Chapter 1
9 January TA 2942
Thorin Oakenshield, restored King Under the Mountain, stopped in his tracks. A tic tugged at the skin beneath his left eye. Mahal, they grow more brazen by the day, he fumed to himself. Whilst his back was turned – with him still in the room! - the furniture had been moved. The desk that had been situated against one wall now sat two meters from it, and the chair he'd left haphazardly abandoned was now tucked neatly beneath the desk's wooden surface, its back to the wall.
His fingers crumpled around the missive he'd been reading from Dain as his ire grew. The untidy mess of parchments and records that had been strewn across the desk's cluttered surface now sat in neat piles. Likely sorted by subject, he groused. The mug he'd nursed through the chilly morning hours once more steamed where it sat upon—
His head reared back. By Durin, was that a doily?
Thorin rubbed one palm down his face, his hand clenching around one of his braids at the end of the gesture. If he thought it would help, he would beat his head against the wall. He did not have time for this. Erebor was a right mess with walls and even stairs crumbled throughout its sprawling belly. Any necessities that had been left behind by the dwarves who had fled decades before were moth-eaten, moldy, or so decayed that they fell to dust at a touch. His dwarves and the men who had sought refuge during the winter months with them were lacking in so many things…yet here sat a doily.
That something or someone – his gaze flicked towards the closed door – could move among Erebor's residents unseen disturbed him greatly. He cared not that the interloper had thus far acted only to aid them. Without knowing what it was, Thorin's nerves were stretched to the breaking point. How could he protect his people from something that refused to be seen?
Thorin tossed the wadded-up piece of parchment onto the desk's surface. Since the Company's secret foray into the blighted land of Faerie two weeks before, such interference hounded not only his dwarves, but the men of destroyed Lake-town, too. He'd been instructed to expect the Nazgûl to walk among them for a time, likely invisible to the naked eye and wreaking terrible fear upon them all, but he was hard-pressed to believe that the undead creatures described to him by Radagast the Brown would slink through his Halls fixing and cleaning.
What, then, was the source of this? The men whispered that his Halls were haunted. Haunted. He bristled at the notion. No, there was another explanation, and one directly linked to Faerie. When he and his select group had returned to Erebor, they must have unwittingly brought something with them.
The question was what.
"Show yourself," he demanded, scanning the room. With fists on hips, he watched for signs of movement. "You've naught to fear," he said, attempting to gentle his voice even as his temper burned hotter.
Nothing. Like the handful of times he'd spoken before, his summons yielded no results. It was maddening.
A rap upon the door ended his efforts to draw the creature out. "Come," he snapped.
The door eased open, and his younger nephew's dark head poked into view. "Is this a bad time?" Kíli asked, brows high.
Thorin shook his head, one hand dismissing his concern. "No more than any other these last weeks," he grumbled.
Kíli's lips twitched. As ever when discussing their new "guests", his nephew responded with delight. "What did she do?" he asked, his dark eyes rushing through the room. Dressed in his travel clothes, his bow and quiver upon his back, Kíli looked to have been preparing to venture into the snowy world outside Erebor's gates to add to their larder.
Before Thorin responded, his nephew crossed the room. "The desk is moved," his ever-observant nephew proclaimed.
Thorin folded arms before him. "I noticed," he said in a dry voice. Then, "She?"
Kíli smoothed one hand across his short beard, dark eyes twinkling. "Has to be a she."
"Because we lack sufficient ladies upon which to exercise your glib tongue?" Thorin dead-panned.
Kíli shot him an assessing glance before waggling a finger in his direction. "Now you sound like Fíli, Uncle." Kíli shook his head and calmly informed him, "I heard one giggle."
"Giggle?" Thorin pounced. When had this happened?
Kíli leveled a look upon him that Thorin had not seen since Dís had last dressed him down for some infraction. "If you were kind to them, you might know more."
Kind? To interlopers? "I am polite," he said between gritted teeth.
Kíli's lips quirked. "That, Uncle, I doubt." He continued his inspection of the room. "Despite your rudeness, it looks like someone is taking care of you."
Rudeness? Thorin scowled at his nephew. They were besieged by invisible creatures, and Kíli labeled it rude to question. Thorin little trusted one who would hide in so cowardly a manner, female or not. "Did you come merely to berate me, or was there a point to this visit?" Striding to his desk, he ripped the chair out of the way before shoving the heavy piece of furniture to its former position.
"Stomping about, snorting like a riled bull… Don't you think you are overreacting?"
"Overreacting?" Mayhap it was time to once more attempt to stuff some reason into his nephew's head. Give him a female, imaginary or otherwise, and he loses all sense. Leaning upon the desk, he crossed his arms and glowered. "What part of unknown, invisible intruders do you not understand? We know not what it is we host, nor do we know its intentions."
"Whatever her intentions might be, she cleans, Uncle." Kíli crossed his own arms with exaggeration and a mocking scowl. "Freeing up our own people to focus upon more pressing needs."
Mahal. Convincing Kíli that their new arrivals might harbor ill will was akin to convincing Bombur that food was unnecessary.
A second knock upon his door saved Kíli from another lecture. "Enter," Thorin called out.
Fíli strode through the door with Dwalin's new second-in-command at his heels, a dwarf formerly of the Iron Hills. "Uncle, enough is enough. Ríkin tells me that now it is not just homes being affected. Every bed within the infirmary has been moved exactly as the others."
Kíli laughed, collecting Thorin's warmed beverage and tossing it back before Thorin could warn him off.
"That beverage was tampered with, Nephew," Thorin said.
Fíli's brows drew together with concern, but Kíli winked at them.
His temper pricked further at Kíli's refusal to listen, Thorin concentrated upon his heir and Ríkin. Fíli, Thorin observed with satisfaction, saw the inherent danger of their situation. His blond nephew stared hard at his brother, his face devoid of its normal humor. The newcomer beside Fíli stood with large forearms folded before his chest, his prematurely gray hair and beard silent testament to the Ironfist blood running through his veins. The dwarf was only a decade older than Fíli, yet not a strand of brown or black hair remained upon his head or within his full beard.
"Has there been any sighting of our culprit?" Thorin asked them.
"Nay," Ríkin answered, the glower upon his scarred face deepening. Like many of them, Dwalin's second in command bore wounds from the Battle of Five Armies. That he remained such a fierce warrior with one eye clouded from the rake of a warg's claws across his left cheek impressed Thorin. The dwarf was not easily swayed from his chosen path. Where many would have left the life of a warrior with such a weakness, Ríkin had trained hard to overcome his new limitation. "Not one sign. 'tis unnatural, my king."
"Unnatural?" Kíli objected.
Thorin lifted a hand, a silent command to quiet. Kíli grumbled but subsided. "You spoke with Lord Bard?" he addressed to his heir.
Fíli shook his head. "Not as of yet. To tell the truth, I hoped we would determine this all to be Kíli's doing."
"Oi!" Kíli objected.
Fíli grinned tiredly. "You must admit, Brother, some of these stunts seem like something you would pull."
Kíli rolled his eyes. "Cleaning houses? Sweeping the floor?" His eyebrows wagged. "Do I look foolish?"
Thorin smirked as Fíli swallowed his response with difficulty.
Kíli's hands found his hips. "Oi! From my own brother."
"Check with Lord Bard," Thorin said. Fíli acknowledged the order with a dip of his head. Changing focus, "Double the guard," he told Ríkin, receiving an abrupt nod of the gray-haired dwarf's head in return. Thorin's hand whipped up again to silence Kíli. "Have our people scour unused portions of the kingdom," he said after a pause.
"Aye. It will be done as ye say," Ríkin said.
Thorin returned to his desk as his nephews and his junior captain departed. Though the dwarves and men residing in the mountain had necessities, and he admitted to himself the creatures had aided them much by adding to their supplies, there was a list as long as the Lonely Mountain was tall that needed doing. The mines had to be reopened. Thus far, they'd sufficed with the ore left behind when Smaug had claimed the mountain, but in their bid to supply the men with the tools they lacked – everything from simple needles to farming plows for the coming spring – the stockpile dwindled fast. They had no wool or animal skins but what the men had brought with them or their hunters managed to supply. In fact, had it not been for the tenuous accord with the elves, the little Erebor's combined hunters managed to trap each day would scarce feed the children among the men. That only the elves' provisions kept the rest of them fed this winter was a bitter brew to swallow.
Accord there might be between elves and dwarves, but it still rankled.
Dipping quill into ink, he scratched out quick orders, praying all the while that if the Ringwraiths had arrived to spy upon them in hopes of ferreting out the location of the Ring or Daphne, they'd not be able to read the Khuzdul glyphs he used. While he held little doubt but that their troubles were Faerie-related, he'd leave no stone unturned. Thorin walked to the door, opening it to find a young adolescent of the race of men loitering outside, a habit Bard encouraged to aid in coordinating their efforts. The teen straightened. "Tad, I need you to rush this to Ori for me. Can you do that?"
The tow-headed boy nodded, his shoulders pulling back. "Yes, sir. I saw him aiding Master Bombur in the kitchens earlier."
Thorin paused in handing over the message. "The kitchens?"
The boy bobbed his head in the affirmative. "They were rearranged last night."
Mahal. Bombur would not be pleased. He watched the youth scurry off and closed the door behind him.
OoOoOo
Ori scanned Thorin's note without surprise while behind him, Bombur's muttered complaints abated not a bit. The cook banged pots and pans as he reordered the kitchen back to his preferred arrangement. If the unknown entities haunting their Halls had intended to help, they had severely misjudged this time. Bombur forgave much, but touch his tools or supplies, and the jovial dwarf revealed his formidable, Longbeard temper.
Ori had expected this order to come. He had started digging through Erebor's library five days past in anticipation of it. Like his king, the scholar doubted their new guests originated from Middle Earth, but with all he'd seen since leaving the Blue Mountains, he did not want to assume before doing his research. He quickly took his leave from the riled cook.
Journeying through Erebor's halls to the library took the youngest of the Ri brothers a quarter hour. He smiled as the towering, carved doors came in sight. That the wealth of history stored inside was his province alone – albeit only for the time being – filled him with fierce pride. He dared to hope the families emigrating from the Iron Hills in a few months' time would not include any scholars in their midst.
Ori pulled one of the heavy, stone doors open, then froze, his mouth forming an "O". Stumbling steps carried him over the threshold. The dusty mess he'd barely begun to set to rights had been replaced with order. His head tilted back, bringing the second floor into view. Bookshelves in all directions gleamed. There was no dust. There was no disorder. Tables had been set to right. The floors were pristine, the marble polished to a high shine, and the hundreds of books that had tumbled from a rotted bookshelf to litter the floor had vanished. Returned to their proper abode, he suspected.
A new thought occurred, and he frowned. It was doubtful that their "guests" knew Khuzdul, so the likelihood that the scrolls and books had been ordered properly was slim. If the helpers had crammed books into any available slot, it would take him years to find the wrongly sorted items and undo what they'd done.
Right then and there, Ori decided Dwalin's new second-in-command, Ríkin, had it right: these intruders needed to be rooted out. Ori's ink-stained fingers dredged through his beard, such frustration as he'd never felt before boiling in his veins. "By Durin," he roared, stamping one foot. "If you cannot read, don't be touching my books!"
OoOoOo
Fíli smirked as Bard's frustration rose.
"It is a prank, Prince Fíli," the man proclaimed with exasperation, tossing a parchment onto his desk. "We have enough with which to contend without creating for ourselves ghost stories and bogeymen."
"Fair enough," Fíli said, thumbs tucked around his two sword hilts. "And normally I'd agree."
"But?" the man prodded, one dark brow winging upwards.
"But," Fíli replied, "something or somethings walk our Halls. This is no prank. Of that, I am convinced. There is too much work being done for it to be a jest – none have the time to spare to construct a hoax so elaborate. Too many have heard whispers when in their rooms alone. Dwarves are always up for a good tale-"
Reluctant amusement lit Bard's dark eyes. "Embellished tales."
Fíli's grin flashed. Bard knew that penchant well, having spent many evenings with Bofur. "Embellishing only makes the tale better," he said. His smile faded. "We've found sections of Erebor put into pristine condition ere any of our repair crews arrived."
Bard startled. "They were restored?"
Fíli lifted on hand in denial. "Not repaired, but the streets were swept clean. The walls and structures are free from any dirt. If not for holes in the walls and such, those villages are ready to be resettled." He stepped closer to Bard's desk, one blunt finger tapping its surface in emphasis. "Every piece of moth-eaten fabric or unusable furniture was in a neat pile, ready for someone to come and cart it off."
Bard's dark brows climbed. "Not your typical ghost story."
Fíli folded his arms before him. "That is the truth." From beneath lowered brows, he asked, "Have you ever heard of such a thing? Do the annals of men record any creatures capable or inclined to such acts?" He hoped against hope the man's answer would be an affirmative. Fíli could only surmise one other source for their unexpected influx of invisible helpers, and that was from Thorin's jaunt to the realm of Faerie.
The dark-haired man rubbed his lower jaw before shrugging. "Nothing to my knowledge. If the snows did not have Dale's library buried, I'd suggest we check there, but as it stands…?"
'twas a slim hope, Fíli acknowledged to himself. With a wave, he allowed the man to return to his more-pressing duties, and headed away from the section of Erebor serving as temporary home to the survivors of Lake-town.
OoOoOo
Kíli's grin grew as he detected the sound of feminine singing originating from his quarters. With utmost care, he unlatched the door and poked his head into the room, eyes sweeping across the seating area and hearth nearest the door. His rooms had changed in the few hours he'd been absent, and he could only preen as his assertions were proved. Compliment the unseen helpers, and a dwarf reaped the benefits, for new pieces of furniture graced the room with fur cushions softening their wooden surfaces. His rickety table had been removed, and a solid piece of rich, gleaming wood stood in its place. A lit candle sat in the center of the table, and… Cookies?
He dared to hope his kindred would keep treating their new helpers with suspicion. The more they groused and complained, the better things became for himself. Kíli scratched his bearded chin, self-satisfied. Breathless sniggers shook his chest as he noted the warm fire in his fireplace.
Should he tell Fíli? No, he decided. If his brother refused to listen to him on this matter, he deserved to forgo the royal treatment Kíli enjoyed.
The singing continued uninterrupted, the language unfamiliar. 'twas not elvish. He'd listened to the beautiful Tauriel's voice often enough to know the sound of it when he heard it. What, he wondered, were these ladies? In his mind, he envisioned hobbit-sized elf lasses. They wore shoes – he'd spotted the tracks one had left in her haste to exit a room when one of the Iron Hills dwarves had taken umbrage to her mopping up his spilled ale. By the foot size, he knew them to be small. What people they were, he didn't know, but the idea that they were a hostile force was laughable.
Filching one of the cookies – by Durin, they were good – he tiptoed onward, trailing the cascade of notes towards the bathing chamber. Peeking around the open doorway, he spied more changes. The bent iron wash bin he'd used since they'd regained Erebor had been replaced by a porcelain tub, one big enough to relax in. Towels draped from a wooden chair next to the tub, and a smooth bar of soap rested upon the seat, replacing the crude mash of ash and grease he'd made do with before.
No, he didn't think he would tell Fíli about this.
"Will you not show yourself so I can thank you properly?" he asked.
A gasp and the singing stopped.
Kíli drew up his most charming smile. "These cookies are fabulous, by the way."
OoOoOo
Ríkin slammed the door behind him, hale blue eye hard, and his lips compressed into a white slash. Foiled again. His pride was smarting – aye, it was! Three days since he'd ordered the guard doubled, and still no sign of the interlopers. His anger only escalated upon spying the pristine conditions of the home he shared with his two brothers, a home he'd intentionally ordered left a mess so as to spot one of the thrice-cursed creatures.
"Before you ask, the cleaning bandit struck again," his younger brother commented in a dry voice. With hair the same silvery gray shade of his own, Eikin was the brother Ríkin had most resembled before the warg. His brother held a tankard of frothy ale aloft in silent, if irony-filled, tribute.
"Ye were to watch whilst we were away, Eikin," he grumbled, shucking his thick coat and discarding it upon one of the heavy wooden chairs before the roaring fireplace.
"Aye, and so I did," Eikin protested, his dark blue eyes intent. "I've not moved from our quarters all this long day, I'll have ye know. The front door has only opened once, and that was to allow Thekkin to return for the noonday meal."
Ríkin frowned. If Eikin said he'd not left, then he'd not left. Mahal, what wizardry is this? If not for the fact that the Grey Wizard had departed Erebor weeks before, he'd harbor suspicions that the wizard was involved. He leaned upon the stone mantel above the fireplace, his hand a fist. Mayhap 'twas time for more drastic measures. As the king had pointed out, their intruders had caused no harm – yet, the more cynical side of him tacked on – but as he and Dwalin had discussed, they could not fulfill their duties in protecting Erebor with unknown beings slinking about with apparent ease.
The king was loathe to use hunters' snares, but what else remained to try? 'twas a matter of pride now as well as security. He'd not let this go, though he little relished the idea of hurting one of the creatures if it was benign. Not that it was benign, he grumbled to himself. 'twas not a dwarf, so it had to have questionable intentions. The king might trust in men and hobbits, but Ríkin would not be so foolish.
His brother's swift inhale had him whipping around.
Eikin pointed with his stein. "Look behind you, Brother."
Ríkin's attention followed Eikin's direction. He froze, aghast to find his coat had been whisked away. With him nary three feet from it! "By Mahal," he roared, at his wit's end. 'twas his duty to protect these Halls, yet the rascally creature acted right under his very nose.
Stomping across the room, he swiped his jacket off the coat tree and shoved his arms inside, his full beard somehow getting mixed up in his haste. And – and! – he heard a wee, high-pitched giggle as unseen hands straightened it out. With another roar, he wrenched his coat to him, his eyes blazing as he glared at the empty space around him. With no warning, he reached out, arms sweeping around him in search of the infernal creature. They came up empty, and his face turned red.
Eikin joined him, arms whisking through the air. "'tis unnatural," he muttered.
"Aye," Ríkin grumbled, fists finding his hips.
"What manner of creature could this be?" Eikin asked. "Do you suppose we've attracted more of those Shire-folk?"
Shire-folk? Ríkin barely repressed the eye-roll begging to be let out. "To my knowledge, Brother, that Baggins fellow cannot turn invisible." His frown deepened. Could he?
Eikin fiddled with his braid, his first and only braid. So far, Ríkin thought with a touch of pride, for Eikin showed signs of becoming a jeweler of note. His brother's gray brows descended until only a hint of the blue of his eyes showed. "Could these kind acts be a front?" At Ríkin's lifted brow, his brother continued, "A ruse to lower our defenses."
With a grunt, Ríkin grabbed his weapons, strapping an additional sword belt to his waist and thrusting one of their eldest brother's prized daggers into his boot. Hefting his trusty halberd, he yanked open their front door. "By Mahal, I'm going to find out."
"How?"
"I don't know."