The door to Dís' chamber slams open about twenty minutes after Nori has settled herself. The princess of Durin's line is ranting loudly about the idiocy of her sons. Her frustration with Kíli is clear and it is obvious to Nori that Dís is reaching her breaking point.

"Princess," Nori greets her.

"You must be Nori," Dís says after a beat.

"The lad told you," she nods. "He tell you how deep in it he is?"

"He told me you believe I will give my permission for him to be trained," Dís says coldly. Nori's sharp eyes note movement behind the princess and she is dismayed when she realises that it is Dwalin. It is somewhat satisfying, however, to see the twitch of his eye when he recognises her. "We have the money to pay off the guild."

"You've already paid them off three times," Nori holds up a coin that had been sitting on the desk. "Most people only get one chance to do that. They won't take your money this time."

"You'll forgive me if I don't take your word for it," Dís sneers.

"Oh, I don't expect you to," she chuckles. "Actually I would be disappointed if you didn't try it. But you can't fight the entire Guild."

"I can think of a lot of people who would thank us for wiping out your kind here," Dís shrugs. "No one will miss the thieves."

"If that's the way you want it," Nori laughs, "of course, the assassins will have taken care of your lads before you've managed to wipe us out, but go ahead. Obviously the deaths of hundreds of dwarves is preferable to allowing Kíli to learn his trade."

"Dís," surprisingly Dwalin cuts the princess off before she can bite back. "We won't slaughter our own people to make up for the boy's inability to control his own impulses. He's a thief, she's offering to teach him. Better he's trained than dead for the sake of Durin pride."

The thief gives Dwalin a grateful look, feeling some of the cracks in her heart at the loss of their future beginning to heal a little. Perhaps she does not have to completely write off what she once had with him, perhaps she could take the risk of letting him into her heart again. She stamps the thought back down and keeps her attention on the task at hand. She cannot afford to get distracted by Dwalin this time.

"Let him become like her?" Dís snarls. "It would do untold damage to the reputation of our line. We've fought against this for eighteen years. How can we let that go to waste? How can we hold our heads high knowing we have a thief in our family?"

"I won't just teach him to be a thief," Nori replies rather than let Dís see that her words have dug into that old, deep wound caused by her own mother and brother. "At least, it won't be my main focus for him although he'll need to pass the trial to be registered with the guild, and I recommend that he gets registered when we're done," Nori puts the coin aside. "Most of us are thieves, but there are assassins and spies among us as well. I tend towards the first two, I won't lie, but I think your son might be more the latter two, and don't you think it would benefit his older brother to have a trained spy and assassin at his side on the day he takes the throne from your brother?"

Dís blinks and Nori can see that this is something that obviously has not occurred to her. In her previous life, the thief had made this same argument only for it to fall upon deaf ears. This time, however, and with the immediacy of the outcome of Kíli's actions forcing an urgency to the discussion, she can see that the princess is obviously considering the implications of it all now.

"You can be discrete?" Dís demands.

"My trade relies on it," Nori smirks. "I have to ask, though, it never occurred to you to tell the boy that you were paying off the guild? You had to know that they would eventually tell you it wasn't going to happen anymore. Unlike the other guilds, our Guild Master answers to the whims of the gang leaders, and they are the ones who have declared that your son has had too many chances. Frankly, I'm surprised they allowed more than one."

Dís glances at Dwalin who gives her the carefully neutral look that Nori knows all too well. It is the look that says I told you so, without drawing too much attention his way. The Princess pulls a face.

"I told him," Dwalin says, "four years ago after the last time he was caught. He stops for a while, keeps to the rules his Ma gives him. Then he gets bored, or frustrated, and starts playing his games with the people who live here and work for his family."

"Dwalin!" Dís hisses.

"The lass needs to know," Dwalin argues, "she's right, we can't take on the whole Thieves Guild even if the guard would agree to it. And I told you that they won't. You and Thorin have tried burying your heads about this, we've warned the boy, obviously it isn't working. It's time you and Thorin faced facts; Kíli is a thief and that means he needs to enter a proper apprenticeship before he gets himself killed."

Dís' face pales. "I never thought you would be the one to…"

"Better a thief than dead," Dwalin tells her and Dís nods, although the betrayed expression is still clear on her face.

"Fine," she breathes after a moment. Nori would feel elated but the victory seems hollow somehow and she suspects that if she does not move quickly Dís will still try to find a way out of this for Kíli. "Train him."

"Tell the lad to meet me in the alley where we parted ways three hours after day-call," she gets to her feet and stretches. "Sooner he's down as my apprentice, the sooner he's safe from retribution." She turns, then pauses. "This isn't something that just goes down on paper and that's the end of it all," she adds seriously. "He trains, he has to. He has about eighteen months until they will force him to take the thief's trial, four years until the spy and maybe five until the assassin's trial. There are no second chances, if he fails he will be killed."

"And if I don't let you train him, you say he will be killed," Dís responds. "What benefit is there to all of this, then?"

"Because if I train him he stands a chance," Nori replies, "your son is good, very good for someone who has never had any proper lessons, but I'm better, as are a lot of the thieves in the guild. If I teach him, he will pass. If he fails I know a safe place for him to go. Provided he doesn't drive me too deeply into the mines, anyway," she has to force herself to remember that these are not the people she knows.

This is not the Dwalin who loves her, or who she believed loved her, this is not the Dís who will confide in her over an ale or two and who sent her to keep an eye on Thorin and the lads. This is not the Fíli and Kíli who she had watched and taught small tricks to but who she had, ultimately, had to leave less trained than she wanted to. She wants to swear to Dís that for as long as Kíli is her apprentice she will protect him, but she also knows that she is no longer the kind of person that they would trust. It took her a long time to earn their trust in her old life. She will have to do that all over again now and she will have to be careful about how she does it.

Rather than saying anything else, she lets herself back out of the window and slips into the nearly abandoned streets below.

She is as unchallenged on her way home as she was on the way there and she is less cautious about it. The dust of the road is heavy on her, the impression she has made upon both of the princes and their mother must be a very poor one, and she wants little more than to wash when she gets home. She has been gone longer than she should have been, but there is little to be done for it and no doubt Briar will understand, if she has even noticed. Dori can be a truly charming host when he puts his mind to it.

"Nori!" A familiar voice calls and her heart drops into her boots before she sets her face into a blank polite expression. Then she turns.

"Guard," she replies with a minute twitch of her lips as Dwalin marches towards her. "Did your mistress forget something?" His face falls slightly, and if Nori had needed any reminders at all that this is not her Dwalin this would be it. Her words had been automatic, an old joke between them about his position guarding Dís.

"She doesn't know I've come," he responds stiffly. "It's about the lad."

"I'm listening," she says after a beat. "But keep in mind that I can't change the fact that he has to start his apprenticeship."

"I'm not asking that," Dwalin shakes his head. "I won't do him the disfavour of it, he needs to learn some responsibility and he's long past the age where he should have done that." Nori can agree with that. "I want you to promise you'll watch over him. Dís has lost enough as it is, losing a son would break her."

Nori winces, after all if she gets things wrong in thirteen years Dís will lose two sons.

"And why would you take my word?" Nori gives him a dangerous smile. "I am a thief. No honour and all that."

"Orc shit," Dwalin hisses. "Why didn't you pull your knife? The other times the boy has been caught he was spotted by other thieves, and they were quick enough to march him to your guild. Why did you give him a chance?"

"Because I was working a legitimate job and apparently I'm a soft-hearted fool," Nori lies.

"You confronted him in front of your employer by all accounts," Dwalin shrugs, "strikes me they already know what your true trade is."

"She does, doesn't mean I'm going to go gutting tweens in front of her," Nori waves her hand. "Hobbits are a squeamish bunch as a race, it's something of a miracle that one left her homeland at all."

"Why did she?" He asks, leaning against a nearby wall.

"Your brother is the head of the Merchant's Guild," Nori shrugs, pulling a sealed note from her pocket, she had meant to deliver it on her way back from meeting Mavik the conversation in his office had forced her to rethink some of her plans, "give him this and then ask him yourself."

"I'm no one's messenger, lassie," Dwalin warns her, but takes the note anyway. "How did you know who my brother is?" He adds after a moment.

"You think I didn't look into you after you so nobley turned me down?" She smirks at him.

"I thought you'd left town," he replies.

"I wouldn't be very good at my job if I couldn't vanish from sight on my own stomping grounds," she purrs, her voice unconsciously taking on a tone she knows has an effect on him.

"Why?" He breathes. "I thought you didn't offer second chances."

"I don't," Nori replies, taking a step closer before she can talk herself out of it and running her finger along his bicep, appreciating the feel of the muscles there. "I thought I would see if you were worth breaking my rule for." His face is serious as he looks down at her.

"And what did you conclude?"

"I haven't decided," she tells him, "but if it works out in your favour I'll let you know."

"I can think of a few things I could do to convince you," he offers and she sucks in a breath, the words sparking a memory of the time that the Dwalin of the future had finally asked her if she would be interested in allowing him to court her and it is that which cuts through the haze of lust and loneliness which has consumed her since she arrived in her own past.

"No," she steps back, "not now. I'll look after the boy," Nori assures him. "He isn't my first apprentice and I don't need you to tell me how important it is that he succeeds here. Fact of it is, if it hadn't been me I doubt he would have been noticed today, it was bad luck on his part. And you needn't worry, thieves don't take advantage of their students, it's a good way to get stabbed in the back when they graduate. Like I said to his mother, if he appears to be in danger of failing I know of a place that I can take him where he will be safe. It's the most I can do."

Dwalin's face falls. "Then it will have to be enough," he sighs. "I will be with the lad in the morning," he informs her.

"You can bring him," Nori says after a moment, "but once we meet up you'll have to leave. I can't take you to the Guild Hall, and once he's banded he's mine to watch out for."

"He's one of the heirs," Dwalin disagrees, "he will always be part of my responsibility."

"Then I guess you need to learn to share, Guard," she looks him over once more.

"Tomorrow, then," Dwalin says stiffly, turning and leaving as quickly as he had approached. Nori lets out a breath and leans against the wall for a moment.

This is not a complication that she needed.

A.N: Were Nori and Dwalin supposed to have that little interaction at the end? No. What did my inner Nori say when I told her no? "Fuck you, I do what I want." This is apparently my life. I love her anyway.