Wisdom Without Words
Summary: Thorin is forced to bring a young Fili to a council meeting. All does not go as expected for obvious reasons.
A/N: This plot bunny came to me as I was watching the news yesterday morning and seeing a similar situation with a congressman who brought his grandchild with him to a hearing in which he was being grilled with questions and what not. The little one wasn't too keen on being ignored so the congressman had to quiet her down by putting her in his lap as he turned to answer a question and oddly enough it worked! Obviously too cute for me to pass up here ^^. So the first half of this scene is inspired by that.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. I make no profit from this. All are sole property of the Tolkien estate, the original creator J.R.R. Tolkien, and Christopher Tolkien.
Bring a child to a council meeting, she said.
He can entertain himself, she said.
He won't make a peep, she said.
Thorin sulked in his seat, biting the inside of his lip in frustration and cursing his sister for forcing the babe onto him. Why his brother couldn't take care of the boy instead was apparently beyond his comprehension. This was an important meeting, albeit a dull and insufferably boring one, but one that needed his full attention. He was heir to the throne after his father and needed to behave as such.
A soft cooing reached his ears.
He looked down underneath the table of the war room and spied Fili tossing his stuffed dragon around by the tail. He had a beaming smile on his face as he threw the toy creature against the ground and then against Thorin's leg. When the child looked up and saw his uncle looking at him he smiled even brighter and hid his face behind his hands, giggling loudly. The sound and the sight of the child warmed his heart, much as he was loathe to admit it, but he didn't dare let it show.
He had the sudden urge to nudge the boy with his foot, but he quickly stamped that thought out for fear of encouraging him.
The conversation above the table paused for a brief moment before continuing. His father, seated across from him, was looking at him with a raised brow, but turned away and said nothing. His grandfather, at the head of the table, barely even noticed beyond the thin attention he gave their displeased guests. More than a few times he caught his grandfather beginning to nod off, and though he couldn't blame the older dwarf, he still felt a little embarrassed. In the end, Thorin chose to follow his father's example just to keep up the sake of appearances, by sitting up straight and keeping his face as impassive as possible.
With a little dwarfling at his feet attacking him with a stuffed dragon.
The emissaries from Dale went on and on about town security as they always did on a weekly basis. And they had a right to it considering they were one of the main providers to Erebor's coffers. Jewels and craftsmanship didn't sell themselves after all. Demand had to be kept high. And moods had to be pacified and smoothed over. Last week it was the slight threat of larger warg pacts in the coming winter. The week before that it was possible sightings of orcs despite contrary evidence. Now they were going on about smugglers bringing in false merchandise and selling it at a far cheaper rate for their own quick benefits.
If Thorin had any say in the matter, he'd dismiss it entirely. It was ridiculous to even place blame in such a trivial problem. If people wanted quality, they ought to expect to pay the proper price and be done with it. But then again, he wasn't king. And at the moment he was a little thankful for it. Erebor was by no means dependent upon anyone for commerce and survival, and if matters came to it Thorin thought Erebor would do well enough to get by on her own, and then some.
But there was tradition to uphold, and futures to secure by keeping such traditions.
The stuffed dragon flew out of Fili's hand when he threw it against Thorin's leg again. The boy whined and crawled over to retrieve it, looking up at his uncle with a smile of victory when it was again in his possession. "Aaaaaaaah," his nephew mimicked of his favorite toy, ending with a giggle and returning to his offensive against his uncle.
One of the Dale elders shook his head and rolled his eyes while the eldest one of the trio just huffed and continued to talk, changing his volume when necessary to be heard over the child under the table.
"Demand just cannot keep up with the prices you charge, my lord," one Dale elder was pleading. "The want will soon diminish if the prices are not dropped-"
"And yet," Thror interrupted, annoyed and tired. "Your people continue to flock to these men who choose to make their jewels instead of mining for them. I fail to find where sense has been mislaid on the part of my people and the daily dangers they put themselves in to feed the want of your own people."
"Perhaps," another younger emissary suggested. "If costs were cut elsewhere to compensate for the loss in price?"
"There will be no loss in value to warrant such a change," Dain said, sitting forward with a stern face. "As the value of our precious gems have not depleted in our eyes nor the eyes of the people you say vie for them so. To even suggest lowering the price is equal to insult to the people of Erebor and our miners."
"Where would you even suggest we take such costs for compensation," Thrain asked, holding a hand up to calm Dain's growing temper.
"The borders of these lands are well provided for and secure, are they not, my Lord Thorin?"
Thorin blinked as the full attention of the room suddenly turned onto him. He opened his mouth to respond, but was cut short by his nephew. Fili grabbed hold of his boot and tried to haul himself to his feet, but couldn't quite manage it and started to get upset.
Thorin reached down with his hand to keep the boy on the floor and pacify him, but Fili grabbed onto his hand and tugged, whining again and again and looking at him with those wide innocent eyes. Thorin gave the boy a warning look and tried again to answer the question posed to him, but Fili persisted and started to whimper like he was about to cry. With an inward sigh, and ignoring how that sound tugged at his heart, Thorin grabbed the squirming boy under the arms and hoisted him up onto his lap. The child instantly quieted down and looked around the room with wide curious eyes.
"To answer your question, my lord," Thorin continued without further pause. "Our borders at present are secure. Though in our last meetings have you not asked for more security for the coming winter?"
The sour-faced man who suggested it sputtered as the two next to him frowned and looked away. "W-well, yes of course, but-"
Fili cooed and reached for the set of border patrol reports in front of Thorin. Thorin pushed it out of his reach, which the boy didn't like one bit. He started whining again, louder this time and slapping his hands against the table. Thorin felt his face redden a little under the attention of the entire room, but one look over to Balin who was failing to hide his own smile helped make up his mind. To pacify the noisy nephew in his lap, and perhaps to stir the pot with these insufferable men just a little more, Thorin grabbed the stuffed dragon at his feet, while the elder was still trying to piece together his words, and waved it in front of Fili's enraptured face, turning his complete attention away from the men and their complaints.
The boy grabbed onto the creature with satisfied glee and quickly started whipping the dragon's head against the table by the tail with a soft, barely-audible thump. Thorin leaned forward and whispered encouraging words in Khuzdul in the child's ear lowly so none other would hear them. Perhaps it might have been out of protocol to even utter them in the presence of an outsider, but the happiness it inspired in his nephew at finally getting some affectionate attention deemed it worthy enough to him. Thorin would endure the lecture from his father later.
The sour-faced man cleared his throat rather loudly, none to pleased with being ignored.
"Yes, my lord," Thorin said, as if placating two children in the room, and having only the time for the one in his lap.
The elder huffed and sat back with a stern look. "Are we really to entertain this nonsense?"
Thorin's eyes narrowed and finally turned back on the man at the other end of the table. He answered without missing a beat, nor changing the calm inflection of his tone as he'd been taught since childhood. "What nonsense can your lordship be referring to?"
"This is surely no place for children, my lords," the surly elder exclaimed. "In Dale, such a thing would not be permitted nor even considered!"
"Does my nephew's presence offend you," Thorin asked, wordlessly daring the elder to dig his grave deeper.
"No, no, my lord Thorin-" one lord tried to interject, but the other elder was having none of it. He puffed himself up, straightened his expensive robes and sat at his full height, which wasn't that far above Thorin's grandfather, who wasn't exactly the tallest dwarf in the room either.
"My lord, this is a council meeting of elders. We have many more important items to discuss-"
Discuss? That was a riot.
"-at hand that require vital attention and immediate decisions than play nursemaid to an infant who should be with his mother or in the cradle where he rightfully belongs. Time for such childish displays is time wasted and poorly chosen! And as I understand he is not even your heir, my lord Thorin, so I fail to understand why the child was even brought here in the first place-"
Thorin's face began to flame again, but this time it was not out of embarrassment, but anger and indignation. He dared a glance at his father and grandfather who wore equal looks of fury and felt satisfaction that he was not alone in wanting to throttle the old man sitting at the other end of the too-long table. To belittle the presence and existence of a child, a dwarfling who just might be heir to the throne one day and was more precious than any singular gem in all of Erebor, was dangerous territory.
Especially for dwarves.
In Thorin's mind it was enough to warrant being thrown out of the mountain by that ridiculously jeweled collar.
"Now, if we might return to more pressing matters, there is still the issue of these prices to absolve."
Before the King, Thorin's father, or Thorin himself could speak a word, Fili responded for them.
By blowing the loudest raspberry Thorin thought he'd ever heard.
And when he looked down at the child in shock, Fili had an epic stink face for a child who smiled nearly every hour of every day since he'd been born.
Before Thorin could even begin to think of how to respond in the wake of his nephew's reaction he heard the low rumble of his grandfather's laughter growing, followed shortly by his father, then by Balin who tried unsuccessfully to hide his own snickering behind coughing. Thorin felt a smug smile tug at his own lips as the roaring laughter echoed throughout the room, to which Fili smiled and joined in on, happily bouncing up and down on his uncle's knee.
The elders of Dale wore distinct looks of offense and bewilderment, and once the laughter in the room calmed down at the repeated bequests of the men, they got the answer Thorin had been wanting to give them since this endless one-sided conversation began.
"I believe my grandson has just spoken wisdom that surpasses your own," Thrain said with a smug face. "Lord Elder of Dale."
The surly old man scowled and pushed back his chair with a loud screech of wood against stone. Thorin paid none of the old men any attention as they stormed out of the room with threatening promises of retribution in their next meeting. But Thorin wasn't worried. Without Erebor, Dale was defenseless, and men who chose to live in the open air tended to have more foolish notions in their blood than dwarves who knew when to seek refuge and keep their heads covered. The outcome today suited Thorin just fine, because it meant relief to his throbbing headache.
Thorin looked down at Fili who was laying back against his chest and laid a soft kiss on the top of his soft head of blond hair. The boy turned his face up and smiled, open mouthed and a wordless exclamation of amusement.
"A-dah," Fili babbled.
And then, completely defenseless as he gazed upon his nephew, Thorin was hit with a face full of stuffed dragon.