3. I walked with you once upon a dream

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Eryn Lasgalen Expedition

Day Two

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"So, how much do you know of this place?"

Bilbo looked startled by the suspicion in Thorin's voice. "I don't know anything of it. I'd heard of it, of course; who hasn't? And I read up on it some after Gandalf asked me to join you, but no more than that."

Thorin grunted in dissatisfaction and Fili interjected apologetically, "It's just that you knew the way to the library and the names of some of the rooms…"

"I… well, I can't explain that, actually." He shrugged, then grabbed at the strap of his rucksack as it slipped. "It wasn't a conscious thing; I just had a feeling where to go."

"Where should we go first, then?" Sigrid asked practically. "Where's most important?"

"How should I know?!"

She ignored everyone's incredulous looks, insisting, "Just think about it. Where's most important?"

Bilbo huffed a sigh, then closed his eyes, muttering, "Most important, most important…"

He started walking before his eyes even opened.

Sigrid contented herself with looking smug.

They followed him deep into the palace, though she ached to inspect every textile they passed and it took the efforts of both she and Kili to tug Fili away from what appeared to be an armory.

After fifteen minutes of walking Thorin's grumblings grew too loud to ignore and Bilbo threw an equable, "Hush up, you," over his shoulder.

Fili and Kili winced, expecting an explosion, but to their shock Thorin quieted and remained silent until they walked down into…

"The dungeon?" Thorin exclaimed.

Bilbo shrugged, looking bewildered. "It's the most important."

"It's not very dungeon-like," Sigrid said, slowly spinning around to see everything. "It's rather pretty, actually."

Thorin scoffed. "Are the bars and locks pretty?"

"Have to agree with him there," Fili said seriously, a frown on his face. "I don't like it here. Bilbo, why is this the most important?"

Bilbo still looked bemused. "I have no idea. It just is."

Thorin heaved a longsuffering sigh. "Fine. Take a look around; let's see if we can find what's so important in this horrible place."

They spread out to investigate. A few minutes passed, then Sigrid let out a muted shriek, making everyone jump.

Fili rushed to her, calling, "What? What is it?"

She turned an unusually pale face towards him. "There's a person in there, dead or, or maybe sleeping."

Fili entered the cell as far as he could with her clutching his arm. "Sleeping. I think. Yes, she's breathing. It's a woman."

"What?" Kili exclaimed. "Where?" He looked through the doorway and stopped dead in his tracks, preventing Thorin and Bilbo from seeing in.

Thorin pushed irritably at his shoulder. "Move, would you? The rest of us would like to see."

Kili began walking again, but slowly, like someone in a dream.

"Kee?" Fili called anxiously.

His brother ignored him and dropped to his knees next to the sleeping figure.

"Is that an elf?" Thorin demanded.

"Tauriel," Kili breathed. His hand hovered over her cheek for a moment before falling into his lap. "Amrâlimê, mamakhhmi asti."

There was a moment of profound silence, before Bilbo blurted, "What? What is happening?"

Thorin spun on him, looking like he was going to explode. "This is why you brought us down here?!"

"Of course this isn't why! How was I to know she was here?"

"You're the one who brought us here— you tell me! You were looking for what was most important and you brought us down to this, this prison and there's a bloody elf down here!"

"It's not… not her! She's not what's most important! It's you all… you, them—" Bilbo cut himself off abruptly, dragging his hands over his face. "I don't know, all right? I don't know what made this place feel so important, but it wasn't her."

"It was," Kili breathed. He still hadn't taken his eyes from the elf-maid's face. "It is. She's everything."

Thorin opened his mouth to retort, then shut it again, wearing a deeply disquieted look.

"She didn't move at all," Sigrid murmured pensively. "You were yelling and she didn't even twitch."

"See if you can wake her, Kili," his uncle ordered.

"Gently! Don't startle her," Bilbo added. He and Thorin scowled at each other.

Kili laid his hand lightly on her shoulder and sighed, all his tension leaving him. Finally he remembered what he was supposed to be doing and gave her a small shake. "Tauriel?" he murmured. "Wake up, âzyungâl."

Her head rolled back slightly, but she slept on.

Thorin sucked in a harsh breath. "All right, we're all getting out of here, now. Let's go."

"No." The word was softly spoken, but everyone could hear the steel beneath it.

"Kee…"

"Kili, we're going now. It's not safe in this place." Especially not for you, Thorin thought desperately. Kili, please.

"No," he repeated implacably. "I'm not leaving her. Not again."

"What do you mean, again?" Fili demanded. "You don't even know her!"

Confusion flickered across Kili's face, but he shook his head. "I do. I don't know how, but I do. And I'm not leaving."

Thorin looked helplessly at his youngest nephew, debating the likelihood of success if he tried to physically remove him. He shook his head in defeat, then beckoned his older nephew out of the room.

"Uncle, what should we do?" Fili hissed. "We can't let him stay here!"

"Give me your phone. I'm calling Gandalf and he won't answer if I use mine."

He handed it over but said, "There's no signal—we're too far underground."

Thorin looked at it and muttered a curse. "I'll have to go back up. Don't leave your brother. Talk to him—I hear Sigrid talking to him now; she's got a good head on her shoulders. Both of you talk to him, keep him distracted. He's obviously under some kind of enchantment; we need to keep him from going farther under. I'll be back down as soon as I'm done."

Fili was flushed with pleasure at the unexpected praise of his wife. "What are you going to tell Gandalf? And you should take Bilbo with you or you're bound to get lost. Bilbo!"

Thorin didn't waste time arguing. "I'm going to tell him to come fix this. He's the expert in ancient magic and he's the one who got us into this—he can damn well come get us out. Dr. Baggins, let's go—I need you to show me the way back to the entrance."

They walked rapidly, sickness curling in Thorin as he thought of Kili's enraptured face. And how was Dr. Baggins finding his way out so easily? The place was a labyrinth.

Bilbo unhesitatingly turned another corner and broke the silence, musing, "You know, I don't understand why Gandalf insisted you needed me when you already have a linguist in Kili."

Thorin's bark of laughter surprised them both. "A linguist? Whatever gave you that idea? He's terrible with languages; barely passed his required classes in school."

Bilbo stopped walking. "Truly? Because he was just speaking two of them— well, three, if you count English."

"What did he say?" Thorin asked slowly, sounding almost afraid to find out.

"Well. The first was Sindarin—"

"He spoke in Elvish?"

"Yes, Thorin, Sindarin is indeed a form of Elvish," Bilbo said with barely restrained irritation, which was entirely unnecessary in Thorin's mind and since when did he call him by his first name? "He called her Tauriel, which means daughter of the forest… or maybe forest maiden? The rest was Khuzdul, which I trust isn't so offensive to you?" He threw Thorin a glare. "Terms of endearment mostly, I think, though the accent is different than I expected so that makes it a bit hard to be certain. Definitely Khuzdul, though. So, things about love and I think he said something about finding her? What? What's wrong?"

The taller man was looking at him with an expression close to horror. "He… Kili. Kili spoke two different dead languages well enough that you understood him."

Bilbo hesitated before admitting the truth. "Yes."

Thorin started walking again, fast enough that Bilbo was practically skipping to keep up. "I need to talk to Gandalf. Now."

"Well, you won't be able to if you go that way! Turn right!"

On the fourth ring Gandalf finally answered. "Fili, my dear lad! How is everything going there?"

"It's Thorin, Gandalf. You need to—"

"Thorin!" The infuriating man had the gall to sound cheerful. "You didn't need to use Fili's phone— I would have taken your call eventually, you know."

"I don't have a week to wait for you to pick up like I did when I was in Rivendell. You—"

"You exaggerate," he said reproachfully, "it was only five days."

"Whatever, Gandalf; just listen to me!"

"You get angry so easily, Thorin; it can't be at all good for your health."

"Listen, you old coot—!"

Bilbo snatched the phone out of Thorin's hand with a reproving tsk. "Hello, Gandalf."

"Bilbo, my dear boy," he said warmly. "How are you getting along there with everyone?"

"Just fine, thank you."

"Indeed? No difficulties with our intemperate Thorin?"

"No, not at all, and quite frankly, he has good reason to be upset. You need to come here straight away."

"Why, I'll be there in a week, isn't that soon enough?"

"No, Gandalf, you need to come now, right now! This place has some sort of enchantment on it; it's all perfectly preserved, there's no decay, not even any dust—"

"Indeed?" The complacency in his tone raised Bilbo's hackles. "Well really, my boy, that doesn't sound like something to complain about. How have you been enjoying the library?"

"I haven't had a chance to enjoy the library yet, actually. Listen—"

"Really? You astonish me, Bilbo. I was certain you wouldn't surface from there except for meals."

Bilbo's temper snapped. "See here, Gandalf, I would love to enjoy the library— except that I knew exactly where it was without looking for it, and then Thorin tried to deface the throne room because he hates the pretentiousness of the elf king and how he, he swings his cloak, for heaven's sake, and there is an elf maid in an enchanted sleep in the dungeons who has bewitched Kili! So forgive me if I am just a little distracted!"

There was a long silence on the other end of the line and he hissed, "So help me, Gandalf, if you just hung up on me…!"

"No, no," he replied, all amusement gone from his voice. "I beg your pardon, old fellow. I will be there by morning."

Bilbo huffed. "Thank you. We will be very glad to see you." He ended the call and tossed the phone back to Thorin, saying with great disdain, "Honestly, wizards."

Thorin froze in the middle of rolling his eyes in agreement. "What?"

Bilbo hummed inquiringly, distracted by some carved writing near the door.

"You said 'wizards'."

"No, I didn't." He frowned up at Thorin with an expression so familiar that Thorin's stomach twisted. Because he'd spent less than two full days with this man and nothing about him should be that familiar. "Did I?"

"Yes."

"Oh. Well… huh. I did, didn't I? That's strange. I don't know why I said that."

They looked at each other for a long, strained moment before Thorin said, "We should go back down."

"Yes," Bilbo agreed uneasily. "We probably should."

"She reminds me of someone," Sigrid said reflectively, staring at the twisting swirls of hair on the floor. "Does she remind you of anyone, Fili?"

"I don't think… maybe? I don't know."

"Maybe she reminds you of herself," Kili suggested quietly. He had shifted to lean back against the wall and his legs were stretched out in front of him, paralleling the sleeping elf.

"That's not likely though, is it?" Sigrid's voice was gentle. "She's an elf. How could we have known her?"

"I don't know. But I know I did." He slid one finger over the curl of hair closest to his leg and closed his eyes. It was the first time he'd touched her, aside from when he'd tried to wake her. "I think I used to dream of her, when I was small. I remember her hair floating around her as she moved and her face glowing… and she would tell me about the stars."

Fili looked uncomfortably at Sigrid, but she was frowning down at her hands.

"Sig?"

She shook herself out of the odd glimpses of red hair swirling around a green-clad form. "Nothing. It's nothing. Really, Fili!" She tried to think of something to distract him with. "You know, I had weird dreams too, when I was younger, about this strange man." She lifted her head and looked at her husband sheepishly. "I don't know why, because aside from your coloring you don't look that much like him, but you reminded me of him when I first met you. It's what caught my attention, actually."

Kili snickered. "Fili's your dream man."

"Shut up, Kili," she retorted comfortably. "I must have been about twelve… I watched a documentary about dragons and it talked about the one that supposedly destroyed Esgaroth. That night I started dreaming about this man— he was blond like you, Fili, but his hair was long and had braids and clasps in it and he had a beard. There was fire and water everywhere and he was in a little boat, calling, 'Take my hand!' I dreamt of him off and on for years." She shrugged, her cheeks pink with embarrassment, and added pensively, "His mustache was so strange—it was long and braided and swung around when he talked."

The three of them looked at each other, then burst out laughing.

"That's what Fili reminded you of, the lunatic mustache!"

"How could he even eat?" Fili gasped.

"I don't know!" Sigrid wailed. "I always wanted to ask him!"

Kili slumped over and made a keening noise just as Thorin burst into the room, wild-eyed, Bilbo hard on his heels. "What? What is it?"

Kili pointed a shaking finger at Sigrid, which only caused her and Fili to laugh harder.

Bilbo compressed his lips, looking torn between amusement and disgust. "They're fine, Thorin."

"What is so damned funny?!"

Sigrid shook her head wildly while Fili cackled, helpless tears slipping down his cheeks.

"You know what?" Bilbo huffed. "We probably don't want to know."

The cell was almost comfortable now, with the addition of Kili's bedding and a few camp chairs. They had just tidied away the remains of dinner when Thorin pulled out the voice recorder and announced, "Okay, Bilbo and I will take the first watch down here with Kili, but before you two go up, team review. Fili?"

"Well, there's an unconscious elf and Kili won't leave her," he replied dryly. "And he thinks he used to dream of her when he was little."

Kili flushed, before grinning wickedly and saying, "Well, Sigrid said she used to dream of you."

Sigrid went straight past flushing into tomato red. "Kili! I said it wasn't him!"

"You said that he—"

Thorin rolled his eyes and asked repressively, "Kili, do you have anything useful to add?"

He kept grinning. "Nope."

"Fine, then be quiet. Sigrid?"

She glared at Kili and shook her head.

"Bilbo?"

"Gandalf's arriving tomorrow morning," he said in an incredibly pleasant voice, "and if he doesn't prove useful I suggest we make him more unconscious than the elf."

Thorin stared at him incredulously for a long moment before starting to laugh.

Fili and Sigrid were getting settled in their tent when he said offhandedly to his wife, "So, I'm your dream man, huh?"

She sighed. "You're never going to let me forget about this, are you?"

"Never." He nuzzled into her neck, making her shriek. "Should I grow a nice long mustache?"

Sigrid giggled helplessly as he pinned her to the ground. "You wouldn't be able to eat. You'd waste away to nothing."

"He was a strong, hairy man—he must have managed it."

She shivered as he pressed open-mouthed kisses to her collarbone. "You wouldn't be able to kiss me."

"I would always be able to kiss you, Sigrid." He licked a slow line up to her ear. "I could be as hairy as Rip van Winkle. I could be covered in hair, could have a beard to my knees and mustache braids swinging to my waist." She laughed at the mental image, even as she shuddered at the way he was murmuring against her earlobe. "There is no amount of hair that could ever stop me from kissing you."

She nudged his head up and kissed her way to his mouth. "Good," she told him firmly. "So stop talking and do it."

He chuckled. "Yes, ma'am."

Sigrid grinned. Who needed dream men?

A/N:

Amrâlimê, mamakhhmi asti: My love, I have found you
agyâdê – my happiness
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This chapter title is from the song Briar Rose/Aurora sings in Sleeping Beauty, and if you've seen it more than once it's probably stuck in your head now. You're welcome. ;) Alternate titles I really wanted to use even though this one worked better: "Nowadays I'm still the king! And I command you to come to your senses!" and "Why you, you, unreasonable, pompous, blustering old windbag!" :D Next chapter will be up sometime tomorrow. Please let me know what you think!