A/N: Hello, dearest readers, sorry for being so late, but here it goes, better late than later.
Thank you very much for the continued support, Mizz Alec Volturi, Nenithiel, Mustard Lady, Celebrisilweth and pallysd'Artagnan.
And welcome, new followers Sakura Dragomir, Bonnie Celt and It Is Life, I'd love to hear from you!
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The searching party was unusually noisy that day, or at least so it was in Bilbo's ears. The Rohirrim seemed more and more depressed under the eaves of the dark forest, used to the wide plains as they were, and started a game of songs to change the mood. Bard pushed the troop forward, eager to finish the orc issue and go after his daughter again, and had to raise his voice over the fair-haired group's singing. The dwarves took wages on how long would it take for Thorin to snap. And the hobbit couldn't fathom how all this could be happening when they knew there were orcs ahead.
Dís had been riding at her brother's side for most of the morning, which annoyed Bilbo without a reason (that's what his reasonable side said in his head and was whacked still by some other side he tried to ignore). The ride the day before had been long and hard, but not noisy. He rode close to Dís and Fíli and Thorin most of the time, and conversation amongst them had been quiet and purposeful. After the last night's conversations raved his mind, the last thing he needed was unnecessary chatter around him and the people he cared most not around him. He wondered if this was what was called jealousy.
As if sensing his thoughts, Dís looked back at him over her shoulder, a smug smile on her lips. Why did she have to have a smile so alike Thorin's? Her beard was thinner, softer, as expected from a dwarrowdam, but her hair matched his rich mane, dark waves of luxury in Bilbo's wildest dreams. With streaks of silver, but the hobbit didn't care about the presence or lack of gold or silver or jewels, as long as the offspring of Thráin was in his reach.
Dís had eased her mount's pace, and soon Bilbo reached her side. His smile didn't reach his eyes, and she noticed it.
"Not the best of our days, huh?"
"My plans after reaching Erebor didn't include this outing, I must confess. I'd rather have plenty of time to… tell you more about the ridiculous courting habits of hobbits, yet…" He took in a deep breath, pondering how much to say and how much to conceal. "Did I tell you, Dís, I really got to know Thorin during our journey from the Shire to Erebor? Of course, we didn't have a chance to get to know each other before the quest, but…"
"But to travel alongside someone is different from sharing a tea table in the peace of one's own hearth." She completed where he lacked words. "No place for pleasantries, no time to beat around the bush. When you know your troop might be in danger - and to be on the road is always to be in danger – if someone shouts duck, you duck; you see a shadow, you alert everybody around you. You confide in your fellows, least you die. To be on the road is different. I know."
Of course she should know. Her life had been short of miserable most of it, since Smaug's attack to Erebor when she was just ten years old, to settling in the Blue Mountains, more than thirty years later. And, obviously, to settle a whole people somewhere didn't mean that somewhere was perfectly comfortable and cozy from day one.
"Dís, I..." He noticed her jaw took over a squarer setting, and he knew he was responsible for it. Stupidly responsible for it. "You know, sometimes I ponder… my people has a very short memory, for all we claim to keep our family trees as treasures and records of meaningful events. We hobbits just try to bury things that don't glorify us very deep, in Michel Delving mathom-house or in our own mathom-rooms. Not that everybody has a mathom-room, because the most usual is to people give mathom away in their own birthday parties, of course. Because when you receive a gift at everyone's birthday party, you're bound to have lots of mathom, even if you don't acknowledge it. I don't give my mathoms away, I don't recall if I ever told you this. Because every mathom given away has some meaning to someone, or had, and we just don't know what it was, because, eventually, the owner of the mathom passed away, sometime prior..."
She looked at the hobbit as if he had grown a second head, for all his chatter.
"…And so…?"
He noticed her bewilderment and how much his line of thought led him somewhere else from where he intended.
"Oh, sorry, Dís, I rambled."
"Of this I'm sure."
"What I mean to say is… We hobbits didn't sprout out from flower fields in the Shire, even if we believe Yavanna was responsible for our coming to be. Maybe we did sprout out..."
"Bilbo, you are digressing again."
"Bebother me!" He cursed, if to curse it could be called. "Yes, I did, sorry, Dís, this is the complete opposite of having a nice chat in a hobbit hole accompanied by tea and cinnamon rolls. Will you forgive me?"
Bilbo's puppy eyes were almost comparable to Kíli's, and Dís was unable to deny him anything. She just shook her head, helpless.
"Just ramble on, Bilbo dear."
He took a moment to take in the fact that she called him dear, and resumed, taking in a breath to gather his thoughts and not ramble again.
"My people are fond of talking about when Marcho and Blanco of the Fallohide clan crossed the Brandywine river and founded the Shire. It was a feat, all right, going to the King of Arthedain in Fornost to grant permission for it, but… None talks about the time between the crossing of the Misty Mountains and this feat. I myself only got to know about it in Elrond's library, and not even the Tháin, my cousin Fortinbras II, ever heard about it."
"So…" Dís approached the issue cautiously. "You hobbits had a time of wandering, too? Just like us Longbeards?"
"That's it!" Bilbo was thrilled by what he had to tell her. "Between the crossing of the Misty Mountains and the crossing of the Brandywine, my people wandered more than five hundred years! And none wants to acknowledge it!"
She considered this bit of information, seeing Bilbo under another light. And he being excited about it gave her even more insight on the nature of her favourite hobbit.
"Which makes you being a Baggins of Bag End…"
"Nothing! Nothing at all!"
Dís was really perplexed by now. She knew being a Baggins of Bag End had been one of his syllogisms to oppose taking part in the quest to reclaim Erebor from Smaug. And now he…
"Bag End doesn't define you anymore?"
Bilbo pondered her words for a little while.
"Bag End is part of my story, the story of my parents. But I'm more than my parents. I'm my family, and my family is Baggins but also Took, the adventurous descendants of the Fallohide clan. I'm my family and also my people, and my people wandered centuries until able to settle. Which part of all this defines me?"
"I don't know. To me, or to you?"
"Both?" He teased.
Dís looked around, to be sure of the little privacy possible in such a situation.
"I'm sure of myself, and more than myself, if you ask me. And I don't need tags to know who or what I want."
"Dís…" Bilbo waited until she looked directly at him, as much as was possible riding ponies. "I'm not bound to a place anymore. I'm ready to share a tea in Bag End or a banquet in Erebor, or in Thorin's Halls in the Blue Mountains. Or a banquet in Bag End and a tea in Erebor, it doesn't matter. And to face everything the road between those places can offer, if only my humble hobbit hole is acceptable. If it isn't, you can juggle me from dwarven hall to dwarven hall as much as you desire, as long as I'm juggled by your hands."
In his eagerness to profess his feelings to Dís, Bilbo became mostly oblivious to his surroundings, confiding in her own attention to privacy. He realized his mistake a bit too late.
Thorin had receded his pony from the front position of the hunting party, the Powers knew since when, and was riding beside him now, opposite to Dís.
His deep rumbling voice echoed in Bilbo's chest, as usual, even if the hobbit refused to acknowledge the effects it had on him.
"Your hobbit hole is entirely acceptable, Bilbo. And don't be humble about it. Many a dwarf never had such a comfortable place to rest for a night."
Bilbo turned his face to Thorin, muddle-headed. It felt like every time he tried to take a step further with Dís, Thorin was there to embarrass if sensing the hobbit's discomfort, the dwarven king urged his pony forward, not before sending a dubious statement.
"I wouldn't mind a bit juggling myself, if my hands are as acceptable as your hobbit hole…"