Chapter Thirty-Five

The Rambles of a Young Mind

Frodo was a bit overwhelmed to say the very least about the current situation that he had found himself in. His young mind was trying desperately to process all the questions being shot at him and answer them in some semblance of order only he was quickly finding himself failing in doing so.

"Enough!" Frodo shrunk back in his chair at Thorin's bellow, blushing deeply when all the dwarves who had been bombarding him with questions meekly apologized and stepped several steps away from him.

"Now," Frodo tried to look Thorin in the eye as the kingly dwarf spoke to him but found that he couldn't quite do so. The best he could manage was occasionally peeking up at the Dwarf King from beneath his eyelashes, "tell us from the beginning all that you know about why you and your mother were stolen from your home."

Frodo was slightly amused to note that the Dwarf King failed to mention his grandfather and cousins but quickly decided that it might be wise not to point this tiny detail out when he took another peek at the dwarf's face.

"Um," he mumbled intelligently as he shifted uncomfortably in the armchair, feeling even smaller than he already was underneath the King's heavy gaze, "well, I don't really know. I mean, I wasn't there when Bovin came into the house. I was – I was," his cheeks started to heat up once more as he remembered exactly where he was.

"Yer were?" Bofur prompted gently from where he was leaning against Frodo's armchair, his presences there was calming and reassuring to the little dwobbit.

"In Mama's study." He admitted meekly before protesting quickly, "I know I'm not meant to be in there, but I wanted to have a look at Sting. Well, um, when I say look, I mean I wanted to hold it and – but, but Mama says that I'm not allowed to because I'm too little. But I'm not, I'm not! I'm bigger than all the other kids my age and I'm stronger too, so – so I was in Mama's study, holding Sting when Mama came rushing in and demanding that I give it to her. And I did and that's when I saw all of Bovin's men – dwarves."

"If any of ya can understand a single word of all that ramble, ya doing 'lot better than me." Gloin snorted and Frodo blushed, remembering how his mama chided him about speaking too fast and not pronouncing his words clearly.

He forced himself to calm down, to take a deep breath and to think carefully over what he wanted to say.

"I was in Mama's study when Bovin's dwarves came in," he spoke slowly and carefully just as his mama had taught, "I had a feeling something was wrong and when I stuck my head out of Mama's study, Mama was racing down the hall telling me to give her Sting and to stand behind her, that's when Bovin and his dwarves appeared with Grandpapa and Uncle Pal, Uncle Saradoc and Uncle Lotho. Mama tried to bargain with Bovin to make him let us go but he wouldn't… especially when he saw me," he shrugged his small shoulders, still not sure why his presences had made such a great impact on Bovin and his dwarves. He noticed Thorin's hands clenching into fists and that several dwarves were glancing between him and Thorin. He wanted to ask why, why was he so important, why did he matter so much, but forced himself to hold his tongue and continued with his tale.

"Mama cut one of Bovin's dwarves with Sting," there were a few pleased rumbles from the gathered dwarves, "but one of Bovin's dwarves hit her over the head and that was when we were taken."

"And no one saw any of you being taken?" Balin asked gently.

Frodo shook his head.

"N'uh. 'Cause we went out the back door and there ain't no houses out the back of the hill, only farm land and it was growing dark so no one would have seen us even if they had been around."

"And on your way out of the Shire?" Balin pressed on.

"The Shire's a big place and not all of its populated." Frodo replied, closing his eyes slightly as his mind brought up the map of the Shire his mother had shown him countless times. "It's easy for one to go through the Shire unnoticed if they don't take any roads and simply go by country. Many of my relatives never knew how many of you Mama travelled with due to them not seeing you all."

"But they would surely notice that you were all gone. None would think to send out search parties?" Dwalin rumbled, his massive arms crossed tightly against his chest, his face twisted into a thoughtful scowl as he leant a little forward to look more closely into Frodo's face.

"They never did when Mama went adventuring with you. Maybe they think we're out on an adventure," Frodo offered his small face pulling itself into a frown, unknowingly making many dwarves in the room mentally compare it to a younger more innocent version of their King's infamous scowl.

"Or not." Frodo continued after a moment's thought, "Not with Lotho. Lotho would never go on an adventure. Not ever. Grandpapa would never willingly go on an adventure either. I don't know." He shrugged his shoulders.

"Not that it would make much difference." He added a little dejectedly, "The first who would come after us wouldn't be armed and so Bovin would knock them off fore they knew what's what." When he saw that many of the dwarves were frowning at him, clearly confused, he quickly went on to elaborate.

"In the Shire, trouble isn't really expected, unless… unless it's a bad a winter and the wolves come in. Like, like," Frodo started to bounce as he remembered the old tales his mama would tell him on wild, stormy nights when the wind was howling outside their smial, "during the Fell Winter and the Brandywine froze over and we all had to rally together and fight them out." He was babbling and blushed deeply when he saw how the dwarves were raising their bushy eyebrows at him in amusement.

"So we won't be getting any armies of Halflings marching upon our doorstep anytime soon?" Dwalin smirked, his dark eyes twinkling.

"I mean," he added as he shot Thorin an amused grin, "we've had just about everyone else in Middle-Earth on our doorstep asking for war."

"Let's hope that it does not come to that." Thorin retorted though his lips twitched slightly upwards. However when he turned back to Frodo his expression was once more stern, "So no one from the Shire will be trying to rescue you or your mother."

"No, most likely not. Well, maybe the Took's and the Brandybuck's but they would need to know from where Mama and I need rescuing. Maybe a message could be sent to them from here to let them know that we're safe?" Frodo asked, looking hopefully up at Thorin from beneath his eyelashes.

"I don't see why we should, not when they're making no effort to help you Mam." Gloin retorted before he let out a grunt of pain as someone, Frodo thought it might be Oin, smack him around his skull.

"We'll see." Was all Thorin said on the matter before he started shooting off questions about Frodo's travels to the Lonely Mountain. How long he and his mother had travelled on the road before they were separated, why they were separated, did the dwarves take good care of him and so on.

Frodo tried to answer all of the Dwarf King's questions without rambling but that was difficult for Frodo had so much to say on the matter and yet so little of it was actually important.

By the end of interrogation – for that was how it felt to Frodo – Frodo was exhausted and wanted nothing more than to curl up in the armchair and cry.

He tried to fend off the tears he knew were coming but he quickly found himself fighting a losing battle and started sniffing miserably as the dwarves around him argued over their next course of action.

"Ah, oh dear." He heard someone say and quickly realised that his weeping had been discovered. He tried vainly to wipe away the tears, only for more to replace the ones that he had wiped away.

"Ah, laddie, it's alright, no need…" Bofur started to say as he knelt down by Frodo's armchair when the door of Thorin's study burst open.

Thorin looked completely exasperated at the sudden intrusion into his study by another dwarf and Frodo could have sworn he heard him mutter, "Does no one know how to knock?" before he exclaimed out a name that Frodo was very certain that he had never heard before.

"Dis." The dwarf standing in the doorway of the study was dressed in rich blue robes, sapphires and gold and silver threads inlaying the collar and the edges of the robe. Silver clasps were threaded intricately through the dwarf's black as night hair, shinning softly in the study's soft firelight.

"Don't you 'Dis' me, Thorin Oakensheild." The dwarf snapped as she – and she was a she, Frodo realised with a start even though she had a lovely black beard gently gracing her chin and cheekbones, intricately woven into the braids on the rest of her hair - marched into the study and stood right up into Thorin's face, "I thought I requested, no demanded, to be informed immediately on when the child was discovered."

"I…" If Frodo was in a somewhat less teary mood he might have been quite tempted to giggle to see the Dwarf King look so flustered and tongue-tied, "I… Dwalin?"

"You were speaking with the high counsel, your highness." Dwalin said as he stepped smoothly forwarded, "I left a message…"

"You should have just come in and told me yourself." Dis snapped glaring furiously at the tall tattoo dwarf who looked as meek as he was possibly able to look being as fierce looking as he was, "Like I care for what those…"

"DIS!" Thorin said raising his voice and interrupting a long line of, Frodo was sure, Dwarven curses that did not speak very highly of the ancestors of whoever sat of Thorin's High Counsel.

"Oh," Dis said impatiently, "like you care what I say about the old maggots. In fact I believe I've heard you say worse things in regards…"

"It is not for those reasons why I've stopped you," Thorin retorted looking exasperated and at quite the end of whatever was left of his patience, "I am stopping you because…" he gestured without looking in Frodo's directions.

Frodo shrank back as yet another pair of cold blue eyes burned into him though at least these eyes were quick to soften upon finishing their analysis of him.

"So, this is him, is it?" the dwarrowdam asked and Frodo was only now struck with how much this madam dwarf looked like Thorin. And Kili too for that matter, now that he thought about it. Was she his mother? Would explain why his uncle appeared to be trying to make himself as small as possible, hiding behind Bofur.

Did Thorin have a sister? Frodo scrunched up his nose trying to remember, was this said sister? If so, she was just as terrifying as her Kingly brother.

"Yes, it is." Thorin replied simply.

Dis moved slowly towards him a gentle smile gracing her lips, her heavy robes wiping softly against the stone floor.

"Hello little one." She came to stand before him.

"Hello." Frodo replied shyly, blushing deeply when she gently took his chin in her worn hand, her dark blue eyes eying him critically as she torn his head this way and that.

"Our forefather's blood is strong." She looked over her shoulder back at Thorin who simply hmph'ed

"Huh?" Frodo asked intelligently causing several dwarves to chuckle. Frodo wanted to push for answers, to ask what was so funny but was stopped when a loud yawn escaped from him.

He blushed and muttered "Sorry."

"Come here, mim ze," Dis said with an amused smile as she held out her hand for him to take, "Let us get you ready for bed."

Frodo hesitated for a moment looking to his uncles and lastly Thorin, who nodded his permission before he slide himself carefully out of the armchair, frowning as he placed his bandaged feet on the floor. It felt rather like walking on mushrooms.

"What is it with Hobbits and their obsession with mushrooms?" Frodo jumped realising he must have muttered his thoughts out loud.

"Waste of perfectly good mushrooms." He replied with a pout before blushing knowing his mother would chide him for his cheek, but instead of being told off he found that he had caused, once again, for the dwarves in the room to laugh.

"Bilbo's son indeed." Balin said with a fond chuckle.

"Come along mim ze." Frodo took hold of Dis hand, feeling oddly reassured to be placed into her care, if only because she had a mother's presences about her. A presences he had been longing to find himself in for many weeks.

He walked carefully out of the study on his mushroom padded feet. He had just gone out of the room before stopping and looking back over his shoulder at the dwarves.

"You will find Mama, won't you?" he asked tentatively, looking at each dwarf before looking at Thorin. "Please?"

"Of course we will laddie," Dwalin rumbled as he moved to ruffle Frodo's curls, "Of course we will."

Frodo swallowed nervously, took one more look around at the dwarves in the room before giving a jerky sort of nodded and allowing Dis to lead him away and out of the his study and Frodo's mind suddenly collapsed into a sleepy mush as a heavy weight left his shoulders.

Author's Note: So this chapter was longer but as I couldn't think of an appropriate chapter title for it, I broke it into two parts and everything became suddenly flowed and made sense... in my head at least. It means I can now expanded on the later half of this original chapter.
Anyway, so you'll be please to hear that I've finally, finally finished writing Part Two of this fanfic. I mean, I still need to edit, grammar-check and that crap but it's now all, finally, written down. Which is great because I was beginning to worry that this would never get done. I feel a bit more motivated now, completing Part Two, so much so that I've already written the first chapter for Part Three :D, which has us back with Bilbo and her story.
I know a few people are worried about her and what might be happening to her in Bovin's hands but just to make it extremely clear right here and now, nothing that has been suggested to me in PMs is happening to Bilbo. She's not being treated particularly well but she isn't being harmed in the way they questioning that she might be. She gets slapped when she tries to escape or being "disrespectful" towards Bovin and his men, but that's as far as it ever goes, otherwise they basically leave her alone, she's just a parcel to be delivered. Hopefully this will ease a few peoples minds. I'm not writing that kind of fanfic, I don't think I ever could, that's why I've changed Bovin so much from how he used to be. So anyway, we'll be back with Bilbo in Part Three and let's just say that there will be, by then, a certain change in the air that will work in her favour ;D