A Better Place - The Hobbit Fanfiction

Alternate Entry Forty-One - The Reasons We Cry

I had to think hard. Bofur didn't know. Dain didn't know. Bard knew. Soviel and Luviel knew. I wondered if any of them were alive. "Where's Bard?" He was probably with his family. I remembered most of them didn't live here anymore.

"Don't think about that just now, Mabyn. Just wait here. You should recover just fine." He patted the back of my left hand and left to attend immediately to someone else.

I did as I was told, and I just laid there. They had opened the windows, attempting for a breeze through the oily stench of the inside of Bard's lovely home, but outside was just as bad. All they accomplished was moving the air around. The corners of my eyes felt cracked and dry from the tears slowly seeping out. I wanted to know what time it was but the people who were still left were going from house to house, street to street, covering the dead and tending the wounded, and only moving those who needed extensive care.

I did not need extensive care. I just needed to hold still, and still, and wonder who I was mourning for that I didn't even know about yet.

Luviel arrived only slowly, and sank to sit against the wall next to me, one leg held out stiff, blood and blackness all over her clothes and still streaking her arms. She'd managed to wash her hands. She laid one light hand against the top of my head and I stared painstakingly up at her. "Is Soviel okay?"

She sniffed, and nodded. "She will be. She has a shattered leg. How about you?"

"I think I have bad cuts in my face, I hit my head, and my right arm is broken."

She tried for a laugh and it came out shakily. She wiped underneath her eyes. I wondered if she was crying for the same reasons I did. All the killing, and the fear, and the exhaustion. "How will you continue to work for Dain?"

"I don't know. I'm not sure how I'll be able to work for Dain without my right arm. I used to be able to write with my left, but I haven't done it in years. I can still sew with my left though."

She nodded, still stroking my hair. "I am sure the two of you will sort something out."

"Luviel."

"Yes?"

"Is anyone else but me alive?"

"Here, you mean?"

I stiffly nodded, closing my eyes as Luviel looked around.

"I saw a few on the ground floor who were not covered," she said, "and there is one more person up here who is unconscious."

"Can you tell me what she looks like?"

"She has dark hair, a little past her shoulders, is slender, and is wearing some sort of silver charm on a leather cord around her neck."

I squeezed my eyes shut. "Her name is Ilia." That meant Poppy was dead too. I sucked in my breath, my lungs trembling. "Luviel. Do you know if Bard is okay? And Bain?" I didn't think she'd know about Sigrid and Tilda's husbands.

Luviel was leaning slightly over me, protective, and her eyes turned even sadder. "I am so sorry, sweetheart. Bard is no longer with us. I do not know about Bain."

My heart punctured, and tears sprang into my eyes. "He's dead?"

Luviel shifted to lie down beside me so she could wrap her arm gently around me. "I'm so sorry, Mabyn, so sorry."

I turned as much of myself as I could, which for the moment meant all I could do was rest my forehead against hers, and cried.

It was nighttime before I even thought to ask. "Luviel, can you bring me home? I understand if you want to stay close to Soviel."