Hello, lovelies! Some notes to kick things off!

1. It's that time of year again - my birthday! Almost. Being a proper Hobbit, I must give the best gifts I can to you all, but lack everything but words. So words you shall have!
2. This is a story told in 10 pieces - and out of order. I will post them one a day, and by the end, you will have the entire picture, ending on what will then actually be my birthday. I've always desperately wanted to tell a story this way, and as it's my birthday mathom, I shall.
3. The title is from John Donne's "Valediction", which is terrifyingly appropriate for this story.
4. Happy reading - and my sincere thanks for giving this story a try! I'd love to hear your thoughts as we go!

six

The first inkling Dís gets that anything has gone wrong comes over the morning meal, seven months since she has seen her youngest son. Balin stops by with the daily list of messages that must get through, and watches with gentle amusement as she goes to try to wake Fíli. He has grown more than two inches since his brother left, grown tall and gangly and always hungry, so she lets him eat a bit before they pester him with his duties. Balin eats as well, but only because she glares his protests into silence. They may not be rich any longer, and food may sometimes be hard to come by, but guests in her home will never go hungry.

When Fíli has woken up enough to be capable of proper speech rather than incoherent mumbling, and of sitting upright rather than slumping heavily over his plate, she slides the list of messages across the table to him. "Your uncle needs these quickly," she tells him. His eyebrows draw together in annoyance, and she sighs. It does not seem so much to ask.

"Can't it wait a bit?" he asks plaintively, giving her his best pleading look. "I've not even eaten yet!"

"You don't have to stop, lad," Balin reminds him, eyes twinkling with amusement. "We all know you lads can link in your sleep! I'm afraid I do need answers to some of those right away, though."

Fíli shrugs, eyes half-closing as his face goes vacant. Dís exchanges a glance with Balin - maternal exasperation and fond amusement, all wrapped up in the constant amazement she feels watching the process. Balin still looks wistful at the sight, and she knows he is remembering what he has lost. It can be difficult to watch as an outsider, she knows full well.

Fíli's eyes shoot open, wide and frightened, and Dís clutches at the plate she is holding - too late. It clatters to the floor and smashes into sharp shards, and she does not notice.

"He's not there!" Fíli's voice is a harsh whisper, and his breathing is a rush of panic, instant and overwhelming. "Mama!"

"What do you mean?" Dís is at his side in an instant, wrapping one of his hands in both of hers. It's an odd thing to focus on in that instant, but his fingernails are short and stubby now. He has been worrying at them. "Fíli, talk to me."

"I cannot feel him! He isn't there at all - not even a hint of him." Fíli stares around, as if looking for his absent brother in the air. "I can always feel him, even when we aren't talking. Where is Kíli?"

"Did something happen?" Balin's voice is low and steady, and there is no hint of amusement in him now. He puts a hand on the side of Fíli's face, directing his attention away from the building panic, keeping him grounded. "Listen to me, lad. What did you feel?"

"Nothing! I reached out, and there's nothing there." One hand goes out into midair, and Fíli looks as if he will burst into tears. They were too young for this, and Dís had known it all along. She tries to speak, but there is panic in her throat, cutting off her voice, and she cannot breathe. "Kíli!" Her son's cry is a sword in her heart, and Dís puts a hand to her mouth. She will not think the worst.

"Did you feel him go?" Balin asks, strong and dependable as solid bedrock. "Fíli, answer me! Was he attacked? You should have felt something!"

"I don't know! I didn't do anything wrong!" Fíli flings himself from his seat, but cannot decide where to go. He storms to the door, then spins around and comes back. He is lost. Dís sits in his empty seat and tries to breathe. Fíli needs her to be strong, but her baby may be gone, and she needs one moment - just one, and then the world will begin to turn again and she will have to stand and walk and breathe in a world gone even colder.

"When did you lose the soul-link? Think, lad!" Balin asks. He follows Fíli, staying in arm's length.

"I don't - I didn't -" Fíli stutters. He runs his hands over his face and through his hair, leaving him wild-looking, nearly dangerous. "We spoke yesterday, but I haven't tried to reach him since, and Mama, what if Kíli's dead?"

"He's not," she says firmly, even though her hands are shaking and her legs will not support her. "Fíli, he isn't. Something has gone wrong, but he isn't dead. You mustn't think it!" She doesn't believe it, but Fíli must. Dwarves who lose a soul-link, severed from a brother or sister or lover by death, often run mad or do themselves an injury in the first pains of the loss. If Kíli is gone, then something must have happened to Thorin as well, and Dís cannot lose all of the little family she has left in one day.

She can mourn her son later. Better to mourn one than both.

Dís stands on weary feet and goes to her son, taking his hands in one of hers and putting her other to the side of his face, capturing his eyes. "We will find him, my son. We need your strength and ability to do that, though. Balin will work with you. He can help you with the soul-link. Can you not?" She turns to Balin at that, and the same sad certainty is in his eyes. He knows what she is doing.

"Aye, lady," he says in a sorrowful breath. She watches him gather his strength, and put a hand on Fíli's shoulder. "There are many forces that can interfere with the soul-link at these distances, lad. The enchantments of the Elves have been known to delay the contact, and there are illnesses or injuries that can make a Dwarf lose the link temporarily."

"It doesn't feel lost," Fíli says. He takes such pride in his composure these days. It has been many years since Dís has seen her oldest weep - but there are tears in his eyes, and his voice is destroyed. "He's just gone."

"Keep it together, lad," Balin says firmly. "You and your brother were chosen for this task because Thorin believed you were ready and capable. You mustn't go all to pieces at the first bump!"

"I was ready!" Fíli roars. His voice cracks. He is still so very young. "Kíli was too young! I told Uncle Thorin! I told you!" He looks at Dís - looks down, she realises with shock, because her wee lad is taller than she is these days, and when did that happen? "He was too small. He was not prepared to fight!"

"Thorin thought him ready," Balin admonishes, gripping his shoulder tight. "And he would not have been fighting alone. Dwalin and Thorin and all the rest were prepared to defend him with all they had. Do not despair of them yet!"

He presses the back of his hand against his mouth and turns away, shaking all over. She will lose him, too.

"I lost both of my brothers in one day," Dís says abruptly, desperation tearing the words from her mouth - and it does the trick. He turns back to stare at her in shock, and she gives a tiny shrug. "Or so I thought. We had a most unusual soul-link when we were children. I could reach both of my brothers in turn, and Thorin and Frerin were nearly inseparable." She passes a gentle hand over Fíli's forehead, lifting the hair off his face. "Rather like you and Kíli, in fact."

"I knew they were connected, but I did not know you shared the link! Strange times, to see three Dwarves share a soul-bond," Balin says, wonderingly. She nods.

"When they went to battle, I stayed with them. I saw it all through Frerin's eyes, and felt Thorin's rage. And then, they were both gone, in a single instant." She closes her eyes at the memory of the agony that had swept over her in that moment, when the entire world had stopped. Her heart breaks for her son.

"But Uncle Thorin returned!" Fíli protests.

"Aye, he did. He walked through the same door he departed from, and I nearly died of fright." She smiles at him - a fearful, quavering thing unworthy of her status and position, but she is a mother before anything, and she will give him what he needs, though it cleave her soul asunder. "The soul-link went through Frerin, we learned. It was broken that day. Thorin and I have never spoken again that way - but I still have my brother."

"And do I, Mama?" It is the worst sound she has ever heard, and Dís breaks apart a little more. She pulls Fíli into her arms, where he stands like a carven thing, trembling all over, and she pours all the love she can into him. She knows it will not be enough.

"Always, my love," she whispers. "Nothing will ever change that."

Fíli sleeps after a while, or perhaps passes out, worn down with tears and heavy sorrow. He looks young and troubled even in sleep, inclining his body toward the empty bed where Kíli has not slept in what feels like a lifetime. She watches him a long while, arms wrapped tight around her middle to ward off the worst of the pain, but it comes in waves she cannot avoid or ignore. Balin takes her arm gently and leads her away to a seat by the window, and kindly pretends not to notice as she weeps in a manner entirely unbecoming of her station.

"How will we keep Fíli with us?" Dís asks after a long while, when her head aches almost as much as her heart for the loss of her little one. She will not see that wild, dark hair again, or the smile that brought so much sunshine to her poorly-lit little home. She will not hold him again.

"We must not lose hope," Balin begins, but she cuts him off, sitting up straight and putting her shoulders back as her mother had taught her so long ago.

"Do not coddle me, old friend. I have lost too much to pretend I can avert it with denial." She puts out a hand, and he takes it in both of his, worn by long years and hard labor. "They are gone, and we must continue. We need Fíli"

He sighs with the weight of years, and nods sadly. "He must be kept busy. He is the heir to the throne, now, and he must be prepared."

She shakes her head, and holds back the tears that would start again. She has not even had time to think of what the loss of Thorin will mean for all of them, or to begin to wrap her mind around that sorrow. It has torn open the wound of so many decades before, when she had believed Thorin and Frerin both lost in an instant, and she does not know how she will not go mad with the pain.

"Kíli!"

The cry from the back bedroom is torn from Fíli's heart, and Dís buries her face in her hands. She has lost nearly everything, and there is no way to protect Fíli from the pain that is upon him, or that which is yet to come as the loss sets in.

If Thorin is not lost as well, she will hate him for the remainder of her life.