#post bofa

[shurikthereject]

After the incident at the ramparts, Thorin is terrified that he will hurt his beloved once again but he's even more scared that he made Bilbo fear him. So he avoids him as much as he can even if it hurt him but Bilbo will have none of that and begs Thorin to talk to him. They both discover that they had nothing to fear and that they are both quite blind to each other's feelings.

Thank you Lana Del Rey.

[balrog-prevention-society]

Fic idea for anyone who wants it...

Thorin working late, nips into Balins office to ask an opinion on the trade deal with Dale. As he opens the door he finds Balins assistant, a beautiful but serious darrowdam. (Even thorin thinks she's serious! But she's a dam in a high office position of course shes serious)

Under the impression she was the only one still working, she'd taken the chance to let down her hair and massage her scalp. (Dwarven equivalent of taking restrictive clothing after a long day)

Thorin walks in and sees her, head tilted back, hands massaging her head with her long red curls hanging down the back of the chair. And completely freezes.

Someone please write this!

[lucigoo]

So ... Bagginshiel-Tober: Day 6 - Recovery Just posted it on A03 here. It is called We Can Heal Together Heres a little snppet

Help he did. It turned out that being a hobbit and fielding fancy tea parties and family squabbles as a matter of course made him good at what Balin called "diplomacy". Bilbo had no idea what he meant, he was just helping people and taking no nonsense as was his way, but if he was talking to elven hearers, dwarven fingers and mannish cooks like they were all acting like a bunch of overgrown Tookish faunts then so be it. They shouldn’t act like it if they didn’t want the comparison made. It was, however , exhausting. Bilbo was such a little fellow who had ended up with so many responsibilities as he was now seen as "one of them" by everyone, even though Thorin still hadn't been coherent enough to take back his banishment. It just appeared to be an unwritten rule to not mention it, no matter what happened and allow Bilbo to carry on with whatever he needed to.

[periculaludus]

The Survivors

He does not want Balin to worry, but he cannot tell him either. He is going to hold him back; he is going to insist on talking. Talking does not help. Maybe this will.

Bofur opens the door and greets him joyously.

“I’m going to Dale, won’t be back tonight,” Dwalin says without preamble.

“Has something happened?” Bofur asks, a slight frown on his face.

“Naw,” Dwalin says impatiently, turning away from him. He wants to leave before his resolve leaves him. “Just going to the tavern.”

“Alright, let me grab my coat,” Bofur replies, waggling his eyebrows. “I quite fancy a pint or two myself.”

“I’m going alone,” Dwalin growls and regrets his tone immediately as he watches his friend’s face fall. “I just need to...” He stops, then raises his fist as he tips his head back slightly.

“Ah, fair enough,” the former miner replies reasonably, nodding his head in understanding. “You need to get shit-faced.”

“If Balin... just...” Dwalin cannot find the words and curses himself. He is no dwarfling who needs to make excuses to his older brother.

“Don’t you worry, mate, I’ll take care of things here. You go and do what you’ve got to do,” Bofur says earnestly. He is trustworthy.

This has been in the WIP folder for a while now, but I was struck by sudden inspiration today, so here goes. It’s an experiment, the first time I’m writing something in present tense, so if it goes horribly belly up, that shall be my excuse. Multi-chapter fic, but I’ll keep it short and sweet, just a couple of vignettes from post-Botfa (yes, canon Botfa) Erebor.

FF.NET AO3

[beacon-of-joy]

FiKi Week: Stone Giants

~Before the entire fandom murders me: I know what the stone giants are. Trust me, I do, and even if I didn’t, I would have found out today. I just decided that seeing as I have written the famous stone giant scene before (more than once, I think) I’d take the term ‘Stone Giants’ a little less literally and see what happened.

This is what happened.

~~~

Kili shifted in his place next to Fili, listening impatiently as a Councilman droned on and on about 'honour' and 'tradition' and 'future of peace and prosperity'. His cloak and ceremonial armour hung heavy off his shoulders. A human would have collapsed from the weight long ago, and even for Kili, who after all possessed the strength of dwarves, it was uncomfortable. The narrow circlet that marked him as the prince and Fili's husband pressed against his forehead uncomfortably. His hair was braided just a bit too tightly, and he could feel a headache beginning to build up. He usually preferred to keep his hair loose, even though he was technically too old and prestigious for such a simple style, but today was special, and Balin had forced him to get his hair braided properly. Kili wished Fili could have done it, at least, but the King had been busy, and so Kili had been left to prepare by himself.

Dwalin glared at him as Kili shifted again, the noise of his armour was drowned out by that of the crowd below the dais, but all eyes were resting on the King and his husband and Kili knew he should stay as still as possible. Still, he glared right back at the old dwarf, mouthing an angry 'what?' as Dwalin scowled.

Fili's fingers brushed against his and the older twined their fingers together, the gold of his signet ring warm against Kili's hand. Kili turned towards his husband to find Fili smiling at him, gentle amusement and love shining in his eyes. Kili smiled back before turning towards the speaker again, trying to school his features into an expression of polite interest. Their hands were still entwined when the speaker finally finished his speech.

Kili almost gave a sigh in relief. It wasn't even that big of a ceremony, just the unveiling of Fili's statue in the Hall of Kings far beneath Erebor. They had been working at it for over a year, since Thorin had died, and Kili had also given it a few touches, but he wasn't much of an artisan and had left most of it the true experts. The Hall of Kings was an enormous corridor beneath Erebor, longer than Kili cared to know, stretching into unknown darkness. Statues of the past Kings and Queens of the Mountain held up the arching roof, torchlight illuminating their still faces. A dais had been set up just before Fili's statue, still covered in a huge length of cloth.

Opposite of where Kili's brother would stand for all eternity, Thorin gazed down upon the gathering proudly, features cold and proud, dressed in armour from head to toe, so unlike Thorin as he truly had been. Kili didn't like Thorin's statue, hadn't ever since it had been revealed in the sixth year of his uncle's rule, but when he had told Thorin, his uncle had just given him a smile. "Erebor needs a strong king now, Kili, a warrior. We are a broken folk, and I have to be strong and brave enough to lead us through these harsh times. My statue has to reflect that, what I have to be, not what I am. I am not the king my grandfather could be, nor the one that your brother will become. I reclaimed Erebor, I must lead it back to its former glory now, for all of us."

Kili hadn't understood what Thorin was trying to say back then, perhaps because his uncle had used far too many words as was his wont, but he had nodded anyway, and vowed that Fili's statue would be truer to the person he was.

Next to him, Fili gave a sovereign nod, a signal to the Craftsmen to pull down the length of cloth covering the statue. Kili looked over at his husband as the men worked, his heart swelling with something he couldn't quite describe. Fili's beard was fuller and longer, moustache braids joined by another braid at his chin. The restless spark of youth had vanished from his eyes, replaced by a kind of contentment that warmed Kili's heart to see. Lines had begun to appear around Fili's eyes and mouth, joined, to Kili's dismay, by heavy frown lines all too soon. His brother had matured, and Kili felt as if he had never loved him as much before, but then again, he always felt that way with him.

An audible gasp went up from the crowd as the statue was uncovered, and Kili's chest swelled a little with pride and approval as he saw it. He himself had offered much critique on the design of Fili's statue, and he was glad to see that the Artisans had followed his orders precisely.

Rising up opposite Thorin, the statue couldn't have been more different. It was made from a light-coloured rock, almost pale yellow in shade. Fili's stone counterpart was cloaked in furs and the King's usual attire, impressive and royal but far from the image of war that Thorin was. The masons had thought of every detail when trying to bring Fili to life through the stone, even etching in the gentle lines around his eyes and the slight shadow of his dimples in his cheeks. The statue was smiling, gentle and benevolent, a king of peace indeed. Fili's eyes had been made of blue jewels, Zircon, Kili knew because he had chosen them, and darker grey rock for the pupils.

Kili leaned over to Fili with a smile, lips a hair's breadth from his husband's ear. "They wanted to leave your eyes like the rest of the rock, can you imagine?"

"That would have been a tragedy indeed." Fili replied, lips quirking up in a smile. "Good thing you were there to put them right."

Kili chuckled as he leaned towards Fili further, tilting his head slightly to kiss his husband gently, humming happily when Fili returned the kiss.

[tawghasa]

Cagamosis - thilbo

Cagamosis - An unhappy marriage.

The problem, Bilbo thinks, is that Thorin is at something of a loose end. He’s never had the indulgence of free time. Thorin has dolled out free time to fighting, to working, to clawing his way across maps and through mountains. To sweat and blood and the chill of inferior forges and noise of battle and the silence of grand meetings after a plea has been made and before assistance has been denied.

Thorin doesn’t know how to sleep in late. Doesn’t know that a bath can be more than a sullen, hurried scrub of cold water over the worst of the days damage. 

Thorin eats like every meal is a delay that makes him vulnerable to attack. Every meal is eaten with him hunched over and hyper-aware. And Thorin doesn’t eat nearly enough meals, Bilbo is sure. Even by dwarf standards, there is a lean and hungry look about him. When they had been travelling Thorin had a habit of pushing his unfinished meals into the hands of someone else as something more pressing demanded his attention. And the food had always been eaten, because times were tough and meals were infrequent and naught went to waste. At the time, Bilbo had attributed it to Thorin’s single-mindedness, a refusal to disrespect important matters by shoving stale bread and thin soup into his mouth while addressing them. 

But now, with easier times, Thorin is simply at a loss with how to deal with plenty. He pushes his food onto Bilbo. He scrapes stew back into the pot. He stuffs anything dry that will keep into his coat for later. He simply doesn’t attend, leaving Bilbo to eat all but the occasional meal without company. 

(And Bilbo has spent many long, happy days keeping himself occupied. But, it’s only since being dragged across Middle Earth and back with no moments of solitude or privacy that he has started to feel that being alone is a little... lonely.)

And it might just be that Thorin is lost without something to work towards. And it might just be that Bilbo has been anticipating things that were never actually being offered. And it might just be that these things take time, that the point of settling down was that so many little things must shift and change and compromise for a new thing to become sturdy, secure, safe. Thorin’s never had that. Has only vague memories of something resembling peace, and all of his life beyond that has been stretches of necessity and ambition leading towards something else. 

So when Bilbo wakes one day and Thorin is gone - is thoroughly and completely gone with the kind of obvious permanence that requires no note, and what could a note even say that Bilbo didn’t already know? - he tries not to take it personally. He has always known that Thorin is a furious engine fueled by fleeting scraps of good memories. And if Bilbo has been able to add fuel to that fire, well. There are worse flames to be consumed by.

[bmouse]

Alright writing prompt. Bilbo's been kidnapped. Thorin (and possibly the company) goes to rescue him and finds him having already escaped, or they rescue him.

jamorio this is what came to mind:

At first it had been a balm on his soul to have duties again. Official, proper duties that were not ‘stare down the Men, so that we might not be cheated’ or 'circle the wagons at night to ward off the wolves’ or anything else in the hardscrabble lot of a once-was-prince. Still, the full load of a king was a hard thing to balance no matter how comfortingly it settled around his shoulders.

Thorin Oakenshield - husband, had other demands on his time.

But apparently not today because Nori had scheduled a meeting of the Security  Council from now until sunset. Thorin looked at the daily planner on the wall, a masterwork of the Artificer’s guild - a cunning thing of little metal letters that hooked together on a series of copper rails, and sighed even as he fondly remembered that it had once been his father’s.

This meeting was not something he had looked forward to but it was best to get it done. It was nearly three years since the reclaiming of the Mountain and the city had regained its craftsmen, its scholars, it’s artists… and a small but persistent band of malcontents.

Honestly, if there were those who would rather not suffer my rule they should not have come back to Erebor.

It was a childish thought and his mother the accomplished stateswoman would surely have scolded him for it but she was not here and Dis was off charming the court of Dale and he would have to get through this on his own meager supply of wisdom.

But perhaps that quantity had also increased. Stranger things had happened. For example he would rather watch the sunset now from a little wooden bench in a balcony garden that from the proud cut-crystal windows of the upper meeting halls.

The doors swung lightly open at his touch and then found himself rooted in the doorway at the sight within. The chamber was empty except for Nori and his burglar, chatting as they sat jauntily on the edge of the enormous meeting table next to a plate of scones and a bowl of clotted cream.

“Oh! You’re here…” he said, smiling perhaps a little more foolishly than dignity allowed and magnanimously ignoring his Spymaster rolling his eyes in the background.

“Thorin, there you are! Here, these were left over from breakfast.’

Bilbo palmed a scone and then hopped off his perch to present it to him. Thorin’s stomach saw fit to remind him that luncheon was too long ago.

"My thanks” he said a few seconds later around the crumbs in his beard. “Though I missed you today, at breakfast.”

“Ah, well.” His beloved suddenly looked shifty, the way Fili and Kili did when a pie disappeared from the kitchen racks. “Schedules, eh? Troublesome things aren’t they… But I suppose it would be rude to be late for my own kidnapping.”

Thorin’s hand switched effortlessly from the scone to the hilt of his sword.

“What?! Kidnapping!?”

“No, no, don’t puff up! It was safe as houses; Nori and I arranged the whole thing. I had the ropes off and my little magic ring on by midmorning and Dwalin’s giving everyone involved a tour of the cells as we speak. And we found an unmarked tunnel that might lead to a library copy room. The scribes are happier than skylarks in spring…”

He trailed off. Thorin hand had just begun to let go of Orcrist’s hilt, finger by finger.

“Well anyway, here. Sit down, have another scone and we’ll give you the full report. ”

[rillils]

I don't know how to feel about this one. Somehow I feel like I should apologise again XD All I know is that it's just so weird - but I was just waking up from a nightmare when I wrote it and then cramps started and I just... I should stop writing when I'm in pain, really. Oh, and this is pretty boring, but at least there's a happy ending XD

(Fíli)

Close your eyes.

It's like before you were born, isn't it? When you die. It's nothing and everything, darkness behind your eyelids, light sizzling through your bones, welding old and new together.

Here, close your eyes.

It's right before you're born.

Ah, now that's some light.

-

You cry out loud - that's how you left this world last time, that's how you enter it again, barging in despite yourself, strong and awake and full of breath in your stubborn miniature lungs. There. You have a new voice, new strenght, new power in your fragile throat - you can scream and they'll listen, now. Now, the worst is behind you.

- You only have tiny hands, and yet you hold the whole world in your wee little grasp. But how would you know? You're fresh life and blood pumped anew in an ancient heart - you wail and it's not too bad, not when your head is cradled in the crook of her arm just so.

You're king, and this is your throne, her lullabies your luxury. -

You won't remember her first smile to you, moved, trembling, happy, but you will carry it with you with every flutter of your heart. -

She calls you, a soft crooning sound, settling upon your forehead with a feather-light kiss. You have a name once again, then. It's strange - it soothes an ache in your heart that was never supposed to be there, it erases the tear tracks on your rosy cheeks, filling the empty spaces and lonely crevices in you with warmth and milk.

It's strange. A good kind of strange.

-

You sleep. You eat. You coo. You keep them up at night, you babble cheerful streams of chitchat to your stuffed toy, you chew on your blanket, on your own squishy fist. You grow into your podgy baby self, eager legs and a waddling little bum still wrapped up in a colourful nappy.

They say you're cute. You don't really understand - although they're smiling; it's always good when they're smiling, isn't it - but you feel- you still feel like there's something missing. Maybe you can't crawl far enough to find it yet. -

They call it a ball - oh, you light up with excitement - and they want you to 'say it'. You try to comply (after all, you've managed so well with maama and da-da in the last few weeks), grabbing it with your small hands and greeting it with a half-toothed smile and a curious, Bo?

Da-da seems happy, and already on about how good you will be with one of these when you grow up - what kind of nonsense is that, anyway? - but nah, you don't like it. So you try again, lips pursed and golden curls bouncing astray on your temples, and then Baw!, you say, solemn like a christening, waiting for Baw to answer your call. Well, it doesn't, but it shines friendly and pretty in its mix of yellow and orange splotches and you giggle, Baw! Baw! Baaaw!, and while Maama smooches the top of your head like princesses do, Da-da - how come you never realized how lucky you are to have one, these days? - smiles even wider, pride sparkling in his eyes.

Tsk. You little perfectionist, you. -

Your first steps are wobbly, of course, but there are hands, there are always safe hands and long arms outstretched to keep you from tumbling headfirst onto the floor. You fall anyway - it's a good job the diaper's still there when you flop on your backside, really, it makes the landing a bit smoother, despite the stain spreading like wildfire on your toddler honour.

So you get back up.

How... How many times were you told to?

Oh. Not yet? Not here.

But it's bubbling in the back of your mind, and you do, and you squeal in delight when your head gets up so high above the linoleum.

Aah, it tastes like freedom. You can do things now! You can go and find what you need to make your young life complete.

... well, at least the Baw lying in the corner doesn't look that far away anymore.

-

It's a long time before you're tasting your first ice-cream - plain vanilla, cool and sweet, and oh infinitely better than mashed apples.

Maama reckons the two of you could share; you chuckle in agreement, clapping your hands - you remember this. It's nice, it's natural. It's instinctive. It sings loud and yearning deep in your heart, engraved in there like the DNA branded on the flow in your veins. It's like a nice memory. Things never taste the same when they're just mine anyway.

Ours, ours used to be your favourite word, now didn't it? Your second favourite. The first one was a name; short, easy, a familiar feeling with no sound to it yet.

But that can wait another while. -

Things keep a linear pattern, at least.

Because you know it, you can feel it, like an old and dusty clue left there by some kind soul to show you the way, and yes - five years, it took five years for you to find each other last time. You're glad fate is following the nice side of your old path.

And you know, you know as soon as you lay your eyes on him.

You can see it with impossible clarity, like an answer suddenly plastered right next to your question mark.

He's the name. Your favourite name, the first word nestling on the tip of your tongue ever since forever.

You will remember his first smile to you - and the bright light washing over the school's courtyard, the pure joy painted in vibrant flecks of hazel and sunshine in his eyes, and the big blueberry-purple stain on his t-shirt. And you will carry it forever in your heart, like a promise, like a picture in your wallet, like the time you smiled right back at him.

These things will stay, keep your hands warm when he's not around to hold them.

The rest - centuries-old memories, somebody else's regrets, the weight of expectations flung at you like discarded clothes - you can forget, now. You don't need that anymore.