It was dark when he woke again, and he was home. He wandered the great halls, the mazes of stairs and mezzanines. A silent Erebor, empty of all life except his own. The high mountains of gold still covered the floors of the great city, in ranges, run through with valleys where a king might walk amongst them. Walk amongst them he did, all glittering and full of light, filling the great chamber with it, where all around him was dark, abandoned. He was alone with his gold and wanted to get away from it. The towering mountains were clinking as if a light quake had come from under them. He climbed the stairs, slippery with it, to cross a great stone bridge that led down through the Gallery of the Kings. The tapestries adorning the great walls high above flapped in a cold wind that was blowing from the outside. They were torn, eaten away by moths. Stone likenesses of his forefathers seemed to gaze down with forbidding empty eyes upon him, on all sides.

He looked at his hands and found they were smooth, in rings of sapphire instead of forge-made calluses. He was in blue and gold and ebony furs.

Ahead there was a light, a small flame guttering high above the dark city. The wind changed; it was hot. A hot wind replacing the icy breaths of the oncoming winter, from the outside, and also from within the mountain hall. Clammy sweat pooled at his temple and on his palms. He walked and walked and walked, his pace quickening.

On the throne a weeping figure bowed his head beneath the effervescent glow of the Arkenstone. It was Fili, his beard grown long and golden. He heard a woman's voice calling out at a distance. Dis? He called her name but no sound came out of him. The girl's voice emerged high and small again. "Do you feel the wind, Taras? It's so hot."

"Dis!" He called again but she didn't answer. She sounded like a little girl, but Fili was aged, his beard grown down his chest and woven thru in gold. He was alone. There was no Kili. No Dis. No Thrain or Thror.

"Don't leave me Taras. I am scared of the wind. It feels funny."

He tried to run, but his legs felt like stone, along the narrow bridge that led to the throne. It began to tremble beneath his feet, stymying his pace. "Fili!" he called. But the king did not see or hear him. Gold fell through his palms like water and tumbled down from the platform. Below the mines were all filled with smoke and it was rising.

"Then give me a coin for the pony," the girl's voice came again. "I want to sit on the black one with the gilded reins."

"Dis!" He screamed her name and with his cry a great crack split the halls and following it a great rumbling that shook him nearly from his feet. He was nearly to the throne and crawling, the only way he could maintain his balance and not tumble down from the bridge.

"Fili!" The jagged funnel of stone above him crumbled, and with it, the throne. Fili sat, transfixed by the gold coins, one handful after another, pouring from between his fingers. They tumbled into the abyss, gold pouring down after it from the broken floors and Fili's hands. The throne buckled and fell, the Arkenstone falling onto Fili's breast. He clung to it, even as gold fell upon his head, coins, goblets, great long necklaces of it like rivers, veritable whirlpools of gold in a raging sea of it, as stone crumbled and fell around it. Could he not see that he would be buried alive? He screamed his name again and again, clinging to a beam of stone, willing himself back onto a gray boat of broken rock that had been the throne's support. "Fili, to me!"

He stumbled down broken stairs when the tides of gold carried him backward toward a solid standing case of steps in the otherwise crumbling nave, chasing the fallen throne, and his nephew as all were swallowed up into the raging glittering tide. "No! No! No!"

He called for Fili. He called for Dis, and Kili, but all the voices had stopped. All that remained was the abrasive clank of metal, millions of gold trinkets and coin tumbling down, stone tearing above as if by unseen hands.

Far below hot metal was melting. He could smell it, feel the heat rising up through the solid sea. He swirled down helplessly with the falling, melting gold. He crawled on his knees to the bottom of the great stairs, broken, cracking, the walls and arches above him groaning. Fili, Kili Fili Kili. He screamed their names over and over but had it made a sound, it was overwhelmed by the breaking of the city around him. The great high doors, of the solidest oak, groaned and bowed forward, falling and splitting down upon the mass of gold and crumbling stone.

And then the walls fell from the great terraces at the front of the city, looking out where the city of Dale would have stood. But all he could see was a blinding light rushing in, fire-wind singing away his beard.

"Where are you Taras? Taras, come back. I see fire."

II

He woke with a start to find Dwalin hunkering beside him. "Arise my king. Break you fast."

Balin touched his shoulder and he lurched upward to sit from his bedroll, nested in the same place he had fallen asleep on watch the previous night. He shook the grass from his hair, muttering the names, cursed as they were to him, too low under his breath for any to hear, half-awake and dazed. His temples ached. "Thrashing about again, my king," disclosed Balin lowly. "Are you unwell?" He pulled his hand back from Thorin's shoulder as he winced at the reminder. "Dreams is all, Balin." The old dwarf pressed his lips together in worry and made a small, helpless sound.

Thorin wrinkled his brows and raised his hand to wipe the cold sweat from it, as Yrsa and Anbur came about to them with hot loaded plates. "Your majesty," the girls gawked together, curtsying in unison. "Kind of you lasses," Thorin forced a smile at the two, so cheerful they were, even little Yrsa, with her mangled hand stuck in her mouth, quaffing what was left on it from breakfast. They were still in their dress clothes from the previous night, their velvet pinafores rumpled. Was there anything good left in this world, if not their faces? "Best you run along, before your sister sees your good clothes are dirtied." "Wait, this one is for Meisar," Anbur said directly to him, setting the last plate upon the flat rocks above where Meisar's empty bedroll and mantle lay rolled up neatly. "Where has she gone?"

"Don't know. Left early before sunup. Reckon she'll come back soon," Freyda's voice came in, jolly for so early a morn. She handed Dwalin a steaming clay cup. "What is this?" he asked, sniffing it suspiciously.

"Try it. You'll like it." She winked at him and he gave her an approving half smile.

"Well then, we've got chicken apple mash, a bit o' cornbread, and this sundry grog the lass had made," Dwalin said, passing Thorin a plate. He took it listlessly, his throat suddenly feeling raw, as if he had been screaming. He picked up a hunk of the cornbread and willed his hand not to shake, not in Dwalin's presence. He had shouldered too much already. A friend was good for him, a lady.

Dwalin ate fast and washed it down with a gullet full of whatever was in the cup. He made a face and spit it upon the grass. "Made it just for you, Mister Dwalin. That's how you thank me?"

"What is it?"

"Coffee, from the Southron lands. Me da was an armed escort for merchants traveling that way. Haradim traded it for weapons. Scary folk he said, covered their faces with black silk and wore coal around their eyes like the girls do in Bree at the grotty inns. It is good, though, I promise. Drunk strong and black the best."

"You beg me drink like a Southron in eye rings like a doxy night lass amongst men?"

"No, Mister Dwalin. You're stubborn and narrow and it's a sight to see ye try new things."

Balin laughed at this and Dwalin's lips made a pouting, grumbling stance. Dwalin never liked directives, or the exotic, Thorin half-expected he would see an affront in it and up and leave. After all, who was she but a woman who seemed so strangely fond of his company?

Before he could ponder their unexpected company any further, a visage invaded him, at all of his senses, when he caught the aroma of the rejected beverage its contents sloshing about the edges of the cup in dark trickles. He could see Thror, seated at his writing-desk in his chambers, with a steaming golden mug of it, strong-smelling and black in the cup. He had nipped some of it out of curiosity when his grandfather's back was turned. He could not remember the taste of it, only the restless night that followed.

"It was brought to Erebor, in the days of old, by merchants to the south. My grandfather was fond of it," he reminisced quietly. Balin's placid smile was suddenly wistful. "Ah yes, yes, I do remember." He nicked the cup and drank what was left in it.

Dwalin grinned; he patted Freyda's back, the way male dwarves did each other's, hard but not rudely. It made her laugh. "You're kind, lass. Next time let the "Urs handle the food, and the Southrons their… coffee." He let out a long chuckle that seems uncharacteristically at ease. Freyda passed him a silver flask and he gulped from it. "That's more like it," he grunted.

"He's friendlier when he's got whiskey in him, isn't he majesty? Might I tempt you with a nip, my king?"

"No, thank you," Thorin muttered. When he sat again Dwalin drew away from Freyda and close to his side. He half-wished he would stay by her. "Where has Meisar gone?"

"Should be back soon," Freyda assured. "We'll leave her to rouse Bofur and Brynja I suppose. No better task, eh?"

"I am here my king. You have summoned me?" Meisar came around before him, her fox-red hound cradled in her arms like a babe, the other two nipping at her heels. Did those curs follow her everywhere?

His voice caught in his throat. "I only… wondered where it was you had gone," he muttered. White brows raised out of the corner of his eye, but Balin said nothing.

"I always come back. That's what's important I suppose." "It is," Balin said kindly. "You have done honorably my lady. You are looking well." She sat, a gracious glance turned at Balin.

"The girls left breakfast for you," Thorin said quietly. "Ah, a good full one. Thank you my king," she smiled timidly, and started on the cornbread, as Freyda urged a seemingly reluctant Dwalin away. Balin had gotten up and left seemingly of his own accord already. Her smile, and her ease, faded inexplicably, alone with him again, the king.

As a king, she thought stonily, but she could not forget how Freyda and Gyda had giggled and whispered and looked her way. She had seen the way Freyda looked at Dwalin sometimes, but-

"It is cold I fear," mumbled Thorin.

"No fault in that; could be worse. We have starved before, haven't we?" There was silence between them again, thick, and uncertain as ever. She liked it not.

"It was noble of you my liege, to allow-"

He made a dark snorting sound before she could finish. "…To allow respite for a wedding, for Brynja and Bofur," she finished, her voice stilting. Silent again, she searched for words between bites. The mash was best, sopped up on the cornbread even better, but suddenly her stomach tightened around it, her throat narrower. "They were very happy, you should know."

"A fool's errand. But who am I to deny true love?" She detected a dark hint of sarcasm on his tongue. His face grew weary and melancholy again, unthreatening but dark. "He has been loyal and true through all. Am I in any position to deny him?"

She shook her head timorously, but she deigned to face him now, to look into his eyes. . He sighed, a shiver in his back becoming heat, a memory of sweet-grass and pipe-weed, and warmth. The shape of her fingers, always curling tight about whatever she was holding, as if…

"My king, you gave Bofur not just your blessing to marry, but half an express command it seems. Or so I have heard."

"What of it?" It came out with a harshness he had not intended. She recoiled a bit and the will that had been in her gaze dropped, eyelids drawn again. He saw Bofur in his mind's eye, the joy upon his face when the vows were made official by Balin, and Brynja's laugh just before she retired. If only in his own long, seemingly endless nights he had seen something as heartening, better than a crumbling city and his head ringing the cries of the dead. Fili and Kili and Dis, crying out for Taras, a trusty servant was it? A sentry that shadowed them? Or one of Dis's governesses? Whoever it was, there had been no sight, no mention of the name since the day of the dragon, and he wished not to think of it any longer. The weed from his pipe tasted unbearably bitter on his lips again. A fool's errand.

A lament rose in his throat for her but it was dry and pitiful. Meisar. She had done her duty to him, protected his life; he owed her better than this, better than-

Shame pattered in his lungs as his breath caught, the pipe-smoke in his mouth growing sour. She bowed her head, away from him, scraped a trembling hand along the last of the mash on her plate, before letting the dogs finish it instead. "Nothing, my king." She stood, suddenly. "I will rouse Bofur and Brynja. I suppose if anyone should have that duty, it is me."

III

She was relieved to find that Bofur was awake and outside his wagon, in naught but his boots, bracers and small-clothes. His arms were stretched up toward the sun as if in celebration, and his braids were out, his hair a fine mess. The sight made her smile. She cleared her throat in Bofur's direction. He turned around and smiled broadly at her. One half of his moustache was up, the other pointed down and looking slick. "Ah, shepherdess. My wife would have a word with ye."

Meisar pushed back the curtain with some hesitation. Brynja lay on the pallet, amid the twisted layers of their bedrolls, blankets and pelts. She was covered in a bear-pelt from her shoulders to her knees and they were each bare. Her cheeks, beneath the honey-brown fluff of her beard (most ardently mussed) bore a soft, peachy glow, warm with affection, warmer with a sheen of perspiration. Her shift along with Bofur's clothes were crumpled together in the corner of the wagon, his hat hung up beside her wedding dress. She stretched her arms and wrapped the pelt around her torso, scooting bare-bottomed over the wagon bed to sit on its edge, legs dangling over carefree and crossed daintily at the ankles. She was a soft girl, thick-limbed and broad-shouldered, but delicate somehow. Perhaps it was the way she looked at Bofur, as if it were the first time she had ever laid eyes upon him, love-struck at first sight.

"I wished to thank ye for letting us to stop and marry. Ye have brought us great happiness by it." She patted the edge of the wagon beside her invitingly, but with an obvious command about it. Even sweetly Brynja had Emli's stubborn determination when she wanted something.

"You can thank Thorin for that. I defer to him in that matter."

""Twas a bonny affair, milady." She smiled dreamily. Bofur turned back to wink at her, a hunger in his eyes.

"I pray you were happy last night," Meisar said quietly, awkwardly twitching against the heady body-scent left by their togetherness. "Something tells me it was a success."

Brynja laughed. "You are cheeky when you want to be."

"I meant no jest," Meisar protested, suddenly. "I only meant… I, supposing Emli counseled you well…" She felt the unfamiliar blush well up, awkwardly.

"Of course, of course. Mahal knows I needed it. In Ered Luin my da would have hided him raw he saw him tumblin' out me window in the morn. Anyway, he never was clever enough to sneak in. And then he left to kill a dragon. I didn't think he live to tell me about it."

"I suppose we did not think Thorin would turn up alive either," she muttered, with some misgivings. She caught herself and smiled, innocuously. "Mahal be thanked, for your sake that at least Bofur did." The girl remained jubilant and gape-mouthed with bliss.

"But he did. Oh he did, and now he has made me his wife, in true." Brynja rested a hand on Meisar's shoulder, looked her squarely in the eye. "We too are possessive, we dwarf women. We don't give away nothing that is ours so easily. Not our love especially. And love is… well it is… ye know, don't ye?"

"No," she answered plainly.