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“I’m gonna do it,” Lóni said, and took another massive slug of his tankard. “I’m gonna do it.”
“As you say,” Gimli said, and patted Lóni’s back. “Might want to wipe your face there, you’ve beer all down your front.”
Lóni cursed and dabbed at his beard with a napkin. “Gone?”
Gimli squinted at him. “You’ve fixed the worst of the damage, aye.”
“Damage?” Lóni said, alarmed. “Gimli, please, tell me truly, do I look...”
Gimli grinned at him and took a sip of his own tankard. He wasn’t nearly so drunk, the bastard. Curse the hollow leg of all Firebeards. “You’re fine, lad. As handsome as you ever were, which is not very. Go on then!”
Why was he best friends with this rogue? “You are a right bastard,” Lóni growled, and took another swig. And another. “I’m gonna do it. I’ll walk right up to him, good evening Frar, I’ll say, and I’ll kiss him.”
“Of course you will.”
“He accepted the necklace.” Lóni nodded to himself. “He said he liked it. I’m gonna do it.”
“I believe you.” Gimli leaned back and crossed one booted foot over his knee, and began to pack his pipe. “Go on, then.”
Lóni stared at his tankard. “But what if it’s too hasty? I don’t know him that well. I haven’t set a day for the dinner, nor the dance. ”
“Excuse me?”
Lóni looked up.
Frár leaned down and kissed him: soft, dry and warm. Hardly a peck, but it sent Lóni’s blood thundering through his ears.
“Good evening, Lóni,” he said in his deep, calm, beautiful voice.
“Aaaaaand I’ll be goin’ then,” Gimli said, and patted Lóni’s back again as he stood. “There you are! You did it!”
Lóni didn’t even hear him leave.
…
Hrera looked around the room. It was beautiful, of course it would be.
She could hear Thrór (her new husband, Thrór son of Dáin, King Under the Mountain, the lord of all Durin’s folk and a Longbeard) moving in the next room. The bed was large and richly detailed, heaped high with pillows and the coverlet embroidered to within an inch of its life.
The door opened, and she turned around. Her massive stiff ceremonial skirts moved a beat after she did, swishing the smooth marble floors. They were nearly blinding to look at, so encrusted with jewels were they.
The King regarded her warily, still dressed in formal armour and crown and huge fur cloak. “Lady Hrera,” he said, and then bowed his head. “Is everything to your comfort?”
“Oh stop, you’re acting like we’ve never met before,” she snapped.
Thrór’s eyes brightened, and he let out a soft, ‘ha.’ Then he shrugged. “It’s been a formal sort of day.”
“I suppose it has.” She looked around at everything again. “Is this how you normally keep it?”
He looked around the room as though seeing it for the first time. “I haven’t really paid attention, not for years. I like the gold, though, don’t you?”
“I mean all those pillows,” she said, and sniffed. “I’m likely to suffocate! Is there room in the bed for any Dwarves?”
He looked a little embarrassed, and turned to fumble at the clasp of his cloak. “I get uncomfortable? The bed is very large, you see, and it grows cold…”
She marched forward and batted his hands away, unhooking the heavy stiff cloak and laying it upon a chair. “Well, not any more it doesn’t. Get rid of… half, yes, at least half. Bend your head.”
He dipped his head obligingly, and she peered at the crown for a moment before carefully unhooking it from his hair. “Dreadful ugly thing. Get yourself out of that armour – Telphor’s great hammer, who wears armour to get married? Longbeards. Then come and get me out of this perambulatory silken prison.”
His lip quirked, and he smiled. His whole stern, careworn face relaxed, ever so slightly. “Yes, dear.”
She blinked. “Dear?” He had never called her that.
“Mmm.” He put a hand to her jaw and leaned forward. He paused just before his lips touched hers, hesitating. Unsure again.
“Oh, don’t you stop there, Thrór of Erebor,” she snapped, and kissed him firmly.
When he drew back she said, “right, that should have happened a long time ago, and would have if it weren’t for your dithering. Now – out of that armour!”
He was still smiling that soft, astonished smile as he began to fight the buckles. She was beginning to suspect that he liked her bossing. “Anything you like, my dear.”
…
“Here.”
Dwalin looked up from the supply-reports. They were growing low on practice-shields. Some of the newer recruits felt it was a matter of pride to split the bloody things, no matter how many times Dwalin barked at them about it. The point was to hit the bugger behind the shield, not to show off your woodchopping skills.
He rubbed his forehead. Perhaps he was working a bit too hard.
“You haven’t eaten for nine hours,” said Orla in her soft, clipped voice. “I brought you food.”
He was instantly ravenous. “Couldn’t hear the growling of my stomach over the growling in my head!” he said, and took the covered dish. Unfamiliar smells rose from it: her Blacklock cooking spices were something of a coveted secret in the Mountain. His mouth immediately began to water. “Orla, I could kiss you.”
She did not move a muscle, but the room suddenly became very close and airless, and his every battle-honed instinct began to shriek. “No, it’s a figure o’ speech,” he began, and lifted his hands. “You needn’t-”
“All right,” she said stiffly.
He blinked. “What?”
Her chin rose, her dark eyes full of challenge. “Kiss me.”
For a moment he could only sit and gawp at her. Sturdy and strong and skilled, she was a sought-after Dwarrowdam. What on Mahal’s good earth did she see in a battle-chewed old Dwarrow with one good eye?
She seemed to guess his thoughts, because the sudden look of irritation was not terribly well hidden. “Kiss me,” she said, even softer. Dangerously.
Dwalin’s mouth closed – he hadn’t even been aware of the moment when it dropped open - and he licked his lips. Then he stood and carefully took her waist in one hand, and kissed her.
He barely even had to bend his head. She was as tall as he, and as strong as he. He could feel that pent-up strength under the hand upon her waist: the thick padding of muscle on her back and the raw power in the arms that curled around his shoulders. Between the pair of them, all that skill, all that brawn and might.
She kissed him so gently.
He pulled away, shaken to his boots. What was he, that tenderness should be showed him?
She put a hand to the back of his neck and kissed the hollow black smudge beneath his glass eye. “You owe me a gift,” she murmured. “I have cooked for you.”
“I’ve yet to eat it,” he said, shocked to the point of idiocy.
Her lip twitched, and he suddenly yearned more than anything in the world to see her smile, just once. What would a smile look like on that beautiful, dark-skinned, inscrutable face? “Shelekika hakhd ra targ.”
…
Giggling.
“Shhh, shhh, they’ll hear us!”
More giggling.
“Mmmm, ohhh Bom, you… yes…”
“Shhh, Alris! Bofur’s right in the next room!”
Some panting, some moans, and a little more giggling.
“Aahhh, Alris… Ah, ah – shh, my dumpling, keep it down!”
“Bombur, you delicious Dwarf, you are hhhhmmmm, not actually encouraging me to… hhaaaaah… be quiet when you… aaaaaah!... do that! Oh, do that yes yes yes Mahal yes…”
BANG BANG BANG
“IF YOU TWO DON’T SHUT UP AN’ LET A BODY SLEEP, I’M GONNA COME IN THERE AN’ PLAY MY FLUTE AND SEE HOW YOU LIKE IT!”
…
“Do you like it?” The Crown Prince looked thoroughly nervous.
Bomfrís accepted the quiver with shaking hands. It was, quite simply, the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen in her days. “Do I like it, he asks,” she said, snorting loudly. Then she clapped her hand over her nose. “That was… ignore that, I didn’t do that.”
He grinned at her, and oh, but he was handsome. Broad-shouldered and bullish, black hair tumbling everywhere as glossy as a raven’s wing, that startling ginger beard, and those lively blue eyes. “I heard you,” he said rather smugly, and even his voice was nice. That was unfair, in Bomfrís’ estimation.
She sounded as raucous as a crow in comparison.
He scooted closer and traced the buckles on the quiver-straps. “These gave me some trouble, I won’t lie. They’re not as good as I’d like,” he said, scowling at the little stylised ravens whose wings clasped the leather together. “I can have another go at them, if you’d-”
She clutched her pretty quiver close. “No, back off, you gave it to me and it’s mine, and I won’t have you pointing out all its flaws. It’s perfect.”
He sat back, his hair sliding over his shoulder. “Oh, aye?”
She nodded firmly. “Mine. Don’t you dare.”
He smiled broadly then, as though he hadn’t actually expected her to love it so completely. Was he daft? Was she falling in love with a gorgeous twit or something? How could he not see that it was absolutely the most perfect present anyone had ever given her? “Thank you, Bomfrís.”
“Thank me?” She shook her head in amazement. “Thank you, you’re the one who made it, and it’s wonderful. It’s really wonderful, Thorin.”
He glowed when she said his name, actually glowed. He was just so – so retiring. He never put himself forward. How could a Crown Prince of the Line of Durin be so damned self-effacing?
Well, she would absolutely change that. He had stood in the shadows of titans long enough.
Impulsively, she leaned forward and bussed his mouth with her own. His mouth was softer than she had expected, and his breath was a split-second puff of warmth on her face.
When she drew back, he looked utterly and totally floored.
Cheeks beginning to blaze, she began speaking as fast as she could. “It’s shorter than the old one I’ve been using, which is good because I’ll be able to find the arrow and draw faster,” she said, and her voice sounded odd and high. “I’ve been working on my speed; I’ll show that haughty elf a thing or two, and it’s important to show the others that we can hold our ummmph-”
Thorin had surged forward like a rising wave, his hands slipping into her sideburns to cradle her jaw, and his mouth fixing upon hers as snugly as a sealed jar. She flailed for a moment, awkward and panicked, and then he pressed forward even harder into her mouth, insistent and demanding.
Well, she couldn’t let that go unanswered.
She immediately pushed forward against him, her mouth practically attacking his. Her hands pressed against his fine tunic, feeling the warmth of blood, skin and sinew beneath. He fell back in surprise at the unexpected move. “Bomfrís, what,” he began, but she made a sound of irritation and clambered onto his lap. That shut him up good and fast.
Her old and stained skirts settled around them like a dropped flower as she grasped his head and brought her lips back to his. His eyes drank her in, and she squeezed hers shut so she wouldn't see the look of complete adoration on that handsome face.
Yes. Definitely softer than she had expected.
…
Bifur hesitated at the doorway, his hand raised to knock.
Ori was muttering to himself, rubbing one of his arms. It was odd that Bifur had never encountered desire before. He had thought himself incapable of it, back when he lived.
It had begun as friendship, he told himself. Only friendship. They were friends.
Close friends.
It appeared that Bifur was one of those Dwarves for whom desire only grew out of closeness.
Ori seemed unhappy, and he slumped down at his desk and fiddled with his pen for a moment. Then he put it back down. Then he picked it back up and fiddled with it some more, his face disconsolate.
“Are you well?” Bifur took a step into the room, and then paused. Though Ori had spent many hours teaching him and helping him communicate, it was not done to enter another Dwarf’s workroom without permission.
Ori looked up, and it seemed that his every knotted muscle just relaxed. “Bifur,” he said, and true gratitude shone in his eyes. “Come in, please… I’m just. I don’t know how we’re to do this. Another rotation. Fíli and Kíli need help with their watch, they can’t do it alone, but I can’t take Nori off Erebor at the moment and Frís is already covering for Náli who is watching Gondor again, and Thorin won’t stop disappearing to Rivendell every so often. It’s maddening!”
“Shhhh, sanmelek,” Bifur said, and he stepped forward to rub Ori’s neck. “Come with me. Leave this for a while, it will keep. I will have a word to Náli, eh? Mahtabnisi betâs.”
Ori let out a long, shuddering sigh, and then he let his head fall back against Bifur’s stomach. “I’m tired.”
“Adrân safkitabi 'aimukhurb,” Bifur coaxed, and gently drew Ori to his feet and pulled the pen from his suddenly-lax hands. “You need sleep.”
“I need a new head, what was I thinking,” Ori groaned, and then he leaned his head on Bifur’s shoulder as the older Dwarf led him from the study through the only other door, obviously Ori’s sleeping quarters. “Thank you, Bifur.”
Bifur made a soft noise of dissent. “No, no thanks.”
Ori groaned when he saw the bed in the corner of the next room. “Oh, my bed, I’ve missed you so. Hullo, bed.” He flopped forward, still fully dressed, face-first onto his pallet and moaned into his pillow. “Bed.”
“Aye, it’s a bed,” Bifur said, amused. He laid a hand on Ori’s soft hair (smelling of the inks he mixed and of smoke from the fire that burned merrily in his study), sifting it for a sweet and surreptitious moment, and then he said, “Zann galikh.”
“Mmmm. Stay here,” Ori mumbled into his pillow, and then he rolled over and pleaded with his eyes.
“You should rest,” Bifur said, and Ori screwed up his face.
“I know, I know. Stay anyway. Sleep.”
Bifur wavered for a moment, but eventually he toed off his boots and clambered onto the pallet beside his clever little love. “Just sleep,” he said firmly.
“Sleep,” Ori agreed in a thick voice, yawning. He half-sat up to press an absent kiss to the corner of Bifur’s mouth. “Nuh-night, Bifuruh.”
He rolled back over and was asleep in seconds.
Bifur grinned at the ceiling for a long, long time before he finally managed to nod off.
…
END