A Tale of Time

Chapter 13: Pieces of Her Heart

Chapter 13: Pieces of her Heart

Thorin is not with Thranduil for long. He returns, huffing, throwing his shoulders against the Elves' grips. Gailien watches with a sullen face as he is thrown in a cell on the opposite side, on the next level up. His hair is dishevelled, evidence of the spiders' home still tangled, and his outer cloaks have been stripped away as well. Orcrist. They have taken his gifted sword.

"Did he offer you a deal?" Balin asks.

"He did," Thorin answers. A low raspy growl, a sure sign of his frustration. "I told him he could go ishkh khakfe andu null. Him and all his kin!" The latter part of his words raises in volume and the Khazadul rings out through the caverns.

Her nose and eyes sting. She frowns, pushing away from the cell bars. She does not usually count herself among her race and Thorin knows this but only an hour or so ago she had called them her kin. A mistake, but one her instincts made. She doesn't even know what his words mean but the poison they are spat with doesn't it make it a hard guess at the insult they carry.

Because she is an Elf, whether she looks like one or not it is where she grew up. It is the culture she learnt and the realm her family belonged to. The very blood in her veins is the same as those that threw her in these cells.

Thorin looks over to Gailien's cell but she is no longer visible at the door. Gailien shrinks against the wall, folding her knees under her arms in the corner where the light doesn't reach. Her hand reaches up behind her head, running through her hair until the cool metal touches her skin.

She undoes the bead, letting the braid unfold itself and she holds it up for her eyes to examine once again. It was made for her – by Dwarf royalty no less. But it does not change the shape of her ears or her nature. Cold and cruel. She belongs to the race she condemns with her own tongue.

Where she felt the comfort of being with the company less than a day ago, she now feels the dreaded loneliness again. The one that she hasn't truly felt since the first hundred years of living in the wild. A part of her cannot help but think that she is on the wrong side of the bars, that she should be a part of Mirkwood's military as was her dream as a child.

But then she would not know the Dwarves. She would not know Kili's humour or Fili's kindness. She would not know Bofur's craftsmanship or Bombur's cooking. She would not know Dwalin's tough, but true nature and she certainly wouldn't know Bilbo Baggins and his habit of finding his way through sticky situations. She would not get to experience what she feels for Thorin.

But she is also faced with the inevitable truth that once this quest has been completed, she will no longer be able to stand by his side. He will have a kingdom to run and she will have the wild to return to. Or Bilbo. She would love to live in the Shire with him.

But for now, for now, she belongs with the band of misfit Dwarves. Holding the bead between her lips, she searches for the loose braid and begins tightening it, redoing the pattern once more and then threads the bead back into place.

But there are more important things than her own mind. Or rather, her mind is the important thing. Shaking her head, she straightens her back against the wall, crossing her legs underneath her and softly places her palms on each knee. Now that they are out of the forest, she should be able to once again use her gift as a Seer. Her breathing slows as her sense of reality is lost. She is pulled into a deep state, not even her pupils moving under her lids.

Around the prison, the Dwarves spend the night muttering to each other, throwing curses to the passing Elves and making talk about escape but there is no viable way to do so and they know this. Though Thorin's trust lies in the Hobbit – a creature he has come to learn to respect.