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atlantablackRating: T+
Word Count: 6,787
No Content Warnings:
Series Status: incomplete
Summary:
It goes like this –Or: Thorin just wanted a half-decent burglar, the company just wanted a decent meal, and Bilbo's finally having to deal with all that grief he's been putting off for decades.
Bilbo falls asleep near the shores of the undying lands and then, for some unknown reason, he wakes up, once again fifty years old, and well, he doesn’t quite know what to do with that.
And if history's clear, someone always ends up in ruins
And what seemed like fate becomes "What the hell was I doin'?"
Babylon lovers hangin' lifetimes on a vine (Ooh)
Do you miss mine?
Us. | Gracie Abrams ft. Taylor Swift
☀︎
It goes like this –
Bilbo falls asleep near the shores of the undying lands and then, for some unknown reason, he wakes up, once again fifty years old, and well, he doesn’t quite know what to do with that. He’s a sensible hobbit, or he likes to think he is, and this is just far beyond anything he could have ever expected.
Bag End is exactly as it was then and he wanders through it, pulling books off of shelves and smiling at furniture he’d never quite managed to reclaim the first time around. He has the vague idea that he should be upset or shocked but after a hundred and thirty-one years he was finding it rather hard to get too worked-up. He felt, if he were being honest, rather disconnected from the entire thing. As if he’s simply living some kind of dream.
He’s wandering through his garden when Gandalf walks up the path and for a split second his heart swoops, lands near his feet, and then that feeling of disconnect comes rushing back over him, leaving him idly wondering why he was surprised at all. The sun is yellow, the grass is green, and Gandalf will always show up at the most inconvenient times, or depending on how you see it, the most convenient. It’s just how it goes.
“Good morning,” he hears himself say, voice thinner than it should be, pushed through a pipe and dissolving as soon as it hits wind.
"What do you mean?" Gandalf says. "Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?"
Bilbo blinks at him, turns a tomato over and over in his palms. “It means good morning,” he finally says, chest tight. “It just means good morning.”
Gandalf blinks back at him for a moment. “Well,” he says after the silence has started to border on rude. “Are you going to ask me why I’m here?”
Bilbo shrugs. “Sure. Why are you here?”
Gandalf’s eyebrows pull together and he seems to hesitate. “I am looking for someone to go on an adventure.”
Bilbo considers this. Considers the company. Considers Erebor. And then very slowly squeezes the tomato in his hand until it bursts red and sticky across his fingers. Looks down at them and thinks blood, thinks Thorin, thinks I can’t watch him die again. Feels himself flash forward to a battlefield and ice beneath his knees, blood on his hands. Grit and dirt caked into his hair to match the blood from where he’d run anxious, grieving fingers through it.
“An adventure,” he echoes, looking up to find Gandalf staring at him with a strange look. “Yes, I suppose that’s fine.” It doesn’t much matter if he says no he knows. Gandalf will simply bring a gaggle of dwarves to his door regardless.
“Is it now?” Gandalf asks slowly, still watching him with that strange, fey look. “I did not think you would agree quite so readily.”
“Then why did you ask?”
“Well that seems to be the done thing to do!”
Bilbo nods. He supposes that’s true. “Should I expect this adventure to start soon?”
Gandalf hesitates again and for a wild moment Bilbo thinks Gandalf is going to change his mind. He’s not quite sure what he’d do in that case but he also can’t bear the idea of someone else being Thorin’s burglar. He’ll hunt the company down himself if he has to.
But Gandalf merely nods to himself after a moment and says, “Yes, very soon in fact, I would even say tonight.”
Bilbo’s chest somehow feels even tighter. “I’ll make sure there’s plenty of food. Good morning.” And then he just turns and walks away quite unable to deal with anymore of Gandalf or talk of dinner or dwarves.
He wanders inside and carefully washes his hands, watches tomato juice slide down the drain and feels his hands start to shake. He’s still resolutely not thinking about it. He’s not.
Instead of thinking about it he cleans, methodically and mechanically cleaning in a way he hasn’t done in ages. First because he’d simply gotten too old and Frodo had been more than happy to help and then because he simply hadn’t been here.
Then he cooks. Pulls every single thing out of his pantry and works on making the most elaborate spread of food that he can make. It takes up all his attention just as he’d wanted it to. He mixes and bakes and fries and stirs and chops and drinks cup after cup of tea trying to hold onto the calm that’s wriggling and trying to get away from him.
And it works it works it works until it doesn’t. Until there’s a solid knock on his door and he’s suddenly confronted with what is about to happen. His heart immediately tries to take up residence in his throat.
It is, exactly as it was the first time, Dwalin standing on his doorstep. “Dwalin, at your service,” he says with a bow.
Bilbo’s mouth goes dry, heart racing. He hadn’t seen Dwalin in far too many years and now here he stands, sure as stone and rock in Bilbo’s doorway, as if they’ve never meant a single thing to each other.
“Bilbo Baggins at yours,” he hears himself say as if from far away. His voice remains steady but it goes thin and high near the end.
Dwalin squints at him but seems to shrug it off as hobbit nonsense and drops his cloak in Bilbo’s arms.
“There’s food,” he manages to say, gesturing weakly towards the dining room. “Help yourself.”
Dwalin grunts and wonders off, leaving Bilbo to stare after him and try to prepare his heart for the next. The calm is slipping. He can feel it. Feel it in the way his hands have started to shake and his tongue feels thick and swollen in his mouth.
Another knock sounds on the door. Bilbo swallows and casts Dwalin’s cloak aside so that he can open the door. And it’s Balin, just as he’d know it would be. He feels feverish. Keeps waiting for this dream to dissolve in on itself.
“Balin at your service,” Balin says, bowing and smiling at him.
“Bilbo,” he manages around the panic beginning to edge its way into his chest. “Let me take your cloak. There’s food that way.”
His hand when he gestures is trembling and Balin’s gaze zones in on the movement, eyes sharp. “Thank you laddie.”
And he’s once again left in the hallways with a cloak and a heart like a hare. A wild kicking thing that wants to escape his chest and return to the wild it came from. He keeps waiting on the dream to end. He knows who’s next, knows which knock is next on the door. And this, this is where the dream will twist, will finally show its true colors. This is where it’ll end like every other dream he has — with blood. Always with blood. Always with violence.
Knowing that it’s a dream doesn’t stop the twin knocks that appear at the door and as if through water he watches himself set down Balin’s cloak and slowly stretch out a hand to open the door. But when he opens the door, it’s just the boys. The boys just as they were all that time ago. No blood, no wounds, no scrapes or scratches or scowls. It’s just the boys wearing serious faces.
“Fíli,” he hears himself say before they can even open their mouths. “Kíli.” And he sounds wrong, he knows he sounds wrong. Knows he’s giving the game away, whatever the game is. But there’s something wretched blooming in his heart, all the blood rushing to his head, a heartbeat like a war hammer.
Fíli and Kíli are both frowning at him. “Yes,” Fíli says slowly, his hand suddenly a touch closer to his sword. “That’s us. How’d you know?”
“How did I know,” he echoes. “That is to say, I do believe, well that is, I believe Gandalf mentioned you earlier when he dropped by.” He doesn’t sound believable even to himself and it’s clear from the set of their brows that they know he’s lying. They drop it though, for the moment, and walk inside when he ushers them in.
The rest of the company trickles in a few at a time and Bilbo bites the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood. Bofur grins at him and everything in his body hurts. Bombur tries to talk to him about the cooking and Bilbo has to make an excuse to hurry off. Gandalf looks at the food on the table and at him and says, “You prepared quite a feast.”
“Yes, well, fifteen mouths is quite a lot of mouths to feed.”
Gandalf hums, looking at him for quite a long time before asking, “And how, my dear hobbit, did you know that there would be fifteen of us.”
Bilbo stares and then turns and walks away. Nothing he says will sound like the truth except for the truth and the truth is a two-toned jagged thing that cuts and cuts and cuts. The truth sounds like a tale out of a song that he can’t quite remember. Sounds like something he can’t deal with. Sounds like his name in the mouth of someone he spent a very long time very carefully not thinking about.
And now, for all his distance, for all his age, for all the good it did him — now he’s minutes, seconds from hearing one final knock on his front door and then it’ll all fall apart. He’s not ready for that. He’s no longer sure this is a dream and he’s not ready for—. He’s not ready.
Yavanna and Mahal and all the other Valar do not care if he’s ready. The knock sounds on the door just as it had before, a harsh noise that echoes through the entry hall and despite himself he turns back around and drifts toward the door like he’s being pulled. Gandalf is watching him when he looks up. Bilbo thinks he’s going to be sick.
Gandalf opens the door.
And then for the first time near 81 years, he’s staring Thorin Oakenshield in the face. Everything inside of him snaps into place so forcefully that he shatters. “Oh,” he breathes. Presses a hand to his heart. And no, he could never be ready for this. He could live a thousand lifetimes and nothing would have prepared him for seeing Thorin again.
Nothing could have prepared him for meeting Thorin’s eyes and having a stranger staring back. “Oh,” he says again, everything beautiful and bright inside of his chest shriveling up. And this is not a dream. This is not a dream.
“I thought you said this place would be easy to find,” Thorin says to Gandalf, swinging off his cloak, his eyes never leaving Bilbo.
“Ah well, I suppose you’ll have to forgive my familiarity with the place,” he says before turning to Bilbo. “Bilbo Baggins, allow me to introduce the leader of our company, Thorin Oakenshield.”
“So, this is the hobbit,” Thorin says consideringly and Bilbo already knows how this goes but he lets Thorin finish anyways. “Tell me master Baggins, have you done much fighting? Ax or sword? What’s your weapon of choice?”
Bilbo’s mouth opens and spite spills out before he can stop it. “It’s nice to meet you too,” he says caustically, heart in his mouth. “If you must know I prefer a sword but seeing as I don’t have one at the moment it rather fails to be relevant doesn’t it.”
In his peripheral Gandalf is staring at him so hard he’s afraid his thoughts might actually end up on display for everyone to hear. Thorin’s mouth opens a bit in shock before smoothly finding an insult to throw. “Having a preference matters little master Baggins when you do not have a weapon. But then, it is as I thought, you look more like a grocer than a burglar and it would seem your lack of weapons makes it even more so.”
There’s a smattering of laughter but Bilbo snaps back before it can really start. “And you sound more like a petty fauntling who hasn’t yet learned their manners than one who claims to be a king. I’m sure you were taught manners at some point in your life.”
Thorin flushes red, a snarl pulling at his mouth as he steps forward, but Bilbo Baggins had never quite learned to be afraid of Thorin, not even when he should have been. He stands his ground, head tipped back so that he can stubbornly maintain eye contact.
“You dare,” Thorin starts, rage thick in his voice.
“Yes,” he snaps, taking the last step forward and putting them toe to toe. “Yes I dare. You are in my home Thorin Oakenshield. Your company is eating my food. And I do not begrudge them for it but I will not let you speak to me like that.”
“And what of when we are on the road,” Thorin demands furiously. “I am the leader of this company. Will you listen to me when I need you to.”
“You keep a civil tongue in that mouth of yours and I’ll do anything you say,” he says, a little too honestly if the flash of shocked murmurs that ripple through the room is anything to go by. They’re both speaking as if his going is already a done thing.
Thorin blinks at him, some of the anger bleeding out of him and leaving only bewildered confusion behind. They study each other silently for a minute and Bilbo wonders how badly his eyes are giving him away. Because if he’s being brutally honest, for all his snark, for all that this is like lightning in his veins, all he wants to do is curl up in his bed and cry. He wants to put his hands to Thorin’s chest just to make sure there’s no wound, just for one last check that this isn’t some dreadful dream about to twist itself into a nightmare. He wants to scream. Wants to get his teeth in Thorin’s skin. Wants to do a whole lot of very un-hobbit like things that he isn’t allowed to do.
“Perhaps, Gandalf, you have indeed managed to find us a half-decent burglar.” It’s the closest thing to an apology Thorin will give and Bilbo can’t help the grin that steals across his face. It’s more than he’d ever gotten before the carrock last time.
“Thank you for your faith,” he says wryly, “Hopefully half-decent is enough to get by the dragon.”
There’s another shocked murmur and then Balin slowly says, “I don’t believe anyone yet mentioned a dragon, laddie. Where’d you get that idea from.”
He blinks. Grimaces. Sighs in annoyance when Thorin’s eyes go flinty with suspicion. “I overheard you all speaking about it at the table,” he tries, fingers twitching as he thinks about reaching out and smoothing away the lines on Thorin’s forehead.
There’s a beat of silence and then Ori carefully says, “I’m sorry master Baggins but, we didn’t talk about any of it yet. Especially not the dragon.” And he does sound sorry which is sweet.
Bilbo hums. “ Gandalf told me.”
“Now you are simply stalling,” Thorin snaps, one hand raising as if to grab him. He drops it when Bilbo doesn’t flinch but his scowl refuses to fade. “Gandalf where did you find this hobbit?”
Bilbo looks at Gandalf and Gandalf looks back. “I found him right here,” Gandalf says, “in his garden with a tomato in his hand.” And Bilbo knows Gandalf is thinking of the way Bilbo had squeezed the tomato until it burst.
“And did you tell him of our quest. Of what we mean to accomplish,” Thorin demands.
“I did not.”
Thorin’s gaze snaps back to Bilbo and he meets it evenly. Thorin is the only king Bilbo will ever follow but that doesn’t mean he’ll allow himself to be cowed. “You won’t believe me if I tell you,” he says in answer to the silent question.
“Try me,” Thorin snarls. He’s beautiful even in his anger and Bilbo has never felt quite so lost.
“You are going to Erebor,” he finally says. “You are going to travel from the shire to Bree and then to a campsite where your ponies will be stolen by trolls. You will rest briefly at Rivendell. From there you’ll go through the misty mountains and encounter stone giants and a goblin pit that you only just escape from. Azog will follow you the entire time.” The hallway is dead silent, the only thing he can hear is Thorin’s ragged breathing. “I can keep going if you wish.”
“These are lies,” Thorin says harshly. “You cannot proclaim to know our journey before it has even began.”
“No,” Bilbo agrees. “I suppose not. But proclaiming it I am.”
“Your hobbit is mad,” Thorin tells Gandalf and then turns on his heel, halfway to the dining area before Bilbo pulls one last underhand trick.
“Ghivashel,” he calls and the room freezes. He knows his pronunciation is off, knows his accent is terrible. But he must get it mostly right because as one every dwarf in the room turns to stare at him with burning eyes. “You called me that once,” he says recklessly, “but you refused to tell me what it means, as I’m sure you’ll refuse now.”
Thorin’s glare could burn this home to the ground. “I would never call you that,” he snarls. “I do not know where you learned that word but it is just another lie.”
He sounds so sure that Bilbo almost believes him. “Are you willing to bet the company on that,” he says, furiously hoping, furiously praying, Yavanna please. “Are you willing to bet your nephews on that. Your kingdom.” And it’s cruel, it’s underhand, but he can see the cracks in Thorin’s resolve and he will dig his fingers into them in anyway he must. He will not be left behind on this adventure.
Thorin storms back over and has Bilbo by the shoulders, slamming him against the door, before he can even blink. There’s a loud clamor of voices and Gandalf draws himself up as if he’s going to shout but Bilbo catches his eye and shakes his head.
“Tell me then,” Thorin says, so close all Bilbo can see is the dizzying blue of his eyes. “Tell me something that only I would know. Something that only one I would call ghivashel would know of me.”
He swallows hard. “You know I still don’t know what that word means.”
“I do not care. Tell me.”
Bilbo thinks and thinks, trying to pinpoint something that only Thorin would know. Or at least, something that Bilbo could not have found from any random dwarf. It takes him a moment but it comes to him in shadows. “Once,” he says softly, leaning forward so that his words are ghosting over Thorin’s mouth. He hopes no one else can hear him. “Once when you were 40 and Frerin only 35—” Thorin’s body jerks at the sound of his brother’s name. “—you snuck down into Erebor’s dungeons because you were both curious about what it looked like. There wasn’t anyone being kept there at the time and so no guards were posted when you got down there. You managed to accidentally lock yourselves into one of the cells and it took a full day before anyone found you.”
“Why would I tell you that story,” Thorin says, fingers gentling around his shoulders. His eyes are very wide and very blue and Bilbo remembers with a sudden clarity why he had spent so many years ignoring the grief that was Thorin Oakenshield.
“Because you were trapped in Mirkwood’s prison and I was trying to get you out and I think you were trying to cheer me up from what seemed an impossible task.”
“Did you get me out?” Thorin asks.
“Got the whole company out,” he says proudly and then swallows when Thorin continues to study him. “You could put me down now,” he whispers, stubbornly refusing to let himself close the few inches between them. He won’t embarrass himself quite that badly.
Thorin stares for another moment and then, in a whisper so quiet Bilbo barely manages to make out the words, “Tell me true, master burglar. I called you ghivashel?”
“Only once and I think it was an accident. Fíli and Kíli laughed about it for hours but no one would tell me why.”
“No,” Thorin says, something close approaching awe in his voice. “I suppose they wouldn’t have.”
“And will you tell me now?”
Thorin smiles, a real smile that causes his eyes to crinkle and Bilbo’s breath catches in his chest. “Not now, another time perhaps. After I recall why I called you that.”
“Alright,” he says, smiling back, dizzy in love. “I suppose I can work with that.”
He’s not sure how much longer they’d have continued to stare at each other if it weren’t for Balin’s very polite cough and the way it sets off Fíli and Kíli who start sniggering to themselves. “Well Thorin? Do you believe him?”
Thorin gently sets him back down, hands lingering for a long second. “Yes, Balin. I believe him. Unless you’ve been spreading stories of my childhood around the shire I do not know how else he could have the knowledge he has.”
Thorin is still studying him, frowning just slightly. “Tell me master Baggins, does this adventure end with us reclaiming Erebor?”
And he wants to lie. Wants to get Thorin to give up on the whole thing. But he steels himself and nods his head. “You get it back,” he says, “but the price is too high, Thorin. It’s not a price you want to pay.” All he has to do is mouth Fíli and Kíli’s names and Thorin’s face goes dark. Bilbo knows him well enough to know he’d see his own death as a necessary sacrifice but his sister-sons, Bilbo knows Thorin won’t see that as an acceptable price.
“We will change that,” he says confidently, only a flicker of doubt in his eyes. “You will help us?”
“I told you Thorin, keep a civil tongue in that mouth of yours and I’ll do whatever you ask of me.”
Thorin’s eyes narrow consideringly but he nods after a moment. “Very well.” He turns back to the company and Bilbo doesn’t quite manage to stop himself before he reaches out and lightly presses the tips of his fingers to Thorin’s back. “We have ourselves a burglar,” Thorin announces and to the company’s credit, they all break out into cheers.
Thorin looks down at him, one eyebrow raising when he spots Bilbo’s hand pressed to his back. Bilbo smiles sheepishly and pulls his hand back. When Bilbo looks at the company he finds them all watching with raised eyebrows, half of them also sporting gleeful smiles. He may not know what ghivashel means but they do and it’s clearly brining them an inordinate amount of joy.
“You should all go finish eating,” he says after a moment of glaring. “I’m sure the food is getting cold.”
“And whose fault is that,” Nori mutters but they all turn and dutifully start tromping towards the food.
Gandalf lingers behind staring at Bilbo as if he’s never seen him. “Tell me, Bilbo Baggins, how far into the future exactly have you been?”
“I dare say that would be telling,” he says with a wink. “Needless to say I’ve been far enough.”
Gandalf laughs. “Fair enough my dear hobbit. Fair enough.”
☀︎
They get through dinner. Bilbo gets through explaining the first half of the journey and leaves it at, “I’ll explain the rest the closer we get to it. I don’t know what we’re going to change so I don’t even know if the second half will be the same!”
He signs the contract, almost starts crying when Kíli calls him master boggins, and finds himself on the wrong end of Dwalin’s mistrustful glare the entire time. He makes sure to smile extra hard every time he makes eye contact with Dwalin just because. He’ll win him over with time.
Thorin still sings and Bilbo leans against the doorway and watches, smiling to himself as he listens. If he could he’d keep them all here and safe forever. A crazy dream but a dream nonetheless.
It’s after he’s gotten them all settled down to sleep and is finally behind a closed door that he finds himself sliding to the floor, his knees giving out on him. He feels raw around the edges, feels like he’s run for miles and miles without stopping, like he’d taken a huge gulp of air and never let it out. Thorin. Thorin’s alive and he, there was no world where he planned for this, where he could make himself ready to deal with something like this.
But deal with it he has, in perhaps the most dramatic way possible. It’s undeniably the most dramatic thing he’s done since his last birthday party in the shire. And oh, oh, he’s trying to not think about that birthday party or the ring or Frodo or all the terrible things still to come. Is trying to not think about choices and goblins and rings. He’s trying.
He’s doing a pretty terrible job of it though if he says so himself.
The first tear falls alone. The second closely following and then there’s a third and a fourth until he’s silently sobbing on the ground, one hand pressed to his chest, one to his stomach, as if he can press all of these emotions back inside of himself through sheer force of will.
He’d gone to the undying lands and it is a pity he never quite made it there. But even when he’d thought of the end, of death, he’d never thought that a reunion with Thorin was in the cards for him. Thorin would go to the halls of his ancestors and Bilbo would go to wherever it was that hobbits went and that would be that. He hadn’t made peace with it because he’d refused to contemplate the notion for longer than a few stolen seconds here and there.
But now. Now. Now he has a chance to see Thorin live and it’s heady and terrifying and he has no idea what to do. Before he can spend too long worrying about it though, there’s a knock on his door. He startles and pulls in a shaky breath, hastily wiping at his face and hoping he doesn’t look as wretched as he feels.
He’s hoping it’s Gandalf who will let him talk in circles and not press for more than he can give but he opens the door and Thorin is standing there, eyes sharp and focused despite the late hour.
“Master Baggins, I wished to speak with you.”
“Oh, yes, well very well, come on in I suppose. What can I help you with?” He sounds hoarse even to himself.
Thorin steps inside and it’s overwhelming, the sheer amount of space that Thorin takes up, the way that Bilbo has to clench his fists to stop from reaching out. Even the first time around they’d never reached a point in their relationship where Bilbo felt comfortable reaching out like that. He cannot imagine Thorin would appreciate it now.
“You say that my sister-sons are the price that I pay for Erebor,” Thorin says quietly after Bilbo has closed the door. “But there is more. What is the rest of the price?”
“Your life for one,” he says, voice cracking. “A war. So many dead.”
“There is more you are not telling me,” Thorin says, eyebrows drawn together. “What are you hiding?”
Bilbo shakes his head, feels tears pricking the back of his eyes again. He can’t speak of the gold sickness and the arkenstone and the way he’d woken up for a long time still feeling the wind on his face and the gaping emptiness beneath him. The way he’d forgiven Thorin because there had never been another option for him but sometimes, when he was very tired and very lonely, sometimes a dragon of spite and petty resentment reared its head and wondered why.
“My death distresses you,” Thorin says softly and then lower, “You have been crying.”
“Yes, well, it isn’t every day you wake up to find that no one remembers you properly or that people you grieved are suddenly alive again.” His voice keeps breaking and he thinks he can be excused for the moment of weakness that sweeps over him when he steps forward and raises a shaking hand, pressing his fingertips to Thorin’s chest in the exact place the stab wound had been.
Thorin’s hand comes up to circle his wrist but he doesn’t pull him off, just holds him there. “Are you going to be this emotional the entire quest?”
“I’m afraid it’s very likely,” he says with a watery chuckle. “In my heart I am very old and very tired and I had made peace with never making peace with your death. This is all a bit much to handle if we’re being honest.”
Thorin sighs and then, in a move Bilbo could not have anticipated, he pulls Bilbo into a loose hug, one hand on the back of his neck, one pressed to the small of his back. Or rather, it’s meant to be a loose hug but given permission Bilbo’s hands latch onto Thorin’s armor tight and he presses himself as close as he can get. If he could crawl inside Thorin and make a home of his ribs he would. He’d protect Thorin’s heart that way, forcing blood into it no matter what.
“I still do not understand why I would call you ghivashel,” Thorin says, sounding tired. “I feel that I am missing something.”
“You don’t know me,” Bilbo says into his chest, sniffling all the while. “Of course you’re missing something. And I would like to remind you that I still don’t understand the significance of that word.”
Thorin is quiet for a long moment, thumb rubbing soft circles against Bilbo’s skin. “Treasure of all treasure,” he says softly, pressing his face to Bilbo’s hair. “It is not a word used lightly. For me to have used it, I must have cared for you deeply. And I cannot remember it.”
Bilbo’s heart hurts. They’d been in lake town when Thorin had slipped and called him that. Thorin had only had two drinks but he’d been loose in a way Bilbo hadn’t seen before and he’d been shamelessly sticking close to his side, soaking up every stray smile, every laugh, knowing that they were in short supply and this might be his last chance for a long while to see or hear them. He’d hoarded the memories away and Thorin had turned to him at one point, said something inconsequential, made important only by the way he’d said the word. Soft and affectionate, the term clearly an endearment even if Bilbo hadn’t had the slightest idea what kind. Fíli and Kíli had been the first to realize what had been said and they’d hooted and hollered and laughed so hard they’d cried. The rest of the dwarves had laughed as well but they’d all looked fond and happy and so he had taken heart in it. He’d taken heart and then he’d never had the chance to hear the word again.
“Maybe one day you will,” he says softly. “Stranger things have happened.”
Thorin hums. He doesn’t pull away, lets Bilbo cling to him in a way that both soothes and aggravates his heart. It’s close but it’s not close enough. He’s not sure there’s anything that would satisfy this craving to press closer and closer.
“You’re shaking,” Thorin says, pulling him somehow closer, like he’s trying to hold Bilbo together through sheer force of will. “You truly grieved me that much?”
“Of course. Of course I did. How could I not. Whatever it is that you felt for me the first time around, I promise that it was returned, even if it took me far longer to realize it. Even if it was too late by the time I realized. But it was returned and I grieved even more when I realized.” It’s too honest, too much, too soon, but Thorin, despite not knowing him, is holding him like he cares and Bilbo is feeling weak.
Thorin hums and the hand on his neck moves up to tangle itself in his hair. “Why are you doing this,” he asks. “You don’t know me, Thorin.”
“No, I do not. But I look at you and I believe that some part of me does. I do not remember as you do but I feel emotions I should not when I see you.”
Thorin tugs at his hair until Bilbo tips his head back, keeping his eyes stubbornly closed. Thorin sighs and leans forward, pressing their foreheads together. “I do not believe I will ever remember you the way we would both like me to,” he says, regret dripping off of the words. “But if I called you ghivashel then some version of me cared for you deeply and I will honor that until I can understand it.”
“You don’t have to do that,” he protests even as he wants to greedily take hold of that promise and swallow it whole.
“No, I do not. But I would soothe the edges of your grief if I can.”
“I’ll take too much from you,” he warns, because he knows himself well enough at this point to know that he will grasp onto this with both hands and refuse to let go.
“Then take,” Thorin says brushing their noses together, the words ghosting over his mouth. “I will tell you if you ask too much.”
Bilbo opens his eyes, finds dizzying blue looking back and nothing but an unfathomable gentleness that he would never have dreamed Thorin was capable of this early on. But Thorin had always cared too much, too big. It’d only been Bilbo that he’d been resistant to for so long and when that had changed it had given him whiplash with how fast Thorin had gone from being aloof and uncaring to caring with his whole being.
He thinks it’s only that he’s given Thorin a bigger reason to care far earlier, not that Thorin has changed in any significant way.
None of this stops his heart from racing as he carefully eases forward, brushing their lips together once, twice, three times, and then he pulls back, eyes wide as he waits for Thorin’s response. Thorin lets out a quiet sigh, licking his lips, his fingers tightening in Bilbo’s hair.
“You believe this too much to ask of me,” Thorin says, bringing his other hand up and brushing careful fingers over Bilbo’s cheek.
“I”m afraid I’m a greedy hobbit,” he replies, leaning into the touch. “Yes, I believe that is too much to ask.”
“Then have peace master Baggins, you have not asked too much.”
“Bilbo,” he says, desperation suddenly prickling at his skin. “My name is Bilbo.”
In response Thorin tugs his head back even further and then proceeds to kiss him senseless. He’d never spent much time considering what kind of kisser Thorin would be as that would have meant thinking about Thorin and that had been something he’d been trying so hard to not do. But if he had he thinks it would have paled in comparison to the real thing.
Thorin kisses like he has a claim to stake, like there’s a fire burning under his skin to match the one igniting under Bilbo’s. He bites and licks his way into Bilbo’s mouth like he’s trying to prove something to them both. And whatever he’s trying to prove bursts into flames between them. Bilbo’s hands find their way into Thorin’s hair, not pulling, just holding on tight as he stands on his tiptoes trying to get as close as possible to an inferno hiding in the body of a dwarf.
“Ask for more,” Thorin says, pulling back, mouth spit-slick and shining, words a dare Bilbo isn’t sure he can meet. “Ask.”
He dimly hears himself gasping for air and he wants everything but he isn’t quite sure he can handle everything quite yet. Maybe later he’ll regret not taking the chance while they’re safe with a bed at their disposal but in the moment he feels bruised and raw and on the brink of tears, Thorin too real to handle.
“Just, just stay,” he manages to get out, voice thick and choked. “Stay here tonight. Please, I need,” he breaks off, fully overwhelmed.
“Yes,” Thorin says, pressing another bruising kiss to his mouth. “Be calm, Bilbo. I will stay.”
It takes some maneuvering, Bilbo unwilling to let go of Thorin and Thorin indulgently allowing it. But eventually they end up in the bed, stripped down to nothing but their underclothes, Thorin’s back to the wall, their legs tangled together, Bilbo’s head pillowed on Thorin’s arm, Thorin’s other arm draped over his waist pulling him closer. It’s the closest thing to content he’s felt since this entire mess of a day started.
“Would you have asked this of me before?” Thorin asks once their hearts have quieted down.
“Oh no,” he says, laughing a little at the idea. “I’m afraid I would never have said anything at all. I wasn’t half as desperate until the very end, and by then it was rather too late.”
Thorin’s hand creeps under his shirt and the feel of skin against skin sends sparks shooting up his spine and makes him sigh happily. “Tell me, how did this first meeting go last time? The details, not the sweeping pictures you painted for the rest of the company.”
He huffs but obliges. “Well, it started much the same, I will admit. You called me a grocer and I was too confused as to why there were so many dwarves in my house to bite back. Truly, much of what happened tonight, just without my willing participation. You planned, Gandalf gave you the key to the mountain, I fainted at the mention of a dragon, and we all went to sleep with the expectation that I would not be joining you.”
“I cannot imagine it,” Thorin says after a moment. “You have a fire inside of you. I cannot picture you without it.”
He blinks, feels tears slipping down his face at all the parts of him Thorin will never get to know. It isn’t that he ever wants to go back to that same hobbit that fainted at the idea of a dragon. It isn’t even that he isn’t perfectly happy with the outcome he’s been granted. It’s only, it feels like he’s cheated. Like he skipped steps that he shouldn’t have.
But he’s too greedy to give this up. Will hoard Thorin’s kisses, his hugs, he’ll gorge himself to death on them before he’ll be willing to give up this. He thinks this should not be causing him as much grief as it is. He had, after all, had eighty years to deal with the grief that Thorin’s death had left behind. But then, it could be said that he never handled it. Had pushed it so far down that sometimes it was like there was no grief at all. A lie if there was ever one.
“Sleep, Bilbo,” Thorin whispers after a long while, the night stretching across them.
“Be here when I wake up.” He’s half-asleep already, lulled by the warmth of Thorin wrapped around him. The safety that emanates from him in waves heady and calming.
“Aye, I’ll be here, I will wake you if I must.” There’s the gentle press of lips to the crown of his head, the hand on his stomach drawing slow circles into his skin, and Bilbo drifts off to sleep.
This may not be the afterlife adventure he’d expected, but it is an adventure, and really, it was already shaping up to be his favorite.
☀︎
End Notes:
I'm a firm believer that you can't just reset a timeline and not expect echoes of old emotions to not linger. I'm half contemplating writing Thorin's POV of this just because of that but tbd
Originally posted on AO3
