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Bilbo Baggins travelled with Thorin’s Company for a little over a year. He then stayed in Erebor for another six months, to help with the rebuilding of the kingdom.
It took about this long for him to finally see Fili and Kili in a well-groomed state. And all it took for them to finally pick up a good brush and head into a proper bath was Thorin’s coronation as King Under the Mountain.
“Who knew you lads were so handsome underneath all that dirt?” Bilbo teases them in their quarters, watching them pin the ceremonial braid beads on each other’s beards. “And who knew you would look so handsome in dwarven robes, Master Burglar?” Kili replies, with admiration hidden within his cheek.
Bilbo stands up then, feeling rather weighed down by the furs he had piled on his shoulder, draping from his arm like a velvet curtain. “Do you think so?” he says, picking at the fine embroidery of the robe. “I feel rather drowned in it all, I must say. And these furs going all the way to the floor… it’ll be dusty by the end of the evening!”
“That doesn’t change the fact that you look stunning, Master Baggins.”
“Almost regal.”
“Me! Regal!” Bilbo’s voice comes in a half-laugh as he crosses his arms at his hip. “I don’t suppose I’m very regal, I’m afraid. If I had a proper hobbit’s shirt to wear, I would.”
“Fili, do you think Uncle Thorin’ll --”
“Of course he will, I mean, look at him!”
“Sorry, will Thorin what?” Bilbo looks up from fiddling with his furs to face the siblings, who had a look of utter mischief.
“Will he even remember that he was crowned king by the end of tonight, with everything else going on,” Fili says, offering his arm to Bilbo, as if he was a hobbit-lass being invited to a party. He is careful to ignore Bilbo’s quizzical stare as they walk. “But come, Master Baggins! The banquet awaits!”
-
After several rounds of dining on roast mutton and fine ale, the tables were pushed to a side of the royal ballroom in anticipation for the celebratory ball. Musicians take up a corner of the room, with clarinets and harps and drums, singing mirthful ballads as guests file in and out of the dances.
For a while Bilbo clings to the side of the room, not quite knowing any of the traditional dwarven dances. Instead he has a look around, trying to seek out familiar faces. He sees Fili and Kili on the far side, each clinging to one arm of a dwarf-woman with a face in the likeness of Thorin, who looked ready to give the two of them an affectionate scolding.
That would be Dís, Bilbo mutters to himself, for really, she was too much like Thorin to not be his sister. Through the crowds of the room Kíli catches Bilbo’s eye and gives him a cheery wave before whispering something in his mother’s ear. Whatever he did say, it made the lady dwarf peer at Bilbo with a renewed interest.
Discreetly, the hobbit tries to move away out of eyesight, weaving amongst the crowds of dwarf-lords and ladies who spoke loudly, pompously, and who moved with splendor in their robes. On the contrary Bilbo sunk into his cloaks and furs, feeling far too small for them, and under the cover of them he was safely invisible, hidden from attention.
In the corner of his eye he sees Thorin, made tall and radiant by the crown upon his head, and jewels that hung upon him. He strides easily amongst his guests, making conversation, shaking hands, putting head to head, like he had done with his kin so many months ago, in Bilbo’s home in Bag End.
Thorin has always had the majestic air about him, and even when he first met him Bilbo had no doubt that he was truly a king. But Thorin is taller and more solemn in his tailored clothes, he is grand, he is steady on his feet as he walks. If Bilbo closed his eyes he would see the statues of the elder kings in the long halls of Erebor, and Thorin would seem to be one of them.
Here was a victorious king, one who took a risk and had it well rewarded. Surrounded by richness not only in gold but in fellowship, he only seemed all the mightier than the stone-carved kings, frozen in time at a prime far beneath that of Thorin’s.
And suddenly there is a possessive reverence that rises within Bilbo for Thorin, and a longing pulls within him to worship the king for himself, to love and treasure a side of Thorin reserved only for the ones who were the closest to him — those who had stayed with him before he had a crown on his head and jewels around his neck. In a fleeting, haunting moment Bilbo understands the way a dragon’s heart beat, and he understands the feeling of dragon-fire in his belly, and he understands love, the angry, selfish, dangerous kind of love.
Then Bilbo collects himself with a gasp, pressing a hand to his pounding heart. Slowly he returns to the scene before him, the music, the dancing, the jovial celebration. And it was not a moment too soon.
“Master Baggins.”
The smile freezes on Bilbo’s face, caught off-guard, as he greeted the king. “T-Thorin! Your majesty. Congratulations! On the coronation, that is.”
Thorin seems to ignore his words as he reaches out to fix a folded corner of his robe. “I almost didn’t recognise you. You look exquisite.” He smooths his hand over the fabric. “There. Perfect.”
“Oh, erm, thank you,” Bilbo says as the king withdraws his hands. “These robes, they’re very nice,” he chuckles.
“Yes. I sense that you aren’t too happy with them, however.” Thorin raises a knowing eyebrow.
“Oh, I don’t mean to offend, I really don’t, I just think that I’m not that suited for this type of wear, you know, being a hobbit and all.”
“I disagree,” Thorin counters easily, and a blush rises to Bilbo’s face.
“Now, master hobbit, now that I have found you…”
It was Bilbo’s turn to raise a quizzical eyebrow.
“I was wondering if you would care for a dance?”
-
“I don’t quite know the steps, I’m afraid,” Bilbo says as he holds onto Thorin’s hands, their palms touching gently.
“Not to worry, I should know it well enough for the both of us,” Thorin says, his eyes crinkling into a smile, which Bilbo thought was one of the most charming things ever. “Just follow my lead.”
“Right. I’ve quite gotten used to that.” Bilbo’s nervousness comes in a joke as he watches his feet move, not quite looking into the dwarven king’s eyes. The furs around him sweep onto the floor and around him as he moves, and for a flicker of a moment he felt rather grand, like a pauper turned into a prince.
“You’re doing very well, Bilbo,” Thorin assures him. “Now for this part of the dance I’ll put my hand on your waist. Is this alright with you?”
And for a moment Bilbo almost laughs, because Thorin Oakenshield, the king of Erebor, was asking him if he could put a hand on his waist, as if he was some untouchable treasure! But he composes himself and nods — “Yes, I suppose that’s quite alright, of course” — and he shivers at the feeling of Thorin’s hand resting on his robes, tucked underneath his cloak.
The music slows down, and as the rhythm drums in his heart Bilbo feels quite at ease — more regal than he ever has any business feeling.
“So, tell me, Bilbo,” Thorin says in his ear as they move. “Is there someone back home you enjoy sharing a dance with? A hobbit-lass, perhaps?”
Bilbo almost freezes at the question. The truth of the matter was that he wasn’t a bachelor much by choice, and it made his face flush at the thought of explaining it to anyone, and to Thorin, no less! So he simply stammers that there wasn’t someone back home.
“Besides,” he says with a curt laugh, “I’m much too old for love. For Shire standards, I mean.”
“And what about you?” He finds himself asking the king, disguising his curiosity with the intent of reciprocation. “Are we to meet any future Queens, and er, heirs, anytime soon?” The words feel awkward in Bilbo’s mouth, and he blushes harder.
“Fíli will be my only heir, as things seem,” Thorin says easily. “I won’t be courting queens anytime soon.”
“Oh. Why?”
“I prefer dwarrow-men.”
“ Oh. ” All of a sudden Bilbo felt like he was looking into a mirror of a sort, and for the first time in his life he felt understood. Many thoughts rush to his mind, but it is the relief that makes him shake as he tries to follow the steps of the dance.
“Me too,” he says quickly, in solidarity, but also to confirm to himself what he had skirted around for years on end.
Now there are two types of jokes in this world. The first type is said to make people laugh, and Bilbo considers himself well-versed in that. But it was the second type that he was the most acquaintanced with: the joke that is confirmed to be a joke only after it is said, to dissolve horror with relief, to take back what was meant with the whole of his heart. For far too long he had given out and taken back the fact of the matter to friends and family in the Shire, and that was the fact that perhaps, perhaps , he preferred lads over lasses.
Thorin seems unaffected by the matter as he raises his arm, spinning Bilbo around him. And in a rush of emotion Bilbo finds words bubbling out of him like a stream.
“It’s - it’s not done this way back home. Two lads, or two lasses, I mean. It has always been man and wife, and - well, I suppose it’s frowned upon. No one really knows back home, t-they just think I’m a mad bachelor. I - well, I suppose you’re really the first to know.”
“I see.” Thorin guides Bilbo with a hand. “Here it’s quite respected, if it pleases you to know. Love is love, it is as simple as that. Mahal forbid you cast judgement from a distance, when you can’t tell apart men from women.”
“It must be nice,” Bilbo says, a bittersweet feeling in his heart. All at once he resented the Shire for the silence he had to keep on the matter, and relieved that his secret was finally known , and kept by Thorin. He felt a stronger affinity to Erebor than ever before, feeling its homeliness despite its lack of homely things, because what really was a home if you couldn’t be yourself within it?
“If I may ask, Bilbo.” Thorin’s voice is so quiet in the moment, and his body is so close to Bilbo’s that their hearts almost touched, and it was how Bilbo hears his words. “If you could describe the perfect partner, male partner, that is, what would you say?”
And Bilbo is almost glad to answer that question, for it was a question he’d longed to be asked of him. But then a creeping suspicion came to his mind.
“Why do you ask that, Thorin?” he says softly, his eyes trained onto his beard, its silver clasps gleaming radiantly, almost teasingly, at him.
“No reason,” Thorin says almost too quickly, and in alarm the hobbit looks up, only to see him looking away with haste, a bright flush building up on his face. It was peculiar that Thorin would say that, for having known Thorin as long as he did Bilbo knows that the dwarf did everything with a purpose beating in his heart.
Suddenly realisation hits Bilbo, and all at once it feels like pieces of a puzzle that clicks into place, and suddenly everything makes sense . Fíli and Kíli’s words, the way Thorin asked him to dance, the way his heart flutters and settles, all at the same time, when he is in the presence of the dwarven king.
It was merely a guess of his sharpest hobbit-intuition, but in the moment Bilbo knew that fortune was smiling upon him. And something Tookish within him rises, something mischievous and bold, something that decides to risk everything he had ever avoided risking in his comfortable hobbit life. So he clears his throat and answers Thorin’s question.
“Well, he would be quite tall.”
“Tall,” Thorin echoes, his eyes drifting around the room. “I don’t suppose there are many tall hobbits around the Shire.”
“None that would court me,” Bilbo reminds him lightly.
Thorin pitches question after question as they move to the rhythm of the music, which had picked up the pace into a jig-like tempo. And Bilbo answers some and leaves others open as they skirt around words, never quite direct, never entirely honest. It is thrilling, foreign, for they had always been everything but indirect and dishonest with each other, since the day Erebor was reclaimed.
Bilbo feels like he is made of paper, and Thorin was the flame he danced around. He holds himself with utmost care and craftiness, careful not to slip and catch on fire. Soon Thorin does most of the talking, his questions beyond simple curiosity, and Bilbo’s heart races at the intense way he stares and he presses.
“Green or brown eyes?”
“Well now, that’s a trick question. What if I liked blue eyes?”
“Do you?”
Bilbo hums instead of answering.
For a while Thorin is silent as he moves Bilbo around the ballroom. The musicians strike up song after song, and though he is long overdue to make his rounds and entertain his guests Thorin stays with Bilbo and Thorin dances with Bilbo.
“This man of our discussions… is he a real lad you’ve met before?”
“I wonder,” Bilbo replies.
“I have never seen a hobbit taller than you in my time in the Shire, Bilbo.”
“Who said anything about hobbits?”
“I see.” Thorin bites his lip as he twirls Bilbo under his arm. “Could he possibly be… a dwarf?”
“Maybe. But —“
“And is that dwarf… me?”
And Bilbo stops dead, startled, feeling the familiar feeling of heated panic rising up in his cheeks, wondering how he managed to get himself lodged in such a situation as this. Through his lashes he darts a glance at Thorin, whose eyes are now warm as he begins to take in the sight before him, as he begins to understand .
“I… I don’t know.” Bilbo trips over his words, despite the fact that he does know, that Thorin was right, and he didn’t know whether to rejoice or burrow himself away. “Do you want it to be… erm, what I mean to say is, would you mind … no, that’s not quite right… how do you… well… you see…”
“I will not take what you do not wish to give,” Thorin says softly. “Even if it is a treasure I have longed for greatly, perhaps more so that the Arkenstone they set on my throne.”
“T-treasure? What treasure?”
“Your heart, Bilbo.”
A soft gasp escapes from Bilbo’s lips, and his eyes well with tears, and he felt that if he was not stronger in mind he may have fainted away onto the ground. That Thorin Oakenshield would want his heart, and that Bilbo wanted nothing more than to give it to him, to have the dwarf own something that would make him feel truly at home. Gingerly Bilbo took Thorin’s hand and pressed it to his heart, feeling like he was joining a key to its lock.
“Well. I would have you take it freely, in fact I would pray that you take it, even if it was worth nothing more than a gem in a mountain of gold. So take my heart. Take it a thousand times over, if you please. It was only ever yours to take, anyway.”
Thorin takes Bilbo’s hand and he kisses it softly, and Bilbo dares to put his head on Thorin’s chest, tucking himself in his arms, in his heart. Safely Thorin held him there, in the way he remembered of his own parents when they danced in the corridors of Erebor all those years ago, under the glow of crystal-lamps and moonlight. And then Thorin Oakenshield remembers love. The part of his heart that he had left buried in Erebor when he fled the mountain was now unearthed, and it was a treasure greater than the gold he had rediscovered, for love made the Lonely Mountain into a home. And for the first time, Thorin feels like he has truly come home.
Thorin squeezes Bilbo’s hand, tucked into his own. “Is the day a dream?” he says in wonder. “To be made a king, and a lover to the one I love, all in the same day?”
Then the music stops, and as dwarves come on and off of the dance floor Bilbo feels encased in time. “I don’t think I can dance another step,” he admits breathlessly. “I think… I need some air. Maybe… maybe we can head to somewhere more private.”
“Agreed,” Thorin says before Bilbo finishes his sentence, as if he knew him, understood him. So he offers Bilbo his arm, like a hobbit-lad would offer a hobbit-lass, and Bilbo takes it with a flourish.
As they walk off the dance-floor Bilbo catches Dís’ eye, and he sees the dwarf-woman watch them with a knowing, wistful glance. But this time, Bilbo doesn’t shy away. He keeps his head held high as he gives Thorin’s sister a nod. He keeps his shoulders tall as he greets Thorin’s guests with him. And as he passes by a reflection of them in the mirror his heart skips a beat, for dressed in robes of dwarf-make, he looked perfect as the counterpart to a dwarven king.
Hanging from Thorin’s arm, close to his side and closer to his heart, Bilbo feels like he has finally found his place at last.