"Mera? You in there?" Ithilwen's voice called from outside my door. "It's been three days!"

Three days? I thought to myself. I haven't slept or eaten in three days?

"I'm-" I started to say, but Ithilwen cut me off as she came into my room.

"Eat." She demanded, holding out a pastry.

I graciously accepted it, only now realising that I was starving.

An amused look formed in Ithilwen's eyes as I practically inhaled the pastry. "It's your shift, by the way." She said.

"Shift? For what?" I asked, confused.

"Oh, that's right, you wouldn't have known. It's your shift to guard our...visitors." she told me.

"Guard the visitors? Wha-" Once again, I was cut off by Ithilwen. She had a thing for doing that.

"Just go to the dungeons. You'll see." She said.

I gasped. What if they were the remaining members of the group Lancaeron had been tracking? Oh, I was going to enjoy talking to them...

I practically flew down to the dungeons, leaving a very confused Ithilwen behind. But when I got there, what I saw was much different than what I had expected...

Dwarves. The dungeons were filled with dwarves.

I stood there for a moment, speechless, until Tauriel approached. "What...how-" I managed to get out, unable to form any more words.

"We brought them here yesterday." Tauriel explained. "Be warned-They're all extremely annoying." But as she walked off, I thought I heard her mutter, "Well, almost all of them..."

I walked down the row of cells, surveying the dwarves. Most of them glared at me, a glare that I quickly rerurned.

However, one of them simply stared at me, his brown eyes meeting my blue ones. But after a second, he dropped his gaze, seemingly very interested in the floor of the cell. I was glad he looked away, because if he hadn't, he would have seen my cheeks turn a brilliant shade of pink.

I began to walk up and down along the line of cells in almost a pacing motion. The dwarves continued to glare at me, occasionally muttering something that I had a feeling that I was glad I didn't understand.

But the one just kept looking at me, averting his stare every time he saw me looking back.

The skies soon darkened, and several of the dwarves had given up on their attempts to intimidate me. In fact, a few of them had already fallen asleep, and were snoring loud enough to wake a dragon. I quickly sent a prayer of thanks that Ithilwen wasn't there, she would have murdered them by now.

Within half an hour or so, the remaining dwarves fell asleep as well. Sinking back against the wall, I sighed in relief. I could finally be in peace.

I slid to the floor,  not caring how cold it was. As soon as I hit the ground, the tears that I had been so careful not to shed in front of the dwarves finally came out. It started silently at first, but eventually escalated to full-out sobbing. But the dwarves were asleep, and their snoring certainly hadn't gotten any quieter. No one would be able to hear me-or so I thought.

"Miss?" I was startled by the voice beside me. Whirling around, I noticed that the brown-eyes dwarf looking at me, concern clear on his face. "Are...are you alright?"

I nodded. "I'm fine" I said, my voice not sounding nearly as strong as I had wanted it to.

"Please, miss, tell me what's wrong." He said. I was surprised-was a dwarf actually concerned about me?

I shook my head.  "It's nothing."

"Doesn't look like nothing" he commented. "And could you tell me your name?" He blushed, hastily adding, "You know, so I don't have to keep calling you 'Miss' and all."

I smiled slightly. "Meriel."

He smiled back. "I'm Kili. Just so you don't have to know me as 'that one dwarf'".

I opened my mouth, but he spoke before I could. "Now, Meriel, is it?" He asked, and I nodded. "Tell me what's wrong."

I sighed. "Have you heard about Prince Lancaeron?"

"A bit, yes." He admitted.

"Well, he...I loved him." I said, closing my eyes. "I loved him with every inch of my body. And he loved me back." A tear escaped, despite my attempts to stop it. "He was the other part of me. We were planning to marry when he returned, but...he never came back..." The last part I said in a barely choked-out whisper.

"I'm so sorry..." The dwar-Kili whispered. "And I'm sorry for making you talk about this, it must be hard for you..."

"It's fine." I tried to smile reassuringly, but judging by the look in Kili's eyes, it didn't come out quite as planned.

A part of me froze. Did I just confess my feelings to a dwarf? I asked myself. Ever since I was an elfling, I had been taught that dwarves were greedy and selfish, and never to be trusted. I was sure that dwarves felt the same way about elves, considering the glares I had received earlier.

But Kili...Kili was different. He had actually seemed worried about me, and appeared to be very kind. As absurd as it sounded, maybe this was one dwarf that I could trust.

***

A/N: A few things-

1) Sorry for not updating in a while! I got a spot in our school pageant, and have been working my butt off to prepare. It should be done by mid-February or so, though.

2) The timeline in this book is nothing like the timeline in the movie. Just so you know.

3) I'm currently going through a bit of an emotional crisis, so forgive me if any of the chapters seems a bit...off.

4) And on a completely unrelated note, I'm going to be deleting and restarting Fading Destiny. (After I finish Secrets, or find the time to write more than one book at once.)

Thank you all so much for your wonderful votes and comments! It means the world to me to have people that enjoy my non-random writing :3 *mwah*

                                            -Vanadessë