Chapter 1- Old Friends from Old Lives

Bilbo Baggins had been born on a relatively warm September morning to a life of quiet comforts and already adoring parents. His life had been, in his opinion, fairly ordinary and respectable. He grew, as most faunts did, with a love for food and warm hearths and the ability to both politely accept your cousin's wedding invitation and insult his future bride's hat in the same breath. However, there was one thing that set Bilbo apart from the rest of his kin. A tiny secret he had been born with that made him a social outcast before he could even sit up on his own.

Bilbo whistled a merry tune passed down from his mother as he got ready for his day. Having finished first breakfast, he followed the hallway to the master suite to replace his patchwork robe for something more respectable for strolling through the morning markets. Once in the typical Shire fashion of shirt, suspenders, waistcoat, and jacket, Bilbo's final morning ritual was to wrap a linen bandage around his right palm. A simple tug of his sleeve covered the hideous marks stretching to his wrist. Conceal anything unrespectable. Such was the way of the Shire, and Bilbo was old enough now that playing by these rules had ceased to bother him. Grabbing his basket on the way out, he was ready for the day.

Living the life of a confirmed bachelor certainly had its perks. For one thing, meal planning was much easier when shopping for one. Another was the autonomy of getting to do and go where he wanted. However, the largest plus for Bilbo was not having to be the focus of every piece of Shire drama. Yes, he was odd, and occasionally he would hear his name being whispered under the breaths of the hobbits he passed. However, on a day like today, he could pass practically invisible, and it was one of the few reasons he would ever thank Yavanna for soulmates.

"Petunia and Bocco finally returned! They were soulmates, I knew it!"

"The next generation gets better about hiding it, I swear to the Green Gardens. So it was a petunia seed he bore?"

"Yes! It's a lovely bloom. They took the burrow right next to Petunia's parents. It's growing in the windowsill right now, but my daughter Willow says they plan to have a petunia plot right along the hedges."

"Won't that be a lovely sight!"

Bilbo's eyes were nearly glued to the ground as he walked. His left hand unconsciously taking hold of the right and rubbing over the bandages. In fact, completely absorbed in his desire not to draw attention, he managed to accidentally run headlong into Cotton Feathertoes.

"Oh! Mister Baggins, did you hear the fine news?"

Bilbo forced a strained smile. "I did. Congratulations to you and your daughter. Is Petunia enjoying being Mrs. Burrows?"

"Aye!" The older hobbit guffawed. "We figured something was afoot, but never once did we suspect Bocco Burrows! Still he will make her a good husband. You ought to come and enjoy the reception."

"Thank you, for the kind invitation. I'll consider it."

"Oh Mister Baggins, you can't lock yourself away because you have no soulmate! Doderic Tunnelly and Gerdon Brockhouse haven't found their soulmates, but they are living happily together. Not every seed can get planted after all."

Bilbo couldn't even keep up the pretense of a smile at this point as his sight drifted back to his right hand once more.

"Right…" He remarked faintly.

"Begging your pardon, Mister Baggins. I meant no insult!"

"N-None taken. I'm terribly sorry, Mister Feathertoes, I'm afraid I found myself lost in thought. However, I need to get to Mistress Chubb's bakery before she sells out of that wonderful rye loaf. It was wonderful to see you though."

"You too, Mister Baggins! We'll see you at the reception tomorrow night."

Bilbo gave a single nod of departure, but not a word that he heard Cotton's incredibly pushy invitation once again. He sincerely hoped he would have a good excuse by tomorrow evening.

Soulmates. Bilbo may have long gotten over his bitterness, but it didn't lessen his annoyance. Honestly, all the fuss made over soulmates. Knowing he would never have such a meeting hasn't made him any less of a hobbit. At least, as he stared down at the wrapping on his hand, that's what he continued to tell himself. Desiring nothing more than his book and his pipe, Bilbo finished his shopping and quickened his pace to his home. Yes, it was shaping out to be a perfectly ordinary day indeed. Well, at least it was until he saw that he had a visitor.

Bilbo's steps slowed as his eyes narrowed in confusion. It wasn't that he never received visitors, but he usually knew they were visiting before they came around. Furthermore, Bilbo didn't know any of the Big People, and so the stranger in grey was very odd indeed.

"Good morning." He greeted.

The man leaned on his walking stick outside Bilbo's gates as he furrowed his eyebrows at the hobbit.

"What do you mean? Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?"

Bilbo had stopped completely at this point. "All of them at once...I suppose." He murmured.

This did little to satisfy the man as he continued to glare down at Bilbo. Almost as if sizing him up. Bilbo shifted on his feet uncomfortably before deciding he refused to be cowed in front of his own home. Straightening his shoulders, he marched right past the man and into his gate. Now, he felt he was on more solid footing.

"May I help you?" Bilbo asked.

"That remains to be seen. I'm looking for someone to share an adventure."

Bilbo's veins turned ice cold, as he spun around to face the man, his jaw dropped.

"N-No, no, no, no. Sorry, there will be no a-adventures here today...good morning." He shakily denied.

Bilbo was on a sprint to his door now, and had nearly made it when the man said something that had Bilbo stopped in his tracks. Dread and horrified awe warring within him.

"And is that you saying that, Bilbo Baggins, or is Adelard influencing your opinion? From what I remember, Paladin was very fond of adventures, but Addy...well, he had his reasons."

Bilbo was chalk white when he faced the man again. No one. No one aside from a very select few knew his attachment to those names, and most of them were dead at this point.

"Do I know you?" He asked in an almost detached sense.

"You do. Or to be more accurate, you did. I have been a very good friend of yours over the years, but maybe not so much in this life."

"I'm sorry?" Bilbo shook his head, baffled. "Just who are you?"

"I am Gandalf the Grey." The man introduced with a small bow. "And if you choose to invite me in for tea, I might be able to answer questions you've had since you've been old enough to have memories not your own."

Bilbo had always been odd. A product of Baggins blood and Took blood mixing, most of the gossips like to say, although he hardly remembered his cousin Adalgrim getting this much attention. No, Bilbo's peculiarity came from a rather insignificant secret his dear departed mother insisted he keep: this was not his first life. He may not know all of the lives he had lived necessarily, but for as long as he could remember, he knew Adelard and Paladin.

His father, Green Lady bless that soul, never made Bilbo feel lesser for it. In fact, after a night where all his dreams had been replaced by memories, some terrible, some good, his father would always let him talk about it before they would grab his maps. He still had charts outlining Paladin's journey through the mountains or all the Men's towns that Addy seemed to find a smidge of trouble in. It felt safe then. Like he and his father were plotting out a story. Belladonna was the one who made him feel abnormal.

Now Bilbo loved his mother, and that was never going to change. However, Belladonna was a hobbit of action. She would never allow her only son to be afflicted with some…curse if that was what this was. So she pried into the past and came up with a solution. Bilbo had been so young at the time, he barely remembered the details of what happened. He just knew it had something to do with dwarves. She attempted to befriend their neighbors to the northwest, and when disaster fell in the form of a never-ending winter…no dwarves came to their aid, and Bilbo was left motherless. It tore his father apart. Belladonna had been the flower to the deadly seed that formed right in the palm of his hand when he asked to marry her. And she died because something was wrong with Bilbo. Something to do with the fact that he had two voices in his head that weren't quite his own. Bilbo came to two conclusions that day:

Dwarves were not to be trusted, and adventures led to trouble. In fact, it was quite by accident thanks to his adoring Uncle Longo that he came to realize another fact about his life. It was perhaps this last point that had buried itself deepest and seemed to wriggle about nervously at the sight of a wizard in his sitting room. Even if any aura of mystery and power had been destroyed the moment he slammed his head into Bilbo's chandelier.

"I'm sorry if I seem…abrupt." Bilbo grounded as he aggressively steeped his tea. "I'm not used to talking about such things as…"

"Past lives?" Gandalf offered with a twinkle in his eye.

Bilbo's lips pressed firmly together at this as he tapped his spoon just a tad harsher against his cup than he intended.

"Quite." He grunted. "Just…not respectable conversation, I'm sure you can…underst…well, guess." He finished uncomfortably.

"What I guess…" Gandalf remarked dryly before sipping at his own cup. "Is that no one in the Shire understands you, or has tried to understand you. That must get rather lonely, Bilbo."

The hobbit found himself even more unnerved by the kindly, sympathetic tones of the wizard.

"You talk like you know me, but forgive me…I'm drawing a blank."

Gandalf did not seem overly offended or put off by the fact that Bilbo didn't know who he was if his continued enjoyment of the warm beverage was any indicator.

"I'm not surprised. I would imagine there are many secrets that Addy and Paladin have been hiding from you."

Bilbo felt his eyebrow quirk. "Such as?"

The wizard seemed to chuckle. "Oh, it's not my place to remind you of past pains. However, I would be willing to guess that you have an aversion to fire? Even a good distance away from the hearth still feels too warm at times."

Bilbo's cup clapped down on his platter spilling a few drops. He never noticed.

"You notice things in large crowds of people. Things that make you feel guilty like noticing where a hobbit keeps their coins or who seems to be the most oblivious."

"Stop it." Bilbo whispered.

"Perhaps most telling of all is your fear of dark spaces. Because you feel trapped. As if you were sitting in a dungeon awaiting…"

"STOP IT!"

Dishes clattered to the ground, but Bilbo couldn't find it in himself to care as he stood tall trying to cower the large man. His chest was heaving, and he had to remind himself of his need to breathe. Gandalf merely peered back at him, calm as ever.

"Surely you realize, by now don't you? Being reborn is no natural thing. It is a curse, Bilbo Baggins." Gandalf intoned with the utmost seriousness.

"Well, I-I could guess…" Bilbo returned, his right hand revealing the slightest of trembles.

"Never fear my dear fellow. I have a plan for exactly how to lift the Amrâb Hufrel's curse and free both your souls! I know I said third time was the charm, but I think this fourth cycle…"

Both? Fourth cycle? Just what was this wizard talking about?!

"Wait a minute!" Bilbo demanded. "I don't know any other lives besides Addy and Paladin's…"

"And that is quite for the best I would believe." Gandalf declared with a decisive nod.

Bilbo's fingers pulled downwards on his face. Confounded wizard! Why couldn't he just speak plainly?

"And being a wizard, do you have the power to break such a curse?" Bilbo asked, refusing to let any hope shine in his voice.

Gandalf's incredulous laughter blocked any ray that he may have had.

"My dear boy, I do not have the power to stand against the Valar, no. I do, however, have an intuition of how said curse can be broken. And that will require us to travel to Tharbad. Tomorrow preferably."

"Tharbad? Tomorrow?" Bilbo repeated incredulously before shaking his head with a depravicating laugh.

He wondered if this would be a good time to bring up that he had been invited to a wedding reception. He would eagerly drink and be merry with the Feathertoes and Burrows if it got him away from this mad being.

"No, I'm afraid that's just not possible."

Gandalf sighed sadly. "Then you will have wasted this life and will be forced to repeat the cycle in another century or so."

Bilbo finally had enough. His eyes were like coal and his voice was like ice when he answered.

"Wasted?! My life is a waste? Look at what happened to Addy and Paladin! They wasted their lives! I'm preserving mine!"

Gandalf didn't say anything as he pushed his tea aside and folded his hands, meeting Bilbo's ire with one of imploring determination.

"What is a life preserved if it wasn't worth living? Oh Bilbo, my boy. The world is not here in your books, dreaming for adventure. It's out there, waiting to be explored."

An ache stirred within Bilbo's heart. Dreams for the future and unfilled plans. Then his Uncle Longo's cruel words drifted from the furthest corner of his mind.

"With this mark that bids you roam, never again will you return to your home."

A shudder beat through him, and much like he did earlier with his bandages, he concealed it behind contempt.

"Oh yes, a world full of nasty, disturbing uncomfortable things that makes one late for dinner. Is that what you think I want? At my age? Really Mister Gandalf…no. I will remain firm on this. I have no desire to leave this smial."

The wizard did not seem to think highly of his answer, but he did not attempt to talk Bilbo out of it again as he stood and retrieved his hat and staff.

"All the same, should you change your mind, I will be waiting at the Green Dragon tomorrow until midday. And if your resolution still holds firm, it has been a pleasure, my dear friend. We will meet again in the next life."

Bilbo could only scold at the wizard's backside with the final jab of allowing the curse to befall another, but he could not say he wasn't glad to be rid of his unexpected company. Now, things can get back to normal. Yet, as the day dragged out into the evening, Bilbo couldn't help finding himself inexplicably bored of his routine.

"This is that dratted wizard's fault." Bilbo complained as he stabbed at his fish. "He must have cast some sort of spell. It's the only explanation. Well, Bilbo Baggins is not so easily duped!"

The feeling persisted even as Bilbo readied himself for bed to the point where he found himself glancing at his old maps. From a purely academic sense, just how far was Tharbad? In reaching out for his bigger map, Bilbo managed to knock a stack of books off his nightstand. A set that gave him pause. In an old, worn blue leather bound journal were the words pressed in silver 'My Adventures' and accompanying it was a red twin, still stiff and blank aside from the golden letters 'Your Adventures'.

Bilbo's mother would have loved that a wizard came for him, specifically. His mother really had tried her best. Belladonna never doubted Bilbo's word that what he saw and heard was real. She only ever regretted that his skills weren't appreciated by the rest of society. Bilbo heaved a large sigh as he put all thoughts of wizards and maps aside as he picked up the dual books, replacing them both carefully before capping his candle. Nothing has changed, not truly anyways. In a few days, this will all have seemed like one of his 'other' dreams.

However, it was not Addy Fallohide or Paladin Took he dreamt of that night like he had so many times in his life. Vaguely, to Bilbo's consciousness, he wondered if this was the other hobbit Gandalf had spoken of, but even those wonderings became hazy as Bilbo was sucked into the memories not of his own.

"Mama, why do we have to leave?" The young hobbit Bilbo was enabling pouted looking out on the golden flat fields of weed and sunflowers with longing.

The other hobbit, though she was taller and more willowy than the hobbits of Bilbo's time, gave him a sad but comforting smile.

"Oh my little Acorn, that is what we must do. We are wanderers. We stay just long enough to cultivate the land and give it new life and then we must move on."

"I don't want to go." The smaller hobbit whined, his bottom lip trembling. "I like it here. The sunflowers like us here."

The mother laughed brightly as she settled the bag she had finished packing in the large cart with the rest of their things. She grabbed her faunt's little wooden sword from where it lay on the ground and pressed it into his hands as they began to gather with the rest of the hobbits.

"Do the sunflowers speak often to you?" She asked with just a hint of surprise.

Bilbo's faunt nodded his head enthusiastically. His mother hummed in thought.

"That is a very special gift. Lady Yavanna says only those with the language of the flowers can help us find our true home."

"Our true home?" The little one repeated.

"Yes, we will not always be wanderers. Some day we will find a land so perfect and green that it will rejoice and reward us with a bountiful harvest, just for promising to care for it. Until then, we head west towards the Horse Lands for Chief Salvia heard the land cry out for help next."

"Can Grandmother speak to the flowers too?" The little hobbit asked in awe.

"That she can. But let's not ask her about it just yet. I think that the fact that the sunflowers are your friend should be a…secret. At least for right now."

"How come?"

"Because my little Acorn, fate is not always kind. And I would spare you from it for just a little while longer if I can."

For a long time, Bilbo just lay in bed as the window slowly lightened with the dawn. He couldn't help blaming that thrice-cursed wizard as thoughts whirled through his head. So apparently he had been a wanderer, and of the Fallohide Clan if he remembered his history lessons correctly. However, that was unsurprising to him. He's always been of the Fallohide/Took line as far as he was aware. And the language of flowers? He had never heard of such a thing. He had been taught that flowers had meaning, but not that they could speak.

For a quick moment, he closed his eyes and tried to listen to see if he could hear the silent voices of the flowers. He gave up on the activity after fifteen seconds snorting at his absurdity as he crawled out of bed. Honestly, what was he really hoping for? Besides, they did it. The holbytas found their true home in the Shire, and the hobbits have thrived ever since. Why would he ever want to leave? Bilbo attempted to go through his usual routine as he tried to ignore the deadline Gandalf had set the day before. Bilbo's blood and soul was not singing with the desire for adventure. He had no memories past or present that was influencing him in any way towards that risky excitement. Well, except for the voice of his father ringing in his ears after he found him crying in his bedroom over Longo's ominous warning.

"Bilbo, I'm going to let you in on a little secret about our 'Baggins' blood that your grandpa Mungo told me. We, Bagginses, love a good story, and we will go out of our way to find it."

"Like Otho snooping into the Shire gossip?" Bilbo sniffed.

"Exactly, so." Bungo chuckled. "So you don't pay a lick of attention to what your Uncle Longo said. If you ever do decide to leave the Shire, it will be because your Baggins blood recognized a good story…and your Took blood said 'go for it'."

"I must be out of my mind!" Bilbo complained as he flexed his right hand once before rushing to pack a bag, hoping he still had plenty of time to meet Gandalf.

Bilbo Baggins has always been an odd hobbit. Hearing the voices of the past and never knowing or desiring a soulmate. He supposed his desire to run out his door after a wizard wasn't that out of character for his wandering soul.

Meanwhile, far to the North, an ancient evil woke from a long slumber with the stirring of a single soul. He hadn't felt this soul in so long. They had always tried to hide it from him. If he was capable of such actions, he would have smiled in delight. He still had plans for this soul after all. Plans that would help his Master to rise again once more, but for now. The best course was to wait. After all, he had the key to summoning this soul to him. And it was a stone that glowed from its own light within. The Arkenstone.

Sorry if this seems all over the place. It'll make sense here before too long, but I needed to establish some world building with Bilbo.