025: Cancer
300 Edition: Thorin is ill.
Dwarves are not susceptible to the ills of Men. Their bodies are strong; their hearts, stout.
What they fear, then, is the illness of mind.
Dragon-sickness, they name it. Gold-lust, think the Men who judge simple avarice to be the dwarves' crippling vice. But they can see no deeper into their ancestral curse. They cannot understand the unseen force that would rend the stoutest of dwarf warriors' hearts.
It consumed Thror, the last mighty King under the Mountain; it drove Thrain mad in his long exile; and now Thorin Oakenshield feels the primal hunger stir within his chest.
He tries to fight it.
But though an oak-branch sits stolid on his arm, his mind is weak. Dark. And the sickness thrives in darkness; it lurks within his blackest memories, taunting him with the glimmer of the Arkenstone.
He cannot sleep. He paces like the caged beast within, but the memories follow him.
The head of mighty king Thror lies before him, evil orc-runes driven into his scalp. Frerin dies in his arms, his armour pierced with arrows. He watches his mother wither away in exile, and Thrain's mind soon follows her into grief. He speaks of lunacy and a glowing stone, and then he speaks no more. The mad king vanishes in the night with a party bound for Erebor, never to be seen again.
Thorin is the last.
The last...
Sometimes, in the late night, in the early hours of morning, he wonders if there's not something he's missing. Sometimes, the shroud of madness lightens and he can almost see them.
Rada. Rada, can you hear me?
Darkness falls again too soon. His face crumples, and he glares at the raven-haired boy who dared lay a hand on his arm.
No... Thorin knows.
He is the last Durin now.