Author's Note: This was meant to be posted on the four year anniversary of when I first published 'The Most Precious of Treasures' on the internet, but... I was working overtime and I forgot. So this is a tad late, by two/three days.

This is pretty much one-shot AU of chapters six and seven of TMPoT, a 'what-if scenario' where it's Thorin, and not Bofur, Kili, Bifur and Ori, who travels to the Shire and discovers Bilbo's alive and the existence of baby!Frodo (who by the way, was adorable to write for again). It was fun to play around with the idea and if I was a bit more driven towards my writing I was would write more for this. And maybe I will one day... after I finish TMPoT. To which, I am working on that, I just... can't get the beginning of Arc 4 right. It's killing my writing life, truly.

Anyway, please enjoy my little 4 year anniversary present for all my TMPoT readers. Thank you all for being such lovely, generous, patient readers and I am sorry for the way, way overdue Arc 4 of TMPoT.

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, settings or themes in this fic, they all belong to their respective owners. I just let them run around my head and occasionally such things as the ficlet below are created.

Mr Tolkien, once again sir, I hope I haven't made you roll over too many times in your grave with my fic. Truly, I write with only the greatest love and respect for your words and your world in my heart. They have been a light in my life since I was six years old and I am grateful every day that Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit exist.

Home For My Heart

The dwarf king of Erebor, Thorin Oakenshield stood out front of a gate of an immaculately kept garden, staring up at the round green door set into the side of grassy hill. It was not a place he expected to find himself standing outside of ever again. And yet, here he was, once again. And once again, he was in search of a burglar. His burglar.

He swallowed thickly.

Not, a voice in his head reminded him venomously, that you are entirely sure your burglar is actually here. She may truly be lying somewhere outside your front door; nothing more than a pile of bones now.

And as he had done for the past several months since he taken up this quest, he shoved the voice away, locking it away in a vault at the back of his mind.

Even if that did turn out to be the truth – and didn't that just hurt his heart to think – he had some unfinished business here, in the Shire, at her home.

He slide a hand underneath his heavy, mud stained cloak, fingering the soft tan backpack he had carried all the way from Erebor to return to its rightful owner. Or to at least, if its owner was truly gone from this life, bury it in the place its owner had loved best.

It was… it was all he could do. This quest of his, it was a self-indulgence. He had long since given up the hope of ridding himself of his almost unspeakable and certainly unbearable guilt he felt in regards to his burglar.

And so, he had not returned to the Shire, to her home, with her pack, in the hopes of easing his guilt, his grief; no these he would live with for the rest of his very long life. And rightly so.

He did not deserve redemption, not for what was done to his burglar by his own hands. It mattered not that he did not remember his crimes against her, enough people, friends, allies, fucking elves had seen his actions, heard his words towards her, they remembered where he did not and they never forgave and they never forgot.

He stared at the soft glow of light coming from the round windows of the house, a beacon of warmth in the cool darkness of an autumn evening.

What would he find the moment he knocked of the round green door with brass door knob standing proudly in the center. Beneath the brass door knob he can still make out the faint mark that had first lead him to this particular hobbit hole all those years ago, gleaming ever so slightly in the pale moon light.

Seeing it gave him an odd sense of hope, an emotion he had not allowed himself to feel in years.

The evening was growing later, turning into night and he had stood out front of the gate for so long his feet were beginning to ache – a wound to his right leg had healed not quite right and made standing for long periods of time a painful effort indeed. Moving quietly, he opened the gate and walked up the stone steps to the round green door, his heart in his mouth.

What would he do? What would he say? For months he had thought these questions over and for months had come up with no answer to either. Nor had he managed to come up with answers to his heart's much darker questions; what would he do if she was not here? How would he survive and live on, when she no longer breathed, her bones lost among the bones of dwarves, men, elves and orcs who had fallen the day of the Battle of the Five Armies?

But… what if she had lived? Lived to travel, safe and sound, back to her Hobbit hole, to live the life she deserved. Alive, safe and loved but hating him with every breathe she breathed.

He shook his head firmly.

This wasn't about him, or his guilt or grief. He was here to set things right, return what was rightfully hers, her pack and his heart, to her hands or to her grave, he would leave them both before returning back to Erebor and…

He hadn't planned much further than that and he did not wish to dwell upon those thoughts, not when he still had his original quest to complete. Heart in throat, he raised his fist and knocked upon the round green door.

Please… please

"Lobelia, for the last time, I am not marrying your son!" he almost collapsed against the door at the sound of the female voice that spoke from the other side of the wood. Her voice.

So long it had been since he had last heard it and yet at the same time, it felt like only yesterday her soft ringing laugh tickled his ears.

He grabbed the frame of the door to keep himself upright, his breath coming out as heavy gasps as he listened to her voice, that even with its current shrillness and annoyance, was the most beautiful sound to him in all the world.

"I will not… No, I refuse to marry…" the round green door swung open, revealing his very own burglar, her lips pursed with annoyance, her sensible brown eyes blazing for a fight as she scowled out into the night, out at him.

"You're alive." He choked out in indescribable relief as her face transformed from annoyance to utter shock at seeing him, instead of whichever of her many, many relatives she had assumed had come calling so late in the evening.

"Him…" she whispered threw barely moving lips, still staring up at him with his own relief echoing within her brown eyes. Then, quite horribly, her brown gaze turned frightened and she staggered backwards and away from him, grabbing for her door to slam, he was sure, in his face.

"Billanna." He caught the door before it could do any such thing and pushed it back open again as gently as he possibly could manage. He had no wish to frighten her, as he so obviously already had, so he made his movements slow and obvious, even though every fiber in his body simply wished to reach out and grab her, hug her close to his body and never let her go again.

"What are you doing here?" Billanna yelped her eyes filled with such panic that it forcibly made his heart ache.

Moving slowly and watching her closely as he reached beneath his cloak, watching as she shied further away from him down her hallway. The pain in his heart was almost tangible to see her so frighten of him but he pushed through it and withdrew her pack from where it was tucked beneath his cloak. Carefully and oh so gently, he set the pack upon the floor before her watching as her face changed from fright to confusion.

"My… what? What? Why?" She stared from the pack to him, then back again.

He thought over his words carefully for all his pre-scripted ones had fled the moment he saw her alive and breathing before him.

"I thought you were dead." He said in barely more than a whisper, "we all did. But…" he swallowed and for the first time since she opened her front door, revealing to him she was alive and well, he tore his gaze from her, "I wished to show my respects and return to you what is rightfully your own. We held a funeral for you; set your pack within a stone box, the others… they made you a garden. But it wasn't right. If you were dead, and your body unfound, your pack deserved to be returned to this place, your home, so you could finally rest in peace."

"But…" her voice came out as stammer, filled with confusion and old hurt, "you banished me. You banished me from your side, from all of your sides. Cast me away. To hold a funeral for me, to bring my pack all the way back, here, to my home…"

"I was wrong." He said looking back at her, staring into her eyes and seeing all the pain and grief he had caused her, "I was wrong and I am sorry. I was so blind, so filled with greed, I forgot about all that was good and true. Forgot about all that I believed in and all who I loved. I was wrong… and this is me trying to make things right."

She stared at him, mouth hanging open.

"You came all this way… by yourself, not knowing if I lived and breathed or if I was nothing more than a pile of bones on the fields before Erebor, you still came all this way to return my pack?!"

"Yes."

"Oh Thorin." She sank down on to the floor of her hallway, "damn you." She muttered as her hands fisted into her blue skirt.

"Damn you and blast you!" She scowled up at him with tear filled eyes, "And I was getting quite good at being utterly furious with you and now… now you've utterly spoiled it!"

"I'm not asking for your forgiveness," He responded hastily, even though it hurt dearly him to say so out loud, "I have no right to ask for your forgiveness but I beg you to hear me, to believe me when I say I am sincerely sorry, for everything. For all the grievances, the offenses and insults I have caused you. Nothing, of course, that I say or do will ever make up for all those injuries, emotional and physical, I inflicted upon you. You have every right to hate me, for what crimes I committed against you are unforgivable and inexcusable. I…"

"Thorin." He immediately stopped his apology speech and stared at her, still seated upon the floor of her hallway, looking up at him with an expression dithering between relief, amusement and warmth. "Do stop before you make your head explode. All this apologizing cannot be sitting well with your kingly sensibilities." It took him a moment to realize she was teasing him.

"It sounded better in my head." He grumbled finding himself once more unable to look at her directly. "The words… do not flow easily." And not because his words were not true, or that he didn't mean them. They were truest things he had ever try to speak and he meant every word from the depths of his heart, it was just… words had never come to him like they appeared to come to her, with wit and thought, her tongue always looked to be ready for battle. He had always been a dwarf whose actions spoke louder than his words.

"But they come from the heart." She was actually smiling at him he saw when he snuck a glance back at her before she let out a small, miserable snuffle.

"Oh, I don't know what to do." She admitted with a small sob, pressing one of her small hands against her face, "I don't know how to feel or what to think. I mean, here you are, all travel-weary and all by yourself, no company or guards in sight to drag me back to Erebor for my trial and execution, and offering me my pack. My pack," She let out a little hysterical laugh, "your sole reason for coming all this way, not knowing if I still breathed or not." She shook her head, causing her golden brown curls, which were loose and hanging around her shoulders and face to sway and glint in the candle light, like the sun upon autumn leaves. "Every time I dared imagine seeing you again, it was never… never like this."

Thorin didn't know what to say to any of that, for much of what she said had him wincing and causing his chest to tighten unbearably. He wanted to comfort her, with words or with actions but he feared how either would be received by her in this current state. Words could be taken the wrong way and actions… well again, entirely the wrong way.

Not to mention, he was still trying to recover from his own shock. She was alive, safe and sound in front of him. And she did not appear to hate him; or at least her justified hatred and bitterness had not yet raised its head, for she too appeared to be in a state of shock over seeing him before her, alive and well.

He remained quiet, still standing in her doorway, his eyes focused solely upon her regaining her composure on the hallway floor, allowing his mind a few precious moments to reconstruct itself with this new, life-changing knowledge.

Only for a whole new wrench to be thrown his way…

"Mama?"

Billanna's body, from where she still sat on the floor of her hallway, stiffen, her eyes flashing upwards to meet his were once more filled with horror and apprehension. His mind, in return, had gone quite utterly blank the moment the word, spoken with the voice of a very young child, rang around the hallway.

He stared down at Billanna, watching how she closed her eyes, licked her lips before composing herself enough to call back down the hall.

"Go back to bed, sweetheart. Mama will be there in a moment." She spoke softly but there was no denying the distinctive motherly authority to her tone. He had heard that tone often enough with Dis that he could easily pick up anywhere. Though, he had not expected, not in all his years to be hearing it here, not when…

He lost that stream of thought as a small, so very small; the tiniest child he had ever seen came barreling on unsteady legs down the hall towards them, coming only to halt due to Billlanna catching them around the waist, pressing them behind her as she staggered uneasily to her feet.

Her stance was an odd cross between defensive and defeat. Her face wore a defeated look upon it while her body stood in the defensive stance Dwalin had taught her. She was only missing her little blade.

"Ooo he?" the little child was pushing against Billanna, fighting to see around her body and to escape the arm that held him back – Thorin was fairly certain the child was a lad, though the child was of an age where boys and girls looked more or less the same, at least to the untrained eye and it had been a long time since Thorin had been around children as small as the one Billanna hid behind her.

"A friend, sweetheart. Come, let's go back to bed." Billanna's tone was close to a beg but the child behind her paid her no heed, struggling enough for Thorin to make out the tiny face surrounded by a tangle of black curls, so unlike his mother's golden brown locks. But it was the eyes, those bright sapphire eyes, filled with toddler curiosity that he found he could not break his gaze from.

"D-warf!" The child exclaimed with delight, fighting even harder against Billanna's grasp, desperate to get a better look at him. It was a desire he could well understand, for he too, if not more so than, desired to look upon the child, this child whose eyes and hair mirrored not his mother's, but his own.

He stared from the blue of the child's eyes to the earthy brown orbs of his mother, her eyes now dull and full of resigned defeat as she met his gaze.

"I didn't know." She muttered, now not meeting his eyes, "Not until Beorn's." she ran her free hand threw her loose golden brown locks with him only then noticing the horrific white scar that cut its way down from the top of her temple to well beneath her cheek bone. Even from this distance he can tell the wound had suffered from infection during the healing process and that it had taken a long time before stitches had been used to close the cut.

He was forced to look away from her scar by Billanna finally giving into her child's demands – and his silent requests – and allowed for him to stand in front of her to clearly see and been seen by Thorin without hindrance.

The little lad's fist was pressed to his mouth as he looked Thorin up and down, his intelligent eyes taking in as much as his toddler brain could process. The child appeared to be delighted by what he saw. Thorin, on the hand, felt as if he had just been run over Azog's warg all over again. There was no denying it; the child was most definitely his.

"Beorn's?" Thorin choked and Billanna gave a stiff nod, still not meeting his eyes.

"I was violently ill for most of the trip to his home – Gandalf and I thought it was due to this," she pointed vaguely to her face, to the scar there, "but upon his return to his home, Beorn informed me of my condition. I didn't know what else to do with the knowledge except to press onwards and return here, so… I did."

"The wizard?"

"He came with me and stayed until after this little fellow was born." As she spoke she combed her hand threw the child's curls.

"Are you angry?" She asked in voice that wasn't exactly frightened but there was most definitely worry there. He let out a strangled sort noise and much like she had done some moments earlier, he sank with a thud to the floor of her hallway, breathing heavily.

"Sweet…"

"Mama." Thorin felt the tiniest of fingers close around his leather coat sleeve and tug, "Mama," he lift his head to stare into the face of the concerned toddler, "he fall down. Mama!" The boy was clearly distressed, his bottom lip trembling though he was clearly fighting back tears.

"You hurt?" The little boy asked, giving his coat sleeve another tug – the tugs barely caused the hard leather of his coat to move – "Mama, make better. Mama."

"I'm – I'm fine mim ze. Just…" he didn't know how to even begin explaining his storm of emotions to the child, his child. He didn't even know how to begin explaining to the child's mother the emotions he was currently experiencing.

"What is your name?" he asked instead, for that was a far more suitable conversation to be having with a child.

The little boy looked from him to back to where he mother still stood, gnawing away upon her bottom lip. She gave the toddler a tentative nod and Thorin suddenly found himself graced with the most brilliant of smiles he had ever seen in his life, surpassing even his nephews smiles – but only just, those twos' smiles could still get them out of some massive scraps with him, if he was having a good day. Or a bad one. Though he tries to hide it, one of his most obvious soft spots was and always would be, his nephews – and even the toddlers mother's own smile – which he had once believed he lived for… and secretly still did – in his heart. If only because the child, while having obviously inherited his colourings, possessed the personality and smile that most definitely came from the hobbit lass still standing a little way from them, biting heavily, now, upon her thumb.

"Frodo Baggins," the toddler gave him an awkward bow, "at yer service."

"Thorin Oakenshield, at yours." The toddler, Frodo, beamed from him to his mother, clearly delighted to have made a new friend, even when he had no clue of exactly who this new friend was or how deep their relationship and blood ran.

"I suppose you would like something to eat then?" Billanna asked her words firm and formal but were underlined with gentleness as she stared back at him. He gave a jerky sort of nod and picked himself off the floor, careful not to knock over the toddler who was still standing close to him, staring up at him with a wide, welcoming grin.

"Up?" Thorin was staggered by just how much trust the toddler was bestowing upon him, his tiny arms raised as he craned his head backwards to look up at him. He stared over to where Billanna was now standing in her front parlor, her face calm but he swore her eyes were dancing with barely concealed relief and mirth.

"Up!" the toddler's request had most definitely changed to a demand and Thorin, hesitantly bent down and lifted the child up into his arms. The child was so small and light to hold that Thorin was afraid he might just shatter him if he… well did anything, hold him close, hold him up, simply holding him was terrifying.

"You can hold him against you." Billanna called from the kitchen, "he is stronger than he looks, you will not break him." Thorin stared back down at the toddler who was watching him, fist once more pressed against his mouth. Thorin with great care pulled the child in close, tucking him against his chest and wrapping his arms securely around him before following after Billanna to her kitchen, passing through her parlor where a fire burned gently in the fireplace, and a book laying opened upon one of the armchairs beside it. She must have been reading when he knocked…

It was strange how such a sight hit him so hard in the gut, leaving him breathless and yet, hadn't this been exactly what he had told her to do? To return, safe and sound, back to her armchair and books? She had done what he asked without probably a single thought in regards to him. She would have probably returned to her old ways of living, whether he wanted her to or not.

The tiny child in his arms squirmed, clearly not liking being ignored and demanded for Thorin's attention by lightly touching his face.

Thorin forced himself to control his emotions before smiling down at the tiny child who beamed widely back at him before they both moved through the sitting room into the kitchen where Billanna was pulling together a hasty supper of cheese, bread, some seed and honey cakes and he could smell a delicious soup heating in a pot over the fire.

"'ake!" Frodo exclaimed joyously clapping his hands together, leaning eagerly towards the treats set out on the table.

"Don't," Billanna said speaking to both the child and himself he realized, "even think about it." She shot him a warning look and he realized that he had actually been reaching, without thought towards one of the honey cakes to give to the child. "It past bedtime," Billanna was adding, "you'll be up all night if you have such sweets."

She did however, pour some warm milk into a child-size cup (which was even tinier than any dwarfling's cup he had ever seen.) and when Thorin sat at the table, with Frodo seated comfortably in his lap, she handed the little boy a cookie which he happily sucked on as he leant back against Thorin's chest.

His happy little noise around his cookie were all that filled the kitchen besides from his mother's movement to get food for their unexpected houseguest. The silence wasn't exactly tense, but there was definitely enough awkwardness in the room that Thorin could give it a good poking at with Orcrist.

Thorin, of course, had questions, questions that would most definitely fill the silence of the kitchen but he wasn't sure where to start, or how to keep the questions from leading into a heated argument or possibly even a fight. And he had no desire to fight with Billanna, he had just found her… and, and their son. Fighting would solve little, if anything. But he had so many questions burning upon his tongue.

"Come along," Billanna sighed as she set his food in front of him, "let's have it. Though I would rather we left the yelling for when Frodo isn't in your arms. Or if it could wait til morning that would be even better."

"Get on with what?" he asked quietly and watched as she rolled her eyes.

"Questions. I know you have them, so ask them and I'll answer the best I can while you eat."

That sounded fair enough to him.

"Why didn't you come back after the battle?" he winced as he spoke. He hadn't meant this to be his first question but it was that or asking about the toddler still sitting in his lap that he was awkwardly eating his food around.

"Did you want me too?" She asked her tone surprisingly deceptive, speaking levels of indifference and cold aloofness while her brown eyes portrayed confusion, pain and grief.

He gave a jerky nod, finding himself unable to speak and it wasn't just because he mouth was full either.

She gave her shoulders a stiff shrug as she began picking at the cuff of her dress's sleeve.

"Hit my head and fell into a ditch," she finally said, looking into his eyes so he saw the truth in her gaze while her hand moved almost unconsciously from her sleeve cuff to the nasty scar cutting down the side of her face "And when I came to, the battle was over, and the side of the ditch I just so happened to crawl out of was the side facing Laketown. It wasn't on purpose that I didn't come back, my mind was simply in too much of haze and blurred to know where "back" actually was. It wasn't until I reached the edge the lake – and started to wonder how I was ever going to get around it – that I realized how far I had come. I was," there was insistence in her tone now, "thinking of coming back, but Gandalf and Beorn had caught up to me by this point and they were all for returning me home."

He could believe that. Gandalf had been less than pleased with how he had handled… everything in his first days of being king of his reclaimed home. And it made sense for the wizard to be happier to return the burglar to her home than to bring her back to Erebor. But even so, some word, anything would have been kinder than believing her to be dead for the past three almost four years.

"The child?" he asked as he found his words once more.

"I discovered that I was carrying him," she nodded and smiled at the little one in his lap, "when we reached Beorn's home. I was terribly ill and," he watched as warm blush swept across her cheeks beneath her freckles, and down her long neck, "Beorn had to carry me the last few miles because I was so weak and ill, that walking became difficult. But I could not bear to be with Gandalf on his lovely horse. It was Beorn who informed me of my condition." She ducked her head, embarrassed making Thorin curious as to how that particular conversation with the skin-changer had gone. He wouldn't have been embarrassed or the least bit bothered by informing the hobbit lass of her pregnancy but Thorin could well imagine that hobbit woman in front of him being beyond mortified at the news.

"I just wanted to come home." She said softly, her eyes downcast, "I was tired and homesick and everything just hurt. I didn't not come back to Erebor after I found out I was carrying him to be vindictive or cruel or deceitful towards anyone. I just truly wanted to come home."

Thorin nodded slowly, staring down at the little child now snuggling into his chest, trying to make himself comfortable against his armor and heavy clothing.

"I was…" he heard her start before trailing off, causing him to look up away from the child and back to his mother, who was chewing upon her bottom lip, "I mean, I am, will." She closed her eyes, clearly forcing her mind to think through whatever she was trying to say before she spoke again, "I've never planned to keep Frodo's parentage a secret, not from him or anyone. I was just…" She looked away her lips pursed, "I am – was going to tell on his thirty-third birthday, when he came of age by Hobbit reckoning, and if he wished, I would send him to you, in Erebor, with a letter, explaining," she waved her hands around her, "everything. Gandalf agrees with the idea. He's even offered to escort Frodo there when the time comes."

"But not you." Thorin spoke with a tight smile causing her to falter in whatever she planned to say next. She stared back at him, her eyes questioning.

"Sorry?"

"Gandalf will escort this child to Erebor to meet with me, but not you? You will not… would not come?" he watched her hesitating, the pain evident in her eyes.

"Do you want me to?" she reword her question from earlier and he groaned heavily.

"You are the mother of my child." He growled lowly.

"Yes, I am." She agreed stiffly, "I am also a hobbit and a thief, remember?"

He winced at her tone, not quite accusing but filled with an almost unspeakable amount of barely controlled pain.

"No," He reminded her quietly and watched as she winced.

"Maybe for the best." She muttered under her breath.

"No," he snapped anger and self-hatred burning like a furnace within his chest, "I would have myself knowing every crime I committed while I was beneath the grasp of the dragon sickness."

"Not from me, you're not." She growled, "Go and ask one of the others for details for I'd just as happily forget about all that misery and pain then re-live it to make you feel better."

"This has nothing to do with making myself feel better." He snapped back, "This is me taking responsibility for the great and inexcusable amount of pain I have caused."

She opened her mouth furiously before obviously thinking better of it, snapping her mouth shut once more and simply settled for scowling down at her table top.

"You truly remember nothing?" She asked finally, her tone even and controlled.

"Last thing I remember clearly and with any kind of certainty is standing before the secret doorway and you looking so proud of yourself for figuring out that ridiculous riddle of a map."

"That…" Oddly she looked rather pained as he admitted this, "that's the last thing you remember?"

"Yes."

"Oh for the love of…" her head dropped to the table top with a smack that caused both Thorin and the once dozing child in his lap to jump. How the child had been able to doze while he and Billlanna snapped away at each other was beyond Thorin's comprehension, but he figured it spoke well for the child's sense of self-preservation nonetheless.

"Mama?"

Billanna simply groaned as she lifted her head from the table top, looking utterly defeated.

"And the first thing you remember after you… woke up?" She asked rubbing the spot where she hit her head.

"It's…" he stared back down at the child settling once more against him, "it a bit of a blur. I can pin-point almost the moment I lost myself to the sickness, but… coming out, I think there must have been relapses, for I seem to have memories that are fragments and most do not make sense. But I suppose I completely came to myself when your coat was found." He winced as a sharp barb went through his chest, the memory of thinking her dead and not remembering how or why she had been able to get into such a situation as her being involved in the battle.

"And you thought me dead?" She finished for him, her face almost unreadable now.

"Yes, and I thought you to be dead."

Her unreadable expression transformed into a look of pained exasperation.

"Typical." She sighed, rubbing her temple, "No, of course you couldn't have snapped out of it when you were threatening to toss me from the battlements, when it would have been extremely helpful. No you have to go and snap out of it…"

"I did WHAT?" Thorin yelled stopped her mid-sentence causing her to finish with a little squeak while Frodo whine loudly; beating his little fists at being woke once again from his nap by loud and unusual noises.

Thorin, for a moment, wasn't entirely certain he would be able to calm himself enough to settle the child down once more but managed to curb his raging emotions to one side and rub a soothing hand over the little boy's back, shushing him back into state of calmness, his eyes closing again for sleep.

"Maybe I should put him to bed." Billanna commented getting up from her seat and moving towards him and their son. Thorin hugged the child closer causing her to roll her eyes.

"Thorin he's not going anywhere. Honestly, you'll see him first thing in the morning, most likely." She held out her arms to him and reluctantly he placed the sleepy child into her arms.

"Don't think you've changed the subject." He added once she had the boy settled in her arms. She looked back at him with confusion for a moment before comprehension dawned upon her features causing her to groan.

"Must we?" She moaned, "Tonight?"

He simply grumbled at her to put the child to bed, not meeting her eyes and feeling his self-loathing raising several knots. He pressed a hand to his face as she left the kitchen, wondering how she bared to even be in the same room with the dwarf who threaten to throw her from the battlements of Erebor. He tried, once again, to access the memories of the time spent consumed by the dragon sickness but as always his mind shied away from them, desperate to never go back to that awful place of darkness, gold and greed.

"Thorin." He jerked at her voice, having not heard her return to the kitchen. Her biting her bottom lip again, her eyes worried, worried for him.

"I can't remember." He groaned, "I don't remember threatening you, I don't…" he gave her a haunted look.

"Maybe there's a reason for that." She said softly but shook her head when he opened his mouth to protest. "The mind does odd things to protect itself. Not remembering the times spent under the dragon sickness is probably your minds defense against it happening again… maybe. Sometime remembering the terrible things one has done under a great and terrible influence can be just as damaging or so I have read." She gave him a tentative smile, "what matters really is even though you don't remember, you are still taking responsibility for your actions, still trying to make things right. And that, I think should be what you focus on, making rights your wrongs, wrongs that you committed when you were under the influence of a great and terrible thing. Not many would be brave enough to do what you are doing, and that is something else you should think on, not hold onto the fact that you don't remember."

He stared at her with undisguised awe causing her to blush and mutter uncomprehensive words beneath her breath as she picked restlessly at her skirt.

"I have," he spoke breathlessly, "never been so wrong about anything in all my life. You are…"

"Utterly mad?" she supplied him a tad dryly.

He smiled at her and she smiled tentatively back before sighing heavily.

"You're still going to want to talk about what happened on the wall though, aren't you?" He simply gave her look to which she simply let out a small defeat exhale of air too.

"Fine… but not tonight."

A part of his wants to protest while another part, a stronger part is grateful that she is simply willing to talk to him at all.

"I should…" He stood up carefully from her table, eyeing the plates.

"I'll wash them up in the morning." Billanna said as she quickly packed away what food was left on the table and placed the dishes and cups that required washing into the sink, "I am not sure my hobbit sensibilities could cope with my plates and cups being thrown around my kitchen." She joked awkwardly causing him to frown for a moment before remembering his nephews and a few others of the company recounting the tale of tormenting their hostess and then would-be burglar by throwing her dishes and cutlery all around her house singing a song that had been stuck in Thorin's head for days every time he caught one of (and it was usually Ori or oddly enough Fili) the company muttering or humming the tune under their breath.

"There's an inn…" He tried again and once more she cut him off, her eyes annoyed and expression exasperated.

"Don't be ridiculous Thorin. There is plenty of room for you here. You can stay in the same room as you did last time. I've…" he watched with interest as she blushed, "already set the room up for you, so honestly, rid yourself of the notion of going to Green Dragon. Beside, they'll be closed at this hour. It's Monday, no one drinks late on Mondays. Come along." She waved for him to follow her out of her kitchen down the hallway to a room that was vaguely familiar to him. His own pack and Orcrist had been laid with great care upon the bed.

"Thank you." Was all he could think to say. Clearly she was as uncertain in regards to words also for she simply hummed in return.

"Goodnight Thorin." She said finally, smiling tentatively up at him.

"Goodnight Billanna." He said in response as he stepped into the bedroom, lit by moonlight and candlelight, both sources of light causing an interesting display of colour, blue and gold to shift around the room.

"Thorin," He looked back over to his shoulder to where Billanna still stood, her back stiff and her hands twisting in her dress. "I'm…" she met his eyes, "I'm glad you're here." And with that she disappeared down her hallway leaving him speechless, relieved and as if a great weight had been lift off of him. It was still there, the weight but it was not as heavy or brutally painful as it had once been.

His heart has once more found it's home.

Author's Note: Once more happy 4th anniversary to TMPoT. I still can't believe its been four years and it's still not done... but to be fair, I never thought it would get to twenty chapters let alone seventy so...
I am trying, honestly, I am, to start/finish Arc 4, it just, the beginning... I know what I want but it just won't write.
I think I need a holiday, a very long holiday where I can just sit down and finish my book (aka fanfiction).

Anyway, hope you enjoy your gift my loyal readers. And to all the strangers who stumbled upon this fic not knowing what to expect. Thanks.