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”You have to eat something, Nori,” Dori coaxed, kneeling by Nori’s bedside. The Spymaster of Erebor certainly did not look the part right then, his usual star-shaped braids lanky and greasy, circles under his eyes so dark and deep they might as well have been a mine shaft.
”I really don’t feel up to it today,” came the reply, Nori just burrowing deeper into the bed, hiding his face in the pillows.
”I know you’re grieving, but you have to eat, nothing will be better just because you starve yourself.” Dori stood up and started to pace, not moving far from the bed on either stride, however. Nori had always been sensitive, much like Ori actually, but whereas Ori had decided that there was nothing to do about it, Nori had developed an unbothered visage that Dori hadn’t seen crack in over a century.
Now, all due to a hobbit, he had fallen into despair so deep Dori didn’t know if he’d ever manage to climb out of it.
“You keep giving me tea so sugary the spoon stands up in it, I think I’ll survive,” Nori grumbled, turning over in bed and in the process swept the blanket even more thoroughly around himself.
Suddenly, and very unexpectedly, there was a knock on the door. Ori was at his apprenticeship, and Dori really couldn’t think of anyone else that would be visiting Nori, especially not now, not in the midst of him grieving. He’d been in the midst of grieving for several months, of course, so it was more a force of habit than anything else.
Dori stomped his way over to the door, hoping to convey just how displeased he was with anyone visiting. Swinging the door open, however, he was torn between elation and rage.
“Oh, it’s you.” Outside his brother’s door stood Belba, and while Dori hadn’t ever been happier to see her, he was liable to do something rash if she tried anything with his brother. “Haven’t you done enough?”
“Is Nori in?” she asked, not even bothering to greet him. She seemed in a hurry for some reason, and uncharitably he thought it was to break Nori’s heart even further.
“It’s not that I don’t love you, but Nori’s… you broke him, and coming here like this won’t help him.” Belba Baggins was visibly pregnant, stomach entering any room long before she did, and she had a very distinct way of standing as if she had to offset the weight of the stomach at all times. Dori did not think it would be good for Nori’s health to see her pregnant with someone else’s child.
“Please don’t do this, Dori… it’s his child,” she sounded as deadpan as he’d ever heard her, but the words did not register as they should.
“Excuse me, what?”
“I was informed that dwarrow never found their Ones outside the Khazad.” She shrugged, suddenly looking gaunt and haggard, circles around her eyes deep and dark enough to match Nori’s, now that he thought about it.
“It’s rare, but it happens, what…” Dori said, not understanding where in everything this comment fit.
“Hobbits have cariads, something equivalent to Ones. Nori is mine. When I fell pregnant, assuming I was not his one – hobbit, as mentioned – why should I stay here and be devastated every time I saw him happy in the arms of another?” Belba looked beseechingly at Dori, and suddenly he understood.
“You’ve kept yourself alive for…?” he gestured at her stomach, not quite daring to say it out loud just yet. They had spoken so quietly, he thought Nori shouldn’t have heard anything, and this sort of thing was better coming from someone actually involved in the whole thing.
“Pretty much, yeah. Now – where is Nori? Dwalin told me he’s been… difficult.”
“Difficult is the least,” Dori admitted, scrubbing a hand down his face, before taking a long, hard look at Belba. “He loves you, and if you love him half as much… you will be very happy. He’s in the left-hand bedroom.”
“Thank you, Dori – for letting me in, and for taking care of him.” Belba gave him a quick hug before she kept moving into the room, a vision so ridiculous that even in the serious circumstances going on, watching the tiny hobbit waddle her way into the Spymaster’s quarters was something else.
At the first sign of raised voices, Dori left his brother’s rooms, vowing to come back once the risk of hearing things he absolutely would not want to hear was over.
When he did poke his in, several hours later, it was to find Nori and Belba snuggled together in bed.