Spring rolls in, although later this far into the mountains than it does in the sleepy Shire to the south east. Nori taps the letter she has received from Briar with one finger as she listens to Trygve report back on what little information he has managed to gather from the recently arrived caravans. They have to be careful about how they fish for the information, it would not do for word of Azog to get out among the general populace before they know more, but from everything that her second has managed to gather the orc is rarely seen during the summer and early autumn and then only from a distance. It lends some weight to the theory that Azog is carefully working on taunting Thorin out of Ered Luin. Her mind is in two places at once, in the Shire with her chosen sister who she regularly exchanges letters with, and here in Thorinuldum where the lack of clear information about Azog's activities is driving her slowly stir crazy.
"Call them off!" Her office door slams open and she sees Dori stood there, face red with anger as one of her people charges in after him.
"It's alright, Ingvar," she assures the other thief. "We'll pick this up later, Trygve, go find the lad and his hound, tell them I need to speak with both of them."
"You're the boss," her second grins.
"And don't you forget it," she smirks. He bows briefly and saunters out of the room, pausing only to look her already irate brother up and down with a wide grin. "Must have been a good night," she says to Dori as she picks up a pen and grabs a piece of parchment. "The last time I saw you looking like that was when you and Eluf were a thing. Do I know him?"
Dori snarls, a sound that she rarely manages to annoy him into making and she hides a smirk behind one hand as she scratches absently at the tip of her nose. Her brother is utterly disheveled. His normally perfectly styled hair and beard is loose about his face, which has turned a very interesting shade of purple after her last comment. His clothes are rumpled, as though he simply grabbed whatever he could get his hands on before leaving his apartment and that is backed up by the fact that he has skipped a couple of buttons.
"Call them off," her brother hisses again.
"I haven't got a clue what you're talking about," Nori tells him, her tone a little bit too gleeful.
Her's and Dori's relationship has not much improved over the last couple of years. Not for lack of trying on Ori's part, who seems to have taken the distance between them as something of a personal challenge. It is simply that Dori seems to think that the fact that Nori has set herself up with a house of her own, which she affords with ease, is something of a personal 'fuck you' to the brother who helped to raise and shelter her. She actually suspects that after being given a week or so to calm down while she blew through her earnings from the caravan her brother expected her to come home, tail tucked firmly between her legs, and very contritely ask him to let her move back in. That has never been Nori's style, although she has no idea how Dori could forget that, and the fact that she has apparently been able to succeed so much now that she is out from under his roof confuses him.
Things between them are cool and they are civil if only for Ori's sake; which includes Dori knowing where she lives.
"The people you keep sending to break into my place," Dori snaps. "This is the seventh time since you left. Seven! The neighbours haven't been hit in three years, but they don't seem to want to leave me alone!"
"Good news travels fast," Nori shrugs. "It's nothing to do with me. Didn't you ever wonder why no one ever tried to break in while I was living there, even when I was away for a while?"
"I never thought about it," he hisses. "I didn't need to."
"Well, start thinking," she replies, making a note of something that Trygve will need to look into, and one of her people who should be back from Bree in the next two weeks. "Although, frankly I don't care one way or the other about whether they dig around the place. Sending them after you would be a waste of time and energy and I have better things to do." She glances at him and sees his confusion. "You're not wrong that they're hitting your place because I'm not there anymore," she sighs, turning in her chair. "But I'm not sending them. They're hitting it because the stupider ones seem to think that I wasn't able to get my stash and valuables out."
"You had no such thing!" Dori objects.
"Oh, don't be so stupid," Nori huffs, "of course I did. You don't get as good as me without building up an emergency stash."
"I didn't find it."
"Of course you didn't," she laughs. "Wouldn't have hidden it properly if you had. Regardless, I managed to get it without you noticing not long after you booted me out."
"You robbed me?" Dori's voice outraged.
"No," Nori gives him a brittle smile. "I retrieved my belongings."
"They weren't yours to begin with," her brother objects. "You stole them from honest, hardworking dwarves."
"It's what I was made for," she reminds him. "And I'm good enough at it to be as high as I can legitimately get. Just because you don't like what I was made to do doesn't mean it doesn't have it's uses." Dori pulls a face.
"Failing upwards," he scoffs.
"I'm at the top of my game," she grins. "Can you say the same?" Her brother looks like he will object again and she holds up her hand. "I'm not moving back in, Dori, actually I'm about to leave town for a few months. Trygve will be here while I'm gone, but he won't be able to call the others off either so I suggest you wait it out with some of that grace you like to prattle on about having."
"If Ma could hear you now," her brother splutters.
"She'd be ashamed of you," Nori replies. "You threw me out for something I had no part in without any of the facts at all, and then you stood by it even after I explained it to you. Besides, it's for the best. What I'm doing now is more likely to bring trouble home anyway, better that it's away from you and Ori. The others will get bored eventually, word will get round that there's nothing worth pinching there and they'll give you a couple of years. If that's all, I've got a lot to sort before I go. And you need to pull yourself together, you've got a reputation to maintain after all." The red hue comes back to Dori's face but this time Nori can tell it is embarrassment rather than rage. "My room's the one on the right. There's spare beads, a comb and mirror in there. Get sorted before you go, you let yourself in, you can let yourself out and I'll see you in a few months once this is dealt with," she taps Briar's letter.
"Why do me any kindness?" Dori asks.
"Because you're still my brother," Nori points out. "And I've got my own reputation to maintain. Besides, if that bunch of idiots see you leaving here in a better state than you arrived in will make them think we're less at odds. Might get them to leave you alone for a bit." She pulls another piece of parchment closer and scrawls something on it before rolling it up and tucking it into a leather tube. "Now, bugger off. I've got things to do."
Dori does as she says quietly, apparently deciding that this is not the time to fuss and she takes that for the small victory that it is. More often than not Dori will fuss at her for the sake of it.
Her brother does not hold her attention for long, her gaze once again turning to the letter from Briar as she jots down a few more notes. Of all the things to pull her out of Ered Luin ahead of schedule, this is not the one that she had expected. Still, it is not necessarily a bad thing and since Kíli has been noticeably restless the last few months, particularly since Fíli has started making noise about heading to Ered Nimrais for the winter again, it would not be the worst thing for his cover if the pair of them were to join a caravan and take off somewhere for a while.
Actually it would be perfect, and the fact that things in the Shire have taken a twist that Nori should have seen coming is just the excuse she needs to leave. She shakes her head and grabs the small leather tube as she gets to her feet. Much as she would like to think that the hobbits would have the sense to keep someone as potentially unhinged as Borden Proudfoot locked up for as long as possible, Briar's letter had said that the Mayor of Michel Delving had decided to release him six months early at the latest. Borden Proudfoot will be free to wander the Shire by midsummer, and Nori wants to be there with Kíli long enough to have established that they are there for Briar and not for anything nefarious. It would be too much of a coincidence for them to turn up and a few days later Proudfoot end up dead. It is one of the reasons that Nori has been so firm when teaching Kíli about the best time to be obvious about skipping town before an assassination. There is a lot for him still to learn about this part of their world, and he will not learn it before his final test. There is no choice in the matter. Not for Nori anyway. She will not allow the possibility of Briar being hurt by the Proudfoot lad, she is still half convinced that the boy did something to the Briar that Nori knew on the quest.
She will not allow her chosen sister to suffer in such a way.
Her small yard out back has a run of bird cages, large enough for them to move freely but not so large as to take up the small space entirely. Trained birds are expensive, but it is something that she was willing to pay out for in order to make some things easier. In this case, it allows her to tell Briar to expect her and Kíli within the next five weeks or so depending on when she can find a caravan to leave with. She releases the bird and watches as it flutters around uncertainly for a moment before turning in the direction it needs to leave the mountains. That done she pauses at the sound of the gate latch moving, hands moving automatically for the knife she wears at her hip even when at home before relaxing when she sees who it is.
Neither of them speaks and she simply tilts her head so that her current companion knows to follow her into the house.
"Took your time," she says once the door is closed behind him. He grunts. "I'm taking the boy out of town. Something's come up with one of my contacts that can't be handled by anyone else."
"There a reason for that?" He asks.
"One, she knows me and the boy best," Nori leads him into the kitchen and goes to the small pantry, pulling out what perishable food she has in there to both pack and eat as an early lunch. The sooner she and Kíli can be on the road the better. "Two, she knows more about some of the various poisons and antidotes and so on than anyone I've ever met. Three, the boy's final test is connected to my contact. Better he does it out of town, and he has good reason to complete the contract, than here and risk failing and being caught."
"How long will you be gone?"
"Depends on how long it takes," Nori shrugs. "Three to four weeks there, same back, waiting for the right moment. Probably four months minimum."
"I'll tell them," he sighs. "Was there anything else?" He gets to his feet.
"Who said you were allowed to leave, Guard?" She asks him. He grins. "You think I'm going to leave for months without getting a proper goodbye?"
Dwalin grins, then tugs her tight against him to kiss the breath from her.
Maybe moving things forward was not such a bad idea.
A.N: I was so tempted to break them up again for a bit, although the getting them back together plan is still on hold for later because of reasons. Luckily for you lot, I didn't go through with it. I have my moments but I'm not quite that mean. Usually. Mostly... Aside from that one time in Wild Magic where I... yeah.