Work Text:
"I'll see to your weapons."
The pair had a bit of a sleepy start to the morning, waking later than usual and rushing Adin's grooming (as much as you could rush a Blacklock's hair when it had to be re-oiled, massaged, braided, and neatly prepared for inspection). Their breakfast had been a few hastily grilled sausages and leftover bread folded over into a crude butty, and in the grey light filtering in through the curtains, Adin's face was pale as he sat beside Dori's fire. There was fear in his eyes and a lifelessness to them that seemed more pronounced in the daylight.
A bath had been taken a few minutes earlier, but the young warrior's hands shook so much that it had been all he could do to soap himself up, let alone relax for a cock-sucking. At last, Dori had him at the door's threshold, once Adin couldn't put his departure off with a mumbled “ten more minutes” any longer.
“One last time, have you got everything? It's always as you're halfway down the road that you remember something, and I won't have that,” Dori prompted, checking the dwarf's face for some flicker of a smile. The loss of any emotion was something the veteran knew well, but it tore at him when he saw that look on a youngster. Thankfully, Adin rolled his eyes and a small grin had appeared as he bent down to root through everything before he closed his sack up.
Not long after came the cry Dori had been expecting from growing up making sure Ori was packed for his lessons: “I've lost my whetstone!” Adin yelled, having finished digging through all the little pockets for some minutes.
Dori checked the clock in the kitchen where he'd gone to collect something for Adin to take on the road – he had five minutes exactly if he was sure of leaving the mountain at all. He reappeared in the parlour carrying a parcel of sandwiches and pressed them into Adin's hand. The whetsone from the night before lay on the side-table.
The young dwarf shook his head, cursing himself. “I can't take yours – that's yours.”
Dori put it on top of the sandwiches and nodded to Adin's pack, folding his arms across his chest and pulling his robe a little tighter against the breeze from the door, which lay on its latch.
“No doubt you'll have more use for it than I,” he said with a smile, and he bent forwards to place a peck on the dwarf's cheek. At least that's got some colour into it, he thought with a smirk, as he watched a faint flush rise up in the lad's deep olive skin.
“I suppose so.”
They stilled again, and Adin bent hastily to pack the gifts into his bag, before standing up and hoisting it. Like he'd done so many times throughout the past few minutes, he eyed the clock
“Time to go,” Dori said softly.
They came together one last time for a long and lingering embrace. Dori made sure to make it tight, and to pour, if he could, all of his warmth and tenderness into it, so much that he thought something would burst out of his chest.
“Thanks for the whetstone... and the sandwiches,” Adin said, “I promise I'll come back as soon as I get home and give it back!”
“And make sure you bring your sword and axe home blunt and bloody, so that I might have the pleasure of tending to them again,” Dori replied with a wink. Adin laughed for the first time that morning, and Dori stayed unresisting for another heated kiss, before having to shoo him out and onto the street.
Dori stood there for a while, watching the dwarf's retreating back as far as he could see down the road. At the corner, Adin paused and turned, pressing his fingers to his lips in a grand gesture so the other dwarf could see it, then blowing towards him. Dori couldn't help but chuckle; he managed to wave back for a fleeting second before he caught the last glimpse of Adin's smiling face as he rounded the bend – and like that, he was gone.
It was months before the company returned to Ered Luin, and it was a cold day. Word had been sent before Grimir arrived to the Hall: there had been a raid on the Ice Bay a month after they had settled in the encampment, and the company was in a bitter retreat. The news hadn't reached Dori.
Until, that was, a knock on the door came. The frigid weather had caused the pipes to freeze, so it was understandable that Dori looked a little miffed that instead of the welcome face of the plumber, he met Sergeant Grimir's eyes.
“Oh,” was the only thing he could muster, trying to put the annoyance out of his voice. Dirma said she would be here between twelve and five o'clock, and it was now five-thirty.
“I trust I'm not bothering you?” the sergeant said, and it was only now that Dori noticed he looked lot greyer than when he'd first come to see him about Adin's arrangement – and he remembered that he should have been away for longer.
Dori's winced a little as he welcomed the captain in – the room was a mess (to his standards), but Grimir stood inside the hallway, and even waved away Dori's attempts to take his cloak.
“I can't stay long, Dori. I've got Farasi to visit next...”
The pause at the end of Grimir's words meant nothing at that moment to Dori, who was still on the cusp of asking questions: did everything go alright with the encampment, why are you back so soon, what service can I be to you?
The last one escaped as Dori heard the words fall bluntly in the space between them. Grimir looked awkward, and his face sagged deeper.
I've got Farasi to visit next...
“He wanted me to give you these, Dori. Before he... before he passed. He promised it to you, and he's kept that promise.” In front of Dori appeared a sword – a broken shortsword, and it had dried blood on the hilt. In Grimir's other palm lay a small whetsone, his whetsone.
Dori didn't realise he was weeping until his face hit the soft cloth of Grimir's shoulder and he was enveloped by strong arms holding him tight to the other dwarf's chest.
“He went in peace, Dori... he went in peace...”
They didn't break apart for a long time, but when Dori raised his streaming gaze to the clock on the wall, he saw not three minutes had passed. He was still clutching the sword between them both, and the whetstone was digging into his palm. He felt afraid to lay them down.
With a heaving chest, he let Grimir go, unable to speak any words in parting. As if to mock him further, his mind insisted on replaying the last moments of his farewell with Adin – innocent, brave Adin – as they'd said goodbye.
“I have to go and see his father,” Grimir said again. Dori saw his cheeks were dry, but his eyes were hollow. Dori didn't want to know any of the specifics – not how Adin died, not how many of those young men died along with him.
When Grimir left, Dori was left looking at the back of the door. The sun had set and filled the room with darkness; he didn't bother to light the fire. Sitting on the sofa, he placed the sword with a dull clink on the top of the table. It didn't have the shimmer it would have, had it been borne proudly back by Adin, and it was reminiscent now of only cold, grey scrap. Dori placed the stone next to it, but something on the back of it caught his eye, and he took it up again. It looked worn around the edges – obviously used – but there was something else on its back, carved so faintly into it that Dori could barely see it in the half-light.
Drawn shakily into the back of the soft stone was a set of lines, and Dori made it out as a rune: the rune of thanks.