she woke, it was dark. Sigrid was pressing a cool rag to her forehead and Tilda looked down worriedly. The house was unsettlingly quiet. Arethusa pushed herself up, feeling faint but much better than she had hours prior. An absence of thirteen dwarves and a hobbit sent panic through her blood. "Where are they?"

Bain came forth, a muddled expression on his face as he looked at the fairy. "I tried stopping them. They weren't pleased with the weapons Da brought." Her frown deepened as she swung her legs off the straw mattress. "Miss Arethusa, you should rest more. You've been out of it for hours. Feverish too." She hardly listened to elvish healers, the suggestions of children she surely ignored even if her head was throbbing harder with each step she took.

"I have to the stop those stubborn creatures before they do something really vacuous." She headed out the door but stalled before descending the wooden steps. Her head was spinning now. The fairy pushed through her own discomfort, tracing paths around the shambolic town.

The town was dark, but there seemed to be a glow coming from the center of the city. Arethusa wandered across the decaying bridges and soft wooden blanks that were a poor substitute for land. It felt as if she were going in circles until she came to the gathered crowd. Above all the hushed murmuring she could hear Thorin's voice proclaiming that he would see Esgaroth restored when the mountain was reclaimed. "Let me through, please." No one noticed the small fairy, most took her to be a child until she raised her voice and began pushing people aside with a startling amount of strength. "Let me through!"

The people parted, letting the fairy through until she came into the company, standing at Kili's side. With a quick glance over the dwarf, she could see he had not had time to fully rest from her healing. His face was pale, and he wobbled on his own feet. Fili took notice of her presence and pulled her between Kili and himself.

Bard was standing amongst the company looking down at Thorin his face set in a grim line as they exchanged quiet words. The man turned to storm away, but Arethusa reached out and took hold of his coat sleeve. The anger in his eyes had not faded until she spoke. "Thank you for helping us, Bard. You are a good soul, and I wish you and your children the best." He said nothing as he stormed away in the direction of his home. The Master of the Lake's voice seemed to echo in the night air as he welcomed the company into his home.

A feast was prepared and while the dwarves and Bilbo dug into the food, Arethusa felt sick. She nursed a small glass of brandy, just enough to make her stomach tingle with warmth. The hobbit looked to his friend worriedly, she had hardly eaten more than a breadcrumb. "Arthie?" Her gaze was blank, Bilbo could not decipher what the expression meant nor could he find something worthwhile to say. She retired early. At least, there was the comfort of a hot bath, but even the scolding water could not quell her anger.

She had been brushing through her hair when Thorin entered, her eyes narrowed and calmly she laid the pearl comb down to the vanity. "Do you see, Arethusa? This is how we are meant to be treated, like kings and queens, not prisoners." He held his arms out in some grandiose fashion that only enraged the fairy.

When she jumped up from the small bench, it turned over. Her hands were balled into tight fists, an energy she had not felt in a very long time was returning to her. Thorin could not comprehend her anger, nor could he do anything but stand in shock when she gripped a book and threw it at him. "You foolish imbecile! You insufferable, pig-headed dwarf!" She threw another book, only this one he caught and the choler in his eyes was the look of a madman. "We're you just going to leave me while you all get arrested and thrown into a cell once more? Was Bard's hospitality so easily set aside that you would steal weapons and risk his family?" Arethusa wasn't sure why, but tears had begun gathering and falling from her eyes.

The dwarf had to take a step back, there was something about her anger that lurked in Darkness but he regained himself and lifted his chin. "What does it matter? We will set off in two days. Erebor will be mine." Balin had told her about illness, Dragon-sickness, it was one of the mind. They had not even entered the mountain, and she already feared he was succumbing to it.

"How often do you come across a person that would aid you in the way Bard did, Thorin Oakenshield? What of the humility that you seemed to possess before we neared this accursed mountain?" Arethusa stood in front of him on the balls of her feet, at the moment they were on level ground. Blue and violet eyes clashing. He puffed out his chest, eyes moving from her own to her lips but Thorin could not bring himself to do or say anything.

He walked to the open balcony, not even having the courage to look at her when he spoke. "I will say nothing more on the matter, Arethusa. Leave me in peace." Thorin had believed he knew how she looked angry from previous but this was something else entirely. A budding fire within her violet eyes echoed of the power she contained. What unsettled him the most was that she smiled before leaving. Outside the door, she ran into two dwarves in an attempt to hide themselves and their actions.

Arethusa slunk into the shadows with them and found each of their ears pulling them out like young children caught eating sweets before supper. "You two rascals were eavesdropping!" They did not deny the accusation but the fairy sighed, she was angry with Thorin, not his kin and especially not Fili and Kili. "Nevermind it. I need to redress your leg, Kili. The Valar only knows it will never heal if you cannot rest up well." The two brothers motioned for her to follow them to the room they had been given for their stay.

Arethusa dug around in her sash, pulling out a small jar of herbal paste that had been left over from her efforts that morning. When she sat on the bedside and began to unknot the cloth that bound the wound, they each observed her carefully. She had a keen eye that was attentive to even the smallest of details and a warmth in her eyes that reminded them of their own mother. With a damp cloth, she cleansed the area of his legs where the arrow had entered. The blackish hue of poison was fading, but she knew like so many other things in the world that it would have to grow worse before it was righted and healed. The fairy laid her hand over the broken skin and murmured the old spells of the Valar.

Kili was awake this time, and he could see the faint light that surrounded the fairy, making her look to be some sort of Ainur. Her touch was gentle and soothing, it eased away all the pain and warmth blossomed in its place. The poison seeped from the wound little by little and into the stained rag. It would take several more healings to remove it all and remove it all she must for even the smallest amount would fester and claim his life in time. A portion of the medicinal paste was pressed back onto his skin before she tied a linen cloth around his leg.

Arethusa was knotting the strip of fabric when Fili spoke, his question struck her dumb. "Do you love our Uncle?" The look in his eyes was too hopeful for her to outright deny the notion.

She gathered the soiled bandages and what remained of her medicine, turning away from the two brothers. "I don't think I'm in a good state of mind to answer that question right now." She was frustrated. Angry. Somewhat hurt by the dwarf king's actions. Like her kind, she was quick to anger.

"I think you are." Fili challenged.

Her voice was defeated when she spoke, "He's stubborn and prideful, that much is true, but he is kind. I might even dare say sweet when he chooses to be though I do not know if what I feel constitutes love." The brother's looked at each other. Arethusa had long noticed the two could speak to each other with just their eyes and knowing glances.

"Our mother used to talk about our father like that." Kili had a smile on his sweat slickened face that made him look nothing more than a curious boy. She returned to the bed and sat between the two dwarfs, they reminded her of her own brothers yet she had come to think of them as sons. "You'll be queen one day. I suspect."

Her laugh was humorless, "A queen that will not settle for her palace? Tell me, boys, what kind of queen would that be?" Even if she did love Thorin Oakenshield her duty would always lie with the sick and wounded of Middle Earth. It was a simple truth, even the fair and peaceful forests of the elves and the white stone of Gondor could not sway her to remain and settle.

"Will you tell us of your home?" It was Kili who had asked, but Fili seemed just as curious.

Arethusa sighed and nodded, "I suppose I can do that." Fili and Kili looked at her with rapt attention, awaiting the stories of her home, a far of land that they could only dream of seeing. "Númenórë was the kingdom of which the Dúnedain descended from, a race of powerful men that wrought great halls and castles from stone and wood. The sea was always calm and crystal, the sky forever blue. The only land to compare the island to in Middle-Earth is the Grey Havens, Lindon. In the center was a great peak called the Meneltarma, the citadel was atop it. That is where fairies and eagles alike kept guard of the sacred temple." She remembered the lone mountain most of all. It was above the clouds and reached the heavens. At night she always felt as if she could pull down stars for herself as they seemed so close and within her reach. She had always believed her mother's necklace had been a star.

"The greatest city was called Armenelos the Golden, the City of Kings. It was hewn from living rock and made to be part of the land, one of the white trees grew there, Nimloth the Fair is what it was called. The line only survives because Isildur saved one of its fruit. When the men began worshipping the Darkness and Melkor the tree slowly died, it marked the downfall of the island and eventually, it was chopped down for a sacrifice." Isildur was young during the dark days of the land, as was his brother. Yet she had watched them grow before her eyes into men only to succumb to mortality.

She had been there when the White Tree of Gondor was planted, and with each of her returns, it flourished. It had been many years since her last visit to Minas Tirith. It was a tall, spacious tree of graceful form. White thin unwrinkled bark over white wood and the leaves were dark green with silver underbellies. In the spring it would produce white flowers, hundreds of them though she had never witnessed another fruit form. "Soon within the golden city Sauron erected a temple. The walls were high and thick. The ceiling was a silver cap, but soot from candles tainted it black and nothing good ever grew or happened again. They resented the Gift of Men, not seeing it truly was a gift. They feared death and envied immortality."

Every race feared dying in some fashion, those that did not know their fate after death feared it more than others. "But is immortality truly such a curse?" The nature of Fili's questioned showed the truth of how blissfully young he was. He seemed to think living forever was not so bad. The innocence of youth still lingered heavily on the brothers.

"Yes, when a man dies, or even a dwarf, they are free. They live their lives how they chose, shaping their own destinies. Elves, fairies, wizards, we are bound to the World and its fate, never to be free even in death. Now, where was I?-ah, yes. Sauron was able to corrupt the leaders and their followers, shadow, and chaos descended upon the island. Manwë called upon Ilúvatar and Númenórë was covered with waves, taken by the sea. I watched from a ship that had set sail for Middle Earth with Elendil and his two sons with others that had managed to leave. Had the island remained for another lunar month I would have taken the blood pact to be a guardian. Cursed to remain on Meneltarma while it sank into the abyss." Both Fili and Kili looked at the fairy with wide eyes, she came close to laughing at them.

"And fairies?" She thought it to be Kili that had asked the question of her race but her mind was muddled with the past. All the friends she had made and had to say goodbye to. The pain and heartache she had endured. She feared the day she would have to say goodbye to this company of dwarves and Bilbo.

"We were always a fair race, quick to anger and equally quick to laugh. Manwë was unhappy with our kind when we bartered life and limb to save our one love. When Númenórë was raised from the sea at the beginning of the Second Age, he banished our kind there to be guardians. Sworn and bound by deep magic to not marry or take a lover. Many tried to hold their oath and still foster love, they perished."

That brought her to speaking of her mother, Rhyannon, "My mother was a different kind of fairy, you see, she was related to Manwë and Melkor by blood. When she met my father, she had the favor of the ones who had written the deep magic, after my birth, there were to be no more fairy children." It had been a long while since she had told anyone the full truth of her past. She never did lie about it to anyone that asked, simply, she chose to leave out details.

Kili and Fili looked to each other, there were a newfound thoughtfulness and excitement brewing within the two brothers. "So -that means- you're the last fairy!?" Kili eyes were wide with the exclamation. Her smile could not reach the depths of her eyes. It was a hard truth she was left to bore, but one she had accepted long ago. "And a Queen already," Fili observed; that was a truth she dearly wanted to conceal, yet the elder of the two brothers was far more observant than she could have imagined.

"Hush now, don't get carried away." A gleam of something beyond sorrow and grief formed in her eyes, a new fondness. "Yes, my mother was Queen to the fairies. Upon her passing, that title fell to me, but I have no kin to rule over. I am but a wanderer cursed to these lands until Manwë says I can come home." It had been ages since she called anywhere but Númenórë home. The land of the Valar was her home, rightfully so, her mother would be there as would her father and brothers and friends. For her, though, home was not a manifested place but people. Home was the people she loved and perhaps she loved Thorin and his company. "You two are not to tell any of the others, not Bilbo, not Bofur, and certainly not Thorin."

Fili lowered his head in an action that mimicked a bow. "As you command, my Lady." Half amused and half annoyed Arethusa leaned over and swatted the blond dwarf on the back of the head playfully.

"Sorry!" His voice cracked and all three had found something to laugh over. Arethusa was more than content staying with the brothers for the night as their uncle had done an excellent job at infuriating her though it was beginning to fade. The fairy situated herself in the middle of the bed, and they each settled next to her.

The three of them had fallen asleep. Arethusa lay between Fili and Kili her arms around each of their shoulders, despite the fact that they were larger than her. Her feelings towards Thorin were unclear to her mind and heart. Even so, she knew, without a doubt, that she loved the two brothers dearly and not just because of her binding mark.

Thorin half-regretted his snappy words towards the fairy and worry plagued him when she never returned before the midnight hour. He went in search of her. Peering in the rooms that had been allocated for their stay until he saw his nephews lying in the same bed, between them was his fairy. A warmth flooded in his chest at the sight and on this night, he slept alone contentedly, regardless of the empty feeling that gripped his heart.

The company awoke for breakfast but the fairy was nowhere to be seen, she was not in the library nor was she still sleeping. She had left with not a note or sign. Fili and Kili looked at their uncle with a critical stare. Only Thorin looked defeated. There was part of his heart and mind that believed she would come back and another part that told him he drove her away.

Arethusa held tightly onto the woven basket as she tried her best to remember where Bard's house had been. Eventually, she came upon the home and ascended the stairs, knocking on the door. She could hear the movement of feet and the sliding of a lock before the door swung open revealing Sigrid in her shapeless and stained nightgown. It had taken several seconds before she looked down and saw the fairy. Once she did, she welcomed the fairy back into their home. "Why have you come back?" The girl's eyes were wide in astonishment.

"I do not easily forsake those who have offered me aid." Arethusa sat the basket she carried on the bench and looked back to Sigrid. "And so I have brought this, and something else for you and your sister."

Tilda walked sleepily into the kitchen, "Sigrid?" she rubbed her eyes and allowed them to focus in the morning light when they landed upon a familiar face. Then the girl was running back through the small home and into the room in which her father and Bain slept. "Da! Arethusa returned. She has brought food and gifts." When Bard walked into the kitchen, the food she had brought was laid out on the table. Sigrid was eating a honey cake, Bain a slab of cured pork and Tilda had pulled a buttered biscuit from the plate. The bargeman looked to the fairy and his eyes softened. He had always been worried about his children since their mother passed and they had taken to Arethusa in such a small amount of time.

"I wish to apologize for Thorin's actions. He is too prideful to do so himself." Bard found he had no words to say in response. The fairy stood and returned to plunder in the basket she had brought. She pulled out two dresses, each of a material that no one but the Master of the Lake could afford. Tilda and Sigrid each took the dress and looked from Arethusa to their father. He nodded and they each went scurrying to their room. For Bain, she had produced a throwing dagger from what seemed like thin air. "The blade is fairy steel, twice as strong as iron forged swords and light as a feather in hand. Trust in it and it will never fail you." The hilt was carved on wood, and the pommel was a small opal stone that shone different colors in the light.

Tilda and Sigrid came out, each wearing their new dresses. They each felt they had the capability of being princesses. A feeling they had never truly had since the death of their mother.