Title: a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
Disclaimer: not my characters; title from Maya Angelou
Warnings: modern-day AU; mentions of torture/kidnapping; victim blaming by the victim; suicidal ideation; in my head, both Fili&Kili have been sexually assaulted - Kili way in the past, Fili during the story, though off-screen. None of it is directly stated or shown, but the implications are there
Pairings: pre-Tauriel/Kili
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 2150
Point of view: third
Prompt: The Hobbit (Film), Tauriel/Killi, Avengers AU (Kudos if they are like Clint/Natasha)
They call her Desert Rose and she's one of the best assassins in the world. Also, on the wrong side. She's been partnered with Snakeweed for the past few years, selling their services to the highest bidder, but Snakeweed seems to have vanished and now she's on her own.
"Here's your new mission," Bard says, tossing a file Kili's way. "You have a month. Make this bitch go away."
"Yes, sir," he says.
.
Fili's waiting in their room, sharpening his favorite knives. "New target?" he asks as Kili starts shedding his gear.
"Solo op," Kili tells him.
Fili is silent for a moment before he says, "I thought we agreed not to take solo ops anymore."
Kili doesn't look away from his bow as he runs his fingers over it. "It's not like I have a choice, Fili. Neither of us does."
Kili's fuck up led to them here. Fili had the chance to run and didn't take it because Kili had been caught, and he wouldn't leave his little brother behind. Kili has yet to forgive himself for it, even though Fili says its fine.
EREBOR can use men of their talents and Kili has never questioned who holds the reins, who hands down the orders. He can't question it. Not while he and Fili are still caught in the trap. (He knows that Fili's ribs still ache when it rains. Knows that Fili is far more bloodthirsty than he used to be. Fili was always the calm one, the one who counseled patience. With his brother's blood on his hands, those traits vanished. They have to get out of here and Kili doesn't know the way.)
They don't like solo ops because if they're out of each other's reach anything can happen. But they don't have a choice.
.
"I've a puppy following me," Tauriel tells Legolas over the phone. Sindarin means no tap works because only a handful of people in the world know the language. She and Legolas made sure of that.
"How long until you put him out of his misery?" Legolas asks. She hears a shot through the line and waits while Legolas confirms the kill.
She watches the archer for a minute. He thinks he's still unnoticed as he sets up his nest. She chose this hotel room purely to bait the trap and it has worked. He must either be a novice or supremely stupid.
(He's tracked her for a week, the longest anyone has ever managed. He is neither a novice nor stupid. He's a mystery.)
"He's cute," she finally says, listening to Legolas slit someone's throat. "I may engage."
Legolas sighs. "Do what you must, sister," he bites out as someone screams. "I'll call in two days."
.
Desert Rose fits her, Kili thinks. She is beautiful and lithe, and her hair – he just wants to run his fingers through it for hours. (EREBOR cut both his and Fili's hair, after they were caught. They could not be memorable, noticeable. They had to become ghosts, and ghosts they became. He misses his hair.)
He follows her for a week, across multiple countries. She doesn't seem to be on a job and the file implied that all of her kills were sanctioned by someone. She and Snakeweed, Bard said, were assassins for hire.
Kili doesn't trust EREBOR or Bard, and he doesn't want to kill her, but – it's her life or Fili.
.
On the ninth day of the archer trailing her, Tauriel breaks into his den. He has a gun trained on her immediately but she keeps her hands in plain sight, body language relaxed. "Peace," she says calmly. "I'm just here to talk."
Up close, she sees that he is very young. Talented, yes, and deadly – but not long out of boyhood. "Who sent you?" she asks.
His hands are steady on the gun. "EREBOR," he says after a moment.
She nods because that makes sense. EREBOR has been after her since she and Legolas burnt Mirkwood behind them and refused to trade one set of masters for another.
Tauriel asks, "What did they tell you?"
The boy says, "I'm here to kill you. Stop trying to talk me out of it."
She laughs. "I'm not going to let you kill me." His eyes narrow, his jaw clenches – he looks for all the world like a hardened killer, but she doesn't believe it. She knows all about masks.
She also knows EREBOR.
"What do they have on you?" she asks. "You're very gifted. I could use a man of your skills."
.
When Fili asks later, Kili will not able to adequately explain how he and Tauriel go back to her hotel room, order pizza, and talk until dawn about Mirkwood, EREBOR, and Lothlorien.
The Desert Rose is as amazing as everyone has ever said. He tells her about Fili, about the fuck-up, about Azog and Uncle. His hands shake when he talks about Azog, but Tauriel does not react except to offer him another slice of pizza.
"Come with me," she offers at dawn. "We'll get your brother out."
He shakes his head because it is too simple. "How is Lothlorien better than EREBOR?"
She smiles at him. "At Lothlorien, not only are you protected from reprisals," she says, "but you can refuse a mission."
That… he has killed too many people that he would have let live, were Fili not at EREBOR.
"And we'll get Fili out?" he asks.
"I give you my word," she says.
.
Galadriel listens to Kili's story. Here, in Galadriel's office, still dressed in his gear, he looks so very young.
Tauriel never knew anything but Mirkwood until Nenya gave her another way; it was the happiest day of her existence when Legolas followed her out. Kili and his brother, though, had a life before EREBOR.
"What is it you wish to do, Kili Durin?" Galadriel asks when Kili finally falls silent.
"I don't want to kill anymore," he says. "I want my brother safe."
Galadriel nods. "I will send three of my best to extract your brother. You will rest." Kili opens his mouth, sitting up straight, but Galadriel raises an eyebrow and he stays quiet. "When you see that your brother has arrived, you will tell Sting all you know about EREBOR's current leadership and policies. Until then, sleep, eat, and try to relax."
Kili glares down at his hands and Tauriel carefully conceals her smile. Galadriel gives her a quick grin before ordering, "Rose, show him to his room. After, send Mithrandir, Strider, and Evenstar to Sting's office. I will see them there."
"Yes, ma'am," Tauriel says, standing.
"Thank you," Kili says softly as he also rises to his feet. It isn't clear if he's hopeful, excited, or thinks he's just in yet another cage, but Tauriel knows that he'll see.
.
Three days after walking into Lothlorien, Kili wakes up to his brother stretched out beside him on the bed, with bruises on his wrists and a bloody lip. (Fili is the only person in the world who Kili can sleep near.)
He just stares at Fili until Fili's eyes open. Fili smiles at him, reopening the cut on his lip. "Smaug was about to execute me," he says, voice hoarse, "when this gorgeous woman burst in and shot him right between the eyes. What the fuck have you gotten us into now, little brother?"
Kili just throws his arms around Fili and sobs into his neck.
.
After giving Fili and Kili time together, breakfast, a few hours for a nap, and lunch, Tauriel leads them to Sting's office. Sting is the head of the records department and keeps track of everything; he is where Lothlorien's intel originates because Sting has informants and tendrils everywhere in the world. He's possibly the most dangerous person in Lothlorien, for all that he's a cheerful little fellow.
If Fili and Kili know anything of worth, he'll be able to gently get it from them; they won't even realize it's an interrogation, and they'll leave as friends.
"Thank you, Tauriel," Sting tells her, handing her a sealed envelope. "Deliver this to Gandalf, please? His old friend White has just resurfaced, and I know he'll want to set out post-haste." Tauriel nods, smiles at Kili, and when she's about to close the door behind her, Sting says, "I'll have Sam show them around after. Snakeweed should be returning this evening."
"Thank you," Tauriel says, closing the door and pausing to decide where Gandalf might be. The infirmary? Fili's extraction turned just a bit messy – Wyrm, Bowman, and Warg had all died, which neatly took care of Tauriel's next assignment. To the best of her knowledge, none of the team had been hurt.
The library, then.
.
Dinner is quiet, with Fili and Kili eating in Kili's room. They'd observed a lot, more than anyone probably expected, during their years at EREBOR.
"Do you think Ma and Uncle would be disappointed?" Kili asks, staring down at his plate.
"No," Fili says after a moment. "We survived, Kili. Nothing would matter but that."
Kili wishes he could believe that. And he is so so glad that Fili is alive, but – if Kili had died beneath Azog's fists, Fili would be free. Fili would never have been caught, forced to kill for EREBOR.
"Hey," Fili says sharply, causing Kili to look up. "I know that frown," he says, reaching out to grab Kili's arm. "It doesn't matter what happened because we are both still here and alive, and don't you dare ever think that my life is more important than yours." He shakes Kili, grip tight enough to hurt, and he demands, "Do you understand?"
Kili nods after Fili shakes him again. Fili sighs and says, "I wish you believed me."
.
Galadriel allows the newcomers a week of respite; only Tauriel and Sting seek them out, giving them time to rest and heal. But whether they'll be operatives or no, they must find some duty in Lothlorien. Because Tauriel has a mission, Sting's assistant Ori (yet to be given a codename) is assigned the task of escorting the brothers around headquarters.
"He is cute," Legolas tells her as they fly to Moria. "A bit young, though."
"Oh, shut up," Tauriel says.
Legolas laughs, pulling out his phone, and adds, "Should I ask Gimli to stalk him for you?"
Tauriel lunges for the phone, shouting, "Don't you dare!"
.
Kili wonders if he'll ever trust anyone but Fili again. Honestly, he doubts it. But he wants to trust this new start at Lothlorien, wants to trust Sting and Ori and everyone who offers to help, wants to trust Tauriel because he has figured out that he didn't have a chance at killing her. And instead of killing him and continuing on, she brought him to Galadriel, Nenya herself, the legend that even the Master of EREBOR feared.
He and Fili still sleep in the same room, still won't be out of each other's sight for more than a moment, still speak only when spoken to. But Fili begins training the youngest recruits, the children of operatives, mostly, and Kili hesitantly asks Sting if there's anything they need translated because he's fluent in four languages, including Rohirric and EREBOR's black speech. (It had been a bad day when Bard figured that out and told the Master.)
Sting happily gives him three binders full of text that's cobbled together from various places and asks him to do what he can.
"They seem to be settling in," Galadriel tells Tauriel six months after she brought a young archer home. "Well done, Rose."
"Thank you, Nenya," she says, trying not to show how truly happy she is. She leaves Galadriel's office and heads to the range, where Kili and Legolas are trying to settle a bet on just who is better with a bow. Neither of them will mention what the loser has to do, so it's sure to be embarrassing.
(She'll never admit it, but she's put money on Kili.)
As she enters the range, Ori's oldest brother Dori calls to her, "Can't you talk some sense into the boys?"
Tauriel laughs. "I'm sorry, Dori, but I'm here to see who is truly the best."
Dori sighs, turning around to glare at Ori. "Are you gambling?"
Kili catches her eye and gives her a small smile. He's only begun smiling in the past month, and usually at his brother or one of the children, so she cannot help smiling joyously back.
She is so very glad she chose not to kill him, so very glad he chose to follow her to Lothlorien.
"Sister!" Legolas shouts. "Get over here!"
Tauriel hurries to him, laughing, and puts a little extra swing to her step, hoping Kili watches.
He is young yet, but he now has the chance to grow and she knows the man he'll be is someone she'd like to know.