A/N: Don't own these characters.
This is a prompt fill. I don't generally do prompt fills, preferring to let my plot bunnies run free range. But I couldn't resist the title.
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The first time that Thorin and Dwalin saw Kili fight, they'd been rather pleased. That feeling hadn't lasted.
"The sword is bigger than he is!" Whined the older Fili, pouting that his younger sibling was being included in this special training time with their beloved Uncle.
Thorin had shrugged, not mentioning that Dis had gone to visit with a friend who had turned out to be ill. Rather than bring the stomach bug back to her young family, she'd decided to stay a few days to help out. So of course Kili was with them today. He was too young to stay by himself.
Fourteen year old Fili outweighed his nine year old brother by a good deal. Kili was all length and no breadth, scrawny even. While the blond older sibling had been beginning to help work the bellows at Thorin's smithy in town and had begun to fill out with muscles.
Dwalin was quicker than Thorin, who was speaking to one of the other dwarrow warriors out on the young-one's training fields. When the exiled royal looked up, his bald friend and distant cousin grinned from where he was having Fili work on battle stances with the heavy axes.
Leaving Thorin with Kili. Dwalin's eyes had definitely been twinkling a bit at the dilemma.
Thorin sighed, looking into the eager and wide eyes of sweet, laughing, scrawny, and eager young Kili. A beautiful dwarfling of almost delicate build. "Where to even start?" The lad's uncle sighed.
"Hey! Girls aren't allowed out here!"
"Oh, let her watch. She can cheer us on!"
"I got something sweet for you, girly."
Thorin looked up at the three boys, all around twelve to fifteen. Dwarrow males feeling their oats along with fresh spurts on their beard growth. All three spotted him standing beside Kili and started to back off, but still grinning mockingly at the younger lad.
Teasing was part of growing up dwarrow. Thorin just hoped this wouldn't send his youngest nephew into a crying fit. He looked down at the mop-headed youngster and whatever he'd been about to say got lost as he stared.
Kili's face had closed off in anger and obvious hurt. But tears would not be falling from those dark eyes. They were narrowed dangerously and locked on target on the oldest of his teasers, a fifteen year old easily twice Kili's size.
"Dwarfling?" Thorin called, hoping to ease the awful tension in those rather narrow shoulders. Then when his youngest nephew basically leapt on top of the tall dwarrow, his teeth bared and fists flying, he tried again. "Kili! Get back here before you get hurt!"
Reckless. It was sheer recklessness. Thorin stared with wide eyes as Kili swarmed all over the older dwarrow who was by now making frantic sounds as he tried to get a hold of the swifter and smaller dwarf. Bite marks and bruises began to appear all over the fifteen year old, his friends watching with dropped jaws.
Nulin stepped up next to Thorin, sighing. "Youngster's got heart. Mine has a mouth." Then both males winced as the older lad put his hand over a bite wound on his bare arm.
Thorin nodded silently as Nulin's young son finally got a hold of Kili by the back of his tunic, holding him out straight armed like a wild animal. He'd seen Kili and Fili wrestle for years of course, but nothing like this untamed melee. "Not wise to attack someone so much larger. Reckless."
Nulin winced as Kili managed to let his arms move into full shoulder extension and basically slid out of his tunic. Instead of backing off, the now bare-chested child ran in and kicked the older lad's knee in a flying leap that used both feet, and his hard soled boots.
"That's enough!" Thorin shouted.
Kili paid no mind, punching the now groaning fifteen year old hard in the hip. His uncle thought that his nephew may have been aiming for a more delicate body part, but his strike had been deflected when the older lad had turned to the side.
"ENOUGH!" Thorin roared.
Kili didn't appear to hear him, and certainly wasn't obeying either.
Thorin winced as the fifteen year old finally swung and knocked the younger dwarfling away with a rough blow.
"Let's have a look at you then." Thorin sighed as Kili sat up, but stopped when he saw that the wild look was still in those dark eyes. "Kili?"
The younger lad popped right up and made a running lunge right back at his target. Only Thorin stepped in this time and basically caught the dwarfling in the middle of his flying leap. Wild cries and animalistic noises came pouring out of Kili's mouth as his hands still reached out in the need to attack.
"Settle down!" Thorin snapped, holding his nephew tight, then wincing as he yanked the child in tight to his chest to get better control. It worked, but at the same time a sharp, bony elbow found his nose as Kili struggled wildly to get free.
"Kili." Fili said the name quietly. "Kili, don't."
Dwalin looked down at the blond at his side. "He won't hear you."
"He hears." Fili sighed a bit. "Kili?"
Thorin spat out saliva tinged with blood, his nose aching. His nephew had hard little elbows. But the noises had ceased, and the struggles had changed in intensity. Instead of making grabbing motions at the older dwarrow that he'd attacked, Kili was just trying to get down.
Cautiously the dwarven prince-in-exile let Kili's feet touch the ground. Instantly the young one ran off toward his brother. Fili opened his arms and Kili fit right in there, the older of the two making soothing noises.
Dwalin looked up at Thorin who was touching his sore nose with something akin to wonder. All three of the adult dwarrow looked over at young Kili, now chatting happily with his brother as if nothing had happened.
"Brave." Dwalin grunted.
Nulin shook his head, looking over at his own, now embarrassed, son. "Your lad's going to be a warrior alright."
"Reckless." Thorin sighed.
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"There were five of them, Kili!" Thorin winced and lifted the ice pack made from the heavy mountain snows outside their cabin from his nephew's swollen cheek. "Your eye is going to blacken."
The now nineteen year old shrugged, laughing a bit as his mother wrapped his hands and their rather raw looking knuckles.
"It's not funny." Thorin snapped. "Five humans, lad. Five. Town guards only let you go because there were too many witnesses that said you were clearly outnumbered and that they threw the first punches."
Kili made a disparaging sound. "I counted three."
"When you started there were three. But two more jumped in." Dwalin sighed as he leaned against the door.
"They were cheating me." Kili winced. "Ow." He peered at his mother.
"Sorry." Dis gave him a long look, and then shot a glance at her brother.
Thorin nodded. This wasn't the first time that they'd had to patch up Kili after a fight. The lad didn't have an off switch of any kind. Unless you counted Fili, of course. "It was only luck that Fili was in town on other business."
Kili ducked his chin.
"Young Gimli was smart to run for your brother when heard the commotion you were making." Thorin frowned at his younger nephew. "You need to keep control, Kili."
"When in doubt, get Fili." Dwalin sighed.
Thorin glanced around, irate. "What?"
"It's what the local dwarrow are now saying. This isn't the only incident, you know that." Dwalin grimaced and gave a bit of a frown. "They love Kili, you know it. I know it. Lad is a bright and lovely dwarrow. Fun and funny. But it's known not to trip that temper too strongly, and if you do? Run for Fili."
Kili hunched his shoulders. "I'm not that bad."
"Yes you are." Dwalin, Dis and Thorin all spoke as one.
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Thorin and Dwalin both put their arms in front of Fili as he tried to go to his brother. When they blocked his path, he shot incredulous looks at them both. "He's out of control."
Dwalin shrugged, watching the dark and wild eyed look in Kili's eye as he pulled his knife out of the raider who'd had the misfortune of being in reach of the enraged young dwarrow. "Not out of control, not really. Focused."
"Not a wound on Kili, really." Thorin mused, then winced as blood splatter sprayed his young nephew in the face. "And there's only three of them left."
"Three raiders!" Fili looked stunned.
Dwalin shrugged, his heavy furs shifting as he did so. "Only three. Kili's had worse odds."
"He's only thirty-three." Fili whined.
Thorin nodded. "Down to two now. They don't stand a chance."
Dwalin frowned. "We need to re-think bladed weapons for Kili. He likes them well enough, but we need something that pulls him back from the immediacy of a fight. Put some distance between him and whomever he's fighting."
Thorin's eyebrows rose. "Could help him rein in that temper."
One of the two remaining raiders died, gurgling around the blade wound in his throat. Thorin and Dwalin dropped their arms, letting Fili go and calm his brother. "Keep the last attacker alive for questioning."
"War hammer?" Dwalin mused. "That would give him a bit of room."
Thorin shook his head. "I'm thinking a bow."
"A bow?" Dwalin seemed surprised. "A hunting weapon."
The dark-haired prince watched as Fili managed to sooth Kili's killing madness, relaxing only as his younger nephew finally began to relax. Then he saw the final raider collapse, probably from sheer blood loss. "Damn it."
Dwalin nodded, sighing at the missed opportunity to question their attackers. "A bow. Well, well. Could work."
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