Short Stories and Drabbles

It's A Wonderful Life

Bilba stood at the edge of a broken path, darkness stretching away beneath her feet, and slumped in defeat. Rain from the earlier storm pattered on her head, sending cold rivulets sliding down the collar of her dress.

Her entire body felt like ice, but not enough to numb the pain in her feet because she hadn't considered they might not be designed to trek through mountains full of sharp rock and bitterly cold ice.

She was miserable and now she was stuck out here being rained on because she was too stupid to remember the path was gone.

Seriously, it had been like a half hour ago, and she'd been there. She'd watched the stone giants fighting, had nearly been killed by them for Yavanna's sake and yet, here she was, like an idiot thinking the path was going to just miraculously put itself back so she could trek down it.

Words ran through her mind, as biting in memory as they had been when she'd heard them out loud.

"She's been lost ever since she left home. You should never have come. You have no place among us."

Bilba flinched and clenched her jaw as pressure built between her eyes. Wouldn't that just be wonderful, if they were to come out and see her weeping in the rain?

What had she been thinking? That she was off on a lark? That she'd skip along picking flowers and stopping for picnics along the way? For Yavanna's sake, she'd worn a dress. No wonder Thorin thought so little of her. She'd given him more than enough cause.

Kili's face floated through her mind and she closed her eyes and bit back a groan. She could still remember her excitement running out the door of Bag Eng, fantasies of love and adventure filling her head.

She'd had visions of riding next to Kili and entertaining him with witty dialogue during the day and impressing him with her cooking in the evening. She'd catch him watching her out of the corner of her eye and would smile coyly and then pretend to be interested in the way ahead while all the while sneaking peeks back at him.

That had been her fantasy. In reality, she'd given no thought to the fact that she'd never ridden a horse in her life, or that the Company hadn't hired her as a cook, because they already had one.

She'd also never given any thought to the fact that Kili might give her no particular notice.

At all.

As far as he was concerned, she might as well not have existed.

At least until tonight when he couldn't have helped but her hear his uncle's scathing dismissal of her.

She was pretty sure the entire mountain had heard.

She opened her eyes and curled her hands into fists. There was no way, just no way she was letting them come out and find her out here. There was no way she was going back either, to face the long months ahead as an outcast, unwanted, unneeded.

Unnecessary.

She took a deep breath and then, carefully, started to shuffle toward the wall of the mountain. There was a small shelf of rock still there, barely a strip of jagged, uneven stone jutting out from the mountain.

She reached where it started, and felt her stomach curdle inside her.

At its thickest point, the path was probably little wider than her foot, and that was being generous.

For the briefest of seconds, she considered giving it up. Returning in defeat to the cave and putting up with their disregard and disgust until they got to a point where she could somehow find her own way back.