Look who's back from the dead! I really appreciate everyone who followed or favorited during the last *checks date* eight months or so (oops)-each notification email I got was really encouraging. Welcome to a new chapter, everyone! A little shorter than normal, but the end felt like the right place to break. So, enough with my blathering, and on with the show!
"I've signed it!" Bilbo panted out one last time before doubling over, hands on his knees. Amaranth winced in sympathy—had he run all the way from Bag End? Poor fellow.
Then she realized what he was saying.
She must have made some sort of sound audible over the dwarves' sudden outbursts, because Bilbo lifted his head to look her triumphantly in the eyes. "I couldn't let you just run off into—into the blue, now, could I? You're not—you're not going anywhere without me, cousin."
Well. Somehow that assuaged a sudden worry she hadn't even realized had risen. And it left room for more sheer excitement that Bilbo Baggins had finally found some spirit again.
"Ah, there you are, Master Baggins!" Balin had steered his pony out of line and rode over now, beaming. "We were hoping you'd be able to join us. Just let me see that contract there."
As he fumbled in a pouch at his waist, finally withdrawing an eyeglass with which to examine the parchment Bilbo held up, Amaranth heard the chinking of metal coming from the ponies in front of her. Then a small leather pouch flew just over a startled Ori's left shoulder. It would have hit Amaranth in the head if she hadn't dodged and let it fall to the dirt path instead.
"Sorry, lass!" someone called out from farther up ahead, and Ori, dropping from his pony and scuttling to pick up the pouch, murmured something under his breath that might also have been an apology.
"What's that for?" Amaranth gestured to the little pouch as he mounted again.
"Oh, 's nothing, Mistress Brandybuck." He flushed red as a geranium, and she would have pressed, but at that moment Balin lowered his eyeglass and beamed down at Bilbo.
"Everything appears to be in order. Welcome, Master Baggins, to the company of Thorin Oakenshield."
Amaranth was sure the relief on Bilbo's face mirrored her own. He was coming too! They would both finally get to have the adventure they'd always played at, and see mountains and go beyond Bree and—what was Thorin saying? Something about "give him your pony?"
"I'm sorry?"
Thorin sighed as if he had no time to be dealing with silly little hobbit lasses who couldn't be bothered to pay attention to him. "I repeat, Mistress Brandybuck, as your services are no longer required, would you be so kind as to let Master Baggins take your pony?"
No longer required? No adventure? Could he do that? Was this it, just because Bilbo had shown up? Amaranth tried not to topple off her horse and quickly collect her scattered flock of thoughts. This couldn't be proper business.
"N-no, no no that won't—be necessary," Bilbo finally began stuttering, whether about the pony or about the abrupt cessation of Amaranth's contract she was not sure, and she nodded firmly.
"Master Balin, may I please see our contract?" She could at least see if Thorin had grounds for this. As Balin handed her the long sheet of parchment flapping in the breeze, she asked Bilbo in an undertone, "I know you read all of this—whereabouts would I find details regarding the end of the job?"
He blinked at her for a second before recalling, "Termination of contract, twenty-third paragraph. Towards the, er, bottom third, I believe."
Feeling Thorin's glare keenly, she skimmed down and found it just where he'd said. This contract shall be deemed breached, broken, and justifiably terminated and thereby in need of intermediary arbitration by a legal third party only in the following underwritten circumstances . . . should the Burglar rob, pilfer, thieve, or otherwise apprehend property rightfully belonging to another member of the Company . . . should the Burglar betray, through any means or to any degree, to any party not a member of the Company and not otherwise entitled to be privy to such knowledge, the quest upon which the Company is embarked . . . should the Burglar abandon, desert, or otherwise forsake the Company of his own free will before the completion or negation of the quest without the assent of the Company . . . should the Burglar perform any action that needlessly jeopardizes the quest or the members of the Company . . . should the Company unjustly withhold from the Burglar the lawful amount of payment for services rendered as stated elsewhere in this Contract . . .
It was ridiculously wordy and specific, but also absolutely silent on such topics as "Should the Company engage a second Burglar." How had Bilbo even gotten the contract, anyway? This was the same copy she had signed last night; had Balin left it for him? Was that kindly face just a mask for how he truly felt about the Company's engaging her?
"Master Thorin," she began, but Bilbo was speaking up again.
"I'm sorry, but if Amaranth stays behind, I stay behind."
Well. That was not something she had expected her cousin to say.
Thorin had clearly not expected it either. One dark eyebrow twitched in annoyance. "You signed a contract, Master Baggins, did you not?"
"As—as did she." Bilbo swallowed hard.
"Aye, and that contract provides straightforward grounds for releasing a burglar from the service of this Company, does it not, Balin?"
Balin tipped his head to one side. "Certain grounds, yes. You will remember, though, we did not write it in anticipation of more than one burglar." He gestured at Amaranth to pass him back the contract, and she did so, hope rising in her stomach.
Thorin all but growled, "Aye, but each of them signed it, it applies to each one."
Balin held up a finger and nodded distractedly as he read. "To each one, yes. But there is no clause regarding releasing a burglar because another one has been hired, or because the burglar's services are no longer necessary. None of the termination clauses apply, and see, here—" he held the parchment out toward the front of the line of ponies and indicated a section farther up—"it says quite clearly that 'this contract is for the duration of the quest and thus shall be deemed satisfied, completed, and fulfilled either when the quest has been achieved or all possibility of its completion has been erased, barring only certain extraordinary circumstances as detailed in paragraph twenty-three.'"
Yavanna bless that ridiculously wordy and specific contract.
"Therefore," Balin continued, "as the Company has conferred and at various times agreed to engage Amaranth Brandybuck and Bilbo Baggins, and as both have signed this contract after such agreement by the Company, not only are they under legal obligation to continue with us or be considered in breach of contract, but if they are forbidden to proceed for reasons not allowable in this document, then they are due arbitration and restitution for their troubles."
"And if I may be so bold, Master Oakenshield, it is only to the Company's benefit to have a spare burglar, should anything happen to one of us, the Lady forbid," Amaranth dared to add. It wasn't as if Thorin could glower any harder without turning into the Dwarven embodiment of a thunderhead, after all.
Though he certainly came near enough, as he gritted out, "Very well then. Get Master Baggins a pony and let us be off."
"No, that—that won't be necessary," Bilbo protested again. "I'm sure I can keep up on foot, I've done my fair share of walking holidays, you know, even got as far as Frogmorton once—"
That was as far as he got before Kili and Fili finished trotting back from their place in line, catching him under his wildly gesticulating arms, and depositing him effortlessly on Amaranth's saddle directly behind her, where he instantly clutched onto her as if his very life were at stake.
"You both do realize there's another riderless pony in this group, don't you?" She was rather proud of how she kept the amount of "I like my cousin but if he's going to be squeezing my breakfast out of my insides the whole way to your precious mountain I may do something very drastic" in her voice to socially acceptable levels.
Kili steered his pony nearer to hers as the group began moving forward. "Aye, but just look at all the baggage it's got to carry! It's already got more than plenty to be doing. Of course, if you'd prefer to share with someone else, I'm certain that can be arranged OW!"
Fili gazed skyward and began whistling the blunted-knives song from last night, as if he hadn't just punched Kili's shoulder for the second time that morning.
Amaranth decided to ignore the entire scuffle. "Where is Gandalf, anyway? I thought he would be joining us."
Kili shrugged. "He'll turn up sometime, he always does."
"He came to fetch me at Bag End," Bilbo said into the back of Amaranth's shoulder. "He had the contract, and said they were waiting at the Green Dragon, and then I was tearing pell-mell down the Hill without even washing up from second breakfast. He's likely been giving the keys to Holman Greenhand down the Row—he always looks after the place when I'm on holiday." Suddenly he sat up straight and freed one arm from its grip on Amaranth to slap at his waistcoat pocket. "Oh bebother and confusticate it—stop! Stop!" he called out. "We have to turn around!"
They had barely gotten out into the fields beyond Bywater at this point, and Amaranth cringed at the grumblings and rising from the dwarves up ahead even as she finally discovered what to do with the reins to make her pony hold still.
"What on earth is the matter," came a familiar if exasperated voice just behind them, and Gandalf himself appeared, trotting up on a white horse that stood rather taller than any of the other ponies.
"I've forgotten my pocket-handkerchief!" exclaimed Bilbo, still frantically digging through his pockets if his wriggling on the saddle behind Amaranth was any indication.
There was the sound of tearing fabric from up ahead, and the dwarf with the funny hat and curved mustaches, Bofur, called out, "Here, use this!" A large piece of what looked like well-worn burlap came flying through the air and very nearly struck Amaranth in the face. She was beginning to see a pattern and she did not care much for it, but this time she managed to snatch the soaring object and pass it to Bilbo. It most certainly looked nothing like a proper handkerchief to her.
She couldn't see his response, but the laughter that arose as soon as he took it from her fingers gave her a good enough idea. The line of ponies again began walking, and Gandalf steered his horse next to Amaranth and Bilbo. Kili and Fili dropped back, and Amaranth wasn't sure whether this was a good exchange or not.
Although, given the volume at which they promptly started up a travelling song in which the other dwarves joined with equal fervour, it was probably best they were not on either side of her—it would hardly be an auspicious start to her burglaring career if she were to go deaf the first day.
Gandalf's revealing a stack of handkerchiefs from some hidden pocket in his robes—along with Bilbo's favorite pipe and a pouch of pipeweed—wasn't exactly a problem, either.
As the fields of Bywater rolled past, and the Dwarven songs filled the late-April air, Amaranth couldn't help but feel that now the adventure had well and truly begun.