Bofur groaned, his voice echoing, "Air. I need air..."

 "My head," Oin's voice echoed worse than Bofur's, "It's spinning."

 "Your voices are making my head spin!" Kali snapped, "Shut your mouths before I shut them for you." she could not remember when they'd stepped from the path, starting the aimless wandering through the never ending, dank forest, but over time a headache had set in. The echoing, blurred groans of the others just made it worse.

 Kali ran into the back of Oin, who was craning his head to see past the others, "What's happening?"

 Thorin shoved his way to the front, by Nori who had taken his turn at leading, "Keep moving. Nori, why have we stopped?"

 Nori looked horror-struck over the edge of the deep ditch he'd stopped at, "The path... it's disappeared!"

 "What's going on?" Dwalin grunted angrily.

"We've lost the path!" Oin wailed.

For a brief moment they all stood, looking over the edge of the cliff. Just as Kali had begun backing away from it Thorin's shout made it's way through the static in her ears, "Find it. All of you look. Look for the path!"

 Kali's mind was so clouded it took a moment for her to comprehend what he'd said, and she had set out for the path but not before shouting, "I tried to tell you that you'd left the path!"

 No one had heard her, and after a lot of searching, they'd pretty much given up on the path, settling for staggering around as if they'd all had too much ale. Balin looked around, "I don't remember this place before. None of it's familiar."

 "It's got to be here," no one really knew for sure what Dori had meant by 'it.' He may have meant the end of the forest, perhaps the path. He may have lost something, I've no idea.

 "What hour is it?" Thorin groaned.

 "I do not know," Dwalin replied, his voice dead, "I don't even know what day it is."

 "Is there no end to this accursed place?" Thorin called out angrily.

 Kali shook her head, trying to keep it from spinning. The shaking only made it worse, adding onto the illusion that clouded her vision: the forest was upside down, the dwarves hanging like bats as they wandered about. 

The earth shifted and tilted some more and Kali's feet slipped from under her, sending her crashing into a large, sticky spider web that was woven into the bark of a tree. However gross it felt, Kali hadn't really noticed as her head felt like it was filled with sand.

Ori stopped and bent down, plucking something from the dead leaves, "Look."

Dori stepped next to his brother, leaning down to get a better look, "A tobacco pouch," he looked around now, "There's dwarves in these woods."

Kali stumbled to her feet and wobbled towards the two, "If we find them perhaps they could help us!"

Kali watched the pouch switch hands, from Dori to Bofur, who studied it, "Dwarves from the Blue Mountains, no less. This is exactly the same as mine."

"Because it is yours," Bilbo snapped, "You understand? We're going round in circles. We are lost."

"We're not lost," Dwalin argued, "We keep heading East."

"But which way is East?" Oin asked, "We've lost the sun!"

Suddenly the dwarves were bickering amongst themselves, Kali included though she could not understand what she was saying (let alone the others, too). Thorin stood off to the side and thought she heard him ask, "What was that?" no one stopped to answer their leader.

If anything the question made the fighting worse. Directly after the question was asked, the Company had begun shoving each other around, their shouts getting louder. Thorin raised his voice, "Enough! Quiet! All of you!" he lowered his voice and looked around, slowly, "We're being watched."

Kali stepped near to Thorin, "By what?"

"I know not by what," he snapped lowly, "But I know by something. Or someone."

"What should we do?" Dori asked, looking shakily around the surrounding shadows, "We're sitting ducks should we stay here!"

 "What was that?" Kali's head snapped to look behind Thorin, staring over his shoulder into the shifting shadows.

 "What was what?" Nori was looking too now.

 "I heard something," Kali's ears and nose twitched, all senses alert, "Like breaking branches."

*

I should have known to stay on the path. Kali couldn't see anything, and all she could hear was severely muffled groans and curses from the others. She knew not how long it had been since the attack, but all she did know was that the Company was most likely going to die and she now hated spiders. They'd all been captured by giant ones and rolled into cocoons, waiting for the untimely demise that was soon coming. Stubborn dwarves, never listening to anything anyone has to say.

 However, there was shuffling closeby and suddenly Kali was falling and hit the ground head first. And, struggling to free herself from the blanket of spiderwebs, another body landed on top of her. Judging by the weight, she supposed it was Ori. The body rolled off and soon there were hands helping Kali get free. She squirmed as the dwarf pulled her up.

 She pulled the webs away from her eyes to find herself staring at Thorin, "Thorin."

 He grunted, "Keep your eyes and ears open, Silverarm. We cannot have you delaying us further."

As if this endeavor was my fault to begin with, Kali continued to pull the sticky white webs from her layers of fur and leather (however, she could not get them from her hair and she feared nothing would). Bofur's voice sounded out, his hat still covered in webs, "Where's Bilbo?"

 Everyone began calling out for the hobbit until his small voice came from somewhere above them, "I'm up here!"

 But then there was half-screaming from Bilbo, thumping noises as he fell from the branches and silence. Kali's brow furrowed and she looked up, "Bilbo?"

 She was not met with Bilbo, though, but a spider who was larger than her and not alone. A whole clutter of them had closed in on the dwarves, reaching out with their frontmost pinchers at the food they'd caught, hoping to eat before their food escaped them.

 There was a slight delay in reflexes, but soon the dwarves had pulled free their weapons and begun fighting against their eight-legged captors. Kali chose her set of double edged daggers, hoping to get up-close and personal with her targets. Indeed she did, too. Slicing through the spiders with ease, however there were many. Perhaps too many for the dwarves, as they were soon becoming outnumbered. 

 "Kili!" Kali finished off the spider she was preoccupied with and whipped around at the sound of Fili's cry, only to see Fili aid his brother with a spider that had grabbed a hold of Kili.

 "Come on!" there was a break in the spiders' advances and Thorin demanded they get a move on.

Everyone obliged, quickly gathering their wits about them and running through the forest as more spiders crawled towards them from all directions. However, the spiders had begun being dispatched by newcomers. The dwarves prepared to fight, but were quickly surrounded.

A tall blonde elf clad completely in green dropped ahead of Thorin, drawing his bow back. His bright blue eyes narrowed, "Do not think I won't kill you, dwarf. It would be my pleasure."

You may think he was speaking to Thorin, but he wasn't. Kali was standing directly behind Thorin in the exact stance as the elf, aiming over Thorin's head. Her arrow was set for straight between those striking blue Elven eyes.

Thorin had no knowledge of Kali, of course, and threw his sword to the ground in anger, thinking himself with no choice but to surrender.

A distressed call came from outside the circle of elves that were surrounding the dwarves, "Help!"

Fili and Kali responded, equally distressed, "Kili!"

He was being dragged across the ground by the foot, clawing to get away from the spider as he kicked out with his other foot. 

Kali still hadn't lowered her bow from the elf, even when a female elf had joined the rest of the group. Kali watched with a stone-hard glare as the she-elf came to Kili's rescue, slicing through spiders as she went. 

  "Throw me your dagger!" Kili was looking from her (as she attacked another spider) to an oncoming spider that was hurtling at him, "Quick!"  

"If you think that I am giving you a weapon, dwarf," the ginger haired elf grunted as she twirled gracefully. Her dagger hit the spider square in the face and it died on impact, "You're mistaken!"

The look she got from Kili in return made Kali's blood boil and the arrow in her bow tensed. The bow string groaned in protest and the elf she was aiming at was lucky her grip had tightened.

Kali was kicked in the back of her knees, pale hands pushing on her shoulders to get her to the ground and immediately a light haired elf had begun searching her, taking every weapon she had visible and still finding more. Her bow and arrows were the first to be confiscated.

"Legolas," he called out softly, "No dirweg; mana gîn a nás-Nogoth." the elf was almost sneering down at her.

"As if he did not know before," Kali muttered to herself as the elf's hands continued to roam her person, "I was, after all, aiming an arrow at his face."

Legolas, upon hearing this, raised an eyebrow in her direction but had not a chance to question as the red haired one approached him. He looked at her, "Gyrth in yngyl bain?"

The ones that you see are dead, yes you incompetent elf, Kali was pulled to her feet as she thought this, and refused the urge to fight against the elf.

The she-elf was very beautiful, with her long and flowing red hair and the tightly-fitted green dress she wore, "Ennorner gwanod in yngyl na nyryn. Engain nar."

Kali snorted and Legolas turned to her, "Is something funny, dwarf?"

"The she-elf claims that more spiders will come, and that they grow bolder," Kali looked about, "The reason behind this is that you willingly let the spiders inhabit your beloved Greenwood-" she paused, "Mirkwood Forest. Of course they will grow bolder because you show them no boundaries or discipline." Legolas glared at her and did not answer what she had said. Kali paid more attention to the other dwarves anyway, and how they were all staring with incredulous looks of disbelief.

And elf handed Thorin's Orcrist off to Legolas. As he inspected it, his glower worsened, "Echannen i vegil hen vin Gondolin. Magannen nan Gelydh... Where did you get this?"

"It was given to me," Thorin answered lowly.

Legolas pointed the sword at Thorin and the others began struggling against the elves, "Not just a thief, but a liar as well. Enwenno hain!"

Take them. A hand was pressed between Kali's shoulder blades and she was shoved forward.

Bofur leaned back to whisper at Thorin, "Thorin, where's Bilbo?"

Bilbo! Kali's gaze went skyward, searching the leaves for the hobbit that had disappeared long ago.

She saw that Thorin was looking around wildly as well, no doubt searching for the same thing Kali was.