"Oh no, no!" Fili protested quickly, shaking his head. "Best not to worry him." in truth they didn't want to tell him because they were afraid of how he might react if he found out they had lost two of the ponies.
"Actually, as our official burglar we thought you might like to take a look into it." Kili interjected, smiling faintly at Bilbo. He hoped the hobbit would agree, then maybe they could find them and get them back before Thorin even noticed they were gone.

"Well, uh, it looks as if something big uprooted these trees. It’s something very big, and possibly quite dangerous", Bilbo noted. "Hey, there's a light", Fili whispers to the others. They all move closer towards the light and ducked behind a fallen over tree. "Stay down" "What is it?" "Trolls", Maleficent firmly said to him, already disgusted by witnessing such creatures. But as Kili and Fili make a run for it to be closer to the trolls’ campfire, "Wait!", she whispers harshly to stop them, but they kept going, making her groan in frustration. She followed them, but instead of walking, she flew instead in order to make herself more quieter. Bilbo was about to follow, but took the stew bowels with him.

The group of them all quickly ducked behind the fallen tree as a mountain troll came stomping past, two more of the dwarves ponies swinging back and forth (and squealing in fright) beneath its' great bulky arms.
"He's got Myrtle and Minty!" Bilbo exclaimed, his lips pursing together as he made his mind up. He looked at the fae and the two dwarves and muttered quietly, though notably distressed by the thought. "I think they're going to eat them, we have to do something!"
"Yes, yes." Kili nodded in agreement as he and Fili took the two stew bowls from the hobbit's hands. "You should. Mountain trolls are slow and stupid, and you're so small they'd never see you!"

"N--No--No!" Bilbo tried to protest but the dark haired dwarf went on nodding insistently as he tried to convince the halfling that it would be safe for him to go into the troll's campsite.
"It's perfectly safe, we'll be right behind you!" he promised.

"If you run into trouble, hoot twice like a barn owl, once like a brown owl", Fili instructed him as they kept reassuring him that it was okay to go into treachorous territory. "Twice like a barn owl, hoot twice like a brown, hoots like a, like a… Uh, are you sure this is a good idea?", Bilbo kept to keep their info in his head, but was still confused. However, as he turns around, he sees that Kili, Fili, and the Fae have ditched him. But, Maleficent didn't really leave him, she was hiding in one of the trees above him, letting the darkness camoflouge her.

But, the problem was that Bilbo didn't get very far, and was eventually caught by the trolls. All three of them. She kept her profile low in the tree, hoping to find an opening, but there wasn't one. That was until she heard a voice in the clearing...

((Fight?))

Having spotted that Bilbo was in trouble, Fili and Kili had made the decision that they would need to go back and get the others anyway. They couldn't leave their burglar to be eaten by trolls, that wouldn't be fair.

"Drop him!" Kili cried as he leapt out of the bushes, his sword held aloft.
"You wot?" exclaimed one of the trolls, looking rather bewildered by the sudden appearance of the young dwarf.
"I said, drop him!" Kili repeated forcefully, twirling his sword around as he glared up at the trolls. With their own shouts and cries, the other dwarves also leapt from their cover and charged at the trolls.

As the dwarves are fighting the trolls, Bilbo manages to steal a knife and free the ponies, but the trolls notice and grab him, holding him by his arms and legs. "Bilbo!", Kili exclaimed as he was about to run forward, but Thorin stops him. "No!" "Lay down your arms! Or we’ll rip his off!" Reluctantly, Thorin drops his sword and the other dwarves follow suit. Maleficent narrows her eyes at their actions, and crouches down in the tree, balancing herself as she crawled like a cat stalking its prey, as she moved from her hiding place and onto a rock behind the trolls. Unintentionally, she saw Gandalf. Where has he been?

The dwarves and Bilbo had now been put in quite the predicament. They were all bound up into individual burlap sacks, and some of them were then tied all together to a large branch which the troll who seemed to do all the cooking suspended over the crackling fire.

As the dwarves tried to beg for their release, the trolls ignored them and began debating how exactly they should cook their new found meal.
"Don't bother cookin' 'em!" protested the troll who seemed to be the youngest. "Let's just sit on 'em, and squash 'em into jelly!"
"No! They should be sauteed with a sprinkle of sage!" protested the cook troll, nodding to himself as he thought that sounded the best way to prepare them.
"Oh, well that does sound nice..." his companion agreed and the other remaining troll scowled and exclaimed loudly.
"Oh quit yer gripin' and get a move on already, dawn ain't far away. I don't fancy bein' turned tah stone!"

Hearing the troll proclaim this, Bilbo looked up and saw that the sun was beginning to rise over the hills and knew if he could stall then perhaps the trolls would turn to stone before they could be cooked, or squashed into jelly for that matter, and eaten.
"Wait, you are making a terrible mistake!" he proclaimed at the trolls as he leapt to his feet the best he could in the sack, shuffling forward.
"You can't reason with them, they're half-wits!" protested Bofur who was one of the dwarves being turned around on the pole over the fire.

"Well, have you smelt them? You’re gonna need something stronger than sage before you plate this lot up!", Bilbo shouted up at the three trolls. "What do you know about cooking dwarf?" "Shut up, and let the…uh, flurgerburbur-hobbit talk"Uh…the-the secret to cooking dwarf, is um...it's uh…the secret is…to…skin them first!", this just made things worse for the other thirteen dwarves. Anger and betrayal, they spoke. "What a load of rubbish! I’ve eaten plenty with their skins on. Scoff ’em I say, boots and all!" "He’s right! Nothing wrong with a bit o’ raw dwarf", one of them picks up Gloin.

Maleficent darted by above the trolls, along with another figure.

"Nice and crunchy" "Uh…not…not that one, he…he’s infected!" "You what?" "Yeah he’s got worms in his…tubes", he just drops the dwarf in disgust. "In-in fact, they all have. They’re infested with parasites, it’s a terrible business, I wouldn’t risk it, I really wouldn’t"

"What would you have us do then?" demanded Bert, the cooking troll. "Let them all go?"
"Well..." Bilbo began in a somewhat over dramatic fashion, looking upwards and raising his eyebrows.
"You fink I don't know what yer doing? This little ferret is taking us fer fools!" Bert proclaimed as he took a jab at Bilbo with the ladle he held in his hand.
"Ferret?!" protested Bilbo indignantly, secretly terrified of what would happen to the group now. But he breathed a sigh of relief as Gandalf's voice boomed out.

"The dawn will take you all!!" and the wizard struck the large rock that he stood upon with his staff, cleaving it in two and letting the rays of the sun pierce through to touch the mountain trolls, turning them to solid stone in a few short moments. Equally as relieved that they were no longer a dinner item for such stinking beasts, the dwarves all broke out into cheers.

Flying down towards the dwarves, the Fae frees them from their sacks. "Ooh, get your foot out of my back!", Dwalin groaned. "Where did you go to, if I may ask?", Thorin curiously and suspiciously asked the wizard.

"Too look ahead." Gandalf answered, with a slight hint of annoyance in his voice.
"And what brought you back?" the dwarf prince enquired with a raised eyebrow of his own.
"Looking behind." Gandalf cleared his throat, rapping one of the stone trolls on the nose with the end of his staff. "Nasty business, still you are all in one piece." the wizard concluded with a small smile.

"Thanks." Kili grunted, smiling gratefully at Maleficent as the fae freed him, and quickly kicked himself free of the sack to help her untie his brother and the rest of the dwarves. They hadn't known each other very long and yet he still found he liked her rather a lot. Maybe they would be good friends as this journey wore on.

"I did make a promise, did I not?", the fae said to Kili, while showing a smirk. "Not here would I leave you", she added. "Gandalf, trolls don't come this far north, do they?", she asked him to make sure.

"There must be a cave nearby", Thorin pointed out as he began to walk off. Upon finding the cave, everyone is investigating inside. "Oh, what’s that stench?!", Bofur exclaimed as they was an awful odor coming from waste and God who knows what else. "It’s a troll hoard. Be careful what you touch", Gandalf told them as they went deeper. Few bugs here and there, but what they didn't know was that they have come upon the trolls’ treasure. "Seems a shame just to leave it lying around. Anyone could take it" "Agreed. Nori, get a shovel" Gandalf and Thorin discover some swords, Thorin picks one up. "These swords were not made by any troll", he noted as he examined it. Maleficent walks to his side to take a glance at it. "That's because these are Elven swords", she answered. She gives one of the swords to Gandalf, who closely examines it.

At hearing that the swords were of Elven make Thorin looked disgusted and moved as if he were going to return the blade he held to where he found it. He had no desire to keep some stinking elf's weapon.
"You could not wish for a finer blade in all of Middle-earth!" Gandalf snapped in frustration at the dwarf prince. "These blades came from Gondolin, forged by the High Elves of the First Age!"

Feeling scolded, Thorin kept his grip on the sword, his hand closing around the hilt as he drew the sword from it's sheathe to balance it in his hand and see how it felt to wield it.

"This sword was made by my ancestors", Maleficent commented after she heard that these swords were made during the first age. "In case you haven't noticed, I am of Elvish descent", she told Thorin as a matter of fact.

Walking over to the twins, something caught her eye in the dirt. "What's this?", she said aloud, which made the brothers come to her attention. Moving dirt out of the way, it looked like a dark sheathed dagger with a very big holding hilt. Taking it out of the sheath, the blade was curved. "I'm not sure whether this is of Orc design, or from a very early age of Men", she thought aloud before twirling the blade in her fingers. "Very light", she commented.

"Looks awfully delicate for an Orc blade." Fili commented softly. His brother seemed to agree it was probably made by Men rather than Orcs.

Meanwhile Gandalf had headed off more towards the entrance, stopping as he thought he had stepped on something. Moving a few of the leaves out of the way he found what appeared to be an elven short sword, made for young elves who were first training to use a blade. Bending to pick the blade up off the floor he called out to the hobbit.
"Bilbo, I believe I have something about your size!"

"Probably right", the fae answered to the twins before putting it back in its sheath and attaching the dagger to her boot. As the others are gathering outside the trolls cave, Maleficent cleaned off the blade of the newly-found dagger. "Something’s coming!", Thorin shouted suddenly. "Stay together! Hurry, now! Arm yourselves!", Gandalf instructed them before they all waited to see who was approaching. The fae had the dagger twirling in her fingers as she held it professionally, as she stood guard with the twins. Suddenly, a dwarf bursts through the bushes on a sled, which seems to be led by rabbits. "Thieves! Fire! Murder!"

"Radagast!" Gandalf exclaimed in surprise, not expecting to have seen the other wizard here of all places. "It's Radagast the Brown!" he announced to the others, then quickly turned to face Radagast, a frown creasing his features.
"What on earth are you doing here...?" it was so unusual for the reclusive wizard to leave his little clearing in the Greenwood, he preferred the company of animals to people. Something very bad must be happening to draw him out into the world.

"I was looking for you, Gandalf. Something’s wrong. Something’s terribly wrong", the brown wizard was now rumbling. "The Greenwood is sick, Gandalf. "A darkness has fallen over it, nothing grows anymore. At least nothing good. The air is foul decay, but worse, are the webs. There were spiders, Gandalf. Giant ones. Some kind of spawn of Ungoliant, or I’m not a wizard. I followed their trail. They came from Dol Guldur", he manages to say. "Greenwood?", Maleficent asked aloud to the wizard. She loved the animals in that forest. Who would harm such friendly creatures? "Spiders can't travel that far"

"The woodsmen who dwell there now call it Mirkwood." Radagast turned to Maleficent to explain. "Whatever has brought them there it is not a power of good, it unsettles me and I have come to seek Gandalf's advice on the matter."

"Dol Guldur? But the old fortress is abandoned", Gandalf said to his old friend. That fortress has been abandoned since the First Age. No power nor being would go there. "No, Gandalf. It is not. A dark power dwells in there, such as I have never felt before. It is the shadow of an ancient horror. One that can summon the spirits of the dead. I saw him, Gandalf. From out of the darkness, the Necromancer has come!", Radagast was rumbling now, and his story was already scary to the fae. The Necromancer? Now it was hurting her mind. Even if someone says his name, her conscious will not clear. "Are you sure?", Gandalf questions the wizard in cautiousness. Radagast takes a sword from his cloak and hands it to Gandalf carefully. "That is not from the world of the living", there was suddenly a howl in the distance. "Wolves? Is that a wolf?" "Wolves? No, that is not a wolf"

Suddenly, something growls from the bushes behind them, and a warg scout pounces out into the clearing and almost hit Fili. "Look out!", the fae shouted and flew straight into the charging warg, allowing her to stab it into it with the dagger. However, two more appeared and charged.