ABBA - Take A Chance On Me

Smash Mouth - I'm A Believer

War*Hall - King of the World

Florence & The Machine - Shake It Out

One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

Nickleback - Animals

Xana - Better Kind of Best Friend

Prince - When Doves Cry

TW: Pregnancy mentions, assault mentions, mentions of last chapter's child abuse, mentions of period, mentions of fertility, mention of miscarriage

SEXY TIMES BELOW

Chapter 25

"I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it." - Mae West

A knock came as they were losing themselves in kisses once more. Erdene made a soft frustrated sound against his lips which Thorin echoed with a grunt of his own.

"Can't we just make out like horny teenagers?" She grumbled before extracting herself from his lap.

Thorin shared the sentiment though he needed a moment to will his cock to go down. He felt very much like he was a young dwarrow again getting stiff every time a young dam glanced shyly in his direction. Though his one was not watching him shyly now, rather with her lower lip pinched between her teeth and a faint blush gracing her beautiful skin.

Mahal. Her grandmother tried to lighten the rich shade of her skin with lemon juice? Why? It made no sense to him. She had such a lovely color, almost bronze with soft rosy pink underneath which became more pronounced when she blushed.

With practiced fingers she adjusted the gorgeous mass of curls atop her head.

Her aunt cut it almost to the roots. Cutting a dwarrow or dam's hair off was a punishment for serious crimes and murder. Not something one did to a child because her hair was too much for her. May I never meet them. He did not trust himself to face those that tortured a young Erdene and not kill them.

Still she smiled at him like he handed her the moon.

He stood, taking both her hips and closing the space between them with another long, lingering kiss. One Erdene returned with equal fervor much to his pleasure. He enjoyed the way her cool, pliant flesh gave easily to his touch. The way her lips yielded to his so willingly. The way her breasts, belly hips fit against him like she belonged there. She truly was made for him and he for her.

And then she cupped the back of his neck, her nails faintly scratching and dear sweet Valar. "If you keep doing that, ekûnê, I will have you over this desk. Damn the audience."

Her fingers quickly extracted themselves much to his disappointment. "Mmm, I would prefer without the audience, thank you. But certainly, over the desk in a variety of positions, yes, please."

Durin be good.

Once again they were interrupted by a knock on the door. A knock he knew well. "Aye, Balin, come in."

Flushing a bright pink, Erdene turned to greet Balin who looked somewhat pink himself.

Now that she was facing the desk which was facing the door, a short end was placed against the wall so the person behind the desk could face those entering, woah. Books. So many books. Her back had been to them while she sat in Thorin's lap, but now that she could look around the room? The wall next to the door, the wall to the left of the desk, even part of the wall leading up to the single window held large dark stained and polished wooden shelves like that in a library in times long past. Every shelf, top to bottom, left to right, was crammed with books. Small books, long books, fat books, all kinds. Some had writing on the sides, some did not.

Now that she looked back at the desk there were three decently sized stacks of some very old looking books with gold and bronze embossed writing set against the wall. There were some neatly folded papers and a raven feather quill - note to self, invent ink pens (she'd already seen herself using a rough prototype in a dream) - with an ink well on a blotter.

Right. Courting contract.

"I thought," Erdene said as she went around the desk with Thorin to sit in the two chairs facing the back of the room before the desk, "the bead meant we were courting?"

"Oh, aye, lass it does. The term courting contract is a bit of a misnomer as it were. This is a marriage contract, drawn up to be amended before the official marriage during courting." Balin donned his glasses, taking the folded over paper and unfolding it. It wasn't patched like Bilbo's had been with an expandable section. Instead this was one long almost legal paper size page sectioned into thirds. He handed it to her over the desk. "This is a standard courting contract for the house of Durin, expectations, compensation, and-"

Erdene glanced at it, turning it over once before handing it back to him.

Balin hesitated in taking it, "Lass I know it's long but you should-"

"Clauses four D and E are irrelevant. Should Thorin and myself ever terminate our relationship I don't want compensation of my weight in gold. If that happens I'm either dead or good as, and I won't need or want money. Clause eight B, should I die there is no one to compensate. No one. My family doesn't deserve a single copper. Please remove it. Clause eleven C, explain the parameters of consummate. Clause fourteen A through D, issue, meaning children? Clause fourteen should have an additional amendment if it is about having a child. Miscarriage is a sad, unfortunate thing."

Balin, for all his years, needed a moment. "Lass," he said slowly, taking more time to speak than she took reading. "Do you mean to tell me you read all that in the space of a heartbeat?"

Thorin too was watching her.

Oh shit. Fuck. Shit. Um… "I read very quickly." Erdene replied sheepishly, looking between them both.

"Ah…I can see that. Might I ask how?"

"Always have. Just the way my eyes and brain work." An memory like hers isn't a common thing but it can be useful. "I…everything I read, I can remember. I usually remember about ninety percent of everything I hear or see."

Balin nodded, "yes, I know someone else who can do something similar. It's quite marvelous. I do envy you both. He can read a book several thousand pages long in a few hours."

Huh. Another brainiac. Cool. "I would love to meet him one day."

"I'm certain once you tour his section of the archives he will be happy to introduce himself."

Erdene blinked at him once, twice, then turned her attention to Thorin with a neutral. "Are we going to Ered Luin?"

Mahal. What had she and his sister spoken about?

"By month's end." Thorin confirmed, taking one of her hands in his and kissing her knuckles lightly. "Do wish to stay in South Yard longer?"

He is a king and that is his kingdom and you knew that when you decided to say yes to him. Erdene pressed her lips together. He could have asked first. "Balin, may we have a moment please? Out of earshot, if you would."

Ah. Balin glanced from her to Thorin and back again. Their first quarrel. "Of course."

Erdene waited eleven seconds after she heard footsteps disappear before, "Thorin-"

He shook his head minutely, stroking the back of her hand with his thumb for another few seconds. Then he gave her one small nod.

"I think you're used to not being questioned and I get that, I do. Your decisions for your family and your people have always been a huge part of your life. But you should have told me you were planning on moving us out of the city." She gently but firmly removed her hand from his. "You do understand that while a good majority of the people downstairs are happy we're happy, there are going to be more people like the Relvi sisters who want me gone or dead in Ered Luin."

She isn't angry, her eyes are gray and amber and green as she speaks. Her anger is violet. Anger he would know what to do with. A shouting match, raised voices, those he knows what to do with. This quiet, calm, it is difficult for him to find a way to respond. Will this set the tone for how all future disagreements will play out? A wife who fights him with calm resolve?

The next words from her lips are an icy knife to his chest. "Thorin…we aren't supposed to talk about this but…in the future I will have a permanent personal guard because there are people willing to push me to my death."

Murder amongst his people isn't common. There are too few who survived the dragon. The murder of a dam, unthinkable. Thorin took her hand once more, finding her small fingers cold as ice. "Tell me everything."

Her breath left her lips in a shuddering sigh. "We're not supposed to."

Thorin took her other hand, warming them in his, holding them to his chest, "bad luck be damned, Erdene. Tell me."

So she told him. She told him of what her future self knew. How his future self (she omitted the Company for now) and Balin, Fíli and Kíli, Dís and even Frerin had given orders to one and all they trusted. If she goes anywhere, there must be a guard and if the guard is new, an additional presence.

"It's weird for me to say," Erdene confessed once she was done explaining. "I haven't even met your brother yet and I know he'll be protective of me. I barely know Balin but he treats the future version of me like a favorite grandchild. Your sister is my sister. I can't imagine not being around her."

She sniffed, fighting back both happy and dismayed tears. "I love you, and I'll go because I want to be with you and be part of this family but I won't lie. I'm a little terrified. Especially when people like those two vipers downstairs felt they could proposition you in front of me without repercussions. Sure, they're from the Iron Hills, and maybe they'll be out of our hair in a week or a month, but what about the family and friends they're staying with?"

The Relvi patriarch had Dain's ear. Mahal's great hammer, this was a mess.

Thorin took several seconds to compose himself before, "tell no one what you've told me. I will handle it." When she frowned at him, eyes wide and gray as a summer storm, Thorin pulled her forward, kissing her forehead, the tip of her nose, her lips gently. "You are my one. Maker help any who try to come between us."

Her smile in return was watery at best. She nodded, wiped at her eyes, sniffling a little, "protective you is sexy, just so you're aware."

He hummed, tipping her chin up with one finger. "Not enough to convince you to come to my room?"

He received a small shove to his breast bone, which he did feel interesting, and her accent shifted to playful once more. "We can go to your room after everyone is gone and I get fed. I'm so hungry I'm about ready to go to the kitchen an' start makin' biscuits and gravy." To punctuate her statement, her stomach did in fact growl at him.

Pressing one more chaste kiss to her forehead. "As you wish, though I'm tempted to let you cook." He turned his head away from her and called with a decently higher volume, "Balin, you may return."

And not thirty seconds later, Balin did. He took his seat, noting once more they were holding hands, and while Mistress Thoroughfare seemed to have wet eyes she wore a small smile. Thorin seemed no worse for wear either.

"Any further amendments?" Balin asked them both, looking from one to the other and then back again.

Thorin looked to Erdene, and she gave him a small nod in return. "At this time, no."

People assumed, once they came back down with Balin in tow, whatever they assumed and money changed hands once again. There was nothing she could do about that. Mera and Dera beat a hasty retreat to lick their wounds as soon as soon as she and Thorin went upstairs to look over the marriage contract.

Balin informed her that the clauses would be adjusted per her requests, and that the contract itself - called a zarb - could be edited and added to during courtship and betrothal to accommodate the couple discovering things about each other. It would also be the legal document they would sign once married.

Married.

Erdene happily settled herself into a seat once everyone was out the door. Across from her Kíli already had his head hanging off the back of the couch. He had rolled his sleeves up to his elbows and he was rubbing his forehead with one hand. "Mahal's breath, amad, I have not seen this many relations since my coming of age." Kíli rubbed his forehead.

Dís ruffled his hair as she passed heading toward the back of the room, "your coming of age was three times as many and it lasted all day." She passed through an open doorway toward the left and was out of sight.

Amad. Does that mean mom, or mother? And what Dís called Erdene before, nan'ith. What did that mean?

Fíli dropped into the seat across from her. "Copper for your thoughts irak'amad?"

Erdene, head slightly canted to the left, repeated, "irak'amad…means aunt?"

He nodded with a small but bright smile. "See, Kee, I told you."

A few coins tossed across the room between brothers.

But amad means something like mom so, "It's a conjunction right? If amad is mother or mom, then irak is a conjunction meaning, what, other or side?"

Balin, who had come into the room, hummed thoughtfully before, "very astute. Your lessons in Khuzdûl will go quickly if you catch on that quickly."

Lessons in Khuzdûl. Christ almighty, did that fit with her fictional languages or her spoken languages? "Well I already speak four languages, what's one more?"

"Six langues!" Kíli goggled at her, "though I've never heard of High," his brow creased, "Klenon?"

"High Valarian and Klingon. And technically, because those two are fictional, I only speak four languages and some bad French." She sighed sitting back, happy to be off her feet. "A fifth language-"

"Seventh." Kíli corrected. "Seven languages."

She rolled her eyes at him, "fictional doesn't count Kíli."

"They do if you aren't a native speaker." He countered cheekily. "What is High Valarian from?"

He asked her to talk about a book? No. Don't drown him in fandom. Restrain yourself Thoroughfare. "A Song of Ice and Fire. It's a really twisted story spanning a half dozen books about murder, betrayal, insanity, monsters, evil, and a family stuck at the center who was just minding their own business at the beginning."

"You're well read as well!" Kíli grinned, smacking his thigh. "Mahal you and uncle were meant for one another, truly."

She wouldn't have been surprised to know Thorin was a reader as well. The bookshelves in his study were filled nearly wall to wall.

"I hope my one is an archer like me." Kíli said dreamily, looking up at the ceiling and closing his eyes. "I only know two others and they're in Ered Luin. Both are male."

It really shouldn't have made her snort, but Erdene had the image of Kíli being rescued by Tauriel in her head, and it just sort of popped out. She covered her mouth instantly but the absurdity of her knowing that he does meet his (possible) one, that she is in fact an archer and a deadly one too struck Erdene all at once followed by a small fit of mortifying giggles. "I'm sorry," she hiccuped, "I am, I really am but I swear I just…she will be and further, Kíli, she will be a redhead."

Brown eyes grew big. "Have you seen her?"

"You know I can't talk about that." She winked at him, and settled back in her chair. "I have a feeling. You're going to get what you asked for."

"From your mouth to Mahal's ears, irak'amad." Kíli prayed with both hands over his heart. He really was such a sweet kid, and, even if he was seventy-six years old, he definitely acted like he was a post-adolescent.

Dís re-entered the room, "the cook tells me less than half of an hour until lunch. Now what are we laughing about?"

"Our new aunt was telling Kee his one will be exactly what he asked for. And red haired too." Fíli supplied.

Fists on her hips, Dís gave her son a once over. "Oh, aye, that I can believe. A firebrand would be your one."

"Amad, don't encourage it, he'll be insufferable." Fíli groused though there was no irritation behind it.

"Don't be jealous Fee, perhaps our new aunt can make a prediction of your one too!"

And just like that, Erdene was fighting a blush. The memory of being pregnant with Thorin's baby and knowing at some point, Fíli had proposed marriage to her at the same time remembering Fíli flirted with her when they first met. Nope. She shook her head, "sorry all out of predictions. I have some questions though." Change the subject, change the subject, change the damn subject! "May I ask why a few of the males were blushing during the congratulations? It was a little-"

"Odd?" Dís supplied. Her knowing grin said volumes.

"Um…yeah."

Dís took that to mean yes. "Ery, please understand, most males never meet a female outside their family, and rarely a female who is as young and pretty as you are."

"And," Fíli added, despite fending off the pillow thrown at him by his brother, "you aren't fully dwarrow, they might have found it a bit disconcerting to be attracted to a woman, let alone their king's one."

Oh. Oh! Well hells if that didn't make her blush even more.

"If my one is half as pretty as you are, woman or not, I'll happily declare her mine." Kíli declared which started a bickering match between himself and Fíli about what type of dam would even look in Kíli's direction.

Balin took the other seat near her, patting his hands on the chair. "Tell me, lass, do you wish to know what those two said?"

Rolling her eyes heavenward, "I have a general idea." Erdene shook her head tiredly at Balin. "Something about me not being a full blooded dwarf or maybe about me being too human, or entirely human. Something about being better in bed than me, or him not enjoying sex with me as much as he might with them. I'm pretty for a half-breed or I'm ugly without a beard. And when Thorin gets tired of me, they'll be willing and waiting."

Balin, for a moment, wondered if the lass actually did speak Khuzdûl. Or at least understood some. "Close. Very close, how did you figure it out?"

"Body language. Vocal intonation." Barely veiled contempt being thrown at her with every dirty look.

"Ah, you are good with people." Balin nodded, watching her with a new light in his eyes. "My wife was too. She read others like a book. It is a skill I didn't envy, she had to grow up hard to learn to evaluate someone in the space of a heartbeat."

Balin was married? People speculated he had a wife before Smaug attacked.

Thorin entered the room while she was speculating mentally. "Erdene," he held out one hand to her, "would you join me for a moment?"

They had some time until the food was ready. She was hungry still but the snacks passed around during the reception were enough for a little while longer. But if he wanted sex he was going to have to wait until after she had something nutritious.

Erdene rose and took his offered hand. He led her back up the stairs to the first hallway rather than the second hallway horizontal to the stairs. He led her past one room then another to a dark brown lacquered door with a shiny copper door knob with the same crest on Thorin's bead etched into the metal.

Thorin turned the doorknob and pushed open the door.

The faint smell of lavender soap, cedar and dry lilacs hit her. Blue-gray curtains blew gently in a breeze coming from two open windows across the room. Someone had pressed and cleaned sheets and dressed a four poster walnut double bed with similar blue-gray drapes hanging around the bed tied back by thick silver ropes. A large armoire sat against the wall opposite the bed, polished and clean. There were two night tables on each side of the bed, a small desk - dwarrow sized - with a chair next to the armoire. A large square mirror with a twisting - juniper? - setting was bolted to the wall between the two windows. There was a soft looking woven blue-gray rug on the floor.

Someone had been kind enough to deposit her bags on the foot of the bed.

Erdene took two steps into the room, her mouth opened slightly in wonder. "When did…?"

"Dís had the room prepared for you last night." He crossed his arms over his chest, leaning one shoulder on the door jamb. "Should you wish to live here before the move to Ered Luin, this room is yours."

And her immediate reaction wasn't so much sadness as it was disappointment. Of course he isn't going to invite you to live in his room. Which kind of sucked? Because every night she would have to go back to her room instead of sleeping next to him. Or he would go to his room and well, yeah, that just sucked. It really did.

One of his thumbs brushed her lower lip. "You are pouting."

She was pouting. Why wouldn't she be pouting? "I'm sorry, I'm not ungrateful, it's just…I was hoping…" Damn it. "Are we not allowed to sleep together, because I definitely thought we could have sex? But is the sleeping sleeping off limits? Is that why I have a separate room? Because I get it, if that's it. I just…I was hoping you might want to sleep next to me."

Mahal's great hammer, where did she get such an absurd idea? "I would very much enjoy sleeping next to you, Erdene. I thought, occasionally, you may want your own room."

Your attachment issues are showing. Knock it off.

The room was actually very nice.

The bed looked particularly comfortable and neat. It had four pillows. The quilt on top looked old, well loved, and, as she trailed her fingers over it she found it overstuffed. She pushed down and found the bed beneath overstuffed as well. Erdene turned, sat on the bed and crooked one finger at Thorin, beckoning him to come hither.

He stepped away from the door with a small, amused smile of his own, pushing it closed behind him. Thorin stopped a foot or so out of her reach, "is there something you needed, mizimith?"

Erdene got up from the bed, closing the distance, reaching between them to toy with the black vest Valis no doubt made him. She flicked the shiny silver buttons open, watching his face as he watched her. "We have a little bit of time."

Thorin pushed her hair back off her shoulders, running his hands down her arms, then to her sides, holding her waist. "We do."

Erdene pushed up, closing the small space between them, pressing her lips to his. Mahal. He would never grow tired of this. Her mouth opened under his, inviting his tongue to twine with hers, eliciting small, soft sighs of pleasure from his one. Her fingers trailed up his chest to find their way into his hair once more.

"Erdene," he growled against her mouth, "if you insist on-" his words caught on a groan as her fingernails scratched lightly at his scalp.

She found herself quickly pushed back onto the bed, a very hard, thick, insistent part of Thorin pressing exactly where she wanted him. He grabbed her wrists, pinning them to the bed with one of his own, her legs spread with him settled beside her and him holding one side of her hip in his other hand.

Ooo, button found. Erdene bit her lower lip looking up at him with topaz eyes. She attempted to wiggle, drawing a strangled grunt from him. The pressure on her hip increased. "Thorin," Erdene whined, attempting to find some friction between their bodies, "please?"

His lips crashed into hers once more, tongue plundering her mouth, silencing her pleading. A wanton moan drawn from her throat. He swallowed it, pulling her closer, angling her hips to grind his length against her heat. Ah. Here is the place where she was hot to the touch. His fingers grazed down her hip to her thigh, then calf, gathering the material of her dress and shift, and sliding them up to bare her stockings, black wool socks that went up to the middle of her lovely bronze and pink thighs, and her small clothes.

Thorin leaned back enough to take in the damp spot on the peach color cotton. Evening before last she confessed how wet she was for him, and now, now he could see for himself.

She wiggled again pushing up against the hand restraining her - if she were purely a child of man she could not do that, he should have been much stronger than her and yet she could - and pouted at him. "Thorin."

The temptation to kiss that pout off her face. Instead he slid his free hand further upward and cupped her wet heat, drawing a soft, needy moan from her lips. "Did you know I almost turned around Monday evening? It took all I had to turn away from your door and not follow you to your room."

She squeezed her thighs together around his hand, "I wish you had!"

He began to rub his palm over the cloth, "tell me how you touched yourself thinking of me."

Oh. Fuck. He wanted her to string words together when what he was doing wasn't enough but it was just close enough to what she needed. "I…" Erdene whimpered struggling with the grip he had on her wrists again to no avail. It shouldn't be this hot to be restrained. She's never had a bondage kink before. He was looking down at her body like he wanted to devour every inch of her. God damn if that wasn't the hottest thing. "I barely got into my room before I had my hand in my panties."

He removed his hand from cupping her sex to slide his fingers past the edges of her small clothes to the wet, welcoming flesh beneath. "Like this?"

Her hips bucked up off the bed into his, "fuck, yes!"

His forefinger stroked gently, finding the small bundle of nerves at the apex. Her hips rocked upwards into his once more, pressing herself tighter against his hand as he began to roll his thumb around her clit. "Tell me more, Erdene, did you use four fingers?"

"Yes, yes, I did. It felt so good to be full." Her voice broke on a sob, "but it wasn't enough, please Thorin, please, please, I need-"

His thick middle finger sank into her channel, "like this?"

Panting, swallowing hard, topaz eyes nearly rolling upward into her head as that one finger began to slowly ease out of her only to slide back into her once more. "Oh…Thorin… just like that."

"So wet for me," he nipped at her lips, her chin, her pulse, and bit down once more on the junction of her shoulder and neck. A high, needy whine escaped her throat, while her body clenched down around his finger. "Tight," he grunted, "Mahal, you are so tight." Perhaps too tight. He had no wish to hurt her. "Relax, allow me in," Thorin's ragged whisper came just before he pressed his ring finger against his middle and the tight, wet heat of her.

Silly dwarf. Didn't he know a pussy was made to stretch? Erdene spread her legs, bending the knee of her left leg and bracing it on the bed. His finger slid in without resistance. The appreciative groan that drew from him made Erdene wiggle beneath him. She leaned as far forward as she could with him holding her down, barely brushing her lips against the corner of his. "Thorin," Erdene whispered against his mouth, "curl your fingers upward."

Dark blue pools of lust met hers, scanned her face for a breath before his mouth caught hers once more. His fingers curled upward inside her making her moan into his mouth, making her hips rise to grind against his hand. Her reactions only fed his, he began to thrust his fingers hard, thumbing her clit in steady flicks, his tongue in her mouth dominant and demanding.

That slow sweet wash of pleasure grew and grew until she was right there, panting against his lips as he hovered just there above her, fucking her with his amazingly thick fingers. He stretched her so well. It felt so damn good. But she wanted-

She needed-

Flexing her wrist and hands and arms, Erdene rasped out a plea of, "Please let me go."

He shook his head, "if you touch my hair or my neck, Erdene we will not leave this room again for a month."

"Please, please, Thorin, I won't, please!"

He released his grip on one of her hands, finding it immediately wrapped around his wrist, almost laughably small compared to his own. Her fingers pressing against the back of his hand, adjusting his touch on her sensitive bud to steady flicks a little faster than he had been, "like that." Before the same hand moved to his shoulder, her nails biting into his clothing and skin as her hips rose and fell with his movements. Her pants grew heavier, her sighs sharper, her moans wanton, and then much to his pleasure, Erdene called his name as her walls began to squeeze his fingers, almost as if she were trying to draw him deeper. Her back bowed off the bed into his chest. The fingers digging into his shoulder moved to his back scratching as she came undone beneath him.

And then, just like his dreams, giggles spilled from her lips as she smiled almost sleepy eyed at him. "For someone new to sex, that was pretty damn good."

He hummed, kissing her soundly. "I am not new to the experience. I am new to the need of it." He stroked the soft curls between her thighs with damp fingers. "I have tried with others. It was much less satisfying." Thorin released her other arm to find it wrapping around his shoulders.

"Should I be jealous?" Her nose brushed his.

He felt her leg come up over his hip, anchoring him against her. He was half tempted to open his laces and move her panties to the side. "Never, ibinê. You have your mistakes, and I mine." His mouth found hers once more, their tongues twining, drawing a groan from him as the curls between her legs dampened further. He tore his mouth from hers as he sank both fingers back into her with no resistance. "Mahal…so wet. So wet for me."

Both of her hands came down to his belt, "we're allowed now, right?"

He withdrew his fingers to help her open it, throwing it off the bed followed by his vest. Her lips pressed to his pulse, sucking, biting, licking, while he began to unlace. "Can you conceive this month?" He murmured between desperate kisses.

What a weird way to ask. Unless…oh, well she hadn't thought of that. "Thorin," she cupped his chin, urging him to look at her, "I can conceive every month. Are you asking if I'm fertile right now? If so, no, that day passed."

His hands stilled. Every month? Mahal's breath. Every month. He pushed up, kneeling above her, his hands braced on the bed as he gazed down at her. "You are fertile once a month, every month?"

Erdene nodded, topaz eyes searching his handsome, if bemused face. "Yes?"

This is why they would have so many children. If he craves her half as much in his later years as he does now, yes, they would have a dozen children or more. "A dam is only capable of conceiving every three months."

She blinked at him, lips open in an O of surprise. Low sex drives plus low fertility, plus fewer female partners, no wonder dwarves had such a hard time maintaining their population.

Erdene tentatively pushed up on her elbows to place a kiss on his lips, cheeks, nose. Pressing her forehead against his, "we're safe right now. I have eleven days until I start to bleed and from there it will be approximately fifteen days until I'm fertile. We have time to figure it out." Her words seemed to help his pensive thoughts.

Together they sank back into slow, heated kisses, wandering hands and the occasional grind of their hips for an ounce of friction that sent them both moaning.

Her stomach grumbled between them. Erdene laughed against his mouth while Thorin pushed up and away from the bed to gather his belt. "Come, Dís has called us twice now to come down to lunch."

Her brow furrowed, head cocking slightly to the side. "She has? I didn't hear anything."

Below them Kíli crudely called upward that courting privilege had to be claimed before it was acted upon. Had she heard his tone Erdene would have blushed, instead she worried her lower lip looking up at him with gray eyes.

He reached to touch her ears gently, thumbs swiping over the shells and lobes. So many dwarrow similarities, and yet, he had found another mannish bit of her. Her hearing was, is, mundane.

I have no idea if I have the energy to write next week's update. I finished my antibiotics, I feel better, but I still have an awful cough and all I want to do is sleep. I may have had Covid and not tested positive for it. My roommate has it too, so we probably picked up at the airport when I came back. It's going on almost 3 weeks now with this.

I will try, but if there is no chapter I am apologizing in advance. You'll have one as soon as I feel better.

I was asked if the lemon and the hair cutting actually happened or if those were my imagination.

The hair cutting happened to me. My mom had cancer, I was four, my hair was waist length at the time. I remember being devastated. I understand why she did it, but that's how simple trauma is for a kid. Add to that even after she passed my hair was kept short, usually in a bob around my chin, until I was about 9 or 10 and my step-mother was kind enough to step in and nix cutting my hair off.

The lemon was my grandmother. It's her story, but it amounts to peer pressure and the times.