Plot bunny nearly killed me. o;
I've always marveled at London's history and wanted to implement it into these two little shits. Oh, and for the sake of not confusing you, Thorin is roughly 40 and Thranduil is 35.
meep.
oOo
The storm had gone.
The sky had fogged, and the streets had muddied.
Black smoke caked itself into the air like a vomit of char, allowing no respite from the reek of soot and fish coming from the dockside.
Alas, it was the first thing that Fili's nostrils had been assaulted with the moment he had finally willed himself to open the door.
He gagged before shutting it again just as quickly.
"Jesus, Kili," he hissed, coughing up the stench onto the thick sleeve of his coat. "How does uncle do it? It smells like rotted fish out there!"
Kili poked his head from the kitchen, dish and towel in hand. "When doesn't it, would be the real question."
Fili nodded, crossing the room to sit on the edge of his bed with a frustrated crease pressed into his brow.
"Did you fix the leak, at least?" Kili called from the kitchen. "Uncle said there was another starting up just upstairs."
Fili sighed, rubbing his temples. Indeed he had attempted to clog the leak earlier that day, but to no avail. The wood in the roof was beginning to rot, and telling Thorin about it would only further dishearten their efforts in that desolate cesspit of a town.
Not that there was much left to dishearten, really.
It was bad enough that they lived so deplorably close to the docks, in a brick hovel slapped in between a butchery and a factory shop that steamed all night long from just down the opposite street. The bridge leading to the tanneries on the other side of town was the only way into the market, the only way in which Fili could get to their uncle and help him close up for the night.
How Thorin managed his sanity despite all this, Fili hadn't a clue.
Their uncle woke at the nick of dawn, and didn't return until the dead of dusk. He would come home, eat whatever sin Kili had conjured in the kitchen that day, and collapse into his bed without saying much of anything.
So Fili had grown to see himself as his uncle's rock. The oldest, and most brawny of the two, and if there could be one who could make it down the bridge and into the market without getting lost and panicking like a two-year-old, it would be him.
Oh, but how it absolutely stank of fish.
Fili groaned, collapsing back into his bed.
"Kili, go to uncle just this once and help him close up, won't you? I always do this stuff."
"If you fancy a whipping when he gets back, then certainly, brother," Kili laughed. "I hadn't known that the simple smell of uncooked fish would cower you so quickly."
Fili frowned and shot up, a scoff in his throat.
There was too many a time in which Thorin had chased him all across the house with one of his belts in hand. And though Fili considered himself a fabulous sprinter, he would eventually give into the fatigue in his lungs and surrender himself to the lash.
Of course, Thorin was no cruel uncle, and so he would only whip him a few times (with a light hand, surely, because Fili knew he would've lied long dead otherwise), before letting him go. Kili would then take it upon himself to sob for the rest of the night, as if he'd been the one beaten.
But Fili knew better than to bring that up, even in jest to Kili's smug little comment. It would be crude, Fili thought, since Kili had grown to pride himself in having stopped so easily crying nearly two winters ago.
Fili was a strong man with little need to prove himself with words, after all. He was taller than Kili, better known than Kili, and certainly more handsome.
It was the stubble. Definitely the stubble.
So of course the reek of gutted fish should be no match for him.
"Fine," he said, tightening his coat about him. "I was just poking at you, anyway."
And with a charming smile that Kili had grown to hate more than Thorin's snoring, Fili braved himself right out the door.
oOo
Business had been slow that day.
In fact. business had been slow for several months now.
Though Thorin prevailed mostly in the honing and forging of blades and sharper things, the sword had truly become a lost art.
It was mostly horseshoes, wheel rims, and iron fittings now, along with the hushed occasion in which a younger nobleman came down from the Mayfair or Belgravia mansions pleading for the smelting of a ring or necklace for his beloved (most assuredly because it was no real secret that there wouldn't a smith within a several mile radius who would craft a nugget of silver into something so perfectly extravagant quite like Thorin Oakenshield could.. for such humble a price).
But it was shameful to associate oneself with a lowbrow commoner, no matter his skill.
So Thorin hadn't felt the raw weight of silver in his palm for various years now, laboring instead to wrought the lesser ilk of iron upon his anvil for hardly a coin.
The city would drain him of life, and rob Kili of his dreams.
For the lad spoke of schooling and books. Expensive books, and Thorin could not dream to afford any of both.
"In a few months now, eh, laddy?"
"In one, actually, if luck abides."
Balin furrowed his brow, looking to the wet filth of the stone ground. "You've dealt with Bard, then?"
"Ai. Agreed to bring us to the Port of Le Havre," said Thorin as he piled what was left of his unfinished work into boxes. "With the rent of a room, of course, and a job at a fishery. Double the coin, less hassle. He also mentioned a school near Rouen. Fili would find his calling. Both he and Kili could start there. Become architects, even."
"All this for a hefty sum of coin, no doubt." Balin crossed his arms, dubiety in the crease of his frown. "And your trade, Thorin? What of your trade?"
Thorin paused, a broken hammer in his hand. "I've sold all of my blades in the hopes of all this. Nearly lent away what was left of my sister's gems. It's memory, and will fade with time. I will not allow Fili the lowliness of nails and pickaxes once I am no longer there for them. Surely you know this, Balin."
"But Thorin, there must be some other way around this. Dwalin and I could–"
"You two have helped me enough, old friend. It's time I do things as I see fit. There is nothing left for us here, if not the luxury of famine."
Before Balin could press further, Fili came running, drenched in sweat. Thorin looked to him and dropped the box in his arms to the floor with a thud.
"And where were you?"
"Sorry, uncle," Fili huffed, trying hard to catch his breath. "Kili needed a hand in the kitchen." He turned to Balin and noticed the distraught look in his eye. "Master Balin? Are you alright?"
"Ai, laddy. Just cold and ready for bed, is all."
Fili nodded before going to help Thorin.
Indeed it was cold.
Freezing, at that, and Fili could not stop himself from shivering even as he moved up and about in his uncle's shop. It was nice here, though. Full of the talents that Fili admired his uncle for the most. He, too, wished deeply for the knowledge as to how a smithy was used. How a weapon was honed, how a fine blade was meld from a shapeless bar of metal.
"Do you think maybe you could teach me someday, uncle?" Fili asked, eying one of the rusted old daggers Thorin had abandoned in one corner of the room. "To be as good as you?"
Balin looked on in silence, noticing the way Thorin's eyes had lowered and darkened – the hurt in his brow – as he turned to face his nephew.
And if Balin had allowed it, the pang of refusal and shattered ambitions would have sure as death been echoed into the room that night. Balin could not bear the thought of it, however. Though Fili was inching closer and closer to the harshness of reality and labor, Balin knew greatly of how devoted Fili was to the worship of his uncle.
So Balin stopped Thorin in mid-word with his hand upon his shoulder, a squeeze in his grasp.
"Lend me a hand with the fruits, would you, laddy?" An old man like me finds it hard nowadays picking up shop."
Fili snapped from his stupor and looked immediately to Thorin, waiting for approval.
"Go," said Thorin after a moment, taking the dagger from Fili's hand. "Come back when you're done."
Ai.
All would come in time.
oOo
It was midnight by the time they returned.
Kili came rushing from the kitchen, smelling of onions.
"Uncle! I thought something happened, I was just about to go next door to–"
"Stay away from the fisherman," Thorin snapped. "I've told you twice."
"But uncle, aren't you going to eat? I've made broth and–"
"Not hungry."
Kili bit his lip and nodded, a silence falling upon them. Thorin shrugged off his coat and hung it at the door before disappearing upstairs to his room. A slam was heard, and then nothing else.
Fili stood still as stone at the door, giving Kili a soft look. He could see the dam brimming in his brother's eyes, and he knew it would break soon.
The food steaming on the table looked especially pleasing that night, after all, as if Kili had really mustered himself into it for hours at a time. Fili crossed the room, taking his brother into his arms. Sure enough, Kili buried his face deep into the fur of Fili's coat and began to quiver in the first droughts of untold emotion.
"There there, Kili," Fili whispered, threading his fingers through his brother's long hair. "Uncle's stressed lately. Master Balin said work's been eating at him. I'm sure he'll help himself in the morning before he leaves."
Kili nodded, clenching tight onto his brother's coat before gulping away his tears.
oOo
Once his door had shut, Thorin unclasped his boots and sat upon his bed to stare hard at the floorboards.
In a few weeks, he would have nothing.
He would sell the last of his tools and shop to complete the coin needed to pay for the trip, and for the advanced rent of a room he hadn't ever seen with his own two eyes. He would have nothing but Bard's word and the clothes on his back to hold on to thereon. And if the fisherman deemed it on a whim, Thorin would be thieved of everything and thrown into the sea, never to be heard of again.
As for Fili and Kili.. Well, Thorin didn't even want to loom on the matter.
He had never been to France; had no real official license to be there. It was a desperate situation, and so he had taken on a desperate measure. For Thorin could not possibly bear the thought of failing his nephews, of failing Dis in his promise.
Kili would have his dream, and Fili would have a future. Both would prosper.
All else mattered little.
oOo
On the first sign of light, Thorin was up and dressing.
He felt spent to the marrow of his bones, his fingers sore and blistered from the sear of his forge.
But it couldn't matter. Though his muscles wept for the softness of his bed, he managed through the door and into the pouring rain of the outside.
The streets were slicked with torrents, reeking of sewage. The harbors, of course, did nothing to help the cause. The sky, though in the nick of sunrise, shone only in dark clouds and gray fog. It was a dreary thing to be beheld in a city so blindly esteemed. Thorin availed his eyes to look only directly in front of him and nowhere else.
It was the fops of the Mayfair mansions and of the main district, he thought, who did nothing about this.
Who watched as good people starved, as children begged for bread, as more and more of the outlanders came and crowded what was left of London's clean air. This town would be its own downfall, and when there was no more trade, no more spare hands to do the filthy works of the factories due to plague or sickness or both, Thorin's only regret would be that he would no longer be there to laugh in the sump of its doom.
He shrugged off his two coats when he entered his shop, going directly to start a warm hearth.
He had two orders of horseshoes that needed finish, and then nothing else.
He went immediately to work, ignoring the sting in his eyes. He'd hardly slept through night (for he couldn't stop from constantly envisioning the undoing of his plans and of Bard's possible deceit), and could hardly keep himself from wanting so very badly to sit back into his chair and sleep.
Two hours passed, and Thorin was nearly finished. He left the irons to heat and sat down, cradling the thrum in his head. In a few more weeks all would be different. And though the reek of fish would forever be a fellow companion to him thereon, at least he would be properly paid to bear it.
He could hear the gentle hum of the rain outside, the silence coming in from the streets. It was too early in the day for most things. He was hungry, but had no money to spare on the luxury of food. He recalled how he'd barked at Kili the night before, and the ache in his head only worsened. He'd been stressed, heaving in conflict.
So many thoughts he could not speak, so little people left to trust. And though he had Balin and Dwalin forever loyal at his side, both had their own families and personal ongoing struggles, and Thorin could not possibly think to burden those two men any further than he already had.
His was one case amongst plenty, and Thorin was never one to find pleasure in the telling of his woes.
It was something that had undoubtedly strained his relationship with his nephews, however; how he no longer talked or listened to them like before. Kili was a tender one. He needed care.. attention, the nuzzle of his head now and then, all things Thorin wasn't ever particularly good at.
Fili was a lighter situation, but still, he needed warmth just like any other growing lad.
Perhaps Thorin really was a farce of an uncle. Unworthy, and utterly unmerited for the love of his beloved nephews–
"Stormin' quite heavy it is."
Thorin stood quickly in surprise.
"Bofur. Didn't think to see you today."
Bofur smiled and hung his hat at the entrance before shedding off one of his coats. He was positively drenched from the looks of it.
"Ai. Just thought I'd fling in for a quick visit." Thorin motioned for him to sit down, but Bofur shook his head and came over to stand on the other side of Thorin's workspace, taking a breath. "How are things with the two wee lads? Heard Fili's growing a stubble already!"
Thorin couldn't stop himself from curling the right corner of his lip in swell pride for his nephew. "He is. It'll grow into a fine beard someday, we'll hope."
Bofur laughed. "There isn't a Durin left alive who wouldn't allow himself the marvel. Business slow these days?"
"Ai," said Thorin, reaching for a rag to clean off the shreds of rust on the counter. "The occasional wheel rim if luck ganders. But it's mostly horseshoes now, if anything." Thorin paused. "And you, my friend? How fares your business?"
"With the holidays poking in 'round the corner, I've 'ad quite a few lads come in. Though I doubt much would change after winter's left."
Thorin nodded. "There will always be parents wishing for the smiles of their children. You bring a bright trade to this darker side of town, friend." He tossed the rag to one corner of the room, and grimaced. And after a moment he said, very faintly: "As I'm sure nothing here will be especially missed a month from now."
Bofur's lips parted as he thought further on Thorin's grim statement. His brow knit upward.
"Thorin, what?–"
But there came a chime at the door that left both Thorin and Bofur frozen in their skins.
oOo
It was quite a sight to see somebody wandering the lesser streets of London with a fairer tint of hair upon their head.
Yellow, more specifically.
Thorin had only seen one woman with such a feat come in with her husband years ago, though a large white bonnet had covered away most of it.
But never a man.
Never one so tall and so lucent, as if a light shone from wherein him.
Bofur coughed into the silence after a moment, muttering something of an excuse as he went towards the door, nearly brushing against the creature that now stood next to it.
Thorin hadn't moved and only stared, unable to say much of anything once the creature had wandered to the left side of his shop, treading its long, gloved finger against one of the old rusted blades Thorin had forgotten to unhinge from the stone wall.
Thorin wondered if he had been noticed at all, and for a minute, he allowed his gaze to wander.
The creature wore a tight-fitting overcoat with black boots of suede leather. A white velvet cloth lied meticulously tied around its neck, matching nearly the pallor of its skin. It stood perfectly erect (astute even), a tilt in its chin as it observed the various abandoned crafts on the wall from 'neath the thick veil of its lashes. It also carried a wrapped bundle in its hand. A weapon, perhaps–
"I hadn't known the shopkeepers of this city were so fell in their knowledge of manners."
The voice was deeper than most. It echoed.
Certainly not what Thorin had expected from such a terribly adorned bigot with waist-long hair that came spilling down from its shoulders like the golden flood.
"And I hadn't known a man was yet inclined to bear the length of a woman's hair." The creature turned sharply then on its heels, facing Thorin, but its face remained unchanged. "And I am no shopkeeper. I am a blacksmith, and have been for many years. You'd do well to remember this before you saunter in here, in a place I've owned and prospered since before the day you could properly suckle on your mother's tit."
The creature smiled.
Slowly at first, and then without choler. Thorin couldn't bring himself to look away even when it began to approach, so close that only the counter of Thorin's workspace separated them. The smell of trees seeped immediately into Thorin's nose, forcing him to draw his next breath a little quicker than seconds before.
"My apologies," the creature said, whispered, as if a sudden secret between them had bloomed. "It is my own unbecoming that has left us on so rigid a start. Allow me to tell you my name, if only I could have yours in return."
Thorin swallowed what was left of his pride, and lowered his eyes.
Perhaps he'd barked insult once too quickly.
Haughty fop or not, Thorin needed money. Badly.
"Thorin," he said simply.
The creature smiled once more (and may gods strike him dead for Thorin could not deny himself the indulgence of staring), before ungloving one of his long hands and offering it. Thorin shook it after a moment, albeit reluctantly, and felt skin that was softer than even the last woman he'd taken to his bed.
"I am Thranduil Greenleaf. I've just settled from Leeds, seeking to trove the many wonders of London."
Thorin scoffed. "You won't find many wonders here. If it's not hunger and filth you're intending to feast your eyes on, I'd deem you in the wrong place."
Thranduil chuckled softly. "Perhaps. Though I could not know fully when I've only just arrived."
Thorin stayed quiet, piercing his eyes into the horribly blue ones of the other. It should be crime to look so vain amidst the guise of something so fair.
"I've come for the sharpening of this blade, you see." With a swift movement, there was a heavy mound put on the counter. Thorin looked to the nobleman before bringing his fingers to the seams, unlacing the weapon from its confines. When he had, Thorin had entirely lost the ability to speak. "It's steel laced in moonstone. I've heard whispers of your talents, and could go to no other place. My son and I are terribly fond of Orcrist, and would hate to see it ruined."
Thorin couldn't take his eyes off of it.
Slim and gleaming; beautiful. A delicate blade twined with a single carven lacuna and a wooden haft.
He swallowed, not taking his gaze away. "Son?"
"Yes," said Thranduil, watching the other quietly with a lilt smirk. "Nearing the end of his adolescence in just a few months, no less." Thorin looked to him then, quite honestly surprised. If it weren't for his offhanded prying, he'd deem the man in front of him too young for a lad of his own. "And yourself, blacksmith?"
"Nephews," he said. "None of my own."
Thranduil nodded, looking to glove his hand once more. "I will pay you finely, Thorin, and will be expectant by the end of the week–"
"Tomorrow."
Thranduil stopped, a faint smile on his lips. "Tomorrow, then."
And before Thorin could say anything further, the man was out the door as if he'd never been there in the first place.
oOo
so um. . is it a-okay for continuation? xx