"Do we really have to go on those things?" Bilbo asked, gazing up at the cream pony.

"Yes, they will get us to the Elvengate sooner," Gandalf said swinging himself up onto his own pony.

"There's a lot to be said for walking." Bilbo stated.

"Not enough to be said, my lad. Are you alright getting up there by yourself?" Glóin asked.

"I... I think so, yes. Thank you."

After several failed attempts to scramble up onto the pony, Glóin left his and gave his hobbit-son a lift to reach his saddle. Even when safely settled, Bilbo looked anything but happy at where he was.

"Thanks, Adad."

"No bother," Glóin assured, climbing onto his own beast.

"Are we all together?" Gandalf asked. "Let's see... Thorin's by me.. Dwalin's there with Balin, Fíli and Kíli are beside Óri who's in front of Dori, Nori's with Bofur behind him-"

Dori turned to pin a sharp look upon his brother. Nori grinned ruefully.

"Óin and Bifur are to the left of Dori, Glóin and Bilbo are behind them.. And there's Bombur to their right. Very good. Shall we go on?"

"You should," rasped the familiar voice of Beorn. "Last night, one of my animals told me that he heard there were Orcs, perhaps two days from here. You had best go now before they catch up to you."

"Thank you, Master Beorn," Gandalf replied, patting the neck of his pony. "Farewell to you."

"Good luck in your journey," rumbled the Skinchanger.

As the ponies followed each other on the thin track leading away from Beorn's Halls, Bilbo glanced back, wondering if the Orcs really were as close as they seemed to be.


As the day wore on, Bilbo grew bored. He and Glóin were bunched together in a small group consisting of Bifur, Óin, Nori and Bofur, who were chatting together in the ancient Dwarven language.

"Adad?"

"Hmm?"

"Will you tell me the story?"

"What story?" Glóin asked.

"With you climbing out the windows..?"

There was a mixed chorus of sighs, shouts and laughter.

"I feckin' hate this story." Óin declared, shaking his head.

Bifur snatched his ear trumpet and safely stowed it away inside his coat. Óin grumbled to himself and focused on the road ahead.

"Well," said Bofur as though he was the one asked. "Your old man here hasn't always been a good lad. I mean, he was better than us-" he gestured to himself and Nori, "but he had himself a wild streak."

Ah. So Bofur was telling that story.

"Do you mind if I tell the story now?" Glóin growled, glaring at Bofur with all his might.

"No, you go ahead."

"When I was in my seventies, about seventy eight, seventy nine..."

"You were 77." Bofur said.

"Oh, yes, 77. Well, I'd known Neoma for a good three years. We'd met a few times and all that. Now, I don't know quite how this happened-"

"You know very well how it happened, you sappy old codger." Nori interrupted. "You realised you liked her and decided you had to get in."

"I was.. I was 77! Nobody makes the best decisions of their lives at 77. Anyway, I'd climb out the window to meet up with her. I just had to see her."

"Did you know she was your," Bilbo paused, trying to remember the name. "Your.. One at the time?"

"Aye, laddie. I knew it for certain after we got caught."

"This is my favourite part," Bofur grinned, moving his pony closer.

"She was learning how to be a jeweller. That's her main trade. So we'd go to the forges and talk until the later hours. One night her teacher came back, must have forgotten something and caught us-"

"Kissing," Nori mouthed, beaming unapologetically as Glóin glowered at him.

"Our very first time. It was highly improper because I hadn't asked her to court me. Yet."

"Tell us of when the blacksmith caught you!" Bofur demanded.

"At that point, I decided it was a good time to return home. Neoma thought the same and we split ways. When I got home, I didn't fancy clambering up the wall-"

Bifur snorted.

"-So I thumped on the door and eventually somebody opened it. Then, it turned out that my brother had our cousins over, as he'd discovered I wasn't in bed."

Bofur and Nori hollered with laughter. Bifur could be heard cackling and Bilbo stared at his adad in shock.

What did he say?"

"They said a lot. Livid, they were, though Dwalin softened when he realised I'd met a lady."

"What about Óin?"

"He muttered a lot, clumped me over the head and we made up before morning." Glóin paused. "Though he did insist that I stop climbing out the window."

"I climbed into your bedroom once." Nori reminisced. "Thought it'd be funny to scare him," he explained to Bilbo. "He got such a shock, he gave me a black eye."

"Never sneak up on Glóin is the moral of that story," Bofur summarized for Bilbo.

"I already knew that!"

"And never climb out the window, unless you want a sore head." Nori added.

"Not even then!" Glóin said. "I'll not have any of my children climbing out a window!"

"I daresay your adad thought the exact same thing." Bilbo mused.

Glóin chuckled. "I don't doubt he did. I don't think he could have been any crosser than Óin was that night, though."

"In fairness to him, I'd have been annoyed, finding my little brother had climbed out the window," Bofur said.

"That's because," said Nori,"'e would bring the house down if 'e tried to climb out the window.."

"Take that back," Bofur threatened, "else I'll never again do that thing you like."

"What th-?" Bilbo tried to ask, but was cut off by his adad quickly shushing him.

"Let's go and see Balin, lad." Glóin suggested, glaring daggers at his now rather sheepish-looking friends. "Ere you find out something you shouldn't!"


It felt strange to be setting up camp again after so many days in Beorn's lodging. The Skinchanger had been kind enough to lend them waterskins and makeshift packs filled with rations as well as medicinal herbs that could come in useful in the forest.

"Fíli lad, let me fix your braids." Thorin called, beckoning his nephew over.

Fíli gently tugged one of Kíli's dark locks and went over. Kíli frowned at the ponies he and his brother had been sorting out and looked around, biting his lip. His eyes lit up suddenly, and he called to Bilbo.

"Help me sort the ponies out?"


The ponies were wonderful creatures, their velvety noses barely touching their hands as they golloped their carrots up. They seemed to know they weren't to leave their current owners and lay down, allowing the dwarf and hobbit to stroke them. One of them snorted as the two got their pipes out, but otherwise they were quiet and peaceful.

"We'd better stay with them for a bit." Bilbo said.

"Mm. That stuff is so mild, I don't know how you can smoke it," Kíli declared, watching Bilbo retry making smoke-rings with ill-concealed wonder.

"It's nice. You should try some." Bilbo said, offering him his tobacco pouch.

"If I try yours, you must try mine." Kíli said, eyeing the pouch with suspicion.

"I will, then." Bilbo said, handing his pouch over.

How bad could Dwarven pipe-weed be?

Kíli patted his pinch of Old Toby down and offered Bilbo a light before lighting his own.

It was when the Dwarf had his soft, pink lips around the stem that a sudden, rather wicked idea entered Bilbo's curly head.

"Wait! You have to take in a great deep breath when you first smoke it."

Old Toby makes the smoker cough like mad if they were to smoke it like that, Bilbo knew. He took a puff of the strange tobacco given to him nose wrinkling at the awful taste and blew it out quickly. At first he felt nothing. Then, without warning, he felt a deep, tickly sensation running through his lungs.

Then the coughing started. Not the controllable, rapid coughing of Old Toby, but a desperate, suffocating cough that had him bent double.

Kíli was most anxious. "Bilbo? Bil- Ahem! Are you-?"

Then he started coughing too.


"Idiots, the pair of you!"

Bilbo would have defended himself and Kíli from this accusation, but his poor throat was too sore to argue with the healer.

"We've all done it," Bofur said.

"Yes, but hobbit lungs are weaker than... don't speak!"

Bilbo settled for glaring at him instead.

"Don't scowl at me, laddie." Óin chided.

"I should've known," Kíli hoarsely stated. "Will he ever be able to speak again?"

"Yes, if he rests his voice and drinks this tea he'll be back to normal in a day or two." Óin assured them.

Bilbo looked at the tea, brewing away in the small pot and shuddered. Óin made the worst-tasting medicines Bilbo had ever drunk. Carefully, he moved away once the healer's back was turned...only to get captured by his adad and sat down.

"I know it's not the nicest, but it'll help your throat out." Glóin told him.

The herbal tea didn't taste too badly. Its taste had a bitter hint of sharp lemons, but this didn't stop Bilbo shuddering after he'd downed the scalding liquid as fast as he was able.

"Good lad. Come on, let's find the branches."


The two youngest of the Company were in rather sorry spirits that evening. Kíli kept clearing his throat and rubbing his neck. Fíli tried to help him by thumping his back, but the leftover tickles persisted and Kíli was left looking like a puppy who had eaten something he shouldn't and was now suffering for it.

Bilbo's throat, on the other hand, was just sore. It felt like it was splitting open on the inside and swallowing was now a nightmare as it hurt even more when the action was made. He, too, rubbed his neck and also had a companion in the form of Glóin, who didn't wallop his back as Fíli did for Kíli, but instead rubbed his back whenever he winced.

"See, this is what happens when you try out things you're not used to." Dwalin said.

"It never did me any harm." Glóin said unthinkingly. Suddenly aware of the twelve gazes upon him, thirteen if the Wizard was included, he shook his head and focused more on his little hobbit.

"Stew's done," Bombur called, hoping to relieve the mild tension that had fallen upon the group. "Get it while it's hot!"

Murmurs of approval met this announcement. Dwarves stood to collect a bowl and spoon. Bilbo looked over at Glóin, trying to decipher why everyone had gone silent earlier, but the dwarf revealed nothing, simply pulling him to his feet and telling him to get his dinner while he could.


Dinner was not a fun affair for Bilbo, nor Kíli. Kíli kept coughing and the stew, though it was utterly delicious, was torture going down. In the end, both set aside their bowls, giving them unhappy looks as they did so.

"This is the worst!"

"It'll be gone by tomorrow."

"Why did I think swapping pipe-weed would be harmless?" Kíli lamented.

Bilbo gave him a poke and a fierce look.

"Well, yeah, but Dwarven stuff is stronger, and-"

"- didn't tell-" Bilbo managed to wheeze out.

"Hush!" Óin growled. "You'll damage your voice."

Bilbo settled for glaring at Kíli instead.

"Sorry, I didn't think it'd do that much." Kíli explained. "I really didn't mean for-" he gestured to him.

Bilbo shrugged, trying to tell Kíli not to worry about it. Óin shook his head at the both of them and began rooting through his satchel. He sat up holding a little pot.

Both hobbit and Dwarf shrank away.

"No," Kíli said decisively. "We don't want any more medicine. It's disgusting, Óin."

"Oh, I think you'll like this." Óin said and he showed Kíli the pot.

Kíli's deep brown eyes sparkled. "Is that honey?!"

"Raw honey, but it'll be as nice. It soothes the throat, you see. Get a spoonful of it down you."

As the two did as requested, Dwalin started chuckling. Óin glared at him.

"It's not funny, Dwalin."

"What?" Kíli asked, now licking the spoon as if trying to get any last traces of the delicious food.

"He played a horrible trick on him," Óin pointed at Glóin, "when he was younger."

"Tell!" Kíli pleaded. "I haven't heard this one."

"He was a little scoundrel when he was younger. Well, he dared my nadad to eat a whole jar of honey. Wasn't a big jar and it was getting empty anyway, but he didn't half suffer for it."

"Did your adad get angry?" Kíli asked, his eyes wide.

"I'll get to that. I was awoken at midnight. He woke up, feeling terrible and decided the best thing to do was climb into bed with me and tell me what the matter was." Óin paused, giving Dwalin a baleful look. "Anyone who's ever had an ill little brother clinging to him can appreciate my situation. Eventually I got the truth out of him and called for Amad to come and get him.

"What happened?" Adad asked, having followed Amad.

"Dare games got out of hand," I said.

He groaned. "Never have children, Óin."

"Don't you like yours?" I asked.

He grumbled and walked back to his own room and that was the last I saw of him that night."

Kíli cackled joyously. "That's brilliant."

"We never had to threaten him with a hiding again. Any time he misbehaved or looked like he was about to, we simply said one word." Dwalin stated. "Honey."

Kíli nearly choked on his spoon in his fit of laughter.

"Might well you laugh!" Glóin told him. "Over a century later and I still can't have honey."

"And it was terrible of you, Dwalin!" Óin scolded. "He's such a melodramatic, whiny little sod when he's ill..."

"I am not!"

"You are! A fraction better than Dwalin, perhaps."

Dwalin sputtered indignantly as Glóin smiled cheerfully at Óin's amendment. Balin smiled softly and shook his head at the three of them.

Kíli, who was now considering the fact his spoon could now be honeyless, grinned.

"That's a brilliant prank, though! I must try it."

"You already did a similar one," Dwalin said, pointing at Bilbo who was also trying to pretend his spoon would never run out of honey. "Thanks to you, my cousin will never need to wallop him, he'll simply have to whisper, 'Dwarven Pipeweed' and that'll end any mischief!"

"You never actually made him eat it, did you?" Kíli asked, giving Dwalin a sorrowful look as though he thought he had.

"How cruel do you think I am? Of course not!" Dwalin answered. "It was tempting at times, mind..."

"I wouldn't have let him," Óin interrupted. "However tempting it was!"


I don't know exactly where the honey story came from, but I'm not complaining! :D Wow,it's nearly thirty chapters long! My baby's growing up so fast :')

Hope it was enjoyed!

Love from Shania. xx