Chapter Text
Nori will be the first dwarf in the history of Middle Earth to admit that he is a coward.
When he fights, he fights dirty. When he runs, he runs hard. When he plays, he cheats- because eking out a living is something Nori has turned into an art form. He has one of those faces. A face you think you can trust, a face that still smiles even when you feel the bite of the knife in your back.
There is a proud history behind Nori’s family line and if he cared to remember it- which he doesn’t- perhaps he would feel ashamed of what he does to survive. He was too young to recall the dragon fire. Dori might make his teas and grumble about decorum but Nori wonders what use decorum has when there is no mountain, there are no lords, and wolves wait at the door to devour the weak.
A coward is not weak. Nori has proven this. There are guards in Ered Luin who no longer have the full use of their sight, though he stopped poking eyes out when Dori gave him that look, that look so like their mother’s that it made him want to go and never come back.
Sometimes Nori does go. He goes, and he travels and swindles and lies and cheats his way from town to town and place to place and bed to bed. There is an invisible cord around his wrist, and no matter the weather it always pulls him back.
Nori does not think of himself as a risk taker, as an honorable dwarf. Honor. What use is that, anymore? It’s a fight or die world and Nori is a fighter. He teaches Ori things when he is home. Important things. Things Dori would shriek and titter over if he knew about them. Ori is a lackluster student but he holds Nori in awe.
That hurts.
When Thorin decides on his mad quest Nori does not wish to go. He is a coward and cowards do not fight dragons. Even the siren’s song of the gold- enough gold for him to stop running, stop backstabbing, stop everything and start over- isn’t enough to sway him.
Then Dori volunteers.
And Ori does, too.
That night Nori gets very drunk and finds an inkist. Though the dwarf is skeptical Nori has the gold to tempt him. Four hours later- a tattoo of a tightly woven cord still burning around his right wrist- Nori drinks a little more and all but bursts into the cave that passes as a throne room in Ered Luin.
Dwalin is on his feet at once, hands on his axes; there is no love lost between them. Thorin holds up a hand.
“Brave and stupid, to come barging in here.” he says, as thoughtful and calm as the eye of a raging storm.
“You aren’t taking them without me.” Nori says. “You aren’t.”
And so Nori is sworn into the company of Thorin Oakenshield, barely sober enough to swear on the axe handle.
Dori is angry, Ori less so; they help him pack and the Brothers Ri depart with their King in Exile.
Nori thinks it all insane but keeps his mouth shut because he might be good at fighting dirty but Dwalin is always within reach, Dwalin and his axes. They gather other lost souls and Nori privately calls them the Company of No Return but he doesn’t repeat these words to Ori, doesn’t want to frighten him.
They find the hobbit, and begin their quest. Nori keeps an eye on Ori, makes sure Dori doesn’t get lost in the shuffle. At night he considers departing silently but he doesn’t.
Then the trolls happen. And the goblins. And the orcs, and the wargs and by the time they make it to Beorn’s Nori is thinking that perhaps insanity is all that is keeping their little company from falling apart at the seams.
Still, the cord is there, stark and inked. He travels on.
After everything- after Thorin and Kili and Fili lie dead, and Dain has become King under the Mountain, and Bilbo Baggins is once again on the road home- Nori sits in a room with Dwalin and listens to every reason the warrior gives as to why he should become the Spymaster of Erebor.
Nori has every reason to refuse. He has gold now, so much of it it sometimes makes him crosseyed. Ori is looked after, Dori too; the cord around his wrist feels a little looser.
Dwalin’s eyes are hooded. He has not smiled since Thorin’s funeral.
Nori thinks of orcs, or men, or elves clambering up on the mountain unaware. He thinks of the King being blind to all outside. He thinks of all the traveling a Spymaster would have to do. He thinks of all the lying, the bribes, the intricate dances of shadow and knife.
Nori clasps Dwalin’s hand.
“I will do it.” he says.
Dwalin’s lips twitch. “It will be remarkably dangerous.” he says.
“As dangerous as trolls?”
“More so.”
“As wargs?”
“Frightfully.”
“As facing down a dragon?”
“You can’t even imagine.”
Nori hooks the thumb of his tattooed right hand into his belt. He is thinking about adding more cords to the design- perhaps thirteen more cords.
“Sounds like the perfect job for a coward.”