"I love you ..."
Those three words melted Bilba's heart. She looked up at Thorin with her one good eye, the other swollen shut. He had hit her hard indeed. Her body hurt – the salt and pepper haired dwarrow monarch had beaten her soundly with his mighty fists and had thrown her against walls.
"I love you ..."
These were the words that Bilba had been yearning to hear from the moment he had insulted her in her home – "you look like a fishmonger". An insult she had barely registered with her daintily pointed ears, as all she could hear was the pounding of her heart at his sight. So tall! So handsome! So ... manly! So virile looking ... that last thought had brought a blush to her maidenly cheeks and a rush of blood to her virginal core. For a terrifying moment she half expected her flutters to make her hover in the air like a bumblebee!
"I love you ..."
He had disparaged her worth throughout the quest, his mobbing occasionally topped up by a casual backhand or kick thrown in as an afterthought. But Bilba endured and fought to make him notice her worth.
"I love you ..."
Those words and the tenderness in his voice would had made her swoon had she not been lying down. But those words – the sound of which she despaired to ever hear – made her heart beat faster. And harder. So hard that it hurt! Did reciprocated love always hurt like this? Yavanna! Oh, how her heart hurt! The pain made her squeeze her eyes. Her breath grew short and spasmatic ...
"My love? Bilba? What's wrong? Jewel?" – she could barely hear the anxious words through the pounding of blood in her ears as Thorin leaned over her. Oh, what sweet words ...
The pain in her chest and sudden nausea made her jerk her upper body up, ramming her head into Thorin's face and breaking his nose. Bilba half consciously grasped his arm and – holding on to his muscular arm - vomited bile into his beard.
Blinded by the pain she dropped back onto the bed. She saw black while the pain drowned out all other sensations ... her last thought before the Light of Eru left her was "he loves me ...".
The regal Elvenking admired the singular view of the King Under the Mountain adding fat, perfectly round tears to the puke in his beard.
He raised the arches of his eyebrows.
"Way to go, penneth", Thranduil sneered at his fellow monarch.
"Killing her gently with your song, are we not?" – the elf chuckled at the brilliance of his wit.
He rolled his eyes and shook his head.
"Fuck, Thorin. What had you done to her that admitting your love made her heart stop?".
Thranduil stepped back and began to examine his elk, checking for signs of abuse. He had left the poor animal alone with Thorin for half a candlemark, after all.
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Written to a prompt by "thatbloodyines".
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AN:
Penneth – Sindarin for "shorty"
I checked "symptoms of heart attack in women" and vomiting was included.