the magic wore off.

"I can't believe it", Bofur said happily. "We're in the cellars!"

"You're supposed to be leading us out of here", Nori hissed. "Not further in".

"Just be quiet and trust me", Bilbo hissed back. He waved them one by one towards a pile of stacked empty barrels. "Come on, get in the barrels, we haven't much time".

Luin fidgeted  anxiously as they all began squeezing in one by one. He trusted Bilbo but he could feel the time ticking on. Several of them had to push Bombur into a barrel, his girth almost making him too big. The dwarves also had to crawl over each other to get into the barrels on top, tucking themselves in with grumbled whispers. It all involved a lot of uncoordinated limbs and snarked comments along with the occasional groan of pain. The whole time, Bilbo kept hissing at them to be quiet and to move quickly.