Hobbit Fic: Such Fair Ostents (Part 2)
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Before he could answer horns winded wild up the valley along the length of the Mountain's eastern spur. The Men, many of whom had been resting their feet seated upon convenient boulders, scrambled to arms while the Elves nocked arrows to bows as one in a fluid, practiced motion but, at Thranduil's upraised hand, did not draw, weapons lowered in guarded welcome. Soon the new arrivals rounded the ranks of the Elven army: hundreds of Dwarves clad in steel from head to toe, their plaited beards thrust into their belts and heavy mattocks in their hands, moving at great speed despite the shields slung at their backs and packs bulging with supplies.
In the lead was a red-haired Dwarf mounted atop-Bard narrowed his eyes, then goggled-a pig, the crest of his helm a bristling flame. Though he was still a goodly distance from them, he hallooed, "Well met, cousins! Me and the lads hurried on through the night, so we're a wee early!" His every word rang clear across the field like a bell, tolling, of a size to comfortably house him and his boar both. "Ah, but I wouldn't miss your wedding for all the gold in Erebor, Thorin! Have you and your dragonslayer signed the prenuptial contract yet?"
Hardly had the echoes faded from the steep rock walls did a ripple of amazed interest pass through the listening Elves and Men, hundreds of necks craning in now unabashed curiosity between Oakenshield's kin and him. The Dwarves of the Iron Hills had come.
Bard finally gave in and buried his face in his hands, a laugh burbling wet up from his throat. He wondered in half-hysterical despair whether it wasn't too late to confess that it hadn't been him who killed Smaug, after all.
· · ·
Thorin's cousin, Dáin called Ironfoot, was by far the loudest Dwarf Bilbo had ever met. Everything about him was loud, from his red beard, brighter than Glóin's and groomed into the shape of tusks, to the fact that he had ridden up on a fearsomely massive pig. When he spoke, it was a roll of thunder, drums beating in the air, that surely would've sent half the Hobbits in the Shire rabbiting for their holes, their doors slammed shut. Yet Bilbo was inclined to like him.
Dáin had leapt from his boar as if his armor weighed no more than a coat of feathers, tossing his helm to a Dwarf whose duty seemed to be to catch it, his red ax to another, and swept Thorin up in a bone-crushing, back-pounding embrace, laughing. Thorin's despondency lifted a bit, a broad smile spreading slowly across his face. "Dáin, you made it," he said, pleased.
"You ought to know better than to doubt me, Cousin," answered Dáin, huffing in mock outrage to a small chuckle from Thorin. "I'll not have you go to the anvil without a proper honor guard, though our house's well represented enough." He nodded to Balin and the rest of the Company above on the ramparts while Bilbo eyed the ranks upon ranks of Dwarven warriors, mailed in steel, and wondered whether Durin's folk could tell the difference between a wedding and a battle. "Dís is going to have your beard for this," Dáin added, suddenly sheepish, "and maybe mine, too, for rushing on over at your raven 'stead of talking you into puttin' the ceremonies off."
At that, Thorin went grim again, and it was impossible to guess which prospect pained him more: explaining to his sister why he couldn't wait until she was present to wed or to his cousin why there would be no marriage to attend, after all. Thorin's jaw clenched. "Dáin..." he began but couldn't continue, eyes straying as they often had since he, Balin, and Bilbo descended the barricade to Bard's tense figure. Unable to find the words he sought in Bard's crossed arms or the lines of his downturned mouth, his gaze fixed stubbornly on the ground to his left away from any Dwarves, Thorin folded his own arms, chin dropping so low his head bowed.
Bilbo's stomach knotted, aching worse than when he'd overindulged in candied apples at a Litheday festival of his tweens. Thorin was not unlike the mountain he was king under, Bilbo thought. A solitary peak that stood, imposing, unmovable as sun and cloud cast shifting shadows upon its rocky faces; sometimes majestic crowned in snow, sometimes forbidding shrouded in mist. It felt wrong to see him so uncertain. Still unflinching but his presence pulled so tightly within that Bilbo was thrown off-balance, like the Mountain had disappeared behind his back or been replaced by another made of paper instead of stone.
For the hundredth time, he silently berated himself for his foolishness with the Arkenstone. True, Thorin had apparently had courtship on his mind since before their adventure began and not made an attempt to inform Bilbo of it or, really, of much at all save their business with the dragon, so he could hardly be blamed for his nervousness at Thorin acting oddly when an army of Elves and angry fishermen was camped at the gates. But he did not mean to lead Thorin to disappointment. Nor Bard into a corner where he was forced to accept a suit he clearly didn't want.
He shuffled his feet and stared at his toes as they curled in the dirt. His fingers itched to rub the comforting gold band of his magic ring, resting heavy and close to his heart in an inner pocket. As Bilbo debated the merits of ducking around a boulder to slip on his ring and vanish for a short spell, just until things were settled, Dáin was studying Thorin with a shrewd glint in his eye.
Dáin finally clasped Thorin's shoulder, a look of understanding on his bluff face; Thorin, slumping, breathed a too-hasty sigh of relief. "Say no more. Why, when I wed my dearest Eir, my tongue was so clumsy I barely stumbled my way through my vows." He shook his head in fond reminiscence. "You never did like to make the good easy for yourself. Asking the hand of a Man you'd not met a month ago! Pah!" Thorin blinked, while worry seeped into the creases of Balin's brow. "Well, fear not! I know my part here and can introduce myself."
Clearing his throat and combing quick fingers through his beard, the bristling ridge of hair on his otherwise clean-shaven head, Dáin surveyed in turn Gandalf, Bilbo, who his curious eyes lingered on for a moment, and the Elvenking, who he dismissed with a grunt, before his gaze found Bard and, with a determined nod, he strode forward to plant himself square in front of the man. His steel-tipped boots were braced wide, his hands gripped on his armored belt. The intent glare he raked Bard from head to toe with was not friendly in the least.
Oh, no, thought Bilbo, in growing horror. "Wait, Dáin-" Thorin said, almost pleading, only to be ignored but for a firm, "Hush, Thorin. You cannot spare your dragonslayer this." Bard narrowed his eyes at Dáin, his hand falling to the hilt of his sword and a cold, serpentine menace in the tilt of his head.
In desperation, Bilbo rounded on Gandalf next to him. Who, to Bilbo's ire, had produced his pipe from one sleeve and was thoroughly engrossed in knocking the tamped ash out of it against his staff, propped on his shoulder, unconcerned. "Do something!" Bilbo hissed under his breath. Thorin, he judged, was in no fit state to. Thorin, in fact, couldn't bear to even watch, one hand covering his face, while an anxious Balin waited for direction and the Elvenking seemed entirely too eager for Bard to relieve Dáin of his head.
Gandalf arched one bushy brow at him and whispered back, "I am a Wizard, Bilbo Baggins, not a matchmaker." Bilbo fumed-were all Wizards so frustratingly evasive?-and Gandalf added after a pause, "Besides, I find such matters of the heart have a way of untangling themselves in due time." The corner of his lips quirked up in a sly smile. And Bilbo remembered that Gandalf had been less and less of a help the closer they got to the Mountain, though the quest was as much his idea as Thorin's.
Resigned that there would be no aid from that quarter, Bilbo tried his best not to fret, for panicking never did a body any good. Or so his father had always said, when his mother was in one of her excitable moods. Thorin's head was still sitting sound upon his neck, Bilbo reassured himself, despite how certain he'd been that Bard would smash that head-with, admittedly, its wandering eyes that lacked all discretion-in like an overripe melon once or twice already. Bard had proved a sensible fellow, of the sort Bungo Baggins would've approved of, hadn't he? He could handle Thorin's cousin.
"Are Men so rare a sight to you, Master Dwarf, that you must gape at me like a sun-struck halfwit?" asked Bard, tone deceptively light. That, however, was not speech Bilbo's father would have stood for, mannered gentlehobbit that he was; Bilbo groaned, one hand mussing his hair. Dáin merely smiled, and it was as pleasant a baring of his teeth as Bard's words were polite.
"There's no small number of disappointed Dwarves in the Iron Hills," he said, "who had thought to claim for themselves Smaug's death and my cousin's hand." To Bilbo's shock, Dáin spat, viciously, at Bard's feet. "It's a soddin' disgrace that the glory of slaying the greatest wyrm of our age and honor of being seated as consort at the King Under the Mountain's side should go to a baseborn wretch who understands naught of Dwarves, his tattered nobility a thin guise o'er his grasping ambition."
Gone was the Dwarf who'd greeted Thorin so warmly, so enthusiastically and in his place was one who, in his cutting disdain, resembled nobody so much as the Elvenking. Bilbo was startled anew. For he had assumed the wrath of Dwarves to be a burning thing that smoldered like hot coals until it burst forth, a raging fire that could no longer be contained within the forges of Dwarven hearts. Dáin circled Bard as he spoke, his measured steps the prowl of a stalking wolf. Even his rounded burr of an accent, agreeably rustic though foreign to Bilbo's ears, hardened, and calculation lay sharp as a knife hidden up a sleeve behind his eyes.
Yet Bard refused to be cowed. "Are you done, my lord?" he asked simply, when Dáin again stopped before him; he had not turned to follow Dáin's movements. At the curt nod, he continued, "Should the dragon arise from his watery grave, these Dwarves of yours are welcome to try their skill and luck against him, and I would wish them joy of it, but neither you nor they were there when Smaug set upon Laketown, so the task fell to me and little glory or honor did I expect to win for it." Furious as Bard was, his voice was level, if clipped and icy as the lake's dark depths. "The lives of my people are worth more than your praise and titles." Rather, it was the tense slope of his jaw and shoulders, the white of his knuckles around the hilt of his sword that betrayed him.
"Churl I may be to you, my house bereft of lordship," said Bard, and at last Bilbo could hear the lash of anger in every syllable, "but do not forget by whose deed there is once more a King Under the Mountain. I won't be denied my due for that service." He stared down at Dáin, the two of them locked in a silent grapple of wills. Then he added, "I have borne insults enough from your tongue. More and you shall answer for them, Master Dwarf, with your head, beard and all."
Bard's eyes blazed, and his words were a soft hiss through his gritted teeth; Bilbo wondered uneasily whether Smaug hadn't somehow left a bit of himself in his killer. Gandalf would know, wouldn't he, and warn them? But when Bilbo snuck a glance at the Wizard, he found Gandalf's attention fixed on the sky past the Mountain's shoulder, where the eastern spur joined. He barely resisted the urge to stamp his foot. What could be of such interest-a passing bird, a passing cloud-up there?
Dáin held Bard's gaze for so long Bilbo's nose wanted to twitch, then chuckled, saying, "Well answered, lad." He clapped Bard low on the back, nearly jolting the surprised man off his feet. The realization dawning on Bard's face was that of somebody who'd learned, too late, that he made a terrible mistake. And Bilbo thought, Wha-? All of Dáin's hostility had vanished into thin air quicker than Bilbo when he put on his ring.
"Your dragonslayer is for sure no halfwit, Thorin! He's got a lick o' fire in his belly, too, dour as he looks." Winking meaningfully at Thorin, Dáin opined in what was probably supposed to be an aside for his cousin's ears, "That's all to the good, as you've two kingdoms between you. And I reckon he'll be a right handful to bed, which is all the better, I tell you!" He slung an arm around Thorin's shoulders and laughed, so loud Bilbo marveled that Thorin wasn't deafened by it. "I gladly give this match my blessing!"
Thorin was so pale that Bilbo feared he might faint, despite his current lack of grievous bodily injury. "Dáin..." he said weakly. He opened and closed his mouth several times, with no intelligible results, before groaning and smacking a hand to his face again while Dáin hummed questioningly. Bard flushed an alarming shade of red. Though whether he was mortified or incensed Bilbo didn't know, if the man could even decide which to be.
Fortunately, perhaps, they were interrupted. An Elven messenger, so light of foot it seemed to Bilbo that he was present in the space of a blink, appeared at his king's elbow. He bowed deep but swiftly and said, "My lords, Prince Legolas begs leave to inform you that Mithrandir's army approaches from the north." Mithrandir was the name the Elves called Gandalf by, Bilbo had discovered in Rivendell, but since when did he also have an army and one on the way here without him? Weren't there only four other Wizards?
It was with a sinking feeling that Bilbo noted Gandalf's sudden graveness and Bard's, a fey gleam in the Elvenking's eyes that caused the hair at the nape of his neck to stand on end. "Gundabad orcs joined by the goblins of the Misty Mountains," the runner continued, unfazed, "in a host ten thousand strong, with many warg riders and a legion of bats." Oh, no, thought Bilbo, as Thorin snarled out a hateful Azog. These wedding guests were most definitely uninvited and unwelcome. "The scouts on the heights report that the enemy marches fast and will be upon us by midday."
"What's this about Azog?" Dáin asked flatly, arms crossed. "I was looking forward to bloodyin' that sprite's pretty face"-he tipped his chin up in challenge at the Elvenking, who smiled-"when time came for you to steal your intended, Thorin, but now I hear the Defiler, cursed be his name, lives and means to offer us battle and no mock fisticuffs either." Bilbo wished he were as calm as Dáin sounded and undaunted at the prospect of fighting a vast horde of orcs. "If this is some joke..."
"No," said Thorin, "that filth has been pursuing us since before we made the mountains." Dáin drew in a sharp breath and nodded grimly, growing grimmer still when Gandalf added, "And in our passage through the mountains, the Great Goblin was slain, for which his kindred no doubt seek revenge." And there's the treasure, too, Bilbo mused glumly. If word of Smaug's demise had reached the Elvenking in his secluded woodland halls, who could guess what other ears had been perked by the dragon's unguarded gold.
All in all, there wasn't much chance of Azog marching his army back the way they came upon finding Erebor defended. Elves, Men, and Dwarves together were outnumbered four to one, and while maybe the Elvenking's warriors and Dáin's could kill more than their fair share, Bilbo would count himself lucky if he managed to stick just one orc with his Elvish letter opener and not get his head bashed in doing it by a second one. An impediment that many of the Men were likely also stricken by. Which didn't bode well for his survival or theirs. Yet, yet... His heart thumped, his ring a hard weight tucked snug next to it.
Hadn't he already stood his ground against Azog? Bilbo gulped. Leapt at an orc and stabbed it to death with a fervor he'd never suspected was in him, for Thorin's sake? He needed to remember that and that he was braver now. Why, it'd be a downright embarrassment, wouldn't it, to quail at a, a skirmish with his friends beside him after he went alone into a sleeping dragon's lair?
"I must warn my people in Dale," said Bard, his matrimonial problems forgotten. "We are not fighters, most of us, and though our men at arms shall do what they can, we have families to protect." He apparently came to a decision, tone firming in resolve, save for a rasping thread that reminded Bilbo he had a boy and two girls. "You know more of this foe than I, my lords, and of war. Whatever your counsel is when I return, we will abide by it." With a cursory bow of his head to the group at large, Bard spun on his heel to leave.
"Bard," Thorin called, and Bilbo thought him too distracted to notice that he'd failed to give Bard any title, voice a concerned rumble that stroked as a loving hand would. Bard's spine stiffened at the familiarity. "Bring your women and children to shelter in the Mountain." Bard made no movement, warier than the stray cats Cousin Lalia insisted on feeding. "Dáin has come with supplies enough that, should the battle go ill, we could withstand siege there for days, until more reinforcements arrive from the Iron Hills."
Finally, Bard turned his head and, swallowing, said, "You have my gratitude, Oakenshield," eyes meeting Thorin's but briefly before he strode off at the pace of a man hurrying away. Thorin watched Bard retreat, his figure soon lost from view in the eager crowd of Men who gathered about him, recognizing that he had news.
Then, sighing heavily, Thorin answered Dáin's long, considering look with a gritted, "Not now," and said to the Elvenking, Gandalf, "Let us take counsel, as Lord Bard suggested." Bilbo fidgeted. He was really of little use to a council of war. A moment's waffling and, seeing as Gandalf was occupied, he followed after Bard at a trot that each step filled with more purpose.
Bilbo elbowed through the press of too-tall Men, muttering his apologies, to where Bard was being roundly scolded by a dark-haired woman with flashing eyes. He blinked, bemused. "-able-bodied as any man!" she was declaiming, "Why should we women cower like rabbits while our husbands and sons die to defend us?" Some of the other women were nodding, though the rest looked rather more hesitant; said husbands and sons wisely kept their silence. They did, however, cast Bard sympathetic glances as he listened, frowning, to the woman.
"Hilda, if you could let me finish!" he cut in when she paused for breath. A beat, as Bard waited to see whether she would heed him, then he asked the older man beside her, "Percy, there were shortswords in the armory and daggers?" Percy scratched at his grizzled chin but nodded. "Let any woman who wishes to arm herself with them," Bard commanded in a carrying voice, "Spears, too, and bows, if they can draw one.
"I will not allow you," he warned at Hilda's sharp cry of triumph, "to join the first charges." She folded her arms, dissatisfied, yet grudgingly held her protests when Bard raised a hand. "You are to be our last line of defense, before the gates of Erebor," he said in a tone that brooked no argument, "and if we have been driven so far back, we shall have need of you, with your strength unspent, to make safe our retreat and the Mountain itself."
Hilda squinted suspiciously at Bard, who bore it with a stern, weary patience-worry roiled under his skin but not the slightest hint that he was humoring her-and was mollified. Bilbo, meanwhile, couldn't help fretting about how both Thorin and Bard planned to be besieged almost as though it were a forgone conclusion. The cram that was all the Company had to eat these past few days threatened to unstick itself from the pit of his stomach and retrace its path back up to his mouth. He did not want to be trapped in Erebor's echoing halls, which were still more tomb than city. One that smelled faintly of dragon. Better than dying, Bilbo berated himself, and he would be among friends either way.
"Anyone else have concerns?" None spoke, Bard searching the fearful but determined faces around him. "Then spread the word," he finally said, with a grim nod, "Arm yourselves and collect what supplies you can from the city. It must be emptied before midday. Those who mean to fight, return here to await orders; the rest, make haste for the Mountain."
The Men dispersed. Some towards where their fellows stood in anxious knots expecting news, many more across the field towards Dale at a run, and all of them only after a respectful "milord" to Bard, a knuckle to the forehead or even an unpracticed bow, that he plainly had no idea how to react to, shifting uncomfortably in half a wince each time. Until Bard was left alone, attended by just Bilbo, Hilda, and Percy. Who cleared his throat and shuffled his feet with the air of a man who had an urgent question but was certain he'd lose his tongue for asking it. Bard sighed. "What is it, Percy?"
Percy couldn't quite meet Bard's eyes as he mumbled to his boots, "The lads, you see, are wonderin' w-whether you..." He trailed off. Bilbo had a good suspicion as to where this was headed, and it seemed Bard did, too, his expression souring and reluctance to hear more written in every line of his body. Which might have deterred Percy, had he not been too busy hemming and hawing to notice.
At last, though, Percy mustered his courage with a deep breath and blurted in a rush, "Are you to wed the Dwarf king, Bard? After the battle. To, to seal an alliance or, or for a share of the treasure? I don't imagine it's for any, uh, husbandly duties?" He laughed, sending nervous glances in Bard's general direction.
Hilda coughed delicately into her sleeve; Bard pinched the bridge of his nose. Percy, Bilbo thought, was very wrong about that. Thorin gazed upon Bard with the heat of-and the tips of Bilbo's ears warmed, as a part of him squirmed at the impropriety of it all-a lover, intent on branding the long stretch of the man's bare skin with his eyes through clothes and mail, from ten paces away.
Bard sighed again and said, tiredly, "How much did you hear?" He didn't sound hopeful that Percy and the others had chanced on a marriage proposal in harmless, idle gossip about why the negotiations were stalled.
"That new Dwarf," said Percy, apologetic now, "The one who rode up on a pig?" As if on cue, Dáin's voice drifted to them on a breeze, unmistakable and ungarbled despite the distance that thinned it to a solitary horn blowing instead of dozens. Bilbo unconsciously craned his neck, the better to eavesdrop, as did Percy and Hilda.
Dáin was patting a dejected Thorin on the back as the two sat shoulder to shoulder on a piece of rubble, watching the Dwarves of the Iron Hills haul their packs into the Mountain and do mysterious stonework on the barricaded gates. "Och! I've gone and put my foot in it, haven't I?" Thorin slumped lower, elbows landing on his knees and face in his hands. "I shall have to make my apologies to your dragonslayer soon as he returns. Though, Thorin, you'd best set your mind to wooin' that poor lad right. You cannot let him..."
To Bilbo, Hilda, and Percy's mutual disappointment, the wind turned and they could listen no further. Percy finished, rather unnecessarily, "He's a mite... loud." Bard's face contorted in a complicated fashion Bilbo likely could not have understood even if he'd known Bard for years. He already felt wretched about the whole affair, torn between wanting to support Thorin in this courtship, his friend in earnest, and beg forgiveness of Bard for the dreadful inconvenience, and his was but a bit role.
"I don't know what to do, Percy," Bard admitted, swallowing hard. Well, Bilbo told himself, it's not a quick rejection at least. That ought to please Thorin. "I've been thinking..." Rubbing the nape of his neck with one hand, Bard looked more untrustworthy than when the Company had hired him as a smuggler, eyes skittering to the side.
"Oakenshield's sister-sons were in Laketown when the dragon came," he said carefully, "but I've heard from my children that neither they nor their two companions or the Elves saw the end of my stand against Smaug. I am only known as a dragonslayer by my word and that of our people. So why can I not deny the deed?" He raked agitated fingers through his hair. "Let another take the credit-one who doesn't object to wedding Oakenshield-and I shall be glad of it!"
All of them stared, gape-mouthed, at Bard. But that's ridiculous, thought Bilbo, before pausing, because why was it so far-fetched? He himself had not seen Smaug's death, just his fall, and had doubted, too, that Bard, whose hands were surely more often plying his barge than his bow, was capable of killing such a beast. Percy chuckled, at first weakly, then with growing conviction. "Don't jest, Bard!" he scoffed, "Nobody'd believe that!"
Bard crossed his arms, expression mulish. "And why not?" he demanded of Percy, who wilted under his glare. Bilbo's nose twitched. There was something very odd about this. While reason suggested that it need not have been Bard who slew Smaug, at the moment Bilbo struggled to picture how anyone else could've done it, like he were reading one of the adventure tales his mother had been so fond of and, of course, the nameless knight errant who appeared midway in was the heir to the kingdom, on a quest that would inevitably lead to a dead dragon and true love.
He supposed, slightly hysterical, that this made Thorin Bard's distressed-and distressing, his mind added in his mother's most impish voice-damsel. Percy, in the meantime, was floundering. "W-Well, because, because you're..." He flapped a frantic hand up and down Bard's tall, lean frame. Not gesturing to any feature in particular, so much as to all of Bard at once.
"I'm what?" growled Bard. Suddenly, Bilbo was very aware of how nicely Bard's new clothes suited him. His shoulders were broad beneath the blue coat, his chest strong but not too thick. It lent his form a clean, supple grace, quite like the swept back arms of a strung longbow, actually, unassuming power held in check, and... and had his waist always been so, so trim? His eyes lingering on the curve of Bard's belt as it dipped over a hipbone, Bilbo couldn't blame Thorin for his fascination. Who wouldn't be at all that Bard's drab, roughspun and shapeless, had hidden? Oh, my... Bilbo wet his lips, mouth parched. His skin felt tight and shivery.
Percy made an inarticulate noise, flushing red as Bilbo's prize tomatoes, then white, then red again. "...you're you," he choked out. Immediately after which he fled, head ducked in a jerky bow to Bard he didn't bother to straighten from as he crossed the field towards a wagonload of supplies bound for the Mountain, trailing his embarrassment like the stench of fish downwind of Laketown.
Bilbo could sympathize. Apologizing to Bard was going to be difficult enough without him fumbling in, in girlish infatuation. His face warmed. Thank goodness the man's attention was presently elsewhere! "Has everybody gone mad?" cried Bard, bewildered and direly unhappy about it. His brow furrowed, and Bilbo had to bite his tongue against the urge to smooth those lines away.
It hadn't been like this before, had it? Charmed, yes, Bilbo was by Bard's home and Bard's family: the former spare and cramped but well loved by the knickknacks tucked into the corners, the sanded surface of the table and mismatched plates, scrubbed to a shine; the latter healthy and content, their affection for one another a glow undimmed despite the unexpected crowd of soggy, sullen Dwarves. He was so grateful then to be indoors by a roaring fire, wrapped in quilted blankets and handed a steaming bowl of fish chowder, that he didn't question his regard for their host. Hilda huffed.
"Percy's just trying to tell you what we women've been doing for years, Bard," she said with a shake of her head, tone exasperated but expression fond. "To no avail, because quick as you are 'bout other things, you're blind and deaf when it comes to this." She stepped close to Bard, who tensed as if bracing for an attack, and gently cupped his cheek. Her gaze softened, and her smile belonged to a younger, shyer woman; it was a touch coy and fresh as the scent of flowers on a bright spring morn. "A sweet fool."
Though Bilbo didn't think Bard could look more startled than he had at Thorin's proposal of marriage from the ramparts, it was a near miss as Hilda's thumb traced the arch of his cheekbone in an intent, circling caress. "Nobody with a lick o' sense, Dwarf or no," she explained, slow and clear, "will want to settle for one of us when they've a fair shot at you." Bard stepped back out of her reach, face gone politely blank; she let him with a small, rueful sigh at his uneasiness. Then she smirked, full of terrible mischief, and said, "Why, there wasn't a woman in Laketown who wouldn't've jumped at a chance to bed you and not a few o' the men, too, I reckon."
Now Bard looked positively flabbergasted. Dazed, he asked in a rasping croak, "...the men, too?" Bilbo sorely wanted to bundle the poor, confused dear into an armchair and feed him tea and biscuits until he was ready to live in a world where, evidently, half his neighbors had romantic designs on him that he'd no inkling of.
Following Bard's stare to the group of Men unloading wagons at Erebor's gates, Hilda said breezily, "Oh, I don't know about Percy, but didn't you ever wonder why your archery students were so clumsy all the time?" Bard grimaced, which Bilbo took as agreement that his students were indeed undeserving of their bows, but seemed reluctant to learn he had yet more secret admirers.
"I... I thought I was a poor teacher," he finally said, voice little louder than a whisper, "and, and they kept paying for lessons out of pity." By Bard's tentative air, he'd already guessed that he was wrong and, by the end of his sentence, was resigned to being so. Hilda threw back her head and laughed. It was a merry sound that cheered Bilbo.
"No, you were a fine teacher!" she assured Bard, who was briefly, quietly relieved, "Patient and well spoken. Certainly the best bow in town!" Any pride he might have felt at that, however, was buried in apprehension as Hilda eyed him, her mirth curling up the corners of her lips. "The trouble with your students," she told him matter-of-factly, "was that they didn't find stance or targets so interestin' a study as you." Bard choked. He covered his face with a hand that didn't manage to hide the red that crept into his cheeks while Hilda chortled, alight with a teasing glee. "And you didn't help with distractin' 'em!" she added, "Always leanin' to murmur in their ears, runnin' your hands all over them..."
And then it was Bilbo's turn to choke. Bard had very nice hands. They weren't clean, fingers pale and slender like the Elvenking's-dirt lined his nails and was smudged across his knuckles, his palms-and were roughened by labor, blunt and sturdy, skin browned by the sun. But there was a fineness of movement to them. Maybe because of Bard's skill as an archer?
Bilbo didn't know. He only knew that remembering Bard's hands sure and steady on the tiller of his barge, the way they'd gripped and slid, firm to guide but not harsh, and held his children later, fingers splayed wide to gather as much of them to him as he could in a tender, careful press... It, it was...
With a muffled groan, Bilbo rubbed at his face, silently cursing this ill-timed revelation that Bard was, well, a rather handsome man. Not to mention a dragonslayer, noble and valiant, straight from the pages of his mother's tales. Who Thorin wishes to marry, he admonished himself sternly, so don't you be getting any funny ideas, Bilbo Baggins!
Hilda had a funny idea of her own, if the playful gleam in her eye was anything to judge by. "Now, Bard," she said, "you keep in mind that the surest way to rid yourself of an unwanted suitor is to wed another." Fast as one of Bard's arrows, she darted in and pecked him on the lips, sidling away, grinning, before he could do more than jerk back and sputter her name. "There's plenty o' us who'd be happy to do you that favor." And with a parting wink at Bard, Hilda left them, a jaunty swing to her hips.
That was too much for Bard. He laughed wildly-or sobbed or both together, Bilbo couldn't tell-until he was shudderingly breathless, shoulders heaving, and sat down, hard, on the ground, legs flung out haphazardly. It was probable, admitted Bilbo, that Bard was in no mood for further talk, but... If I don't make amends now, I may not be able to. With this sobering thought to fortify his nerves, Bilbo approached the man like he would one of Cousin Lalia's cats and cleared his throat.
"Master Baggins?" Bard squinted up at him, half nonplussed that he was there and half mistrustful of his intentions. "Do you want something of me?" asked Bard warily, "Not my hand in marriage, I hope?" His mouth twisted in a crooked smile, wry and bitter, that failed to reach his darkened eyes. "Though why not? Since it seems my... appeal"-he almost spat the word-"has no bounds and, as they say, the more, the merrier."
Strange of Bilbo to notice as they were boring holes through his skull, but Bard's eyes were a striking, changeable green. He shook his head dumbly. "Uh, n-no..." That would hardly be honorable to Thorin. Coughing, he tried again. "No, of course not!" When his denial, which may have been a little shrill, drew a wince from Bard, he offered, haltingly, "And surely it's not so bad as that? The Elves, at least-" Bard snorted.
"A number of them were quite keen on... seeing my bow," he said flatly, "and even after I told them it was naught but a simple yew longbow and lost with Laketown, besides, they were not deterred, begging a show of the skill that slew Smaug." He chuckled. It was too jagged a sound to be pleasant on the ears. "Fool that I am, I believed them to be mocking me, for no Man can match the aim of the Elves, and would make my excuses." He folded his legs in and hunched over, the heels of his palms pressed to his eyes, and for a moment Bilbo panicked, fearing tears. Thankfully, Bard had proven his mettle against a foe greater in horror than the most determined suitors, regardless of how many. "To long, blinking stares that I... I just ignored." His tone was dry as dust and self-deprecating.
Oh. Bilbo fidgeted, not certain he understood. Wasn't it natural for the Elves to be curious about Bard's mastery of the bow? Granted, one would also assume the Elvenking's warriors had duties enough to occupy them, what with the Men in need of aid and a looming war with the Dwarves, that they wouldn't persist in pestering Bard so, unless... Oh! His insides wriggled distractingly until he had to fist his hands and curl his toes. Whether the Elvenking was among the number who'd waylaid Bard should be no concern of his, though they were awfully friendly...
"I'm sorry, Bard. Very sorry," he blurted, before his thoughts could wander to impropriety, "Truly, I had no idea of Thorin's w-wedding plans when I gave you the Arkenstone." Bard's watchful patience was difficult to bear; his gaze hung like a millstone around Bilbo's neck. Head bowing under that heavy weight, Bilbo couldn't help it and babbled, not bothering to stop for air.
"Which, which I knew was precious to Thorin-was betting on that, in point of fact, a, a barter for the gold you were promised-but I didn't know why, not really, and I, well, I simply wanted to tell you I feel dreadful for all this, all the hassle I've caused you." His heedless rush came to an abrupt halt. I did it. An apology, fumbling as it was, and now he could only wait, gulping, for Bard to condemn or forgive him. "And I was so proud of my cleverness, too," he muttered glumly, shuffling his feet.
Bard said nothing for what seemed to Bilbo hours, long and stifling as the ever present gloom that dwelt in the Mountain's halls. Finally, slowly: "This is no fault of yours." Relief crashed over Bilbo's head, unexpectedly fierce, and rattled him down to his bones. He heard no anger nor resentment in those words, deserving as he was of blame by any measure, for acting in ignorance and haste. With a shaky breath, he risked a glance at Bard. Who was smiling.
It was the barest curve of his lips, more a shade than a shape, and Bilbo couldn't miss the strain it cost Bard to feign that he was untroubled, his comfort a tremulous thing, but the sight pushed and shoved at the walls of Bilbo's heart from within, until his whole chest felt fit to burst, far too small to contain his sudden affection, flaring hot and bright, for this man, this good man. "You meant well, on everyone's behalf," Bard continued, "and that counts for much, to me, no matter how this ends." His eyes found Thorin, gesturing to a tall hill on the southern spur while the Elvenking, surprisingly, nodded, and his expression turned pensive. "We all must make the best of what we're given."
Ai, but Bilbo ached at that resigned acceptance! Joy was too much to ask of Bard, for a betrothal, plighted out of his people's desperate need for gold, to a Dwarf he'd spent more time quarreling with than in friendship. Yet Thorin would not want their union to be a sacrifice or a hardship. And Bilbo did not doubt that he would be bending every last bit of his considerable will, that fabled Dwarven stubbornness, towards soothing Bard's worries, now that he'd glimpsed their depths.
"I know you and Thorin didn't, didn't exactly"-Bilbo struggled to put into kinder terms the way they were always at cross purposes-"set off on the right foot." Of course, soon as the words left his mouth, he could've slapped himself about the ears. Bard didn't have to be reminded of that!
Looking unspeakably weary, Bard sighed. "Master Baggins..." Bilbo paused, a pang stabbing through him at Bard's stillness, fragile as eggshell-thin porcelain, then decided he owed this to Bard and to Thorin, too. So, he forged on, back stiffening in resolve.
"He can be rude and thoughtless," he said, "unreasonable and unbudging as his mountain when his temper's up." Recalling Thorin's earlier dismissal of him as a useless, bumbling coward, Bilbo frowned, before giving himself another mental shake. "But he's honestly not so bad, once you get to know him." He bobbed his head and smiled, reassuringly, he hoped. "He's become a good friend to me, one I wouldn't trade for all the treasure in, in the world, and I'm sure he'll be to you a g-"
"Bilbo," hissed Bard, jaw clenching, and Bilbo was so startled by the sound of his personal name on Bard's tongue that he squeaked. "I appreciate," said Bard, calmer, "that you wish for Oakenshield's success, but this is between him and me, and we..." He swallowed. "We must reach an accord, the two of us, apart from our friends and followers. If this, this alliance is to work."
Then Bard laughed again, a quiet huffing that was not without a certain droll bemusement. "I never could've imagined any of this happening to me," he said, burying his face in his hands in an already practiced motion. Bilbo made the appropriate noises of sympathy. For one, he'd rather be enjoying a leisurely elevenses than preparing to meet a horde of orcs in battle, but did he regret stepping on the road from Bag End? He patted Bard awkwardly on the shoulder and thought that Gandalf had been right, after all.
· · ·
END
There will be no sequel wedding. Feel free, however, to pretend I wrote a whole novel's worth of Thorin wooing Bard slowly and thoughtfully until he at last wins the hand of his tall, dark, and dour love.
Before he could answer horns winded wild up the valley along the length of the Mountain's eastern spur. The Men, many of whom had been resting their feet seated upon convenient boulders, scrambled to arms while the Elves nocked arrows to bows as one in a fluid, practiced motion but, at Thranduil's upraised hand, did not draw, weapons lowered in guarded welcome. Soon the new arrivals rounded the ranks of the Elven army: hundreds of Dwarves clad in steel from head to toe, their plaited beards thrust into their belts and heavy mattocks in their hands, moving at great speed despite the shields slung at their backs and packs bulging with supplies.
In the lead was a red-haired Dwarf mounted atop-Bard narrowed his eyes, then goggled-a pig, the crest of his helm a bristling flame. Though he was still a goodly distance from them, he hallooed, "Well met, cousins! Me and the lads hurried on through the night, so we're a wee early!" His every word rang clear across the field like a bell, tolling, of a size to comfortably house him and his boar both. "Ah, but I wouldn't miss your wedding for all the gold in Erebor, Thorin! Have you and your dragonslayer signed the prenuptial contract yet?"
Hardly had the echoes faded from the steep rock walls did a ripple of amazed interest pass through the listening Elves and Men, hundreds of necks craning in now unabashed curiosity between Oakenshield's kin and him. The Dwarves of the Iron Hills had come.
Bard finally gave in and buried his face in his hands, a laugh burbling wet up from his throat. He wondered in half-hysterical despair whether it wasn't too late to confess that it hadn't been him who killed Smaug, after all.
· · ·
Thorin's cousin, Dáin called Ironfoot, was by far the loudest Dwarf Bilbo had ever met. Everything about him was loud, from his red beard, brighter than Glóin's and groomed into the shape of tusks, to the fact that he had ridden up on a fearsomely massive pig. When he spoke, it was a roll of thunder, drums beating in the air, that surely would've sent half the Hobbits in the Shire rabbiting for their holes, their doors slammed shut. Yet Bilbo was inclined to like him.
Dáin had leapt from his boar as if his armor weighed no more than a coat of feathers, tossing his helm to a Dwarf whose duty seemed to be to catch it, his red ax to another, and swept Thorin up in a bone-crushing, back-pounding embrace, laughing. Thorin's despondency lifted a bit, a broad smile spreading slowly across his face. "Dáin, you made it," he said, pleased.
"You ought to know better than to doubt me, Cousin," answered Dáin, huffing in mock outrage to a small chuckle from Thorin. "I'll not have you go to the anvil without a proper honor guard, though our house's well represented enough." He nodded to Balin and the rest of the Company above on the ramparts while Bilbo eyed the ranks upon ranks of Dwarven warriors, mailed in steel, and wondered whether Durin's folk could tell the difference between a wedding and a battle. "Dís is going to have your beard for this," Dáin added, suddenly sheepish, "and maybe mine, too, for rushing on over at your raven 'stead of talking you into puttin' the ceremonies off."
At that, Thorin went grim again, and it was impossible to guess which prospect pained him more: explaining to his sister why he couldn't wait until she was present to wed or to his cousin why there would be no marriage to attend, after all. Thorin's jaw clenched. "Dáin..." he began but couldn't continue, eyes straying as they often had since he, Balin, and Bilbo descended the barricade to Bard's tense figure. Unable to find the words he sought in Bard's crossed arms or the lines of his downturned mouth, his gaze fixed stubbornly on the ground to his left away from any Dwarves, Thorin folded his own arms, chin dropping so low his head bowed.
Bilbo's stomach knotted, aching worse than when he'd overindulged in candied apples at a Litheday festival of his tweens. Thorin was not unlike the mountain he was king under, Bilbo thought. A solitary peak that stood, imposing, unmovable as sun and cloud cast shifting shadows upon its rocky faces; sometimes majestic crowned in snow, sometimes forbidding shrouded in mist. It felt wrong to see him so uncertain. Still unflinching but his presence pulled so tightly within that Bilbo was thrown off-balance, like the Mountain had disappeared behind his back or been replaced by another made of paper instead of stone.
For the hundredth time, he silently berated himself for his foolishness with the Arkenstone. True, Thorin had apparently had courtship on his mind since before their adventure began and not made an attempt to inform Bilbo of it or, really, of much at all save their business with the dragon, so he could hardly be blamed for his nervousness at Thorin acting oddly when an army of Elves and angry fishermen was camped at the gates. But he did not mean to lead Thorin to disappointment. Nor Bard into a corner where he was forced to accept a suit he clearly didn't want.
He shuffled his feet and stared at his toes as they curled in the dirt. His fingers itched to rub the comforting gold band of his magic ring, resting heavy and close to his heart in an inner pocket. As Bilbo debated the merits of ducking around a boulder to slip on his ring and vanish for a short spell, just until things were settled, Dáin was studying Thorin with a shrewd glint in his eye.
Dáin finally clasped Thorin's shoulder, a look of understanding on his bluff face; Thorin, slumping, breathed a too-hasty sigh of relief. "Say no more. Why, when I wed my dearest Eir, my tongue was so clumsy I barely stumbled my way through my vows." He shook his head in fond reminiscence. "You never did like to make the good easy for yourself. Asking the hand of a Man you'd not met a month ago! Pah!" Thorin blinked, while worry seeped into the creases of Balin's brow. "Well, fear not! I know my part here and can introduce myself."
Clearing his throat and combing quick fingers through his beard, the bristling ridge of hair on his otherwise clean-shaven head, Dáin surveyed in turn Gandalf, Bilbo, who his curious eyes lingered on for a moment, and the Elvenking, who he dismissed with a grunt, before his gaze found Bard and, with a determined nod, he strode forward to plant himself square in front of the man. His steel-tipped boots were braced wide, his hands gripped on his armored belt. The intent glare he raked Bard from head to toe with was not friendly in the least.
Oh, no, thought Bilbo, in growing horror. "Wait, Dáin-" Thorin said, almost pleading, only to be ignored but for a firm, "Hush, Thorin. You cannot spare your dragonslayer this." Bard narrowed his eyes at Dáin, his hand falling to the hilt of his sword and a cold, serpentine menace in the tilt of his head.
In desperation, Bilbo rounded on Gandalf next to him. Who, to Bilbo's ire, had produced his pipe from one sleeve and was thoroughly engrossed in knocking the tamped ash out of it against his staff, propped on his shoulder, unconcerned. "Do something!" Bilbo hissed under his breath. Thorin, he judged, was in no fit state to. Thorin, in fact, couldn't bear to even watch, one hand covering his face, while an anxious Balin waited for direction and the Elvenking seemed entirely too eager for Bard to relieve Dáin of his head.
Gandalf arched one bushy brow at him and whispered back, "I am a Wizard, Bilbo Baggins, not a matchmaker." Bilbo fumed-were all Wizards so frustratingly evasive?-and Gandalf added after a pause, "Besides, I find such matters of the heart have a way of untangling themselves in due time." The corner of his lips quirked up in a sly smile. And Bilbo remembered that Gandalf had been less and less of a help the closer they got to the Mountain, though the quest was as much his idea as Thorin's.
Resigned that there would be no aid from that quarter, Bilbo tried his best not to fret, for panicking never did a body any good. Or so his father had always said, when his mother was in one of her excitable moods. Thorin's head was still sitting sound upon his neck, Bilbo reassured himself, despite how certain he'd been that Bard would smash that head-with, admittedly, its wandering eyes that lacked all discretion-in like an overripe melon once or twice already. Bard had proved a sensible fellow, of the sort Bungo Baggins would've approved of, hadn't he? He could handle Thorin's cousin.
"Are Men so rare a sight to you, Master Dwarf, that you must gape at me like a sun-struck halfwit?" asked Bard, tone deceptively light. That, however, was not speech Bilbo's father would have stood for, mannered gentlehobbit that he was; Bilbo groaned, one hand mussing his hair. Dáin merely smiled, and it was as pleasant a baring of his teeth as Bard's words were polite.
"There's no small number of disappointed Dwarves in the Iron Hills," he said, "who had thought to claim for themselves Smaug's death and my cousin's hand." To Bilbo's shock, Dáin spat, viciously, at Bard's feet. "It's a soddin' disgrace that the glory of slaying the greatest wyrm of our age and honor of being seated as consort at the King Under the Mountain's side should go to a baseborn wretch who understands naught of Dwarves, his tattered nobility a thin guise o'er his grasping ambition."
Gone was the Dwarf who'd greeted Thorin so warmly, so enthusiastically and in his place was one who, in his cutting disdain, resembled nobody so much as the Elvenking. Bilbo was startled anew. For he had assumed the wrath of Dwarves to be a burning thing that smoldered like hot coals until it burst forth, a raging fire that could no longer be contained within the forges of Dwarven hearts. Dáin circled Bard as he spoke, his measured steps the prowl of a stalking wolf. Even his rounded burr of an accent, agreeably rustic though foreign to Bilbo's ears, hardened, and calculation lay sharp as a knife hidden up a sleeve behind his eyes.
Yet Bard refused to be cowed. "Are you done, my lord?" he asked simply, when Dáin again stopped before him; he had not turned to follow Dáin's movements. At the curt nod, he continued, "Should the dragon arise from his watery grave, these Dwarves of yours are welcome to try their skill and luck against him, and I would wish them joy of it, but neither you nor they were there when Smaug set upon Laketown, so the task fell to me and little glory or honor did I expect to win for it." Furious as Bard was, his voice was level, if clipped and icy as the lake's dark depths. "The lives of my people are worth more than your praise and titles." Rather, it was the tense slope of his jaw and shoulders, the white of his knuckles around the hilt of his sword that betrayed him.
"Churl I may be to you, my house bereft of lordship," said Bard, and at last Bilbo could hear the lash of anger in every syllable, "but do not forget by whose deed there is once more a King Under the Mountain. I won't be denied my due for that service." He stared down at Dáin, the two of them locked in a silent grapple of wills. Then he added, "I have borne insults enough from your tongue. More and you shall answer for them, Master Dwarf, with your head, beard and all."
Bard's eyes blazed, and his words were a soft hiss through his gritted teeth; Bilbo wondered uneasily whether Smaug hadn't somehow left a bit of himself in his killer. Gandalf would know, wouldn't he, and warn them? But when Bilbo snuck a glance at the Wizard, he found Gandalf's attention fixed on the sky past the Mountain's shoulder, where the eastern spur joined. He barely resisted the urge to stamp his foot. What could be of such interest-a passing bird, a passing cloud-up there?
Dáin held Bard's gaze for so long Bilbo's nose wanted to twitch, then chuckled, saying, "Well answered, lad." He clapped Bard low on the back, nearly jolting the surprised man off his feet. The realization dawning on Bard's face was that of somebody who'd learned, too late, that he made a terrible mistake. And Bilbo thought, Wha-? All of Dáin's hostility had vanished into thin air quicker than Bilbo when he put on his ring.
"Your dragonslayer is for sure no halfwit, Thorin! He's got a lick o' fire in his belly, too, dour as he looks." Winking meaningfully at Thorin, Dáin opined in what was probably supposed to be an aside for his cousin's ears, "That's all to the good, as you've two kingdoms between you. And I reckon he'll be a right handful to bed, which is all the better, I tell you!" He slung an arm around Thorin's shoulders and laughed, so loud Bilbo marveled that Thorin wasn't deafened by it. "I gladly give this match my blessing!"
Thorin was so pale that Bilbo feared he might faint, despite his current lack of grievous bodily injury. "Dáin..." he said weakly. He opened and closed his mouth several times, with no intelligible results, before groaning and smacking a hand to his face again while Dáin hummed questioningly. Bard flushed an alarming shade of red. Though whether he was mortified or incensed Bilbo didn't know, if the man could even decide which to be.
Fortunately, perhaps, they were interrupted. An Elven messenger, so light of foot it seemed to Bilbo that he was present in the space of a blink, appeared at his king's elbow. He bowed deep but swiftly and said, "My lords, Prince Legolas begs leave to inform you that Mithrandir's army approaches from the north." Mithrandir was the name the Elves called Gandalf by, Bilbo had discovered in Rivendell, but since when did he also have an army and one on the way here without him? Weren't there only four other Wizards?
It was with a sinking feeling that Bilbo noted Gandalf's sudden graveness and Bard's, a fey gleam in the Elvenking's eyes that caused the hair at the nape of his neck to stand on end. "Gundabad orcs joined by the goblins of the Misty Mountains," the runner continued, unfazed, "in a host ten thousand strong, with many warg riders and a legion of bats." Oh, no, thought Bilbo, as Thorin snarled out a hateful Azog. These wedding guests were most definitely uninvited and unwelcome. "The scouts on the heights report that the enemy marches fast and will be upon us by midday."
"What's this about Azog?" Dáin asked flatly, arms crossed. "I was looking forward to bloodyin' that sprite's pretty face"-he tipped his chin up in challenge at the Elvenking, who smiled-"when time came for you to steal your intended, Thorin, but now I hear the Defiler, cursed be his name, lives and means to offer us battle and no mock fisticuffs either." Bilbo wished he were as calm as Dáin sounded and undaunted at the prospect of fighting a vast horde of orcs. "If this is some joke..."
"No," said Thorin, "that filth has been pursuing us since before we made the mountains." Dáin drew in a sharp breath and nodded grimly, growing grimmer still when Gandalf added, "And in our passage through the mountains, the Great Goblin was slain, for which his kindred no doubt seek revenge." And there's the treasure, too, Bilbo mused glumly. If word of Smaug's demise had reached the Elvenking in his secluded woodland halls, who could guess what other ears had been perked by the dragon's unguarded gold.
All in all, there wasn't much chance of Azog marching his army back the way they came upon finding Erebor defended. Elves, Men, and Dwarves together were outnumbered four to one, and while maybe the Elvenking's warriors and Dáin's could kill more than their fair share, Bilbo would count himself lucky if he managed to stick just one orc with his Elvish letter opener and not get his head bashed in doing it by a second one. An impediment that many of the Men were likely also stricken by. Which didn't bode well for his survival or theirs. Yet, yet... His heart thumped, his ring a hard weight tucked snug next to it.
Hadn't he already stood his ground against Azog? Bilbo gulped. Leapt at an orc and stabbed it to death with a fervor he'd never suspected was in him, for Thorin's sake? He needed to remember that and that he was braver now. Why, it'd be a downright embarrassment, wouldn't it, to quail at a, a skirmish with his friends beside him after he went alone into a sleeping dragon's lair?
"I must warn my people in Dale," said Bard, his matrimonial problems forgotten. "We are not fighters, most of us, and though our men at arms shall do what they can, we have families to protect." He apparently came to a decision, tone firming in resolve, save for a rasping thread that reminded Bilbo he had a boy and two girls. "You know more of this foe than I, my lords, and of war. Whatever your counsel is when I return, we will abide by it." With a cursory bow of his head to the group at large, Bard spun on his heel to leave.
"Bard," Thorin called, and Bilbo thought him too distracted to notice that he'd failed to give Bard any title, voice a concerned rumble that stroked as a loving hand would. Bard's spine stiffened at the familiarity. "Bring your women and children to shelter in the Mountain." Bard made no movement, warier than the stray cats Cousin Lalia insisted on feeding. "Dáin has come with supplies enough that, should the battle go ill, we could withstand siege there for days, until more reinforcements arrive from the Iron Hills."
Finally, Bard turned his head and, swallowing, said, "You have my gratitude, Oakenshield," eyes meeting Thorin's but briefly before he strode off at the pace of a man hurrying away. Thorin watched Bard retreat, his figure soon lost from view in the eager crowd of Men who gathered about him, recognizing that he had news.
Then, sighing heavily, Thorin answered Dáin's long, considering look with a gritted, "Not now," and said to the Elvenking, Gandalf, "Let us take counsel, as Lord Bard suggested." Bilbo fidgeted. He was really of little use to a council of war. A moment's waffling and, seeing as Gandalf was occupied, he followed after Bard at a trot that each step filled with more purpose.
Bilbo elbowed through the press of too-tall Men, muttering his apologies, to where Bard was being roundly scolded by a dark-haired woman with flashing eyes. He blinked, bemused. "-able-bodied as any man!" she was declaiming, "Why should we women cower like rabbits while our husbands and sons die to defend us?" Some of the other women were nodding, though the rest looked rather more hesitant; said husbands and sons wisely kept their silence. They did, however, cast Bard sympathetic glances as he listened, frowning, to the woman.
"Hilda, if you could let me finish!" he cut in when she paused for breath. A beat, as Bard waited to see whether she would heed him, then he asked the older man beside her, "Percy, there were shortswords in the armory and daggers?" Percy scratched at his grizzled chin but nodded. "Let any woman who wishes to arm herself with them," Bard commanded in a carrying voice, "Spears, too, and bows, if they can draw one.
"I will not allow you," he warned at Hilda's sharp cry of triumph, "to join the first charges." She folded her arms, dissatisfied, yet grudgingly held her protests when Bard raised a hand. "You are to be our last line of defense, before the gates of Erebor," he said in a tone that brooked no argument, "and if we have been driven so far back, we shall have need of you, with your strength unspent, to make safe our retreat and the Mountain itself."
Hilda squinted suspiciously at Bard, who bore it with a stern, weary patience-worry roiled under his skin but not the slightest hint that he was humoring her-and was mollified. Bilbo, meanwhile, couldn't help fretting about how both Thorin and Bard planned to be besieged almost as though it were a forgone conclusion. The cram that was all the Company had to eat these past few days threatened to unstick itself from the pit of his stomach and retrace its path back up to his mouth. He did not want to be trapped in Erebor's echoing halls, which were still more tomb than city. One that smelled faintly of dragon. Better than dying, Bilbo berated himself, and he would be among friends either way.
"Anyone else have concerns?" None spoke, Bard searching the fearful but determined faces around him. "Then spread the word," he finally said, with a grim nod, "Arm yourselves and collect what supplies you can from the city. It must be emptied before midday. Those who mean to fight, return here to await orders; the rest, make haste for the Mountain."
The Men dispersed. Some towards where their fellows stood in anxious knots expecting news, many more across the field towards Dale at a run, and all of them only after a respectful "milord" to Bard, a knuckle to the forehead or even an unpracticed bow, that he plainly had no idea how to react to, shifting uncomfortably in half a wince each time. Until Bard was left alone, attended by just Bilbo, Hilda, and Percy. Who cleared his throat and shuffled his feet with the air of a man who had an urgent question but was certain he'd lose his tongue for asking it. Bard sighed. "What is it, Percy?"
Percy couldn't quite meet Bard's eyes as he mumbled to his boots, "The lads, you see, are wonderin' w-whether you..." He trailed off. Bilbo had a good suspicion as to where this was headed, and it seemed Bard did, too, his expression souring and reluctance to hear more written in every line of his body. Which might have deterred Percy, had he not been too busy hemming and hawing to notice.
At last, though, Percy mustered his courage with a deep breath and blurted in a rush, "Are you to wed the Dwarf king, Bard? After the battle. To, to seal an alliance or, or for a share of the treasure? I don't imagine it's for any, uh, husbandly duties?" He laughed, sending nervous glances in Bard's general direction.
Hilda coughed delicately into her sleeve; Bard pinched the bridge of his nose. Percy, Bilbo thought, was very wrong about that. Thorin gazed upon Bard with the heat of-and the tips of Bilbo's ears warmed, as a part of him squirmed at the impropriety of it all-a lover, intent on branding the long stretch of the man's bare skin with his eyes through clothes and mail, from ten paces away.
Bard sighed again and said, tiredly, "How much did you hear?" He didn't sound hopeful that Percy and the others had chanced on a marriage proposal in harmless, idle gossip about why the negotiations were stalled.
"That new Dwarf," said Percy, apologetic now, "The one who rode up on a pig?" As if on cue, Dáin's voice drifted to them on a breeze, unmistakable and ungarbled despite the distance that thinned it to a solitary horn blowing instead of dozens. Bilbo unconsciously craned his neck, the better to eavesdrop, as did Percy and Hilda.
Dáin was patting a dejected Thorin on the back as the two sat shoulder to shoulder on a piece of rubble, watching the Dwarves of the Iron Hills haul their packs into the Mountain and do mysterious stonework on the barricaded gates. "Och! I've gone and put my foot in it, haven't I?" Thorin slumped lower, elbows landing on his knees and face in his hands. "I shall have to make my apologies to your dragonslayer soon as he returns. Though, Thorin, you'd best set your mind to wooin' that poor lad right. You cannot let him..."
To Bilbo, Hilda, and Percy's mutual disappointment, the wind turned and they could listen no further. Percy finished, rather unnecessarily, "He's a mite... loud." Bard's face contorted in a complicated fashion Bilbo likely could not have understood even if he'd known Bard for years. He already felt wretched about the whole affair, torn between wanting to support Thorin in this courtship, his friend in earnest, and beg forgiveness of Bard for the dreadful inconvenience, and his was but a bit role.
"I don't know what to do, Percy," Bard admitted, swallowing hard. Well, Bilbo told himself, it's not a quick rejection at least. That ought to please Thorin. "I've been thinking..." Rubbing the nape of his neck with one hand, Bard looked more untrustworthy than when the Company had hired him as a smuggler, eyes skittering to the side.
"Oakenshield's sister-sons were in Laketown when the dragon came," he said carefully, "but I've heard from my children that neither they nor their two companions or the Elves saw the end of my stand against Smaug. I am only known as a dragonslayer by my word and that of our people. So why can I not deny the deed?" He raked agitated fingers through his hair. "Let another take the credit-one who doesn't object to wedding Oakenshield-and I shall be glad of it!"
All of them stared, gape-mouthed, at Bard. But that's ridiculous, thought Bilbo, before pausing, because why was it so far-fetched? He himself had not seen Smaug's death, just his fall, and had doubted, too, that Bard, whose hands were surely more often plying his barge than his bow, was capable of killing such a beast. Percy chuckled, at first weakly, then with growing conviction. "Don't jest, Bard!" he scoffed, "Nobody'd believe that!"
Bard crossed his arms, expression mulish. "And why not?" he demanded of Percy, who wilted under his glare. Bilbo's nose twitched. There was something very odd about this. While reason suggested that it need not have been Bard who slew Smaug, at the moment Bilbo struggled to picture how anyone else could've done it, like he were reading one of the adventure tales his mother had been so fond of and, of course, the nameless knight errant who appeared midway in was the heir to the kingdom, on a quest that would inevitably lead to a dead dragon and true love.
He supposed, slightly hysterical, that this made Thorin Bard's distressed-and distressing, his mind added in his mother's most impish voice-damsel. Percy, in the meantime, was floundering. "W-Well, because, because you're..." He flapped a frantic hand up and down Bard's tall, lean frame. Not gesturing to any feature in particular, so much as to all of Bard at once.
"I'm what?" growled Bard. Suddenly, Bilbo was very aware of how nicely Bard's new clothes suited him. His shoulders were broad beneath the blue coat, his chest strong but not too thick. It lent his form a clean, supple grace, quite like the swept back arms of a strung longbow, actually, unassuming power held in check, and... and had his waist always been so, so trim? His eyes lingering on the curve of Bard's belt as it dipped over a hipbone, Bilbo couldn't blame Thorin for his fascination. Who wouldn't be at all that Bard's drab, roughspun and shapeless, had hidden? Oh, my... Bilbo wet his lips, mouth parched. His skin felt tight and shivery.
Percy made an inarticulate noise, flushing red as Bilbo's prize tomatoes, then white, then red again. "...you're you," he choked out. Immediately after which he fled, head ducked in a jerky bow to Bard he didn't bother to straighten from as he crossed the field towards a wagonload of supplies bound for the Mountain, trailing his embarrassment like the stench of fish downwind of Laketown.
Bilbo could sympathize. Apologizing to Bard was going to be difficult enough without him fumbling in, in girlish infatuation. His face warmed. Thank goodness the man's attention was presently elsewhere! "Has everybody gone mad?" cried Bard, bewildered and direly unhappy about it. His brow furrowed, and Bilbo had to bite his tongue against the urge to smooth those lines away.
It hadn't been like this before, had it? Charmed, yes, Bilbo was by Bard's home and Bard's family: the former spare and cramped but well loved by the knickknacks tucked into the corners, the sanded surface of the table and mismatched plates, scrubbed to a shine; the latter healthy and content, their affection for one another a glow undimmed despite the unexpected crowd of soggy, sullen Dwarves. He was so grateful then to be indoors by a roaring fire, wrapped in quilted blankets and handed a steaming bowl of fish chowder, that he didn't question his regard for their host. Hilda huffed.
"Percy's just trying to tell you what we women've been doing for years, Bard," she said with a shake of her head, tone exasperated but expression fond. "To no avail, because quick as you are 'bout other things, you're blind and deaf when it comes to this." She stepped close to Bard, who tensed as if bracing for an attack, and gently cupped his cheek. Her gaze softened, and her smile belonged to a younger, shyer woman; it was a touch coy and fresh as the scent of flowers on a bright spring morn. "A sweet fool."
Though Bilbo didn't think Bard could look more startled than he had at Thorin's proposal of marriage from the ramparts, it was a near miss as Hilda's thumb traced the arch of his cheekbone in an intent, circling caress. "Nobody with a lick o' sense, Dwarf or no," she explained, slow and clear, "will want to settle for one of us when they've a fair shot at you." Bard stepped back out of her reach, face gone politely blank; she let him with a small, rueful sigh at his uneasiness. Then she smirked, full of terrible mischief, and said, "Why, there wasn't a woman in Laketown who wouldn't've jumped at a chance to bed you and not a few o' the men, too, I reckon."
Now Bard looked positively flabbergasted. Dazed, he asked in a rasping croak, "...the men, too?" Bilbo sorely wanted to bundle the poor, confused dear into an armchair and feed him tea and biscuits until he was ready to live in a world where, evidently, half his neighbors had romantic designs on him that he'd no inkling of.
Following Bard's stare to the group of Men unloading wagons at Erebor's gates, Hilda said breezily, "Oh, I don't know about Percy, but didn't you ever wonder why your archery students were so clumsy all the time?" Bard grimaced, which Bilbo took as agreement that his students were indeed undeserving of their bows, but seemed reluctant to learn he had yet more secret admirers.
"I... I thought I was a poor teacher," he finally said, voice little louder than a whisper, "and, and they kept paying for lessons out of pity." By Bard's tentative air, he'd already guessed that he was wrong and, by the end of his sentence, was resigned to being so. Hilda threw back her head and laughed. It was a merry sound that cheered Bilbo.
"No, you were a fine teacher!" she assured Bard, who was briefly, quietly relieved, "Patient and well spoken. Certainly the best bow in town!" Any pride he might have felt at that, however, was buried in apprehension as Hilda eyed him, her mirth curling up the corners of her lips. "The trouble with your students," she told him matter-of-factly, "was that they didn't find stance or targets so interestin' a study as you." Bard choked. He covered his face with a hand that didn't manage to hide the red that crept into his cheeks while Hilda chortled, alight with a teasing glee. "And you didn't help with distractin' 'em!" she added, "Always leanin' to murmur in their ears, runnin' your hands all over them..."
And then it was Bilbo's turn to choke. Bard had very nice hands. They weren't clean, fingers pale and slender like the Elvenking's-dirt lined his nails and was smudged across his knuckles, his palms-and were roughened by labor, blunt and sturdy, skin browned by the sun. But there was a fineness of movement to them. Maybe because of Bard's skill as an archer?
Bilbo didn't know. He only knew that remembering Bard's hands sure and steady on the tiller of his barge, the way they'd gripped and slid, firm to guide but not harsh, and held his children later, fingers splayed wide to gather as much of them to him as he could in a tender, careful press... It, it was...
With a muffled groan, Bilbo rubbed at his face, silently cursing this ill-timed revelation that Bard was, well, a rather handsome man. Not to mention a dragonslayer, noble and valiant, straight from the pages of his mother's tales. Who Thorin wishes to marry, he admonished himself sternly, so don't you be getting any funny ideas, Bilbo Baggins!
Hilda had a funny idea of her own, if the playful gleam in her eye was anything to judge by. "Now, Bard," she said, "you keep in mind that the surest way to rid yourself of an unwanted suitor is to wed another." Fast as one of Bard's arrows, she darted in and pecked him on the lips, sidling away, grinning, before he could do more than jerk back and sputter her name. "There's plenty o' us who'd be happy to do you that favor." And with a parting wink at Bard, Hilda left them, a jaunty swing to her hips.
That was too much for Bard. He laughed wildly-or sobbed or both together, Bilbo couldn't tell-until he was shudderingly breathless, shoulders heaving, and sat down, hard, on the ground, legs flung out haphazardly. It was probable, admitted Bilbo, that Bard was in no mood for further talk, but... If I don't make amends now, I may not be able to. With this sobering thought to fortify his nerves, Bilbo approached the man like he would one of Cousin Lalia's cats and cleared his throat.
"Master Baggins?" Bard squinted up at him, half nonplussed that he was there and half mistrustful of his intentions. "Do you want something of me?" asked Bard warily, "Not my hand in marriage, I hope?" His mouth twisted in a crooked smile, wry and bitter, that failed to reach his darkened eyes. "Though why not? Since it seems my... appeal"-he almost spat the word-"has no bounds and, as they say, the more, the merrier."
Strange of Bilbo to notice as they were boring holes through his skull, but Bard's eyes were a striking, changeable green. He shook his head dumbly. "Uh, n-no..." That would hardly be honorable to Thorin. Coughing, he tried again. "No, of course not!" When his denial, which may have been a little shrill, drew a wince from Bard, he offered, haltingly, "And surely it's not so bad as that? The Elves, at least-" Bard snorted.
"A number of them were quite keen on... seeing my bow," he said flatly, "and even after I told them it was naught but a simple yew longbow and lost with Laketown, besides, they were not deterred, begging a show of the skill that slew Smaug." He chuckled. It was too jagged a sound to be pleasant on the ears. "Fool that I am, I believed them to be mocking me, for no Man can match the aim of the Elves, and would make my excuses." He folded his legs in and hunched over, the heels of his palms pressed to his eyes, and for a moment Bilbo panicked, fearing tears. Thankfully, Bard had proven his mettle against a foe greater in horror than the most determined suitors, regardless of how many. "To long, blinking stares that I... I just ignored." His tone was dry as dust and self-deprecating.
Oh. Bilbo fidgeted, not certain he understood. Wasn't it natural for the Elves to be curious about Bard's mastery of the bow? Granted, one would also assume the Elvenking's warriors had duties enough to occupy them, what with the Men in need of aid and a looming war with the Dwarves, that they wouldn't persist in pestering Bard so, unless... Oh! His insides wriggled distractingly until he had to fist his hands and curl his toes. Whether the Elvenking was among the number who'd waylaid Bard should be no concern of his, though they were awfully friendly...
"I'm sorry, Bard. Very sorry," he blurted, before his thoughts could wander to impropriety, "Truly, I had no idea of Thorin's w-wedding plans when I gave you the Arkenstone." Bard's watchful patience was difficult to bear; his gaze hung like a millstone around Bilbo's neck. Head bowing under that heavy weight, Bilbo couldn't help it and babbled, not bothering to stop for air.
"Which, which I knew was precious to Thorin-was betting on that, in point of fact, a, a barter for the gold you were promised-but I didn't know why, not really, and I, well, I simply wanted to tell you I feel dreadful for all this, all the hassle I've caused you." His heedless rush came to an abrupt halt. I did it. An apology, fumbling as it was, and now he could only wait, gulping, for Bard to condemn or forgive him. "And I was so proud of my cleverness, too," he muttered glumly, shuffling his feet.
Bard said nothing for what seemed to Bilbo hours, long and stifling as the ever present gloom that dwelt in the Mountain's halls. Finally, slowly: "This is no fault of yours." Relief crashed over Bilbo's head, unexpectedly fierce, and rattled him down to his bones. He heard no anger nor resentment in those words, deserving as he was of blame by any measure, for acting in ignorance and haste. With a shaky breath, he risked a glance at Bard. Who was smiling.
It was the barest curve of his lips, more a shade than a shape, and Bilbo couldn't miss the strain it cost Bard to feign that he was untroubled, his comfort a tremulous thing, but the sight pushed and shoved at the walls of Bilbo's heart from within, until his whole chest felt fit to burst, far too small to contain his sudden affection, flaring hot and bright, for this man, this good man. "You meant well, on everyone's behalf," Bard continued, "and that counts for much, to me, no matter how this ends." His eyes found Thorin, gesturing to a tall hill on the southern spur while the Elvenking, surprisingly, nodded, and his expression turned pensive. "We all must make the best of what we're given."
Ai, but Bilbo ached at that resigned acceptance! Joy was too much to ask of Bard, for a betrothal, plighted out of his people's desperate need for gold, to a Dwarf he'd spent more time quarreling with than in friendship. Yet Thorin would not want their union to be a sacrifice or a hardship. And Bilbo did not doubt that he would be bending every last bit of his considerable will, that fabled Dwarven stubbornness, towards soothing Bard's worries, now that he'd glimpsed their depths.
"I know you and Thorin didn't, didn't exactly"-Bilbo struggled to put into kinder terms the way they were always at cross purposes-"set off on the right foot." Of course, soon as the words left his mouth, he could've slapped himself about the ears. Bard didn't have to be reminded of that!
Looking unspeakably weary, Bard sighed. "Master Baggins..." Bilbo paused, a pang stabbing through him at Bard's stillness, fragile as eggshell-thin porcelain, then decided he owed this to Bard and to Thorin, too. So, he forged on, back stiffening in resolve.
"He can be rude and thoughtless," he said, "unreasonable and unbudging as his mountain when his temper's up." Recalling Thorin's earlier dismissal of him as a useless, bumbling coward, Bilbo frowned, before giving himself another mental shake. "But he's honestly not so bad, once you get to know him." He bobbed his head and smiled, reassuringly, he hoped. "He's become a good friend to me, one I wouldn't trade for all the treasure in, in the world, and I'm sure he'll be to you a g-"
"Bilbo," hissed Bard, jaw clenching, and Bilbo was so startled by the sound of his personal name on Bard's tongue that he squeaked. "I appreciate," said Bard, calmer, "that you wish for Oakenshield's success, but this is between him and me, and we..." He swallowed. "We must reach an accord, the two of us, apart from our friends and followers. If this, this alliance is to work."
Then Bard laughed again, a quiet huffing that was not without a certain droll bemusement. "I never could've imagined any of this happening to me," he said, burying his face in his hands in an already practiced motion. Bilbo made the appropriate noises of sympathy. For one, he'd rather be enjoying a leisurely elevenses than preparing to meet a horde of orcs in battle, but did he regret stepping on the road from Bag End? He patted Bard awkwardly on the shoulder and thought that Gandalf had been right, after all.
· · ·
END
There will be no sequel wedding. Feel free, however, to pretend I wrote a whole novel's worth of Thorin wooing Bard slowly and thoughtfully until he at last wins the hand of his tall, dark, and dour love.