Fire licked the logs, crackling off the ends of the littlest twigs in twisting copper wires. The heat singed his cheeks and his forehead under his hood, and behind, outside of the ring of the fire, the cold lurked about his shoulders, nipping and whistling in the trees. Above, half-hidden behind bare branches, hung the round moon, golden in the black evening.

Kíli tipped his head back, to look up at the moon.

Laughter was dying out around the fire, echoing soft into little ripples.

Kíli hadn't been listening, warm and contented. He looked from one smiling face to another around the fire. It had been one of Glóin's stories – rare they were, but all the better for the scarcity – and the rest of them were chuckling still around their pipes.

"Well," Bofur put both hands on his knees, "I don't know about you lads, but I'm about ready for a song."

A stick cracked behind him and Fíli stepped over the log, settling himself beside Kíli. Holding out his hands to the fire, he rubbed them together.

"And where have you been so long?" Kíli asked him. Curiosity squirmed on the inside of his ribs. He kept it there as best he could.

"Oh, I've been about." Fíli smiled. "Had something to find." He tugged his pipe from its place in the sleeve of his coat.

"And did you find it?"

Fíli fidgeted with his pipe. "Curious?"

When Kíli looked at him, Fíli was grinning.

Kíli shoved him and Fíli laughed.

"Fine then, don't tell me," Kíli leaned back towards the fire. "And I won't tell you why I'll be staying late at the forge."

Leaning back, Fíli stuck out his feet. "Suits me fine."

Kíli hadn't thought it would work. Didn't mean he hadn't hoped. "Turns out, you're the least fun here," he said.

Fíli shrugged. "I wouldn't be too sure about that. Not yet, anyway."

That made it worse, and Fí knew it.

Kíli cast him a look, sidelong. Fíli was ignoring him, that little smile just in the side of his mouth. Bofur was getting out his fiddle. The others were arguing about songs.

Fí struck a light. "So, which nights will you be out, then?"

This time it was Kíli's turn to smile. "Well as long as we're not telling each other things,"

Fíli looked at him, the light from the fire dancing in his eyes, and Kíli shrugged. "It was your idea, after all."

Bofur started clapping time and the others began to pick it up. "Alright lads, together. On second thought." He got to his feet and began to stamp. "All of you, up noe. Let's get yer backsides warm again.

"And somebody get my brother up," Bofur drew a few notes from the fiddle on his shoulder. "He's gone and got too fat to do it on his oen."

Fíli and Kíli each took one of Bombur's hands, but they pulled too hard, and poor Bombur almost stumbled into the fire. Kíli caught him, and they were all roaring with laughter at Bombur's startled face as the music began.

Their hands beat a steady pulse. The song was one they all knew, and there was no reason not to sing, not tonight. A big log on the fire popped, sending up a spray of sparks that chased the music into the dark.