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Thorin takes Bilbo to bed early.
This is not uncommon. He has healed well enough from his wound that he often pushes for an early night, where he spends his time between Bilbo’s knees, his bristly cheeks playing desirous melodies up Bilbo’s thighs, sucking him off and kissing him mad until he turns Bilbo over to fuck into him with the patience of one who has waited a year for a proper bed.
Bilbo indulges him. Why would he protest? He’s blissfully happy. The mountain is won, the battles are fought, and Durin’s heirs are alive. Bilbo has one of them with his nose in his neck, panting and cursing through the wolfish grind of his hips, his forge-worn hands pumping at Bilbo’s cock, kissing him through his peak, and feverishly chasing his own.
The afterglow masks all other worries. Bilbo rests his head on Thorin’s chest, the barrel drum-drum of his breath, and does not even register the hunger pains in his belly – in all of their bellies he must say, because well-fucked or not – Erebor is starving.
Thorin’s hand, swaying in a gentle caress up Bilbo’s flank, stops, and the king rises from their bed to robe himself and sit upright on the bed, sweaty from sex, but no longer so blissful.
“What is it?” Bilbo asks, resting on the pillows.
Thorin is silent, though Bilbo can see him swallow, the movement of his throat backlit by the glow of the hearth fire the servants kept roaring at all hours in the king’s chamber.
“Dáin has not left,” he eventually says.
“No, he hasn’t.” Bilbo has noticed. He likes Dáin well enough. He’s good for a drink and a laugh, and he’s always treated Bilbo well. He especially likes talking about his pigs, of which he brought three to Erebor.
A sigh and Thorin turns his head to look at Bilbo straight on. His eyes gleam and glisten, with something like tears. “He won’t until his generals are satisfied.”
“With what?” But no, Bilbo is aware, he is only feigning the ignorance. He would have to be blind to not know, and Bilbo has faced a dragon, trolls, goblins, wargs, and all the gnashing biting terrible things of Middle-Earth – he is smarter than most. He understands why Dáin’s generals have called for their daughters, their sons, to lead the grain caravans into Erebor – pink-cheeked, eyes bright, bowing to Thorin with their shirt-collars two-buttons looser than is proper to show off a peek of skin. Not that Thorin looks – but Bilbo has been around enough flirting young hobbits in the Shire to know what that meant. Some things are universal it seems.
“They ask for my marriage, and they will pay for it in grain,” Thorin confirms, then he makes a mistake, and reaches for Bilbo’s hand lying limp on the bedspread. Bilbo pulls away and flinches at the hurt in Thorin’s eyes.
“Dáin confirms this?” he asks, though Bilbo is sure, and he does not know why he is asking.
“He tried to stall them.” Thorin is speaking quickly, which is strange for him, he’s a king who works in slow surety and sounds as such. Panic, that is odd. “I’ve been speaking with Balin and Bombur about the food stores. We don’t have enough.”
Thorin tips his noble head down. “Bilbo, there is a way to–”
“I wish you well then,” Bilbo says, his feet already on the floor. He doesn’t want to hear any of Thorin’s solutions . He doesn’t want to be let down, nor will he stand Thorin sacrificing anything for his sake. “I’ll send someone in the morning for my stuff. Don’t worry about finding me a room. I’ll ask Dís.”
He walks while he talks, and there is more that he says, but he cannot recall it, and it does not matter. Whatever he says is nonsense, and Thorin does not come after him to correct it.
~
Dís does find him a room, adjacent to her very own, and she spends the first day after that horrible revelation shepherding herself to and fro between her chambers and his – bringing him news of court and foolish gossip for distraction.
She tries to keep the announcement from him, but a servant enters late in the afternoon when Bilbo is still in bed his eyes red and aching from the tears he cannot hide from Thorin’s sister. The servant’s face is aglow with only the chiefest of gossip, she whispers frantically in Dís’ ear by the door and looks rather put out when Dís dismisses her coldly.
“Don’t keep it from me,” Bilbo says when Dís walks back to where Bilbo lays wrapped in a thick blanket. “He kept it from me for so very long.”
“He has accepted the courtship proposal from Lady Gemna, daughter of Lord Gregor of the Iron Hills,” Dís says, kneeling at Bilbo’s side.
It’s a blow unlike any other, somehow worse than the night he’d just had, sleepless, aching, half-mad, and convinced that Thorin would rip through the door with all of his graceless bravadoes to proclaim that it was a joke, a facade, that there was a cavern deep in the mountain with hundreds of jars of sealed grain, so what did they need the Ironfoot for?
No, Bilbo doesn’t live in fantasies anymore. He should know better. He left those behind in Bag End, the home he wanted now, even Thorin haunted that house too, an epic figure curled over the mantle of his fireplace, singing mourning songs.
“Well, how much food did we get?” Bilbo asks.
Dís’ lip twitches, with what Bilbo hopes is a repressed smile. “Her father runs grain farms up and down the entire western slope of the Iron Hills.”
Good, then. The pain is worth something.
~
There is Lady Gemna, daughter of Lord Gregor, in the arms of the king, the white light of a hundred diamond chips weaved into the brown fall of her hair and beard. Thorin keeps a steady hand on her back, guiding her through a pair dance. They are not the only ones dancing on the grand golden floor of the throne room, but they are the most admired. It is a courtship ball after all.
Bilbo stands by the wayside, studiously ignoring the benches full of breads and cakes so graciously donated to the feast by Gregor, lord of the fucking grain, when Fíli comes to him.
“You need not stay, Bilbo,” he says, looking very handsome and apologetic. Dís has dressed him in fine Durin Blue and even tied some ribbons into his braids. Courting ribbons. It is not only Thorin who must play nice for some supper.
“Oh, don’t be silly,” Bilbo reassures him. “I enjoy a good party, just like everyone else. Besides, I’m stuck in the mountain until spring just like the rest of you. It won’t do me well to go hole up in my rooms until the warm weather comes back.”
“I would not blame you,” Fíli says, softly. His mouth purses, jingling the sparkling gemstone claps in his mustache. “She dresses excessively. It’s rude. Like they think Uncle’s heart can be won with pretty gemstones.”
Bilbo shrugs. It is all he can do. “They’ve already bought him. Now they want to show off. It is not a strange assumption to assume that a dwarrow-king would like glittery things.”
“They do not know him, Fíli snaps.
“Thorin is not easy to understand,” Bilbo says with a weak smile.
Fíli blinks. Then slowly, he says, “Not if it’s you.”
Bilbo sighs. “Fíli–”
“No. No. Someone has to say it.” Fíli nudges his chin at the dancefloor where Thorin twirls the Lady Gemna into a bend and a dip. She tips her head back and laughs. Thorin does not react to it, in fact, his eyes never focus on her face, and he scans the crowd instead. “Uncle is a fool, and I have never seen him surrender so easily. You deserve better than to see him posture about with that dwarrowdam who can never love him.”
“And you think I do?”
It was rare on their journey that Bilbo looked at Fíli and saw the king that would once rule Erebor, but more and more frequently there is a steadiness in his face, a knowing, and Bilbo feels very young in the face of it.
“I think it is hard to love him, but there is no one in all of Middle-earth who does it better,” Fíli says, grabbing a drink from a passing tray filled with mugs of watered-down but cold ale. He drinks half of it in a swig and then passes it off to Bilbo’s empty hand.
“If he should surrender, make sure you do not,” he finishes, and dances with a renewed sense of vigor, into the throng of the crowd.
~
Thorin corners him in a hallway one day, nostrils flared, like he’d run up ten flights of stairs.
“Bilbo,” he barks, cast in the light of the great hall behind him. “Please, a moment.”
Bilbo is proud of his steady feet, though they’d very much like to flee, and even more so of the cool tone of his voice asking, “What can I do for you, Thorin?”
“Bilbo,” Thorin says, and his voice is on a plea, a sigh, Bilbo can hear the apologies in it. “I have not seen you in weeks.”
All of his cool calm evaporates and Bilbo stomps forward until he’s tipped his chin up, spitting fury at Thorin.
“I’ve made myself, busy, helping to run your mountain. You might have bought the grain you so desperately need with my happiness, but by the Lady, half your dwarrow don’t know what to do with it. I’m in the kitchens rather often you know, teaching your people how to ration and cook. Apparently cooking is a lesser trade, I didn’t know that. Funny enough how that’s ended up!”
“I didn’t buy our food with anything of yours,” Thorin growls, and there it is, the fury Bilbo wants. He was tired of sulking and crying, he doesn’t have enough energy for it. “If you would but speak with me for more than a moment, then we could have this resolved.”
“Resolved?” Bilbo is aware of just how hysterical he sounds. “What resolution? I get to love you and the whole mountain starves. You have no solution.”
“I would beg ,” Thorin hisses. “Beg the help of my enemies, if it would get you to speak with me again. The Lady…” Thorin sighs and gambles a hand on Bilbo’s elbow where he rubs his thumb in a comforting circle. “The Lady Gemna is nothing to me.”
“To you. To others, she means a great deal,” Bilbo says, and storms off, cradling his arm to his chest like he might banish the warmth of Thorin there.
~
“Gandalf would come, if I asked,” Bilbo says to Dís a few nights later, exhausted.
She’s snuck some of the home-brewed Ered Luin moonshine she brought to Erebor into his tea, and he’s been far more forthcoming with his thoughts than he preferred.
“Aye,” Dís says, bracketed by the arms of a plush armchair. “The wizard is fond of you. Though he is unreliable with everyone else.”
“Ah,” Bilbo waves his hand about. “He and Thorin could get along if they tried.”
“For you, Thorin would invite Thranduil himself into the mountain,” Dís says.
It rings too true, and he’s tired of people saying it when it hasn’t exactly been done. “Apparently not. He allows Dáin’s lords to swarm all over him,” he snaps.
Dís reaches for the liquor bottle and pours more of it into her cup. She does not ask if Bilbo wants more.
“It’s not a merry mountain Bilbo,” Dís tells him, with all the sincerity of a general prepping their troops for war. “It’s hard-won and hard-fought and it’s spent centuries picking the bones of my family clean. You, you need to go break some bones of your own.”
~
Bilbo doesn’t plan for what happens. Dís gifts him a set of new clothes, commissioned from one of the rich Iron Hill lords Bilbo detests but must admit holds a mastercraft in color matching. When Bilbo walks into the dining hall he expects, maybe, a few interested glances at his finery. Instead what he gets is an almost awed silence and a lot of staring. It reddens his cheeks and ushers him over at an unelegant trot to where Bombur is ladling stew into bowls for dinner time.
“Bilbo!” Bombur stammers once he recovers from the shock. “You look stunning!”
“Thank you, my friend,” Bilbo says, then leans in and lowers his voice. “I didn’t think a new waistcoat and jacket would cause such a fuss!”
“Bilbo,” Bombur says, looking a tad baffled. “You come into the dining hall dressed in dwarven courting robes and don’t expect any commotion? You’re the hero of Erebor! The line will stretch out the door for an audience with you.”
Oh.
Dís might be mad.
Bombur’s laugh was good-natured and jolly. He rests a comforting hand on Bilbo’s shoulder.
“Don’t worry too much about it. You’ll have the pick of the litter. Here, take some stew. It’s not much, but we’ve got a new shipment of grain this morning beyond the Orocarni – rice. It soaks up the spices well, and it’ll fill you up, even if we’re low on meat.”
The stew was fragrant, a vibrant colored red from spices he cannot name. Bilbo will eat just about anything these days, especially something seasoned with more than salt and so delicious smelling.
As usual, Bilbo seats himself at the Company table – a long stretch of a wooden bench right below the king’s raised dining dais where Thorin and Dís and the boys sat when court was in full swing. As of now, it was just Thorin up there, the Lady Gemna, and a good half dozen noble dwarves Bilbo did not recognize. Gemna, at Thorin’s left, only stopped chattering when Thorin raised himself up from his slouch, wide-eyed, to gawk at Bilbo as he settles himself down for dinner.
Bofur, who is already sitting at the table with his cousin, watches the exchange with a glee bordering on concern.
“Pay up, Bifur,” Bofur says aloud, then signs it to the dwarf in question. With a grumble, Bifur upturns his pockets, and drops five gold coins into Bofur’s hand, returning with a grumble to his stew.
“Do you really need to be placing bets, with all the wealth you possess?” Bilbo says dryly.
“With all the peacocking going on around here? I’ll have more gold than Smaug could ever have dreamed of,” Bofur answers gleefully.
“I didn’t plan this,” Bilbo admits.
“Oh, we know. Those clothes have Dís written all over them. Still, you wear them well. Thorin will notice.”
“I’m not sure I want him to,” Bilbo says.
“He’s not bound yet, and neither are you. Who is to say what will happen?”
“Now–” Bilbo starts, because he doesn’t want any hope, not even when it’s well-meaning, but is interrupted by a “hello” from behind, in the rough timbre of a good solid voice.
“Master Baggins, is it?”
Perched behind him is a well-dressed dwarf. Short, but not overly so, with warm brown hair tied in a hefty three-strand braid and beard. The vibrant dark green dye of his tunic does wonders for his eyes, a dark black-brown. He has no ornament but a gold ring in his ear dotted on the end with a small emerald.
“I am Sora, son of Kora,” he introduces with a bow. “May I sit?”
Bofur puts up no protest, and Bifur is smirking beneath his beard, so Bilbo scoots to the right to make room for him.
“I am sorry for the intrusion, but I could not help myself. We have all heard many tales of the burglar Thorin Oakenshield brought to the mountain. You have done much for Durin’s Folk, and I must thank you for it.”
“Oh!” With all the ruckus Bofur was making, Bilbo expected something more… ribald from any approaching dwarves. He supposes he should be grateful the courting robes truly weren’t advertising anything untoward. “You are too kind, Sora.”
“I am not, only truthful.” He really is not bad looking. Smooth warm skin, a good welcoming voice. His focus is entirely on Bilbo and nothing else.
“Tell me, Sora? Are you from the Iron Hills?” Bilbo asks.
He nods. “Yes, though not originally. I am a Stiffbeard, but I have spent more time among Durin’s folk than my own people. I am an adoptee of sorts.”
“A Stiffbeard? I’m sorry, I’m not familiar.”
Sora’s smile flashes like stars. “Do not apologize, we are spoken rarely of here in the West. My family comes from beyond the Orocarni. The rice you eat today is my family’s trade, it grows well in the mountain plateaus – though I have only seen them a few times in my life. My parents are merchants, and they send their wares to me at the Iron Hills. I was fostered there as a child, and have remained since.”
“Then I have you to thank for the food,” Bilbo says. “We can use all we can get our hands on, thank you, truly.”
“Bombur made a diamond out of a coal mine with your recipe,” Bofur concurs toasting his spoon in thanks. “Stiffbeards make right good soups. Spicy and thick.”
“It is no trouble, I do only what I can for the people who have taken me in,” Sora says, still smiling.
“Have you been in the mountain long?” Bilbo asks.
“A few days. King Thorin sent for my party weeks ago, unfortunately, we were delayed by the weather. I am happy to say Erebor lives up to the tales told, and I will gladly assist in her restoration.”
“I am sure you’ll do a splendid job,” Bilbo says.
Sora ducks his head, looking quite chuffed. “You flatter me, Master Baggins. I must ask, would you like to take a walk with me sometime? They have unearthed a new emerald cave in the lower levels. The light of the stones would dazzle themselves in your eyes.”
Well, that was quick.
While he’d prepared himself (however briefly) for the flattery his new attire would bring him, Bilbo hesitates in the full face of it, and thankfully, or perhaps not, did not have to continue forth with an answer – because behind Sora, in all his scowly brooding wonderfulness, stands Thorin.
“Bilbo,” he says, his face a storm to behold. “May I speak with you?
“My King,” Sora says, bowing his head and then standing. “It is an honor. Sora, son of Kora at your service.”
“Yes. Well met.” And when Sora did not move, Thorin’s following words came as barbs. “Sora, I must ask you to take your leave. I have need of Master Baggins. Urgent matters of state.”
“Oh, yes!” Sora says, for what else was there to say when the king is insisting? But if Thorin thought the dwarf would give up so easily, he was wrong. Sora turns back to Bilbo and takes the hobbit’s hand. He brings it up and brushes his lips, just so gingerly, over the fine bones in Bilbo’s fingers. Thorin looks like he might pull his sword on him.
“You are a busy hobbit, Master Baggins, but think on my request. I will ask on it again tomorrow and hope for a good answer,” Sora says, and with a perfectly elegant bow to Thorin, strides whistling, from the dining hall.
Bilbo watches him go, perhaps too long, for when he turns back to Thorin his face has only gathered more thunder.
“Well, state business?” Bilbo asks.
“He is forward with you,” Thorin says flatly.
“He is acting as he should,” Bilbo says. “I am not bound, or married, and who is to begrudge anyone a little fun in all this dreariness?”
Thorin is jealous. Bilbo wants to poke at Thorin’s displeasure, if only because it proves that, again, something was here and thriving between them.
“He seems charming and smart. You invited him, I might add.”
“I invited him for you!” Thorin hisses, which makes truly no amount of sense.
There’s a throbbing behind Bilbo’s eyes. He wishes it was the spices. He rises with his dirty bowl in hand, intent on finishing his meal in his room.
“Then I don’t know what we’re talking about, Thorin. Good day.”
~
Sora proves to be a bright spot in this mess.
Does Bilbo intend on pursuing him? No, not truly, but he finds it difficult to steer away his pure kindly attempts at courtship.
He doesn’t pester Bilbo often, he did come to Erebor to work after all, but every day or two Bilbo will have a knock at his door and find Sora outside of it with – at first – small trinkets of jewelry or metal figurines. Only once Sora caught an eye upon the flowers Bilbo kept in his room, scraggly weed-like things but with blooming purple florets that he’s dug up beneath the snow on the side of the mountain, does Sora comes with little bouquets of his own – dirt dark beneath his nails.
“Sora,” Bilbo says after taking the third offered bouquet, the guilt creeping in. “I’m flattered, really, but you shouldn’t go muddying yourself to get me flowers. I can’t–”
“No, no, Master Baggins. I’m a grown dwarrow, and I know well enough what I can and can’t do.” He extends his arm and huffs happily when a speechless Bilbo places his hand in the crook of his elbow.
“Besides,” he adds on as they take a walk down from the royal quarters to the bustling merchant hall, “how else are we supposed to get your King’s attention?”
There is the sudden intense urge to run, not unlike being under the eyes of Smaug, with the knowledge that you have tricked, and possibly angered, a very important person.
“Don’t tense up, Bilbo, please,” Sora says and pulls them to a stop. Bilbo supposes they look rather intimate standing together against the wall, in frantic conversation. “I know you meant me no insult, it is plain to anyone with sense that your heart is with the king, and his with you.”
“But–” Bilbo ran one of his hands over his face. “You pursued me? Why?”
“You are fascinating, and beautiful. Your curls are brighter than beaten copper, and anyone with good sense would not step between a dwarrow and his One.”
“There seems to be a lack of good sense around here,” Bilbo says, a tad hysterically.
“Ah well, Dáin has not surrounded himself with the brightest diamonds in the mine.” He pulls Bilbo back into a walk, and they navigate the crowd with ease. “That doesn’t mean I won’t do what I can for you. The Lady Dís might have my head if I don’t.”
~
The re-opening of the Forge Hall is a great affair, buoyed even further by Thorin’s known prowess as a blacksmith. He leads the reopening tour, with the Lady Gemna on his arm. He wears nothing by his arm guards, work trousers, and steel-toed boots – but he still looks ever-like a king. He also looks absolutely ridiculously attractive, and it’s infuriating. Unfortunately, Bilbo is given a full sight of him, standing at an honored spot at the front of the party with Sora, who plays the dutiful escort.
“The miners have found an iron vein, five floors above us,” Thorin says, pointing out the dwarves on the platform above us, high above the forges where they’re dumping the iron in from carts. “It’s a new rich vein, and it will serve us well for making the metal supports downed by the dragon.”
“Don’t go putting the Iron Hills out of business now, cousin,” Dáin quips, with a wide grin and his arms crossed.
“Oh, I have bigger headaches to squabble with you about metal prices. Have no worries there.”
“I imagine wedding planning takes up a great deal of time!” Sora says, and Bilbo might faint, truly, in the middle of this hall. Thorin’s expression shutters between surprise, fury, and back to poorly concealed interest.
The Lady Gemna, of course, takes it in stride, her interest far from feigned. “Well, there will be plenty of Durin Bue. That I will say!”
“I would expect nothing less,” Sora says, then turns to Bilbo with a pleased hum. “I imagine you would like some colors of your own country Bilbo in the decor. I cannot say I am opposed, though I know nothing of flowers if that is what you desire.”
“You’re engaged?” The Lady Gemna asks, and claps her hands together. “I was not aware. A well-paired match for our hero of Erebor.”
“They are not engaged,” Thorin growls, startling Gemna right out of her joy. She looks at him, openly, like she does not understand the protest – and a small part of Bilbo feels burningly righteous that she is so oblivious.
“You would have to approve such a tie with me. While he is in Erebor, Bilbo’s hand is under the protection of the royal house,” Thorin clarifies with all the confused staring. Mostly staring. Dáin’s gleeful face is impossible to misinterpret.
Bilbo steps away from Sora, and marches right up to Thorin. “Since when was this the rule? And I must remind you that I am my own hobbit, Thorin. If I wanted to get married I could do it right now, and you would have no say in it.”
“It is my mountain.” There is real fury in that voice now. Gemna has stepped away from him, her pretty face twisted in sorrow. They might suddenly be without food in the morning if this continues.
“It is my life!” Bilbo shouts, and in the moment, decides on pettiness. “Dís would approve it. I need no approval from you.”
“She would not.” Though Thorin doesn’t sound sure, only desperate.
“Yes, she would, because she would like to see me content in this place. One of the few who actually would.”
“All I’ve desired…” Thorin starts, rumbling out of him like a rockfall, loosed from the top of a peak and gaining speed in anger, “... since we’ve won this mountain, besides the safety of my people, is want happiness for you. And I’ve been trying to tell you for weeks! You won’t let me near you.”
“And why should I?”
“Because why I marry anyone who isn’t you! ”
For the Forge Hall, it is rather quiet. Bilbo does not want to look up and see the gawking of the metalworkers. He thinks he hears Gemna squawking somewhere in the crowd of nobles, no doubt protesting… all of that, but he doesn’t care enough to worry about it – instead he’s speechless, eye to eye with Thorin whose face wars between the merits of silence or adding fuel to the fire of his declaration.
Thorin decides on neither.
“Excuse us,” he says to the crowd at large and grabs Bilbo by the arm, walking them over, at a speedy pace to one of the hallways in the cavern, that host the private forges.
“The tour cousin?” Dáin shouts from somewhere behind them. Bilbo can hear the smug grin in his voice.
“The next person who bothers me today is banished from Erebor. Keep them away from us Dáin, and you can have anything from the treasury you desire,” Thorin shouts, and from the iron-shod grip he has on Bilbo’s hand, screaming with intent, he surely means it.
Thorin yanks him into a doorway on the left, his private forge, and immediately those calloused fingers are on Bilbo’s cheeks, pulling him into a kiss – hard, full of teeth, clumsy and uncoordinated but Bilbo might weep just from the feel of him, the scent in his nose, Thorin groaning under his lips.
“I cannot do it, I cannot,” Thorin repeats into his mouth. “You have taken yourself with the very same dwarrow I brought here to save us.”
“Sora–” Bilbo starts, then breaks into laughter when Thorin growls at the very name, his warm hands braced firm on Bilbo’s hips. “Stop, Thorin! Sora isn’t courting me.”
It’s enough to pry Thorin away, though he only goes so far, resting his forehead against Bilbo’s and peering down at him with wide questioning eyes.
“You just said you were,” Thorin says, breathless.
“A lie, not even a lie of my own. It was Dis’ idea. She was relying on your jealously, and thought it might prove fruitful.”
Thorin groans, pained and seems poised to fall or faint, but Bilbo holds him strong.
“Did we just have a row in front of your betrothed?” Bilbo asks.
Thorin winces. “My engagement has not gone far enough, that it cannot be undone.” He breathes out loud through his nose, bringing his hands up to Bilbo’s flushed cheeks, holding them as gentle as he ever has before.
“Bilbo I am sorry, I made the decision in anger, because you left that night and would not speak to me,” Thorin says. “I tried to tell you my plan, I did. Lord Gregor has provided most of our food, yes this is true. But I had Dáin write to Sora and his family on my behalf, so that we might form less dependent partnerships. And so that I would be free to pursue you, as I desire above all things.” He squeezes his eyes shut. “There has been so much confusion…”
“Shh,” Bilbo says, heart alight with the revelation. He places the lightest of kisses on Thorin’s lips. He tastes the same, smells the same, sweaty and beautiful as he is. “We have much to discuss, you and I. I’ve missed you, and I’m still right cross about a dozen things. I just, please…”
They reach for each other at the same time, and through their uncoordinated mess of a kiss, somehow Thorin manages to get Bilbo hoisted onto a workbench, and Bilbo has never been more thankful for Thorin’s observance, his strength. This is Thorin’s forge, his workshop, and though it might not be the intended purpose, Thorin finds oil in one of the side drawers of the bench and slicks his fingers up – lifting Bilbo’s leg over his hip, and sliding them in, fulfilling an ache and a torment.
Bilbo moans, high in the throat, and grasps hard at Thorin’s hair with one hand, and his shoulder with the other. It is not long before he’s whimpering, shaking, begging under his breath while Thorin pumps his fingers right where Bilbo needs them, biting at his neck all the while, the bruises blooming like wildflowers.
“Never again,” Thorin rasps, and he jerks upward, moving his hips in a subconscious motion. Bilbo pants to see him, hard in his trousers, straining at the fabric. “I will not go without you again.”
“I will be much less polite with the next dwarf on your arm,” Bilbo says and grunts when Thorin pulls his fingers out. “I’ve faced a dragon. I’ve faced worse dangers.”
Thorin grins, rare to behold, and unbuttons himself just enough to free his cock. Bilbo reaches down just to pump him, just to watch the fluttering of his eyelids, and the groan out of his mouth, and the hefty silky feel of him in his palms.
“You, are the hardiest thing I know,” Thorin whispers, and nips at Bilbo’s lip, before kissing him wet and mad and hot.
“Thorin, now.”
“Demanding, too,” Thorin says, but complies and moves Bilbo down to the edge of the bench where he can position himself well. He thrusts in slow, with a large inhale, Bilbo’s fingers making treasured paths through the swathe of dark hair, pushing up until he’s fully sheathed.
“I love you,” Bilbo sighs, and revels in the thrust, the moan, it brings out of Thorin who fucks him in earnest on the workbench.
It’s quick. It’s not their most elegant affair, but Bilbo is already close – his cock fat and dripping against his belly – while Thorin grunts and fucks through his own pleasure. He braces one hand on the bench top, then with his other grabs Bilbo by the cheek and holds his mouth open, biting at his lips, too savage to be called kisses.
“Amrâlimê,” he groans, that and a dozen other endearments that were only ever for Bilbo. Gemna would never find herself here, fucked by soot-stained hands, Thorin’s back filmed in sweat, basking in the sweet scent of his mouth, his hair.
Bilbo laves at Thorin’s thumb, braced at the corner of his lips. He fucks as best as he can back into Thorin’s cock, a shallow tease that keeps him right on the edge. “Please, Thorin. Oh, please.”
Thorin picks him up, and pulls out, but turns Bilbo quickly so that he’s standing with his arms braced over the workbench, with his ass is presented outwards. Thorin fucks back in with one long stroke, and plasters himself up against the line of Bilbo’s back, taking one hand to pump at Bilbo’s cock.
“That’s it. Come, now. Come, for me. Only me,” Thorin moans.
Bilbo pushes his head against Thorin’s shoulder, pushing his hips in little circles, faster and faster and faster until he freezes, and shakes through his orgasm. He shoots all over the side of the workbench and falls to his elbows while Thorin fucks away, behind, bordering on oversensitivity. He doesn’t last long, and he slams in, moaning, his teeth at the tip of Bilbo’s ear. Bilbo can feel him, hot and wet inside, and for a moment Thorin just stays there, breathing hard, nosing up and down Bilbo’s hairline.
Eventually, Bilbo laughs and swats him away. “Now, you smell foul. Sex in the forge is only good for a moment.”
Thorin kisses him on the cheek, loud and smacking, there is not a spot of tension in his body, and Bilbo relishes in that loose-limbed comfort he spend so long working for only to lose it – yet here it is again, come back – faithful.
Thorin rests his nose in the sanctuary of Bilbo’s neck and says, “I will take any and all moments with you.”
~
Sora proves too fond of his adopted hills to stay in Erebor permanently, but he lingers, like many others until spring when the snow thaws and the unearthed soil proves black and beautiful for the growing season.
(Gemna and her father took their leave of Erebor before Thorin and Bilbo even emerged from the Forge Hall, cursing the king and his hobbit all the way – but some things in the end, do not matter, and work themselves out.)
Bilbo sees Sora off from the gate personally, with a hug, and a promise of a firm scolding if he did not send a raven every now and again.
“I’ll be back, Bilbo,” he promises. “It is my job after all. You’ll be growing your own crop soon enough, but better now that we keep the grain flowing between my family and yours, yes?”
“You’ve done more than that,” Bilbo says, holding his hand over his forehead to block out the sunlight. He’s squinting at Sora, saddled up on a shaggy pony, its bridle covered in Durin blue pendants, its saddle stitched in threaded geometric gold patterns. There’s a new sword at his belt too, one of the finest blades yet out of the new forges.
Dís has been very generous in her gifting, if only because Thorin no longer mopes about the mountain in a self-induced heartbreak.
“I am proud of it.” Sora leans his head to the side and smiles. “Though I think it is time to leave, lest your husband boots me off his doorstep himself.”
And yes, there was Thorin by Erebor’s gate, with a bear fur wrapped round his shoulders like it was mid-winter. But that, and the silver gleam of his new crown, made him quite an imposing figure even from leagues away.
“I won’t let him,” Bilbo swears and means it.
Sora bows his head for the Consort Under the Mountain, and turns his pony round into a canter, following the caravan line already on a march ahead back to the Iron Hills. Bilbo lingers, to watch him go, then sprints, with a skip, back to his mountain.