A/N - Oh sweet lord! I AM BACK!
I happy to announce that my marriage went off without a hitch and after a long, and wonderful honeymoon I am ready to begin posting the second installment of the Amadel series. I was originally posting a one shot between the two stories but decided to absorb it into the second story entirely. Billa is going to have a tough time of it, but I hope you will all join me for this great adventure! The next chapter is written and will be posted in 2 weeks.
Furkhekurikl Danukkhulbuzdinin or The Seeding of the Fertile Fields
All around the mountain winter was fighting to keep its grip on the land, snow still piled in the ditches and icy winds kept faces red and chapped; above it all stood a small figure their full skirt billowing in the wind that rushed down from the mountain's peak. The figure frowned down at the frozen lands around the mountains foot; the hold of winter was still too strong for her to begin the work she loved best, the craft of planting and nurturing, of producing fare hearty enough to feed her family, her people. She could summon the scent of the dark earth from last year's memories and she could revel in the small sprouts she tended through the darkness in her work room, but she was yearning and desperate to sink her hands and feet into real soil again. Of course her vision was currently tinted rose from the time that had passed since last spring, she knew that her body would be aching and her nights would be short as soon as the ground thawed but she couldn't find it in herself to care; for she was a Hobbit and spring had already begun back in the Shire, her family had already begun their travel back home to meet it.
"Your Majesty," a young dwarrow stepped onto the balcony, one of Balin's young runners who was new enough to the mountain that tall tales still preceded her, though she had finally convinced him he needn't bow quite so deeply anymore. "Lord Balin and Ori have requested a seat to afternoon tea, if your table still has room."
Billa's schedule was more hectic than it had been in the Shire but the Queen still maintained a proper day that included elvensies and afternoon tea, though the fare did not include a shire style spread, as winter continued the mountain had undergone shortages of most everything and she was not one to eat lavishly while her people were reduced to flavorless, though still filling, fare.
"Please, remind my nadad that my table is his as well and I shan't have him requesting his presence at family meals."
"Of course my Queen." Quickly he darted back inside to carry her message to Balin, Billa turning to follow behind her guards silent in their shadowing of her. Tea maybe simple but should still be prepared with care.
"So it's a fertility rite?" Billa queried as she stirred her tea, Balin and Ori flavoring their cups as well.
"That is a very apt description." replied Balin, "Did you have any in the Shire? I want to be certain to explain everything adequately."
Billa couldn't help but chuckle, "You could say that every marriage in the Shire is a fertility rite. Most couples have their first babe within a year."
Billa would have again been the odd duckling back home, she and Thorin had been married for six months and she still was not with child. Billa found it vexing but Thorin said it was normal for dwarrow couples to wait decades for a pregnancy. "But we don't have a specific festival or ritual for fertility, no."
Balin and Ori engaged in a silent conversation over their teacups, their eyebrows were so expressive Billa was almost afraid to ask questions at all. "Would this ritual be like Durin's Day? Or Lithe?"
"Not quite." Ori gave a nervous chuckle "This is a bit more, um, public?" He blushed furiously.
"It will be quite a bit different in that it is actually a ritual and not just a celebration with a large feast. Though there will be a feast as well." Ever the teacher Balin began to explain the origins of the Furkhêkurikl Danukkhulbüzidîn or the Seeding of the Fertile Fields in Westron.
"In the beginning there was Eru Illuvatar and his Valar and as he created the First born and waited to sing them awake the other Valar became jealous. What offspring did they have to give glory to their name and craft? So Aule created the dwarves and named himself Mahal, or Maker. But Eru discovered this treachery and ordered Aule's creations be broken back into stone and dust. This brought great sadness to the Vala for he had crafted them with his own hands and named them, they were his children though they did not move or speak and Eru saw this love and allowed the Dwarves to be born into existence, second born to his Elves.
But Aule had a wife, a goddess of all things green and growing and she had no children of her own and there was none of her in Mahal's creations so she pleaded to her husband, "Craft me children of my own and let them be a piece of me and you so all will know you care for me." Like any good husband he did as his wife ordered and so hobbits were born. Soon all of the races were put onto Arda to tend it or destroy it as was their calling. So the seven fathers and mothers settled in their Mountain halls and mined the earth and the Hobbits settled in the Anduin Vale and tilled and toiled. They were happy.
Until one winter the snow grew deep and Morgoth's children scratched at the door. The Children of Mahal were starving for they had no skill at keeping the earth and creating stores for winter. Their skill was in battle and mining, forging and crafting and slowly they starved. But the watchful nights receded eventually and the people emerged from their Halls, hungry and bitter for the privation they had lived. They went to Mahal's alter a great statue of mithril of the finest craftsmanship, and their wisest Priests and craft masters sat in deep meditation. For five days they sat and meditated together asking the Maker for guidance and support and on the sixth day the floor of the alter split and smoke poured from it. And when they breathed the smoke from the rock they heard Mahal's voice.
"My children" some said his voice was booming, others said collected yet commanding "you seek guidance from me in the matters of the green earth when I have no knowledge to share. I bid you pray to my wife and Consort the Green Lady, for she and hers are the keepers of the wheat and grass. She is not like us my children and finds no love in metals and gems but perhaps you can craft something to appease her in prayer."
So the seven kingdoms banded together sending forth their finest weavers and metals smiths to Khazad-dum to create an offering for the Consort. They made a robe of deepest green, like meadow grass in high summer, they trimmed it with gold for wheat and a crown was forged of delicate mithril with every flower they could find shown on it in glittering gems. They toiled for months and finally when they finished they took it to the temple and prayed. Again they prayed for five days and again on the sixth day the alter floor broke and instead of smoke a plant with a golden flower sprang forth.
"My Husbands children, you have crafted me a beautiful gift that combines the beauty of my realm with the glory of my husbands'. I am well pleased! I will help your fields be fertile and crops grow in a great bounty but I cannot work my magic as I once could for I am far across the sea but I bid you to seek two avatars of myself and your Father, dress them as we would dress in armor and silks and lavish them richly. Then before the whole of your Kingdom have them pray at this alter. We shall bless them as you wish to be blessed and their happiness will sustain your harvest."
And her voice faded from their minds leaving the scent of a summer breeze and the heat of the sun on their skin. It so happened that only a few years prior the Prince of their Kingdom had married a beautiful dam with hair of gold and eyes of blue and the couple was much loved by the people. So they were chosen as the avatars of the Valar. Their people bathed them in scented water and braided their hair with mithril and gold, they feasted sumptuously from their stores. No expense was spared and at last the Princess was clad in the green robe and crown of Yavanna and the Prince in the finest armor any had ever seen and together they prayed at the altar of Mahal. Time passed and they slipped deep into a trance and their bodies went limp and their eyes glazed until they seemed almost sleeping. Suddenly, they sat up and looked at their hands and garments. They turned to each other and spoke. "My wife." the voice was not their Prince's but Mahal's "You look beautiful." "You are very dashing as well husband." The lilting tones of Yavanna came from the Princess. "Let us help your children grow a great garden, come to me my King for the fields are fertile and need only love and time to bear fruit."
In front of the kingdom the two came together and loved each other deeply. For a day they came together again and again as the people watched and rejoiced to see the strength of their future King and Queen. And when they finished the two fell into a deep sleep and the next day the fields were planted. Time passed into summer and the crops sprouted and grew and more calves were birthed than ever before. Every aspect of the summer was ideal and brought them a great bounty. Soon it was discovered that the Princess was pregnant and many believed she conceived during the ritual; so the people rejoiced further for not only would they be well fed but there would be a new Royal in their mountain."
"And that is the festival Furkhêkurikl Danukkhulbüzidîn, we only hold it during times of great need and only when there are two avatars for Mahal and Yavanna to work through, which is why we're having it this year."
"What is so special about this year?" Billa queried "Surely we had greater need last year?" Of course they had, their stores had barely made it through this winter and this year would be a battle as well.
"Only married couples of the royal line are allowed to participate." Balin blushed only slightly in comparison to Ori who had been red faced for the last twenty minutes.
"Wait," Billa took a deep breath "you mean that you want Thorin to... to TUP me in front of the whole mountain!?" Balin could not keep his face from flashing red "Technically it will be Mahal and Yavanna, not you and Thorin."
Billa would have made a smart remark about it still being her bare bottom on display for all and sundry if she hadn't fainted instead.
"That did not go the way I hoped." Balin admitted as he waited with Thorin and Ori in the living room, awaiting Oin's exit from the bedroom where Billa had been deposited to save her from awakening on the floor.
Thorin snorted, "If you expected her to swoon from the sheer honor then you are losing you edge."
"I didn't expect her to swoon at all!" Balin flapped his hands about in his agitation "Honestly, I hardly expected her to find the idea on par with burgling from a 'furnace with wings'." The two would have continued their conversation, eventually turning it into a row, if Oin had not exited the bedroom in that moment.
"She's fine! She's fine!" the grizzled dwarf shouted, cutting off the swarm of questions and concerns from the other two, "Didn't knock her head or anything, sounds like she fainted very gracefully all things considered but she would like a word with you Thorin and said she would get back to everyone later about the Seeding." Oin quickly excused himself; his day did not stop because one hobbit fainted!
Thorin left Balin to salvage the rest of the days appointments for both the King and Queen, appointments were sometimes pushed back or changed entirely, something the population of Erebor attributed to the couple languishing in the "honeymoon" phase of the marriage but more likely because they needed desperately to sleep or escape the mountain entirely.
The fire burnt low in grate and cast long shadows on the wall, giving the room a feeling of late evening instead of the middle of the afternoon. His wife was sitting up in bed, her fur coat and dress switched to a simple nightgown.
Thorin knew his wife could have a temper to rival his own but Billa was also so much younger than him, it was only a year ago that she shared intimacy with another person and now she was asked to share it with an entire population. "Billa?" she stayed quiet, her eyes not leaving the fire but her hand beckoned him closer.
"You realize this is-" her breath hitched "very strange to me." With gentle yet firm fingers Thorin turned her head away from the fire making her meet his gaze, her green eyes usually so verdant were dull and tears were beginning to gather in the corners.
"Oh kurdel," he wrapped his wife in his arms, settling on the bed next to her, allowing her to curl into him, "it is not something we have practiced often, long before the fall of Erebor, as we only do it in times of great need. My Grandfather and Grandmother were the last to participate in the Seeding and they were both very young when they did so, only just in their first century. Thror fell into gold sickness far before I was old enough to receive tutelage on such a subject and Thrain went wandering as well, luckily for us my Mother was much more open about these kinds of expectations and my Grandmother felt it her duty to pass such things on to her new daughter." Thorin took a moment to settle them both on top of the bed, Billa spooned to his chest.
"There is much ritual before the actual ceremony and we would be entering a state of deep meditation. I am not sure if we would become the true embodiment of the Vala or if we are merely to reenact the first Seeding but we would not be doing it with out normal faculties. The priests will have us use different substances to help us achieve our mind set, special oils and fumes that will dull our minds and inhibitions. Grandmother said it was very much like not being there at all. She could feel an intense burning, a need and knew that Thror could help quench it, but she doesn't remember everything that happened, the entire event being a haze of memories that she could not recall, though no one could look her in the eye for many weeks after."
Billa gave a small snort into his shirt, her voice was small but no choked with tears, "I imagine not. I don't think I could look anyone in the eyes ever again."
"Would you be embarrassed to do the harvest dance in the Shire?" he asked, knowing already what the answer would be.
"Of course not! That would be such an honor, the whole of the Shire depending on you to give a great performance, all the work and practice that must be done to make everything perfect. I always wanted to give the harvest dance, like Mama and Papa did."
Thorin smiled to himself, glad that his knowledge of Hobbits did not fail him, "Then think of this not as a Hobbit but as a Dwarrow, this is an honor only possible with the participation of the royal family and it is magic that we use only in times of greatest need. Just because we have not celebrated this in several centuries does not mean we have forgotten it, that we do not teach its importance. This is not an opportunity for voyeurs but a moment of great reverence. Anyone who treated it like a peep show would find themselves bare faced and homeless before the next bell rang."
Billa chuckled and allowed her hands to rub up and down her husband's chest.
"Though don't be surprised it everyone runs from the hall immediately, that is partially the point after all to promote fertility in all parts of the mountain, not just the fields and livestock and everyone will want to take advantage of any lingering magicks." He moved the hand that was cradling Billa's head down her back to rest on her hip, running his thumb across the expanse of Billa's lower stomach. "Perhaps this is the moment we need to start a family of our own."
Billa's entire body froze, her breath stuttering out of her throat, it was perhaps cruel of Thorin to play upon his wife's desire for a child, he knew that she wanted and yearned for one and feared the trouble they had had in conceiving lay in her still irregular cycles, but he also knew that dwarrow were not a fertile people and some couples took decades to have babe.
Oh and Billa did ache, she wanted so badly to give her husband a child. She had never doubted her want for children and though she was a little younger than she thought she would be, she couldn't deny how much it would mean to fall pregnant; to herself, her husband and her people.
"Perhaps I will stop giving you advice on negotiation skills, if insist on using them against me." She teased and dropped her hands to cover Thorin's wandering one on her pelvis.
He let his voice go dark and deep and dipped to catch Billa's lips in a slow kiss, "Perhaps you should." Billa went pliant in his arms and arched up into the kiss. Maybe the population of the kingdom wasn't so wrong in their assumptions of the royal couple after all.