A/N: I am moving some older one-shots here if they talk about the kiddies.

DAIN AND OTHIN

Middle Earth, original Wren and Thorin, Timeline#1

Wren's POV

Your two youngest children are chalk and cheese. From quite an early age they are often mistaken by other races for being twins, though very different in appearance they are the same height through most of their lives. Not by the Dwarves though, who do not have two children at once, the smallest difference between siblings being six years. Dain and Othin are viewed as a miracle of Erebor, the latter born only two years after his brother.

The older one of the two brothers, Dain is the least Dwarven in appearance among your children, lither and thinner than the rest, hair of deep red colour, eyes green as leaves of the oaktree he was conceived under. He has his father's profile and your cheekbones.

Othin is stocky, close in his build to the King and Thror, the oldest prince of Erebor. He has wide open blue eyes, and he is always smiling. If angered or frustrated, he fights and rages, but still with a grin on his face. He is always looking for trouble and always finds it. When punished for yet another broken bow stolen from older warriors or ponies let out of the stables, he gives an apologetic smile as if saying, "But wasn't the fun worth it?" He is easy to understand and predict.

His older brother is anything but. Quiet, seemingly lost in his thoughts, he is the closest to you of all your children. He is a skillful swordsman, the only one allowed to touch the King's renowned sword. He is deadly and unpredictable in a fight, while his younger brother is all brutal force and lunge. Othin wields two battle hammers and keeps them under his bed. Dain never uses his magic in training fights.

Dain is the only of your sons who remains close to you after he reaches the age when he is allowed to train with older Dwarves. He still comes to you in the evenings after the day in the training yard. When he knows that no one will see you two, he lies his head on your lap while you sit on a large bench reading your books. His hair is soft and runs through your fingers.

Since Othin learnt to walk he is always somewhere above your eye level. First, you had to take him off tall shelves and more often that you care to remember from the canopy of your bed. The King retains the habit of checking the bedroom for his youngest son before pulling on the strings on your tunic long after Othin moves into his separate chambers on the other side of the Royal Halls.

Later, he is often seen climbing on the supports in the mines and forges under the Lonely Mountain. He is the only Dwarf you know who is fond of heights. You suspect that he probably hates them like any other but cannot pass any challenge in front of him. For the same reason he often demands his brother to practice swording with him. After five minutes he lifts his face from the muddiest puddle in the yard, Dain takes additional pride in knocking him down in the most humiliating spot, and grins. "Again!"

'Again' was his first word. The King was teasing him with a rattle and then gently thumped him to the top of the head, when the prince was too slow to batter it away.

"Again!" He was laughing and baring his teeth. Many years later this wide ferocious smile will be the biggest fear of his foes on a battlefield.

Dain learns to read very young and seems to be entranced with the Erebor Library. Sometimes you have to remind him to go to bed. Myrna, the Erebor librarian, secretly, or at least she thinks so, brings him food there. He never takes time from his training to read but his sleep and rest often suffer.

The first burst of Dain's magic comes with his first breath and his first scream. The circumstances of his birth are so ungovernable, the King being the only person with you that day, stranded in the middle of a storm with nothing to assist you in labour but one blanket and a bucket of water. The golden sparks hit the King into the face, rush through his arms, umbilical cord still connecting you and your son. Dain's second furious scream is louder and the walls are shaking from the surge of his magic.

He learns to reign it early, in simple perfect harmony, while you after half century of coexisting with yours still feel like it is an untamed beast on a feeble leash. Dain is entertaining his brother in his cot by producing golden balls bouncing from walls and ceiling. He hides his magic from everyone else except you and his brother, until the King takes him into his study and they have a long conversation there, the contents of which you never find out. Dain comes out of the chamber with straighter shoulders and more self-assurance that you have ever seen in him before that day.

You walk through a passage and hear soft quiet voices from one of the alcoves. Your two youngest children are sitting in front of each other, some small object between them concealed by their bodies. Their heads are touching, lowered over whatever seems to absorb their attention so much. You peek. It is a dead frog.

Othin's voice is full of tears. "I didn't mean to… I didn't see him there, just put the hammer down..." It is the rarest picture, your youngest without a smile on his face. He is nine and for Dwarves he is still almost an infant. But not for his older brother. Dain is frowning and gently touches the leg of the animal.

"Even if you didn't mean it, it is your fault. He was alive and now he is dead." Othin sobs.

"Can't you do anything? Alike what you did with the bird's wing?"

"The bird was injured, this one is dead. Do you know what dead is, Othin?" Othin nods.

"Would he not have a bit of life left in him?" He sounds hopeful. "He is not completely squished." Dain sighs.

"I'll try but you have to remember what he looks like now, Othin. See this?" He lifts the front paw and it falls floppily on the floor. Othin sobs again. "That what hammers and swords do. You have to remember when you lift them, that is how it ends."

And then he covers the little slimy body with his palm, and warm golden glow surrounds the frog. Othin is holding his breath. The long webbed legs twitch, and the frog jumps up, fully recovered and only slightly squished. Your sons laugh and catch it.

"Let's put him back where you took him," Dain's voice is soft. It reminds you of your own voice when talking to the King when he is repentant after some mistake he made. The tone reassures that all is forgiven but reminds that nothing is ever fully forgotten.

You step in the shadow and watch the two princes walk pass you through the passages, shoulders touching, both staring at the thrashing frog in Dain's gentle hands. Mother's love for her children is undoubting and eternal but at the moment you also feel pride and gratitude for being the one who brought these lives into this world.