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Chapter Text

Frodo spent most of the voyage standing on the deck, staring out to the distant West. He had told Bilbo, when he had first returned from the quest that had claimed the largest part of him, some years ago, that his sight had changed somewhat, as he’d carried his burden.

(The burden which Bilbo had put on him. According to Gandalf, they would live out the rest of their days in the Undying Lands, and those days would not be numbered. Privately, Bilbo thought that should they live a million or more days, there still would not be enough time to forgive himself for giving the Ring to Frodo.)

Maybe Frodo had more gifts than mere sight, and maybe telepathy was among them, for he always turned to Bilbo when these thoughts tormented him. “Are you comfortable, Uncle?” he asked. What a good boy. So kind, when Bilbo had ruined his life. No need to trouble him further.

“I was thinking,” said Bilbo, frowning and looking for what he had been thinking. “Oh, I think I made a mistake in my book. I changed a word or two in chapter five, and I’m afraid it affected the meaning of the whole passage. I wish I hadn’t done it.”

Gandalf, who was never far, let out a chuckle. “I’m afraid it’s too late now to turn back and change it again, my friend.”

“I know,” grumbled Bilbo, who enjoyed being ridiculous quite a bit. “I know that. But all the same, I can’t put it out of my head. if I could, I’d make many changes.”

“I think I see something,” said Frodo, pointing at the horizon.

Bilbo straightened up in his chair, or at least tried to, as much as his sore back would let him. He could not help feeling a minute pang of regret over the young body the Ring had allowed him to keep over the years, however uncomfortable it had been for his soul then. He had grown so terribly old, so terribly quickly, after leaving Bag-End. He hadn’t noticed it on the road to Erebor, chalking up his fatigue and sore muscles to the expense of travel, but he hadn’t been able to deny it upon his return to Rivendell, and especially after the Ring had been destroyed. Some nights, he had watched in wonder as the skin of his hand thinned and stretched over his bones and tendons. Finally, it matched. Finally, he looked as brittle as he felt.

Of course, that satisfaction of being in the correct shape was marred by the fact that absolutely everything hurt when he moved now. But no matter; had he been less foolish, the ageing process would have happened gradually and he may have had time to get used to it; he could only blame himself.

Gandalf offered him his hand, and he and Bilbo went to look at the seascape. Bilbo, of course, could not see anything; given his aged vision, however, it didn’t mean it wasn’t there. These days, he could only barely see Frodo even if he was right in front of him. Of course, even that didn’t mean much; Frodo had been fading even before Bilbo’s ability to see.

(Elrond had told him that it would be a great shock, but Bilbo had insisted on seeing him anyway. It was a great shock. Frodo was barely there, a tiny, shadowy thing amid endless white sheets.

“I should have given you the mithril shirt,” Bilbo murmured when the Elves were gone. “I don’t know why I didn’t, really, except that I didn’t think I could part with it. But it’s just a token; it’s not him, and he would be disappointed that I failed to protect you. I should have given it to you. I’ll give it to you now, if you wake up.”

Gandalf told him, later, that the shirt had saved Frodo’s life in Moria, and surely after. “This”, thought Bilbo, clutching his oldest friend’s hands with his own, withered and shaky, “this is the best thing I have ever done.”)

“Ah,” said Gandalf after a moment of contemplation. “I believe you’re right, Frodo. It’s too distant to be certain, but your eyes are keener than mine.” He took a deep breath and hummed contentedly. “Yes, I think I remember this.”

“What do you remember?” asked Frodo.

“The scent of home,” said Gandalf with a smile.

The two Hobbits sniffed for a little bit. It took a moment before he noticed anything besides the omnipresent smell of salt, and even longer before it resolved into separate things he could identify. It was such a strange mix of scents that it barely made sense; warm and comforting like baking bread, and subtle and earthy like trees and flowers, with a faint, bitter undercurrent that he couldn’t place. “Yes,” he said at last. “Yes, I understand what you mean.”

“I don’t smell anything,” said Frodo. “Except… It’s foolish, but I think… strawberries? I might just be hungry.”

“Strawberries,” Gandalf echoed, his voice a deep rumble. He gave an amused laugh. “I’ll bring you something to eat, my dear Frodo. It’ll be a while yet until we reach our destination, even if we can already smell it.” He turned to stride off. As he left them, he added, “Enjoy the smell before enjoying the rest, my dear fellows. You are the first, and perhaps the last Hobbits to do so. Perhaps it will reveal something to you that it does not to the rest of us.”

Once he was gone, Frodo gently touched Bilbo’s shoulder. “Uncle?”

“Oh, would you be so kind and bring the chair over? I want to watch for these shores.”

Frodo dragged the chair over and helped Bilbo onto it. It was less comfortable than the armchair in his room in Rivendell, but sitting was always an improvement. He relaxed, and waited for Frodo, who kept giving him strange looks, to tell him what was on his mind. “Uncle?” he called again, after a long stretch of silence.

“Nephew?”

“You said you wanted to change your manuscript?”

It took Bilbo’s tired mind a minute to trace the conversation back to this. “Mmmh. Oh, yes. Well, you know, it took me long enough to complete it, and I’m glad that I did, but it means that it’s done, not that it’s perfect. I wish I’d fixed a few mistakes.”

“Which ones?”

Bilbo closed his eyes. He was constantly sleepy, in his old age, and the soft movements of the boat weren’t helping. Finally, right before dozing off, he mumbled, “I think the main thing is, I would change the ending.”

Bilbo woke up with a start when the boat stopped its gentle rocking. He lifted his hand to block the golden rays of the sun that blinded him; for a moment, he thought his vision had worsened, and that he would have to go through his undying days with faulty eyes, but when he adjusted to the light, he realised that it had not worsened as he had thought, but had gone completely bad. His hand… His hand. His hand, unmarred by years and adventures.

“What?” he asked, staring at it in awe. Its cleanness and its youth.

“I said, ‘Good morning’,” said Gandalf.

“Oh,” said Bilbo, and he looked around for the first time. The Undying Lands looked remarkably like the Shire. “Good morning. Have we been here long? That is, how long did I sleep?”

Gandalf… only, Gandalf wasn’t Gandalf. Well, he was; Gandalf had always been Gandalf, untouched by time since Bilbo had met him as a child. But his garb was different, and his hair had gone back to grey. Strange, but for all Bilbo knew, this was the power of this country. It would explain why his hand was not his hand. Perhaps they could change their appearance at will, though Bilbo wasn’t sure that he would choose to look younger. He had been stuck there long enough.

In any case, Gandalf the Previously White considered him gravely. “You were not asleep, Bilbo Baggins. Your mind drifted, but your eyes were open.”

This didn’t sound right, and not only because Gandalf’s tone was off. Then again, Bilbo was an old Hobbit, prompt to forgetting things. “I’m sorry, Gandalf,” he said. “I must have lost track of time. You know how it is. Where’s my boy?”

“Your boy,” repeated Gandalf, looking around him. It did look very, very much like the Shire. Was the Shire in Valinor? No, that made no sense. “What boy?”

Bilbo frowned at his hands. He supposed that Frodo was not a boy anymore, and least of all his.

“No matter,” said Gandalf. “I’m glad you recognized me, anyway. I have come here looking for someone to share in an adventure that I am arranging, and you may have solved the difficulty of finding that someone.”

Bilbo peered up at him, startled out of his reverie. What game was Gandalf playing? “I beg your pardon?”

“And I will grant it to you. Now, I’ll go and tell the others, they’ll be pleased my search yielded such swift results. Well?”

Bilbo felt that his head would explode, and saw that he had dropped something. Looking down, he saw that it was his smoking pipe, which was impossible, since he’d given his last two to Merry and Pippin when they had stopped in Rivendell on their way back from the war. He leaned over to pick it up, and saw that it was even more impossible, because this was not one of the pipes the twins had made for him, but the one that had cracked in his rucksack when he’d fallen in the cave of the Misty Mountains. It was whole. Unbroken.

“What,” he said to Gandalf, considering his words with care, “What sort of adventure?”

Gandalf’s eyes twinkled under the brim of his hat.

Chapter Text

So, Bilbo had gone back to the past. Either that or he had hallucinated eighty year's worth of history, through prophetic visions or through the potency of Old Toby. As Gandalf spoke, the likelihood of either option began to dwindle and die. Bilbo barely listened to his words, since he already knew them.

“And these thirteen Dwarves will be coming to Bag-End for dinner tomorrow,” Bilbo said, trying to remember what he’d had in his pantry, eighty years before. He didn’t remember any of them complaining about the amount of food, but he also couldn’t remember whether he had gone shopping between Gandalf’s visit and theirs, and if he was supposed to do it again.

Hold on. Was he supposed to do everything again?

“Don’t be alarmed, my dear fellow,” said Gandalf, noticing his budding panic. “They will be content with whatever you serve them, I’m sure.”

“So long as it’s not vegetables,” Bilbo replied absently. The journey, and the mountains, and the goblins, and the dragon, and the battle, and Thorin…

Thorin. His stomach churned. If the journey hadn’t started, then Thorin hadn’t died. Thorin was alive, and headed as they spoke for the Shire. Bilbo was seized with the sudden desire to run, although the direction he wanted to run towards was unclear.

What if…

“I would change the ending.” What if this was the reason he was back here, in Bag-End, before the quest? What if this was his change to make things right? To arrive to his ideal ending, “And they lived happily ever after,” like he’d long wanted?

“Are you feeling well, Bilbo?” Gandalf asked.

“To tell you the truth, I’m a little lost,” admitted Bilbo. “Confused. Very confused. And they’re coming here. Oh, what shall I do? I need to make a will. I’ll be damned if I let this harpy get her grubby hands on my silver spoons a second time.” He got up, but even the surprise of being able to do so without help did not make him pause long; he started mumbling again and pacing as he did so. “Oh, never mind, they’re only spoons, they’re only things, and Frodo will give Bag-End up in the end.” He froze. “No,” he realised. “He won’t. He won’t have to. He can have the silver spoons. He shall have them all, and everything else. Oh, Bilbo, you fool.” He gazed up at Gandalf, who had been looking about him politely while Bilbo had been having his little crisis. “I need seven Hobbits,” he declared.

“I doubt the company would be willing to embark so many on their quest,” Gandalf remarked.

“Not for the quest. I need their signatures for my will.”

“I am not proposing to bring you to your death, my friend.”

Bilbo frowned, frustrated at the wizard’s inability to read his thoughts. He had long assumed that he had that power, since he seemed to always know what Bilbo was thinking, and now it occurred to him that magic had little to do with it; it was too bad that Bilbo had failed to notice the intimate knowledge that came with a long-lasting friendship until it was gone.

His oldest friend did not know him, and his dwarven friends would not remember him either; Thorin would look at him and see a stranger. And Frodo…

Frodo was not born yet. He was alone.

“Bilbo?”

Bilbo, surely not for the last time, shook himself from his dark thoughts. “My relatives are greedy, Gandalf. You would be shocked. Otho has been after my house for a long time, and if he doesn’t see me for a while, they’ll assume that I died and that he and his brood can invest it. I’m leaving everything to my cousin Primula’s unborn son. It’s a long story.”

“So it seems. I would love to hear it sometimes.”

Or read it; although it had taken Bilbo more than seventy years to get around to finishing it, and he didn’t know that he had that kind of time right now. “Let me worry about all of this. You’re very busy; I bet an illustre wizard such as yourself has better things to worry about than the salvation of a Hobbit hole.”

“It is a very good hole,” said Gandalf. “It would be foolish of an illustre wizard, as you called me, to dismiss it so casually.”

“That’s because you’ve always been the best of them,” Bilbo thought. Aloud, he said, “Anyway, you have to give the directions to the company. Here, you had better draw a sign on the door, just in case.” Gandalf gave him a queer look. “You never know,” Bilbo babbled, “some of them may get lost.”

“Some of them may,” agreed Gandalf. “A shame about your door,” he noted leisurely as he carved the sign into the wood. Bilbo hummed absently, his mind already far away, making plans for the future. “It looks like the paint is fresh.”

It was, Bilbo remembered distantly. It had just been painted green, a week and a lifetime before.

It wasn’t so much that he had forgotten the order in which the Dwarves had appeared at his door, but he hadn’t thought of it in a long time (he’d pondered it for all of ten minutes while writing the first chapter of his book. That part was the easiest to write.)

So he wasn’t surprised, exactly, that it was Dwalin who knocked first, but it still gave him pause. For some reason, he’d expected Balin. “Good evening,” he said, bearing the Dwarf’s unfriendly gaze with all the grace he could muster. There was no reason it should be otherwise; Dwalin didn’t remember that they were excellent friends. “Bilbo Baggins, at your service.”

“Dwalin,” he replied. “At yours and your family’s.”

“You are my family,” Bilbo didn’t say. “Please, come in,” he did reply. “Let me take your…” He considered the axes and knives that he could see poking out of Dwalin’s sheathes and pockets, and the rest that he couldn’t see. “Actually, follow me, you can leave your weapons in one of the guest rooms.”

The process of disarming himself took Dwalin a long time, which made Bilbo smile, though he made an effort to look properly intimidated by all the ways the Dwarf could potentially murder him.

He sat Dwalin at the table and began piling food in front of him while the Dwarf never stopped staring. “You know,” he said at last, “I may be hungry, but perhaps you should keep a little for the others.”

“Nonsense,” said Bilbo. “I have plenty more.” He did. He had come home to a full pantry, but then he had started panicking about making a good first impression and being a good host for his once and future friends, and he had spent the day and the evening before buying and cooking food. It was fine. “Besides, the others are going to be here soon.”

“Maybe,” allowed Dwalin. “I wouldn’t count on most of them being punctual.” As if the universe was making fun of him, there was a knock immediately after he had finished his sentence. Bilbo grinned, and Dwalin pointed at him threateningly with a chicken leg. “Don’t gloat, I said most of them.”

Bilbo went to welcome Balin, and watched him and his brother reunite with a bittersweet feeling in his stomach, and not just because he had tasted many of his dishes throughout the day (after all, he couldn’t risk serving disgusting food to his guests. He had to make the delicious sacrifice).

He couldn’t help remembering the days before the Fellowship left Rivendell, when Gandalf had told him in confidence that he wanted to pass by the mines of Moria, but that he didn’t have much hope for Balin and the others. He’d later confirmed Balin, Ori and Oin’s unhappy fate (as well as his own; Bilbo did not know why anybody had been surprised to see Gandalf reappear after his alleged death. There simply was no getting rid of that wizard, which was perfect for Bilbo’s taste). Bilbo added the Moria fiasco to the list of things that he needed to take care of.

“Am I early, or is everyone else late?” asked Balin when he and his brother had finished insulting the other’s appearance.

“A bit of both,” replied Bilbo. “Gandalf didn’t give me a precise time, but I think he’ll arrive soon.” If he recalled, he and the rest of the company had arrived only a few minutes after…

Oh, no. He was not ready for this. Nope nope nope nope nope.

“Master Baggins?” Balin called, not startling Bilbo at all.

“Yes,” he said, which was an answer for absolutely nothing. Some air, he needed some air. “Master Dwalin, would you show Master Balin to the dining room? I need to fetch something in the… garden.” They looked at him strangely, but to be fair, if he kept acting the way he was now, he would have to get used to everyone thinking he was a lunatic.

He gave them a polite smile and went outside, taking a few deep gulps of cold air. He sat on the bench, looking up at Gil-Estel as he asked for strength, and waited, until eventually, two familiar heads appeared in the distance and started making their way to Bag-End. He watched them and tried to chase away the images of their dead bodies, lying next to their uncle in the funeral chamber.

(It wasn’t a fair comparison, because Merry and Pippin were far younger than Bilbo had known Fili and Kili, and more rambunctious. But every time he saw them together, mostly at celebrations, with a young Merry steering a toddling Pippin around, that image kept coming back. He could not help it.

“I wish you wouldn’t invite your ghosts everywhere you go,” Gandalf said, popping up next to him at the party for Frodo’s thirtieth birthday. Bilbo emerged out of his reverie with a smile.

“I don’t invite them,” he told his friend. “They are always with me.”)

“Good evening,” he called out when the brothers were within earshot. “Bilbo Baggins, at your service.” He got up to give them a bow. When he finally made eye contact, his heart constricted. He forced himself to focus on them as they were, and not as they would be, lying dead on Ravenhill.

“Fili.”

“And Kili.”

“At your service,” they finished together.

Bilbo thought, “You will live a long life and grow old and be happy.”

“I have a ton of food inside,” he told them, cracking the door open. “Do you like pie? I have a lot of pie. That is, if Balin and Dwalin haven’t eaten all of it. Wait.” He looked down at their boots. More precisely, at their mud-covered boots. “Wipe your feet before you come in.”

The brothers exchanged a sheepish look, but obeyed Bilbo’s command, scraping the worst of the mud off on the grass. “You don’t have shoes,” Kili remarked.

“I don’t need shoes, I’m a Hobbit.”

“What do you do when your feet are cold?” asked Fili.

“I complain, usually. All right,” he said, examining the boots. “That seems enough. You can come in.”

“Thank you,” said Kili, barging in as soon as the door was halfway open. “Nice place, did you build it yourself?”

Bilbo snorted. “No, my father did. It was his wedding present for my mother. You’ll soon find that I’m nowhere near a builder. I’m a scholar and a writer.”

“Our friend Ori is a scholar too,” replied Fili. “You’ll like him.”

“I’m sure I will,” said Bilbo. “Excuse me, what is this?” He pointed an indignant hand at the mount of weapons Kili was dropping on the floor. “Did your mother raise you to make a mess?”

Kili did not look even remotely embarrassed. “Where am I supposed to store these? Here?” he asked, glancing at the pipe rack hanging on the wall.

“Certainly not.” He showed the brothers to the guest bedroom. “And do not mix them with Dwalin’s, you know how he is with his weapons.”

“I do,” agreed Fili, shuddering as he took off his armour. “Have you known him long, then? I wondered that Gandalf suggested you for this quest, but if you’re a friend of Dwarves, then it makes sense.”

“I am a friend of Dwarves,” Bilbo assured him. “Though not of this one yet. Gandalf and I are old friends, that is why he suggested me. I just met Dwalin this evening.”

Fili blinked at him. “But you just spoke as if you knew him.”

Oh, confusticate it all. “I am gifted with prescience,” he said. Fili stared at him. He made a face. “Fine, I’m a good judge of character with a strange sense of humour and a good wizard friend who told me a bit about all of you.” Hopefully, Fili wouldn’t check the veracity of that statement.

“How is this?” asked Kili, gesturing at his neat little pile of knives and arrows.

“Not bad,” Bilbo declared. “Now you can go and have supper with the others.”

He did not need to tell them twice. They bounded out of the room and ran blindly across the hall, heading towards Balin and Dwalin’s voices. Bilbo took advantage of this respite to catch his breath. He could not stop picturing their future selves, and the more he tried to repress it, the harder it was.

“You will live a long life,” he chanted to himself. “I will see you grow and be happy. You will live, you will live, you will live.”

(“I stayed in Ered Luin for years,” said Dis. “I refused to come to this place where all the people I love died.”

“I understand that,” replied Bilbo.

“It was Dwalin who convinced me to give it a chance. I suppose you know that he made many trips between Erebor and the Blue Mountains.” Bilbo nodded. Dwalin had never missed an opportunity of dropping by for tea and supper in Bag-End. “He told me of everything that was done, everything that had to be rebuilt. All thanks to them. My boys…” She trailed off. He politely waited for her to continue. “I keep wondering what they would have become. Don’t you?”)

“We’ll find out,” Bilbo told himself. He took a deep breath, made himself smile and came out of the room in time to get the door when it was knocked on again. He had the presence of mind to step aside immediately, which was the one thing that prevented him from being buried under an avalanche of guests. The smile he gave Gandalf over the chaos of Dwarves was not forced. “Right on time,” he told him. Then, to the rest of the company: “Hello, I am Bilbo Baggins, and I will be your host this evening. If you wish to put down your personal belongings, the coat and weapon room is over there, and please don’t wreck my house, I need it to make my relatives jealous.”

There was the expected chorus of introductions, which Bilbo did not even try to decipher, since he already knew all of these freaking people. Instead he took the time to have a moment of silence for his past self, who’d spent the first few days of the quest trying to subtly make people repeat their names one after the other.

“Supper is ready to be eaten.” By the time his sentence was finished, he was alone with Gandalf and Dori in the entrance. The former looked amused, the latter embarrassed.

“May I help you serve?” he offered.

“Thank you, Master Dori, I’ll take care of everything. Enjoy your evening.”

Dori beamed and left. Gandalf shrugged his shoulders as high as the ceiling allowed. “I should offer to help as well, but I don’t think I want to risk it.”

“They do say that wizards are wiser than the rest.”

Loud noises erupted in the dining room. Bilbo pursed his lips, but Gandalf seemed very pleased by this development. “Did you ever find your seven Hobbits for the will?”

He had, and it had been much harder than he anticipated to convince them that he hadn’t gone completely off the rails. “Does it matter? There won’t be a house left to pass on to my heir once the night is over.”

Gandalf laughed and joined the company. Bilbo breathed in, and out, and followed him.

The party was a lot more fun than Bilbo remembered, possibly because he didn’t care one bit about his plates this time. They still sang their little song about him and his quirks, prompted by the way he rolled his eyes when Bofur started juggling the glasses, but he had the grace to give their antics several slow, sarcastic claps. “Nice improv,” he complimented.

“Little did you know, we rehearsed it on the way,” teased Bofur.

“It was well done. So well done, in fact, that you’ve earned the right to help me wash and put everything away.” The Dwarf groaned. “Come on, Friend Bofur, you have to stimulate your appetite for dessert.”

“Worry not, my appetite doesn’t need stimulation. I’ll have dessert now, since you mention it.”

Bilbo was interrupted in the middle of his response by knocking on his door, which was the moment when it occurred to him that he had done precisely zilch to prepare himself for this. The laughter ceased instantly, which was good, since it left him the quiet he needed to really make a deep dive into his own crippling anxiety.

Gandalf grimly said, “He is here,” and started to get up, but Bilbo beat him to it.

“Let me,” he murmured. He forced his legs to move, and even though it was oddly reminiscent of trying to command his aged body to walk, too soon he found himself at the door.

“This is fine,” he thought. “I can do this.” After all, he had managed to pull himself together for Fili and Kili, and Balin, Ori and Oin. He could do this. He could definitely do this.

He pulled the door open. Thorin Oakenshield looked down at him. Bilbo closed the door.

So, nope, actually, he could not do this. His mistake.

“Bilbo?” Gandalf called from the other room.

“Mmh?” Alright, the farce had lasted long enough. This was really nice, and all, but he was ready to go back to the Undying Lands. Glorfindel had promised him to show him the cool places where the Elves hung out, and he’d prepared some songs for them. And after all, while he spent some not-so-merry time in this dream, Frodo was probably lonely, waiting for him to wake up. He shouldn’t keep Frodo waiting.

“One moment,” he called out, and then pinched his own arm as hard as he could. Nothing changed. He was still in the entryway of Bag-End.

He sighed. Well, it couldn’t be that painful. He opened the door. And no, it wasn’t that painful the second time, actually; it was worse. Very, very much worse. “Good evening,” he said. Then, wanting to circumvent a comment he vaguely remembered about looking like a grocer, he went on, “Bilbo Baggins, at your service.”

Thorin frowned and stared him up and down, which Bilbo bore with no little embarrassment. After conducting his little inspection, Thorin asked wryly, “Are you?”

Bilbo blinked, wondering if he’d missed something. He probably had, to be honest; his mind did tend to wander. “Am I what?”

“At my service.”

“Well, I haven’t signed the contract yet,” admitted Bilbo, “but I am your host, so I am at your service, at least for the night.”

“It doesn’t usually involve slamming the door in guests’ faces,” remarked Thorin.

“Oh, I’m sorry about that,” said Bilbo, wincing at himself. Ah, the dreaded consequences of his idiotic actions. “It may have seemed strange, but there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation.”

Thorin didn’t reply at first, but as Bilbo determinedly didn’t provide said explanation, he was obliged to ask, “Am I likely to hear it?”

“Certainly,” he replied cheerily. “You see, it’s a Hobbit custom to slam the door in the face of an esteemed guest. I didn’t do it earlier with the others, because I thought I might be axed for my politeness, but you seem like an understanding fellow.” Thorin didn’t speak. “It’s a mark of respect, really,” babbled Bilbo, fighting valiantly not to squirm under his dead friend’s watchful eye. “Anyway, please come in, I’m sure the others are waiting.”

When Bilbo had shut the door and turned to show Thorin in, he realised that though the others had in fact waited, they hadn’t done so in the dining room; and he found himself stared at by twelve Dwarves and a wizard. The latter seemed to think that Bilbo had lost his mind or was weirder than expected, and that in either case, the spectacle would be entertaining to watch.

“Gandalf,” said Thorin. “I thought you said this place would be easy to find. I lost my way twice.”

“How,” Bilbo mouthed to Gandalf, who gave him a quick wink.

“You found your way in the end,” Gandalf said lightly.

“Yes, and then I was almost turned away at the door.”

Gandalf cleared his throat. “Well, Hobbits have their customs, I suppose,” he said with a significant look at Bilbo, who pretended not to see it. “I believe introductions aren’t needed, so we…”

“Actually,” Bilbo cut in, “ I introduced myself.” He gave Thorin a pointed glance.

Thorin did not look impressed. “I did introduce myself. To the door.”

Dreadful consequences. Bilbo wondered how long he would hear about this for. “Nobody appreciates old regional customs anymore,” he declared sadly. “Soon people will even disregard basic etiquette and stop introducing themselves to the Hobbit who cooked a large meal for their company.”

Thorin made a point to straighten up and show off how much taller he was than Bilbo. “Thorin Oakenshield,” he said, inclining his head. “Leader of this company. At your service.”

Despite what he’d said, Bilbo spared Bofur the chore of doing the dishes. Instead, he took it as an excuse to avoid the dining room, and found that it made the whole business easier.

He tried to convince himself that he would see Thorin live past the Battle of the Five Armies, but, and this should not have surprised him, his heart was a stubborn thing which refused to listen.

He leaned his forehead against a cabinet and tried to calm down. How was it that what should have been an absolute blessing, what should have generated tears of joy, caused him a universe of pain? How did it not erase a lifetime’s worth of grief? How long had he vainly wished to see Thorin again, how many nights had he dreamed of their last goodbye, and of what he wished he’d said? Why wasn’t he happy? Why did he want to curl into a ball and wail until he found himself back in a boat sailing West?

“Ah, Bilbo, come here, my dear fellow,” called Gandalf.

Bilbo straightened up and pushed it all away. He could do that. He’d chosen good humour for decades, he couldn’t allow himself to fall apart now. Later. Later. Later.

He wiped his hands and made his way back to the dining room. “I’m here,” he told Gandalf, and only Gandalf, and not anyone else in the room whose presence may or may not trigger a fainting spell.

“I was just explaining to everyone that you’d accepted the position of burglar in Thorin’s Company.”

Let it be known that he had, in fact, said no such thing. “I did, then?” he asked wryly. “I have not seen the contract.”

“And I did not offer him the job,” Thorin remarked. He half turned in his seat to peer at Bilbo. “He doesn’t look like a burglar, more like…”

“Looks are deceiving,” Bilbo cut in. He swore to Eärendil, if he got compared to a grocer, Thorin was not having any dessert. What was even the problem with grocers? No way to get groceries without them. “For instance, you look like you were going to say something rude, but I’m sure you’re way too polite to do that. For all you know, I robbed all of your Company right under their noses.”

“Likely,” scoffed Dwalin.

“Where are your weapons?” asked Bilbo.

A hint of doubt crossed Dwalin’s face, and it came back when Bilbo didn’t break eye contact. He became red in the face. “What…”

“I’m joking, they’re still in the other room. Made you scared though.”

Dwalin scowled fiercely, but he did seem to believe him, at least. He grumbled something about Hobbits who should be careful lest they be murdered for a joke, but since he didn’t have his weapons on him, there was a limit to the efficacy of his threats.

“Besides in jest, have you any experience in thievery?” asked Thorin.

(Thorin’s beautiful eyes flashed as he looked at Bilbo. “You would steal from me?”)

“Not yet. Have you?” He still wasn’t looking at Thorin’s face, so he missed his reaction, but he could tell with moderate to absolute certainty that he was being glared at. “Are you willing to enter a mountain and risk ending up in worse shape than my cousin Lobelia’s rosemary pie entry at the 677th annual pie contest of Buckland?”

A few of the Dwarves snickered openly, and a few more cleared their throat to hide their amusement. Thorin did not laugh, but Bilbo was not overly surprised. “A dragon is no laughing matter.”

“Neither are burnt-up pies. You did not answer my question. Are you willing to do it?”

“No,” admitted Thorin.

“There you have it, then,” said Bilbo. “I’ll go inside. I’m light on my feet, and I’ll wager that Smaug’s never smelled a Hobbit before, so he won’t hear or smell me coming.”

“How do you know the dragon’s name?” asked Gandalf.

Bilbo frowned at him. He’d forgotten that he had to pretend not to know about what he hadn’t been told yet. This may be easier if he remembered to pay attention when people were talking. Though honestly, if he couldn’t count on the wizard to cover for his blunders, who could he count on?

“I’m a scholar,” he said lightly. “I read it in a book.” Gandalf raised his eyebrows and stared at him, but Bilbo averted his eyes. They landed on Thror’s map. Perfect. “Is that the map, then?”

“Yes,” replied Thorin. “I suppose you’ll want to take a look at it, Master Scholar?”

Bilbo looked up at his face by reflex, and got lost there. Thorin looked younger than Bilbo recalled; probably because Bilbo had grown very old and Thorin had died way too soon. But he looked sterner than in Bilbo’s memory. Of course, most of Bilbo’s memories of him had been replaced by his last moment, and the tranquil smile on his face when he’d spoken his last words.

That memory came to him again now (“I’m glad you’re here…”), but Bilbo pushed it far, far away. He really needed to get a grip on his drifting mind, this was becoming annoying.

He shook his head and blinked several times in quick succession, focusing his gaze on the map. “I’m sorry,” he said, “I don’t know how helpful I could be. For all that I can decipher Cirth, I’m sadly not proficient in Khuzdul.” He wondered whether he should say something about the moon runes, but that may be suspicious, at least to Gandalf.

Besides, Bilbo was loath to miss an opportunity to visit Rivendell; if Gandalf knew about the runes, he would have no reason to push the company that way to ask for Elrond’s advice, since all they’d have to do was wait out the moon cycle and make Gandalf read them. Plus, the change of route would impact the rest of the journey and negate Bilbo’s advantage. Better to keep the runes to himself.

“I am not too sure about this, Thorin,” said Balin. “No offence, laddie.” Bilbo waved this aside. Last time, he’d agreed with him wholeheartedly.

“Aye,” said Dwalin, “the wild is no place for gentlefolk who can neither fight nor fend for themselves.” Well, alright, that was a little hurtful.

“I’ll be fine,” said Bilbo. “Besides, I just redid my will. Even if I die, I’ll at least have the satisfaction of posthumously causing my cousins extreme frustration and disappointment.”

This did not seem to assuage Balin’s concern. In fact, more of the Dwarves seemed to share it now.

“I was joking,” he said. He had a feeling it wasn’t the last time he would need to specify this. “This was a joke. Please don’t worry about me, I may not fight, but I can fend for myself. I’ll at least be safe until the dragon.”

He must have done a piss job of being persuasive, because Gandalf still felt compelled to add, “You asked me to find the fourteenth member of this company and I have chosen Mr. Baggins. There's a lot more to him than appearances suggest, and he's got a great deal to offer than any of you know, including myself. You must trust me on this.”

Thorin nodded his assent, and asked Balin for the contract. Bilbo made a show of reading it. “About the funeral arrangement,” he said, “what do they entail, exactly?”

“Burial, typically,” replied Balin.

Bilbo hummed. “Where?”

“Where it’s possible, I suppose. Though we can add a mention that you be moved to a place of your choosing when we can afford to do so.”

“That would be lovely. Do you have a pen?”

Balin took out a quill from his pocket. Bilbo handed him the contract, sidestepping Bofur, who made a point to shove his pointy hat into his face, because if he couldn’t make him faint, he would at least be as obnoxious as he could. “Should I write down the address to your family plot?”

Bilbo shook his head. “Just refer to my will, it’s all in there.” He imagined the expression on Elrond’s face, if he did die and a bunch of Dwarves showed up in Rivendell to claim a spot as a grave for their dead Hobbit.

Balin gave him the contract back, and Bilbo borrowed his quill to sign it.

“Well, it’s done,” he announced.

“Welcome, Master Friend,” said Bofur, giving him a healthy slap on the back. “Good to have you on board.”

The others bade him welcome as well, though none more enthusiastically than Gandalf, and none less so than Thorin.

“We should drink to that,” intervened Gloin. “Master Baggins, I don’t suppose you have any wine left?”

“You know very little of my people, to ask such a question,” Bilbo scoffed, turning to head to the pantry.

As he did, he caught Thorin’s voice, low and near Gandalf’s ear. “I cannot guarantee his safety, nor will I be responsible for his fate.”

He halted a second, listening for Gandalf’s reply. When it came, it made him smile. “Somehow, I don’t believe this will be a problem.”

If Bilbo could brag about one thing, it was that he had timed his retreat more or less perfectly. “Well,” he said after clearing up the glasses for a second time, “I’d better go to bed now, since we leave early in the morning.”

“What, now?” asked Nori. “But what about dessert?”

“Oh, yes, do feel free to help yourself to anything that’s left. In fact, please eat all you can, it would be better not to leave anything to rot. Good night!”

“But wait,” cried Kili, grabbing at Bilbo’s arm. “We were about to sing.”

“Please do. Stay as long as you like, all night even, although I don’t have many beds. Sweet dreams!”

“Don’t you want to hear our song?” asked Ori.

Bilbo hesitated. “I… I would love to hear it,” he lied, “but I’m very tired. Maybe you could sing it again later? It’ll be a long trip, I’m sure we’ll have a lot of time for singing.”

“But it’s not a travelling song,” protested Fili.

“Leave him be,” commanded a stern voice. Bilbo felt a rush of gratitude for Thorin, but he went on: “A Hobbit would not care about dwarven songs.”

Bilbo’s smile waned. “I should let it go,” he thought. His mouth did not follow that order.

“All due respect,” he said, “you do not know the things a Hobbit would care about. And though you did not ask, I will tell you one of them: getting a good rest before a long journey.”

Thorin bowed his head. The other Dwarves looked sheepishly between the two of them. Before the silence became heavy, Bilbo forced himself to cheer up, and said, “You will all be grateful in the morning, when you take the road with a fresh and well-disposed Hobbit instead of a cranky one. Good night.”

He received a few answers on his way out, and paused to catch his breath in the hallway. None of them commented on him, which was good, but he tore himself away when he heard the sounds of instruments being tuned. He closed the door of his bedroom right before the first notes of the song started, but they filtered through anyway, and so did the Dwarves’ voices.

As Thorin and the company began the mournful ode to their lost home, Bilbo finally, finally allowed himself to break. He wept as he took off his clothes and dressed for the night, he wept as he crawled under the covers of his bed, and he wept as he fell asleep, lulled by the melody and the voice that had been taken from his past and thrusted into his present.

Chapter Text

Bilbo’s knowledge of the future, or past, or present, did not take too long to fail him. In fact, it failed him the very next morning, when he woke up before dawn and found that this (breakfasting with almost the entire Company in Bag-End) was entirely novel. He’d had most of them over for breakfast and other meals throughout the years, but the sight of Kili and Fili tossing pots of jam to each other and being altogether way too lively for six in the morning was…

Bilbo didn’t know what it was. Disconcerting, maybe. Upsetting, to be sure. “I will see you live,” he thought at them in order to remain calm. “And I will have you over for breakfast again.”

Though he changed his mind about that a few moments later, when the young Dwarves caught sight of him and dragged him to the table to butter his toast, pour him coffee and overwhelm him completely with their rapid-fire speech.

The other Dwarves were no help at all in this matter, obviously, and all seemed rather delighted that Bilbo was on the receiving end of their attention rather than the rest of them. Bilbo looked at Balin a little desperately, but the old Dwarf smiled and winked at him.

“You’re embarking on a quest to rob a dragon,” Gloin laughed. “You should be able to handle two youngsters.”

Bilbo huffed while Kili protested being called a youngster. “Two different sets of skills.” The only way he’d known to keep the little ones quiet was to tell them stories, but most of his stories were about the quest he was on right now, so that was a moot point. “Would you stop poking me?” he demanded.

Kili looked wounded. “But you didn’t answer my question.” Goodness, Bilbo had not heard that there was a question. He needed to listen to these people. “How old are you?” Kili asked (for the second time, apparently).

“A hundred and thirty-one. No, wait. I’m… fifty? Yes, fifty years old.”

“See, I told you,” Kili told Gloin. “He’s more of a child than I am.”

“That’s why he doesn’t have a beard,” agreed Fili.

“I’m not a child. Hobbits have shorter lifespans than Dwarves, and come of age at thirty-three.”

“Oh, interesting,” said Ori, leaning over the table to catch Bilbo’s eye. “Why thirty-three? Why not a round number?”

Bilbo shrugged. “No idea. Our ancestors were fanciful, I suppose.” He turned to Fili. “And Hobbits don’t grow beards. Nothing to do with my age.”

“I’m so sorry,” said Fili. “I had not realised… What misfortune. Is that why you hide yourselves in holes?”

“You needn’t feel embarrassed, Master Boggins,” Kili assured him. “It’s not your fault at all.”

“If anyone tries shaming you on the road, just tell us, and we will deal with them,” continued Fili.

“If it really bothers you, we can build you a fake one,” offered Kili. “We have ponies, they probably don’t need all of their mane.”

“Quite right,” agreed Fili. “Awfully selfish of them to parade with all that hair while Poor Master Boggins is doomed to walk beardless.”

Bilbo drank his coffee and reflected on the fact that while he did need to pay more attention to what was being said, there were some things he probably could afford to miss.

It had not been lost on Bilbo that Thorin had been absent from the breakfast table. He waited until everyone had finished eating to ask after him.

“He went to the inn ahead of time to check on the ponies,” answered Balin. “We were supposed to go back last night, but after seeing how comfortable your dwelling is, we decided to accept your invitation to stay.”

“As well you should,” replied Bilbo. “You’re always welcome here, invited or not.”

Balin seemed a little taken aback. “That is very kind of you to say, especially to strangers.”

Fili jumped in. “We’re not strangers, we’re colleagues. Besides, Gandalf told Master Boggins about us, so he knows us already. Isn’t that right?”

Bilbo nodded, his eyes drawn to the familiar shadow of Gandalf he could see through the window, sitting on the bench and smoking. “Speaking of the wizard, I should bid him good morning.”

He got up, but before he had reached the door, he remembered something. “By the way,” he said sternly. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed that nickname you call me. It’s Bilbo Baggins. If you cannot remember my last name, you can use the first.”

“I think we’ve angered Master Boggins,” Kili grimaced.

“Not at all, Chili,” Bilbo retorted on his way out.

The sun was barely above the hills when he joined Gandalf. “Good morning,” Bilbo said. “And before you ask, I mean it as a weather forecast.”

Gandalf smiled down at him. “I see,” he rumbled. “Good morning, Bilbo. I assume you’re all packed and ready to go?”

“I’m all packed, and as ready as I can be, considering what they’ve done to the bathroom.”

“On the bright side, you won’t have need of it for a while.”

“Fair enough,” Bilbo agreed. “Gandalf?”

“Yes?”

“If any of them asks, could you confirm that you told me everything you know about them and their quest?”

Gandalf did not seem overly surprised by his request. “Certainly.”

“Thank you.”

“Are there any ancient Hobbit customs I should also lie about?”

“I’ll tell you as soon as I invent them.” After a pause, he added, “And I’ll tell you the rest too, in time.”

Gandalf hummed a little, his gaze boring into Bilbo as though it could extract the truth from him that way. “You are a queer little fellow, Bilbo Baggins. I am looking forward to hearing all that you have to say.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll make it worth waiting for,” said Bilbo. Just then, Fili poked his head out of the window at the left of the door. “Not eavesdropping, are you?” he scolded with a tender smile.

Fili shrugged. “Not at the moment. We’ve finished washing the dishes. Balin asks if you’re ready to leave?”

Bilbo nodded. “I’ll get my pack.”

“I must confess,” Gandalf said when Fili had closed the window, stopping Bilbo in his tracks, “that coming here, I had high hopes for you, but I did not expect you to follow me so readily.”

“You were a dear friend of my mother’s,” Bilbo replied, “and I already consider you a dear friend of mine. You said yourself that you didn’t want to lead me to a premature death, and I trust you. Why wouldn’t I follow you?”

Gandalf exhaled a perfect ring of smoke. “It is not often that a Hobbit leaves his home. I expected you to look like you’d miss it.”

(He had not turned back as he’d left his home for the last time, though he had felt Gandalf’s gaze on him until they had veered off the road. “Are you sure you won’t miss it?” Bofur asked.

“Of course I will,” Bilbo replied, making an effort to keep his voice light. “But I have found friendship in many places. Wherever I go, I always miss something.” Plus, a part of him longed to see Erebor again, even if another part dreaded it.

“You’ve come a long way from the Hobbit who would not leave his hole,” commented Dwalin, prompting the others to recite “I am a Baggins of Bag-End” in a mocking tone. Bilbo laughed with them, and they started to sing a walking song, and it was easier to walk away now.)

Bilbo smiled. “Of course I will,” he said. “But it will be there if… When I come back. In the meantime, the world is ahead, and I cannot wait to see it.”

He went through the door. This time, Gandalf didn’t stop him.

In all of his idle years, Bilbo had forgotten how boring travelling could be. Well, not really; he quite enjoyed the walking bits, especially in his younger body, which obeyed his commands and did not grow tired after a few steps, and the scenery remained beautiful no matter how many times he saw it.

Pony-riding, on the other hand? Dreadful. It was the definite proof that anything, even something as benign as sitting, could be made terrible by adding a saddle to it.

There was another thing, too; he had forgotten how little everybody talked to him in the beginning. Not that it wasn’t fair, they didn’t know him and had no reason to engage in small chats filled with inside jokes that didn’t exist yet (or in deep conversations in the deep of the night when the air was too heavy to sleep and the call of Old Toby was too strong to ignore).

But it did make being with the others, most of whom had known each other longer than Bilbo had been alive, very awkward. He knew that bridging that gap would take time, and even telling them the truth would not speed the process, but it still smarted, being excluded from a friend group he’d been a part of for more than half his life.

Plus, he kept messing up, like the time he’d asked a sulking Gloin if he was missing Mimli, only to get a weird look and realise that he’d never been told that Gloin had a wife, let alone her name.

Or at the start of the journey, when they had joined Thorin at the inn, and Bilbo, taking care to avoid meeting his eyes as much as possible, had gone straight for his old, trusty Myrtle, and Ori asked how he knew the pony’s name. Bilbo had to tell him with a straight face that Hobbits spoke the language of ponies. Needless to say, it was not his proudest moment, and it didn’t seem to matter how many times he berated himself for his lack of focus, he could not help himself.

(There may be a not-so-small part of him that desperately wanted to tell them the truth, but he could not do that. Not yet, perhaps not ever.)

He supposed he would have to reconcile himself to the fact that his dear friends would think him bizarre; luckily, he had had plenty of practice with that in the Shire. But as much as he could explain away knowing the name of Gloin’s wife or pretend to converse with the ponies, there were some things he had more trouble justifying.

Case in point: A couple weeks into their journey, as they settled for the night and passed the food around, Kili was jostled and spilled a good third of his supper on the ground.

“Kakhf,” he cried, prompting Fili (and a healthy portion of the rest of the company) to snicker.

Before he thought to hold his tongue, Bilbo scowled, “I know for a fact that your mother did not raise you to use that kind of language.”

At the mention of his mother, Kili bowed his head and did his best to look contrite. “Sorry,” he said, wiping the rim of his plate with his sleeve. Bilbo was so busy shaking his head at the lack of manners, he did not immediately notice that the others were looking at him with varying degrees of horror.

Bilbo thought back to what he’d said and cringed. Right. “I mean,” he said, chuckling a little. “I assume. Of course, I don’t know his mother, but given that she is a princess, it’s not out of the realm of…”

“How do you know our secret tongue?” demanded Dwalin.

Bilbo blinked. A lot. “Beg pardon?”

“How did you know it was a cuss word?” Balin asked, his tone a tad gentler than his brother’s.

Bilbo sincerely hoped that he was not sweating. Gandalf, who had wisely retired and was smoking near the place where they had tied the ponies, would not be able to get him out of this one. “Well,” he said. “I mean. It… seemed obvious?”

This did nothing to alleviate the Dwarves’ suspicion. “Do you speak Khuzdul, Master Baggins?” Ori asked tentatively.

“Of course not,” said Bilbo, and for once, it was the truth; he did not, in fact, speak Khuzdul, though he would have loved to learn.

The complete truth was that it was somewhat difficult to travel for months with thirteen Dwarves and not pick up a few things along the way, especially when most of them swore more often than not. Especially when one of them was Nori. By the end of the journey, the company had collectively decided to ignore the fact that Bilbo had acquired an honourable (or dishonourable) lexicon of curses and insults.

(This had been conveniently resolved when Dain had given him the title of Dwarf-Friend after being crowned. After that, Nori had taken it upon himself to fill in the gaps in Bilbo’s sketchy Khuzdul vocabulary. For the record, Bilbo had not asked him to do this, Nori just thought it was funny.)

“I just… picked up a few things,” Bilbo hedged. “In my travels, and such.”

Oin perked up, shoving his trumpet deeper into his ear, which, in Bilbo’s opinion, may be the root of his hearing problem, or at least contribute to it. “You have dwarven acquaintances?” he asked.

Bilbo stayed resolutely silent, since he did not quite like where this conversation was headed, and looked down at his hands, which had started to be travel-grimed.

Unfortunately, the Company seemed to interpret this as a confirmation, and they suddenly grew very enthusiastic.

“Where are they from?” asked Bombur.

“What are their names?” asked Dori.

“Are they from the Blue Mountains?” asked Gloin.

“Bâhutharkûn?¹” asked Bifur.

“He must have known them well, if they used Khuzdul in front of him,” Ori whispered to Nori.

“That, or they were pissed,” replied Nori.

“Do you think we know them?” asked Kili.

“Chances are, they’re related to at least one of us,” said Fili.

“Our cousin Fruma has been to Bree before, perhaps you’ve heard of him?” asked Bofur.

“What did you say about Fruma?” asked Oin, aiming his trumpet at Bofur. “Because I once commissioned a table for my workshop from him, and that dur-rugnul² delivered me the shabbiest slab of stone I’ve seen in my life. Mahal Himself would deny him access to his Halls.”

“It’s possible,” Balin told Dwalin. “We’ve all taken the East Road before, it’s not that far from Hobbiton.”

“I don’t like it,” Dwalin muttered. “Dwarves should not go around and use our language in front of outsiders.”

Bilbo tapped a little rhythm on his thighs with his fingers, waiting for it to pass. Besides the questioning, he could feel a heavy gaze fixed on him. Not looking up was torture; meeting that gaze head-on would be worse.

At last, Thorin snapped, “Enough.”

The others stopped abruptly at his command, Oin in the middle of a rant about Fruma’s piss-poor carvings.

“Well?” Thorin said. “Speak up, Halfling. Who are these Dwarves who taught you our sacred, hidden tongue?”

Bilbo huffed an annoyed breath. “First, I have a name, it's for using. Second, I know enough to recognize a swear word in any language when I hear it after someone spills their broth. And third, I will not tell you who taught me any word I may or may not know, as I would not want to incriminate anyone. It’s evidently a sore subject…”

“It’s not sore, lad, we’re simply curious,” Balin intervened.

Bilbo pressed his lips together. “It seems a little sore to me,” he said, gesturing at the way everyone had closed in on him during the questioning. They all more or less took it as a cue to relax their stance, but his point was already made. “In any case, I don’t want to get anyone in trouble. No, don’t insist, I’ll not say.” He made a show of zipping his mouth shut, and decided that this argument was rather clever of him. “I would also like to point out that at least three of you have spoken your sacred, super secret hidden tongue in the last five minutes, and that one of you speaks it exclusively, so…” He made a vague gesture with his hand. “You may want to work on your discretion, is all I’m saying.”

This did the trick of stopping the flow of question, but did surprisingly little to endear him to the company.

Not that they treated him badly, but he could see the curiosity in their eyes, and the incomprehension at being denied answers. It was a by-product of holding them at arms’ length; Bilbo could not be surprised that the distance was reciprocated, but it could make him sad, and it did, and it could make him afraid that he had lost something he could never get back, and it did.

So the days passed, and while the tension in the group ebbed (and the Dwarves decided that it was unnecessary to keep their curses to themselves, since Bilbo already knew them), the tension in Bilbo did not ease.

To relax, he did a quick run down of the timeline in his head every now and then, just to make sure they were on the right track. He did this most nights, after supper; but one night, it occurred to him that he didn’t remember what day it was. Once again, and surely not for the last time, he cursed himself for not packing a notebook to keep his thoughts in order, or a calendar to mark off the days, which tended to all blur together. Lindir, who had tried for years to teach him how to tell the time and date by looking at the stars, would be extremely disappointed in him, but Bilbo was always off by at least three days, and he needed accuracy.

Of course, he went to Balin for this, who told him that it was May 19th.

Bilbo frowned at him. It sounded familiar, though he could not recall that anything special had happened before the trolls. The memory hit him like a welcome brick. “Truly?”

“Truly, laddie. Why? Did we miss your birthday?”

“No, my birthday is in September.”

Dori materialised at Bilbo’s side as if out of thin air. “What day, Master Baggins?”

“Bilbo, please.”

“Aye,” said Dori. “What’s your birthday then, Bilbo?”

“September 22nd.”

Dori nodded thoughtfully. “September 22nd. I’ll make a note of it.” He kept nodding to himself as he walked away.

“Don’t mind him,” said Balin, “he makes a point to remember all of his friends’ birthdays. Expect him to remember yours.”

Bilbo smiled. Every year, without default, he had received a birthday letter from a raven tapping at the window of his study, until he’d left Bag-End. Then, in Rivendell, the raven had taken to delivering the letters by hurling itself at Elrond. Bilbo was lucky that the Elf had a better sense of humour than most people expected from him. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

Bilbo waited for the next distraction—which came mere seconds later, when Kili and Fili practically jumped on Balin to complain about Dwalin pretending that he’d seen fleas on Kili’s coat—and slipped away, heading for the high point of the hill nearby. There was no coverage to speak of, so the rest of the company would easily find him if he was missed, but he didn’t think he would be, and if he laid down on the ground, he could pass for a medium-sized rock, probably.

He sprawled on his back, burying his fingers into the soft earth, and waited for the sky to become fully dark, bathing in his memories.

(A few days before leaving Rivendell, Elladan came to visit him to help him finish packing, and Bilbo had asked in jest if the Elf needed a hand with his own packing. Elladan had become serious.

“Years ago, on the 19th night of May,” he said, “I was wandering the plains between the Old Forest and Rivendell. My brother had returned home after many days of hunting Orcs, but I was seized with doubt and was seeking my path. I did not know whether I should stay in the home of my father, or join my mother across the sea. I looked to the sky for guidance, and suddenly, a star blinked out. One moment, I was looking at it, and the other, it was gone, and I was reminded of the brevity of all living things, and was filled with purpose. Do you know, I believe it was that same year that you met your own fate.”

At Bilbo’s stricken expression, Elladan smiled. “I will not be boarding the ship. I will not make the journey to my homeland with my father. I will stay here, or in Lothlorien with my grandfather, or in Gondor with my sister and my brother-in-law, and I will spend all of my life looking for beauty in the world, and when I find it, I will shield it from what would cause it to fade, until I fade myself.”)

Bilbo let his memories wash over him and allowed himself to enjoy them, even though they, like Elladan’s star, had disappeared, and would not come again. He stared at the sky and thought that somewhere, perhaps not very far from here, an old friend who did not yet know of his existence was having an existential crisis, soon to be followed by a revelation. The world was so large, and Bilbo had only seen a small portion of it, and there was always more to see and love. This time, if the chance was granted to him, he would see more of it, and he promised himself that he would make friends wherever his feet took him.

Speaking of friends, he was only moderately surprised when Thorin’s face entered his field of vision, blue eyes boring into him. “Hello,” Bilbo said breathlessly.

“Hello,” replied Thorin. “I was appointed with the task of reminding you that we should not wander away from the group. May I ask what you’re doing?”

“I am seeking my path.”

“I believe you would have better luck finding it if you looked down rather than up,” said Thorin.

“Maybe,” allowed Bilbo. “Or maybe Hobbits fly, and you’re about to be very impressed.”

“You impress me all the time. Why, only earlier today, I saw you get on your pony, and I was very impressed that you did not fall off.”

Bilbo hated, hated that he wanted to laugh. “Yes, that’s right, mock the Hobbit about his lack of horse-riding skills. I’d like to see you try your hand at a Hobbit specialty.”

“I feel perfectly confident in my ability to eat ten meals a day.”

“See, you say this now, but the tricky thing is sustaining it for a long time. And it’s seven meals a day, thank you very much.”

Thorin smiled thinly, and looked up at the sky. “So,” he said. “What are you doing, really?”

Bilbo hesitated. What could he say without revealing too much of himself, let alone of his accidental time travel? “Well, you see, years and years ago, a star died,” he recited, recalling Lindir’s preaching from back before he’d realised that Bilbo was a lot more interested in hearing about the myths of the stars than in learning their science. “But because of the distance, we’ve been seeing it in the sky all this time. Don’t ask me why, I hate astronomy.”

Thorin did not look impressed with him. Fair enough. “I fail to see your point.”

“My point is that this star has been dead for a long time, even though we still perceive its light, and tonight its death will catch up with us, and we’ll finally see it disappear.”

Thorin, wearing a face that Bilbo knew and secretly called his “what kind of elven nonsense is this?” expression, rolled his eyes and sat beside him. Then, as if Bilbo was physically dragging him down, he let out a heavy sigh and lay down to watch the sky.

Bilbo said nothing. He could say nothing. He didn’t know what to say to this Thorin who did not know him, which was why he’d been avoiding him in the first place. And yet he could not bring himself to wish that he would leave, which might happen if he said the wrong thing.

Worse: what if he spoke, and did not get an answer, and glanced at Thorin, and found no one there with him? What if he was dreaming all of this after all?

Thorin broke the silence first, as if in answer to a question Bilbo had not asked: “I cannot sleep.” His voice was a low rumble, perfectly suited for a confession.

“Nightmares?” Bilbo asked, turning his head to look at him.

It occurred to him too late that they were not yet close enough to bring up each other’s traumatic past, even though he’d heard Balin’s tale of it already.

Thorin did not look surprised at his guess, but his brows furrowed. “I have them too,” Bilbo said apologetically.

Thorin scoffed at that. “What would plague a Hobbit’s nights, I wonder.”

Bilbo almost snapped at him. What would plague his nights? All the people he had lost. All the mistakes he had made. “Oh, you know how it is,” he said lightly instead. “I lost one of my doilies a few years ago. It was one of a set. Very devastating. You couldn’t possibly imagine.”

He simply must have done the worst job in the world in his attempt at levity, because Thorin asked, “Who did you lose?”

Bilbo’s heart clenched painfully in his chest. He could not, would not use Thorin to soothe the trauma of losing Thorin. That would be fucked up. “Please don’t ask me this,” he requested in a quiet voice. “I cannot speak of it.”

Thorin hummed. “I understand.”

They were silent for a moment. “As for your nightmares,” Bilbo continued, since he was evidently physically unable to shut up for longer than five minutes at a time, “I could sing you a story.”

“I did not know you sang. I suppose you’ll say that there’s much I do not know about you.”

Actually, Bilbo had been about to say that he couldn’t imagine living with Elves and not picking up singing, but that was better. “I much rather prefer making up songs to performing them, to be honest, but Hobbits sing, and I’m a Hobbit.”

“What do Hobbits sing about?”

“Mostly about the things we are doing, like walking, or gardening, or cooking. We also have great party songs.”

“You wish to sing me to sleep with a drinking song?”

“No, if you must know, my songs take after the elvish tradition.”

Thorin stiffened at that. “You're fond of the Elves.”

Bilbo thought about his answer for a second. “Yes,” he said. “I am very fond of them.”

He liked their memory and their sadness, and he liked living with them and listening to their stories and he liked the peace and healing they gave him. He had many friends among them, and he would make as many more as he could. He didn’t think it was right that he should feel guilty about this. Even the Company had eventually understood that his affection for them wasn’t less because of his affection for Elves.

“I am very fond of all species, if you must know,” he told Thorin. “I don’t think it’s a bad thing. Besides, my songs may have elvish themes, but they are still mine. Here, let me sing one to you now, so you can judge. It’s in Westron,” he added before Thorin could object. Though he had written a Sindarin version of the one he had in mind, which even Erestor hadn’t found bad.

Thorin hesitated. “You wrote it?”

“Yes. Don’t worry, I won’t pollute your ear canals with something an Elf wrote, even though I think you’re missing out.”

“Sing your song, Master Baggins.”

Bilbo cleared his throat and began. It was one of the last songs he’d written before he left Rivendell, when all the Dwarves had come to say goodbye. Legolas and Gimli had been with them, and in between two tearful conversations around the fire, the topic of their meeting and relationship had come up, and Bilbo hadn’t been able to resist making up a few verses. It was a sickness, really.

He sang softly, hoping that his voice didn’t carry over to the rest of the camp, about their unlikely friendship, forged by war, a competition to kill the most enemies, and admiration for the Lady Galadriel. Bilbo had the presence of mind to change the names, but besides that, he managed to remember the lyrics impeccably.

When he was done, Thorin had a strange expression on his face. “A nice story,” he said, his voice a little on the cold side.

Bilbo could not resist. “Inspired by real events.”

“I would ask you not to make a mockery of our grudges.”

“How is this mockery? Elves and Dwarves existed long before you did, and they were not always enemies.” Thorin scoffed, but Bilbo went on. “I am not inventing anything. Have you heard of Celebrimbor and Narvi? They are the most famous pair, but I’m sure there were others. In the First Age, your people traded with the Elves, built for them and received their craft in return. One of them even took the Kuzdhul name he was given as his common name, and they say his dwelling was magnificent because it had been made by Elves and Dwarves together. Can you imagine what the world would look like if it had continued until now?”

“What is the point of such conjecture?” Thorin demanded. “It didn’t happen, and it can’t possibly happen now. Not after everything that occurred between our people.”

Bilbo sighed. “You don’t know that. No one can tell what will come to pass.” Of course, he only realised the irony of what he was saying once it was said.

Thranduil had told him, during his visit to Rivendell to bid him farewell, that the example set by Legolas and Gimli had already changed the way Elves and Dwarves interacted, at least East of the Misty Mountains. It had only been a few years since the end of the war, but it had done more to bridge the gap between the two races than decades of reluctant trade between Erebor and Mirkwood.

But if Bilbo did what he’d set out to do, Gimli and Legolas would not be part of the Fellowship, and would not then travel with Aragorn to save Merry and Pippin. They would not become the sworn brothers Bilbo had met. So, truly, even Bilbo could not tell what would come to pass.

It was a steep price, but Bilbo would pay anything to give Frodo a chance to live. He would simply need to stick around and find a way to fix hundreds of years’ worth of resentment and prejudice. Easy peasy. He’d do that one morning, and then spend his lunch break figuring out the Gondor debacle.

“What are you thinking of?”

Bilbo jumped a little. “Oh, you know, a lot of things.”

“Such as?”

“What we’ll have for breakfast tomorrow, when we’ll get in sight of the Hoarwell, how to trick governments into diplomacy, cooperation and benevolence, what those flowers were that we saw earlier…”

“We just ate, and you’re already wondering about the next meal?”

Of all the things to question, he’d chosen this one. Honestly. “I’m a Hobbit, Master Oakenshield, this is what we do.”

They were silent for a moment. Quietly, Thorin said, “It was a good song.”

Bilbo turned his head towards him sharply. “Really?”

“Would I say it if it wasn’t true? It was good. Thank you for singing it to me. You have a nice v… Oh.”

Bilbo half sat up. “What is it?”

“The star,” said Thorin, gesturing at the sky. “It blinked out. Did you see it?”

Bilbo smiled ruefully. “No, I was looking at you.”

Thorin pursed his lips. “That ought to teach you to seek your path in the sky. You know what would help? A map. I have one, if you wish to borrow it.”

“I will,” said Bilbo. The map had ended up with him in the end. For years, it had hung over his desk, and he kept forgetting to take it off and hide it when his Dwarves came to visit (they all pretended not to see it, since he’d technically stolen it, though the official version was that he meant to send it back but hadn’t gotten around to it yet). He’d pressed it between pages of the Red Book when he’d left the Shire. He started to wonder where it was, now, if Frodo had taken it with him or given it to Sam with the book, until he remembered that it was, in fact, in Thorin’s pack.

Right.

He sat all the way up. “We should go back to the camp.” Thorin gave him a strange look, but he got up and led the way back down the hill. Bilbo spared a last glance at the sky. Perhaps Thorin was right, and it was all nonsense; or maybe the star only showed his path to Elladan.

(Or maybe Bilbo should have looked at the sky instead of letting himself be distracted.)

“Come, Master Burglar,” Thorin called. “I can’t show you your path in life, but I can at least show you the path to your bed.”

That, Bilbo decided, was better than nothing.

Chapter Text

Somehow, despite his best effort, Bilbo still managed to lose track of the days.

He blamed the Elves for this; there was no calendar in Rivendell, no appointments to keep. He’d lost the habit of knowing what day of the week it was, and once Lindir had decreed him hopeless, he would just tell Bilbo the date when he asked, instead of insisting on teaching him how to read the sky.

His mind drifted, and time went on without regard for him, and when the weather went bad, he discovered that a good way to distract the Company from the rain was to teach them traditional walking songs from the Shire (and a few ones that he had written himself). When the skies cleared, he found himself on better terms with his friends (Thorin excluded; in the most ironic turn of events, he seemed to find Bilbo’s hobbitish songs less pleasing than Bilbo’s elvish songs), and also in an unfamiliar spot.

This was strange; every place they had chosen to set up their camp had been at least a little recognizable. But this one? Bilbo had no memory of it at all. What could he have changed already, that they’d strayed from their path, even by a little bit?

Frowning, he decided to walk around, to try and find where they could have camped the last time. They were close to a patch of woods, so it was possible that it would start raining again and that they’d have to take cover under the trees.

Now that he was looking, the trees did look a little familiar, and so did some of the rock formations. He could have sworn he’d seen a fallen tree just like that before, though why he remembered something like that, he couldn’t say. And that smell…

He stopped short. The smell. “Oh, Bilbo, you fool,” he muttered. He made to turn back, but thought better of it, and headed right for where he knew the entrance of the cave would be. Now, if he could only find…

It was not the sight of his beloved Sting that arrested him, traipsing through gold and grime, old bones cracking under his feet. At the end of the trolls’ lair lay twin swords; one, Bilbo had seen Gandalf wear throughout his life (though he had left it behind when boarding the ship to the Undying Lands). The other…

(At his funeral, the King under the Mountain received two gifts from the Kings of the neighbouring kingdoms. Bard, newly crowned King of Dale, deposed the Arkenstone upon his breast; Thranduil, the Elvenking, placed the sword he had confiscated when Thorin had been his prisoner.

Bilbo watched them do it, and wished he could rip his heart out of his chest and put it in the tomb, with the person it belonged to. His was an unworthy gift, but it was fitting, that all three things Thorin took with him in death had not been there for him when he needed them in life.)

Shaking himself from the memory, Bilbo searched the floor for Sting. He finally dug it out of a century or more’s accumulation of dirt, dust, and other things he preferred not to think about. He took it out of its sheath, just to say hello and make sure it was real, but since he was in a hurry, he resheathed it, tied it at his waist and headed out, to fresh air and to his friends.

Bombur was the closest one he reached. He gave Bilbo an odd look. “Where have you been, Master Baggins?” he asked as Bilbo regained his breath. “We’ve already started on supper.”

“Where’s Gandalf?” panted Bilbo.

“Gone,” replied Dwalin, not far from there. “He and Thorin had an argument. He went off to have his tantrum.”

Bilbo rolled his eyes, counting the Dwarves in his head. “Where are Kili and Fili?”

“Guarding the ponies,” replied Bombur.

“Why all these questions?” asked Dwalin. “Do you suddenly feel the need to keep track of everyone in the Company? I believe Bifur went to take a piss, if you’re interested.”

“Thank you, I’ll add it to my notes,” Bilbo replied absently. “I was simply wondering if you needed someone to bring them their supper.”

“No need, lad,” Bofur said, coming to get more bowls to hand off. “I just sent Ori.”

“Oh, good,” said Bilbo.

Oh, not good. Ori “I’ll give a dragon a taste of the dwarvish iron right up his jacksie”? Not good at all.

“Well, I’d better go,” he said, walking away as fast as he could without alerting everyone to the situation.

“Go where?” asked Bombur.

“Oh, you know. Over there. Bye.”

He stalked off, though not briskly enough not to hear Dwalin say, “He probably went to take a Bifur.”

He caught Kili and Fili halfway between the place where they had tied the ponies and the place where he thought the Trolls may be. “Where’s Ori?” he demanded immediately.

The brothers exchanged a guilty look. Whatever secret telepathic conversation they had, Bilbo wasn’t privy to, but it ended in Fili being elected to tell the story. “Well, you see, we found some trolls, a little way over there, and we sent him to do some recon.”

“You sent Ori to fight trolls?”

“Of course not,” Kili replied.

“He’s only going to gather intelligence while we bring back the others.”

“Who do you take us for?”

“Oh, interesting,” said Bilbo. “You think that Ori is going to stand by and wait for you while trolls are devouring the ponies? Do you ever think about things?”

Fili and Kili stared at him. “How did you know about the ponies?” asked Kili.

Speaking of people who did not ever think about things. “I… I mean, I guessed. Obviously, they took the ponies. Why else would you send Ori to spy on trolls? Ah, ah. Anyway, you’d better get the others.”

“Where are you going?” asked Fili.

“I’m going to make sure that the trolls don’t eat poor Ori.”

“How?”

“I’m going to distract them. Tell your uncle and the others to be discreet when they come.”

Fili nodded solemnly. “Got it. We’ll be there as fast as we can.”

They ran off, leaving Bilbo to wonder if he’d really done the smart thing here. After all, the more people he involved in this, the more he risked losing. But if he did it alone, it was Ori’s life he risked…

“Come on, Bilbo, you old fool,” he berated himself, heading towards the trolls. “You survived a dragon, you can handle a few trolls.” In any case, he’d done it before, sort of, and he knew that no matter what, Gandalf would end up rescuing them by dawn, unless he’d drastically changed the timeline already.

All he had to do was keep a bunch of Dwarves alive by then. How hard could it be?

He hid behind a bush when he came in sight of the back of the trolls. As he’d suspected, they had made quick work of capturing one single Dwarf, and were in the process of arguing over the cooking, while one of them was stirring a large pot, and the other two were tying Ori to an oversized spit.

Bilbo considered barging in and trying to talk them into not roasting and eating his friend for dinner, but he did not like to give up his position just now. He wished that there was some way to convey to Ori that he needed to keep the trolls occupied until the others arrived, or until Bilbo figured out how to save him.

Or just that first part, since surely any Dwarf would laugh at the idea of a Hobbit saving them.

“You should skin him before roasting him,” one of the trolls said, the one stirring the pot (maybe Bert? Bilbo could never remember which was which). Bilbo’s head snapped to attention at that.

“No,” argued another (Tom? That had to be Tom), “the skin’s where all the flavour is.”

“I agree,” said the third (probably William, Bilbo decided), “the skin is where the dirt is, and the dirt is what makes it good.”

“You stupid beasts have no idea what you’re talking about,” Bilbo said aloud. As soon as he did, Tom and William moved to look at where the voice had come from; Bilbo darted back behind his bush, but it was needless, as they assumed that the voice had been Bert’s.

“What did you just say?” asked William.

“He called us stupid beasts, is what he said,” accused Tom. “I won’t stand for it.”

“I didn’t call you that, you’re making it up,” protested Bert.

“Whatever,” said William, “we do so know what we’re talking about. Let’s skin the Dwarf and rub it in dirt; that way we all get what we want.”

“The only thing that’s dirt is your opinion,” Bilbo snapped.

“He did it again! He insulted us again!” cried William.

“Well,” said Tom, “in that case, he’s not wrong. Skin it and rub it in dirt? You’d be losing perfectly good flesh!”

“It’s not good flesh,” argued Bert. “It’s what’s inside that’s good. That’s why we skin it, so we can stop wasting our time with the disgusting part.”

“Yes, and your cooking is bad enough,” said Bilbo, trying to find a path that would lead him to Ori out of sight, or at least, that would allow him to draw Ori’s attention to him.

Bert raised his spoon at the others in warning. “What did you say about my cooking, you ugly cow?”

“I didn’t say anything about your cooking,” said Tom. “But allow me to: it’s terrible and I’d rather eat my own sh…”

He never finished his sentence; at that moment, twelve Dwarves emerged from the forest with great cries and started attacking the trolls.

Admittedly, Bilbo did not speak Khuzdul, but he did have a good grasp on Westron; that being said, he did wonder if he had misused the word discreet all of his life, because it seemed to mean a very different thing to Dwarves.

He stared at the mélée, trying very hard to remember why he was going to all this trouble to save these people. He was very close to Rivendell. He wondered if Elrohir had made it back there by now. In his first life, he hadn’t met him during that first visit, since he’d stuck mostly with the Dwarves, but it would be nice to see him.

But no, of course, he couldn’t give up on the Company. Sighing long-sufferingly, he tiptoed over to the ponies, and with the help of Sting, he cut through the ropes that kept them prisoners. He was largely unnoticed by the trolls and his friends in the chaos of the fight, and he managed to return to the shadows just in time to see one of the trolls lift Ori up by the arms and threaten to quarter him. Immediately, the Dwarves laid down their weapons.

As the Trolls tied them up, Bilbo looked up at the sky. It would be at least a few hours before dawn, and he didn’t think that he could delay them with words for that long. He may be good at talking in circles, but not quite that good.

And where was Gandalf? Presumably, off towards Rivendell; could Bilbo reach him and bring him back before one of the trolls decided to take a dwarven bite? No, no, he couldn’t risk it. That would be too stupid a way to lose a friend.

Ultimately, he didn’t have a choice. He had to win Gandalf time to come back.

Minding his feet, he sneaked closer to the trolls to hear them speak over the shouts of the Dwarves.

“I’m hungry,” complained Tom.

“We know,” said Bert. “You’re always hungry.”

“If he weren’t, he’d be complaining about it anyway,” said William.

“Let me just take a bite, there’s enough of them going around,” pleaded Tom. With these words, he seized Nori’s leg and held him up over his head, ready to gobble him up.

Bilbo prepared to lunge out of the bush to save his friend, but Bert beat him to it, slapping his great hand across Tom’s back. “Put it down, you great lump! You’ll ruin your appetite.”

“Yes, put it down!” cried William. “Plus, it’s not fair that you should have one now, when we’re all hungry the same. That means an extra portion for him.”

“Shut your trap,” snapped Bert. “He’s not getting an extra portion, we’re all getting the same.”

“But there’s plenty of them,” argued William.

“They’re all for the stew, I’m telling you.”

“All but this one,” Tom said, pointing at Nori, whom he had put back down with the others.

“No, if he’s having an entrée, I’m having one too!” And William grabbed at the Dwarves, caught Bifur by the middle and snapped his teeth at him.

“Wait!” shouted Bilbo, coming out of hiding. “I cannot let you do this.”

In surprise, William dropped Bifur to the ground. Bert stood up, and Tom leaned his ugly mug towards Bilbo. “What is that thing?” he asked the others.

“Another one of these,” said Bert, gesturing at the pile of Dwarves, who had all quieted down since Bilbo had shown himself (though there was still some angry muttering in the pile).

“Nah, he’s too little,” said Tom.

“Never mind what he is,” William cut in. “Catch him before he flees.”

“You don’t need to catch me, I came of my own volition.” The trolls made confused noises. “I came willingly,” Bilbo explained. “Look, I’ll tell you plainly, not riddles and no overly complex vocabulary, I heard you from over yonder, and though I understand your hunger, your words made me shiver. Now, and it is for your own sake I say so, I implore you not to eat these Dwarves raw. I may be a simple thief, but I’m also something of a renowned cook in my fief, and…”

“A thief!” exclaimed Bert.

“Did I say a thief?” Bilbo asked, shocked. “Oh, bother me, I meant to say… Well. I meant, only, that… Oh, no, I said it, didn’t I? What a fool. I’m in some hot waters now, I’m telling you. When the Chief Thief hears that I’ve blabbed, he’ll have my skin, I can promise you that.”

“The Chief Thief?” William repeated stupidly.

“So you say there are more of you?” asked Bert.

Bilbo pretended to be confused. “More of us? What? Ahah, no. No, that doesn’t… That doesn’t ring a bell. What an idea. No, no more thieves, and certainly not a whole band.”

“A whole band!” William shrieked.

“Are they all as tiny as you are?” asked Tom, already licking his lips, presumably imagining a dozen more Bilbos to eat as amuse-bouche.

“No, I’m actually the tiniest one,” replied Bilbo. “Wait, no, I take it back, I mean… What others? There’s no one else. I’m alone.”

“He’s lying,” said Bert. “We’ll collect them all once we’re done eating these Dwarves.”

“No, but that was my point,” Bilbo cut in, avoiding a swipe of Tom’s hand, who tried to knock him down. “You should not eat them! My group of thieves and I, that is to say, just me, since there are no others, and definitely none bigger and meatier than me, we’ve been following them for weeks to attempt to rob them, and we’ve seen them eat.” He dropped his voice in a mock-whisper. “They’re filthy, and they’ll eat anything. Oh, I’d be careful, if I were you, and not eat them raw. Not eat them at all, in fact. They probably have all sorts of worms and parasites in their tubes.”

Predictably, the Dwarves started protesting that they certainly did not have parasites, and that they were very clean.

“I’ve seen them!” Bilbo assured. “One of them even has fleas in his coat, I’ve heard them say it!”

The trolls started glancing uneasily at the Dwarves, but Bert frowned at him. “He’s lying to save their skins,” he growled. “I bet there aren’t even a group of thieves with him.”

“I say, we skin him, and see if his friends come to his aid,” agreed William.

“They won’t come to my aid,” said Bilbo, who started to wonder if he’d made a terrible mistake. “You see, I was watching the Dwarves, while they’re busy… Elsewhere.”

“Oh?” Tom said, closing in on Bilbo. “And what are they doing, then, if they’re not taking advantage of the Dwarves being gone to rob them?”

Shoulders slumped in defeat, Bilbo stammered, “I…” But then, he straightened up as inspiration struck him. “Well, they found a more interesting target. We came upon this cave, a little farther in the woods, with lots of shiny things. Look, I even took a sample!” He brandished Sting in front of him, as if very proud of his find.

Recognition hit the three trolls at once, and anger was soon to follow. “The cave!” cried the trolls, and they forgot entirely about the Dwarves and Bilbo, making a run for it.

Bilbo rushed to free Bifur and Nori, who were closest to him, cutting through their bonds and waving away their congratulations for his quick thinking. “I have an unfair advantage,” he muttered as he headed towards Dwalin while the other two went to grab a weapon and assist him.

“A working brain?” said Fili. Bilbo flashed him a smile, and for a reward, he freed the prince next.

“They’ll be back soon, so we’d better hurry out as fast as we can,” said Bilbo.

“You should have told them that the thieves could make themselves invisible,” Kili joked. “That would have delayed them even longer, flailing around trying to hit imaginary enemies.”

Bilbo almost snapped that he had done his best, but that was a good point. Besides, “That would be a sight to see,” he agreed.

“We’ve no time for this,” Thorin snapped at them. Bilbo glanced at him before he could help himself. Dwalin had untied him first, and he was glaring at his nephew and at Bilbo, which was profoundly unfair. “Where did you get the knife?” he demanded.

“In the trolls’ cave,” Bilbo replied. “That part was true, I came upon it earlier.”

“How did you know where it was?”

“I didn’t,” lied Bilbo. Although, he had forgotten where it was, so. Half a lie. “I followed the smell.”

“Why didn’t you alert us?”

He huffed, annoyed now. “There was no time. I told Kili and Fili to do so, and by the way, I also told them to be discreet.”

“Right,” said Kili. “I forgot about that part.”

“I didn’t,” said Fili. “I just didn’t know what you meant by it.”

Bilbo rolled his eyes so far back he saw the inside of his own head. “Bebother it all. And why am I being questioned, exactly? We should be running, and you should be thanking me. Poor Bifur almost got murdered.”

Thorin looked furious to be talked to this way, but Bilbo, who still had trouble looking him in the eye, was not cowed. Finally, he said, in a very pinched voice, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Bilbo replied magnanimously. Then, when Thorin’s back was turned, he caught Bofur’s eye and said, “If that’s what I get, I’ll let you all be snacked on next time.”

Bofur grinned at him. “Hope you don’t foresee something like this happening more than once.”

No, just the once, twice if one counted Smaug, though his threat to grill and devour them had mostly been implicit.

“Let’s go,” Thorin ordered as soon as the last Dwarf had been liberated.

Sadly, they did not manage to go too far; they had barely begun to run when one of the trolls jumped out of a patch of trees to cut them off, roaring in rage and making big movements with his arms. Dwalin slashed at his hand with his axe, drawing blood, but it only seemed to make him more angry, and with an enthusiastic swipe, he sent the Dwarf flying against a tree. His next blow was aimed at Gloin, but Thorin pushed him aside to attack him with his sword.

Meanwhile, the other trolls, who were perhaps a little smarter than Bilbo gave them credit for, had reappeared as well at the back of the company, encircling them and preventing a retreat. Bilbo was stuck in the middle, though he wondered if he may not crawl between two Dwarves and stab a troll leg. But it seemed that the Dwarves were determined to keep him away from the hands of the trolls, who, now that Bilbo considered it, would be very mad at him for duping them.

It was all very noisy, and very overwhelming, and Bilbo thought that this was the stupidest way this could end, since they were not even past the Misty Mountains yet, when suddenly, the thunderous voice of Gandalf resounded: “THE DAWN WILL TAKE YOU ALL.” And it did; the boulder that hid the rays of the sun broke under the force of Gandalf’s staff, and the trolls, though they tried to block them out with their own hands, started to stonify.

The Dwarves cheered, and rushed to thank Gandalf (much more readily than they had to thank Bilbo, he noticed wryly).

“Well,” Gandalf said when he reached Bilbo, after hearing the tale of the night from every member of the Company. “I was worried I’d left you all helpless, but I see that they’re in good hands.”

Bilbo shrugged. “Even with my efforts, I don’t know if we would have made it before dawn, if you hadn’t come.”

Gandalf hummed. “You at least knew to play for time until then, from what I gathered. You knew that trolls turn into stone in the sun?”

Bilbo hesitated, but there was no point in lying, so he nodded. “I’m a scholar. I read it in a book,” he said, certainly not for the last time.

Gandalf smiled knowingly. “A scholar, and an actor.” He chuckled to himself. “A band of thieves. Truly, Bilbo. You never fail to surprise me.”

“Now you know how the rest of the world feels about you,” Bilbo replied with a smile. “Oh, and I saw a couple of swords in the trolls’ cave, I think one of them would suit you.”

“And the other?”

“Th…” Bilbo clamped his mouth shut. Even now, it was difficult. “I suppose,” he relented after a moment, “that Master Oakenshield might be convinced to use a weapon forged by an Elf.”

Gandalf huffed a heavy sigh, and made to follow the Dwarves towards the cave. As he did, he said lightly, “A wizard’s work is never done!”

Chapter Text

Bilbo had never understood why wizards had such a bad rep. Of course, he had only met the one, since he didn’t include the brief moment when the company had encountered Radagast in the woods as meeting someone; but since the one wizard he knew was also something like his best and oldest friend, he was inclined to think that they couldn’t be all that bad.  He assumed that it was much like his reputation in the Shire, and that it was only misunderstandings and differences of opinions being piled on top of each other until only wariness remained.

(He and Elrond often sat together when they opened and read their letters, one of them occasionally reading passages or even entire missives to the other. He did not know what comfort it brought to the Elf, but he remembered acutely what comfort it brought him when he felt a warm hand on his shoulder.

“Frodo lives,” Elrond reminded him as Bilbo shook, from old age and from rage.

“In his own home,” Bilbo muttered darkly. He still had enough strength that the paper of Merry’s letter crumpled in his hand. “That… That insult to the name of wizards stabbed him, in his own home.”

“And yet, Frodo lives,” Elrond said, “and Saruman is gone. He will not corrupt or destroy anyone or anything else again.”

“Do they not come back, when they die? As Gandalf did?”

“Only if it is the will of the Valar. I do not believe that they’ll want to send this one back. They might want a few words with him. I am only sorry that he was too far gone to accept your nephew’s compassion. It would have done him good.”

“He can rot, for all I care,” said Bilbo. Merry had mentioned that Frodo had forgiven the wizard not a minute after the attempted stabbing, saying that since the blade had glanced off on the mithril shirt, no harm had been done, but Bilbo didn’t have that kind of grace in him. Not where Frodo was concerned.

“I meant that it would have done Frodo good,” said Elrond, and he would not say more.)

In any case, he had more curiosity for wizards now than he did the first time around, maybe because he wanted to know which version of the White Wizard they were more similar to.

So far, Radagast was nothing like Gandalf, but Bilbo could not imagine that he was anything like Saruman. In fact, if he reminded him of anyone it was of Porto Baldfoot, a strange Hobbit who lived near the Western end of the Shire, near Little Delving. Bilbo’s mother used to bring him mince pies once or twice a month when Bilbo was a child, to help out, as any proper Hobbit lady would, since Porto was not well enough to work then. He had been found wandering in the White Downs one day, and at first no one had realised that he was a Hobbit, since his hair was not curly and his feet were hairless and his face was not and he was rather on the tall and stocky end. But the Mayor had him taken to his hole and treated there. When he had finally been coherent enough to talk, it had appeared that he had no memory of who he was or what had happened to him, but he had shown such great enthusiasm at the piece of mushroom pie he was offered that it had been decided that he must be a Hobbit, though certainly a queer-looking one, and that he should be given a small, unoccupied shed somewhere and a traditional Hobbit name.

It now occurred to Bilbo that Porto Baldfoot was not a Hobbit at all, but a Dwarf who had hit his head on his way out or from the Blue Mountains, and that it must have seemed more convenient to everyone involved to pretend that he was a Hobbit than having to deal with it. Well.

That was besides the point; the point was that Radagast was like a wizard version of Porto, whom Bilbo guessed was the Hobbit version of some poor Dwarf who may have been mourned by his family. He should definitely look into that at some point.

But also, more importantly, while Bilbo listened to the wizards discuss the Necromancer and the old fortress and all the things Bilbo had not cared about in his first life and were very relevant to his second one, he noticed that Radagast had mushrooms in the pocket of his coat.

And not any mushrooms either! These were sheep’s heads, Bilbo could tell by smell alone. How on Middle-Earth had Radagast managed to get his hands on these at this time of the year? Was that magic? Because if so, it was a thousand times more impressive than anything he’d ever seen Gandalf do.

“Gandalf,” said Radagast, “why is there a halfling sniffing my pocket?”

Bilbo shook himself off from his mushroom reverie. “Begging your pardon,” he told Radagast. He was vaguely aware that he’d lost track of the conversation, which was most unfortunate, and that Gandalf had been given something, he did not know what. “I smelled your mushrooms. That is, I saw them before I smelled them. Good morning.”

Radagast squinted at him. Then, to Bilbo’s astonishment, he leaned towards him and smelled him. And really, at this point, he might as well be doing a Porto Baldfoot impression, the resemblance was uncanny.

“Gandalf,” Radagast said again, “why does your halfling carry the scent of the Gardens of Lorien?”

“Does he?” asked Gandalf.

Radagast seemed surprised. “You didn’t notice?”

“I must admit that I don’t often smell my friends in normal circumstances, and even less so when I’ve been on the road with them without the opportunity to take a bath.” He turned towards Bilbo. “Bilbo, might I…?”

“Certainly not,” said Bilbo, suddenly self-conscious. “Unless Old Toby is grown in Lorien and Lady Galadriel has been posing as my weed vendor this whole time, I do not smell anything like the Gardens of Lorien. Now, if we’re quite done smelling each other, I’m sure we can find something more useful to do, such as finding a way to convince Master Oakenshield to go to Rivendell.”

Radagast, as if Bilbo’s mention of weed had reminded him of its existence, huffed and puffed on his pipe. Goodness, Bilbo missed smoking. He definitely needed to take it up again.

Gandalf raised his eyebrows at him. “How did you know that we were headed to Rivendell?”

“You said yourself that you needed someone to read the map, and since we conveniently headed that way, I assumed that’s where you were leading us, so that Master Elrond could do it.”

“How do you know that Master Elrond will be able to read the map?”

“He’s a very smart and capable Elf.”

“And how do you know that?”

Bilbo stared Gandalf right in the eye. “I read it in a book.”

“One day, you must show me your library, my dear Bilbo. It sounds like you have quite the collection. Though perhaps your selection is lacking in one area.” At Bilbo’s inquisitive sound, Gandalf explained, “The Gardens of Lorien Radagast referred to are not the same as the forest of Lothlorien where Lady Galadriel resides, but the place in Valinor where Lord Irmo lives with his wife, Lady Estë.”

Bilbo tilted his head. “That seems like an inconvenient naming convention.” Gandalf gave this a chuckle. “And he says I smell like these Gardens? Have we considered that perhaps Radagast’s pipeweed has expired?”

“Either that, or you’ve been having secret holidays in Valinor.”

Bilbo gave him a short, slightly hysterical laugh, but he was saved from having to think of something clever to say by the growl of the wargs.

Right. That. “Gandalf,” he said pointedly while the Dwarves dispatched the first beast and tried in vain to prevent the ponies from spooking, “if you know of a secret entrance to the Hidden Valley, now would be a fine time to lead us to it.”

“I do, but it’s across the plain. I’m open to suggestions as to how to reach it while being hunted by a pack of wargs and whatever sent them towards us.”

Bilbo glanced at Radagast, who was staring at his pipe in deep concentration. Bilbo wasn’t certain he had noticed that they were being attacked. “If only someone had a sleigh pulled by really fast rabbits,” he said with a raised voice.

Radagast startled. “Oh, yes, quite,” he said. “I’ll draw them off.”

“Great idea,” muttered Bilbo, rushing towards the Dwarves to tell them the plan. Really, one had to do everything around here.

As far as Bilbo could tell, there was not much difference between the two times he had lived through this fight. Of course, this was entirely unreliable, since he could barely remember it. These were the things that had faded in his memory. Others, like the unfortunate grocer comment, had not.

Anyway, the outcome was the same; the orcs realised that they’d been fooled by Radagast, they stopped chasing him to hunt the Company again, Elves fought them off, Gandalf found the secret passage, and all was well, except for Thorin’s foul mood. Then again, Bilbo had started to expect that.

Apparently, for Thorin, it wasn’t just a phase.

Finally, they came out of the pass. Bilbo took a deep breath. The scent of home, he recalled.

“The Valley of Imladris,” announced Gandalf. “In the common tongue, it’s known by another name.”

Bilbo couldn’t quite conjure up the same sense of wonder he’d felt when he had looked upon Rivendell for the first time. Some things could not be replicated, he was coming to learn, and he was lucky enough to have felt it once.

And in many regards, what he felt now as they came in sight of the last homely home Bilbo had known before going West was an even deeper feeling. It was the feeling of one who saw a beloved place he thought he had left forever.

“Rivendell,” he said, tears pricking his eyes. He could not berate himself for being a sentimental fool. He had loved this place. He loved it still.

He had the stupid urge to point things out to his friends as they navigated the road to Elrond’s house. There was the very spot, over there by that bridge, where Elrond had called Aragorn by his real name when he was twenty, as Aragorn himself had shown Bilbo. Near that tree, Lindir had once called one of Bilbo’s poems “decent enough, for a mortal” (the fact that said poem was about Lindir himself surely did not figure into it). By that pillar, Elladan and Elrohir had reconstituted a fight they’d had with orcs for him and Arwen, who had laughed and pointed out that the fight sounded much less impressive by Aragorn’s account of the event.

Finally, they reached the porch, where Lindir himself welcomed Gandalf, and ignored everybody else, as Lindir was wont to do.

Bilbo managed to be a good little time traveller, staying discreetly behind the group instead of teasing an Elf he didn’t yet know about his stiff posture and poor manners. He turned away, admiring the way the golden light of the afternoon hit the walls just so. Everything was beautiful at that hour.

A horn blared, signalling the return of Elrond and his riders. Bofur grabbed his arm and shoved him in the middle of the group, which Bilbo thought was a little excessive. Loud enough to be heard by Thorin, if not by the rest of the group, he said, “Are those the Elves who fought the orcs with us?”

Sadly, his intervention had very little effect; the Dwarves had already decided that they were attacked, and all he could do was watch the back of his friends’s head as they readied themselves for a battle that would not take place. Bofur’s hat was very dirty.

Elrond dismounted and came to greet them. He and Gandalf exchanged a few pleasantries, before his attention turned towards the Company. “Welcome, Thorin, son of Thrain,” he said.

“I do not believe we have met.”

“You have your grandfather’s bearing. I knew Thror when he ruled under the Mountain.”

Bilbo did not miss Thorin’s stiffness as he replied. “Indeed? He made no mention of you.” He had the distinct memory of rolling his eyes at the rudeness of it all the first time around, but he couldn’t summon annoyance right now. Perhaps it was the benefit of insight, but he couldn’t help attributing some of the wariness in Thorin’s tone to wondering how much Elrond knew about his grandfather’s madness. And unfortunately, the answer was: a lot of it.

“Light the fires, bring forth the wine. We must feed our guests,” Elrond said. Bilbo couldn’t help it. He caught Elrond’s eye as he smiled. “Ah. I see you’ve taken up your old habit of taking unsuspecting Hobbits out of the Shire,” he told Gandalf as they made their way into the halls.

“He is hardly unsuspecting,” replied Gandalf. “In fact, he insisted on coming.”

“To be sure,” Elrond agreed wryly.

“What are they talking about?” Gloin asked, not far from Bilbo.

Bofur beat him to the answer. “They just agreed that you smell like waste.”

Bilbo wasn’t sure how this was possible, what he had done to affect the timeline so much already, but this time, the room he had been given faced East, which meant that he had a more extensive view of the garden.

He couldn’t help the pang of regret that had come when Dori and Nori had been offered his old room, the one that he’d stayed in both during his first visit and when he had taken permanent residence in Rivendell. At least, he had the comfort to know that Dori would prevent Nori from stealing anything that wasn’t attached to the floor.

As he dropped his pack next to the bedside table, he glanced out the window and spotted a patch of tiny blue flowers. Even if he hadn’t been taught the names and properties of all the flowers native to the Shire as a child, he wouldn’t have any trouble recognising myosotis, as they had become a favourite of his mother’s after his father’s passing. She picked them on her rare outings, tied them up with a ribbon and hid them underneath her pillow before sleep.

“Eh, Baggins,” Nori called from the door. “You’re going to be late for supper.” He snorted. “Never thought I’d have to say those words to you, of all people.”

Bilbo gave him a vague smile. “Go on without me. I would like to change before eating, and Elrond won’t be offended.” Nori raised an eyebrow. “I assume,” Bilbo added.

“We’ll save you a plate,” Dori said from over Nori’s shoulder.

“We’ll try,” Nori coughed. The brothers disappeared behind the door, and Bilbo closed it behind them, relishing in one of the first moments of silence and peace he’d had since…

Well. Bag-End, probably. Not that he didn’t love company, and the Company; he was a Hobbit, after all, and he loved these Dwarves. But he could admit that he missed being able to hear his own thoughts. And he had a lot to think about.

Radagast’s words, for one. He had a feeling that the scent he’d mentioned was a metaphorical one, rather than an actual smell, but one could not be too sure with those Wizards. He sniffed his own armpits, and grimaced. That was his own fault, really, he should have known better. Breathing through the mouth, he resolved to take a bath, instead of merely changing clothes. A private bath, though, since he entirely refused to partake in the desecration of Elrond’s fountains.

Soaking in the giant tub that had been provided for him, and blowing bubbles under the surface, he thought about what he knew.

He knew that this wasn’t a dream. He knew that this wasn’t a hallucination. He knew very little else.

He was in the past. He had presumably been sent there, unless he’d unlocked some sort of Hobbit power by smelling the air of Valinor. Which, now that he thought of it, wasn’t impossible; maybe this was just what happened when Hobbits tried to cross the sea, and no one had known to warn him because he and Frodo were the first to try it. And what about Frodo? Would he be sent back to his own past too? Was there another Bilbo waiting for him there? How he wished that he were that Bilbo!

But no. Frodo was not born yet, and that was that. He couldn’t let himself despair of it, or he would be unforgivably late for supper, instead of merely fashionably so.

What else?

If Radagast was to be believed, Bilbo had gone past the shores, only, he had no notion of it. That was troubling. What if he had been given a mission, or some kind of clue, or a clue to decode the clue?

“Think, Bilbo, you old fool,” he told himself.

The Gardens of Lorien. Of all the places to go in the Undying Lands, that was the place Radagast had recognised. Bilbo didn’t know much about what was in Valinor. He hadn’t asked much about it, thinking that there would be time to discover it himself, the more fool him. And now, he couldn’t very much ask Gandalf about it, since the goal here was to not arouse suspicion.

He supposed that the idea that he would be in a garden made sense. He didn’t know who Irmo and Estë were, but it may be worth inquiring, if he could.

He could not quite shake the feeling of wrongness, and it was not until he had dried himself off with Elrond’s ridiculously soft towels and gotten dressed that the reason for it dawned on him.

(Bofur sat with him after the funerals. Bilbo tried very hard not to be self-centred and remember that he was not grieving alone, but he could not manage more than a wordless mumble.

Thankfully, Bofur did not mind it. He patted Bilbo’s arm in sympathy and did not break the silence until Bilbo was ready.

“Where do Dwarves go when they die?” he asked. His voice was the steadiest it had been since he had found out that Kili and Fili had not survived the battle.

“We go to the Hall of Mandos,” replied Bofur. “In a room aside by Mahal from the rest, where we gather with our ancestors and wait for the world to end, when we will be given the task of rebuilding it.” He paused. “Hobbits?”

Bilbo shook his head. “I have no idea. We’re not a religious people.”

“Well, wherever they go, I’m sure visitations can be arranged,” Bofur said. Bilbo could tell that he was saying it to be kind, but he could not take comfortable lies at the moment.

“I will never see him again,” he said, testing the words he had been thinking for days. “I will never see him again.” His eyes filled with tears. “I will never see him again.”)

He had gone for healing, yes. He had gone for Frodo. He had gone with a tiny hope at the back of his mind that he may run into Aulë and beg him for just a minute with Thorin. Whether that had happened or not, he had no more memory of it than of the rest, and he had no right to be sorry for it when he’d been avoiding actual, alive Thorin for the entirety of his second life.

He had no right, but he was sorry for himself anyway.

Whatever the Valar had in mind for him when they sent him back, Bilbo didn’t know; he imagined that they would have liked him to be careful, to change only what was necessary, and leave the rest alone. But Bilbo was not made of such strong stuff; the first time he had come to Rivendell, he had stayed mostly with the Dwarves and Gandalf. This time, he could not resist going off to find old friends.

He found two of them in one of the libraries the next day, though one of them was easier to recognise than the other.

“Not bad, Estel,” said Elrohir, bending over a small human child and examining a piece of parchment. “You made a lot of progress while I was gone. Father must be pleased with you.”

The child nodded enthusiastically. “Do you think Elladan will be impressed?”

“Yes, but my brother would be impressed by any little thing,” Elrohir declared dismissively. “Approval easily given is worth little. Seek mine instead.”

“Lindir said the same thing about you,” Estel pointed out.

Elrohir scoffed. “Lindir is a stuck-up…” Bilbo cleared his throat, cutting Elrohir off from finishing whatever delightful thing he was sure to say next. “What is this?”

“Good morning,” said Bilbo, coming further into the room. “And well-met. I’m Bilbo Baggins, of the Shire.”

“Ah,” said Elrohir. “Well-met, Master Baggins. I’m Elrohir, son of Elrond.” He placed his hand flat on the child’s head. “This is my foster brother Estel. Master Baggins,” he told Estel, switching to Sindarin, “is the Hobbit who travels with the Dwarves .” He made a show of wrinkling his nose at the mention of Dwarves, which made Estel laugh.

Bilbo, not so much. “Please, do not mock my friends. They may not share your culture, but they are good-hearted and deserve respect.”

Elrohir did not look so pleased with himself now. “Forgive me, Master, I did not know that you spoke our language.”

“Even if I did not, you should not make fun of them,” insisted Bilbo. “They are better than you think.”

“I’ve never met a Dwarf before,” said Estel. “Adar told me not to disturb them, but if you are their friend, could you introduce me?”

Bilbo glanced at Elrohir, unsure whether he was allowed to say yes, but Elrohir shrugged, unconcerned. “Could you?” he asked Bilbo.

“Of course. I’ll introduce you both, if you promise to be kind, and not to tease them in Sindarin.”

“I’m always kind,” Elrohir retorted. “As for the other thing, I promise to only tease them in Westron.”

Bilbo half-expected Elrohir to forget about the conversation completely, or perhaps to need Estel to remind him later; but he strode in the next time they were gathered for a meal, holding the child by the hand. Bilbo tried to find Aragorn in Estel, in the way he moved or smiled or spoke, but with decades between the two versions, he could not find much.

This was maybe the queerest thing Bilbo had experienced so far. To be sure, the whole thing was strange, and he was travelling with friends who had died, whom he’d mourned, some of them fairly recently. But also, one of his good friends, the future King of Gondor, who had led a war against Mordor and healed Little Merry Brandybuck with his own hands and spent countless nights telling Bilbo about his adventures throughout Middle-Earth, was ten years old, being dragged through the room by his future brother-in-law.

This wasn’t a dream, Bilbo was pretty sure, because though he had some imagination, he didn’t think he would have thought of that.

Elrohir came first to Elrond’s table to bow to his father and Gandalf, and, to Bilbo’s delight, he even bowed a little to Thorin. Then, grabbing and lifting Estel by the armpits, he glided over to Bilbo’s side, dropping the child unceremoniously in front of him. Bilbo tried not to remember the one time he had been obliged to pretend that he hadn’t seen and heard Aragorn and Arwen speak in low voices below the window of his room. It was better for his overall sanity.

“Good evening, Master Baggins,” Elrohir said, keeping his voice and expression as neutral as possible.

“Hello, Elrohir, and Estel.” He stood up and cleared his throat, though calling on his friends’ attention was not needed; they had all ceased speaking as soon as the Elf and his charge had approached, and were now ogling them and Bilbo. “Allow me to introduce you. This is Fili, Kili, Balin, Dwalin, Oin, Gloin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Dori, Nori and Ori. Everyone, these are my new friends, Elrohir and Estel, son and foster-son of Elrond. Estel had never met a Dwarf before, and very much wanted to.”

Estel came up to the table and smiled, bowing his head. “Well-met, friends of Master Baggins,” he greeted them, so politely Bilbo saw Dori place his hand over his chest, as if to prevent himself from swooning. “I hope you’re enjoying your stay here.”

Several Dwarves opened their mouths, but before they could say anything disagreeable, Bilbo pretended to cough to draw their eyes, and then glared at them the way he had when he had seen a twenty-five-year-old Frodo Baggins try to sneak into his pantry to steal from his stash of Old Toby. He didn’t know if he managed to instil the fear of Iluvatar into the Dwarves the way he had into young Frodo’s heart, but they at least knew enough to hold their tongues.

“They’re thrilled to be here,” Bilbo told Estel, who beamed at them.

“I’m so glad,” he said. “Oh, will you come to the Hall of Fire tonight? I heard Lindir say that you sang a song yesterday, I’d love to hear it!”

Several Dwarves cheered. “Of course you would! There’s a good lad,” said Gloin.

Bilbo glanced up at Elrohir. “Do you think they’ll be allowed to?”

Elrohir shrugged. “If not, we’ll have to convince Father. Lindir was properly scandalised when he told us about it, we must make it happen again.”

“Which one is this Lindir, again?” asked Kili.

“Don’t bother, he’s not the one you were flirting with,” Dwalin replied.

Elrohir smirked. “What a pity. Please, do flirt with Lindir. Someone ought to.”

Estel narrowed his eyes. “What does flirting mean?” he asked Bilbo.

Bilbo had already been obliged to explain these things to Frodo and had forsworn doing so ever again, and especially not to someone he had seen flirt with his future wife with his own two eyes. “I’m sure I don’t know,” he told Estel. “Why don’t you ask Master Elrond? And do not forget to tell him that it’s something you heard Elrohir say.”

Elrohir widened his eyes. “Why,” he said flatly in Sindarin.

“I’m going to have to watch a prince of Dwarves try to engage with Lindir because you have a bad sense of humour,” Bilbo replied cheekily. “And what do you know? I also have a bad sense of humour.”

Elrohir seemed torn between being concerned for his near future and being amused, which was usually the state Bilbo liked to leave people in. “Come, Estel,” he said, distracting the boy from looking at the weapons Fili had laid on the table in front of him. “Let us go to our own repast. I look forward to hearing your songs,” he told the Dwarves before leaving, murmuring at Estel and sending Bilbo wary glances.

Satisfied, Bilbo turned back to the Dwarves, who were, once again, staring at him. “What?” he asked. “What have I done now?”

“You speak their gibberish,” observed Oin.

Oh, that. Confound it all. “It’s called Sindarin,” he said, taking his seat at the table. “And I speak a little of it.”

“How little?” demanded Dori.

Bilbo grimaced. “Oh, you know. Enough to get by.” Unsurprisingly, he managed to convince no one of this. “That is, I am a scholar.”

“So we hear,” drawled Dwalin. “A lot.”

“Well, elven lore and history are some of my fields of study. So, of course, I had to pick up a smidge of the languages, because not everything has a translation, and not every translation is good.” That would be easier to explain than Glorfindel bullying him into learning Sindarin to prevent him from wallowing in his own misery.

“Back up,” said Bombur. “Your field of study is elvish stuff?”

Bilbo sighed. “One of them.”

“Mahal’s toenails,” Ori whispered, horrified.

“Thorin said you had a taste for the Elves, but this is a little far,” Nori said.

Bilbo opened his mouth, tripped on the word, then changed course. “Master Oakenshield said what?”

“Nothing, laddie,” Balin assured him. “Don’t listen to them. You’re free to like what you like. Everyone’s taste is different.”

“There’s different,” Nori muttered, “and then there’s being…” He waved his hand looking for the right word.

“Mebelkhags mashagul,” said Bifur.

“Exactly,” agreed Nori, before translating for Bilbo: “Elf-mad.”

Bilbo frowned at him. “If you dislike the Elves so much, why do you take their belongings with you?” he asked. Nori raised his eyebrows. “There’s a salt shaker poking out of your sleeve.”

Nori carefully put his hands under the table top as Dori glared at him. “Point taken.”

“Besides,” Dwalin pointed out, “he’s not the only one who has a taste for Elves.” He smirked at Kili, who grimaced.

“It was a joke!”

“Leave him be,” chided Bilbo. “And again, I do not have a taste for Elves. I do like them, but not in the way I feel you’re implying.”

“You are free to do whatever you like in your free time, Bilbo,” said Bofur. “Who are we to judge if that is an Elf?”

That was it. Resistance was futile, Bilbo knew it from experience. “Fine,” he declared. “I will, thank you for your approval.”

Bofur snickered, raising his glass to concede Bilbo’s point. Bifur shook his head and muttered sadly, “Afbâlu galikh Zantulbasn¹.”

Ori, looking quite more purple than Bilbo thought was normal, whispered, “You’re not really going to do this, Master Baggins, right?”

Bilbo chewed on his salad before answering. “Do what?”

“An Elf,” said Dori, putting his hand on Ori’s forearm as if to soothe him, or prepare him for the worst.

“I don’t know. Apparently, I’m Elf-mad. I hope none of them looks my way tonight, or who knows what will happen?”

“Yes, that has been our long-time fear with Kili as well,” Dwalin deadpanned, dodging Kili’s fist when he tried to retaliate with a punch.

Gandalf approached him after the meal, grumbling in his beard. “I’ve had my concerns about you, my dear Bilbo, but I can at least congratulate myself on having brought someone with sense along on this quest.”

“You think I have sense?” asked Bilbo, not feigning his surprise. What in the world could have possibly led him to that conclusion?

“You at least have enough to surpass the collective sense of the Dwarves in your Company. Ah, that’s not quite the compliment you think this is,” he added with a smile, which Bilbo returned easily.

“What have they done to offend now? Besides making themselves a nuisance to the Elves? No, wait, let me guess. Master Oakenshield does not want Master Elrond looking at his map.”

“This fool would prefer to see his quest fail rather than placing his trust in an Elf. Not, mind you, one of the Elves who betrayed him, but one who opened the doors of his house to him and his kin. If it were that great fool of a silvan Elf king, I would… Are you quite alright, Bilbo?”

Bilbo forced his teeth to stop grinding and schooled his features into a polite smile. “Hm? Oh, yes, quite.” It was not Gandalf’s fault that he didn’t remember that Bilbo liked Thranduil. Though technically speaking, he also liked the Dwarves, and that had not prevented Gandalf from speaking ill of them, whether or not they could hear it. Bilbo would have to work on all of that. “Well, good luck convincing him.”

“Actually,” Gandalf said, “I was counting on you to help me.”

“Me?” Bilbo laughed. “How can I possibly help with that? It’s not like he would listen to me. Apparently, he thinks I have a penchant for Elves. If I tell him that he can trust one of them, he’ll either assume that my affection for them is blinding me to their treachery or that I’m the treacherous one.”

Gandalf gave him a piercing look. “So you won’t try?”

Bilbo tried to come up with a way to say that Gandalf would eventually convince Thorin of cooperating without needing Bilbo’s help. Tricky. “I think that if you’re hoping to pull the Bilbo card on him at some point in the quest, you ought to wait until it has a chance of working.” He looked around him to make sure no nosy Dwarves or Elves were eavesdropping, and dropped his voice just to be safe. “Perhaps instead of convincing him to trust an Elf, you should convince him to double-cross Master Elrond.”

Gandalf cocked his head to the side. “Should I?”

“He can’t think that you’re conspiring against him if he thinks you’re conspiring with him,” explained Bilbo. “You’re not going to tell Master Elrond why you want the map read, are you?”

“I suspect he already knows.”

“Of course he does, but that’s not your problem,” Bilbo dismissed impatiently. “Just tell Master Oakenshield ahead of time that you plan on lying to Elrond. Make him your ally.” He huffed. This was way too much effort for something that they didn’t need. Bilbo remembered the way into the mountain just fine, he didn’t know why he bothered, honestly, except that for some reason, the thought of leaving Rivendell so soon was unbearable. He needed more time.

“I believe you’re right,” Gandalf said, laughing to himself. “It is awfully mischievous of you to suggest, but I’ll go along with your plan.”

Bilbo was seized by a sudden rush of fear. “Oh,” he said. “Do you think I’m a bad person?”

Gandalf shot him a surprised look. “Bad? Now, now, Bilbo. Of course not. You’re clever, that’s all. There’s no shame in that. Be careful, though, or people will find you as meddlesome as I am.”

Meddlesome, Bilbo could live with. It was strange, though, being associated with Gandalf in that way. Of course, they had been associated together before, since they were great friends, but that was because Gandalf lowered himself to the level of a Hobbit. They smoked and laughed and shared gossip over tea. Bilbo had never been likened to the wizard before, had never been made accomplice to his schemes, or even made aware that they existed outside of Thorin’s paranoia. He hadn’t exactly been included in the group for the first part of the journey, but he also had never been othered from mortaldom either.

But he couldn’t pretend that he didn’t feel that strange otherness. He felt so far away from the Dwarves. Was this why he couldn’t bear to leave Rivendell?

“Do you want to tell me what’s bothering you?” asked Gandalf, drawing Bilbo out of his murky thoughts.

Bilbo desperately, desperately did. “I’m afraid that would only bore you to death, and if you die, that’ll leave me alone to deal with everyone. No thank you, though it was kind of you to ask.”

Gandalf chuckled. “Well. If you change your mind, you know where to find me. Supposing that I manage to convince Thorin by tonight, will you come to the reading?”

Though he dearly missed looking at maps, which were some of his favourite things to study and look at, Bilbo did not think he would be able to look at this one and not fall into a pit of sombre memories. Besides, right now, he needed to be a good Hobbit and socialise more than he needed to be a good burglar. “Prior engagements,” he begged off. “Don’t worry about it, my friend, I’m sure you’ll do a good job nonetheless.” And even if he didn’t, the moon runes wouldn’t be readable for a few days more. Hopefully, that would be enough to figure out his next steps.

Chapter Text

It took them a few songs, but the Dwarves eventually relaxed enough to enjoy the Hall of Fire. The sight of it, some of Bilbo’s dearest friends sharing music with others of Bilbo’s dearest friends, warmed him even better than the fire did, though he would have given much to see Thorin and Balin amongst the crowd as well. He suspected that Thorin’s presence would somewhat put a damper on the others’ mood, though, which was unfortunate to think about. For so long, Bilbo had not been disposed to think ill of his fallen friend, but now that he was not-so-fallen, he had to face the reality of who Thorin really was, instead of who he’d remembered him to be, and that reality was that Thorin could be very unpleasant when he was not disposed to please.

“You seem gloomy,” remarked Fili, sitting down in the seat next to Bilbo. “I thought you liked this sort of thing.”

“I choose to believe that you’re talking about the singing, and not about my so-called Elf-madness.”

Fili grinned, though half his attention was on his brother, who was trying to make his audience laugh with a punny tale. “Don’t worry, I’m not one to judge. Will you sing something tonight?”

Lindir had been kind enough to give Bilbo a notebook, in which he had intended to take notes about the adventure; so far, all he had written down were verses which he half-remembered, and a few which were clearer in his mind and which he didn’t want to lose. If he died, at least, there would be a trace of his work left. That being said, looking down at his tiny handwriting, he was reluctant to present his poems. It felt like cheating, somehow, to pretend that he’d come up with his work on the spot, that he hadn’t worked hard on them in his first life.

“Not tonight,” he told Fili. “What about you? Are you going to delight us with the tale of how you rescued your cousin from the ghost of the blue mountains, except it was really Kili wearing a sheet with two holes for the eyes?”

“No, but I might tell the tale of how I sent an assassin after whoever told you that story,” Fili replied cheerfully. “Let me guess. Was it Gloin?”

It was indeed, though Gloin may be confused at the accusation, since Bilbo would not hear that story for about fifteen years. Bilbo mimed zipping his mouth shut and, eager to end the conversation, claimed that his throat was dry and that he needed some tea.

He wandered out of the hall, tempted to actually go fetch himself a hot beverage, when he caught sight of a lonely figure on the porch, standing ramrod straight at the edge and looking out into the distance.

“Good night,” Bilbo said, joining him at the guard rail. Erestor inclined his head.

“Master Baggins, good night. I hope you are enjoying the Hall of Fire?”

“Very much, but I needed to get some fresh air. I do love the music.”

“I tend to prefer poetry,” Erestor said. “But a little music is fine.”

They stood side by side for some time in silence. Erestor, Bilbo knew, enjoyed his silence. He was very thoughtful; Glorfindel had often teased his statue-like manners.

Speaking of which. “I think Glorfindel is not at home?”

“He is with the Rangers this night, as he has been since you came. He and the other son of Elrond are chasing the Orcs which were after you.”

“I thought so.” Though he had expected it, for he would have seen Glorfindel if he had been there, it still stung to have missed him. “I so wanted to see him. To meet him, I mean. My mother was fond of him.”

Erestor gave him a sharp glance. “Belladonna Took,” he said. Bilbo perked up. “I might have known. It has long been my thought that there is one family of Hobbits who dares to venture out of the Shire. Of course, you are related to them.”

This may have been true once, but Bilbo had seen a non-Took Baggins, a Brandybuck and a Gamgee in Rivendell, and all three of them had gone farther than Bilbo or Belladonna ever had. “I am a Baggins, technically,” he told Erestor. “But yes, I take your point.”

“I was informed by Gandalf that she had passed. Glorfindel was sorry for it, and so was I, though I knew her less than he did.”

“Thank you. I wanted to write, for I knew she had friends here, but I did not know how, or I did not dare.”

“The news came anyway.” Erestor graced him with a rare smile. “For the record, Master Baggins, either Elrond or I open the mail in Rivendell, and neither of us would resent getting your letters.”

“You’re very kind. And not very careful, I might add. You do not know what we Hobbits consider news, and I am long-winded even by our standards.”

“It would be an entertaining distraction from harvest yields and the like.”

“Bilbo!” cried Elrohir, emerging from the Hall of Fire and looking about for him, holding Estel by the hand. At the sight of Erestor, he straightened up and gave a polite bow. In a more formal tone, he said, “Master Baggins, I tire of the performances. We, Estel and I, had the idea of giving you a tour of the house.”

“Isn’t it past Estel’s bedtime?” Erestor cut in. As if on cue, Estel yawned, though he valiantly attempted to hide it. “If you wish, I can take him to his bedroom, so that you can entertain our guest.”

Estel said, “I am not tired yet.” The sentiment was somewhat ruined by another yawn, and the fact that he could barely keep his eyes open.

“That would be lovely,” said Elrohir, lifting Estel by the armpits as if he weighed nothing and handing him to Erestor, who received him with a gracious, albeit slightly forced, smile. “Come, Master Baggins,” Elrohir went on, ushering Bilbo away speedily. He whispered, “I apologise for rushing you, but I think that your dwarven prince is planning on propositioning Lindir in the next few minutes, and I would rather be out of range when he discovers that the idea came from me.”

Bilbo laughed. “Well, Elrohir. Where is your courage?”

“Present me with an orc army, and I will fight to my last drop of blood,” Elrohir declared. “But Lindir gets shrill when he is angry and my father has very sharp ears. Let us move, quickly.”

They ended the visit with one of Bilbo’s favourite parts of the house. Of course, Bilbo knew the layout already, but it was amusing to see Elrohir take his role as a guide so seriously.

“And finally, this is the Hall of History,” Elrohir announced, spreading his arms grandly as they climbed the stairs and crossed the corridor into the hall.

The hall was on the first floor of a circular building, the centre of which was roofless and filled with vegetation. Most prominently, a pale tree climbed up towards the sky, its leaves glowing a soft silver under the beams of the moon. Directly in front of them was a staircase which descended into that garden, its posts attached on both sides to a balustrade which bordered the edge of the floor, some sort of blue-coloured ivy creeping over the rail. The wall opposite that balustrade had no windows, but there were doors on both sides of the entrance which suggested that there were rooms surrounding this hall.

“Throughout the century, nay, the millenia, my father has collected some artefacts of more or less importance, and some of them we are exposing here, for anyone who is willing to see,” recited Elrohir. He gestured at the doors on either side of them. “These lead to the library, in which he keeps books and manuscripts or engravings in special conditions to preserve them. I don’t have the keys, unfortunately, but if you have the chance, I recommend taking a look later. It is also where my father’s private collection is, where he hides what he pilfered from his childhood home.”

“Pilfered!” exclaimed Bilbo. “I am shocked and appalled. What would your father say to hear you blacken his name thus?”

“I believe he would tell Erestor to stop telling us that he pilfered his childhood home,” mused Elrohir. “Come on.”

Elrohir started them on the path, remarking on some of the memorabilia they passed. “If you wish, I can have one of our loremasters give you a more detailed visit,” he said when he noticed the stars in Bilbo’s eyes. “I must admit, my craft lay in this.” He directed Bilbo to the tapestry on the far side of the room, where a large tapestry was displayed on the wall.

Bilbo was familiar with that piece, but he was glad when he still felt the awe that came when he contemplated something especially old, though he knew that parts of it were recent additions.

“This is my family tree. Arwen and I started it when we were young,” Elrohir said, pointing at his father’s name, then his mother’s, and at his and his siblings below; then, he indicated the gilded threads which linked them to another branch of the tree. “Estel was not the first child my father fostered, though it is said he may be the last. The first was Valandil.” He smiled wistfully as his eyes found the name. “He was an old man when my brother and I were born, but he held us and pretended to steal our noses. He is the only older brother I’ve had. He taught me all I know about being one myself.”

“You were lucky to have so many siblings,” Bilbo said, scarcely thinking about his words. His cheeks warmed when Elrohir looked back at him with an arched eyebrow. “That is, I’m an only child. I can’t imagine what it’s like, to have so many.” To lose so many. Maybe lucky wasn’t the right word.

But Elrohir gave him a small smile. “So I was,” he agreed. “Very lucky. And one day, I will add Estel’s name to the tapestry.”

His real name, presumably. “You know, if you ever want to take on another project, we in the Shire have enormous family trees.”

“I will think about it,” laughed Elrohir. He lifted his head suddenly, his ears twitching. “Ah, I think my father’s business with your friends is done for the night. What is that about, by the way?”

“Gandalf asked me to help Master Oakenshield with his research. We are attempting to decipher a map that his father left him. It’s very academic for me, of course, I’m only doing this for scholarly purposes.”

“Of course.” Elrohir did not seem to buy his fib, which, given the lack of effort Bilbo had put into selling it, wasn’t surprising. Then again, the Elf did not seem overly interested in the subject. “Shall we go back? I wish to bid my father a good night, and warn him that Lindir may be having a fit.”

“Go ahead,” said Bilbo. “I’ll find my own way back. I want to look at this a little more.”

Elrohir inclined his head and walked away, letting Bilbo circle back to the entrance at his own pace. But instead of getting out, he descended the dozen steps into the round garden. At the foot of the stairs was a path which headed to the centre, until it met the tree, where it divided in two and met on the other side to form a circle. Bilbo followed the path there, and sat against the tree, looking up through the hole in the ceiling. Through the branches, he could just make out the moon, whose beam gave his surroundings an eerie glow. And, of course, he saw Gil-Estel, and whispered his usual greeting.

“There you are.”

Bilbo almost had a heart attack; luckily, Hobbits had strong constitutions. Above him was Thorin, leaning against the balustrade. Bilbo must have been more tired than he’d thought, because he had the inane thought that looking down on people suited Thorin perfectly. It gave him a regal air. Very fetching.

Bilbo blinked up at him. “I—Sorry, I had no idea you’d be looking for me.”

Thorin looked disgruntled, though he couldn’t very much deny that he had, in fact, been looking for him. “I am returning from the meeting. Gandalf tried to convince me to show my grandfather’s map to the Elf.”

“Master Elrond,” corrected Bilbo.

“It seems that he has now changed tactics, and instead of appealing to my reason, he now wants me to double-cross the Elf.” At Bilbo’s grave look, he amended, “Master Elrond.”

“Fancy that. Gandalf? I wonder that he thought of that.”

Thorin did not seem very impressed with him. “He didn’t. You did, didn’t you?”

“How do you figure?”

“It seems like something you would have cooked up.”

“Is that what you think of me? That I’m a schemer?”

“I don’t know what to think of you, Master Baggins. What I’ve observed is that you have been one step ahead of us all throughout this venture.”

“Only one step?” drawled Bilbo. “Dear me.”

“You have your reasons for being here, which you will not share.”

“Is it not enough that you asked me and I said yes?”

“I asked a lot of folks, and few of them ever said yes. In fact, you have met them all.”

“I’m very sorry for it, but it is not my fault. Nor is it Master Elrond’s.”

“I can’t trust an Elf,” Thorin gritted out.

Bilbo opened his mouth to say he didn’t have to trust him, only to work with him, but what came out was, “Why not?” He rolled his eyes. “No, no, I know. History, precedence, betrayal, all of that. But Master Elrond isn’t like that. He might even help us. Has it occurred to you that he might have some advice regarding dragon slaying?”

“Why would it?”

“Because his father slew Ancalagon, the largest dragon that ever existed?” Bilbo offered. Honestly, why did they teach in dwarven schools?

Undeterred, Thorin said, “It seems that it is his father that we ought to speak to, then.”

Bilbo chuckled. “Well. We can definitely try, but I should warn you, I’ve been talking to him every night for quite a few years now, and so far, he hasn’t replied once.”

“Pardon?”

Bilbo pointed up towards Gil-Estel. “Eärendil. The evening star? That’s Elrond’s father.”

Thorin rolled his eyes and stalked away, muttering “Elf nonsense” under his breath.

“What?” asked Bilbo, getting up at last to follow him. “It’s true!”

The afternoon before the Midsummer moon, Elrond found him on the porch, contemplating the view. “You don’t see many Hobbits so far out of the Shire,” he remarked.

“Thank goodness,” Bilbo replied easily. “I like being the exception. Makes me feel special.”

Elrond’s lips twitched. “In fact, I haven’t seen one in Rivendell since Gandalf brought your mother here. Or, I should say, since she demanded he bring her.”

Bilbo grinned. “I do not think she had to insist very much. Gandalf likes his Hobbits.”

“That he does.” He regarded Bilbo strangely, though not unkindly. “You love this house.”

Bilbo smiled up at him. “I do.”

“You love it in a way I’ve rarely seen in people who have only been here once.”

Well. “I love it as if I could stay here forever,” said Bilbo. He could not stand to lie to Elrond, he realised with some surprise. He could lie to Gandalf, and didn’t really mind it, even though Gandalf was his oldest friend. But there was something distasteful about lying to Elrond. Perhaps it was because he had welcomed him as a matter of course, or because they had both lost a lot, and yet Elrond was still so kind, and Bilbo aspired to be like him.

“You are welcome to do so, if that is your wish,” Elrond told him.

Bilbo swallowed thickly. “I may take you up on that, one day. But I have…” He sighed deeply. “Things to accomplish before I can do so.” Besides, if he succeeded, it was possible that he may want to stay in Erebor. It was equally possible that he would die, or that he would live, but Elrond would board the ship to Valinor eighty years too soon.

And Bilbo might go with him. There were many things to consider, and he didn’t like to do it yet.

Elrond put a hand on Bilbo’s shoulder, chasing these thoughts away. “Do not despair, Master Baggins. I see darkness on your path, but I see light also.”

Bilbo took a few deep breaths to calm himself down. “Thank you. It’s very generous of you to have invited me, when you have no reason to want me around.”

Elrond’s eyes pierced him gently. “A Hobbit who travels with thirteen Dwarves and Mithrandir as their contracted burglar, who speaks Sindarin and writes songs about our legends, who is so quick to befriend my friends and sons? I think I have reasons to want you around.”

“Who doesn’t love an enigma?” Bilbo joked. “Admit it, you want someone to babysit Estel while you take some time off.”

“Are you offering?”

“Certainly! I could provide some references, but I left my address book at home.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

They fell quiet; Bilbo struggled with his next words. “May I ask you something?”

“You do not require my permission.”

 Elves. “Would you mind telling me about the Valar Irmo and Estë?”

If Elrond was surprised, it only manifested in a raised eyebrow. “I would not mind,” he said. “Irmo, or Lorien, which is the name under which he is commonly known, is the Master of dreams and illusions.”

Bilbo’s spirits sank. Was it a dream after all? Was he really in Valinor, stuck in a vision?

“Estë the Gentle, his wife, is the Mistress of healing and rest.”

He blinked up at Elrond. “Healing?” he echoed. That would explain it. It was the whole point of going to Valinor in the first place. To heal.

Was this what this was? Why he’d been sent back? To heal?

“Their dwelling is a place in Aman where the hurt is sent,” explained Elrond. “It is where I shall find my wife Celebrian when the time comes to journey West.”

That was probably the place where he would need to stay when Celebrian found out that he’d let two out of his three children remain in Middle-Earth forever, Bilbo thought. As far as he knew, Arwen would not announce her choice for some years, but he wasn’t sure if Elrond knew about Elladan, even with his prescience. That promised to be an awkward conversation. He did not envy either of them.

“Thank you for telling me,” said Bilbo.

“Knowledge is to be shared, not hoarded. If you have more questions, never hesitate to ask.” He watched Bilbo for a moment. “Will you come to the reading of the map tonight?”

Bilbo shook his head. “I don’t think so. After all, you do need a babysitter.”

Bilbo had not spent that much time with children other than Frodo, except to tell them stories so that their parents could shake their heads at him. He had assumed that his nephew’s talent to bat his eyes and pout his lips when making a request was specific to him, but he was coming to realise that it may just be something all children did.

“Please, please, Master Baggins, tell me another story,” insisted Estel.

Bilbo wondered if it was something he had subjected his own mother to. He didn’t think so; Belladonna would never have withheld stories long enough for him to beg.

“Alright, alright,” he relented, putting on a big show of sighing, as if he were granting a great favour. “Fine, you win, I will tell you one more. But after that, you’ll have to go to sleep, or I’ll get a scolding from Master Elrond.”

“Master Elrond doesn’t scold,” said Estel, settling into his bed and pulling the covers up to his nose.

“Perhaps you’ve never done something to earn a scolding,” said Bilbo. “Let us not begin now, yes? So, a story. A story, let us see.”

Out of nowhere, he felt something like a prickle in the back of his mind. He rubbed at his neck, but the sensation didn’t stop. Strange. Frowning, he met the curious gaze of the child who waited for him to begin his story. He softened as he began.

“In a hole in the ground there lived a Hobbit,” he said.

Bilbo had noticed that Estel’s preferred mode of storytelling was a more interactive sort than what Frodo preferred. “Was his name Bilbo Baggins?”

“No,” scoffed Bilbo. “Though he was a Baggins, his name was Frodo. He lost his parents at a young age, and so, he went to live with his uncle, who had a reputation for being a little mad.” He gave Estel a pointed look, and the child laughed.

“Was his name Bilbo?”

“Yes, very good. Now, our story begins when Frodo’s uncle decided to leave their home forever.”

“Why?"

“Because…” Bilbo looked down at his hands. “Because it was time. He was very old, and he wanted to retire.” Because he was beginning to feel ill-at-ease in his own skin, and he could not figure out what was wrong, and he thought that he might figure it out by doing the very thing which had given his life meaning: going East. Bilbo shook his head. “But that’s Bilbo’s story, and we’re talking about Frodo, who is altogether a much more interesting Hobbit, with a better story. His uncle had left him master of their house, but it was not the only thing he had left him. He also gave him a magic ring he’d found while travelling. One day…”

And he went on, and on, with Estel interjecting now and then to ask questions. Bilbo took care, of course, to change key details, most of them pertaining to Aragorn himself and his part in the story. There seemed little sense in burdening the child with the weight of knowing his own future; he would be burdened by his present soon enough.

But he told him of the Ring, and where it had come from, and where it had been found, and what needed to be done with it. He felt the familiar twinge of guilt as he spoke, since he was all but entrusting a child with the responsibilities of knowing.

If Bilbo failed, someone would know, even if that someone was a child; Estel would grow into Aragorn and remember these stories and do the right thing. If Bilbo didn’t fail, telling this story still would not be in vain; the world ought to know about Frodo, but if it couldn’t, at least one person would.

“And then what happened?” asked Estel.

Bilbo peered at him. He had come to the end of the story; the Ring was destroyed, a nameless king was crowned in Gondor, and the world was saved. Frodo lived. Frodo went home. He didn’t know how to tell this next part. How did one tell a child that the story he had followed eagerly did not end happily? He had never been good at that part. Frodo had cried the first time Bilbo had confessed that the King under the mountain had died in the last battle, and had begged Bilbo for days to take it back. Change the ending.

If only it were that easy.

“Frodo lived in the Shire for a little while,” Bilbo said, losing his storytelling voice to adopt a more conversational tone. “But then, he was invited to go to the Undying Lands with his uncle. They sailed West together to recover and heal.”

Estel sat up. “You went to the land of the Gods?” he cried.

Bilbo almost told him that it was just a story. But something in the boy’s grey eyes stopped him. He had the vivid memory of being plunged into his mother’s fantasy lands, of facing the monsters and exploring the landscapes she fabricated for him with her words, and the disappointment he felt when he realised that they had not left the patch of woods they were playing in, and that his sword was not the golden blade enchanted to always find its target, as she had told him. But the flower crowns she weaved had been real, and her excited eyes had been real, and the hand that held his had been real. He could not deny them.

He smiled at Estel, and said, “I did. But I don’t remember it, sadly, though I imagine that it was very beautiful, with all sorts of friendly people.”

“Why did you come back?” asked Estel. “Did Frodo come back too? Why is he not with you? Did he stay there? Is he back in the Shire with Sam?”

Bilbo dropped his eyes. “He stayed there. I was sent back alone.”

“Why?”

Bilbo had no idea. Something was niggling at him, as if it were searching his memory for an explanation and not coming up with one.

Odd. He hadn’t felt that way since Arwen had tried to teach him guided meditation, years ago, because, as she had informed him, “If you don’t stop thinking so loudly, there will be great strife in the house of Elrond.”

“Why?” repeated Estel, drawing Bilbo back to their conversation.

“Because it wasn’t fair,” said Bilbo. “It shouldn’t have been Frodo, taking the Ring to Mordor and sacrificing his happiness. He only did it because I gave it to him. So I’m having a do over, and this time, I’ll have to destroy the Ring myself.”

Estel made a thoughtful sound, playing with the hems of his sleeves idly. “I guess that makes sense,” he allowed.

Bilbo was relieved that he was still in that age where one did not question every single aspect of a miracle, but accepted it for what it was and took the next logical leap with ease.

Though, perhaps it was just Aragorn’s character to do so. He had never seemed particularly fazed by the strange ways of the world.

“So, you’re going to Mordor then?” asked Estel.

“If I can. I do have to slay a dragon and survive a battle first.” And a bunch of other things along the way.

“Can I go with you?”

“I’m not sure Elrond would appreciate me taking his child to Mordor,” Bilbo replied, recalling the worry that had lined his friend’s forehead when Pippin had been embarked into the Fellowship. The goal here was not to give Elrond a heart attack.

“He has been training me,” Estel assured him; sitting up. “Mother says I have to be prepared, and that I will grow to be the protector of Middle-Earth.”

“Well, if I don’t succeed in my mission, I at least have the comfort of knowing that Middle-Earth is in safe hands.” This seemed to mollify Estel enough to lie back on his bed. “Keep training and growing, and then we’ll see.”

“I’m already taller than you,” he remarked.

Bilbo pressed his lips together. “Impertinent boy.” Estel grinned. “This is the thanks I get for telling you a story no one else in the world knows. Next time, I will tell you the story of Elfin and the seven squirrels, that will put you right to sleep.”

“I already know that one.”

Bilbo smiled and patted Estel on the head. “Sleep well, my dear.”

He waited until Estel’s breathing evened to leave him, taking the lamp with him as he left Elrond’s rooms. Back in the main part of the building, he was surprised not to find Erestor or Elrohir. Not knowing who to report back to, he went back to his bedroom to make sure that he had not forgotten to pack anything, only to find that someone had opened his bedroom window.

Rivendell had often seemed to him to be ruled by a different climate than the rest of the world’s: summer was never sweltering, and winter never biting; yet, the air was chilled tonight, and what’s more, a strangeness carried him to the window as he went to close it. That same strangeness made him look out of it, and catch a glimpse of Elrohir, standing still as a statue and staring out to the east. A mist seemed to have risen from that direction. Bilbo couldn’t remember an attack on Rivendell from that night, though they had left in such a hurry, it was possible that he’d missed it. But Elrohir, as far as Bilbo could see, didn’t look tense or frightened, rather… Excited?

Suddenly, a figure emerged out of the mist, all clad in white and radiating brilliance, the likes of which Bilbo couldn’t avoid recognising instantly. Elrohir ran towards the light, exclaiming, “Grandmother!” The Lady of Lothlorien caught him in her arms when he reached her, her brilliance finally dimming enough for her attendants to finally show beside her. Erestor, whom Bilbo had not seen until then, joined the scene to invite everyone inside.

Galadriel murmured a few words to Elrohir, who beamed and half-ran away from her. Erestor led the rest up the stairs to the eastern porch, leaving Galadriel alone in the gardens, apparently admiring the view. A moment passed, and another, and between one blink and the next, Bilbo found her lifting her head and staring straight at him.

He felt the primal urge to duck beneath the window and hide from her poring eyes, but as soon as he said it, the same strangeness which had pulled him to the window before now grabbed him and kept him in place.

Right. Elves. She bowed her head slightly. He blinked once, and she had released him. He closed the window, and walked out of his room, out of the hall and down the stairs. She was so much taller than he remembered.

Bilbo had not thought about Lady Galadriel very much in his first life, and when he had, it had mostly been in relation to Frodo. He had trusted her because she had been kind to Frodo, and he and Gandalf had shared a good laugh when they had gotten on the boat to the Undying Lands and Frodo had nearly walked into a wall when he’d seen her smile.

She was very beautiful, Bilbo realised now that he was looking at her up close and with eyes that hadn’t been blinded by age. He wouldn’t start walking into walls just yet, but there was no denying that she had the power to soften a few hearts. Gimli hadn’t stood a chance.

Neither did Bilbo. She raised her head, as if looking for something, and her eyes met his. “Good evening, Bilbo Baggins, of the Shire.” Her lips were not moving. Bilbo shuddered.

“Good evening,” he said aloud.

Her eyes seemed to pierce into his soul. He wondered what she saw there.

“I’m glad you’re here.”

Bile rose in Bilbo’s throat. He recoiled, beating down on the memory that had invited itself in his head.

“You carry a heavy burden,” Galadriel stated.

He swallowed, thinking of what waited for him in the Misty Mountains, and beyond. “Not yet.”

She gave him a soft smile, full of pity. The nice part about her speaking with her mind was that this smile did not fade when she said, “Come to see me in Caras Galadhon, before you go on your long journey. I will have gifts prepared for you.”

Bilbo’s Baggins instincts were to decline the gifts a first time; Bungo would be appalled at his son if he saw him nod gratefully and without protest. At least, he remembered to bow. “I will, my Lady. Thank you.”

Bilbo sat in the garden long after the lady left him. He knew, in theory, that he needed to check up on the others at some point, as it was getting fairly late and they would need to skedaddle, but his encounter with Galadriel had drained him, if not of energy, at least of his sense of urgency.

Did she know? Had she read everything in his mind? He had gone through the motions of the meeting almost without conscious thought, but now, he wondered if he needed to be worried. Would she tell Gandalf, or anyone else in the White Council?

The White Council. Bilbo jolted awake. Was Saruman there already? Bilbo could hardly risk finding out. He hurried up the stairs and made for his bedroom.

He found Dori, Nori and Ori loitering right outside his door. “There you are, Bilbo!” cried Dori as soon as he came into view. “We have been looking for you. Thorin is furious.”

“What?” gasped Bilbo. “You can’t be serious. Has someone alerted the Shire Gazette?” Nori snorted. “What is it this time?”

“He gave the map to your Elf…”

“Master Elrond, and he isn’t my…”

Nori waved that complaint off. “Sure. Anyway, it more or less came out that we want the map to break into Erebor, and the Elf…”

“Master Elrond,” Bilbo corrected tiredly. He would curb the Dwarves’ rudeness if it killed them all, which was, at this point, likely.

“That’s very nice, Baggins. Do you want to hear it or not?”

Ori cut in. “Master Elrond has taken Gandalf apart to prevent us from going forward.”

“Ah,” said Bilbo. The others seemed to expect him to say something else, so he added, “Bummer.”

“Bummer,” repeated Nori. “Quite.” Bilbo had a feeling that he was being mocked. Before he could come to a decision on that matter, the rest of the company emerged from a bend in the hallway and headed straight towards them, Thorin at their head.

From the look of it, Dori had not underestimated his mood. “Well?” he demanded. “Where were you?”

“I was putting the child Estel to sleep,” Bilbo replied. “Wh…?”

Thorin did not let him finish. “We’re going. Now.”

“I…”

“I’m not letting them put us away in their dungeons.”

“There are no dungeons in Rivendell,” said Bilbo.

“Not another word from you,” Thorin ordered with a venomous look. “That will teach me to listen to you. I did what you told me, I trusted the Elf, and now, we need to run.” Bilbo had barely intervened, in his opinion, but if it pleased Thorin to blame him, fine. “Well?” asked Thorin.

Bilbo almost reminded him that he’d forbidden Bilbo from speaking, but it would have been poor timing. “Are we waiting for something?”

“Yes, you. Go pack.”

“Oh.” That was easy. Bilbo cracked his bedroom door open, retrieved his pack, and closed the door. “All set.”

Somehow, even that seemed to provoke Thorin. He gritted his teeth, turned away and gestured at the Company to follow him out.

Nori gave him a light punch on the arm, which Bilbo took to mean “Good job” and departed. Bofur hung back to wait for Bilbo. “Friend, I don’t know if you’re a good burglar, but whatever you lack in talent, you make up for in sheer nerves.”

Bilbo didn’t reply. He let Bofur step out before he did, bidding a silent farewell to his second home, and wondering when he would return, and what state he would be in when he did.

If he did.

Chapter Text

“I said I was sorry,” said Bombur.

Bilbo kept his arms crossed, glaring at the cauldron as if he had been the one to offend. It wasn’t fair to the poor cauldron, which hadn’t been present at the scene of the crime, but it was better than glowering at the Dwarf.

“I can try to find them again,” Bombur tried.

“We’ve no time to waste on this,” said Dwalin. “Keep cooking.”

“By my beard, let me go, then,” said Gloin. “As long as it settles the matter. Where did you say you found them?”

“It was a few miles from here, I can’t say exactly.”

“You are not leaving the Company for this,” Thorin said sternly. “It’s not worth it.” They had set up their camp on a rocky terrace, about a third of the way up the Misty Mountains. It had been ten days since they had left Rivendell, and though Bilbo was very anxious to get on with the mountainous ordeal, he still had his priorities.

“I’ll say!” scoffed Bilbo. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The Dwarves stared at him.

“Mushrooms,” said Dwalin. “To be clear, you’re upset about a bunch of mushrooms.”

“Not just mushrooms!” cried Bilbo. “Good mushrooms.”

“You did not even see them,” argued Nori.

“No, but from Bombur’s description, they sounded delicious.” Bilbo shook his head sadly. “To think we may have eaten mushrooms tonight. What a tragedy.”

“You should never have mentioned it,” Bofur told Bombur, who, to his credit, seemed genuinely remorseful.

“I’m sorry, truly. I had no idea that mushrooms were so important to Hobbits. I promise that I’ll never again discard them.”

“Unless they’re poisonous,” Nori pointed out. “Hey, Baggins, have you thought of that? Bombur may have saved us from being poisoned.”

“Please,” Bilbo deadpanned. “If he’d picked them and brought them to me, I would have known if they were good to eat.” He let out a mournful sigh. “Good mushrooms.”

Bombur handed him a bowl of stew with an apologetic smile, which Bilbo acknowledged with as much grace as he could. He took a spoonful, trying very hard not to imagine how much better it might have tasted. Bofur watched him until his amusement could not be contained and he started laughing, spilling a good third of the content of his bowl (which wasn’t a huge loss, as far as Bilbo was concerned) on his lap.

“I’m very glad this happened,” he informed Bilbo, who narrowed his eyes at him. “We might never have found out about your secret obsession with a plant.”

“I beg your pardon,” Bilbo retorted, “mushrooms are not plants. They are a type of fungi.”

“Ew,” said Kili.

“And I am not obsessed with them, thank you very much. I am simply appreciative of them, as a gourmet.”

“We had to hold you back from hitting Bombur,” remarked Dwalin.

Bilbo sniffed. “I will thank you not to exaggerate. I shook my fist at him, but I’m sure I did not intend to hit him.”

“You hit me.”

“It was an accident!” protested Bilbo. “Perhaps you should think twice next time you attempt to restrain me. That was very unmannerly of you.”

“Are all Hobbits like you?” asked Fili.

Bilbo furrowed his brow. “We all like mushrooms a sensible amount, if that’s what you mean.”

“Not particularly,” he said. “I meant.” He gestured at Bilbo. “You know, are they all…”

“Willing to go on an adventure with thirteen strangers,” offered Kili.

“Oh, that,” said Bilbo. “Well.”

Fili shrugged. “I was going for friendly, but that works too.”

“Friendly?” Dwalin repeated incredulously. “He hit me.”

“How many times do I have to apologise for that?” asked Bilbo.

“Once would be fine.”

“Oh. I’m sorry. It is possible that the idea of these poor, uneaten mushrooms made me lose it a little. I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

Dwalin snorted. “The day I get hurt by Hobbit fists is the day I deserve to be hurt.”

“You didn’t answer me,” Fili pointed out. “Are all Hobbits friendly like you?”

Bilbo pondered it for a few seconds. “It’s hard to say. Hobbits are social creatures, but we are also conditioned to reject anything outside of our community. We are friendly with our friends, and we don’t tend to make friends outside of the Shire.” He paused. “Which makes sense, since most of the Hobbits I know have not gone farther than twenty miles away from the place they were born.” This seemed to astonish the others, so Bilbo added, “Why would they? The Shire is a delightful place, and they are satisfied with it.”

“Aren’t you?” asked Dwalin.

Bilbo thought about how to answer it. “I am satisfied with the Shire for what it is,” he answered at last. “It is superb and I love it wholeheartedly. But there are a lot of beautiful places outside of it, and I want to see…” He trailed off.

When it was clear that he would not finish his sentence without prompt, Nori obliged. “See what?”

“Everything,” he replied, though he felt that it was a wholly inadequate answer. “Starting with your mountain. I guess I’m not the Hobbitest Hobbit ever. You’re really not getting the best sample with me.”

“I beg to differ,” said Dori. “I think you’re a great Hobbit.”

“An excellent one,” agreed Ori.

Bilbo smiled fondly at them. “That is very kind of you to say, though I must mention that most Hobbits would not agree with you. They thought I was bizarre. Why, they sometimes called me Mad Baggins.”

“What?” Ori exclaimed. “Who? Who called you that?”

“I can’t be sure, but I do believe that it was the Sackville-Bagginses that began it. They’ve always wanted Bag-End. My neighbour’s cousin’s second wife said that she had overheard them talk about making me flee the Shire in disgrace. Can you believe it?”

The others stared at him, looking so deeply taken aback even Bilbo thought it was a bit excessive.

“Is everything al…”

“Second wife? What in Mahal’s name does it mean?” Bombur demanded.

Bilbo blinked at him. “The second one he had? The one he married after the first one?”

“Hobbits take several spouses?”

“Not at the same time,” said Bilbo. Well, at least not unless all the parties agreed. “But Tomburan—that’s my neighbour’s cousin—his first wife passed away when he was still young, and after a respectable mourning period, he remarried.”

The Dwarves looked wildly uncomfortable with that revelation. This was a little surprising to Bilbo, since he didn’t remember having a similar conversation in his first life. Then again, Tomburan was still currently in his mourning period, and would not remarry for a few years, now that he thought about it.

“But what about his first wife?” asked Bombur.

“She’s deceased,” said Bilbo.

“But what about when he and his second wife join her?”

“Join her where? She’s deceased.”

“Yes,” Bombur agreed, “I understand that she’s deceased.”

“Are you sure?”

“He means after they join her once they, too, are deceased,” explained Bofur. “Wherever Hobbits go in the afterlife.”

“I don’t know,” admitted Bilbo, trying not to remember a different conversation he’d had with Bofur concerning the afterlife of Hobbits. “I’ve never thought of that. I suppose it’ll be awkward, but if he’s found love again, no one would fault him for that.” Except for a bunch of Dwarves who had never met him, evidently.

“Hobbits can love several times?” asked Nori.

Bilbo nodded. “Most of them,” he amended. “Like with everything, there are exceptions. We’re not a monolith. Some of us love once, and never manage it again, no matter how much easier it would be for us to move on.”

He did his best to keep his tone neutral, but given the looks of pity he garnered, his success may not be complete. He bristled at that at first, until his vision shifted, and pity became compassionate understanding.

Which was worse, but for a different reason. He needed to change the subject, five minutes ago. “From your reaction, I take it that Dwarves only marry once?”

“We cannot love again,” said Bombur, “let alone marry again. It goes against our very nature.”

“I should be very cross, if I went to the Halls of Stone before my wife and discovered that she had taken another spouse,” declared Gloin.

“Even if that was what made her happy in your absence?” asked Bilbo.

“You don’t understand. I am absent now, and yet I know that she is faithful to me, as she knows that I could not and would not look at another,” explained Gloin. “Death would be no different, since we know that we will be reunited in the end. We need patience, not another Dwarf to make our marriage complicated.”

Bilbo supposed that it made sense. And, after all, he had been stubborn enough to stay faithful to a dead Dwarf who didn’t even want him, in life or after, so he had no lessons to give to anyone.

“I understand that. I still will not fault poor Tomburan, but I understand.”

Bombur patted his hand. “Ah, well. But you are a Hobbit, after all, not a Dwarf. There’s hope for you yet.”

Bilbo sniffed, snatching his hand back. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” he declared.

“We could find you a nice Elf,” Bofur offered with a smirk. “Surely, there’s got to be one who likes reading as much as you do and wouldn’t mind going on their knees for you.”

Bofur had been one of Bilbo’s very best friends in his first life. It would be greedy to have that a second time, and if Bilbo hated one thing, it was greed. Plus, he had so many Dwarf friends. He could afford to murder one of them.

Luckily for Bofur, and less luckily for the general mood of the group, Bilbo did not have the opportunity to try to push him over the edge of the mountain; a heated voice rose  from the back of the group before he could propose the idea.

“Don’t be crass,” Thorin snarled, rising to his feet.

Bofur seemed more surprised than cowed. “Apologies,” he mumbled, at a loss. The silence that followed was so uncomfortable Bilbo was relieved when Thorin huffed and walked away from the group.

Only then did Bofur look at Bilbo. “You knew it was a joke, yes? I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“Of course,” Bilbo assured him. “It’s fine, I have a sense of humour, unlike some people.” Well. Bilbo was sure that Thorin did have a sense of humour, hidden under the scowling and the furs, but it only emerged once in a while, to compare honest burglars to grocers.

But from the corner of his eye, he glimpsed Balin’s wince and the concerned frown he addressed Thorin, so before anyone had the chance to, he got up and followed Thorin.

He hadn’t gone far from camp, so Bilbo pitched his voice low and hoped that the others wouldn’t be able to hear. “Did I do something wrong?”

Thorin considered him, not exactly unkindly. “I was talking to Bofur, not to you.”

“Well, he was talking to me, not to you,” replied Bilbo, not exactly unkindly either.

Thorin crossed his arms. “I don’t understand.” Neither did Bilbo. “In Rivendell, you were upset that some of us implied that you had a preference for Elves.”

“I wouldn’t say upset,” said Bilbo. “Annoyed, maybe. Wait. How do you know about this?” This was a ridiculous question. That information could have been relayed by literally any member of the Company. Bilbo was merely surprised that his reaction had been noticed. “Never mind. Well? What does that have to do with anything?”

“Were you not annoyed, just now, when Bofur made his comment?”

“No, I…” Bilbo trailed off. Hadn’t he been annoyed? “A little. He was only teasing me.”

“If it made you uncomfortable, then I did the right thing, telling him off, didn’t I?”

Bilbo scrunched his nose. “I can defend myself. And I would have done it more gently.”

“Gently,” repeated Thorin. “Gentleness doesn’t accomplish anything.”

“I beg to differ. It does more than you think.”

“Perhaps in your Shire, but not here.”

“It was a joke,” Bilbo said. “We’re not talking about fighting dragons. I’d take your advice then, if it comes to that, but in the matter of conversation, I think I’m going to do things my way.”

“Fine,” snapped Thorin. “Do it your way, and I won’t interfere.” And with that, he went back towards the camp. When Bilbo joined him, after taking a long breath and sending a quick prayer to Gil-Estel, he had wrapped himself up in his fur and was laying with his back turned to the rest.

Another successful chat for Bilbo.

They trudged on. Though their pace was relentless, and had been since they’d left Rivendell and Thorin imagined himself chased by Elves and wizards, their progress was slowed by the difficult terrain. This was something that Bilbo had forgotten in his years of peace, how hard mountain climbing was. He remembered his heartache and his despair, but his mind had faded out the dozens of small cuts which the unforgiving ground dug into the soles of his feet. Bilbo told himself that he would remember it this time, but time and time again when he settled down at night the relief was such that he forgot to make note of it in his journal, so that seemed unlikely.

The climb didn’t seem to wear on the others as much as it did on him, which Bilbo privately attributed to their boots, but there was also a distinct lack of speech in the group. No one sang in these days.

Bilbo didn’t think he imagined the tension. He didn’t recall anything like it the first time, but mostly, he didn’t recall much of that stage anyway. Sometimes, he caught Kili and Fili whispering and sneaking glances at him. This wouldn’t have worried him, except that once, he saw Balin and Dwalin doing the same, albeit more discreetly.

“Should I apologise for something?” he asked them, making Dwalin shake his head and stalk off.

“No, no, laddie. You haven’t done anything wrong,” said Balin.

Bilbo was tempted to agree, except it seemed that Thorin’s foul mood worsened every time he spoke or made himself seen. And though that didn’t necessarily translate into poor behaviour on Thorin’s part, it did translate into a lot of frowning and brooding.

And all of this would have been bad enough on its own, but Bilbo also had the future, both near and distant, to worry about. While they walked, he had to keep his attention on watching his steps and that of his comrades (just because no one had fallen to their death the first time didn’t mean that he hadn’t changed enough to cause their early demise on the second try), but as soon as Thorin announced that they had gone far enough today, Bilbo engaged in a debate with himself, debate which only ended when he succumbed to exhaustion and laid down to sleep.

His dilemma was this: should he avoid the stone giants? It seemed that they had survived them the first time through sheer luck, and since there was no way that Bilbo could remember every movement he’d made that evening and replicate it perfectly, it was a big risk to take.

But if they didn’t avoid them, would they find the cave that the goblins had trapped? If they didn’t, if they took the original route over the mountains, Bilbo would be flying blind from then on, and they may be delayed or stopped by anything. They had made it through the goblins once, without him, and could presumably do it again. Besides, if they didn’t make the goblin stop, Bilbo would not find the Ring, and who knew what that would lead to?

But then, Bilbo would not have the Ring. He would never give it to Frodo, and that whole thing would be out of his hands.

In whose hands would it be, though? A goblin, maybe. Gollum at best. Bilbo could tell Gandalf the truth once the Smaug quest was done (if he survived it; if not, then Estel would surely tell someone) and Gandalf would do what he did best: meddle.

But Gandalf could not carry the Ring to Mordor. And whether as a punishment or for a greater purpose, Bilbo alone had been sent back. There had to be a reason for that, even if he didn’t know it. It may be that he was meant to atone for the sin of giving Frodo the Ring by carrying it himself to its destruction. If he didn’t, would he be sent back again? He didn’t think he had it in him to do everything twice, let alone three times.

And once he had reached that conclusion, again he wondered: should I avoid the stone giants? And if so, how?

Every night, he fell asleep without having made a decision, and every morning, he felt his window of opportunity close a little more, until once, he woke up to the unmistakable sound of thunder.

The storm had come.

In the middle of being tossed around by the movements of a stone giant beating another stone giant with some giant stone, it occurred to Bilbo that he needed to find a way to describe it better in his book. The first edition hadn’t done it justice at all. This was what happened when one wrote one’s memoir sixty decades after the facts; the sense of urgency faded, and what had been and was again one of the most terrifying moments of his life became a footnote in the adventure.

All of this to say: he did not avoid the stone giants, mostly because he could not figure out how. By the time they were in range of the battle, it was too late to change course, and Bilbo earned himself some serious stink-eyed looks from half the group when he asked if there was no other path they could take.

“Hold on!” Kili cried as the giant whose leg they were forcefully riding on hurtled them toward the mountainside. As brutal as their actions looked, they had seemed to move slowly from afar, but Bilbo had only enough time to throw his hand in Kili’s direction before they had to jump on the ledge to avoid being crushed.

Bilbo’s life was too long to flash before his eyes, but:

The world blurred; his fingers were caught; he was pulled by the arm away from the edge and the void beneath; his shoulder nearly popped out of its socket; left side scraped the rocky cliff he’d almost fallen in; his head was hit by something; stars danced in front of his eyes; for a moment, he thought that he saw an immense figure lower itself to his level and examine him with kind, luminous eyes; “Amanaišāl¹,” sang someone, their voice like trickling water.

Soon, it all faded, leaving him breathless, bruised and bleeding. In the blink of an eye, the figure was replaced by Kili, who touched Bilbo’s shoulder and winced in sympathy when his fingers came away bloody. He said something, but it was muffled by the thunder and the slight ringing in Bilbo’s ears.

The rest of the company joined them, almost delirious with relief. Bilbo did his best not to draw attention to himself, but sadly, Kili dragged Oin to him, and the healer could not be content with checking him out, he had to announce it to everyone.

“Now, that’s quite…” Bilbo started to say, but Oin grabbed him by the face, none too tenderly, to see to the bump on his head.

“Hmmm,” he stated.

“It’s fine, I’m fine,” said Bilbo, shaking him off. “Truly, you’d think I went toe to toe with a stone giant. Speaking of, shouldn’t we get a move on? Seek shelter perhaps?” He gave Thorin a pointed look.

Thorin, for a change, was glaring at him. Or maybe just looking, it was hard to tell, with those eyes. Such beautiful eyes. “Master Baggins is right,” he said.

Bilbo blinked up at him. He must be more concussed than he’d thought, or else Thorin had hit his head too. “I am?”

Thorin ignored him. “There must be a cave somewhere. Dwalin, Bifur!” He walked away to give instructions.

Kili stayed with Bilbo, hovering miserably as Oin helped him to his feet. “There you go,” said the old Dwarf. “You ought to be more careful, my lad.”

“It was my fault,” Kili intervened before Bilbo could make a reply. “I’m sorry, I should have been more careful.”

Bilbo shook his head, triggering a pounding spell in his skull. “Nonsense.” He started to dust himself off, remembered that he was drenched, and abandoned the task. “I would have fallen down the mountain if you hadn’t grabbed me. Besides, you’re not the one who led us to the playground of stone giants.”

His remark was intended for Kili alone; unfortunately, since the storm was so loud, he almost had to shout it, and it did not go unheard by Thorin, whose ears were sharp when it came to catch dissent. “I am sorry that the road displeases you,” Thorin snapped, zeroing in on Bilbo. “Perhaps you should have stayed at home with your books, Scholar.”

Bilbo frowned. Why did he have to say it like that? As if scholar was a shameful thing to be. “I am not the only scholar in this group, and if you wish to insult me, please find a way to do so without insulting others who have done nothing wrong.” Thorin turned away without response. “Well? Is it so difficult to find my faults, then?”

He meant it as a joke, but if anything, instead of breaking the ice, it solidified it. “You’re simply not worth thinking about that much,” Thorin replied without looking back.

Bilbo told himself: “This is just a quip, and you asked for it. He doesn’t really mean it. It doesn’t have to hurt.” But he was glad that Thorin was no longer in a position to see the expression on his face.

He gave himself five seconds, thought: “These are not the worst words you ever heard him say” and resumed walking, batting away Oin’s attempt to check on his side.

In the cave, Bilbo gave up on getting rid of Oin and let him examine his scrapes and bandage them, as well as his left arm, which sported impressive cuts Bilbo had failed to notice. “I’ll need to take a look at it later to make sure that it’s not infected,” Oin told him. At Bilbo’s lack of a reaction, he added, “It’s important. You won’t be half as good a burglar if I have to amputate one of your arms.”

“Mmh,” replied Bilbo. Oin gave him a pat on the head and went to watch his brother’s futile attempts at lighting a fire with wet matches and wetter wood.

“No fires in this place,” declared Thorin. “Get some sleep. We start at first light.”

Bilbo was well aware that they would not see the first light, but he did take Thorin’s other order.

Or at least, he tried to. Alas, when he laid his head on his makeshift pillow, commonly known as his pack, and closed his eyes to sleep, it eluded him. Instead, images flashed behind his eyelids, too fast for him to compute. Some of them he thought were memories, of Frodo and of the dragon, of his mother and his dwarven friends, of the elves and of the sea.

The rest impressed upon his mind a land of the brightest green he had ever seen, a new kind of green. All of a sudden, the string of images froze on that of a tall being clad in grey whose face he could not fathom. It opened its mouth to sing, and Bilbo opened his eyes, unsure if he had fallen asleep after all.

But no: the others were still settling down on their cots around him, and Bofur sat at the mouth of the cave to take the first watch. Out of a habit he didn’t recall picking up, Bilbo looked for Thorin, and found him digging through his pack. Perhaps sensing Bilbo’s attention, Thorin lifted his gaze. Their eyes met and held a few seconds; for that moment, Bilbo didn’t feel Thorin’s scorn or antipathy. Just looking, and seeing. But too soon, Thorin averted his eyes and frowned, and that was that.

Bilbo lay back down, but no matter how many sheep he counted and how tired he was, sleep would not come, even for the couple of hours they had before they were forcibly awakened.

When he could not take it anymore, he got up, packed up his things and went to sit beside Bofur. “I can’t sleep. I’ll take the watch.”

“We can take it together, then,” Bofur replied cheerily. “Thorin would not be happy to wake up and realise that I skirted my duty.”

“That’s fine, you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference in his mood.”

Bofur gave this a chuckle, but no response. Bilbo was prepared to sit in silence until the goblin trap was activated and they all fell into the mountain.

“He didn’t mean it,” Bofur told him. Bilbo did not reply, which Bofur interpreted as him not knowing what he meant, though he did. “That thing he said about you not being worth thinking about, he didn’t mean it.”

“He meant it,” said Bilbo with absolute certainty. He could not lie to himself; the Thorin who saw him as a worthy friend did not exist yet. Perhaps Bilbo had changed too much for him to exist at all. It was fine, he told himself, as long as it kept Thorin alive.

“Well, if he does, that is his opinion, not that of the whole company. The rest of us know your value.”

Bilbo shook his head. “It is very kind of you to want to comfort me, but it is not necessary. It’s quite fine.” And it was. It truly was. Thorin owed him nothing, not even his thoughts or his respect. Even if Bilbo somehow managed to earn these, he could never make Thorin feel about him the way he felt about Thorin, and anyway, it couldn’t be the point of returning to the past. He was there for another kind of impossible.

Bofur patted his arm. “Alright, if you say so. He’s cruel sometimes, when he’s worried.”

“I know.”

“I just wanted to make sure you knew that we’re all… Well, at least I’m glad you’re here.”

The words arrested Bilbo.

(I’m glad you’re here.)

He shrunk against the blow, closing his eyes.

(Eyes were the windows of the soul, Bilbo had heard. He knew the very moment Thorin died, because the light in his eyes, the eyes Bilbo loved so much, faded and disappeared.)

“Bilbo?” called Bofur. “Are you alright?”

(“I’m glad you’re here.”)

“Fine,” he gritted out. “I’m fine.” Except for the fact that he couldn’t breathe, that he felt like he was burning up and that his stomach was killing him. It hurt, it hurt so much.

(“I’m glad you’re here.”)

His life was over, how could he go home? How could he stay? Where could he go to avoid this absence?

“Breathe, what’s wrong?”

Bilbo opened his eyes to convey to his friend that he needed to be quiet to avoid alerting the others, but when he did, he saw that Thorin was already awake, and what’s more, he was looking straight at Bilbo.

“What’s,” he began. The rest of his sentence never came; the sand below them sank, the floor collapsed, and the Company fell into the goblins’ trap.

Chapter Text

(“And then the goblin king said…” Bilbo stopped in the middle of his tirade. Usually, Frodo hung on his every word, but a pensive air had settled on his face. “What is it, my boy?”

“I have a question about your story,” Frodo admitted.

Bilbo must have told him that story a dozen times already, but this was the first time Frodo had ventured to question it in any way. He was growing, and fast. “Ask away.”

“You said you were down in the cave having a riddle contest with Gollum during that part.”

“I was.” Bilbo was far from the mountain, and far from that abominable creature which longed to sink its nine teeth into hobbit flesh. Yet, he fancied that he could still hear Gollum’s voice in his nightmares.

“So how do you know what the goblin king said and did, or what it looked like?”

“A very good question,” said Bilbo. “Well, as you’ll recall, I had a dozen friends up there with the goblin king.” And some of them even made it alive to the end of the adventure, he thought bitterly. “They described the meeting and the fight well enough. One of them was even kind enough to give me a copy of his note.” That Ori, very serviceable.

This answer did not seem to assuage little Frodo’s concern. “But how do you know that it’s all accurate? What if they made mistakes?”

“Mistakes happen, of course. No one’s memory is infallible. I’ll say, how do you know that I didn’t make a mistake?”

“Uncle, no!” cried Frodo. “I know you didn’t, you couldn’t have!”

“How lucky for me,” chuckled Bilbo.

“The parts where you were there, I know they’re all true,” continued Frodo. “I know it.”

Bilbo tried to laugh it off as he went back to telling the story. True, yes, it was all true. For the most part, at least. The most important part. And anyway, did it matter if he had made some small changes? A story should be good and true, but if it couldn’t be both, it should at least be good.)

For a while, there was silence.

No, that wasn’t right.

For a while, there was a continuous ringing, but it was less a noise than an indication that Bilbo was going to have to be more careful with his head bones than he had been thus far.

He half-lifted his head, wondering why his bed was so uncomfortable, even for his old age, and suddenly remembered that he was supposed to see Gandalf, to meet…

Even as he thought it, the knowledge eluded him and faded from his mind. As he blinked his eyes open, it all came back to him: the time travelling farce, the stone giants, the goblin trap. He had gone through the motions of being searched for weapons by the goblins’ pinching fingers, and had dropped to the floor to escape their cruel attention. Then, he had waited to be caught, but perhaps he had become too good at disappearing like a thief, because no one had seemed to notice him.

Climbing it had to be, and climbing he did, for about a yard; then, as he looked for somewhere to place his feet, something gripped his hand. When he lifted his head, he found himself nose to nose with the snarling, half-rotten face of a goblin. He gave a high-pitched cry of surprise and disgust (no matter how bad he smelled after days without a real bath, he could not imagine that he stank half as bad as the goblin did), and tried to snatch his hand back, throwing himself away from the cliff and plunging into the empty air, and taking the goblin, which hadn’t let go of him, with him.

A wave of dizziness had overtaken him, then, and everything had gone black, until now. The world was slowly coming back into focus, though in the dimness of the cave everything appeared in shades of grey.

And then, two points of light flickered on at the mouth of a tunnel.

Bilbo shuddered. The points of light did not move at first, but when they did, it was almost impossible for him to stay still. There it was, the figure that had haunted his nights for years, with its creepy crawl and its ragged breathing and its hissy, terrible voice…

“Yes. Yes. Yes! Yes! Gollum, Gollum.”

Bilbo’s stomach twisted to nausea. The creature advanced, muttering to himself, and beating the Goblin when it began to struggle. How Bilbo loathed him, and how he wished he would die of his own accord.

And Bilbo saw it.

There it was, half-flying, half-falling from Gollum’s ersatz pocket.

Bilbo could admit it, now; part of him had been hoping that the Ring’s future destruction would have reverberated into the past. That it would have disappeared when Bilbo had been brought back. That Frodo’s sacrifice wouldn’t have been for naught. That Bilbo wouldn’t have to make the same sacrifice, wouldn’t have to go to Mordor and destroy himself in the process. That he had been sent back to heal, as promised, free from the overpowering shadow of the Ring.

But there it was, and Bilbo was a coward, and Bilbo wanted to leave the Ring there, for another to find, and he wanted to have it for himself, and keep it for another sixty years.

“Gollum, Gollum,” spat the creature, and Bilbo reminded himself that this was the fate that awaited anyone who kept the Ring. This was what it did to its bearer. Besides, if he kept it too long, history would repeat itself, and Frodo would be destroyed again.

No, not that. Never that.

Gollum dragged the Goblin away. Bilbo steeled himself. He stood. He walked. He looked down at the thing that had ruined his dear, dear nephew, the most precious being that had ever existed.

“Not this time,” he murmured, stooping to pick it up. He took a few deep breaths, and on an exhale, he touched it.

It was immediate. He could feel instantly the thing’s influence, spreading in his mind, in a way he hadn’t noticed the first time. Perhaps it had been gradual, or perhaps he had been too entranced to pay attention. But he felt it now, the way it gripped his thoughts and held on.

“Don’t put it on,” he ordered himself.

He put it on.

The world’s colours changed. It seemed strange that he had forgotten this, since it hadn’t been that long since he’d put it on for the last time (well. It had been twenty years), but somehow, these memories had left him from the moment he had given up the Ring.

But as it all came flooding back to him, it became evident that something was different. Something…

Itched. He looked down at his finger, realising what he had done. He pulled the Ring off, frowning at it in disgust. “Not this time,” he said again, and shoved it into his pocket. He checked his hand again, but the itchy feeling had gone. How curious; for one moment, he’d almost felt as if he had developed an allergy to the Ring.

Which wouldn’t be terrible, as it would at least ensure that he would be tempted to wear it as little as possible.

Well. No matter. He had the Ring, which meant that he’d done what he’d come for. He could head out, now.

He glanced at the tunnel down which Gollum had slinkered with his prey. Though Bilbo couldn’t remember the way out exactly, it wouldn’t be the hardest thing in the world to find it. He didn’t need to play games for it. And if he didn’t go in there and give his name and home address to Gollum, Gollum would not be able to track him down, or to give the enemy the means to do so.

There was no reason to follow Gollum, especially since Bilbo did not know what he would do if he faced the creature.

(Bilbo stared at Frodo’s hand for a long time when his nephew showed it to him.

“It’s only a finger,” Frodo said, his voice flatter, more distant than it had been.

It wasn’t only a finger; even with his rheumy eyes, Bilbo could see that there was less of Frodo than there had been, and he wasn’t referring to his body. He could see it in Frodo, because he could feel it in himself. A vast and terrible hollowness.

Still, the finger was a physical thing he could focus his bitterness on. More to the point, this was an injury attuned to his guilt.

Sensing this, Frodo put his uninjured hand on Bilbo’s frail shoulder. “Don’t blame yourself, Uncle.”

“If I hadn’t spared him…”

“If you hadn’t spared him, Sam and I would have never found our way to Mordor. And what’s more, it wouldn’t have been destroyed. I would not have given it up. You did the right thing.” It was reasonable, of course; but Bilbo’s old mind did not care for reason. It cared for running thoughts in circles. All he could see was this: Frodo’s hand, the stump where the thing Bilbo should have killed had bitten flesh, bone and tendon off.)

Bilbo pulled Sting out of its sheath and headed for the tunnel that led to Gollum’s cavern.

He walked through the tunnels as if in a dream, because he had dreamed of it so many times before. In his dreams, he could not control his feet or the steps they took; it felt that way now too. He kept telling himself of all the things he wanted to change, but in the end, he ended up retracing his steps. He reached the shores of Gollum’s underground lake, and watched his silhouette as Gollum finished the goblin with a stone, and Sting’s blue light flickered and faded.

“The cold hard lands, they bites our hands, they gnaws our feet!”

Though Bilbo did not mistrust the water as many hobbits did, he did not love it, and what’s more, he had not learned to swim. Even if he had, if Gollum saw him and met him in the water, he would certainly outswim Bilbo at any time, with his froggy limbs.

Looking around him, Bilbo saw a pile of pebbles. He bent down to pick one up, and threw it into the lake, creating a few ripples and, more relevantly, a resounding ‘plonk’ noise as it sank into the water.

Immediately, Gollum’s head snapped up, and Bilbo was seized by those ugly, glowing eyes. Part of him wanted to run, part of him wanted to spit. He did neither. He just stood there, as though whatever energy controlled his body had left it to its own devices. He could not kill Gollum from there, but he could wait for Gollum to come closer and kill him then.

Or, he could spare him. But Gollum did not deserve to be spared. He was a grotesque creature who survived (survived only, for it did not thrive) on suffering, his own and others’. There was not enough of him to save, and if there was, should he be saved? Should Bilbo try? Why? So that he could go on to be the treacherous thing which had almost killed Frodo? So that he could go on to prevent Bilbo from destroying the Ring?

(“I forgave him, in the end,” Frodo said, startling Bilbo out of his spiral of thoughts and regrets and guilt. It took him a moment to realise that he was still talking about Gollum. “Did Gandalf tell you his story?”

“Sparsely,” Bilbo replied.

Frodo was silent for a bit, his eyes far away. “His name was Sméagol. He was something like a Hobbit, once. Before…” He shuddered, raising his hand as if to reach for a necklace, or a ring on a chain. His fingers instead closed on a white gem Bilbo had seen Arwen wear before. “It would have done it to us,” he continued, his voice trembling. “This is what we would have been, if we hadn’t…”

“If you hadn’t,” Bilbo muttered. His own hand, he realised, had automatically begun to search his pocket, of its own accord; he stilled it, and grabbed Frodo’s hand instead.

“It wasn’t Sméagol’s fault,” said Frodo. “It was the Ring. He had it for so long, he could not control himself. I don’t know that there was much of himself to control, by that point. The Ring used him, took everything he had, and then left him when it was all he had left. I don’t think blaming Sméagol is fair, especially since Gandalf was right, and he had a role to play in the destruction of the Ring. In any case, since he is gone, there’s nothing to do but forgive the evil he did.”)

But why? If Frodo felt better forgiving his enemies, that was all well and good for Frodo, but Bilbo was not Frodo. True, Bilbo had forgiven Thorin for plenty of things, but that wasn’t Thorin’s fault, really. What he’d done, he’d done while in the thrall of the Arkenstone and the treasure. And what was Gollum’s excuse?

Oh. Right. Well.

Gollum’s eyes blinked out and didn’t reappear. Bilbo squinted and thought that he saw a shape sliding through the water, and guessed that it was him, though he had not heard the plunge.

He tried to follow Gollum’s progress, but the cave was too dark, and Gollum’s movements too slick; soon enough, he lost track of the ripples of the water. He wasn’t afraid, not really. He had been there before, and he knew how this thing ended, for the most part.

When Gollum appeared, he did not emerge from the water as Bilbo expected, or from high up as he had the first time; one moment, there was only darkness around Bilbo, and the next, two pinpricks of light, a few feet away. One moment, silence, the next, hissy breathing.

“Bless us and splash us, Precious! That’s a meaty mouthful.”

Bile rose into Bilbo’s throat. “It could have been us,” murmured a voice inside his head. For once, it did not belong to the Ring.

“Don’t,” he warned when Gollum began to slide close to him. Bilbo half raised his sword, though he did not attack. “Stay back.”

Gollum snarled and muttered, asking who or what Bilbo was. The very sound of his breathing offended Bilbo, making something hot coil in his gut. “If only he would die, now, of his own accord, and I did not have to decide, and I did not have to think of him or encounter him ever again,” thought Bilbo.

Alas, creatures scarcely dropped dead out of nowhere, and when he saw that Bilbo was deep in his thoughts, Gollum attempted to crawl closer again.

“Back!” cried Bilbo, lifting Sting and making a warning slashing motion with it. “I don’t want to…” To what? Hurt him? He did, didn’t he? Why else had he followed him to this awful, stinking cave?

Gollum’s evil gaze was fixed on him. But no, it was not so evil now. The other side had emerged, scared but wondering, expecting to be punished but hoping not to be. Maybe it was not too late for this side.

Bilbo lowered his sword. “I don’t forgive you,” he thought. Aloud, he said, “If you want to seek healing, go to Rivendell, West of the mountains. I’ll meet you there, and help you however I can.”

Gollum’s pupils widened and shrunk as he muttered words Bilbo did not try to decipher. But as he did, his hand sought the cloth he wore around his middle, and when his fingers slid into the makeshift pocket and discovered its emptiness, his eyes grew icy. Slowly, excruciatingly so, he turned to Bilbo, eerie in his stillness.

“He stole it,” he hissed in a quiet voice, as if he couldn’t believe that Bilbo, or anyone, would do this to him. “He stole it,” he repeated. He started to tremble, his hand seeking the purchase of something he could hurl. “HE STOLE IT!” he finally roared, leaping at Bilbo.

Bilbo’s first instinct was to run, but he couldn’t risk Gollum following him, since he did not want to risk putting on the Ring to do so, and without it, he had no chance. Gollum threw rocks and pebbles at him, and when Bilbo avoided them he threw himself, toppling them both and scratching and sneering at Bilbo, baring all of his nine teeth and struggling to wrap his long and bony fingers around Bilbo’s throat. Bilbo fumbled for his sword, but he had dropped it in the melee and it was now pinned half underneath him, its hilt digging painfully into his back. He fended Gollum’s attacks as well as he could, but Gollum was driven by more than hatred or appetite; his was a hunger Bilbo knew well.

Still grabbing at Bilbo’s throat, he leaned his face towards Bilbo, his eyes bulging almost out of their sockets. Acting on an instinct Bilbo did not know he had, he took the next opportunity to free his hand, and, scooping dirt and gravel from the ground, tossed them at Gollum’s face, aiming for the eyes.

Gollum’s shriek was deafening, rage and spite mingled with pain. Bilbo took advantage of his distraction to push him away and take his sword back. Gollum was swift to recover, however, but Bilbo was ready. When Gollum leapt at him again, so did Bilbo; he threw himself sideways and swiped at Gollum with his sword, catching him in the temple with the pommel. Gollum fell like a dead thing on the ground, though his frail shoulders still rose and fell with his breath.

Bilbo took a moment to catch his own breath. He felt for the Ring in his pocket, the relief to find it there making him dizzy. He desperately needed to take up smoking again.

There was no time to lose; he heaved himself to his feet, holding his own back as he did so. As it turned out, even youth did not spare one’s body from physical pain if one put said body through the Misty Mountains.

Bilbo forced himself not to look back at the prone figure on the floor as he made his way out of the cave. This was not the last time he and Gollum met, he knew it. Bilbo was not sure that there still was a role for Gollum to play in his story, as there had been in Frodo’s, but even if there wasn’t, Gollum would take it upon himself to make himself known, that was certain. The poor creature was too attached to the Ring, and he would not hesitate so long to leave his cave this time around, even if Bilbo had not given him his name or his home address. But since Bilbo had decided not to kill him, he would have to bear the consequences of his choice, whatever these be.

In the meantime, he had orcs and goblins and a dragon to fight.

Chapter Text

Bilbo imagined that not having to run from Gollum would accelerate his sortie, that he would rejoin the others in advance and that if they were quick enough, they could avoid the pale orc and his troop altogether.

Bilbo was quite wrong. His mistake had been, shockingly, to trust himself to find the exit of the tunnels on his own, by memory, and to do so fast. Perhaps what he should have remembered was that it had been eighty years since he’d set foot in those tunnels, and that he’d only viewed them with the Ring on, and the Ring blurred everything from the real world.

“Bebother this,” muttered Bilbo, flinching when his voice carried. How was he supposed to find his way out of this pit? He wasn’t a Dwarf, able to orient himself underground. He could maybe have oriented himself by the sky if he saw it, but stones might have been as distant as the stars, for all that he could read them.

(“You could try the hand trick,” suggested Kili.

They had sat at the top of the stairs; below them, in the treasure chamber, half of the others were looking for the Arkenstone, while the rest were making piles of golden coins, which seemed a desperately silly endeavour to Bilbo. There were so many, it would take a Dwarf’s lifetime to count, and an Elf’s to spend. Counting it seemed like a waste of time, even if the purpose was to divide the final sum. There was no way Bilbo could take a thirteenth of it back to the Shire, and for what? To taunt his cousins with?

Well, actually, that didn’t sound so bad.

He had grown tired of the spectacle hours ago, and had half a mind to go exploring, but, as he had admitted to Fili and Kili when they had joined him on the platform and asked why he looked so sour, he was worried that he would get lost and never find his way back.

“What’s the hand trick?” he asked them.

“It’s something that we teach young Dwarves who have not yet learned stone-work,” explained Fili.

“I see. When you say young…”

“Infants,” confirmed Kili.

“Back in the Blue Mountains, most of the halls are not as refined and recognisable as they are here,” continued Fili. “Especially the newer additions, which were dug to support the influx of refugees after…” He trailed off, gesturing at the room at large. “You know. Dragon.”

“Yes, I’ve heard of him,” drawled Bilbo. “So what is the trick?”

“You put your hand on the wall, and you start walking. The trick is that you do not take your hand off the wall, which prevents you from going in circles. After a while, you’re bound to find the way out.”

“And when you say a while…”

“We’ve never lost anyone forever,” said Kili. “There may have been a few mishaps, but on the whole, everyone was found eventually.” He grinned, but his expression turned grim when Thorin’s voice rose, calling them back to the search. Though he had not been called, and though he knew that it was useless, Bilbo followed them down, reasoning that looking in vain for a gem which was hidden in his pocket had to be better than getting lost in the endless halls of Erebor while trying Kili’s hand trick.)

Sighing, he headed for the nearest wall and held up his hand to it. The surface of these walls were not smooth and polished like the ones in Erebor were, and as he walked Bilbo could not help smiling at the idea of what Fili and Kili would have to say about it. Surely that it was crude craftsmanship on the part of whatever natural element carved underground cave systems, and that the decor was boorish, and by Mahal, would it kill someone to build an aeration system? The air was stale, and if not for the breeze, it would be downright intol…

The breeze. Bilbo perked up. Now that he thought of it, there was a breeze now where there hadn’t been before. It was working, against all odds, the hand trick was working, and he was headed in the right direction!

He jogged ahead, forgetting in his enthusiasm to keep his hand on the wall, and had to backtrack a couple of times to find the right way again, cursing himself all the while.

But it was worth it in the end, when he took a turn and was blinded by the light of day, fading as it was. He had no idea how long he had spent in those tunnels, unconscious or wandering, but through the small passage out of the mountain, he guessed that it was something like late afternoon. He took a moment to breathe and to congratulate himself, and it was nearly his undoing. Behind him, not too close but not far enough for his comfort, came an anguished cry, half sorrow and half maddened rage, bouncing from cave wall to cave wall until it reached him and made the hair rise on his arms.

Perhaps letting Gollum live had been a mistake he would come to regret, but it was too late to change it now.

(Hadn’t it always been? Bilbo, for all his self-confessed faults, was not a murderer. Now that he saw the open sky and breathed the fresh air, it seemed incredible that he had considered the idea.)

The sun was already dipping below the horizon as he ran down the mountain to join the others. He did not anticipate being able to sneak up on them without the Ring, but he managed it anyway, because the Company’s attention was on Fili, who said, in the tone of someone who isn’t being believed, “Master Baggins would not abandon us, I know it.”

“We must go back for him, he may have fallen into another trap,” added Kili.

“He did not come to our aid,” remarked Gloin.

“Don’t you see? That’s why we think that something must have happened to him, otherwise he would have…”

“Please, what could a Hobbit have done against an army of Goblins?” Dwalin interjected. “He did well in hiding, he would have hindered our flight.”

Bilbo gaped at him. His feet had led him close to the group, close to Bofur, who was toying with his hat, a miserable expression on his face. “How rude,” he muttered. “It’s not wrong, but he didn’t need to be this blunt about it.”

Bofur nodded his approval, before doing a double take and giving a great cry. He bore the effusions of the group as patiently as he could, and when asked how he had gotten past the goblins, replied, “I took a shortcut.” Later, at Beorn’s house, the others would press him more, and he would admit to falling into a pit and finding his way through the tunnels, though he would not mention Gollum yet, nor the Ring. That evening, he would find Gandalf looking at him strangely, but this time, he would not avert his eyes and mumble vague excuses, but pledge a silent promise to come clean about everything later.

But now, he only dismissed the Company’s question, turning to a more urgent matter. “We have to go, quickly. There are orcs and wargs coming after us, I… I saw them. I think the goblins sent for them.”

Thorin, who had been conspicuously silent throughout the whole exchange, perked up at that. “Do you think…” he asked Balin, who winced but acquiesced.

As if to give credence Bilbo’s more or less false warning, they heard howls coming from the direction of the mountain. Bilbo mouthed the words as Thorin and Gandalf said them: “Out of the frying pan, and into the fire.”

They started running before Gandalf ordered them to.

“Run!”

“We can’t outrun them, we need to take a stand!”

“Careful, there’s one on your left!”

“Faster, faster!”

“I’m doing my best!”

“Less talking, more running!”

“Over there!”

“Watch out!”

“The trees!”

“Watch out for the trees!”

“No, up into them!”

“Up into the trees, all of you! Come on, climb! Bilbo, climb!”

Bilbo could not imagine a time when he had loved running. Even when he was a child, his fondest memories were not of throwing himself into a run. He preferred the idle wandering that usually led to his mother telling him a story, interrupting herself now and then to point at a flower and say, “Look, my flea, these ones are Four O’Clocks, and they’re blooming, which means it’s time for tea!”

(It did not help that most of his memories about running involved something running after him, usually for nefarious reasons.)

Nevertheless, he had never been more glad for his young body’s ability to run than he was now. Even the day they had fled from the orcs before reaching Rivendell hadn’t felt so perilous, perhaps because Bilbo knew then that the Elves weren’t far and he had faith that he would be saved, one way or another, even if he got hurt.

This chase was a different matter. There was nothing but a cliff at the end of the path, and though there would be Eagles, there was also fire and the pale orc, which would be riding forth any minute now.

“Bilbo!” called Gandalf, grabbing him by the collar and hauling him to a tree branch with enough force that Bilbo almost became the world’s first flying Hobbit.

But he was too low still to be completely out of danger. Looking up, he saw that Thorin had not climbed very much higher than he had, and what’s more, that he seemed to be waiting for him. Bilbo almost faltered at the sight.

“Climb!” Thorin shouted at him. The injunction worked wonders, and suddenly, Bilbo found a second wind. He scrambled up the tree with an ease which reminded him of climbing the party tree as a child, his father clenching his teeth with dread as he went higher and higher, branch by branch. This, he could do. He could climb, just as long as the tree remained steady.

The tree did not remain steady. Bilbo felt the branch lurch under his feet. Thorin grabbed him by the arm, and when they both looked down, they realised that the wargs had begun gnawing at the trunk, their teeth ripping gashes into bark and sap, and when their efforts did not yield swift enough results, they threw themselves at the trees, making them tremble with the sheer force of their shoulders.

“There!” said Thorin, pointing at the closest tree, which, as theirs tipped and fell, was suddenly within jumping distance. “Quick, jump!” Despite his order, he did not let go of Bilbo’s arm as he jumped or when he landed. He did not look at him either, and Bilbo wondered if Thorin had forgotten that he was there, and if he was simply pulling him along out of reflex.

Dori and Ori were already perched on this tree, and the four of them were soon joined by Dwalin; in normal circumstances, Bilbo would wonder if their combined weight would make the tree topple, but this time, the point was moot: the wargs were there to ensure that it did.

Onto the next tree they went, and the next; Thorin did not let go of Bilbo’s arm until they reached the next tree. Then, when there was nowhere left to jump, Thorin finally uncurled his fingers, a look of agony on his face as he watched Kili and Fili defend themselves against the assault.

“It’s going to be fine,” Bilbo told him.

Thorin glared at him, disbelieving. “And how?”

“Trust me,” Bilbo wanted to say. He almost did, but then, entering the clearing atop his white beast, a throaty voice rang out.

Bilbo’s blood froze in his veins. His eyes unfocused.

He had not thought of this. Too long, his mind had been on Gollum and the Ring, on whatever came after Erebor was saved and Thorin was safe. But of course, there had to be a reason why Thorin was not safe. How silly of Bilbo to have forgotten it.

“Azog,” said Thorin.

“Shit,” thought Bilbo.

“It cannot be.”

But it was. Bilbo watched Thorin’s face transform with hatred. The one comforting thing was that even when he’d most despised him, Thorin had never looked at him like that.

(Well. Not until the Arkenstone, but that hardly counted.)

“Khozd-shrakhun,” spat Azog. Bilbo did not think it was very polite.

Thorin pulled himself up. Bilbo remembered his expression well, and the set of his shoulders. It was a stance which said, “I am going to battle, and if I die, so be it.”

“Don’t,” he hissed. “Don’t do this. Don’t put yourself in danger, don’t force your friends to stand between you and your death.”

“Don’t force me,” he didn’t say. “I promised I wouldn’t.”

Thorin stared at him for a long moment, but Azog kept goading him, and Bilbo knew that this was a lost cause. Later, maybe, Bilbo’s words would hold sway over him, but Thorin did not trust or like him yet.

Theoretically, Bilbo could let him go and face Azog and whoever else he wanted. But there was a nagging thought at the back of Bilbo’s mind that told him that saving Thorin in his first life had been a stroke of luck, and that one wrong move would cut the second attempt short. Bilbo could not imitate his own movements from eighty years ago, even if he remembered them. Plus, even knowing that he would survive his wounds, he would rather not relive the delightful scene of Thorin sprawled on the floor, bloodied and unmoving.

And he’d promised.

Thorin had stopped paying attention to him. He was in a staring battle with Azog, a precursor to a real battle. Bilbo needed to think of something, and he needed to do it now. He cast a helpless look at Gandalf, and as he did, his eyes caught on a bright light in the distance. It was Gil-Estel, shining more brilliantly than Bilbo had ever seen it, as if readying to swoop in and save them all. As he stared at it in awe, a shape flew in front of it, eclipsing its light for a fraction of a second.

“Oh, Bilbo, you old fool,” he thought. Lobelia would be right to label him Mad Baggins for this.

“Master Oakenshield,” he called. “Please.”

Thorin frowned at him, annoyed to be distracted from his target. But that was enough; he had turned his way, even briefly. Bilbo forced his hand to let go of the branch.

His reflex was to scramble for purchase, but he found none. The last thing he saw before falling was Thorin’s wide eyes when he realised what had happened. Bilbo thought he saw the beginning of a gesture to grab him, but he would never be sure.

Thorin cried something, but it was covered by the rush of the wind in Bilbo’s ears, the words undistinguishable. He was falling so fast even panic could not catch him; thankfully, panic did not fly as well as Eagles.

Thorin was furious when Bilbo woke up, and this time, it was genuine, and was not followed by an embrace. Bilbo could admit to himself that he was disappointed.

“What were you thinking?” Thorin demanded, as if it had been Bilbo’s decision to fall.

Well. It had been, but Thorin was not supposed to know this. He thought it was an accident, and he still managed to fault him for it, nevermind that he was correct.

“Where…?” asked Bilbo. He hadn’t realised that he’d fainted. He didn’t even recall being rescued. Over Thorin’s shoulder, Gandalf was giving him a tired glare, and behind him, the rest of the Company was standing about, looking relieved. “Is everyone alright?”

“Yes, we’re all here, and we’re all unharmed,” Balin replied kindly.

“Thought you were done for, there, Bilbo,” Bofur said. His tone was light, but his voice trembled.

“Oh, no,” thought Bilbo. “I didn’t think of that.”

“No, no,” he said lightly, sitting up and forcing Thorin to recoil. “I’m alright. Don’t worry about me.”

“You fell,” snapped Thorin. “Why were you not gripping the branch?”

“I did not do it on purpose,” he lied. “Why are you angry?”

“I am angry because I said that the quest would be too dangerous, and you said that you could handle it. Now look at what happened.”

“I slipped,” retorted Bilbo. “It happens.”

“Not when dangling from a tree above a cliff,” snarled Thorin.

“We don’t need a repeat of Forluk,” commented Gloin.

Bilbo frowned. Had he hit his head? “Forluk?” he repeated.

“It was a cousin of a cousin of Mimli’s who dwelled in the Blue Mountains. One day, we were crossing the Tower Hills on our way back from a fair, and he fell from a precipice. We never found his body, though we sent search parties.”

Huh. Bilbo opened his mouth to ask more questions, but Thorin cut in, even more furious after the interruption. “Never mind that. We’re going ahead. Gandalf, bring him back to Rivendell. You can catch up with us after that.”

“Wait a minute,” said Bilbo. “I’m not going back to Rivendell.”

“You don’t have to stay there if you don’t like it, though I assumed that you’d be glad to go back to your precious Elves.”

“I’ll say, it would be a nice trade,” Bilbo shot back. Then, he sighed. “No, I don’t mean it. I said it to be unkind, I’m sorry.”

Thorin’s eyes flashed. “I don’t care. Gandalf!”

“I’m not taking part in this,” declared the wizard. “You are quite on your own.”

“I don’t understand why you’re so upset,” reasoned Bilbo. “I fell, but I was caught. Anyway, you said yourself at the beginning of the quest that you wouldn’t be responsible for my fate. Well…”

“Oh, Thorin,” sighed Balin.

“Those words were not intended for your ears,” Thorin said, toning down.

Well, that was too much. “They were not wrong. My goodness, I know you’re the future king and that you were a prince before that, but someone ought to have taught you that the world does not revolve around you.”

Given the way Bilbo could almost see smoke coming from Thorin’s ears, this was probably not the right thing to say. “Excuse me?”

“People do not fall from trees and cliffs just to spite you personally,” Bilbo explained, having, in the middle of his ever-growing annoyance and self-righteousness, somewhat forgotten that he had, in fact, fallen on purpose, and entirely for Thorin’s benefit. “Have you noticed that you’re the only one around here who felt entitled to yell at me for it? I’m fine, by the way, and no, really, there is no need to help me up, I’ll get there on my own, but thank you for offering.”

Still fuming, Thorin nevertheless offered his hand to pull Bilbo on his feet. Bilbo smiled. “Look, that ought to cheer you up.”

Following his gaze, Thorin’s breath itched when he realised what Bilbo meant. Far into the distance, only half visible through the foggy horizon, the Lonely Mountain stood, undisturbed by the plans of dwarves and orcs and wizards and hobbits. Thorin’s hand tightened around Bilbo’s.

“Erebor,” said Gandalf. “The Lonely Mountain. The last of the great dwarf kingdoms of Middle-earth.”

Only Bilbo was close enough to Thorin to hear him whisper, “Home.” Bilbo gave Thorin’s fingers a squeeze before letting go.

Chapter Text

Now, it should be noted that the next statement ought to be taken with a grain of salt, because he could not prove it, but: Bilbo thought that they might be ahead of schedule.

He did not have a valid reason to think so, except that he vaguely remembered the drag that were the first few days after the confrontation with Azog, remembered Thorin pushing himself to trudge on in spite of his injuries, remembered Dwalin and Balin’s concern, their frantic reassurances that they could take their time, and parallel to that, the awful feeling that Azog and his band were only one step behind, and they were simply not going fast enough to keep the advantages the Eagles had granted them.

But Thorin was not injured now. Through the bits of accounts the others reluctantly gave Bilbo as they climbed down from the eyrie, he was able to piece together what had happened while he’d been unconscious. It had gone more or less according to his plan: after his supposed fall, Thorin had been so distracted (Dwalin’s word) that he had forgotten to rise to Azog’s challenge, and the fighting on the part of the Company had been limited to throwing flaming pine cones at the wargs until the Eagles had swooped in and rescued them.

In fact, of all of them, Bilbo, with his scraped left side, his injured arm and his unfortunate habit to use his head as a knocker, may be the most wounded of them all. On the one hand, he preferred it that way, but on the other, it also made him the slowest. As if Thorin needed another reason to want to send him away.

In another life, they had walked the Carrock side by side, Thorin because he was injured, and Bilbo because he had begun to realise that Thorin’s side was where he wanted to be. In this life, Bilbo pushed and pushed to make sure that even if he was at the back of the group, he was still in the group.

His efforts were barely sufficient, but surprisingly, Thorin did not sneer at him, and did not seem so annoyed when he saw Bilbo lagging behind. He never repeated his demand that Bilbo turn around and head back to Rivendell, though it may be that he realised how foolish that would have been, with Azog presumably behind them.

Every night, as they did their best to set up camp with what remained of their luggage post-goblins, Oin sat Bilbo down and treated his injuries, tutting at him and pretending not to hear Bilbo’s protests as he pinched and prodded him. “At this rate, you won’t make it to the dragon, lad,” Oin kept telling him.

“Hobbits are sturdier than you think,” Bilbo kept reminding him.

“Hmfr,” Oin replied each time. As far as Bilbo remembered, he didn’t think Oin’s bedside manners had been so poor when Thorin had been wounded.

One such evening, Bilbo noticed Thorin skulking about as Oin reluctantly declared that Bilbo’s cuts and bruises did seem to be healing quicker than he had originally anticipated.

“Don’t think that you’re off the hook,” Oin informed him.

“I’m sorry, are you disappointed that I’m better?” Bilbo asked. Oin pretended not to hear him, packed the tincture he’d made on the road from Bilbo-did-not-want-to-know-what, and left him be.

Bilbo lifted his head to smile at Thorin. “I did tell you all that Hobbits have strong constitutions.”

Thorin gave him a sharp nod. “I have had a discussion with the wizard.”

“And where did you hide the body?” Thorin stared at him. “Right, not funny. What did you talk about?” He frowned, seized by a sudden suspicion. “It’s not about me going back, is it?”

“No. It’s about the orcs. Gandalf believes that they are on our trail, and he would like to have more information about their movement.” He paused, considering. “He raised the idea of you going to spy on them.”

“Splendid,” said Bilbo. “Shall I go tonight?”

“I refused, due to your current…” Thorin gestured at Bilbo, mumbling the end of his sentence: “...state.”

“We have been over the fact that you’re not responsible for me, yes?”

Thorin’s eyes darkened. “You’ve made your case, now I must make mine. Suppose that you get caught, and put the quest in peril.”

“That is a risk with the dragon too,” Bilbo pointed out.

“Yes, but by the time we reach Erebor, you will be completely healed.”

Bilbo did not love the fact that Thorin had a point. He was very used to being the reasonable one in their relationship, and the reversal of the roles was not enjoyable for him, not at all. “What do you suggest, then?”

“I was thinking of going myself,” said Thorin.

Never mind, Bilbo was still the reasonable one. “Forgive me what I’m about to say, but that is the worst idea I’ve ever heard, and my first cousin twice removed once tried to put grass in his pipe.” Ah, Pippin. “If I get caught, the orcs might keep me alive long enough for you to rescue me. If you get caught, they’ll kill you right away.”

“If I get caught, I’ll kill Azog,” Thorin stated.

“Yes, and with that mindset you might try to get caught on purpose too.” Bilbo shook his head. “They are a long way behind us. Even if all goes well, how will you rejoin the group?”

“I’ll run.”

“But how will you find us?” Bilbo insisted.

“Easily.” Bilbo snorted. “What is that?”

“But you’re…” How to say it nicely? “Directionally challenged.” At Thorin’s uncomprehending look, Bilbo added, “You couldn’t find your way out of an eggshell.”

“Pardon?” thundered Thorin.

“You keep turning to Balin to decide which way to go, you couldn’t identify my house on a straight road and Kili told me that he found you wandering the halls in Rivendell because you couldn’t find the way back to your bedroom.”

Thorin rolled his eyes. “He was exaggerating. All of their doors look the same. I’ll teach him to shut his mouth.”

“Or you could tell me an embarrassing story about him, and let me teach him a lesson,” Bilbo suggested. To his absolute delight, Thorin seemed to consider it.

“We’ll see,” he allowed. He narrowed his eyes at Bilbo. “If you play the spy, the problem remains. How will you rejoin us?”

“I can find my way.” With the Dwarves’ heavy boots and the appalling disregard they had for their surroundings, he did not anticipate that to be a problem.

“But can you run?” challenged Thorin.

Ah. That. Bilbo did not appreciate Thorin’s look of triumph. It was an uncomfortable precedent to set. “I could run. Maybe. Is spying so very important, in the grand scheme of things?”

“It was Gandalf’s idea.”

“Why doesn’t he go, then?”

“Because, my dear Bilbo,” Gandalf cut in from where he was perched on a large boulder all the way across camp, “I am needed at the front.” He puffed on his pipe, emitting a tree-shaped cloud of smoke on the exhale.

Bother these wizards with their sharp ears. “Oh?” said Bilbo. “Needed?”

“I am looking for something, if you must know.”

That was new. “What for? Perhaps I can help.” Bilbo paused, waiting for Gandalf to reply. When he didn’t, he asked, “No, no, fine, don’t tell me, I don’t need to know. I’m only a Hobbit, I’m sure you don’t need my help, though you did ask for it in the past, and now that I think about it that is the reason why I’m here. To help. Anyway, shall we have supper soon? I am feeling peckish.”

“A friend, Master Baggins,” Gandalf sighed. “That is what I’m looking for.”

“Can I apply?” By the fire, Bofur snorted. Now that Bilbo paid attention, it was possible that this conversation was no longer confined to the three of them.

“Unless you happen to be a skin-changer who lives nearby, then you are not the friend I am looking for,” replied Gandalf.

“Ah!” said Bilbo, who had quite forgotten about Beorn, or rather, that they would soon be coming upon him. “Super. Maybe he can do the spying for you, then.”

“A skin-changer?” repeated Ori, his voice high amidst the chatter of the other Dwarves, who all seemed to be sharing the same sentiment.

“That’s not natural,” said Dori.

“Is he under some spell?” asked Kili.

“Did a wizard do this to him?” asked Fili.

“Did you do this to him?” Dwalin asked Gandalf.

“Is that how you met him?” Bofur added.

“Is it completely safe?” asked Oin.

“Ma arniki¹,” said Bifur.

“Does he run some kind of hostel?” asked Bombur.

“Will we have to take some kind of detour from our original road?” asked Balin.

“That is bound to delay us,” commented Gloin.

“A delay is optimistic, that’s if he doesn’t eat us raw,” remarked Nori.

“Enough,” Thorin cut in, raising his voice to make himself heard. The others fell silent. “Gandalf.”

“Yes, yes.” Gandalf paused to smoke, though Bilbo guessed that it was mostly for effect. Damn, did he miss smoking. “A skin-changer. It is natural, it is not due to a spell, from a wizard or otherwise. It is certainly not one of my spells, since I have never met him before, or never in his human shape. Nothing is ever completely safe, but you should be safe from him if you do as I say. As far as I know, he does not run a hostel, but his house is almost in our way, so it shouldn’t delay us overmuch. And he does not eat animal or dwarven meat, and you should not speak of it in front of him, Nori.”

“How is he a friend, if you’ve not met him?” asked Thorin.

“A relevant question, thank you,” muttered Gandalf. “He is a friend of a friend. Radagast knows him well.”

“The rabbit wizard?” said Kili.

“The Brown Wizard,” corrected Gandalf, in the tone of someone who capitalised the first letters of each word. “I Would Ask That You Be Respectful, As He Belongs To An Order Which Demands It.”

Well, he did keep mushrooms in his pockets, which made him a good wizard in Bilbo’s books. “Does he live very far from here?” he asked Gandalf.

“In Mirkwood,” Gandalf replied.

Bilbo sighed. “Not Radagast, Beorn.” Only when Gandalf stared at him did Bilbo realise that he’d fallen for his trap.

“How do you know the skin-changer’s name?” asked Ori.

Bilbo said, “I read it in a book,” and then because it was becoming seriously stale, he added, “in Rivendell.”

“You had time to read in Rivendell?” Dwalin deadpanned.

“I’m a scholar. I made the time.” Bilbo waved his hand to dismiss the subject. “Let’s not allow ourselves to be distracted. How far away are we from this Beorn’s house?”

“A couple of days’ travel, if we are diligent and lucky,” said Gandalf.

“I’ll say, dividing the group doesn’t seem very diligent,” observed Balin.

“But how much luck we can count on remains to be determined,” argued Gandalf.

“Sending an injured Hobbit as a spy would be pushing it,” Thorin said.

“I take your point, Thorin Oakenshield,” Gandalf said, pushing his hat further down on his head so that only the end of his pipe was visible underneath the brim. “We shall do without intelligence. Ah, I suppose that won’t be such a change for this company.”

Thorin glared at the wizard, but didn’t respond to the barb directly, only muttering under his beard: “Kakhuf².”

Bilbo shot him a scandalised look. “Bless you.”

“Can you at least pretend not to understand?” Thorin asked him.

“Only if you ask nicely.”

Thorin did not dignify that with a response.

They made it to the border of Beorn’s garden without orc encounters, which served to prove Bilbo’s theory that they were early. For all that it made him nervous, he was also relieved not to have to risk being used as a warg’s chew toy.

That being said, there remained the question of whether Beorn would take them in without the immediate danger of being pursued by the orcs.

Gandalf stopped them from going ahead and entering Beorn’s property to give them a list of rules to avoid annoying their host-to-be, a list which notably included vegetarianism. The Dwarves were predictably not thrilled about that.

“Are we bound to make stops in every meatless house in the world on our way to Erebor?” complained Gloin.

“Oh, do shut up, you fool,” Gandalf rebuffed him. “You were not happy when the trolls attempted to eat you, were you? Well, animals are like family to Beorn, and I don’t think he would be happy if you tried to have one of them for dinner.”

The Wizard proceeded to suggest his plan to introduce the Dwarves one by one, but Bilbo, who had been nice and silent for most of the conversation, couldn’t help himself. “Wouldn’t it be better to be honest?”

Gandalf frowned down on him. “This person that we are visiting is touchy, to say the least. I suppose it didn’t say so in the book you read, but we need to be delicate about it.”

“And lying is delicate?”

“In most cases, no. In this one, it is not only delicate, but required.”

“Because he dislikes Dwarves,” said Bilbo.

“Yes.”

“So we should humour his dislike for an entire race even though he doesn’t know anyone in this Company. I get it. Only, won’t he be angrier once he finds out that he’s been deceived?”

“I imagine that there is a point you would like to make?”

“I think we should explain everything and treat him like a reasonable being instead of like a beast who will explode at the sight of twelve Dwarves at the same time.”

“Are you volunteering?” Bofur asked.

“I don’t think…” Thorin started, but Gandalf, who looked impatient with Bilbo and much more disposed to put him in danger than he had been at the beginning of the conversation, interrupted him.

“Why not? If he breaks you in half, we will not have a burglar, but at least we’ll know that it’s a bad time for a visit. Go on, then.”

That ought to teach Bilbo to open his big mouth. “Are you truly going to let me go alone?” he asked Gandalf. The wizard had at least agreed to accompany him part of the way, leaving the Dwarves well out of sight of the front door just in case.

The wizard puffed on his pipe. “My dear fellow, you should look at this as a lesson. You ought to learn that your words have consequences. Don’t you have an idiom for this in the Shire?”

“Yes, yes,” sighed Bilbo.

“You have proved yourself more than able to talk the talk,” Gandalf mused. “Now, let us find out if you can walk up to Beorn’s house and get us all invited to stay the night.”

Bilbo huffed. “I’ll get us invited, but as for you, I’m not so sure.”

“Get yourself invited, first of all. Good luck!” And with that, he gave Bilbo a push toward the door and strode merrily away.

Dratted wizards. “Well, in for a fourteenth share of a treasure, in for a pound, I guess,” Bilbo muttered before walking up to the door and knocking on it decisively.

It was possible that they had made more noise with their conversation than they’d thought, because Beorn opened the door almost at once, as if he’d been listening in. Out.

Bilbo thought he remembered Beorn very well, even if he hadn’t seen him in decades; the hulking form of the skin-changer still caught him by surprise. “Um,” he said, very eloquently.

Beorn considered him, his facial expression ungentle.

Bilbo took a deep breath and started talking. “Well met, sir, I am Bilbo Baggins, at your service.” Beorn emitted a low grumble. “Thank you. I am travelling with some thirteen companions of the dwarven persuasion. Very nice people.” Another, lower grumble. “Sure. We’ve unfortunately fallen on hard times. You see, we have an orc problem.” Yet another, lower grumble. Bilbo was very curious as to how low he could go. “I know! An infestation. They have been pursuing us since the Misty Mountains, and we were wondering if you would be so kind as to invite us to stay with you for a little while. You see, I think it’s rude, personally, to invite oneself into another’s abode, but we have a Wizard, and you may know how Wizards are, or you may not, but they’re not the most polite of people. Oh, they’re very interesting, to be sure, and they’re good to have for birthday parties, because they bring great presents and excellent fireworks, but then you’ll be enjoying a comfortable smoke on your porch and they’ll swoop in and all but force you on an adventure. Not that I’m complaining, of course, I did come willingly, this time, but you know, I was supposed to be on a healing retreat with my nephew.” Bilbo tilted his head. In retrospect, it was just like Gandalf to interrupt his trip to the Undying Lands and take him back through time for a do over.

Beorn sniffed loudly. “And what are you, little fellow?”

“I am a Hobbit from the Shire, pleased to meet you,” Bilbo replied agreeably, though he was wondering why he tried to be polite when obviously Beorn didn’t care for politeness, and was barely listening to him anyway. “Might we come in? The wizard can stay outside if you’d prefer.”

“Wizard,” Beorn echoed gruffly. “What wizard?”

“His name is Gandalf.”

“Never heard of him.”

“Of course not.”

“Thirteen is a lot of Dwarves,” he grumbled. “I don’t trust Dwarves. Don’t like them.”

“Why not?”

“They’re greedy and callous with the lives of those they deem lesser than theirs.”

Bilbo tilted his head. “But my friends aren’t like that. And maybe in the past some Dwarves have been, erm. Close-minded. But maybe they had their reasons. And truly, we hate to bother you, sir, but since we have been so unfortunate, we resorted to appealing to your hospitality.” No reaction, how encouraging. “Now, I will be frank with you, the last time I had them over for supper, they did not behave with a tremendous amount of table manners, but we had some great fun. There was some singing, and stories…”

Beorn perked up. “Stories?”

“Yes. We can tell you some tonight, if you’ll invite us to stay.”

Beorn scrutinised him, as if wary of being played for a fool. But after a moment, he stepped away from the door. “Tell your friends to come in,” he ordered. Bilbo grinned. “And bring the wizard. I want to hear his stories too.”

Chapter Text

(It had started as a private joke, but Bilbo was starting to think that gazes really did have weights, and moreover, that some people’s were heavier than others’. Case in point: there Bilbo was, basking in the warmth and beauty of Beorn’s garden, relishing the numbing buzz of the bees, and he could feel Thorin’s eyes on him like a coat draped around his shoulders, even before he turned and met it head on.

That being said, it was worth noting that he had heard him also; Bilbo didn’t know if Thorin was actively trying to sneak up on him, but one thing was clear, he had picked the wrong boots to do so.

“Too rambunctious, in there?” Bilbo asked. He could hear the rest of the company, tipsily agitating for more of Beorn’s homemade ale. He’d slipped out once he was done with dinner, right when their host had decided it was a good idea to mention his wine cellar.

“No, I was looking for you,” replied Thorin.

Bilbo swallowed thickly. Thorin’s words made something ache, deep within him; if he had to pinpoint it, he would say that the feeling was located below his ribcage, close to his spine. Very strange. “Well, I’m here.”

Thorin took it as an invitation to join him. He stood at Bilbo’s side, staring at him without much of an expression, which was a massive improvement from the way he usually frowned and stared. “What are you doing?”

Bilbo shrugged. Mostly, he’d been thinking, though he could not remember what about. “Plotting to steal the roots of Beorn’s flowers to plant them in the Shire.”

“I see.” Thorin did not say more, but he turned away to sit on a trunk that had been laid as a bench. Now that his eyes were no longer aimed his way, Bilbo found himself missing that thrill. More than that, he wished he knew how to read Thorin, his thoughts and his moods. It was all so bothersome, and he felt very awkward asking, all of a sudden.

He searched his pockets; but they were empty, save for his little trinket he’d found–or won. That wouldn’t do at all. At a loss, he gazed around him, and finding the most fitting possibility, he bent to pluck a flower, which he then offered to Thorin.

Thorin raised his eyebrows at him, the faintest trace of a smile already on his lips. “You’re giving me a daisy,” he said flatly.

“No, of course not,” scoffed Bilbo. “It’s not a daisy, it’s a red aster.”

“I fail to see the difference.”

“One is a daisy,” Bilbo explained patiently, “and one is not.”

“Ah, of course. And why are you giving me a flower that is not a daisy?”

“Because I have no penny to offer you in exchange for your thoughts, but I would like to know them anyway. So…”

“So, a flower for my thought,” said Thorin. His fingers grazed Bilbo’s when he took the flower; Bilbo felt it in that place below his ribcage. “Very well,” he said, tucking the flower carefully in the inner pocket of his coat. “I would like to ask a favour of you.”

Bilbo hummed inquisitively.

“What you did, standing between me and the pale orc, was very brave, and I owe you my life. But I would have you promise not to put yourself in danger for me.”

“I don’t understand,” Bilbo said after studying him for a while. “You know I’ve been hired to rob a dragon, right? It was in the contract, I can fetch it if you wish.” He made to leave, but Thorin grabbed his wrist.

“You are hired to check the place out, and not disturb the dragon if he is alive. That is your job; protecting me is not. I would see you safely returned to the Shire, with your stolen roots and your share of the treasure. Now, Master Baggins. Promise.”

“Fine, I promise,” said Bilbo, scowling without force. “I promise, I will not help you. In fact, should I see you trip and fall in a ditch, I shall turn away and ignore your cries for help.”

“If I fall in a ditch, I won’t cry for help, as I will be too busy climbing out of it.” Thorin smirked. “And if I couldn’t, I doubt you could help me. Dwarves are a good deal heavier than Hobbits.”

“How do you…” He trailed off when he remembered, with no small amount of embarrassment, his own close call in the Misty Mountains. “I never thanked you for, um. Well. Rescuing me from my fall.”

Thorin bit his lower lip, contemplating Bilbo’s words. “Did you know that in dwarvish culture, when two Dwarves save one another from peril, they become Barkbâhu ?”

“Of course I did,” said Bilbo. Thorin snorted. The sound was a delight, and Bilbo vowed to make it happen again as much as he could. “Of course I did not know. I don’t know what it means.”

“The literal translation would be ‘axe friend’, though it is thoroughly lacking. I suppose it means friends who have battled side by side, or axe by axe, who have risked their lives for the other.”

“But I’m not a Dwarf, so it doesn’t count.”

“I would argue that it counts even more,” Thorin countered. “Dwarves help each other as a matter of course, as a duty, but since you are not one, you didn’t owe me aid. It means a lot that you gave it.”

Bilbo mulled this over. “So, friends,” he said.

“Aye. It also means that we can dispense with formalities. So you can call me by my first name.”

“That’s good,” Bilbo said, “since I’ve always done so before.”

Thorin smiled. “And when I am King, you will not need to call me by my title.”

“That’s good,” Bilbo said again, “since I never intended to.”

“You’re a clever little thing, Master Baggins.”

“No, no, that won’t do at all. You’re my axe friend, Thorin, you can call me by my first name.”

Thorin opened his mouth, but the words he meant to say never came out; Dwalin appeared at the door of the house and cleared his throat, a wry smile on his face. Thorin’s own smile was gone. He glared at Dwalin, and his voice was low again when he spoke, a sharp contrast to what it had been a moment before. “Itkit.”

Dwalin shook his head, his smile growing wider. “Ini hu amrâlul.”

His response did not seem to please Thorin, who gritted his teeth so hard Bilbo could hear the grind. “What’s that?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Thorin replied coldly. “Let’s go back inside.”)

It was strange that, of all nights since the beginning of their adventure, the first one they spent at Beorn’s house was the one when Bilbo had his first dream of Thorin, or rather, of his first life’s memories with Thorin. It might have been convenient, if the memory had contained clues and indications as to what Bilbo should change to make his second go-round more successful than the first, except it didn’t seem to show him anything useful. Besides, after a few minutes of wakefulness, the memory started to blur in the manner of regular dreams, until he only vaguely recalled the more vivid parts.

Perhaps it was his fault for not looking up prayers to the Vala Lorien while in Rivendell. Although, if he was honest, he’d never been one for praying to the Valar, even after learning of their existence. The only time he could muster something like reverence was at night, when he looked up to see Eärendil watch over the world, and at this point, it felt less like reverence was more like reassurance, the same feeling Bilbo used to have when he came to Rivendell’s dining hall in the mornings and saw Elrond wait for him at the table, unchanging throughout the years. Constant, and there.

He was startled from his thoughts by something flung at his head. Something, it turned out, was Kili’s coat. “What the…” he cried, shooting up. “Kili!”

“Sorry, Bilbo, but you were so deep in thought that you didn’t hear me call you.”

“Several times,” added Nori, who lurked right behind Bilbo’s shoulder. “What had you so distracted, Baggins?”

“None of your concerns,” Bilbo replied primly. Turning back to Kili, he added, “And you. I guess there were no gentler ways to attract my attention than to throw your coat full of fleas on me?”

“For the last time, my coat does not have fleas!”

“Please stop talking about fleas, or our host might take you seriously and throw us out,” Dori intervened from a few cots away.

“For all we know, he has fleas himself,” muttered Nori, using Bilbo’s shoulder as a resting place for his elbow.

“I’m sure he does not, and you shouldn’t ask him about it,” snapped Dori, horrified.

Bilbo opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted by Kili, who thoroughly distracted him by saying, “Anyway, I wanted to ask if you intended to eat breakfast? Uncle said you should eat while you can.” He frowned. “He said something about seven meals a day, but I’m not sure I understood it.”

“Big shocker,” Nori deadpanned. Bilbo, not wishing to encourage his mocking, stepped aside, leaving him unbalanced. He didn’t quite fall on his face, but it was close enough to make Kili laugh.

“Shall we go to first breakfast, then?” Bilbo asked, taking Kili by the arm.

“Sure,” Kili replied good-naturedly. They were almost at Beorn’s table when Bilbo’s words seemed to land. “Wait. First breakfast?”

As it turned out, Beorn didn’t serve second breakfasts, nor did he serve seven whole meals a day; but he did serve three admirable meals, as adequate as Bilbo recalled.

“Adequate,” Fili echoed when Bilbo said so. Beorn and Gandalf were in a not-so-secret conference in the other room, leaving the Company to enjoy a business-free moment together. Bilbo could tell that it grated on Thorin, to not be included in the big people talk, but besides staging a coup, there was not much he could do about it, and his mother had always said that one should not revolt on an empty stomach.

“Well, it is almost up to Hobbit standards,” Bilbo explained. “For an unexpected breakfast, I mean. He couldn’t have known to prepare his pantry for fifteen people, after all.”

“Not that it’s an excuse, eh?” teased Bofur.

“Don’t encourage him,” Dwalin muttered.

“Well, my uncle always said that the best way to judge someone’s hospitality is to drop by unannounced.” Bilbo wrinkled his nose. “But then my father would reply that it said more about my uncle’s manners than about his host’s hospitality, so I suppose it depends on how you look at it.”

Every moment could not be spent eating and entertaining his friends, however; he took advantage of a lull in Beorn and Gandalf’s conversation to approach the latter. “Well, my dear fellow, I hope you’re enjoying your opportunity to replenish your reserves.”

“I am, especially since I suppose we’re in for some lean time soon,” replied Bilbo.

Gandalf’s eyes twinkled. “Oh?”

“That is the next step, isn’t it? We’ll have to make whatever we take with us in Mirkwood last.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t believe that you’ll find a market on the way,” Gandalf agreed.

“Could you help us?” asked Bilbo.

“How?”

“I don’t know. Could you make my pockets larger on the inside so that I can carry more food in them?” That seemed more elaborate than what he’d seen Gandalf do, but one could hope.

Not too much, apparently. “I’m afraid not. You’ll have to rely on the pockets you have. Ah, but I notice that you didn’t remark on my blunder. I said ‘you’ instead of ‘us’. Perhaps you didn’t notice? Unless you know that I will not be joining you in Mirkwood.”

Bilbo huffed. He was so sick of lying. “At the beginning of our adventure, you agreed to wait for me to tell you everything. It would be nice if you didn’t try to trick me into revealing more than I mean to at every turn.”

Gandalf laughed at this. “Ah, Bilbo, but you don’t need me to trick you. Don’t worry, I won’t push you this time. I’m simply glad that you won’t insist on keeping me with you.”

Bilbo shrugged. “If you have more important things to do, who am I to stop you?” Especially since, if memory served, Gandalf would be off to unveil Sauron’s resurgence. Plus, he meant it: if Gandalf had decided to do something, the only way Bilbo could think to dissuade him from doing it would be to reveal the truth.

Not yet. Dragon first, evil overlord second.

“Good,” said Gandalf. “I count on you to help me explain this to the others, then.”

Fine. Thorin first, then dragon, and then evil overlord. Let it not be said that Hobbits were lazy.

Standing in Beorn’s garden once more as the others were gorging themselves on Beorn’s ale, Bilbo tried to calculate probabilities. It was fifty-fifty; half of Bilbo thought that he had twisted his friendship with Thorin too badly for him to follow him outside, and half of him thought, “I will turn around, and he will be there.” It was almost not worth it to turn around and risk the disappointment, but of course Bilbo had never been one to spare his own feelings.

He turned, and there Thorin was, observing him from the bend of Beorn’s house. Bilbo smiled at him. “I wanted a moment of quiet,” he explained, though Thorin had not asked. “Not that I don’t enjoy a party, but…”

“I understand,” said Thorin. He was frowning, as he was wont to. “Should I leave you alone?”

“No, please,” Bilbo replied nonsensically. “I mean, stay. Please.”

Thorin’s eyes scoured the garden and fell on the tree trunk. He went to sit on it, his steps lighter than they had been the first time.

Bilbo briefly wondered if it would be quite sick of him to try to recreate the moment from his first life. In the end, he couldn’t resist. Having had more time to pack, he had remembered to pack his purse, but he’d neglected to take it outside with him, so he went in search of a flower. This time, though, he dismissed the asters; instead, he picked a morning glory. It was still vibrantly blue, though it had already begun to close. Bracing himself, Bilbo held it up in front of Thorin.

And this time, instead of looking amused, Thorin looked deeply troubled. “Master Baggins, why are you giving me a flower?”

“Because my purse is in the house, so I have no penny to offer in exchange for your thoughts,” Bilbo explained. “But I would like to know them anyway, so have this, and tell me.”

“I don’t require payment for my thoughts,” Thorin replied, still wary. “If you ask for them, I’ll tell you them for free.”

Bilbo dropped his hand, and did not look down to watch the flower fall to the ground when he let go of it; he just let go, and accepted that it was gone for good. “What were you thinking?” he asked, sitting down at Thorin’s side.

“I was thinking that you must have been lonely, in the Shire, to follow us so readily.”

Bilbo agreed before he had the chance to think about it. In all honesty, he couldn’t remember how he used to feel before the quest. Content, he imagined, but in the way one felt when the life they led was inevitable. Content, because he could not change his fate. Content, because seeking more was scary, and because finding more could, and would, hurt.

“I suppose I was, a little,” he told Thorin. “I was on my own for a long time.” He hesitated for a moment, wondering how much of himself he could reveal before Thorin regretted his inquiry. But the Dwarf regarded him in a silent invitation to continue, so he did. “Well, I don’t have any siblings, which is rare for a Hobbit. My father died a few years after I came of age. My mother lived for eight years after his death, but she was never the same, so I stayed with her as much as I could to support her. I didn’t make many close friends at that time, though I had many acquaintances, and I never married. I suppose I got used to being alone.”

When he chanced a glance at him, Thorin didn’t look bored or sorry to still be in this conversation, but he didn’t look pleased. “Your mother didn’t remarry?” he asked.

It wasn’t the weirdest transition Bilbo had ever heard (he had lived with Elves; and worse, he had lived with Elladan; he had to get used to meandering conversations), but it was a little too out there for him to respond right away. “Um,” he said. “No. She became sick with grief, at first, and when she was better, she had no desire to mingle.”

“I see. I heard you say that Hobbits could find love again, so I assumed…”

“Oh, I should have known this would have everybody’s knickers in a twist,” Bilbo muttered. “You didn’t understand me. I didn’t say that it is an obligation to remarry, only that it is possible, and that it happens occasionally. We can love several times; the first time isn’t always the right one. But some of us don’t want to search for love again after…” he trailed off.

“After you have lost that which makes you whole,” Thorin offered.

“I don’t think love makes you whole, or that losing it halves you,” said Bilbo. “Perhaps it is different for Dwarves, but for me, bereavement is painful because it is bereavement, not because a part was cleft from my soul.”

“But you were changed, certainly.”

“Of course I was, but we change all the time, and not only because of death.”

Thorin nodded grimly. “The others were correct, then.” At Bilbo’s questioning noise, he explained, “There were some theories amongst the group that you had, perhaps, lost someone dear to you. Dearer than parents. I thought it may be that which gives you nightmares.”

Bilbo didn’t respond for a long time. It wasn’t fair. He’d told himself he wouldn’t do this. “I lost my friend,” he said at last. “He was my dearest friend. Nothing more.” But more than enough.

As if it cost him, Thorin murmured, “I’m sorry.”

Bilbo almost wanted to laugh. “It was a long time ago,” he said.

“That’s no reason to dismiss your grief, if it is still with you.”

“It is.” It was the one thing he had never been able to leave behind; Bilbo had carried his grief with him for so long, he could not fathom giving it up, even with the person who had caused it in front of him. “But the world didn’t end, though it felt like it at the time,” he said. “Whether I wanted to or not, I had to keep going.” Gandalf would probably have kicked his behind all the way to the Shire if he hadn’t. Sometimes, Bilbo wondered if it was affection that kept the wizard coming back to him, or if it was a sense of responsibility that made him want to ensure that Bilbo didn’t completely wallow in his pain.

No, that was nonsense. Of course Gandalf loved him. It was probably a mix of both.

He shrugged this off. “And I did. I find happiness when I can, and when I can’t, I just… Bear it as well as possible. We all have our moments of pain.”

“Some more than others.”

“Sure, but…” He trailed off, trying to find the right words. “I miss him, my friend. All the time, I find myself wishing I could speak to him, and hear what he would say back, and I am very sad that I can’t. But I can find Gandalf, or another friend, and talk to them. It’s not the same, but I can find joy in their response. I can… I can find joy in yours.”

Thorin stared at him, incredulous. “You can find joy in what I have to say?”

He rolled his eyes, though Thorin had a point. “Occasionally. Despite what everyone, including me, says about you, I know there’s more to you than your intense sulking.” Thorin opened his mouth, but Bilbo shook his head. “No, I think deeply. You sulk.”

“Is that what you do? You think deeply? I wondered.” At Bilbo’s inquisitive noise, he went on. “Sometimes, you seem far away. Absent, even, and you look sad when you come back.”

Well, drat. If Thorin noticed these things, it meant that Bilbo was doing an even worse job at hiding them than he’d thought.

“My head is full of memories,” said Bilbo. “Not all of them are bad. If I look sad when I, um, ‘come back’, as you said, it is because they are in the past. But there’s more than horror and grief inside of me. There’s love and joy too, and they’re more linked than you’d think.”

Thorin nodded gravely. “I see.”

Bilbo laughed suddenly. “Well, this has been suitably depressing. How about I make you angry now? Old habits die hard, as my father would say. Gandalf told me that he would leave us soon.”

Thorin stared at him. “Pardon?”

There it was. “His business is taking him South of here. We’ll have to traverse the woods on our own.”

“Considering how useful the wizard has been so far, I don’t know how great a loss it is.”

“He helped with the goblins, didn’t he?”

“Somewhat,” Thorin acknowledged begrudgingly. “Why did he tell you, and not me?”

Bilbo shrugged. “Because he wanted you to take your ire out of me rather than on him, certainly.” Thorin snorted. “Fine. Because he thought you’d take it better coming from me. You haven’t been hiding your distrust of him. You may not like me, but at least…”

Thorin cut him off. “I do not dislike you.” Bilbo did a double take. “What?”

“Master Oakenshield, that may be the nicest thing you’ve said to me.”

“That isn’t true. I said you have a nice voice once.” He paused. “I am not the most agreeable Dwarf, I know this.”

“No,” agreed Bilbo, “but there are more important things in the world than agreeability. Besides, I was teasing before.”

Thorin eyed him for a moment before turning his head to look ahead. “We’ll make do without the wizard. We’ll have to.”

“I am worried about the food.” Bilbo couldn’t remember much from the forest, only flashes as grotesque as fever dreams that came abruptly and went just as fast, but he did remember the hunger, how it had weighed on all of them. It was hard to imagine how heavy emptiness could be, how hard it was to think about anything else. He was less than eager to repeat that experience, but they’d gone into the woods as prepared as they could be, and it still hadn’t been enough.

“I am too,” admitted Thorin. “It will not be an easy journey. If we had more time, I would find another route.”

Needless to say, they didn’t have more time, unless they wanted to vacation in Lake-Town for a few months and try their luck next year. Bilbo doubted that his purse was full enough to afford them that treat.

“We should have asked the Rabbit Wizard to lend us his sledge,” sighed Bilbo. “We could have packed it with supplies and dragged it behind us.”

“We could do that with any piece of wood, but it would slow us down,” argued Thorin. “I fear that unless Gandalf knows a way to make our packs bigger on the inside, we’ll have to rely on the old… Why are you looking at me like that?”

Bilbo might have been staring. “Great minds think alike,” he chuckled. “I already asked him. He has no spell for us.”

“Of course not. Why would he pick now to be of use?”

“Don’t be so harsh, he’s doing his best, poor old fellow.” Bilbo stood, stretching his arms. “Why couldn’t the Eagles drop us on the other side of the woods, um? That’s a better recrimination.”

Thorin gave no reply. When Bilbo turned to inquire as to the reason for his sudden silence, he caught the tail end of a strange look the Dwarf was giving him.

“What’s the matter?” asked Bilbo. Thorin shook his head, standing in his turn. It brought them so close Bilbo had to take a step back. If he hadn’t, they would have been close enough to hug. He tried hard not to dwell on that, but it was an almost impossible task when he recalled how warm it had felt, and how cold he was now.

“Bilbo, you old sap,” he chastised himself inwardly.

“We should go back inside,” Thorin said curtly. “With any luck, we won’t have left the others alone long enough for them to have asked the skin-changer about his animals.”

“They wouldn’t…” Bilbo trailed off. “You’re right, let’s go back.”

He started towards the house, assuming that Thorin would be at his heels, but when he held the door open, he noticed that Thorin had been lagging behind. At Bilbo’s questioning noise, he made a dismissive gesture. “Never mind, Master Baggins.”

Reasonably, Bilbo held so many secrets, he couldn’t be miffed that Thorin kept a few of his own. He gestured Thorin in, taking a last glance at the garden, where the asters lay undisturbed. He sought the flower at the foot of the trunk, but perhaps they had stepped on it as they left, for Bilbo could not find it anymore.

Sighing, he followed Thorin inside.

If Thorin had been more or less gracious when Bilbo had told him about Gandalf’s departure, the same could not be said for the rest of the group when Gandalf announced it over supper.

Thorin, as he usually did, let them express their protests for a full minute, sitting quietly and absorbing each of their words before silencing them. Bilbo watched him do it from the corner of his eye; when they had sat down for the meal, Thorin had taken the seat next to him, not suspecting how agreeable he was being to Bilbo. His hands were flat upon the table, his thumbs idly tracing the veins of the wood. Bilbo wondered about it for a long moment, a vague smile stretching his lips, barely listening to the conversation. When he looked up, he caught Fili’s gaze from the other side of the table. The prince lifted an eyebrow. Bilbo took a drink from his glass.

“I’m glad to see you being so reasonable about this,” Gandalf was telling Thorin. He gave Bilbo a grateful glance, unjustified, since Thorin hadn’t made much of a fuss upon learning the news.

Perhaps the two of them could afford to think a little better of Thorin.

“Since you won’t be there, it’ll be one less mouth to feed on the road,” Thorin replied. “Speaking of which, we ought to make some arrangements about this.”

“I took care of that,” said Gandalf. “Beorn kindly agreed to help you on the matter of food. Of course, your packs will be difficult to replace, but we still have Master Baggins’, which you can each carry in turn.”

“Or he can do the carrying, since it’s his pack,” suggested Nori.

“If I carry the food, I’ll eat it too, I’m warning you,” Bilbo declared primly. “I’ll do much for you, but not break my back.” The memory of back pain was a long way away by now, but he was not eager to get it back, no matter how odd it was to have gone back to his young body.

Fortunately, Beorn had another suggestion. “I have some woolly bags. They’ll be uneasy to carry, and I will want them back at the end of your quest, but I’ll lend them to you if you wish.”

“That’s kind of you,” said Kili.

“Yes,” agreed Dwalin, though his tone was more suspicious. “Awfully kind.”

“Where did you come across woolly bags?” asked Dori. “Are there artisans around these parts?”

“I made them,” grumbled Beorn. “As I said, they are yours to take and to give back. I will not expect back the food you will carry in them. I know Dwarves are not fond of debts.”

“Nor are Hobbits, I can assure you!” Bilbo said before one of the many Dwarves in the room found something to say to that. “Cumbersome things. Why, I remember very well that I forgot my purse at home once when going to the market. My cousin Amaranth had to lend me money to buy a pound of courgettes, and when I tried to pay her back, she insisted that I invite her for lunch instead and then gave me advice on my curtains, which as interest seemed like quite a lot. Very annoying. Speaking of courgettes, might I be of assistance preparing the packs? I’m quite good at packing, and at food.”

Beorn, who had been staring at him from the moment Bilbo had started his impromptu speech, startled a little.

Gandalf chuckled. “Of course, Bilbo, but don’t expect courgettes.”

Bofur, two seats away from Bilbo, leaned over Ori and asked, “What are courgettes?”

They took the woolly bags in the end, as was sensible, and Bilbo’s concern was a little assuaged, though not too much; after all, they had taken them the first time too, and though he thought that they were fuller this time, he doubted it would be enough.

“We need more water,” he told Beorn, contemplating the packs they had stored in Beorn’s shed.

“I gave you as much as possible, but you need to be able to carry these things,” argued Beorn.

“Could we not take some of the food out and replace it with…”

“I have no more waterskins, little fellow,” Beorn cut in. “There is no use making yourself sick over it. If you are determined to go through the woods, then you will have to be content with what I gave you.”

He left Bilbo and Gandalf alone in front of the shed. “I hope he’s not angry at me,” Bilbo told the wizard.

“If he is, it is his own affair. But are you well, Bilbo?”

Bilbo could think of few fates worse than starvation, but one of them was dehydration. “Water is important, Gandalf.”

Gandalf’s eyes glassed over. Something passed over him, a shadow or a light, Bilbo couldn’t tell. He knew that state, though. He’d seen it often enough; one could not live in the house of Elrond for twenty years and not recognise what foresight looked like.

But Gandalf shook himself out of it, and merely said, “Yes, I wager you are correct. Water will be important.”

(“Dark and dreary were the deep valleys,

where limbs gigantic of lowering trees

in endless aisles were arched over rivers

flowing down afar from fells of…”

“Don’t you think that’s a little dramatic?” Amaranth interrupted his reading.

It was rare enough that she let him read his poetry to her, he ought to be grateful she let him get that far.

That being said… “I was in the middle of a line, do you mind? And what do you mean, dramatic? I almost starved in these woods. I earned the drama.”

“If you say so.” Amaranth was one of the few cousins who accepted him back into Shire society first after his return and supposed resurrection, but it didn’t mean that she believed his tales. If anything, she tolerated them, but she seemed more interested in reorganising Bilbo’s sitting room than anything he had to say.

He resigned himself to put his poetry away, and she perked up, jumping on the occasion. “Oh, but could you tell me again about the food in Rivendell?”

He smiled and followed her lead. After all, this was the Hobbit way; who would prefer discussing starvation and other unpleasant things, rather than talking about feasting with Elves?)

“Thus at last came they to Mirkwood’s margin under mountain-shadows,” Bilbo recited under his breath.

“What’s that?” asked Fili.

“I was thinking about the food in Rivendell,” he replied distractedly.

Fili shrugged. “No meat. I think we’re better off here.”

“There’s no meat here either.”

“Yes, but at least we’re far from the Elves,” Fili retorted.

Not for long, hopefully.

“Well, if we’re all ready,” Gandalf said loudly, stepping away from the forest in a hurry. Bilbo had not seen him take a few steps towards the trees, but given the wizard’s strange mood, he would not be shocked to learn that they had burned him.

Bilbo approached him to say goodbye, and Gandalf gave him a kind smile. “You will have to manage this company,” he told him.

“I am not their leader, Thorin is.” Gandalf harrumphed in response. “I wished to say, Gandalf. It may sound silly coming from me, but be careful.”

“Ah, my friend,” Gandalf chuckled, lowering himself to pat Bilbo on the shoulder. “It doesn’t sound silly. Good advice never does.”

Bilbo waited for a moment, expecting his friend to say more. “Well, are you going to tell me to be careful?”

“I will not,” replied Gandalf, “since I know that you won’t listen. I will tell you, instead, not to believe everything you see in these woods. But also, do not disbelieve everything either. Woods are never one thing, evil or good. You may find perils in a green and sunny clearing, and you may find luck in the dark. That’s all I’ll say.”

Bilbo inclined his head, scrunching up his nose. “I will miss these cryptic declarations of yours, Gandalf.” He meant it, too.

Gandalf peered down at him for a few seconds, then nodded to himself. “Well, I’m off. Don’t let the spiders scare you.” And on this, he turned away, leaving Bilbo alone with his formidable anxiety.

And thirteen Dwarves, whose thirteen pairs of eyes were all fixed on him. “Shall we start?” he asked, at a loss about what they were expecting from him.

Somehow, this seemed to unfreeze them; they all started moving again, adjusting their shoes and coats and making sure that their bags were closed properly. Thorin beckoned Bilbo forward. “I would prefer it if you stayed where I can see you,” he informed Bilbo.

This was new. “Why? Are you worried that I’ll do something stupid?”

“Precedence is not in your favour, Baggins,” Nori remarked from a few feet away. Bilbo was going to shove Oin’s trumpet in his ears.

“I am not worried,” Thorin said, glaring at Nori. “Simply, if we are in danger, I would prefer that you were close.”

Right. Because Bilbo was such a poor fighter, he could not be trusted to defend himself. He supposed that he couldn’t fault Thorin for thinking of that. “Fine. I’ll stay next to you.”

“Perfect.”

And so, while phantom foes with fell voices in the gloom gathered, together they entered Mirkwood.

Chapter Text

Someone was singing. Their voice was clear as a bell, and though Bilbo couldn’t distinguish words, he thought that they sang of peace.

Unfortunately, no one else in the Company heard it. They had been in this blasted forest for many days; Bilbo was tempted to number them as fifteen, but it was hard to keep track, as the air itself made it difficult to think. They were not out of food yet, but it was coming to be a concern, even with Bilbo’s efforts to conserve it. To be frank, it was difficult to remember to conserve it. Thoughts swam by, in and out of his head as if carried away by the current, making ripples instead of waves. Sometimes, minutes seemed to pass between the blinks of Bilbo’s eyes. Sometimes, entire lifetimes.

“The air is poison,” mumbled Bofur, and so, of course, he tried to stop breathing, until Bombur slapped the back of his head, making his hat tumble to the ground.

Bilbo bent forward to grasp it, but in doing so, he caught a glimpse of a river, at the bottom of the ravine above which trailed the road they were walking. He squinted, leaning low to identify what he’d seen, a dark figure in the water.

He gasped when his vision settled, the figure’s edges sharpening. It was impossible, and yet, there he was, looking at Bilbo from beneath the surface of the river with bright blue eyes. Bilbo watched in horror as he tried to gasp and no air came to his lungs, as he tried to swim, but of course, he didn’t know how. He’d never learned, he’d always been afraid of the water, after…

He extended a hand towards Bilbo. His middle finger was cut after the first knuckle. Bilbo dropped his bag and plunged, crying his nephew’s name.

“Who’s Frodo?” asked Thorin.

Bilbo blinked rapidly, clearing an image he already could not recall out of his head. He was sitting on the ground, his back against a tree, his head leaned against something soft. He lifted his hand to touch. So soft. He peered up, and found Thorin’s gaze. So beautiful.

“You have the loveliest eyes I’ve ever seen,” he mumbled, his hand still running on Thorin’s fur cloak. Thorin grabbed his fingers to still them. There was something warm on his waist, and it took Bilbo a moment to realise that it was Thorin’s other hand. A dream, then. He settled against Thorin’s shoulder. “Lovely,” he murmured. “So lovely.”

“There was a song,” he heard himself say. “I think I wrote it in my head. It went,

Fallen Frodo’s fond farewell

Made Middle-Earth miserable

Bilbo Baggins’s boat brought both

Away apart after all.”

“Is that a Hobbit style of poetry?”

“I invented it, so it’s certainly not gnomish.”

“There are spiders,” Bilbo said. “Do you see them?”

They had run out of food that morning, though they still had a little water left. Even with the supplies Beorn had given him, even with rationing, Mirkwood was Mirkwood, determined to suck them dry. Perhaps Lady Estë was in Bilbo’s corner, but whoever ruled fate didn’t like him very much.

“I see spider webs,” Balin replied. “It makes sense that there would be spiders.”

“Big spiders,” said Bilbo. “Balin, once Erebor is reclaimed, it will be enough, right?” Balin didn’t speak. “No need to seek other mountains. Erebor is enough, and you’ll be safe there.” No lonely grave to be discovered by Gimli and Frodo. Balin could live out the rest of his life in peace. Ori could grow old, and Oin could stay with his brother.

Bilbo blinked, but Balin was not beside him anymore.

“I’m thirsty,” he told someone he loved. Had loved. Would love. Loved still? “Conjugation is confusing.”

“One day, I will teach you my language.” This voice. He wanted to cry. “Then we will see if you still find Westron confusing.”

There was a deer. He remembered a deer. “Don’t shoot it,” he told Thorin. “It’s just existing here.”

Thorin looked at him strangely. “Shoot what?”

But it was gone again, like water or sand between fingers. Days later, Thorin shot at the deer and missed again. Bilbo longed to ask someone why he had been sent back if he could not change anything.

“Tell us a story,” asked a child.

“In a hole in the ground, there lived a Hobbit,” Bilbo started automatically, but he stopped. He wasn’t supposed to say. What if Gandalf found out and made him give up the quest? He would go to Mordor, he would deal with the Ring, but he needed to save Thorin first. He needed the children to survive.

“What happened to the Hobbit?”

“He left his home to defeat a monster and lost himself on the way,” said Bilbo.

Kili pouted. “That’s not a very good story.”

“I’m working on it.”

Bilbo came to with wet lips, which was surprising, because he had drunk the last of his water the day before. He licked his lips, and caught Thorin’s guilt-ridden expression. “What…?”

“You should have gone back to Rivendell,” Thorin told him.

“Not this again.”

But Thorin looked miserable, not angry. “The Elves might not have provided you with seven meals a day, but at least you wouldn’t have starved with them.”

Bilbo shook his head. “We’ll find the way out of here. I promise.”

Thorin did not appear to hear him. “I’ll have killed you, after all.”

Without thinking, Bilbo grabbed his arm. “Listen to me. I’m going to climb up a tree to find the way.”

“You fell from a tree, and I failed to catch you.”

“Must you be responsible for everything that happens all the time?” asked Bilbo. “My goodness, if someone trips within twenty feet of you, is that your fault?”

“I should have caught you,” Thorin muttered, before saying something else that Bilbo couldn’t decipher.

“There are spiders around us,” Bilbo told him. “I don’t remember the timeline, but I think they’re due to attack soon. I’ll climb, but you have to keep everyone safe.” Thorin’s head was low. Bilbo reached up to shake his shoulder. “Please, listen to me.”

“I do,” said Thorin. “Go on, climb your tree. I’ll keep everyone else safe.”

Head spinning, Bilbo gave his shoulder a squeeze before letting go. Truth be told, he thought that everyone could use some air from above the treeline, but Dwarves were not as likely to make it there as he was. He used Nori’s head as a step ladder to boost himself up, and started his journey to the top, ignoring the sting of the bark which scraped his palms. He moved his body as if through slime, his arms paining to pull his weight. It didn’t make sense; he should be lighter, what with the enforced diet. Oh, to eat again.

At last, he reached the final branch, pushing the canopy apart to see the sky. It was dark, past evening and almost fully night, but after the gloom of the forest, it was almost blinding. The sky only sported a few early stars, but as Bilbo drew in relieved breaths, he caught sight of the most brilliant one.

“Hello again, my friend,” he told Gil-Estel. Gil-Estel said nothing back, but for the briefest of moments, Bilbo imagined that its light shone brighter to greet him.

Truly, his fancifulness knew no bounds.

They were much farther to the East than he’d believed. In fact, Bilbo wouldn’t be surprised if they came upon Elves soon. He must have been counting the days wrong, or he had forgotten some time; even now, when he tried to recall his last few weeks, all he had were snippets of memories. The whole experience felt like a dream or a nightmare.

Part of him would have liked to stay up there all night long, taking in the sights and, more vitally, breathable air, but his anxiety about the Company was rising steadily to meet him, and it climbed much faster than Bilbo had.

The others were safe when he reached them. Most of them slept, except for Dwalin, who kept watch, and Thorin, who never seemed to sleep, but leaned against an outcropping of rocks covered in moss. Bilbo sat next to him and asked, “Are you feeling better?”

But Thorin paid no attention to his question. “I did not see any spiders,” he informed Bilbo. “I told the others to be vigilant.”

Bilbo’s eyes roamed across the sleeping company. “Yes, I can see that they took your words to heart.”

“I can’t blame them. It seems that we have been in this accursed forest for an age. It rots the nerves, and they are all so hungry.” Thorin gave him a rueful smile. “And soon, that will not be our biggest problem.”

“Water,” agreed Bilbo.

“Gandalf said not to drink from the river, but I wonder…”

“No,” Bilbo cut in, shuddering as he remembered poor Bombur, whom they’d had to carry almost all the way to Thranduil’s door, unsure if he would ever wake up. Then, something else occurred to him. “Did I fall into it? The river?”

Thorin frowned down at him. He seemed more alert than he had been earlier in the afternoon. “No,” he said sternly. “You didn’t fall into it. You jumped into it. Luckily, Dwalin and I managed to catch you.”

“Oh,” said Bilbo.

“You were yelling your nephew’s name.”

“My nephew,” repeated Bilbo. Now that Thorin mentioned it, he vaguely remembered talking about Frodo. “Did I tell you he was my nephew?”

“That, and you said something about him drowning in the river. I don’t recall what exactly. The air… I saw things, too.” Thorin shivered, which Bilbo felt, as, and he had not realised it until then, they were somewhat closer than they had been at the beginning of the conversation. Bilbo did not know if he had moved or if Thorin had, or both perhaps, but their arms were flushed against each other, and it did not seem strange. They had done it before, he recalled suddenly; somehow, his body remembered what his mind couldn’t, and his feet had led him to his usual sleeping spot.

“Do you wish to tell me what you saw?”

Thorin shook his head, but spoke anyway. “I saw my father. He ran through the trees and beckoned me to follow. I almost did, but then… Well, you had to be prevented from drowning.”

“You’re welcome,” Bilbo murmured.

“I heard things also. Voices of my people, begging me to help them.”

He seemed so miserable that Bilbo couldn’t help taking his hand. It was, of course, entirely friendly. “They’re not real.”

“They were,” said Thorin, glaring down at their entwined fingers. “They were voices I knew. I’d heard all of them before. These were the voices of the people I failed.”

“You can’t help everyone.”

“As a leader, it is my duty.”

“Leaders, lords, kings, princes,” Bilbo enumerated. “People. People can’t do miracles. You’re just a person.”

“When someone takes on the mantle of a leader, they are not just a person,” argued Thorin.

“That sounds tedious.”

“Are you not a landowner?”

“That’s hardly the same thing.”

“Isn’t it? Don’t you have a responsibility to your tenants?”

Bilbo considered it for a while. “It’s not like that in the Shire,” he eventually replied. “Yes, if one of my tenants has trouble making ends meet, I will find an excuse to invite them to dinner, and then bake them a pie and bring it over under the guise of thanking them for a lovely evening. But I would do it for a neighbour, and they would do it also for me if I fell on hard times. It’s not because we owe it to them as landlords, but as fellow Hobbits. I can’t pretend that things are perfect there, we have Hobbit families who struggle, but we also wouldn’t let them starve, not when we have enough.” Thorin hummed in answer. Bilbo leaned his head so that his cheek rested on Thorin’s arm, calculating the distance between the Shire and the Blue Mountains. “I’m sorry that we didn’t try to help you when you needed it,” he whispered.

But Thorin didn’t answer. Bilbo felt his even breath, caressing the top of his head. His hand, still held by Bilbo’s, had relaxed. He slept after all.

Bilbo tried to smile, but he was too tired. He followed Thorin’s lead.

He heard the singing voice again the next night. Gently, he pushed back the fur Thorin had covered him with, and knowing that he might lose his way but unable to help himself, he started seeking the singer, nodding vaguely at Bombur, who was on guard duty, as he passed him.

It was too dark to see properly, but Bilbo almost did not feel his feet and the ground under them. Rather, he felt that he was floating, his toes skimming the grass. For there was grass, and it was soft and wholly unlike any weed he had walked on, in these woods or elsewhere. He breathed in, and as expected, the air was different here, pure and… whimsical?

Soon, he found some light, and realised that he was coming to an opening in the tree, and the sky was piercing through the foliage, and it was afternoon, not the middle of the night, and the voice which had been singing no longer sounded like bells, but like birds chirping, and it came from next to him, and he could hear the words, and it was a beautiful song he knew, for he had translated it in his first life. It was about a hunt in which the hunter spared a deer and was granted three wishes.

He went on his way, and when he emerged into the clearing, he found that he had been wrong before; he was not in the middle of a forest at all, but at the edge of it. In front of him was a vast plain covered in a sea of grass and delicate white flowers, spread in clusters like foam, stretching further than his eyes could see. Above him, the sky was as he had never seen it before, intense and almost aggressively blue, as if it had been painted a new hue. Far in the distance, he could glimpse a vaguely dark shape. At first he thought that it was a house, but then it changed into a cone-shaped building, before doubling in size and becoming a castle, and then losing half its height and turning into a boat. Bilbo could not summon panic in his state, but he was wondering if he had banged his head against a tree branch.

“Um,” he said.

“Oh, I forgot,” said a voice at his side, speaking Sindarin. “Close your eyes.”

Bilbo obeyed. Someone, presumably whoever had been talking, put his hand on his shoulder.

“You must picture it in your mind.”

Bilbo was tempted to open his eyes to stare at his tall friend’s tall face. “I’ve never been there. I don’t know what it looks like.”

“It will adapt to your idea of it,” explained the voice. “Death takes many forms. It is different for everybody.”

Oh, good. “I don’t know what it is for me.”

“Take your time.”

He did. He measured his breathing for a bit, and thought of the time when he had seen the most death, after the Battle of the Five Armies, in front of the Gate of Erebor. Sure enough, when he opened his eyes, there it was: in the horizon, across the fields of grass, there stood the Lonely Mountain, though from his vantage point, Bilbo could tell that its entrance was not barred by the makeshift door hastily built by the Dwarves right after Smaug’s death, but the massive, intricately carved doors that Dain had rebuilt with the help of the Men of Dale after his coronation.

“What does it look like?” asked Bilbo’s friend. His voice was golden, kind and musical. When Bilbo tilted his head up to look at him, his face matched.

So this was a dream, thought Bilbo. And he opened his mouth to say so, but of course, since this was also a memory, and one could not change memories, what he said instead was, “A mountain.”

“Oh, interesting.”

“What does it look like to you?”

“A white tower,” replied Bilbo’s friend.

“And on the inside?”

“I can’t recall.” At Bilbo’s sceptical expression, he explained, “I am living. The Halls are for the healing of the dead. I suppose there is no need for me to remember.” He paused, then asked eagerly, “Shall you truly knock?”

Bilbo grinned. “Do you think they’ll let me in?”

“No, but you should knock anyway, just to see.”

Bilbo narrowed his eyes at his friend, not losing his good humour. “You’re much more serious in the songs, Master Nóm.”

“It goes to show that you should not believe anything you hear in songs,” replied the Elf. “Ah, I think you were missed after all,” he added.

Following his gaze, Bilbo saw coming towards them from the trees a long figure, or rather, it impressed itself upon his sight. To his mortal eyes, it felt like he had been staring at the sun for too long, a shadow made of light. The sound of singing, like bells.

And then, in a blink, it was all gone; Bilbo stood once more amidst the trees of Mirkwood, and it was almost morning but not quite, the dimness of dawn such a vast contrast with the vivid colours of his dreams, it took him almost ten minutes to find his bearings.

Somehow, even knowing that this couldn’t be anything but the truth, that he had been to Valinor and had met some Valar and Elves and seen the Halls of Mandos, did not improve his mood. In fact, it made it worse, for if he had been there, he had also been cast out, and he still did not know why. All this memory had done was trouble him, since it had made him wander away from camp in half sleep, and now, he was not sure he could find it again.

He couldn’t even use the hand trick this time, he thought mournfully.

Things were not as dire as Bilbo, in his sour mood, had believed at first; in fact, they were worse. For if he found the camp more easily than he’d feared, he found it empty.

This time, either because Bilbo’s warnings had been efficient or because he was so damn lucky, the spiders were not to blame, or at least, Bilbo didn’t see the telltale webs or the murder cocoons in which they wrapped their victims before devouring them. Bilbo didn’t think he’d been absent long enough for all of his friends to have been eaten.

At least, it was to be hoped.

“Think, Bilbo, think,” he muttered, spinning on his heels as he looked for clues.

Was it possible that they were looking for him? But no, that could not be, they would have left at least one Dwarf at the campsite in case he came back on his own. Had they been captured by the dark creatures which were said to haunt these woods? Orcs, or goblins, or who knew what else? Had Old Man Willow cousins in Mirkwood? Bilbo tentatively gave a kick to a nearby tree, and had great success in hurting his toes.

“Ow,” he cried, then patted the tree in half-hearted apology. As he turned away, his gaze fell on a spot of colour on the other side of the camp, a bright blue thing which tickled Bilbo’s memory. He made his way across the abandoned bedrolls and stared down at it, uncomprehending.

He had indeed seen that particular shade of blue before. A morning glory, its like he’d only encountered in Beorn’s garden. The petals were folded and dry, but it had kept its colour, so intense it bordered on violet, and made all the more vibrant by the pale yellow of its centre.

He squinted at it, as if doing so would prompt it to reveal its secrets. “What…?” he began, but stating his question would not bring an answer from the universe, so he fell silent, trying to reason it out. Flowers did not travel on their own, so someone must have brought it there; that someone could only be Thorin, since no one else had been about when Bilbo had attempted to give the flower to him; he must have kept it in his pocket, since he could not have been holding it in his hand the whole time; for it to have fallen from his pocket now, of all times, he must have taken it out himself; therefore, the flower was a message. Thorin, being dragged from camp with the Company, must have dropped it there for Bilbo to see.

Which meant that they were in danger, once again, and that Bilbo had to save them, once again.

Except dragging thirteen people usually made a mess. As far as Bilbo could see, no mess had been made, except for what had been left by the Dwarves. They must have been encircled, and forced to walk out of the campside on their feet. A sentient enemy, then. And since there was no sign of a fight, a sentient enemy who was silent enough to encircle a company of Dwarves discreetly enough not to raise suspicion.

Bilbo sighed. It was a rare thing that he was discomfited by the prospect of meeting Elves.

There were first times for everything.

Chapter Text

Sadly, no matter how softly Hobbits could tread upon the ground, Bilbo knew from experience (specifically, from trying to surprise Lindir once or twice when he’d been quite bored) that he had no chance of sneaking past Thranduil’s guards.

Or, well. He would have had no chance, he reflected as he stared at the Ring, sitting at the centre of his palm.

Catching up with the others had not been too difficult. At first, he had been afraid of being too far behind, and that he would find the gates of the elven kingdom already closed. Even with the slower pace at which the Elves would be going encumbered by thirteen Dwarves, it would have been a struggle. Hobbits were not known for their great speed.

Luckily, the Company had accounted for this (or more likely, they really, really hated Mirkwood Elves) and had staged a rebellion right in front of the gates.

Because it had worked out brilliantly for Bilbo, who had reached the Company midway through and taken advantage of the chaos to slip the Ring on and slither into the group, he would not comment on the wisdom, or lack thereof, of taking a stand where the Elves could most easily get reinforcements. Besides, they were all tired, hungry, thirsty, and incoherent. He could not truly blame them.

As they’d passed the gates, which had closed ominously behind them, Bilbo had realised that it was the first time he’d put the Ring on since finding it again in Gollum’s cave. Moreover, prodding his memories and inspecting his own feelings, he couldn’t remember being tempted to do so, or thinking of doing it at all. This had happened occasionally in the sixty years he’d had it; sometimes, when he was lucid enough to worry about the Ring, there followed long stretches of time when it almost faded from his mind, as if overcompensating.

But the surprises were not over; as soon as he’d started thinking about this, he felt a light tingle in his finger. Nothing to complain about to begin with; a curious little prickling. Or, like being stung by a house spider. An itch, which became more and more unpleasant as time went on and nothing was done about it. Something perhaps akin to burning one’s skin with warm water, or water hot enough to boil tea in. Something painful, which cannot be contained to the back of one’s mind anymore. Something…

“Did you hear that?” asked the captain, the Elf with the red hair Bilbo thought looked familiar. Prince Legolas, whom she was addressing, turned in the direction of Bilbo. Of course, though he was invisible, his hiss of pain had been all too loud, echoing in the vast halls of the dungeons.

“I did, but I see nothing,” replied Legolas. “Strange.”

Bilbo did not wait for them to be gone to find himself a shadowy corner and remove the Ring. He lifted his hand to look at the damage, and almost let out a cry of surprise when he didn’t find any. Given how unbearable the pain had become in the last moments, he’d expected blood, or at the very least blisters. What on earth was happening to him?

“What was he saying to you?” Bilbo heard Legolas ask the Elf captain. They stood together, close to the alcove Bilbo had taken refuge in.

“Nothing,” she replied, a little fast. She said more, but it was too low for Bilbo’s ears.

“I don’t think so,” Legolas said, sounding perplexed. “Come. Father wishes to speak with their leader.”

Ah, yes. No doubt that would go very well.

Bilbo did not make his presence known to the others right away. Not for a particularly wise reason, only, he needed to find some food and drink, or he would die. It was wise enough for him.

He tried, truly tried, over the next few days, to wear the Ring as little as possible; of course, there were times when he had no choice, but even then, he did his best to take it off as soon as possible. So far, the pain he’d felt had not gone beyond the itchy phase, but it had manifested every time.

This whole mess made circulating the woodland realm tricky. He could never access the kitchens long enough to take more than a couple of fruits at a time, which was hardly filling for a Hobbit of his age. At first, he imagined that, having been hungry for so long, first on the road, where one could not get a proper meal, and then in the forest, where one could not get a meal, proper or not, being hungry in the grand corridors of Thranduil’s kingdom would not make much of a difference. Yet it seemed worse, somehow, to endure it there, when he knew that there was food to be had, but not by him.

He dreamed of it, when he could sleep, which was not often. Since he could not bear to wear the Ring at night, he tucked himself into uncomfortable out-of-the-way corners, and closed his eyes for a few minutes at a time, always wary of being seen. That, too, played tricks on his mind. Sometimes, he jolted awake and was sure of having seen strange shapes in the dark. Since they always vanished after a blink, he tried almost successfully to blame the visions on his exhaustion.

It was altogether not a very pleasant stay.

When, at last, he had the guards’ schedules more or less memorised, he risked a visit to his friends. Their genuine cheers were a balm to his heart, and though he had to run and hide for a bit when the Elf captain came to see what the ruckus was about, he would never forget Dwalin’s sigh of relief, or Dori’s teary expression, or Bombur’s quiet, “We thought you’d gotten lost in the woods.”

Next, he went to find Thorin, who had been imprisoned apart from the others. And somehow, his subdued reaction was the best of all. “I knew you’d come,” he told Bilbo with absolute unwavering faith. “Don’t ask me how, I knew you’d find a way.” It was dark in his cell, but his blue eyes seemed to pierce the gloom as they rested on Bilbo. “You look terrible,” he said.

Bilbo rolled his eyes. “I hope you like your new home,” he deadpanned.

“Do you find ways to eat?” asked Thorin, ignoring Bilbo’s jab.

“I get by.” It was the best that could be said about it. Judging by the furrow of his brow, Thorin guessed it. “Never mind that. Listen, I have a plan to get us all out of here.”

“Good.”

“However, we can’t go just yet.” He braced himself for Thorin’s reproaches or demands that he be freed right away. But Thorin said nothing, only waiting for him to continue. “There is to be a party of some kind, in a little over two weeks. The Elves will be distracted. I’ll steal the keys and set you free then.”

“How?”

Bilbo blinked at him. “Master Oakenshield, you may not remember this, but I was hired to burgle. Burgling is my job. I’m a burglar. I can steal some keys.” At least, he was fairly confident that he’d be able to do it again.

“I meant, how will we escape?”

Bilbo considered telling him, but thought better of it. He didn’t want to risk Thorin asking him to think of a better plan. “I’m working on it.”

Perhaps because these words seemed to do the job of reassuring Thorin, they became Bilbo’s new motto whenever his friends asked him if he’d found a way to get them out. And Bilbo must have built more credibility than he’d assumed, because incredibly, they believed him. In fact, they never asked any follow-up questions, except for Nori, who tried to quiz him on famous prison escapees throughout history (most of them Dwarves Bilbo had never heard of; after a while of this, Bilbo started to invent his own stories of Hobbit break-outs, which entertained Ori more than his brother).

Every evening, he checked on everyone to collect messages, for each other or for Thorin, before going back to Thorin’s cell, relaying their messages, and finding himself a place to sleep. One such evening, Dwalin beckoned to Bilbo. “Listen, laddie,” he whispered, “I know that we never really bonded that much, but I would like to say that I’ve always had complete faith in your abilities.”

Bilbo raised an eyebrow. “You have?”

“Yes, of course.”

"I thought that I couldn’t fight or fend for myself, and…”

“Oh, you know how it is,” Dwalin cut in. “You have a few pints, you say things you don’t mean, and really, you’re a good sort. A little short, but you’re doing great.”

Bilbo beamed, touched. He didn’t think that Dwalin had gotten fond of him until after the battle. “Thank you, Dwalin. That means more than you kn…”

“Yes, yes. Listen, do you think it will take long to get us out of here?”

“Oh, well, I’m working on it.”

“Super. Do you think you might hurry it along?”

“Oh,” said Bilbo, confused as to Dwalin’s sudden sense of urgency. “Um, certainly. It shouldn’t be very much longer. I’m sorry, I know being locked up is really hard, not that I’ve a lot of experience of that, but…”

“It’s fine, it’s more comfortable than sleeping in the woods, and at least they give us food,” said Dwalin.

“Then why…?”

“I can hear them,” Dwalin said darkly. “Every single night.” He shuddered. “It’s unbearable.”

“The Elves?”

“The She-Elf. But she’s not the issue, for once.”

Bilbo pondered that riddle for a moment. When he solved it, he tried very hard not to laugh.

He failed.

“It’s not funny,” Dwalin informed him.

“No, absolutely it’s not,” agreed Bilbo. He cleared his throat. “Every night, you say?”

“She makes a round, and then she stops in front of his cell, right above mine, and I have to listen to his pathetic attempts at flirting until she finally leaves. It’s intolerable, Bilbo. If we don’t leave soon, I’m afraid I’m going to do something drastic to avoid that torture permanently.”

“Oh, don’t say that,” chided Bilbo. “Plus, how would you do it? They’re not giving you knives, are they?”

“No need for knives, I’ll be choking on my own vomit.”

Bilbo wrinkled his nose in distaste.

“Oh, I apologise for shocking your fragile sensibilities,” deadpanned Dwalin. “Try listening to a Dwarf you’ve known since infancy make a joke about being tied up to the very Elf who captured him.” He shuddered again. “You know I’ll have Dis, his mother, to answer to, once this is over. I can’t imagine she’ll be pleased if she arrives to a freshly reclaimed Erebor and finds her youngest son conniving with an Elf.”

She would probably be relieved to find him alive, thought Bilbo.

He had wondered, briefly, why it was that she had taken to linger in front of Kili’s cell, but with the Ring’s unusability and the fact that he had more interesting matters to think about, he’d failed to investigate. Now that he knew, dozens of questions swarmed his mind. Mostly, he wished he knew if this had happened the first time around. He couldn’t remember much of the Elf captain, except that he’d seen her with Legolas on the battlefield. He had been too busy and sad to ask if she had lived, and he didn’t think Thranduil had ever mentioned her afterwards. Not that Bilbo would know, since he didn’t remember her name.

He would never know, but it may be better this way. After all, even if there had been something between Kili and the Elf, he had died too soon for anything to come out of it.

What a waste, Bilbo thought. He firmly believed that love was never in vain, but he suspected that he would never be able to look at a relationship cut short without the deepest melancholy.

Despite his efforts not to press Bilbo, Thorin’s impatience was increasing. Bilbo was not sure that he did much, besides waiting for him to arrive for his nightly visits.

“Master Baggins.” Thorin stood and rushed to the bars when he saw him appear at the end of the hallway. “What news?”

Bilbo shook his head. “I’m still working on it,” he murmured. “I’m sorry this is taking so long, I promise that I will get you out in time.”

Thorin pressed his forehead against the bars. “I know.” He observed Bilbo for a moment. “How are the others?”

“They’re being patient. I think they’re enjoying being fed, but that’s about it.” He forced himself to smile. “Dwalin is prepared to beg the Elves for a quick death, though. Apparently, Kili has been flirting with an Elf, and rather badly at that.”

Thorin frowned. “Kili? He must be attempting to obtain information, or perhaps to steal a weapon from them when they are distracted. That is the only explanation.”

Bilbo stared at Thorin. “The only explanation for Kili flirting with an Elf?”

“Kili would not flirt with an Elf,” he affirmed.

“Excuse me, Kili?

“Kili would not flirt with an Elf,” Thorin repeated, with the frantic assurance of someone who liked to pretend that something he did not like did not exist. Bilbo had a feeling that this was a sentence he had told himself many times. Many, many times. “Cease laughing,” commanded Thorin. Bilbo pressed his lips together. “Cease it, I say, immediately.”

“‘m nt lghng,” Bilbo mumbled, turning away.

“Stop it,” said Thorin. “Where are you going?”

Muffling his laughter with his hand, Bilbo glanced over his shoulder. “Nowhere,” he said, sobering at the sight of Thorin’s worried face. He hesitated, before asking, “How are you?”

He had a plan for this: if Thorin found his question odd, he would say that the others had asked. It would not surprise him that Balin, for instance, had inquired about his state. It was plausible.

But Thorin just sighed and slid down to the floor in a strangely unregal manner. Bilbo followed him, sitting with his back against the wall next to the barred door.

“I’ve always been comfortable in solitude,” said Thorin. “In fact, in many cases, I prefer it to company. It gives me leave to reflect.”

“To brood,” said Bilbo.

“If you wish to call it brooding, I shall not argue with you.”

“Good,” said Bilbo. “I would win the argument.” He hummed a little. “I can understand, you know. Seeking to be alone.”

“I’ve no doubt.”

Bilbo’s stomach twisted at these words. They were not much, but they still awakened something greedy and demanding in him. He craved to know how Thorin perceived him, if his image of him was or could ever near completion. Could it, when Bilbo hid so much of himself?

He would tell him. Once they both survived the battle, and once the Ring was dealt with, Bilbo would sit everyone down and explain everything. If they were angry with him, at least it would be their genuine reaction to his true self, and if they decided that they never wanted to see him again, Bilbo would take it. He deserved it, maybe.

“That being said,” Thorin continued, unaware of Bilbo’s torment and drawing him away from it, “when I picture solitude, that is not what I have in mind.”

“Sure,” Bilbo replied, his throat suddenly parched. “You would have a more romantic vision of it, I think.”

“Romantic,” Thorin echoed.

“You know.” Bilbo waved his hand, a useless gesture, since they were sitting almost back to back, only separated by a wall and a door. In any case, Thorin could not see him. “A lone king, walking the halls of his mountain, at the little hours before dawn. Everyone is safely tucked in bed, but he doesn’t sleep, for a ruler is never free from looking after his people. He stops, possibly, somewhere with a good vantage point, so that he can keep an eye on the kingdom. I would say that perhaps his hair is blowing in the breeze, softly but dramatically, but I don’t suppose there’s much wind inside a mountain.” He paused. “Something like that.”

“Something like that,” agreed Thorin. “Though I will have to refresh myself on where the good vantage points are, when we have reclaimed Erebor.”

The image of Thorin, surveying mounds of gold, a foreign, dark glint in his eyes, came unbidden in Bilbo’s mind. “That’s alright,” he made himself say. “It’ll come back. Worst case scenario, Ori and I will draw a map for you.”

“I thought I was ‘directionally challenged’ and ‘couldn’t find my way out of an eggshell’.”

Bilbo smiled. “That’s fine. I’ll follow you at a distance. I’ll walk very quietly, so you won’t notice me, and if I perceive that you are frowning more than usual, I will clear my throat and pretend that I was passing by, fancy meeting you here, I was just going back, would you mind walking with me for a bit?”

“What about when you leave?” asked Thorin. “What if I still don’t know the way?”

Bilbo’s heart sank. As if he needed the reminder that his fate would lead him away from Erebor. “I’ll have to train someone to do it,” he replied lightly. “They won’t be as natural as me, but it’ll have to do.”

“Will it?” Bilbo had nothing to say to that. “Tell me about the Shire.”

“What would you like to know?”

“Do they really call you Mad Baggins, there?”

Bilbo hesitated. Technically, no one did yet, though he’d left in an even queerer fashion than the first time, so he did not have high hopes for his reputation. But the nickname wouldn’t be for years, after Lobelia, who was still a Bracegirdle, married Otho. At least, Bilbo was pretty sure that they were the ones who had originated it.

But he’d already dug his own grave by thoughtlessly mentioning the nickname to the others, though he hadn’t been aware that Thorin was listening at the time. “They do,” he said.

Thorin huffed an annoyed breath.

“It’s not that bad,” Bilbo assured him.

“Being ostracised isn’t that bad?”

“It’s not… I didn’t mind it. Not really.” Thorin didn’t respond. Bilbo wondered if it was a good idea to keep talking. Then, once he established that it definitely wasn’t, he went on. “I left the Shire for a bit. When I returned, I was…” He swallowed. “Different.”

“I see,” said Thorin.

“The fact that I left at all was unusual, and some of my acquaintances were already wary of me. But then I started behaving in a way that wasn’t considered proper, and so the nickname was born. I suppose that I could have explained myself better, or made an effort to fit in again, but it was like trying to put on pants you’ve outgrown: very uncomfortable, and everyone would be able to tell that there’s something wrong. But more than that, I didn’t want to pretend, not when everything felt so… So unfair, and unsettled. I felt different, and in some way, when they noticed, and when they called me mad, it was like they said, ‘we see it, we see that something happened to you and you changed’. As if I wasn’t imagining it.” Bilbo realised that he was trembling, and he hugged his knees to his chest in an attempt to stop the tremors. “Like proof that it wasn’t all in my head.”

“I see,” Thorin said again. Bilbo wondered what it was that he saw.

“They’re not so bad,” he continued. “They called me mad, and they disapproved of everything I did, but I was still invited to birthday parties, whether I wanted to be or not. I was not completely alone, and when I was, it was mostly my own choice.”

Thorin took a deep breath. “You do not have to defend your living to me, Master Baggins. What do you think would happen if you admitted to not being satisfied with the way you were treated?”

Bilbo pressed his forehead against the top of his knees.

“I have watched you, when we are all gathered together. In the admittedly rare occasions when we are not chased by orcs and spiders and Elves. You said that Hobbits are sociable creatures, and you did not lie. I can tell that you enjoy the company.”

“Of course,” said Bilbo. “I love them. Being with them.”

“I know. When Erebor is ours again, you do not have to rush home to the Shire. If you wish to remain with us, we would welcome you.”

Bilbo closed his eyes. It was an offer he’d been given multiple times, once by Thorin himself, at the feast in Lake-Town, after Bilbo had publicly vouched for him. Dain had offered, after the funeral, and Balin, with a promise that he would always have a home. And then, many years later, Dis had renewed the offer, though she had not been surprised when he’d declined it.

He made himself say, “I’m very relieved that you said that. I was not looking forward to travelling in winter.” None of this was a lie, and none of it was a promise to stay, though he so badly wanted to.

“I’ll have a room for you,” continued Thorin. “Somewhere you can see the sun. Unlike here,” he added with a sardonic twist.

“It’s not so bad, though it would be better if we could see the stars.”

“Why? Is another one scheduled to disappear soon?”

“No,” replied Bilbo. “Only I—Well. You’ll mock me.”

“I don’t mock you. If nothing else, you mock me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right. I don’t mind it if you do it.”

“Oh.”

“Is it more elvish nonsense?” prompted Thorin.

“No.” Bilbo pondered it, then amended, “It is elvish, but it’s not nonsense. Or it is, perhaps. Well, here goes. When I feel—vulnerable, you might say, I look at Gil-Estel and ask for strength.” Silence. “Now, I don’t know that it works, or that he listens, but it makes me feel better, which is the important part, I suppose. It’s something of a comfort, to imagine him up there, watching over us all. Even if it’s nothing more than that.”

“When you say ‘he’, you are referring to your Master Elrond’s father, yes?”

“He is not ‘my’ Master Elrond,” Bilbo responded sulkily. “Yes. Eärendil. I’m surprised you remembered.”

“I do listen to you, Bilbo.”

Oh, wonderful. As if Bilbo needed the accelerating heart rhythm. Truly, that infatuation thing was most inconvenient. “I’m sorry about it then, since most of what I say is…”

“Please,” Thorin cut in. “Don’t. I listen. Would you… Do you want to tell me about that star? How did an Elf manage to get up there?”

“It’s a long story. There’s an entire lay about it. I can recite it to you if you’d like.”

“Did you write it?”

“No, but I translated it.” He paused. “I did write a few verses about Eärendil. I don’t know if it will make the story more accessible, but…”

“I’d like to hear them.”

“Why?” Bilbo wanted to ask. He thought he could guess, but did not dare hope that even the strongest friendship could make Thorin Oakenshield interested in Bilbo’s ramblings about old elven legends.

But, well. He’d asked, hadn’t he? So, in a low voice, Bilbo began: “It went like this,” and recited his Eärendillinwë, closing his eyes and thinking of the other time he’d done so, at Elrond’s hearth in the Hall of Fire. He thought of the small form of his nephew, dozing on a chair nearby, barely recovered from his dreadful injury, of seeing him in peace and surrounded by Bilbo’s friends, safe for now. It seemed incongruous to Bilbo that he should be singing this song now, which Frodo had heard, who would not be born for more than twenty years.

Thorin was quiet a while after Bilbo finished. Bilbo, who had performed in front of highly judgmental Elves and had become quite unselfconscious about his art, was content to let the silence linger, listening to his and Thorin’s breathing.

Finally, Thorin asked, “Do you know what a habergeon is?”

“I… Yes? Not anymore. I don’t recall. I know I researched the term while writing the poem, but I’ve forgotten its meaning since.”

He heard a strange noise. It was Thorin’s laughter. “Incredible. You can remember verses and lays and songs, but not what a habergeon is.”

“Well,” replied Bilbo, not angrily. “I care about the verses and the lays and the songs, and the stories. I don’t know what knowing what a habergeon is has ever done for me. Besides, poetry rhymes, the words have a flow, a melody. That tends to stick. Weapons, not so much, unless you stick them into somebody.”

“A habergeon is not a weapon. It’s a sort of jacket made of mail.”

Right, Bilbo knew that. Had known that. “It does sound familiar.”

“I liked your song.”

“Thank you.” He hesitated. “When I was a child, my mother used to tell me that I was born under the beam of Gil-Estel, and that it made me a child of Eärendil. It’s an old legend that she picked up somewhere. ‘A child of Eärendil is a wanderer’, she said. I think she was projecting.”

“I’m not so sure,” said Thorin. “You’ve done quite the wandering, recently.” Bilbo hummed. “Did she travel a lot?”

“Some, when she was young. She went to Rivendell, and all the way to the shores, beyond the Blue Mountains. She would have tried going East, if she hadn’t fallen for my father.”

“He was not like her?”

“Oh, no, my father was very proper. The wildest thing he ever did was marry my mother.” Bilbo grinned. “When I was a child, she used to have bouts of restlessness. She would pretend to pick a fight with my father, and then she would declare, ‘that’s it, I’m going back to the Elves.’ She would take me by the hand and we would go off to have adventures in the Shire. Then when night came, we would go home, and my father would greet us at the door, with a flower for her and a pastry for me, and ask, ‘how were the Elves?’ She would say, ‘very agreeable, but I did miss you.’” Bilbo chuckled to himself. “I suppose everyone thinks that their mother is the very best, but I’m the only one who is right.”

That made Thorin laugh. “Someone has to be.”

“No, no,” said Bilbo, “you must not agree with me. What about your mother?”

“She was the very best, of course.” Thorin fell silent for a few moments. Bilbo thought that the conversation had come to an end, though he badly wanted it to continue. But at last, Thorin said, “When Smaug attacked, she refused to leave the mountain until every single Dwarf had been rescued. We had to drag her out. My grandfather was unwell and could not rule, and my father was in shock. My siblings were too young. She and I had to lead our people. She was my strength, for many years.”

Bilbo swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Is she…?”

“Yes,” said Thorin. “She died a few years before the battle of Azanulbizar. Her lungs failed her.”

“I’m sorry.”

“We all have our moments of pain, isn’t that right?” asked Thorin. Bilbo thought he might be quoting him. “My brother took it the hardest. My sister Dis and I, we had made our peace with her death, but he still had hope. When she died, it was as if the world had gone dark for him.”

Bilbo could so, so understand that feeling. In the first few years following Belladonna’s death, the realisation that he would never hear her voice or see her face kept hitting him like a brick, no matter how many times he’d had it. Even now, after decades upon decades, it seemed unrealistic to him that her life was over, that she was not out there, having an adventure without him. That they would not reconvene for tea, and tell each other what they’d been up to.

“For you too?” asked Bilbo.

Thorin sighed. “It had gone dark long ago.”

“I’m sorry,” Bilbo said again. Thorin did not acknowledge it, but Bilbo knew he’d heard. They did not speak again, letting the silent night fill the space between them.

Chapter Text

When the day they were to escape came, Bilbo went from cell to cell to warn the Dwarves to be ready. It was a useless effort, as they had been ready to get out of their prison from the first moment they had entered it, but Bilbo preferred to err on the side of caution, if only this time.

Kili, amazingly, did not seem overly excited to be going. “It hasn’t been so terrible,” he shrugged.

A wall separated him from Fili on one side, and from Bifur on the other. Bilbo raised his eyebrows at Bifur, who made a sign that Bilbo thought he recognised. Struggling to recall his scant knowledge of the dwarven sign language (scant knowledge which definitely didn’t come from Bifur himself on a feasting night when Bilbo had taken his pilgrimage to Erebor after leaving the Shire, if anybody asked), he signed back the closest approximation of “love” he could muster. Bifur did a double take, then began to laugh.

“What?” asked Kili, who’d missed Bilbo’s hand gesture, but not his hilarity.

“Bifur called you a fool,” said Bilbo, who had scarcely learned more than how to make fun of people (Nori) behind their backs in his first life.

“Hmf,” sniffed Kili.

“He’s right,” said Fili from the other cell, giving Bilbo a wink.

“You don’t know anything. Listen.” He beckoned him forward, and Bilbo obliged. In a low voice, Kili said, “Do you have any advice?”

“Tons,” Bilbo replied easily. “Never start a book by page twenty-second. Page one is much better. Trust me, I’m a scholar.”

“What are you on about? No, I meant advice about, about.” He glanced about them, as if embarrassed. He finished in a whisper: “About love.”

“Ah,” said Bilbo. “You see, I’ve had limited experience with that.”

“But you’ve had some, even just a little bit,” insisted Kili.

“Well. If you really want to know, my only advice would be to not fall for someone who is too infatuated with the idea of dying to return your feelings. I don’t know how relevant to you that is.”

“Not at all,” Kili replied cheerily, “but it’s not terrible. Have you seen her, Bilbo?”

“Passingly.”

“Isn’t she…?” Kili trailed off. “She’s tall, isn’t she?”

“Sure.”

“And beautiful.”

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, my father always said.” Kili shot him an irritated look. “She’s enchanting. Now, remember: we’re escaping tonight. Yes?”

“Of course. Wait, does that mean that I won’t see her again?”

Bilbo turned to Bifur. “No, actually, you were right,” he told him. Bifur started laughing again.

For the most part, Bilbo had been managing very well without the Ring. In fact, the closest he had come to worrying about being discovered had been on a stroll through the pantry, when he’d had to hide between two large cheese loaves from the kitchen staff, and had overheard them discussing missing food and the search for a kitchen thief. However, after a few minutes of eavesdropping while munching on some crackers he happened to have stolen, it became evident that the Elves believed that one of their own was to blame. As much as he would have liked to credit his success to his burglarizing talent, it seemed that the Elves were so sure of their own superior sense of observation that they missed his presence entirely.

(Instead of taking that personally, Bilbo elected to congratulate himself on a theft well-accomplished and sought something else to worry about. That wasn’t too difficult.)

That being said, he did not have the heart to enact the most crucial part of their escape without invisibility. One wrong move could compromise everything, after all, and he dared not imagine how that would impact the rest. And so, he did put on the Ring that night, delaying it as much as he could until he was steps away from the drunken guards, the keys in his line of sight. This time, curiously, it seemed that the Ring was not affecting him as strongly as it has before. He managed to snatch the keys and slip away. Emboldened by his success, he decided to keep it on until he was in the dungeons. It was not so far, anyway; there were only a few hallways, and then…

All of a sudden, Bilbo cried out; without warning, the Ring had become so heavy and hot it hurt his hand. He hurried to take it off, marvelling that his finger was intact again. His relief didn’t last long, for an Elf was standing right in front of him. Bilbo stood very still, as if doing so would turn him invisible again. He was doomed, and he knew it. What he didn’t know was what he could do now. Certainly, at any moment, the Elf would recover from his surprise and call the guard, or restrain him himself.

Only, the Elf did not call for help. He just kept on gazing at him curiously,  and while his face was fair and lovely, perhaps the loveliest Bilbo had ever seen in an Elf, his eyes were an intense, burning red. Slowly, he leaned forward, long white-blond hair cascading over his shoulder. “Well, well,” he said at last. “And what are you, little master?”

Bilbo was suddenly terribly afraid, and he wished that he had been allowed to pass through the Sea to the Undying Lands and stay there, regrets or no. He didn’t answer the Elf’s question, but turned on his heels and started running. He took a turn down the hall, and collided with a tall, robed figure. Looking up, he saw that it was Thranduil, and he wanted to cry with relief, even after remembering that Thranduil wasn’t his good woodland friend yet and that he would probably object to Bilbo’s presence in his halls.

“If it isn’t our kitchen thief,” said Thranduil, placing his hand on Bilbo’s shoulder to prevent him from running away, as if Bilbo’s first instinct hadn’t been to hug him. “And what were you running from?”

Bilbo glanced at his back, but no one was chasing after him. In fact, no one was there. “Apologies, Your Grace, I thought I saw a bat,” Bilbo told Thranduil, because it sounded a little less insane than saying that he hallucinated Elves when he was under stress.

Apparently, not so much less that it didn’t make Thranduil question his sanity. “A bat,” he repeated. He watched Bilbo with cold eyes. “Very well, little thief. If you will mock me under my own roof…”

“I meant no disrespect,” assured Bilbo. “I apologise. You see, I had the misfortune of developing a rather facetious personality in my old age. I blame it on too much time spent in the company of Gandalf.”

“Gandalf,” Thranduil echoed. “You know Mithrandil?”

Bilbo shrugged. “I’m basically his best friend.”

Thranduil considered him for a while, and during that time, Bilbo thought back on his words and resigned himself to the fact that Thranduil was yet another person he had loved in his first life who would assume he was kooky in his second.

At last, Thranduil said, “Come with me,” in a tone that brooked no argument.

Not that Bilbo would argue. Only, he would have preferred not to be thrown in prison. “Please, Sire,” he said in Sindarin. “I have an errand that cannot be delayed.”

Thranduil seemed even more surprised now than he had when Bilbo had mentioned Gandalf. “You speak our tongue? How?”

Bilbo was tempted to brag and list all of his elven friends, but since those included Elves Thranduil could contact to have confirmation (as well as Thranduil himself), that could not possibly be wise. “I’m a scholar,” he replied simply. “I beg you to listen to me. I’m sure your dungeons are lovely, but I am unfortunately not at my leisure.”

“No, indeed,” replied Thranduil. “Well, little thief, since you have made me late to my own feast, you’ll come with me, and perhaps I’ll hear what you have to say.”

Bilbo perked up, nodding gratefully. “Thank you, Sire.” Thranduil led him away, and Bilbo resisted the urge to check behind him that they were alone. Then, Thranduil’s words fully sunk in. “You mentioned a feast?”

“It goes beyond even our great elvish comprehension,” Legolas said to his father, staring at Bilbo in wonder. “What do you make of it, Adar?”

Thranduil took a sip of wine. “I don’t.”

“It’s a mystery, even to me,” said Bilbo. “I try not to question it.”

“But you’re so small,” Legolas insisted. “And you’ve eaten more than five Elves in one meal, and now you claim that you eat up to seven times in a day?”

Bilbo shrugged. “Some of my kind eat more than seven times, because they take snacks in between meals,” he informed Legolas.

“When do you find the time?” wondered Legolas. “Do your days measure differently than ours?”

“No, at least I don’t think so. It’s rather that we don’t do much else. As to where we put it, I don’t know what to tell you. I was very hungry, and so I ate. I do not know where it goes from there, and I’m sure I would not like to.”

“Fascinating,” said Legolas.

“Yes, exceedingly,” said Thranduil. “Now that we’ve explored the eating habits of our guest, we can move on to more important things.”

Bilbo chewed on it, and on a bite of bread, for a minute. “What would you know, Sire?”

“I want to know what you are, since clearly, you’re not a Dwarf.”

“Not unless my parents lied to me,” replied Bilbo. Thranduil narrowed his eyes at him. Right. Not in the mood for jokes. Got it. “I am a Hobbit. A Halfling. A Perian , if that’s more up your alley.”

“But you are allied with the Dwarves.”

It was possible that denying it would be wiser, but Bilbo did not want to renounce his friends, even out of necessity, and besides, he did not want to deceive Thranduil. “We travel together,” he compromised. “You understand, it’s not safe out there for a small person such as myself.”

“Yes, especially if one such person takes paths it is not for them to tread.”

Bilbo considered it. “Who’s to decide which path one should tread?”

“I do when the path is mine,” snapped Thranduil. “And what’s more, I know what they want. I have read their hearts. They long for gold, and they will stop at nothing to get it, even if it brings desolation upon the world.”

“Desolation has already been brought upon it,” replied Bilbo. “It is not only gold long for. They have lost their home.”

Thranduil dismissed this with a haughty wave of hand. “There are other mountains.”

“And there are other forests, but this is the one you live in, and I bet you wouldn’t like to be forced away from it,” Bilbo pointed out. “Besides, Gandalf wants the dragon dead.”

“Mithrandir wants many things. He will have to learn the frustration of not getting them.”

Bilbo heaved a sigh. “The things he wants are not for himself, though, nor for anyone in particular. He works for the wellness of the world. Just because the picture he sees is larger than it looks to you…”

“Are you calling me near-sighted?” demanded Thranduil. Legolas addressed a sharp shake of head to Bilbo, as if to tell him to quit it.

But Bilbo, for all that he liked the king, had enough of this. “Well, yes!” he cried, “I am. Is it surprising? Gandalf has been wandering this land for who knows how long, while you’ve been holing yourself in your neat little forest. So yes, I think that you see less than he does, and what’s more, you want to see less than he does, because then you have an excuse for not doing anything about the things that are outside your field of vision.”

Thranduil glared at him. Bilbo tried to hold his ground despite the ache in his heart. He was suddenly acutely aware that the other Elves had stopped conversing and were all looking at the king, except for Legolas, who was studiously examining his empty plate, and the captain who visited Kili, who was watching him with interest. But he kept his attention on Thranduil, and the memory of the king delaying his march on Erebor to help the people of Laketown came back to him in a flash.

He softened his voice. “I’m sorry,” he told the king. “I shouldn’t have said that. It’s not different from what we do in the Shire, where I come from. We became so blind to the rest of the world that we wouldn’t know if war broke out until it crossed the Brandywine River. I’m only here because Gandalf came to fetch me directly at my door, and once I saw the Dwarves’ sorrow and homesickness, I could not deny them aid. Can you?”

Thranduil didn’t respond. He remained silent, and after some time, the din of conversation resumed. The night went on, and Elves began to sing and tell stories, and Legolas got up to join the merriment. Once he was gone, Thranduil finally said, “You speak of their sorrow, but what about the lives waking a dragon would endanger?”

That was a point Bilbo couldn’t refute. He gritted his teeth, bidding a mournful farewell to his old title of Elf-Friend, and another to his once-friend. “There is a necklace in Erebor,” he said dully. “It is made of silver, with pearls and white gems. I believe that these were found in an Orc hole after a raid.” He watched Thranduil’s face harden to steel. “According to the contract I signed, I have a right to a portion of the treasure of Erebor. I don’t care for gold, but I’ll claim that necklace for you.”

“These gems belonged to my father,” Thranduil snarled. “They are mine, by right.”

“Well, if you want to get it back, you can come along with us,” retorted Bilbo. “I’m not trying to bargain with you; you are right, the necklace is yours, and I will give it to you, whether you help me or not. But in order to do that, we do need to leave your realm.”

“I cannot let the Dwarves go,” declared Thranduil.

Bilbo chuckled dryly. “Of course not. I’m not asking you to let them go. I’m asking you to let me go, so that I can help them escape.”

It was the Elvenking’s turn to laugh. “They cannot escape. They are under lock and key, the dungeons are guarded and the front door is barred. Should you spend an age wandering my halls and stealing from my pantry, you would not find a way out.”

Bilbo smiled. “Bet?”

“I am not getting in a barrel while the Elf is watching,” Gloin declared stubbornly, the others all too quick to agree with him.

The deal they had made was simple: Bilbo would stage his escape with his friends, and Thranduil, who did not know that such an escape was possible and had been made before, would observe, and not intervene. He had been less than pleased when they’d found the drunken guards passed out, but so far, he had held to his word.

The Dwarves had been somewhat staggered and less than happy when Bilbo had explained the situation, but Thorin, taking a few seconds off from glaring at Thranduil, had silenced them and commanded that they did as Bilbo said. So far, everything had gone according to plan.

So far and, it seemed, no further.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Bilbo said. “Get in the barrels this instant.”

“Not while he’s there,” retorted Gloin.

“This is humiliating,” agreed Kili.

“Bebother it all,” muttered Bilbo. Sighing, he turned towards Thranduil. “Your Majesty. Would it trouble you overmuch to pivot so that my friends are not within your sight as they climb into the barrels?”

“That is not part of our agreement,” Thranduil said airily.

“No, it’s not,” Bilbo admitted. In Sindarin, he continued: “Would you not indulge the pride of those who are but children to you, younger than the youngest of your subjects?”

Bilbo had to be sleep-deprived, or perhaps he’d eaten too much at the feast; for a fraction of a second, he had the impression that Thranduil was repressing a smile.

“Very well,” said the Elvenking. “Because the request was so well-made.” And to Bilbo and the Dwarves’s astonishment, he turned around to face the door. “Proceed,” he commanded, as if doing them a great favour.

“Now, get in the barrels,” hissed Bilbo. There was some more grumbling, but Thorin hissed something in Khuzdul, prompting them to obey. Ironically, he did sneak Thranduil’s back a hateful glance before getting into his own barrel.

Dwaling grabbed at him as Bilbo made sure that everyone was accounted for. “What did you say to the Elf?” he demanded in a low voice.

Bilbo gave him a level stare. “That you were immature and that he was worse if he didn’t behave like an adult at his age. Can we please get a move on?”

Dwalin muttered something rude-ish that Bilbo pretended not to hear.

He said, “Hold your breath!”

Someone said, “Hold my… What do you mean?”

Bilbo did not reply; he pulled the lever, the floor tilted downward and the barrels slid into the opening. Thranduil, who had come to stand next to Bilbo, peered down at it, perfectly impassible as the Dwarves yelped and yelled as they fell.

“You are aware that I will be sending my guards after them as soon as you are gone, of course,” Thranduil said conversationally.

“It was not part of your agreement that you don’t,” replied Bilbo, thinking that since there were Orcs awaiting them outside, having some elvish reinforcement was not the worst idea.

“And how will you get out?”

Ah, yes. This. “As ridiculously as possible, Your Highness.” He cleared his throat, waved at the king, and walked to the centre of the room, trying to assess where he needed to be to make the floor tilt again.

“You did not tell me your name,” said Thranduil. “I would know who to ask for my payment.”

“You won’t need to ask, I will bring it to you if I do not die.” Bilbo swallowed thickly. “But I am Bilbo Baggins, Your Highness. At your service.” He bowed; whether the movement was all that was needed to attain the correct balance for the door to activate, or whatever ruled fate had an odd sense of humour, Bilbo couldn’t tell. All of this was to say, as he bowed, the floor tipped and carried him down into the water.

Chapter Text

Though Bilbo had forgotten much, one thing he hadn’t was how to swim, since he’d never learned it in the first place. He stayed underwater for only a few seconds, which he spent reeling from the shock of the fall and the impact of his body against the surface. “Someone could die from this,” he thought, but of course, the Dwarves had been protected by the barrels, and even drunk Elves were unlikely to fall that way. As for Hobbits, there were hardy folk, but even so, it took him a moment to remember that he needed to stay afloat, or he would drown. His thoughts were foggy, and batting his arms and legs was difficult, as if he waded through mud instead of clear water. His ears were popping, though he imagined he heard a voice, a beautiful voice like a sunrise (it made no sense, the sun made no noise), singing for him, no words, only a melody.

A hand grabbed him by the back of his coat and heaved him to the surface. He scrambled for purchase and ended up clutching at Thorin’s barrel, panting to refill his lungs. He was speaking to him, they all were, their words mingling out of sense, and in the background, the song faded until he could only remember its existence, and not its sound. At last, it went out of his head as he shook it and shivered. Fully submerged, he had not been cold; now that his head was above water, he felt frozen to the core.

Thorin’s words finally resolved into, “Are you alright?” It was not the first time he’d asked.

“Go,” he spluttered, gesturing in the direction of the rapids. Thorin gave his own order, and off they were, bobbing down the river, each member of the Company taking turns dragging Bilbo after them. It was not the most comfortable way to travel, to say the least, and Bilbo did not look forward to the mighty cold that had harassed him afterwards, but it had the advantage of being quick. They mostly let themselves be carried by the current, paddling now and then to steer out of the way of the rocky borders of the river, until they came out of the cave and into the morning sun. Ahead was the dreaded series of waterfalls. Thorin saw them first, and he had only enough time to gesture at Nori to hold on to Bilbo before they began to plunge.

When Bilbo emerged from that ordeal, he heard a horn coming from behind. He and Nori, still clutching Bilbo’s arm, turned at the same time to seek its origin, and saw that Legolas, along with Kili’s friend and other guards, were chasing them on land.

“I guess your pal Thranduil wasn’t so keen on letting us go, eh, Baggins?” said Nori.

“Not so,” agreed Bilbo, and he pointed at the guardpost ahead. There, one of the guards pulled the lever which opened and closed the gate, blocking their escape.

“That was a solid effort,” Dori said, one or two barrels away. “Now what?”

They piled up against the gate, the Elves surrounding them and preparing to attack. But Bilbo wasn’t looking at them; from the bushes and the trees around them, he caught some movement. “Look out!” he cried, but it was too late. One of the Elves stumbled, and when they fell, a black arrow protruded from their back.

“Orcs!” shouted Thorin, at the same time Legolas cried, “Glamhoth!”

At once, the attention of the Elves turned from recapturing the Dwarves and was rerouted to killing the Orcs. Bilbo was inclined to trust them in that regard, and so, instead of focusing on the fighting, he crawled his way, barrel to barrel, towards Thorin and his nephews.

“We need weapons,” said Dwalin.

“We need a way out,” replied Fili.

Kili craned his neck towards the lever. The horrible memory of his wound, brown and putrid and warm to the touch, flashed across Bilbo’s eyes. “Wait,” he cried, snatching at Kili’s arm as he began to pull himself out of his barrel. The momentum, and the fact that he had let go of Thorin’s barrel, made him sink to the forehead, and he had another taste of water before Dwalin pulled him back up by the shirt collar.

“Would you be careful?” demanded Thorin. Bilbo paid him no mind. As if he’d been anything but careful this whole venture.

“I’ll pull down the lever,” said Kili, still trying to extract himself from the barrel, and from Bilbo’s grasp.

“You’ll get killed is what you’ll do,” replied Bilbo.

“We’ll get killed anyway if we stay trapped here like water rats,” growled Dwalin.

“Fine,” said Bilbo, “then let me…”

“No!” yelled Thorin, Dwalin, Kili, and, curiously, Oin, who, for once, had made good use of his trumpet.

“You didn’t let me finish,” scowled Bilbo, though he had nothing to add, since they’d known perfectly well what he’d been about to suggest. Drat, if only he could remember which Orc had shot the poisoned arrow at Kili, then he could organise some kind of coverage. But try as he might, all that came to him was the black blood oozing from his wound, and how pale he’d turned, and then…

(Lying on the funeral slabs, one on each side of their uncle, their skin white as marble, still and silent in a way that had always seemed improbable when they’d been alive…)

Bilbo was pulled out of his dark thoughts by an Orc leaping at them, crying, “Undur kurv!”. He landed on top of Bifur, who seized his face and mashed it against his own forehead, dazing him and allowing him to grab his weapon. For some reason, the cracking sound jolted Bilbo back into motion. “Try to grab as many of their weapons as you can. Meanwhile, I can sneak up there. No one will pay attention to me.” He pulled Sting out of its scabbard and showed it to Thorin. “And at least I have something to defend myself with.”

“That can’t possibly end well,” commented Dwalin, mid-wrestling with his own Orc.

Bilbo had to concede that point, but he was also more than willing to deal with the injury himself, rather than see Kili suffer again. Besides, Hobbits had strong constitutions, he would certainly be fine with a little poison.

“I’m going,” he asserted, and if the others disagreed, they were now too preoccupied with the fight to prevent him from doing it. He made for the bank, heaving himself out of the water with some difficulty, his soaked clothes weighing him down. Luckily, Bofur noticed him struggling and gave him a boost, in the form of grabbing him by the back of his coat and throwing him on the guardpost.

Bilbo just had time to nod his gratitude before he was all but tackled to the ground by an Orc. And this he had definitely forgotten: that it wasn’t only the arrow that Kili had had to contend with, but a whole gaggle of Orcs, who, contrary to what he’d announced earlier, had paid very close attention to him.

He took the fall on his shoulder, and managed miraculously not to hit his head again. Therefore, he could not blame a concussion for not raising Sting on time to parry the Orc’s attack. He watched it descend, mind blank, and forced himself to keep his eyes open.

It stopped inches from his face. An arrow sliced through the air and embedded itself cleanly between the Orc’s shoulderblades, though Bilbo only saw it when the Orc fell face first on the ground. Looking up, his gaze found the Elf-captain’s eyes, though she did not stay motionless long. In the second it took Bilbo to be attacked by another Orc, she shot and fell three more, including the one closest to Bilbo.

“Get a move on, Bilbo, you old fool,” he thought. Reaffirming his grip on Sting, he ducked to avoid a blade aimed for his throat and ran up the stairs to the guardpost, where he found the lever guarded by an Orc.

“Mat, pushdug glob¹,” snarled the Orc.

It did not sound polite, but Bilbo had no time to ponder it, as the Orc charged on him, his knobby fingers wrapped around a black knife. Bilbo raised Sting to block the blade, and ended up hitting the hilt, cutting into the Orc’s fingers and making him drop his weapon. Clutching his injured hand to his chest, the Orc spat at Bilbo and grabbed for Bilbo’s neck with his other hand. Bilbo slashed at it with Sting, but the Orc darted out of reach, hissing and spitting.

Bilbo had no instinct for combat, but luckily, it did not seem that his opponent had any either, for other than charging at Bilbo over and over until one of them got tired and fell dead, he did not appear to have a clear strategy. Which meant that Bilbo would need to figure out a way out of the fight quickly, since it was likely going to be him who tired first.

After parrying an umpteenth time, Bilbo decided that he was at least smarter than an Orc. Clutching Sting, he growled, in his best approximation of whatever accursed language these Orcs spoke, “Undur kurv.”

His garbled speech must not have been very far from the real thing, for the Orc stopped in his tracks for a moment, attempting to puzzle it out and giving Bilbo an opportunity to lunge, thrusting his sword up to the Orc's throat. He didn't make it quite so high, but the Sting's point found a gap in the Orc's threadbare chainmail and penetrated his flesh easily.

Bilbo took a step back as the Orc crumbled in front of him.

(For days, he sat next to Frodo's bed, staring at his face and wishing for colours to return and flush his cheeks again so ardently that when they did, he thought at first that he had conjured them by force of will.

Elrond came every few hours to check on the wound. “I doubt it will ever fully heal,” Elrond whispered one evening, in Sindarin to avoid frightening Sam, who dozed in the chair next to the bed. “It is a great privilege, to be whole in this world. We often forget it.”

Bilbo was sure that he never would.)

“Bilbo!” cried a dead Dwarf. Nope, not dead. Kili, watching him from his barrel. He pointed at the lever, and reality came back to Bilbo.

“Move,” he ordered his feet, and they did. But as he neared the lever, a shadow fell upon him; above him, blocking the morning sun, an Orc had climbed on the guardpost and stood ready to jump on Bilbo.

"Shit," thought Bilbo. The Orc braced himself and leapt.

An arrow whistled past, sinking into one of the Orc's eyes and changing the arc of his fall; he hit the lever on his way down, his weight lowering it and opening the gate.

Well. Bilbo was not about to look a gift horse in the mouth, as his father would have said.

Backtracking quickly, he gave the Elf-captain a brief salute and made his way back to the river, taking care not to stumble on the corpse of the Orc he had killed. "Here, Bilbo!" cried Ori, and Bilbo seized the hand the Dwarf held out to him, letting himself be pulled into the water and dragged after the barrel.

Having played his part, Bilbo elected to focus on not drowning and clung to Ori’s barrel for dear life, letting the chaos of the ongoing fight drift past him. From time to time, Ori warned him to hold his breath before rapids, or steered him away from stray arrows or rocks, but for the most part, Bilbo had very little to do.

Finally, they managed to lose the Orcs and Elves. They kept going a while longer though, just to be safe, but stopped right before entering the bend that would take them in view of Laketown.

Kili’s first words upon leaving his barrel were, “Did you see her?”

Bilbo, who had been busy trying not to keel over and die from the shivers, looked up at him, a tad irritated. “What?”

“Tauriel,” said Kili. Bilbo made a note of her name, in case it came up later. Given the stars in Kili’s eyes, it was likelier than not. “She helped us. She saved us! Wasn’t she wonderful?”

“She shot an arrow at an Orc,” Dwalin corrected. “You’re reaching.”

“I am not,” protested Kili. “Bilbo, you saw her. She was trying to help us. Wasn’t she?”

From behind Kili’s head, Bilbo saw Dwalin mime retching. It was possible that he would kill him if Bilbo encouraged this budding romance, but Bilbo was partial to interspecies love. “I’m sure she was,” he replied, ignoring Dwalin’s glare. He patted Kili’s arm. “Now if you don’t mind, we have slightly more pressing matters to take care of.”

“Such as?” asked Kili.

“Such as, how are we going to take on a dragon without weapons?” asked Balin, coming up behind them and making Bilbo startle quite badly. When he looked at his friend over his shoulder, Bilbo saw him holding a black mace, which he’d presumably stolen from an Orc. “These barely count as weapons, laddie,” Balin said in response to Bilbo’s raised eyebrows. “I don’t know what kind of smith made them, but they’re a disgrace to the trade.”

“They’re better than nothing, and surely, a sight better than whatever they have in Laketown,” said Bilbo.

“I wish you’d thought to grab our weapons,” muttered Gloin.

Bebother it all, and in particular ungrateful Dwarves. “Darn, you’re right. Would you like to go back and fetch them?”

Gloin raised his hands in defence. “All I say is that as long as we’re making deals with the Elves, we might have gotten our belongings back.”

“Speaking of which,” Thorin cut in. “What deal did you make with him, Master Baggins?”

Now, Bilbo was in it. He grimaced. “I bet him that I could find a way out of his dungeons, and that if I could, he would let us take it.”

“Only as far as the gate, anyway,” said Nori.

“The gate part was not part of our agreement,” replied Bilbo.

“And that’s it?” Thorin furrowed his brow impressively. “He agreed to this, just like that, because of a bet?”

“The thing with Elves is that you have to know how to talk to them,” Bilbo babbled. “Make a pretty sentence, insult their pride a bit, flatter them so that they feel inclined to help, speak some Sindarin, quote an old tale or mention their old enmity with the neighbours, and there you go. It’s fairly standard. Shall we go now? I don’t know about you, but I’d prefer not to linger.”

“He’s right, the Orcs will be regrouping,” said Dwalin.

Not only that, but Bard would cross their path sooner rather than later, and Bilbo preferred it to happen later.

For Bilbo had made a plan in his head, in the long and boring hours spent hiding in Thranduil’s halls, and most of it hinged on getting on Bard’s good side. While the Dwarves were charming people, Bilbo thought he’d have more luck with that if he caught Bard alone.

And so, they trudged on, following the bends of the river. It was mightily uncomfortable, drenched in freezing water, especially when the day began to fade, and a chill wind came with the early evening.

At this point, Bilbo was expecting, and dreading, the cold which had plagued him for most of his stay in Laketown. He was so occupied with this that he did not notice that Thorin had fallen into step with him, near the back of the group, until Thorin cleared his throat.

“Yes?”

“You did a good job, getting us out of there,” Thorin said. “Well done.”

Bilbo beamed at him. “That’s awfully nice of you to say, Master Oakenshield.” His words did not seem to please Thorin, for some unfathomable reason. “What?”

“What do you know about Laketown?” asked Thorin.

Bilbo perked up. “Excuse me?”

“You said that we would find no better weapons in Laketown. I thought perhaps you’d heard of it. Or read about it,” he added wryly.

“To be sure,” Bilbo agreed joyfully. “Our bookshelves are stocked with books about the place. It is the number one tourist destination for Hobbits who seek to find themselves.”

“You’re extremely funny.”

“I practise.” Sobering, Bilbo went on. “I think Gandalf mentioned that it used to be called Esgaroth, and that a lot of the people of Dale moved there after the dragon came and their homes were destroyed.” If Gandalf’s absence was good for anything, it was that Bilbo could use him mercilessly as a source of information. “Besides the Elves, they’re completely isolated from everyone. I assumed that they’re not thriving in an environment like this. At least not enough to have a weaponshop in the city centre.”

Thorin hummed thoughtfully. “Even if they did, I doubt we have the means to pay for weapons. As it is, we might not have enough to bribe our way into the town.”

“Why would we have to bribe our way in?” asked Bilbo. “Can’t we show up and ask? Wouldn’t they be glad that some people are there to inject money into the town?”

“Perhaps, but that would raise some questions,” said Thorin. “They may not be happy to hear that we plan on entering Erebor. Or,” he added darkly, “they might want to supplant us and steal the treasure for themselves.”

Considering how willing the inhabitants of Laketown had sent them to the dragon, Bilbo highly doubted it. “We don’t have to tell them that we’re going to Erebor,” he argued instead. “We could say that we’re travelling to the Iron Mountains, to visit your kin. Does that sound reasonable?”

Balin, who, unbeknownst to Bilbo, had been listening in, interceded in Bilbo’s favour. “The lad’s right, Thorin. In any case, we’ll need a boat to make our way to the Mountain. We are too pressed by time to go there on foot. As it is, we are cutting it rather close.”

“How much time do we have until Durin’s Day?” asked Thorin.

“A month, exactly,” replied Balin.

Bilbo frowned. Now, why did he feel like he was forgetting something?

“Oh!” cried Dori. “Bilbo! It’s your birthday!”

Ah, sure. “So it is. Dear me.” He wasn’t certain how old that made him. Was he fifty-one now, or a hundred and thirty-two? And how to account for the time in Valinor he didn’t remember?

“We’ll get you a present when we reach Laketown,” said Ori.

“How about a cake?” asked Bombur.

“That’s not necessary,” said Bilbo. Although, he would not say no to cake, even after the elven feast. “Let’s reach Laketown first, and then we can talk about that.”

Chapter Text

It was possible that time and regrets had embellished Bilbo’s memory of the town, but he didn’t remember Laketown being quite so dingy. “It’s so flammable,” was all he found to say when Balin asked him what he thought of it.

They had gathered in front of the guard’s hut to pool their money together. Bilbo, desperately avoiding looking at the mountain, whose shadow seemed to have fallen over the Company, was staring at the town instead.

“Not a lot survives dragon fire,” explained Balin. “Dale was built of stone, and even that fell to ruin when he came. Wood is more flammable, but it’s less expensive, especially if you’re expecting to have to rebuild.”

“I don’t understand why they stayed,” said Ori, separating from the main group to join them. “If they knew that the dragon would attack, they could have left.”

“To go where?” asked Balin.

“West, like we did.”

“You forget that we have family. Where one Dwarf dwells, another is always welcome. Men are not like that.”

“They fight over each other’s territory constantly,” Dwalin said, tearing himself from the others. “And when they don’t, it’s because they’re busy fighting over ours.”

“Not all of them do that,” argued Bilbo. “The Shire used to belong to the Northern Kingdom, and when Hobbits were looking for a place to settle, the king gave us his permission to have his hunting ground. And when Aragorn…” He clamped his mouth shut, realising a little late that sharing the plan of Gondor and Arnor’s future king to emancipate the Shire was not the smartest idea he’d ever had.

“Yes?” prompted Balin.

“Ah, nothing, anyway, no matter,” stammered Bilbo. “Forget it. Say, since out of all of us, I seem to have the better opinion on Men, perhaps you should let me do the talking.”

“Talking?” repeated Ori.

“He means lying,” said Dwalin. “He’s going to try to pull one over on the guards, like with the Trolls.”

“Yes, well, I do hope you won’t barge in and start attacking these people like you did with the Trolls,” Bilbo retorted, piqued at being called a liar. Which he was, but still. Dwalin wasn’t supposed to know that. “Just stand behind me and nod at what I say.”

“As we did at the skin-changer’s house, then,” said Balin.

“Just as soon as the others are finished bullying poor Gloin out of his purse,” agreed Bilbo. “Come to think of it, no one asked me for my money.”

“No one thought you had any,” Nori shot back, having liberated Gloin from his savings at last.

Bilbo looked for and found Thorin’s gaze. Thorin was silent, which might have been on par for the course for him, if he had not spent all of his imprisoned time talking to Bilbo. Bilbo thought he might know why; he was not the only one feeling the mountain’s dark presence looming over them.

“Bilbo is going to bamboozle the Men into giving us a warm welcome,” Nori informed him, tossing Bilbo the purse. “If that goes as well as convincing the Elvenking of letting us go, we ought to get ready to trash the place.”

“There won’t be much to trash,” commented Dwalin.

Bilbo counted the coins rapidly, nodding to himself as he came to a round sum. He took a deep breath before marching to the door of the guards’ hut and knocking on it briskly.

“Father,” he thought, “forgive me for what I’m about to do.” As soon as the door opened, he greeted the two guards jovially. “Good day! We are the Baggins party. I am Master Baggins.”

The guards exchanged puzzled looks before one of them said, “The… party?”

Bilbo made a show of frowning. “The Baggins party. Fourteen people?” At the guards' lack of reaction, Bilbo crossed his arms. “I see. The Master must not have informed you of our arrival. We sent a raven.”

“What is this about?”

“The Baggins party, we sent a raven to warn you of our arrival,” Bilbo said again, louder and articulating each word carefully. Then, as if all of his patience had been exhausted by the conversation, he huffed and said, “May I speak to your supervisor? Even better, lead me to the Master, we’ll arrange this in no time.”

“I’m not sure…” began the guard, baffled.

“What’s your name?” asked Bilbo, narrowing his eyes at him as if trying to remember specific descriptors.

“Please, come this way,” said the guard, ushering him through the hut and out towards the bridge.

Bilbo hated to press his luck, but he also did not want to leave the Company out in the open. If even one stray Elf passed that way, they would be toast. “And my friends?” he demanded.

Luckily, the guard, who did not seem to have much experience with overbearing customers, agreed to Bilbo’s demand easily.

Once they had passed the bridge, they were led through the town at a brisk pace by one of the guards, and Bilbo found himself nearly shoved at the Master’s front door. He suspected that he had made no friends of the guards.

It was not the Master who answered the guard’s knock, but his deputy, the repulsive man whose name would come back to Bilbo any second now, certainly.

“What?” he snarled, addressing the guard rather than Bilbo.

“Master Baggins…”

“There is only one Master here,” the deputy cut in. He lowered a condescending gaze on Bilbo and the Dwarves. “What’s this?”

“Sir, they claim to have sent a raven.” The guard spoke rapidly, as if this would prevent another interruption. No such luck. “I wasn’t inf…”

“A raven for what?”

“Hello,” said Bilbo. “Well-met.”

“You are the alleged Master Baggins, I suppose,” said the deputy.

“At your service,” said Bilbo. “My companions and I sent your Master a raven to ask that accommodations be made ready for our stay in this town. We are travelling to the Iron Mountains, to visit my friends’ kin.”

“You are not a Dwarf.”

“Astutely observed,” Bilbo replied cheerfully. “I am in fact their travel manager. Now, if you would be so kind as to show us where we will be staying…”

“We are not a hotel,” hissed the deputy.

“...And then we can settle the bill,” Bilbo continued, lifting the purse and jiggling it to make the coins sing.

From deeper into the house, Bilbo heard the sound of hurried footsteps, and then, the door of the hall was thrown open all the way, revealing the flushed face of the Master, who cried, “Master Baggins! Of course, of course! Come in, the rooms are not ready yet, but you’ll have a glass of brandy in the sitting room, yes?”

His beady eyes stuck on Bilbo’s purse, the Master dismissed the guard and the deputy with a vague gesture, and took the Company to a sitting room, which blessedly contained a fireplace. Dori and Dwalin immediately started to work on lighting a fire, while the others appropriated every surface available that even remotely resembled a chair.

“My apologies for the help,” the Master said airily. “Not everyone can be trusted with important information, you understand. Do remind me, how long will you be staying?”

“A fortnight,” replied Bilbo. “And then, we will of course need boats. I mentioned the boats, I think.”

The Master, who might have agreed to anything including giving his firstborn child away, nodded wildly, his attention never wavering from the purse. At last, Bilbo handed it over to him, and the Master scurried out of the room, officially to check on the rooms, but really just to count the coins.

“Scum of society,” commented Gloin.

“That’s Men for you,” said Dwalin.

Bilbo rolled his eyes, but just this once elected against disagreeing.

For his troubles, Bilbo was rewarded with a toast.

“To Bilbo,” Fili called out, the rest echoing him and slamming back their chops of ale.

They were, all of them, too exhausted to make a real celebration out of the evening, but they had gathered around the long table in the dining room the Master had generously allowed them to use and were enjoying a dish of too salty fish and leek as if it were a feast. Dori had deplored the absence of cake, which no one would have been able to provide, but he had been appeased by the promise of a visit to the market the next day, when, presumably, all of them would be rested.

Bilbo did not expect to be rested; every ten minutes or so, he made a mental check-list of his nose, throat and ears, anticipating to find them runny, scratchy or clogged. He had already made a collection of handkerchiefs and had asked the Master’s second-in-command if there were wise-women or apothecaries nearby who may be employed. The man surely took Bilbo for a hypochondriac now, but Bilbo knew what was in store for the next few days. If all that stood between him and illness was a couple of cups of well-brewed herbal tea, Bilbo would stuff himself with these until he was fully liquid.

“Are you feeling well, Bilbo?” Kili asked when Bilbo palmed his forehead to check for fever.

“Yes, why? Do I look sick?”

“You are a little flushed.”

“It’s the ale,” said Nori. He sat at Bilbo’s side, officially because he and Bilbo were great friends and whatnot. Unofficially, it seemed that Nori had been inspired by the notion that Bilbo might be hiding a purse on his person, and had been trying to pick his pocket all evening.

“I’m on water,” said Bilbo, keeping an eye on Nori’s hands.

Nori raised his mug. “Maybe that’s the problem.”

“I meant to ask, Bilbo,” Ori cut in, leaning over Nori to make eye contact. “What was that raven stuff you told the Master?”

“It was a lie, Ori,” said Nori, pushing his brother’s face away. “I don’t know how good you are at burglary, Baggins, but you’re a seasoned actor.”

“Ah, ah,” said Bilbo, quite uncomfortable now, and not from being sick. “If you must know, I was imitating my cousin Lobelia.”

“The one who burns pies?” asked Thorin.

Bilbo was quite startled to hear him speak. Sitting at the head of the table, Thorin, perhaps more tired than any of them, had been silent since the meal started. Bilbo had not realised that he was listening, though he should not have been. Thorin, it seemed, always listened when Bilbo spoke.

“Yes,” said Bilbo, his voice a little choked. “How do you…?” But of course. Bilbo had joked about this, a million years ago. Their second first evening together. “Ah. Well, besides burning pies, she is known in the Shire for yelling at folks in the service industry. I was not shrill enough, I think, but it did the trick.”

“She sounds delightful,” remarked Nori.

Bilbo made a noise of ascent, but his attention did not waver from Thorin, nor did it when the others began a contest to determine whose embarrassing cousin was the worst, which Dwalin won when he mused that Nori was, technically, a distant cousin.

In spite of their exhaustion, or maybe because of it, they were slow going to bed. They filed up the stairs with heavy feet, Bilbo dropping to the back of the pack to idle next to Oin to make sure that they ended up in adjacent bedrooms.

His efforts were thwarted; as they split up in pairs, Balin called out to him. “You wouldn’t mind sharing with an old Dwarf?” asked Balin.

“Only if you wouldn’t mind sharing with an old Hobbit,” replied Bilbo.

“One year older does not make you old, laddie,” laughed Balin, and he was so agreeable that Bilbo did not begrudge him the fact that the healer of the Company was now three rooms away.

As they set their meagre possessions down next to their beds, Bilbo said, “I assumed that you would room with your brother.”

“No, Thorin will have to bear his snoring for now,” said Balin. “Well, this is charming.”

It was not. Bilbo did not doubt that somewhere in this hall was a beautifully furnished bedroom, but he was also certain that that bedroom was being used by the Master, and that he did not much care to spend anything for his guests. There were two beds, with thin white sheets to sleep under, and a simple wooden chest at the bottom of each bed. That was the extent of the furniture; beyond that, there was not much to look at. Bilbo did not even think that the walls had been painted in the last… Well, ever.

“Yes,” he replied absently. “Charming. Say, Balin, did Master Oakenshield seem preoccupied tonight? More than usual?”

Balin sighed. “Ah, laddie. It stirs up old feelings, being this close to the Mountain.”

Bilbo was afraid of that. “It was your home too, and you don’t seem as… Stirred, I guess.”

“We are different people. Thorin has a melancholic disposition.”

“You don’t say.” That was the understatement of the Third Age.

“No need to fret, Bilbo. He is not one to lose focus. Besides, he has not forgotten you.”

“Pardon?” Bilbo asked, as politely as he could.

“He asked me to look after you. Not that I wouldn’t have, of course.”

Bilbo mulled this over, or tried to, but his brain was functioning at minimum speed tonight. He could not fathom any of this. “I’m sorry, what do you mean? He asked you to room with me?”

“Yes.”

“For what reason? Oh,” he said. “Was he afraid that nobody would want to share a room with me?” Surely, they were all more or less friends by now, weren’t they? How ridiculous of him. Bilbo fought a smile. Balin said nothing, regarding Bilbo curiously. “But wait, why didn’t he ask me to share his room, then?”

“Now, now, Bilbo. That wouldn’t be very proper, would it?”

“Proper? Balin, I know he’s a king, but we’ve all been sleeping on the ground. I think he could manage to bunk with a commoner for a few nights.” Balin chuckled. “What?”

“You are very clever, Bilbo; you manage to have conversations all on your own.”

Bilbo was still trying to figure out what that could possibly mean when he fell asleep.

Bilbo woke with the dawn and without a sore throat. Balin still slept at the other end of the room, as evidenced by his intense snoring, and did not wake when Bilbo left to use the bathroom and came back to dress after having done his ablutions.

He wandered back downstairs into the sitting room, joining Dori and Bombur for tea and pre-breakfast bread toasts. The others trickled in one by one throughout the morning, all of them in better moods than they had been in a long time.

All but one, that was. Bilbo chose not to dwell on this.

Besides, there was something else on his mind. “I should be sick by now,” he mused aloud, breathing deep to check if his nose was stuffed already. And certainly, it felt a tad runny, but nothing dramatic. This didn’t make sense.

“Can Hobbits predict their sicknesses?” asked Bofur.

Bilbo hummed as he felt his throat for lymph nodes. “Oh yes. We even schedule them in. My favourite time to be sick as a child was when I was supposed to clean my room.” It had never worked; whenever he tried, his father would examine him, find him much sicker than Bilbo said, and insist to make him drink cod liver oil by the jar. Bilbo was miraculously cured after the first spoon.

“Hobbits are much more interesting than I thought,” said Ori. “Bilbo, what are you doing?”

Bilbo had been trying to look at his tongue in the reflection provided by his spoon. “It just doesn’t make sense,” he said, more to himself than to Ori. He’d changed some things, sure, but the circumstances of his cold had stayed the same. Was it possible that his immune system had been improved by something he’d done differently? Maybe Thranduil served cold medicine at his feasts.

“I think he’s cracked,” Bofur told Ori, taking the spoon away from Bilbo. “Friend, perhaps some fresh air would do you some good.”

Besides the most important events that had marked his first stay in Lake-Town, Bilbo had only vague memories of how he’d spent his days. The head cold hadn’t helped.

And so, he did not remember if he’d ever been to the market. Nothing seemed especially familiar to him, he thought when he, Bofur, Dori and Nori strolled in the narrow alleys between the stalls. Certainly, there was not much that stood out, and not much except for food.

“Now, Bilbo,” said Dori when he expressed that sentiment. “I would assume that after being hungry for so long, you’d be glad to be able to buy food.”

He had a point, and maybe, had the wares been more exciting, or more plentiful, Bilbo would have been happier. As it was, he could not help compare these sorry stalls to the colourful ones of the Shire. For the first time, he felt a pang of longing for his old home.

“It lacks crafts, that’s what’s missing,” said Bofur.

“You could set up shop and sell yours,” said Nori.

“I left them all in the Blue Mountains, I’m afraid,” Bofur replied, either unaware that Nori was teasing him or unwilling to rise to the bait. “All except for this,” he said, taking his long pipe out of his pocket.

Bilbo tilted his head. “You know, I had no idea you’d made it yourself.”

“That’s on you for not guessing it!” said Bofur. “Here, take a look.”

He showed Bilbo the pipe. It was simple in design, and by no means the most elegant pipe Bilbo had ever seen, but its surface was smooth, and it had a nice colour. Given that Bofur was a toy maker and not a pipe maker, it was very impressive. Bilbo said so, which made Bofur laugh. “Well, I don’t know much about it,” said Bilbo, a little embarrassed that he, a so-called writer, could not find better words to compliment it. “My interest in pipes is usually in using them, not describing them.”

“Do you smoke, Bilbo?” asked Dori.

“I used to,” replied Bilbo. “I stopped a few years ago. Elrond said that it would do my lungs no favours.”

Bofur frowned. “I didn’t know you knew him already.”

“Oh, bebother me,” thought Bilbo. “That is, he didn’t tell me directly . He told my mother. Yes, right, he knew my mother, that’s a true fact. He told her, and she told me. Apparently, smoking is bad for you.”

“I don’t know about that,” said Bofur. “What does an Elf know about other people’s health?”

“Half-Elf,” corrected Bilbo, “and I guess as a healer, he knows more than most.”

Bofur shrugged. “Won’t keep me awake at night. My old one smoked all his life, and he died at the honourable age of 264.”

“But he might have made it to 265 if he hadn’t smoked, have you thought about that?” asked Nori, using Bilbo's shoulder as an armrest.

“No, and I won’t think about it now either,” Bofur said cheerfully. “Now, Bilbo, I think you’ve well earned a treat, after everything.” He held out his pipe to Bilbo, who, it was true, had been eyeing it enviously. “You’re welcome to it.”

“That’s very kind, but I left my weed at home.”

“Not all of it,” muttered Nori.

“What was that?” asked Bilbo. Nori shoved his hand into the inner pocket of his coat and pulled out a pouch. A familiar one. “Did you steal this from my house?” demanded Bilbo, snatching the pouch from Nori’s thieving hand.

“You did say to empty your stores,” Nori pointed out. He had, at that. “And what was I to do? Leave them in your cupboard to rot, and risk you coming back to bad weed? You could have smoked them and been poisoned.”

“Why did you have that if you stopped smoking years ago?” mused Bofur, which was a very good point, and once again, Bilbo was an imbecile.

“For guests,” he invented. “And for friends to steal, evidently. You know what? I did earn a little treat. Thank you, Bofur.”

Bofur beamed. “Happy day-after-your-birthday, Bilbo.”

It was dicey to do it so soon, for he ran the risk of being exposed as a liar in front of the whole town, but it needed to be done sooner or later, and Bilbo had the somewhat stupid notion that the universe was on his side.

It may be that it was the second evening he spent in Lake-Town, and he hadn’t so much as sneezed. His nose, wet that morning, was fully dry by noon. He had to take it as a sign.

He climbed the wooden stairs to the front door of the house. Before knocking, he looked for Gil-Estel in the sky. He did not usually speak his greetings aloud, but this night, he murmured, “Good evening, my friend.” Then, he knocked, prepared to meet another friend.

Bard’s grim face appeared at the door. “Yes? What…?” He frowned when he didn’t see who had knocked. His face cleared when he looked down and noticed Bilbo, who gave him a sardonic look. “Oh, apologies. May I help you?”

“Well met, Master Bard,” said Bilbo. “My name is Bilbo Baggins. You do not know me, but I know you. If you would invite me in, I need to have words with you.”

Chapter Text

“Don’t tell me you’re scared to lose,” Bofur taunted him. It was their last night in Laketown before leaving; the boats had been made ready for them, a bargeman having agreed to take them upriver and to bring back the empty boats to the town, and their accounts had been settled. With nothing more to do, they had elected to have one last night of rest before starting on the last leg of their desperate venture.

Now, in his first life, Bilbo had taken that opportunity to drink Bofur under the table, freshly recovered from his cold and wanting to defend his people’s drinking capacity. In retrospect, it had worked out for the best, since Bofur had been too plastered to go to the Mountain with them, and so had taken care of Kili’s leg injury.

That being said, Kili’s leg was not injured this time, and what’s more Bilbo had grown wiser and less proud in his old age. “Oh please. I assure you, I’m not scared for myself,” he retorted. “I am simply preventing you from making a mistake you’ll regret in the morning.”

Bofur pretended to sniff at Bilbo. “Smells awfully like loser talk to me.”

“Don’t be so hasty,” Bombur chided. “Remember Fruma.”

This prompted a few of the Dwarves to grumble about Fruma’s prices and marketing tactics, but Bilbo ignored them, asking Bombur, “What about Fruma?”

“He once challenged a Hobbit to a drinking contest in Bree,” explained Bofur.

“What my brother means to say is that he was once demolished by a Hobbit in a drinking contest in Bree,” added Bombur. “According to the story, she disappeared the next morning, before he could propose. He talks about it to this day. I would take it as a cautionary tale, Bofur.”

Bofur rolled his eyes. “That hardly counts. Fruma is a light-weight.”

“And you’re light-brained,” Nori called from across the room.

“That’s uncalled for, you don’t know what we’re talking about!”

“Don’t need to!” Having said that, he turned back to his conversation with Fili, Kili and Dwalin. Given Kili’s intensity and the look of exaggerated despair mixed with hilarity on the others’ faces, Bilbo thought he could guess the subject. Closeby, Bifur and Oin were playing at one of the card games the Dwarves favoured, which were based on counting and which had always seemed unnecessarily complicated to Bilbo. Then, near the fireplace was another cluster, composed with Ori and Balin, who were discussing a matter of obscure lore, Gloin, dozing in his armchair after spending the day searching the house to make sure that they would not leave anything behind, and Dori, who was drinking tea and seemed content to let the various conversations wash over him.

After the adventure had ended and he had gone back to the Shire, Bilbo had seen his friends here and there when they visited him, but he had rarely seen them all together at once. Of course, they had all been together for the last few months, but now that the mountain was in view and it was all drawing to a close once more, Bilbo started to dread the separation. Would it be the last time, he wondered, that they were all gathered and happy?

Except, of course, that they were not all gathered. He looked around, furrowing his brow and trying to recall if he’d seen Thorin this evening.

“He’s outside,” Bofur supplied, surprising Bilbo. “Go on, I can get perfectly drunk without you.”

“That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard,” commented Bombur, to Bifur’s agreement.

Bilbo hopped down from his chair. “I think I’ll get some air.”

“You do that,” laughed Bofur.

“Don’t drink too much, we’re starting early tomorrow,” said Bilbo, sidestepping him on his way to the door which led to the northern side of the porch. It wrapped around three sides of the great house, and though it was not much higher than the street, it still gave a nice view of all but the eastern direction.

Thorin did not seem to notice Bilbo joining him, absorbed in his contemplation. Rising above the line of roofs was the lonely mountain, its dark silhouette an ominous backdrop which came to pollute any good thought that may be had in this village. Ori had been right to wonder why the Men of Dale and Esgaroth had remained under this shadow. Bilbo felt sick to see it.

And soon, he would have to go inside it and confront the monstrous things it held. He swallowed around the lump in his throat. He had done it once, and he would do it again, of course. Of course.

“Enjoying the view?” he asked Thorin, who startled out of his reverie, darting his gaze to Bilbo’s face. He seemed caught out, which prompted Bilbo to add, “Come to the other side, I want to watch for Gil-Estel.”

Thorin nearly rolled his eyes, but perhaps remembering their conversation in the woodland dungeons, he abstained. With one last longing look towards the mountain, he followed Bilbo to the western side of the porch, and together they looked at the darkening sky.

Bilbo pulled out his pipe and began to fill it, relishing the return to old habits. He lit the pipe and took a long, slow drag, letting the familiar warmth fill his throat. It was possible that Elrond was wrong, or that healthy lungs were overrated. He lifted up the pipe towards Thorin. “Old Toby?” he offered.

Thorin shook his head. “Thank you, no, I prefer Southlinch.”

Mentally, Bilbo mapped the way straight to Mordor. There was no more need to make the detour to Erebor, he could go straight to Mount Doom and stop taking so much trouble in order to save Thorin’s life. If that fool wished to live, he could just save himself.

Oh, that he had known this earlier! To think he had wasted eight decades pining after this Dwarf! How much heartache would he have been spared if he’d only known? The grocer comment was one thing, but this ?

“Did I say something wrong?” asked Thorin. “You’re looking at me the same way you looked at Bombur when he discarded these mushrooms he found near Rivendell…”

“Must you rub salt in the wound?” cried Bilbo. Though he had not suspected it, Bombur had not been as close to death when he had fallen in the river in Mirkwood as he had been during the Mushroom Incident. But that was beside the point. “Southlinch? That is criminal!”

“The other brands have a taste.”

“Yes, that taste is tobacco, Thorin!” The name slipped out before he could yank it back. He cringed, bracing himself for the hurt he knew would follow, that had followed every time he’d said that name since Thorin’s death.

It… didn’t. It didn’t? It didn’t hurt. He’d said it, and it didn’t hurt. Could he say it again?

He looked up at Thorin and met his eyes, his wonderful blue eyes with the wonderful weight of their wonderful gaze. He had forgotten what it felt like to love him without mourning him.

He laughed. “Thorin. Thorin, have you… Have you considered that you don’t like smoking?”

Thorin watched him warily, as though Bilbo was a wild animal susceptible to running away or attacking. Which, given Bilbo’s train of thought these last minutes, wasn’t entirely unreasonable. “I like the activity.”

That, Bilbo could relate with. “So do I. I won many a smoke ring blowing contest in my days.”

One corner of Thorin’s lips twitched. “I meant, talking over a pipe.”

Bilbo stared at him. “You know that you can do that without the pipe. It’s just called talking.”

There, he’d seen it. The faintest hint of a smile. “I find conversations held while smoking more peaceful than the usual sort.”

Bilbo hummed. “Except for when your Hobbit burglar threatens to throttle you for your bad taste in weed.”

“You didn’t threaten to throttle me.”

“Oh? My bad, I meant to.”

There it was: a real, handsome smile. Bilbo gorged on the sight. In his first life, he had thought there would be time to enjoy Thorin’s rare smiles later. Never again would he be so wasteful.

“We could also talk over tea,” Bilbo suggested.

“I always thought that tea was more conducive to idle chats.”

“You and I have had different tea times, and very different pipes.”

Thorin chuckled. “You should be more careful with your turns of phrase, Scholar.”

Bilbo, who was a writer and as such knew that one should never be too careful with their turns of phrase, blinked up at him. “What do you mean?”

“You know very well. You cannot fool me by batting your eyelashes innocently. I am not Dori.”

It was Bilbo’s turn to grin. His cheeks ached with it. “No, you are not. I’ll have you know, I’m a perfectly proper gentle Hobbit.”

“By your own admission, you are not.”

Bilbo hummed. “Fair enough. See? Idle chat.” He lifted his pipe in demonstration. “Not reserved for tea.”

“Perhaps I meant impersonal, instead of idle.”

“Because we’re having such a profound discussion right now…”

“Well, you know me enough to agree that I am not Dori. How much more profound does it get?”

“You’re right. I’m practically part of the family.” And before Thorin could refute it, or worse, agree, Bilbo shook his head. “Southlinch. What a disgrace.”

“It’s the most affordable strain.” That was a good point, actually, though Bilbo would never in a million relived lifetimes admit it. “Besides, I thought you didn’t smoke.”

“I quit some years ago. This is just a reward for how brave I’ve been.”

Bilbo’s tone was clearly that of a joke, but Thorin’s voice was warm and sincere when he answered. “Well deserved.”

Bilbo cleared his throat, wondering if the dusk was enough to hide his pink cheeks. “If you say so.”

They fell silent, and after a few minutes, Eärendil lit up the night. And though Bilbo could feel the oppressive weight of his future and see the shadow of the mountain in the not-so-distant North, for this night, it seemed that things were looking up. Perhaps it was foolish, with all that he knew, but basking in the pleasant presence of Thorin under the brilliant beams of the Silmaril, he could not help hoping that things would turn out better than they had the first time.

Bofur did not follow his advice and drank copiously, but he had the merit of not being insensible upon waking. “Who’s the light-weight now?” teased Bombur, as he and Bilbo heaved him to his feet.

“My skull,” complained Bofur.

“What about your skull?” asked Bilbo.

“It wants out of my head.”

“I’m sure it will live with the disappointment,” said Bilbo. “Come on, the others will be waiting.”

There were no crowds to see them off, which was just as well, and they did not have the piles of weapons that had been lent to them, which was slightly more terrible, though Bilbo couldn’t imagine what they’d thought they’d accomplish against a dragon with some rusty hatchets anyway.

The bargeman they had hired made eye contact with Bilbo when he came aboard the boat, but said nothing to him, addressing Thorin instead. “Is that your whole party?”

Thorin nodded. Balin, more political, approached him to thank him for his troubles and chat while the man made ready to sail. Amazingly, in the four days they spent on the boat, none of the Dwarves thought to ask his name.

In any case, there were little opportunities for talk during those days, for everyone seemed deep in thought, immured in their anxieties about what the next step of their quest would bring. Bilbo thought that it was very rich of them to be anxious, since of all of them, he was the one who would risk his hide. That being said, he was in no mood to jest either; the closer they came to the mountain, the more he watched Thorin, and what he saw did not appease him in the least.

At last, the bargeman brought his boat to a stop. “This is as far North as the river will bring you,” he said grimly. “You will have to walk the rest of the way to the Iron Hills.” He paused. “That was your destination, correct?”

Bilbo grimaced at the question. Luckily, Balin took it in stride. “That’s right,” he said. “Thank you for the lift.” He got busy ushering everyone off the barge, leaving Bilbo behind to give the bargeman a tiny smile.

“Good luck on your journey, Master Baggins,” said the bargeman.

“Thank you,” said Bilbo, though in his heart, he knew that he had better than luck this time around.

It seemed to Bilbo that it had been a while since he’d walked so much, but of course, it hadn’t been. Already, though, the memories of his time in Mirkwood were growing dim, which was for the best, and he could not recall walking much in the woods.

Now they were back at it, and unfortunately, the terrain was not the most agreeable, either to step or look on. With time, Bilbo knew, the land between Laketown and Erebor would heal and learn to grow things again in the wake of the dragon’s death, but for now, Smaug’s repeated assaults had left it barren and grey, and from the looks of it, the sky agreed. Heavy clouds hung low over the land, painting the world dark and doing nothing to improve the Company’s general mood.

In the evening of their second day on foot, they set up their camp in the shadow of a hill, and Bilbo endeavoured to cheer the others up by telling them the much-romanticised version of Belladonna and the Phantom of Himling. Bilbo was quite certain that Belladonna had encountered neither ghosts nor evil sorcerers during her stay on that island (he did not, however, wholly rule out the band of miscreants bent on sabotaging Belladonna’s picnic), but that tale had always amused him as a child, and he’d retold it himself, even adding a couple of dramatic pauses now and then, when he’d needed to entertain his little cousins.

He did not expect the others to listen to the end, but there were some grumbling when he reached the end. “Are you telling me that she went to all that trouble and all she had to show for it by the end was the drawing of a flower?” demanded Gloin.

“Not just any flower,” Bilbo corrected sternly. “A flower with petals of gold and leaves of silver, which emits light in the darkness. Unseen in Middle-Earth.”

“And she just left it there,” said Nori.

“As a botanist, she knew that it was unlikely that it would grow anywhere else,” Bilbo told him. “If she’d plucked it, it would have withered and died. Of course she left it there.”

“It’s not true, is it?” asked Ori.

Bilbo hesitated. “Well, as with all stories, some of it is true and some is not. She did go to that island chasing a ghost.” With a net and her good humour, and nothing more , Gandalf had once recounted. “And she did draw the flower I described.” Only, even Bilbo, once he had grown up and thought about it, didn’t really know that there had been such a flower.

Still, it was a good story; even the Dwarves, when they were done complaining, seemed to agree that it was.

“You should write books,” Kili said as they lay down to sleep.

Bilbo gave a weak laugh. “It would take me forever.”

“So? Ori can write for you if you dictate. He’s a scribe, you know.”

“How nice of you to volunteer other people’s services without asking them first.”

“Oh please,” Fili interjected. “As if you hadn’t spent the whole adventure bossing us around.”

Bilbo pinched his lips in distaste and turned away from him. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about. Go to sleep, now. Long day tomorrow.”

And it was. The foothills grew steeper and more treacherous to climb, but at least, the weather improved somewhat as the day wore on, though the landscape was still too bleak to sing as they walked. They took a short break for lunch and started again.

“Take heart, Bilbo,” Balin said, noticing Bilbo struggling not to stumble. “It is only the Desolation of Smaug.”

“Ah, yes. Only that.”

“This land was green and fair once. Mahal willing, it will be again.” Balin’s gaze was far away, bent on a past that Bilbo could not imagine. “People say that we Dwarves appreciate nothing but stone, but it’s false.”

“Aye, there’re gems also,” agreed Gloin, passing them by. “And gold and silver and iron. Lots of precious stuff, really.”

Balin smiled sadly at Gloin’s back. “Lots of them, that’s true. In that way I guess our taste aligns with that of a dragon.”

“I know that’s not true at all,” said Bilbo. “I’ve been with all of you long enough to know how much you treasure other things. Family, home, honour. We may not have the same attitude towards these things in the Shire, but we care about them too.”

“You’re very kind to say so,” said Balin, tapping Bilbo lightly on the shoulder. “We do care about the land also. This…” He gestured at the charred remains of trees and grass. “This is wasteful.”

“Well, it’s good that we’re doing this then,” replied Bilbo. “Once the lot of you have reclaimed Erebor, everything will be different. Better. For the people and for the land. Don’t forget, you have a Hobbit on your side. I bet I could convince Thorin to plant some crops, maybe one or two flower patches.”

“I don’t doubt that you would, laddie.” Balin still seemed dejected, and so, to distract him, Bilbo explained his plans for, as he dubbed it, Erebor’s front and backyards. He even managed to bring Bofur into the conversation to weigh in for the colour scheme, though Bilbo thought that they could do better than blue and brown.

Some hours later, Thorin and Dwalin fell back to the end of the group. “We’ve been talking about sending scouts to scope out the front gate,” said Dwalin. “The kids volunteered.”

“Sure, I’ll go,” said Bilbo. The other three didn’t respond, so he sighed. “Sorry. I know I was supposed to let the conversation play out, but you were always going to ask me to go and keep them out of trouble, so I decided to cut to the important part.”

“Smart,” said Dwalin.

“I will go with them,” Balin cut in, interrupting Thorin, who was certainly about to ask for that very thing. “Someone needs to keep Bilbo out of trouble while he’s keeping Fili and Kili out of trouble.”

“Thank you, Balin,” said Thorin, sounding more grateful than the situation warranted, and also more sombre. “Be careful,” he told Bilbo as he and the other three departed.

“Don’t worry, they’re safe with me,” said Bilbo, giving him a reassuring pat on the arm. It did not do its job, for when Bilbo turned one last time before the hills separated them, Thorin’s eyebrows were cast down, foretelling a storm to come.

Chapter Text

“What do you think of your future home?” Bilbo asked Fili and Kili.

These two could normally be counted on to have some light conversation, but even they had become dreadfully bleak as they approached the ruins of the old city. The most he could get out of Kili in answer was, “Hm, fine.”

As for Fili, he bypassed the question completely and asked, “Are you anxious at all, Bilbo?”

“About what?”

The two of them, and Balin, stared at him as if his brains had been caught escaping by his ears. “The dragon,” said Kili. “You do remember that part, don’t you?”

Ah, yes. The truth was that Bilbo had been so preoccupied with not letting the others’ dark moods get to him that he had, momentarily, set the dragon aside. Now that it was mentioned, Bilbo might have considered being anxious about it. He gave a show of trembling. “Of course I’m anxious! Can’t you see, I’m shaking! But, you know, I have to contain myself, or you might think that I can’t do my job.”

If he had to guess, Bilbo would say that his theatrics convinced zero percent of his dwarven audience. Kili palmed his forehead. “I told you that he was insane. Gloin is going to owe me so much money.”

“Gloin did not say he wasn’t insane, only that it wouldn’t prevent him from burglaring,” countered Fili.

“I would prefer it if you abstained from making bets on my mental state,” said Bilbo. “This has to be illegal. Balin, remind me to tell your brother to arrest them.”

“He will, as soon as he collects his payment,” replied Balin. He seemed cheered for a bit, but then, he shuddered as he caught a glimpse of the crows flocking about the Gate. “These are ill-news. Let us go back, I doubt we’ll see anything more worth reporting.”

Bilbo nodded, but let them go ahead and looked at the city some more. After he had left the Shire, he had come to Erebor for a visit, and to meet Thorin’s sister, but in spite of Dis’ gracious invitation, he had not wanted to room within the mountain. Instead, he had stayed with Bard’s grandchild Eona, a middle-aged lady whose mother, Tilda, had raised on stories of the Company’s adventures. In between visits from the remaining members of the Company, she’d taken Bilbo out in the city, showing him the sights and the much-needed improvements her family had made to it. It had been ruins when he’d first seen Dale, and it was ruins now, but he remembered walking its clean streets, taking a turn in the marketplace, seeing all the happy folks who lived there in part because of him and his friends. He remembered stopping in front of a plaque placed where Girion had attempted to kill the dragon. He remembered, also, climbing the endless stairs of the observation tower, a massive building near the domed hall of the king, from which one could survey the city and the mountains at its back. The tower had been an invention from Bain, but the dome was already there, though falling apart. Certainly, one could climb that and have a similar view.

“Bilbo?” called Balin.

“I’m coming,” he said, and turned his back on Dale, for now.

In fact, Balin did mention the bet to Dwalin and the others when they returned to the main group, if only to collect his own payment.

“You didn’t participate in this bet, did you?” Bilbo asked Thorin as Gloin, who of course didn’t have any money left after Laketown, figured out a payment plan with the others.

Thorin shook himself out of his brooding long enough to say, “Of course not. Betting would have been unfair to the others, since I knew for a fact that you were insane.”

They went on. On the afternoon of the second day at last, they made their camp at the foot of the stairs which would lead to the hidden door. The spirits within the Company had sunk to an all-time low, but the idea that tomorrow at last, they would find the door’s landing, though the door itself would not be opened for several days, was enough to reanimate them for the time being.

Bilbo, at that time, thought that he could not bear to let his friends go through the moment of disappointment again, when the last ray of the sun shone on the door and nothing happened. Nor could he come out and say what the answer to the riddle was, since…

Well, he could, but that would certainly raise some questions.

That being said, dropping hints such as exclaiming about the brightness of the moon out of nowhere did not seem much better (and would be unfair to the few of his companions who had betted against his insanity). And so, in true Hobbit fashion he decided that the best way to telegraph the answer to one riddle was to pose other riddles.

Bilbo’s first hurdle with this clever plan was that he did not know how to bring a riddle contest about. He was pondering over this deeply during supper, when Bofur was kind enough to help him.

“So, Friend Bilbo, what is the entertainment tonight?” Bilbo blinked up at him, wondering what he’d missed while lost in thought. “Or have you given up trying to cheer us up?”

“You knew?” he asked, dumbfounded. He hadn’t expected them to give his actions much thought, since evidently, any weird behaviour could be attributed to a disease of the mind.

But his friends all confirmed that they’d noticed his efforts, even Oin, who for once had his ear trumpet at the ready. “We’re not stupid, Bilbo,” said Kili.

“Oh, good,” said Bilbo. “Then perhaps you won’t find my idea too challenging. I was thinking about a riddle contest.”

The Company did not seem enthused about it, but given that they’d more or less requested a group activity, they could hardly refuse to do it now. Bilbo stood up and climbed on the log which had been his bench and was now his stage. He cleared his throat, and began:

“My head is struck by a forging hammer,

sheared close by a shaping blade,

honed smooth by a fierce file.

Sometimes I swallow my tempered foe,

when bound by rings, I heave from behind,

thrust a long limb through a hard hole,

catch hard the keeper of the heart’s pleasure,

twist with my tongue and turn back

the midnight guardian of my lord’s treasure,

when the conquering warrior comes to hold

the gift of slaughter, the joy of gold.”

The others stared at him, somewhat bemused. “Uh,” said Nori, and more echoed his words.

Bilbo let an appropriate moment lapse before saying, “It’s a key. Obviously.”

“Yes, obviously,” said Dwalin.

“That sounds likely,” said Bofur.

“I thought you’d like it, it has the word hammer in it,” said Bilbo.

“Hm-hm,” said Bombur.

“To be sure,” said Balin.

“Well? Did you like it?” asked Bilbo. For some reason, Bofur laughed so hard he fell off his rocky stool. These Dwarves. “If that’s how you take it, I’ll stop,” Bilbo scolded, adopting a stern voice. On the other side of the camp, he caught a hint of a smile from Thorin, and had to repress a smile of his own.

“No, no, go on,” said Kili. “We’ll be good.”

“We’ll try,” corrected Nori. “D’you have another one, Baggins?”

Bilbo did have another key riddle, but given the others’ reaction to the first, he did not want to offer the second, which he’d only heard when his uncle Hildigrim had drunk a little too much at Bilbo’s thirty-third birthday party and had started getting bawdy. “I do. This one I’m sure you’ll like:

I am the lone wood in the warp of battle,

Wounded by iron, broken by blade,

Weary of war. Often I see

Battle-rush, rage, fierce fight flaring—

I hold no hope for help to come

Before I fall finally with warriors

Or feel the flame. The hard hammer-leavings

Strike me; the bright-edged, battle-sharp

Handiwork of smiths bites in battle.

Always I must await the harder encounter,

For I could never find in the world any

Of the race of healers who heal hard wounds

With roots and herbs. So I suffer

Sword-slash and death-wound day and night.”

“A shield! I know this one,” cried Ori. “A shield, it’s a shield!”

“I can’t be sure, but I think it’s a shield,” said Oin, who, sitting near Ori, had caught the full blast of Ori’s enthusiasm in the trumpet.

“It’s a shield,” confirmed Bilbo. “Congratulations. Now, for the last one…

Curved lamp of the air, cunningly formed,

Or silver wheel, I wane and wax in turn,

And chase after gold from gleaming day’s star.

Well known to earth-dwellers from east to west

Watchful wanderer, lighter of the dark,

When night’s shadows abound, I make it bright.”

Admittedly, Bilbo had reworked this from another, more complicated riddle, but nevertheless, he was inordinately proud of the Dwarf, and of himself, when Kili was the first to get it.

“I knew I was the smartest Dwarf of the Company,” he crooned, rising to stretch.

Balin chuckled. “I never doubted it, lad.”

Bilbo wisely abstained from commenting on that, but his expression must have spoken for him, for Fili laughed at it and said, “He did say the smartest Dwarf, Bilbo.”

Kili caught the exchange, and looked abashed. “Of course, Uncle is smarter. And Balin too, I suppose.”

“Much obliged,” said Balin.

“And I solved the first riddle,” Ori interjected.

“Only because you knew it already,” retorted Kili. “Fine, Ori is smarter too. And Oin knows a lot about healing.” He paused. “I’m at least smarter than Fili, right?”

Bilbo feigned to look behind himself. “Excuse me, you’re asking me to respond to that? My boy, my father taught me that the best way not to keep mauled by a bear was to keep out of its way. I’ll abstain from that conversation, if you don’t mind.”

“Very wise,” said Thorin, who had snuck close to Bilbo without his notice. “If nothing else, you are, no doubt, the smartest Hobbit of this Company.”

Bilbo sniffed, trying not to let himself be intimidated by the fact that Thorin had elected to settle close to him for the night. “Evidently.”

Bilbo kept awake late into the night, far after Dwalin’s watch had ended and Dori’s had begun. He wondered why Thorin, this night of all nights, had chosen to come next to him, only to lay silently and not speak to him, as they used to do before they had come to their accursed destination. He could not discipline his thoughts, and could not even determine any meaning from them.

But also, he felt deep in his heart the conviction that he and Dori were not the only ones keeping a vigil, and that next to him, Thorin was as awake as they were. Yet, he did not speak, and his eyes were closed.

Bilbo’s eyes were wide open. He lay on his back and watched the sky, as he used to do when he lived in Rivendell. Sometimes, Glorfindel or one of Elrond’s children would sit by him, and once or twice Erestor. At first he did not know what he sought, but it had found him all the same. Now, he waited in silence, and when he saw the star of High-Hope which gave him strength, he turned to his side and looked at Thorin. “How are you?” he whispered.

Thorin did not pretend to be asleep. His eyes, when he opened them, gleamed with starlight. They were strange and pale, even by night. “I am so close.”

“Yes.”

“So long, it was a dream. I did not think I would see it again.”

“I know. Is it…” Bilbo hesitated. “Are you glad? Does it hurt?”

“Yes,” said Thorin. “Those things and many more. I can’t explain it rightly. Only a few days from now, I could be inside. The kingdom of my father’s father. My kingdom.” Bilbo shivered. “Are you cold?”

“It’s nearly autumn.” He wrapped his coat tighter around himself. “What was Erebor like in autumn?”

Dimly, he saw Thorin’s expression change. “I scarcely remember.” He was silent for a long time. Bilbo listened to his breathing, watched the silhouette of his shoulder rise and fall with each intake and outtake of breath. Soon, his eyelids dragged down, but before he could sink into sleep, Thorin murmured again. “Is that strange? All I’ve done, to get back something that I don’t remember clearly.”

“It’s home,” Bilbo mumbled. And home was less a place than a feeling, anyway. But he did not say that, because between one thought and the next, he was asleep.

Finally, Durin’s day dawned. Bilbo had been exempted from watch duty since they’d set up camp on the doorstep, as he would need all of his energy for his ordeal, assuming they found the door and its keyhole.

Bilbo spent the day trying not to feel too impatient with the Dwarves as they became frantic in their search for the keyhole, since there was little merit in knowing the answer to a riddle faster than everyone else when he had already solved it eighty years ago. If only there was a way to let them know that their panic would do no good, that they would find what they were searching for, that they only needed to trust him…

He was drawn out of his train of thoughts by Fili, who joined Bilbo where he stood, facing west. “Gave up already?” asked Bilbo, surprised.

“Obviously we’re not making any progress by…” He gestured behind them, where Nori tried to use his thief’s tools to crack the as-yet-inexistant lock. “And since our burglar himself isn’t worried at all, I might as well not be either. I trust your judgement.”

Bilbo patted Fili’s shoulder. Or, actually, it was his arm, since that was all that Bilbo could reach easily without standing on a stepstool. “Good lad.”

Fili attempted an exasperated grimace, but it soon gave way to conspiratorial nonchalance. “I guessed that you had a plan.”

Bilbo’s eyes widened briefly, wondering if perhaps Fili was a better spy than he had assumed. Which would not be much, because Bilbo had not assumed that Fili could spy at all. “Um,” he said, opting for prudence. “Don’t confess to things you haven’t yet been accused of, you fool,” he told himself. To Fili, he asked, “What makes you think that?”

“You always have a plan!” exclaimed Fili. “You always know what’s going on, and what’s going to happen, so I think that you’ve been scheming about how to defeat the dragon all along.” Bilbo tried to laugh it off. He was vastly unsuccessful. “Besides, since you speak Elf, maybe your Elf friend told you something about the door.”

Bilbo’s forehead creased. “You don’t think that if Thranduil knew how to open the door, he would have done it years ago?”

“Not Thranduil, the good Elf.”

“Elrond? Oh, we didn’t speak about… Wait,” said Bilbo. “Thranduil is a good Elf too!”

For his loyalty, Bilbo received dubious looks not only from Fili, but from the rest of the Company as well, though it didn’t take them long to turn back to their task. “He did seem really friendly, that one time when he threw us in his dungeons,” muttered Fili.

“Well, we were trespassing,” Bilbo argued, though it was a weak one. “Anyway, neither he nor Elrond told me anything. In fact, I’m not sure that either of them was thrilled that we were poking the sleeping dragon, so to speak.”

Fili perked up. “So he’s asleep? Not dead?”

“How should I know?”

Fili scoffed, but before he could answer, both of them startled when Nori threw one of his picks to the ground. “This is useless,” he declared.

“Dwalin,” said Thorin, and Dwalin started to bang on the rock. With his feet. This did not look any more productive to Bilbo than Nori’s efforts had been.

“Stop, stop!” he cried, heading towards Dwalin. Thorin pulled him to his side just in time for Bilbo to narrowly avoid being bashed in the head by one of Dwalin’s fists. “All you’re going to do is break your legs. What happened to waiting for the last light of Durin’s Day?” He gestured at the sky; at their back, Arien was sinking towards the earth, leaving red and orange trails behind her. The Moon had not made its appearance yet; but Bilbo hoped that they would remember his riddle when he did.

“We have to do something,” said Balin. “We have but one chance.”

Bilbo looked down at Dwalin’s feet. “Yes, and that was a good use of everyone’s time.”

“What do you suggest we do?” Thorin demanded, his tone more biting than it had been in a while.

“Nothing,” said Bilbo. “Just wait. We’ll have plenty of time to bash our toes against the wall after night comes.”

“Worst comes to the worst, we send the little guy through the front gate,” said Dwalin.

Bilbo had not liked that joke the first time, and he liked it even less the second. “Sure,” he said merrily over his shoulder. “Or we could use your head as a battering ram and make a new door on the side of the mountain. Let’s workshop this.” He had come up with that repartee too late in his first life and had long regretted not having thought of it in the moment. If for no other reason, his little time travel adventure would not have been wasted now.

“Or we could do neither and use the key we have,” Balin said. He seemed to ready himself to separate them, as if they were brawling toddlers, but Dwalin laughed and gave Bilbo a slap on the back, which almost killed him, but it was worth it. “Bilbo is right.”

That felt so good to hear. “So we wait.”

So they waited. And while Bilbo would have been serene waiting on his own, he could feel the others’s mounting anxiety weigh on him, though they were studiously avoiding to look his way. As the afternoon and then the evening went on, he found himself wishing that he had not stopped them before.

When the last rays of the sun filtered through the distant silhouette of Mirkwood, Bilbo held his breath, feeling strangely light, as if all of it had only been a dream. When, finally, the sun’s rays dimmed and vanished, he braced himself for the anger and the blame, and…

Nothing. His friends did not turn their ire on him, in fact, none of them turned their gaze from the space where the door was meant to be. They were all still, and then, Balin heaved a long sigh. “I guess it was too good to be true,” he said.

Thorin shook his head. “It can’t be all. What did we miss?”

“Maybe it wasn’t meant to be,” replied Balin, already resigning himself to reality. “Come, let us go back.”

One by one, they went to the stairs. One by one, they started to leave.

“Wait,” Bilbo said, but no one heard him, or no one listened. Maybe all the credit he’d had with them had been expanded, or maybe it had only been allotted to him because he had a role to play, and now that it had seemingly come to an abrupt end, so had their faith.

And there was the crux of the matter, wasn’t it? It was not their disappointment and anger that he dreaded, but watching them all leave without him. Not empathy, self-preservation. Bilbo disliked himself intensely.

“Wait,” he said again, “it’s not over, it’s not the sun, it’s…”

“Moonlight,” said Thorin.

Bilbo stopped short. Unlike the others, Thorin had not turned fully away to regain the stairs yet, and so, when moonbeams filtered through the clouds, weak at first and then suddenly brighter than they had ever been, he saw it and understood. His eyes were shining when he looked back at Bilbo.

“You knew?” he said slowly. Bilbo couldn’t answer. Thorin approached the door with care, as if rushing would make it disappear. He inserted the key into the keyhole, and by a process that Bilbo in his ignorance of mechanics could only call magic, the door opened, its hinges groaning under the weight of stone and years of disuse.

Kili and Fili gave Bilbo discreet thumbs up as they filed into the mountain, but the solemnity of the others prevented them from cheering aloud. This was not a moment of lighthearted adventures, of solving riddles and singing walking songs. This was the return of a heartbroken Dwarf into the home of his childhood.

And besides, the job wasn’t done yet. In fact, for Bilbo, it had arguably just begun.

They stood at the mouth of the tunnel leading to the door of the treasure hall, he and Balin, the latter trying to explain what the Arkenstone looked like and Bilbo nodding as if he was listening. “In truth, I don’t know what you’ll find down there, lad,” said Balin.

Bilbo shrugged. “Only one way to find out, I suppose.”

Balin seemed more concerned by Bilbo’s lack of hesitation than by the nervosity he’d shown in his first life. “Are you sure you want to go? No shame in turning back.”

“That’s a pretty long way to travel only to give up at the finish line, Balin,” said Bilbo, trying to lighten the mood. It did not work.

“You were good luck on the way,” said Balin. “We would not have made it here without you. That counts for something.”

“Thank you. You’re a good friend, but I have to do this, or at least, I have to try.” Balin smiled and opened his mouth, but Bilbo shook his head. “I’m not being brave, but I can’t let you or Thorin or anyone else go down there instead of me.”

Balin opened his mouth, presumably to respond to Bilbo’s statement, but then something different seemed to catch his attention. “So, I see that you are on a first name basis now.”

Bilbo, very eloquently, said, “I…” Truth be told, he had not thought that anyone had noticed.

“Don’t be embarrassed. I wondered, that’s all. You can’t blame an old Dwarf for being curious.”

“That’s not important. If you’ll excuse me, I have to go rob a dragon now.”

Someday, he would run out of dragons and goblins and dungeons and other excuses to end conversations. Luckily for him, that time had not yet come. He left Balin in the tunnel and went forth, crossing the large halls and staircases that the Dwarves had built as if they expected giants to move in, which, now that Bilbo thought about it, was pretty convenient for a dragon, and coming at last to the doorway of the treasure hall.

Bilbo took the walkway, stopping for a few seconds to gaze upon the heaps of golden coins and trinkets. Seeing all of it, one thing became clear to him. “There is no way I got a fourteenth of all that,” he thought. Even before Bilbo had renounced his whole share and only taken what he could carry back to the Shire, and even taking into account the Arkenstone, there was no way that the pile he’d been presented with amounted to a fourteenth. A fourteenth of what had been counted thus far, maybe. What an insane amount of gold. It wasn’t even pretty.

Shaking himself from his reverie, he stretched and cracked his knuckles, the sound of which echoed throughout the vastness of the chamber. Now, to it. He had only two goals in mind; one, to get the Arkenstone, which to his best recollection was buried somewhere near a pillar; second, to wake up a dragon and get that dragon where Bilbo needed it to be. Easy enough.

Bilbo climbed down the stairs, and not so carefully began to walk upon the treasure. He did not try to be quiet, and anyway, coins and jewels slid beneath his feet and made a racket. The dragon interaction would have been easier to conduct if he already had the Arkenstone in hand, he thought, but sadly, he didn’t think he could access it without Smaug getting up and stirring the pot, which would make the hidden gem emerge, so to speak.

“Well, no delaying the inevitable,” he said, aloud. As expected, the sound echoed and filled the space, but no dragon revealed itself. He cleared his throat, and then, he did it again, but longer and louder.

Still nothing. Bilbo sincerely hoped that he would not have to resort to his old trick of, when playing hide-and-seek with his younger cousins, loudly proclaiming that he was entering a room, so that his preys would know not to let any hairy toes protrude from underneath the bed. “I sure hope there are no dragons here” seemed a little too infantile a ruse to play on a fire-breathing creature.

Not bothering with discretion, Bilbo climbed down the stairs and stopped at the edge of the treasure. There, he bent down to take a golden goblet, of which there seemed to be a monstrous number. He toyed with it for a while, then advanced, wondering if he would have to surf on waves of coins in order to get that lazy lizard out of bed. He threw the cup over his shoulder, ignoring it as it clattered against the stone steps. Stomping his feet for good measure, he picked up a good handful of coins and carried them to the top of the stairs; once back on the walkway, he made a little pile of the coins, and went back down to repeat the process. He had the idea, from reading numerous old legends and speaking to numerous old people, that dragons were in some way connected to their hoard. If such was the case, it followed that Smaug would sense the withdrawal that Bilbo was making, though he would not make it far with his little piles.

His stacks were as high as his knees when, finally, something seemed to disturb the gold. In the middle distance, too far to attribute the noise to Bilbo’s trips up and down the stairs, gold coins rolled, the shape of the mounts shifting. Something rumbled and snorted, something big and dark which lifted from its resting place, making an avalanche of gold as it rose. Bilbo had seen this once before, but he could have seen it twice or twenty times, it would not have mattered; this was not a sight to which the mortal eye could get used to.

The good news was that the first part of Bilbo's plan was going well. The bad news was that Smaug was infinitely bigger than Bilbo remembered.

“What is it?” asked the dragon. “A thief in the night?”

Chapter Text

(“‘Where did they come from, and what will drives them on?’” read Bilbo, mindful of using the proper accent, for he knew that Erestor was not far and that he was very particular about Quenya and its pronunciation. Taking care not to damage the spine, he pushed the book towards Elrond. “I don’t understand,” he admitted.

Elrond had been giving him Quenya lessons for a few months now, and Bilbo was not too humble to say that it was going very well, in no small part because a large portion of the tales in Elrond’s private library were in that language. As he had been progressing, ancient texts he hadn’t dared dreamed of reading had been unveiling themselves in front of his eyes, filled with lore and legends and some surprisingly sarcastic letters from high kings to their vassals who also happened to be their cousins.

And yet, much of the language still evaded him. He still needed a tutor. Luckily, Elrond was either really friendly or really bored. “Which part troubles you?”

“The whole thing,” replied Bilbo. “Not the language. I understand the words, but I don’t know what they mean.” To be fair, he had not read the whole essay, only its interminable introduction, but talking about the texts before reading them tended to help him.

“This text poses two questions,” explained Elrond. “First, where did they come from; who are ‘they’? It is known that only Eru Illuvatar can create life. It is said that he made first the Elves and mortal Men, and that he gave life to the Dwarves which Aulë their maker had carved from stone.”

“What about animals?”

Elrond smiled. “Sadly, the legends do not answer that question clearly, though it is speculated that the Valar designed them, and Illuvatar breathed life into them.” He paused, waiting for another question. “You do not ask about Hobbits?”

“I hear that we are descended from Men.”

“It’s a theory, though some of your race have remarqued in the past that Men tended to appropriate all that was good in the world.”

Bilbo laughed. It sounded like something his own mother could have said. “True, true! Well, if it comforts them to claim Hobbits as their relatives, I can’t begrudge them that. So… ‘Where did they come from’, it’s about the rest, yes? Like Orcs?”

“Orcs, goblins, and still more,” agreed Elrond. “If I remember correctly, the author had dragons in mind when he wrote this. The Dark Vala, Morgoth, claimed their creation, but he could not make living things. It follows that if he did not make dragons and Orcs, he…”

“Corrupted them,” said Bilbo. “I read that somewhere. There were no details.”

“It may be for the best.”

“That part is clear,” said Bilbo. “What about the second part? ‘What will drives them on?’”

Elrond pondered it for a second, as if weighing his words. “It is nowhere said that Illuvatar had made this world and his children to suffer in it. Morgoth introduced strife into his music, and imposed his dark will upon Middle-Earth. The unfortunate creatures he corrupted were not made to be evil, and only were because he touched them. It follows that without his touch, they could choose not to hurt and kill. They could be peaceful, regardless of their shape.”

“But when Morgoth was killed…”

“He was not killed,” Elrond corrected, “he was imprisoned by the Valar.”

“Is that why the Orcs are not peaceful? Because he’s not dead?”

“It is possible, or perhaps they now depend on another lord’s commands. These things I do not know, and they find no answers in this essay.” Elrond gave Bilbo the book back. “The author does not propose solutions, only reflections on the nature of people, and the compulsions they are placed under.” He sighed. “Oaths, for instance.”

“Ah,” said Bilbo, looking down at the author’s name, etched in bright letters on the cover. He hesitated, but couldn’t help himself. “Except that oaths are taken willingly. If Morgoth picked up a couple of big lizards and bred them into Glaurung, I don’t think he bothered to ask for their permission first.”

Elrond seemed more amused than offended, thankfully. “It is not said in our histories whether he did or not, and so I will refrain from making definite statements,” he declared. “Read the text, little master.”)

“What will drives him on?” Bilbo wondered as Smaug uncurled and crawled towards him.

“What is it?” asked the dragon. “A thief in the night?”

“Speak, you fool,” Bilbo thought. “Don’t let him roast you before you have the chance to say a word.”

“Well,” he said, finding the strength to stammer a few words. “Well, it’s not past supper time yet, so more like a thief in the evening.”

The dragon slithered around a pillar. “Ah, I see. A clever thief. Interesting you should mention supper, I am feeling a little peckish. Perhaps I should have a taste of you.”

Fair enough, Bilbo had walked right into that one. “I had rather not, if it’s all the same to you,” he declined politely. “But if you wish to eat, the people from Lake-Town gave me dry beef. I have some left in my pack that I will share with you.”

“What a kind offer,” said Smaug. “I don’t expect thieves to have such generosity.”

Well, Bilbo did not expect dragons to use sarcasm, but there they were. “I did not come here to rob you,” he told Smaug. “Only, you have not been seen outside in some time, and so there were rumours that you were dead. I was sent to check because I lost a bet, but now that I see you’re alive, I’ll see myself out.” He made as if to leave, half turning from the dragon.

“A thief and a liar,” Smaug hissed, stopping Bilbo in his tracks. “I will give you a chance to tell the truth now, before I burn you to a cinder.”

Bilbo frowned. His head hurt very much, certainly from the panic. “If you want the truth, I don’t know why I’m here.” He sighed, wondering if he should take advantage of the moment to unburden himself. Smaug would die by the end of the night, or he would not, and Bilbo would have bigger problems than him spilling his secrets. Dragon-sized problems. “It’s an exercise in futility, if you want my opinion on the matter, because I did it all before, and they did not tell me why they sent me back. I don’t know if I’m supposed to fix something, or everything, or leave it all as it was and it’s some sort of punishment because I gave my nephew…” He trailed off. That may not be good information to share. “I ruined his life, it’s a long story. That’s not the point. I was told that we were going to the Undying Lands to heal, and this doesn’t feel like healing. Do you know what I mean?”

While he spoke, Smaug crawled all the way up to him. He and Bilbo were face to face now; if he wished to incinerate him on the spot, he very well could, and there was little Bilbo would be able to do about it. Run, if he was fast enough. “Do not try to distract me, Thief.”

“I am not trying to. Believe it or not, that’s the most honest I’ve been in months.”

“You cannot escape me now,” Smaug cut in rudely. Then, as if smelling a ruse, he drew back and growled. “There is a familiar scent about you,” he told Bilbo.

“I did switch colognes recently.” To that of Estë’s gardens, if Radagast was to be believed. An enduring fragrance, if it had lasted through months of travel and irregular hygiene practices.

“Tell me,” Smaug continued, ignoring him, “where did you leave the Dwarves? Did they come with you inside the mountain, or did they push you inside and run away? Cowards,” he spat, as if Bilbo had answered him.

“I think that we’re having two different conversations,” he told the dragon. He had the feeling that he was not being very wise in the way that he addressed Smaug, but frankly, he had been careful last time, and that had still ended with Smaug trying to burn him. It seemed like a losing battle Bilbo did not care to fight.

“Perhaps you even left them in Lake-Town,” rumbled Smaug. The thought seemed to arrest him. “Yes,” he said, agreeing with himself. “You did not lie, earlier. I smell these fish-eaters on you. I did wonder that such a small being kept such strange company. You’ll come to a bad end, if you keep such friends, Thief.”

“Yes, you said that last time too, but what do you want from me?” asked Bilbo. “I’d offer you my friendship, but I doubt you’d accept it. Besides, it goes against my principle to befriend someone who ate the people of my already established friends. Call me old-fashioned, but I find it unethical.”

“You miserable little thing,” snarled Smaug. “Offer me your friendship? I would sooner befriend a worm!”

Bilbo thought, “Don’t say it, Bilbo, you fool, don’t say it.”

But Bilbo had never, ever been able to keep an amusing thought to himself once he’d had it. He said it. “I don’t think worms are that hard to find, I could bring you one if you’d like.” Smaug roared furiously. “Fair enough, goodbye!”

He ran.

Headfirst into Thorin, actually, who waited for him in the hallway. ( His face blank of emotion, the tip of his sword aimed at Bilbo’s chest, and in Bilbo’s pocket, the thing he wanted most in the world, right next to the thing Bilbo wanted most in the world. What a happy pair they made. ) Bilbo, who had narrowly avoided being barbecued and was in no mood to be interrogated, decided to preempt Thorin’s questions. “I didn’t find it, there was no time, Smaug…”

Perhaps summoned, Smaug proved Bilbo’s point by barging through a wall, sowing stone over them. Thorin grabbed Bilbo by the arm and dragged him down the hallway, all but throwing him behind a patch of wall.

“Run,” Thorin commanded, “find somewhere to hide.”

“But…” said Bilbo.

“This was not a request.”

Drawn by their voices, Smaug took steps after thunderous steps towards them. Fair enough, thought Bilbo, and he took off, running until he was out of Thorin’s sight. There, he waited, listening as the rest of the Company joined Thorin and made the perfect distraction.

“Don’t die,” he bade them silently, and once the sounds moved further down the hallway and into a different part of the mountain, he took a deep breath, gathered his scant courage, and traced back his steps towards the treasure hall.

He had to trust the Dwarves to survive, but hiding went against his plans.

He stayed in the treasure hall mere minutes, though it seemed to him much longer; then, he jogged all the way to the Front Gate, only losing his way once or twice, which he vowed never to tell Thorin. He did not stop until he reached it, breathing heavily and trying to shove his lungs back in their proper place. Honestly, only Dwarves would be foolish enough to live somewhere with so many stairs.

He did not remain there for more than a minute, though, and soon, he moved, looking up at the tall mount of ruined stone which stood in place of a front door. Up there, all the way where the top of the pile met the remnants of the wall, was a small space, so narrow that a Man, or even a Dwarf, could not crawl through it. But evidently, when Smaug had arranged his fortifications, he had not accounted for Hobbits.

Slowly, hoping against hope that the Company was sufficiently distracting Smaug and that the dragon would not hear Bilbo’s scaling attempt, he began to climb. Stone by crumbling stone, he went, inhaling more than a century’s worth of dust as he did, disrupting dead spiders and not daring to look down. He’d had a childhoodful of experience climbing, trees and whatnot, but on the other hand, he did not have the time to fall and start over. If he missed his chance, then…

No, he couldn’t. He could not. There was a reason he had been sent back, and not knowing it could not be his excuse to fail.

Before he knew it, he was at the top, and when he crawled through the gap, disrupting the local population of dead spiders, he found that the night was not so black as he had expected. Indeed, had he been in the Shire right then, he would perhaps still be smoking on his front porch, naming the stars.

Behind him, something made a great and dreadful noise. “Right,” he muttered, and set to climbing down. Then, as soon as his feet touched the ground and without losing a moment, he took off.

(“Were you afraid?” asked Frodo, sneaking a glance at Bilbo, presumably to see if he could lick the dough off the bowl and get away with it.

They had not started baking for the fun of it, for once. Bilbo’s scheme was twofold; one, the winter had been harsh that year, and so he and the other landowners—well, most of them anyway—were taking turns organising parties for any nonsensical reasons—this time, it was Bilbo’s turn, and he had picked the completely made-up elven tradition of Neighbourhood Pick-Nick Day, celebrated every year on the first Sunday of February—in order to make sure that the Hobbits whose food stores had suffered the most were fed. Bilbo was determined to throw a better party than Lobelia had the previous week—and, of course, to feed all the hungry Hobbits—for what she’d called First Barbecue of the Year on the Last Day of January Celebration—ridiculous.

The second part of Bilbo’s plan was to distract his young charge. This had been Frodo’s first winter without his parents, and soon, it would be his first spring without them. Bilbo had enough experience with grief to remember how much all those first times stung. Soon, flowers would bloom on Drogo and Primula’s graves, as they had on Bilbo’s own parents’. Best keep the lad occupied.

The baking session had started very well, with Bilbo and Frodo singing different versions of baking songs. And then, out of nowhere, midway through their third batch of cookies, Frodo had asked if Bilbo could tell his story again, especially the part with the dragon. Perhaps the oven’s heat had brought this on. In any case, there was no need to beg. Bilbo loved telling that story. It was, in his opinion, his only story worth retelling.

“Were you afraid?” Frodo asked him.

“You shouldn’t eat uncooked batter, I hear it’s bad for you,” said Bilbo. “Yes, I was. At one point do you mean? The answer is still yes.”

“Facing the dragon.”

“That thing was the size of… Of… Well, I can’t compare it to anything, really.”

“The size of the Shire?”

“No, not quite. Still pretty big. It was… Roughly ten Gandalf tall.”

“That’s pretty big. I would be afraid too.”

Bilbo shrugged. “To be fair, even if I was one Gandalf tall, I would be afraid.”

“Do you think Gandalf would be afraid?”

Bilbo considered it. He had this idea that Gandalf was often more afraid than he led on, perhaps because others counted on him to have a handle on every situation. And maybe Gandalf would have known how to handle a dragon, but that didn’t mean that he wouldn’t have been afraid.

“Probably,” replied Bilbo. “These things do breathe fire, after all. All the same, he would not have let it stop him. That’s how you know someone is really brave, Frodo-lad. They’re afraid, but they fight on anyway. Just like Bard the Dragonslayer, and…”

“Just like you!” Frodo exclaimed.

“Erm,” said Bilbo. “I didn’t so much fight the dragon as much as talk to it for a while.”

“That was still brave, Uncle. I wish I could be brave like you.” His eyes shone very blue.

Bilbo heaved a sigh of defeat. “Fine, you can lick the bowl.” Frodo did not need him to say it twice.)

Dale, empty, might have been scarier if Bilbo had taken the time to think about it. Certainly, ghosts peopled it, but he was too preoccupied with not getting lost to notice any.

Luckily, it was a city built by Men, and, in spirit if not in size of architecture, its street plan resembled what Bilbo was used to in the Shire, which was to say that it felt more intuitively formed than, say, some dwarven cities he would not name.

Soon, all the ways converged, and they all led to the hall of the king, which seemed to stay upright through stubbornness rather than through the strength of its foundation, its walls charred by fire and rotted by time and indifference. The front door had never been closed, and now sagged, still hanging miserably from its hinges, a miserable welcome.

Bilbo stepped in, his feet marking the dusty floor, and headed for the stairs, stopping when he reached the upper balcony to curse all the things Men and Dwarves had in common, and himself for caring so much about members of both these races. Only he could be so foolish as to deliberately put himself through 162 steps, and know that he still had maybe as many left to go.

But he did go, and soon, the stairs, which had so far been manageable, became steep and narrow and downright unfriendly, and interrupted by long stretches of dark hallways. He spared a moment to think about whoever these passages had been built for, now long dead, and perhaps unremembered.

He had almost resigned himself to making his new home on the landing between step 304 and 305, when he looked up and found that step 318 led to a door, ajar, and as he blinked, trying to decide whether he was dreaming it, a familiar glow passed through the space between the door and its jamb.

Bilbo darted up the remaining thirteen steps and pounced through the door, which all but disintegrated at the impact, and found himself at the very top of the dome, derelict as the dome was, especially from his vantage point. He guessed, from the rusted remains of a bell, that this part used to have a roof, but there was nothing but open night above his head, an unloneliness of stars.

He could not hear anything coming from the mountain, and there was no way to know what was happening in there. Nothing in Dale was moving either, which did nothing to calm his nerves.

All he could do was wait, and hope.

Finally, after an eternity made of at least fifteen minutes, something started inside the dwarven realm. First, the ground vibrated, making Bilbo regret having climbed such a fragile structure. Then came a great cry of rage, and an indefinable cacophony of destruction that made the hairs on Bilbo’s arms stand. At last, the sounds became closer and more urgent. Bilbo did not think that these were the sounds Dwarves made as they were eaten, but he thought he remembered the roar of a dragon being bullied and buried in molten gold. Was it too much to hope, that his absence had not condemned one of his friends to death?

And then, all too suddenly, the makeshift gate imploded, pounded on by the force of a dragon’s neck. From his vantage point, Bilbo saw Smaug emerge from the rubble and the dust, covered in flames and still dripping tears of gold, his entire shape exuding hatred and ill-intent.

It was very possible that this was the end, for Bilbo, but before fear had a chance of taking hold of him, he remembered Frodo, and more than the thought of what Smaug would do to the people of Lake-Town, more than his own safety or anyone else’s, the memory of his nephew bolstered him. Frodo’s adventure had demanded so much more than bravery. Indeed, it had taken everything.

“Smaug!” he cried, drawing the dragon’s malicious eyes towards him. Halting in his course, the dragon flew above Bilbo’s perch, growling menacingly as he circled it.

“Miserable imp,” he roared. “You tricked me! Or at least you thought so. I will be avenged! Curse you, and curse those filthy Dwarves! I will burn them all!”

“If you truly want to spite them, I have a suggestion for where to start!” Bilbo pulled the Arkenstone out of his pocket and held it up above his head.

The dragon’s eyes flashed when he spotted it. He drew up his neck, and Bilbo saw the fire building within his throat.

This was it. Either his plan worked, or he would get burned alive. Either way, there was no more he could do. Smaug opened his mouth. Bilbo closed his eyes, and bade a silent farewell to Frodo, whom he would not get to meet this time around. Estel, at least, knew his story, and would tell Elrond and Gandalf, and the three of them would surely work something out. Find the Ring on his scorched remains. Carry it to Mordor, drop it into the pit of fire. Go on. There were no three people better equipped for this currently in Middle-Earth.

Bilbo held up his breath…

And heard a loud hiss, followed by a great roar of pain. He cracked one eye open and saw Smaug flounder in the air, something poking out of that gap in his scales. In the night, he saw a figure, perched on a half-crumbled tower, his bow still held high, surely basking in the truth of his aim.

The dragon shrieked and cried and struggled to maintain himself in the air.

Soon, he failed at that. The sound of Smaug’s fall echoed in the night, and deafened the ones who had caused it.

Chapter Text

“You can see the future?” asked Tilda. She quickly hid her hands. “How many fingers are behind my back?”

“Ten, I hope,” said Bilbo.

“He’s not a mind reader,” said Sigrid. She frowned, giving Bilbo a once over. “Unless…”

“No, not a mind reader.” That he knew of, anyway. Until recently, he hadn’t been a time traveller either.

“But you can see the future?” asked Bain.

Bilbo hesitated. His plans had initially not featured Bard’s children; but when he had knocked on the man’s door, it had seemed like a miracle that Bard had not immediately shut it. Instead, in the time it had taken him to come to a decision regarding mysterious Hobbits who claimed to know him, Sigrid had invited Bilbo in for tea. Bard had remained silent throughout, watching him grimly as Bilbo gave a short and confused explanation.

“Not exactly,” Bilbo admitted, wondering how truthful he could be before they stopped believing him. “I know some things that will happen unless we do something to change them.”

“Can all Hobbits do that?” asked Tilda.

Bilbo quickly assessed whether they were at all likely to encounter other Hobbits besides him. He shrugged. “Sure, yes. It’s a secret, though, so don’t go about telling everyone.”

“Then why are you telling us?” she asked.

Bard leaned forward. “That’s a good question. Girls, Bain, why don’t you head to bed?”

“But…” Tilda began to protest, but Sigrid took her and Bain by the arms and dragged them into the other rooms, giving Bilbo a tight smile as she did.

As soon as the door closed, no doubt to hide three children listening in, Bard went on. “Why did you come here, of all places?”

The moment of quasi-truth had come. “Because I need your help,” said Bilbo. “Something horrible is going to happen to your town, and I can’t stop it on my own. You are familiar with the name of Smaug, I think?” Bard tensed. “He is going to wake up, and soon. My friends and I are on our way to kill him, but it won’t work. They can delay him, but he will…”

“Your friends,” Bard interrupted. “You mean the Dwarves you travel with?”

“You heard about us?”

“People talk, especially in small towns. Tell me, Master Baggins. Are they here to kill the dragon, or to take its gold for themselves?”

Bilbo considered this. “In this situation, it’s not one or the other. They would do both, if they were able.”

“Without care for whoever they hurt in the process.”

“It’s not…” Bilbo trailed off. It never was that simple, but he couldn’t explain it to Bard in a way that the Man would be able to understand. “Look, it doesn’t matter whether they care or not, or whether you believe that they care or not. You care, and so do I.” Bilbo braced himself. “I may not be a mind reader, but I know what you’re thinking now. You want to denounce them to the Master, and warn the townspeople about the danger they face. Let me tell you what will happen if you do that: my friends will tempt the Master with rich rewards when they succeed in taking back the gold, and the Master, who is a greedy man, will not only support them, but also take advantage of the situation to arrest you. Once arrested, you will be unable to protect your town from the dragon when he comes. He will come.”

Bard let out a ragged breath. “So my choices are to be arrested or to do nothing? No, of course. You have a plan. Let’s hear it.”

“Smaug will wake up, and he will leave the mountain. We can stop him before he reaches Laketown. I know that you still have your ancestor’s arrows hidden somewhere.”

“If you know this, then you also know that my ancestor’s arrows failed to kill him the first time.”

“Maybe,” Bilbo agreed. “But they did dislodge one of his scales. If you shoot there…”

“I would have to be close to him,” argued Bard. “If he’s flying and I’m on the ground, the chances that I’ll miss are quite high.”

Bilbo opened his mouth, closed it. No, surely he could not. And yet, the seeds of a bad idea had been planted and were blooming in the apparently fertile ground between his ears. “What if I can make him fly closer to the ground?”

“How?”

“Never mind that. I’ll take care of it. But tell me, could you hit him, if he were close enough?”

“I would need a bow.”

Bilbo huffed. Evidently, that man loved to argue. Unfortunately for him, this was Bilbo’s area of expertise. “How about a wind-lance?”

“Where do you intend to find a wind-lance, if not in Laketown?” asked Bard.

Bilbo grinned. “Well. If I recall correctly, there’s a perfectly usable one in Dale. What do you say, Master Bard? Do you want to kill a dragon with me?”

“Well, that worked out,” said Bilbo when he emerged from behind the remnants of the dome.

Amazingly, the hall of the king had not managed to sustain the weight of a dragon falling on it. Half of it now lay on the floor, and the other half, after a long moment of pondering whether it should follow its mate down, had decided to remain upright for the time being. Bilbo, who had survived the carnage by sliding down the back side of the dome and hurling himself off the building, was eminently thankful for that mercy.

It took a moment for the cloud of dust to fall and clear, and when it did, Bilbo found himself face to face with Smaug’s massive, and quite dead, snout. He was still staring at it when Bard joined him.

He had not seen the corpse, the first time. He had made the journey back from the mountain with Gandalf and Thranduil, and neither of them had wanted to visit the ruins of Lake-Town. Bilbo had seen them at a distance, but the carcass had been indistinguishable from the rest. He didn’t think he’d ever seen such a big dead thing, but when it came to it, Smaug in death looked like all the other dead things he’d seen in his life.

(His father, so pale in his sickness, and his mother, sagging in her armchair as he’d left her alone for a mere moment to fetch her a cup of tea; a giant spider’s legs curling back against its torso; an Orc all but hurling himself onto Bilbo’s blade; “I’m glad you’re here.”)

Where did they go, the spirits that had been corrupted by Morgoth? Where did they come from, what will drove them, and where did they go when death stopped them?

“Master Baggins?” Bard called.

Bilbo shook himself from his reverie and grinned up at Bard. “You did it! I thought I was cooked for a minute there.”

Bard considered him gravely. “I thought you could see the future.”

“I could see a future,” Bilbo reminded him. “And I think we managed to avoid it.” He glanced back at Smaug’s carcass. “Thanks to you.”

“Thanks to us both,” said Bard. “You… Goaded it. That was your plan?”

“It worked.” In that dark moment, Bilbo had not even considered what would happen to Bard, if Smaug had burned him before he’d had a chance to shoot. Who would have told Thorin and the others? How would they have explained? “It’s all that matters.”

Bard looked as if he was tempted to disagree, but in the end, he gave Bilbo a sharp nod. “I suppose you’re right. So then it’s… Over? It’s over. We don’t have to fear that beast anymore.” Hesitantly, he reached a hand towards said beast, but he retracted it before making contact. Such things took time. “It’s always been there, threatening us. I don’t know what it could change, to be safe.”

Bilbo had some ideas. “You could build better houses,” he suggested. The joke didn’t register, or perhaps it did, but it didn’t make Bard laugh. A pity. “You’ll have to tell everyone, first.”

“I wonder if they’d believe me.”

“That’s a little too big of a proof to be able to overlook,” said Bilbo, pointing at Smaug. “Speaking of, I should go back and tell the Company.”

Bard turned to peer at the mountain’s vast silhouette. “We are not the only ones from whom everything changes after tonight,” he remarked, not the least bit enthusiastic. “I wonder…” But he did not go on, so really, what he said was: “I wonder.”

So did Bilbo.

Oin took a much needed break from treating the Company’s various scraps and bruises, only to zero in on Bilbo as he and Thorin came in through the Gate and declare, “Your turn, Master Idiot. Dress down to your knickers.”

Bilbo stammered, “Dinner first, Oin! And why are you calling me an idiot?” As far as he could recall, he hadn’t done anything idiotic in a while, at least not where Oin could see.

“It’s in regards to the dragon provoking, if you catch my meaning,” said Bofur. “Did you invent another disagreeable cousin to imitate?”

“I wish I had the imagination necessary to invent Lobelia,” replied Bilbo. “I didn’t provoke anybody. Is it my fault that the dragon woke up?”

“I’m inclined to say yes,” Nori said, materialising next to Bilbo and giving him a light punch in the arm. “Good to see you in one piece, Baggins.”

“And it will be even better to see you once I’ve examined you,” Oin added, shoving Nori out of the way. “Don’t hit my patients.” He started to prod and poke at Bilbo, pretending not to hear his protestations. Thankfully, Bilbo managed to escape his ministrations before losing his clothes.

“So, what is the program now?” inquired Fili, once it had been ascertained that they all had and most likely would survive the night.

“We should establish living quarters,” said Balin.

“And do something about that smell,” agreed Dori.

“That will be fine for tonight,” Gloin cut in, “but as soon as the sun rises tomorrow, we must start exploring the ruins, and make plans for reconstructions.”

“The first order of business should be to rebuild the gate,” countered Dwalin.

“Are we expecting an attack?” asked Kili.

“Nisullakan,” replied Bifur, “nargalabî ag za mahmunugôn¹.”

“Nevermind that, without a gate, we will be exposed to the elements when winter comes,” admonished Oin.

“Speaking of that,” interjected Bombur, “we should talk about our food inventory.”

“That shouldn’t be an issue, on account of us being rich now and all,” Nori pointed out.

“If no one’s selling, being rich won’t do us much good,” Bofur objected.

“Should we write to the Iron Mountains?” offered Ori.

“Enough.” At once, every voice quieted, and all eyes turned to Thorin, whose back was to them.

He stood away from them, at the mouth of an hallway which, Bilbo knew, led back to the Treasure Hall, more than half in the shadow. There was an ominous quality to his tone that Bilbo didn’t love. From the looks that the others exchanged, he was not the only one.

Their instincts were not long to be proved right.

“First,” said Thorin, turning to them. The light of the torch did not touch his eyes. “We must find the Arkenstone.”

“Well,” thought Bilbo. “Bother.”

If Bilbo’s hopes had sunk slightly, a night and most of the next day’s sleep was sufficient to refill his hope supplies. Sometimes, despair and exhaustion were dangerously hard to tell apart.

After all, no one had died, and yes, Thorin was once more looking for the Arkenstone; “But why shouldn’t he be?” Bilbo mused, quite sensibly. “He needs it.” Just because Thorin wouldn’t find it unless he happened to be looking for it in Bilbo’s coat pocket didn’t mean that it would be reasonable to expect him to throw in the towel after one day. Bilbo had no right to expect that of him, and it didn’t prove anything.

Sometimes, hope and delusion were dangerously hard to tell apart.

Though the argument from the previous night had been put to rest by Thorin’s demand that they find the Arkenstone, by the time Bilbo got up, it had begun again, and when time came to sit down for supper, it appeared that they would soon either have to start eating gold coins or implement a more efficient working schedule.

“Fine,” relented Thorin when Bilbo was elected to report the grumbling of the group. He felt rather silly, especially when Kili had pushed him in the direction of the Treasure Hall with his two thumbs in the air, but Thorin did seem more at ease when they were alone than with the rest of the Company. “I do not have time for their whims.”

“Starvation is not a whim, Thorin,” said Bilbo. Twice, now, he had hungered in the woods, and in the halls of the Elvenking. Unless he was mistaken, that could not be healing.

Thorin turned away from the oceans of gold, his posture rigid as if the movement cost him more than he could afford. The others had taken refuge in a vacant room near the devastated front gate, isolated enough from the outside to be warm but close enough to the way out not to be plagued by the stench of the dragon. Here in the Treasure Hall, the odour was at its most nocive, digging its way through nose hair and burrowing itself in Bilbo’s brain until he was dizzy with it. They needed to figure out an aeration system, quickly. Between the smell and Thorin’s wild eyes, it was becoming difficult to breathe.

“I know it, better than most,” Thorin whispered. He shifted back, gazing upon his hoard. A different kind of hunger. How sorry Bilbo was that he could not satisfy it.

Softened, he said, “Spare me at least a few of them. The rest can help you in your search, but there are other matters which…”

“Nothing…” Thorin began, before catching himself. “I need the Arkenstone. You understand me, don’t you?”

“Of course,” replied Bilbo. “I need you to get some sleep. You understand, don’t you?”

The hard line of Thorin’s mouth trembled. “I do not require a minder.”

“I have yet to see evidence of that.” Bilbo’s hand was far from steady when he reached out to his friend’s arm. “Come.” Thorin looked down at him, and though everything about him looked rough and unyielding, he went easily after Bilbo, following him down the corridors.

Chapter Text

In the days that followed, Bilbo discovered without surprise that he enjoyed his managerial position.

Officially, of course, Thorin, being the King and the leader of the Company, gave the orders. But at a time when his only verbalised command was “Find the Arkenstone”, Bilbo took the initiative of exploring the unsaid.

After all, he explained to the others, if all of them were in the Treasure Hall stirring the big pile, they were bound to tread on one another’s toes.

“This wouldn’t be such a concern if you wore shoes,” remarked Nori. Bilbo ignored him.

“We should map the area and implement a rotation,” he went on. “And meanwhile, those who don’t dig can do other useful things.”

“And Thorin knows about this,” said Dwalin.

Bilbo didn’t blink. “Obviously, none of us would do anything that went against Thorin’s wishes,” he deadpanned.

“Obviously,” parroted Bofur, with a wink. Bombur sighed at his brother’s antics, and so did Bilbo.

Having distributed everyone’s tasks, Bilbo was free to roam around. Technically, he had assigned himself Thorin duty, but his feet led him away from the Treasure Hall without his brain’s approval. He wandered a while, heading down to the lower levels, walking the narrower corridors which had been largely untouched by the dragon’s wrath. If he ignored the dust and the emptiness of the passageways, he could almost imagine that he was back in his own time, sixty or so years later, walking with Dis in silence. It sometimes felt like he hadn’t known the same people she had, her stories not matching the friends he remembered and his not matching the brother she’d grown up with and the sons she’d raised. But they worked around it, and when they didn’t, there were always the wordless moments of communion, of wondering what might have been, and what was.

( “I really appreciate this,” he told her when he felt her steps slow as they neared their destination. “Dwalin told me that outsiders are not usually allowed here.”

Dis fixed him with a steady gaze. Bilbo had been relieved upon meeting her to find that she did not have her brother’s blue eyes. He did not know how he would have fared if she had. “They are not,” she confirmed. “In your case, it seemed fair to make an exception.” She stopped at the door of the crypt. “Take all the time you need.”

He did not ask if she would go inside with him. It made sense to him that she didn’t want to, and even after having made the entire journey there, he was not sure of himself.

But he went in, and found a row of stone slabs bearing the names of the dead, and walked down to where Thorin’s name was etched in brillant letters of mithril; all these years, and all this pain, all for this. He raised his hand to the stone. It was so, so cold against his fingers. “Hello, my friend,” he told the insensible bit of rock, and the corpse behind it. “How long it has been.” )

This was how Thorin found Bilbo, standing in the middle of the hall and staring at the graves of his ancestors. “You found the crypt,” he said, and this is what jolted Bilbo out of his memories.

“Ah,” said Bilbo, wondering if should lie, and if not, how he could explain his presence there. He hesitated so long that he ended up saying nothing.

“It is a strange thing,” Thorin mused, “that I will be buried here, but neither my father nor my grandfather were.”

Bilbo nodded and spoke without thinking. “Yes, I know what you mean.” Thorin gave him a startled look. “Before I left the Shire, I thought that I might die, and that I wouldn’t be buried with my parents.”

Thorin frowned. “Did you not specify your burial place in your contract?”

It had been so long, Bilbo had nearly forgotten this, but he was inordinately pleased that Thorin did. “You remembered.”

“It shouldn’t be an issue now that the dragon is dead, but if you were to…” He trailed off, perhaps unwilling to be morbid.

Luckily, Bilbo did not have the same problem. “Fall down and crack my skull open against the pavement?” he suggested.

“You underestimate the thickness of your own skull,” said Thorin. “But if such a thing were to happen, we would see to it that you’re buried according to your will.”

Except that according to his will, Bilbo would be buried in Rivendell, where he’d retired and been at peace. He’d accepted it, in his first life, that estrangement from the place that had borne and grown him. His grief and the Ring had made it unavoidable.

“What are you thinking of?” asked Thorin.

“Various burial practices,” Bilbo told him. “Did you know that some Men burn their dead on pyres?”

“Savages.” Bilbo grinned at the comment, and turned away to hide it. “Yes, I know, you do not want me to judge other cultures.”

“No, but don’t censor yourself, I so enjoy scolding you. Besides, once you’re officially king…”

“I am officially king.”

Bilbo rolled his eyes. “Once you’re crowned, I won’t be allowed to tease you anymore.” Not that it would prevent him from doing it.

“No?” asked Thorin. “That would be a shame.”

“Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll find a way around that. We Hobbits may not be as litigious as Dwarves, but we have a few tricks up our sleeves.”

“It’s all these books you claim to have read,” agreed Thorin. “Which reminds me, I may be compelled to remember the way to the King’s Library.”

Compelled, thought Bilbo. He glanced back one last time to the tomb which, hopefully, would remain empty for many years to come, and turned back to the Dwarf who, hopefully, would not occupy it for a long time. “Compelled?” he prompted. For books, he could certainly compel.

He liked the Treasure Hall about as little as he’d ever had, which was to say that the draw it exerted on him warred with repellency. That, added with the awful smell, did not make him want to venture there.

It had been lucky, then, that he’d found the Arkenstone so fast. In his first life, Smaug had stirred the treasure by getting up from his nap, and tossing Bilbo around for the length of their conversation; it had occurred to Bilbo as he’d faced the dragon that neither of them had made the same movements, and so that the Arkenstone might well stay buried this time. But when he had gone back, after meeting Thorin and being told to hide, his eyes had been drawn to it like magnets as he surveyed the vast expanse of jewels. It was true that it shone brighter than anything in this dark place, that it gave off its own light and could not be overlooked, and yet, the fact that it had surfaced at all had to be significant.

Luck, or something more.

Was this healing? He wondered.

“Another one,” called Bofur from behind a pillar. “Oh, there’s a whole pile of them over here. Might make more sense to move the rest of the headwear over here.”

“I take it that Bofur is on crown duty today,” said Balin, standing at Bilbo and Ori’s side as they tried mapping the hall.

Truthfully, they were on “whatever they happened to find a lot of” duty, all of them, all the time. Bilbo had never asked how long it had taken in his first life to sort all of this out. It was the kind of information that would haunt his nightmares.

“Any progress?” asked Thorin from behind them. Bilbo could excuse his jumpiness by the fact that he had been distracted by his map, but he didn’t think that it justified the unease with which the Dwarves reacted to their king’s sudden appearance, almost backing away from him, and by association, from Bilbo.

“Oh yes,” Bilbo said lightly. “We’ve almost completed the first section. Don’t look so happy, there are about fifty sections overall.” He paused, but no one laughed. “Never mind. We’re advancing.”

“Good.” Thorin gestured at Balin and Ori to leave them, and once they did, hurriedly, he narrowed his eyes in their direction. “If I told you to watch them, what would you say?”

“That I’m not a babysitter,” Bilbo almost said. Technically untrue, and also not the kind of jokes Thorin was in the mood for, he could tell. “I would ask why they needed watching?”

“But would you do it?”

Bilbo hesitated. “I…”

“Oy, Bilbo!” called Bofur, lost somewhere around section eight. “Come here a sec.”

Bilbo made to join them, but Thorin grabbed his wrist. "They’ll come to you if they need something, not the other way around."

Bilbo huffed. “I can navigate a pile of gold without stumbling, but thank you for the show of faith.” That wasn’t strictly true, so he was glad that Thorin didn’t relinquish his arm and allowed him not to make a fool of himself.

“What do they want with you?” Thorin demanded.

“I don’t know. Maybe they want to test the acoustics of this room and they need one more singer.”

“There’s no time for…”

“It was a joke,” Bilbo said. “Not a really good one, I will grant you that. I don’t know what they want.”

Bofur emerged from behind a hill of gold. “Hey, lad, what are you doing? Didn’t you hear m–Oh,” he cut himself off, zeroing in on Thorin’s hand, still holding Bilbo’s wrist. “Sorry, we didn’t know you were busy.”

“Not at all, what do you need?”

“We don't need anything,” Bombur said with caution, glancing up at Thorin. “Only, Bifur found that thing you needed.”

“What thing?” asked Thorin.

“Right,” said Bilbo. He turned to face Thorin, forcing him to let go of his wrist with no small amount of regret. “There’s a–that is, I heard about… Oh, listen. We all need to keep a reasonable head.” Thorin narrowed his eyes at him. “By we, I mean you, mostly you. Listen, how much would you mind it if I took one necklace?”

“What necklace?”

“Oh, just a little one with some stones, you know.”

“Lasgalenibnul,” said Bifur. Granted, Bilbo didn’t know a lot of Khuzdul, but he knew enough to glare at Bifur.

“Really,” he said. Bifur shrugged, signed a quick “Sorry” and left with Bofur in tow. Bracing himself, Bilbo looked back at Thorin, who considered him coolly. “They’re his, Thorin,” he sighed.

“They most certainly are not.”

“Now, please hear…”

“It was not Elves who retrieved these gems from orcs, and it was not Elves who cleaned them and restored them. If he wanted them, he should have paid his due to King Thror.”

“But…”

“We have had them long enough,” Thorin continued, ignoring Bilbo's interruption. “They were the property of my grandfather for fifty years before he offered to let Thranduil buy them back. By dwarven law…”

“Yes, I know how dwarven law works,” snapped Bilbo. Once, during a visit, Ori had glanced at the map hanging in Bilbo’s office and mentioned in passing that if a stolen object’s lawful owner did not stake a claim for the object within fifty years, its ownership transferred to the thief. Very helpful, that Ori.

“Then you know that these gems are ours by right.”

“Funny you should say that now. Didn’t you also say that you had come to Erebor to take back what was rightfully yours? Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t Smaug in here for more than fifty years?”

Going by the way he pressed his lips together, Thorin was not amused by the comparison.

“Fine,” said Bilbo. “The necklace belongs to you. Very well. I’m not asking you to give it to Thranduil out of the goodness of your heart. I’m asking you to give it to me . You don’t like Thranduil, but you like me, right?”

Thorin gave him a disbelieving look.

“I’ll take that as a yes, since I don’t care to take it as a no,” said Bilbo. “Let me have it. Please.”

“Don’t you see why I cannot? If I give it to you, you’ll give it to him immediately.”

“Of course, and what of it? Am I not free to do what I like with the share of the treasure you promised me? Where in my contract is it written that I must consult you on my spendings? If I wish to go to Lake-Town to buy a pair of gloves, will you forbid me from paying the vendor?”

“If you wish for a pair of gloves, why would you go to Lake-Town, when Dori would be glad to make one for you? I assure you, they’ll be better made than anything you’ll find in that water slum they call a town.”

“That is very much not the point.”

“I cannot allow you to pay for our ransom!” Thorin shouted. “Don’t you think I know that’s what you promised him? I will not be blackmailed, and neither will you. He had no right to capture us and make demands on my treasure.”

“Do you hear yourself?”

“Quite well, do you?” retorted Thorin. Bilbo glared at him. “Do you deny that you promised him that necklace in exchange for our escape?”

“No. You’re right, I did promise him, but…”

“That was not your promise to make. I’m sorry that you have to disappoint one of your precious Elves, but you agreed on a price you cannot pay.”

“I can pay it,” argued Bilbo. “I could. You’re refusing to let me.”

“He’ll live. Or he won’t, I don’t care.”

“You would have me go back on my word?”

“He can’t harm you when you’re in the mountain. It is of no consequence.”

Bilbo straightened up. “Very well. Since my word is worth so little to you, you shall have none more,” he declared before pursing his lips.

Thorin closed his fist, a thunderous expression blooming on his face as soon as he realised what Bilbo meant. “You cannot be serious.”

Bilbo didn’t reply.

“You petulant child,” he spat.

Bilbo didn’t reply.

“Have it your way. At least now we have a chance for some peace.”

Bilbo didn’t reply.

“You’ll not last an hour!” roared Thorin.

Bilbo didn’t reply. Thorin stomped away, and Bilbo trailed after him.

“What’s going on?” asked Nori when they joined the others, who had stopped working to make ready for supper.

“Nothing that concerns you,” growled Thorin. Somehow, he managed to make even the way he sat convey how angry he was.

“What did you do?” Dwalin asked Bilbo.

Bilbo didn’t reply.

“What did he say?” asked Oin.

“Nothing, he will not speak,” explained Bofur. Evidently, he, Bifur, Balin and Ori had not been far enough away that they had managed to avoid the sound of Thorin’s wrath.

“What? Why? Is he ill?” Ori came to sit next to Bilbo. “Is it your throat?”

Bilbo didn’t reply. He felt really bad about it, too.

“He’s giving Thorin the silent treatment,” Bofur explained. “And I suppose it applies to the rest of us as well?”

Bilbo didn’t reply.

“That's not very fair,” said Kili. “What did we do?”

“More relevantly, what did Thorin do?” asked Nori.

“That is not your concern,” Thorin barked. “Leave him be; he wishes to be stubborn, that is his business.”

Bilbo didn’t reply.

Fili snorted. “Good luck, Bilbo. I don’t know if you know this, but Dwarves have a reputation for being headstrong.”

Bilbo didn't reply. In fact, he never did, and not for lack of trying from the Dwarves. While a fire was made and preparations for the stew were commenced, a riddle contest was initiated, and then a song contest, and when that didn't work, an Elf insult contest. But Bilbo only attended distantly. His lips were sealed, and he did not laugh, he did not sing, he did not grimace and he did not speak. And most of all, he did not look away from Thorin.

The Dwarves paused their efforts when supper was ready to be eaten. But when Bombur made to hand Bilbo his bowl, Thorin said, “If he is hungry, he can ask for food.”

Bilbo didn’t reply.

Kili said, “But, Uncle…”

“Let him ask.”

Bilbo didn’t reply.

After that, he was not the only one who was silent. The others ate guiltily, and Bilbo only regretted that he could not speak to assure them that it was not their fault. But he had a point to make, and backing down now would only make Thorin more certain that he could have all he wanted without suffering consequences.

Not that Bilbo’s silence meant much to Thorin, just enough to make him mad. But still, it was the principle of the thing.

The Company did not try to make him speak again; when the food was gone, except for Bilbo’s portion that no one dared touch, they prepared to go to sleep. Bilbo was nearly nauseous from hunger and thirst, but he simply sat on his bedroll and stared at Thorin, who was visibly boiling with anger at this point.

Bombur, whose bedroll was conveniently closest to him, murmured, “I can pretend to throw your supper away and hide it somewhere.” Bilbo didn’t reply, but he shook his head slightly. Bombur gave him a beseeching look, but didn’t press him again.

Across the room, Thorin laid on his side, turning his back on him. Bilbo wondered if Thorin could feel the weight of his eyes on him the way Bilbo felt that of Thorin’s eyes when he looked at him, or if that kind of intensity was something one had to work for or earn through hardship. He laid on his back, wondering if tomorrow he should start speaking again or continue with his silence. An alternative would be to speak only in Sindarin, just to really annoy everyone.

He didn’t have to make that choice. When he woke up, sometime in the middle of the night if he had to guess, Thorin was kneeling in front of him. There was a wooden box on the floor next to him.

Bilbo peered up at him with trepidation. “You win,” Thorin said gruffly. He pushed the box towards Bilbo, and cracked it open to expose the gems inside.

Bilbo reached out to trace one of them with the tip of his finger.

He peered up at Thorin, who wore a strange expression on his face. “Truly?” he asked. Thorin bowed his head in silent assent. Bilbo scrambled to his feet and launched himself in Thorin’s arms. “Thank you,” he murmured. He tried not to enjoy the fact that Thorin returned his embrace too much, but after giving up on that moment on the Carrock, he felt entitled to this.

“It’s important to you,” Thorin said, his voice strangely even. “Isn’t it?”

Bilbo stepped back to look him in the eye. In a low voice, he said, “The Elves don’t have to be our enemies, even if they’re not our friends.” It felt manipulative to include himself in that statement, but he had the odd inkling that Thorin would not have liked it otherwise.

Thorin furrowed his brow, but didn’t deny Bilbo’s statement. “I would have peace with you, if with no one else.” He removed his hands from around Bilbo, forcing him to let go as well, and said, “Come. The stew is cold, but I can restart the fire and heat it up for you.”

“The King himself would serve me food?” teased Bilbo. “I’m so honoured.”

Chapter Text

“Well, he’s here,” Dwalin announced grimly as they regrouped.

By Bilbo’s count, aided in large part by Balin’s mental calendar, they were roughly two weeks before the Battle of the Five Armies was set to begin, and Bilbo was beginning to wonder how they were supposed to win it with not one, but two less armies than expected; but at last, two days ago, movement had been spotted in Dale, and now, this morning, an elven envoy had approached the mountain. Bilbo had not been allowed to speak to them, but he'd caught a glimpse of Legolas’s red-haired colleague, Tauriel, through the small gap in the makeshift gate the Dwarves had erected out of debris.

“Probably there to collect,” Dwalin went on, flashing murderous glances at Bilbo. “Nice way to make friends.”

Bilbo shrugged. “Not everyone is as agreeable as you are, my dear.” Dwalin rolled his eyes. “I suppose I should go and get it over with.”

“Not so fast,” said Thorin. “Why should you go there? If he wants the gems, he can come to collect them himself.”

(“I would know who to ask for my payment.”

“You won’t need to ask, I will bring it to you if I do not die.”)

“I said I would go,” reasoned Bilbo. “Anyway, don’t you want to know how many Elves he brought with him?”

Thorin narrowed his eyes at him.

“How convenient for you,” grumbled Dwalin, but Balin murmured something in Thorin’s ear, and Thorin actually took the time to consider the idea.

At last, he said, “Fine. But you’ll take Kili with you.”

Kili perked up at this, but before he could manifest his enthusiasm, Fili cut in: “Uncle, I would like to go instead.” Ignoring his brother’s betrayed expression, he went on, “Being your heir, I need to take more responsibilities. Let me go with Bilbo, and act as your envoy.”

Bilbo didn’t know that Fili could pronounce the word responsibility without choking on it, but it seemed to convince Thorin. “It is decided then.” Having made his statement, he turned and walked out, but paused at the last step to gesture at Bilbo to follow.

Bilbo, who was of course nothing but obedience, scrambled to do so, patting Kili’s arm in solidarity on the way.

At first, Bilbo struggled to catch up to Thorin, but he soon decided to go at his own pace, since after all, he knew which direction he was headed. And indeed, the Dwarf waited for him at the entrance of the Treasure Hall, staring at him as he approached. If Bilbo hadn’t been invited to join him there, from his expression, he might believe that he was intruding.

“Are you angry?” asked Bilbo, wondering how many of their conversations would start that way in the future.

“No.”

“Then you might consider smiling.”

“I have something for you,” Thorin stated. Then, with visible effort, he pulled the corners of his mouth upward.

Bilbo beamed. “How charming.”

“Here.” Thorin all but shoved something in Bilbo’s general direction. “You are going to need this. Put it on.”

Bilbo blinked down at the gift. “Oh,” he said brokenly. He took it, running his fingers on the pearls arranged in delicate patterns on the collar of the shirt. Several times, he opened his mouth, but he could say nothing.

“Well?” Thorin asked in a softer voice.

“Give me a moment,” said Bilbo. He could use a thousand of them. “Thank you. I… I must not insult you by refusing it and saying that it’s much too great for me, but…”

“No, indeed. It is a token. Of our friendship.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“It will keep you safe. Its beauty is incidental.”

Bilbo wasn’t sure that was true; if it had been meant as a purely practical object, its sight would not squeeze his heart so. Though maybe it had as much to do with the gifter as with the gift itself.

“Will you not put it on?” Thorin pressed.

Bilbo perked up at that. “Are you saying that I might be attacked by the Elvenking?”

“You may choose to think the best of him, or of others,” Thorin said in a low voice, his eyes darting in, of all places, the direction of the Company. “But let me choose to protect you so that you can keep doing so.”

Bilbo took a deep breath, and put his hand on Thorin’s arm. “We’re all on your side,” he whispered. “Remember that.” Thorin kept eye contact with him for a long time.

“I know you are, Bilbo.”

Bilbo excused himself to put the mail shirt on and reflect on what had changed. Thus far, Thorin hadn’t manifested much paranoia towards the Company, but that last conversation worried him. When he came back, he needed to figure out how to nip that in the bud. How could he prove that they would not hide the Arkenstone? If he suggested that they all let Thorin search their belongings, not only would it break their heart, but nothing kept Thorin from also searching Bilbo, and then…

Bilbo eyed the box which contained Thranduil’s necklace, given to him by Thorin. Another token of friendship that would be tainted by Bilbo’s duplicity. How much could be excused away by good intentions?

“Listen, I know that it seems strange to all of you, but you need to trust me when I say that it is the best course of action,” Bilbo said, though he wasn’t sure of that at all.

Fili peered up at him. “I know this.” He had been peculiarly silent for the whole trek out of the secret door and down the mountain, and if the situation had been less tense, Bilbo might had started singing, or telling a Merry and Pippin story (Kili and especially Fili were fond of these, although Ori had theorised that the two of them were folk characters that recurred in Hobbitish fairytales, a notion which Bilbo had done nothing to dispel). As it was, Bilbo let the silence go on as long as he could bear it. “I do trust you, continued Fili. “Honestly, if I’d known what your argument was about, I would have sided with you.”

“Really?”

“If giving up one necklace stops Thranduil from declaring war on us, I’ll gladly give it up. By my beard, I’ll throw in a bracelet if he’ll stop being such an arse.”

“Well, that’s…” Bilbo stopped himself short of saying “strangely reasonable”. He cleared his throat, and went back to his first object. “But then why are you mad at me?”

“Mad at you?” repeated Fili. “What in Mahal’s name gave you that idea?”

“You haven’t stopped frowning since we left, and you’ve barely said a word. If I doubted before that you and Thorin were related, those doubts are gone, that’s the best impression of him I’ve ever seen.”

“High compliments from the master,” said Fili. “Don’t think any of us have forgotten the impression you did of him when we were in Thranduil’s dungeons.”

Bilbo laughed. What he wouldn’t have done to raise moral. “Thank you, thank you.”

“But I wasn’t trying to do an impression of him. I’m sorry if I haven’t been good company, but I’ve been worried.”

“What about?”

Fili didn’t respond for a long time. Finally, he stopped Bilbo with a hand on his arm. “Bilbo, I know that you are loyal to my uncle in a way that I cannot hope you would be to me. However.”

“Fili, no,” said Bilbo. “You know I’m loyal to you, not just to Thorin. He is not the only one I…” He cleared his throat. “I value the whole Company, and I care deeply about you.”

Fili gave him a bright smile. “Thank you. It means a lot. I care about you too.” He made an effort to be serious again. “But I was saying this, because I want to talk to you, and… Of course, your instinct would be to report any word that may sound treasonous to Uncle, but I promise that I would never want to usurp him, or to sow discord in his relationship with you.”

Bilbo raised his eyebrows. “I know. You can speak freely, I won’t tell him anything you would rather I keep to myself.”

Fili exhaled. “Right. Good. So. Kili and I were raised on stories about the time our family ruled over Erebor, as you can guess. We were always taught that Smaug was attracted by the treasure because it was the greatest treasure in any land. But it wasn’t until more recently that the truth about King Thror’s madness was revealed to us.” He paused. “Gandalf told you this, I think.”

Bilbo nodded shortly. “He also said that Thorin was not his grandfather.”

“I wouldn’t have believed that he could be touched by… By dragon-sickness,” said Fili. “But you’ve seen how obsessed he is with finding the Arkenstone.”

“Well, he does need it to unite the seven dwarven kingdoms.”

“You’ve seen how he was, with the necklace,” Fili insisted.

“He gave it to me in the end,” protested Bilbo.

“After hours.”

“But if he truly were mad, he could not have parted with…”

“Bilbo, he denied you food and drink.” Fili ducked his head to look Bilbo straight in the eye. “He denied you. For hours. You.”

“We were fighting,” protested Bilbo, but it was a weak argument. His hope was waning, as fast as it had waxed when Thorin had given him the necklace.

“Uncle knows what it is to be hungry and thirsty. He would never subject you to that, fight or no. In Mirkwood, he gave you the last of his water, and was sorry that he could not give you more.”

“What? He did?” Bilbo blinked at him, trying to summon the memory, but it wouldn’t come. Mirkwood was a blur, where he was concerned.

“I’m afraid,” said Fili. “I should not say it aloud, but I am. He has changed. He has been changing since we came into sight of the Lonely Mountain. Tell me you haven’t noticed it. Tell me that I worry about nothing.”

Bilbo sighed. He wished he could reassure Fili, but he didn’t have the heart to dismiss his fear, especially because it was justified. “I cannot,” he admitted. “Perhaps it was not such a good idea to leave the others alone.”

“No, but that’s why I insisted on going instead of Kili. Of the two of us, he is Uncle’s heart.” Fili gave Bilbo a smile at his bewildered expression. “It isn’t jealousy. I do not think he has a preference for my brother. Only, when we were children, he called me gêdith , which means Little Joy, and he called Kili madtith, Little Heart.”

Bilbo wrestled with two conflicting instincts; a part of him wanted to cry and curl into a ball, the other wanted to hug Fili and beg him not to die. Finally, he managed a trembling, “That’s so sweet.” Then, swallowing around the lump in his throat, he added, “Be careful though, now I know two more words of Khuzdul.” Three, technically, since these were compound words. Languages were so fun.

Fili did not seem concerned by this in the slightest. “So? You’re going to have to learn it eventually. It’ll be expected, you know.”

“Will it?” No one had told him that, the first time. Then again, it had been clear to everyone that he wouldn’t be staying in Erebor after the funerals. Perhaps Khuzdul was reserved for the people who lived in dwarven kingdoms.

“Of course,” Fili replied easily. “We’ll start on it once the Arkenstone is found and everything is settled. We don’t have to wait for the ceremony, even.”

“Right,” said Bilbo. And this time, there would be a ceremony, even if he wasn’t there to see it. He would not have to see Dain be crowned in Thorin’s place. No offence to Dain.

“You look sad. Not having second thoughts, are you?”

Bilbo shook his head. “No, I was just doing my Thorin impression again.”

Fili smiled briefly. “We’ll go in, give the box to Thranduil and go back. No need to linger more than necessary.” Bilbo hummed distractedly. “No need to make conversation beyond a greeting.”

“Are you sure we can afford a greeting?” Bilbo drawled with a wry glance.

“No, you’re right. I’ll chuck him the box and we’ll be on our way.”

“I feel something,” Bilbo said, shuddering. “I think… Yes, that’s right. That is my father rolling in his grave.”

“Fine, we can say hello,” allowed Fili. “But no pleasantries. You can pay all the social calls to the Elves you want once…” He trailed off with an anxious look behind.

“Fili.” The prince turned his eyes on Bilbo. “Gandalf was right, you know. Thorin is not his grandfather. This is a battle he will win.”

“Of course,” Fili hurried to say. “I know that. The only thing, Bilbo, is that until he does…” He hesitated. Then, steeling himself, he said, “Perhaps you should avoid doing anything that may make him angry again.”

Bilbo did not know why the first thing that came to him was, “But he would not hurt me.”

He would. Bilbo knew it all too well.

When they arrived at the ruins of Dale, Bilbo was surprised to see that the crowd was not entirely comprised of Elves.

“Men?” constated Fili. “Why are there Men here? Did they ally themselves with Thranduil?”

“No, that doesn’t make sense,” said Bilbo. “He has no need of them.” And they hardly needed him, either, unlike last time; Smaug hadn’t set fire to their houses and stores of food. They shouldn’t have needed to leave Lake-Town.

“No, indeed,” said a voice behind them. Bilbo and Fili turned to look up at Thranduil, clad in armour and towering over them. “You came, Master Baggins. I did not think you would.”

Bilbo straightened his back. “Perhaps next time you will lend more credit to my word,” he said lightly.

“Perhaps,” Thranduil allowed in a clipped voice. “Do you have it?”

Fili lifted the wooden box. “Courtesy of the King under the mountain,” he told Thranduil.

Thranduil gestured at one of the guards who stood at attention behind him. The Elf bent to pick up the box and opened it for his king. Inside, the gems shone so bright their light was reflected on Thranduil’s face and eyes, bathing him in a white glow. For a moment, he did not sport his usual scorn, and Bilbo could plainly read the wonder in his heart.

(Thranduil stood, straight as a ramrod, at the window of Bilbo’s room, surveying the landscape. “The Greenwood was ravaged by evil things for too long,” he told Bilbo, who was slumped in his armchair, which he could barely stand to leave these days. “It would not do to leave it in that state yet.”

Bilbo nodded, understanding mingled with regret. First Glorfindel, then Elladan and Elladan, and now Thranduil. Was Elrond the only Elf actually going to Valinor? “That has nothing to do with your son’s decision to delay his departure, of course.”

Thranduil sniffed haughtily. “Legolas can tarry here if he wills, his path is his own. I would not leave a single Elf to walk alone in Middle-Earth, if I can help it, but I may join you yet. Someday, perhaps. When the world has changed beyond recognition.”

“I’ll wait for you,” said Bilbo. “I’ll take notes of all that happens in the meantime, so that I can report back when you get there.”

“Good,” Thranduil said, his voice distant. “I may miss your letters. You mustn’t stop writing, even if you cannot send them, lest you forget Sindarin. I suppose they all speak the old tongue there.”

“I don’t know about that, but if they do I shall bully them until they all speak your tongue,” said Bilbo. Thranduil’s shoulder shook once in silent laughter. “Sire, if I may ask something of you…” Thranduil turned to stare at Bilbo with his strangely hawkish eyes. “You’ll be busy looking after your own Kingdom, I’m sure.”

“But you would have me spare a glance farther to the East,” said Thranduil.

“If that’s not too much trouble.”

Thranduil moved gracefully, going to sit in the chair Bilbo had asked Elladan to drag into his room for guests. “I never told you this,” Thranduil started. “I suppose I didn’t wish to tarnish something you did out of kindness.”

“Something I did?”

Thranduil lifted a hand to the necklace he was wearing. Bilbo squinted at it until it resolved into the necklace he had gifted him at random, after the Battle of the Five Armies.

“Oh,” said Bilbo. “Yes, it was done like that. It's very kind of you to wear it. I picked it because it reminded me of you.”

Bilbo blamed his weak eyesight for imagining a small smile on Thranduil’s lips. “These gems were not originally a necklace. They belonged to my father, King Oropher, and were his prized possessions. They became mine after his death, but were lost when Orcs began to invade Greenwood and we were forced to retreat to the North. I know not how it came to be in possession of Thror, or how long he had them before he ransomed them to me. Indeed, I did not even know where they might be found once Smaug was slain. I asked them of your friend the King, but he refused me. I thought I would not see them again, until you presented them to me freely.”

“I had no idea,” Bilbo said honestly.

“I know. It meant all the more to me.” He paused. “As long as I live, I will not forget it. And as long as they live, your friends will never want for aid if the Kingdom of Greenwood can provide it.”

“Thank you,” said Bilbo. “It eases my heart to know that.”

“It would perhaps ease it even more if I told you that I’ve been obliged to welcome one of your Dwarves in my halls on more than one occasion since my son returned from his affairs in Gondor.”

Bilbo cocked his head. “Willingly?”

“I feel compelled to mention that I offered Gimli, son of Gloin better accommodations than I did to your friends.”

“Ah, yes, a good lad. I heard that they’d struck up quite the friendship.”

“They have.” Thranduil bowed his head. “Seeing them together has had a queer effect on the Elves and Dwarves in the East. I doubt our rapport has been as good as they are now since the Second Age. May it comfort you.”

“It does.”)

Thranduil made another gesture. His expression closed off at the very same time the box’s lid did. “I shall not thank you for this,” he told Bilbo, who was trying not to show his relief that Thranduil hadn’t searched the box more closely. “After all, you simply honoured an agreement.”

“That’s fine, I didn’t do it for your gratitude.” Bilbo glanced around. “Um, why are all the Men here?”

Thranduil gave him a cold look. “You’ve collected more than one debt on your way to the mountain,” he informed him. “Come with me.”

“Bard,” said Bilbo.

Fili slowed down to follow his gaze. “Who?”

Bilbo nodded in the direction of Bard, who stood at the edge of a group of angry-looking Men. They were not close to the hall of the king, but Bilbo still craned his neck to see if he could catch a glimpse of the dragon’s corpse through the narrow streets heading off from the square Thranduil was leading them to. Bard noticed them at once. “The grim Man who comes towards us. He’s the one who slayed the dragon.” Fili did not ask how he knew that, or how he knew the man himself, so Bilbo continued. “Be nice to him, we need him on our side.”

“Understood,” murmured Fili.

“Bard,” called Bilbo.

“I would wish you a good day, but it is not,” Bard replied curtly.

“What happened?” asked Bilbo. “Why are all the people of Lake-Town here?” Not that they didn’t have the right to be there, but it did seem like kind of a weird time to be collectively visiting the ruins of Dale.

“Orcs,” spat Bard. Bilbo’s heart stuttered. “They came the night you fought the dragon, while the townspeople slept. Slaughtered dozens of families before others were alerted by the screams. They left once they realised that you and your Dwarves had left the town.”

Bilbo’s entire body went cold. He had to ask. He had to ask. “Your children…?”

Bard shook his head, sharply. “They didn’t reach my house until later in the night. My eldest led her siblings to safety.”

Bilbo exhaled, relief making him dizzy. “Thank goodness.”

“You said the town would be safe if I killed the dragon. You never mentioned Orcs.” Bilbo hadn’t been sure how his asking after the children would be received, if Bard would see him for the selfish beast he was, but somehow, despite the accusatory nature of his words, the Man’s tone was more plaintive than reproachful.

“I didn’t know. I didn’t…” His voice broke.

Fili’s hand squeezed his shoulder. “Of course you didn’t.”

Bilbo looked away from Bard’s sharp eyes. How was it possible that he didn’t know? Had there been an attack the first time? Frantically, he searched his memory, but all he remembered was the dragon, flying to burn the town in revenge. At the time, all that was in his mind was that countless innocent lives would be lost, because of what he had done, and how relieved he’d been when Kili, Fili, Bofur and Oin had joined them in the mountain, safe and healed. He hadn’t even questioned how Kili’s leg had healed. There had been more important things to worry about, and now he would never know.

“They were looking for us?” asked Bilbo.

“Apparently,” said Bard. “I wasn’t there, as you know, but the Master of the town is placing the blame on you.”

“Why?” Fili scoffed. “We didn’t ask for orcs to follow us. We’re sorry for it,” he added when Bilbo made a face at him. “Of course, very sorry. But we didn’t know that they’d made it out of Mirkwood. In fact,” and he glanced at Thranduil as he said that, “perhaps you may ask the Elvenking why his guards didn’t finish all of them off.”

Thranduil’s face was unmoved. “Perhaps they did ask,” he replied. “Perhaps I sent for food and supplies to be brought here, and perhaps my healers tended to the wounded. Perhaps someone should not open their mouths before they know the whole story.”

Fili, looking embarrassed, bowed his head. “I apologise.”

“Well,” said Thranduil, before switching to Sindarin for Bilbo’s benefit. “ At least this one apologises. There may yet be hope for the line of Durin. ”

Bilbo certainly hoped so. “Was the town completely destroyed, then?”

Bard shook his head. “Not destroyed. There was some damage, of course, but nothing integral. If we all worked together, we might rebuild before winter set in, with some help.” He glanced at Thranduil, who very obviously pretended not to notice.

Fili blinked at him. “Then why…”

“The orcs pillaged our supplies,” Bard explained. “We have no food, and barely enough firewood to last us a week. At this rate, burning the houses would be more efficient than repairing them.”

“I thought King Thranduil…” started Fili.

Thranduil cut in. “King Thranduil is King of Greenwood, not of Esgaroth. We have done what we could, but our supplies are not endless, and neither is our good will.”

Fili and Bilbo exchanged a look, both wondering how to convey that they could not offer food, without making it clear that they had not the means to withstand a siege. Bilbo cleared his throat. “I will speak to the King about what can be done,” he told Bard. “It will be winter soon, after all, and Dwarves from the Iron Hills are on their way to us. I cannot, of course, make promises of providing food in his name.”

Thranduil snorted. “Of course.”

Fili glared at him. “What ever does that mean?”

Thranduil didn’t reply. Bard cleared his throat. “I should warn you, I don’t think it is food that the Master of Lake-Town is after.”

“No? But I thought…”

“There he is!” cried a filthy looking man with a snivelly voice.

“Oh, good,” said Bilbo. The Master’s assistant, or deputy, or whatever he was. Bilbo briefly closed his eyes and summoned patience, and tried to list all of the reasons why this was worth it. Thorin. Fili. Kili. Perhaps he could trace back their steps and find that patch of mushrooms Bombur had snubbed.

When he opened his eyes, the Master of Lake-Town and his underling were striding towards them, pushing Bard to the side and making him collide against Fili. A crowd formed around them as the deputy pointed at Bilbo, seemingly not noticing Thranduil. “You! You were with the Dwarves, you’re the one who brought them to Lake-Town!”

Bilbo wondered how the man would react if he told him that he would end up eaten by a troll. But that might raise some questions, so he abstained.

“If you have a problem with Dwarves, tell us so directly,” Fili intervened, coming to stand at Bilbo’s side. Peripherally, he saw that Bard was inching away to mingle with the crowd.

“But of course!” exclaimed the Master. “We welcomed you into our town, gave you our best lodgings, and…”

“Gave?” repeated Fili. “Did we not pay for our stay?”

“Well. Yes. Nevertheless, we showed you more kindness than we’ve ever shown to strangers,” the Master continued, quickly recovering from his blunder. “And this is the thanks we get! You brought orcs to our doorstep!”

“We did not bring orcs. We did not know they were following us!”

“Then you are fools,” snarled the deputy. “Fools and liars. Did you not claim that you were travelling to the Iron Hills?”

“We did,” agreed Bilbo. “Our mission was secret, and we could ill afford the word of our arrival to spread. Call this a lie, I call this a precaution. The orcs who attacked you must have heard that we were headed to the Iron Hills, which is why they’re not here, attacking you a second time, but certainly on their way there.”

Bilbo could practically feel Fili vibrate with anxiety at the thought of the Dwarves of the Iron Hills’s danger, so he ended his little fib with the sign for “Liar”. The prince’s eyes widened a bit, but he subtly gestured something which Bilbo took to mean, “Understood.” Bilbo had a feeling he would have a lot of explaining to do after this.

“Never mind that,” spat the Master. “Now that the dragon is gone, we ask that you return what was stolen from us.”

“Begging pardon?” asked Fili.

“Smaug stole the riches of Dale when he destroyed it. We demand to have it back, and more besides as reparations for the damages,” the Master declared vehemently.

“Alright, for starters, I would highly encourage you to adopt another tone, especially if you’re going to talk to the King,” Bilbo said, “because the one you’re using right now is the surest way of not getting anything you demand.”

“I would be curious to know how gold would help you,” Fili pointed out. “If what you seek is food and shelter, gold isn’t going to provide either of those.”

The Master sneered at them, but his little helper intervened. “Sire, why are we even bothering with them? You should be talking to the king, not his messengers. Do they even have the authority to speak for him?”

“Yes, we do,” Fili affirmed, glancing at Bilbo. “He…”

“This is Fili, crown prince of Erebor,” Bilbo cut in. He glanced at Fili just in time to catch the tail end of a weird look the Dwarf was giving him. He had no idea what Fili had been about to say, but for credibility’s sake, it was better to start with the political power, and maybe end there too. He doubted that having the Company's burglar on site would do them any good. “The king’s sister-son and heir.”

Fili seemed to get the message, as he stood as straight and as regally as he could. Which was fairly regal, to be fair, though Bilbo would always see him as the Dwarf who in another life had pushed him towards three trolls and told him to hoot like different kinds of owls if he was in trouble. It was a little difficult to take him seriously after that.

Bilbo raised his eyebrow at Fili. Something in the high tilt of his chin gave Bilbo the impression that he was entirely flying by the seat of his pants, and that he hadn’t been prepared to be put on the spot.

Bilbo, who liked to think of himself as a kind Hobbit, turned back towards the Master. “What I’m wondering,” he said, “is whether you’re the one we should be speaking to.”

“How dare…” the deputy began.

“You're the Master of Lake-Town,” Bilbo went on. “Granted, I haven’t been here long, but I was under the impression that Lake-Town was built on the ruins of Esgaroth, not Dale.”

“So?”

“So, I believe that the king under the mountain and his envoy would prefer to deal with the demands of the Lord of Dale himself, concerning the riches that should be returned to his city.”

“There is no Lord of Dale,” scoffed the Master. “There hasn’t been one since the dragon attacked and killed him!”

“He’s an outsider, Sire, he doesn’t know our history,” said the deputy.

“And I suppose the Lord of Dale doesn’t have descendants…?” ventured Bilbo.

Slowly, the Men’s eyes veered to the corner where Bard stood, looking horrified. “You cannot be serious.”

“Bard? Lord of Dale?” snarled the Master.

“This was his plan all along!” cried the deputy, rounding on Bard and pointing an accusing finger at him.

“You’re joking, Alfrid,” protested Bard. “I didn’t even say anything.”

“He didn’t have to,” claimed, apparently, Alfrid. “We’ve all seen him speak to the Dwarf and the, the…” He waved at Bilbo in the rudest way he possibly could. “That,” he finished lamely. “They’re in cahoots! I bet he paid him handsomely, too!”

“I very much beg your pardon, but that’s a wild accusation to throw around,” said Bilbo. “Especially since of the two of you, there’s one that seems more likely to accept a bribe, and that’s not him.”

“Easily proven,” declared the Master.

“Oh, what do you intend to do?” asked Bard. “Hold me by the ankles and shake me to see if coins fall from my pockets? I did not take any bribe, and those who know me can vouch for my honour. And what’s more I didn’t ask to be named Lord of Dale, nor to be the people’s liaison to the Dwarves.”

“Quite right,” agreed Fili. “He didn’t ask. Perhaps the people should decide who they want their spokesperson to be.”

Bard gave them a tired look. “Why do you hate me?”

“He’s right!” called a person in the crowd. “The prince of Dwarves is right! We should have an election!”

“We want Bard!” called someone else.

“Oh, and what has Bard ever done for you?” demanded the Master. “Where was he, when the orcs came to our town, hunting for the Dwarves and killing everyone in their path?”

There was a murmur of assent in the crowd. It lasted all of two seconds, until it became clear that Bard would not be defending himself, and someone had to do it for him.

“He was slaying a dragon,” declared Fili, stunning everyone into silence.

“Oh, he was,” laughed the Master. “Is that what he claimed?”

“It is what I saw,” said Bilbo. So far, the people’s eyes had been following whichever Man or Dwarf was talking, but now they all stopped on him. He took a deep breath, and, in his old storyteller voice, he began the tale.

“The night we came into the mountain, we found the dragon, ruminating over the treasure of Erebor. My companions, brave as they are, demanded that we attack the brute, hoping that surprise would give us the advantage. But then, the King under the mountain bade them be silent. He was there, when the dragon came, and though he was then but a child, he remembered the ferocity of the beast. ‘We must not merely rely on our strength,’ said he, ‘but also on our cleverness. If we can guess at the dragon’s plans, it will be easier to defeat him.’ And so, we neared the hall of treasure. Not a sound could be heard in the halls, except for a trickling of coins when the dragon moved. Suddenly, we heard a great rumble, followed by the voice of the great beast. ‘My stomach!’ cried he. ‘It twists in hunger! It has been a long time since I have feasted. I shall soon pay a visit to the people of Lake-Town!’

“Hearing this, we were appalled, as we had received such kind treatment on our visit just days before. We retreated and devised a plan. One of us would go out of the mountain and ride to Lake-Town to warn its people. Meanwhile, the rest of the Company would distract Smaug for as long as they could. I was chosen as the messenger, since I am no great dwarven fighter. Yet, the dragon was a cunning foe, and divined our plans. Though I rushed as fast as my steed could carry me, it could not match the wings of Smaug. I was in Dale when I saw him crash into the gate of Erebor and head for Lake-Town. In despair, I called out to him, intending to beg him for mercy for the innocent people of Lake-Town. Alas, it laughed at me. ‘The only mercy I will provide is that I will eat you first,’ he growled. I thought that my last hour had come, when suddenly, a figure rose through the night, a bow at the ready. It was a Man, who had seen us leave the town and had remembered the prophecies of old. He guessed the motive of our quest, and in his kindness, decided to follow us and help us if he could.

“When he saw the dragon fly to devour me, he said, ‘This monster will not take another life. I will finish what my ancestor started. Die, Smaug the Cruel!’ and he fired at the beast.

“Never did an arrow fly with truer aim. Smaug was hit straight through the heart and fell instantly. Immediately, it seemed that the stars and the moon shone brighter, for that great blight had been as a cloud of evil hovering over this land. And in that renewed night, I saw him as I see you, Bard, the Dragonslayer!” Bilbo cleared his throat. “Or something like that. You know, poetic licence. But that’s pretty much what happened.”

“Bard the Dragonslayer!” yelled someone.

“We want Bard the Dragonslayer as our leader!”

More voices rose through the crowd, advancing on Bard and the Master. Bilbo turned to Fili, who, of course, was staring at him as if he’d grown a second head. “We should go,” declared Bilbo.

“But…” Fili began.

“They can figure it out. But just in case, I would prefer not to get caught in political unrest. I’m quite smaller than they are.”

This seemed to decide Fili. He grabbed Bilbo’s arm and pulled him to a side street, which happened also to be where Thranduil was waiting for them.

“Impressive,” he commented as he followed them out of the place. “Did you prepare this ahead of time?”

“Nope, made it up on the spot,  and I am so stressed,” Bilbo said. Now that the storytelling fervour had left him, he found that his hands were shaking quite badly. Fili patted him on the shoulder.

“I thought you did amazing,” he told Bilbo, but the look in his eyes clearly added, “although it was all incredible crap.”

“Yes,” said Thranduil, “it appears that you’ve managed to convince a large portion of the population that Bard Dragonslayer is the leader they want, and that the Dwarves meant to warn them of the danger. I hope Thorin Oakenshield knows how hard you work for his image, though I cannot imagine him being grateful for it.”

This was the most obvious bait Bilbo had ever heard, but before he could stop it, Fili retorted, “Oh, he’s plenty grateful.”

“I suppose he is,” Thranduil said. “Is that mithril I hear under your shirt, Master Baggins?”

Bilbo frowned, but once again, he wasn’t fast enough for Fili. “You forget yourself, King Thranduil. Bilbo’s undershirt is Bilbo’s affair, not yours.”

“Indeed,” said Thranduil. “And on that note, I will return to my own affairs.”

Bilbo’s heartbeat quickened. “Wait, not yet.”

Thranduil and Fili made eerily similar faces at him.

“You can’t leave now, what about…” He gestured behind them. “What about whatever this is? They still need help.”

“I have already given them infinitely more than I owed.”

“What about support?”

Fili groaned. “Are you seriously asking Elves to support the Men of Lake-Town? The ones who demand retribution from us? Us, including you?”

“I’m not asking him to back the Men asking us for gold. But have you seen how they live? The Master is one thing, but I trust Bard’s words, and they’re going to need help to survive the winter.”

“We can’t help them, Bilbo,” argued Fili. He spared a glance at Thranduil and lowered his voice. “We can’t afford to.”

“If we all work together…”

“Oh, spare me,” Thranduil cut in. “I cannot stand more idealist ramblings. Master Baggins, I bid you adieu. Good luck with your Dwarves, I suspect you’ll need it.”

Bilbo’s heart sank as Thranduil strode away. If he and his army left, there would be no one to fight the orcs. The Men would be slaughtered, and the Dwarves would remain in the mountain until the gates were broken down or Dain arrived; but even his army would not stand a chance without the Elves. There was only so much killing Azog would accomplish, if Bilbo could even manage it, and he wasn’t sure how he would do that.

“I don’t know why you like him,” Fili told Bilbo as they watched the Elvenking’s retreating back.

(“It does comfort me,” said Bilbo.

“Good,” said Thranduil. “One should not attempt the journey West with a heavy heart.” Bilbo hummed in agreement. “On that note, I have a parting gift. When I received your last letter, I sent my son to Erebor, to collect messages for you.”

“I don’t suppose they were thrilled that I didn’t warn them myself that I was leaving,” Bilbo said with a grimace. In truth, he had tried to write farewell letters, but he couldn’t bring himself to send them. How could he say goodbye to these people? What did one say?

“I don’t know,” Thranduil replied off-handedly. “I left before they did.”

Bilbo let out a muffled sob. “You…”

“I saw them on the path a minute ago. I assume they’ll be here within the hour.” He kindly pretended not to notice Bilbo wipe at his eyes. “One should not attempt the journey West with a heavy heart,” he said again.

Bilbo laughed. “I did a very smart thing when I became your friend.”

Thranduil inclined his head. “Do not forget your promise,” he told Bilbo, standing up. “I’ll look forward to a full report when I join you.” He paused at the door. “My friend.”)

“He has a good heart,” Bilbo said. “I know he does.”

Thranduil’s head moved, as if he had heard, but of course, he was too far already. He kept walking until finally, he took a turn and disappeared.