When Shadow stirred from her uneasy sleep, a slight dizziness fogged her senses. The haunting dreams had dredged up the relentless wrath of the dragons she had eluded, a vivid reminder of the grim fate that awaited if their paths were to cross again. "Are you okay?" inquired Balin, his presence a steadfast silhouette against the window, with Thorin beside him, draped in a blanket.

Shadow blinked away the confusion. She had drifted off, cradled by Thorin's shoulder—so why was she lying down now?

"It seems my shoulder was not quite the epitome of comfort for you," Thorin mused, as though his words plucked the very questions from her thoughts. He extended a plate towards her, a simple offering of bread. "Here, this is all Bard could spare until he ventures out to the market for more."

"If you so desire, Lady Shadow, you may venture into the town's markets to scrounge for sustenance for yourself and your companions," Bard offered. At his words, Shadow glanced up, her fingers pausing mid-lick, her gaze locking with Thorin's. In their depths, violet clashed with blue, a tangle of twilight hues. "As you wish, Shadow," intoned the king shrouded in shadow, and a glimmer of a smile crossed her lips. Unfurling from around Bilbo, she rose to confront Bard. "When do we leave?" she inquired, her voice carrying a note of readiness.

With a subtle lift of his lips, Bard replied, "Now, should you choose so." Taking a satchel, he strode towards the threshold. Shadow cast a lingering look upon her comrades before slipping out into the biting, tasteless chill.

Outside, the cold bit with an indifferent cruelty, even more unwelcoming than the previous evening's embrace. Shadow exhaled a heavy sigh, her arms clenching the warmth of her core closer, her cloak drawn taut against the frosted breath of the town. Warmblooded by nature, she was, yet even the fieriest spirit could feel the cold's thieving fingers drawing heat away, regardless of lineage.

"Here," Bard's voice broke through the frost, as he tossed coins to a leatherworker who in exchange handed him a waterskin, and then other necessities as they wandered from stall to stall. The cycle continued until the sun reached its zenith, and Bard decreed it time to return.

"There, that should suffice," Bard declared, extending his arm courteously for Shadow to take. She placed her own within his grasp, both proceeding along the precarious bridges of the town. Abruptly, someone seized her wrist, wrenching her into a dim alleyway, and a hot breath skittered across her face. Shadow's eyes snapped shut, then flickered wildly open at the intrusion.

"Ssh, now, we wouldn't want the town to hear your cries, would we?" hissed Alfrid, stepping back to reveal his master. Despicable he truly was, egregiously so—bulging with gluttony, crowned with a mop of red hair, and eyes, small and cold. "Ah, you must be the fine lady that stirred the city's murmurs this Tuesday. Accomplice to Bard and a party of dwarves, as I hear," he oiled, his voice as viscous as Alfrid's nature.

"Shadow!" Bard's call echoed distantly, and Shadow strained against her constraints. But the town master clamped an oppressive shackle around her wrist, drawing her chokingly close, his fetid breath defiling the air between them.

"Oh, no, my little puppet, you shan't return to Bard—not yet. You will accompany me, answer my queries, or face certain... disciplines, shall we say?"

~❈~

Disbelief clutched Bard's heart tightly. How had he failed to protect another, especially one as resplendent as Shadow? The potential jeers of the dwarves echoed in his mind—an intolerable chorus. They'd flay him alive, serve him up to the very dragons they fled, no doubt. And atop this horrid banquet of thoughts, the weightiest dish was guilt, a burden he was certain he could never bear.

Frantic, he waded through the chaos he'd been swept into, his eyes scouring for the beguiling woman. It was then he caught sight of Braga, the guard captain whom Shadow had forever marked. The man, with arm swathed in cloth, now stained a sickening red from Shadow's earlier grace, stood stoking the flames of Bard's anxieties. The wound harbored signs of infection—a grim tribute to the day's horrors—and without care, Bard knew it would only fester further.

"Braga," Bard called out, moving toward the man who was now less one arm, a stark reminder of Shadow's wrath. Braga turned, his sneer cutting across his features like a blade. "What do you want, Bard?" he spat venomously.

Bard, taken aback, paused before shaking his head in an attempt to dispel the hostility. "Have you seen where Shadow has gone?" he queried, his voice strained with urgency.

Braga snorted with derision. "As if I'd spare a thought for that woman. No, I haven't seen her, but maybe our dear master has. Why don't you go ask him, Bard?" His sneer deepened, a grotesque mimicry of a smile, before he erupted with laughter, his cronies joining in the cruel chorus.

Leaving Bard steaming silently under the steel-colored sky, they sauntered off, their mirth a bitter echo in the still air.