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Chapter Text

The raven arrived on a Mersday. She was as black as ink, and her feathers had a glossy shine that spoke of youth. Bilbo watched her alight on his fence, her flapping wings disturbing the bushes nearby for a moment before she settled. There was no question about where the raven had come from, or who might have sent the message attached to her thin leg.

Bilbo stood up from his bench. A sort of excited impatience spread through him at the thought of spending the morning reading a letter from his dear friends in the East. Still, he made sure to walk up to the fence with a casual air.

“Greetings, Master Baggins,” the raven croaked.

“Good morning,” Bilbo said, offering his arm. “Will you come in? You must be tired from your journey.”

“Indeed I am! Flying all the way from the Lonely Mountain is no child’s play,” she cried, then hopped along the fence until she was near enough to close her claws round Bilbo’s forearm. Then she hauled herself up onto his shoulder with unexpected gentleness, mindful of her sharp talons. “I am Crä of Rauk, and I bring news from the Kingdom of Erebor—and a message for you, as you can see.”

“I do,” said Bilbo, one finger grazing the rolled-up parchment. “And how fares the Mountain?”

“You would ask questions before feeding the messenger?” asked Crä. “I thought hobbits knew better than this.”

“Indeed we do!” Bilbo agreed with a laugh. “How uncivilised of me.”

Bilbo went inside as Crä continued to talk about how famished she was. He pushed the round door closed behind him, humming his absentminded agreement with what she was saying. He lifted his arm, and the raven squawked and climbed up it until she was on his shoulder.

With now both hands free to use, Bilbo made quick work of untying the roll of parchment from Crä’s leg. It was quite large and heavy, even for a bird of such size. He looked down at it with puzzlement.

Crä gave Bilbo a low croon in thanks for relieving her of her burden, her beak ruffling the curls behind his ear. The action made Bilbo unfreeze. He shoved the letter into a back pocket, not even peeking at its contents, and then strode into the dining kitchen.

Frodo was setting the table, good lad that he was. He smiled up at Bilbo when he walked in, then gave a little jump, almost dropping a plate. It was one from the porcelain set Bilbo’s late aunt Ruby—and Frodo’s grandmother on his father’s side, coincidentally—had given him as a welcome-back gift after his adventure. Needless to say, her disapproval of his journey had made her choose a set with a rather lurid flower pattern. Bilbo wouldn’t have minded it if Frodo had chipped or even broken the plate.

“Yes, Frodo, there’s a raven on my shoulder. I noticed.”

“Greetings, Young Baggins,” said Crä, taking in Bilbo’s nephew with an inquisitive beady eye.

Frodo stared, looking faint at the sight of the talking animal. Bilbo rolled his eyes and went to stir the sausages in the frying pan, the bird twisting her neck so she could keep Frodo within her sight. Really, Frodo was reacting as if Bilbo had never told him about the speaking ravens of the North. Then again, perhaps being told about them wasn’t quite the same as hearing one.

“A pleasure,” said Frodo at last.

“The pleasure is certainly mine, Young Master. I am overjoyed to finally meet the Burglar’s chosen heir,” croaked the raven. “To think many of my cousins and siblings met you before I did! Why, they couldn’t even greet someone in Westron, yet His Highness chose them over me time and time again!”

Thorin probably sent the ravens who couldn’t speak the language to avoid scaring any of Bilbo’s neighbours into an early grave, but he refrained from explaining this to Crä. Something told him that she wouldn’t take that piece of information as a compliment.

“Oh, I’m—I’m sorry to hear that.”

Crä huffed, but Frodo’s words seemed to appease her. “So am I. But let us speak of merrier things!” She flapped her wings, throwing Bilbo’s tousled hair into further disarray, and glided to the table. “Your name is very well known back in the East, you know?”

Frodo shot her a curious look. “It is?”

“Why, yes! Your most esteemed uncle”—Bilbo snorted—“has regaled His Highness with many delightful tales about your person throughout the years. You have made him hoot with mirth more than once.”

Bilbo tried to imagine Thorin hooting with mirth and couldn’t. His memories of the dwarf were solemn, always tinged with a melancholy and sadness so profound that the emotions threatened to overwhelm Bilbo even in the present. It was good to hear that his dear friend had turned less stoic and more jovial with the passing of the years. He only wished he could have experienced the change in person. Suspecting it thanks to the lighter tone in the King’s letters was simply not the same.

Frodo glanced at Bilbo, his eyes accusing. The old hobbit spotted mortification at the thought that his childhood indiscretions had been narrated to a Dwarven King—the Dwarven King, as it were. Instead of throwing a tantrum, however, Frodo set the ugly plate down with a low sigh. It seemed that he had decided to act as if nothing were out of the ordinary.

Bilbo tried not to show his disappointment by poking at the sausages. He liked it whenever Frodo overreacted and asked a million inconsequential questions. When he was little, there was no end to his queries, but as he grew older, those occasions became scarcer the more he became used to his odd uncle.

“Well,” said Frodo, “that King Thorin finds enjoyment in retellings of my everyday life is… an honour.”

“A dubious one, I’m sure,” Crä cackled.

“That, I cannot deny!” Frodo retrieved two mugs from a cupboard with a smile. “Oh, I haven’t got the pleasure of knowing King Thorin in the flesh, but he has sent me many a kind word through his letters to my guardian, and Uncle Bilbo himself has told me of his innumerable great deeds. Being the cause of his laughter is a dubious honour, yes, but not one I would resent.”

“You were no object of mockery,” crooned the raven.

“I know his laughter wasn’t unkind,” said the young man, setting the mugs on the table. “Rather, I imagine it was a fond counterpoint to the good-natured yet world-weary sighs my uncle bestows upon me whenever I do something daft—which is always, by his standards!”

“You deserve each and every sigh I have ever bestowed upon you,” Bilbo quipped. He pushed the sausages into a plate and shook his spatula at his nephew. “If you weren’t so foolish a lad, I wouldn’t have to sigh at you quite so often. Now go get some scones and cakes from the pantry, will you? A couple of conserves wouldn’t go amiss, either, and some fruit and ham for our guest.”

“Of course, Uncle,” sighed Frodo, leaving the kitchen.

“And be quick about it!” Bilbo called after him. To Crä, he muttered, “That boy, I swear…”

“He’s nice enough,” she said, tilting her head in a manner that Bilbo knew all too well from years of interacting with ravens. He petted her, scratching the nape of her neck and carding his fingers through her glossy feathers, and she warbled at the caresses. “Not a proper dwarf at all, but then again, he is no dwarf, so I suppose that is a good thing.”

“You suppose well.”

When Frodo returned with the food, they sat down to eat.

Breakfast was a relaxed affair. Frodo was odd for a Baggins, very much like his uncle, and thus welcomed the oddity of a talking raven joining them at the table with open arms after he got over the initial shock. Bilbo participated little, eager to see how his nephew fared interacting with a being from outside the Shire.

Frodo did wonderfully. He asked Crä about Erebor and the human cities near it. Letting his curiosity take hold, he asked about the River Running and the Long Lake, and wondered if the desolation had been erased from the lands surrounding the Mountain. True to his hobbit heritage, he also asked about what dwarves ate, and how often, and if they were prone to having dreadful table manners like Bilbo had described in his tales.

Crä left not a single question unanswered, and her descriptions were rich and detailed, if sometimes strange due to her telling things from a bird’s perspective. Bilbo listened to the raven’s words as if they were a breath of fresh air after weeks in the depths of Mirkwood.

Of course his friends had described the Lonely Mountain to him in their letters—how it glittered in the torchlight after the gems and ores decorating the ancient halls had been buffed and shined, and how the Front Gate had been rebuilt into a graceful archway with robust doors.

They had told him about it all, and they had boasted and bragged and begged Bilbo to make the journey and see with his own eyes the splendour of the kingdom he had helped recover. He never had, for more than one reason, but he had never doubted that it was as lovely as they made it sound.

Crä, however, crowed about Erebor with such pride in her tone that it made Bilbo feel as if the words from all the letters he hoarded in a wooden box in his personal library were finally coming to life. The raven’s voice morphed in his ears, and it became rich and gravelly and solemn, and the descriptions of the chambers and mines and hallways left Bilbo failing to recall the breakfast in front of him as he stared at the bird, her black glossy feathers reminding him of dark tresses and her claws of silvery hair beads.

Then Crä realised his sausages had gone cold and pecked at them.

“Oh, you dratted thing,” Bilbo muttered, shooing her.

“But it has gone cold,” said Crä, as if that were reason enough to help herself to his meal.

“And I have a perfectly warm hearth to heat it back up; thank you for your concern,” Bilbo replied, then noticed that Frodo had finished his own breakfast while Crä had been talking. Perhaps he wasn’t that odd a Baggins, then. Not as odd as Bilbo, at least. “If you’re done, my lad, then you may be excused.”

Frodo nodded and went to gather up the dishes and cutlery he had used, but Bilbo stopped him.

“I’ll do it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes!” Bilbo pushed off his chair and took his plate. “Now go.”

Perhaps sensing the strange mood Bilbo was in, Frodo nodded again and left after telling Crä that he still had many questions for her. Not surprisingly, the raven puffed her feathers and promised that later she would answer all of the boy’s queries to the best of her ability. Bilbo shoved his sausages back into the frying pan and put it on the hearth with a little more force than necessary. His head was brimming with familiar baritones that he had thought long-forgotten, and it made his chest ache.

Crä pinned him with her probing eyes, but he ignored her. There was silence until he was sat back at the table, his food suitably hot and greasy. He tucked in, deciding to continue ignoring the raven for the time being. She wasn’t going to fly off until she had delivered whatever news she had been told to deliver, so he didn’t feel pressured to keep her entertained.

Ravens, however, were clever creatures who enjoyed being paid attention and good conversations, so she soon started strutting along the table and ruffling her feathers to show her displeasure. Her attitude evoked images of brooding dwarves in Bilbo’s mind. With a suppressed chuckle, he relented.

“You said you had news for me?” he prompted, holding out a bit of sausage. “From Erebor?”

She took the peace offering and gobbled it down. “Yes, though most of it has been said in the company of your nephew. All there is to add is that the Company of Oakenshield misses you so, and they all would be very glad if you would accept their invitation this once.”

“Invitation?” Bilbo frowned.

“The letter I carried here,” said Crä. “It is not just that.”

Bilbo had actually forgotten that Crä had delivered a letter. It seemed silly, writing something when you had a raven who could speak the words you wanted and even intonate them the exact way you wished so that no meaning was lost to the recipient.

But Crä had delivered a letter—a large one, rolled up and tied off with a strip of red velvet, Bilbo observed as he took it out of his pocket. It was also sealed, the gold dot of wax showing a crown surmounted by seven stars. The emblem of the Line of Durin.

For a moment, he fancied not opening the letter. Let it simmer, a voice in his head said, and only pick it up when you’re positively burning to know its contents. He had played this game many times before: Resisting to read his mail, if only to extend the excitement of having a letter from his friends that he hadn’t read to exhaustion yet.

Crä’s words, however, made him lose the game in less than a minute. She had called the letter an invitation, and while Bilbo had been invited to Erebor many times over the years by different members of the Company, it had never sounded quite so official. Funny, how a formal request for his presence would be forwarded through the lips of a bird. Well, beak.

He broke the seal and unrolled the parchment. A smaller letter fell onto Bilbo’s lap, and he gave a quiet gasp. This one sported a blue dot of wax with two identical ravens back to back. It was Thorin’s personal stamp.

He set what he guessed to be the invitation down and picked up the little envelope, his fingers definitely not trembling. Thorin and he wrote to each other with a certain amount of regularity; there was nothing odd about getting a letter from him. At least, there shouldn’t be, but Bilbo’s heart was acting as if there were.

“I think I’ll—” He made a vague gesture and got to his feet. “Yes, I should—yes. He’ll need a reply, most likely, and my writing supplies are in my studio, so I best go there and read this.” Bilbo reached for the invitation. “These, I mean. Both of these.”

“Very well,” said Crä, edging for the bits of sausage Bilbo had left.

“Oh, please help yourself. I won’t be too long.”

“There is no need to rush, Master Baggins,” Crä assured him. “You may be as long or as swift as you like. I will wait.”

Bilbo gave a little bow, feeling a bit foolish, and almost ran down the hallway. The letters were heavy in his arms, demanding his attention, but he refused to read them unless he was sitting on his desk with the door locked behind him.

He rushed past the drawing room where Frodo was lounging with a pipe and a book, ignoring his nephew’s sound of inquiry. When he at last reached the studio, he shut himself inside and sat down on his stool, the old wooden chair creaking under his weight. He put Thorin’s letter down and held up the other. Just like with his meals, he wanted to save the best for last.

The bigger letter was the invitation Crä had mentioned, asking him in sparkling dark-gold ink to join the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the reclaiming of Erebor. The text was encased in lovely symmetrical patterns. Bilbo ran his hands over them, wondering if he could convince some hobbit woodworker to carve them into something. Dwarven designs were beautiful, simple in their intricateness, and Bilbo found that he wanted Bag End to have a little of that.

He put the invitation down, took a deep breath, and held the smaller letter up. The seal broke when Bilbo slipped a finger under it, not even needing to tug. The letter unfolded in his hands, easy as breathing, and Bilbo’s eyes raced through its contents.

Without meaning to, he began to smile. The letter was something one would expect from an effusive lover, not a former travelling companion, yet Thorin wrote of the agonising distance between them and missing the sound of his voice as if those were common things to tell a friend.

Of course, they weren’t just friends. Not really. They may call each other that, but once upon a time, there had been the beginnings of something else between them, and that budding something had never withered. It had survived prejudice and cursed gold and half a century with a whole world keeping them apart, and it would continue to do so.

Bilbo traced Thorin’s handwriting with a fingertip. He could almost hear the King whispering the words. His imagination could never make justice to that silken baritone, but Bilbo’s smile softened all the same.

In his chest, there was a stirring. It thrummed under his skin and sent him back to the day when he had ran down Hobbiton Hill to catch up with his group of dwarves. He hadn’t felt like this in a long time, but he knew what it meant. It was akin to a fever, but where a high temperature sapped one’s energy, the fire burning inside Bilbo made him want to walk out the door and let his feet take him as far as they could.

He didn’t let them wander far this time. He trotted out of the studio and back through the hallway, entering the kitchen with Thorin’s letter held against his chest. Crä looked as if she had been waiting for him all along. She tilted her head at him, prompting him to speak. Something about the way she moved made Bilbo suspect that she already knew what he was going to say but was waiting for him to confirm it out of sheer politeness.

“No need for a letter, after all. My reply is rather concise,” Bilbo grinned. “Please tell Thorin I said yes.”

Chapter Text

Samwise Gamgee readjusted Frodo’s travelling cloak for the eleventh time. Bilbo coughed—not laughed—into his hand as his nephew shrugged his friend away with a huff. Sam was a charming lad, but he could be a worryguts of immense proportions, especially where a Baggins of Bag End was concerned. Bilbo blamed it on the boy’s father, who for some reason had begun to hero-worship Bilbo during his youth and never quite stopped despite Bilbo’s increasingly bad name.

Not that Bilbo didn’t like being someone’s idol. What he disliked was that adolescent hobbits were destined to social ruin if they followed in his footsteps. That was the only legacy he could offer: ill repute and richness of spirit—as well as loads of profitability if one picked one’s adventures wisely, though Bilbo ignored what part of joining a handful of dwarves in their mission to slay a dragon was wise.

“All ready then, Hamfast?”

“Aye, Mister Bilbo, sir,” said the hobbit, hands fluttering over the pony’s saddle and bundles. No one had the right to look so awake before elevenses. “Just making sure nothing goes rolling down the hill while you’re riding to Bree. You sure you don’t need me to come with? It’d be no trouble, sir. None at all.”

“Oh, there’s no need. We’ll be fine,” Bilbo assured him. “But you’re more than welcome to join us anyhow.”

Hamfast paused his fussing over the pony Frodo would be riding and glanced at Sam over his shoulder. The man had never allowed his youngest son to step out of the Shire so far, and all of a sudden he was letting him go on a journey that would take him across the biggest maps that Mad Baggins owned, the large ones that spoke of landscapes no hobbit outside of the Tooks had ever seen.

Bilbo waited as Hamfast thought, the man’s shoulders tense. He gave a surprised blink when Hamfast finally turned back to the pony with a firm shake of the head, starting to tug at straps and buckles for the fourth time. It seemed that Bilbo was correct about where Sam’s fretting came from.

“Nay, Mister Bilbo, it’s all right,” Hamfast mumbled. “This is Sam’s trip, not mine.”

“He’ll be all right,” Bilbo said softly.

“Aye, and you’d best be all right too! You and young Mister Frodo both.” Hamfast ran a hand through his hair, whiter than Bilbo’s despite his younger age. “We’ll be expecting to hear from you, Mister Bilbo, sir, so don’t you go forgetting to write.”

After promising that he wouldn’t, Bilbo got on his pony and waited for Frodo and Sam to do the same. He shifted in his saddle, telling Hamfast that he was comfortable and keeping his grumbling to himself. In truth, he hadn’t ridden a pony in decades, and he hadn’t missed it in the slightest. Frodo seemed to have his reservations about horse-riding as well, holding the reins as if they were snakes, but Sam looked at ease on his mount.

Hamfast walked alongside them for a while, chattering with the two boys and reminding his son to take good care of Frodo. Sam swore to his father that he wouldn’t leave Frodo’s side at any point, which just made the young Baggins embarrassed. Bilbo laughed and laughed, and then he started whistling a merry tune.

After a while, they reached the bridge that would take them over The Water and into the village of Bywater, and Hamfast parted ways with the three of them there. Frodo and Bilbo pretended to admire the clear blue skies while the hobbit patted his son on the knee and wished him a safe journey, sniffling and blubbering as he did.

“I’ll be back soon, Pa,” Sam promised, squeezing his father’s hand. “You’ll see.”

“Aye,” Hamfast replied. “Now go. Meet them elves and see them sights—and come back! Come back to your family and friends.”

“I will. I swear I will. But for now, goodbye!”

Bilbo gave Sam the better part of half an hour to get his snuffling under control, then pulled the youth into singing all sort of songs with him as they rode. Hobbits tending to their gardens and feeding their poultry raised their eyebrows at them but said nothing. It was no surprise that Bilbo Baggins would be leaving: once an adventurer, always an adventurer.

The company he was keeping was surprising, he supposed. Frodo and Sam weren’t what one would call entirely ordinary hobbits, but they were still respectable. The other hobbits would assume they had agreed to accompany him to make his journey less strenuous a task. A hobbit of Bilbo’s age needed the strength and sprightliness of youth with him, even if he was in very good shape indeed to be as old as he was.

They stopped for some luncheon once they reached the East Road. They had missed two meals already, and while the boys hadn’t complained once, Bilbo didn’t want to cause them too much grief before the real hardships of travelling started. Whilst in the Shire, they could take their time and have as many meals as they wanted, but in a little over a week they would be joining an envoy of dwarves from the Blue Mountains. Although there shouldn’t be any shortage of food in their provisions, there certainly wouldn’t be enough to feed three hobbits the way their customs dictated.

“I’m staggered that Merry and Pippin didn’t come to say goodbye,” said Frodo over the meal. They were sat under the shade of a pear tree and his dark curls were speckled with the golden light that filtered through the leaves. “Maybe even a bit hurt.”

“Don’t you go feeling down about it, Mister Frodo,” Sam was quick to reassure him. “They must be sleeping in, the pair! You know them. Stay up late and get up late, those two. When we come back, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that they skipped out of bed after the noon thinking they had time for second breakfast before coming to see us off.”

That made Frodo’s spirit rise, and Bilbo jumped at the opportunity to show off his storytelling prowess, describing in perfect detail how Merry and Pippin would run out of their homes in nothing but their nightgowns, a half-eaten toast in hand as they rushed to Bag End.

By the time he was done talking, Frodo and Sam’s cheeks were red with laughter. Their friends had done more embarrassing things in their lives, so it would be no surprise if Bilbo’s predictions turned out to be right. It would also be no shock to the more civilised residents of the Shire. Another nail in the coffin of Bilbo’s reputation? Yes, definitely, since all strange events were his fault in one way or another. But still amusing to all.

Once they finished eating the sandwiches they had packed, they mounted their ponies again and resumed their journey. They nibbled on some biscuits as the sun went down and stopped for the night at the home of one of Bilbo’s many acquaintances. When dawn broke, they got up—though Frodo muttered indistinctly as he gathered his things—and moved on.

The following days were very much the same, and it brought Bilbo a quiet sort of joy to be back on the road. His companions were nothing like the ones with which he had shared his first adventure, but the difference was in no way bad. Just different. It was a given that he missed his dwarves and wished they were there with him, but the knowledge that he would be seeing them again soon was enough to shake away most of the melancholy before it could grab him.

During one evening, while they were setting camp a few miles from Bree, Bilbo began humming under his breath the same tune that saw him off all those years ago. The voices of his friends were faded with time inside his head, but the genuine emotion with which they had sung was still etched in Bilbo’s memories. He liked to think that some of that raw passion seeped into his own voice whenever the familiar song spilt from his lips.

“Uncle?”

Bilbo didn’t look up as he laid out his sleeping mat. “Yes, lad?”

“Where did you learn that song?” asked Frodo. Bilbo did look up then, and his expression must have betrayed something since his nephew waved his pipe round and crossed his legs with exaggerated nonchalance. “It intrigues me to no end. You sing it and hum it and whistle it so often, but always under your breath, as if you don’t wish for anyone but yourself to hear it.”

“If that was my goal, I clearly failed,” Bilbo said, then sighed. “I learnt it from my dwarf friends, of course. It’s a song about home.”

“I wouldn’t think singing of home on the road is a good idea, Mister Bilbo,” mumbled Sam, stirring their potato soup. “Makes me homesick, it does. Don’t it make you feel that way too?”

“A little, yes, and also not in the least.”

Sam and Frodo exchanged frowns over the fire, then looked back at him. “Whatever you mean?”

“Well, I will try to explain, but don’t feel too bad if you don’t understand me. What I am about to say is not a thought that crosses hobbits’ minds often or at all, and so I will not be surprised if you don’t manage to wrap your heads round it.” He smiled at his young companions, pulling out his pipe from his rucksack. As he lit it, he said, “You see, before, I would have said that home is behind and the world ahead, but for some time now I have known that my home is both behind and ahead of me.”

“You can’t think the whole world your home, Uncle! There are countless places you haven’t seen, innumerable things about it that you will never know. How could you possibly call it your home if you are a stranger to it and it to you?”

“I don’t think he means the whole of the world, Mister Frodo,” said Sam, his bright eyes pinned to the old hobbit over the campfire. “What say you, Mister Bilbo? Do you mean the whole of the world?”

Bilbo’s smile turned soft. “I say it’s a matter of perspective. My whole world may not encompass the whole world, after all.”

The boys grew quiet at that, Frodo’s brow furrowed in thought and Sam giving the tiniest of nods before going back to making sure their humble feast didn’t get overcooked. Bilbo stood up and went to spend some time with the ponies. He murmured sweet things at them and petted their muzzles, his pipe hanging from his lips, then meandered back to the camp and accepted his bowl of soup with a small smile. Dinner was a quiet affair, and Bilbo wondered why his words would have put the boys in such a pensive mood.

When the time for bed arrived, Bilbo curled up in his sleeping mat with his back turned to the boys. Sam and Frodo’s whispering was still easy to hear despite the crackling of the campfire, but he didn’t try to make out their words. In fact, if he let his mind drift, it almost sounded like another language. And if he fell asleep imagining that the boys’ young voices belonged to another pair of youths, then no one had to know.

Chapter Text

It had been a few months since Bilbo had last been in Bree, and not a lot had changed. The town was very much the same as he remembered it. The shops and pubs and stalls were all in their usual places, the people still favoured clothes with browns and greys, and the streets were still half-cobblestone and half-mud.

To any regular hobbit, the place would seem jaded and unappealing: the Shire was very much alive with colour and birdsong, which were things the human settlement lacked. To Bilbo, the rough practicality of the town brought a smile to his lips.

“There’s a dwarf!” said Sam, pointing ahead.

Bilbo planted both hands on the pommel of his saddle and pushed, gaining a few extra inches to peek over the crowd. He grunted as every joint in his body creaked in protest. Without a doubt, the stout figure up ahead could be nothing but a citizen from the Blue Mountains—and he was waiting where Bilbo had been told their escort would be. Bilbo spurred his pony and dismounted when he reached the dwarf, telling the boys to stay put on their saddles.

“Good day,” he said, rubbing the small of his back to dispel some of his discomfort. “Bilbo Baggins at your service.”

“Narvari at yours,” replied the dwarf,Glancing at Frodo and Sam. He asked, “What brings you hobbits here?”

“We’re here to join the envoy bound for Erebor. I wrote to your King Regent some time ago—Dávur, I think, was his name—and he agreed to let us travel with you. I have the letter here. One moment.”

Bilbo turned to his pony and started rummaging around the bags and sacks hanging from its sides. Things had moved about during the previous days of travelling, and digging up the small slip of paper was more difficult than he had intended. By the time he found it, the back of his neck was burning with an awkward sort of embarrassment.

“Ah, yes, good. Here you go!”

The dwarf inspected the letter with a magnifying glass. As if Bilbo had the skill or patience to forge the riotous scrawl of a dwarf he had never met in his life! Once he was done, he waved at them to follow him.

Bilbo guided his pony by the reins, choosing to give his poor back and other more delicate parts of his body some respite from the past few days of riding. Sam and Frodo trailed after him, still on their ponies and making sounds of awe at the littlest of things. Bilbo found it quite endearing. He was glad that the boys seemed to be taking so well to being on the road for the first time. If he had had to deal with someone who complained as much as he had on the quest for Erebor—well. Bilbo didn’t think he had enough patience to deal with someone like that. Sometimes he wondered how his hard-boiled friends hadn’t dumped him into a creek and left him there.

Near the East Gate of Bree was the envoy of dwarves that would be travelling to Erebor with them. A couple of humans were with the group—merchants and Rangers, by the looks of them. Bilbo supposed they would go with them only part of the way. He doubted they had also been invited.

Finally, they were brought to Dávur. He was a brown-haired dwarf with a frizzy mane and beard that were kept from looking too wild thanks to many golden beads of different sizes and hues. His eyes were sharp but kindly, and he greeted them with zeal.

They were introduced in proper dwarf fashion: lots of bowing and pledges of service took place. Bilbo had a moment of panic when the King Regent moved in to bash their foreheads together, but he managed to squawk ‘gently!’ before the dwarf could put a dent in his skull.

Frodo was introduced then, with Sam right behind him. After that, they were shown to the wagon onto which they should load their things and then themselves. Bilbo instructed the boys in how the bundles should be stacked and then they had a meal in a nearby inn with some of their future companions.

Not two days later, they were on the road. Bilbo had purchased some extra blankets to make the wagon’s floor more hospitable. It had the side-effect of Frodo and Sam burrowing in them and napping the days away after a week of journeying. All the jostling about had made them quiet down after a week of unrelenting enthusiasm.

The boys had made plenty of new acquaintances, both dwarven and human, while their excitement had lasted. Now that the novelty of being on their way East in a caravan full of strangers had worn off, however, they were more selective with whom they spent their time. It had taken one incident with a rooster and a head of cabbage to understand that they should stay away from certain people. They had groused and pouted at Bilbo as they plucked feathers from their hair, but he had laughed and offered no comfort other than telling them there was no better way of learning than through experience.

Bilbo’s acquaintances were limited to the King Regent and those who poked their heads through the wagon’s canvas to meet the prestigious Bilbo Baggins of the Green Hills. Frodo had given him the funniest look the first time he heard someone call Bilbo that. His nephew’s face was even funnier after Bilbo explained that what hobbits considered disgraceful was often commonplace or even honourable in other realms, which meant that the world at large thought him a most excellent fellow. Still, he remained himself, and so he encouraged his visitors to come by as little as possible.

After some time, the excitement of having Bilbo Baggins as a travelling companion wore off, and things went quiet in their wagon. The caravan of dwarves continued on, bidding farewell to the human Rangers and merchants as they left the West further behind.

Some nights, Bilbo would be coaxed into telling a story after dinner. His tales would always be met with unanimous delight. There was no surprise there, considering that it was about the retaking of an ancient dwarven kingdom and his audience was comprised of dwarves. He enjoyed the attention paid to his storytelling immensely anyhow.

Sometimes, and especially during the hours of daylight, Bilbo would peek out of the wagon and try to recognise the scenery. For some time, he thought he could. His eyes would drink in the sight of a creek or a tree trunk or an oddly shaped rock and he would feel as though he shared a secret with them, but after a while the feeling decreased and then stopped altogether.

“How much longer till we reach the Trollshaws?” asked Frodo one night. “I would like to see the stone statues.”

“We’re giving that whole area a wide berth,” grumbled a dwarf, squinting down at his bowl of gruel with greens. “Just in case. Some of us wanted to take a detour and have Master Bilbo tell us the story of that night under the statues, but Lord Dávur insisted that we reach Erebor as soon as possible, so it could not be.”

“It’s for the best, I think,” Bilbo said, finishing his meal.

Sam asked, “Why’s that, Mister Bilbo?”

“Because that particular night casts King Thorin in rather an unflattering light!” Bilbo replied, causing everyone within hearing distance to laugh. “What would he do if he were to discover that I have been telling such tales about him? I dare not find out.”

Frodo remained in a bit of a sour mood at having lost his chance to see the statues, but soon forgot his temper in favour of helping Sam teach their new friends to play conkers. Bilbo left them to it and retired for the evening, indulging in his pipe just outside their wagon.

His eyes remained fixed eastwards as he blew his smoke rings and remembered. It was silly to long so intensely when he was getting closer to the source of his yearning, yet long he did. Old men such as him had a right to be wistful, he thought, and then he blew another smoke ring.

Chapter Text

They reached Rivendell the following day. Lord Elrond welcomed them with grace, and there was song and cheer that night all across the elven city. Bilbo laughed from his seat, clapping every time a performance ended and nudging Sam toward any elf that glided past them. It was no secret that the youngest Gamgee had a fixation with the immortal people, and Bilbo was the sort to encourage such unhobbitish behaviour.

After the feast, Bilbo joined Lord Elrond for some wine in his study. There he met the Lord’s twin sons and stayed up exchanging stories until the wee hours. When he finally tiptoed into his assigned quarters, a sliver of soft pink-golden light could be seen tinting the far horizon. Dawn was near.

Bilbo stifled a yawn and changed into the silken nightclothes that had been left for him. They were loose and warm, and he gave a contented sigh at the chance to dress so comfortably for the first time since leaving Bree. Then he slipped under the covers, careful not to waken the boys, and let sleep claim him.

All too soon, he awoke to the sound of someone knocking with courteous firmness on his door. Frodo rolled onto his stomach and covered his head with his blankets, and Sam continued to snore away in his own bed. Grumbling, Bilbo resigned himself to be the responsible adult and get the door. He shuffled out of bed and went to greet whoever it was with a yawn, not bothering to straighten his clothes or card a hand through his hair.

One of Elrond’s servants was there, immaculate the way only elves ever managed to be. She curtsied when Bilbo blinked, frowned, and asked if there was anything she needed, foregoing his good manners altogether.

“My Lord would like to see you in his study, Master Baggins. At once, if possible.”

“Very well, but I will have to get changed,” he said, gesturing at his nightclothes. “I was sleeping, you see.”

“I apologise, Master Baggins.”

“Oh, no need to say sorry,” he told her, though he was pleased that she had. “Give me a moment.”

He washed his face with the pitcher and basin in the corner table, then changed into one of the garbs that were hung in the wardrobe—small elven clothing that was far too wide at the waist and sported colours far too bright to have belonged to elven children. It was nice to know that Rivendell had prepared for the arrival of its guests.

Once he was ready, he followed the elf down the hallways and into a splendid room with a vaulted ceiling and intricate tapestries adorning the bits of wall that weren’t covered by books and scrolls. Hands itching to close round an ancient tome or two, Bilbo almost forgot why he was there. Then he noticed the people in the room, and he turned his attention to them with a sigh. As his sweet mother would tell him: people first, books later.

Lord Elrond was sitting on a chair so grand and luxurious that it might as well have been a throne, his gaze serene but twinkling. Around him were a couple of proper-sized—or ‘hobbit-sized’—chairs. Two of them were already taken.

“Merry!” Bilbo gaped. “Pippin!”

The two jumped out of their seats in unison. Lord Elrond covered his mouth to keep his smile hidden. Bilbo wanted to shout at him. There was no humour in the situation. He stomped forward, ready to wallop the two fool boys in the head.

“Mister Bilbo, we can explain,” said Merry.

“Oh, I’m hoping you can!” Bilbo huffed. “What do you think you’re doing so far away from home?”

“We want to go with you!” said Pippin.

“Yes! I mean, wouldn’t you agree that it’s unfair,” Merry added in his most reasonable tone, “that only Frodo and Sam get to see Erebor after everything you’ve told us about it? We all should have a chance to see it.”

“Precisely.” Pippin nodded. “And we’re all best friends. If they get to see Erebor, so should we!”

“Because best friends do things together.”

“All things.”

“Most things,” Merry amended.

“So where’s Fatty?” asked Bilbo, though he already knew the answer. Fatty may be a close friend, but he was far too good a hobbit to go further than the Shire borders. “Tucked away in one of your pockets, perhaps?”

“He was too scared to come,” said Pippin. “But we weren’t!”

“And for once, I do believe that I agree with Fatty,” Bilbo snapped. “Do you know how dangerous the roads are these days? Even if there are less orcs round these parts, there are still others capable of evil skulking about. That you two made it this far travelling on your own is so improbable that I’m having a hard time believing it!”

“Ah!” Pippin grinned. “But we weren’t alone!”

“We travelled with you,” said Merry. “Only, we hid amongst the provisions all this time.”

“We stayed so many days curled up,” groused Pippin. “Everything aches!”

“All I’m getting from this is that you are responsible for the shortage of food that no one could explain. It was driving Lord Dávur mad!” Bilbo rubbed his temples. “I am very disappointed in you, boys.”

“Why?” Merry frowned. “We didn’t do anything bad.”

“Really! Running off like this isn’t bad! And I bet I’m not the only one who considers this a surprise. No, I bet you didn’t have the mind to leave your parents a note or a letter or anything that might put their minds at ease!” Bilbo’s hands went to run up and down his braces, something they did when he was agitated, but all they found was the smooth elven tunic. He started pacing instead. “Your families must be going mad looking for you two! What a sight it must be, Tooks and Brandybucks leaving no stone unturned as they try to find their missing children!”

“We aren’t children!” cried Pippin. “We’re tweens!”

“Practically adults,” added Merry, “if you think about it.”

“You’re fifteen years too early to call yourselves that, Meriadoc Brandybuck. Goodness! Just—from where did you get the idea that doing something like this is even the littlest bit acceptable?”

“From you,” they said in unison.

Bilbo’s mouth snapped shut. Lord Elrond didn’t bother hiding his smile this time.

“I believe there is some merit to your nephews’ words, Master Baggins.”

“Cousins.”

“Cousins,” the Elf-lord accepted.

“And there actually isn’t,” Bilbo said. “I was a full-grown hobbit when I went on my adventure. Your business is your own at that age. But you boys are still under the care of your parents and your families. Leaving in such a way was a completely selfish thing to do and I hope that you are ashamed of yourselves.”

“We were going to send a letter home when we reached Rivendell,” said Merry, squirming under the weight of Bilbo’s disapproval. “That’s why we talked to one of the elves, to ask for paper and a quill, but in the end they just made things more complicated. No offence,” he added, bowing to Lord Elrond.

“You’re still going to write that letter,” Bilbo cut in before the Elf-lord could reply. “And you’ll make sure to say I looked after you from the very first day.”

“But they’ll think you—”

“I know what they’ll think, and I don’t give a fig. Better have them believe you were safe under my care all this time than stowed away between crates and stealing scraps of food. And you aren’t coming to Erebor.”

“What!”

“After this? Oh, no. I wouldn’t have a moment’s peace worrying over what you two are up to. No, you’ll stay here with Lord Elrond’s people and wait until I return from the East.”

“That is entirely unfair!” howled Pippin, stomping one big woolly foot.

“Yes!” Merry said, sounding just as distressed. “We’ve made it this far. Why not take us with you the rest of the way?”

“Please, Mister Bilbo!”

“Absolutely not.”

“If you leave us here, we’ll just sneak after you again,” Merry challenged, chin up and arms crossed.

“Lord Elrond’s people won’t be so careless as to let you slip away.”

“You say that,” Merry said, giving Bilbo a very pointed look, “as if you thought hobbits couldn’t sneak round and past elves unnoticed. But that’s not true, is it?”

“Don’t you go using my own stories against me! What happened in Mirkwood is very different from what would happen here if I had you stay. But fine, yes. You want to come? You can come, although”—Bilbo raised a halting hand when the boys began cheering—“I want you two on your best behaviour. No more sneaking about and nabbing food and going places without letting someone know first. Are we clear?”

“Yes, Mister Bilbo!”

When the caravan left Rivendell a few days later, it was with their provisions restocked, two additional hobbit lads, and a small party of elves. Lord Elrond had been invited to the celebrations in Erebor as well, Bilbo had been surprised to learn. Though if one thought about it, it made quite a lot of sense—Thorin probably wanted to rub his reclaimed and thriving kingdom in the Elf-lord’s face. They took the lower route of the Pass of Imladris to cross the Misty Mountains. It was just wide enough for the wagons, and more than once they thought one might tip over the edge.

Bilbo took to glancing down at his loyal Sting, which he had strapped to his hip the moment he had stepped out of the Shire. He dreaded glimpsing a blue glow each time his eyes darted to it, but the blade remained silver. Not three moons after they had entered the mountains, they left them behind.

Not many weeks after, Bilbo spotted the Carrock through the mist one morning. Although it was a ways up north, he thought that they might head that way and stop by Beorn’s lands to rest for a day or two. They were making good time, so there was no reason to hurry ahead.

However, he soon discovered that the skin-changer remained as fond of visitors as he had been when Thorin’s Company had slinked into his home. A caravan of sixty-something people, mostly encompassed of dwarves, wouldn’t be well-received by the solitary fellow. Though Bilbo was quick to learn in Thranduil’s Halls that the bear-man was anything but solitary these days.

“You’re Beorn’s son,” Bilbo repeated, but he still didn’t quite believe it. “His son?”

“Yes,” said Grimbeorn, giving Bilbo a close-lipped smile. The resemblance was there. Grimbeorn was as large and fierce-looking as his father, although his hair was somewhat lighter and his expression a lot more amicable. “He sends you his regards.”

“Oh! Well, how kind of him.” To avoid looking too pleased by the fact that Beorn remembered him and had told his son to greet him in his stead, Bilbo picked up a strange purple fruit from the bowl in front of him and began peeling it. “Please tell him he is remembered with fondness, if a little exasperation, and that he is welcome to Bag End at any time he wishes.”

Grimbeorn gave a polite nod, not one to speak more than strictly needed. Bilbo didn’t mind. Grimbeorn’s father had been a taciturn man as well. It was to be expected that his offspring would share the trait. Their conversation finished, Grimbeorn turned to listen to the person sat on his other side.

Bilbo bit into the strange fruit, its sweet taste filling his mouth as he watched the skin-changer exchange quiet words with the blonde elf. The world had changed a lot more than he had expected. Perhaps, instead of believing what passing travellers would tell him, he should have wandered farther than Bree.

Now that he was closer to Erebor than to Hobbiton, Bilbo could see that the journey wasn’t so arduous if it wasn’t a secret mission to reclaim a kingdom and slay a dragon. There had been little dangers on the road, something that Bilbo was glad for but that most elves and dwarves found ominous, but Bilbo decided to ignore the puckered brows round him and stay cheerful for what waited up ahead: Erebor, his friends, and a feast the likes of which he had never seen.

Chapter Text

The first feast that left Bilbo agape was in Dale. There was no denying that Lord Elrond and the Elvenking had been gracious—if reluctant, in the latter’s case—hosts; they had had delicious foods and entertainment ready for their guests. But if there was something that hobbits and humans shared, it was that they knew no limit when it came to carousing.

The Dalish people handed out ale and cold meats to the travellers that filed into the main hall. It reminded Bilbo of the one where the Master of Lake-town had hosted a party in the Company’s honour fifty years before, but this one was different. For all the prosperity that the Kingdom of Dale enjoyed these days, the great hall’s grandness was of a practical and humble nature: its stone walls were clean and covered in tapestries, the firepit at its centre well-kept despite its use, and the narrow but tall windows let in plenty of light during daytime.

A few minutes after Bilbo found himself a seat at one of the long tables, the King of Dale strode up to greet him. He was dressed in garbs that were surprisingly unpretentious for someone of his rank, his greying hair tied back with a silver clasp, and there were deep grooves in his face that spoke of long days and nights devoted to hard work. Bilbo stared at him for a long moment, then startled.

“Bain?”

Bilbo knew that Bard had become the leader of his people, so it was only logical that his son would have stepped up to fill his shoes at some point. Bilbo’s image of Bain, however, was that of a wet-eared and hot-headed boy running after his father and scowling at the soaked dwarves—and hobbit—in his home. To see him with a crown upon his brow was staggering.

“Aye! Well met, Master Hobbit,” laughed the man. “Be welcome in my city.”

“You mean kingdom!”

“Some call it that,” Bain conceded. “Though Da never liked that title. Said it was the same as calling the thrush a hawk, and I find myself agreeing with him. Dale still has much to do before deserving to be called a kingdom. But now is not the time to speak of these things. Come! Tonight, we welcome you and your travel companions. Let us drink and eat and toast to you and your good health!”

And so they did, and the party was splendid. It once again reminded Bilbo of the way the Master of Lake-town had greeted them during their quest to retake Erebor, though now there were no starving faces in the crowd, and people weren’t dressed in sullied rags. Bard had indeed been a good king to his people, and judging by the way people clapped Bain in the back and made way for him, so was his son.

A plethora of songs were sung that night, and Bilbo’s boys got lost in the crowd somewhere between his fourth and fifth flagon of mead. He didn’t worry or send someone to fetch them; they were young, but not foolish—or at least Bilbo trusted the smart ones to keep the daft ones out of trouble.

Besides, he recalled his own excitement upon visiting a human city of the northeast for the first time. Trying to curb their desire to run about and see as much as they could of the place would be in vain. Not to mention that having four pairs of ears slithering round would put him up to speed with what was going on in Dale much faster than talking with the King himself.

Bilbo was introduced to many men and women that night. He did his best to remember their names and treat them with his distinct brand of hobbit cordiality—which, truth be told, wasn’t very cordial—but soon grew weary of all the socialising and retreated outside.

He sat on a bench with a plate and a flagon, his eyes pinned on Erebor. Its peak was covered in pure-white snow, turned blue by the night’s glow. Bilbo tried to remember if it had been like that as well the first time he saw it. He couldn’t. The image his mind conjured up was of a reclaimed Erebor, golden-brown in the pearly light of dawn on the day he left for the Shire.

“Home is behind,” he said, the words coming out with a half-tune. They were, after all, part of a song he had written a few years after returning to his green door and cushioned armchair. It had been a way of connecting with his previous self, with the hobbit that had gone on an adventure but never returned. Sighing, he muttered, “But what is behind and what is ahead? You turn round and the meaning changes.”

“Does something trouble you, Master Halfling?”

Bilbo gave a jump, his hand flying to his side as he tried to find the person who had startled him. It wasn’t a hard task: a tall man stood a few feet away from him, his face young and noble despite the weariness of travel etched onto his drooping eyes. He was clad in rich dark fabrics, an elegant tree embroidered with silver thread onto the front of his shirt. A sword and a white horn, both silver-tipped and gleaming, rested at his hip.

“Oh, you gave me quite a fright, you did,” Bilbo scolded the man.

“You have my apologies. I didn’t mean to do so.” His grey eyes traveled to Bilbo’s hand, a small smirk tugging at his lips. “It is a warrior’s instinct to reach for his weapon when he feels there might be danger nearby, and for that, sir, I commend you. Alas, there is no mighty metal with you at this moment.”

“What?” Bilbo’s hand clutched his pocket, cold fear gripping his chest, and then he realised that the man was talking about his sword. “Oh, yes. Yes, silly me, I left it—left it in the wagon. Didn’t think I would be needing it here, but I can see you think differently.”

“Indeed I do.” The man rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. Oddly enough, there was nothing threatening about the gesture. The man was a warrior, that much was obvious, yet it was clear that he was far from being a mindless one. “I come from faraway lands, Master Halfling,” the man continued, “and I have seen many things in my life. One could say I am used to being more cautious than most.”

“You come from the South, then? How far down?” asked Bilbo, then shook himself. “Oh, but where are my manners! I’m Bilbo Baggins of the Shire.”

“Boromir son of Denethor,” replied the man, giving a deep bow. “Though there is no need for you to introduce yourself, Master Halfling. I know who you are. Tales of you quest were my favourite as a boy.”

“Were they now? Well, I hope not to have disappointed you. I look far less impressive than the ridiculous retellings that I have come to hear on my way here. Some of them make me a giant! Why, I am a hobbit, which means I am no giant. Nor a dragon-slayer, mind. I hope you don’t believe I slew the beast. That was all King Bard’s doing.”

“You were described as no taller than a child, quick of wit and fierce of character, garbed in pale jewels and wielding a glowing blade.” Boromir’s eyebrows rose at the sight of Bilbo’s feet. “Though there was no mention of woolly toes.”

“How very preposterous,” Bilbo huffed, but he was grinning. “Please have a seat.”

Boromir did, shifting his sword out of the way. To Bilbo, having to be always minding one’s weapons seemed bothersome, but the man didn’t even seem to notice. It was as if he had been born with his in hand, or at least acquired it right after learning to crawl. How different were the peoples of Middle-earth! Some as gentle as flowers, others as fierce as wolves.

They remained outside for some time, eating Bilbo’s food and drinking Bilbo’s mead. The hobbit deemed it adequate to share, seeing how making new acquaintances was all about making good impressions. Despite being of the race of Men, Boromir appreciated the gesture as well as one of Bilbo’s neighbours would have, or perhaps even better since there was no suspicion in his eyes and mutters of mad adventures. Yet he never ate or drank more than Bilbo, and he even went inside to get them some venison and red wine after Bilbo’s flagon and plate were emptied.

Pleasant fellow, Boromir. A bit brash and prideful, but it was to be expected. During their chat, the man had revealed to be eldest son of the Steward of Gondor, which made him a Prince of sorts from what Bilbo could understand.

Now that he thought about it, Merry and Pippin were a little like him, which could be blamed on their being the heirs of the closest things that hobbits had to nobility titles. Bilbo supposed, then, that it was a particular brand of eccentric behaviour reserved for the aristocracy. He knew another pair of Princes—and a King—who also fit the mould.

Sleep came to Bilbo with no resistance that night. He had been given a room in King Bain’s home, and he found it impossible to turn down the offer of a lush mattress. He searched for the King’s sisters, having missed them during the celebrations, but soon gave up and retired for the night. The girls, who were now grown women, were most likely already deep in slumber.

The next morning, he admired the decorations that he had overlooked in his drowsy stumble to the bed, then let his nose guide him to the hall where breakfast was being served. He was surprised to see Boromir sitting between Merry and Pippin, the boys sporting grins that reached their ears as they listened to whatever the man was saying. The looks on their faces told Bilbo that it must be a story; for they were usually reserved for when they were sitting under the Party Tree and listening to Bilbo talk about trolls and giant spiders and dragons.

Frodo waved him over and Bilbo joined them at the table with little fuss, not wanting to interrupt Boromir in his story-telling. In any case, an oliphaunt could have stomped on their table and neither Boromir nor his captive audience would have noticed Bilbo’s arrival.

“—glaring at me through the mist with their repulsive faces.”

“And what did you do then?” asked Pippin, biting an apple with great trepidation.

“Why, I did what a warrior of Gondor does, of course! I unsheathed my sword”—Boromir swept an arm out in a wide arc, as if drawing an imaginary blade out of its scabbard—“and met the foul beasts straight on!”

“Story time?” Bilbo whispered.

“Story time,” Frodo confirmed. “About his travels here.”

“Ah, yes. He told me a few anecdotes last night. Quite impressive.”

“Don’t see why Merry and Pippin are so smitten with Mister Boromir’s stories,” Sam muttered. “They aren’t nearly half as interesting as yours are, Mister Bilbo.”

“All stories have merit,” Bilbo said, filling his plate with what smelled like beef-and-barley buns and reaching for a jar with steaming coffee. Pouring himself a cup, he added, “Mine were only special back home because they were the only ones that spoke of great deeds in distant realms.”

“Oh, stuff and nonsense!” Sam countered. “Your stories were special because they spoke of the importantest things. Friendship and courage and loyalty.”

“And burglary,” added Frodo, grinning at his uncle from behind his cup.

“Hush up, you two.”

Ignoring the boys’ quiet laughter, Bilbo turned to his breakfast and thought of all the things he should do before the caravan continued with its journey. Talking to Bain was high on the list. They hadn’t had a proper conversation the previous day, and Bilbo wanted to pass on his condolences on Bard’s passing, as well as congratulate the boy—the man—on what seemed to be excellent leadership skills. He also wanted to hear news on his sisters, and greet them if it possible. Then he might go for a stroll and see how much of the ruins had been recycled in the construction of the new Dale.

Lost in thought as he was, he almost missed it when Boromir stuttered in his retelling of how he had halved some dark being or other and wished him a good morning. For a fraction of a second, Bilbo felt the impish need to recite Gandalf’s riddling questions regarding good-mornings, but then decided to spare the human. He looked up from his meal and returned the greeting with a smile. The Captain of Gondor visibly relaxed.

“I wouldn’t recommend eating so much, Master Halfling,” said Boromir. “We’ll be riding out to Erebor after breakfast. The swaying of the wagons might upset your stomach.”

“I have yet to meet a hobbit who brings up something he gobbled down,” Bilbo laughed.

“Mister Bilbo’s right, Boromir!” said Pippin.

“If there is one thing we hobbits are good at,” Merry patted his belly, “it’s keeping our stomachs full.”

“And don’t call us halflings,” Pippin chided their new friend. “It’s in bad taste.”

“I’m afraid races other than hobbits haven’t got a clue as to what is in good or bad taste, my lad,” Bilbo said. He wiped his mouth with a handkerchief and stood up. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have plenty to do before we move on to the Lonely Mountain.”

Chapter Text

Erebor grew closer by the minute. After a day’s ride, they were almost at the gates of the ancient kingdom. Bilbo couldn’t help but notice how different the landscape was. The air was clean and didn’t reek of sulphur and rotten flesh, and there was healthy-looking vegetation growing by the road. Up ahead, Bilbo knew, the River Celduin would be rushing down the mountain, its waters clean and clear as they followed it to its source.

He rested against the wagon, his eyes flickering from this rock to that tree to those birds. Everything was so alive. He almost couldn’t believe that this place was the same place he remembered with such solemnity. It was inconceivable that such terrible things had happened in lands that now were so peaceful.

“Master Bilbo.” Boromir spurred his steed so it would bring him closer to the wagon. “Are you well?”

“Yes, of course I am.”

“But you’re crying!” said Pippin from his spot in front of Boromir. Bilbo still wasn’t very sure how he had convinced the man to share the saddle. “You can’t be fine.”

“What makes you sad, Mister Bilbo?” asked Sam.

Frodo rested a hand on Bilbo’s shoulder. “Can we help, Uncle?”

“Silly children,” Bilbo chuckled, thumbing at the tears. “I’m not sad. I’m gladdened by what my eyes see. All these years, I refused to visit Erebor because I feared recovering from dragon-fire and ruin was impossible—”

“Well,” Frodo patted him in the back, putting an end to his mounting emotions. “Better late than never, as we Bagginses say.”

“Yes.” Bilbo nodded. “Yes, as we say.”

“Is it really so very changed, Mister Bilbo?” asked Merry.

“Oh, yes. There were almost no plants round Erebor when I first came, and the air was permeated with vile vapours that sometimes rose from the mountain.” Bilbo wrinkled his nose as if he could still smell it. “A dragon’s breath is nearly as deadly as its fire, I’d say. I have no idea how the Lake-men endured it for so long.”

The wagon jostled to a stop, sending the hobbits in it knocking into each other. Pippin smothered a giggle behind his hands, but it didn’t save him from Merry’s rude gesturing. Ignoring the boys’ antics, Bilbo worked himself free of Frodo, who had got squashed against him by a flailing Sam, and padded to the front of the wagon. Raising the blanket that covered the front opening of the bonnet, he tapped the jockey’s shoulder.

“Excuse me, but is there any reason why we have stopped?”

“Everyone has, though the reason escapes me,” the jockey said, her golden beard wagging as she talked. She fiddled with the reins in her hands, giving a sigh. “I suppose we ought to wait until those in front of us start moving again.”

“Thank you.” Bilbo let the blanket fall back in place and rejoined the others. “I have no idea what is happening.”

“Perhaps one of the wagons broke a wheel,” said Sam.

“We heard no commotion,” Pippin said, straightening in the saddle and almost knocking Boromir in the chin. The Gondorian had named him Guard’s Squire, an honorary title that Bilbo doubted held any real meaning but which Pippin had taken to with a bit too much zeal. “Would you doubt us?”

“Oh, shut up, Pippin,” grumbled Merry.

“I will go find out what is keeping us,” said Boromir. He lifted Pippin by the armpits and placed him in the wagon, much to the boy’s dismay. “You stay here, little one. It could be dangerous.”

“Wait! Don’t leave me behind! It’s impolite!” Pippin cried, but Boromir was already cantering away on his horse. Pippin slung a leg over the wagon’s wooden boards, intent on chasing after him, but Merry grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and yanked him back. “Let me go, Merry!”

“He said it could be dangerous!”

“Listen to your cousin, Pippin,” Bilbo said, pulling out his pipe. “For once, he talks sense.”

“Do you think it could be bandits?” asked Sam, peering out of the canvas.

“This close to the Mountain? Doubtful,” Bilbo snorted, going about lighting his pipe. “Very doubtful. No, I’m thinking more along the lines of a welcome party riding out to meet us. Probably full of dwarven warriors to make sure no thieves or crooks are sneaking into the kingdom.”

Frodo gave Bilbo an innocent smile. “Will we be leaving you at the gate then?”

“Cheeky.”

Bilbo thrust his pipe into his nephew’s hands and strapped Sting to his hip.

“Uncle?”

“Smoke that.” Bilbo pointed at the pipe. “I’ll be right back.”

He climbed off the wagon, giving Merry a scathing look when the lad made to grab him by the collar like he had done with Pippin. Unlike the young Took, Bilbo wasn’t in the business of getting into a pickle every hour of the day. He would stay hidden from view if the situation looked unsafe.

“All right, you boys stay here,” Bilbo said, then repeated, “I’ll be right back.”

“Be safe, Mister Bilbo,” said Sam, taking Bilbo’s travelling cloak when he held it out. “Don’t go playing hero like in your stories. You’re no dwarf-warrior, sir!”

“I know that, thank you. Now stay put.”

Bilbo gave his waistcoat a firm tug and started walking toward the mountain. The wagon he and the boys were in was about halfway down the caravan, so it would take him a bit of speed-walking to reach the front quickly. He waved at dwarves and elves as they peeked out of their own wagons. No one looked distressed, merely confused. That was always a good sign.

He spotted Boromir after a short while of walking. The man was not only dismounted but on his knees as well, and Bilbo’s heart gave a leap at what that might mean. He couldn’t see those to whom Boromir was paying his respects because the man’s steed blocked his sight, but the deep-blue banners with the star-crown of Durin waving in the wind were unmistakable.

Bilbo trotted up to the small group of people who had gathered there, words stuck to his throat as he tried to call out but failed. The distance shortened until there was none left. When he noticed Bilbo’s arrival, Boromir guided his horse out of the way.

Two dwarves came into view. They stood proudly in front of Bilbo, dressed in exquisite velvets and downy furs. Upon their brows sat silver circlets studded with strange and gleaming jewels whose names Bilbo didn’t presume to know.

“Fíli?” Bilbo asked, his eyes wide as they slid to the other dwarf. “Kíli?”

“At your service,” they said in tandem.

The brunet grinned and pulled Bilbo into an embrace. “It’s been a long time, Master Baggins!”

“Oh, yes, I suppose it has,” Bilbo stammered, giving Kíli an awkward pat. He pulled back, shock melting into absolute delight as he took in the brothers. “It has been a long time indeed, if my eyes don’t deceive me. My goodness, look at how much you’ve grown! I was convinced you all would look the same as the night you knocked on my door, what with you dwarves living as long as fir trees, but dear me, was I wrong! Look at you both. Oh, look at you both!” he cried, pulling both Princes into a firm embrace. Against Fíli’s shoulder, he sniffled, “It’s been entirely too long.”

“If there is someone Time hasn’t touched, that is you,” laughed the blonde dwarf, his long beard tickling Bilbo’s cheek. “You have been missed, Master Baggins.”

“And you as well. Never doubt that,” Bilbo replied. He then held the brothers at arm’s length, his eyes narrowing. “And what is all this ‘Master Baggins’ nonsense? That is no way to address a friend! Or have I lost that title?”

“Never!” said Kíli.

“We just don’t want to overstep,” said Fíli.

Bilbo was distracted for a moment by their long manes and beards, oiled and plaited and beaded, so different from the shoulder-length hairs and patches of coarse stubble that they had sported during their questing days. Then he shook himself.

“Gibberish,” he scoffed. “Now, see here: If I feel at freedom to call a pair of dwarven Princes and their uncle, the King, by their name instead of their titles, not even using an honorific when talking to them, then they, in turn, are very much allowed to take the same liberties with me.”

Fíli smiled. “That is reasonable.”

“More sensible still would be stop delaying this caravan,” huffed Bilbo. “We’ve been on the road for many months, you know? We’re all quite tired despite the few breaks we could catch in the elven realms and King Bain’s halls.”

“Very true,” said Fíli, clapping a hand on Bilbo’s shoulder. He told a dwarven guard something in their language, and the warrior bowed before trotting away toward the first wagon. Turning back to Bilbo, Fíli smiled from ear to ear. “All right! Lead on, then, Bilbo. We would join you in your wagon, if there is any space for us.”

“More than enough! This way now. Boromir, are you coming?”

With that, they walked back. Fíli and Kíli linked arms with Bilbo, telling him how excited everyone was about his visiting. The younger Prince tried to make Bilbo promise he would stay for the winter. Fíli put an end to it by reaching behind the hobbit and slapping his brother in the back of the head. Bilbo laughed and tried to calm his thudding heart. Really, asking such difficult questions already!

It was true that Bilbo had thought to remain in the Lonely Mountain for the cold season, but that had been before catching Merry and Pippin. He had to return them to their families, and he couldn’t just send the boys on their own back West. They weren’t children, but they weren’t adults either.

Bilbo introduced the dwarf brothers to his charges, the young hobbits jumping to their feet and tripping over each other to meet the famous—or infamous, depending on Bilbo’s mood when he retold his adventure—Princes of Durin’s Folk.

They sat down to talk amid the woollen blankets and stacked boxes. They began by discussing Bilbo’s stories, and Kíli gave them a new twist as he answered the questions thrown his way. The tale that Bilbo had told a thousand times transformed itself through Kíli’s words, and the hobbits were enraptured as if they were hearing it for the first time.

Bilbo exchanged amused looks with Fíli, somehow having known without knowing that this would happen. Without their noticing, the caravan started moving again at some point. The rest of their journey to the Mountain was spent debating on whether Bilbo or Kíli were telling the truth about the quest.

When they reached Erebor, the Front Gate was open for them, yawning into the large entrance hall. The caravan trickled in, the wagons being emptied and redirected ten at a time. When it became Bilbo’s turn to unload his possessions, a group of dwarves flocked round him and his boys, unburdening them of everything and squirrelling away with their crates and bags.

“I hope we aren’t being robbed?” Bilbo asked Fíli.

“Not at all,” the Prince said. “They were instructed to take the hobbits’ assets to the Royal Wing the moment they arrived. That’s where you will be staying. We worried that the apartments we chose would be too large for only three of you, but now that we know you are indeed five, I think you will find them suitable.”

“I’m sorry about Merry and Pippin,” Bilbo apologised yet again. “I still don’t know how it took me so long to find out they had sneaked along. I suppose us hobbits are too good at slinking round, even from one another!”

“It’s quite all right, Bilbo,” said Kíli, holding each of the stowaways in a firm headlock. “The more, the merrier! I’m sure Uncle will love to meet them all. Good people are always welcome in Erebor.” To the heads trapped in his arms, he asked, “And you are good people, aren’t you?”

“Yes, very!” squeaked Pippin.

“Mighty good folk,” wheezed Merry.

“Prince Kíli,” snapped Boromir, jumping off his horse. “I ask that you unhand the little ones.”

“Peace! I’m not hurting them.”

“Yet I must insist.”

Bilbo rolled his eyes and took a few steps away from the over-worrying human and Kíli. He gazed at the walls, the ceiling, the floors, and marvelled at how everything was so different from his gaunt memories. It was like their friends had described in the letters. Outside, vegetation and animals had returned to embellish the walls of the Mountain; inside, Erebor gleamed as if every surface were made of precious metals and stones, sunlight pouring inside through the open gates and windows and skylights, with rows of gentle torchlight along the walls.

A shuddering breath escaped him as he drank in the beauty of the Mountain. His eyes shone with tears again, one hand coming to rest against the foot of a statue. It was smooth but not cold like he had expected. He closed his eyes and let the carved rock beat under his palm—the hammering deep in the mountain’s bowels where miners were working, probably, or perhaps something else altogether.

“Hello,” he murmured.

Chapter Text

The rooms were nice. In truth, that was a colossal understatement, but Bilbo had decided to steadfastly ignore the excessive opulence of their apartments. The boys were plenty excited on his behalf anyway, and someone needed to retain their wits if they planned to make it to dinner on time.

Dinner! Of course he had come to the Lonely Mountain to celebrate, and celebrations often included a good deal of food and drink and music and cheer. But the festival was still a week away, and Bilbo should have expected his old friends to organise a private welcome meal on the eve of his arrival, he really should have, yet the thought had never crossed his mind. He had been otherwise occupied thinking of what he would say when he finally saw them, or how he should address them, or whether they would greet him as warmly as they did in their letters to him.

There had been a lot of nerviness mucking about his thoughts, and it had blinded him to the obvious. When Fíli and Kíli had delivered the invitation to him—which hadn’t been an actual invitation but more of a reminder of something they considered evident, at least on Kíli’s part—Bilbo’s tongue had twisted and he had stumbled over his feet. Sam had come to his rescue, quick as thought, guiding Bilbo’s arms through the crook of his elbow and enquiring about the dishes that would be served. The Princes had turned their attention to the young always-ravenous hobbits, and Bilbo had been spared.

Now he stood in a lavish chamber, dusting off his clothes as he unpacked them and set them on the large four-poster bed. He wondered just how out of place they were all going to look in their simple attires, yet he refused to open the wardrobe that Fíli had promised was full of clothes ‘worthy of their good burglar’. He remembered what dwarves found worthy of him, and he had no interest in wearing a chain-mail corslet to a dinner with friends.

His charges, however, held no such scruples.

“Mister Bilbo, look!” Pippin called, striding into his room. There was a soft clinking sound, but Bilbo refused to turn round. “You were right. They have shirts made of steel! How obsessed can these dwarves be with metals?”

“About as much as hobbits are with food, I would wager,” he replied absentmindedly, picking up his blue brocade waistcoat. The pattern was simple, not quite flowery but not entirely abstract, and he had worn it so little that it looked new. Nodding to himself, Bilbo set it aside. Now all he needed was a shirt, a jacket, a tie, braces, and breeches. And a handkerchief, of course. “Could you ask Frodo to give me my lemony dotted ascot? I remember he packed it with his things.”

“All right.”

“And take off that thing,” Bilbo said. Pippin groaned at the command, but the clinking increased as the boy walked out of the room. Bilbo guessed that to mean that he had complied. “And put it back where you found it!”

“Mister Bilbo, sir?”

“Yes, Sam?”

“Terribly sorry to bother you, sir, but I’m not sure what to wear.”

“Anything’s fine, my boy,” Bilbo said, a toast-brown pair of breeches joining the waistcoat. “Just wear your best clothes, but make sure to shake off the dust they accumulated on the road before putting them on.” Bilbo tore his gaze away from the laid-out shirts he was perusing to give the boy a reassuring smile, but Sam’s expression, a mixture of resignation and despair, gave him pause. “What is it, lad?”

“These are my best clothes,” sighed the boy, gesturing at what he was wearing. If Bilbo was quite honest, he saw little to no difference with the clothes he wore while pruning Bag End’s flowerbed. “They aren’t acceptable for having dinner with royals, I don’t think.”

“I will have you know I once ate dinner in nothing but my underthings while in the presence of the very same royals we’ll be dining with tonight,” said Bilbo. He beckoned Sam to come closer, and the boy obeyed with aplomb. Bilbo picked lint off his jacket and straightened the lapels with a firm tug. “There we are. What a fine young man.”

“Very fine,” agreed Frodo, walking in with Bilbo’s ascot. “You wanted this, Uncle?”

“Yes, thank you, my lad.” Bilbo accepted the silken cloth and wrapped it round a hand. To Sam, he said, “Of course, I think I might have something that fits you, if you want to wear something different for the occasion.”

“Oh, no, Mister Bilbo, I couldn’t—”

“Your chestnut waistcoat would suit him,” interrupted Frodo. “With the peach cravat and those sandy breeches Missus Banks got you for her birthday. And I saw a very nice maroon jacket in my wardrobe. It doesn’t look very hobbitish, but it could work.”

Bilbo hummed. “Yes, it could. Sam?”

“I don’t want to ruin your pretty clothes, Mister Bilbo. Please don’t bother.”

“Don’t be foolish, Samwise Gamgee. Clothes are meant to be used and occasionally ruined, and rest assured that I won’t mind at all if you do the latter. In any case, I don’t think you’ll ruin anything: you’re more careful than these three put together.”

Bilbo gestured at his nephew and the door to include Merry and Pippin in his statement. Sam blushed at the compliment, but opened his mouth to defend his friends all the same. Bilbo turned back to the clothes on his bed and started humming to keep him from speaking. He tossed the ascot on top of his chosen waistcoat and breeches, and started looking for the garments Frodo had mentioned.

“Now, how about I give you the clothes?” he proposed, tossing a periwinkle cravat aside. “Then you can take them to your room, maybe try them on, and decide if you want to wear them or not. We still have a few hours before dinner; there is no rush.”

“I’ll go get the jacket,” said Frodo, then slipped out of the room.

Sam ended up choosing to wear the maroon jacket and sandy breeches, but returned the waistcoat and cravat after deciding that he would be fine with his own. Bilbo tossed them onto his bed before closing the door to his room. His bed was full of clothes and he gave a sigh at the thought of having to tidy up all that after dinner. He hoped the servants would do it. He would make sure to thank them for it later.

Tugging at the hem of his waistcoat, Bilbo ran his eyes up and down the boys to make sure that they were all presentable. Getting themselves sorted out and ready had taken longer than he had anticipated, but they could still make it on time.

Frodo and Pippin looked like perfect Shire boys. Merry had donned a grey jacket with golden runes etched on its borders. It was much more dwarvish-looking than Sam’s maroon one, and he had chosen it after the young gardener had admitted to feeling silly due to being the only hobbit dressed in odd garbs. Bilbo had almost slipped on his mithril shirt but bowed out at the last moment, picking up a simple cotton shirt instead.

“Is everyone ready?” he asked. At the boys’ chorusing yeses, he opened the door that led to the hallway. “Right. Onwards then, my good lads. We have some dwarves to meet.”

Chapter Text

The dwarf guards outside their apartments acted as guides, escorting Bilbo and his boys through the torchlit tunnels. It didn’t take long to reach their destination. Just a few turns, in fact, and they stopped in front of talls stone doors. Several voices could be heard from within. They were muffled, and he couldn’t make out what they were saying, but he knew, somehow, that the one to snap a remark just then was Dori, and the quip that followed belonged to Bofur.

Bilbo’s stomach twisted into knots, and he willed himself to relax. It wouldn’t do to ruin his appetite so early in the evening.

Trying to project calmness so the boys wouldn’t get skittish, he took a steadying breath, brushed the guards aside—who had meant to announce them—and knocked. On the other side of the doors, the soft buzzing of conversation died, then came back tenfold and with the added noise of furniture scraping against the floor.

Before Bilbo could register what was happening, the tall doors before him opened and Bofur barrelled into him with a bright grin. The boys screeched in surprise and jumped back, but Bilbo was too busy laughing to notice. His old friend let him go, prattling on about how good it was to see him and how they all had so much to tell him.

“The family tie with your cousin is a lot more obvious now,” Bilbo quipped, taking in the streaks of white through Bofur’s hair and moustache. He was then promptly pulled into Dori’s crushing embrace. “My goodness, you lot haven’t changed at all, have you?” he laughed, wiping at the corners of his eyes as he greeted his friends one by one. “Oh! Oh, please, gather round, everyone, let me introduce you all properly—this is my nephew, Frodo, and these are his friends, Sam, Merry, and Pippin. Boys, come say hello, go on.”

“Mister Frodo!” cried Dori, shaking the boy’s hand. “We meet at last! Your uncle wrote to me a lot when he had just taken you in, did you know? Asked for advice on how to deal with a precious little jewel such as yourself. You could say I helped raise you from afar!”

“Oh, please!” Bilbo snorted, extricating himself from the circle of Bifur’s arms. “The credit’s all mine! Besides, I didn’t ask only you. Sam’s parents as well! And Thorin, of course. Where is he, by the way?”

“Right here.”

Bilbo started and turned round, one hand going to his chest to keep his heart from bursting out. The King’s mane and beard were longer and greyer, and there were many more braids and beads in his hair, and his face looked older and wiser, with a thin long-healed scar splitting his eyebrow in two and missing his right eye by a breadth. But then Thorin smiled, all dimples and white teeth, his irises clear as the sky in summer, and it was as if no time had passed at all.

“Oh, you—you’re—” Bilbo laughed and slapped Thorin on the arm. “Goodness gracious, you made me jump, you silly dwarf!”

There was a strong pull in Bilbo’s chest making him lean closer, and he hoped that it would send him falling into Thorin’s arms. By the look Thorin was giving him, he was feeling something similar. The room around them grew hushed for an instant, and then of course it erupted into noise.

“I know you! You’re the important dwarf, Thorin Oakenshield!” cried Merry, taking a step forward. He held out a hand, dirt and grime caked under his nails due to the long months on the road. “Meriadoc Brandybuck at your service, my good sir.”

“And Peregrin Took,” said Pippin, his grin a twin to the one Merry was sporting. He offered his own hand as well, which was also dirty. Had the fool boys not washed before changing? “I have never met a King before. We hobbits did away with those pesky titles ages ago.”

“I don’t think we ever had them,” Merry said.

“Right!”

Bilbo wanted to crawl under the nearest rock. There was a reason why he had agreed to bring just Frodo and Sam to Erebor: the boys were sweet and gentle, yet they both had a core of steel that would help them fit right in amongst the outwardly rough yet inwardly kind dwarves. Merry and Pippin, on the other hand, were one of Gandalf’s fireworks gone wrong—too bright and too loud, and too close to be anything but a hazard.

Thorin didn’t seem to find them taxing in the least, or if he did, then he didn’t show it. His polite smile never wavered, even growing in size as the boys rambled on. He shook their hands with a firm but gentle grip—Bilbo knew this by the way the cords of his wrist, exposed when he raised his arm, didn’t tense with the strength of a tight hold—and made to move on to give Bilbo a proper greeting when Pippin spoke again:

“Mister Bilbo has told us all about you and your companions,” he said, looking the King up and down with an assessing eye. “Say, you are older than I had thought. Mister Bilbo always described your hair as all dark but for a few strands of silver, but now I see that it is more of a grey colour than anything!”

“Pippin!” Bilbo scolded him.

“I presume Master Baggins was describing me as he remembered me,” said Thorin, his eyes locking with Bilbo’s. “Indeed, a long time has passed since we last saw each other.”

“How long?” asked Pippin.

“Half a century.”

The sound Pippin made was one of utter bafflement. He turned his round disbelieving eyes on Bilbo. Without breaking eye contact with Thorin, he gave a little smile and shrugged, unable to deny the King’s words.

“It’s a long trip,” he said, though it sounded like an excuse instead of an explanation.

“But now you’re here,” said Thorin, finally disentangling himself from the young hobbits. He approached BIlbo with a smile and rested a hand on his shoulder. “And we have prepared accordingly.”

He gestured at the long table waiting for them a little ways into the room. Silverware glittered under the torchlight, and there were bowls and platters filled with slices of fruit and cheese and cold meat. Bilbo heard the boys gasping and squealing their delight behind him, and he chuckled at the predictability of it all.

Linking arms with Thorin, Bilbo let himself be introduced to some new faces—Glóin’s wife and son, and Thorin’s sister, and Bombur and Bifur’s spouses. Then he let himself be guided to the table, where everyone sat as they bantered, something that Bilbo had keenly missed over the years. Exchanging dry remarks over letters wasn’t quite the same as throwing verbal rocks back and forth over the table.

Bilbo sat at the head, shooting the dwarves a fond look of exasperation when they whistled and bowed their heads at him. He sniffed and swapped his empty plate for a platter heavy with food, then shushed everyone when they teased him for it.

“You emptied my larder once upon a time,” he reminded them. “It is high time that I returned the favour.”

“So that is why you have brought all these minions along!” said Nori.

“Naturally.”

Nori hummed, pointing at Merry and Pippin with his fork. “Say, those two pebbles look like they have potential. D’you reckon I could borrow them? I’d give them back in one piece, of course.”

Before Bilbo could reply, Dwalin grunted, “None of that.”

Nori flicked a bit of tomato at him. “No one asked you, my dear.”

Dwalin didn’t deign Nori with a reply, but he did catch and flick the tomato right back at him. Bilbo laughed, catching Thorin’s eye as he did. The king and his nephews were sat to his right, and Frodo and Sam were to Bilbo’s left. Bilbo looked down the table, taking in all the faces present. To someone who was used to eating with only another person, such a raucous gathering should have been overwhelming to the point of discomfort. Unsurprisingly, Bilbo felt right in his element. He had missed this, more than he had realised.

He reached out and patted Frodo’s hand. While Bilbo was enjoying himself, he hadn’t forgotten that Frodo had grown shy of others after his parents’ accident. Dealing with people had become something of a challenge to him, for reasons that Bilbo understood all too well, but he hoped that the lad would be able to put up with the noisy dinner long enough for Bilbo to enjoy his friends’ company without feeling like he was torturing his nephew.

Frodo’s hand slipped from under his and squeezed his fingers. Bilbo glanced at him, and found a small but honest smile in the boy’s face. Relief rushed through the old hobbit, and he found himself smiling back.

“I trust the journey went well,” said Thorin.

“It was quite uneventful, if that is what you are asking. Uneventful to the point of mind-numbing dullness. Some action would have been welcomed,” replied Bilbo. He hollowed out some bread as he talked, then filled it with bits of cheese and fruit. Once he was done, he took a bite. “Really, I was hoping I would have some new stories for you once I arrived, but it was all rather boring. The only event worthy of note was when I found those two rascals”—he nodded at Merry and Pippin—“chatting away with Lord Elrond in Rivendell.”

“I can imagine your surprise.”

“Surprise? You mean my annoyance! Why, the nerve of them,” Bilbo huffed, making Thorin laugh into his mead. “You would think they had more wits about them, but it is now obvious they do not.”

“Yes, we do!” cried Pippin.

“I see no evidence of it.”

“We’ll just have to show you, then,” said Merry.

Bilbo rolled his eyes. “By all means, do.”

“As long as you don’t disrupt the preparations for the celebrations,” Thorin cut in, “you are free to prove your wit to Master Baggins here as much as you wish.”

The excited look the young cousins exchanged promised nothing but trouble, but Bilbo decided that it wasn’t his problem. Thorin had given them permission to run amok, so it was now Thorin’s responsibility to deal with them when the time came.

“How are the preparations coming along, by the way?” Bilbo asked.

“Well enough,” Fíli replied, stabbing some greens with his fork. “King Bain proposed to celebrate the refounding of Dale along with the retaking of Erebor and we accepted, so the week of celebrations will have events both here in the Mountain and down in the city.”

“It was Lady Sigrid’s idea,” Kíli told Bilbo, as if that explained everything.

From their correspondence, Bilbo could remember the Princes’ letters mentioning Bard’s children every now and again. They had mostly talked about Bain and how the boy had grown to be a fine man; mentions of Tilda and Sigrid were often related to the former’s scandalous marriage to an Easterling by the name of Yumruk and the latter’s promotion to Captain of the Dalish Army not long after turning thirty years of age. Bilbo had seen neither sister during his short stay in Bain’s halls, but he hoped to see them soon, if only to congratulate them on their accomplishments.

Still, he failed to see how the joint celebration being Sigrid’s idea was relevant. It was a good idea, of that there was no doubt, but surely someone else would have come up with the idea even if she hadn’t, and the idea would have been considered just as good. He told the dwarven King and Princes as much, and they chuckled.

“The idea would have been considered good, yes,” Thorin agreed.

“But someone somewhere would have deemed it too complicated to be worth it and complained until it was dropped,” Fíli pointed out. “Captain Sigrid made sure no such complaints got in the way of making her vision become a reality.”

“Which is a good thing.” Bilbo gave a firm nod. “Nothing should stand in the way of a good party!”

“You remember Captain Sigrid, Master Baggins?” asked Lady Dís, leaning forward to be seen past her eldest son’s golden mane. “It has been quite a few years since you last saw her, and your acquaintance was a short one.”

“I remember all of Bard’s children,” Bilbo smiled. “Though I suppose they aren’t children any more.”

“Indeed they haven’t been for a long time,” she agreed. Her tone was mildly reproaching, but it regained its airiness with ease. “King Bain is a father to three children of his own now, however. Though it is the Lady Tilda who has had the most offspring.”

“Four of her own blood, and two from her husband’s previous marriage,” Kíli confirmed.

“How lovely!” Bilbo said, and he meant it. While he had never felt the need to have children of his own, he had always found great joy in seeing other people’s families grow in number. Of course, after raising Frodo, he could better see the appeal of having one’s own youngins. “I’m afraid I didn’t see either of Bard’s daughters the short time we spent in Dale.”

“Captain Sigrid is a busy woman,” said Fíli. “I’m afraid not even her brother sees much of her, and she’s the captain of his army! Tilda lives East of here, in what used to be a small Dalish settlement that has now grown into a fine city where many traders and merchants do their business. She’ll arrive for the celebration some time this week.”

“I hope there will be an opportunity to meet them all,” Bilbo said.

“Seeing how you have arrived a whole week before the celebrations start, I don’t think that will be a problem,” Thorin replied. “There will be time to spare to meet with the Dalish royals at some point, and do many more things.”

Bilbo smiled into his cup. “Indeed.”

Chapter Text

If there was something Bilbo hadn’t missed about this side of Middle-earth, it was the cold. He was certain that if wintertime hadn’t been completely ruined for him during the Fell Winter of his childhood, then his miserable trip back to the Shire after his adventure had finished the job.

He had spent the snowy season comfortably enough, burning sweet-scented logs in Beorn’s large hearth and drinking rich honey-wine. Still, his mood had been despondent at best, and whenever the chillier climate rolled around, he couldn’t help but feel that same old resigned tiredness. Not to mention his bare woolly toes didn’t appreciate the biting cold. Sturdy as they may be, hobbit feet just weren’t used to the unforgiving northeastern weather.

But a Baggins he was, despite his lack of respectability, and he would rather get dropped into the Long Lake than get caught wearing shoes. Pippin, who seemed to be suffering the increasingly colder climate almost as much as Frodo, had already taken to gallivanting around with a pair of dwarven boots. His natural curiosity and blatant lack of proper hobbit manners—that is to say, his Tookish blood—meant he had only paused for a moment at the odd suggestion of footwear before accepting the offered boots.

Frodo had accepted his own pair as well, adequately gawping at the gold clasps and soft lambswool interior. However, he hadn’t actually puts the boots on yet. Bilbo suspected Sam would faint when Frodo finally did; he was rather looking forward to it.

Merry seemed to think the whole footwear business ridiculous, but the curious and even jealous glances he stole at Pippin’s boots told another story. He would probably end up slipping on a pair at some point, but Bilbo had no idea whether the young Brandybuck would like the experience or not.

The boys were in Frodo’s room, their chattering indistinct but lively. Every now and again, they would burst out laughing. It felt strangely like a sleepover at Bag End, except this home featured a lot more rock and a lot less wood. Bilbo hummed, puffing on his pipe as he gazed at his naked feet. They were propped up on a footstool, and a low fire crackled in the stone-carved fireplace just beyond, warm and inviting. He wriggled his toes; they were a little cold. He narrowed his eyes at them and leant forward to poke at the fire. He then leant back, wriggled his toes once more, and refused to admit defeat. His feet were not that cold.

There was a knock at the door, the quick taps echoing through the apartments. In Frodo’s room, the boys grew quiet. Bilbo took a puff of his pipe and went to open the door, quickly stepping aside to invite in the people standing right outside.

“My lads! Come in, come in,” he said, smiling as Fíli and Kíli strolled in. Then he gave the third dwarf a puzzled look for a moment before it clicked. “Good evening, Gimli, lad.”

“Master Baggins, sir.”

Glóin’s son gave a short bow, patting down his bushy and frizzy beard. Then he stood there, eyes wide and surprisingly young despite the fact that Glóin’s son was considered a fully grown adult now. Bilbo waited for something, then thought Gimli might be waiting for something and promptly got annoyed by these cultural cues that he always seemed to miss around the dwarves.

“Well, are you coming in or not?”

“Oh, well, I mean,” the dwarf stammered, “yes, mayhaps, if it isn’t too much bother—”

“Go on, then, get inside, will you? It’s more of a bother holding the door open.”

“Yes, Master Baggins, sir.” Gimli hurried inside and bowed repeatedly. “Thank you, sir.”

“What is all this ‘sir’ nonsense? Did Glóin tell you to call me that?” Bilbo squinted at the princes. “I certainly hope those two fools over there haven’t been telling you silly things about how you should behave around me.”

“We said nothing,” Kíli said. He shrugged off his ceremonial cape and sat down on one of the armchairs. His brother did the same, and Kíli was quick to prop his booted feet up and onto Fíli’s lap. “Gimli’s just a very proper lad, at least when he wants to be.”

“Well, either stay and be interesting or go and be proper somewhere else,” Bilbo told Gimli, making a shooing motion as he returned to his armchair. “Do you know where I’d be if I were truly very proper? In Hobbiton, having never left it to begin with! Shows you how much proper does for you. Take it from me, Gimli, lad. Always be a bit more daring than the rest. Anyhow—boys, we have company!”

Pippin trotted into the drawing room, his avid eyes landing on the guests almost instantly. He grinned.

“Mister Gimli! And the Princes! Hello!”

Merry bumped into Pippin from behind, then stepped to the side and cleared his throat. “Greetings, gentlemen.”

“Good evening,” Fíli greeted, inclining his head as he accepted Kíli’s pipe. “Care to join us?”

“How nice, thank you,” said Pippin, sitting down on the floor by Bilbo’s feet, cross-legged and still grinning.

The rest of the hobbits followed, arranging themselves on the floor with Gimli since all the nearest chairs were occupied and no one wanted to drag or push heavy dwarven furniture around. Sam wrapped a quilt around Frodo’s shoulders; the young Baggins didn’t protest beyond a low sigh. Fíli nudged Kíli’s feet and pointed at them. Kíli grinned, sharing a look with his brother that meant they were reminiscing about something.

“So what brings you here at this hour?” Bilbo asked.

“Nothing in particular,” said Kíli. “We just wanted to see you, and thought you might want to see us as well. Tell us a few stories. Or we could do the telling. You haven’t heard of what Fíli did down at the sapphire mines four days ago, have you?”

“No, no,” Fíli cut in. “That is hardly an interesting story—”

“It’s a hilarious story!”

“—and I won’t let you bore Bilbo and his nephews with it.”

“Oh, we aren’t his nephews,” said Merry.

“That’s right,” Pippin agreed. He explained, “We’re both Mister Bilbo’s first cousins twice removed, though from different parts of the family, sort of. Mister Bilbo’s aunt—Mirabella Took, that is—is Merry’s great-grandmother, and one of Bilbo’s uncles—Hildigrim Took—is also Merry’s great-grandfather as well as mine; me on my father’s side and Merry on his mother’s. Hildigrim also married Rosa Baggins, who happens to be Bilbo’s first cousin once removed, and our great-grandmother, so we are also Mister Bilbo’s second cousins thrice removed on the Baggins side.”

“But I call them fool boys,” Bilbo supplied.

“That’s only because our familial ties are too obscure for you to refer to us as nephews or cousins.”

“Even if they weren’t, I would still call you fool boys.”

Ignoring him, Pippin turned back to his dwarven audience. “So technically, if you’ll call us anything, it should be cousins.”

“I’m Bilbo’s cousin, and I call him uncle,” Frodo pointed out.

“Do you truly keep track of all that?” asked Kíli, giving the hobbits a bemused and slightly horrified look. “It seems exhausting.”

“No more exhausting than putting on shoes every day,” Sam said.

“Shoes are a sensible garment,” Gimli chimed in. “You hobbits are the odd ones, leaving your feet unprotected, exposed to the elements in such a way! Uncivilised, I tell you. What creature worth their beard allows themselves to be so vulnerable?”

“Uncivilised?” Merry bristled.

“Beard?” Sam sputtered.

Frodo giggled. “I think you mistake us for dwarves, Mister Gimli.”

Kíli looked at his brother. “I believe we were just called uncivilised to our faces.”

“Quite,” Fíli concurred.

“Oh,” Frodo’s eyes went wide, “I did not intend—”

“Peace, Frodo,” said Fíli. “We you know you meant no offence, and we take none.”

That seemed to calm down Bilbo’s nephew, though he still looked embarrassed over his slip-up. Bilbo, on his part, was beaming with pride. How delightful it was to see the boy’s silver tongue take everyone by surprise, himself included. He was shaping up to be a true Baggins of the eccentric kind, and Bilbo couldn’t be more pleased about it. If there was something life had taught him, it was that doing as told and as expected was never quite as rewarding as taking Middle-earth by storm.

Bilbo sucked on his pipe and then peered down when no smoke made its way into him. The fire had consumed all the pipe-weed while he was distracted talking. He frowned, patting own his pockets for his pouch. The young Gamgee noticed—of course he did—and fussed until Bilbo relinquished his pipe, then made quick work of cleaning the pipe’s bowl and filling it up with a new pinch of leaves from his tiny weed box.

“Thank you, Samwise.” Bilbo took a puff and blew three rings, one smaller than the other. “So tell me about the festivities, Fíli. You are the future king. Has your uncle allowed you to help organise things, or has he been a tyrant about it?”

“Uncle Thorin hasn’t been involved in the preparations all that much, to be honest. He is quite busy at work with other projects these days.” Fíli entwined his fingers atop Kíli’s boots. “I must admit he seems to worry over Moria. We all do, in fact. Balin left not that long ago to build his kingdom, but we haven’t heard a lot from them ever since they got to the mines.”

“Is there a danger in them?”

“An orc pack or two,” Kíli said. “Nothing he and his people can’t handle.”

“Still, we worry.” Fíli twiddled his thumbs, eyes distant. “A life of hardship is tempered by cautiousness.”

“And old habits are hard to break,” Kíli added.

“Very true,” Bilbo said, nodding. His boys nodded as well, though he doubted they understood what they were agreeing with. Frodo, perhaps, understood better than the others. “So Balin won’t make it to the celebrations?”

“We are unaware,” Fíli said. “You’ll have to ask Thorin.”

“Though chances are his guess is as good as ours,” Kíli said, then laughed at Gimli’s shocked look. “What is it, Gimli? Still can’t wrap your thick skull around the fact that we speak of Thorin so casually?”

“He’s your king.”

“He’s family first,” Kíli pointed out, grinning around his pipe.

“He’s king first!”

“Technically, he became king after we were born, so he was our uncle first.”

“Are you children always like this?” Bilbo asked.

“Oh, yes, all the time,” Kíli beamed.

“We haven’t really done a lot of maturing,” Fíli admitted. “Our beards are longer, but that’s about that.”

Bilbo gave a hearty laugh then. How he had missed these boys. It gladdened him to hear their voices again, even if he remembered them younger and different in a way he couldn’t explain: they had grown richer and deeper with the years, an undertone of wisdom to them that Bilbo was still having trouble wrapping his head round. Why, Kíli almost sounded like Thorin when he acted officious! Bilbo would have never thought that such a thing was possible, but stranger things had happened.

The conversation went on after that, not really going in any direction but bouncing back and forth and slipping from one topic to the next with gentle ease. Gimli took it upon himself to keep the fire burning, something for which Bilbo’s feet were immensely grateful. Kíli reached out to tickle one of Bilbo’s toes at one point, then sniggered and leaned away when he almost got a kick to the face. Sam was so alarmed by Kíli’s actions that he threw a quilt over his and Frodo’s feet. Bilbo didn’t have the heart to tell him that a quilt wouldn’t be enough to deter Kíli if the Prince decided he wanted to tickle Sam’s toes.

despite all the fun he was having, Bilbo called it a night the third time Pippin yawned. He put out his pipe and got up from his comfortable seat, ushering everyone either to bed or to the door. The hobbit-boys whined and so did the two younger dwarf-boys—Fíli insisted he, as a heir apparent, didn’t whine but rather voice his protests in a high pitch—but Bilbo remained firm. He hugged the Princes at the door and patted Gimli on the back, though he made sure to make the pat more of a hard slap, enough to make his palm sting, since he knew dwarves preferred such displays.

After he had wrangled his young hobbits into bed, he crawled under his own sheets. A low fire crackled away at his room’s hearth. Bilbo used the opportunity to listen to the Mountain around him, breathing quietly as he strained his ears to catch all stray sounds. Erebor had healed well. She was alive, the stone of her walls warm and humming, and there always seemed to be a candid light in the corner of Bilbo’s eyes, as if she were glowing from within. It felt like it was always just before sunrise or right after sunset—the soft brightness, fleeting yet constant.

Bilbo rolled over, lying on his side, and reached under his pillow. There, warmer than the mountain yet always colder than a blade in winter, his precious ring. He had neglected it today. He would not neglect it the next day. No, come morning, he would make sure to slip it in his pocket and carry it with him, maybe put it on during the day at some point and play a few tricks on unsuspecting darves. Maybe even give Thorin or someone from the Company a spook, remind them all that the sole reason they ever got out of Mirkwood’s dungeons and so many other tight spots was because of him and his excellent skills. Yes, he would do that, and then they all would reminisce and have a good laugh.

Chapter Text

Morning arrived with an unbearable chill. Bilbo dragged himself out of bed and changed into his warmest clothes, then donned a serviceable dwarven jacket from his room’s closet. It was a deep maroon colour that Bilbo liked to think suited him well, and so he put it on with a satisfied air. He doubted the dwarves had remembered so small a detail, and yet he felt a nebulous warmth directed at his friends, as if the happy coincidence were enough to commend them.

Bilbo noticed the jacket had an inner breast pocket, and in it he slipped his precious ring. He gave it a pat just to make sure it had gone in and stayed in—holes in pockets were a dangerous thing. His fears assuaged, he gave the jacket a tug and then smoothed it down.

Before leaving his quarters for the day, he stoked the hearthfire and shook out his clothes from the previous night. There were servants to do that, he knew, but he was a bachelor, and one with a ward at that, and so he was used to tidying things up as he went. Of course, Bilbo’s idea of order was somewhat different from that most people had: to him, so long as the floor was visible and most clutter was piled up against the walls or in mathom rooms, things were shipshape. True order was for people concerned with appearances.

Bilbo walked out into the living room and found Sam there, frowning down at a positively ancient-looking tome. He smiled to himself, thinking that he should have known. It was still early, even by hobbit standards, but Samwise Gamgee was as much of an early bird as his father, for all that he slept like a log.

“Sam, my boy,” Bilbo greeted. “Good morning.”

“Good morning, Mister Bilbo, sir,” said Sam, jumping to his furry feet. “I’m terribly sorry if I woke you.”

“Wake me, Sam? Dear boy, you’re so quiet that you could sneak up on mice.”

Chuckling, Bilbo went to the chimney and pulled a glittering chain. It was connected to an equally glittering bell that rang somewhere they couldn’t hear, but it set things in motion all the same. His job done, Bilbo sat down to wait for a servant to appear.

“What are you reading, lad? Tell me about it.”

“A book. An elfish book.” Sam’s cheeks turned red. “Mister Lindir lent it to me when we was at Rivendell, but I haven’t been able to read it yet. I told him I’m learning my elf-letters, and he said this ought to help me.”

“Did he?” Bilbo held out a hand. “Let’s see it then. Give it here.”

Sam went to Bilbo and sat down by his feet; he had always done so ever since Bilbo started teaching him about the world beyond the Shire. It was a gesture reserved for children, but Bilbo didn’t have the heart to tell Sam to stop, or any of the other, young hobbits who still had the habit of sitting around Bilbo cross-legged on the floor despite being old enough to be tweens. Oblivious to Bilbo’s musings, Sam placed the book upon his upturned palm with reverent gentleness, though it was unclear whether said awe was directed at the tome or Bilbo himself.

Clearing his throat, Bilbo opened the book and began flipping through the pages. He was careful but nonchalant, yet his eyes shone with an avid interest. “Ah, yes,” he said after a spell. “Very good indeed. How useful to have the texts in both Sindarin and Westron in the same tome. It makes for easier learning, doesn’t it?”

Sam nodded vigorously but kept quiet. He could see Bilbo’s focus and didn’t wish to disturb it.

“These are Rivendell poems, dear boy,” Bilbo continued some minutes later, giving the yellowed pages a fond pat. “I’m sure you recognise a few of these, and maybe even remember a couple. I have them in my own library back in Bag End. Oh! How lovely.” Bilbo peered down at the elegant ink strokes. “It has A Elbereth Gilthoniel in its entirety. I’ve never had the pleasure to read it all.”

“Then you go ahead and keep it Mister Bilbo,” Sam said. “You’ll use it better than me.”

“Better than you? What use can someone who’s already learned his elf-letters have for a book like this? Don’t be daft.” Bilbo closed the book and tapped Sam on the crown of his head with it. Then he handed him back the tome. “Besides, Mister Lindir lent it to you, my lad. It’s yours to keep and use.”

“And give away,” Sam said, ever stubborn and selfless.

“And keep,” Bilbo said again, his tone unyielding, “which I recommend that you do, or else you’ll never finish learning Tengwar.” Bilbo smiled at the boy. “Or, as you call it, elf-letters.”

“I’ll finish!” promised Sam, his cheeks colouring again.

Four servants entered then, already carrying trays full of all sorts of food—cold and warm, tough and buttery, salty and sweet. They bowed and offered to pour their tea and cut their fruits, then asked if they wanted anything else. When Bilbo said no to all, they retreated with a bow. Sam remained quiet during the whole exchange, eyes flickering between the stone floor and the strangers, and only shook his head when Bilbo asked him if there was anything he’d like that wasn’t on the trays.

Admittedly, they were very well-packed trays, with a myriad of things to try and taste. The servants had probably been told about hobbits and their appetite. Bilbo relocated from his armchair by the fire to the table. Sam lowered himself into the chair to Bilbo’s left at his command—the boy was capable of staying standing unless told to sit—and they had breakfast in-between snatches of read-aloud Sindarin poetry. Sam’s voice turned from fertile earth to chiselled clay when he spoke in the elven language. It was obvious that he had a gift.

“I have no doubt that you will finish learning how to read Elvish, dear Sam,” said Bilbo after Sam finished a poem, pouring himself a cup of tea. “You did finish learning your hobbit-letters faster than Frodo.”

“Only because he was ailing for so long,” Sam said softly.

“The only thing he was ailing from was boredom,” Bilbo quipped, but they both knew it wasn’t true. It had taken many seasons for Frodo’s humours to regain some balance after his parents’ accident. Bilbo sipped on his tea and reached for a scone. “Now read me Vi Dýr Ennui, will you?”

The rest of the boys joined them for breakfast not long after. Sam put his book away, red-eared and bashful when Merry and Pippin tried to get him to speak in ‘tall-folk tongues’. Bilbo put an end to the teasing by ringing the bell again. Some minutes later, another group of servants showed up with overflowing trays of food and drink, swapping them out for the ones that were already empty or close to it.

Bilbo poured everyone a steaming cup of tea, then lathered the scones with cream cheese and passed those along too. The boys laughed and chattered as they ate, piling fruits and meats onto their scones, and like that breakfast flew by. Bilbo drummed his fingers on the table all the while, casting glances at the door, but no knock came.

“Waiting for someone, Uncle?” asked Frodo.

“Not really, no.” Bilbo drummed his fingers some more. “But I’m considering something.”

“Which is?” Pippin asked through a mouthful of bread.

“Don’t speak with your mouth full,” came the automatic chiding, then Bilbo replied, “About having second breakfast with the others. But I do wonder how one goes about getting them together. I understand that they all live in different levels of the Mountain. Besides, not even us, royal guests as we are, may step into the royal family’s quarters unless invited.”

“Aren’t we in the Royal Wing?” asked Merry.

“We are, yes, but it’s larger than you’d think,” Bilbo told him. He remembered the tour Thorin had given him all those years ago, how Bilbo had found the long corridors dark and echoing, how the great rooms had been tall and empty. He hoped it would feel different now. “I ought to ask the guards. They’ve been such help so far.”

Pippin finally swallowed his toast. “Have they?”

“Peregrin Took,” Bilbo shot him a look, “the fact that they don’t speak much doesn’t mean they aren’t helpful. You could learn a thing or two from them, in fact! Less chit-chat and more doing things of substance.”

“Oh, no, I’m quite fine this way, thank you.”

Bilbo rolled his eyes and thumped on the floor. “Make yourself useful and go fetch the guards. I must know if having second breakfast with my friends is an option at all. Now, boy!”

Pippin stood up grumbling to do as told. The rest of the boys grinned at one another but kept quiet, wisely not teasing their friend lest Bilbo turned them into his gofers as well. It was Bilbo’s favourite way of making them reflect on things he believed they shouldn’t have done. To his credit, he was seldom wrong when dispensing punishments, and the boys learned their lessons more often than not.

Pippin returned with the guards shortly after and, unaware of what entailed proper dwarf etiquette, offered them food and drink and a chair to sit. The guards exchanged a quick glance, their unwillingness to cause offence but lack of wish to join the hobbits at the table obvious. Bilbo decided to spare them the awkwardness of having to think for themselves.

“Sit down, Pippin.” Bilbo smiled at the guards. “Good morning, my dear fellows.”

“Good morning, Master Baggins.” They bowed to Bilbo, then a little less deeply to the boys.

The boys returned the greeting and then Bilbo spoke, “I was wondering if there might be a way of sharing second breakfast with the rest of the Company. It’s to my understanding the hobbitish second breakfast overlaps with the dwarven first meal.”

“We were told to guard your door,” said one of the guards, unhelpful to the extreme.

The other one added, “The Company seldom have their morning meal together, Master Baggins. Everyone is quite busy at that time, preparing for the working day ahead. Some gather for lunch, when their schedules allow it, though this they do down at Master Dori’s eating house. The upcoming festival has kept them all hard at work, however. I fear your wish for a shared meal with your companions of old may be difficult to fulfil, Master Baggins.”

“I expected as much,” Bilbo sighed. “Never fear, I’ll find a way. Or, at least, I know of someone who might.” He smiled again, his eyes narrowed with the beginnings of mischief. The young hobbits shared nervous glances around the table, but Bilbo paid them no mind. “Where may one find Master Bofur?”

Chapter Text

“How kind of you to come visit so soon,” Bofur twirled his moustache as he laughed. “I thought for sure you’d be spending your first morning in the Mountain with our King and his pair of Princes! There’s much for you to catch up on.”

“The same could be said for us. Besides, they’re busy with royal things, and I am loath to interrupt them,” Bilbo said as they walked down the market. Many shops were still closed, but some were already opening or restocking before the day really began.

“Interrupt! That’s a load of bollocks,” Bofur scoffed as if the mere idea of rules applying to Bilbo were rubbish. “I’m sure their guards and servants have orders not to turn you away. The last thing your presence would do is disturb them—or any of us. You’re welcome in all our homes.”

“Yes, I do know that,” Bilbo said, “but I suppose I just don’t wish to be overbearing.”

“You could never be. We’ve all missed you.”

“He’s right, Uncle,” Frodo piped up. He and the other boys were trailing behind Bilbo and Bofur, and the two guards from their apartments followed several steps behind to give them a semblance of privacy. “You haven’t seen your friends for fifty years! It makes sense they would want to have you around as much as possible. Right, Sam?”

“Mister Frodo’s right, Mister Bilbo,” Sam said, two parts honesty and one part blind agreement.

“What is this? Have you all colluded to reassure me?” Bilbo snorted. “Lay off it!”

“Aye, you heard the burglar, boys!” Bofur called over his shoulder with a fake scowl. “Lay off it!”

“Oh, hush.” Bilbo smacked his arm, chuckling, “and give us the tour you promised.”

“Well, this is the market’s upper level. The most respectable and luxurious businesses are up here. I’m proud to say me and my kin own two shops that do quite well despite—or maybe due to—selling mostly things made out of wood. It’s exotic to some and commonplace to many who lived in hardship before the retaking.”

“Woodwork is always a delight,” Bilbo said in a decisive tone, “and I’m sure three dwarves as skilled as you create no small amount of beauties worthy of buying. I may have to commission you a little something for me to take back once we return West to the Shire.”

Bofur’s smile, which hadn’t dwindled at all since Bilbo showed up to demand a casual tour of the markets, waned at that. “Thinking of leaving already? Come now, you’ve only just arrived! I beg of you to put those thoughts out of your mind, Bilbo, at least until after the celebrations are over.”

“I will try,” Bilbo promised, “but I enjoy thinking of home even as I enjoy my time here.”

“The whole world,” said Sam from behind them. “Right, Mister Bilbo?”

“Quite right, Sam.”

“What’s that?” Bofur asked.

“Nothing. Just a silly hobbit thing. Pay it not mind.” Bilbo poked his friend on the shoulder. “And give us that tour! Goodness, how many times do I have to ask? Just point at things and tell us what they are. Like that stall there. What does it sell? Who is the owner?”

“Well, it’s about to open, so why don’t we go and find out? You might walk off with a purchase or two.” Bofur grinned, then asked the boys, “You lads wanna explore?”

“Yes!” they all chorused, some louder than others.

Bofur turned to face the group of young hobbits then, his hands on his hips and his expression serious. Or at least as serious as someone such as Bofur could manage, which wasn’t very serious unless someone was missing or in mortal peril of some kind. Even then, his face’s capacity for seriousness was debatable. The white tufts of hair that the past decades had threaded into his beard and braids didn’t help with making him look serious, either.

“All right. You lads can go explore, but stay on this level. In a little while you’ll hear a bell; it’s the bell that tells us it’s close to lunchtime. Some time after the first ring, you’ll hear the bell again. I want you all to be back right here by then. If you get lost, ask for directions to cobbler Regin’s corner.” He pointed at a shop not very far away that above its door had a big boot-shaped sign with something written in dwarf script. “Is it clear, lads?”

“Very,” Merry said.

“Crystal clear,” Pippin assured him.

“We’ll be back on time,” Frodo promised.

Sam leant closer to Bilbo and whispered, “I’ll make sure of it, Mister Bilbo, sir.”

“That settles it then!” Bofur clapped his hands, then gestured at the guards. “I think you’d best keep an eye on the boys, in case they forget to where they should ask directions or something else. Don’t fear for Master Baggins here. I’ll take care of him, inasmuch as one can take care of a grown hobbit-burglar! Four little hobbits, though? They’re a bodyguarding priority, all right.”

The guards shared a look, then bowed their agreement.

“Don’t try to lose them,” Bilbo warned his wards. “The Mountain is large, and it has many more hallways and rooms than any smial you’ve ever been in. Don’t be foolish and think you can go wandering off on your own. I’m talking to you, Pippin, you rapscallious Took. You always look where you shouldn’t.”

“Do not!”

“Do, too. Now go, and stay within the guards’ sight.”

The boys went, bright-eyed and hasty in their curiosity. Bilbo watched them go, and then let Bofur guide him through shops and stalls for a while. There were many things to see, and Bilbo felt annoying with himself for not being able to properly focus on the tour he had demanded.

Before long, he slowed them to a stop in front of a place that seemed to sell nothing but rocks. Bofur gave him a knowing look, his moustache curving into a smile. He reached up and curled one end of it, managing to look both ridiculous and cunning at once.

“So,” he said, “I reckon there’s someone a certain other someone wants to see.”

Bilbo tried to think of a witty comeback, but his thudding heart and heated cheeks made it difficult. “It’s not that I want to just see him. I enjoy spending time with you just as much.”

“Don’t lie, Bilbo, you besotted burglar,” Bofur said, tugging at his moustache once before releasing it. “Besides, my statement can be interpreted both ways, y’know? Thorin’s been dying to see you. I’m sure he’ll throw a tantrum when he finds out you saw me first today.”

“I was trying to—”

“You were,” Bofur agreed, grinning, “which is why his tantrum will be probably very short. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try your best to ingratiate yourself with the old grump-king, aye? And lucky for us, we know just the person to help us out.”

“We do?” Bilbo asked, amused despite himself as Bofur ushered him toward yet another shop.

“Aye,” Bofur said, lifting his eyebrows when the scent of baking and cooking finally hit Bilbo’s nose. “You told me once that the way to a hobbit’s heart is through their stomach—well, the same may be said for a certain King Under the Mountain, and he’s mighty fond of a certain fussy dwarf’s pastries.”

Having said that, they entered what could only be Dori’s eating place—not a pub, as Dori had made sure to tell Bilbo over a letter once. Bilbo knew it was called The Three Gems, but the Khuzdûl script had made it impossible for him to tell that it was Dori’s place. Inside, it was surprisingly plain, but still lovely, a mixture of stone and wood that made Bilbo’s heart glad for some reason.

“Master Dori!” Bofur called, throwing one hand up in the air and clutching Bilbo’s shoulder with the other. “O pastry master, we summon ye!”

Bilo heard noises behind a wooden door that could only lead to a kitchen, then Dori replied, “It’s too early for whatever it is you want, Master Bofur!” A second later, he pushed into the room, hands full of flour and an apron tied to his front, but otherwise as immaculate as always. His scowl evaporated when he saw Bilbo, “Or maybe it’s not.”

“Depends on whether you’re in the mood for some meddling,” Bofur said, pulling Bilbo in as if offering up a particularly delectable tea blend to their friend. He waggled his eyebrows. “The morning calls for a romantic morning meal.”

“Second breakfast,” Bilbo muttered, his cheeks burning even as he smiled. “And I wanted everyone to be there, not just us.”

“Oh, yes,” Dori said, approaching them with his face full of joy. He doesn’t seem to have heard Bilbo at all. “It’s most definitely not too early for this. It’s just the right time, in fact. Come, Bilbo, please. Do step into my kitchen.”

“Quite an honour,” Bofur whispered to Bilbo.

Dori went to them and shooed a sniggering Bofur, then herded Bilbo into the back of the shop, where a few other dwarves were hard at work kneading and mixing and stirring. “We’ll bake something nice and wholesome for the king, and then you’ll take it to him and join him for breakfast.”

“Thorin’s a busy fellow. I don’t want to impose,” Bilbo said, less because he meant it and more because he wanted to see if Dori would be as adamant as Bofur in saying that Bilbo could never impose.

It turned out that he was. “Impose? You? On Thorin? Bilbo, have you gone mad? He’s been desperate to see you since the last time he did, which means he’s gone fifty years too many without your face to gaze upon, which means that the idea of you imposing on him even the slightest bit is as ridiculous as the thought of Dwalin dating my brother.”

“Dwalin is dating your brother,” Bofur said, joining them in the kitchen.

“Yes, and it’s ridiculous. What self-respecting guard dates a thief?”

“What self-respecting thief dates a guard?” Bilbo quipped, then laughed at the nasty look Dori gave him. “I’m sorry, but I had to.”

“If you were anyone else, I’d throw you out on your ear. As it is, I’ll just tell you to hush and put this on.” He handed Bilbo an apron from a nearby cabinet. he then turned to Bofur, who was leaning casually against a table but steering clear of anything important. “I don’t remember inviting you into my den.”

“The lion growls,” Bofur chuckled, pushing himself off and toward the door, both hands raised, “and so the goat takes its leave. I wish you all the luck with cooking, Bilbo. I’m sure Thorin will love what you make for him.”

“I don’t know about that,” Bilbo said, busy with tying the apron behind his back.

“I do.” Bofur grinned, pushing the door open, “He loves you, after all.”

And for an astounding third time in the span of a single morning, Bilbo blushed to the roots of his hair.

Chapter Text

Bofur returned to The Three Gems with four hobbit boys and two guards in tow just as Bilbo was giving the pastries he had baked the finishing touches. Merry and Pippin wheedled and whined for a taste, and in the end Bilbo gave his wards a cheese scone each when they pointed out that he had forgotten to pick them up. Their honest praise helped him wrangle his nerves, illogical as they were, into something akin to submission.

Dori lent him a lovely basket. Bilbo put the warm pastries in it and then covered them with his own handkerchief, his initials stitched in a corner. Bofur laughed at the detail, and Dori gave Bilbo a smile that looked almost indulgent. The boys didn’t ask, having heard the story of Bilbo’s forgotten hankie enough times to understand what was so funny about Bilbo’s action.

They walked back to the Royal Wing as a group. Bilbo watched his boys flit between stalls and unwittingly charm the merchants and sellers into giving them gifts. Merry and Sam seemed to be particularly successful at getting free samples, which pleased the former and flustered the latter.

Dori had left his assistants in charge of the kitchen until he returned, and he waved off Bilbo’s concern that he was keeping him from his work when he wouldn’t stop mentioning it. “Bilbo, please, I enjoy my craft, but I’m no slave to it. If I decide to step out for a moment, then that’s what I will do!”

“You sound like a dwarf in control,” Bilbo said.

“That’s because I am,” Dori replied, puffing his chest. “The quest ensured that my brothers and I would have enough wealth to do anything for the rest of our lives. I chose to do what I want.”

Bilbo gave an amused huff. “Isn’t that what you all did?”

“Not quite,” Dori said, but he didn’t explain further, and Bilbo didn’t ask.

“But most of us did,” Bofur said. “Although our wealth sometimes meant that we were responsible for the fate of Erebor almost as much as our King is. A good economy’s an important part of every civilisation, and being the wealthiest dwarves in the kingdom, we’ve had to live many times not for ourselves but for others. I find it nice, caring for our people, but sometimes the responsibility’s a bit crushing.”

“None of us signed up to become counselors and advisors to the King,” Dori muttered, reaching for the basket hanging from Bilbo’s arm to adjust the handkerchief over the pastries. “We all had selfish reasons to join the quest, and all of a sudden we found ourselves in a position that made being selfish impossible, or at least unadvisable.”

“You could have chosen a selfish path,” Bilbo pointed out.

“No,” Bofur said.

“We couldn’t have,” Dori agreed.

Bilbo knew what they meant. It was true that only thirteen dwarves had chosen to try and reclaim the Mountain for their people, which made dwarves seem like a race that was used to looking out for themselves even if it meant turning their back on each other. Bilbo had learned, during and after the quest, that such an assumption couldn’t be farther from the truth: dwarves cared for each other so much that a mere handful was willing to face a dragon for the rest of their kind, that families stuck together even when a law-abiding chef couldn’t disapprove more of his thieving brother’s antics even if he tried, that leaders rode out to meet unspeakable dangers and left their people behind to keep them safe in case they did not succeed.

For all that dwarves loved precious metal and stones, sometimes to the point of sickness, when push came to shove it was clear that their priorities lay elsewhere. Bilbo smiled to himself, hitching the basket to carry it more comfortably in the crook of his elbow. Indeed, dwarves weren’t a selfish race.

“Mister Bilbo, sir,” Sam called, running up to them with his cheeks red and something in his hands. “The nice lady from over there gave me this. She says it’s a wishing stone, and you use it to light candles and make wishes.”

Dori leane closer to look, then scoffed. “Nothing more special than a run-of-the-mill knapped piece of flint. And it won’t do much good on its own! You see, lad, you need to strike it against steel for it to light anything. Like this one here, have a look.”

Dori brought out a small tinderbox from one of his pockets. He opened it and showed Sam his fire-making tools. Then he pulled out his fire striker and went on to explain how to strike the flint against the steel to better create sparks, what steels were better for the task, what rocks were good for striking and which ones were not. Sam’s blush, if possible, only deepened: the young hobbit clearly hadn’t expected to become the sole recipient of Dori’s undivided, nurturing attention.

Bilbo chuckled and watched and chuckled some more whenever Bofur tried to chime in only to get shushed almost instantly by the older dwarf. Noticing the spectacle, the other boys soon gravitated toward Dori, crowding around him as they walked to listen in on his impromptu lesson.

When they got to the Royal Wing, Dori gave Sam his fire striker. “Well, there you go. Now you’ll be able to light candles and make wishes to your heart’s content. Just remember to strike away from your body—and roll up your sleeves until you get good at it! You don’t want to set yourself on fire.”

“I couldn’t keep this,” Sam mumbled, still blushing.

“You will unless you want me to become very cross indeed,” Dori said, patting Sam’s arm. He turned to Bilbo, his expression morphing into something mischievous. “And you’ll tell me how well our illustrious King liked the pastries later. Say, tomorrow. Come down to The Three Gems with the boys. I’ll cook you that thing you used to blubber about during our journey. Elevenses.”

“He used to blubber about everything,” Bofur cackled, then danced away before Bilbo could smack him.

Bilbo smoothed down his jacket very primly, peeved at his friends, perhaps in excess, due to the strange zap of dread he felt whenever someone hinted at his relationship with Thorin in front of the younger hobbits. He had never explicitly told them that the King and he were… something. Something more, but also something less.

He should have told Frodo, at least, but he had never found how to say what he wanted to say without feeling foolish. I’m in love with a dwarf-King whom I chose to leave behind. We write each other tender words of could-be love. When I’m laid down to rest, I want to be buried underneath an oak tree. How could he say any of those things without the hot sting of regret and shame creeping up his face?

“Thank you, Dori, yes, I’d love to have elevenses at your place.” Bilbo cleared his throat and prompted, “Boys?”

“We’d love to go!” Pippin cried. “Can you make us dwarven food?”

“We hear it’s spicy,” Merry said.

“I don’t know about spicy, but it’s definitely different from hobbit food,” Dori replied, torn between amusement and offence when confronted with such a basic description of his culture’s rich cuisine. “The spices are most certainly not the same ones, which is what may make you think of it as spicy.”

“It’s good,” Pippin assured him.

“Of course it’s good,” Dori said, then left as he muttered dark things under his breath.

Bofur laughed and began to walk down the hallway.

“Well, I’m going too. Enjoy your morning meal—I mean second breakfast.”

He bowed with a flourish and grinned when he straightened up, then left to catch up with Dori.

“I like your friends, Mister Bilbo,” said Pippin.

“So do I,” Bilbo replied.

The guards opened the heavy doors to the Royal Wing, and the hobbits stepped in. The basket felt incredibly heavy in Bilbo’s arms all of a sudden. He was tempted to just head back to their apartments and let the boys eat everything he had baked that morning. He was also trying to figure out how to make them go to their rooms and let him seek out Thorin so they could have a private little breakfast of their own.

In the end, dear Frodo made the decision for him.

“We’ll have second breakfast in our apartments then, Uncle,” he said, his eyes crinkling up with his smile, “and you can have it with your friend the King and his nephews. I’m sure you’ve got lots to talk about, and we’ve been in the way enough for now.”

“Although,” Pippin said, leaning to the side to looking at Bilbo over Frodo’s shoulder, “I wouldn’t be opposed to finding out what flavoursome meals grace a dwarf-king’s table in the morning.”

Merry smacked him in the arm. “Pippin!”

“What?”

“Let Mister Bilbo have some time with his friends!” Merry crossed his arms. “You wouldn’t like to be like my cousin Merimas, would you now? Always inviting himself to our picnics by The Water. Mighty annoying.”

“Oh, yes, mighty annoying, that’s right.”

“So we’ll stay in the apartments and ring the bell.” Merry’s lips curled into a wide grin. “And we’ll gorge ourselves on food while Mister Bilbo has to mind his manners in front of his royal friends.”

“Yes, let’s do that,” Pippin said, pointing at Merry. He turned to Bilbo. “Have fun, Mister Bilbo.”

He slipped down the hall and through the door to their apartments then. Merry and Frodo shared a cheeky look before Merry ran after him, and soon Bilbo was left standing only with his nephew and his gardner’s son in the hallway.

“Well then,” Bilbo said, but the boys didn’t go.

He adjusted his grip on the basket as a subtle way of reminding them that they should be on their way to terrorising the servants with Merry and Pippin so he could be on his way to monopolising a certain King’s morning.

Sam and Frodo didn’t move, both of them sporting different expressions that still managed to transmit the same message of curiosity and care. Bilbo harrumphed and looked down the hallway, toward the end where he would turn right in order to head to the King’s Quarters.

“Well then,” he repeated, and this times the boys moved.

“Have fun, Uncle,” said Frodo in that impish tone that he reserved for teasing Bilbo.

“Yes, yes, go already.”

“See you later, Mister Bilbo,” said Sam, almost squeaking.

They stepped into the apartments without looking back once, which helped Bilbo unwind a little. The guards, silent for a dwarf but not silent enough, took up their posts guarding the entrance. Bilbo wasn’t sure why the Royal Wing needed to be so closely guarded when Erebor had been in peace and seen no real disquiet for the past fifty years, but he appreciated the thought of having his boys so safe.

Before he could let doubt pull him into the apartments as well, Bilbo strolled down the hallways and turned right. A few corners and corridors later, he found himself standing in front of the double doors that led into Thorin’s chambers, a guard standing on each side. Its surface, exquisitely carved and now well-kept, had nevertheless retained a porous texture from the decades Smaug had left it to collect dust and damp. It didn’t look brittle by any means, yet Bilbo ran a gentle hand over it before asking the guards to announce him instead of knocking.

Chapter Text

Bilbo was let into a drawing room where a tall fire blazed in a hearth, its opposite wall covered in tomes and scrolls and decorations. The place looked opulent in a strangely well-worn sort of way, lived in, welcoming despite the lingering formality.

It reminded him of Thorin.

He smiled softly to himself, stepping further in as the door clicked shut behind him. His heart was hammering inside his chest, but he didn’t feel out of place. He felt alive, warm, expectant. He wanted to see Thorin and wanted Thorin to want to see him. There was a faint sting there, in the fact that Bilbo had had to come looking for him as though he were the host when he was the guest, but the thought was fleeting and its prickle forgotten as soon as it was felt. He wanted to see Thorin. It didn’t matter who took the initiative to make that happen.

As if his thoughts had summoned him, Thorin stepped into the room from behind a tapestry. He was dressed in simpler garbs than the ones from the previous evening—goodness, had it really only been the previous evening?—but he still looked every bit the King Under the Mountain.

His beard was held in a simple braid and so was his mane. The gentle morning casualness that clung to him made him appear younger despite his greyed hair and wrinkled skin and long-healed scar. When his blue eyes alighted on Bilbo and crinkled into a soft smile, he looked even younger still.

“So,” he said, his voice not unlike honey dollops, “here is the burglar.”

Bilbo smiled back, lifting the basket. “I bring food.”

“Courting me in the ways of your people, I see,” Thorin teased, still holding the tapestry up with an arm. He motioned to the armchairs and low table by the fire. “Have a seat. I’ll bring the coffee from the other room.”

“I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” Bibo said, lowering himself onto the nearest armchair.

“You’re not,” Thorin replied. “I’ll only be a moment.”

And a moment it took him to come back with the steaming jug and two silver cups. He set them down on the low table, then helped Bilbo put everything that was in the basket also on the table. Thorin hummed in appreciation, taking in all the freshly-baked pastries.

“It’s a good thing my nephews are dealing with the Council this morning. I have no wish to share this homely feast,” he said, helping himself to a crusty little meat pie. “Although the smell alone might be enough to summon them.”

“And how does it smell?” Bilbo asked.

“Lovely,” Thorin replied, then took a hearty bite. He closed his eyes and sighed in contentment, but waited until he had more or less swallowed before saying, “And it also tastes that way.”

“I’ll let Dori now,” Bilbo said.

“Don’t be coy, my good friend. I am familiar with Dori’s baking, and this is not it. No, this pie is the work of a hobbit whose homemade meals I haven’t had the pleasure of having in a very long time.”

“I actually cooked for you only once in my home,” Bilbo said, picking up a biscuit.

“That should be rectified.”

“I very much doubt you’ll hike all the way West for some watery soup.”

“It was only watery because you were working with scraps that night,” Thorin pointed out. “This time your pantry would be fully stocked, unless dear Frodo and his friends storm it when we aren’t looking.”

“Or I could just cook for you here,” Bilbo said, then busied himself with eating his biscuit. He had to remind the knot in his chest that Thorin wasn’t privy to his thoughts of home away from home and small whole worlds. “All kitchens are good for cooking, regardless of whether they’re in the East or West, or whether they belong to hobbits or dwarves.”

After a pause, Thorin said, “Yes, they are.”

They ate and talked until the coffee ran out, then relocated to the balcony in Thorin’s study, where they sat in its single stone bench. The few pastries that had remained stayed behind, tucked back into the basket. Smoking and eating didn’t tend to mix well. Hobbits in particular tended to be very fastidious about the order of things—smoking was to be done after having finished eating, and doing both at once was only somewhat acceptable during parties. Food and pipe-weed, after all, were best enjoyed separately, otherwise the tastes and smells got tangled up and it became impossible to take pleasure in either.

Bilbo and Thorin shared a comfortable silence at first, looking down at the sprawling Dale, its stone and wood buildings giving off a gentle glow in the wintery morning light. Only Bilbo smoked at first, pulling out his pipe and weed pouch from his jacket and blowing rings into the sky. There was a surprising lack of wind so far up in the Mountain, and Thorin soon explained that it was due to the balcony being located in what Thorin described as a ‘pocket’ in the mountain’s face.

The dwarf-King explained it in more detail than that, of course, sometimes resorting to words in his native tongue when he couldn’t find one in Westron that expressed what he wanted. That, coupled with the fact that Bilbo was pretty clueless when it came to rock formations—and rocks in general, truth be told—made him lose the thread within moments, but he still enjoyed listening to Thorin talk, blowing smoke rings and making little interested noises every now and then.

Eventually, they fell into silence again, but it was different than the previous one. There was an undercurrent of something in the air. It wasn’t bad, but it made Bilbo’s heart skip a beat for no reason. Expectation, he realised, recognising it from when he had been waiting for Thorin to step into the drawing room. They were headed somewhere, here and now, in the privacy of Thorin’s balcony. Bilbo wondered if he was ready for it. He knew that he wanted to be.

Into the silence, Thorin murmured, “There is silver in your hair.”

“And almost no black left in yours,” Bilbo quipped instantly.

Thorin grinned. “Your waistline is the widest I have ever seen it.”

“And your beard is long enough to tuck into your belt!” Bilbo laughed.

Those two last comments were more flirting than they were teasing, but Bilbo tried not to pay it much attention. It wouldn’t do to ruin their morning because he was too self-conscious to enjoy himself—and over amicable bantering, no less! They had been more straightforward and less careful with each other regarding these matters in their letters, and their friends had had no qualms about addressing the unaddressed thus far. Still, a certain amount of carefulness wasn’t amiss, especially if they didn’t want to end up where they were likely to end up if they weren’t cautious.

Bilbo glanced at Thorin. The dwarf’s gaze was trained on him and swimming with quiet fondness. It startled the hobbit into taking a sharp inhale. The sudden amount of smoke choked him, and he coughed into his hand, eyes watering.

Thorin’s hand settled between his shoulders. “Bilbo, are you well?”

“Yes,” he wheezed, his cheeks stinging with embarrassment. It was quite mortifying, the way he was acting as if he were a blundering tween instead of over a century old. Thorin tried to have him raise his arms above his head, but Bilbo waved him off. “Really, Thorin, stop fussing. I’m fine.”

“Is it just the smoke,” asked the King, “or are you in poor health? Should I call Nái?”

“No, it’s all right.” Bilbo cleared his throat and let himself lean into Thorin, just enough to get away with it. “I’m fine now.”

“You never did care for cold weather,” Thorin said.

“There are many things for which I do not care,” Bilbo sniffed, making Thorin chuckle. “And who is this Nái person?”

“Óin’s daughter and apprentice. She was promoted to Court Physician when he left for Moria.”

“Oh! I had no idea he was a father.”

“Unlike his brother, Óin is more secretive about his family.”

“Everyone is more secretive than Glóin when it comes to their families! But tell me, will they come to the celebration? Óin and Ori and Balin? I would like to see the entire Company reunited.”

“And we all share that sentiment, but I doubt they will come,” Thorin said, an apologetic pitch to his words. “Moria thrives under Balin’s rule, but it has only been two years since the colony settled in those ancient halls. The new dwarves of Khazad-dûm need their leaders to remain with them and provide order.” Thorin slid his hand down Bilbo’s back, eliciting a small shiver. When he continued talking, his voice seemed to have grown richer, “Very much like Erebor needed hers after we managed to reclaim it.”

Oh, there was a world of meaning behind that ‘we’. Bilbo kept himself from stammering something silly just on time. It was too much, feeling all these things at such an advanced age. Thorin’s presence had the power to make him a bundle of nerves just as it turned him into a boneless heap.

What would everyone back in the Shire have to say about him, the Master of Bag End, if they found out how badly he swooned under this dwarf-King’s words? Bilbo didn’t care at all, but thinking about the amount of gossiping he would cause—once again!—was amusing. He bit down on the end of his pipe and took a small puff, fighting off a nervous giggle.

“But I do believe,” Thorin added when Bilbo remained silent, “that Balin might send Ori in his stead.”

“I see.” Bilbo breathed out, too distracted to think of blowing a smoke ring. “Why Ori?”

“So he can see his family and friends.” Now Thorin’s thumb was rubbing circles in the small of Bilbo’s back, and it was becoming very hard indeed to keep himself from tugging the King closer still by his long beard. “Dori has been threatening to march right up to Moria if the lad doesn’t visit soon.”

“Oh, dear,” Bilbo tittered. “That sounds very much like the Dori I remember.”

“He remains as loyal to his brothers as always.” Thorin’s lips curving into a smirk. “And perhaps even more suffocating. Nori was very relieved to move out, and Ori to leave the Mountain altogether.”

“Oh, stop that.” Bilbo nudged him. “You make Dori sound as if he were some sort of vile beast.”

“He is invasive, quick to anger, and strong as an ox,” Thorin pointed out, at last removing his hand from Bilbo’s back. Bilbo missed the contact straight away, though he appreciated the way his face stopped feeling quite so warm. “I daresay he is a more dangerous version of that relative of yours—the one that keeps trying to steal your silverware. Lobethia, was it?”

“Close enough, though I will not mention her actual name. I fear that would summon her.”

“I doubt even she would be able to come crawling out of the stonework when there are months of travel between you.”

“Let us not put it to the test, shall we? Frodo’s friends did manage to sneak along, after all, and right under my nose! Though it is true that they were able to keep their presence a secret from me only until Rivendell—but still! I shudder to think that Lobelia might have been more successful in her sneaking.” Bilbo grimaced at the thought and took a puff of his pipe. Turning his attention back to Thorin, he raised an eyebrow at the smirking dwarf. “What is that cheeky look for?”

“You said her name.”

“Goodness me, I did, didn’t I? Oh, I will never forgive myself if she does show up.” Bilbo looked round, making sure that there was no Mistress Sackville-Baggins barrelling into the balcony all of a sudden. “I swear that woman is stubborn enough to come all the way to Erebor just to spite me. Against travelling, she is, until word reaches her that I’ll be staying in a cave filled with riches.”

Thorin raised his right eyebrow, his long scar curling around his eye with the movement. “A cave?”

Bilbo patted his knee. “A very pretty one.”

“Hmm. In any case, the guards at the Front Gate wouldn’t let her pass; not even if she claims to be your kin,” said Thorin in an amused tone. “Your confirmation and permission would have to be given first, and then mine. So rest assured, my friend, that there will be no Lobelia to sour your mood while you are a guest in my ‘cave.’ ”

“Oh, that is quite a relief. I can sleep in peace now.” Bilbo gave a mock bow. “I am most grateful, Your Highness.”

“Think naught of it, Master Baggins,” intoned Thorin. “Now do pass me that pipe.”

“It’s Longbottom,” Bilbo warned, but handed the pipe over anyhow.

“I am no longer partial to Southlinch.” Thorin accepted the pipe with a soft glimmer in his eyes. He wetted his lips and closed them round the lip of the stem, then took a puff. He settled against the bench more comfortably. “The men of Dale have taken to growing their own pipe-weed. From seeds they bought from someone in the Shire’s Southfarthing some decades ago, I believe. Hornpipe Twist, they call it.”

“I had no idea whatsoever, but now that I do, I have no choice but to try it.” Bilbo beamed at Thorin, and even dared another nudge. “So you smoke that these days? Bit of an odd name, but it sounds promising. If you have a pouch with some leaves about you, we can smoke it now.”

“I’m afraid I haven’t the habit of carrying pipe-weed round with me any longer. My tobacco jar remains in my quarters at all times these days, and though it’s indeed very close to retrieve it, I find myself unwilling to move at present.” Thorin stretched his legs out, smiling as he passed back the pipe. “But I could describe the taste, if you like, to sate your curiosity for now.”

“I expect that will only make me more curious. But by all means, please do.”

“Well,” Thorin smacked his lips gently, considering, “it tastes stronger than Longbottom, but isn’t quite as bitter as Southlinch. It’s got a smokey aroma that is surprisingly pleasant, but it turns acrid if one indulges in it for too long without interruption.”

“To be enjoyed in moderation then,” Bilbo mused, nursing his sweet and spicy Longbottom. “I don’t believe I could do that.”

“So long as one remembers to accompany it with some tea, there is no need for moderation,” Thorin said.

Bilbo frowned. “Mixing smoking with food?”

“Think of it as an accompaniment. They complement each other quite well, I assure you.”

“An unlikely match.”

Bilbo repacked his pipe with his tamper, his movements quick and precise. He sprinkled the leaves into the bowl, then pushed and grinded with his flat-ended tool. He relit it gently, blowing kind air onto the hot ashes. Once he was done, he offered the new round’s first puff to Thorin, who accepted it with his bright eyes, once again, fixed on Bilbo.

“Maybe so,” the King said, “but one that works nevertheless.”

Chapter Text

Eventually, duty called Thorin away from the balcony. They were both reluctant to put an end to their shared morning. A mere breakfast, no matter how delicious and enjoyable, was simply not enough. Bilbo wanted to stay for elevenses and lunch and high tea and dinner and supper. He wanted to stay in Thorin’s quarters, tidy but lived-in, and make a place for himself in them.

They parted with reluctance, lingering at the door when it was time for Bilbo to leave. Thorin rested a hand on the door handle and watched Bilbo with hooded eyes, two pools of fresh water. Bilbo watched him back, drinking in the details that made up his dwarf-King. With his free hand, Thorin reached for Bilbo’s own and kissed his knuckles.

“I will see you at dinner tonight,” he promised.

“I would like nothing more.”

Thorin smiled and kissed his knuckles again, then let him go and held open one of the doors. Bilbo stepped out and nodded at the guards posted outside, then started and turned back.

“Thorin! The basket. Dori’s basket.”

“Oh, yes. One moment.” Thorin disappeared inside, then returned a second later with the basket in hand. He gave it to Bilbo with the few pastries they hadn’t eaten tucked under Bilbo’s handkerchief. “It would be a shame to leave these delicacies here when I won’t have the chance to enjoy them before the day is done.”

“Leave them for your nephews then,” Bilbo said.

“They too will be much preoccupied with royal matters to enjoy your baking,” Thorin replied, contrite yet seemingly pleased by that. “But I’m sure your nephew and his friends won’t say no to getting their hands on your brilliant pastries.”

“Brilliant!” Bilbo scoffed, but he was smiling. “And, you know, for someone who has seen them just once thus far, you seem to be quite certain that you know the boys well.”

“You have told me about them at length in your letters,” Thorin said simply.

Bilbo’s smile took on a nervous edge at the mention of their epistolary dalliances. Snippets flashed through his head. Candid and honest words, so far confined to parchment, suddenly made real. The idea of being held accountable for things he wrote to the King over the past fifty years—true things, yet much too tender to revisit in plain daylight—didn’t sit well with the old hobbit.

He had expected to ease into this perennial love between them, even expected it, but the reality was another. He found himself rushing into it with little thought, and Thorin matching his recklessness with his own brimming emotions. It was too much. It wasn’t enough. Bilbo both wanted and was loath to want it. For now, he decided to ignore it.

“Well!” He held Dori’s basket close to his chest and nodded down at it. “I’ll make sure to tell them these come with the King’s regards then.”

“Please do. It’s a little late for second breakfast, but perhaps they could eat them for luncheon.”

“There’s no such thing as a fixed time for food,” Bilbo said. “Hobbits have meal times that we follow to a fault, that’s true, but we also eat whenever the mood strikes.”

“I had noticed,” Thoin laughed, then cleared his throat.

Bilbo remembered the guards flanking the door then. He took a step back. “Well, anyhow.”

“Yes.”

“Good day, Master Thorin.”

Thorin gave Bilbo an amused look. “Good day, Master Baggins.”

Bilbo returned to his apartments, feeling as though the truest part of him was still out in the balcony, blowing smoke rings and leaning against Thorin. His mind kept jumping back to little things that had happened during their second breakfast, and by the time he opened his door, he was smiling from ear to ear.

Then, just as he closed the door behind himself, he realised why Thorin had looked amused.

“Oh, blast it!” he said, slapping a hand over his eyes.

“Mister Bilbo?” Sam asked from somewhere near the fireplace.

“I called him Master Thorin!” Bilbo said apropos of nothing, which only confused his audience further.

After a pause, Pippin asked, “Isn’t that his name, though?”

“He isn’t ‘Master’ anything,” Bilbo snapped, lowering his hand. “He’s a king.”

The boys were all lounging in front of the fire, half-full plates and goblets scattered around them as they played a dwarvish tile-based game by the orange glow. They were all looking at him with rather clueless eyes. Pippin had his boots on, and Frodo had donned a pair of thicks socks to cover his wooly feet. It was then that Bilbo noticed just how cold his toes were after having sat for so long in Thorin’s balcony. That far up the Mountain, it was a miracle that his toenails hadn’t frosted over.

His embarrassment morphed into uncomfortable annoyance then. He patted his chest and smoothed his hands down his coat to calm down. He was much too old to be so flustered so often, and much too wise to be so foolish. Yet he felt as though everything he had done ever since he got to Erebor was switch between moods like a tween and miss his footing much too often. The worst part was that he couldn’t seem to help any of it.

Bilbo harrumphed and went over to the boys with a mild scowl in place.

“Someone fetch me some socks,“ he commanded, setting down the basket on top of the tiles laid out in a complex labyrinthine pattern on the carpet. “And finish these.”

Predictably, Merry and Pippin swooped down on the basket and began fighting each other for the privilege of having the first pick. Bilbo rolled his eyes but didn’t stop them, simply telling them not to break the basket with their struggling. Frodo sighed and began collecting whatever tiles he could from under his friends.

Sam went to retrieve Bilbo a pair of socks. By the time he came back, Pippin had won over Merry and was munching on the sole mince pie left. Merry nursed his slice of sweet yeast cake with a slight pout, but his honest face made it impossible to hide the fact that he was enjoying his pastry. The pout was due to having lost the tussling match more than anything.

“Had fun with your friend, Uncle?” Frodo asked.

He dropped the tiles into a leather pouch one at a time. They clinked quietly, and Bilbo took a moment to inspect them from where he stood. They were simple in their beauty, clearly made of a soft type of stone that was easy to engrave with the symbols and runes required to play.

A distant part of Bilbo’s mind wondered where the boys had learned the rules of the game. Probably at the market, he decided, when they had gone exploring. He felt a pang of regret at having missed the chance to live that with them. Then he thought that having them teach him how to play would be just as good a memory, if not even better.

“Indeed I did,” Bilbo said at last. He gave a sigh as he sat down on the armchair Sam had vacated. He pulled on the socks with a slight grimace. They felt strange, but the warmth they provided was undeniable. “Meeting with friends is always a pleasure.”

“Speaking of friends,” Merry straightened up, “will you tell us about them?”

“I’ve already told you the story countless times.”

“But you never really told us about your friends,” Frodo pointed out, “apart from the obvious.”

“Yes, that,” Pippin said. “We know who’s the king and who’s the historian and who’s the toy maker, but we don’t know much beyond that. We don’t know why they’re your friends, or how you came to be friends. We just know they didn’t like you at first, and you didn’t much like them, and then one day you all had a change of heart.”

“And that’s exactly why I cannot tell it in my stories,” Bilbo said. He picked up the last honey cake. Thorin loved honey cakes. He had probably left this one for Bilbo. Because Bilbo also loved honey cakes. “Changes of heart are seldom easy to explain.”

“You can try.” Frodo raised both eyebrows. “We will listen.”

“Yes, children always listen, don’t they?”

“We do when we want to,” Pippin said, which was very true.

“And we do now,” Merry added.

“Want to listen,” Pippin clarified unnecessarily.

Bilbo gave them all a suspicious look. “You’re being worse than Farmer Maggot’s mutts when they get their fangs on a good bone.” He set down the cake. “What are you boys after? Let’s hear it. Out with it.”

“It’s nothing,” Frodo said, his blue eyes round.

“We’re just curious,” Sam said from where he had sat at Frodo’s feet.

Bilbo narrowed his eyes. If Frodo and Sam were taking the lead, then that could only mean that the young hobbits had conspired together to achieve something. What, Bilbo wasn’t sure, but he would find out.

He reached over and plucked a tile from the pouch, then held it up. “Don’t play games with me. I can see through you.” His point made, he threw the tile back into the pouch. “So out with it.”

The boys all shared a glance. For a moment, it seemed that none would talk, but then the unlikeliest one spoke up.

“You haven’t seen your friends in fifty years,” Pippin murmured. “Not once.”

“Why does this come as a surprise to you lot? We are celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Erebor’s retrieval,” Bilbo said, pulling out his pipe and lighting it with a great deal of annoyance. He was suddenly not interested in eating the honey cake any longer. “I helped them retrieve Erebor! That was what my adventure was all about. Did you ever listen, all those times I told my stories, you fool boys?”

“Yes, but I suppose we didn’t make the connection,” said Frodo. “This celebration sounds like it’s for something that happened a really long time ago, and you always talk about your adventure in such a way that it feels like it was only yesterday.”

“It was only yesterday,” said Bilbo. “To me, it was.”

“But it wasn’t.”

“Yes, but I never—it’s just—oh, leave it.” Bilbo puffed on his pipe for a moment, mulish and sour. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“You always say that,” accused Pippin.

“Yes, you always say we won’t understand,” said Merry, “and then refuse to even try to explain things altogether!”

“Because you haven’t lived enough yet to understand some things,” Bilbo snapped. “Life has lessons in store for you that you won’t see coming, but not all lessons are the same for everyone, so what’s the point of sharing mine if they might not apply to you?”

“Because they might?” Pippin retorted.

Bilbo harrumphed and blew a smoke ring. It gave him time to keep himself from snapping nasty things at the young boy. It wasn’t his fault that he was impertinent, and it wasn’t their fault that they were curious. Bilbo had taken care to make his friends a felt but blurred presence in his tales, to hide how much he cared, to conceal just how deeply his adventure had marked him.

His oddness had already been unwelcome in Hobbiton when they thought he had joined the quest for the gold. Bilbo could only imagine how much worse it would have been if they had discovered his true reasons—the thrill, the longing, the solemnity.

“They might not,” he said at last.

A part of him hoped that would be the case.

Chapter Text

As promised, Bilbo and Thorin met for dinner. It wasn’t a private affair like second breakfast, which should have been disappointing but wasn’t. Bilbo was thankful for the presence of the Company and the boys around the long table. It allowed him to measure just how affected he was by that morning’s events.

The answer was not very. He was not unaffected, but he wasn’t shaken the way he had been immediately after returning to his apartments. A quiet afternoon by the fire learning to play a dwarven tile game had been enough to let him process his emotions and gather his wits.

There were still poignant questions on his mind, but they didn’t twist his insides like they had earlier. They simply waited to be answered the way a farmer waits for rain. There was a certain anxiousness to them, a certain unignorable trepidation, but it was nothing Bilbo’s old heart couldn’t handle. It had certainly handled worse fears before, and it had always recovered.

After dinner, just as the servants were clearing the plates away, Pippin asked Merry something in a quiet voice, to which Merry replied with an equally hushed answer, and after a short but lively struggle with their hands out of sight under the table, Merry and Pippin brought out a pouch Bilbo had grown familiar with during the afternoon. As one, they placed it on the table. Its contents clinked and clanked the way little stone tiles do.

“We propose a tournament,” Merry said.

Kíli threw his head back and laughed. Everyone else followed suit, some louder than others, but it was obvious that the boys’ proposal had caught everyone’s interest. Or mostly everyone’s. Bilbo rolled his eyes and leaned back against his chair, deciding then and there that he wouldn’t participate. He wasn’t the competitive sort. He rather preferred cheering and booing from the sidelines.

Nori leaned forward, eyes twinkling. “And what would the prize be?”

“We hadn’t actually thought of that,” Pippin said, breezy as breeze. “Food, maybe?”

“You just ate!” Bofur laughed.

“A hobbit’s appetite is never gone, good sir,” Pippin said with profound gravity.

After some debating, they decided that whoever winned could ask a favour of someone who had participated in the tournament, and the chosen loser would have to comply. Bilbo got up with a yawn and excused himself. Everyone protested, but he insisted that he was old for a hobbit and needed his rest after such a long journey: it had only been a day since his arrival.

Bilbo rested a hand on Thorin’s shoulder on his way out, giving it a light squeeze that could either be nothing or something. He would leave the touch’s meaning open to the King’s interpretation.

The apartments were quiet without the boys. He hadn’t been alone in them so far, and having grown used to the continuous murmurs and giggles of the four young hobbits made the sudden peace feel jarring, almost empty. For an introspective one such as Bilbo, he found it surprising that he preferred their company over his usual solitude.

He stared into the hearthfire, pipe in hand, and took a puff. In the past, being alone had been a defence, a protection against an unspeakable pain too keenly felt in his younger years. He wondered when he had started liking company over solitude. Was it when Frodo moved in? Or was it before that, when he grew used to the cacophony of twelve dwarves and one wizard around him? Or did he ever actually prefer solitude to company?

Bilbo no longer could tell. He knew he liked his own company, but he ignored if it was the company he liked best. He ran a hand over his inner chest pocket, thinking of Thorin and Frodo and so many others whose presence brought smiles to his wrinkled face. He suspected not. He suspected he was rather tired of keeping himself company.

As if on cue, there was a knock on the door. Bilbo smiled. Not a big and bright smile, but a soft and sincere one. He debated getting up to answer, but decided he was rather comfortable with his feet propped up on the armchair across from him and the kind fire so near his chilly frame.

“There’s no lock, you know,” he called.

The door grumbled open after a moment, the way heavy stone doors often did. Thorin stepped inside. He was still wearing the same attire he had for dinner--a rather formal one compared to the garbs Bilbo had seen him in that morning. He looked regal and, more importantly, at easy with that regalness. He always had, even when he had been King-in-Exile, but now he glowed with a gentle authority that belonged to fair and noble kings whose kingdoms prospered, seldom seen in these days of growing darkness.

“Knocking is a courtesy,” Thorin said, closing the door.

“Do we need such courtesies?”

“Perhaps not,” Thorin acquiesced. “But it pleases me to show you the respect you deserve.”

Bilbo puffed on his pipe but said nothing, coils of smokes escaping him every time he parted his lips. He took his feet off the armchair and gestured at it. The invitation was clear, and Thorin accepted it with a tilt of the head.

“You took longer than I thought,” Bilbo said.

“I didn’t wish for them to catch onto the fact that I lost on purpose,” Thorin replied.

“They may have realised anyhow.”

“I’m sure they have.”

The King waved at Bilbo to bring his feet back up, onto his lap. After a moment, Bilbo complied. It reminded him of how Fíli and Kíli had sat in a similar position the previous night. Actually, that wasn’t the first time Bilbo had seen them sitting like that. They had also done it during the quest. Bilbo thought he could even remember Bofur doing it with his brother and cousin, and the Ri brothers with one another. He might have even seen Nori prop his feet up on Dwalin’s lap once or twice.

“Is this a dwarf thing?” he asked.

“What is?”

Bilbo wiggled his toes as explanation, and Thorin set his warm hands on top of them to still the movement. “Your nephews sat like this last night, when they came for a chat after dinner.”

“Ah. Hm. Yes, I suppose it is.”

Thorin seemed deep in thought all of a sudden. He ran his hands through the curly tufts on Bilbo’s feet, toward the ankle rather than the other way around, sending the carefully groomed hairs into disarray. Bilbo wiggled his toes again, this time with mild annoyance.

“You’d better fix that,” Bilbo said.

Thorin chuckled and smoothed the hairs down. “It implies being someone’s foundation,” he said.

“Holding someone’s feet?”

“Yes.”

Bilbo made a curious sound. “How peculiar, but I find it rather enchanting. Feet are quite important to us hobbits, but we have no such tradition back in the Shire. We brush our feet before entering smials and such, and we tie bells round our ankles when we dance, and we bless our soles when we’re grateful or shocked, but that’s about that.”

“You bless your soles?” Thorin asks, smiling.

“Oh, hush. I’m sure dwarves have something similar with their beards.”

Thorin pursed his lips but kept his silence. He stroked Bilbo’s feet the wrong way again, then smoothed the hairs back down. He kept on doing this, and Bilbo soon grew to enjoy the prickle of unkempt tufts combined with the ticklish pleasure of having them returned to their orderly state.

“So did you?” Bilbo prompted.

“Did I what?” Thorin asked, relaxed and content as he stroked Bilbo’s feet.

“Lose on purpose.”

“Oh, yes. I believe the young Peregrin was rather pleased to have bested me in the game.”

“I bet he was.”

“Dwalin was quick to best him shortly afterwards, however.”

“The horror,” Bilbo laughed.

“I believe he did it to avenge me.” Thorin paused. “He was rather ruthless about it.”

“Worry not, my dear. Tooks and challenges are like moths and flames.” Bilbo blew three smoke rings, then huffed a laugh that scattered them into shapeless coils. “If anything, you should pity Dwalin. Pippin won’t rest until he gets a rematch and comes out victorious.”

“Dwalin will never let him win,” Thorin says.

“Exactly why you should pity Dwalin.”

Thorin gave a chuckle, but it was short and distracted, the way one laughs when thinking of something else. Bilbo inclined his head a little, trying to get a better look at Thorin’s face. He didn’t seem upset, but he did seem to be thinking of something that wasn’t readily apparent.

“Something on your mind?” Bilbo asked. “I’d say scone for your thought, but maybe a ruby or some other pretty stone might do the trick with you.”

“I’ll accept the scone if you bake it,” Thorin replied, prompt and chivalrous.

“Thorin,” Bilbo said, almost a chide if not for his smile.

“It’s nothing.” Thorin shook his head. “I was just sad that I couldn’t join my nephews in their visit last night. I rather wish I could have, but needed to reply to some letters and go over a few things. I finished about the same time they returned from your apartments. That only frustrated me further.”

“Thorin,” Bilbo said again, and this time his voice reflected the fluttering in his chest.

Sad. That was the silliest part. Thorin being sad over something. Such a silly way to feel. So small. Only three letters. The word alone wasn’t imposing the way ‘rage’ or ‘passion’ were, but it was its simplicity that made it imposing in itself. Sad. Such a silly, terrible way to feel.

Then it registered to Bilbo that Thorin had been sad over being a good king—over having responsibilities he had longed for before the reclamation of Erebor and using his time to be a caring ruler. Over not spending more time with Bilbo.

“Thorin,” Bilbo said, yet again, and this time his tone returned to chiding.

“Selfish, I know.” Thorin raised a hand. “You needn’t tell me.”

“Selfish would’ve been coming here,” Bilbo said, even though the previous instant he had been ready to tell Thorin he couldn’t be sad over such reasons when he had a mountain to run. “But you didn’t.”

“But now I have.”

“Are you neglecting any duties tonight?”

“A king’s duties are never over,” Thorin said, averting his eyes as he went back to stroking Bilbo’s feet. “There will always be something or someone that requires my attention.”

Bilbo knew this, yet the idea rankled. He wanted to be the centre of Thorin’s attention. He knew he was, in these moments they snatched for themselves, but he wondered what it would be like if they could always be like this--a dwarf and a hobbit, sitting together by the hearthfire, the former petting the latter’s woolly toes. Not a King under the Mountain, not a Baggins of Bag End. Just Thorin and Bilbo.

But Thorin and Bilbo weren’t themselves without being who they were. Bilbo nibbled on his pipe. He was used to thinking the world unfair, but he usually let it wash over him. Now the sense of impotence clung to him like wet rags. It bothered a very fragile and seldom acknowledged part of him, but he feared that trying to peel it off might only damage it further.

He wiggled his toes again, and Thorin looked up.

“I’ll have to steal some moments out of your day here and there then.” Bilbo took a final puff of his pipe and smiled. “I am quite a good burglar, after all.”

Chapter Text

The next day came like any other. Or rather, it came like the two days Bilbo had spent in the Mountain so far. It was cold, and he had the blankets wrapped around him rather tightly, but the moment he remembered how he had finished the previous evening, he felt warm at his very core.

Thorin had left not long before the boys arrived, as if sensing their approach through the stone walls. The fire had been burning cheerily still, the dwarf-king having made sure to keep it high every time it threatened to grow smaller. Bilbo hadn’t donned his socks, an irrational part of him wanting to feel Thorin’s hands run through his tufts of hair.

Even after fifty years of reign, Thorin’s hands remained rough and calloused despite their gentle touch. It was strange, but at the same time lovely. Bilbo wondered how his own hands must feel to Thorin. Soft and pampered, maybe, with a single blister on the middle finger of his writing hand, a small but protruding knob that in the Shire spoke of educated hobbits—a physical mark denoting his oddness.

He raised his writing hand to his lips, a small smile tugging at their corners. Only Thorin made him think of such things, such little and unimportant details. Bilbo couldn’t care less about the state of his hands on any given day, but when Thorin was there to hold them, to kiss his knuckles, to run his thumb over them, all of a sudden it mattered. Never mind that Thorin’s hands weren’t the hands of a king and so Bilbo needn’t have the hands of a hobbit.

But his prominent Took blood revelled in the knowledge that Thorin liked him, hobbitish hands or not. It kept the smile firmly on his face as he got out of bed, changed quickly into warmer garments, and finally left his chambers to have breakfast with the boys. He smiled down at his short nails and chubby finger as he buttered up his toasts and scones, and poured his coffee and brewed tea for the boys. At last he chuckled when he realised that all morning he’d been thinking about hands when the previous evening he and Thorin had been talking about feet.

What would they talk about next, he wondered. Noses? Ears? Whatever the topic, Bilbo was looking forward to it, whenever it may be. Thorin had told him the previous evening he wouldn’t be able to join him for second breakfast like they had done that day, and indeed he might not even be able to join them in the evening for dinner. The idea of not seeing Thorin for an entire day seemed agony, but Bilbo refused to succumb to despair. Hadn’t they lived in different edges of a map for half a century? Surely a day was nothing. It would probably be over before Bilbo even noticed it.

“Uncle?” Frodo asked.

“Yes, my lad?”

“Is everything all right?”

“Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Well,” Frodo exchanged a quick look with the rest of the boys, “it’s just that you’re frowning all of a sudden.”

Bilbo noticed only then the hard knot into which his face had contorted. He smoothed his expression. “Don’t worry about it, lad. I got lost in silly ruminations. Never mind. Let’s talk about our day ahead. Have we got any plans?”

“Elevenses with Mister Dori,” Pippin chirped, all aglow about it.

“He promised us spicy dwarven food,” Merry said with a broad grin.

“I remember now,” Bilbo nodded. “Very well then. Elevenses with Dori. What would you like to do until then? Stay in playing the tile game? Or maybe we could walk around the market levels again.”

“Mister Nori offered to be a guide for me and the boys today,” Pippin said, attempting to sound casual.

Bilbo narrowed his eyes at him. “Did he now?”

“He did,” Pippin assured him. “Last night, after you’d left. I think he meant it as an apology for Mister Dwalin beating me at the game. I couldn’t say no to him.”

“It wouldn’t have been polite,” Frodo said, then hid a smile by taking a great bite out of his toast.

“Indeed,” Bilbo said, still suspicious. “And where does he plan to take you?”

“Oh, well,” Pippin shrugged and made a waving motion, “here and there. This mountain-home of theirs is quite big, after all. There must be many interesting places to visit.”

“We’d thought maybe you could do your own thing while Mister Nori showed us around,” Merry piped up.

Bilbo leaned back against his chair and thought about it. The boys looked hopeful and excited. Denying them their outing would wound their good mood nearly fatally. Still, Bilbo didn’t know if he wanted them running around the Mountain with a proud former thief as their guide. He would send the guards with the boys, of course, but with Nori there, the poor dwarves would probably be left given the slip in no time.

It wasn’t that Bilbo didn’t trust Nori or the boys. It just felt too much like putting a toddler in charge of other toddlers. Frodo, Merry, and Pippin all had a great capacity for mischief, and Sam, poor sweet lamb that he was, had a tendency to go along with things so long as it wasn’t dangerous or bound to land him in too much trouble.

“I’m not sure I like this idea,” he said at last.

As predicted, the boys’ faces fell.

“What? No!” Pippin cried.

“But why?” Frodo asked, his round blue eyes betrayed.

“I simply don’t. Nori is a good dwarf and a good friend, but you boys have only seen him twice before, and I don’t think—” Bilbo stopped when he noticed the guilty shift that rippled through his audience. Realisation hit him alongside a bizarre surge of dread. “The market yesterday. What did he tell you?”

“Nothing!” Sam spoke then, his voice squeaky but rough after being silent for so long. “I swear, Mister Bilbo, sir, Mister Nori only showed us around, the nicest shops and stalls, and then he bought us the tile game.”

“He bought it?”

“Yes! With the weird dwarven coins.” Sam made the square shape typical or Erebor currency with his fingers. “He taught us the rules too. Also wanted to teach us how to cheat, but we said no.”

“You said no,” Pippin muttered.

“It’s dishonest!” Sam said.

“It’s a game!” Pippin shot back. “And I could’ve beaten Mister Dwalin last night if I’d know how to cheat!”

“Ho!” Bilbo shouted, a hand raised, and the boys fell silent. “It’s much too early to be yelling over tile games and whether cheating on them has any merit or not. The day hasn’t even truly started, and I’m still trying to decide if I should let you go with Nori.”

“Say yes, Uncle,” pleaded Frodo, who seldom begged for anything.

Bilbo pursed his lips. “I’m thinking.”

Frodo leant forward, resting his mop of dark curls on a perfectly good loaf of bread he had been cutting into slices and slowly polishing off with his tea. From that angle, his pout looked even more pronounced. “Uncle. Please.”

“I’m thinking,” Bilbo said again, this time with an edge to his voice that demanded absolute silence. He took a long moment to decide, then spoke with the same authoritative tone, “If you go with Nori, you’ll take the guards, and you shan’t lose them. We still have some weeks to go in Erebor, and if you disobey me now, I will breathe down your necks for the rest of our stay as if I were the ghost of the very dragon that haunted these halls for so many years. Are we clear?”

“Crystal!” Pippin said, Merry and Sam nodding along.

Frodo smiled. “Thank you, Uncle.”

“Yes, yes, you’re very welcome.” Bilbo reached over and pinched one of his nephew’s pale cheeks. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do—which leaves you lot quite a bit of wiggle room!”

The boys had promised to arrive on time for elevenses with Dori. When Nori came to collect them, he promised with a great deal of gesturing and smiling that he would deliver them to his brother’s eatery himself. Bilbo wasn’t sure if he would believe him under any other circumstances, but he at least believed that Nori wouldn’t risk his older brother’s wrath.

For his part, Bilbo got a small rucksack ready, grabbed a walking staff, and headed for Dale on foot. Much to his displeasure, he had to pull on a pair of socks and boots. He was no longer the sprightly middle-aged hobbit who had run properly barefoot around Erebor and Lake-town the first and last time he was in these lands. The cold settled at the marrow of his bones now, despite his youthful appearance, and he didn’t want to risk falling ill with the celebrations only a few days away.

He hitched a ride on a human merchant’s wagon at the Front Gate and arrived in Dale just after lunch. The city was alive with the preparations, people running to and fro with armfuls of food and garlands and a thousand other things. A few slowed down to peer at Bilbo curiously, and so he pulled his thick fur-lined cloak over his head, shielding himself from weather and looks alike. He had no wish to be bothered quite so early into his outing.

Bilbo stood there for a moment, trying to regain his bearings. He found that they rather eluded him. Dale was much changed, and the mere day he had spent in it on his way to Erebor not a week ago hadn’t been enough to reacquaint him with it.

He should have asked for a map. He was good with those, and it would have made everything much easier. But alas, he hadn’t thought of it, and so now he was destined to wander around until he bumped into what or whom he wanted.

Pulling the cloak a bit tighter around himself, Bilbo began walking. Even if he wasn’t sure where in the city he was, sometimes he would look at a building, squint, take a step back, and suddenly a memory covered in dust and debris would spring up from the recesses of his mind.

It was never enough to realise where in the city he was, and he would have been surprised at himself if it had: Bilbo’s memories of Dale were eclectic, full of gore and chaos and white snow streaked with red and black blood over old grey stones. The pristine buildings he saw all around him now were nothing like that, just like Erebor had been nothing like the mountain he remembered.

“It’s healed,” he told no one, looking up at a house and patting its strong walls.

That was the word for it. Healed. When Bilbo had been to the East, the land had been sickly and sad. Now it was hale and hearty. It gladdened him beyond words, beyond any sort of intelligible speech.

And never once did he think that he had helped do this. Never once did he look at the clean faces of Tall Folk, and hear the laughter of children, and smell the fresh scent of flowers and baking, and think that he had done this.

Because to him, he hadn’t. To him, it had been the effort of tired but hopeful people with precious little to lose and a world to win. He had just been a hobbit away from home, and he had done his part, but to him, his part had been negligent. There were no heroes in Bag End. They were all here.

“Master Baggins,” a voice called.

Bilbo gave a little jump, retrieving his hand from the wall and turning around. “Gimli!”

“Good day to you, sir,” Gimli said, giving a low but quick bow. He was dressed as if for battle, and he gripped his axe with a somewhat interesting amount of anxiousness. “I heard no word that you would be here today. We would have prepared accordingly, had we known.”

“That would be because I didn’t alert anyone to the fact,” Bilbo said, puffing up. “I wasn’t aware I needed to let people know my comings and goings as though I were some foolish child in need of looking after.”

“Not at all, sir!” Gimli replied. “Not at all.”

“Well good then.”

Gimli holstered his axe and offered an arm. “May I keep you company, sir?”

“Very well.” Bilbo clasped Gimli’s arm, thankful to have someone to lean on. Walking with boots on uneven cobblestone was a great challenge to his old bones. “Show me around, lad, and tell me what you’re doing in Dale.”

“Helping with the preparations,” the young Gimli said, steering Bilbo down the street at a slow pace. “I’ll be staying in the city for the following days, providing a dwarven hand where it is needed. Last-minute fixes and the like. Heavy-lifting. Increased security. Word of the festival has brought in many unfamiliar faces! Best to keep an eye out for any sort of trouble. We’ll ensure nothing gets in the way of the anniversary. Fifty years!”

“Quite some time,” Bilbo agreed.

“Not a lot by dwarven standards, and yet so much has happened.” Gimli chuckled, a strained but sincere sound, and gave Bilbo a cheeky smile. “And still the surprises aren’t over! Not many thought you’d come, but I believe they’re pleased to have been proven wrong.”

“I enjoy proving people wrong,” Bilbo said, and Gimli chuckled again. “Where will you be staying in the following days?”

“King Bain has some rooms available to dwarven guests all year. Emissaries and politicians from the Mountain often use them. Sometimes even the King stays here, though not very often these days. He’s been mighty busy, what with having to sort everything out before the festival starts and whatnot.”

“A King’s duty is never done,” Bilbo said.

“Very true!” Gimli nodded. “Very true indeed.”

“You would know much about ruling, wouldn’t you,” called a lilting voice, “Gimli son of Glóin?”

Gimli stiffened and went as red as his read beard. They turned in tandem to address whoever it was. By the looks of it, Gimli was well-acquainted with the person to whom the voice belonged, but he appeared to wish he weren’t.

Bilbo blinked in surprise when he saw an elf he thought to be Thranduil at first, then realised was just one of his kin who looked strikingly like a younger and cheerier version of the Elvenking. Bilbo squinted at him. He seemed familiar, in a distant and nebulous way. Perhaps Bilbo had crossed him during the Company’s enforced stay in the Halls of Mirkwood or during the final battle for Erebor?

“I have no time for you, elf,” Gimli snapped. “Go back to your wine and leave us be!”

“You misremember, dear fellow. My father is the one who enjoys wine,” the elf said calmly, stepping closer. He clasped his hands together and smiled down at them, but the gesture seemed to incense Gimli further rather than appease him. Bilbo watched on, quietly amused. “I prefer ale.”

“Ale! You elves wouldn’t know good ale from sullage!” Gimli spluttered for a moment, then shifted Bilbo’s hand on the crook of his elbow so it’d have a better grip. “Come along, Master Baggins. Let us waste no more time.”

“Oh!” The elf’s smile turned a strange mix of genuine and frozen. “Master Baggins!”

“Master Baggins I am,” Bilbo replied, equal parts polite and bemused. “And who might you be?”

The elf gave him a chiding but amused look. “Legolas of the Woodland Realm.”

“Oh.” Bilbo frowned, then remembered. “Oh!”

“Oh,” repeated Legolas, looking about ready to start laughing his head off.

“You’re the one that fought Bolg,” Bilbo said, letting go of Gimli’s arm and stepping forward. The young dwarf have an unhappy huff at being denied the chance to leave the elf behind, but he stayed next to Bilbo. “I heard all about it from Bofur later. And I’ve heard a great deal about you since!”

“Have you?” Legolas asked.

“Yes, I have. Even though you elves probably think dwarves can’t write, they very much do. I’ve kept extensive correspondence with my old friends over the years. I never thought I’d live to hear the tales of a misbehaving elven Prince, I must say.”

“And I never thought I’d live to be scolded by a hobbit,” Legolas said, arching his eyebrows. “At least my misbehaving is a lot more harmless than my father’s. So far, I haven’t thrown any dwarves into any dungeons.”

Bilbo huffed. “As if you could ever keep them there.”

Gimli barked a laugh, and not a moment later Legolas too threw his head back and laughed, though the sound of his mirth was a lot gentler. Gimli stopped short and glared at the elf, his delight at Bilbo’s remark ruined by the Prince’s enjoyment of it.

“What do you have to laugh about?” he demanded.

“A sharp wit and a matching tongue are always a pleasure to find,” Legolas said, adjusting his quiver.

It was only then that Bilbo noticed that Legolas was also dressed as if for battle, his bow and arrows tuckied against his back. It had taken Bilbo longer to notice because elves’ uniforms were deceivingly elegant, which drew attention away from the fact that they were comfortable fighting clothes.

Bilbo furrowed his brow, then rolled his eyes when he realised the reason behind the battle-ready garments. Elves and dwarves! Really, even after so long, they still held onto their petty squabbles. They would probably try to pass it off as sentry duty if he asked, but he knew better.

“Prince Legolas,” Bilbo said, talking over the beginning of Gimli’s retort.

The elf canted his head. “No need for titles, Mister Baggins. In my lands, being a Prince means nothing of substance.”

“Nonsense,” Gimli muttered high enough for them to hear. “Utter nonsense.”

“Legolas then,” Bilbo corrected. “Do you have any plans at present?”

“Other than taking a walk, no.”

“Then you can join us in ours,” Bilbo said. “You can both tell me about the preparations.”

Legolas didn’t seem too keen on the idea, and neither did Gimli. They looked at each other, for once appearing to agree on something. Bilbo rolled his eyes and hooked his arm through Gimli’s again. If they couldn’t say no, then he could very well make them say yes.

“Shall we then?” He tugged at Gimli’s arm.

“Of course, Master Baggins,” Gimli said with some reluctance.

They walked together for the rest of the afternoon. It was an interesting experience, seeing Legolas and Gimli throw quips at each other over Bilbo’s head. They were not friends, that much was certain, yet there was a budding something between them. Bilbo very much wished he could see it bloom into whatever it was.

Legolas showed Bilbo the Woodland tents where his father and subjects resided for the ceremony, but they didn’t enter at Gimli’s insistence, and Thranduil didn’t come out to greet them despite Legolas’s attempts to draw him out. Bilbo guessed it was for the best. He and Thranduil weren’t on bad terms, indeed they had parted on a somewhat friendly note all those years ago, but Bilbo didn’t want to push his luck with the Elvenking.

The Rivendell elves were another matter altogether. They had taken residence in an old but sturdy building near King Bain’s own home. It was nowhere near the pearly beauty of their homeland, but they were thankful guests as well as gracious hosts, and they didn’t hesitate to invite them in for tea when Bilbo demanded that they stop by to say hello. Elrond offered Bilbo the seat to his right, which seemed to appease Gimli a great deal and delight Legolas for reasons Bilbo ignored.

After that, they walked around some more, dusk fast approaching as the sun fled from the cold. Bilbo spotted Boromir across the street at one point, helping set up a heavy-looking wooden structure while still managing to look every bit the Captain of Gondor that he was. Busy as he was, Bilbo decided not to interrupt him. He suspected the man would be more disappointed than glad to see Bilbo, considering Merry and Pippin weren’t with him.

“I’d best head back now,” he said, looking up at the darkening sky.

Gimli and Legolas helped him hitch a ride on one of the last wagons headed for Erebor that day. They stood side by side at the edge of the city and waved until Bilbo let the tarp fall closed. He settled in for the trip and smiled to himself. It had been a nice day away from everything. The distance from the Mountain had helped him miss Thorin less. He was sure it would have been unbearable if he had been confined to the stone halls with no hope of seeing the dwarf-King.

But now the day was almost over, and tomorrow he would try to have second breakfast or dinner with him again, and come the festival, they would have plenty of time for merriment and each other. With that thought in mind, Bilbo closed his eyes for a light rest while the oxen pulled the heavy wagon forward.

Chapter Text

The festival began with a wondrous feast in Dale. Thorin and Bain greeted the people from a small scenario that had been built in Dale’s central plaza. They kept it short, aware of the northern chill and mindful of those guests who weren’t used to it. Bilbo and his boys were certainly grateful for it, shifting in their boots, uncomfortable but warmer than if they had been barefoot.

Bilbo remembered the conversation he’d had with the Company that first dinner after his arrival: they had implied that the celebrations would happen both in Erebor and Dale, but from what Bilbo had seen in the past few days, it seemed that most activities would take place in the human city.

Erebor was crowded with dwarves from all over Middle-earth, and they apparently would be having their own private celebration during the week to rejoice in the reclaiming of the ancient mountain-home. Bilbo had wondered aloud several times and to different people if that was wise. Not inviting someone to a party was a grave insult in the Shire, but his dwarf-friends had promised time and time again that wasn’t the case here. Bilbo supposed they knew better than him.

Music began playing when the speech ended, Thorin and Bain bowing to each other before striding off the stage to join everyone in their march to the main hall. Despite its great size, it was soon crowded with the visiting royals and nobles and honoured guests, leaving little room for the common people of the city and Mountain. Such a thing had been kept into account, however, and the rest of the population split off to continue the feast in side-halls and neighbouring buildings.

They all sat in their official places, which left Bilbo about halfway down the table, the furthest he had sat from Thorin since arriving north. It was strange. Truth be told, he wasn’t sure he liked it. He had fumed and grumbled about the embarrassing places he’d been made to sit by his friends in the previous week—mostly to Thorin’s left, where a king’s spouse would normally sit. Now that he found himself in the place suited for someone of his rank and status, he felt compelled to grab his chair and drag it all the way up to the head of the table so he could sit with Thorin.

The elves were sat away from the dwarves, the humans acting as a barrier but also a bridge, flitting from here to there with jokes and gossip and merry tunes. The hobbit boys acted in a similar manner, shouting tavern songs with dwarves one moment, then giggling with elves the next. Merry and Pippin had made it their mission to drag Boromir around with them in their quest to speak to every person in the hall. Bilbo watched on with a great deal of amusement as the imposing nobleman let himself be guided around by two creatures who barely reached his belt, looking quite at ease with that bizarre turn of events.

As the evening feast progressed and things got less prim-and-proper, Kíli ushered Bilbo into the seat to Thorin’s left with an impish grin. Bilbo didn’t put up a fight about it, which was probably the reason why the Prince had looked so smug. Bilbo scooted his chair closer to the table so he could grab food from the many platters in front of him with ease. Then he smiled at Thorin.

“Quite the lively evening,” he commented.

“Quite.” Thorin smiled at him for a moment before frowning at the room at large.

“Is there something wrong?”

“Not yet,” Thorin said, his eyes fixed on something.

Bilbo followed his gaze and found Thranduil staring at them—or rather at Thorin. The Elvenking was drinking from a goblet as he pretended to listen to Elrond, yet it was clear to Bilbo that he was in fact giving his all to the impromptu staring contest. Bibo rolled his eyes and patted Thorin’s hand.

“Thorin, dear? Eyes on me, please. Unless you do find Thranduil a fairer sight—”

Thorin’s eyes snapped to Bilbo. “Never.”

“Oh, Thorin, I was just teasing,” Bilbo said, chuckling. “Don’t worry your pretty head over it.”

Thorin hummed but said nothing else, choosing to stroke the tender junction between palm and wrist with his thumb. Bilbo pulled away and rubbed away the ticklish feeling such a soft touch had caused.

“Thorin!” he laughed, because he was sure the King was aware.

“Bilbo,” the dwarf replied, his face stoic enough to almost convince Bilbo that Thorin was innocent.

“You wicked thing—” Bilbo stopped when he saw Thorin’s expression shift, looking at someone behind Bilbo. Not a person he detested, by the looks of it, but his face still became a blank mask of propriety. Bilbo looked over his shoulder. “Oh!”

There stood Bain with two women flanking him. They were both lovely, one tall and noble in a way that made Bilbo think of Boromir and Fíli, the other soft but with a dimpled smile that reminded Bilbo of Frodo and his friends. Both women had skin weathered with long years of hard learning and hard work, very much like Bain did. It was that last clue that finally made an old memory jump to the forefront of Bilbo’s mind.

“King Bain,” Bilbo greeted, pushing his chair away from the table and standing up. He bowed, short and quick, but still respectful. “And these must be Lady Tilda and Captain Sigrid. My word, how you’ve grown!”

“I fear we cannot say the same of you, Master Burglar,” said the one whom Bilbo thought to be Sigrid, broad-shouldered and with her hair held up in a practical knot. She tilted her head, smiling down at him with a tactician’s coolness. “Indeed, it appears as though you might have shrunk.”

“People do get shorter as they age,” said the other woman. Tilda. She stepped forward and curtsied. “We’ve come to pay our respects, Master Hobbit. We were sorry to miss you when you stopped by a week ago.”

“I was sorry to miss you both as well, but I promise that your brother more than behaved himself,” Bilbo said, and the sisters laughed, Bain joining in after giving a good-natured huff. “I’ve heard much of you throughout the years, though I’m sure there is much that didn’t reach me. Allow me to congratulate you both on the things I do know, however.”

“Thank you, Master Hobbit.” Tilda curtsied again. “I’ll introduce you to my husband and children some other time. Right now they’re much too entertained talking to the Mirkwood elves.”

“I wouldn’t dream of prying them away from such riveting company,” Bilbo said, and Tilda laughed.

“It’s been a pleasure seeing you again, Master Burglar,” Sigrid said, giving a curt bow.

Her wish to disengage from the conversation was a little abrupt, but she didn’t appear eager to stop talking to Bilbo. The Captain probably had decided that she had said all she wanted and was thus ready to move on. Bilbo could respect that. He bowed back.

“The pleasure was mine.”

The other two siblings also bowed, and Bain also exchanged a quick bow with Thorin before striding off with his sisters. Bilbo followed them with his eyes as he sat back down and noticed that they were moving around the room, greeting guests and allies alike.

“Shouldn’t you also be doing that?” Bilbo asked.

“I will in a moment,” Thorin said. “For now, I’m letting Fíli handle the diplomacy.”

Bilbo was going to quip about not being sure if that was wise, merely for the sake of old times and his memory of young foolish dwarves, when the doors to the hall opened with a bang and a creak. They let in a rush of cold air and, to Bilbo’s surprise, a few white specks that looked suspiciously like snowflakes.

The room grew quiet for a moment. A tall figure with a staff stepped into the silence, robed in grey and sporting a pointy hat that only made him taller. He pushed his hat back and pulled his scarf down, revealing a familiar face that Bilbo hadn’t seen in the last five summers.

Gandalf had arrived.

Chapter Text

“Gandalf,” Bilbo said, straightening up in his surprise. He had guessed the wizard would show up for the celebrations, but it was still good to be proved right. “He’s here!”

Thorin stood up with measured poise. “So he is.”

“Let’s go greet him,” Bilbo said, hopping out of his seat.

Gandalf stepped further into the hall, enough for the guards to close the doors and keep the snow out. He smiled and exchanged greetings with anyone who so much as looked his way, bowing and shaking hands and clapping shoulders. He acted as though he were old friends with every single person in the room, and Bilbo had a suspicion that while not true, it wasn’t untrue either.

At last Bilbo made his way through the tall crowd to stand near enough that his friend noticed his presence. Gandalf’s reaction was instantaneous and hilarious—his eyebrows shot up, and his grey eyes became the size of saucer plates. It only lasted a second, however, because then his astonishment turned into delightedness.

“Bilbo!” the wizard said, throwing his arms open and kneeling down. “Oh, my dear Bilbo!”

“Gandalf, my good fellow, where in the hills have you been?” Bilbo laughed, hugging the man tightly. He pulled back and gave Gandalf a reproachful look. “It’s been years since we last saw you! Frodo has missed you.”

“I know, dear friend, and I am sorry for not visiting in so long.” Gandalf clasped Bilbo’s hand between his. “There were matters that needed my attention. Dire matters.”

“Everything is always dire for you,” Bilbo said.

“I cannot deny that! But for things to be handled and solved in due time and form, there must be someone who takes them with what would appear to be excessive seriousness. In any case, I’m here now, and right on time!”

“You missed the opening ceremony and showed up halfway through dinner!”

“Which is precisely when I meant to arrive,” Gandalf said. “But Bilbo, whatever are you doing so far from home?”

“Am I far, truly?” Bilbo shot back. “Or am I there?”

Gandalf started, then gave Bilbo his wise and twinkling smiles. He opened his mouth to reply, but something over Bilbo’s shoulders caught his eye. His smile grew. “Who do we have here!”

Bilbo then remembered the king behind him, so he stepped aside and gave a half-turn to introduce—

“Mister Gandalf, sir!”

“We haven’t seen you in the Shire for years!”

“Party Tree parties aren’t the same without your sparklers!”

“What have you been up to since we last saw you? Wizardly things, I bet!”

Bilbo blinked at the four hobbit boys elbowing and pushing each other in an attempt to stand as close as possible to the mighty wizard while respecting his personal space. He looked behind them, but still there was no Thorin. He pushed himself up on his tiptoes and looked further into the hall. The familiar face remained missing.

Perhaps Thorin had stopped to talk to someone on the way over? Bilbo berated himself for not having checked that the dwarf-king was right behind him as he walked. They should have held hands. That would have made getting separated near impossible.

Bilbo turned back to the boys and wizard in front of him. Gandalf was laughing and attempting to hug all four of them at once after Frodo had tripped and sent them all stumbling into his arms. It was difficult—the boys were older now, taller and in some cases wider, no longer the small fauntlings Gandalf would pick up all together in his long arms and carry around as though they were mere grocery bags.

Still the wizard tried, and in turn the boys hunched their shoulders and giggled as they tried to make themselves revert to a smaller size they had left behind several summers before. Bilbo huffed and chuckled, telling his lads to stop being foolish.

In the end they gave up trying to have Gandalf hug them all at once and each gave him a hug. Frodo was the last one, and he stayed clinging to Gandalf even after their hug had ended. The wizard didn’t seem to mind—if anything, he looked pleased as punch—and while Bilbo found it a bit embarrassing, he decided not to say anything about it. Out of all the evils in the world, hugging was not among them.

“I am very glad to see you all,” Gandalf said, giving each of the boys am honest smile. “It’s true what you say: I have been remiss to visit the Shire for some time now, and I regret it with every ounce of my heart. Alas, work always comes before play, and I had a duty to fulfil.”

“Is it done now?” Pippin asked.

“Not quite,” Gandalf replied, “but for now there’s nothing else that can be done.”

“So you can take a break,” Merry concluded.

Gandalf made a noncommittal sound.

“Well, you’ve come to the right place!” Pippin continued. “The dwarves and humans have organised a party that will last all week! Sort of like Lithedays but longer. Or rather Yuledays since it’s cold now.”

“Yes, and there’s dwarves and humans everywhere,” Merry said. “And elves!”

Pippin leant in. “The elves are weird.”

“Are not!” Sam said.

“I meant it as a compliment!” Pippin retorted. “Sort of.”

“I am well aware of every race’s quirks, Young Took,” Gandalf said.

He patted Frodo’s back and then stood back up, towering over the little group of hobbits. He shook the hand of a woman who seemed to have been waiting for them to stop speaking. Bilbo then noticed that several people were standing around with varying degrees of impatience as they waited for their turn to shake the wizard’s hand. It struck Bilbo as odd, used as he was to seeing most Shirelings pretend Gandalf wasn’t there whenever he dropped by for a visit.

“Now, I have some people to greet, but I will join you later,” Gandalf said. “We’ll catch up then.”

Bilbo nodded, then herded the boys away.

“Gandalf!” Merry said to himself with no small amount of wonder. He elbowed Sam. “Who’d’ve thought he’d be here, right? Took me completely by surprise to see him!”

“It actually makes a bit of sense, though, doesn’t it?” Sam replied. “He’s a wizard. They must’ve invited him.”

“And he did help in the quest,” Frodo chimed in.

“He made Mister Bilbo steal things!” Pippin said with an excess of glee.

“He didn’t make me steal anything,” Bilbo refuted, absent-minded, as he made the boys sit down at their table. Thorin’s seat was empty, and a quick glance around the hall didn’t reveal his current location. His absent-mindedness took on a sharp edge. “If anything, he stole me from Hobbiton and away on one of his harebrained journeys!”

There was a short silence. Bilbo sat down and looked up. The boys were exchanging glances, their gentle frowns confused and worried, but they didn’t say anything. Bilbo felt an instant and deep pang of guilt. It was a well-known fact that he was a crotchety old hobbit. The lads loved that about him—his waspish wit and quick quips brought them endless entertainment.

However, the nonchalant nature of his grumbling made them be unsure of how to react whenever he let his temper flare for real. They weren’t scared. It wasn’t fear what made them quiet and uncertain, but rather a deep concern for their lovable grump.

Bilbo took a small breath and picked up his knife and fork. “Anyhow, it was all for the better, in the end. Harebrained journeys are excellent storytelling material.” He paused for effect. “And I did end up stealing things, Gandalf or no Gandalf.”

The boys laughed, longer and harder than usual, but it was enough to have the tension disperse like fog in the morning. They tucked in after that. Boromir joined them not long after with a pitiful amount of food in his plate; some time later Legolas stopped by to offer Bilbo some wine, which led to Gimli showing up to usher the elf away but ending up following the Silvan Prince back to a table full of bottles and flagons and drunk people to have a drinking contest.

Bilbo made sure that the boys finished at least two full plates before letting them run off once again. After that, he waited for Thorin to return to his seat for some time. Bilbo ate two more plates, then finally went to talk with Elrond and Bombur. His dwarf-king was probably busy doing kingly business, and it was selfish of Bilbo to want him to be there all the time. He had a kingdom to run. They could talk in the morning—although they wouldn’t be able to dance in a hall full of people then. Still, Bilbo preferred quiet intimacy over horsing about in public.

Speaking of which, Merry and Pippin were dancing on a table nearby, trying to get Boromir to climb up as well, and Frodo was laughing and clapping as he watched Sam dance with an elf. They tried to get him to join them in their merrymaking a couple of times, and even attempted to talk Bombur and even Elrond into it. The dwarf, being so large he couldn’t move without aid, didn’t accept the invitation, but Elrond indulged the boys with a little dancing, which made his daughter laugh very much from where she was sat at the table.

It was a good evening. When Thorin eventually returned, it was to officially close the first day of the festival along with Bain. They stood together once again as they gave their speech, Thorin patting snow from his hair and furs. Bilbo wondered at that, but now the dwarf’s sudden and complete absence from the hall made more sense—he had left at some point.

Whatever had drawn Thorin away from the festivities was probably solved now, judging by Thorin’s expression. A small knot that Bilbo hadn’t felt tightening around his heart loosened. Thorin had simply been busy being a king. It would probably happen again, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t enjoy whatever moments they could steal for themselves in-between Thorin’s obligations.

Just then, the dwarf-king caught Bilbo’s gaze across the room, and his eyes seemed to agree.

Chapter Text

The following morning was white and cold. Bilbo woke up in his large dwarven bed, but this time he wasn’t alone: four younger hobbits snuffled quietly around him, huddled close under the pile of furs and blankets they had thrown over the mattress the previous night.

They had arrived late from the feast; late enough for it to be early. The boys had been silent and shivering from the trip back to Erebor, and Bilbo had wasted no time in putting them all to bed together, no ifs or buts allowed. If there was something that his old quest had taught him, it was that shared body warmth was better than the tallest fire.

Since he was in the middle, Bilbo woke everyone up as he climbed off the bed—he pushed and pushed at the layers of covers as he crawled toward the foot of the bed, exposing the boys to the chilly room with each shuffle forward. They groaned and moaned in their sleep, squirming and curling up to fight off the cold as best as possible. Soon they relented, however, and resigned themselves to the start of a new day.

“Come on, boys,” said Bilbo. “I thought you’d be excited for the second day of the festival!”

“We are, Uncle,” Frodo said.

“But can’t we sleep a little longer?” asked Pippin.

“You’ll miss breakfast if you do, and you know second breakfast isn’t nearly long enough for you to eat as much as you should.” Bilbo climbed off the bed and rekindled the fire in the hearth, which had puttered out during the night. “Besides, we might not even get a second breakfast today.”

That made the boys finish waking up in a heartbeat. They all shot upright, bouncing slightly on the mattress. Their hobbitish curls were standing up in all directions, but wildest of all were their haunted eyes.

“What!” Pippin said. “But we must have second breakfast!”

“It was bad enough on the road,” Sam added, “when we’d get barely three meals a day!”

“And little to no snacks!” Pippin finished.

“What’s there to keep us from it?” Frodo asked.

“The festival,” Bilbo said simply, finishing buttoning up his waistcoat. He wrapped, tied, and tucked his cravat with a quick flourish, then shrugged into a jacket that was thicker and longer than his usual, its cuts and patterns a mix of Dalish and Ereborean fashion that Bilbo found quite charming. “Come on then, boys—go get ready! I’ll ring for breakfast while you get dressed.”

As predicted, they were forced to skip second breakfast for the first time since arriving in the Mountain. The boys grumbled and whined, but were quick to divert their attention to all the wondrous things waiting for them down at the festival. They spent a good portion of the morning walking around Erebor, playing games and charming strangers.

Bilbo trailed after his boys at a leisure pace, the now-expected pair of guards trailing after him in turn. He was otherwise alone at first, but he was soon joined by Kíli and Nori. It was odd to see the Prince without his older brother nearby, but Bilbo guessed it was to be expected—Fíli was Thorin’s heir, and as such he probably had plenty of responsibilities his brother didn’t, many of which might have increased during the festival.

Seeing Kíli with Nori, however—that was even odder than not seeing the Princes of Durin together. They got along well enough, but Bilbo had no reason to believe they were close or shared any common interests outside of their old quest. The way they joked and smiled at each other told a different story.

Bilbo realised he was… upset about that. He thought back on all the letters he had sent and got during the years. It had always been obvious that all members of the Company had remained on good terms, but this unexpected and easy camaraderie left Bilbo feeling acutely aware of all the years he had been absent, all the jokes he had missed, all the day-to-day interactions and shifts in dynamics.

It had been obvious enough when he had seen Dwalin and Nori. Bilbo had known about them, of course, but the thought of them together hadn’t quite processed for him until he had seen them banter over dinner and rest their hands on the table just close enough to brush their knuckles.

Bilbo supposed there were some things letters couldn’t transmit.

He had a moment in which he wanted to be mad at his friends for not having written him more, better, in greater detail. Then he huffed a chuckle and told himself to stop being silly. He had been the one who had chosen to leave. The astonishment he had felt upon seeing Erebor healed, Fíli and Kíli’s long beards, Thorin’s grayed mane—the bitter hole in his chest was one he had dug himself.

“So what are you doing later?” Kíli asked, unaware of Bilbo’s turmoil. “It’s still early in the day.”

“We might go with the boys down to Dale,” he said, a small smile on his face. “Plenty of activities and things to see and do. Besides, I quite believe they’ll enjoy the opportunity to see the snow without being ready to fall asleep where they stand.”

“I see.” Nori grinned. “So is it safe to assume that this is their first time seeing snow?”

“Indeed it is. I expect them to be particularly difficult to wrangle today.”

“Oh, let them have their fun, Bilbo,” Nori said with the tone of someone who was never involved in child-rearing. His grin grew wider. “If you think they’ll be so difficult, I wouldn’t mind lending you a helping hand in looking after them.”

“Why do I feel that would be a bad idea?” Bilbo mused aloud.

Kíli laughed, “Because it is!”

“Bad ideas are just good ideas in disguise,” Nori said, winking as he tapped his nose. He slung an arm over Bilbo and pulled him closer. “Come on, Master Baggins, my dear and good sir. Don’t you want to be free today? Freer than you shall ever be with the little pebbles rolling around the soles of your feet?”

“Your insistence only makes you sound mighty suspicious, Nori,” Bilbo pointed out, chuckling as he gently pried himself away from his friend. “And that only makes me less and less willing to accept your offer!”

“Hey, well, it’s a good offer, though,” Nori said, shrugging. “Just think about it. Thorin will be down in Dale today as well. I could look after the lads while you two could walk around, see the sights, have a chat.”

“And what’s in this for you?” Bilbo asked.

Nori grinned again, this time with a wicked glint in his eyes. “Well, if you must know, my dearest Dwalin son of Fundin will also be down in Dale, and I seem to recall a little young hobbit wanting to have a rematch with him. I would be delighted to organise and oversee all that.”

“Yes!” Pippin said, all of a sudden right in front of them. He threw a fist up in the air. “I want my rematch!”

“See, Bilbo? The pebble wants his rematch.”

“The pebble wants his rematch!” Pippin repeated.

“Yo do know they call little children that, don’t you?” Bilbo asked Pippin, who gave Nori a betrayed look. Turning to his friend, Bilbo said, “If you’re doing this, I want you to make sure it’s fair.”

Nori’s smile was sharp and mischievous. “Of course.”

The snow in Dale’s many streets and alleyways had long since become dirty with the coming and going of people and animals. Still, the rooftops remained white, the pale winter sun making them glow. Bilbo quite liked it. There was a part of him that had always linked snow to bad things, but here and now it was nothing other than beautiful to behold.

The boys seemed to agree. It had stopped snowing long before the break of dawn, yet all four hobbit lads still looked up, expectant, as if their wide-eyed wonder could will another snowfall into existence. Bilbo hoped it wouldn’t. It was cold enough, and they had just the right amount of snow to enjoy it without freezing. The last thing he needed was going back to the Shire with four sickly young hobbits in tow. His reputation, bad as it was, would truly shatter if such a thing happened.

“Look!” Merry said, walking backward and laughing at the strange footprints his boots left behind.

“That can’t be right,” Frodo laughed, then laughed harder when he glanced at Sam and noticed his friend’s pinched expression still hadn’t relented at all. “Come on, Sam. Boots aren’t so bad.”

“It’s the socks I’m not liking, Mister Frodo,” Sam grumbled, shifting his feet as he barely kept from yanking the offending footwear off. “Feels off!”

“Feels cosy and warm,” Bilbo corrected. “Else your toes would turn blue and shatter from the cold, just like ice—crash!”

Sam’s eyes widened in fear. “I won’t take them off, Mister Bilbo, sir, I swear.”

“Smart choice,” Bilbo said, leaning on his walking stick. “Now go along, you boys. Mister Nori has promised to take good care of you for the day, but send a raven if you need me. Mister Nori knows how to call them, and they know how to find me.”

They said goodbye and parted ways. Nori led the boys away with a bright smile, getting lost in the crowd in a blink, and Bilbo went off to find Thorin after looking heavenward for a fraction of a moment. Frodo and the others had taken a liking to Nori, which Bilbo didn’t mind, but he did worry about the dwarf being a bad influence. Well, perhaps ‘bad’ was the wrong term for it. Nori wasn’t, at his root, a bad person. He was just controversial. Quite creative when it came to interpreting rules. He was supposed to have left his life of petty crime behind after the quest, yet he still had a tendency to not read the law the way it was written.

But there was no point in thinking about it now. The boys were gone with Nori, and Bilbo trusted Nori to make sure the boys were safe and happy. Nori had always seemed to take good care of Ori in Dori’s stead during the quest, even if his methods were a little unconventional. There had been good rapport between them, brotherly and teasing and affectionate. Nori treated Frodo and his friends very much like he had treated Ori back in the day.

Bilbo wondered how Ori was doing.

Just as he thought this, he rounded a corner and spotted Thorin walking down the busy street in a slow stroll, his back to Bilbo. He was with King Bain and Gandalf.

It looked like Thorin was busy being a king once again. Bilbo was disappointed, but he couldn’t deny that he had been expecting it. Just the previous night he had reminded himself of the fact that Thorin wasn’t free to do as he pleased with his time: he had a kingdom to run. Bilbo, however, living the life of a well-off bachelor with a grown and mostly self-sufficient heir, still couldn’t help but be miffed by this.

Why did Erebor need a king anyway? The Shire didn’t have one, and they were quite the prosperous land. Surely the Lonely Mountain wouldn’t cave inwards if Thorin delegated all his duties for a day and spent it with his hobbit.

Bilbo frowned at himself. That was no way to think. It was selfish and petulant. The Shire and Erebor were nothing alike. And the Shire had a Mayor and a Thain. Not a monarchy by quite a lot, but still some sort of hierarchical order was observed in the Shire. It was needed, no matter how relaxed. It was bothersome and frustrating and vexatious, but it was needed.

As if sensing his turbulent thoughts, Gandalf turned around, his eyebrows already arched up in silent inquiry. Bilbo tapped his walking stick against the cobbled ground twice, making sure to give the wizard the most genuine smile he could muster up. Gandalf smiled back, his eyes bright and interested, and Bilbo felt his stomach drop.

“Bilbo!” the wizard called over the noise.

That made the other two in their small group stop and turn around. There was no point in staying back now. Bilbo waved and went to them. As he got closer, he noticed that the Kings had donned clothes meant to impress but not intimidate.

King Bain was dressed plain but regal, a poor boy turned king who hadn’t forgotten his beginnings. Bilbo still had a hard time accepting that this noble and humble King was the same boy who had given him the stink-eye all those years ago.

Thorin was clad in thick furs and deep blue fabrics, and gold thread had been used for the pattern in his clothes; it all matched and accented his crown beautifully—or rather circlet. Thorin had worn his actual crown the previous evening, which had upset Bilbo in ways he couldn’t describe until he noticed how the heavy crown didn’t seem to cast dark shadows over his face, but now the King was wearing a simpler but still lovely ornament.

“Master Baggins,” said King Bain, bowing.

“Your HIghness,” Bilbo bowed back. Feeling awkward but unwilling to embarrass Thorin with an unintended slight, he also bowed to him. “My King.”

“Master Baggins,” Thorin said, bowing back. His eyes were warm, but his tone was serious.

“Why don’t you join us, Bilbo?” Gandalf asked, leaning into his staff.

“Oh, I wouldn’t wish to get in the way of kingly business and all that,” Bilbo said, gesturing at the two monarchs. He smiled at Thorin. “Although I do hope the King under the Mountain will have time to indulge an old friend and stroll with him at some point later today.”

“Why later when it can be now?” Gandalf said. “Dear Bilbo, I insist that you join us in our walk. We were merely taking in the festivities. You won’t be getting in the way of anything, and more importantly it would delight us to have you with us.”

“I agree with Gandalf,” said Bain.

After a moment, Thorin said, “So do I.”

Bilbo faltered at that unexpected pause, but then smiled again. “Well then, if you really don’t mind.”

“Not at all, dear Bilbo, not at all.” Gandalf spread an arm, welcoming him into their little group as they resumed their walk. “We were talking about the garlands. It’s a good thing they put them up before it snowed, else they would have risked having someone slip down and get hurt.”

“Though I fear that means they shall stay up all winter,” Bain said, then sighed. “Of course, it’s more likely that the first snowstorm or even a heavy snowfall will take care of unhaging them long before spring returns to these lands.”

“You’ll pick them up as they come down,” Gandalf said cheerily.

“ ‘Little by little the job gets done’,” Bilbo intoned, then added, “Something my father used to say.”

“He sounds like quite a wise man,” Bain praised.

“He was a prudent hobbit,” Bilbo agreed. “Sensible from curls to soles.”

“He must have been, to raise a son so calm and collected in the face of danger.”

“Oh, I was hardly ever that,” Bilbo chuckled. “But you might want to thank my mother for whatever wits I had about me when I most needed them. She was the intrepid one in our family. It ran in her family. Many thought I didn’t have it in me, myself included, but I proved us all wrong.”

“And who helped you do that?” Gandalf prompted.

“I did.” Bilbo pinned the wizard with a deadpan stare. “You just scratched up my door.”

Bain threw his head back and laughed. Next to Bilbo, Thorin let out an amused huff. Bilbo smiled, feeling his insides turn to mush at the sound, and reached for Thorin’s hand. The King reacted in an instant, clearing his throat and clasping his hands behind his back the moment he felt Bilbo’s fingers brush his own.

Something sharp stabbed Bilbo in the chest, but he recovered quickly. He clutched his walking stick with both hands and cleared his throat as well, trying to soften the sting of Thorin’s rejection.

“Oh!” said Gandalf. “A juggler! Let’s go see.”

They all followed the wizard, the Kings murmuring their agreement. Bilbo stayed quiet. Thorin wasn’t to blame for how he had behaved. It was Bilbo’s fault, he knew. He had forgotten where they were and who they were. Thorin hadn’t. Thorin had remained a king, and Bilbo—well, Bilbo had remained a carefree hobbit bachelor.

There was a conflict of interests here that would need to be addressed. The sooner, the better. Assuming Thorin had also noticed. And if he hadn’t, Bilbo would bring it to his attention, and then they would address it.

But did they have to? Bibo had never said he would stay after the festival. Thorin had never said he wanted Bilbo to stay after the festival. Bilbo had been invited to remain for the winter, but neither of them had mentioned anything more permanent.

That would have to be addressed too then. Bilbo wondered how he would even bring it up without giving Thorin the wrong impression. Not forceful but not disinterested. He would have to find a balance, something he hadn’t been very good at in his life so far.

Chapter Text

Eventually, Bilbo bumped into familiar faces in the crowd of merriment. Nori waved at him as the boys kept laughing and shoving each other, doing something on the floor that Bilbo couldn’t quite see. However, he thought he recognised the patterns. He suppressed a smile and moved closer, Bain close behind in his curiosity.

“What are you lot doing?” Bilbo asked, his voice loud and carrying over.

The hobbit boys jumped upright, more startled than guilty.

Pippin grinned from ear to ear. “Conkers!”

“Is it a hobbit game?” Bain asked.

“Indeed, and quite a simple one,” said Bilbo, a soft derision in his tone. “With all the exciting games to play in this celebration, you pick conkers? What kind of fools has the Shire bred in you all?”

“Traditional fools, it seems,” Frodo laughed, tying a new string around his large chestnut. “You have to admit this is quite a good game, Uncle.”

“I never said anything to the contrary,” Bilbo sniffed.

“Quite a simple game,” said Pippin, imitating Bilbo’s voice. “That sounds like contrariness, if you ask me.”

“Hush, you.”

“They had quite a group of people asking them to teach them how to play, not long ago,” Nori said. “They all found it rather hilarious that the prize for winning was eating your rival’s chestnut. I, at least, should’ve seen it coming, but I did not.”

“And he laughed the loudest!” Pippin said. “He thinks hobbits being great eaters is so funny.”

“You’re all so small,” Nori replied, reaching out to ruffle Pippin’s hair, “and yet you eat enough to put a fully grown dwarf to shame. It’s impressive, and also, yes, quite hilarious. But you don’t know how odd you look, stuffing all that food in your mouth and actually managing to swallow it.”

“Well, you don’t know how odd you look,” Pippin retorted, “with all that hair in your face!”

“Peregrin Took.” Bilbo gave him a hard look. “That’s quite enough cheekiness for now, lad. Get back to breaking Frodo’s conkers.”

“He didn’t break my conker!” Frodo said. “Sam did!”

“It was an accident, Mister Frodo, sir,” said Sam, his ears red. He had the heart of a horse chestnut in his hand, as though afraid to eat it. He offered it to Frodo. “You can have it, if you’d like.”

“Sam,” Frodo laughed, “just eat it.”

“Or I can eat it for you,” said Merry. “It’d be no trouble.”

All four boys went back to playing and bickering. Thorin stepped closer to Bilbo, and Bilbo almost jumped out of his skin and the sudden proximity. It wasn’t bad, of course. It was nice. He wanted to lean into Thorin and get lost in the furs of his cloak. Instead he smiled and gestured at the boys.

“Fancy a game?”

“Perhaps,” Thorin said, to which Bilbo blinked in surprise. “I had wondered for a long time what playing conkers would be like, and whether you’re as good at it as you once claimed.”

Bilbo stared at him for a long moment, not sure of what Thorin meant. It must have shown in his face because Thorin started, “When we first met, I asked if you were proficient with any weapons—”

“Oh! Oh, yes, right, of course!” Bilbo slapped his forehead with a hand. “Silly me, I had forgotten that.”

“I hardly expect you to remember every word we have ever exchanged,” Thorin said, a small smile on his face. “It would require a great deal of effort.”

Bilbo wanted to say that it didn’t, actually. He wanted to tell Thorin that the sound of his voice was as natural and familiar to him as the whispers of a gentle breeze over the rolling hills of the Shire, that he could recognise Thorin’s baritone even if he went deaf, somehow. Then again, remembering a sound did not equal remembering words.

But it was true that Bilbo remembered almost everything he and Thorin had ever said to each other. The letters they had exchanged over the years were a given: he had reread them until he knew them by heart. But the conversations they had had during their quest also remained seared in Bilbo’s memory, both the good and the bad.

“I remember quite a few,” Bilbo said in the end.

Thorin’s smile grew a little larger. “So do I.”

“Uncle!” Frodo called, effectively ending the moment. “Come play, won’t you?”

“Frodo, this is hardly the time or place to be playing conkers,” Bilbo chided. “I’m speaking with the King, here. Kings,” he amended, throwing Bain an apologetic glance.

Bain waved the silent apology away. “Master Baggins, please. Celebrations demand celebration. Surely we can take a moment to enjoy this traditional hobbit fair game? I am rather interested in it. Would you boys mind if I gave it a try?”

They all shook and nodded their heads, which was quite confusing but in the end meant that no, they did not mind and would in fact be delighted to play conkers with King Bain of Dale. Now, that was something to tell their friends back at home! They started telling the King all the dos and don’ts of the game, going into great detail about why the prize mattered so much—basically because it was free food—and why winning was so important—which, again, was because of the free food.

Bilbo laughed behind his hand, then noticed Nori and Gandalf speaking in hushed tones out of the corner of his eye, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying from where he was standing. He was about to move closer to listen in when he noticed Thorin was looking at him rather intently. Bilbo gave him the most innocuous smile he could manage.

Thorin inclined his head, gesturing for them to move a little ways away from everyone else. Bilbo nodded and they moved, only a couple of steps, but enough to make it obvious that they were having a private conversation and should not be interrupted. Thorin waved at a small group of dwarves stomping by laughing and bowing, then turned his attention back to Bilbo.

After a moment, he asked, “Are you enjoying yourself?”

“Yes, of course,” Bilbo replied. “All hobbits enjoy good cheer.”

“Yes, but,” Thorin paused, “I meant here, in general.”

Bilbo frowned. He wasn’t sure he understood. “Yes, of course,” he said again. “Dale is a lovely place to be, and despite the rather cold weather and my having to wear these boots to fight it, I find myself delighted at nearly every turn. You all have planned a wonderful party.”

Thorin ran a hand down his long grey beard. Bilbo still was having a hard time adjusting to the thought of Thorin having any sort of long beard, be it grey or black, apart from the short and simple one he had had when they met. Well, short and simple for dwarves. Bilbo had been rather scandalised with it, even if it was the simplest one out of all of the Company’s beards.

A whoop of victory from Bain made Bilbo and Thorin look back at the group. The King was clapping Sam on the shoulder while Pippin picked up a new horse chestnut to play. Bilbo shook his head, thinking that Bain was now acting much closer to the age he had been when Bilbo first saw him. He looked back at Thorin, who was looking off into the distance. Bilbo tried to follow his gaze, but found nothing of interest.

“Thorin?”

The dwarf-King’s eyes snapped back to him. “Yes, Bilbo?”

Bilbo thought it rather rude to ask a King if he had been spacing out, so he almost asked something else. But then he remembered who he was and who Thorin was and, most improtantly, what their relationship was, so he asked, “What’s so interesting about the horizon that you kept staring at it?”

Thorin looked offended for a moment, but then laughed. “I merely got lost in pursuing a thought.”

“Your thought is on the horizon?” Bilbo raised his eyebrows.

“Sometimes I think it might be, unattainable as it seems.” Thorin sighed. “But I’d rather not discuss it.”

“We can, if you ever do,” Bilbo said, “But that doesn’t sound much like a thought.”

“It’s more of a wish,” Thorin agreed.

Bilbo pulled out his pipe, already stuffed with some Longbottom. He showed its contents to Thorin, who nodded. Whether it was with approval or recognition, Bilbo couldn’t tell. But Thorin didn’t say anything as Bilbo lit a match and got his pipe smoking, not even any sort of chitchat regarding the local pipe-weed. Bilbo took a long puff of his pipe, then let it out.

“Rather sad to have a wish perched upon such an unreachable place.”

“I’ve had wishes perched upon more perilous places, and sometimes they have still managed to come true,” Thorin said. “This one just might flutter closer as well.”

Bilbo nodded and offered his pipe. “Here’s hoping.”

Thorin accepted the pipe with a nod of his own. “Hoping indeed.”

Chapter Text

It was the third day of the week-long celebration, and Bilbo had decided to visit the expanse of land between Dale and the Lonely Mountain that had been reserved for feats of strength and strenuous theatrics. It hadn’t been his idea and indeed not even in his list of things to do that day, but Sam of all people had insisted, and the boy rarely ever showed such pointed interest in something, let alone was intrigued enough to ask for permission to indulge in it. And really—if he wanted to see a group of people grunting and flexing under the wintery sunlight, who was Bilbo to tell him no?

“My only demand is that we take a blanket,” he had said.

The boys had complained at first, no wonder feeling that it would look silly or, heaven forbid, be silly, but Bilbo couldn’t have given less of a fig. If they were going to sit around all day watching people engage in activities that would give your average hobbit a heart-attack just from thinking about them, then Bilbo was going to make sure he and the fools he had for young charges at the very least stayed warm throughout it.

Of course, they all ended up huddling under the blanket around him after an hour of sitting in a snow-damp bench and growing increasingly puzzled by everyone’s antics. Bilbo had tried to explain that the antics were sports, similar to conkers and golf and plant-growing, but the boys couldn’t really see the similarities. Bilbo didn’t blame them. Prize-winning tomatoes were very different from throwing a large rock farther than everyone else.

At least the activities were amusing to watch, partly because they seemed so strange to them, unused as they were to this kind of games. Pippin just about went out of his mind with delight when the caber toss competition began somewhere around noon. It had never occurred to him that someone strong enough might be able to lift and throw an entire tree trunk.

Bilbo tried to explain that it wasn’t actually a tree trunk, but Pippin would have none of it. He kept chanting ‘trunk toss’ as the contestants walked up to the wooden pole and threw it. Eventually, he got a fair amount of people chanting alongside him in the stands. Bilbo joined in at one point, but that was only because it was Dwalin’s turn, and he had wanted to distract his friend.

No elves participated in the caber toss, which appeared to be the norm. Bilbo felt a bit disappointed at that. Elves, delicate as they looked, were powerful warriors capable of incredible deeds. It was a shame that they let appearances get in the way of showing off what, without a doubt, would have been a marvellous display of physical strength. But no matter. There were still many games left, and Bilbo was certain they would at least deem one worth joining. Archery, perhaps.

To no one’s surprise, Beorn’s son won the caber toss. He roared and threw his fists up in victory, then bowed and shook hands with his competitors with such demureness and politeness that Bilbo had a hard time containing his laughter. Oh, but he was the living image of his father—such a wonderful juxtaposition cohabitating one body in perplexing harmony.

There was a small break after that, and the hobbits took the opportunity to wheedle people into getting them food. They were much too comfortable under their blanket to move, even if it was to get sustenance. Of course, they would have, had everyone around them been not so willing to accommodate their requests. In no time, they found themselves surrounded with baskets whose bottoms were warm and tops were covered with steaming pieces of cloth to keep their delicious contents hot.

The boys wasted no time gorging themselves on pies and dumplings, meat cuts and potato bread. For Sam and Pippin, their lunch included unscrewing any jar whose contents looked appealing and pouring all sorts of sauces onto anything, then wolfing down the results of their culinary alchemy with unparalleled zeal.

“No, no, no,” Bilbo said at one point, taking one jar in particular from Pippin before he could upend it on his mince pie, “and no! That is most certainly not the way to eat this sauce, you boorish child. It will burn your tongue to a sorry husk and then you will be spewing fire like a dragon but from the wrong end!”

“Really?” Pippin asked, and he looked more fascinated than concerned.

“Really,” Bilbo said. “Here, look.”

He opened the jar, then took a teaspoon and scooped up just a bit of the dark green sauce. Sam handed him a bun sliced open at his request, which he tapped with the spoon until all the sauce had transferred onto it. He finished off the sandwich by adding some meat slices and a few vegetables and pickles to it, then he closed it and cut it in half with a knife.

“There we go.” He gave one piece to Pippin and the other to Sam. “Now try it.”

Sam took a bite; Pippin did as always and seemingly unhinged his jaw in order to fit the entire thing into his mouth at once. Sam reached for his mug of water about three seconds into chewing; Pippin opened his eyes wide and began chewing faster.

“I did warn you,” Bilbo said.

In the end, Pippin forewent his own mug altogether, picking up the water jug and chugging down its contents in earnest. The other boys laughed at him, and Bilbo didn’t feel one bit guilty when he joined them with his own wheezing chuckles.

After lunch, the games resumed, with Thorin and a few of the other dwarves joining them in the stands. He sat down behind Bilbo, probably realising that he would be risking life and limb if he dared disturb the impromptu blanket-burrow the hobbits had made for themselves. Bilbo threw him a little smile over his shoulder, then rolled his eyes.

“Who has a sports competition,” he asked by way of greeting, “when there’s snow everywhere?”

“We do,” Dori said, spreading a picnic blanket at the hobbits’ feet. He began pulling food out of the basket he had brought, all of it clearly made by his own hands and with their hobbit guests in mind. “Now, who wants some cheesy onion rolls?”

“Elders first,” said Bilbo over the cacophony of young hobbits. He leant back in his seat once he had his roll, letting the boys crowd around Dori as baby chicks do around their mother hen.

With their little burrow undone, Thorin took the opportunity to move over and sit next to Bilbo just as Dwalin arrived. The dwarf had changed into formal clothes after the caber toss, and he casually tucked a free end of the blanket around Thorin, cocooning him in with Bilbo, before ruffling Merry’s hair.

“Can I have one?” he asked Dori, gesturing at the rolls.

“These aren’t for you,” the cook sniffed.

Bilbo huffed a chuckle and stopped paying attention. He turned to Thorin, who was smiling at him in that way which made the world go all soft and glowing. Bilbo loved it when Thorin smiled like that. It made him feel all soft and glowing in turn. It was a good way to feel. He didn’t mind it in the least.

“So,” he said, “where have you been?”

Thorin laughed at that. “Taking care of some business with your friend, the wizard.”

“From what I gather, he is your friend too.”

Thorin made a noncommittal sound. “Wizards are more friends of convenience than of people. He comes and goes as he sees fit, and there is no way of contacting him in one’s hour of need.”

“Because he is there when one most needs him,” Bilbo pointed out. “Always.”

Thorin canted his head, though Bilbo wasn’t sure if it was in agreement or acknowledgement. He decided he didn’t mind not knowing and took a bite of Dori’s homemade roll instead. It was beginning to grow cold, which was a crime.

He gave a little appreciative groan. “Delightful. Have you tried them?”

“They are not for us,” Thorin said.

“Us?”

“Us, the dwarves. Dori made them for you and the boys. Researched hobbit recipes quite a bit, I’ve heard. He’s been looking forward to cooking for you.” Thorin nudged him gently. “You ought to give him the pleasure of hosting a dinner in your honour.”

“My honour!” Bilbo laughed. “What does a hobbit have to do with that? Respectability, yes, but honour? We have no need for that in our cosy little hobbit-holes.”

“And yet you have more than many I know,” Thorin said, easy and honest.

Bilbo spluttered for a moment, then shrugged and took another bite of his roll. It truly was delightful. Dori’s mastery of the kitchen area really was undisputed. There was many a housewife back in the Shire that would go green with envy upon tasting his cooking.

Without warning, Thorin leant against Bilbo’s side, a solid and warm weight against him, warmer than blankets and furs and even hearthfire, and he brushed his lips against Bilbo’s whitish curls for the smallest of moments. Bilbo felt his face grow hot, and it grew hotter still when he realised that he was blushing like some sort of tween with his first crush. His natural response was to harrumph at Thorin, incapable of clicking his tongue in severe reprimand due to the pastry in his mouth.

The dwarf-King crinkled his clear blue eyes merrily down at him before leaning back and acting as though nothing had happened. Him, kiss the crown of Bilbo’s hair, in plain daylight, with strangers and friends alike all around them? Lies.

“Anyhow,” Bilbo said loudly after swallowing. “Of course Dori can host a dinner for us. I’d be ever so pleased, and the boys would love the chance to sample even more of his excellent cooking, I’m sure.”

“Oh!” Dori looked up from where he was keeping the boys’ hands full of his rolls and dumplings and quiches. “Well, that’s just wonderful to hear, Bilbo! Just wonderful. I’ll get started on the meal plan right away. Not that I haven’t drafted some ideas already, but—paws off!”

He slapped Dwalin’s hand away with the flat of his butterknife. The boys laughed, and so did Bilbo and Thorin. Dwalin gave them all a very put-upon look, but he relented with a grunt and went to sit with Nori a short distance away. Nori laughed and petted his reddened knuckles as he consoled the big oaf and promised to filch a roll or two for him later.

Chapter Text

As expected, the elves participated in the archery competition. It was late in the afternoon when some people dragged out the targets and placed them far away from both the audience and contestants. Well, it wasn’t actually that late—wintertime just had an awful habit of cutting days short.

Bilbo settled in, now with a smoking pipe in hand, letting some of his weight rest against Thorin, who simply shifted to better fit against Bilbo. Decidedly not smiling to himself, Bilbo narrowed his eyes as several archers walked up to their assigned spots. He thought he recognised Boromir. The darkling light of the fast-approaching evening made it harder to appreciate what was happening, but he supposed that it had the added benefit of making the games all the more challenging.

Spending a day outside in the cold to watch people mooching around with pointy objects would have been rather dull without Thorin to grunt his approval and sneer his derision at the different participants, but archery stood apart from the other games. Hobbits were more than capable of appreciating long-range weapons—kept you out of danger. Bilbo himself had a rather good aim. Still, he was an amateur by these people’s standards, and he was looking forward to being amazed by their feats of archery, assuming he could see a damn thing.

“Know anyone? Other than Boromir, that is,” he asked Thorin, clapping politely as the archers finished lining up and bowed. He tried not to fluster when they bowed to Thorin and effectively made them, a pair of ancients huddled together under the same blanket, the centre of attention for one long moment. “Oh, was that really necessary?”

“I am royalty,” Thorin reminded him. “They would have done the same with Bain, had he been here.”

“Why isn’t he here?” Bilbo asked, peering at Thorin.

“He had a meeting with Gandalf,” Thorin said, then pointed at the first archer in line as she readied herself. She was squinting something fierce. Bilbo supposed her night vision wasn’t very good. “That is Mildburg, daughter of Hrodulf. She is a successful fur-trader, a fact which her father finds frightfully upsetting to this day.”

Bilbo raised his eyebrows at him. “He is upset because her daughter is successful?”

“He is upset because she is not a Royal Scribe like him,” Thorin said, then grimaced and clapped when she hit the third ring from the centre. “Oh, that’s dreadful,” he muttered, then noticed Bilbo’s eyes still on him. “Ah, er, Hrodulf had hoped she would succeed him in his position once he grew blind as a bat and Bain required another scrivener.”

“How selfish,” Bilbo said, then took a puff of his pipe.

“We all have hopes for who our children might become,” Thorin said.

Bilbo made a little noise of dissent. It seemed that all he did was disagree with Thorin on everything. He wondered if he should worry about it, but the amount of fun he had bickering with his dwarf laid all his concerns to rest as soon as they rose. He blew a ring of smoke and was about to reply when he saw Merry and Pippin crawling away.

He leant forward and hissed, “Where do you two think you’re going?”

Pippin whipped his head back to give him a wide-eyed look. Merry turned around with a pout that attempted and failed to look innocent. “We’re bored, Mister Bilbo.”

“And thirsty,” Pippin added.

“We’re going to get some refreshments, is all.”

“Do you want anything?” Pippin asked, suspiciously obliging.

“For you to stay out of trouble,” he said.

“Sure thing, Mister Bilbo,” Merry said with a wide grin just as another of Miss Mildburg’s thunked into the target. “Won’t even notice we’re gone.”

“I very much doubt that,” Bilbo said, leaning back against Thorin and watching them go.

After thinking about it for a moment, he twisted around and caught Dwalin’s eye from where he had sat down two rows back. He jerked his head at the retreating boys. Dwalin nodded and left his seat, making quick work of reaching the ground and following after the young hobbits. Bilbo sighed under his breath, then turned his attention back to the games.

At least Sam and Frodo were still sitting at his feet, both of them leaning against Dori like calves under a robust tree. The dwarf had an arm around each of them, and though Bilbo couldn’t see any of their faces, he was sure that the boys were asleep and Dori was delightedly making sure no one would disturb their rest.

“Would that all my charges were this peaceful,” Bilbo said, looking down at the placid trio. “Merry and Pippin are single-handedly responsible for this greying mop of hair, I swear it.”

“Do they spend a lot of time with you in the Shire?” Thorin asked. “You don’t mention them often in your letters.”

Bilbo waited until Miss Mildburg’s finished shooting her last arrow and bowed—she had done rather abysmally, in Bilbo’s humble opinion—and then shrugged as he replied, “They spend a lot of time around, not exactly with me, but close enough to be a bother. They like Frodo, you see, and he did spend a short time living with Merry before joining me in Bag End. A very short time, but his cousin’s special brand of fooling about tends to leave something of an impression.”

Thorin chuckled. “He is certainly hard to ignore.”

“That’s a Brandybuck for you,” Bilbo said around his pipe.

“Will you stop talking?” Dori whispered over his shoulder. “There are children sleeping here.”

“Oh, forgive me, I was unaware that we were supposed to watch the games in absolute silence while everyone around us cheers on,” Bilbo whispered back, then took another puff before handing the pipe to Thorin. “And they’re hardly children.”

“They are!” Dori said, then turned his head away.

Bilbo rolled his eyes. He looked at Thorin and made a rude gesture at Dori’s back, which prompted the dwarf-King to choke on a bit of smoke and muffle his coughs with their blanket. Dori said nothing more, but he gave them a mean look over his shoulder—or at least it seemed like he did; it was harder to tell with the daylight almost gone. Bilbo patted Thorin’s back and gave Dori an innocent smile that he hoped was more credible than the pout Merry had given him.

It took Bilbo a few seconds to realise that Thorin had used his coughing to get their faces close. This time, he didn’t wait to be blindsided. This time, he was the one who leant in and landed a peck on Thorin’s cheek. As fate would have it, Thorin picked that exact moment to land a peck on Bilbo’s cheek, which resulted in a peck on the lips.

Bilbo made a sound similar to a goose getting chased by a child, and Thorin jerked back with a small gasp. Even with the sky slowly turning from pale-grey to dark-blue without any of the usual twilit lightshow, he could tell that his dwarf’s cheeks were the colour of ripe tomatoes. To top it off, some of the Company members started hooting and laughing somewhere behind them—Bilbo thought he could make out Nori, Bofur, and Glóin.

Thorin turned around, face still red as embers, and shouted, “Will you shut up!”

“Of course, my King!” Glóin said, then fell backward cackling.

Dori once more turned around as much as he could without disturbing his two hobbits and proceeded to violently shush them all. Bofur stuffed a fist in his mouth, then stuck his free hand in Nori’s mouth, which, judging by Nori’s lack of reaction, was something perfectly acceptable for him to do. Bilbo hid his face in his hands for a moment, then extricated himself from the blanket with as much dignity as possible. He felt instantly cold.

“Bilbo?” Thorin asked, reaching for him.

“I’m going for a walk,” he said.

“But Lord Boromir’s next after this elf.”

The vulnerability in Thorin’s voice made Bilbo smile. He went to caress his cheek but then decided to just pat his shoulder instead. He slid his hands into his pockets, closing a fist around his ever-present comfort. “I know. It’s fine. I just need to stretch my legs.”

He walked away, his steps sure despite his poor vision. Hobbit feet were made to walk, and he could almost feel the ground before touching it, even through his thick dwarven boots. He knew where to go.

It didn’t take long before he had left the playing grounds behind, but he hadn’t headed for Dale. Night had arrived in one fell swoop, the consistent thunking of arrows finding their target and the following cheers from the crowd growing distant with each step, and he found himself wanting to take a walk in the rough plains. They were more rock than soil, weeds and pebbles and the odd molten stone scattered through the landscape.

Bilbo sat on a dark-grey slate, soft patches of moss greeting his hands for a moment, and then he took off his boots. It was cold, but it felt right. He had worn no boots here half a century back.

How silly to get worked up over such a small thing. They were adults. They could kiss if they wanted. They could huddle under a blanket if they wanted. They had exchanged love letters for fifty years. Not friendly letters, not amicable letters, not courteous letters. Love letters! They could kiss if they wanted!

It was no secret. It had never been. There was no reason to treat it as such, no reason to doubt, to fear, to wonder—and yet here they were. Here he was, marching off in a flustered haste because Thorin’s lips had brushed his. Foolish. How very foolish. They could kiss if they wanted.

Bilbo sighed, long and exasperated, and stared off into the night. It was pretty, star-filled and glittering, but it wasn’t enough. Grumbling under his breath, he shifted until he was facing Erebor. It glowed in the night, never sleeping, always working, the soft purr of its workforce tickling Bilbo’s soles even now.

“Home is ahead,” he hummed, “the world behind.”

His voice petered out after that. He hadn’t actually meant to sing the words in that order. It had just happened. He mixed things up like that sometimes. It always made Frodo laugh. Must be the old age, or some long-repressed wish. Who knew?

“Bilbo.”

He looked over his shoulder to see Thorin standing there. He had no business looking so nervous. Wasn’t he supposed to be an incredibly powerful dwarf-King? Still, hadn’t Bilbo been so nervous himself just a short while ago that he had stomped off into the night? One mustn’t throw stones when living in a glass smial.

“Yes, dear.”

Thorin didn’t say anything for one long moment. Either he had too much to say, or nothing at all. Bilbo wasn’t sure which option he preferred, but he was willing to work with anything. He had done everything for this, and he could still do more.

At last, Thorin said, “You…”

Bilbo waited, then smiled and prompted, “Me?”

Thorin ran a hand down his long beard. He had worn it in a simpler style today. Bilbo hadn’t noticed before, covered by the blanket as it had been. It looked rather lovely.

“Forgive me,” Thorin said, chuckling. “I had not intended for this talk to be so soon, but I believe we—”

They both jumped as the world exploded into fire and colour around them, the night sky alight with hundreds, perhaps thousands of fireworks, all burning and whistling and soaring over their heads with their loud popping and whizzing. Bilbo got to his feet, mouth hanging open as he watched the spectacular show unfolding before his eyes.

He looked down just as Thorin did, their gazes locking. This hadn’t been planned. This wasn’t part of some masterplan to woo Bilbo. He could see it in the way Thorin’s face was slack with wonder, no doubt mirroring his own expression, and that made the moment all the more special.

“Those fool boys,” Bilbo said.

Thorin burst out laughing. “I did give them permission to misbehave.”

They moved as if in a dream, bathed in rainbow-flares of light, and they embraced under the blossoming colours.

When they kissed this time, it was no accident.

Chapter Text

Perhaps predictably, the games had ended by the time they made their way back. People were gathered in clusters, talking about the spectacular fireworks show that had lasted quite a long time and what it might have signalled. No one seemed to think that they had gone off by mistake—or rather due to the meddling of two young hobbits. Bilbo gave Thorin an amused look, but found that the dwarf-King didn’t appear to find the comments all that entertaining.

Bilbo took advantage of the fact that they were holding hands to give Thorin’s a squeeze. The slight pressure dissolved Thorin’s frown, and the dwarf regale Bilbo with a sweet little smile as they navigated their way into the city.

“We ought to find the others,” Thorin said.

“We ought to find the boys,” Bilbo clarified. “Specifically, Merry and Pippin.”

“They might still be where the fireworks where. I suggest we look for them there first.”

Bilbo nodded. “Lead the way.”

They arrived at a small building a few minutes later. Bilbo recognised it as one of the smaller warehouses, meant to keep away tools and contraptions that would see no use until the warmer months returned. Unused as it was during this time of the year, Bilbo thought it a rather clever hiding spot, if only a little obvious for those looking to bump into things that might have been hidden away.

“Not the best hiding spot,” Bilbo said, taking in the building’s facade.

“Damp and cramped,” Thorin agreed. “Not at all ideal for fireworks, which is exactly why it’s an ideal hiding spot for large quantities of them. I should have known that your boys would figure it out. Clever little devils, just like their uncle.”

“I am uncle to only one of them,” Bilbo said, “and that one had nothing to do with the impromptu fireworks show. I am as blameless as an innocent babe.”

Thorin laughed, clearly not agreeing with Bilbo in the least. Then he stopped abruptly and inclined his head, brow furrowing. “Do you hear that?”

Bilbo strained his ears. For a moment, he heard nothing, and then he heard what could be nothing but Kíli’s muffled shouting coming from within the warehouse. Bilbo blinked at Thorin. He had never heard Kíli quite so cross. Judging from Thorin’s look, it was not something frequent. There were other voices rising and falling, all of them sounding different degrees of vexed, but Kíli’s was a constant thundering.

“What in good heavens is going on in there?” Bilbo asked.

He had half a mind to not even bother finding out and march back to his quarters for a quiet night with Thorin. Some food, some wine, some foot rubs. Perhaps some more kissing. Perhaps some keeping themselves warm as the hearthfire died down. But it would be remiss of him, he knew.

A sharp shout from Kíli sent Thorin grumling something in dwarven as he stepped forward to open the door. It creaked open, stiff and heavy with cold and disuse. Some snow became loose from the roof and landed on them, making Bilbo squawk and hurry inside, patting hismelf down. Thorin stepped in after him, shaking the snow off with a disgruntled expression.

Sepulchral silence reigned when they entered, but like all silences in their group, it lasted a short instant before everything devolved into an even louder ruckus. Bilbo could do little more than look around as all the members of the Company and his four boys jumped forward to try and make themselves heard first, which in turn meant they all shouted at him with their booming voices and shrill squeaks until Gandalf, who had thus far been quietly laughing somewhere in the shadows, stepped forth and banged his staff against the stony floor.

“Enough!” he said.

Merry piped up, “But I was just trying to tell Mister Bilbo—”

“Meriadoc Brandybuck,” Gandalf cut in, “I said enough. Neither King Thorin nor Bilbo Baggins are deaf, and so they do not need your lot bellowing like demented oxen at them. Take a step back and make yourselves heard by turns.”

“Me, first,” said Kíli, his expressions dark.

Behind him, Fíli covered grimaced and his face with one hand.

Pippin pouted. “That’s not—”

“Shut up!” Kíli pointed an accusing finger at the young Took. “You’ve ruined it all!”

“All right, Kíli, that’s enough of that,” Bilbo said, stepping between them. “I understand the lads got their hands on Gandalf’s fireworks, but I will not tolerate such aggressiveness. They’re just boys.”

“Yes!” cried Pippin. “We’re just tweens!”

“Practically children!” added Merry.

“Children or not,” Glóin said, “you should know better than to set off an entire arsenal worth of explosives!”

“You could have been badly hurt!” Dori said.

“Dwalin,” Bilbo turned to the towering dwarf, “weren’t you supposed to be looking after them?”

“As if we’d let him trail us,” Pippin huffed, then yelped when Merry elbowed him.

Dwalin’s face grew red. “They’re a slippery pair.”

“They could’ve been hurt!” Dori insisted.

“I would never leave my fireworks unattended in a glorified barn if they were capable of inflicting harm, Master Dori,” said Gandalf, leaning on his staff. “I assure you, they are most benign contraptions.”

Dori made a sputtering noise that clearly begged to differ.

“It’s true, they don’t burn,” Bilbo said. “They’re just very loud.”

“Well, they’ve still ruined it all!” Kíli said, looking at Thorin as though his uncle might agree with him. He was looking increasingly frazzled by the second. “Don’t tell me you’re not upset about this! We’ve been planning this entire thing for so long!”

Bilbo huffed a chuckle, raising a hand in a placating gesture. “Kíli, come now, you’re a grown Prince, this is hardly becoming of you. Not to mention that they’re just fireworks. I’m sure our wizard—”

“UNCLE THORIN WAS GOING TO PROPOSE WITH THOSE!”

Once again, silence descended upon the warehouse. Bilbo turned to Thorin.

“Were you, now?”

After an awkward beat, Thorin said, “My nephew speaks the truth.”

“I see.” Something inside Bilbo spread its wings and began to soar. He tried to keep himself from grinning like a madman, but only succeeded in beaming unashamedly at his dwarf-King. “And what if I said no? You would’ve spent your gold on all these fireworks for naught.”

“The fireworks would’ve gone off anyhow,” Thorin snapped, cheeks as red as the tip of his cold nose, “because I would have absconded the throne anyway!”

There was another beat of silence.

“Abscond?” Sam asked.

Thorin took a deep breath and straightened his back. “Yes, Young Gamgee. I have not ruled long, but I have ruled enough.” He gestured at Fíli, who stepped forward with a smile. “It is time for newer and wiser blood to be sat under the Arkenstone.”

“And for the older and besotted one to enjoy his golden years without the pressures of kinghood,” said Fíli. He nodded at Bilbo, “And, if fate would have it, with a hobbit by his side.”

Bilbo pretended to consider it. Finally, he said, “Well, I don’t see why we couldn’t make this a mid-festival announcement. I mean, we’ve already used the fireworks, and people are mighty curious as to why they went off. Would be a shame not to use the opportunity to get engaged.” As an afterthought, he told Fíli, “And get you crowned.”

Thorin made a strange sound, like being wounded but not quite, like lowering yourself into a hot bath but not quite. Kíli whooped and threw his fists up into the air, the rest of the Company clapping and cheering and shaking hands with one another. Some of them even exchanged coins. Gandalf quietly accepted a hefty pouch from a grumbling Dwalin.

Fíli gave his uncle a gentle pat on the back, a huge grin hiding behind his golden beard.

“That sounds quite sensible, Bilbo. Doesn’t it, Uncle?”

“Mahal,” Thorin said, his voice raw, and then he cleared his throat and said, “It does.”

Bilbo smiled at him, prim and proper, his heart hammering in his chest and threatening to burst out at any moment. He extended a hand, and Thorin took it with infinite reverence. Calloused and warm, larger than Bilbo’s, so familiar it could be his own hand.

“How shall we gather everyone for the announcement?” asked Bilbo, looking around.

With that, the Company burst into action, running off to tell people to gather at Bain’s Hall. Not ideal, Bofur confided in Bilbo, considering that Thorin had meant to propose to Bilbo at Erebor’s gate, but it would do. Then he ran off to do his own bit of people-herding.

Thorin and Bilbo walked to the Hall hand-in-hand, quiet but aglow, and found a small chamber off the main room where they could wait until the time to step out came. They closed the door behind them, somewhat muffling the sounds of the arriving folk. Bilbo wrung his hands together, straightened his jacket and fixed his hair, fiddled with Thorin’s cloak and furs to keep himself busy. The noise was growing, and so was his anxiousness.

He looked up at Thorin. The dwarf was smiling down at him, soft and in love, and the knot of mounting stress forming in Bilbo’s belly seemed to be replaced by a rush of warmth. He rolled his eyes at Thorin, and the King’s smile grew. If someone had told him that morning that he would reach the end of the day engaged to his dwarf, Bilbo would have probably made some scathing remark.

But it was true. It was true! In his eternal waspishness, even he had to admit, there were far worse ways to end one’s day.

Chapter Text

People continued to gather in the Hall, a Company member coming every now and then to knock on the door and declare that they were ‘almost ready’ for their announcement. But people kept arriving—humans, elves, dwarves. They were crawling out of the woodwork in their curiosity, and soon the Hall was full to bursting and the doors had to be thrown open for those outside to see and hear what was going on inside.

Bilbo had proposed making the announcement in the central plaza’s scenario, where Thorin and Bain had inaugurated the festival, but his friends and beloved—betrothed!—seemed to think it much too informal a setting for so big a proclamation. In truth, Bilbo didn’t see a problem with that, but Thorin’s plans for his ideal proposal had already become ruined. He wouldn’t rob him of the opportunity to at least take control of the situation where he still could.

Bilbo watched Thorin from where he was sitting on a chair. His dwarf fidgeted where he stood, but when he noticed Bilbo’s eyes on him, his smile was wide and dimpled. Bilbo crossed his arms.

“For how long have you been planning this?” he asked, eyes narrowed.

Thorin looked sheepish only for a moment, his annoyance triumphing in the end. “Longer than I care to admit, now that all my careful planning has been blown to the ether by two children.”

“Oh, Thorin,” Bilbo chuckled. “Those aren’t children. They’re hellions.”

“I’ve noticed,” Thorin said with a flat voice.

Bilbo raised his eyebrows at him. “Hellions with explicit permission to ‘prove their wit’ from the King under the Mountain.”

“I didn’t expect them to interfere with this!” Thorin defended himself. “I had expected them to hide my crown, set the pigs loose at the market, something normal. Not set off an entire cart worth of fireworks that had been hidden away to avoid exactly this sort of thing from happening!”

“I suppose you haven’t known them long enough to understand just how volatile a combination Tooks and Brandybucks make.” Bilbo went to him and patted his arm. “There, there, my dear. Now you know.”

“I wish I had known sooner.” Thorin covered his hand with his. “I wanted to surprise you.”

“You did surprise me.” Bilbo grinned. “Only you were surprised as well.”

Thorin smiled down at him, his neck bowing so their faces grew closer. He gazed into Bilbo’s eyes for one long moment, face gone soft, and then he sighed. “You know of my feelings, Bilbo. I would like to know of yours.”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

“I would like to hear it said plainly.”

“You yourself have yet to say it plainly, my good King,” Bilbo teased.

“I love you,” Thorin ground out, “plainly.”

Bilbo gaped like a fish for a second. “Oh. Well. That’s—did you have to growl it out?”

Thorin gave him an earnest look.

“Oh, all right, fine, you’ve caught me.” Bilbo took a deep breath, then said, “I love you, too, and also plainly. I must say, though, that is a rather unusual way of saying it.”

“There is nothing usual—”

“Or plain, except our love, perhaps—”

“—about us,” Thorin finished, pretending Bilbo hadn’t said anything.

“I assure you, this whole ordeal would have gone much more pear-shaped if you had had to ask a member of my family for my hand. They would have had plenty to oppose regarding our union, though all their reasons would have been ridiculous and all their points moot.”

Thorin smiled down at him. “Well, at least Frodo seems to have given us his blessing.”

Frodo, Bilbo thought, his heart stuttering. He had completely forgotten. Frodo needed him. Though the boy wasn’t of age, he was old enough to care for himself, yet Bilbo didn’t wish to cause him undue distress. He had lost his parents already, and had had a hard time settling in Bag End after his short time in Buckland. He needed stability and love, a dedicated and nurturing guardian. Bilbo had done his best to do and be what Frodo needed since the boy had moved in with him, but now he had gone and agreed to a marriage without consulting his charge.

How could he have been so selfish, so foolish, so very Tookish? Bilbo stepped back and pressed a hand to his forehead, his mind a vengeful cacophony all of a sudden. There was a good reason why he and Thorin had adopted a glacial pace when dealing with each other. Their choices didn’t affect just them; their lives weren’t just theirs. In a blind moment of immeasurable joy, Bilbo had committed the terrible mistake of forgetting that.

Their love wasn’t a secret, but it was much too late to shape themselves around it. It had already been much too late when they first met. Older people seldom got the chance to reinvent themselves around newfound feelings—there was simply too much life interfering, too much history, and their case in particular was complex to a fault.

“Frodo,” he said aloud, voice tremulous.

“What’s wrong, Bilbo?” Thorin asked, hand outstretched.

Against his better judgement, Bilbo took it, but he didn’t move closer. “He’s just—I don’t know how to explain it all to you, but I’ve done him a great disservice by accepting your proposal tonight. I should’ve asked first. I’m his only family.”

“Didn’t you say the Brandybucks were related to him?”

“Relations aren’t family, Thorin,” Bilbo snapped, then squeezed Thorin’s hand. “Forgive me. I’m reeling. How am I such an expert in making myself feel both ecstatic and miserable at the same time?”

Thorin tugged gently, and Bilbo let himself get pulled closer.

“Peace, my love. We’ll talk to him,” Thorin promised. “Or you may do so on your own if you wish.”

Bilbo nodded, sighing. “There is simply so much. One decision sparks so many consequences, so many questions, so many more choices to make. It’s terrifying. Most of all, it’s exhausting. I don’t wish to deal with any of it.”

“I understand,” Thorin said, thumb stroking his knuckles.

A hot pulse of shame washed over Bilbo’s face. He was being selfish and foolish again, complaining to the King who had given up his throne for him. Or mostly for him. Bilbo liked to think he had been a considerable factor in Thorin’s decision, but that would also be such a weight to carry, and he was afraid that resentment may sprout from it. The last thing he wanted in this world and the next was to have Thorin resent him. Not again. Not after he had been forgiven.

He lifted Thorin’s hands to his lips and kissed them, not softly or coyly, but decisively. I love you, the kiss said, plainly. You will never regret this. You will never regret me.

“We’ll sort it out,” Bilbo said.

“Of course we will,” Thorin said, resting Bilbo’s hands on his chest. “We have faced greater challenges, you and I, and while I am by no means belittling the importance of solving whatever concerns you have regarding Frodo, I am certain we will find a solution.”

Bilbo hummed in agreement, flexing his fingers to luxuriate in the velvety softness of Thorin’s furs. His chest still felt tight with worry and guilt at having forgotten his dear Frodo so thoroughly. What a dangerous feeling joy could be. Only three letters. The word alone didn’t command respect, but it still made people follow with blind eyes and open hearts.

“There’s so much to say,” Bilbo murmured.

“I’m sure he’ll listen,” Thorin said.

“No, not to Frodo. To you. Between us.” Bilbo clutched at Thorin’s furs. “Don’t you agree? We have hardly spoken, not of the things that matter, not of—of things that matter. We’ve spoken of pipe-weed and fair games and food, but what about the rest?”

“We did just tell each other the most important thing of all,” Thorin countered.

“And what if I have more to say?” Bilbo looked up at him.

Thorin’s face was serene when he said, “Then it will be my privilege to listen.”

Bilbo looked back down. He steeled himself, then nodded and took a step back. Thorin let him go, mouth downturned. He kept dancing in and out of Thorin’s reach, Bilbo noticed, both physically and emotionally.

He only hoped that in the end there would be no distance between them.

Chapter Text

“I had meant to come back,” Bilbo began. “Retrace my steps.”

Thorin smiled. “There are safer ways to travel to Erebor now.”

“No, no. I mean my steps.” Thorin’s expression grew confused. It was Bilbo’s turn to smile. “The steps of my journey back to the Shire. I thought that maybe doing such a thing would remind me how I managed to believe my lies all those years ago, all the justifications and excuses and arguments in favour of returning there instead of staying here, and why believing all of my falsehoods and pretexts was better than…”

Bilbo trailed off. Thorin danced into his reach then, his hand clutching Bilbo’s, his forehead touching his own. They had never bumped foreheads before. He found it more intimate than kissing. He would definitely not be against the idea of doing it more often. The years he had spent deprived of Thorin’s touch were too many, and Bilbo intended to make up for every second they had lost.

“All this time,” Thorin said, “I thought you felt regret.”

“Regret?”

“Over agreeing to the quest,” said Thorin, his voice soft, “and everything that took place after.”

“Oh, Thorin.” Bilbo gave a light tug at one of Thorin’s silver braids. “You know I would never. I could never. I’ve told you a thousand times already.”

“Reading it in letters isn’t quite the same as hearing it.”

“So do you trust my words now then?”

“Perhaps.” Thorin’s shoulders bowed under an impossible weight. “Our parting was so bitter—”

“Our parting was sad,” Bilbo corrected, “not bitter.”

“I thought you wished to forget.”

“I never wanted to forget,” said Bilbo, bringing the end of Thorin’s braid to his lips. “Not everything. Not most of it. And the things I do wish I could forget are my own failures and what they caused.”

“Bilbo—”

“You can’t say I’m not to blame, Thorin. I am.”

The Arkenstone had been a shortcut and a trapdoor. Bilbo hadn’t realised that until after the damage had been done. World-weary and homesick, he had just wanted the quest to end at last. The dragon had been slain, the treasure recovered, the Mountain reclaimed. Yet there had been armies on their doorstep, and Bilbo had—well, he had misjudged things terribly.

He still felt a deep shame whenever he thought of what he had done and how easily he had been forgiven afterward. Thorin’s hand clutching his as the King struggled to draw breath, the bedridden Princes asking him to stay, the entire Company faring him well the day he had left. And then there had come the letters. Oh, the letters. So much love poured into words, given mortal shape in mortal symbols, and flown across an entire world to reach its intended recipient, time and time again.

He hadn’t deserved those letters, much less the feelings they confessed.

“Who’s free of blame then?” Thorin challenged. “Who in our Company can claim to be free of it?”

“Most of them, I’d say.”

Thorin sighed. “Bilbo, we’re old now. It’s been years. Our mistakes and misdeeds were swiftly forgotten in the wake of our victory, and we shouldn’t forget, but we should forgive. We should forgive ourselves.” Thorin’s hands came up to cup Bilbo’s cheeks. “Don’t you think we’ve repented enough, all these decades? The distance, the isolation, the yearning, all that festering fear and time wasted, all those prayers and questions unanswered. Don’t you think we deserve to lay all that to rest?”

“I think we must be held accountable for what we did and didn’t do.”

“Don’t you think we have?”

“I do.” Bilbo disentangled himself and took a step back, once again, and looked down. “You know I do. But it never feels like enough.”

“Well, it is,” said Thorin, his tone firm.

Bilbo wiped at the corner of his eye with as much surreptitiousness as possible. Thorin held out his arms, and Bilbo stepped forward again, still looking down, and let himself be pulled into an embrace that smelled of furs, snow, and warm stone.

“Amrâlimê,” Thorin sighed against his curls, a gentle victory.

After a beat, Bilbo said, “So that’s how you pronounce it.”

Thorin laughed. “Fifty years I’ve been calling you this. You could have asked.”

“What for? There was no point.”

“Isn’t the pursuit of knowledge something of a hobby to you?”

“Yes, but it would have been a sorry business indeed,” Bilbo pulled back just enough to gaze up at Thorin, “knowing how to say it but not having you there to call you that.”

Thorin’s smile was dazzling, dizzying, devastating in the best of ways. He leant down, and Bilbo had no trouble agreeing to the ensuing kiss. It was firm, steady, certain of its welcome and in no rush to leave. Bilbo had no rush in cutting its visit short, either. Tasting the curve of Thorin’s smile was something that Bilbo doubted would ever becoming a task.

When they finally broke the kiss, Bilbo was sporting a smile to match Thorin’s.

“So,” he said, “we’ll be living here?”

The uncomfortable tug of guilt made itself known again. How could he be so happy when he was, by all intents and purposes, speaking of deserting Frodo? The lad wouldn’t want to stay, and Bilbo hated the fact that he knew he wouldn’t go back if Thorin wanted to remain in Erebor. He loved Frodo, and a good guardian would put his charge’s happiness before his own, wouldn’t they? So why couldn’t he? Why wouldn’t he?

Because he wanted this second chance. It had begun before the proposal, the little traitorous whispering which told him that maybe it would be nice to stay for some time in the north, reacquainting himself with both Dale and the Lonely Mountain, reacquainting himself with old friends, reacquainting himself with his dwarf-King.

He wanted to stay and live a life he had denied himself out of shame and guilt decades before. He wanted to let himself want it, deserve it, seize it. When it was ripe for the taking, was it really so awful that he found it impossible to deny himself any longer? He thought of Frodo and knew the answer to that question, but he still wanted to think he could have it.

“I absconded the throne to give you the chance to decide,” Thorin said.

Bilbo blinked. “What, really?”

“If you wished to return west, I would join you. Erebor has had me long enough.”

“You’d give up a kingdom—this kingdom—for me?”

“Yes,” Thorin said, that simple answer making Bilbo’s eyes sting. “I never reclaimed it for myself. It was for my people. I know I’ll leave the Mountain in good hands, and so I have no fear about going.”

Bilbo considered this, then smiled ruefully. “I know what I want, but I must speak with Frodo before taking any more decisions. He is my charge and my heir. He has a right to have a say, even if he may not want the same things I do.”

“Of course,” Thorin said.

“But, between us,” Bilbo lowered his voice as though revealing a secret, “I haven’t really had time to see Erebor as much as I wanted these past few days, and I doubt all of winter will be enough to become properly acquainted. I’d like to stay and come to know its halls the same way you have.”

Thorin smiled. “I would love to introduce you.”

“And I would love that.” Bilbo closed his eyes. “But I must speak with Frodo first.”

Thorin kissed Bilbo’s forehead. “I will fetch him.”

Chapter Text

Bilbo watched Thorin slip out of the room in search for Frodo, then collapsed into the nearest chair. It wasn’t quite collapsing, per se, seeing how most chairs in Dale were all human-sized and he had to hop up instead of just flopping down, but the feeling behind the action was definitely one of boneless exhaustion. He was bewildered by and utterly cross with his own capability for swinging between happiness and despair, which only added two more emotions to his current concoction.

Rubbing his temples, he tried to sort out what exactly he needed to tell and ask Frodo. So many consequences, questions, choices. He truly didn’t wish to deal with any of it. His was a comfortable existence where difficult decisions were far-off strangers. Returning to Erebor had been such an ordeal from the very beginning. A good ordeal, but an ordeal nevertheless.

He touched his breast pocket, seeking comfort. He felt a familiar round shape through the fabric, and though his heart throbbed in his ears, he grew calmer. His precious ring always helped him focus. What a delightful trinket. He was so lucky it had come to him. It had been such a great help during the quest and then during his life in the Shire. He patted it, then let his hand drop.

Frodo chose that moment to step into the chamber, pink-faced and teary-eyed.

Bilbo hopped off the chair, arms spread. “My dear boy.”

“Uncle,” Frodo said, then stepped forward and pulled Bilbo into a tight embrace. “Oh, I’m so happy for you! I don’t know what to say or how to say it, but I’m so happy for you! You love him so much, and he loves you, and I’m just so happy.” He pulled back and wiped some tears away. “I’m sorry Merry and Pippin ruined the proposal. They just got another stern talking-to from all your friends—and Sam.” Frodo laughed. “Oh, Sam. I think he’s angrier than all of them combined.”

Bilbo squinted at him. “Sam?”

“Yes!” Frodo continued laughing. “I was as surprised as you are that it finally happened! He has well and truly lost his temper over something. I must say, I am so very thankful his ire wasn’t directed at me. What a formidable glare!”

Bilbo began chuckling, but then remembered why Frodo was here. The lad’s humour seemed promising, but Bilbo wasn’t about to start hoping that things may finally go his way. “Ah, yes, I’m sure it is. But come here, Frodo, lad. Do sit down. We need to talk.”

Frodo gave him a curious look but complied. “About what?”

“Well,” Bilbo sat back down. “All this situation. It affects you, too, you know?”

Frodo’s expression grew more confused. “It does? How?” His eyes went wide. “Am I going to be a prince? Am I going to be king? Oh, Uncle, tell them I can’t. I don’t know the first thing about ruling. I’d make an awful king! Tell Thorin I killed your tomato plant. He’ll understand.”

“Settle down, lad. Your eyes are going to pop off. First, Thorin doesn’t give a fig about tomato plants or gardening in general, so he would not understand in the slightest. Second, stop reminding me you killed my tomato plant; I’m not over it yet. Third, you won’t be king, and I doubt you will become a prince. I’m not certain how that whole mess works, but it’s none of our concern, you can be sure of that.”

“All right,” Frodo said, looking relieved.

“Now, there are other matters we must discuss.”

“Which are?”

Bilbo smoothed down his jacket. “Thorin and I have your blessing, then?”

“Yes!”

Bilbo’s lip trembled at Frodo’s uninhibited beaming. “Thank you.” He cleared his throat. “All right, so, if we have your blessing, that means we shall be married, which leads to our next problem.”

Frodo gave him a funny look, still smiling. “Problem? What a funny way of being joyful you have.”

Bilbo harrumphed. “There is a problem, lad. You’re just young and daft enough not to see it.”

Frodo leant back in his chair with an indulgent grin. “Enlighten my young and daft self, then.”

“Married couples tend to live together.”

“That’s not a problem.”

“It is for us,” Bilbo said, “if we can’t agree on where to live.”

“Oh. Right. Well, just talk to Thorin about it.”

Bilbo closed his eyes and mustered up some patience. “I don’t mean Thorin.”

Frodo’s eyebrows flew up. “Oh.”

“Hm, yes, oh. Now you get it.”

“Yes. Er.” Frodo frowned for a moment, then shrugged. “Well, that’s fine. I’m old enough to head back alone if you decide to stay here. I’d like to live in Bag End, if that’s all right with you. I’m old enough for that, too. The house is a bit big for one hobbit, but you were fine on your own for a long time.” He looked uncertain for a moment but seemed to recover the next instant. “And I can send you your things! You can write a list before I leave, and I’ll make sure to mail you boxes with all your books and maps and clothes and that china set you like so much.”

“I’m not sure I like the thought of sending you back to the Shire alone.”

“I won’t be alone. Merry and Pippin and Sam will be with me.”

Bilbo gave him a flat look. “That’s not as comforting as you think it is, my boy.”

“I guess it isn’t,” Frodo chuckled. “But we can sort all that out later. Do you really want to stay cooped up in here talking about all these boring things when you should be outside announcing your engagement to a King?”

“These boring things are necessary,” Bilbo said, then leant forward and squeezed one of Frodo’s knobbly knees. “I want you to know what you say matters. I’m sorry I accepted Thorin’s proposal without consulting with you first.”

“Well, it was all rather spontaneous,” Frodo said, mirth dancing in his eyes. He covered Bilbo’s hand with his. “And, Uncle, it’s been fifty years, but when we first saw him at our welcome dinner, you looked at each other the way my parents did.” Frodo shrugged again, a little smile on his face. “I’m not going to get in the way of that, and neither should you.”

Bilbo found himself surreptitiously wiping tears away for the second time that evening. He smiled at his charge, his boy, and wondered when he had grown so kind and wise. “You’re a good lad, Frodo.”

Frodo smiled, unashamed of the tears framing his own eyes. “You’re a good uncle, Bilbo.”

They stood up and hugged, and Bilbo patted his boy’s back, not thinking of how many more hugs they would have before they were separated, perhaps for ever. How strange, how cruel, that one’s own choices, one’s own happiness, should also break one’s heart so expertly.

Frodo pulled back, brow furrowed as he looked at Bilbo. After a moment of deliberating something in the quiet recesses of his mind, the boy gave Bilbo an impish grin that no doubt came from his mother’s side of the family.

“So, I have to ask,” he said. “Can I call King Thorin ‘Uncle’ ?”

Chapter Text

Bilbo would always remember the announcement of his engagement to Thorin son of Thráin, King under the Mountain, King of Durin’s Folk as a colourful if somewhat nippy blur. His boots lay discarded somewhere in the rocky plains and thus his toes were beginning to resent his decision to take them off. But as Thorin held Bilbo’s hand in front of everyone and declared them engaged, a steady warmth suffused Bilbo’s entire body. People of all kinds cheered and clapped at the news—elves, dwarves, men, the single Beorning and wizard in their midst, and of course the hobbit lads. Bilbo rolled his eyes and bounced on the balls of his feet and pretended that it was all a rather pompous imposition when he would rather be eating bread and cheese in some quiet corner.

Truth be told, he would indeed rather be doing that, but finally becoming Thorin’s betrothed in an official capacity made all the pomp and circumstance of the world a small price to pay. In the end, however, his hobbitish prayers were answered in the form of the impromptu banquet that followed the announcement of their impending nuptials—as well as Fíli’s coronation, poor lad, he was the one who deserved all the attention, but he seemed far too delighted to let Bilbo shake all the hands and thank all the folk that should have by right been more interested in Fíli’s statement than his own.

Bilbo tried to divert the attention to Fíli a few times, out of a desire to have him get the recognition he deserved and not an absolute reluctance to deal with another well-wisher. Fíli always deflected them and sent them right back to him with a smile and a wink so cheeky yet so charming that Bilbo had a hard time deciding if he wanted to laugh or lob a piece of mince pie at him.

Thorin did not let go of Bilbo’s hand for the duration of the celebration, and Bilbo found great pleasure in pretending to listen to the endless line of people congratulating them when he actually had his complete focus on the way Thorin’s wide hand cupped Bilbo’s own. It was warm and rough, still calloused despite many years of kingly duties instead of smithing and adventuring, and Bilbo found it a little bit charming, a little bit sad, how some things remain with a person until the very end.

He watched with an air of polite disinterest as a genteel Dalish woman who had just finished congratulating them walked away. He gave only a soft harrumph to show his vexation. It had been long years since he had last tried to hide his annoyance at social obligations, but he supposed embarrassing his betrothed would be remiss of him.

Thorin chuckled by his side, so Bilbo turned to him with an eyebrow raised.

“Is there something you would like to say, dear King?”

“You still do this,” Thorin said, gesturing at his own nose.

Bilbo frowned. “Do what?”

“The rabbit thing. With your nose.”

Bilbo twitched his nose. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Thorin laughed and kissed Bilbo’s knuckles, then beckoned the next well-wisher forth.

After the celebration was over and they had all returned to Erebor for the night, Thorin walked Bilbo to the hobbits’ assigned quarters. The guards posted outside pointedly looked away, which was a bit embarrassing but nowhere near the level of mortifying needed to keep Bilbo from doing something. The lads giggled somewhere behind Bilbo as he kissed his dwarf-King goodnight, but when he turned around to give them a scathing look, they had all fled into their rooms.

Thorin grinned. “They fear you.”

“A wise thing to do.” Bilbo got on his tiptoes to kiss Thorin once more. “Goodnight, my love.”

Thorin smiled down at him. “Goodnight, my love.”

Bilbo gave Thorin’s beard a small tug, and the King laughed and leant down for a final kiss. Bilbo watched him go, leaning against the door like a lovelorn tween. Then he remembered that he was a grown hobbit and shut the door with an amused huff.

When he turned around, the boys had come out of hiding.

“So you’re really marrying King Thorin?” Merry asked.

“Isn’t he a bit, you know,” Pippin mimicked Thorin’s long mane and beard, “on the fluffy side?”

“Yes, he is.” Bilbo went to sit by the fire, fishing around his pockets for his pipe. “I suspect he will make a great cuddling companion.”

The boys arranged themselves around him without prompting, which Bilbo found sweet. Merry stoked the fire, Sam fetched them blankets, and Pippin brought out some food he had hidden away in his room just in case. Frodo stayed by Bilbo’s side, chin on his knee, his eyes bright and happy still. Bilbo took great comfort in seeing the boy so taken with the idea of Bilbo’s marriage despite that it might mean their separation. He finished lighting his pipe and began smoking, his free hand petting Frodo’s dark curls.

“So the wedding will be here?” asked Pippin. “Will it be soon? I don’t want to miss it.”

“We haven’t spoken about that with Thorin yet.” Bilbo blew a smoke ring. “Perhaps tomorrow.”

“Well, you’ve got to invite us,” said Merry. “We basically made it happen.”

Bilbo gave the boy a glare, but Merry’s face paled only when he noticed Sam staring at him with dead eyes.

“Which, by the way, we’re very sorry about,” Merry hurried to say.

“Yes, we’re very sorry and won’t do it again,” Pippin said.

“Of course you won’t,” Bilbo said. “I doubt I’ll be getting engaged a second time.”

“But,” said Pippin, one finger and both eyebrows raised, “if you do, we won’t do it again.”

“Hurrah,” muttered Bilbo around his pipe.

“They’re right, though, Uncle,” Frodo said. “I’d like to be here for the wedding as well, but we’ll be returning to the Shire after winter ends. Do you think you and Thorin could have your wedding before then?”

“Well, I suppose royal weddings require a bit more planning than your usual Shire bells, but I will ask Thorin what can be done about it. I doubt you will be allowed to travel here a second time until you all become of age.”

The boys looked pleased at that, and they ate and smoked by the fire until their yawns outnumbered their willpower to stay awake, at which point they all marched to bed with sleepy smiles on their faces wrought from different joyous thoughts. Bilbo’s reason to smile, he assumed to be the easiest to divine. He was engaged, he was in love, he was happy. Simple things that simple folk take for granted and are blessed enough to experience from their very youth. But Bilbo knew to cherish it.

He thought of Thorin’s lips on his as he shrugged out of his garbs, he thought of Thorin’s forehead against his when he slipped on his sleepwear, and he thought of Thorin’s hand in his when he curled up in bed. The smile on his face followed him into his dreams.

The next morning, Gandalf showed up for breakfast. The late end of their previous evening meant that the boys hadn’t yet risen, so Bilbo sat down to enjoy the first meal of the day in his old friend’s company for the first time in years. The servants made quick work of bringing in the many platters and bowls and jars filled with all sorts of delectable things, and then it was only Bilbo and Gandalf.

As it was their custom, they chatted about nothing in particular for a good while as they ate and drank their fill of everything on the table, attempting to outwit each other in every word they uttered. Bilbo liked to think he was getting quite good at sassing old wizards.

As per usual, Bilbo left not a single thing untasted, whereas Gandalf pecked around the cold cuts and bread as though he were some kind of bird. Watching him rake his grey eyes over the many plates and pots and pies only to lift a single bit of something and nibble on it was always as fascinating as it was bemusing.

“So you will be staying,” said Gandalf, “and Frodo will be going.”

“Frodo and the rest of the lads, yes. As a matter of fact, I was hoping you’d agree to escort them back to the Shire.” Bilbo passed some ham rolls to Gandalf as though trying to bribe the wizard. “I know you’re a busy man these days, but I would really appreciate the favour. My reputation in the Shire will be in irreparable tatters after this, no doubt, but seeing how I won’t be going back for the time being, I can’t bring myself to much care.”

Gandalf laughed and so did Bilbo, then the wizard said, “Of course I will see the boys safely back home. I did the same with you, didn’t I?”

Bilbo polished off a blueberry muffin. “The situation is very different.”

“Not from where I stand,” Gandalf said, taking a ship of his tea. “I am even delivering a lone Baggins to the illustrious hobbit-hole of Bag End. Speaking of which, will Frodo live alone? I had meant to ask. I know it’s none of my business, but I’m merely curious.”

“He said he wouldn’t mind it, but I’m thinking of asking the Gamgees to move in with him. I’ve thought about it for some time now. I think they would do him well. They are what every family should be,” Bilbo said. “Loving, caring, understanding.”

“You speak as though you were not these things yourself.”

Bilbo snorted. “I’m not. Not as much as they are, at least. I’ve tried my best. I’ve done as right by him as I can. My conscience is clean, for the most part.”

“For the most part?” Gandalf echoed.

“Well, I am deserting him to spend the rest of my days married to a dwarf.” Bilbo plucked some grapes from a platter and popped one into his mouth. “But Frodo said we have his blessing, so I’m hoping what little corners of my mind still feel guilty about this will eventually fade away.”

“I am confident you will see that your happiness is harming no one,” Gandalf said, smiling.

Bilbo made a noncommittal sound, drank some coffee, and reached for more food.

“Anyhow, can you believe this is our first proper meeting since you arrived?” Bilbo said, slathering some strawberry jam onto a thick slice of bread. He took a bite of the corner he had already slathered and then continued. “A crime, really.”

“My deepest apologies, dear friend,” said Gandalf. “It was by no means intentional.”

Bilbo hummed. “You’ve been a busy wizard, I hear.”

Gandalf’s bushy eyebrows shot up, his eyes sparkling. “The busiest.”

“With fireworks and kings and such.”

“Indeed.”

“So is it safe to assume that you have become less busy now that you have time to have breakfast with your favourite old hobbit adventurer?” Bilbo finished preparing his slice of bread and took another bite. “Or is this social call getting squeezed in between two world-saving appointments.”

Gandalf mien darkened then, a deep worry that carved furrows into his aged complexion. “My friend, I would wish nothing more than to have that be the truth. As fate would have it, however, the appointment that might save the world is, in fact, this one.”

Bilo set his food down. “What do you mean?”

Gandalf leant forward. “Your magic ring cannot stay here, Bilbo.”

Bilbo frowned, growing cold. “But it’s mine.”

”You will soon have another ring upon your hand,” Gandalf said impatiently. “One that you can wear every day and which ought to mean more to you than some piece of jewellery you found at the bottom of a goblin-cave.”

Bilbo’s hands curled into fists. “You’re only saying that because you want to take it from me.”

”No, Bilbo. I want you to give it to Frodo.”

Bilbo gave an incredulous huff and stood up. He marched to the fireplace, fishing around his pockets for his pipe and weed-pouch. “To Frodo! That boy would lose my ring faster than the hare runs.” He lit his pipe with shaking hands and took a few calming smokes, staring into the fire, grey clouds gathering about him with every breath. “And you want me to give it to him? For what?”

“He’s pure of heart, just like you,” said Gandalf behind him, “and if my suspicions are right, then only someone of such light can own it the way you have—for decades and without harm.”

”But it’s been with me all this time. It chose me. It’s safe with me. I don’t see why he should own it.”

”Because you will be staying here with your future husband,” Gandalf said, his chair creaking, and Bilbo heard his soft footsteps approach, “and Frodo will be inheriting everything that is yours in the Shire. The ring should go to him too.”

”Well, I don’t see why it should,” Bilbo snapped, whirling around. “It’s mine!”

And here Gandalf grew tall and terrible, neither man nor shadow but a creature of great power.

”Bilbo Baggins!” Gandalf boomed.

Bilbo shrunk away and whimpered, then let himself be held.

”I don’t wish to part with it,” he said into Gandalf’s robes. “It’s precious to me.”

”I know, Bilbo. I know.” Gandalf stroked his hair. “Yet you must.”

Bilbo sniffled. “And the boys? You’ll still take them home to the Shire?”

”I will personally see to their safe delivery,” Gandalf promised, then twinkled down at bilbo. “And I hear the young Brandybuck and Took have talked a certain Prince of Gondor into visiting their land. Not to mention that we’ll travel with the dwarves of Ered Luin.”

Bilbo was quiet for a moment, then said, “The boys want to be at the wedding.”

“Then we shall have it before winter ends,” Gandalf said. “You shall have all the help needed to plan it.”

Bilbo nodded, and Gandalf guided him back to the breakfast table with a kind hand.

The wedding was the most ridiculous thing Bilbo ever experienced. The announcement of their engagement had been fancy enough by his standards, a proper party full of good cheer and food, but the actual ceremony had gone on for an entire day. It contained dozens of smaller ceremonies that needed to be observed, and a dozen more due to the fact that Thorin was not only King under the Mountain but King of Durin’s Folk as well. Bilbo hadn’t thought of that, but apparently it made things more complex. It seemed being a king always made even the simplest of things more complex.

Balls, dinners, lunches, dances, walks, vows, gifts, and more. So much more. The Company had helped them organise the wedding, of course, and they had unofficially divided themselves into two groups—one to help Thorin and one to help Bilbo. Somewhat insultingly, Bilbo’s group had more people in it. It made sense, seeing how he had no idea how dwarven weddings were, but he still found it all manners of infuriating, and he complained until the very day of the ceremony.

He remembered hobbit couples saying they could remember every single detail of their weddings. Simple affairs, back in the Shire, but important all the same, and he didn’t doubt those claims. But Bilbo? Bilbo only remembered what mattered. The boys, dancing atop the tables with Boromir. His dwarf-friends, laughing and toasting to Thorin and his good health at every chance they got. And, of course, Thorin.

Thorin in his robes, gold and silver and blue, flowers and leaves embroidered into the fabric to honour his husband, winter blossoms weaved into his hair and crown. Thorin smiling, holding his hand, pouring him mead, dancing with him. Thorin, alive and well and old, gloriously old and grey and wrinkled, a lifetime of suffering and achievements, and the rest of his years to sit by the hearth with Bilbo by his side.

People would say Bilbo wept at his wedding, kissed his dwarf’s hand and wept and murmured secret words into the King’s knuckles. When asked about it, Bilbo would always reply that that day he knew nothing but joy.

The boys left when winter ended, the dwarven caravan of Ered Luin eager to get on the road after months of snow and being away from home. Gandalf sat with them in their wagon, and Boromir followed close behind on his steed. Bilbo waved from the stone gates, his hand in Thorin’s, his chest pocket empty, and a ring of white gold gleaming and warm upon his finger.