#barufel

Episode Three – The Road Goes On

May 19th, 3, Fourth Age – Rivendell

“I rather believed that your husbands were never going to allow you out of their sights again, Gwathelion,” the Lord Elrond remarked wryly, when Bilbo tracked him down inside his uncle’s private library. “Nor were any of your Dwarven Kindred, for that matter.”

Elrond did, in fact, have good reason to believe this, Bilbo acknowledged, as his husbands, nephews, and brothers had been consistently behaving in a manner that one could rightly classify as overprotective since Bilbo had properly reunited with them all. They all seemed to be of the opinion that their Hobbit might vanish into thin air if they did not keep a proper watch of him on a constant basis. Bilbo rather despaired to imagine how much worse they were all going to behave once they were on the road and away from the safety of Rivendell.

“I snuck away while my older faunts were distracting them with their archery lessons. Tauriel and Lindir were ‘not arguing’ about the proper way to wear a quiver – and my children and the Company seemed to find such a conversation exceedingly amusing – when I slipped off the training field,” Bilbo admitted, shrugging. “I needed to talk to you and to give you this,” Bilbo nodded his head toward the grey cloth-wrapped parcel in his arms, “Without an audience.”

“You may always come to me, at any time and for any reason,” Elrond knelt down so that his dusk-silver eyes were level with Bilbo’s own, a tinge of regret in his voice. “I am quite loath to send you so far away from me, nephew mine, even if it is the best way to keep your physical person safe and the only possible means we have of healing the wounds that your soul carries.”

Bilbo smiled at his uncle with gentle affection, “I know, Emelmuindor. I shall miss you so very much after we depart tomorrow. Sometimes, I rather wish that the world were not quite as large as it is. It would have made the journey to Mordor a shade less difficult.”

Elrond chuckled and agreed, “Perhaps a shade.”

“Oh, here,” Bilbo offered the medium-sized bundle in his arms to his uncle, “This is for you.”

Bilbo’s Elven uncle accepted the soft package and deftly unwound the cloth, which was protecting the gift inside of it, in a single, swift motion to expose a tapestry that had been folded ever so carefully. Elrond let it fall open and then gasped in wonder and bittersweet delight as he took in what Bilbo had painstakingly depicted on the shimmering fabric.

It had taken Bilbo two full months to weave, because of both its size and his desire to ensure that it was absolutely perfect before he presented it to his uncle. The tapestry portrayed that which could never again be real – Elrond and his wife, Bilbo’s aunt Celebrían, with their children, Bilbo’s parents, and Bilbo himself in a field of pink verbenas, smiling and carefree. Bilbo had carefully covered the front of the tapestry with a clear polish that would not crack as it dried and had blown a very thin layer of silver dust onto it, giving the scene a hazy quality, as if it were a memory that you could view with your eyes and not just your mind. The border was dark silver with Quenya runes that spoke of family and unyielding love embroidered on it in a lighter shade of the same color.

“Bilbo,” Elrond breathed out, his voice thick in his throat as he spoke, “This is beautiful. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Bilbo replied softly. “I know that the loss of them still affects you greatly during the summer months; I hoped that this might help, a bit.”

“It shall,” Elrond agreed, pulling Bilbo into a warm hug. “And you are right, the summer is when their absence is the hardest to bear – I lost both my wife and my sister during the pinnacle of that season… and then I nearly lost my nephew as well. I cannot tell you how grateful I am that you survived your trials in Mordor, Gwathelion.”

“Because of your tireless efforts,” Bilbo reminded, returning the embrace. “That I lived, despite the thick poison in my lungs and the damage wrought to my soul by the Ring, was because you refused to give up on me, when even the Lady Galadriel feared that I would not survive. You toiled for a solid week without rest to heal me, expending much of your power to do so, Uncle.”

Gandalf and Galadriel had relayed as much, when Bilbo had finally awoken from the unnatural sleep that had claimed him after the Ring had been destroyed. Bilbo could only just remember that choking sleep, the thick black that had done its best to consume him, but what he recalled best about that nightmarish time was the warm light that he clung to, for it made him feel safe and reminded him that he was still loved, and that he had followed back into the realm of life. That light, Bilbo now knew, had been his Elven uncle obstinately refusing to abandon his Hobbit nephew to the clutches of death.

“I would have given it all, had it been necessary,” Elrond insisted seriously, pulling back so that Bilbo could see the resolve writ upon his countenance. Bilbo grinned, his tone as sure as his faith in his favorite uncle, “I know.”

“It truly was that close?” Dwalin’s voice sounded from the doorway, making Bilbo start. He spun around to see Dwalin and Thorin hovering just outside of the room.

Elrond did not react as if he were surprised at all by the sudden presence of Bilbo’s husbands – he probably had known that they were there all along, lurking outside of his private library and listening in on what was supposed to be a private conversation between uncle and nephew – he simply raised an eyebrow at the pair and surreptitiously folded the tapestry over his arm, concealing the image sewn upon it. Bilbo, for his part, had to suppress an exasperated sigh, because he truly had not wanted his husbands to know that the perpetuated fallacy of his death had very nearly not been an erroneous account of those particular events at all. They worried enough about him and as much as Bilbo’s heart and soul sung at the obvious care and concern that they displayed for him, he worried that their overly defensive actions were spurred more by guilt for their mistakes than by anything else.

Bilbo knew that Thorin and Dwalin loved him and that they had missed him terribly, but after that first emotional day of being together again he had started to fear that once their guilt had faded, once their elation at knowing he was alive settled into something more temperate, that they would remember he was the Hobbit whom they had been so unsure about keeping for months, the person whom they had so adamantly wanted to change even after their marriage vows had been uttered. Bilbo could never be a Dwarf, would never value many of the things that Dwarves did, like gold and combat and glory, and once they truly realized that… well, what if they decided that he was not good enough again? What if the proud and suspicious people of Erebor, who already called him Prince Consort with such gladness even in his absence – as Balin had cheerfully reported to him – dismissed him as unworthy because he could not properly relate to them?

As resolute as Bilbo had been when first asked, he now had serious doubts about returning to Erebor. Oh, he still wanted to go – because even the idea of parting from his husbands and brothers and nephews made his soul ache something fierce and wretched – but fear pounded at him incessantly and anxiety gnawed at his heart mercilessly.

It did not help that Thorin and Dwalin had avoided touching him as much as they possibly could over the past week that they had rested in Rivendell. They would hug him and hold him when he asked it of them, but only when he asked and never of their own volition. They refused to kiss him, or sleep with him – innocently or otherwise – and even when they did embrace him, their hands did not wander as they nearly always had before, during the Quest and while they rested in Erebor following Smaug’s very timely demise. They let Bilbo touch them, on their arms and shoulders and backs, as much as he desired to, but they rarely reciprocated and never initiated anything but brief and entirely innocent caresses when they seemed to believe that he needed such from them.

Bilbo’s current misgivings about his place in the Mountain and his husbands’ behavior were, of course, the very subjects that he had wished to converse with his uncle, in the strictest of confidences, about as he hoped that Elrond would provide some measure of reassuring clarity regarding their actions that Bilbo was apparently incapable of perceiving on his own. But he could hardly do so now, not when Dwalin and Thorin had entered the room and were all but hovering over his person.

“It was closer than anyone would have liked,” Elrond tactfully replied a few tense moments later, when it became blatantly obvious that Bilbo was decidedly not going to confirm Dwalin’s all too apprehensive query, would have rather marched back into the heart of Mordor than do anything of the kind, “But Bilbo survived and has recovered well from those wounds. My magic played a part, but his own strength saw to the rest.”

And there it was, the afore mentioned guilt, flashing like lightning across the finely chiseled features of the Dwarrow whom Bilbo loved beyond reason. Sadness lanced through Bilbo’s heart, but he managed to keep it off of his face and hidden from his husbands and uncle with only a little difficulty. He had quite a considerable amount of practice at concealing his true and more unpleasant emotions from others, after all. Hobbits used manners like a mask to obscure what their relatives and neighbors might find disagreeable and Bilbo had been no exception to this rule – what confidence he had gained to bluntly express his feelings and thoughts during the Quest had been stripped away in the aftermath.

“We should have been with you, Khajmel,” Thorin spoke mournfully.

A vision of Thorin and Dwalin shorn and shackled – the prisoners of Orcs – swirled into his mind’s eye. It was but a remnant of a waking dream, one of the many that he had been forced to endure during his journey to Mordor thanks to the thrice-damned and wretched Ring, but the flashing images still horrified him as much now as they had then.

“No,” Bilbo denied emphatically, shaking his head to rid it of the horrible scene. “No, I’m glad you weren’t. That you two, that all of the Company, were safe in Erebor was an immeasurable comfort to me, Fy Alawon. It was one less thing for me to fear as I journeyed South; that Sauron was incapable of harming any of you to punish me for destroying the Ring.”

His husbands, rather unfortunately, did not seem to have been made one whit happier by such a declaration. Perhaps, Bilbo acknowledged, he should refrain from making remarks that even slightly eluded to how frightened he had been while on his own. It would only increase their guilt and that was the last thing that Bilbo wanted.

A soft knock on the open door of the library silenced any reply that Thorin or Dwalin might have had and then an Elf with hair so blonde that it was nearly white glided into the room and inclined her head respectfully, “I beg pardon for my intrusion, my Lord Elrond, but a missive has arrived from Caras Galadhon for Ernil uin Glaur that bears Mithrandir’s mark.”

“Gandalf,” Bilbo murmured, enormously relieved to see the sealed dark green parchment resting on the silver tray in the Elven maiden’s dainty hands. If his Godfather was well enough to write then he could not be too terribly injured.

“Thank you, Vanlanthiriel,” Elrond said as Bilbo accepted the proffered letter eagerly.

“Yes, thank you,” Bilbo agreed, waiting only until the attendant had departed from the room before breaking the letter’s seal and beginning to read.

My Dear Godson,

I can not fully express in a mere letter how glad I was to learn that you are safe and out of Saruman’s tainted reach, for I feared the absolute worst when I discovered his foul plans. I am so grievously sorry for the fate which has befallen the Shire, befallen your gentle people, and regret beyond regret that I was unable to prevent it from happening. The White Council exists to ensure that such things never happen and yet we utterly failed to protect Yavanna’s Light in Arda; I cannot deny that this was almost entirely due to our own collective arrogance and our willful blindness regarding the faults of one of our own. That your people paid the price is a tragedy, a travesty, one that I and the rest of the Council shall grieve for the rest of our lives.

Rest assured, my dear Bilbo, that the fallen Istari shall not remain unpunished for the atrocities which he has committed in his devastating madness. He shall be dealt with, shall be banished from Arda, one way or another, to meet the divine justice of the Valar. I swear it shall be done.

Your uncle, the Lord Elrond, has made known to me and the rest of your kin here, in fair Lothlórien, that your Dwarves have come for you and mean to bear you to the Kingdom of Erebor. If this truly pleases you, then I am pleased as well – I do believe that you will be happiest in Erebor, even if Thorin and Dwalin hardly deserve you. Do inform them, from me, that I can and will turn them into toads, if the need should arise.

May Yavanna ever bless you with love and laughter and Green, dear Bilbo.

Gandalf Greyhame

Post Script: The Lady Galadriel has informed me that I ought to relay my improving health to you. I am perfectly fine and there is no need for you to concern yourself over my person. I have been injured far worse than this, on many occasions.

Bilbo felt himself choking on air in stark incredulity as the final few sentences sunk in and then he thrust the letter toward his uncle unceremoniously, “Read the last bit.”

Elrond took the piece of parchment without question and focused on the bottom of the page, his left eyebrow quirking upward in a combination of disbelief and resigned exasperation. After a long moment, Bilbo’s uncle sighed, “Mithrandir certainly has a way with words.”

“I love him, but sometimes I really do want to hit him over the head with his own staff,” Bilbo muttered. “Honestly, telling someone who is already worried that, ‘I have been injured far worse than this, on many occasions,’ is not at all helpful.”

“Believe me, nephew mine,” Elrond returned the letter to Bilbo, “As tempting as the urge is, it won’t actually help. His skull is simply too thick.”

Thorin snorted in startled amusement at the implied admission, “When?”

“When he marched himself into my home and informed me that he was taking my untrained nephew to face the last of the Great Drakes,” Elrond replied dryly.

Come to think of it, Gandalf had gone to bed early that first night that the Company had been in Rivendell during the Quest, Bilbo recalled, as the Grey Wizard had claimed to be suffering from a minor headache. Bilbo had not thought much of it, at the time, because he had been significantly distracted by his uncle and cousins, whom had tried very, very hard to convince him into not continuing to head eastward with the Dwarves. If the Company had not slipped away like shadows in the night, while Gandalf had kept the White Council busy, then it was very likely that one, if not all four, of Bilbo’s cousins would have chased after him with the intention of dragging him back to the Valley of Imladris.

“I knew how to use a bow,” Bilbo protested. “And I was fairly proficient, even then.”

Elrond shot him an unimpressed look, one that made him feel as if he were once again a wild fauntling with a penchant for getting himself into trouble, “Yes, but you didn’t have one until you got here and by that point you had already encountered Orcs and Wargs and had nearly been eaten alive by three Cave Trolls.”

“He has a natural skill with short-blades, both when it comes to throwin’ knives from a distance and in usin’ daggers in a close-range fight,” Dwalin relayed in Bilbo’s defense, pride ringing in his voice and clearly visible in his countenance. “And his sword work was improvin’, in leaps and bounds, durin’ each trainin’ session that we had on our way to Erebor. Faster than most of the Dwarves that I trained back in Ered Luin and they had years to advance their skills.”

Having pride directed toward him was, Bilbo supposed, much better than the leaden guilt. At least it was not the apathy or the disdain for his person that he secretly dreaded might come. Bilbo was not overly fond of weapons or fighting, quite the opposite in fact, but he knew that as long as he pushed himself to become stronger and faster – less helpless and weak and like a grocer – then he could, at the bare minimum, retain a modicum of his husbands’ respect as their guilt dwindled, day by day. Being esteemed as a capable warrior would be better than them thinking him worth nothing at all.

So, Bilbo did not hesitate in deciding to say, “I’ve hardly mastered any of those skills, though, or any of the others that you wanted me to learn. You said that you wanted to establish regular training sessions once the Mountain was secure. If you’re both still willing to teach me, I enjoyed learning from you.”

Dwalin and Thorin looked immediately pleased by the request, proving that Bilbo had made the right choice in asking. He had not lied to his Melodies, not really. As much as he despised battle, he did understand why having the ability to defend oneself and those whom one loved was such an obligatory and vital skill to hone if one planned to traverse the Wildes of Arda – and he had derived some satisfaction from knowing that he could protect his Kindred, if need be, because of the instruction that he had received during the Quest. He had discovered that the exercise which naturally came with the training was an excellent way to relieve stress and irritation, as well. Plus, having his husbands’ undivided and physical attention was something that he craved rather desperately and he was willing to go to extreme measures to get it.

“Absolutely, Laslel,” Dwalin replied eagerly, his arm and shoulder muscles flexing ever so slightly. It was, Bilbo knew, an inadvertent indication of his excitement for such a scheme; one of the many things that Bilbo had missed so much about his Melodies.

Thorin’s eyes sparkled, as if starlight was reflecting off of twin sapphires, “We can go back down to the training fields now, if you like. There’s time enough until Luncheon for us to run sword drills with you.”