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It seemed odd that Bilbo should be the one so often left with their great king, and yet, it was not so odd: the other members of the company were frequently occupied with the many tasks that befall those beginning a kingdom anew. There was much to do, but of course few dwarves would take notice of a hobbit, let alone listen to him, and so the responsibility of staying with the king often fell to Bilbo.
For though the company had achieved every goal they had set out after, and a few more besides, and the worst that happened to them was that Fili would forever bear a limp and Nori could not raise a hammer as easily as he once did... For all of that, still Thorin had fallen into a shadow within himself, and would not rouse from it.
Oh, Thorin would walk, and speak, and eat (though not much), but the life had gone out behind his eyes. The last time Bilbo could remember seeing it was when they were huddled together in the tent on that terrible day, Thorin apologizing with not enough breath and Bilbo weeping at the sight of his wounds, which must surely be mortal.
But they were not; between Gandalf and the elves and Thorin's own stubborn heart, he had passed through danger and now was in reasonable health, though some of the bandages remained.
In whispers and hisses the company decided that Thorin was sick (he must be sick, he must get over it), and that he must be allowed to rest. So Thorin spent his time in his rooms other than those occasions when he needed to perform official functions, which he did flawlessly but remotely. Bilbo saw the humans and elves frown at him; saw Thorin's own people look fearful.
"If I did not know better, Gandalf, one might think he Faded," Bilbo heard an elf say, low, one night at the dinner table.
His heart leapt into his throat, but Gandalf merely shook his head. "No, Ivaldir, dwarves do not Fade. They are made of the very stuff of the earth. They will not fade until it does."
But still, as he sat in silence with the King Under the Mountain, Bilbo watched him closely, unable to entirely dismiss the fear that Thorin might simply slip away into the mountain gloom.
At first the memory of the Gate had kept Bilbo skittish, nearly fearful; he had tiptoed quietly around the room and often fingered the pocket with his ring in it. But Thorin took almost no notice of Bilbo at all, and when he did, it was merely a flicker of a glance, or perhaps every so often a long, sad look.
So then, fear mostly assuaged, Bilbo grew resentful. Thorin Oakenshield could treat him so harshly, gain a gold-filled kingdom, and yet act so wounded - well, the nerve of him! It wasn't decent.
But even the memory of such betrayal could only last for so long, and after all there was blame on both sides. After a fortnight Bilbo had lost his grasp on both anger and grief, and another emotion came to take its place: worry.
He could not help himself, and after all, he reasoned, he had very little else to do. It was impossible to see the King Under the Mountain refuse meals and cheer and news in favor of sitting silently by the hearth, and not feel it as an ache under his breast.
Even so, it took another week for Bilbo to gather his nerve enough to actually talk to Thorin, other than to offer him food or bring him tidbits of news from the others.
"Thorin," he said one day after too much mental debate, his voice sounding overly loud in the hush of the room.
It took a moment for the dwarf to turn his shaggy head toward Bilbo, and when he did, his forehead was furrowed like he was puzzled by the noise. He stared at Bilbo for a long moment, but eventually he opened his mouth and asked with a voice rusty from disuse, "Yes?"
Even a word was something from Thorin these days; Bilbo tried not to let his heart skip in excitement. "I, er... Would you do something for me?"
Thorin looked even more puzzled at this. Bilbo found himself hoping that the presumption would make him angry; that Thorin would scowl at him and chide him like he would have before.
But he did not; instead the frown faded from Thorin's face, leaving it blank, and the dwarf king merely asked, "What is it you require?"
That was a problem, because Bilbo hadn't actually thought of anything yet. He panicked, flailing around in his mind for something reasonable to ask. What could Thorin do? Slay orcs, rally troops, thunder at people for minor offenses? None of them seemed very necessary at the moment.
"Would you sing, please?" Bilbo found himself asking. "Sing, like you did in my hobbit hole, that first night that I met you. I find myself homesick, and I... I would like it."
Overdoing it, Bilbo you old fool, he scolded himself. He was not truly homesick, or at least he did not think he was - there was so much to be done here, and even when he did nothing at all, Thorin seemed to occupy the whole of his attention.
An emotion that Bilbo couldn't name flitted over Thorin's craggy face. He rose up in his seat, just a little, and hope rose in Bilbo's chest.
"I cannot promise you a ballad, and my voice is out of use," Thorin warned. Bilbo just nodded. Thorin sighed, opened his mouth, and began to sing:
Over the river there's a town that has burned
And past that the mountain to which we've returned
Where once there were many, now stand fourteen
The stone seems to sigh, "Where have you been?"
The sky overhead is burned into ash
The once-quiet air rings with battlefield clash
Even the rock is lost; slicked over with mud
And the foot of our door is soaked through with blood
Inside the mountain is the trove of lost treasure
But when it lies in a tomb, it gives us no pleasure
We cannot reshape our gold; the forge has gone out
Our tears banked the fires and our craft is all doubt
There once was a home here, I remember it well
There was joy and creation ere Erebor fell
Now we've retaken our land and no longer must roam
But all the gold in the mountain cannot reshape our home
Thorin's voice faded to only a deep hum in his throat; he turned his face away to stare into the fire. Bilbo tried to speak, but his voice was caught in his throat and he had to clear it several times to get any words out.
"That's beautiful, but terribly sad," he said. Thorin smiled like he was offering Bilbo the last bit of light left in him; his eyes bruised dark and the corners of his mouth barely turning up, and that was terrible too.
If Bilbo weren't the type to be seized by impulse then he never would have come on this venture to begin with. So it did not surprise him so much as it might have to find himself climbing to his feet and throwing himself at Thorin, wrapping his arms around the dwarf king's shoulders and pressing close.
He felt Thorin tense, startled, and had to shut his eyes: There was still fear there from his flirtation with the void under the gate.
But Thorin's great bulk stilled under him like a horse quieting, and as Bilbo opened his eyes again, a careful hand came up to settle at the small of Bilbo's back.
"Peace, Halfling." His deep voice rumbled through Bilbo's ribcage like the rushing tide. "All is well."
Bilbo felt the sting of tears behind his eyes. He clutched fistfuls of old fur in his hands, holding on so tightly, like he could stop Thorin from slipping away. "It is not," he said, remembering a quick blade, a quiet chuckle, a hopeful song slipping upward from his chimney with the smoke.
Now there was just this: a once-proud dwarf who sat listlessly by the fire wishing only to be alone, growing thinner every day while those who loved him best watched, unable to reach him through the fog that had settled over him in the gold-lust's place.
It was like pushing at a wall, but Bilbo couldn't help it, couldn't stop feeling like if he just said the right thing, just tried a little harder, maybe he could reach the king. And then maybe Thorin would blink, and life would come into his eyes, and he would look down at the halfling with mingled bafflement and resignation, and things would be as they were before.
Bilbo softly started to sing:
I've heard tell of a king of old
His mountain was deep and full of gold
But deeper still, the legends say
Was the loyalty of those who saw him that day
But which day was that, you couldn't know
For he slew Azog and saved his people from woe
When disaster befell them, he felt the same pain
But he clung to his hope till the dragon was slain
His voice trailed away thinly; Bilbo gulped away his embarrassment. Oh, he would never have dared to do this, any of this, if Thorin was in his right mind, but... well. "I know it's not very good," he said, "just a bit of fancy."
He realized that he was still clutching to Thorin and made to step back, but the arm at his back tightened and held him in place. Bilbo looked up wonderingly; Thorin tilted his head down. There was something different about his eyes. Bilbo felt hope go through him like a sword; painful and impossible to resist.
Daringly he put a hand up to touch Thorin's cheek; his fingers skimmed Thorin's heavy jawline.
"You have won what you wanted," Bilbo said. Thorin's face clouded over and he made to pull away, but Bilbo gave in to madness entirely and brought up his other hand to hold Thorin's head in place. "No, do not turn from me! I tell you, you have triumphed, so why do you mourn?"
Thorin's sigh ghosted over his skin. Bilbo almost jumped, he was so shocked when the king spoke.
"I have brought us here, yes, but at such cost. And now our kingdom is in ruins. I cannot... I cannot fix these things."
"No," Bilbo said slowly, "no, you cannot, but you do not have to. Look at the company now; they are putting the pieces back together for you."
"You are right. They have no need of me," Thorin said, and sudden anger seized Bilbo's insides. He glared up into Thorin's stubborn face.
"And if your only task was to get us here, would that make you unworthy?" Bilbo demanded.
"No," Thorin said, surprising him. Then his face darkened. "But it would make me an unworthy king."
Bilbo threw his hands up to his head and tugged on his own curly locks in frustration.
"That is what a king does, as best I can understand it!" he cried. "A king leads! Well, you led, my king, and even in your absence your presence leads them still. And you wish to be angry at yourself for allowing them to use their worth?"
He was practically straddling Thorin's lap, and as part of him marveled at his own nerve, the rest of him saw Thorin's shoulders slump, saw him start to look tired again, and panicked.
"Please do not go away inside yourself again," Bilbo begged, "I... I do not want to be left alone."
Something about his words stilled the king; he paused and looked at Bilbo with a frown.
"I've no idea what you mean. You are close with others of the company, are you not? My nephews? Balin? That - that toymaker?"
Bilbo scowled at Thorin a tiny bit; he knew Bofur's name perfectly well, so Bilbo had no idea why he'd not use it.
Otherwise, Thorin was right - Bilbo was by any standards much closer to near everyone in the company than he was to Thorin himself. And yet... and yet... "And yet, I love you best," he whispered, the tips of his ears burning. He dropped his gaze to his bare feet.
For a long, horrible moment he just stood there, too close and too far all at once.
Then thick arms came up around him and it was as though the landscape moved; Bilbo wasn't sure what had happened until he realized that Thorin had finally risen from his chair and was looking down at him, a smile on his face, tiny but unmistakably real.
"Oh," Bilbo said, and swallowed. Thorin's smile grew wider. Carefully he leaned down and pressed a kiss to Bilbo's forehead. Bilbo shivered under it; it burned like a brand.
The king drew back.
"Perhaps you are right, Halfling", that deep voice rumbled. "Perhaps it is time I stop grieving the things I cannot change, and tackle the task ahead, though it be a mountain itself."
"Perhaps," Bilbo rasped.
***
That night when Balin came to check on them both, at the scrape of the door Thorin got to his feet. Bilbo could have cried to see it; the way the fur slid off the king's lap as he pushed himself up, the eagerness in his eyes, the way Balin stopped dead and looked to Bilbo.
"I am sorry, my old friend," Thorin said, a hint of uncertainty visible from this angle. "I never meant to fall into shadow the way I did, but I am with you all now. Tell me what needs to be done."
"What... but..." Balin and Thorin's gazes both turned to him. Bilbo swallowed and lifted his chin.
"He was sick," Bilbo said, as plainly as he could, trying to hold back the elation from his voice. "Now he is well."
Balin kept staring at him with those shrewd eyes that always reminded him of Gandalf. Finally he spoke with a disbelieving shake of his head, "There is certainly more to you than meets the eye, Halfling."
"So people keep saying," Bilbo replied. Balin smiled at him. Thorin's broad hand settled itself on his shoulder, and Bilbo laughed aloud for joy at the weight of it.