I've wanted to write another Thorin and Bilbo featured fic for a while, so I thought I would indulge myself :) I know I have already written a sick Thorin fic, but since in that one he was getting taken care of by his little nephews, he wasn't your typical grouchy sick Thorin, and I wanted to write one where he was so I subjected out poor Hobbit to his stubbornness and bad attitude instead ;) This is a kind of AU story and mixes both the Book and the Movie. As in they're in Laketown for a lot longer like in the book, but the characters are still how we see them in the movie, and Kili is still injured. So I don't really know what you want to call it, it was just a one shot that popped into my head and I wrote it. I hope you enjoy it in any case. I have a few more one-shots in mind for the future as well :)
A Friend For All Weathers
A Hobbit Fanfic
By the third day of their stay in Laketown, Bilbo was beginning to get on edge. Mostly, he just wanted to enjoy the rest, not have to think about what had happened on their journey up to that point, and certainly not about what was to happen next when he would have to play a burglar and walk straight into a dragon's lair without a by your leave. But the other part of him simply wanted it all to be over, and this delay was just making him more and more nervous by the day.
He wasn't the only one champing at the bit, however. Thorin was about ready to eat nails and Bilbo knew it, but the dwarf was too ill to get out of bed at the moment, despite everything he tried. It seemed that the pushing and lack of good food and sleep and minor wounds contracted from their time with the elves, and their escape down the river had finally taken its toll and put their leader down roughly.
Bilbo and several of the others dwarves had also gotten colds, and he had been miserable the first day there, but he felt better now whereas Thorin was only worse, and practically delirious with the fever. On top of that, Kili had his wound to deal with, and it seemed they might be staying in Laketown for a while longer than they had planned, but Durin's Day was fast approaching, and that fact was only making everything worse. Thorin's attempts to get better by completely choosing to ignore his condition, only made him worse, and true to form, he was so stubborn that he would not stay in bed until he was forced to do so because he couldn't find the strength to drag himself out of it.
It was Fili and Kili first who tried to look after him, but Kili was already ill, and Fili was spending most of his time seeing to his brother, and was on his last nerve with his angry, bedridden uncle so he eventually gave up and tried to pass the job onto someone else.
Oin, as the healer did what he could, but Thorin refused to drink his tonic and there was more than one occasion where it was flung across the room accompanied by curses and professions of being fine, only to be drowned out by hacking coughs that claimed otherwise.
Bomber tried to bring his soup, which was treated likewise, and Bofur tried to use his gentle, friendly manner, but had to beat a hasty retreat. After even Balin attempted to talk some sense into his old friend to no avail, the other dwarves decided that they just wouldn't bother. Dwalin made one last effort to shout abuse at the leader, thinking this tactic might work, but it was met only with steely silence and Dwalin gave up as did the rest, only leaving Thorin to pine away by himself without the aid he needed.
Bilbo wasn't going to have this. The longer Thorin refused help, the longer they would have to stay there and the harder they would have to rush to get to Erebor before Durin's Day. Bilbo knew that no matter how bad a mood Thorin was in now, it was nothing compared to what he would be in if they missed the deadline. No, that certainly wasn't an option. So he was determined to take drastic actions.
He took the medicine that he had seen Oin trying to give Thorin the day before, and with a deep breath, and many long stares from the others who didn't dare speak up, he entered the sick chamber.
Thorin lay under a pile of blankets, his breathing labored, interrupted by coughs every few minutes, and his face flushed with fever. Bilbo had never seen him look worse, and felt terrible for the time Thorin had been left in the elves' dungeons without proper food or accommodation. He looked utterly miserable, all except for the two fever-bright eyes that glared death at the poor unsuspecting hobbit.
"Now don't you give me that," Bilbo told him matter-of-factly. "I know you're not feeling well, but that's no reason to snap at everyone. They're just trying to take care of you."
Thorin growled at him as he approached like a feral creature. Bilbo just gave him a glare of his own back and set the bottle of medicine on the side table. Thorin watched with a burning gaze as the hobbit mixed some into a cup of tea and stirred.
"Now," he said as he worked. "You are going to take this medicine and you are going to get better because we have a mountain to reclaim. And if you'd just stop being stubborn for a minute, you might actually start to feel better!"
He brought the cup around and reached down to lift Thorin's head, bringing the cup to his lips. Thorin turned his head aside and if Bilbo wasn't so annoyed at that moment, he might have smiled at the childlike behavior coming from the dwarf king, the noble and majestic leader of their company. As it was, he was in no mood for nonsense.
"Nope," he said firmly, pulling Thorin's head around and clamping his small hand firmly on the back of his neck. "You're going to drink this, or I swear I will get Dwalin to sit on you while I do it!"
"I don't need it!" Thorin rasped, his voice all but gone from the coughing, and fought a hand from under the blankets, pushing Bilbo's hand away so that some of the tea sloshed out of the cup and fell onto the blankets. Bilbo was undeterred.
"Drink it, Thorin," he commanded in no uncertain terms.
Thorin glared at him. "No."
They had a staring contest for a few moments before a coughing fit caused Thorin to have to concede and he doubled up on his side while Bilbo patted his back.
"There, see, if you would take Oin's medicine, that would go away."
"No," Thorin said. "I'll be fine."
"So you plan of walking up the mountain like this then?" Bilbo nodded sagely. "Of course, because you can stand perfectly well, can't you? And on your own too!"
Thorin gave him the death glare again. He knew perfectly well he could not stand. After a very vocal moment when he had tried to get up to use the bathroom earlier and had to be practically carried by Dwalin, he knew that all too well. Bilbo thought that maybe if he played on the dwarf's huge amount of pride, he could wear him down to taking the medicine and getting some rest.
Bilbo put the cup to his lips again. "Come on then, Thorin. Drink up."
Thorin glared at him for a few more seconds then lashed out and knocked the cup from Bilbo's hands defiantly. Bilbo closed his eyes as tea splashed over him, letting a deep breath out his nose.
"That was lovely," he said sarcastically. "You are a huge child, you know that?"
Thorin's only answer was to cough again. He rolled over so his back was facing Bilbo. The hobbit mopped tea from himself and then the floor before leaving the room, indignation stiffening his spine as he met the others' gaze, angry that they were only witnessing his failure when he had been so foolishly sure that he could talk some sense into the stubborn dwarf.
"Don't take it so hard, Bilbo," Fili told him with a small wry smile. "Uncle is terrible when he's sick. He should wear down before long."
"If he doesn't do himself real harm first," Bilbo said and shook his head. "No, I'm not waiting that long. Perhaps I can at least get some broth into him."
Fili shrugged but Bilbo was determined to do something, not sit around like the rest of them, so he filled a small bowl with the soup that Bombur had made and made his way back into the lion's den.
"Go away," the pile of blankets with Thorin's glaring eyes at the top growled at him.
"No," Bilbo told him firmly and went to sit on the side of his bed again. "I've brought you some soup, and you're going to eat it."
"Make me," Thorin snarled, coughing miserably and sniffing through his red nose. It rather ruined the frightening effect.
"I will make you if I have to," Bilbo told him in no uncertain terms, only earning himself another glare and an unimpressed blink. "It's just soup. You need nourishment."
"I'm not hungry," Thorin protested.
"I don't care if you're hungry or not, you need to eat!" Bilbo said, dipping a spoon into the soup. "It's very good. It's either this or porridge."
Thorin glared at him again. "I'll throw that across the room too."
"Fine," Bilbo said. He set the bowl on the side table and raised the spoon to Thorin's lips but before Thorin could stop him, the hobbit plugged his nose and held it until Thorin had to breathe and then dumped the soup in. Thorin spluttered, but was forced to swallow. Bilbo did it again for good measure, and then sat back as Thorin spluttered and stared at him with a betrayed expression that would make it seem like Bilbo was torturing him.
"Will I have to do that again, or will you eat the soup?" Bilbo asked, smiling benignly, even while Thorin glared at him as if he were the devil himself.
The dwarf held the glare for a while before he fell into another coughing fit, and then he seemed to sag. He didn't say anything, but Bilbo saw, with some mean satisfaction, that he was defeated. He reached forward and propped Thorin up with pillows and then sat on the side of the bed, bringing the soup into his lap as he took up the spoon again.
"Good," he said as Thorin took a bite without trouble. "Now let's see if we can get the rest of this into you."
It took some more coaxing, but Bilbo was able to get the majority of the soup into Thorin, and thankfully none ended up on either of them or the floor. Afterward he poured Thorin a cup of water and got him to drink. The dwarf drank greedily, as if having just realized how much he needed the water and Bilbo had to stop him lest he make himself sick. He pulled the cup away and patted Thorin's knee before he stood up.
"Very good. I'll give you some more to drink later. Why don't you try to sleep now?"
He decided that trying the medicine again now would be pushing his good fortune, and decided that if he had gotten Thorin to eat, he was beginning to break him down as Fili had said.
"I can't sleep," Thorin growled at him, slumping back dejectedly. "I can't breathe, and every time I drift off, I start coughing again. And everything aches. And my eyes hurt too much to stay closed or to stay open because of my sinus."
"Maybe you should stop glaring so much then," Bilbo told him. "That can't help."
Thorin said something in dwarvish that Bilbo guessed to be less than polite. "Just go, if you're not going to do anything but spout sarcasm at me," Thorin growled at him.
"If you need anything let me know," Bilbo told him before he left.
The others seemed impressed he had gotten the soup into Thorin.
"You're a natural," Fili said with a laugh. "Uncle must really admire you if he will actually do what you ask him."
"It did take some persuading," Bilbo said modestly.
It was later that Thorin's fever took a turn for the worst. Oin tried to see to him, but the dwarf leader would have none of it, and finally the healer left the room, not being able to do anything for the dwarf when he was acting in such a way.
"Perhaps you can do something now too, lad," Oin told Bilbo. "Try to get some of that tonic into him if you can. If his fever doesn't go down we're going to have to force it down with a tub of cold water and he will like that even less."
Bilbo knew how dangerous it could be to suffer such a high fever for so long. He set his jaw and went back to Thorin's room, his heart instantly clenching as he watched the dwarf tossing on the bed, tangled in his heavy blankets. His shirt was drenched in sweat and his hair clung to his face and neck in a way that could hardly be comfortable. He groaned and coughed and whimpered pathetically as he fought weakly against the fever and seemingly his own body.
Bilbo went over to him and wrapped a hand around his forearm, horrified to find it burning. Thorin jerked at his touch, his eyes flying open, the fevered haze even more prominent now.
"L-leave me 'lone," he gasped out, his voice turning into wracking coughs that doubled him over.
"I'm not going to leave you, Thorin," Bilbo told him gently, setting a kind hand on his forehead, worry wrinkling his brow as he was again aware of how hot the dwarf king was and how badly he needed to bring the fever down. He reached to the side table and poured some of Oin's medicine into a water cup. He reached down and pulled Thorin's head into the crook of his elbow.
"Here, drink," he said, pressing it against the dwarf's lips.
Thorin sipped some, but coughed, causing it to dribble out the side of his mouth onto his chest. Bilbo tried again, but the dwarf shook his head, weakly pushing the cup away,
"Bitter," he said.
"Drink it, Thorin," Bilbo told him firmly.
Thorin shook his head and closed his lips. Bilbo sighed and set the cup aside for now. He stood from the side of the bed and reached down to pull the heavy, suffocating blankets from around Thorin'g legs. The dwarf snatched at them as he drug them off.
"Give them back," he said weakly.
"You need to cool off, trust me, you'll feel better."
"I'm freezing," Thorin said as a chill wracked his body.
"I'm sorry, Thorin, but you need to cool down." Bilbo threw the blankets onto the floor and then left the room for a minute to fetch a bucket of cold water from outside and several towels. He came back and set the items on the floor beside the bed, reaching down to pull Thorin up against the pillows.
"Come here, this will make you feel better," he said soothingly to the dwarf, starting to wrestle the sodden shirt off of him, but was mostly unsuccessful as Thorin flailed.
"Get off me!" he cried hoarsely.
"This will feel much better, I promise," Bilbo told him, and finally managed to struggle the shirt over Thorin's head and tossed it with the blankets on the floor. He then soaked the towels and wrung them out and started mopping the sweat from Thorin's burning body, before settling one towel on his chest in an attempt to cool him down a bit. The other he settled over his forehead, leaving it there for a few seconds before he began to gather Thorin's hair up off his neck.
The dwarf seemed to have calmed down a bit, still coughing, but his movements were a little less frantic. Even though he moaned whenever the cold cloths touched his fevered skin, Bilbo saw the relief clear in his features as he started to cool off a bit. He began to plait the hair back into a single braid and the motion seemed to soothe Thorin and calm him even further.
"Frerin?" he muttered softly, groping up and clasping Bilbo's hand that was still tangled in the dwarf's hair. He was surprised that Thorin would call for his brother, but figured that he must be in some fevered dream. He tightened his hand around the dwarf's though, and squeezed it comfortingly.
"I'm here, Thorin," he whispered.
Thorin relaxed instantly and seemed to fall into a stupor. Bilbo went back to work cooling him off, and after a few minutes passed, he took up the medicine again and propped Thorin against his shoulder before pressing it to his lips, coaxing the delirious dwarf gently. Thorin drank with little fuss this time, and Bilbo breathed a sigh of relief that he had gotten the medicine into him. He stood and cracked his back before replacing the cloths once more and then pulled a chair to the side of the bed so he could continue his vigil through the night.
He stayed with Thorin until dawn, keeping him cool with the cloths, and soothing him when he was beset by nightmares. His fever finally broke a few hours before dawn and Bilbo cleared the sweat away from him once last time, exhaustion and relief pouring through him, and he settled a clean, dry blanket over him before he bent his head onto the bed by Thorin's shoulder and allowed himself to drift off as well.
He woke with a start to someone croaking his name. Sun shone through the window and as he sat up hurriedly, he saw Thorin looking thrashed and exhausted, but his eyes were open and didn't have any of the fevered brightness in them anymore. Bilbo smiled at this and reached for the water jug, filling a cup and pressing it to Thorin's lips. This time the dwarf drank without protest and gladly, and lay back with a heavy sigh as Bilbo put the cup aside again.
"How do you feel?" the hobbit asked, checking Thorin's brow just to make sure the fever really was gone.
Thorin groaned. "I'll live."
"Well, you had better, because I spent enough time trying to keep you alive," Bilbo told him.
A very small smile quirked the side of Thorin's mouth. "I mostly remember you yelling abuse and drowning me with soup."
"It worked, didn't it?" Bilbo inquired with false indignation, folding his arms over his chest. "No one else seemed willing to tempt your anger. You might have died without me."
Thorin closed his eyes, that small smile still on his face. "Thank you," he whispered after a long time.
"What was that?" Bilbo asked teasingly.
Thorin turned back to glare at him. "I won't say it again."
Bilbo smiled this time and adjusted the blankets around Thorin's shoulder and stood up. "I'll leave you to get some rest."
Thorin caught his wrist as he was about to go away. "Really Bilbo. Thank you. I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't come on this journey."
"I could still fail," Bilbo said quietly.
Thorin shook his head. "No, because I believe in you."
Bilbo felt a warmth enter his heart at that and smiled as Thorin's eyes closed again and he seemed to drift off into a deep sleep.
If even that stubborn old dwarf could believe in a small hobbit, then Bilbo certainly could believe in himself. He turned back to look at Thorin's sleeping form one more time before he left the room and closed the door behind him, going to tell the others the good news.