Archive of Our Own ^beta

Before

A warm tingle had always been beneath his fingertips. Something strange, not able to be explained, yet he tried. His mother used to say it was hobbit magic, rooted deep in the Shire, below smials and into the good, green earth. Father used to say sometimes people simply felt a tingle in their hands or back or feet, and it was nothing.

And yet, Bilbo found that it was more than what it seemed. Whether he grabbed a lantern that lit beneath his fingertips into a pleasant flame or brushed his hand over rising bread and watched it plump up just a bit.

Perhaps it was why his tomatoes won at the festival every year. They grew taller and wilder than anyone else’s, producing bright red fruit, sometimes with dashes of purple or green that were exceptionally flavorful. Maybe it was how flower petals reached for him as he passed or critters from all over came to stand at his doorstep.

A broken toe once healed by only holding it, a secret the shadows on the walls danced with and buried away.

Odd.

They called him odd for many things, but Bilbo Baggins preferred the privacy of his smial after his parents died. He gave up on the forced niceties and longed to be elsewhere; the East Road could carry him anywhere, and Bilbo dreamed of it. His feet weren’t tethered to the Shire, something his mother seemed to understand, but Bilbo told no one else.

Yes, he was odd. But life passed him by in a bizarre blur, too quickly—children were adults with children of their own one day, settling into larger smials and shaking their heads at him for not filling his own.

But Bilbo lacked commitment for that sort of thing. He wasn’t tied here, but a lantern waiting for someone to light a fire under his feet.

Waiting and inevitably becoming comfortable in his routine kept Bilbo still. Perhaps a life in the Shire wasn’t dull—color was splashed across a canvas if he only opened his door and peeked out. Growing things awaited him; flower petals reached for his fingers, squirrels and pigs were at the door to be given a hello and proper approval for mischief.

Bilbo always liked mischief.

So, when Gandalf the Grey and his thirteen dwarves fell into his smial, Bilbo wasn’t sure why he was so put off by it. Adventure waiting at hand! A dream offered on a golden plate, his for the taking, something to make real. The Great East Road called to them, and Bilbo put his foot down and said he wouldn’t answer.

Perhaps it was comfort or fear.

A sorrowful song, and the dwarf who sang it changed Bilbo’s life.

He followed and breathed in the smell of the world: wildflowers and great trees, tall grass, craggy rocks shaped by a river’s current, animals surrounding them, even the ponies, who all took a great liking to him and Bilbo to them.

Friendship with some of the dwarves came quickly. But the King Under the Mountain kept his distance, and Bilbo found that made bittersweet sense because Thorin lit the fire under his feet.

And what an adventure it was—nothing like the books but fraught with more danger and ridiculous situations. Peril, and Bilbo had quite enough of it by the goblin tunnels, thank you very much. The ring in his pocket felt foul, and he wasn’t entirely sure how, but he hardly had the time to ask anyone before he swished and swashed his sword at orcs until eagles carried them all away.

Thorin.

They called to him as the eagles flew over valleys, forests and mountains. Thorin didn’t stir, and Bilbo never experienced such terror, such potential grief clawing at his ankles, ready to swallow him beneath the earth.

The eagle he sat on turned its head and looked at him sometimes—rather, Bilbo felt very inspected by a massive yellow eye and wasn’t entirely confident that he would make it to the Carrock either.

But make it they did.

Bilbo reached Thorin first, sliding to his knees and grabbing the stubborn dwarf’s coat. Looking at him, Bilbo felt Thorin was alive and warm, and he could feel his heartbeat flutter beneath his hand. He pressed his hand against Thorin’s chest.

The dwarves surrounded him, and Gandalf was there, but Bilbo closed his eyes, healed Thorin from a terrible slumber, and felt the king’s ribs snap together again.

Thorin looked at Bilbo as he awoke and seemed angry with harsh words to share, but he wasn’t. And it was a hug that Bilbo would remember for a lifetime.

Of course, Gandalf and the other dwarves demanded an explanation. Well, the dwarves did, torn between elation and suspicion, while Gandalf glared at Bilbo from above his staff and seemed to inspect him as much as the eagle he’d flown on had.

Bilbo looked at Thorin as Gandalf informed him of his lifelong oddity in a grand and accusing way, and the warmth of what they shared was carried away on a cool breeze. A chasm widened between them, and Bilbo thought he might have seen it with his own eyes.

He had no answers to give anyone because Bilbo didn’t know how or why.

But atop the Carrock was hardly the place to try, and getting down was a task none wished to repeat. They moved on quickly while they had daylight ahead of them, and it was the quietest the company had been since they silently snuck out of Bag End, leaving behind only one trace they’d been there.

They arrived at the edge of the wood before a valley and a house in the distance that belonged to someone Gandalf seemed apprehensive to bother. It wasn’t a particularly good sign, but they’d only had nasty ones since they left the blasted Shire, so they would try.

Presently

But, just before the company rushes ahead and meets Beorn, we catch up to the story and the answers that await us, and they always seem to come from the mouths of meddling wizards.

“Radagast! Again! We are hunted by orc and you run us down before we can make our escape!”

“Perhaps you should run faster, Gandalf!” Radagast shouts, hopping off his sled and throwing his arms in the air. “You called to me and so here I am!”

Gandalf huffs. “I hardly called to you,” he says. “But what message did you receive?”

“A plea for help, Gandalf,” Radagast says, looking between them. “All alive, by my count. If your magic didn’t call to mine, then whose did?”

“As I am the only one with a staff and wizard to his name, I would expect it to be mine,” Gandalf says sourly. “Perhaps you’re mistaken.”

“Do we not know of another with magic among us?” Thorin asks. His voice booms, sudden, sure, and unfriendly.

Bilbo blinks, bouncing on his toes as he stands by a tree. He opens his mouth as everyone looks at him, then closes it. “Well, I,” he starts, then stops. “Magic, is it? One time—”

“One time, indeed,” Gandalf interrupts. He peers at Bilbo more intently. “And unexplained. Did you send a plea for help?”

“Did I—what? Send a plea for help? I don’t even know what that means. I do know there’s a pack of orcs after us and the house is apparently our only hopes of survival—”

“Indeed!” Radagast says as he hurries to Bilbo. “Beorn protects this land. Not to worry, not to worry. Let’s see now.” He sticks his face close to Bilbo’s, leaning in and narrowing his eyes. “Ahh… yes. Yes. Yes, yes. A plea and yet… who are you?”

“Bilbo Baggins,” Bilbo says, leaning back a little. “What on earth are you talking about?”

Gandalf storms closer and leans down, tipping his hat back until he’s too close as well. He stares at Bilbo, his eye twitching. “This is most unusual,” he says. “Weak and, yet… growing.”

“Not weak. Certainly not weak,” Radagast says. “Only new. Like a hatchling. Don’t you see him?”

“Green, yes. Green,” Gandalf says. He looks troubled and steps away, leaning on his staff. “How can this be? Into the Third Age?”

“Into the proper age! One of our order. Fascinating. In a hobbit, no less.”

“Enough with riddles,” Dwalin snaps. “What in Mahal’s name are you saying?”

“A Maia,” Fili says, frowning. He looks between Gandalf, Radagast and Bilbo. “That’s what you mean. What you are. I’ve read about Maiar.”

“You have?” Kili asks at his side. “What is it? What sort of mirror?”

“Maiar, laddie,” Balin sighs. “Must we never have a day’s rest again?”

“This is most impractical. We do not have the time. He’ll need to be taught.”

“Indeed, indeed! Meet the order, of course. Surely Saruman knows. And a staff, Gandalf, he needs a staff. It’s the most important part of your journey so far. You cannot go on without a staff.”

Bilbo stares between them, his heart racing. It’s uncomfortable, tightening his chest, and he feels it’s harder to breathe. His life—all of it—tumbles to the forefront of his mind.

Friend to all things green and growing. Green, they said. Grey, brown, white, and two blueses. But green, not a mention of it, yet the color has surrounded Bilbo from the moment of his birth until, well, now. Flower petals and their leaves reach him, and tomato vines grow wild in his garden. Grass blades tickle him whenever he lies down on a hill away from Hobbiton and peers up at the blue sky. They’ve always tickled his neck, arms, and feet, moving like things with a mind of their own.

But it isn’t always green. Things that grow, things that give and provide life. A donkey at his doorstep or a bird fluttering onto his shoulder to say hello. Bread that rises just a bit when he touches the dough and lanterns that light a gentle, golden flame with only a brush of his fingertips.

Yes, it’s all been there. Everything has been there from the beginning, often unspoken and lost into the earth or shadows on Bag End’s walls. He can’t be too odd, or things will change in Hobbiton. Oddness might turn into something more sinister in his fellow hobbits’ eyes.

But a wizard? And a most unusual one, Bilbo gathers, seeing Gandalf and Radagast peering at him as if they’ve never seen anything like him. Which, he supposes, they haven’t.

But surely not a wizard? They’ve been around since the world's creation if the stories are to be believed, and Bilbo would remember if he had a hand in that.

“Find a tree,” Radagast says. His tone is gentler. “Find a tree, Bilbo.”

“We’re still being hunted!” Ori says, sounding frightened. “We have to keep moving!”

“Aye,” Thorin agrees. His voice is deep and harsh, biting deeply. He glances at Bilbo and turns his back on him, looking at Gandalf instead. “We’re on a quest for Erebor. Not for trees.”

Bilbo winces—Thorin spits it, every bit of doubt and suspicion that he had leading up to the Carrock increased tenfold. Saving his life only mattered when he thought Gandalf did it, and it’s strange how such a deed, entirely without intent, should be met with anger. Bilbo doesn’t know if he tastes bitterness or who it might be directed at—himself or Thorin.

All he knows is that he never wants to taste it again. Any of it, in fact, as he regrets running out of his door.

He doesn’t know what to say, and Bilbo sees Gandalf’s eyes soften. He sees how he shoots a brief, sharp glance at Thorin, much like he has been this entire journey before his hand rests on Bilbo’s shoulder.

“To safety first.”

He isn’t sure that safety will feel like it—the world is off balance, and Bilbo barely feels tethered to the ground.

But to Beorn’s house they go, arriving relatively unscathed. Gandalf and Radagast argue in hushed tones while Radagast’s rabbits merge seamlessly with the neverending line of animals in and out of the home. The dwarves peer at Bilbo and he pretends not to notice, but he sees hesitant smiles, sympathy, wariness, suspicion, and anger.

It’s hardly his fault. Magic! He doesn’t want it. Perhaps he once did and never felt like he belonged in the Shire, always with the East Road calling to him, but now that he’s ventured onto it, it’s… well, it’s brought peril and fear. Unfriendliness. Friendships. Fondness, dare he say it.

“He didn’t know it would happen at all! The stubbornness of dwarves!” Gandalf suddenly booms. “Would you rather have died and the quest die with you?”

Bilbo sees Thorin glaring at Gandalf and can’t stand it. He walks outside and into a massive garden.

It’s overflowing with vegetables, herbs on massive windowsills, flowers and many other plants. Gourds are enormous, pumpkins shining orange under a clear sky, tomatoes as plump as a dinner plate look fit to burst, and cabbages larger than his head are lined in neat rows. It smells like soil and grass and green, growing things.

Bilbo ignores how flowers reach for him, and vines gently cling to his ankles and calves. He simply breathes it all in and looks at a meadow and towering tree. Oak, far bigger than the one atop Bag End, and Bilbo smiles as he steps under its shade. A few leaves on the ground are as big as a man’s book.

A small thump next to his foot makes Bilbo look down. Of all things not to be humongous here, he thinks, and sweeps an acorn from the ground. He looks at it in his palm, feeling the potential for a very large life someday, and smiles. Bilbo pockets it and looks up at the tree.

“Well, I’ve found one, haven’t I,” Bilbo says dryly. “A tree. A magnificent tree, yes, but find a tree lacks information, don’t you think? Instruction! You’d think if I’m blasted… Bilbo the Green, and, goodness, how horrid that sounds… you’d think that I’d know which tree to find. Is it here? Mirkwood, perhaps? Or I’ve left it behind in Rivendell or the Shire. A staff! Me! Can you imagine it? I don’t know the first thing about magic. And what does Gandalf do? Cast a bit of light and break some rocks? Will I be able to sprout flowers from dry dirt? Light a dozen lanterns at once? A party trick? And why should I even try?”

Bilbo feels bitter, suddenly and fiercely. His eyes sting, and he bounces on his toes.

“Why should I bother with any of it? What good will it do me? Already, I’ve lost friends. Saved a life I care very much about and I don’t expect… expect anything from that, but perhaps not anger. Look at what it’s already done for me. I’m a hobbit for Yavanna’s sake!”

He looks at the tree as the wind rustles its leaves.

“I’m only a hobbit,” Bilbo says. He blinks quickly, unsure why a pit widens in his stomach. It leaves him feeling hollow, cold and alone. The warmth of home, of the garden, of life, disappears and, for a moment, leaves him breathless.

“I’m a hobbit,” he repeats. Surely, saying it will make him believe it more, but being a hobbit feels like it’s slipping out of his grasp.

What an awful thing to feel yourself disappear.

He doesn’t know who he is or even what—a wizard in the Third Age, Gandalf scoffed, and it is such a thing to turn his nose up at. To hide away in the shadows of Bag Ends walls or to let the earth swallow it, a secret or something spoken but meant to be forgotten. He should be able to brush it off his shoulders and continue the quest, as Bilbo has a job and means to do it.

“You are a hobbit, my dear fellow.”

Bilbo blinks quickly and wipes his nose, turning to look at Gandalf. He leans against his staff at the edge of the garden. “Am I?” he asks. “Because I’ve been told I’m something else, Gandalf.”

“Coming into it all a bit… late doesn’t erase the past. You are a hobbit and a wizard,” Gandalf says, though his mustache bristles. “Certainly, you are both. Give it time. It’s only the first day.”

“The first day of how many?” Bilbo asks. “The first day of what?”

“The first day of coming to terms. And finding a staff, I believe,” Gandalf muses, glancing up at the oak tree. “Yes, good. Radagast and I will discuss it with you, my boy. But, take heart! If anything this unfortunately timed situation can give us, it’s taking back Erebor.”

Bilbo raises his eyebrows. “Taking… taking back Erebor? I refuse to take that entire responsibility! I’m a burglar, not a wizard!”

“You are a hobbit, a burglar and a wizard! This puts you at a great advantage. No, you cannot take Erebor back yourself, lad. But with a bit of help,” Gandalf adds and smiles just a bit, “and some luck, it may prepare you for the task ahead. Look at the tree, my dear fellow, look at the tree!”

He gapes as he watches Gandalf turn and head to the house. Bilbo shakes his head, muttering under his breath, and looks at the tree. He laughs, spreading his arms apart briefly.

“Entirely of no help. Not a single blasted bit of it,” Bilbo says to the tree. “Look at the tree. Of all trees, are you the one? As likely as a dwarf to trust anything, even after saving their bloody lives….”

Crack.

Bilbo leaps back, clutching his chest, and gawks at the oak tree’s broad trunk. There’s a crack in it, from the left side through the middle and downward, as if someone swung a sharp sword straight through it. It makes a low creaking noise as the chunk of the tree teeters in place before it falls slowly to the left, then down with a horrendously loud and earth-shaking thump.

He stares at it, afraid Beorn will storm out of his house and demand to know what’s happened to an ancient oak tree. It’s a wonder the whole thing doesn’t fall over. A gust of wind rustles the leaves, and the branches look as if they are taking a breath and sighing, settling.

Not an uncommon sight to tell the truth, but Bilbo let the earth swallow that secret for a very long time.

He clasps his hands behind his back, looking at the house, around the corners of it and out past the garden. Bilbo takes a few hesitant steps forward to look at the massive piece of wood, twice his height and about as wide as him. He looks at the middle of it, shining beautifully light brown with veins of age and stories, and his heart thumps as he feels its life beneath his feet.

In the middle of the wood, a staff lays neatly. It’s deeper brown than the wood around it, closer to Gandalf’s in color, but it looks odd. Rather like a sewing needle with a blunt bottom for… walking, Bilbo supposes. It has small bumps and knots, and the top is perfectly smooth and rounded. Gandalf and Radagast’s staffs are gnarled and twisted like branches to hold one of those stones, and Bilbo wonders if this makes him another oddity.

He’s terrified to touch it.

But then, some of the hobbit wears away and makes room for something other.

Bilbo touches the staff—a mere press of his fingertips against the smooth wood. He closes his eyes and sighs before wrapping his hand around it and picking it up, sticking the blunt end into the earth and glancing up at the top.

He doesn't feel remarkably different.

Frowning, Bilbo taps the staff against the ground and looks at the sky. Strange that it all is, now that he knows something he may have known all along, he finds himself drawn to Beorn’s home.

On the veranda, a dwarven king stands. His arms are crossed as he leans against the house, and Thorin peers at Bilbo, neither scowling nor frowning. Yet, that chasm has appeared between them, and Bilbo wants to stitch it up like a tear in a waistcoat. Wants to tell Thorin he didn’t choose this—as much as Thorin didn’t decide to be a prince, neither did Bilbo choose to be a wizard. But here they are, taking up the mantle and fulfilling whatever oaths they’ve silently taken with the world, written however many moons ago.

Thorin gestures—a small thing, just a tilt of his head. It’s an invitation that Bilbo eagerly takes, not forgetting about the staff he clumsily carries but not wanting to think about.

“You’ve a staff,” Thorin says once Bilbo steps onto the veranda. He looks it over with a skeptical eye. “It’s not much of one.”

Bilbo huffs a surprised laugh, unable to help. “Yes, well,” he says, looking up at the staff and then at Thorin. “I suspect I’m not any better of a wizard.”

“Do you feel any different?”

“No,” Bilbo says. He frowns. “A bit. A bit like the Shire is even further behind than it already felt, I suppose. Or, rather, I’ve run too far ahead.” He shrugs helplessly. “I don’t know. I’m sorry, it’s—”

“It makes sense, Master Baggins,” Thorin interrupts. His tone is more amiable than Bilbo expected it would ever be again. “When we lost Erebor to the dragon and wandered for many years, I watched the fine threads of silver in my coat unwind, tear, stain. The prince I was that day and the dwarf I was, moons later, sitting under the night sky and feeding a babe whose name I didn’t know… Erebor and the prince were far behind.”

Bilbo blinks slowly, swallowing, and tightens his grip on the staff. “Oh. Oh, well… but you found yourself again,” he says. He hopes that the faint, selfish hope isn’t too obviously heard. “A king now, off to reclaim Erebor.”

Thorin smiles, wry and bittersweet. “Aye,” he says. “As I’ve been reminded a dozen times over,” he adds with a discreet glance at the house, then at Bilbo. “It took time. Many years. But we built a home sturdy enough to house even the most stubborn line of Durins. I found my footing again. You’ll find yours, Bilbo.”

He isn’t sure why his eyes sting, but Bilbo nods, swallows the lump in his throat and pats his thigh. “Yes. Yes, I hope you’re right, Thorin,” he says. “I’m very happy you found yours, you know. Of course I am. I meant everything I said.”

“Aye. I know you did,” Thorin says. He moves closer, resting his hand on Bilbo’s shoulder. “And I meant everything I said. Forgive me for disparaging you and your newfound… wizardry. Extraordinary how easily I fall back into old habits,” he sighs with an unamused turn of his lips.

“Gandalf’s words?”

“Balin’s. They’ve been commiserating.”

Bilbo laughs. “Well,” he says. “A right nasty shock, if I’m honest.” He grins. “A little more so for me, if you’d believe it!”

Thorin chuckles. “I do,” he sighs. “You’ll come to me if anything changes.”

Considering he says rather than asks, Bilbo supposes he means if he starts to feel a wider divide between hobbit and wizard. It’s a sobering thought and somewhat frightening—he won’t forget anything, will he?

His parents, his family? Friends? The donkey with a blue bell around her neck, his tomatoes, or how spring feels in the Shire before it gets hot. The feeling of the Shire, alive and beating like a heart alongside his own, ever reaching for him. No, he can’t forget it.

Can he?

Bilbo nods and smiles briefly. They fall into silence, each lost to their thoughts and look beyond the veranda as tiny raindrops fall. It’s a misty rain and crisp—autumn showers steadily drifting toward snow flurries. They’ll be in Erebor when it snows, but so much lies between them that Bilbo isn’t sure how any of it will look.

Not tonight, tomorrow, in a month, or a year.

——

Gandalf, Radagast and Beorn spirit Bilbo away to discuss his staff. The wizards argue more than they offer any sort of help, and Beorn keeps calling Bilbo little hare now, grown wild and free, and it’s all very stressful.

But he learns he’s supposed to carve the top of his staff to his liking to hold the stone. Only, he has no stone, and Gandalf is particularly ruffled about it. Radagast seems sure it’ll pop out of another tree, or some such thing and Bilbo doesn’t like how seriously they take him when he says he might just find it in Erebor.

Though, Gandalf says, that doesn’t bear thinking about, which sounds dreadful. Instead, Bilbo asks about something else that doesn’t bear thinking about—losing his memories as he becomes more of… of a wizard. Gandalf’s in a low mood, and the question seems to offend every one of his sensibilities, but he calms down before he answers only, no, my boy.

They must move on as Beorn is tired of smelling the stench of orc, and Gandalf leaves them the moment they arrive at Mirkwood. But Radagast promises to keep them on the road, away from illusions and sinister magic, and to teach Bilbo while he’s away. Gandalf looks more ruffled about it, but Bilbo’s fed up with his sour moods and wishes him all the best.

Radagast is a strange, smelly fellow who stands too close to Bilbo, but he’s filled with thrilling tales about the world as it was and currently is. He keeps the dwarves wrangled more easily than Gandalf ever has—likely because he doesn’t speak in riddles and tells Thorin in gory details what’ll happen if he strays from the path—and keeps everyone safe and warm. Red eyes still peer at them through the darkness, and occasionally, they hear the tinkling laughter of elves, as Thorin spits, but Radagast hardly seems bothered.

It’s elves that muck it all up, anyway.

King Thranduil is interested in Thorin, Radagast and Bilbo, though he treats them all like dung on the bottom of his pompous shoe. But he’s faced with two wizards, even if he’s never heard of one and seems to doubt Bilbo’s a wizard at all. Radagast saves them from being thrown into the dungeon, and King Thranduil escorts them out, eyeing Bilbo keenly.

The orcs only give them half a day of peace in the forest. Bilbo is whittling his staff and hoping he isn’t destroying the poor thing, but he hasn’t gotten a blasted chance to finish.

It seems like the orcs never let them breathe, not through the road to Lake-town nor their brief stay in Lake-town itself.

Bilbo finishes carving his staff. It’s gnarled on the end like branches, familiar now, but there’s something fluid about how they twist, a bit windswept yet sturdy enough to hold a stone. It hasn’t popped out of any trees, but Bilbo’s magic still exists within him. He’s shown Radagast all he knows he can do, and Radagast has shown him what he thought he couldn’t.

But there’s been little time.

And a shadow has been descending over the company, like a dragon with wings large enough to blot out the sun.

Thorin has changed. With every step they take toward the mountain, Bilbo sees the shadow grow larger—teeth, claws and spikes protrude from it. Thorin’s hand still brushes across Bilbo’s back and holds his shoulder, but it’s colder now, not the warmth that’s felt like a fire burning in the living room hearth.

The warmth of home.

Looking back, the Shire has been swallowed hole. Looking ahead, the mountain grows wings long before they step inside and find Smaug buried beneath the gold, alive and well.

The ring in his pocket feels fouler than ever, but Bilbo can’t rely on metal or stones to help him, so he endures a hostile world to escape a jagged maw and fire that singes off half the hair on his feet. He’d been so proud of it in the Shire, the bit that came from his father, and Bilbo thinks of it as they flee Smaug.

He thinks of another home, swallowed by a cold lake, and how they set the dragon upon it.

Heartache.

Bilbo has experienced it before, but not like this. There’s no getting through to Thorin, trapped in gold sickness and selfish and cruel. Radagast’s attempts are futile, but the wizard flits between Erebor and Dale and spends long, tiring moments with Bilbo.

He can feel the magic here, yes, uncomfortable and something he wishes he could peel off like a cloak. But he has little magic of his own here, deep in the stones of Erebor. Yet, moths, mice, and rats find him as easily as squirrels find his doorstep, and Bilbo lets them remind him of home. Of living, growing things, and how they all deserve a chance.

A chance to be saved.

“The mountain does live, Bilbo,” Kili says earnestly as they sit around a warm fire. “We feel her as much as you feel the Shire. Can you really not feel it?”

“Aye,” Bofur agrees. The dwarves have been quiet and without laughter the past few nights. His mustache twitches, and he smiles, as genuine and fond as one can be about home. “It’s true. Mountains have souls, deep down, and they’re as alive as you and me. Even this one.”

“Filled with our dead,” Dwalin grunts. “But she never dies.”

Bilbo looks between them as they rumble an agreement. He looks at the fire and thinks about it; perhaps life is buried in the earth that gives it. Perhaps home lives and breathes before anyone settles there—perhaps it’s simply waiting for everyone to catch up.

Radagast smiles when Bilbo looks at him.

Right.

Bilbo digs his toes against the stone below, unpolished and smattered with minuscule pieces of rock and dust knocked loose by Smaug.

“Right,” Bilbo announces, grabbing his staff and hopping to his feet.

“Where in Mahal’s name are you going?” Fili asks. “You can’t do anything! Don’t put yourself at risk!”

Smart boy.

“I am he that walks unseen. Told the dragon that,” Bilbo says, grinning. “And I lived to tell the tale. Never laugh at them, by the by!”

He runs out of the room and down hallways and staircases that have become familiar. He runs until he reaches a mighty treasure hoard that takes up an entire district and fills old shops on the outskirts of its walls with gold, silver and emerald.

Thorin is here, but he’s not who Bilbo looks for. He looks for life in stone, metal and precious gems instead. And he doesn’t touch the ring, which he must tell Radagast about. Though, Gandalf may be the more sensible choice.

Bilbo lets his heart lead him through the treasury he had been hoping never to see again.

Erebor lives and so do all things that it gives life to.

He finds the stone between one massive pile and the next. Each tower as tall as Smaug, but they’re separated by a long line of dark stone. And, in the middle of it, sits a green stone. She’s been waiting for Bilbo to catch up, and he laughs as he swoops to grab her.

She’s shaped like a pinecone. He might think the stone was carved purposefully, but its edges are sharp, blunt, uneven, and natural. Not an emerald, but a paler green with veins of cream running through it. They sweep gently in curves as if windswept, and Bilbo smiles.

Magic lies in this stone, untouched by sickness but instead the world's magic. She hasn’t always been here—she’s a world traveler, somewhat like Bilbo these days. And what stories she must tell!

“What are you doing?”

Bilbo turns to look at Thorin as he approaches, his long cloak sweeping across the stone and over gold coins, which tinkle with every footstep. He’s hunched somewhat, carrying the weight of illness on his back, and deep, dark circles surround his eyes.

They look momentarily hungry, as if Thorin thought Bilbo held the Arkenstone, which remains missing. The disappointment he feels shrouds him in shadow and darkness under the cover of the dragon’s wings.

“Would you mind if I kept this one?” Bilbo asks. He smiles. “Very pretty and dare I say it, hobbitish.”

“For what purpose?” Thorin asks sullenly. “One stone may give way to three and a dozen and an entire treasury. It belongs in the mountain.”

“I don’t think I could carry an entire treasury,” Bilbo says. He waves the stone. “This, however, is lovely. Part of my share.”

Thorin chuckles, dark and cruel. “Your share,” he repeats. “Nothing leaves this mountain. Times have changed, Master Burglar, and your contract withers. It’s nothing more than a rock,” he adds with venom, looking at the stone in Bilbo’s hand. “A child’s toy.”

Bilbo looks at the stone. “Is it?” he asks. He looks at Thorin and smiles. “Then you shouldn’t miss it much.” He tosses it and catches it before turning his staff down.

“What are you doing?” Thorin asks sharply.

He slots the stone into the top of the staff and holds it at his side, closing his eyes. Hobbit battles wizard, but the magic creeping into his blood, warm and comforting, feels like home.

Feels like the part that’s always been missing, that has made him odd, called to green, growing things and animals at his doorstep, flames lit beneath his fingers… it slots into place and satisfies the oath, destiny, and an outcast hobbit’s longing.

Bilbo looks at Thorin, who seems momentarily shocked. Speechless. But the inevitable anger and hate come back; his suspicions have been confirmed, and someone has stolen from him. He stalks closer to Bilbo, but Bilbo is tired of it all.

Sickness lives—it grows and spreads and infects. It has life, but it’s a destructive life and doesn’t belong in the heart of a good person or simmering dangerously beneath a mountain that awaits her people.

He lifts the staff above his head and brings it back down—a mighty crack echoes as if he splits the mountain in two, and a reverberation flows through mounds of gold and into the walls and the very heart of the mountain. It flows through Thorin, like light meeting shadow and casting it away.

Even a shadow as large as a dragon's wings.

Thorin stumbles backward and holds his hands out at his sides. He breathes deeply and looks wounded, confused, and shaken. He looks at Bilbo, and he’s paler, but his back straightens out, and the darkness that clouded his eyes dissipates.

“Bilbo,” Thorin says. He sounds lost and afraid. “Bilbo. What has happened? What did you do?”

“What I’ve always done, I suspect,” Bilbo says, leaning against his staff. “Cared for living things.” He clears his throat. “Thorin, I’m sorry—”

“You’re sorry?” Thorin interrupts. “You? After everything you’ve done…” he trails off, looking at Bilbo, and his blue eyes are brightened with tears that swim gold. “I would have you never apologize again.”

Bilbo can’t and won’t reach out. There’s still too much unspoken between them, and he isn’t sure what he did cured everything for… well, for good. He knew he must, so he did, and now Bilbo doubts himself. He’s doubted himself since he ran out of the door, no matter what sort of bolstering the dwarves have given him or the soft tenderness Thorin has shown increasingly since the Carrock.

Even if it was interrupted for a day or two, Thorin has been a solid presence not only for the company but for Bilbo. Whether it’s been something he’s said quietly by the firelight or how he’s smiled from across their camp—his warm hand on Bilbo’s shoulder, steadying him when he feels untethered from the earth.

He seems to know when Bilbo doesn’t know who he is anymore and oft says the same thing: Bag End awaits you.

Home awaits him, Thorin tells him, and Bilbo has so dearly wanted to believe it.

“I’m bound to offend you or muck things up once in a while,” Bilbo says. “You’re home. That’s all I ever wanted for you. For all of you.”

Thorin gazes at Bilbo, and pain is written plainly in his eyes. “Aye,” he whispers. “I knew it before we came here.” He looks around the treasury, then at the stone near his feet. “Will you leave me to my thoughts?”

“Oh, erm… are you—oh, well, yes,” Bilbo says. “Yes, of course. You know where to find us. Don’t… don’t linger for too long. Not because anything, er, well, bad… just don’t, alright? I know what it’s like to be stuck. We want you by our side again.”

For a moment, Thorin looks guarded. But he smiles and it’s the barest of smiles, but there, brief and brighter than all of the gold in Erebor.

“I won’t be long, Bilbo.”

Bilbo takes heart, nods, and leaves Thorin. He hurries up familiar stairs but stops before entering the halls as he hears a loud clang. He looks at Thorin below and sees the raven crown slide across the stone, thrown from Thorin’s hand. He takes off the cloak and steps away from it, but he doesn’t come up the stairs. He will, Bilbo knows, and heads back to the company.

The dwarves demand to know if he spoke to Thorin, but Bilbo merely smiles. He’ll leave it to Thorin to do the talking.

Of course, as Thorin steps out of the mist and shadow in dawn’s early light, the weight of it all gone from his shoulders, he doesn’t have much time to speak with them.

War arrives at their doorstep, and while they don’t want to fight it, as they’ve just barely won the quest and a battle in the mountain, they must.

Gandalf seems equally relieved and ruffled by the stone in Bilbo’s staff. But Bilbo and Radagast can tell the tale when they get to Dale, in between the fighting, and the new lord of Dale, or rather the fisherman—and Bilbo really needs to ask Bard how that happened—and a pompous elvish king are there to listen.

“Who are you?” King Thranduil asks with quiet wonder.

“Didn’t we say,” Bilbo says with a quick smile, “Bilbo the Green.”

Gandalf vows to teach Bilbo, but Radagast isn’t going anywhere. They’ll be his mentors, and Gandalf wonders how they can manage the entire world’s lifetime worth of lessons, but he seems less annoyed by it all.

Bilbo has a dwarven king and his blasted nephews to save first.

It’s terrible, as war is—nothing books could have prepared Bilbo for. But he has a staff and understands his magic better. He understands it better in ways no one can teach him because it’s his. Because the Valar seem to like jokes or playing by their own rules, they’ve given him more than a stone.

He knows things he oughtn’t, but they help him save Thorin’s life on Ravenhill. While still bizarre, wizard settles in his bones when he sees Thorin's blood returning to pinken his skin and lips and knows he’ll be well. He cries for a while, not because he knows he’s destined to be something else but because he nearly lost Thorin, Fili, and Kili.

Bilbo saves many other lives in the coming days.

Leaving Erebor after the war is fought and won is not practical. Thorin, Fili and Kili will be down for some time, and dwarves from the Blue Mountains have been called back home at the start of a long winter. Dain lends a host of dwarves, coming and going from the Iron Hills over the following weeks to get Erebor into tip-top shape.

As much as an empty, cold, but not lifeless mountain can get.

Bilbo helps where he can, but he spends most of his waking time with Gandalf and Radagast. They fight often and exhaustingly, but they teach him a wealth of history and magic and confide many secrets their order wouldn’t otherwise. And goodness, an order! Led by Saruman the White, whom Gandalf speaks about with the look of someone remembering an old mentor whom they very much dislike but respect.

Saruman shows up on Erebor’s doorstep and announces he hardly believes it but stares intensely at Bilbo and his staff once he greets him. He looks angrier than Bilbo expects, even after Gandalf’s harrumphing, and Saruman doesn’t particularly seem… kind. Certainly not in words or the glances he sends the dwarves and Radagast, oddly, but Bilbo even more so.

Like he’s beneath him. A bug to squash under his ugly shoes.

They don’t entertain him for long as he seems to find Erebor intolerable in its current state. Saruman vows he’ll see Bilbo soon, and Bilbo barely refrains from telling him he isn’t looking forward to it.

“Are we supposed to… trust him?” Bilbo asks as they watch Saruman travel away from Erebor. They stand on the ramparts, and Saruman is a dot on the horizon, but Bilbo still wonders if he can hear him.

Gandalf rests his hand on his hip, grimaces and raises an eyebrow. It looks like he doesn’t think so, but he doesn’t say it.

Bilbo finally remembers to show him the ring, which has a cruel presence and life to it, and he regrets it shortly after. Gandalf could take off his blasted shoes and dig his toes into the earth of the Shire—perhaps he’d lose some of his endless impatience and rudeness.

But, well.

It does seem like a serious business.

That’s for after.

“And how else am I supposed to feel?” Thorin asks in the royal hallways. “I’ve been an invalid for nearly two months.”

“Is it that bad, Thorin?” Bilbo asks with exasperation, looking at Thorin’s arm around his. He needs stability. “Needing a bit of help walking around?”

“Aye, Master Baggins,” Thorin says. “It is. I don’t want my subjects to see me this way.”

“Your sub—your subjects? What on earth are you talking about? You don’t have any. Well, you have very few, anyway, as your sister’s convoy isn’t even here yet! And you fought in a blasted war with the dwarves who are here. Seeing you might make everyone feel a bit heartened. Have you thought of that?”

Thorin sighs. “If they aren’t my subjects,” he says, “then no.”

Bilbo looks up at the ceiling, shaking his head. “Yavanna save me from hot-headed dwarves,” he says. “What about if I let you go suddenly? And you fell? Perhaps you’d prefer for them to feel sorry for you.”

He laughs, then winces, touching his abdomen. “That might not be the effect I hope my presence has, either,” Thorin says. “Dwarves value strength and a king that can stand on his own.”

“Bite down on your tongue, stand straight, and look proud. It’ll be over before you know it.”

“Aye. I’ll likely wake in my bed and need you to tell me how falling went over.”

Bilbo laughs and pats Thorin’s hand. “It’ll be alright,” he says. “A bit of a wave and smile. You have my full confidence.”

“And I thank you for it,” Thorin says dryly. “Have you not learned any spells to speed healing along?”

“You’ll want the elves for that, I’m afraid.”

Thorin grimaces, stands straight and proud, waves and smiles, and gets through his first royal appearance without a single incident.

And the mountain is undoubtedly heartened—spirits rise, hopes are taken, and everything moves faster, smoother. All because of the threat of elves—at least Bilbo likes to amuse himself with the thought.

It’s Thorin who is at the center of Erebor. He succeeded in his quest, survived dragon sickness, and will return everything the mountain has been missing. Life will fill the halls again; not soldiers who clink and clang wherever they go, but cobblers and chefs, jewelry makers and tailors. Children will run here and there between lessons, and couples will get married and start their own families.

Thorin wished to do it and succeeded, though he is reluctant to take any credit. Dragon sickness haunts him still, and guilt overwhelms their conversations sometimes. Frustration and anger can follow on both their parts, and Bilbo knows it’s because they’re not getting the response they want from one another, but he’ll never blame Thorin. He seems keen to blame himself from this life until the next, and Bilbo simply won’t have it.

After one too many of those conversations—between numerous good ones—Bilbo asks Thorin to meet him on the ramparts at dusk. It’s not a particularly good view for the sunset, and it’s blistering cold, but Bilbo has very fine dwarven cloaks and thick dinner jackets to wear.

The dinner jackets have been made for him, but the cloaks were brought from the Iron Hills, and Bilbo believes they’re child-sized, but that’s alright. They keep him snug, warm, and less grumpy than Gandalf. He and Radagast are off gallivanting together to Gondor or some great city of men to read archives. They nearly brought Bilbo along, but, well…

Well.

Bilbo wraps his arms around himself and looks at Thorin as he walks up the rampart stairs. He smiles. “It’s terribly cold,” he says. “And I’m not sure I’m sold on the view quite yet. Snow seems to get blown away from the entry into the mountain. This whole southeastern side.”

“Aye. The winds come from the north here,” Thorin says. He steps beside Bilbo and sighs, his breath clouding before him. “It keeps trade alive.”

“Mmm, yes. That’s certainly a plus.”

“And,” Thorin says, glancing askance, “come two weeks, you may be singing a different tune.”

Bilbo huffs. “And how’s that?”

“Snow falls where it falls when the winds die down. It’s a soft blanket over the valley. Quiet, but a peaceful quiet,” Thorin says. “Sometimes, we won’t see the ground until May.”

“May!” Bilbo exclaims. “May? It’s on its way to muggy in May in the Shire! Snow, still on the ground! I thought, agriculturally, this place was sound before the dragon.”

“You thought right. We have plenty of easily tilled land, fertilizer, and dwarves who can plan growing seasons around the winter. Some years, we’ve relied more on trade, but every mighty kingdom faces a harsh winter.”

Thorin walks closer to the ramparts and looks up at the sky. “This will be one of them,” he continues, then looks at Bilbo with a faint smile. “It isn’t such a bad sight.”

Bilbo steps beside him and follows his gaze. Only a few strips of cloud line the sky, lit pale yellow as the sun sets, and the sky turns pink. Pink and purple hues are dashed across the mountainside, over the valley and the snows beyond it. Yes, he might’ve spoken too soon about the view. He looks at Thorin and sees violet in the glossy sheen of his hair, and his eyes look softened by a pastel sunset.

Perhaps it’s Thorin who looks soft all around.

“No, I suppose it isn’t,” Bilbo says. He holds the furred cloak tighter around himself and hums. “A sight I could get used to seeing now and again.”

Thorin raises his eyebrows. “You wish to visit Erebor?” he asks. “Coming and going in between secret journeys like the grey wizard?”

“Oh, posh,” Bilbo laughs. “They might make me as mad as they’ve always called me in the Shire! I don’t want to do wizardly work,” he adds, glancing at his staff leaning in the corner. “And yet, I feel I must in some way. But nothing secret and certainly nothing so dangerous. Traveling and doing what I’ve always done… well, that doesn’t sound so bad.”

“Caring for living things,” Thorin says, smiling. “You could do that from the Shire, Bilbo.”

Bilbo wrinkles his nose. “I’m not sure I could. Well, that, yes. But I don’t think that’d make anyone particularly happy. Some order that I’m a part of seems too official, but not at all, considering Gandalf can’t remember the blue wizards’ names! And, anyway… the Shire is before. It’s before. Not at present,” he says, frowning. “Not my present.”

Thorin scoffs and moves closer, nudging his elbow against Bilbo. “Is it not?” he asks. “Were you not born there? Are you not a hobbit?”

“You know how I feel—”

“I know that you feel one way or another depending on your mood, Master Baggins,” Thorin says. “And I’ll remind you that nothing can take the Shire from you. If I were to become a wizard tomorrow,” he adds with distaste, “good luck to any that says I am no longer a dwarf. Would you disagree?”

Bilbo sighs, glaring a bit. “It would be impossible to disagree,” he says. “But who says you’re right?”

“Who says it matters?” Thorin asks firmly but kindly. “What does it matter, Bilbo? No staff nor wizard can change it unless you choose to. You’ve been lost, and it upsets you not to know who you are or where you belong anymore. That in itself might be an answer.”

He opens his mouth to argue, then closes it. Bilbo looks out at the valley, seeing it sing with deeper purple hues and golds. He sighs, closes his eyes and breathes cold air deep into his lungs.

“You know,” Bilbo says, “I was lost once. When I was a lad, barely up to my mother’s hip. On an adventure of my own making, no doubt, but there I was. Lost and in an unfamiliar place. Terrifying, truly, especially when our gardener found me. I couldn’t believe he’d gotten himself lost as well. Of course, he chastised me and said if I’d only followed my nose, I would’ve seen I was hardly a hill away from home. Lost in Hobbiton and behind my own home, he kept saying. The humiliation of it reminded me to always follow my nose and perhaps dig my toes into the earth so I might be more familiar with where I stomped my feet every day.”

Thorin gazes at Bilbo with such breathtakingly beautiful honesty in his soft smile, how he follows every word and seems to enjoy another silly tale from the Shire.

Bilbo tells them quite a lot, he realizes. In Thorin’s rooms around the hearth late in the evening, with shared ale and various baked goods, they exchange many tales from their childhood or the mischief they got up to that maddened their parents.

He hardly ever speaks of lessons with Gandalf and Radagast, as much as they’re a part of his near-daily life. It’s difficult to explain, but something he instinctively knows he should keep close—still, it isn’t the reason he doesn’t talk about it. Not with Thorin, with whom Bilbo shares more of his life than he ever has.

It simply doesn’t belong because Thorin, in his rooms and dressed down from kingly fineries, isn’t King Thorin Oakenshield. He’s merely Thorin, and Bilbo is Bilbo. They’re a dwarf and a hobbit who were brought together by extraordinary circumstances and meddling of the highest caliber.

Bilbo fiddles with the ties of his cloak at his neck. “I suppose that was your point, wasn’t it?”

Thorin grins, bright and handsome. “My point?” he asks with a teasing edge. “To what, wizard?”

“Oh, shush, you,” Bilbo chuckles. “Blast it. Well, I suppose I can’t show you one spell I’m fond of. Best kept to myself, I reckon.”

“Go on and show me your party favors,” Thorin laughs, squeezing Bilbo’s shoulder. “I’ll let you know what I think of it.”

“Oh, I had no doubt about that,” Bilbo mutters. He grabs his staff and looks up at the sky. The last traces of light are disappearing, and stars twinkle in the night sky's deepening blues. “Ah, good enough. I’ve been perfecting this one. Even Gandalf likes it.”

He clears his throat once, twice, and once more before Bilbo flutters his hand around the green stone at the top of his staff. It glows green-yellow, and he taps the end of his staff twice on the stone. The glow gets brighter until small, round lights flutter into the air, this way and that. They float above their heads before falling just a bit and begin to bob in the air.

Bilbo looks at Thorin, who stares at the lights with nothing short of awe. His lips are gently parted as lights move slowly, gracefully between and above them.

“Fireflies,” Thorin says. He looks at Bilbo and grins, fond and lovely, with something far more significant. “They look like small flames, except you’ve forgotten their warmth.”

He huffs, then laughs. “Yes. Yes, I have, haven’t I? I’ll work on that next,” Bilbo says. He grins as Thorin steps closer and feels his heart skip as the king offers his hand. He takes it. “A bit better than before, isn’t it?”

“Hmm,” Thorin hums with a wry glance at the ramparts he stood on and betrayed those who aided them. “It has its drawbacks. I know, Bilbo,” he adds as Bilbo opens his mouth, and that’s all they say about it. “We’re no longer in an elvish city. Anything would be an improvement. It was their foul magic that made me speak of my birth to a stranger.”

“Oh?” Bilbo asks. Thorin pulls him closer, and Bilbo can hardly think why he should step away. “How do you know it wasn’t my magic?”

“Hmm,” Thorin hums again. He fails to hide a smile. “Perhaps it was. Should I question everything I say and do in your presence, Master Burglar?”

Bilbo shrugs, pressing closer until he’s snug against Thorin’s side. “Welllll…” he says. “If it’s to your benefit, why should you?”

He laughs, and his arm fits around Bilbo’s waist so well, it feels like something else that’s been missing for a very long time fits into place. Bilbo knows he’s never been this happy, and that’s quite a long time to wait, but he doesn’t dream of changing it for even a moment.

“Remind me not to put you on my council once it’s officially a council,” Thorin says with good humor. His lips press gently against Bilbo’s hair, and his sigh is warm and a bit shaky. “How would you feel about a dance, Bilbo?”

Bilbo bites his lip, telling himself this is as real as being a blasted wizard, even if it somehow feels less so. He blinks and looks up at Thorin. “A… a dance? A dance?” he asks. “Here?”

“Aye. And in my chambers, if you’d like,” Thorin says. He squints a little. “With more decency than it sounded.”

He laughs for a good long while, holds the front of Thorin’s cloak, and nods. Thankfully, some dwarven dances are slow, easy to follow, and with no hopping whatsoever. Bilbo must teach him how hobbits dance; he suspects he’ll have plenty of time.

Bilbo will still do his duty as a wizard. He feels the call and knows the staff wasn’t born from a tree lightly. But that hardly means he has to stray far from Erebor and it doesn’t mean the Shire isn’t home.

He’s as much of a hobbit as he ever has been and as much of a wizard as he was born to be. There’s room for both, no one better than the other, but… well, Bilbo still leans a little closer to home.

Not because he’s afraid or being a wizard is new and still confusing.

Home can be anywhere he wants it to be and… all of them at once. The Shire, Erebor, in Thorin’s arms.

The kiss they share under the light of, well, not-fireflies.

Important matters are ahead, choices, and figuring out what it all means. But here, tonight, on the ramparts in Thorin’s arms, warm and cozy, smelling fire smoke and tobacco, leather and something sweeter, well.

That’s for after.