"If she is in Dale, I should like to meet her."
Balin had given Dís a funny look then. While she may not have held the same hatred for the elves that her brother had held, she was most definitely not fond of them, and referred to them in the same derogatory terms that the rest of her race used.
"Balin," she continued, "this woman may be an elf, but she saved my son's life. More than once, from what you say. And if Kíli saw something in her, then perhaps I can see it too."
"I'll make inquiries."
When they finally arrived at the far side of the lake, there was a cart, accompanied by young Ori, waiting for them. The city of Dale bustled all around them. If it were not for the scorched bricks and the ruins here and there, you'd never have believed that just over a year ago, not a single soul lived there, and that none had for almost a full century. It would seem that just about every man, woman and child whose ancestors had fled Dale had returned. It was almost like those faint, distant memories of the festivals put on to celebrate a good harvest or the changing of the seasons or some of the festivals unique to the culture of men that they had been invited to. Almost, but not quite. There was a twinge of sadness to the place. No one in Dale would ever forget dragon fire, or the loved ones they had lost.
Dís felt a certain kinship with the people of Dale, despite being so very different. Many of these people had lost their families because of her brother's blasted quest, as she had. How could anything but shared experiences bring about a better sense of empathy?
It was a two hour trek to the main gates of Erebor (if you could call it a gate; it was really just a massive hole in the side of the mountain where Smaug had exited), and there was a welcoming committee there to greet them.
Your sons should be here to greet you, she thought bitterly. And your brother. Not these strangers. It was unfair, she supposed, to call Dain a stranger; she'd known him most of her life, and he'd always been a kind-hearted and well-meaning dwarf. She simply felt bitter because it should have been her brother there, wearing a crown and smiling at her. She realised this, and mentally chastised herself.
"Welcome Dís, daughter of Thrain, son of Thror," he said kindly, "to your ancestral home. Know that you are to be treated as the royalty you are, and shall want for nothing."
I'll want for my sons, she thought. I'll want for my brother. I'll want for my husband, too. She said none of this, though, and simply smiled back at Dain and thanked him.
The king under the mountain stepped forward and took his cousin by the arm. "I'm so sorry about your sons and your brother," he said softly to her, and Dís could tell by his face that he truly meant it. "It is always such a tragedy when one so young dies."
If anyone in Erebor knew what Dís was going through, it was Dain. Dain and his wife had struggled for many years to bear any children, until finally, and unexpectedly, they produced two children within two years. While the youngest child – a son, Hain – was alive and perfectly well, their daughter had died in a terrible accident when she was only twenty – still a very young child by dwarf standards, and only the equivalent of a ten year old among men – when she had been venturing further from home than she had permission to with some of the other children (not her own sons, thank Mahal), and they had been found not by the guards (unless you count them finding what was left), but by an orc pack. No one liked to think too much about it, but it was a well known fact that orcs will eat anything and everything, and like to play with their food.
"I appreciate your kind words, my lord. It means a lot."
Dís feigned exhaustion after a painfully quiet dinner, and retired to bed. Her room was in the royal chambers, and she was almost certain that it had been her room as a child. It was one of the few parts of the city that didn't have the stink of dragon in it, or the musty stench of dwarves trapped in the city, slowly desiccated in the cool, dry air within. Dís shivered at the thought of how close she came to being one of that number.
When the dragon came, and Thorin was the one taking charge, Dís had been up in the royal chambers with their mother. Thorin was preoccupied getting everyone out, and didn't notice their absence until Frerin went to leave – last one, as usual, and he grabbed him by the shoulder and asked him.
"I thought they were out already!" he said, panic beginning to truly set in. While his older brother, his father, and his grandfather were all preoccupied with the mountain and its treasures, Frerin had always valued his family over all the gold in Erebor. Or at least, he was the only one to do so visibly. Thorin shared his feelings, mostly.
Thorin had simply turned and ran up to the royal chambers. And there he found his sister and his mother. His mother was curled up on the floor, her back to him, dress burnt away to reveal charred, blackened skin. There was a terrible, raspy breathing coming from her, but there was no point in trying to move her; she'd be dead in mere hours.
Dís, on the other hand, was perfectly fine, physically. She was sitting there, pulling at what was left of her mother's skirts, crying, beginning to realise with her childlike logic that her mother was not going anywhere.
"Amad?" she cried out. "Amad, let's go! We have to find Adad, and Grandad, and Thorin and Frerin."
Thorin went up to her, his heart pounding in his ears. All those years of training for battle had never prepared him for the true horrors of this, for trying to explain to his twenty-year-old sister that their mother was going to die, and that they couldn't get her out, and that they had to go now.
"Dís," he said, his voice thick. "we have to go now. And we cannot take Amad."
"But why? Why do we have to go? And why can't we take Amad? And why can't Amad get up?" The word 'up' was dragged out into a full on sob, and Thorin was certain that that was the moment his heart truly broke. He could have survived quite well the loss of Erebor if he hadn't seen that, but seeing his sister – the baby of the family, and an unexpected joy for their parents late in life – trying to get her dying mother to move to safety broke him.
"Amad is badly injured, Dís. She will be dead soon, no matter what we do, and we would never make it out of the mountain alive trying to bring her with us. And she wouldn't want us to get ourselves killed for that."
Dís was silent for a moment before pressing her small lips to her mother's burnt forehead and whispering a sad farewell. She turned to Thorin, eyes full of tears, and ran into his waiting arms. She may have been too big for carrying at that point, but to her big brother, the warrior, she was as light as a feather.
As soon as Dís was safe in his arms, Thorin broke into a run, and made it out of the gates just in time.
Dís grimaced at the memory. She didn't know if, had their roles been reversed, she would have been able to get Thorin out, and for that reason, amongst others, she had always had the utmost respect for her brother.
Dís fell into a restless sleep that night, and was plagued by visions of her family, wounded and covered in blood – both their own, and others' – and woke up in the morning feeling worse than she would have if she had not slept at all.
After a brief breakfast, Dís went to the library. At the main desk, Ori was nearly buried in old scrolls, and was busily transcribing them to preserve the knowledge, for many were nearly destroyed with age. He told her that Balin was in the side office, working away at his own not-inconsiderable mountain of scrolls in peace away from the younger dwarf's chatter. They'd both get more done that way.
Balin's office – which had been his office before Smaug came along as well – was a messy room, filled with books and scrolls on just about every imaginable subject. It had always amazed her how much Balin could remember of the contents of these books and scrolls, having not laid eyes upon them in almost a hundred years. He had only been going grey when they were driven out.
"Have you made inquiries then?"
So absorbed in his work was he that he jumped and smashed a bottle of ink on the floor. Balin swore and went to clean up the mess of broken glass and black ink. That stain would never come out of the rug.
"Don't sneak up on me like that, Dís!" he said, annoyed. "That could have spilt on an important scroll or book, and some of these are the only existing copies!"
"Sorry. But have you?"
"I have. There is an elf goes by the name of Tauriel living and working as a healer in Dale."
"Why do I get the feeling that there's more than that to it?"
"First off, I'd just like to warn you that this may not be the Tauriel we know. For all we know it is a popular name among elves!"
"Balin." There was a distinct tone of warning in Dís's voice; a tone that she'd used frequently as a parent.
"The elf has to wee babies, and the timing adds up so that there's a strong possibility that they're Kíli's."
"K-Kíli's?! I could be a grandmother?! Oh Mahal! I have grandchildren! I'm not old enough to have grandchildren! Kíli wasn't old enough to be having children! Did the person you asked say much about them? Did they give you names? Are they boys, girls, or one of each?"
Balin chuckled and remembered all those years in Ered Luin. It had taken weeks of nagging from Thorin, Fíli, and Kíli to persuade her to let her youngest go. At forty-five, he was just barely considered grown up, and was still very much a child in his mother's eyes. Most dwarves didn't even consider things like marriage and love and a family until they were about twice his age! She may have been in her fifties when she married Víli, but that had been different; Víli was her one, and there was little to no point in putting it off any longer.
"The answer to all three of your questions is 'no, I don't know.' To find that out, my dear, I think you shall have to go to Dale and seek out this elf yourself."
"Thank you, Balin. You've been very helpful. Would you come with me to meet her, if it's not too much trouble? I don't want to do this on my own."
"Of course. We can go this afternoon, if you'd like?"
"That would be great."
Dís wandered off to gather some things. Dwarves may not have been known for their manners, but Dís would never go visiting a new mother without bringing some cake or freshly baked bread. She knew from her own experiences how exhausting and draining looking after newborns could be, and when Kíli was born, she'd got shockingly little sleep, and frequently missed meals simply because she forgot about them. If these children were even a little bit like their father, Tauriel would be run off her feet with them.
Dís met Balin at the gate, carrying a small basket containing one of her lemon cakes. She had never prided herself on very many things, but jewellery making and baking were the two things that she had always excelled at, and anyone who sampled her wares could attest to that.
The chatter as they made their way down the mountain was sparse, and mostly concerned mundane things that need not be repeated about the weather and the like. As they approached Dale, though, Dís grew nervous. She began to worry that Balin's sources may have been mistaken, or that this was a completely different elf who just so happened to have the same name. She rarely allowed herself to get her hopes up, but as they came ever closer to the city, she realised that she had done exactly that regarding this elf and her children.
Balin must have noticed her panic, because he stopped and turned to her. "I know that you're worried that this will all turn out to be a wild goose chase, but I'm nearly certain that this is our elf. She disobeyed her king in coming to help us, so I wouldn't be surprised if she ended up in trouble upon her return to Mirkwood. It's not outside the realms of possibility that she was banished when they found out who the father of her children was."
Dís merely nodded, her face unreadable. She was worried about all that could go wrong with this meeting.
Balin lead her down a narrow street to a building at the very end with a sign outside to say that it was an apothecary and a healer's shop. This was the place. This was where her son's lover lived. It was a charming building, with a freshly painted blue door and window boxes in full bloom. Dís, while not versed in the studies of a healer, was able to recognise some of the plants as being of use in the medicinal sense.
"Shall we go in?" asked Balin, looking over at the dwarrowdam he'd known since she was a newborn. Dís nodded. There was no sense in putting this off forever.
The bell above the door rang as the two dwarves walked in, and an elderly man behind the desk looked up at them. "What can I help you with?" he asked, but both dwarves' attention was elsewhere. They were both entirely focussed on the red-headed elf, fast asleep in a rocking chair in the corner, with a tiny babe in each arm.
