Clarity of Vision Chapter 28
Title: Clarity of Vision, Chapter 28
Relationship: Thorin/Bilbo
Characters: Bilbo Baggins, Thorin, Kili, Fili, Balin, Dwalin, Dís
Fandom: Hobbit
Warnings/Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Word Count: 3600
Story Summary: In a Middle-Earth where Erebor never fell, a shadow remains in the heart of the Lonely Mountain. Bilbo Baggins finds himself drawn reluctantly into a quest that will lead him across the continent--from Bree to Lake Evendim to the icy North and beyond--with a party of five dwarves searching for an artifact that will cure the ailing King Thrór.
Chapter Summary: The road from Bree to the Misty Mountains is a smooth one. Only a few crises arise, such as goblin attacks and public speaking.
"Ow!" Bilbo said as he was jolted a few inches to the left. "I think I rather prefer travelling by horseback, all things considered."
Thorin looked up from the parchments he was studying. "Wagons are more practical for covering long distances at a steady pace," he said. "Oxen tire less quickly and can pull heavier loads." He waved at the boxes of tea and the supplies being brought back from Ered Luin. There had barely been room for the two of them, but Thorin had refused to evict anyone from their own wagon, so they had settled down among the groceries and mining materials. "There is also safety in numbers, and our cargo is too valuable to risk. If we are lucky and the mountain pass is open, we may well make Erebor in a month." The wagon shuddered as it hit another rock, and he winced. "Though I admit it has its drawbacks."
"I'm sure being undercover will be nice when it's windy or snowing," Bilbo said, indicating the canvas stretched in an arch over the top of the wagon. "But I do miss seeing the sky and the trees and everything."
"What a hobbit you are," said Thorin, amused. "One tree is much like another, and the sky is merely the sky, after all."
"A birch is nothing like a beech, and they're both completely different from a pine," Bilbo retorted. "And as for the sky--it's different every day and every hour. Who could tire of watching it? How you can bear to live sealed up in stone, I don't know."
Thorin opened his mouth as if to make some sardonic rejoinder, then closed it again and looked down at his parchments. Bilbo saw him swallow. After a moment he put the papers down and moved to the back of the wagon, where he untied a section of the canvas and opened it up. "Come here," he said.
Bilbo gingerly made his way to the back and sat down next to Thorin on the floor of the wagon, crossing his legs.
"What's that?" Thorin said, pointing.
"That? Why, that's a sycamore, of course."
"A sycamore," Thorin repeated. "And that?"
"A fir." Bilbo looked at him. "You don't expect me to believe dwarves really don't know any of this?"
"Obviously some of us learn such things," said Thorin. "But growing things are...not generally the province of my people." He pondered for a moment. "Let me ask you a question: what do you call the soft black rock you dig out of the ground that burns smokily?"
"That sounds like coal," Bilbo said.
"And what do you call the hard black rock that burns without smoke?"
"Well, that's coal too," said Bilbo. "Just...one is high-quality coal and one is low-quality coal. There are probably fancier Westron words for them, but I don't know them."
"Just so," said Thorin, looking pleased. "In Khuzdul those are two different rocks, just like your shikkymore--"
"--Sycamore."
"--yes, that, and your beech are different trees. In general we have two words for trees: zurm-khubûb-ghelekh and zurm-khubûb-zuz."
Bilbo rummaged through his meager Khuzdul. "Tree-forge-good and tree-forge-bad?"
Thorin nodded. "Trees good for burning and trees not good for burning."
Bilbo considered this for a time. "That seems...kind of sad to me," he said finally. "But then, I suppose it's sad that I don't see a lot of differences in rocks and gems, for that matter."
There was a long pause as the wagon jolted along. "I suggest a trade," Thorin said. "I shall continue with our Khuzdul lessons, and in return you can teach me the names of the trees and plants we see."
"Oh," said Bilbo, "That sounds quite nice! It's a shame there are no flowers blooming right now, but perhaps I could sketch some for you and we could study that way."
Thorin nodded gravely. "Acceptable," he said.
So Bilbo spent the long day explaining the difference between an oak and a maple, and quizzing Thorin on different kinds of pines, and learning the Khuzdul for various items of clothing as well as reviewing the genitive case.
And at some point when the wagon hit a particularly rough patch of road, Thorin put his arm around him to steady him, and Bilbo decided he didn't mind wagon travel so much after all.
Their progress was plodding and steady, and the days fell into a routine as they headed east toward the Misty Mountains. After hearing Fíli and Kíli praising Bilbo's cooking extravagantly, the wagonmaster decided to put him to work helping with meals. This arrangement made Bilbo feel more useful, but had the drawback of making him run afoul of the official caravan cook, a fussy and meticulous dwarf with very strong ideas of proper cooking.
"He sounds quite a bit like you, actually," Thorin said one evening in their wagon, as Bilbo complained that mushrooms were never meant to be stewed when they could be braised, and was it really necessary to use that much pepper on everything?
Bilbo sputtered in outrage, then subsided. "Well," he said after a moment, "There's nothing worse than two fussy people, you know. Because we're never fussy in the same way, and so it's bound to be a disaster."
Thorin took a bite of dinner and chewed thoughtfully. "You're right, though," he said. "Too much pepper."
"Well, of course I'm right," Bilbo snapped, his outrage rekindled. "Can't you go out there and tell that murderer of meals to stop it? You're his prince, after all!"
"I was stripped of my title by my father, remember? I am just a common dwarf," Thorin said.
Bilbo burst out laughing.
"What?" Thorin felt annoyance prickle his skin.
"As if you are a common anything," chortled Bilbo.
"You did not think I resembled a prince when first we met," Thorin reminded him, and Bilbo turned a bit pink.
"I didn't have the faintest what a prince would even look like," he said. "Besides, it's different here, in front of your people. Do you really not see how they look at you? My dear Thorin, they act as though you're their king already."
"Hush," said Thorin, and made a quick sign against ill-luck. "I will not be king of Erebor for many years still."
"Everyone in this caravan would die for you, is what I'm saying. And you've been acting differently since we joined them, too. You really don't notice it?" he added curiously, looking at Thorin's face. "You're more...regal in front of them. More remote. Like a mountain in the far distance, grand and unattainable."
Thorin shrugged uncomfortably at the wistful tone to his voice. "Luckily I have companions like Balin and Dwalin, who know better than to take me too seriously."
"Not just Balin and Dwalin," said Bilbo. Thorin looked at him, and he smirked. "I believe Fíli and Kíli have learned not to take you too seriously either."
"That's a comfort," Thorin retorted, feeling obscurely relieved.
Bilbo finished up his meal with a few extra complaints and then tilted his head, frowning. "What's that sound?" It was a gentle rattling noise against the canvas stretched over the wagon. "It sounds like…"
He lifted the cloth at the back; Thorin looked over his shoulder to see a shifting gray curtain thrown over the hills that faded into the twilit distance. "This is good," he said.
"Rain is good?" Bilbo sniffed. "Seems like an extra hassle to me."
"It means warmer weather, and a chance that it will melt the snow from the passes," Thorin said. "We may get to Erebor even sooner than I thought." He let the flap drop and turned back to his work. "I may not be too late to save my father and grandfather."
"I still wish you'd speak to that dratted cook," Bilbo grumbled, but gave Thorin a crooked smile to show that he didn't mean anything by it. And so they traveled on through the dusk in a comfortable silence, listening to the rain patter on the cloth, the whistling of the driver and the snorting of the oxen.
The rain slowed them down now and then when wagons became mired in mud, but their progress was steady, and soon they were rising up into the foothills of the Misty Mountains. Bilbo looked slightly wistful when he realized they were going to bypass Rivendell, but even he had to admit that a few dozen dwarves might be a little much for the Last Homely House to handle.
The weather cleared again and Bilbo insisted on riding outside on one of the shaggy pack ponies, his breath steaming around him in the thinning air and his cheeks red with cold. Thorin rode beside him, looking back at the trail of wagons dotting the rutted road. His people.
They were raided by goblins once, late at night as everyone was cleaning up from dinner. Thorin couldn't find Bilbo in the chaos of gibbering shrieks and lowing oxen and felt panic grip him, then forcibly reminded himself that Bilbo had survived Moria perfectly well without him and returned to grimly slashing at the furious hordes. As the goblins began to flee, he finally spotted Bilbo fighting back-to-back with the fussy cook, armed with his knife and a frying pan as a shield.
"Why didn't you use the--you know?" Thorin asked him later, as the camp settled down for the night. He could hear drunken songs breaking out; everyone was still full of nervous energy from the attack.
"The--oh, the ring?" said Bilbo, sounding faintly surprised. "I guess it didn't cross my mind. It wasn't like I was going to duck out on Dori, after all," he added. "I've finally got him to understand how to properly cook venison, it would be a waste if he got himself killed."
Thorin hid a smile at the fact that the "dratted cook" apparently had a name at last, and turned back to his parchment, squinting at the angular lines. After so many years of reading Sindarin, Khuzdul almost looked strange to him sometimes.
Don't think about it, he told himself. You are on your way home at last.
"What's wrong with Thorin? What do you mean? I hadn't noticed any change." Kíli didn't look up from the arrow shaft he was whittling. All around them, camp was breaking for the morning; the sounds of hammering and yelling surrounded them.
"The past few nights, he's been studying something to the point of not sleeping," Bilbo said. "He snapped at me when I was whistling, told me he needed to concentrate."
"Sounds normal to me," Kíli said with a grin. Then he looked at Bilbo's expression and sobered. "I don't know, Bilbo, truly. You say something is bothering him?"
"He was reading out loud a little in Khuzdul. I couldn't understand most of it, of course, but I thought I heard the words for 'silver' and 'mithril.'"
"That narrows it down greatly," said Kíli, his eyes dancing, and Bilbo huffed a breath.
"Point taken. And maybe something about a 'secret light'?"
A hand came down from behind Kíli and cuffed him lightly on the head. Fíli put his hands on his hips and glared at his brother. "It's the Ceremony of the Moon, you clot. You hear it every year--don't you even listen?"
Kíli stuck out his tongue. "Not often."
Bilbo ignored their teasing. "The Ceremony of the Moon? Didn't you mention that before? What is it?"
Fíli's face scrunched up and he scratched his nose. "Hey, Balin!" He waved Balin over. "Could you explain the Ceremony of the Moon to Bilbo? You're better at these things than I am."
"Well, now," Balin said comfortably, settling on the log next to Kíli. "There's a long history behind the Ceremony of the Moon, and it's important to remember that--"
"--The abbreviated version is fine," Bilbo said hastily. "I mean, we're moving out soon and I want to make sure I get the basics."
"Oh," said Balin, looking disappointed for a moment. Then he brightened: "In its simplest form, the Ceremony of the Moon is held on the night of the dark of the moon closest to the Winter Solstice, thus the darkest night of the year. On this night, we gather around great bonfires to mourn the death of the moon and implore Mahal the Maker to bring it back to us. We sing late into the night, until the bonfire dies out. It's one of our high rites, very solemn."
"Very boring," corrected Kíli, and Balin gave him a disapproving frown.
"Well, why is Thorin worrying about it so much?"
"Oh!" said Balin. "I hadn't thought--the Ceremony will be in two nights. It's a call-and-response chant, started by the highest-ranking woman in any community, and followed by the highest-ranking man. We--he and Dwalin and I, I mean--haven't celebrated it in years; it can't be done without a woman to start the chant." He scratched his head. "I'm thinking it likely he tried to get out of it claiming he wasn't a prince any longer, and I'm thinking it equally likely that Dís was having none of that. Now, in order to fully understand the Ceremony, it's important to go back to the dawn of time, when Mahal made the Seven Fathers of the Dwarves deep within the mountains of Middle Earth, crafting them in the darkness in secret."
Across the camp, Thorin and Bilbo's wagon lurched into motion, and Bilbo gave a squeak of alarm (mixed with some relief) and ran after it before he was left behind. Thorin was leaning out the back, holding out his hand with an exasperated look, and Bilbo grabbed it and was swung in just in time.
"Balin was telling me about the Ceremony of the Moon," Bilbo said as they settled in. "Will you be leading it with your sister?"
Thorin made a grumbling noise in his throat. "I told her Balin was a better choice."
"That's what you've been so irritable about," Bilbo said. "You're nervous."
"I am always irritable," Thorin said.
"This is a different kind of grumpiness from your usual baseline cantankerousness," Bilbo said. Thorin glared at him. "Oh, I don't blame you for being nervous," Bilbo added, pulling a needle and thread out of his pack. "Having to recite something in front of a big crowd--I'd be jittery too."
"It is not that," Thorin said. "Well, not entirely. It's that...it has been so long," he said softly. "I have not celebrated the Ceremony of the Moon for more than thirty years. Three decades I have been on the road, away from my kind. I fear sometimes that I have become…" He hesitated. "...un-dwarvish." He made a sound caught somewhere between a sigh and a growl. "I do not believe I can express in Westron the wrongness of such a thing."
Bilbo frowned down at the sock he was darning. "I'm certainly no judge of dwarvishness," he said. "But I would think Balin and Dwalin and Dís would tell you if there were something wrong." He shrugged. "They adore you. Everyone here adores you, even if you are irritable almost all the time." He looked up at Thorin and raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying you don't trust their judgment?" Looking away from Thorin's wry smile, he cleared his throat. "So, am I allowed to attend this Ceremony?"
"You are part of our community. I spoke to Dís about it, and she agrees that you are an honorary dwarf and thus welcome at our rites."
"Well," said Bilbo. "You'd better tell me more about so I know what I'm getting into."
"Very well." Thorin got more comfortable on his cot and crossed his arms. "To begin with, you must understand the beginnings of the dwarven people, before the coming of either Elves or Men. Deep under Mount Gundabad, Mahal crafted the Seven Fathers of the Dwarves, and kept them there in the secret darkness. Now it happened that…"
The story was a long and quite fascinating one, and involved Mahal coming to the greatest smiths of the dwarves "in the time of starlight" and leading them in the crafting of two great vessels of silver and gold, burnished to brightness. Bilbo listened intently as he stitched, enjoying the cadences of Thorin's voice and the way it blended with the creak of the wheels, the rustle of canvas.
After all, as the Old Took always said, "A long story for a long road is a blessing indeed."
"So I hear tonight is the big Ceremony," Bilbo said.
Thorin grunted without looking up from his papers.
"Nice coincidence that it came just as we reached the highest point of the High Pass," Bilbo added. "Good clear weather, too."
"Why do you not wear the brooch I gave you?"
"What?" Bilbo looked confused, and Thorin frowned.
"You have not worn the brooch since you left the Shire."
"I--Well, it seemed unwise to wear something so valuable in Bree. Lots of shady folk there, after all."
"We are no longer in Bree," Thorin pointed out.
"I--" Bilbo bobbed back and forth as if searching for the right words. Thorin waited. "I wasn't sure if you would mind or not. I mean, it's rather...conspicuous."
"I gave it to you," Thorin said simply. "I meant for you to wear it." He paused, considering. "Unless you prefer it be a private token."
"No, it's not--that is to say, I--"
A knock on the canvas at the back of the wagon broke off Bilbo's confused stammering, and Balin's head peeked in. "Thorin? Could you come and salt the bonfire?" He nodded at Bilbo's confused face. "For purification, of course."
"Of course," Bilbo echoed.
Thorin nodded and put down the parchments. "The Ceremony proper will not begin for a few hours," he said to Bilbo. "Balin will bring you if I am too busy."
Balin nodded and smiled; the canvas fell shut on Bilbo still standing in the middle of the wagon, his face wrinkled in concentration.
The wood was piled high for the bonfire; Thorin joined Dis in tossing a handful of salt on the pile and saying the correct words of consecration.
"You'll need this," Dís said, draping the ceremonial stole about his shoulders. He ran the smooth cloth through his fingers, feeling the cool of the mithril thread that picked out the raven sigil against his hands. She smiled at him, a tilted smile that was a little wry. "You've never had to do this before, have you? Grandfather and Father have always outranked you, whereas I have been the female leader for all of Erebor for decades now. Are you nervous?"
"Certainly not," Thorin said.
She took the two ends of the stole and tugged them gently. "I'm sure you'll do fine," she said reassuringly.
There were other preparations, of course: crescents and circles to be traced on the ground around the fire, auguries for the weather to be consulted, traditional thanks to be said to the preparers of food and cutters of wood. But soon enough the last glimmer of sunlight faded from the snow-capped peaks around them, and the spark was lit that would start the bonfire roaring.
Dís stepped forward, facing the crowd of dwarves. She lifted her hands to the sky and sang in Khuzdul:
Hear us, O Mahal; O maker of the Fathers, hear our prayer.
The moon has fallen into darkness, and its light is vanished from the sky.
We call to you, Mahal, maker of our fate: we pray for the return of the moon.
"Hear us, O Mahal," said the rest of the dwarves, a low rumble in the darkness before Dís began her second stanza.
Her voice was deep and solid as the mountains, and when had his little sister become so strong and so graceful? Thorin felt his eyes stinging suddenly as he watched her, imploring the Maker for the return of light. He blinked hard and saw Bilbo standing between Balin and Dwalin at the edge of the firelight, looking at him. Their eyes met and Bilbo winked.
And then it was his turn.
He stepped forward as Dís stepped back and closed his eyes, letting the old Khuzdul phrases resound from his heart as he lifted his voice:
For it was You who crafted it of purest silver; of finest mithril you forged it true.
You placed it in the sky to be our light; the secret light which none other ken.
For it waxeth and waneth in its secret ways, and so too do we Your people wax and wane.
The fire was warm on his face, and his sister was steady at his side; the voices of his people were with him in the dark, and the star at Bilbo's throat was brighter than any star in the sky.
In this day of darkness, in this time of blackness, we rest in our faith of You, Mahal.
As You did not abandon our Fathers, so surely You will not abandon us.
For we live in darkness, but the darkness does not claim us.
The secret light burns within us, the sacred light of joy.
Relationship: Thorin/Bilbo
Characters: Bilbo Baggins, Thorin, Kili, Fili, Balin, Dwalin, Dís
Fandom: Hobbit
Warnings/Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Word Count: 3600
Story Summary: In a Middle-Earth where Erebor never fell, a shadow remains in the heart of the Lonely Mountain. Bilbo Baggins finds himself drawn reluctantly into a quest that will lead him across the continent--from Bree to Lake Evendim to the icy North and beyond--with a party of five dwarves searching for an artifact that will cure the ailing King Thrór.
Chapter Summary: The road from Bree to the Misty Mountains is a smooth one. Only a few crises arise, such as goblin attacks and public speaking.
"Ow!" Bilbo said as he was jolted a few inches to the left. "I think I rather prefer travelling by horseback, all things considered."
Thorin looked up from the parchments he was studying. "Wagons are more practical for covering long distances at a steady pace," he said. "Oxen tire less quickly and can pull heavier loads." He waved at the boxes of tea and the supplies being brought back from Ered Luin. There had barely been room for the two of them, but Thorin had refused to evict anyone from their own wagon, so they had settled down among the groceries and mining materials. "There is also safety in numbers, and our cargo is too valuable to risk. If we are lucky and the mountain pass is open, we may well make Erebor in a month." The wagon shuddered as it hit another rock, and he winced. "Though I admit it has its drawbacks."
"I'm sure being undercover will be nice when it's windy or snowing," Bilbo said, indicating the canvas stretched in an arch over the top of the wagon. "But I do miss seeing the sky and the trees and everything."
"What a hobbit you are," said Thorin, amused. "One tree is much like another, and the sky is merely the sky, after all."
"A birch is nothing like a beech, and they're both completely different from a pine," Bilbo retorted. "And as for the sky--it's different every day and every hour. Who could tire of watching it? How you can bear to live sealed up in stone, I don't know."
Thorin opened his mouth as if to make some sardonic rejoinder, then closed it again and looked down at his parchments. Bilbo saw him swallow. After a moment he put the papers down and moved to the back of the wagon, where he untied a section of the canvas and opened it up. "Come here," he said.
Bilbo gingerly made his way to the back and sat down next to Thorin on the floor of the wagon, crossing his legs.
"What's that?" Thorin said, pointing.
"That? Why, that's a sycamore, of course."
"A sycamore," Thorin repeated. "And that?"
"A fir." Bilbo looked at him. "You don't expect me to believe dwarves really don't know any of this?"
"Obviously some of us learn such things," said Thorin. "But growing things are...not generally the province of my people." He pondered for a moment. "Let me ask you a question: what do you call the soft black rock you dig out of the ground that burns smokily?"
"That sounds like coal," Bilbo said.
"And what do you call the hard black rock that burns without smoke?"
"Well, that's coal too," said Bilbo. "Just...one is high-quality coal and one is low-quality coal. There are probably fancier Westron words for them, but I don't know them."
"Just so," said Thorin, looking pleased. "In Khuzdul those are two different rocks, just like your shikkymore--"
"--Sycamore."
"--yes, that, and your beech are different trees. In general we have two words for trees: zurm-khubûb-ghelekh and zurm-khubûb-zuz."
Bilbo rummaged through his meager Khuzdul. "Tree-forge-good and tree-forge-bad?"
Thorin nodded. "Trees good for burning and trees not good for burning."
Bilbo considered this for a time. "That seems...kind of sad to me," he said finally. "But then, I suppose it's sad that I don't see a lot of differences in rocks and gems, for that matter."
There was a long pause as the wagon jolted along. "I suggest a trade," Thorin said. "I shall continue with our Khuzdul lessons, and in return you can teach me the names of the trees and plants we see."
"Oh," said Bilbo, "That sounds quite nice! It's a shame there are no flowers blooming right now, but perhaps I could sketch some for you and we could study that way."
Thorin nodded gravely. "Acceptable," he said.
So Bilbo spent the long day explaining the difference between an oak and a maple, and quizzing Thorin on different kinds of pines, and learning the Khuzdul for various items of clothing as well as reviewing the genitive case.
And at some point when the wagon hit a particularly rough patch of road, Thorin put his arm around him to steady him, and Bilbo decided he didn't mind wagon travel so much after all.
Their progress was plodding and steady, and the days fell into a routine as they headed east toward the Misty Mountains. After hearing Fíli and Kíli praising Bilbo's cooking extravagantly, the wagonmaster decided to put him to work helping with meals. This arrangement made Bilbo feel more useful, but had the drawback of making him run afoul of the official caravan cook, a fussy and meticulous dwarf with very strong ideas of proper cooking.
"He sounds quite a bit like you, actually," Thorin said one evening in their wagon, as Bilbo complained that mushrooms were never meant to be stewed when they could be braised, and was it really necessary to use that much pepper on everything?
Bilbo sputtered in outrage, then subsided. "Well," he said after a moment, "There's nothing worse than two fussy people, you know. Because we're never fussy in the same way, and so it's bound to be a disaster."
Thorin took a bite of dinner and chewed thoughtfully. "You're right, though," he said. "Too much pepper."
"Well, of course I'm right," Bilbo snapped, his outrage rekindled. "Can't you go out there and tell that murderer of meals to stop it? You're his prince, after all!"
"I was stripped of my title by my father, remember? I am just a common dwarf," Thorin said.
Bilbo burst out laughing.
"What?" Thorin felt annoyance prickle his skin.
"As if you are a common anything," chortled Bilbo.
"You did not think I resembled a prince when first we met," Thorin reminded him, and Bilbo turned a bit pink.
"I didn't have the faintest what a prince would even look like," he said. "Besides, it's different here, in front of your people. Do you really not see how they look at you? My dear Thorin, they act as though you're their king already."
"Hush," said Thorin, and made a quick sign against ill-luck. "I will not be king of Erebor for many years still."
"Everyone in this caravan would die for you, is what I'm saying. And you've been acting differently since we joined them, too. You really don't notice it?" he added curiously, looking at Thorin's face. "You're more...regal in front of them. More remote. Like a mountain in the far distance, grand and unattainable."
Thorin shrugged uncomfortably at the wistful tone to his voice. "Luckily I have companions like Balin and Dwalin, who know better than to take me too seriously."
"Not just Balin and Dwalin," said Bilbo. Thorin looked at him, and he smirked. "I believe Fíli and Kíli have learned not to take you too seriously either."
"That's a comfort," Thorin retorted, feeling obscurely relieved.
Bilbo finished up his meal with a few extra complaints and then tilted his head, frowning. "What's that sound?" It was a gentle rattling noise against the canvas stretched over the wagon. "It sounds like…"
He lifted the cloth at the back; Thorin looked over his shoulder to see a shifting gray curtain thrown over the hills that faded into the twilit distance. "This is good," he said.
"Rain is good?" Bilbo sniffed. "Seems like an extra hassle to me."
"It means warmer weather, and a chance that it will melt the snow from the passes," Thorin said. "We may get to Erebor even sooner than I thought." He let the flap drop and turned back to his work. "I may not be too late to save my father and grandfather."
"I still wish you'd speak to that dratted cook," Bilbo grumbled, but gave Thorin a crooked smile to show that he didn't mean anything by it. And so they traveled on through the dusk in a comfortable silence, listening to the rain patter on the cloth, the whistling of the driver and the snorting of the oxen.
The rain slowed them down now and then when wagons became mired in mud, but their progress was steady, and soon they were rising up into the foothills of the Misty Mountains. Bilbo looked slightly wistful when he realized they were going to bypass Rivendell, but even he had to admit that a few dozen dwarves might be a little much for the Last Homely House to handle.
The weather cleared again and Bilbo insisted on riding outside on one of the shaggy pack ponies, his breath steaming around him in the thinning air and his cheeks red with cold. Thorin rode beside him, looking back at the trail of wagons dotting the rutted road. His people.
They were raided by goblins once, late at night as everyone was cleaning up from dinner. Thorin couldn't find Bilbo in the chaos of gibbering shrieks and lowing oxen and felt panic grip him, then forcibly reminded himself that Bilbo had survived Moria perfectly well without him and returned to grimly slashing at the furious hordes. As the goblins began to flee, he finally spotted Bilbo fighting back-to-back with the fussy cook, armed with his knife and a frying pan as a shield.
"Why didn't you use the--you know?" Thorin asked him later, as the camp settled down for the night. He could hear drunken songs breaking out; everyone was still full of nervous energy from the attack.
"The--oh, the ring?" said Bilbo, sounding faintly surprised. "I guess it didn't cross my mind. It wasn't like I was going to duck out on Dori, after all," he added. "I've finally got him to understand how to properly cook venison, it would be a waste if he got himself killed."
Thorin hid a smile at the fact that the "dratted cook" apparently had a name at last, and turned back to his parchment, squinting at the angular lines. After so many years of reading Sindarin, Khuzdul almost looked strange to him sometimes.
Don't think about it, he told himself. You are on your way home at last.
"What's wrong with Thorin? What do you mean? I hadn't noticed any change." Kíli didn't look up from the arrow shaft he was whittling. All around them, camp was breaking for the morning; the sounds of hammering and yelling surrounded them.
"The past few nights, he's been studying something to the point of not sleeping," Bilbo said. "He snapped at me when I was whistling, told me he needed to concentrate."
"Sounds normal to me," Kíli said with a grin. Then he looked at Bilbo's expression and sobered. "I don't know, Bilbo, truly. You say something is bothering him?"
"He was reading out loud a little in Khuzdul. I couldn't understand most of it, of course, but I thought I heard the words for 'silver' and 'mithril.'"
"That narrows it down greatly," said Kíli, his eyes dancing, and Bilbo huffed a breath.
"Point taken. And maybe something about a 'secret light'?"
A hand came down from behind Kíli and cuffed him lightly on the head. Fíli put his hands on his hips and glared at his brother. "It's the Ceremony of the Moon, you clot. You hear it every year--don't you even listen?"
Kíli stuck out his tongue. "Not often."
Bilbo ignored their teasing. "The Ceremony of the Moon? Didn't you mention that before? What is it?"
Fíli's face scrunched up and he scratched his nose. "Hey, Balin!" He waved Balin over. "Could you explain the Ceremony of the Moon to Bilbo? You're better at these things than I am."
"Well, now," Balin said comfortably, settling on the log next to Kíli. "There's a long history behind the Ceremony of the Moon, and it's important to remember that--"
"--The abbreviated version is fine," Bilbo said hastily. "I mean, we're moving out soon and I want to make sure I get the basics."
"Oh," said Balin, looking disappointed for a moment. Then he brightened: "In its simplest form, the Ceremony of the Moon is held on the night of the dark of the moon closest to the Winter Solstice, thus the darkest night of the year. On this night, we gather around great bonfires to mourn the death of the moon and implore Mahal the Maker to bring it back to us. We sing late into the night, until the bonfire dies out. It's one of our high rites, very solemn."
"Very boring," corrected Kíli, and Balin gave him a disapproving frown.
"Well, why is Thorin worrying about it so much?"
"Oh!" said Balin. "I hadn't thought--the Ceremony will be in two nights. It's a call-and-response chant, started by the highest-ranking woman in any community, and followed by the highest-ranking man. We--he and Dwalin and I, I mean--haven't celebrated it in years; it can't be done without a woman to start the chant." He scratched his head. "I'm thinking it likely he tried to get out of it claiming he wasn't a prince any longer, and I'm thinking it equally likely that Dís was having none of that. Now, in order to fully understand the Ceremony, it's important to go back to the dawn of time, when Mahal made the Seven Fathers of the Dwarves deep within the mountains of Middle Earth, crafting them in the darkness in secret."
Across the camp, Thorin and Bilbo's wagon lurched into motion, and Bilbo gave a squeak of alarm (mixed with some relief) and ran after it before he was left behind. Thorin was leaning out the back, holding out his hand with an exasperated look, and Bilbo grabbed it and was swung in just in time.
"Balin was telling me about the Ceremony of the Moon," Bilbo said as they settled in. "Will you be leading it with your sister?"
Thorin made a grumbling noise in his throat. "I told her Balin was a better choice."
"That's what you've been so irritable about," Bilbo said. "You're nervous."
"I am always irritable," Thorin said.
"This is a different kind of grumpiness from your usual baseline cantankerousness," Bilbo said. Thorin glared at him. "Oh, I don't blame you for being nervous," Bilbo added, pulling a needle and thread out of his pack. "Having to recite something in front of a big crowd--I'd be jittery too."
"It is not that," Thorin said. "Well, not entirely. It's that...it has been so long," he said softly. "I have not celebrated the Ceremony of the Moon for more than thirty years. Three decades I have been on the road, away from my kind. I fear sometimes that I have become…" He hesitated. "...un-dwarvish." He made a sound caught somewhere between a sigh and a growl. "I do not believe I can express in Westron the wrongness of such a thing."
Bilbo frowned down at the sock he was darning. "I'm certainly no judge of dwarvishness," he said. "But I would think Balin and Dwalin and Dís would tell you if there were something wrong." He shrugged. "They adore you. Everyone here adores you, even if you are irritable almost all the time." He looked up at Thorin and raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying you don't trust their judgment?" Looking away from Thorin's wry smile, he cleared his throat. "So, am I allowed to attend this Ceremony?"
"You are part of our community. I spoke to Dís about it, and she agrees that you are an honorary dwarf and thus welcome at our rites."
"Well," said Bilbo. "You'd better tell me more about so I know what I'm getting into."
"Very well." Thorin got more comfortable on his cot and crossed his arms. "To begin with, you must understand the beginnings of the dwarven people, before the coming of either Elves or Men. Deep under Mount Gundabad, Mahal crafted the Seven Fathers of the Dwarves, and kept them there in the secret darkness. Now it happened that…"
The story was a long and quite fascinating one, and involved Mahal coming to the greatest smiths of the dwarves "in the time of starlight" and leading them in the crafting of two great vessels of silver and gold, burnished to brightness. Bilbo listened intently as he stitched, enjoying the cadences of Thorin's voice and the way it blended with the creak of the wheels, the rustle of canvas.
After all, as the Old Took always said, "A long story for a long road is a blessing indeed."
"So I hear tonight is the big Ceremony," Bilbo said.
Thorin grunted without looking up from his papers.
"Nice coincidence that it came just as we reached the highest point of the High Pass," Bilbo added. "Good clear weather, too."
"Why do you not wear the brooch I gave you?"
"What?" Bilbo looked confused, and Thorin frowned.
"You have not worn the brooch since you left the Shire."
"I--Well, it seemed unwise to wear something so valuable in Bree. Lots of shady folk there, after all."
"We are no longer in Bree," Thorin pointed out.
"I--" Bilbo bobbed back and forth as if searching for the right words. Thorin waited. "I wasn't sure if you would mind or not. I mean, it's rather...conspicuous."
"I gave it to you," Thorin said simply. "I meant for you to wear it." He paused, considering. "Unless you prefer it be a private token."
"No, it's not--that is to say, I--"
A knock on the canvas at the back of the wagon broke off Bilbo's confused stammering, and Balin's head peeked in. "Thorin? Could you come and salt the bonfire?" He nodded at Bilbo's confused face. "For purification, of course."
"Of course," Bilbo echoed.
Thorin nodded and put down the parchments. "The Ceremony proper will not begin for a few hours," he said to Bilbo. "Balin will bring you if I am too busy."
Balin nodded and smiled; the canvas fell shut on Bilbo still standing in the middle of the wagon, his face wrinkled in concentration.
The wood was piled high for the bonfire; Thorin joined Dis in tossing a handful of salt on the pile and saying the correct words of consecration.
"You'll need this," Dís said, draping the ceremonial stole about his shoulders. He ran the smooth cloth through his fingers, feeling the cool of the mithril thread that picked out the raven sigil against his hands. She smiled at him, a tilted smile that was a little wry. "You've never had to do this before, have you? Grandfather and Father have always outranked you, whereas I have been the female leader for all of Erebor for decades now. Are you nervous?"
"Certainly not," Thorin said.
She took the two ends of the stole and tugged them gently. "I'm sure you'll do fine," she said reassuringly.
There were other preparations, of course: crescents and circles to be traced on the ground around the fire, auguries for the weather to be consulted, traditional thanks to be said to the preparers of food and cutters of wood. But soon enough the last glimmer of sunlight faded from the snow-capped peaks around them, and the spark was lit that would start the bonfire roaring.
Dís stepped forward, facing the crowd of dwarves. She lifted her hands to the sky and sang in Khuzdul:
Hear us, O Mahal; O maker of the Fathers, hear our prayer.
The moon has fallen into darkness, and its light is vanished from the sky.
We call to you, Mahal, maker of our fate: we pray for the return of the moon.
"Hear us, O Mahal," said the rest of the dwarves, a low rumble in the darkness before Dís began her second stanza.
Her voice was deep and solid as the mountains, and when had his little sister become so strong and so graceful? Thorin felt his eyes stinging suddenly as he watched her, imploring the Maker for the return of light. He blinked hard and saw Bilbo standing between Balin and Dwalin at the edge of the firelight, looking at him. Their eyes met and Bilbo winked.
And then it was his turn.
He stepped forward as Dís stepped back and closed his eyes, letting the old Khuzdul phrases resound from his heart as he lifted his voice:
For it was You who crafted it of purest silver; of finest mithril you forged it true.
You placed it in the sky to be our light; the secret light which none other ken.
For it waxeth and waneth in its secret ways, and so too do we Your people wax and wane.
The fire was warm on his face, and his sister was steady at his side; the voices of his people were with him in the dark, and the star at Bilbo's throat was brighter than any star in the sky.
In this day of darkness, in this time of blackness, we rest in our faith of You, Mahal.
As You did not abandon our Fathers, so surely You will not abandon us.
For we live in darkness, but the darkness does not claim us.
The secret light burns within us, the sacred light of joy.