WAIT!
HAVE YOU READ CHAPTER 24? OR 19-23? IF NOT, READ THOSE FIRST! I'VE BEEN UPDATING VERY QUICKLY IN A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME.
We now interrupt our regularly scheduled Bilba content for our first interlude! Introducing the cantankerous princeling's POV!
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.
-;-
Thorin, son of Thrain, son of Thror, was no stranger to a great number of things in this world. Nor was he unaware of how much an "absolute stubborn arse of a dwarf" he could be; the statement usually bolstered by some measure of fond exasperation from his sister and less so from Dwalin. Truly, he was quite renowned amongst his people for his stubborn will- it was something that had served them well in their wandering days, fueling him to do what needed to be done and damn the consequences.
But in more recent times, he found that that stubbornness stood no chance against their supposed burglar, who continued to vex him for no other reason than her mere existence.
From the very moment that she had opened her door to him back in the Shire, his sister's name upon her lips, Thorin had gotten a feeling that it was only the beginning. And oh, he had been right.
For one, the Halfling was female.
While it may have been true that dwarrowdams were known to travel and quest, their short numbers had pushed them to remain in Ered Luin for their own safety, only venturing out if there were little other options. The same could not be said for those of the Shire; of a race he knew little to nothing about. Surely, the mere presence of a female would bring nothing but trouble to their company.
(And oh, how right he would be proven down the line on that front.)
She matched him almost perfectly in tone and posture as he'd circled her in assessment, hardly finding anything of note to comment upon aside from the obvious. She appeared more the part a grocer than the burglar the wizard had promised to find him; never mind that the silly creature wore nothing upon her feet! Never mind that she bore his gaze with nothing but a quirked brow and a distinct air of distaste for his presence, or that she had been naught but pleasant to the majority of the company whilst they spent their time in her dining hall.
No, the only thing of note; or rather things of note- were the instances of the odd fainting spell and the fact that she appeared to know Balin to an extent, even going so far to compliment his contract writing skills as she signed with a flourish.
The fainting spell was something that continued to linger in Thorin's mind. It could have been any number of things, really; the shock of dwarrow crowding into her home without so much as a "by your leave"- something that had earned the wizard a thorough tongue-lashing once they'd gotten on their way. But the spooked look that she'd had in her eye the exact moment before it happened was suspicious.
It had fallen by the wayside as the night dragged on, continuing to fill their cups until shooing them off to rooms that were much more comfortable than he had anticipated, the early morning to come on all of their minds.
The Halfling had prepared a warm meal, a spread that they all could appreciate before departing. She seemed to have even prepared well enough in her packing, thank Mahal. No calls or petulance in the matters of leaving her home behind, either.
No, the issues began once he realized that the little thing was not so mousey or demure as he'd initially assumed. Never mind that she seemed to know most, if not all of his company by name. Of course, his bafflement and irritation were only furthered by the vague comments Balin continued to make as they left the Shire behind them and ventured into the wilds. That the Halfling known as Bilba Baggins had lived amongst his people for several seasons and somehow come across and befriended the majority of his company without his knowledge.
And then there was the matter of Dis, but even his nephews were vague on that matter, and it only further soured his attitude regarding the Shireling. Dwalin couldn't help but chuckle at the expression he'd worn for most of the day as he mulled it over, clapping him on the shoulder with a knowing look in his eye.
Thorin would not put a name to it, exactly, but he was uneasy enough to know than an outsider of their race was so casually mingling amongst them without being bothered by… anything, really. She seemed to have the common sense to not go prying in matters that did not concern her, and was lighthearted enough even if Thorin groused that she spent too much time around the House of Ri.
By extension, he supposed he would include Balin, since the advisor had taken the youngest as his apprentice.
The middle- Nori, was one that he distinctly disproved of, as did Dwalin. The guard's proverbial hackles rose every time the thief sent a look their direction, occasionally accompanied by a jaunty wink or smirk. However, he (wisely) kept his distance, apparently keen on remaining unseen amid the company. So long as he did not cause any trouble, Thorin would be content enough to let it lie, for the moment.
He learned of the Halfling's encounters with orc scouts and wargs as he heard her telling others amid the company, tone soft as she recalled the Rangers she knew and the wandering she'd done.
Rather than sympathy, some other, unnameable emotion swelled in his chest. Something he couldn't put a name to but made him want to scoff.
She was a weak link in a chain that was already barely holding itself together. From his understanding of second-hand information, the burglar the wizard had found for their company was in her mid-life, already injured and further needing assistance from Oin for salves and the like. Already proving to be a burden before true conflict had even begun to rise on the horizon line.
-;-
And then came the trolls.
Thorin knew that the Halfling had been sent to take his nephews their evening meal. He had been thoroughly irritated with the wizard to begin with, and the pair had seen to it that he was even more incensed before noon.
Good riddance to the wizard's untimely departure; the meddling creature had only served in stirring up the constant embers of their disagreeing opinions of the other. Perhaps it was a certain skill that all wizards possessed, perhaps it was simply a clash of two ornery, stubborn beings who refused to bow to the will of the other. He didn't know, nor did he care.
Gandalf may have been the one to tip the scales in his decision of a quest, but Thorin had been thinking it long before the meddling fool had crossed his path.
Regardless, the Halfling had been sent into the woods.
Thorin could acknowledge that perhaps he had been too hasty in assuming the worst when she didn't immediately return. It would hardly have been the first time that one had been sent to attempt to end the line of Durin, no matter how much the wizard or any other of the company vouched for her character.
He remained watchful, rising to his feet as Fili was the one to eventually return, bellowing about there being trolls in the wood and missing ponies and Mistress Baggins deciding to see if there was to be anything done with Kili watching over her.
The brothers Ri leapt into action the swiftest, the thief leading the charge as the rest of the company followed into a situation that surely could not have ended well. Fili tossed Kili his sword as they met him, the youngest heir looking nervous before charging into battle against three mountain trolls who should not have been so far away from their homeland.
Of course, there was the pointed hiccup of the blasted Halfling managing to get caught by the trolls.
Against his better judgement, Thorin found her gaze; to his surprise, there was far less fear there than he had expected to find. No, there was an inner light there that plead with him to fight. Perhaps confused, he'd laid down his arms, remaining that way as the trolls bundled them up, the Halfling continuing to silently communicate something that Thorin simply didn't understood.
And don't remind him of the absolute nonsense she'd started rambling about with bad meats and parasites- even if it had somehow managed to convince the trolls otherwise.
For thinking on her feet, the Halfling certainly had a gift in speech, being able to stall for just enough time that the thrice-cursed wizard needed to make a grand return and an even more dramatic show of rescuing them all.
-;-
Finding that the Halfling was in possession of a set of daggers his sister had forged probably should not have startled him as much as it did. After all, she had first thought and called him Dis upon their first meeting on her doorstep. But perhaps the reason he had found it so strange was that it was one thing to hear, and another to actually see for himself that perhaps the Halfling was not as false as his suspicious thoughts deemed her as he returned the well-crafted blades.
Following the chaos of the troll hoard and fleeing the orc pack that had begun to hunt them, he managed to find time to approach Balin of the matter once they had reached Rivendell. Not in front of the Halfling or the tree-loving elves, no; he waited until their bellies were full post-raid of the kitchens.
It was no secret that Thorin held no love for elves, let alone those who may have been kin to the Elf-king of the East. It was what possessed him to ensure his company stuck close, creating a camp of their own where he was easier to watch over them.
Balin simply shook his head and told Thorin to inquire after the tale of how the Hobbit- here he had been given a rather firm look from the advisor- had come by them himself.
And perhaps, if the Hobbit had not been so inclined to spend all of her time in the presence of elves for the duration of their stay, he might have.
Truly, when it came down it, Thorin didn't know what to make of the Hobbit. She continued to evoke some measure of animosity within him without even making a conscious effort. Balin continued to plea with him to make an effort to set aside his past prejudice to try and connect with the fourteenth member of their company.
Mahal help him, he just couldn't.
It made him too uneasy to think of how quiet she was on her too-large feet, how easily she seemed to slip into place next to the dwarrow of his company where he continued to struggle to simply speak to half of them.
Doubly so when out of the blue, she simply appeared in their camp, ignoring Thorin's disbelieving look entirely in favor of striking up a conversation with Bofur and Bifur as though they'd simply left off in a conversation elsewhere.
His only consolation of all of this was that at least Dwalin shared some of his sentiment. Thorin was reluctant to say that he might have Dwalin's full support on this cause- he too, had met the Hobbit whilst she had been in Ered Luin. He had little to say of her, either. Aside from being unbearably polite and having the audacity to not wear any footwear while there was cold weather about, he had only officially met her once.
It was frustrating, not having anyone he was willing to ask about information on the Hobbit in their company.
(Later, he would acknowledge that he had very much so brought that scenario down upon himself, but in the moment, he refused to allow himself to bend first. He was Thorin Oakenshield, heir to the Lonely Mountain, and he would not let a Hobbit get the best of him.)
-;-
Thorin spent far too much time in thinking about the Hobbit, considering how little he associated with her. He didn't know what possessed him to turn so sharp when it came to her, either. Every time he went to speak to her, regardless of intent, it always seemed to come across as sharp. Dismissive, even.
It wasn't until they had made it to the mountains following their departure from Rivendell that he was finally able to place the name of what the Hobbit evoked in him with her mere presence amongst his kith and kin.
Jealousy.
He, Thorin Oakenshield, was jealous. Of a tiny thing who looked as though she would snap in half at the first sign of a brisk wind.
Oh, his sister would never let him hear the end of it should she ever catch wind of this in the future. Of that, he was completely certain.
Thorin didn't fully realize it until she had started a snow-battle during one of their first days in the higher altitude. The way that she could create such mirth despite their circumstances, dragging everyone in the company to participate without needing to say a word. She had an ease to the way that she did it, so subtle that he doubted had he been mulling over it since day one, he would have even noticed.
As it was, he did.
She revolved around the brothers Ri and the House of Ur, primarily. From the conversations he could hear at the front of the line, she had known them the longest and the most of the company, though she was beginning to become more familiar with the others the longer they travelled the paths.
In particular, however, she seemed to have a far more complex relationship with the thief. Likely due to the fact that they were of the same cloth. She a burglar, he a thief. There wasn't any other scenario that made sense to him.
(And yes, perhaps he spent too much time thinking on it, but there truly wasn't much else to occupy his time as their days drew on into weeks, into months on the road.)
-;-
Thorin's mood soured further, if that was even possible, when the Hobbit protested long and loud against entering the path into the Misty Mountains.
Road was perhaps too strong a word to use for the narrow, winding trail that vanished into the horizon, the only thing that would keep them from falling to their deaths the craggy, rough rocks that might provide handholds in an emergency.
But as it was, his mind focused on the image he desired to see; a scared Halfling who was far too soft to make it through the mountains.
He should have realized that there had been more.
Perhaps it was simply a Hobbit magic, that they were so attuned to the world around them that they could sense things that dwarrow could not. That her predictions of dark things on the horizon would come to pass as the storm opened above them.
As the battle of the stone giants occurred.
As he clung to her scruff, the only thing grounding either of them the remainder of the company clinging to the rock behind him.
As she plummeted into the thick mists, copper curls whipping against her face.
She wore the House of Ri's mark in her hair.
Suddenly, so many of the things he had put aside as Hobbit mannerisms made sense. So many small encounters that he had thought odd, so many of the careful looks and curbed words.
He should have known that Dori would not simply allow it to stand as they went head to head, emotions running high between all of them. Guilt lay the foundation for his emotional state, but above it stood a tower of cards that had come crashing down abruptly.
Everything that he could possibly blame the Hobbit for he could and did, wielding his words with a force and a snarl he never thought he was capable of against his own kith and kin. Burning bridges that would likely never be able to be repaired as the lines in the sand were firmly drawn.
When it finally died down, Thorin could not help but grieve for a moment.
Regardless of the Hobbit's place in the company, she had indeed been a member of their company. And he had been the one responsible for her death. She should never have come on this quest, so far from her own homeland. She would never be returned to her earth that she was so fond of, no funeral rites of her people to lay her to sleep.
It nearly made him sick.
-;-
After spending three days in the lair of the goblins, Thorin thought that perhaps he had taken a hit to the helm one too many times. It was the only thing that could possibly explain how their very alive burglar was standing before them following their flight from the mountain.
He'd told Gandalf that she had been lost!
And lost she had been, but she had not yet crossed into her Lady's lands yet.
Despite himself, despite knowing how he had been treating her, he demanded to know why she had come back. Of any of them, she had little reason to owe them anything. And perhaps some of it had been a true, genuine fear that she had returned for vengeance. A shade disguised as the Hobbit whom had once been a member of his company.
But no- she had simply told him off, in true Bilba fashion. That she had the energy to do so, despite not knowing what she had faced in her own ordeals, spoke more to her character than Thorin had bothered to learn of her before now.
-;-
Thorin had already suspected that the Hobbit knew how to wield a blade. She knew Nori, and Dori was no slouch himself in wielding such a weapon. Kili she had roped into teaching her archery along the way- something that had grated on his last nerve to no end, but resigned himself to. His nephew and the Hobbit alike seemed to be set in their ways when it came to particular things. And if it brought them pleasure, so be it.
It turned out to be one of the things that saved his life.
He charged the pale orc with fire in his veins and a rage like no other.
From everything that he knew of battle, it would never have gone his favor. The warg knocked him from his feet, languid as a mountain cat as it turned to eye him with a feral intelligence like no other creature he'd seen. It was unnerving.
When the arrow buried itself in the dirt next to Thorin, he thought it had been Kili who had loosed it. Until he noticed the distinctly elven fletching.
His gaze flicked to the small female, shaky and appearing as though she would topple at any moment. It gave him the moment to brace himself he needed before charging back into the fight.
A fight that none of them, let alone he, would win in the condition they were in.
The mace hit him with the force of a falling boulder, catching him square in the chest and feeling bone crack and shatter beneath the force. As if that had not been enough, the warg saw fit to lock its jaw around him and throw him like a bag of potatoes.
From there, his memory blurred. He was certain that he heard the Hobbit screaming something over him, heard the battle as it unfolded, but he was unable to move. He could barely breathe under the force of his wounds, left there as he desperately attempted to bring air back into his damaged lungs.
He could hear Azog, but death had yet to take him and so he was confused. What could have distracted the monstrous Defiler to give up the single thing that seemed to drive him?
He managed to turn his head, watching the Hobbit fend off the Defiler against all odds stacked against her. Watched as Azog finally managed to grasp her, watched as she managed to land a blow that not many could say that they could achieve.
Watched as she was thrown from the cliff.
And in that moment, a moment of peace amid the battle and blood and fire, it finally clicked.
Bilba Baggins reminded him of Frerin.
-;-
The next thing Thorin became aware of was that it didn't hurt as much to breathe. Prying open his eyes, he found himself relieved to see the faces of the wizard and Dwalin above him rather than that of his Maker's halls.
"The Hobbit?"
"Alive."
He grunted, rolling the best he was able to with the uncomfortable pressure in his chest, finding that the word spoke true as Gandalf turned his attention to the other member of the company who appeared to need his aid.
Dwalin quietly regaled him of what he knew of the cliff battle as the wizard and Oin set to work on exchanging words. How they had all been trapped on that blasted tree with almost no time to do anything as he'd run off like the stubborn fool he was into Azog the Defiler's waiting maw. How Bilba had been the one to rouse herself and pull herself to safety despite what surely had been serious injury. How she had been the one to stave off Azog, even going so far as to wield Thorin's own shield against the orc before being thrown from the rock as the eagles arrived.
Thorin could not find anything in him but stunned astonishment.
He owed the Hobbit his life.
Or perhaps something else, as he tiredly watched the brothers Ri and House of Ur fretting over her fragile form. She was made even more so by Bofur's larger stature wrapped around her like a cloak.
They did not know how she survived the mountains, nor what she had gone through to make it back to them. But Thorin knew for certain that things would not be able to go on as they had. Too much had changed too quickly for him to continue acting the fool.
He needed to right the wrongs he'd made.
Just as soon as he closed his eyes for a moment.