Winter passed swiftly. Between ongoing restorative efforts and planning for the future repairs there was little time for the present and before any of them could believe it, spring was upon them. The repairs on Dale had reached a point that the men were able to move back into their own town and leave the mountain in peace, though there would still be extensive trade and work happening both in Dale and Erebor that would be collaborative efforts. As uncomfortable as Bilbo had been with the idea of men in the mountain, the reality of the silence they left behind was too much like the silence in the lower levels of Mirkwood's dungeons for his own peace of mind. He hated to think what it was doing to Thorin. Despite Bilbo's worries, the nightmares did not become more frequent and the daytime slips had stopped entirely since the battle. While the lack of Men in the mountain made it more comfortable for Bilbo to move about the mountain, he couldn't help but hope for the first of the caravans to arrive from Ered Luin just so the mountain didn't feel so deserted.

After all, even with the few of Dáin's people that had remained to help with the restoration, Erebor was severely under-populated and as the roads thawed and even Dáin's people made ready to leave once more, the idea of thirteen dwarves and a hobbit being the sole occupants . . . it was daunting. Though he did have to admit that it was nice to just be among the company once more. They did not have the time to spend together that they once had, the tasks necessary to refounding a kingdom keeping them all busy, but they still made time at least one evening a week to dine together. There was only one rule at these dinners; no talk about the mountain. They unanimously decided that there were enough meetings for that purpose that they were owed one evening to be themselves rather than Thorin's Thirteen—as they'd been named.

Bilbo, Balin, Fíli and Thorin in particular had had more than enough of meetings to last them into the next lifetime. The rest of the company had excuses to avoid the more lengthy audiences—Bofur, Bifur, and Dori were needed to oversee the restorations, Bombur necessary to oversee the kitchens, Dwalin to inspect the guards, Kíli often accompanying him, Nori was hard enough to find as he searched for secret passages and weaknesses in the hide of the mountain, Óin still had patients to see who had been injured during restorations while Glóin was still attempting to oversee the cataloging of the treasury and Ori was working tirelessly on the reorganization and preservation of the library( a task Bilbo would have loved to assist with were he able to read Khuzdul)—but for the King, his chief advisor, his heir and his consort to be . . . well, there was no escape from the planning of the lords, each lobbying for his guild's place and funding. Instead, dinner was reserved for talk of their individual hopes, progresses and plans, and while many of these involved the mountain, no talk of funding or debate on locations was permitted. While these dinners never lasted long enough before the demands of the mountain claimed them once more, they were everyone's favorite time of the day. Sometimes, by the end of them, it was easy to forget the later hardships of the quest and go back to the time when they invaded Bilbo's home but with the added warmth that their journey had brought them.

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Time continued to pass and caravans of dwarves continued to filter in as the roads became passable once more. Every time a new dwarf arrived, chaos ensued as they attempted to reclaim the home their family had once lived in and the guild-space they had once had in the market. Actually, market space—even more than family homes—was one of the fiercest debates Bilbo had ever seen. As ferocious as he'd once thought hobbits to be when the quality of their produce or pastry was brought into question, it had nothing on dwarves when they were going full tilt on the worth of their craft.

Countless dwarves, some too young to have ever seen Erebor, let alone held a position in a guild at the time of her fall, demanded audience with Thorin to debate their claim to prime places in the market. While the hobbit couldn't understand their arguments directly—as they were in Khuzdul—there were a few words in many of them that he recognized from the quest and he knew them to be far less than complimentary words. He wasn't even certain why Thorin insisted that he sit in on court as there was nothing he could contribute, but he was more than willing to oblige his mate as there was little else he was suited to do at the moment.

He still hadn't mastered writing since the loss of his hand and occasionally lost his grip and dropped what he was carrying so he was of no use to Ori and Balin in the libraries for those reasons alone. Not to mention the fact that he couldn't read the language. Occasionally he was consulted when there was a text in Elvish, but those were few and far between and not enough to merit his continual presence in the library. And even with both hands he would have been no aid to the rebuilding efforts, knowing absolutely nothing about stone-works, so rather than protest that he would be more useful elsewhere, day after day he sat and listened. For the first few weeks he'd attempted to learn the language and pick up on common phrases, but, even though he knew that they had to be there, his ear couldn't even tell when one word ended and the next began. After a few weeks of frustration, he'd given it up and resigned himself to sitting between Thorin and Fíli, attempting to keep his lack of understanding from his face as he listened to arguments and complaints in a language he didn't understand.

It was during one of these sessions that a dwarf came bursting through the door, Khuzdul falling from his lips so rapidly that even Bilbo knew that something catastrophic must have happened. This certainty was only solidified when Fíli shot to his feet and was out the door before anyone else could move. Thorin was only a half-second behind him, barking a hasty order over his shoulder as he swept out the door. They were moving so quickly that Bilbo had to break into a full run to catch them and then had to jog to keep up with their longer legs.

"Thorin, what's happening?" Bilbo panted.

"They've arrived," Thorin replied before continuing down the halls, taking what seemed to Bilbo, even after so many months, to be random turns that eventually led them to the repaired front gates where a veritable army of dwarves with wagons were coming through them.

Bilbo stood there in confusion as Thorin walked to the wagon being driven by a dark-haired dwarf that looked vaguely familiar, even though Bilbo couldn't quite put his finger one why, and grasped the back of his head, touching foreheads before he began speaking to him. Bilbo walked slowly over in confusion when Thorin turned and gestured for him to come, a strange smile on the dwarf's face, wondering just who this strange dwarf was only to have his unasked question answered in the form of Kíli.

"Mother!" he cried barreling into the dwarf that Thorin had only just greeted. He couldn't hear her reply, but he could see from the way that she wrapped around her son that she was thrilled to see him. Only a second later Fíli, too, was crashing into them, wrapping his arms around his mother and brother and nearly knocking them off their feet. As Bilbo grew closer, he could hear that she was muttering at her sons in Khuzdul, alternating between pressing kisses into their hair and pulling back to look at first one then the other, her hands on their cheeks as if she needed to verify that they were truly there.

Even without understanding what was said, Bilbo couldn't help but smile at the reunion of mother and children. Still smiling, he molded himself into Thorin's side to wait for her to be done. Thorin smiled down at him and wrapped his arm around Bilbo's shoulders, pulling the hobbit more snugly against him. Eventually, with a shuddering sigh and a surreptitious brush of her eyes against her sons' hair, Dís pulled away and Bilbo got his first look at a dwarf woman. Or at least he assumed it was his first look. He'd always assumed that the company was having one over on him when they'd told him that he would likely not be able to tell dwarf women from the men, but looking at her now . . . there were subtle differences, her jaw a bit rounder under her beard, her eyebrows a bit finer and her fingers a tad thinner, but she could easily pass as a male dwarf to the untrained eye.

"Thorin, who's this?" she asked, glancing at the hobbit and the possessive and protective arm her brother had around his shoulder, her voice a tenor to her male kin's' baritone, though still lower than Bilbo's own.

"Dís, I'd like you to meet Bilbo Baggins," Thorin replied smiling warmly at his hobbit. "This is the hobbit Gandalf suggested as our lucky fourteenth member and he has been that and much more besides. Twice over, he is the reason that I stand before you now and we owe him a great deal of the credit for allowing us to stand here now, though his deeds in that regard are too numerous to mention standing in the entry hall. Perhaps we will persuade him to tell of his part in the quest over dinner. He is rather fond of telling the tale to any who will listen. But most importantly, he is my chosen mate."

When her brother finished speaking, Dís looked at Bilbo in a way that made him feel decidedly like a cut of pork being inspected for quality. He began to wonder if that studying gaze was hereditary or if Thorin and his sister had been trained in it from birth and fought the urge to squirm under her scrutiny.

"You finally chose a mate," she said at last, her face giving away none of her thoughts on the matter.

"I did," Thorin agreed, his voice calm and sure.

"And he's agreed to have you?" she asked, her tone edged with something that Bilbo couldn't place but that made him feel wary all the same.

"He has," Thorin replied. With that, her face split into a grin and Bilbo was reminded instantly of her youngest son. Before he could blink, she had closed the space between them and pulling her brother into a crushing hug before turning to Bilbo.

"You've chosen a hard mine to dig, my lad," Dís said clapping Bilbo just a touch too hard on the shoulder. "My brother is not easy to get on with. He's perhaps the most arrogant and pig-headed dwarf I've ever had the misfortune of meeting."

"He is," Bilbo agreed, fighting the urge to rub the spot her hand had come down on. "He can be quite the insufferable dwarf when he has a mind to. But you fail to mention his good qualities, such as his devotion, both to his chosen causes and those he loves. For all his arrogance, he is also a generous, kind mate and a wise ruler."

"Don't step out of line and lose this one, Brother," Dís said with a laugh, not noticing how her words made all of her kin flinch. "You'll not find another like him."

"I have no doubt that you are right, Sister," Thorin replied, pressing a kiss to Bilbo's forehead. "Come, you must be hungry. I'll show you to the kitchens." He offered her his arm, but she walked around him.

"I'd rather Bilbo do it," she said and made to take Bilbo's right arm only to stop at the cool firmness of the wood where she'd anticipate warm give of flesh before recovering herself and threading her arm through his, grasping his wrist with her left hand and resting her right arm on the hobbit's bicep above the leather bindings. "After all, we have much to talk about and to learn about one another. Besides I've heard that hobbits are experts in all matters of food. I much rather he lead me than you. I still recall the debacle of the night you made dinner."

Bilbo was still for a moment, shocked that she had done that. It wasn't that he'd ever told them not to, but the company seemed to make it a point to avoid touching his right arm, other than Thorin that is, and to have her gripping the wood as if it were flesh and blood rather than unfeeling and dead . . . he actually found it relaxing. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed such easy contact, even if he couldn't actually feel it. With a sudden smile, he brought his left hand from behind his mate and placed it over hers at his wrist.

"It would be my honor, My Lady," Bilbo replied, beaming at her and cutting off Thorin's protests that his cooking was quite edible. "I would love to accompany you to lunch and get to know my future sister-in-law. A perhaps learn a bit about my mate that no one else would dare to tell me?"

"But of course," she replied with a laugh. "After all, you can't go marrying him without a full knowledge of his habits, can you?"

"No," Bilbo agreed, ignoring the groan coming from behind him. "However, I'm afraid Thorin will have to accompany us. I, well, I still can't find my way in all these blasted tunnels. It's been months now and I'm just as likely to lead us to the mines or the forges as the kitchens."

"All the more fun," Dís replied lightly. "After all, it's more enjoyable for me to embarrass Thorin when he's there to hear it."

"I think you're going to regret introducing them, Uncle," Fíli whispered loudly behind them. Thorin merely sighed and wrapped his arm around Bilbo's shoulders once more, leading them into the kitchens in the heart of the mountain. It wasn't as if he could have avoided introducing his sister and his hobbit, could he? At any rate, all he could do now was accompany them and attempt to contain the damage Dís could do to his reputation with tales of their youth.

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So . . . not sure how many chapters are left in this one . . . Thorin and Bilbo got wordy and emotional on me here for a bit so . . . maybe 60 total? 58? IDK, let's find out together, shall we?

schattenwind: Glad that you're enjoying it. Don't forget that sleep's important! Hope to hear more from you soon!

That's it for now folks. The next chapter is written and the one after that then . . . well we'll just see how many more there are,

stickdonkeys