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English
Series:
Part 68 of 365 days of fic , Part 8 of march madness
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Published:
2024-03-09
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1,266
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1/1
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for he who made you bitter made you wise

Summary:

Dwalin stared at the hobbit, some strange sense causing the back of his neck to prickle.

Notes:

I'm gonna apologize up front for this one. The ending is and is not ambiguous, so decide on your own what happens. I probably will not continue this one, but you never know. Enjoy! *ducks and hides*

Work Text:

 

    Dwalin stared at the hobbit, some strange sense causing the back of his neck to prickle. They had gone to sleep after the mess with the trolls, with their resident Burglar – or fool, if you listened to Thorin – shaky and pale and fumbling with his little letter opener. The next morning Dwalin watched the hobbit wake with the swiftness the lad had yet to show. No one else seemed to notice. Even Thorin, who showed the hobbit more attention than most assumed, did not seem to notice the change. And to be honest, the changes weren't overt. The hobbit was a little more aware. A little quieter with his complaints. But what stuck with Dwalin the most was that the hobbit had stopped touching them.

   Dwalin had wondered if Balin had taken the lad aside. In their culture only family or close friends were allowed to be so comfortable with another's person. The hobbit had had a terrible habit of reaching out to touch them every time he tried to talk to them. Dwalin had seen the looks Gloin and Óin had sent each other the few times the hobbit tried to talk to them. The lads were rambunctious enough that the hobbit seemed leery of getting close to them to try. Dori was a dragon guarding his horde on a good day and Dwalin pitied the fool who tried to touch Nori at any point of day or night.

    Then, between one day to the next, the hobbit just...stopped.

    The hobbit stopped more than just the touching. By the time they left the bedamned elvish city the hobbit barely spoke to any of them at all. The hobbit would not look them in the eye. And worse yet, he had started flinching from them. Just a little.

    No one knew what had happened. Thorin refused to ask Tharkûn about it. The old wizard seemed distracted as well, one eye always on the sky and his head in the clouds. There had been a hasty conference between Balin, Óin, and Gloin. Those three were of the mind that perhaps some cultural taboo had been crossed. None of them had tried to fight for the hobbit's honor at the Trollshaws, after all. They had all let the lad stew in his silence. Fíli and Kíli had even joked that their journey was much more pleasant with the hobbit's silence. Had that been cruel in hobbit culture? No one knew and Tharkûn was too distracted to ask. If he even knew.

   Then when the hobbit did try to speak up, telling them that the path they were on wasn't safe, that they should wait – only for Thorin to snarl at the lad that his opinion wasn't needed, nor wanted. Dwalin understood his old friend's impatience. Durin's Day was fast approaching and all delays may cause their Quest to fail...but the way the hobbit had stared at them, face pale and lips pressed thin...it made something twist in Dwalin's gut.

   They had misstepped with the Burglar. They just didn't know how ...or how to fix it.

    Then they'd been caught in the midst of a thunder battle and half the Company had almost been lost. Only the hobbit's – Bilbo's – quick thinking had their kin moving from what seemed like a steady perch to a part of the mountain that wasn't a rock giant's leg. Dwalin saw Thorin's aborted attempt to pat Bilbo's shoulder – only for the hobbit, for Bilbo, to flinch away so hard he all but brained himself on an outcropping of rock.

    Everyone saw it. No one knew what to do about it. Even Tharkûn seemed concerned but Bilbo was evasive even with him.

    Dwalin wasn't sure how things would have continued, except then the floor fell out from under them and they were all too busy fighting to stay alive. Dwalin would admit to looking for Bilbo as they fell. He was certain the others did as well. But Bilbo was gone, after pushing a goblin that was about to brain Ori off the ledge...and be taken over as well by the vermin's grubby hands. Dwalin wanted to fight down into the depths to recover the body – it was the least they could do – but then they were captured and it was all a bit of a blur as they fought their way free of the maze of Goblin Town...

    Only for them to emerge into the dying embers of twilight and right into a horde of orcs with Azog at the helm.

   Dwalin had long made his peace with death. He would return to stone with his axes in hand, that he knew. What burned was the knowledge that their Quest would remain unfulfilled and their home forever to be the den of that scourge, Smaug.

    Dwalin did not, ever, expect a wild hobbit to appear, his letter opener brilliant blue in the dark of night, falling upon Azog and striking him down with a war cry that made Dwalin roar back with pride. That was all the opening their Company needed. With Azog dead the orcs were scattered, easy for them to pick off one by one.

    Their Burglar, their Bilbo, stayed in the center of the clearing, covered in blood and with a nasty gash along his hairline. Dwalin wanted to go to him. He saw Thorin start over – only to stop short as that little letter opener was leveled at Thorin's throat.

    Silence struck them all.

   “I,” said their Burglar, their Bilbo. “Have had quite enough. Not now , Gandalf,” Bilbo did not look away from Thorin. Dwalin found his heart thundering in his throat. “Now, listen here. This is what is going to happen and if a single one of you try to argue with me,” Bilbo drew himself up and Dwalin felt quite breathless. “I will shave you barefaced and then tell the Lady Dis exactly what all of you have been up to.”

    Dwalin wanted to whimper. What a threat! He had never heard such a declaration in decades, not since their time in Erebor, when Dis herself had threatened Fíli and Kíli's father for daring to touch her hand. It was the stuff of stories and legends. Dwalin could see he was not the only one so struck. Even his King seemed a bit starry eyed by the Burglar's backbone.

   Thus the Company found themselves going up and around Mirkwood, following a path that only Bilbo seemed to know. Bilbo got them to Erebor well before Durin's Day – and, without telling them how – sneaked into their Mountain and killed the dragon in the depths.

   Thorin attempted to place mithril on Bilbo, then. Bofur too was soon seen carving stone rings from gems tucked away in his pockets, trying to slide them onto Bilbo's fingers when it seemed as though the hobbit was not looking. Dwalin would admit to trying to slip weapons into Bilbo's belt. They were all denied. The flinching had stopped after the dragon's death, but the Oath Bilbo had demanded of them quite tied their hands when it came to dealing with the gold. But that matter soon turned to a trifle, since right after the elves and men had been dealt with, their Burglar, their Bilbo, disappeared from the Mountain, no one the wiser, as to where he went.

    A year later the whole world was shaken as the One Ring of Sauron was destroyed, along with all of the Mordor and the hordes of orcs and beasts that lay within...

    Along with their Bilbo, their Burglar, who had found it.