Bilbo in Laketown

A scene from my fanfic "The Most Precious of Treasures". It's a flash-back of the companies time in Laketown and the start of Thorin and Bilbo's relationship.


“And there I was, at the mercy of three monstrous trolls!” Thorin turned his head curiously in the direction of his burglar’s voice coming from somewhere outside the house the old Mayor of Laketown had been kind enough to give them for the duration of their stay.
Thorin strode out of the front door of the house and into one of the courtyards that opened out into one of the town’s streets.
He quickly spot the company’s burglar sitting on a bench near the side of the house, underneath a tree, with a number of human children sitting around on the grass in front of her, all sitting with their backs straight and heads turn towards her in full attention to what she was saying.
“… whether it be turned on a spit or whether they should sit on us one by one and squash us into jelly.”
Thorin lent against the stone wall of the house, arms crossed and fighting back a grin as he listened in amusement as the human youngsters gasped in horror and shock, some even reaching for their neighbour and hugging themselves close.
Bilbo smiled down at them all, her eyes glowing as she continued her tale.
“They spent so much time arguing the wither-tos and why-fors, that the Sun’s first light cracked over the top of the trees – Poof!” The children all jumped and gasped as Bilbo waved her hands about dramatically. “And turned them all to stone!”
The human children laughed and cheered, clapping their hands as Bilbo hopped up on the bench and gave a few bows.
“Now off you go all of you, your parents are quite likely wondering where you are. I’m sure it’s quite close to your tea time.” Bilbo said hands on her hips and looking in Thorin’s mind at least, quite like a mother.
Aunt, his mind said quickly shoving the thought of Bilbo being a mother out of his mind forcibly. She looks altogether like an aunt! Not a mother, an aunt.
There was a chorus of awww’s from the children before they started to unsurprisingly plead for just one more story, just one.
“No, sorry. Off you all go.” Bilbo said wagging her finger at them.
“Could we come by tomorrow then maybe?” a young lad whom Thorin grudgingly noted was quite close to his own height even though the lad could only be of thirteen years of age.
“Oooh, yes,” the other children cried clasping their hands out in front of them, “Oooh, please say yes Miss Baggins, please. Please say yes.”
Bilbo seemed to be thinking over this carefully though Thorin could see while the children could not, that this was all theatrics. The hand on her hip, a finger pressed to her chin thoughtfully as she tapped one of her large feet against the bench’s stone surface, was all theatrics to stir and tease the human youngsters.
“Well,” Bilbo drawled out slowly, not looking at the begging children standing around her but up at the clear sky above them, throwing colours of deep orange and purple as the day sunk into evening, “let me think….”
“Oh, please, Miss Baggins, please…” the children clambered as one, some bouncing up and down in the agitation and desperations.
“Oh alright, if I must.” Bilbo sighed dramatically and the children were once more cheering and dancing around.
“But only,” Bilbo started raising her voice over the children’s cheers, “only if you all go straight home now and do everything your parents ask of you this evening, and by that I mean, you wash your hands and come to the table for your dinner the first time you Ma asks you, along with going straight to bed at bedtime. If you do all that, then tomorrow I will tell you another story. Do you all promise.”
“We promise. We promise.”
“Alright then, off you go. See tomorrow.” Bilbo said grinning as she waved after the children who were all running from the courtyard laughing and singing.
“If only we had you around when Kili and Fili were dwarflings.” Thorin called to her as she hopped down from the stone bench. He had obviously caught her by surprise because she quickly lost her balance and stumbled causing for him to move forward and catch her before she fell.
“And you lot all say I need a bell.” She said as a way of greeting as she brushed down her new clothes – the clothes of a eight year old noble girl Thorin remembered as he watched for a brief moment her dusting down before clearing his throat and looking quickly away. While the clothes fitted her fine in length, the fabric was straining some around her chest area and hips. He had never realised just how curvy the hobbit was until they had arrived in Laketown and she had more or less been forced into wearing dresses, as it was considered most undignified for a woman of her age – all of forty he thought somewhat grouchily. She was still just a babe in dwarrow years – to be walking about in tunics, waistcoats and trousers. The hobbit had been less than thrilled to be once more forced into wearing dresses again – it had be long, hard fought battle in the Shire for her to wear whatever she wished – but she was gritting her teeth and keeping her mouth shut about it. For their quest sake and for his sake. Though neither the sake of their quest or him had stopped her from threatening to beat them all bloody with her letter opener if they so much as breathed a word about her new clothing situation.
She had already beaten Kili over the head with her letter opener on the first day she had worn a dress after he had, rather stupidly exclaimed that she “looked like a girl!” to which she rather crossly replied “that’s because I am one, you half-wit!” before smacking him over the head with the flat side of her little blade and marched smartly out of their dining room.
“You do need one.” Thorin replied as he set her straight and stepped back to a respectful distance ignoring the fact that she was rolling her eyes at him.
“I wore one remember. I almost scared Oin half to death.”
“He doesn’t count,” Thorin replied lightly, “he’s already deaf.”
“What about Gloin then? Mister I-have-the-eyes-of-a-hawk-and-the-ears-of-a-fox?” the hobbit asked dryly and Thorin fought back a grin.
“You are never going to allow him to live that down are you?”
“Not on his life.” She replied with a one of her sun filled, mischievous grins, her earthy brown eyes sparkling merrily. Thorin wonder to himself if it were possible to drown in such pure and loving happiness, for she was seemly brimming with it and Thorin seemly wished to remain in her warm presence forever.
Then forget this quest, forget the mountain, the gold and your revenge. Forget it all and be with her. Be with her and be forever happy. A voice that sounded surprisingly like his grandfather whispered softly in his ear.
He shook his head, clearing the voice from his mind, though the words sank into his heart with a sense of longing for a simple future that this offer promised.
Clearing his throat again, he changed the subject.
“You left out your part with the Trolls.” He commented as they started walking around the courtyard towards the large and beautiful garden growing along the other side of the house.
“No I didn’t.” she replied, stretching her arms above her head as if she was reaching out to grasp the last rays of warmth from the setting sun. “You just missed the beginning of the story where I got caught and you lot had to come and save me.”
“That wasn’t…” Thorin sighed heavily feeling her brown eyes boring into him.
“That wasn’t what I was referring to.” He continued quietly. “I was referring to how you were the only one of us who thought to push for time. Only you thought of different ways to stall those damn creatures.”
“Oh well, I was thinking of you lot when I edited out all that.” Bilbo admitted her round cheeks flushed with pleasure at his rather badly spoken compliment.
“Oh?”
“Well, I hardly think any of you would appreciate the little ones reciting to their parents and everyone else in Laketown too for that matter that one of the ways I stalled the three monstrous trolls from eating you all was by telling them that you were all infected with parasites. Wouldn’t really send the right message to all the big folk here now would it? Even if it isn’t true and it was only said to try and save your lives.”
Thorin simply shook his head bemused that she had actually thought all that through. She was probably right – she was almost always right he was discovering, not that he was going to admit that to her, at least not any time soon.
“Thank you.” was all he could think to say not that he needed to say much more for she was once more sending him that glorious smile of hers.
He quickly found himself once more fighting the desire to kiss her. It was quite a common desire of late but he had to take care for whenever he gave into it so as to not startle her. The hobbit was quite inexperienced in almost all things related to courting – despite the fact that she had run away to join this quest on the very day she was meant to be married – and so he needed to take great care in not scaring her with anything she wasn’t expecting.
“You are very good with them.” He said after a few moments of companionable silence. She let out a cheerful little laugh that did funny things to his heart such as causing it to soar in his chest and flutter about like a bird. It was all quite ridiculous really what this tiny slip of woman could do to him.
“Lots and lots of practise.” She chuckled fondly. “I do have a lot of cousins remember.” She beamed as she always did whenever she spoke of her many, many little cousins still safely tucked away in the Shire.
“And you love them all dearly.”
“With all my heart.” She agreed with a softer smile as she gaze in the direction of Mirkwood and the Misty Mountains. In the direction of her home, his heart thinks with a sting, the place where she belongs…
“If I could have gotten away with it I’d have several of my own by now.” Her voice brings him back to reality.
“Pardon?” He asks and is amused to watch her dimples turn a brilliant ruby red.
She ducked her head shyly, staring intently down at her bare, curly feet.
“Bilbo.” He says stopping in the middle of the garden path, gently catching hold of her arm and tried to coax her to look at him. “Bilbo.” Still no luck. “Billanna.” She peeks up at him from under her golden brown curls. Third time was the charm. The use of her birth name also probably helped too.
“Now,” he said as he caught hold of her chin gently but firmly within his grasp and turning her head up towards his, “what did you mean.”
“Nothing.” She mumbled her blush intensifying.
“Billanna…” the hobbit sighed in exasperation.
“Fine.” She finally grouched out, “All I meant was that if I could have had children, without all the hassle of being married, I would have done so already…”
“Ah…”
“Yes, see even among dwarves that kind of thinking is frowned upon.” She huffed crankily, pulling her chin free of his hand and crossing her arms defensively across her chest. “I can’t adopt or even foster one of my little cousins without someone throwing a fit over my not being married. As if being married has anything to do with being able to raise a child properly.”
“It does help, I have heard.” Thorin replied rather dumbly. He wasn’t good with these types of conversations; Bofur, Balin and Dori were the dwarves who would know best of what to say to the hobbit. Mahal, even his nephews and young Ori had better ideas of what to say and what not to say when dealing with his, that is, their burglar.
Yes, he had grown better at talking with the hobbit lass since their time together sitting in the cells under the palace of the damn elvenking trying to figure out a means of escaping but even so, his conversation skills were still much to be desired.
“My father raised me just fine.” Bilbo snapped hot in reply. “And Fili and Kili seem no worse for wear being raised by your sister and you. Or Ori being raised by Dori. Or…”
“Billanna…” the hobbit stopped short in her rant to look up at him her cheeks exploding with colour once more as she ducked her head.
“Sorry, you must think me very silly or…” she trailed off with squeak as he pulled her into his arms and tucked her head beneath his chin. It felt better than he would ever openly admit to have her in his arms like this. Better if they were… he didn’t allow himself to finish that particular thought.
“Never,” he said into her curls, “apologize for speaking your hearts truths with me. I do not find you silly for your wishes. I think I can even understand them a little.”
“Really?”
“A little. I know from watching the struggles my sister faced once she lost Fili and Kili’s father that life as a woman can be far more challenging when dealing with things that for man would be as simple as beating a hammer onto an anvil.”
“My life would have been much simpler if I had been born a lad.” Bilbo replied with a sigh, her fingers lightly tracing the silver beads in his hair and beard, “there would certainly be no talk of me having to marry because I can’t possibly take care of family affairs once Papa passes on because I am a simple hobbit lass whose only goal in life is to look pretty, get married and produce lots of little hobbit children.” Thorin lips twitched as he fought back laugh at the high-pitch and slight nasal tone the lass had taken to using as she finished her sentence obviously mimicking one of her many stuck up aunts.
“Is that what you were told?”
“After my Mama died? Yes, all the time. Not so much from my Took and Brandybuck relatives but from my aunts on my father side?” Bilbo snorted, “They were worried too. Constantly even, that no one would want to.”
“Marry you?”
“Yes. I was quite wild when I was younger,” Thorin gave her a look which she returned with a very dry one of her own, “alright, younger than I am now, happy? Anyway, I was quite wild during my fauntling and teens years and not the tiniest bit interested in being a proper hobbit lady of my station.”
“You sound like my sister,” Thorin chuckled, “go on.”
“Yes, well I was wild, running all over the Shire, searching for adventures and what not. Of course that all changed once Papa grew ill and I had to take care of him. All my aunts on his side of the family were pleased because I had finally calmed down enough to make me appear respectable enough for marriage only…”
“You have no wish to marry.”
“None what so ever.” Bilbo agreed, “And Papa backed me up on this, for the most part. Only with him getting weaker and weaker, I guess…” she trailed off with a sigh before shrugging. “Not that any of that matters now.” She smiled up at him, “Not with me here with all of you, on the other side of the Misty Mountains.”
Thorin stared at her for a moment before letting out a small chuckle.
“Nothing keeps you sad or disheartened for long, does it?”
“Hmmm, no, not really.” She smiled serenely as she shook her head. It was more than Thorin could bear. He bent down and caught her smiling lips with his. He felt her grow tense in his arms for a moment before relaxing into his kiss.
“Uncle! Bilbo! DINNER!”
Thorin groaned in annoyance at his nephew’s ill timing while Bilbo giggled sheepishly in his arms.
“Come, story-telling is hungry work.” Bilbo said as she slipped easily out of his arms and Thorin immediately missed her presences in them.
“One day…” he growled under his breath causing the hobbit lass to giggle so more.
“Come O’ Great King our dinner awaits.” She said as she caught his arm in her much, much smaller one and started pulling him towards one of the entrances to the house.
One day, he thought as he allowed himself to be pulled along by his burglar. One day he would get his burglar completely alone in a room with a big bed, a locked door between them and the rest of the world, with his nephews – and the rest of their companions too – being far, far away.
He smiled at the thought as he and his hobbit strolled into the dining room, Bilbo almost skipping in front of him before she was bombarded by his nephews and young Ori who dragged her off to the opposite end of the table to where he sat – he was going to have a word or two to his nephews about that for he was sure that they were only doing this to vex him – chattering a mile a minute.
His annoyance however faded when she shot him an amused slash apologetic smile over her shoulder as she allowed herself to be pulled along by his nephews.
It was amazing how just one of her smiles could make all the bad and terrible feelings inside of him simply disappear.
At least for a time…