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One Week Out From the Holiday.
Bilbo stood at the end of the bed, tightened the tie of his dressing gown, and cleared his throat.
Thorin looked up from his laptop, over the top of his reading glasses. They were only a couple of months old, because it had taken Bilbo such a long time to convince Thorin to stop squinting at screens and go to the optometrist. “Yes?”
“What are you working on?”
“Just that charity thing,” Thorin shut the laptop quickly.
“I thought that was finished.”
“Just wrapping it up,” Thorin put the laptop down the side of the bed. On paper, he had retired five years ago, leaving Fili in charge of the constitutional monarchy of Erebor. In practise that had meant going from sixty hours a week to thirty, until Bilbo had got into a dreadful row with him three years ago and really threatened to leave, and he’d finally, quietly changed his phone number and let his office in Erebor be passed on to a cluster of junior ministers. But there always seemed to be ‘some charity thing’ that he needed to help out with, which occasionally did seem to involve real charities and mostly, Bilbo suspected, some kind of military consulting work, or worse, actual military work. But at least he did less of it and tried to hide it; Bilbo had accepted that would have to be enough for him.
Thorin smiled at him. “You’ve got something to ask forgiveness for.”
“No I don’t,” said Bilbo, giving an affronted laugh.
“Why are you standing at the end of the bed looking guilty, then?”
“I don’t look guilty,” Bilbo scoffed. “But–”
“Yes, but?”
“You know this, uh, this weekend holiday by South Lake End, that the lads are doing with their families? A few months ago they asked us to come, and we couldn’t go.”
Thorin folded his hands in front of him as if still looking for a sword hilt to rest them on. “I vaguely recall. You conveniently booked us a romantic weekend to Mithlond at the same time.”
“Yes, well, it’s the best time to go to the seaside, the last of the good weather in the off-peak season,” Bilbo said hurriedly. “Anyway. The point is. I think we should go to the lake.”
Thorin stared at him. “You wanted to go to Mithlond. You’ve been trying to get me to come on a weekend away for six months.”
“Yes, but,” Bilbo raised his hand, wincing. “It’s this whole thing with the nanny–”
“What?”
“Kili and Tauriel’s nanny had to cancel. It was in the family chat.”
“I muted the family chat,” Thorin said. The family chat included Thorin, Dis, Fili, Kili, Tauriel, Fili’s nineteen year old daughter Svala and Kili’s eldest daughter Thela, and finally Bilbo. The chat consisted of daily photographs of children with food on their faces, requests for old recipes, people asking if anyone remembered the names of specific distant relatives, and Dis organising family lunches in Erebor, although the latter had tailed off now that only Fili and Svala were able to attend. When Thorin had properly retired and got a new phone number, Bilbo had added him to the group. He’d never messaged in it. Bilbo had also added him to a group for the Company (everyone except for Gandalf, who did not own a smartphone, but did somehow always seem to know where and when to be anyway), and a group just for the old cousins in the royal line (Dwalin, Balin, Oin, Gloin, Dain - Bilbo wasn’t even sure how he’d got invited into that one) and a group for their local Shire neighbourhood (mostly this was people looking for missing packages). Thorin had never messaged in any of those, either. As far as Bilbo knew, he’d muted all of them immediately.
Bilbo made a pained expressed and pulled out his phone. “Hmmm. Well, Kili tagged you a couple of days ago so you should still have got the notifications, here - at Thorin Oakenshield, I know you’re busy for the lake weekend, but can I check if plans changed and you’re not busy that weekend? and then yesterday - at Thorin Oakenshield, can you let me know if you can join the lake holiday?”
“I turned off notifications for all messages,” Thorin said.
“You still reply to me.”
“Except for you,” Thorin said.
“Well, then Kili started messaging me directly. It sounds like they’re kind of desperate. It’s their first time seeing Fili since Kili and Tauriel moved to the Greenwood. Kili really wants this holiday to go ahead.”
Thorin let the pause stretch out, clearly waiting for Bilbo to get to the part where this was relevant to him.
“But the nanny had to cancel,” Bilbo reminded him. “So there’s a whole bedroom spare in the lake house. And your sister has a geology conference she says she can’t get out of.”
Thorin raised one eyebrow and continued to wait.
“And with Fili’s engagement breaking off, I really think they could both use a bit of emotional support–”
This finally drew a reaction, if a mild one. “Fili got engaged?”
“Yes,” Bilbo said in an exasperated tone, putting his hands on his hips. “To that nice lady from the Orocarnis, you met her a year ago at Dis’ birthday, she works in– Well, I suppose that doesn’t matter since we’re not going to see her again.”
“Alright,” Thorin said. “I’m caught up with the family gossip. Why are you still standing there instead of coming to bed?”
“I cancelled the Mithlond cottage,” Bilbo said in a rush. “It was still in the full refund period. And I’ve talked the airline into letting us transfer the tax from the flights to a new route to Esgaroth Airport.”
“Bilbo!” Thorin sat up sharply. “I’m not going to spend our first weekend away in six months babysitting Kili’s bloody mob!”
“You won’t, you won’t,” Bilbo soothed him with a gesture. “He’s promised you won’t. We’re just there to help with the cooking and dilute the tension between the lads.”
“Well, you won’t be watching them!” Thorin waved his hand in a wide arc. “Last time someone tried to bring a child into Bag End you were practically laying down newspapers and bubble-wrapping the tea cups!”
Bilbo pinched the bridge of his nose. “The flights are booked. I’ve told him I’ll come. If you really can’t stand to join me, you can stay here and start your memoirs or something.”
“Thank goodness. I’ve been meaning to get to them,” Thorin growled, rolled over and pulled the bedsheets up to his beard. “Good night.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake— Thorin, don’t put this on me, they’re your family—” he meant the tone to emphasise ‘family’ but instead the emphasis ended up on ‘your’.
“Good night,” repeated Thorin, and turned the light out on his side of the bed.
Part one.
On Friday night they arrived at the airport and Thorin picked up the rental car. About a mile from the lake, he pulled into a lay-by and asked Bilbo to drive the rest of the way.
“Why?”
“There’ll be security guards, I don’t feel like dealing with fans tonight.”
“You can’t hide. They’ll ask both of us for ID,” Bilbo warned him, unclipping his belt.
“If you’re driving you’ll have to do the talking,” Thorin muttered.
“They never want to talk to me,” Bilbo laughed.
“Maybe they should. You’re a war hero too. If they knew what you’d done they’d be clamouring for an autograph.”
“Oh, pish-posh! Not even then. Nobody cares unless you get photographed with a big sword and your helm off,” Bilbo opened the door and climbed out.
They traded places, pausing as their paths converged in front of the bonnet. It was dusk and there was a glimpse of the long lake in a gap between the trees. Bilbo felt his heart race a little faster at the far, small line of the Misty Mountains in the distance. He had missed the sight of mountains, these five years since they’d settled back in the Shire, into a quiet life in the flatlands and the anonymity of Bag End. He’d meant to come back sooner. Thorin followed his gaze and they both leaned against the bonnet to admire the fading, red and a pink light. Thorin kissed him quickly, perhaps to break him out of his reverie and remind him they were already late, perhaps just as an apology for his stubbornness. Bilbo squeezed his arm beneath the battered leather jacket and they got back into the car.
It took a while before Bilbo had adjusted the seat to suit his frame. While he was trying to figure out if he could lower the steering wheel, his phone dinged.
Thorin lifted it out of the cup holder between the front seats. “Kili wants to know if we’re still joining for dinner. Fili’s putting something together.”
“Tell him we’re five minutes out,” Bilbo finally felt comfortable behind the wheel and clicked his seat belt in. He heard Thorin tap out a quick message. Thorin knew the passcode to his phone. Bilbo did not know the passcode to Thorin’s, had never asked, and did not intend to.
Just a little further on, they turned off the road at a small sign for the holiday let. It had evidently been chosen for its privacy and for the large, thorny hedge that they passed through a few yards from the turning, which looked to encircle the whole property. They could see the house at the bottom of the driveway, through the thinning trees. It hadn’t been chosen for its luxury; it looked outdated and a little in need of fresh paint. Fili, like Thorin before him, didn’t want headlines in the papers about the monarch spending silly money on personal holidays. Bilbo thought that might have made sense in Thorin’s time, after the war when every penny was necessary for the restoration of Erebor after its long occupation. But that was twenty-five years ago. Erebor was no longer a washed out ruin of a nation, bankrupted by its occupiers and drained of most of its populace. The last census put them at two million residents, nearly half of whom had returned from the diaspora of old Erebor and most of the rest welcomed from across the world. They were still small for a city-state in the West of Middle Earth but growing faster than most. These days the tax coffers must flow as broad as the River Running. And the Durin royal family had more than enough of their own wealth to spend after Thorin’s careful nurturing of their reclaimed estates from the restoration.
Bilbo thought ruefully of the cancelled cottage in Mithlond. It had had an outdoor spa pool on the deck.
There was a much smaller cabin just on the other side of the hedge, beside the road, probably to serve the currently empty field for campers and tents, when the house was hired for proper dwarf family gatherings that could involve dozens of visitors coming and going for days. A dwarf in a security uniform was smoking on the steps outside the cabin; Bilbo could see another through the window. The security guard put down his pipe and came over to the car as Bilbo wound down the window.
“Evening, sir. You’re Mister Baggins, I presume?”
“Yes, thanks, do you want to see my license?”
The security guard bent down further to look at the passenger side. “No need. Welcome, your highness.”
Thorin gave a polite, pained smile and a small wave.
“You can drive on up, there’s space to park on this side of the house.”
That turned out to be a generous description; although the driveway widened behind the house, it was already occupied by a large people-mover minivan big enough for Tauriel to drive and a sleeker, vintage car in dwarf proportions. Bilbo tried to wriggle the rental car past them both and tuck onto the end of the drive, turning the nose to face the house. In the half-light he didn’t see the line of large stones marking the edge of the lawn, and there was an agonising scrape just as he pulled in.
“Ah, fuck, you’ve dinged it,” Thorin hissed, jumping out before Bilbo had even put the handbrake on.
“Yes, I know, I’m sorry!” Bilbo snapped back. He tried to open his door but Thorin was in the way, leaning over to see the damage. “Can you—“
“Don’t open your door,” Thorin called, muffled from outside of the car and with his head down by the wheel. “You’re too close to these rocks.”
“I said I’m sorry!” Bilbo climbed over the gear stick and went out the passenger door, where he’d manage to leave too much room. Thorin came back around, looking stormy but successfully resisting the urge for further comment. The warm, romantic moment in the layby had evaporated. They got their small trunks from the car and went up the steps to the veranda.
The place was what they called a co-sized house, designed with amenities for both the small and large races, which meant large door frames and high ceilings but small steps and low benchtops. They were always mismatched sort of buildings, trying to be jack of all and master of none, the architecture out of proportion with itself. They were never quite small enough for hobbits.
Bilbo had seen a large, sliding glass door round the front of the house, which faced the lake, but from where they’d parked the closest door was a small back entrance with a frosted window. As they approached, it swung open and Fili came out, his phone to his ear. He must have driven straight from the palace, as he was still in suit trousers and a collared shirt, his braids done in a formal business-appropriate style. He raised one finger in a ‘just a minute’ gesture at them and strode past to find a quiet spot on the veranda. ‘Just a minute’ with Fili usually meant at least half an hour, so they continued past him. Bilbo could hear more than one child screaming inside. His head was beginning to ache.
Through a laundry and a hallway to the bedrooms, they found the main room. It was a large kitchen with a breakfast island and a full dining table, opening onto an open-plan living room with floor-to-ceiling windows looking over the lake and a small beach. The decor was a bit rustic, with several throw pillows on the settee embroidered with ‘HOME SWEET HOME’, but it wasn’t as bad as Bilbo had feared. The kitchen looked newly installed, at least.
The place seemed to be completely full of people and noise. Kili was hunched in front of his six year old, who was sobbing uncontrollably about how her younger sister had snatched her favourite toy in the entire world. Tauriel was sitting on one of the bar stools, which had all been set to a dwarf height so her knees were comically high, trying to soothe the preschooler, who was also howling. The ten year old was in the pantry yelling about how there were no biscuits left. All three sisters had dark red hair in varied levels of disarray. There was no sign of the oldest daughter, Thela, who was a year older than Fili’s daughter Svala and usually missed no opportunity to spend time with her cousin. Bilbo remembered vaguely that she was at an expensive boarding school outside Rivendell, paid for by her grandmother, studying for her final exams; or at least, perhaps that had been her excuse not to join this delightful gathering. Two pots were steaming on the stove, with several piles of sliced vegetables and meat laid out on the countertop. In the living room, on the couch, was Fili’s daughter Svala. She had her father’s blonde hair, her uncle’s height, and apparently her great-uncle’s impassivity in the midst of chaos: her feet were up on the coffee table and her nose almost against her phone.
Kili looked up at them. “Hello! Glad to see you!” He turned back to the six year old. “Darling, I know it was yours, but she’s not even four. She’s still learning. Can you please say sorry for kicking her?”
The six year old year’s howls seemed to double in volume.
“Hi,” said Bilbo, putting his bag down by the fridge. He glanced at Thorin. “I’ll take over dinner.”
He rolled up his sleeves and took a glance over the ingredients laid out. He could make something of this, simple enough.
“Thank you,” Tauriel said weakly. She looked slightly green. “The kids are going feral with hunger but Fili’s just disappeared— oh,” she put her fist to her mouth. Thorin appeared beside her and took the preschooler off her lap. He sat down on the next bar stool and pulled over a bowl of grapes that someone had left out. The preschooler instantly cheered up and began shoving them into her mouth.
Tauriel sprinted for the door through to the back laundry room. There was the sound of liquid gagging noise into the large, porcelain sink.
“Is she sick?” Bilbo looked over his shoulder, washing his hands thoroughly under the kitchen tap. He looked at Kili. “Has she touched any of this food? I’ll toss it and make something new—“
“It’s not contagious,” Kili said sharply. Bilbo looked over at him. Kili was looking at Thorin with a glare, clearly daring him to react out loud. Thorin was looking at Kili, clearly doing his utmost to not react out loud. There was somehow a very awkward silence beneath the six year old’s continued sobs.
“Ah,” said Bilbo and went back to the cooking. He actually had to take a second to count. That would make five, he thought at last. Assuming it wasn’t twins.
As the preschooler had gone quiet, Kili was able to calm down the six year old at last. He sat her on the bar stool that Tauriel had vacated, beside Thorin, and went to the pantry, saying, “No one’s eaten them, they’re right here.”
The biscuits were just on a low shelf, and he handed them to the ten year old. She was already slightly taller than her father. “Thanks, Dad!”
She wandered off to drop down on the couch behind Svala, offering her cousin a biscuit and leaning over to look at her phone. “Oooh, who’s that? Do you have a boyfriend?” Svala took one of the proffered biscuits and launched into a dry lecture that sounded, to Bilbo, like some kind of extremist and somewhat violent feminist manifesto, interspersed with incomprehensible teenage slang.
Behind him, Kili and Thorin were having a quiet and guarded conversation over the heads of the two younger children. Bilbo heard the phrases, “…more responsible,” and, “…you’re not even a hundred…” and, “…when are you going to marry her, at least?” as Kili sunk lower and lower towards the kitchen island. Bilbo noticed there were dark circles under his eyes and his beard was longer than the usual shadow. Bilbo ached to intervene, wanted to point out that he, Bilbo, was only seventy-five and unmarried. But of course Thorin would just say that was totally different.
Tauriel didn’t come back, presumably lying down in one of the bedrooms. Bilbo focused on the cooking. There was a recipe book open in the corner but he ignored it. In twenty minutes he’d whipped up a thickly sauced pasta with a side of vegetables and a few fresh salad bits as finger food for the little one. He’d just turned the hobs off when Fili walked back inside.
“Sorry about that. Some minor crisis in the foreign office. Thanks, Bilbo,” Fili walked up to him and gave him a quick one-armed hug. “How was the flight?”
“Bit of bad weather over the mountains, but we only hit it on the descent,” Bilbo handed him a pile of plates. “I’m really sorry to hear about your lady troubles.”
“It’s fine,” Fili slapped him on the shoulder and took the plates. “Better now than after the wedding, I don’t need another failed marriage in the news cycle. The breakup was a mutual decision.”
He strode off to set the table. As Bilbo turned round to look for cutlery in the kitchen island, Kili caught his eye across the island and mouthed, “It wasn’t mutual,” at him, and made an exaggerated grimace. Bilbo decided that he was his way of advising that he not bring up the subject again.
Fili put the plates down and came over as if to hug Thorin as well, but instead pointed at the preschooler. “You can’t feed her whole grapes. They’re a choking hazard.”
“Oh yeah, sorry, I should have said,” Kili muttered, resting his elbow on the counter in front of him and propping his chin in his hand.
Thorin raised an eyebrow. “I’ve never heard of a child choking on a grape.”
“You have to cut them up. Just warning you before Tauriel sees you,” Fili reached past him to grab a water jug. Kili got up to help Bilbo with the glasses.
Thorin took out a very large pocket knife from inside his jacket, flicked it open, and began cutting up the last of the grapes and hand feeding them to the preschooler, who said brightly. “Can I see your knife?”
Thorin cleaned it, closed the blade and handed it to her. She cooed over the embossed curls of silver in the handle. The six year old tried to reach for it but, after a quick glance at Thorin, withdrew her hand and said assertively, “I get the next turn.”
It was hard to have an adult conversation over dinner, due to the frequent interruptions from the children. Bath and bedtime took another ninety minutes while Bilbo unpacked and helped Svala fill the dishwasher while Fili went off to send ‘just a couple of critical emails’. There was a lot of noise still coming out of the kids’ bedroom, where Kili was apparently trying to brush someone’s teeth, so he gave himself a quick tour down to the beach and back. The path was lit by little solar lamps and the night air a comfortable level of cool. He looked for Thorin to join him on the walk, but he couldn’t find him. When he got back inside, brushing the sand off his bare feet on the mat, he found Thorin coming out of their bedroom with the ten year old in pyjamas, who was clutching a dog-eared homework book to her chest. “Thanks, Thorin! I’ve got the first ten kings after Durin now. Good night!”
Bilbo found a bottle of wine in the fridge and started pouring glasses for everyone except Tauriel. He and Thorin sat in the living room, saying nothing for a while. The single-pane glass let the cool of the night in, and there was the hoot of an owl in the trees nearby. The house was beginning to settle into the quiet when Kili appeared, took a glass and slumped into the settee opposite them.
“Tauriel’s gone to bed early,” he said. “I think the kids are almost asleep.”
“I’m not,” said Svala, who was in the corner on her phone again. “Can I have a glass of wine?”
“No. You need to go to bed too,” Fili appeared in the doorway from the hallway, closing his laptop and leaving it on the kitchen island. He poured himself a cup of water and joined them, leaving the last wine glass sitting sadly on its own. He sat on the enormous, human-sized armchair at an angle and crossed his legs.
Svala looked up from her phone. “Why should I go to bed? It’s barely nine o’clock! Besides, the socket in my room doesn’t work and I need to use the charger in here.”
Fili pinched the bridge of his nose. “Can we have some grown up time please, sweetheart?” He looked at Thorin. “I need your advice on this situation with the referendum. The palace is trying to stay neutral but I think at some point, ‘no comment’ looks like I’m taking sides.”
“Then pick a side,” Thorin replied.
“Fine, I’ll just go ring Mum and tell her I’m hanging out by myself on your weekend away with me,” Svala said loudly in her father’s direction, stood up and walked out. Fili did not react to this threat. Behind Fili’s back, Bilbo watched Svala walk through the kitchen and pick up the wine glass as she went. Bilbo was the only one who saw her, and she briefly made eye contact with him. She froze, the glass in her hand, and he gave her a shrug and put his finger to his lips. She disappeared down the hall at the fastest speed a teenager could move while carrying a full glass of red wine.
Bilbo said into the lull that followed, looking at Kili, “Congratulations, by the way.”
“Thanks,” mumbled Kili, turning his glass between his hands and staring into space like a dwarf walking, bloodied, off a battlefield.
“Kili,” Thorin rumbled. “What’s your plan? You don’t have Dis to help you with a newborn, now you’re in the Greenwood.”
“It’s fine. I don’t have a job. I’ll stay home when the baby arrives and Tauriel will go back to work for Thranduil.”
There was a moment of silence. Thorin said, “And this will be the last one?”
Kili shot him a very dark look. “They were all supposed to be the last one, Thorin. You’ve got no idea what you’re talking about.”
Fili said, in a conciliatory tone, “It is more complicated, uncle.”
“It seems pretty simple—“
“No, it’s not,” Kili cut him off. He leaned forward and put his wine down with a sharp clack on the coffee table.
Fili took a long swig of his water and said, “If you want to come back to Erebor, I’m sure Mum would help, and you can have your job back in the cabinet office, we’ve only got a contractor—“
“Stars above, please, can you all just stop?” Kili slumped back again and buried both hands in his hair. “Can I please get some sympathy instead of your helpful opinions on how to run my life?”
He gave Bilbo a pleading look, as if begging for a lifeline to escape the quicksand of his family. Bilbo looked at Thorin, who after a moment cleared his throat. “Fili, did you want to talk about the referendum? Let’s go outside and have a pipe.”
He and Fili went out the sliding door onto the decking that faced the lake, which glinted serenely beneath a sinking crescent moon.
Bilbo did his best to smile at Kili and sipped his wine. “Obviously I don’t know much about it, but it does seem like you’re taking on a lot.”
“We know. We’re trying. I mean, trying in the opposite way people usually mean,” Kili nodded. “Like Fili said, it’s complicated. You know elves aren’t like the rest of us mortal races. Biologically. They don’t do prophylactics, they’re essentially super sub-fertile for most of their lives. We’ve been to a lot of doctors, and they said it’s, like, an evolutionary arms race between males and females to prevent pregnancy except when circumstances are absolutely perfect,” he raised his hands and locked his fingers together. “But when you introduce something new, it’s like exposing someone to a germ their immune system has never seen before, and, well…” he let his hands fall into his lap.
Bilbo wrinkled his nose. “Did a doctor tell you that? Compare your relationship to a foreign disease?”
“It was just this one consultant, and not in as many words.”
“That sounds like discrimination, you should probably report that.”
Kili shook his head. “We’ve heard worse over the years. I can’t be bothered any more.”
Bilbo said, “It’ll be all right once they’re all a bit older. I know you lot think more than two children is shocking, but hobbit families are a lot bigger. One of my cousins has eleven. Our neighbour down the road had five in six years. Hobbits don’t have more hands than you and they cope. If you let them run a bit wild they’ll be fine.”
Kili sniffed and picked up his wine again. He sipped it slowly. “That’s not really the problem. The elvish doctors we went to in the Greenwood have this traditional medicine idea, you know, they believe in fëa and things. They said elvish women spend their fëa in creating their children. That’s why they want to have so few. And too many, especially this close together, it’s draining on their lives. They said that’s why she’s getting sicker every pregnancy,” Kili stared into his wine. “They said there’s been cases where elves have died, after they give birth, just from the kind of, like, the effort of creation. I don’t know. It sounds a bit woo-woo, but she is sicker every time.”
Bilbo swallowed. “Oh. So what are your options? Surgery, surely?”
“Yes. I’m booked in,” Kili had gotten to the bottom of the wine glass. “But to be extra safe they’re recommending Tauriel gets surgery too. But it’s not reversible for her. So it’ll be forever,” he drained the last of the wine. “She has to decide whether I’m worth that. She could live another twenty, thirty thousand years. Anything could happen. She’ll meet other people. We’ve always talked about it, but it makes it a lot more real,” Kili cradled his empty glass between his hands. “Or we split up now, become co-parents, and accept that everyone was right, Thorin was right, the tabloids were right, this was never a good idea. That would solve the problem as well.”
Bilbo watched his face for some time. He looked so much older than the rollicking, wild young soldier that Bilbo had first met all those years ago, when Thorin had been an exiled wanderer trying to unite the Erebor diaspora to reclaim their homeland. He would probably live two hundred years longer than Bilbo, but that was a short season in an elf’s life; it was all relative.
“And you’re telling me all this so I can explain it to Thorin?”
Kili gave him a watery smile, a little of his youth showing through again. “Yeah. It’s like, would you want to talk about your sex life to basically your dad?”
“But your queer step-uncle is fine, sure,” Bilbo waved it away. “I am sorry, Kili. I know what it’s like to want someone and feel like the whole world is against you, even your own folk, until you’re even doubting yourself.”
“I know. That’s why I asked you to come,” Kili said quietly. “Thanks for listening. Thanks for talking Thorin into joining.”
“Oh, it was no problem, really, the weather in Mithlond was going to be awful,” Bilbo lied. “I’m sure we’ll all have a lovely weekend.”
Part Two.
The bed was large enough for four dwarves, which meant the lumps in the mattress were avoidable if they didn’t lie right up next to each other. Bilbo slept in and awoke about nine to find Thorin had already gone. The noise of children who’d been awake since six filtered down the hall and through the closed door, so Bilbo rolled over and read his book until they receded somewhere outside.
He showered, dressed and went out to find only Tauriel lying on the couch in the living room, looking a lot better than the night before. She gave Bilbo a commiserating smile as she nibbled on toast.
“Where is everyone?” Bilbo asked, raising his eyebrows at the mess covering every surface of the kitchen, as if a bomb made of breakfast food had gone off just above the kitchen island.
Tauriel ticked off on her fingers, “Kili’s in the shower, Thorin’s taken the kids outside looking for wild strawberries, Svala’s still asleep, Fili’s on his emails.”
The eggs had already run out and the bacon was cold. He ate it anyway, along with a bowl of cereal and drank a fresh cafetiére of coffee. Kili arrived looking like a dwarf who’d been up since six in the morning but was at least clean, and Tauriel just had time to put her plate on the coffee table before he lay down on top of her. She gave an affectionate ‘oof’ and patted his head. Bilbo focused on his breakfast to give them a moment of peace.
By the time he’d finished, the horde of children had descended onto the kitchen again for a second breakfast and he scurried over to the couch with his coffee to enjoy the view of the lake. To his disappointment, the children invaded the living room next, attempting to pile on top of their parents on the couch, though Kili put up a valiant defence with a cry of, “Alright, alright, give Mum a bit more space!”
Thorin followed them and sat down beside Bilbo, sliding his heavy arm over Bilbo’s shoulders.
“Good harvest?” Bilbo asked. Thorin reached into the pocket of the boundless leather jacket and held out a stained paper towel that cradled a small cluster of tiny, crimson strawberries. Bilbo popped one in his mouth. They were sweeter and lingered longer on the tongue than the popular garden breeds in the Shire.
“Will you make me a coffee?” Thorin asked.
“I just sat down!”
“So did I,” Thorin grinned, and kissed his cheek. “Please.”
Bilbo grumbled but got up, went to the kitchen and began to wash out the cafetière again. He saw Kili go past behind him and from out in the hallway, heard him rap on one of the bedroom doors.
“Fili? Do you still want to do that loop walk along the shore path? I’ll just get a bag together.”
“Yeah, I’ll be five minutes,” came the muffled reply.
By the time the coffee had brewed, Kili was back outside Fili’s door, now in solid boots with a small walking bag hanging from one hand. “Are you done?”
Bilbo could hear Fili on the phone. There was a pause as he asked the other end of the line to wait, and then he called through the door. “Sorry, something’s just come up, can you give me thirty minutes?”
“No. You said you’d be ready by ten, I want to go while Tauriel’s still well enough to keep the kids entertained,” Kili opened the door. “Come on, just call back later.”
“I can’t. It’s the chancellor, treasury is starting a fight with the national bank and I need to defuse it until Monday. I won’t be long.”
Kili withdrew and came back into the kitchen looking furious. Svala finally emerged, yawning and pulling on a sweater. Kili said at once, “Hey Svala, do you want to do a loop walk along the shore and around the big hill? It’s eight miles.”
“Heck yeah,” Svala grabbed a mug and filled it with water from the tap. “I’ll just get my boots and some toast to go. Do we have to take a security detail?”
“No, the security detail is just for the monarch,” Kili said darkly.
Svala gave him a thumbs up as she downed the rest of her mug. “Is there any water left in the kettle for coffee, Bilbo?”
“Have this one, I’ll make another,” Bilbo pushed the cafetière towards her.
“Thanks,” she filled the mug with coffee and meandered off to get dressed. Bilbo washed the cafetière a second time and put the kettle on again. If anyone did a run to the town for food, he would make sure they bought a bigger coffee pot.
By the time the second round was brewed and he could bring it to Thorin, Thorin had the preschooler on his lap and was reading her a book about storm giants. Bilbo put the coffee down on a little table nearby. Kili and Svala were out on the front deck in their walking boots. Bilbo was tempted to join them. Eight miles was a pleasant outing in the shire. He went out to ask.
Svala pulled out her phone. “Uncle Kili, can I take a selfie for my socials?”
“Sure. Just make sure to blur the background or we really will have to take the security detail,” Kili grinned into the camera as Svala put her arm around her uncle’s neck and leaned in close. “Say, ‘dysfunctional royals!’”
“Dysfunctional royals!” Kili echoed.
Bilbo felt old and out of touch as he leaned against the doorframe and watched them. They looked so stout and strong, he’d never keep up with them. Besides, maybe he’d finally get a bit of time with Thorin. He waved as if he’d just come to see them off. Kili waved back and they vanished down the steps towards the lake.
The sun was warming the day to a pleasant enough temperature to swim. Bilbo and Thorin moved to the deck and sat looking out over the lake. The air was clear and sharp out here, so far from any major cities and with the prevailing winds off mountains. They read their books and Bilbo was almost beginning to feel that this was a proper holiday.
Forty-five minutes later, Fili emerged and looked around. “Did he seriously leave without me?”
Thorin said without looking up, “He went with Svala.”
Fili pulled out his phone and flicked through it. He pointed the screen at Thorin. It showed an idyllic, filtered picture of Kili and Svala with the sunny lake behind them. “She’s posting selfies of our location on her public account. Did none of you think to stop her?”
“We’re in the middle of nowhere,” Thorin said, not looking at the phone. “They’re fine. They’ll be back after lunch.”
“Speaking of which,” Bilbo eased himself out of the chair. “I’ll get started on food.”
—
Three hours later, Kili and Svala were still not back at the house. Fili stalked from room to room, alternatively calling each of their phones in turn. Eventually he discovered that Kili’s phone was in the shower room anyway, and Svala’s was going straight to voicemail. Tauriel was trying to keep the children distracted with a puzzle that was both too complex for the youngest and too boring for the oldest. The six year old asked her loudly. “Where’s Daddy?”
“He’ll be back soon, darling,” Tauriel pushed her daughter’s hair out of her eyes, but after a moment she got up and began to ring Svala as well. She paced around the kitchen as it rung briefly and went to voicemail again.
Fili went out onto the deck and shut the door behind him. One of the security guards appeared, apparently at his call, and the two of them had a conversation too quiet to be heard even through the thin glass. The security guard nodded and then turned away and started speaking into his walkie-talkie.
Bilbo tipped his head back and then glanced at Thorin, who was draped in the armchair reading his book and ignoring the entire palaver. Bilbo nudged him with his knee. “Do you think we should go out and look for them?”
“They’ll be fine,” Thorin said, resting his head on his closed hand.
Fili stuck his head back inside. “We’re calling over the other security shift from the hotel in town. I’m just going to the gatehouse to see if we can contact the local force, in case there’s been any unusual reports. Thorin, do you have any contacts in the area who could help?”
“Nope. They’ll be fine.” Thorin said, “You two used to disappear for days at Svala’s age. I don’t remember Dis ever calling the police.”
Red splotches appeared on Fili’s cheeks. “Yeah, because we were wandering refugee children. Nobody would have cared. Svala’s literally the crown princess,” he pulled the screen door closed with a snap.
Thorin gave a heavy sigh and put his book down. He got up and clapped his hands. “Come on, kids, let’s get down to the beach.”
The youngest two children cheered, and the ten year old gave a half-hearted smile, glancing at her mother. Tauriel was busy looking up walking maps of the area to work out how much ground a search party had to cover and she didn’t notice. Thorin gathered towels from the cupboard and the bags of swimming gear and herded the three children out the door.
When Tauriel looked up, Bilbo briefly saw the panic on her face before she covered it quickly. “Where’s the children?”
“Thorin’s taken them for a swim,” Bilbo told her.
Tauriel shoved her phone in her pocket and headed for the door. “Two kids per adult by the water, that’s the rule.”
“Tauriel, just relax—“ Bilbo started to say, but she was already gone. Bilbo was now alone in the cavernous living room. He tried to read his book for a few minutes, but the quiet was now too distracting for him to get through a sentence. He sighed heavily and got up, went to the fridge to check their supplies, and started planning their dinner.
—
He had a passable, hobbit-ish supper ready by four in the afternoon, and went out to call everyone who was on the beach. When he turned around to go back inside, he nearly fell over with relief. Through the glass, he saw Kili and Svala walking in the back door.
“Oh, Yavannah, thank you,” Bilbo rushed inside. “Are you two alright?”
Svala was filling her water bottle from the tap and drained it without taking a breath. She plugged her phone into the charger on the kitchen countertop and tried to turn it on without success. Kili was in the doorway talking quietly and reassuringly to the security guard who had followed them inside. They both looked a bit tired and hot but otherwise fine.
Fili was suddenly beside them. He threw his arms around Svala. “Durin’s beard, where were you? I was about to call the armed forces and get the helicopters out.” He pulled away and gripped her arms. “You scared the shit out of me!”
“I’m sorry, we got lost,” Svala mumbled. “The hill blocked reception and then my phone died.”
“Why did you leave with no other way to contact me? I thought something really bad had happened!”
“It’s my fault,” Kili got in between them, peeling Fili off Svala. “The map was on my phone, I left it behind and I didn’t want to go back until it was too late. I thought we could just follow the most obvious path.”
Fili turned on him. “Ugh, can you both just use your common sense, for once!”
Kili tried to cut him off and repeated, “Fili, it’s my fault.”
Fili would not be deterred and rounded on his daughter again. “No, Svala, you are old enough to take proper preparations on a day walk. We shouldn’t be babying you. You nearly ruined this holiday for everyone.”
Svala, who looked close to tears now, spat her words with teenage fury. “What holiday? You’re not even on holiday, Dad! You haven’t stopped working since we arrived!”
Fili took a moment to respond. Then he said, “You’re right. I’m sorry. Things just keep coming up.”
“This always happens!” Svala countered. “Why can’t you just put your phone down for one weekend?”
Fili shook his head. “If you want me to call a car so you can go back to your mum’s, I’ll understand—“
“I don’t want to go to Mum’s, I want to hang out with you! Mum doesn’t want me anyway, she was thrilled when you asked to take me on her weekend so she can meet all her bloody deadlines!” Svala’s voice was rising now, and she did rub a tear quickly away, trying to hide it by turning her back to everyone except Fili. “I don’t have parents, I have line managers.” She pushed past him and stalked away down the hall. Fili started to go after her, but she snapped at him. “Leave me alone, I just want to get some clean clothes.”
Fili let her go. He went out the back door, muttering something about talking to security to call off the alerts. Kili moved like he was going to follow Fili, but before he could, Tauriel and the children arrived from the beach. The kids sprinted to Kili, yelling, “Dad’s back!” and doing their best to knock him off his feet.
Bilbo sighed and looked over at Thorin, who was just arriving behind the others, carrying all of the towels, buckets and spades. He seemed to have caught the end of the drama, but Bilbo saw him glance at Kili and just for a moment, there was a look of relief as strong as Fili’s had been when he’d seen Svala. He dropped the pile of laundry in the corner and went back out onto the deck. There was a stiffness to his shoulders that Bilbo didn’t like the look of, and he left Kili to his family reunion and went outside.
Thorin was leaning on the railing, looking out of the lake, his head hanging low.
“You alright?” Bilbo slipped up close to him and ducked under his arm, snuggling against the side of his chest. “Were you that worried about Kili?”
“Not really,” Thorin said softly. “More about Fili,” he sighed heavily. “Just had a moment of Déjà vu. And it’s hard, seeing myself from the outside.”
Bilbo swallowed. He said at last, “Fili turned out alright. Svala will be fine, too.”
Bilbo waited to see if he wanted to say anything else, but he stayed quiet, watching a small family of heavy-winged birds - geese or swans, it was hard to tell from a distance - taking flight off the lake, leaving a trail of ripples behind them. Bilbo, with as much forced cheer as he could manage, said, “Shall we have an early dinner?”
Part Three.
After Saturday night dinner, it was still full daylight outside, so there was no way of convincing the younger kids to go to bed. Svala had not emerged from her room. Thorin and Kili took the children back down to the lake to skim stones while the rest of the adults washed up and tidied. Bilbo found baking ingredients and tinned fruit in the cupboard to make a kind of heavy pudding, something like a cake and something like a trifle, with fresh fruit and cheese on the side. There was enough for even the pickiest eaters to to fill up before bed, although they couldn’t be convinced to all sit down together at the table as Bilbo would have preferred. However, the extra large pudding was enough to get bedtime underway, and the children were herded off to the bath.
Kili came back to the kitchen to look for some beloved toy that the preschooler needed. Bilbo was sitting with a cup of tea at the kitchen island while Fili was at the sink with suds up to his elbows trying to clean the pans that didn’t fit in the dishwasher. As Kili went past, Bilbo heard him say quietly to Fili, “I checked on Svala, she seems fine, she’s just determined not to come out until you apologise.”
“Apologise for what? For looking out for her?” Fili said defensively, trying to balance the largest pot on the drying rack. “I don’t want to be working, I want to be on holiday.”
“I know. She knows, too,” Kili mollified him.
“It’s just been so busy since—“ Fili started and then stopped himself, and then started again, “Since you quit.”
“Fili, let’s not do this now.”
Fili leaned on the side of the sink, wiping his hands with a dish towel. “Will you come back to Erebor when the new baby is a bit older? It’s just been a lot, doing it without you.”
Kili shook his head. “I can’t.”
“We were supposed to run Erebor together,” Fili said softly. “That’s what Thorin wanted. He said if it wasn’t for the legal complexity, he would have made us co-regents. And you just dropped it when it got hard.”
“That’s not why I left,” Kili said, in the voice of deepest exhaustion. It sounded like this was not the first time they had had some version of this conversation. “I liked being your unofficial deputy,” he gave a half-hearted laugh. “I liked being in charge. I miss when people did what I asked, without me having to yell at them five times to get their shoes on.”
“Then come home. If it’s about Tauriel’s health, we can get the Greenwood doctors to come to us, I’ll pay for their flights, hotels, whatever you need.”
Kili shook his head. “It’s not the doctors. It’s Erebor,” he lowered his voice until Bilbo had to really work hard to pretend he wasn’t eavesdropping. “It’s the things they were saying about my kids.”
Fili stared at him. A range of emotions crossed his face, anger and shock and deeper things that were hard to read. “I didn’t know it was that bad.”
“Maybe it wasn’t. Or not from the outside. But my tolerance is pretty low when it comes to the kids,” Kili gave him a commiserating smile. “You get it.”
“Is it really easier… I mean… among the elves? Really?”
“In the Greenwood, and for Thela in in Rivendell, it’s different, the elves are old enough to have seen it all before. Old enough to be polite no matter what they really think.” Kili shrugged and held up the toy he’d been looking for. “I have to get back to bathtime.”
—
Svala had not emerged for dinner or pudding, but either hunger or the screaming from the bathroom drove her out at last. Bilbo found her a plate and enough leftovers for a decent meal.
Svala retrieved her phone from the kitchen charger and flopped onto the couch to eat and check her messages. Thorin was helping Tauriel read the children their bedtime stories, Fili was back in the bedroom with his emails, and Kili was tidying up the lounge. Bilbo offered him a cup of tea and he accepted gratefully and sat on the other couch, across the coffee table from Svala. Bilbo took the oversized armchair, sat cross-legged on the huge seat cushion and disappeared behind his book, which was a thrilling account of pre-historical Shire archaeology.
“I’m sorry about today,” Kili said to Svala.
“It’s ok,” Svala let her phone fall onto her chest and put her empty plate on the coffee table. “I was actually having fun until Dad flipped out. It was like an adventure.” Kili laughed and Svala’s voice perked up a little. “Not exactly infiltrating enemy lines on foot to overthrow the tyrannical reign of Smaug, but I guess I’m not old enough for that yet.”
“Yeah, we’ll save that for next holiday,” Kili said. “Are you messaging Thela?”
“Yup. I already narked on you,” Svala raised her phone. “She says it would never have happened if she were here.”
“She’s got Tauriel’s sense of direction,” Kili rolled his eyes, “Sorry she couldn’t come this weekend. She really misses you, she just couldn’t take the time off school. When her exams are done, what if you guys took a few weeks together? Do something wholesome like walking the Shire and Ettenmoors.”
“Dad would never let me.”
“I’ll convince him. Anything you need to book, we’ll do it under fake names. You can just go wandering, like Fili and I used to. It’s safe as long-halls around there.”
Svala smiled broadly. “Yeah, ok, if Thela is keen. Thanks, Uncle Kili.” She stared up at the ceiling. “When Mum and Dad split up I used to wish Thela and I were sisters. I thought you and dad had such a good childhood, growing up together free in Ered Luin. I know now it was really tough in those days, but at least you had each other, you had a brother. All I wanted was a sister.” She glanced at him. “And I wanted you and Tauriel to be my parents.”
Kili didn’t tell her ‘don’t say that’ or ‘I understand’. He just let her finish. Then he said, with a tone of mock horror, “Don’t even joke. That would make it six kids. Six.”
Svala grinned and raised her head. “Bilbo, did you and Thorin ever think about kids?”
“Uhhhh, nope,” Bilbo said, without lowering the book. “And frankly, I’m glad we didn’t meet until Fili and Kili were adults. ‘Seeking a Single Uncle Raising Boys’ was not in my online dating profile.”
Svala propped herself up on her elbows. “I thought you met before the war? When Thorin was ruling Ered Luin?” she narrowed her eyes. “How’d Thorin meet a tax auditor from the Shire while he was rebuilding Erebor?”
“I wasn’t always a tax auditor,” Bilbo said, still from behind the book. “You may not believe it, but your great-uncle Bilbo used to be cool.”
Svala looked at Kili. Kili winked at her. “Bilbo was a spy. He was the spy. The only one who infiltrated Smaug’s inner court. All the intel that we needed to bring down the occupation, it came from Bilbo.”
Svala looked between her uncle and the cover of Bilbo’s book. She said with a small smile. “No, you’re pulling my beard.”
“I’m not,” Kili laughed.
“Yes, you are,” Svala threw a small, embroidered pillow at him.
“Watch the tea!” Kili dodged her. “Ask Thorin, if you don’t believe me. He’ll neither confirm nor deny, and then you’ll know it’s true.”
There was a long moment of silence, during which Bilbo remained hiding behind his book. Then he heard an electronic clicking noise. He looked up. “Did you just take a photo of me?”
“It’s fine, you can’t see your face,” Svala was thumbing her phone. “You’re just posed in such a perfectly hobbit-ish way, it’s adorable. I’m going to send it to Thorin.”
Bilbo grumbled and raised his book again. He had a few minutes of peace to read about the first attempts by the Hobbiton college professors to excavate the barrows east of the Shire, and all the curses that were attributed to the project. Just as he was getting the most gruesome bit, there was the sound of rapid footsteps in the hallway. Bilbo lowered the book with a sigh of annoyance to see Fili stomping through the kitchen looking very red in the face. He was heading straight for the Svala.
“What are you doing? Delete it, now!”
“What?” Svala sat up, and Bilbo saw at once that she had an expression much closer to guilt than confusion. He put his book down and shuffled to the edge of the chair.
“Svala, delete it,” Fili held out his phone. Bilbo stood up and Fili handed it to him. Bilbo felt his heart begin to pound as he saw the photograph of himself, sitting cross-legged in the center of the armchair with the book up over his face, and the caption beneath, Just found out my sort-of uncle was the top spy for Erebor lol. YES THIS GUY.
“That’s an anonymous account,” Svala cried. “No one knows it’s me. How long have you been spying on me?”
“Svala, I have an entire secret service dedicated to the security of the realm, of course I know about your secret social media accounts,” Fili’s voice was starting to rise. “You’re posting state secrets to a public feed! Get rid of it, now!”
Svala’s jaw was trembling. She picked up her phone and navigated through it. “There. I deleted the post.”
“The whole account, Svala!” Fili swept his hand around the room.
“Why? No one will know. It’s not like I tagged Bilbo. It’s just a stupid place for me to post dumb thoughts, it has like ten followers.”
“It’s obvious from the account that you’re a dwarf, how many hobbits do you think have a ‘sort-of’ dwarf niece in Erebor? Really? It would take one of my analysts minutes to figure it out. Mahal, what were you thinking?”
Thorin appeared behind Bilbo like a wraith coming out of the shadows, still carrying the picture book with the storm giants. “What’s going on?”
Bilbo handed him Fili’s phone, which was still showing the photograph on Svala’s account. Thorin took a moment to absorb what he was seeing, and then took a screenshot before the post reloaded and disappeared. Without a word, he walked out. Bilbo was left with Fili berating Svala while Kili tried to calm them both down.
He sat back down in the armchair, his book still resting by his hand, and wondered whether the fallout was going to be worse for national security or family dynamics.
—
Bilbo had gone outside for some air, and to watch the moon vanishing over the distant mountains. He heard the sliding door open and close and looked up to the welcome sight of Thorin, who came to lean on the railing beside him.
“I made some calls, got a guy I know to enquire with a contact he has at the social media company. The post had four views before Svala deleted it.” Thorin entwined his fingers on the railing. “One was Fili, one looks like an Erebor intelligence agent monitoring social media, and one was Thela, so Kili’s going to talk to her if she doesn’t already know to keep her mouth shut. The other view, we got some details and my guy is trying to follow it up. It looks like an Erebor account but it was routed through a popular VPN server so it could be anywhere.”
“What does that mean?” Bilbo asked.
Thorin shrugged. “Lots of people use VPNs for lots of reasons. It was probably nobody, looking for nothing.”
“But?” Bilbo asked.
“But,” Thorin turned towards him. “I don’t think we should go back to Bag End, just for the time being. Let’s book that nice cottage in Mithlond for a couple of weeks.”
Bilbo nodded. It had been a long time since they’d had to think about this sort of thing. He had quit this life as soon as he was sure Erebor was won; he felt far too old and tired, now, to do any sort of subterfuge.
“It was a pretty benign post,” he said with a weak smile. “Could anybody actually have learned anything from it? Really?”
Thorin held his gaze. “If someone had the rest of the puzzle and were just missing this one piece… you know what they are looking for.”
Bilbo nodded, closed his eyes and breathed out slowly. When he opened them, Thorin put his arm around him. “Come on. Let’s get an early night. We have to take the rental car back by noon, and arrive early enough to pay for the scrape in the paintwork. Fili’s people will sort us tickets to the coast.” Thorin squeezed him close as they walked back inside. “I’m sure it was nothing. They’ll trace the account to some kid in Rohan pirating video games and we’ll be home in a week.”
—-
Nobody had had a chance to go to town, so there were still no eggs in the morning, but Bilbo was up early to pack and managed to make a huge batch of pancakes and a jar of jam. Everyone was awake by nine, and the kids who had been up since six came back for seconds, so they all sat down at the table together for the first time all weekend. It was a subdued breakfast. The little conversation they managed mostly consisted of pleasantries and the logistics of when everyone had to get back home. They did at least all agree that Bilbo had made very good pancakes.
Bilbo had just finished clearing the bedroom and was checking under the bed when Svala appeared in the doorway. She was still in her pyjamas, with no braids in her hair.
“Bilbo, I’m really sorry,” she said, her voice sounding slightly tearful. “I just didn’t think.”
“It’s ok, kid,” Bilbo clambered off the floor, his knees aching a little. He gave her a friendly pat on the arm. “I made a lot of decisions without thinking when I was young. That’s what made my life interesting.”
“I have to stop being a brat and grow up,” she said bitterly. “I’m going to be queen some day. And Dad’s gonna need me to try out his shoes long before then.”
Bilbo gave her a commiserating grimace. “I don’t think Fili wants you to grow up with that responsibility,” he said. “He just doesn’t know there’s any other way to grow up. But there always is. Maybe you can run away and join a foreign resistance movement. Like this guy.”
Svala laughed. “I do think it’s actually pretty cool. Sorry if my post sounded mean.”
“Yeah, thanks for cyberbullying me, that was the worst part,” Bilbo picked up his bag. “Come on, I’ve got to say a proper goodbye to your horde of red-headed cousins.”
—-
As they cleared the table after breakfast, Thorin said to Fili, “Do you really think no one cared about you, when you were children?”
“Hmm?”
“When Svala was missing, you said no one would have cared about you and Kili as children. I hope you know that’s not true. I know it wasn’t an easy life in the Blue Mountains, but we were never unloved. If you had gone missing, I would have had five hundred dwarves out looking for you as easy as that,” Thorin snapped his fingers.
Fili didn’t answer for a moment. At least he said, “I get so scared if I think about her getting hurt or lost, it feels like being back in the war, that constant sense of danger approaching. When do we stop worrying about our children?”
Thorin replied, “You don’t. You worry about them until the day you die.”