Blackfoot

Chapter 1

The fight had been long and bloody, the dwarves did not know how to give up and neither did the orcs. They fought and clashed and when King Thror was slain, they thought it was all over.

But then the dwarf prince charged in, taking on their leader, and while the fight continued, many held their breaths.

The prince cut off Azog's hand, and as his shriek of pain and rage echoed through the battlefield, she charged forward to kill the dwarf prince, to defend her master, but as she leapt, as she went for the kill, something happened, and she found herself stopping short.

For a long moment, red eyes stared into blue and all she understood was that she could not hurt him. He stood there, waiting for her to attack, his eyes fierce from the fighting, but even with all she had been trained to do, she could do nothing.

She turns and flees after her master, but even as she does, for the first time in her life, she feels she is going the wrong way.

The battle now over, she sits listening to her masters screams as they try to fix his arm. The orcs who pass her shoot her filthy but scared glances. She would just growl if they got too close, nipping at their feet, and they would back away. She had killed more than her fair share of them over the years.

She was uncomfortable, she did not understand why she had been unable to finish the dwarf, she had never failed to make a kill. Never. It was why Azog used her, because she was good at what she did, she had killed many for him and this was the first time she had failed.

When the call for her head went out, she was more than surprised, but then, if she could not kill for him, what use was she? The surprised was replaced by amusement as she saw the orcs hesitate, something that was often her enemies downfall, these orcs should definitely know better with her.

She tore through them, orc blood spilling to the floor before bolting, it wouldn't take them long to be rid of their nerves and she was no match for the amount of orcs at Azog's command and as much as she hated running, now was the time.

Muscles rippling under heavy black fur caked with blood, she leapt, clearing the large gap of the old fortress, and then she did not stop, her legs pumping as fast as she could to be clear of any danger as orc shrieks followed her.

It wasn't until she bounded into a bright, sunny clearing, that she stopped, howling with pain as the sunlight burnt her eyes and she retreated to the edge of the forest, where there was shade, that she stopped.

She used the moment to catch her breath, her large form breathing hard. It wasn't until she steadied herself that she thought of something.

She was free.

What this meant, she wasn't entirely sure. Her entire life had been spent in the service of Azog, it was all she could remember. She didn't know of the world beyond where he had been.

Sniffing the air, she slowly stepped free from the forest, allowing her darkness sensitised eyes to adjust to blinding light. Once in the open, she drew in a long deep breath. The air was strange, so many scents hit her at once and yet, there was no threat, no sense of being hit at any moment.

With a happy yip, she bounded over to a particularly grassy spot and began to roll around it, the grass feeling great against her coat. This was all very new to her.

She stayed out in the plain, even chasing after butterflies, until she realised she was thirsty. She went in search of a stream, following the smell of water in the air.

Finding one, she padded along in it for a while, the water soothing her feet, which only now she thought of as sore. It led her to a waterfall and for a long time she stared at it, this was something new, she had never seen a waterfall before, the sound of cascading water was oddly soothing.