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Bilbo pressed his ear to the door but he could hear no sound of heavy boots on the ground nor the murmur of any voices. He was in between, which was always dangerous, all the more so because of his current designation with the inhabitants outside his hidden door.
Bilbo rested his forehead against the soft wood and sighed. In between he didn't have to answer all of the numerous questions of his Shire kin about the lack of spouse – or spouses – he'd brought back. In between he could exist in a place where he was forgiven for all his trespasses, known and not. In between Bilbo could just...rest and not panic and worry and all the hundred other things that had taken up his mind since he'd accidentally dropped his pretty little ring into the golden river of mixed dragon fire and melted treasury items.
That had been quite the mess.
Bilbo was still unsure just what had happened. One moment he was running from that great wurm and the next the ring was slipping off his finger, exposing him to the beast and his dragon fire. Bilbo hadn't meant to call on the Old Gifts of his people. Most of his kin couldn't do it anymore, or if they did it was in small ways, not like this. Bilbo had reached, with everything he had, and felt...something stir in the back of his mind. For a moment it felt like he was back in the Shire. He could smell the sweet hay being pulled in from the fields, the last of the harvests just getting tucked away before the cold snap of the fall. For a moment it felt like his feet were back in his beloved Bag End – but also so much more.
The Old Festivals were kept secret in the Shire for good reason. Their traveling days had been long, and even with the help they had been given here and there, most of their lore stayed within their people and not told to Outsiders. It was said that once upon a time, when they still traveled from camp to camp, that they had been blessed with a gift from a Stranger fallen from a star. It was said that even the Stranger didn't know what he had done to them, for he had left too soon to see what his blessing had done. The lore said that because of something that had happened between their people and the Stranger, the Stranger made it possible that they were able to leave no one behind. That they had a kind of...walking trick, was what the old timers called it. That they could find a crossroads and s t e p in between and they would find themselves miles and miles away, home again or safe if need be.
Bilbo had never stepped in between before. He'd seen his mother do it in the Fell Winter, to try and save his father, but it hadn't worked. Her attempt was what caused her death years later, wasting away from something they called the Fading, having used up too much of her spirit to stay in the world of the living anymore.
Putting on his little ring had felt a lot like what he imagined being in between felt like. Halfway. Indistinct. Stretched thin, like too little butter over too much bread. The world had looked strange too, not quite twisted, but more like a silver mirror that had been improperly made, turning the well known into something terrifying at first glance.
Bilbo hadn't liked it, to be honest. Perhaps losing the ring was a blessing in disguise. But losing it at that moment, when he was running from a dragon in a foul temper...that had been rather inconvenient. An absolute disaster. Which was why, at that moment when all seemed lost, Bilbo had reached...
And with a s t e p, went between.
Bilbo had watched, frozen, as all the world about him went crimson and gold and then white as the fire licked over the space where he had been. He saw his little ring bounce up from the piled gold, spinning in the air, almost looking like a strange eye spinning about...and then it too melted, combusting into flames as it joined the rivulets of gold streaming about where Bilbo had once stood.
But, when he checked, Bilbo found himself whole and well. His feet were on well known boards. He was standing in Bag End's front hall, looking out the front door and into a dwarven treasury turned into a nightmare with a rampaging dragon going this way and that. To be honest, he'd panicked. He'd run out of Bag End, shouting for help and somehow...somehow he felt his kin, all of the Shire, reach back. He wasn't...he wasn't really in the Shire. But he was. He wasn't really in Erebor. But he was. He was in between and for whatever reason, in that moment, so was the Shire.
All of it.
His Took family were the first that reached back. It felt like a great spiderweb in his mind, all of them leading to him right in the center. There was a little of that strange blue fire that had come from his little ring – maybe it had helped him somehow? – but most of it was emerald and gold and smelt of the fresh plowed earth in spring. It was the sense of home and all of it stretched out from him, connecting family after family, through the massive genealogies they all kept, connecting them all together, so that no one would ever be left behind.
Bilbo still didn't know how his kin knew what he needed. One moment he was in between and the next it felt like he had a dozen minds all looking through his eyes, all of them looking at the dragon – and at the little empty spot on the dragon's chest. His hands had moved on their own. They'd pulled a bow from...somewhere and fitted an arrow to the string. Hobbits always had excellent aim. They were known for their keen eyes and ability to hit their targets – though most of their targets these days were at the summer fairs. Bilbo had drawn the bow back. He'd let the arrow fly.
Bilbo Baggins had killed Smaug the Golden with that fateful blow.
He had been released from that strange hold on his mind, feeling the way his kin were sprawled out where they had been standing or sitting, all of them feeling mentally sore and...tired. Then Bilbo had a great many other things to worry about, namely the river of molten gold that he was being pushed towards, so he had to figure out how to get out of that first before he poked at the strange connection that he could still feel in his head.
Once he was clinging to a rock and marveling over the fact that he had survived, another problem came to him. Namely that he was supposed to have gotten his hands on the Arkenstone for Thorin...and now that Arkenstone was potentially somewhere in that mess of molten gold.
Bother.
Thorin had become...strange in the days leading up to this mess. All his dwarves had. Where Thorin and Dwalin would loom over him, tucking him between the two of them at Laketown, Bilbo had been left alone. Thorin and Dwalin were snapping at everyone, even each other, when before they had been so in sync that Bilbo thought nothing could disrupt that.
As it turned out, that strangeness stayed, and after Bilbo returned without the Arkenstone – and without an angry dragon on his tail – that odd hostility did not disappear. It just grew worse. And worse. And when they had found the Arkenstone, with Bofur chipping it out of the solidified gold to place in Thorin's hand, that madness had seemed to spread from dwarf to dwarf, until all of Bilbo's Company were wild with it. So wild that they turned away the elves and men who had come to help them. So mad that they threatened war on Bard and Thranduil's people. So mad that when Bilbo spoke up about it, Thorin turned on him, held him by the throat and dangled him over the wall, naming Bilbo a Betrayer and Enemy of Erebor.
Then Thorin had let go.
As he fell Bilbo reached once more, that inner part of him still sore and painful, but what else was he to do? The rocks below were razor sharp. Bard and Thranduil had already ridden away, angry at Thorin's threats. Bilbo did not think anyone saw him fall. So all he could do was reach...
And s t e p in between.
He'd ended up flat on his back in Bag End's front hall...but it wasn't Bad End. Not exactly. It was...strange. Different. It held all the feeling of home without the touch. And when he'd opened his door, it opened not into the Shire but into a hall that he did not recognize. A hall that was quiet and cold. A hall...
That was in Erebor, hidden deep, deep in the belly of the Mountain.
The Old Gifts came easy to him then, as he sneaked about the Mountain, trying to figure out what was going on. That was how he realized that there were armies marching on Erebor. That was how he realized that his dwarves were mad, for Thorin was wild-eyed with it, strange and fey and not himself. None of them were. So what was a hobbit to do but to fix something that was so broken? He'd had to bring in his aunts, of course, and with them came most of the Brandybuck matrons – who were a force in and of themselves – and with their help they found the nasty web of something that was hanging over the mountain and snipped away at it with their golden scissors, strand by strand until that web fell away like frost on a spring morning.
Then did Bilbo see his Company become his Company once more. He saw them...wake up perhaps was the best term. Bilbo wrote a little note and tucked it into what remained of his bedroll and pack, since none of the Company had touched it since his...well. Since the incident on the battlements. He hadn't stuck around to see if they'd found it, but he supposed they had, since when Bard and Thranduil came again, this time angry and defiant about the armies of orcs and wargs and bats and all number of evil things coming their way, Bilbo saw Thorin give out the part of Bilbo's share of the treasure for their help. Thranduil had been rather snooty about the whole thing, if you asked Bilbo, but Bard seemed to see something in Thorin's changed demeanor, and pledged that he and his people would help. That seemed to shame Thranduil into helping – also the long look the elven king had given Bard was interesting – and the elves had joined the fight as well. And with the coming of the dwarves from the Iron Hills, it looked almost like it would be a fair fight.
But Azog and his ilk never liked to fight fair. So when Bilbo's Company was lured out of the gates and into the depths of the battle, Bilbo had reached once more...and his kin had come running to help.
Bilbo wasn't sure how the elves, men, and dwarves saw it, but with the hobbits' old gifts coming into play, they were able to s t e p between the fighting and slip knives into ribs, ruin ankles, slash bellies and all manner of things that helped turn the tide of the battle in a snap. But it was Thorin, Dwalin, and the boys facing Azog and his fiercest lieutenants in the ruins that had almost ended Bilbo. He had done everything he could to stop the White Orc, collapsing the ice in one mad last chance effort that finally, finally saved Thorin's life. His Took cousins had made sure Fíli and Kíli survived. And for a moment, when Thorin was in Dwalin's arms and the din of battle was receding, Bilbo thought...well. He was a silly fellow but he thought that Thorin and Dwalin saw him, even though Bilbo was still in between, and had reached out towards him.
But he was a coward and had fled from them, stepping to the side and ending back in the odd Bag End before he knew what he was doing. He'd huddled in a corner for an entire candlemark until his uncle Isengrim had come and fetched him, taking him back to the Great Smials and tucking him into bed there.
And now here they were, in this strange in between. The Shire – their Shire – was gone. They'd tried to go back, tried to step back into the world that is and was, but the Shire they found was destroyed. Completely. Crops were gone. Fields devastated. It looked as though a great inferno had swept over the land, blackening it to ash and dust. Bag End itself was gone, as were most hobbit homes. A few ruins remained here and there. The only thing they had now was the in between...
And the lands about Erebor, on the mountainside, were flowers were starting to peek through the ash.
All their homes had one door that led to the in between and one door that led to the halls under Erebor, were the dark was so complete Bilbo couldn't even see his hand when he waved it in front of his face. They were being careful – so very careful – when they ventured out into Erebor's surrounds. Bilbo was still the Enemy of Erebor, the Betrayer, the Thief. According to Thorin's ranting during that moment any hobbit seen in Erebor would be killed. Their entire species were Outcast. But they had no where else to go so the bravest of his kin would go slipping through the halls, finding what tools they could find, so that they could go out into the fields about the mountain and start planting what they could. Hobbits had lived a long time wild planting. Hiding their crops in the open, where an unpracticed eye would overlook their plants and gardens, that had been their way for longer than they had lived in the peaceful, orderly Shire. They were out of practice with it, yes, but the knowledge remained. They'd done it once before and they could – and would – do it again.
Which led to here, with Bilbo on the cusp of sneaking out of his strange Bag End. One of the cousins had said that they'd heard the wizard was coming to Erebor. Bilbo rather wanted to see Gandalf. He wondered if Gandalf would be able to see them. Perhaps the wizard would be able to let them pick a different place with their in between, somewhere far from Erebor, where they did not run the risk of being killed on sight. But Bilbo would not know until he spoke to Gandalf. So out he must go.
Bilbo sucked in a breath, his heart hummingbird quick at his throat, and opened the door. Now or never. He hadn't meant to take his entire people there and not back again, but here he was. It was time for him to do what he could to fix the problem he'd caused.
One step at a time.