The roaring in his ears subsided eventually. Tauriel knelt before him, telling him quietly what the elves had apparently told her already, hands on either side of his face. He realized dimly that she was repeating herself, to make sure that whenever he could pay attention he would have all of the information.

"I'm fine," he croaked, but he said it in Khuzdul. Tauriel went immediately from soothing him to glaring up at the other elf.

"It was poorly done," the elf admitted, kneeling beside Tauriel. "Forgive me please, cousin. Morwinyon truly believed you dead, and you walked in - I apologize."

"You assumed," Tauriel said. "I thought better of the daughter of Elrond."

"She thought to protect our cousin," someone else snapped, and Fili looked up. "You cannot upbraid her for that."

The elf who spoke stood next to another who looked so alike that Fili took a moment to make sure he wasn't seeing double before he remembered that Elrond had a pair of twin sons. Were all of his wife's relations this rude?

Tauriel looked as if she was about to begin snarling at everyone, but he wanted to hear more about Morwinyon and knew Tauriel did, too. "It's fine," he told her. "Everything is fine. Morwinyon lives."

Tauriel nodded, expression melting into a soft smile.

The other elves exchanged glances. "I will fetch Father," one of the brothers said, so Fili stood, brushing off two offers of assistance to do it, and wondered what these elves didn't want to tell him.

Later Arwen, apparently feeling guilty for her greeting, sat beside him while he absorbed the news that his brother, wife, and mother lived, and that he had two children.

"Twins?" he said. "You're sure?"

One of Arwen's brothers shrugged a shoulder. "I do not have a special knowledge of twin existence-"

Arwen muttered something that sounded suspiciously like 'lies.'

"-but," the first continued, pointedly ignoring his sister, "Morwinyon did say there were two."

Tauriel all but vibrated in her seat beside him. Elrond, who had fallen silent after relating the state of Fili's family, looked on benevolently, as if the whole affair was his doing.

"Tauriel and Angion," Elrond said now. He sounded like he was trying to be helpful.

Fili wanted to snap that he knew their names, but of course he couldn't. He didn't know their truenames either - no one would, except Dis and the children themselves, if Morwinyon didn't know Khuzdul. Maybe Kili.

Were Tauriel and Angion their amilesse? Had Morwinyon decided they should have three names? He didn't know. Moreover, he wasn't sure he could ever learn: it wasn't done, to walk up to someone and ask their truename, even your child. Thorin had known Fili's, because Thorin had been there for his naming, but they had never spoken it.

"Tauriel," Tauriel herself said, sounding gleeful.

"We have to go to them," Fili said, but something niggled at his mind. "Wait, you only heard of them?"

"Only Morwinyon and Kili passed through here," Arwen replied. "She said that Lady Dis stayed with the children."

But where? Fili thought, mind scattering every which way. Dis, and by extension the rest of the family, could not have gone to the Lonely Mountain as that dwarf had implied: the news of twin heirs of Durin - twins! A male and female matched set! - would have travelled so far that even Fili and Tauriel would have heard of it then.

Elrond said, "They are with the Dunedain, and safe as anyone."

"But not safe with me," Fili said, hoping that Elrond would understand what he meant. He hadn't felt this torn since the mountain. He had to choose yet again, when he had thought he was finished with such difficult choices. Surely his responsibilities as a father outweighed those as a husband, but if Tauriel and Angion were safe…

They wouldn't know him, if he hared off into camp, shouting for his children. They wouldn't know Tauriel - Tauriel-his-sister. Dis might not be best pleased to see him after all these years either, and he didn't want to scare Tauriel-his-daughter or Angion.

The names were already confusing.

"We must find Morwinyon and Kili," Tauriel said, priorities clearer than his. "If they still think us dead, they will be suffering. We can stop that."

Fili, glad to have firm directions, agreed.

"Would you have married Kili?" Fili asked, weeks after the mountain. Tauriel looked sharply at him and away.

"I loved him," she said.

"That isn't what I asked."

Tauriel shook her head, but she did it slowly. "I think I would have," she said. "Not so quickly as you and Morwinyon, perhaps. But yes."

Fili nodded and went back to searching for something to eat. Supplies were scarce, since they had not wanted to take any from the mountain. Trying to sound careless and failing, he asked, "If you knew what would happen?"

She sighed. "I do not know. I like to think so. I thought I would even if it meant exile, before. I do not know what I would have done if I knew it meant exile alone."

She wasn't exactly alone, not with him here, but he took her point.

"And you?" she asked after they had unearthed a few mushrooms and tufts of something green that Tauriel assured him was edible when stewed. They were leaning over tiny campfire, watching the bubbling mass.

"Me?"

"Would you have married Morwinyon? Knowing what would happen?"

"I'm not sure not marrying her would have changed anything about either of our actions," Fili said. "If not marrying her would have meant she wouldn't go after Azog, I would have left well enough alone."

"Morwinyon was always going to seek Azog," Tauriel said. "She is her mother's daughter - and mine too, a little, I suppose. I did not think to keep her in Mirkwood, but then, I think she would have left eventually. I heard Lady Laeriel say something once to Thranduil: a wolf can act but like a wolf."

"Morwinyon wasn't a wolf," Fili said. "She might have surprised you."

Tauriel raised an eyebrow. It startled a laugh from him.

"I would have married her anyway," he decided. "I'm not sure saying no would have occured to me."

He stayed very still when Tauriel reached out and carefully tucked a loose strand of hair behind his ear. "That should only be done by family."

She snatched back her hand immediately, blushing. "My apologies."

"None necessary," he said. "You would have married Kili." He reached deliberately out, giving her time to move away even if he knew that elves didn't rest such importance on this sort of thing. One of the braids holding her hair back from her face was skewed. He fixed it.

"Siblings," he said, "never let one another go out without decently near hair."

It was Tauriel's turn to laugh. "I have failed in my duties. Turn around and I will do my best."

He did.