Princess Dis was very, very happy that neither Tauriel nor Kili were down here to greet the new arrivals to Erebor. It wasn't that Hedal Stonebrace was difficult to find, it was the dwarfling she was carrying that would have stopped their hearts. At first glance, it certainly stopped hers.

The dwarfling was adorably looking around with wide gray-blue eyes, with soft brown curls teasing his forehead as he watched all the commotion of the arriving dwarves. The baby's small mouth was open with curiosity as he clutched tightly to Hedal's cloak for safety.

Dis' eyes narrowed. Even though her mind told her that this little dwarfling was far too old to have been conceived before Kili had taken his leave, her heart almost froze for a moment. Mentally she thanked the Maker that her elfish daughter-by-marriage was nowhere in sight.

Suddenly Dis spun, looking around. Who was here? Was Tauriel really staying away? She slowly relaxed as she didn't spy the tall she-elf anywhere. Still, it would be better to get that dwarfling back to his mam and out of Hedal's arms before any rumors started.

Dis made her way through the crowd over to the Stonebrace clan, moving in and out of the confusion of new arrivals returning to their ancestral home. There was laughter and tears and a great deal of awe. She stopped next to the rather ordinary looking dam. Pretty, but nothing that elevated her to true beauty. Looking at the younger dwarrowdam, Dis remembered the small kindnesses and gestures the lass had made to others in their community over the years. She was fond of Hedal, always had been. Dis even felt that the lass might be prettier than the far-too-slender she-elf her son had married. Still. That was where Kili's heart lay and as his mother she'd make sure of his happiness. Truthfully, Tauriel was growing on her as well.

"Lady Dis?" Hedal had turned, her face flushed and smiling. The young dwarfling in her arms hid his face in her braids.

"Who do you hold here?" Dis asked, pitching her voice toward welcoming friendliness and polite curiosity.

Hedal beamed. "My cousin's child, Decther." The lass' eagerness in looking around Dis, and her disappointment in not finding a certain face, betrayed her.

"Do you hope to find him seeing you with a child and thinking he might want a family?" The words came out too bluntly and Dis wished she could take them back as Hedal went white and then a furious red. Even so, her reaction was evidence enough. "Oh lass."

"Decther was getting heavy for his mam." Hedal whispered, her face still looking downwards, unable to match Dis' gaze. "That's all."

"We need to chat." Dis said, not unkindly.

"I really don't expect anything." Hedal gestured toward another dwarrowdam, passing the young dwarfling back to his mother with some reluctance. "I know it isn't possible."

"Hedal, Kili is already married." Best to get it over with quickly. Dis ushered the dam over to the side, calling for some wine. "I'm sorry. I really am, I didn't know how you felt."

Hedal sat on a bench looking wan and shaky, her hazel eyes almost pleading. "He spoke of me?" She said with some small hope.

Dis nearly moaned, not wanting to hurt the poor dam. "It's very complicated." She allowed, "he thinks well of you. But the marriage, it's done."

A rise in voices and general noise drew Dis' attention. Arriving livestock and wagon goods. She saw Fili arrive and take charge and she nodded to herself. Her lion, so strong and bright, he was a fitting heir to her brother.

"The Silverstone dam will make him happy." Hedal appeared to be putting a brave face on things.

Thinking of Fili, Dis nodded in agreement. Who would have thought such a thing possible? Kili's former betrothed falling in love with Fili, and he with her. Still, at that meeting there had been a stiffness between them that was new. Wait. She turned back toward Hedal. "No, oh, sorry. No. Kili married following his heart. Not Silverstone."

"His heart?" Hedal sounded lost, her mind trying to fill in the possible gap. "Kili married, but not to the Silverstone dwarrowdam?"

Dis straightened as she heard some more raised voices. "Damn it. The Coldtoes and the Mikkenstones are feuding again? I thought that long settled!"

Hedal caught at Dis's hands as the princess started to stand up. "Please, whom did Kili wed?"

Dis looked down at the face full of misery, then over at the escalating argument between two clan elders. "Hedal, there's no easy way of telling you but there is no secret. Kili fell in love with a she-elf of the Mirkwood. They pledged their hearts and their lives together and are very, very happy. The elves have differing traditions than do Dwarves, naturally. We will need you to give a quit-claim on Kili, though he was never really yours legally."

"He was …"

Dis' eyes sharpened on the younger lass. "No. Darling. Whatever you shared, it's over and done. Kili married and you must move on as well. You knew before he left that he wasn't to be yours and I'm sorry for bruising your feelings. You're a good dwarrowdam and a good friend to this family."

"Friend …"

Dis' shoulders relaxed as she stooped down to kneel in front of Hedal, taking both her hands in her own. Rubbing some warmth into those hands, Dis felt bad for how this conversation was going. She was mucking it up, but there was no good way to deliver such news. "Kili sees you, has always seen you, as a good friend."

"Me too." Hedal tried to smile, failing but trying.

"Kili has fallen in love with the other half of his soul." Dis said, deliberately using a Dwarven turn of phrase from their tales of grand romances. "He wants you happy, and he cares for you, but he is not meant to be your mate."

"He never was." Hedal admitted, squeezing Dis' hands back, nodding to show she understood. "He was always promised to another. I understand."

"Good." Dis hesitated. Behind her she could hear more raised voices, but cutting through that was Fili's angry bellow. She needed to find out what was going on, but she couldn't neglect the poor lost soul in front of her either. "Lass. Get settled and come find me. We will discuss your future and find something that suits you, whatever you need to be happy."

Hedal nodded and Dis handed her a handkerchief. "I have to help out with this mess, but we will meet and all will be better, I promise. You are a friend to this family and we will not forget that."

Dis turned and took about a dozen steps before suddenly stopping. Looking to her left, and up, she sighed. "How much of that did you hear?" She asked of Tauriel.

The red-haired lass did not pretend to misunderstand. "Most. I have good hearing. She …she wasn't what I expected."

Dis looked back at where she'd been, but found Hedal had already moved to rejoin her clan. She looked back up into a sympathetic gaze. "She is no threat to you."

"No." Tauriel agreed, gently licking her bottom lip. "She, she really cares about Kili doesn't she?"

"He loves you." Dis said quietly.

Tauriel brushed off the remark even as she nodded. "No, I wasn't looking for reassurance, not again. I have been blind in my jealousy. Kili said she was a friend, and I have no doubt he sees her that way. But Jalessa was right, this isn't the sort of dwarrowdam to sleep with someone she's not in love with, is she?"

Dis didn't want to agree but also couldn't lie, not on this. "I wasn't sure until I saw her again today. I don't know how I didn't see, but she loves him." She waited to see how the she-elf would react, a bit nervous actually.

"Over the years I have seen friends, some wanting more and others not. I …how is it that I suddenly feel sorry for this poor dwarrowdam? I should hate her." Tauriel said, sounding a bit lost.

"No. Hedal loves him, but it will never grow to true love unless he returned her feelings. Without feeding a flame, it dies out or starves. What you and Kili share is very special, and you have no rivals for his heart."

"I really don't, do I?" Tauriel seemed chagrinned as she gave a sad smile. "I have made a big thing out of these quit-claims, and I shouldn't have."

Dis opened her mouth to agree, but thought better of it. "You were following your Elvish ways of looking at things. No matter what is said, there is no fault in that. The fact that you can see now that Kili's past is no threat to your lives together, is all to the good." She said charitably, finding that while soothing her daughter-by-marriage, she was also telling the truth. "We will get the quit-claims for King Thranduil. You and Kili concentrate on making me a grandmother."

Tauriel's face flushed becomingly under the teasing of the princess. That's when Dis realized that a small crowd had gathered around them, including the Mikkenstone and Coldtoes clans. "My daughter-by-marriage." She gestured toward the taller she-elf. "Wife of Prince Kili of Erebor. It's a good match. Tauriel, daughter of the Mirkwood, now my daughter and of Erebor."

Tauriel gave a short curtsey as murmurs started up all around them. No one seemed to know quite what to say, but the fact that she was openly accepted by Princess Dis of the Line of Durin went a long way.

Though in the back, a dwarrowdam watched and wondered.

o.o.o.o.o

Kili walked into his rooms expecting to find his wife dressing for dinner with the family. He liked timing his arrivals to find her either sponging off or in the middle of putting on clothing. It thrilled him to have the right to come home to such a sight, and to participate. He grinned.

Though what he found was a dimmed room. The hearth held a fire, but it was banked and there was a silken screen pulled in front of it so that it only cast off a minimum of light. There were no lit lanterns, only candles. Dozens upon dozens of candles.

Kili's eyebrows shot up and he carefully sniffed the air. "Not all these candles could be scented, or I'd not be able to breathe." He commented, though he wasn't sure exactly as to the whereabouts of his lovely spouse.

"Really? That's what you're going to say right now?" Came the sultry voice of the she-elf who held his heart.

Kili turned with a grin and then nearly tripped over himself as she stood there partially wrapped in a silken robe of royal purple. The garment framed her pearlescent skin but was open at the throat all the way to her navel where a belt hung loosely knotted. Her curves weren't overly abundant, but were firm and luscious and he was seeing a lot of them. The silk material of the robe teased both his eyes and her flesh, drawing a response from her nipples that had them standing at attention. Kili's palms began to sweat and his pants no longer fit, making him highly uncomfortable in only the very best of ways.

Tauriel stepped toward him and as she did the robe parted all the way up to that same belt, giving him an excellent view of his wife's very, very, long leg.

Kili moaned and sank to his knees, only to get an ever better look at the shadows created within the robe as Tauriel neared him. He sniffed again, taking in the delicious scent of his she-elf and the lavender of her soap. Her fingers found the clasps of his tunic, loosening them quickly. He raised his arms and she pulled the heavy leather free of his body.

While Tauriel was busy with the leather, Kili took advantage and leaned in closely. His nose and face pushing past the thin shield of her robe and making her squeal, a sound that delighted his senses. He'd made that sound come out of her and his heart nearly burst with pride and longing.

Kneeling, he was too low to easily reach his main goal, but he bent enough to reach the back of her knees and she huffed and made another wonderful sound that pulled a grin from deep within him. She pushed on his shoulders, but Kili wasn't going anywhere, not until he was ready.

He could hear her breathing become more and more ragged as he licked and nibbled at the backs of her knees. Her hands had to find his shoulders for purchase and support in order to keep from falling.

"Kili, love, please …."

He loved the sound of her pleas. His hands travelled upwards to her thighs though he kept his mouth at the knees. She hit him, balling a fist against his shoulder. He bit her on the back of one knee in retaliation. She nearly came apart on him. He loved it.

"Kili!" Tauriel was tugging on him now, her breathing reduced to panting.

Instead of moving up her body, he wrapped his arms around her knees and lifted, standing. In a precarious balance, she clutched at his head as he blindly found the way to their bed, tossing her down.

The robe parted, though the belt was still in place, it held nothing back. Tauriel's red hair spread out behind her like a rich curtain and her green eyes near glowed in the light of the candles. She held out her hand to him.

Kili grinned and lifted one of her feet. She protested until he put his mouth on her ankle and trailed a line of nibbling kisses up the inside line of her leg. She whimpered when he reached her thigh and then screamed when he went higher.

"Kili please!"

"You started this." He muttered darkly, burying his face in her essence and making his Tauriel yelp out his name over and over again.

Several hours later the last of the candles guttered out, leaving the room in near darkness. Only the banked glow from the hearth softened

Tauriel's skin was dewy with perspiration, her robe lost somewhere in the darkened room, though strangely enough the silken belt tie was still about her waist. Kili leaned in and lapped leisurely at her belly while her hair carded through his hair. He wasn't much better off, nude except, he thought, for a single woolen sock.

"Love?" He asked a wealth of questions with that one word.

"I am your love." She responded warmly, wrapping one of those delightfully long legs back around him.

He waited. He waited for her to ask him about Hedal's arrival today, not that he'd seen her. Jalessa's words had made him wonder about his feelings, and the other lass' as well. He'd not set out to see Hedal today, instead busying himself with kingdom business. He waited for the question of whom he'd learned from that led to tonight's wonderful events. No one. He'd only ever done that with her. Would she believe him? Her declaration of trust and love earlier had been grand, but what about now, when they were alone.

"I think you tore my robe."

Kili tutted his tongue and shook his head, rubbing his hair against her side. "I ripped it off of you, but I didn't hear the material tear."

"Good." She fell silent.

Kili waited several long moments, then waited even more. Finally he rolled, propping his chin on her hip. "You're really not going to ask."

"I don't need to anymore." She said. "And I'm sorry."

Kili smiled, turning his head enough to kiss the bone of her pelvis pointing down to a shadow that beckoned him on further. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I ever gave you cause not to trust me." Not that he could have known he would love and marry an elf.

She laughed, rolling up on top of him, her knees on either side of his chest. Tauriel looked down at him before sliding down his body to meet a certain part of his anatomy that was rising to the occasion. She slid over him, throwing back her head as she took him inside, squeezing him hotly with her body.

Kili yelped this time, then moaned long and loud.

"You have nothing to be sorry about. I realize that." She said as he reached up to cup her breasts, running thumbs over the peaks in a silken move. "But Kili, as much as I feel sorry for her, I have to let you know, I really don't want her close to us. It's not fair to me, or to her. It would hurt us both."

Kili said nothing for a while, his brain shorting out trying to focus on the words while his hands were busy trying to get her to pick up the pace of her hips as she rode him up and down. Tauriel felt sorry for Hedal, since when? But she'd never lied to him, not ever. Those thoughts vanished as she started moving faster, drawing him up tighter and tighter until he could take no more and rolled Tauriel onto her back.

She made begging little noises at the back of her throat as Kili staked his claim on her body and her heart. Her long, long legs wrapped around him urging him on harder until they both fell over the edge into oblivion.

Both came too about the same time, clinging to one another in a sweaty pile of limbs and hair. She laughed and tried to sit up, only to draw up short as he was lying on a large section of long red hair.

They laughed and petted and scooted until he was sitting with his back against the headboard, and she was leaning on his chest.

"So. Whatever you want, it's yours. On a mithral platter."

She pinched him. Hard.

Kili jumped lightly, swatting her hip though it turned into more of a caress.

"Tonight was to show you that I trust you completely, not to ask for anything." She poked him, though not hard this time.

"I like trust." He murmured suggestively. "I like it a lot."

"But if I had someone around who loved me romantically, even if I didn't return the feeling, would you care to have them around me?"

Kili frowned in the darkness, then sighed. "No." He admitted with some reluctance. "Truthfully, I wouldn't. I just, she's a friend."

Tauriel listened to him, and to his heartbeat. "Then whatever you decide, I will endeavor to live with."

Kili gave her a long hug, saddened. Because he knew, friend or not, he wasn't going to hurt his wife by keeping Hedal close to him. He needed to talk this over realistically. His mind went from dwarf to dam and back again, then sighed. "I'll speak with Bilbo tomorrow." He promised.

o.o.o.o.o