And now, the moment we've all been waiting for! Or is it? Either way I'm excited!

Inspired by a prompt I stumbled upon by lateforerebor on tumblr.

Summary: Bilba "Bell" Baggins decides that she's waited quite long enough to take her mother's advice and old stories and go on an adventure of her own. What she didn't expect was to end up in Ered Luin and be adopted by dwarves! AU, Pre-Quest, Undecided Pairings.

-;-

The first-and likely last time- that Bilba would speak a word of Hobbitish in the presence of a dwarf was at the arrival of the middle son of Ri one gloomy night during midwinter. Likewise, the first- but certainly not the last time- that the Hobbit wielded a weapon was during the same night.

Bilba's eyes snapped open at the tiny sound of something clinking against glass, and she bolted upright in her bed, eyes immediately going to the window that was positioned alongside the foot of the bed. A dark shadow was blocking light from coming in, and she quickly and silently reached for the closest object to her- the rather solid broom that she kept next to her bed at all times.

That wouldn't be enough for her, however- she needed something else. Something that she could use as a distraction.

Her book would do nicely, she thought as the window clicked open and the dark figure entered.

"Now Bilba," she remembered her mother saying to her once, "If anyone ever tries to harm you, immediately go for an offensive move- they won't expect that. Follow up with another full attack with something you feel comfortable using. If you have a candlestick then use it. A book, a bauble, a broom- any of them can be used as weapons if you need them to. Of course, that is only if you can't get to your knife or conkers. And don't forget to yell for help."

The sound of the heavy tome hitting the intruder in the side of the head was the only sound in the room for a split second before Bilba shrieked a war cry in Hobbitish that would have had her mother applauding and lunged, her broom in hand. She and her cousins had always played with sticks as faunts, and so her mother had gotten her a walking staff made of thick wood that she taught her daughter how to use when she was older. And while her walking staff was out of reach, the broom certainly wasn't, and she knew how to use it.

"DORI!" she shrieked as the intruder stumbled back with a surprised grunt, unable to fend off her skilled blows as she advanced. "DORI, HELP!"

There was a noise like thunder down the hall, and then the door burst open, quite literally as the hinges bent and gave way and Dori barrelled into the room like a dwarf possessed. With a noise not unlike a strangled squawk, the intruder managed to escape out the window, just as Bilba landed another heavy blow to the back of the head. Dori, enraged as he was, tore after the unknown out the window as Ori flew into the room as well, immediately rushing to the Hobbit's side as a slew of aggressive Khuzdul came through the window. After several long moments of the growled banter, Ori's concerned expression slowly turned to amusement, and at Bilba's flustered, anxious expression explained in a tone that was obviously adjusted to hide his laughter,

"I see you've met Nori."

-;-

It was needless to say that the next morning was awkward on more than one account. No one had slept much after the incident- Dori and Nori had been locked away in one of the bedrooms as Bilba and Ori had spent most of the night together in Ori's room, knitting and working on Sindarin until they had both nodded off at one point.

Which brought them to where they were now.

Nori had been delegated to the small couch in the living space, and as the morning dawned- indeed, the sky was only just beginning to brighten when the three dwarves and one particularly exhausted Hobbit convened upon the kitchen.

Bilba, wary and still more than a little anxious, eyed up the newcomer with suspicious eyes. For one thing, this newcomer had a strangely large amount of red- or was it chestnut?- hair pulled up and styled into that of a star, and his beard was rather handsome in its groomed state as well.

"For such a wee thing, you have a fine arm." Nori commented with a cheerful grin as Dori stiffly went about his morning ritual of making tea and breakfast for the lot of them.

Indeed, there was a rather ugly bruise forming to the right of his eye, which had swollen slightly during the night and did not at all help solidify her first impression into a positive one.

"Evidently not good enough." She muttered back, crossing her arms tightly over her chest. "As you're still conscious. And talking."

Ori nudged her foot with his own, and she knew that the youngest of the trio was trying to hold back his laughter at the situation that they all found themselves in.

"Do you happen to make a habit of breaking into homes, or is it simply a hobby for you to do in your spare time." Bilba inquired lightly, though Dori and Ori both knew that the temper of their Hobbit was about to make a grand entrance if Nori happened to say the wrong thing.

It went without saying that Dori was secretly hoping for the latter.

"Does it count as breaking in if it's my home? Specifically, my room?" Nori inquired.

"Considering your claim of not breaking in, there was a suspicious amount of lock picking involved." Bilba shot back.

The tense atmosphere was broken by Dori's arrival with food- a simple porridge with raisins and an earthy black tea, of which Bilba could detect walnuts in the scent. However reluctantly, he placed a bowl and a mug down in front of Nori as well, though slightly heavier than with she and Ori.

"We haven't been introduced. I am Nori, at your service."

"Bilba Baggins, and yes, you most certainly are."

"A pleasure. Now, what on earth would bring a lass like you to my room?"

Dori's expression was dark as he opened his mouth to reply, but Bilba was quicker to the draw.

"I happen to be exchanging work for board, if you must know. Though I hardly think it relevant considering the circumstances that brought you to the room I happen to occupy at the moment."

Dori's dark expression turned to one of smug pride. He had certainly groomed the Hobbit lass into a right spitfire during the time she had been spending with them. Not that she needed much help- she had a temper to start with.

"Relevant like how the room is mine?"

"It would be, if you deigned to grace us with your presence more than thrice a year." Dori finally said, narrowing his eyes at the redheaded dwarf. "However, as it was simply gathering dust and Bilba was looking for somewhere to stay, I made the decision to allow her to stay. And while I am thinking of it, I have told you countless times to stop trying to surprise us with your appearances- perhaps this time you might have learned something!"

Nori's expression soured, and he barked off something in Khuzdul before falling silent.

"Don't use that tone with me." Dori growled back. "And certainly not in front of Bilba. She'll not be going anywhere- not even due to your sudden reappearance."

The dwarf glanced at the Hobbit, who glared back at him fiercely. She was relieved at the statement that she would be allowed to stay, but her current ire was still first and foremost in her mind.

"I suppose I have no one to blame but myself." Nori finally huffed, his stiff stance relaxing and an easy smile gracing his features again. "I'll stay on the couch while I'm here."

"Damn right you will." Dori snorted, a faint smirk crossing his own features as the tension all but vanished from the room. "But it is good to see you, little goblin."

Nori made a face.

"One day, you will stop calling me that." He groused.

"Not any time soon." The silver haired dwarf replied smartly, returning to nurse his mug of tea primly.

-;-

Bilba and Nori's relationship, if it could be called that, didn't go particularly well following the initial confrontation. The Hobbit, while perfectly civil to Dori and Ori, was wary at best to the middle Ri and made her opinion known to the thief on several occasions during the first couple of weeks.

Nori, on the other hand, had started off wary but quickly grew curious about the Hobbit lass. He had heard of the Shirelings, but he had not actually passed through their territories before, preferring to go south-east on his wanderings. Plus, learning that both the Hobbit and Ori were working at the Grey Goose due to Dori's… habit… of kicking out his cooks, he decided that he was going to help his older brother find a cook that he couldn't possibly find fault in.

Call him what you like, Nori was nothing if not loyal to his kin, and his brothers above all. Tolerating the Hobbit was just part of his nature until he could figure out what aim she had.

If she had one, his mind said thoughtfully.

Paranoid he may be, but Nori had not had the luxuries of growing up in stability like Dori and Ori. Dori had been of age when the dragon attacked Erebor, and Nori had only been dwarfling. Ori had not even been a thought in his ma's eye until the Blue Mountains.

He remembered, faintly, the attack of blistering fire and smoke clouding the halls of Erebor. His mother's auburn hair obscuring his vision as she clutched him close to her chest, calling for Dori as they stumbled through the dark, the screams of the grieving and dying haunting him still. His mother, stumbling and crying out for Dori as a roar, louder than the largest crack of thunder or tolling bell, resounded throughout the mountain. A shriek and then pain, worse than he could ever recall, scorching heat that filled the air.

He would later recall cold ointments being pressed against the back of his neck and along his shoulders, down towards his hip. His mother, her beautiful smile gone as she clutched him closer than she ever had before, Dori's worried frown hovering over him in what few moments he could remember of the journey west, before coming to rest at Ered Luin.

He was the in between of his brothers. Dori could still remember the days of peace in Erebor, though his memories had since faded over the years of absence.

Ori, however, knew nothing of their homeland. He knew nothing of the pain and fear that had plagued their family and kin, having been born here in the Blue Mountains. No, it was a life of simplicity and normalcy for Ori.

Nori had been displaced by the shift between Erebor and the Blue Mountains. Circumstances had shaped him to become a thief in order to provide for his family. His mother had known, he thought. How could she not, after seeing all that he had been through. Because of that, he suspected that she allowed it as a way to vent his unsolved grief and anger.

Dori had suspected, perhaps, though he had never been told. When they all grew older, and Ori's tutoring fees came up, Nori had been the one to supply the coin to pay. Dori knew nothing more than that it had been Nori, Balin's sad, knowing smile following the thief out the door after he had paid for everything.

Shortly after that had come the open suspicion, the accusations, and finally the outright fighting. They tried to keep Ori out of it- the single thing that the pair could always agree on was that Ori always came first, despite whatever problems arose.

No, the real problem had been the single night that Ori had come home from his studies to find both of his brothers at one another's throats, snarling the most foul of insults at each other before Dori finally drove him out with a howl of rage and a thrown teapot at his skull. He had fumed about it for the first several days, but then a deep ache had settled in his bones as grief settled in.

He had only returned from his wanderings a handful of times since that day, and Dori seemed perfectly content to leave the matter alone, and so he had to leave it as well, even though he wanted nothing more than to simply talk and make it better somehow. All he wanted was his brother back- not this stranger with false smiles and forced cheer whenever he returned.

So yes, he would keep an eye on this Bilba Baggins until he had figured out how she had come to take his place in their home.

-;-

"You shouldn't be out alone, you know."

Bilba snorted, sitting on the back step of the Goose and sipping at her mug of tea. It had been busier, busier than she was used to, given the light snow that had powdered the streets the night before. There were twice as many dwarves and men in the tavern than usual, and it was only thanks to Bombur and Rorin's help that she hadn't gotten swamped under all of the food she was serving. Her shawl was wrapped around her shoulders comfortably, and Nori couldn't help but notice that it had similar stitching to that of Dori's new gloves and Ori's new scarf.

"So I recall many folk telling me." She replied dryly as the star-haired dwarf pulled out his pipe and lit it, leaning against the wall next to her and looking up at the sky.

There were clouds in the distance, promising snow for the following day, but there was nothing blocking the view of the glimmering stars and the azure depths of the sky. The moon was just climbing above the nearest peak to them, the light illuminating the street in an eerily clear light. "And yet I packed my bag and walked out of the Shire with hardly a thought. Wandered to the Grey Fells and along the coast before making it here. And all on my own, I may add."

"And why did you come, then?" Nori asked, half in suspicion, half curiously.

"My mother always used to tell me stories of her adventures. It wasn't until after she passed that I would never get the chance to tell my own if I never left the Shire." Bilba said carefully, glancing up at him with a guarded expression. "Thank you, though."

"For what."

"Dori may not have realized that you were behind it, but I know it was you who brought Bombur to the Goose." The Hobbit replied primly, though there was a faint smile on her lips. "You're not as bad as you like them to think, you know."

"Perhaps you don't know me as well as ya think." He replied, puffing out a smoke ring and trying to convince himself that her words were closer to the mark than he would like to admit.

"Perhaps not." Bilba agreed. "But that may have had something to do with the situation in which we first met. Your bruise is almost gone now, by the way."

"Ya do have a wicked arm, lass." He smirked, looking down at her.

"I know." She replied smugly.

It had to have been the way she said it that coaxed a chuckle out of the thief, and Bilba finished her tea in comfortable silence before pulling out her own pipe and setting to lighting it. At that, Nori couldn't help but quirk a brow at her.

"Hobbits are no strangers to our pipeweed, Master Nori." She hummed, reclining her head and puffing a perfect smoke ring into the air. "We supply most of the region west of the Misty Mountains, after all."

Nori couldn't help but blink in surprise at the startlingly bright smile the Hobbit leveled at him before she extinguished her pipe with skilled practice and wandered back into the tavern, leaving him wondering if that had been the tiny creature's way of starting fresh.