Coming Of Age – Chapter 5
Erimm and JoraLee were up early at the crack of dawn. They were busy assembling their piece they think would impress Balin and Dwalin. They ended up choosing ten sets of swords as well as five shields.
JoraLee fired up the forge and decided to work on a piece of jewelry he was making, a surprise for his sister he didn't get to finish yesterday.
The sudden banging on the door told them that it was not their fine visitors but a couple of very upset ones.
"Erimm! I know you're in there! Open the door!" It was followed by more banging.
Erimm hurriedly opened it for fear the heavy-set man that rushed in would break the wooden panel.
"Greetings, Curian and I see your older boy Crudd, how do you do this fine morning?"
The Cimbollis were a family of heavies. each of them weighing at least 200 to 300 stones. As the patriarch of the family Curian was the heaviest. Wheezing into Erimm's living room, he sat down and breathed hard, and pointed rudely at Erimm, "Your daughter, where is she?"
Erimm shook his head, "I don't know. She must be out and about. You know these young people; they like to go out early in the morning for long walks."
Curian banged hard on the table causing the items to topple over but he didn't care, "Did you know what she did to my Shia? Did you?" He yelled at Erimm. "She hit my daughter!"
"Oh? Well, Um, I'm sorry but you know…children, they get into fights all the time…"
"At the Coming of Age ceremony! Erimm! No one fights at the Halls in Erebor!"
"Well, I'm sure it's not the first time."
"When I complain about this to the King, it will be the last time. Erimm. Now, where is your daughter?"
Standing straighter, Erimm shook his head, "ThoraLee is not here."
"Then I shall wait till she returns." Then he sat back to wait. His seat creaking strenuously against the weight. Erimm arched an eyebrow, hoping against hope the chair would hold; it was a set you know, the table and four chairs.
Dwarves were known for their hospitalities but in this instance, Erimm didn't feel too hospitable. He sat down and lit his pipe keeping busy with his own thoughts. Curian's son began to move about the house and looked about him, moving the decorations and deliberately dropping them on the floor, breaking many glasses and crockeries. Erimm tried not to react to the young man's boorish behaviour. He figured he'd get his due when the time come and those items were replaceable.
An hour had passed before Erimm heard what he hoped was his guests' arrival.
"Father! I'm home!" He heard ThoraLee's voice.
"Ah! She's home, now it's payback time." Curian was rubbing his chubby hands together.
When she opened the door, Crudd struck her immediately knocking her back outside. Erimm, not expecting the young man to strike his daughter rushed out of his chair and ran for ThoraLee.
But Balin was already by her side and Dwalin had rushed to restrain Crudd. "You will pay for this, young man."
Despite Crude's size, he was no match for Dwalin.
"Oh! Let go of my son!" Curian was yelling at Dwalin.
"This is your son?"
"Yes, it is. He has done nothing wrong, let him go." Curian tried to look fierce but ended up looking like a flopping fish out of water.
"Wrong? Nothing wrong? He struck a girl! You bigot."
"Oh! What did you call me? Do you know who I am? I am the richest merchant here in Dale. I will make sure no one will do business with you once I mention your name."
Dwalin leaned close to him, "Is that how you do your business? Threatening other folks?"
"Business is business. It's none of your business how I do mine, so if you leave now and mind your own, I'll forget I met you."
At this moment JoraLee came out of the house and seeing the commotion and her sister lying on the ground approached Balin.
"Master Balin, What's going?" JoraLee bent down to check on his sister; Crudd had hit her on her left cheek and it was swelling and turning her cheek a deep red.
"That young man just hit your sister, do you know him?" Balin pointed to Crudd with his chin, he was still cradling ThoraLee.
JoraLee nodded, "He's Shia's older brother."
"Who?"
"That girl she hit last night at the ceremony."
"Oh…Oh!" Balin suddenly saw the connection. "Still it doesn't give him the right to hit her. We have rule here in the Kingdom. Men do not hit women."
JoraLee nodded as he smoothed his still unconscious sister.
"Let's take her to her room and bed, how about showing me where it is?"
JoraLee nodded and stood up with him, Balin carried ThoraLee and they walked into the house and into her bedroom.
Placing her gently on her bed Balin also said, "We'll need something for the swelling, young man."
JoraLee nodded and left the room. Five minutes later, he came back with a salve and applied on her skin and covered it with a warm cloth.
"This should keep the swelling down," JoraLee explained. "Father keeps a supply of it. Um, Thora and I get into scraps now and then, so…eh…it works well." JoraLee blushed slightly.
Balin saw him flushed but didn't say anything. When he was young, he had his fair share of scraps himself; Thorin was a horrible friend, always getting him in trouble...ah, those were the days…
"We should leave her be. I think she will be out for a while." Balin said.
JoraLee nodded and the two left the bedroom. As they entered the living room, they saw the damage Crudd had done earlier. The broken glasses.
JoraLee exclaimed and rushed to the floor across the room and picked up some pieces of colorful glass, "This was Thora's favorite. The first one she made when she was ten…"
Balin shook his head in sadness, "Someone should make that young man pay for it."
JoraLee shook his head, "He has already. ThoraLee hit his sister, this is payback."
"No JoraLee. This is bully. Trust me that young man will pay for it. That family will pay for it." Balin was turning red with anger.
JoraLee looked up at Balin and shook his head, "Trust me, we don't want any trouble. They will be back for more trouble."
Balin eyed at JoraLee, "Tell me JoraLee, has this kind of behaviour happened before? To your family or to someone else?"
JoraLee pause for a moment than he nodded, "But I don't want to sound like a snitch or something, I mean, usually if we leave them alone, they do the same. Most of the other folks do that as well."
Balin nodded as he stroke his beard slowly, thinking. But he didn't say anything about the matter anymore.
At this time Dwalin had come in, "…can't believe that obnoxious fool tried to tell me nothing happened! Striking a girl!"
Balin grinned at his friend who sat down beside him, Erimm was sitting by his son. "Where is ThoraLee? Is she all right?"
Balin answered for him, "She is still unconscious and in bed. We put a soothing salve on her cheek, it should keep the swelling down to the minimum. I can't do anything about the bruise though."
Erimm said, "Thank you, Master Balin, I don't know what would happen if you were not here."
"Think nothing of it. But mark my word, that family will be made to pay for what they did to your daughter." Then he looked up at Dwalin, "Did you see what they did to the property here?" He waved at the floor.
Dwalin looked around and saw the damage and shook his head, "They are terrible people. Oh, they will pay all right."
"Father, we should clean up before Thora wakes up, before she finds out what Crudd had done."
Erimm nodded his head.
"Come, we'll help you, young man." Balin was standing up.
JoraLee shook his head, "No need, sir. It'll not take long. Father, why don't you take these gentlemen to the workshop in the back and show them the swords. After all, this is what you came for." He tried to smile encouragingly.
The two dwarves nodded and they followed Erimm out of the house through the back door and to their workshop while JoraLee began cleaning up.
…
When ThoraLee finally woke up, she felt even more horrible, especially her face. Then she shot upright as she recalled what happened.
That bully Crudd Cimbolli had ambushed her at her home and hit her square in her jaw. She put her hand on her jaw and almost screamed. It was huge and it hurt something bad. She felt like half a puffy pastry; a very huge half pastry.
Then she started to laugh…hysterically. This was payback. Payback for all the punches she gave to Thorin. Now she was spotting a matching bruiser. Irony could be cruel.
She moved her jaw about her and found that it hurt…a lot. Damn that Crudd. Wait till I lay my hands on that fat buffoon! I'll make him regret he ever laid a hand on me ever.
She left her bed and left her room and looked around the living room. It was quiet all over the house as she walked into the kitchen. It was too clean and tidy. Something was not right.
Entering her room again, she decided to change out of her dress. Back to her work clothes, back to working with her jewelry…she looked over to where her little dressing table was her work; her first metal engraving tool set her father had given her when she turned 10 where she made her glass ornament that was …she dashed out of her room fast and to the living room where the mantle was, where her favorite ornament was…but it was gone. She spun around the room looking for it, "Where is it? This had better not be a joke. JoraLee is going to pay for trying to pull a prank on me like this." She ran out of the room and into the kitchen and didn't see the ornament either. Then she looked out the window and saw there was smoke bellowing out of the chimney, indicating that someone was in the workshop.
She ran towards the workshop, readying a blistering speech for her brother; he knew not to touch her precious ornament.
She winched the opened hard, "JoraLee! If you hid my ornament, you'd better give it back to me now or I'll…I'll melt all your bloody tools together and bury them in the deepest part of the lake…give it back NOW!"
All four dwarves stopped what they were doing as they stared at the angry vision before them.
"Well, how are you doing, ThoraLee?" Balin greeted her.
Thrown off her game, ThoraLee glanced at Balin, surprise that he was here, as well as Dwalin who was waving at her timidly. "I'm fine sir. Just sore."
"Good. I'm glad. I have to say you have some wonderful work here, Ms ThoraLee." Dwalin nodded enthusiastically.
ThoraLee slowly approached the work table where they were examining an array of the twins' work.
After a while, ThoraLee pulled her brother aside and asked him about the ornament again.
Reluctantly, JoraLee explained to her what Crudd had done.
But instead of getting mad and stomping off, ThoraLee just fell on the floor and wrapped her arms around her knees and buried her head. Soon they could hear her sobbing.
Feeling horrible, the men surrounded her and tried to console her.
Balin and Dwalin told her that they had sent father and son to the magistrate to be dealt with.
At that point, ThoraLee shook her head, "It's no use, the Magistrate is in his pockets. He's not going to do anything."
Balin was indignant, "Is there no honesty in this place anymore?"
Dwalin shook his head, "The King shall hear about this."
ThoraLee said, "No, forget about it," she said sadly as she wiped her tears away. "It's a childish trinket anyways. It's time to move on." Then she stood up and took a deep breath and let it out.
Balin nodded at her spirit, "That's the attitude. Now come here and show me how you manage to etch this piece of metal so finely. I'm really interested to learn."
Smiling at her new friend, she proceeded to show him. JoraLee and Erimm were grateful to him for being able to distract her and soon lifted her spirits and in no time she was back to her lively self.
The two dwarves spent the whole day and early evening with the family. They had learned a lot about this new family and what they learned they liked very much. Of course, the twins were often quarrelsome but what children weren't? And they really enjoyed their company.
As the sun to set, Balin and Dwalin took their leave. Waving a good night to them, ThoraLee gave them a hug each as she had grown to like them very much and was sad to see them leave.
On their way back to the palace in Erebor, the two began discussing, "Dwalin, what do you think?"
"About what my friend? There are so many things to discuss." Dwalin replied.
Balin nodded, "First JoraLee's future, you heard his father, he had no problem as to what we suggested. He knew we could advance him.
"Who is going to be his teacher?"
"Why Master Odin, of course!"
Dwalin nodded; Odin was a 230 year old dwarf who was a master swords-maker. Although he no longer make swords, Balin knew that he could be pressed into teaching JoraLee, especially when the old dwarf saw his work; he couldn't deny furthering the young man his talent.
Dwalin continued, "Next topic, those fat buffoons. Something must be done about the injustices. Not just to ThoraLee but to others, from what I'm told. JoraLee informed me that it had gone on for a long time, especially to the business around Dale."
"A whole family of bullies to gain profit without heavy lifting," Balin said thoughtfully.
"What are you thinking, Balin?"
Balin shrugged, "That it is time that family makes a living again, in the honest way."
Dwalin nodded, "I like your way of thinking, my friend." He laughed jovially.
"I'm glad you like it too, come on, I'm getting thirsty. Let's see what our fine Prince has been up to all day today." Balin laughed.
"Missing the fair and fiery maiden, ThoraLee."
They laughed heartily, "That she is, fiery. I tell you, Dwalin, that girl is one ball of fire. Thorin is going to have his hand full when he weds her."
"You think so?"
"I know so. They are a perfect match."
"If you said so. I guess I might as well begin work on their wedding gifts."
They laughed again as they approached the gates; the gate guards waving them through upon recognizing them.
….
End of Chapter 5
As always, thank you! Before I go on, please let me know if you like this story so far or if I should go on. Just a simple yay or nay…or any feedback would be great, I am up for it as I am not sure how anyone likes so far.
Thank you!
J.