Chapter Text
He should have suspected something when he arrived to find the dining hall, boisterous more than ever these days with the upcoming Yule celebrations, completely deserted save for his family, gathered in front of their typical spots on the royal dais. He should have heeded their carefully neutral expressions as a chair was pulled out for him and as dinner was served without ceremony. He should have realized that his father said barely a word throughout the meal, only speaking after calling the group to order with a solemnly raised hand, followed by a pronouncement that seemed to be fresh news only to Thorin’s ears.
“I don’t understand…” he began, then shifted in this seat. He looked around the table, at the faces of his dearest family and friends who now looked upon him with something akin to concern. It made him uncomfortable. “You’re sending me away?”
“Yes,” Frerin answered immediately with a smirk, earning a clicked tongue from their mother and a weary sigh from Thrain.
“We’re not trying to get rid of you, if that’s what you’re implying,” Dis said over Frerin’s protests. “Think of it as an extended holiday.”
Thorin took a careful swig of ale, considering what his father had said just before. “And you all believe that a holiday, away from the mountain, is what will best prepare me to assume the throne next year? Not being present and at Father’s side to ease the transition?”
“You’re the last person that needs any formal preparation, my son.” His mother laid a gentle hand on his arm. “As your father mentioned, you’ve been dedicated to this mountain, day in and day out.”
“A little too dedicated, to be sure,” Dis put in, waving away Fris’ tutting about being interrupted. “All you do is official business. You’re the first dwarf through the entrance hall every morning and the last of us to enter their chambers each night. Dwalin’s seen the guards’ reports”—she nodded to their cousin, seated with his arms crossed next to a weary-looking Balin—“so I suggest you don’t deny it. I haven’t seen you enjoy a minute of leisure, not since, well…”
Thorin felt the entire family grimace. The ill and fatal turn that Thror took following his recovery from that damned goldsickness would always hang heavy on their hearts. He blinked away the memory of his grandfather’s last descent from the throne. “The kingdom needs me. If I am to become King in a year’s time, every minute I spend in this mountain must be a minute learning how to best serve our people.”
“You are to become King of Erebor, not Erebor itself,” Thrain said, his words boldly cutting across the table. He leaned in. “You cannot wear the crown if you have lost sight of who you are without it.”
His words were met with silence from the family. Thorin felt frozen, his heartbeat thundering in his chest at the suggestion that he lacked any sense of self-awareness.
Balin let out a loud sigh. “Your Majesty, if I may?” At Thror’s nod, Balin met Thorin’s gaze steadily. “This is not the first time a succession like this has occurred. There are two instances of the King’s willing abdication during his lifetime.” He tapped a thin stack of paper on the table. “In both successions, there are records that the Crown Prince formally receives the abdication before the kingdom on Durin’s Day, and he is crowned after about a month of transitional preparation.”
Thorin’s frowned, anticipating what Balin would say next.
“A month, Thorin. Not a bloody year.” Their seneschal sat back in his chair. “Ever since your father announced to the council that he plans to abdicate, we have had no concern of your readiness to be King. We could announce His Majesty’s abdication tomorrow and you could be crowned forthwith, as it were.” Balin gave a small smile. “But, dear cousin, we would be doing you a disservice.”
“We’d be doing Father a disservice by delaying his rest!” Thorin cried.
“Peace, son,” Thrain said sternly. “This idea has nothing but my full support. As I said, Erebor needs a king who understands not just the mountain’s place in the world, but his own.” The King smirked. “If you’re protesting out of concern for your dear father, know that I’d be offended by your lack of trust.”
Thorin lowered his gaze, sensing he was outnumbered. “I do trust you, Father,” he said, looking back up at his family, “and I trust that if this is the will of the family, it must be for the best.” He squared his shoulders. “I’ll do it, then.”
—
Later, after everyone had retired to their own chambers, Thorin fiddled with a pipe in Dis’s study, glaring at his siblings. “I trust Father, but it appears anti-thetical to send me away if he is planning to abdicate in order to rest from the duties of the throne.”
“You don’t think I said the same thing?” Frerin muttered around his own pipe.
“Hush, both of you,” Dis sniped. “This was Father’s idea. Remember how he used to tell us of his travels as a youngster? He thinks you’ve been deprived of a chance to see the world. Besides,” she gestured between herself and Frerin with a grin, “he’ll still have us to help him.”
“Terrorize him, more like,” Thorin said, feeling a grin grace his own face. “I’m guessing it was your suggestion to exclude Fili and Kili from dinner so as not to detract from your arguments?”
“On the contrary,” Dis said, rolling her eyes. “They loved it. They wanted to go with you.”
“Oh?”
“Relax, you won’t be playing babysitter.”
Frerin blew out a smoke ring. “Even I considered tagging along, but we’ve agreed that maintaining the secrecy of your identity would be more difficult with more Durins in your party.”
“Let alone those Durins,” Dis snorted. “We can’t have foreign lands thinking you’ve been sent out as a spy.”
“Or an exile.”
Thorin sighed, finally lighting his pipe. Absently, he did wonder at the last time he had a sit-down like this with his siblings.
He couldn’t recall it.
“I’ll miss you both,” he said, then ducked as a cushion came flying at his head.
“Don’t get sappy, idiot.” Dis waved her pipe dismissively. “Just do us a favour and don’t go finding someone you like better than us.”
“Or falling in love,” Frerin said, laughing when the cushion careened his way. “Oi! I’m only saying, you’re going to have a right old time explaining yourself. And if you bring them home without telling the truth, we’d all be horrible actors.”
Thorin rolled his eyes. “The last thing on my mind is romance.” He blew out some smoke, revelling in that near-forgotten feeling of warmth his chest. “So, where do you two suggest I go first?”
—
Thorin grunted as another cloaked man shouldered him while walking past, causing him to narrowly miss stepping into a deep puddle at the side of the road. He turned to bark at the man for minding his space, but the figure was gone. Not for the first time since arriving at this town, he found himself yearning for some minimum level of politeness west of the Misty Mountains. He refused to regret leaving Rivendell with such haste.
With a scowl, he re-adjusted his pack and continued further into town. The man at the gate had named several public houses where he could stay, and Thorin knew he needed a night of rest to determine his next course of action. He had learned the hard way that arriving in a region without any substantial plan was a surefire way to accidentally get caught up in a minor battle, rooming next to the village idiot, or—worse of all, so far—forging arrowheads for elves.
He let out a heavy sigh of relief when a sign bearing one of the pub names appeared, swinging in the damp spring wind as he turned a corner. The main floor of The Prancing Pony was comfortably full, and Thorin felt his heart skip a beat when he noticed a table of dwarves in the corner. He’d seen the odd dwarf or two along the road since leaving Erebor, but none in such large company.
The chances that one of them knew who he was were too high.
Before he could turn around to find another pub, one of them made sudden eye contact. “Oi! Lookit what we have here!” the dwarf called out loudly.
Thorin stared for a second. He felt several of the pubgoers turning their eyes his way. He steeled himself and, ignoring the call, stepped towards the barkeep. “Do you have a free room for the night?” he asked.
“‘Fraid not,” the man answered with a sorry smile. “Though that group over there grabbed a few with multiple beds.” He filled up a mug with a frothy ale, pushing it to Thorin. “Won’t hurt to make nice.”
And so Thorin found himself at the head of a table clearly built for menfolk, his legs swinging pathetically, with several pairs of dwarven eyes staring at him, eager for an answer to their last question. He cleared his throat. “Yes, I left Erebor in the winter once the heaviest of the snow cleared and it was safe to journey outward.”
Cries of awe erupted from the dwarves. “Erebor! You don’t say!” The dwarf who first called him out grabbed the top his oddly-shaped hat in disbelief. “My brother migrated there with his family last season!”
Thorin would have almost certainly met them, then, as they greeted all new arrivals to the mountain at each day’s dinner. “Have you heard from them at all?”
Another dwarf replied in harsh Khuzdul. Thorin tried not to stare at the axe head protruding sharply from his brow. “Almost every month. He’s in the kitchens, and he’s been trying to work his way up and prepare a meal for the King one day!”
“I’m sure he is a fine cook. I can’t recall a single bad meal from Erebor’s kitchens when the public is invited to a royal feast.”
The dwarf with the strange hat widened his eyes. “You’ve supped on Bombur’s cooking!”
This earned some groans from the other dwarves, who soon turned to other conversation. Thorin chuckled, taking a swig of his drink. “I take it you speak of him frequently?”
“We just miss him, is all. But we have to close business affairs in the Blue Mountains before we can join him.”
“The Blue Mountains?” Thorin repeated. “Ered Luin?”
“Correct-o,” Weird Hat replied. “We head out on the morrow, but we’ll be stopping in The Shire for a couple weeks to see if we can’t make some coin beforehand. You’re welcome to join if you’re looking for work, too. I see those forge burns on your hands, I can bet you’re more than a half-decent smithy.”
A question must have been apparent on Thorin’s face, as Weird Hat laughed. “Don’t get your tailfeathers in a twist, Ereborian. The hobbits are harmless.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “And they brew a wicked ale.”
—
The candlelight at Thorin’s side table flickered as a breeze blew into the room through the cracked window. Around him, the dwarves slept on, snoring loudly.
Thorin dipped his quill into a fresh pot, taking care not to spill any ink on the bedsheets, propped up as he was by thin pillows. Beside him, Dis’s last letter lay unfurled, and he glanced at it with fondness before beginning his response:
Dis,
Thank you for continuing to reassure me that Erebor does not look to be on the brink of collapse in my absence. I am glad to hear that Father’s visit to Dale went well and that King Bard is in support of our succession plan. I trust that he will keep the plan in confidence until the formal abdication.
I care not to write more of Rivendell than what I had sent previously. I should add, however, that Lord Elrond assured me that the elves would not dare to spread word of my identity in the region. I trust that he will remain true to his word. I hope this does not put a damper on Frerin’s plan to start a war on Elvendom following my story of the incident with his twin sons and the cheese knife.
I have arrived in Bree, though I will departing tomorrow. I met a group of travelling dwarves who are heading for Ered Luin, and I will join their small caravan. Oddly, a pair of cousins have kinfolk in the mountain—should my travels with them go well, see to it that a “Bombur” finds an opportunity among the royal kitchenstaff.
I await further news. Give the boys my love.
Thorin
P.S. Can you ask Balin to find any information Erebor may have on hobbits?
—
The sound of distant barking tickled the edges of Thorin’s senses, pulling him from a second night of easy slumber. The smell of burning coals wafted gently above him, signalling that someone was already awake and heating the forge. He blinked himself awake and stretched groggily on his sleeping mat, rolling to pull aside his makeshift curtain that separated him from the other dwarves dozing in the smithy’s back room. He shook his head at the way Bifur was batting at the air madly in sleep and took it as his cue to duck around for the chamber pot.
The dwarves had arrived in The Shire, this idyllic land of rolling farms and startlingly green hills populated by a race of creatures who Thorin was shocked to find smaller than even Mahal’s children, just two days ago. They set up the smithy in the late morning, and by the time the sun had signalled high noon, a messy line of the jovial hobbits had formed, each eagerly awaiting their turn to request something from the new visitors.
Apparently, dwarven crafts were something of a marvel among hobbits.
When he emerged, a low murmur of voices could be heard coming from the smithy entrance. Thorin marvelled at these hobbits’ eagerness, to come so early and request what was likely a new gardening or kitchen tool—from yesterday’s customers, he had learned the names and designs of enough such objects to last a lifetime.
He doubted he’d be forging a proper weapon in the couple weeks the dwarves planned to stay in The Shire.
He slipped outside of the back room and made his way to the front entrance, where Bofur was perched on top of a table and whittling at a piece of wood. “I’m afraid I still don’t quite get you, Master Hobbit,” Bofur was saying.
“I don’t see what’s so difficult to understand,” the hobbit in front of him said. Thorin recognised the tone in his voice—it was the same one of exasperated patience that Balin used to use on him and his siblings when they were younger. “It’s a simple baking tool, surely you’ve something similar in your halls and mountains for cutting cookies and dough just so… Oh! Hello there! Perhaps you’d be able to help me?”
It took Thorin an embarrassingly long time to realise that the hobbit was addressing him. Bofur snorted into the dead space, but Thorin was clearly still half asleep.
This hobbit looked like his kinfolk, yes, but he was also so much different. The curls on his head caught the morning sunlight just so, his face was handsomely lined, and his eyes twinkled with a sincerity that was the probably the driving force behind his arriving at the smith so early.
His eyes were also fixing Thorin with a look that suggested he thought Thorin particularly dull.
“Er,” Thorin began, drawing another snort from Bofur. The dwarf shook his head and hopped off the table.
“This one here worked in the kingdoms of Men before,” Bofur said, waggling his eyebrows at the hobbit before leaving to head for a workstation. “Probably knows what you’re on about.”
The hobbit raised an eyebrow, the look assessing Thorin’s stupidity dissipating slightly. “Oh?”
Thorin cleared his throat, trying to stay professional and ignore how the hobbit’s eyes were a striking hazel that reflected the light of the lit forge behind them. “What is it that you need?”
The hobbit made an odd gesture with his hands, like he was trying to mime out a small ball. “A cookie cutter. Or, rather, a dough cutter. In the shape of a star! I need it to make my mother’s famous recipe of mincemeat pies which, yes, I recognise we are months past Yule, but I promised my dear Frodo that we would make the pies and he does so greatly need some cheering up these days.”
Thorin blinked, digesting the barrage of words. It didn’t help that spots of pink had risen in the hobbit’s cheeks as he got more excited. “A dough cutter in the shape of a star?”
“Yes!” The hobbit clapped his hands. “I know my old ones are packed deep away in storage somewhere, and when Hamfast told me that your smithy had opened again, I did figure it would be much quicker to have new ones made than to go delving into my abyss of a mess. And it would be a lovely gift for young Frodo!”
Ah. Frodo was probably a son, meaning this hobbit probably had a wife. Thorin straightened, letting his breath steady out again. “We could certainly have these… cookie cutters made in short order. Let me grab some parchment so we can work out a sketch.”
“Oh, marvellous, just marvellous!” the hobbit said, breaking into a grin that had Thorin sighing internally at the lost potential. He stuck out his hand for the warmest handshake Thorin had felt in days. “And your name, Master Dwarf?”
“Thorin, at your service.”
The hobbit held his hand for a beat before drawing back. He’d likely met a dwarf or so before, but Thorin let out a loose breath when it didn’t seem like he would inquire further about a family name. “Thorin,” the hobbit repeated, the grin still on his face. “Bilbo Baggins. A pleasure.”
—
Thorin frowned at the gate in front of him and cursed his refusal of written directions from Bofur. Some mad instinct had him offering to hand-deliver the hobbit—Bilbo’s—cookie cutters the day after they had been ordered, and Bofur had only snorted when Thorin asked for directions to Bilbo’s house—or smial, as he had been corrected.
Now, Thorin could only guess at whether the fence was oak or ash, placed at the bottom of the hill as this was or next to a cornfield as others were. He fiddled with the package in his hands, the cookie cutters inside clinking.
“Hullo! Are you here for the pies?”
Thorin turned as a small voice piped up just near his knee. A hobbit child stared at him with big blue eyes, his face smeared with some sort of berry juice.
“Now, now, Frodo, remember your manners with guests.”
Well. It seemed to Thorin that his memory was quite fine after all.
“Thorin, it is lovely to see you again!” Bilbo chirped, coming up the opposite end of the path with a basket in hand. He grabbed Thorin’s hand in another warm handshake. “And my dear nephew here did get it right, despite the lack of any niceties. I’m assuming you’ve got my cookie cutters in that bag there.” Bilbo’s eyes twinkled again. “Are you here for the pies?”
Thorin felt a grin begin to split his face. Nephew. He tucked his follow-up questions away and held out the package for Bilbo. “I’m here to deliver your order, as agreed,” he said, waving away the small pouch that Bilbo began to proffer. “No need for that yet. Just drop by the smithy after you’ve used them and found them to your liking.”
Bilbo raised an eyebrow. He tapped his nephew on the shoulder. “Frodo, why don’t you head on inside and start tidying the kitchen.” Bilbo straightened, a determined look on his face. “I do intend on paying you today, Thorin, so if you find yourself free tonight you are more than welcome to see your crafts in action.”
“Tonight?” Thorin repeated, drawing a little giggle from Frodo before the child scurried through the gate.
“Tonight,” Bilbo said, following his nephew into his property. “Though, if you do choose to come back, just remember to follow the path left around the oak tree.”
Thorin blushed. “You… saw me circle back earlier?”
“Twice, actually.” Bilbo grinned. “Tonight, then?”
Thorin tried to tell himself it was for the good of ascertaining the quality of his craftsmanship that he answered with an deep nod, “Tonight.”
—
The odd circular door that appeared commonplace for hobbit smials was still tall enough that Thorin didn’t need to duck as he entered, letting Bilbo grab his cloak with an enthusiastic smile. “Frodo was a bit concerned that you wouldn’t show,” he whispered. “He’s been talking about how he wants to teach you the recipe all day!”
Thorin could hear a child’s absent humming drifting through the rooms, mingling with the scent of cinnamon and sugared apples. A warmth settled over him that had his heart beating a little faster, reminding him that this was the first time he had stepped into a proper home since leaving Erebor.
The fact that it was the home of a rather handsome hobbit whom he had only met the day prior was not lost on him.
“Come! The kitchen’s just this way,” Bilbo said. Thorin followed him through a sitting room with a cozy fireplace and a dining area with a long wooden table, feeling that sense of ease continue to wash over him with every detail of a lived-in space, from the opened books scattered across tables to the blankets draped over each cushioned chair.
The ease subsided slightly, however, as they entered the kitchen and Thorin beheld what could only be described as a mountain of dough on the table in front of little Frodo, whose eyes were wide with excitement. “Is that… all for the pies?” he asked, only partly in jest.
Bilbo chuckled. “That’s the plan! We figured it’s only fitting so that we can test out our new cookie cutters. Thoroughly.”
Frodo grinned at him, eyes wide with excitement. “We have to make lots of pies, Mister Thorin!”
With a quick glance at Bilbo, Thorin leaned forward conspiratorially. “Don’t tell me it’s so that you can eat them all?”
“No!” Frodo laughed. “Uncle said we’d only be able to make Yule pies if we give them out to Sam and Mister Hamfast and all the other neighbours, too, so he wouldn’t have to roll me out of bed every morning!”
Thorin smiled, nodding sagely in a manner that had him flashing back to when he used to listen to Fili and Kili’s innocent attempts at rationalizing their mess of the day as young dwarflings. “Your uncle speaks a lot of sense.”
“And he’s already found a cheerleader, it seems!” Bilbo squeezed Thorin’s arm. “We ought to keep you around, Thorin!”
“I suppose you do,” Thorin said, returning Bilbo’s smile easily. The hobbit hadn’t let go of his arm yet.
“Well, come on then!” Frodo piped up, causing Thorin to blink back out of the middle distance. He’d wager Bilbo was doing the same. “You roll out the rest of the dough, Uncle Bilbo will do the filling, and I’ll cut out stars for the tops!”
Thorin watched as Frodo gleefully reached behind the dough mountain to pull out one of the freshly-made cookie cutters, sinking it into a rolled sheet of dough. Frodo gasped in delight, holding out the new star in his hands. “It’s perfect!”
A rolling pin was handed to him, and Thorin looked up to find Bilbo meeting his gaze once again. “A marvel of dwarven craftmanship,” Bilbo said lowly, and Thorin chuckled despite himself. “While Frodo’s got that covered, let me show you how to roll out the dough properly.”
—
It became a habit after that night. Thorin would rise in the morning, either the first or second dwarf to wake in the smithy, before filling up his diary for the day with the earliest hobbits to queue for their orders. He would complete his tasks, setting out the newly forged items out for the next day’s pickup, then head out of the smithy while the sun was beginning her last descent.
Mahal bless the fact that the other dwarves did not comment about it.
He would arrive at Bilbo’s smial at dusk, just in time for a dinner that Thorin always insisted on helping to prepare, but from which Bilbo always shooed him away with a cheeky grin.
After a week, Frodo started asking Thorin to read a story, which is how Thorin found himself sitting in a cozy armchair day after day, a little hobbit perched in his lap with a book, directly across Bilbo’s soft gaze and cheeks, his face tinged a lovely pink with warmth from the hearth.
And when Frodo went to sleep, Bilbo and Thorin would sit outside in the cool spring air, sharing a smoke. Bilbo would try to offer the bag of coins in exchange for the cookie cutters before Thorin would politely refuse, bidding the hobbit a farewell and heading back to his camp.
On the eve of Thorin’s departure, Frodo dozed off before Thorin could say a proper goodbye. It was probably better that way.
“He’ll miss you, you know,” Bilbo said that night, as they shared one last smoke together. Thorin tried to ignore the pull in his heart when he thought about it.
“And I, him,” he said neutrally, staring out into the night.
“It was a great thing you did, with the cookie cutters,” Bilbo said after a moment of silence. “You know that day, when I ran to your smithy for the order? The night before was the anniversary of his parents’ death, and the one thing I knew would cheer him up was some jolly good baking. Yule or no Yule, my mother’s pie recipe can bring joy to the hearts of any.” Bilbo huffed good-naturedly. “I do wish you’d accept my payment before you leave.”
“It is a gift, as I’ve said before,” Thorin said. He considered Bilbo’s words, wondering if it was worth it to continue sharing anything at this eleventh hour. “I see how much you care for Frodo, as if he were your own. I… I have my own charges, the sons of my sister. Their father died when they were young, and I’ve raised them as my own two boys.”
A gentle hand landed on his forearm. Thorin turned and—when had Bilbo gotten so close?
“You haven’t spoken much of your family,” Bilbo said quietly, the pipe his hands lowering to his lap.
Thorin exhaled slowly, realizing that despite this last night in the Shire, there was no way he could lie to Bilbo. “They remain in Erebor,” he replied. “I won’t be returning until the Autumn season, in time for our Durin’s Day celebrations.”
“Autumn,” Bilbo repeated, almost absently, and—there.
Thorin saw it. A glimmer of hope reflected back at him in Bilbo’s eyes, leaving Thorin with the possibility that he might not be the only one hearing his own heartbeat right now.
“Pity, then, that you have to leave for the Blue Mountains tomorrow,” Bilbo continued, voice barely above a whisper. “With all that time you have before heading home, I should have liked to get to know you further.”
Thorin tapped his pipe, thinking of home. Yes, it was the grandest mountain in the east, filled with glimmering stone walls and the passionate cries of his dwarven kin. Yet, in the few months since he set foot from Erebor, that place had felt farther and farther away, with the sense of home only becoming ever present the more time he spent with a rather wondrous hobbit, his nephew, and their own version of a fire-warmed dwelling built beneath solid earth and stone.
He blew out one last smoke ring before steeling himself and resting his own hand atop Bilbo’s. “Try it again,” he said.
Bilbo’s eyes widened, ever so slightly. “Try what?”
Thorin squeezed the hand of that wondrous hobbit. “Asking me to stay.”