The Three Women Of Durin

The King Under The Mountain

"Eighteen," Cece found herself saying, almost so quiet that no one could hear.

"What did you say, lassie," Dawlin who sat before her turned to face her.

"Eighteen," She said again, a little more confidence in her voice, "Well you have you lot, thirteen, a hobbit, fourteen, a wizard, fifteen, and us three, eighteen." She spoke, apparently, this was enough to cause an uproar.

"Woah, woah, woah. I have spoken nothing of the sort about going on this quest," Bilbo suddenly piped up, his voice noticeably higher. "And I do not to intend to join either,"

"And who invited you along," Bofur questioned the three girls.

"I did," Gandalf suddenly said which caused a silence to spread across the room and the girls to glance, starry-eyed at the wizard.

"That is not your burden to bear," Thorin said sternly to Gandalf, his dislike for the girls fairly obvious in his features, maybe it was because he still thought of them as maids.

"But I will bear it," Gandalf said back before turning to the whole table. "Whether you like it or not these three girls have been plucked from the lives, worlds, universes to join us on this quest. They have been found by one of your own and brought here, therefore I believe it to be fate that they come with us," he spoke wisely to the group whilst raising out of his chair and looming above all the beings in the cosy home.

"But you forget Gandalf," Thorin said standing out of his chair too. "This is my quest, this is my journey, it is my home we are reclaiming, my fate and most importantly this...is my company. I choose who comes and who stays, and I say that these three remain here, in fact, they can go, we will not be needing them for the rest of the night," He said, glaring at the girls and Gandalf.

"Do not fight me on this Thorin, you know not what these girls can do. I sense something within them, they will be a mighty use to us. They may even save your life," He said, the last part visibly got under Thorin's skin, he sat back down, as did Gandalf and they left each other in their thoughts. Suddenly the blonde prince spoke up.

"We may be few in number, but we're fighters. All of us. To the last dwarf," Fili spoke up, slapping his hand on the table, "We do not need the help of three females or a hobbit," his brother followed on.

"And you forget we have a wizard in our company Gandalf would have killed hundreds of dragons in his time," Kili said, riled up with energy and passion. At this Frankie audibly snorted as Gandalf tried to get the dwarves to think otherwise.

"How many then?" Dori said.

"What?" Gandalf replied, slightly lost for words.

"Well, how many dragons have you killed?" This caused an uproar when Gandalf chose not to answer and instead took another puff of his pipe which he ended up spluttering right back out. The three girls again expected this, but what they didn't expect was for Thorin to slam his hand on the table, hard enough that half the cutlery danced its way to the floor. It worked and brought the fighting dwarves to a stop.

"It does not matter how many dragons any of us has killed, what matters is that together it is possible for us to kill another. In each one of you, I see a fire which doesn't perish. Trust me, it is possible for the dragon to fall before us, despite our numbers," he said, with power and courage.

The three girls watched as Thorin continued to make his little speech, it was evident how much he cared about this mission, maybe gate-crashing was the best idea. When he finished it appeared that the words of the king with no mountain pierced the dwarf's hearts with hope, and that's all they needed, cheers erupted from the dwarves as the threw their drinks in the air.