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Clarity of Purpose, Chap. 2
Title: Clarity of Purpose, Chap. 2
Chapter Summary: Bilbo flees the Shire with Thorin on a stormy, wind-swept night.
Relationship: Thorin/Bilbo
Characters: Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield
Fandom: Hobbit/Lord of the Rings. Begins in 2968, twenty-six years after the events of "Clarity of Vision" and fifty years before the canonical events of "Lord of the Rings." Thus, characters' ages and the geopolitical situation will be different than LoTR canon!
Warnings/Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Word Count: 2300
Summary: Thorin Oakenshield and Bilbo Baggins have been parted for many years now, despite the love they bear each other. Now Thorin's research has uncovered a dire threat to Middle Earth--the Ring he carried a little while and then gave to Bilbo. Together with a group of companions composed of the different Free Peoples of Middle Earth, they must attempt to destroy the artifact before its Dark Lord can re-capture it.
Bilbo Baggins had never ridden a horse before in his life. Ponies, certainly. But horses were made for drawing wagons and ploughs, and most definitely not for perching on while flying over the ground at a breakneck pace.
Bilbo wrapped his arms more tightly around Thorin and held on for dear life.
The cottages and farms of the Shire flashed by as they galloped east and south through the icy rain and gusting winds, and Bilbo waited for the familiar terrors to grip him, waited for the unshakeable certainty that he had forgotten something, that he must turn back, to sink its claws into him and force him to beg Thorin to return. He waited, shivering with more than cold, feeling the powerful flanks of the horse beneath him carrying him further and further from Bag End, from safety, from home.
It was only as the stallion's hooves thundered on the bridge across the Brandywine, leaving the Shire irrevocably behind, that Bilbo could admit that he felt no terror, no compulsion. He didn't feel anything at all.
No, that wasn't exactly true.
As he rode through the dim and rain-washed dawn with Thorin, his destination unknown, with danger clearly stalking their every step, Bilbo realized his heart was pounding and the world seemed sharp and focused. He could smell the leather of Thorin's coat and the scent of wet horse, feel the the rattle of the rain across them, cold and bracing. There was a strange wild beauty to it, Bilbo thought as thunder muttered and rolled nearby. He felt his arms tighten once more around Thorin's waist, and for an instant Thorin leaned back slightly against him, an acknowledgement of his presence. Bilbo could feel Thorin's long loose hair brushing against his curls like a caress. It was truly Thorin, he thought, not a daydream or a fantasy, and the mysterious emotion in him flared brighter, suffusing his whole body.
Cowards who did not dare to leave their homes did not feel joy at fleeing through the night on a black horse into the unknown with a dwarven king. That was how Bilbo knew that the unknown emotion that was pulling at the corners of his mouth, making his heart race, and bringing tears to his eyes--whatever it was, it could not be joy.
By the time they camped late in the day, however, the strange feeling had long since given way to weariness and irritation. Thorin helped him off the stallion--it was far too high for him to dismount alone--and he collapsed into a groaning heap on the sodden ground.
"Couldn't we have stopped sooner?" he moaned, staggering to his feet on legs that felt made of rubber. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to walk again."
Thorin was already collecting the driest sticks he could find to make a fire under an outcropping of rock, away from the endless drizzle. "If you hadn't insisted on delaying our departure, we could have stopped sooner," he growled, his gaze flicking across the landscape, his hand on his sword hilt even as he knelt to blow a spark into life.
"Well, forgive me for wanting to make sure I had everything before you dragged me off into the wilderness!" Bilbo wobbled over to the fire, his damp clothes unpleasantly chill around him, and sat down on a stone, holding out his hands to the flame.
"We needed nothing beyond you and--and that which you carry," said Thorin.
"Well, at least you let me grab that mithril coat of yours. I have a bad feeling that might come in handy," huffed Bilbo. "Really, of all the rude behavior--barging in and insisting I leave this very minute, that the fate of the world hinges upon it, my goodness, you haven't changed a bit." Though he had, Bilbo realized with a painful twinge, seeing where the threads of gray in his hair and beard had turned to streaks of silver.
"Neither have you," Thorin snapped, gazing around the little copse as he unsaddled his horse. It lipped placidly at his hair, unconcerned by the rain. "Now," he said as he returned to the shadow of the rock where Bilbo sat, "To understand the situation, we must go back to the Second Age, when a being calling himself Annatar, the giver of gifts, came to the elves and cozened them with flattery and lies. And they--"
"--Do you really think so?" stammered Bilbo. "That I haven't changed, I mean? Because--" He broke off, looking away from Thorin's dear face with an effort--so many years, so much time lost--and into the fire, which swam and shimmered in his vision. All the shocks of the night seemed to be catching up with him at once, somehow. "Because I rather think I have; after all, I wasn't--I wasn't brave enough to come to you, all those years. I fear I have grown small and old, and--and afraid, and petty, and--"
He broke off as strong arms caught him up and held him close. "Never say such things," whispered Thorin into his hair, wrapping his arms around Bilbo's shaking frame. "Do not speak so; I shall never let you speak so, not while I am here with you at last." He held Bilbo and murmured ridiculous, extravagant endearments until Bilbo's shoulders stopped shaking, until he took a long, trembling breath and nodded against Thorin's chest.
"I'm all right," Bilbo managed finally. "So." He cleared his throat. "You were telling me about the Second Age?"
He felt Thorin's small huff of breath: not quite a laugh, not exactly a sigh. "The history lesson can wait," Thorin said, wrapping his arms more securely around Bilbo. "Sleep."
Warmed by the fire on one side and by the warmth of Thorin's body on the other, Bilbo fell asleep listening to the rain fall on the leaves.
He dreamed not of the Shire and his cozy home, but of open spaces: plains and seas and vast expanses of sand, all shining bright in the sun.
The history lesson was postponed until the next evening, as they made camp by the road. "In the Second Age, a being seemingly of great wisdom and cunning came to the elves then living in Eregion--the land through which we now ride, as a matter of fact--under the rule of Galadriel and Celeborn," said Thorin.
Bilbo looked up from the fire. "The Lord and Lady of Lothlórien? The ones I met?"
Thorin nodded. "The very same."
Bilbo frowned. "So...if that was the Second Age, and this is the Third...how long ago was that?"
"It was six thousand years ago."
Bilbo nearly dropped the piece of jerky he was nibbling on. "The world is so old," he complained.
"May I return to my utterly essential history lesson?" asked Thorin gravely, but there was laughter lurking in the depths of his eyes. When Bilbo waved at him to proceed, he cleared his throat and continued: "Galadriel could see the untruth at the heart of Annatar, but his real nature was hidden from her. He was one of the greatest of the servants of Morgoth, the Enemy of All, called by his foes Sauron, the Abhorred. But his fair guise and flattering tongue won over the hearts of many of the elves, and he convinced them to rise up against Galadriel and Celeborn and drive them from Eregion. Then were Galadriel and Celeborn sundered for a time, for Galadriel went to Khazad-dum and took shelter there before passing to Lothlórien in the east, but Celeborn would not enter the halls of the Dwarves. But Galadriel was a guest in Moria for many years, and great was her friendship with the dwarves in those days gone by."
"Oh," said Bilbo. "She...she seemed to like you," he remembered.
"She is unusually wise and sagacious, for an elf," Thorin agreed, deadpan. "But here she passes from our tale, for now Sauron, under the guise of Annatar, had sway over the smiths of Eregion. Working with them, there were made twenty rings of great power. Nine of them he gave to human kings, and seven to dwarves. The elven smith Celebrimbor made three rings for the elves, and Sauron's hand never touched them. But lastly, deep in the heart of Mount Doom in his kingdom of Mordor, he made one final ring. And this ring focused all his power, and bent its will upon the sixteen rings he had forged. The humans who held the Nine were enslaved to him utterly, and though the dwarves proved impossible to enslave, the power of the One Ring twisted the seven dwarven rings in ways more subtle and yet still baneful. And that One Ring gave Sauron immense power, until the day it was cut from his hand and he was defeated--for a time."
The shadows beyond the little campfire were deepening; Bilbo glanced at them nervously and then back at Thorin. "I'm--I'm guessing that you didn't drag me from my home in the dead of night to give me a history lesson," he stammered. "Is my ring connected to this somehow? Did Sauron make that one too?"
"Show it to me," said Thorin.
Bilbo reached into his pocket and drew it out. It had been quite a while since he had really looked at it, he realized, and as he saw it now he was enchanted anew by its beauty: so simple, yet every curve seemed so utterly right and soothing to gaze upon. He felt himself smiling as he held it up to let the firelight glint on it.
Then he caught a glimpse of Thorin's face, trapped within the golden circle, and blinked in surprise, for Thorin's expression was stiff with loathing, as if staring at a deadly snake or a handful of maggots. "What--"
He never finished his question, for Thorin reached out with a stick and flicked the ring from his hands into the fireplace.
"No!" cried Bilbo, leaping forward. He felt Thorin's hand holding him back, and realized he had been about to reach into the fire to save his ring. It lay there in the fire, reflecting the flames all around it in golden glory, and Bilbo ached to seize it back.
"It will not melt," said Thorin's voice in his ear. "It is heavier than even the purest gold; why did I never realize that in all the time I carried it?" His voice was thick with disgust. "Blind fool."
He reached out once more with the stick, spearing the golden circle and drawing it unharmed out of the flames. "Put out your hand," he said.
Bilbo hesitated, his hand trembling and uncertain, torn between his terrible desire to have his ring back and fear of being burned.
"It will not harm you," said Thorin. "Do you trust me?"
Bilbo swallowed and nodded, and the tremor left his hand.
"Truest of hearts," murmured Thorin. He let the ring fall into the palm of Bilbo's hand and turned away as if he could not bear to see it touch Bilbo's skin.
It felt heavier than before, somehow, as if it had absorbed the heat of the fire and turned it into gold; yet it was only warm to the touch. He held it up, looking at it--and caught his breath.
"There are words engraved on the inside," said Thorin without looking at it, and his voice was a dead thing, filled with bleakness.
"Yes. How did you know?" said Bilbo. He stared at the exquisite letters of flame twining and untwining along the gold.
"I have found...documents, deep in Erebor, that told me of this," said Thorin. "I cannot read the letters on the ring, but I know what they mean." He snapped the stick over his knee with a sudden, savage movement, and hurled the pieces into the dark. "Put it away," he said, and Bilbo blinked, for his voice was gentle and filled with pain, at odds with the fury of his actions.
Bilbo tucked the ring back in his breast pocket. "Tell me what they mean," he said, but somehow he already knew.
"You carry the One Ring of Sauron," said Thorin. "The essence of his corrupting power, the item that could give him total sway over all of Middle Earth. He seeks it now, Bilbo, with an unsleeping malice. He will not rest until it is his once more. He has sent out--"
He broke off suddenly, staring into the shadows beyond the campfire, which seemed pitifully small in the vast darkness. Bilbo started to say something, and Thorin made a brusque gesture to keep silent. Bilbo swallowed his words, feeling sweat prickling his skin even in the cold. Thorin motioned for Bilbo to stand against the largest of the boulders, then placed himself in front of him, barring the way, his hand on his sword hilt. An eerie silence seemed to fall across the clearing, and for a long moment they stood without moving as the fire crackled and Thorin's eyes scanned the shadows.
Then Thorin unsheathed his sword with a grating of steel and bent to seize a burning brand from the fire, all in one fluid motion. "Show yourself!" he cried into the night. "And know well that before you touch a hair on his head, you must first spill my heart's blood onto the earth!" There was a desperate ferocity in his voice as he brandished his sword, standing between Bilbo and the darkness. "And the blood of the Line of Durin shall cost you dear!"
For another long moment nothing happened. Then from the darkness came a wry chuckle. Beyond the fire a form stepped from the shadows, coalescing into a figure in a gray robe with a smile on his familiar face.
"Tharkûn." Thorin's growl mingled relief and exasperation in equal measures.
"Gandalf!" squeaked Bilbo.
Chapter Summary: Bilbo flees the Shire with Thorin on a stormy, wind-swept night.
Relationship: Thorin/Bilbo
Characters: Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield
Fandom: Hobbit/Lord of the Rings. Begins in 2968, twenty-six years after the events of "Clarity of Vision" and fifty years before the canonical events of "Lord of the Rings." Thus, characters' ages and the geopolitical situation will be different than LoTR canon!
Warnings/Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Word Count: 2300
Summary: Thorin Oakenshield and Bilbo Baggins have been parted for many years now, despite the love they bear each other. Now Thorin's research has uncovered a dire threat to Middle Earth--the Ring he carried a little while and then gave to Bilbo. Together with a group of companions composed of the different Free Peoples of Middle Earth, they must attempt to destroy the artifact before its Dark Lord can re-capture it.
Bilbo Baggins had never ridden a horse before in his life. Ponies, certainly. But horses were made for drawing wagons and ploughs, and most definitely not for perching on while flying over the ground at a breakneck pace.
Bilbo wrapped his arms more tightly around Thorin and held on for dear life.
The cottages and farms of the Shire flashed by as they galloped east and south through the icy rain and gusting winds, and Bilbo waited for the familiar terrors to grip him, waited for the unshakeable certainty that he had forgotten something, that he must turn back, to sink its claws into him and force him to beg Thorin to return. He waited, shivering with more than cold, feeling the powerful flanks of the horse beneath him carrying him further and further from Bag End, from safety, from home.
It was only as the stallion's hooves thundered on the bridge across the Brandywine, leaving the Shire irrevocably behind, that Bilbo could admit that he felt no terror, no compulsion. He didn't feel anything at all.
No, that wasn't exactly true.
As he rode through the dim and rain-washed dawn with Thorin, his destination unknown, with danger clearly stalking their every step, Bilbo realized his heart was pounding and the world seemed sharp and focused. He could smell the leather of Thorin's coat and the scent of wet horse, feel the the rattle of the rain across them, cold and bracing. There was a strange wild beauty to it, Bilbo thought as thunder muttered and rolled nearby. He felt his arms tighten once more around Thorin's waist, and for an instant Thorin leaned back slightly against him, an acknowledgement of his presence. Bilbo could feel Thorin's long loose hair brushing against his curls like a caress. It was truly Thorin, he thought, not a daydream or a fantasy, and the mysterious emotion in him flared brighter, suffusing his whole body.
Cowards who did not dare to leave their homes did not feel joy at fleeing through the night on a black horse into the unknown with a dwarven king. That was how Bilbo knew that the unknown emotion that was pulling at the corners of his mouth, making his heart race, and bringing tears to his eyes--whatever it was, it could not be joy.
By the time they camped late in the day, however, the strange feeling had long since given way to weariness and irritation. Thorin helped him off the stallion--it was far too high for him to dismount alone--and he collapsed into a groaning heap on the sodden ground.
"Couldn't we have stopped sooner?" he moaned, staggering to his feet on legs that felt made of rubber. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to walk again."
Thorin was already collecting the driest sticks he could find to make a fire under an outcropping of rock, away from the endless drizzle. "If you hadn't insisted on delaying our departure, we could have stopped sooner," he growled, his gaze flicking across the landscape, his hand on his sword hilt even as he knelt to blow a spark into life.
"Well, forgive me for wanting to make sure I had everything before you dragged me off into the wilderness!" Bilbo wobbled over to the fire, his damp clothes unpleasantly chill around him, and sat down on a stone, holding out his hands to the flame.
"We needed nothing beyond you and--and that which you carry," said Thorin.
"Well, at least you let me grab that mithril coat of yours. I have a bad feeling that might come in handy," huffed Bilbo. "Really, of all the rude behavior--barging in and insisting I leave this very minute, that the fate of the world hinges upon it, my goodness, you haven't changed a bit." Though he had, Bilbo realized with a painful twinge, seeing where the threads of gray in his hair and beard had turned to streaks of silver.
"Neither have you," Thorin snapped, gazing around the little copse as he unsaddled his horse. It lipped placidly at his hair, unconcerned by the rain. "Now," he said as he returned to the shadow of the rock where Bilbo sat, "To understand the situation, we must go back to the Second Age, when a being calling himself Annatar, the giver of gifts, came to the elves and cozened them with flattery and lies. And they--"
"--Do you really think so?" stammered Bilbo. "That I haven't changed, I mean? Because--" He broke off, looking away from Thorin's dear face with an effort--so many years, so much time lost--and into the fire, which swam and shimmered in his vision. All the shocks of the night seemed to be catching up with him at once, somehow. "Because I rather think I have; after all, I wasn't--I wasn't brave enough to come to you, all those years. I fear I have grown small and old, and--and afraid, and petty, and--"
He broke off as strong arms caught him up and held him close. "Never say such things," whispered Thorin into his hair, wrapping his arms around Bilbo's shaking frame. "Do not speak so; I shall never let you speak so, not while I am here with you at last." He held Bilbo and murmured ridiculous, extravagant endearments until Bilbo's shoulders stopped shaking, until he took a long, trembling breath and nodded against Thorin's chest.
"I'm all right," Bilbo managed finally. "So." He cleared his throat. "You were telling me about the Second Age?"
He felt Thorin's small huff of breath: not quite a laugh, not exactly a sigh. "The history lesson can wait," Thorin said, wrapping his arms more securely around Bilbo. "Sleep."
Warmed by the fire on one side and by the warmth of Thorin's body on the other, Bilbo fell asleep listening to the rain fall on the leaves.
He dreamed not of the Shire and his cozy home, but of open spaces: plains and seas and vast expanses of sand, all shining bright in the sun.
The history lesson was postponed until the next evening, as they made camp by the road. "In the Second Age, a being seemingly of great wisdom and cunning came to the elves then living in Eregion--the land through which we now ride, as a matter of fact--under the rule of Galadriel and Celeborn," said Thorin.
Bilbo looked up from the fire. "The Lord and Lady of Lothlórien? The ones I met?"
Thorin nodded. "The very same."
Bilbo frowned. "So...if that was the Second Age, and this is the Third...how long ago was that?"
"It was six thousand years ago."
Bilbo nearly dropped the piece of jerky he was nibbling on. "The world is so old," he complained.
"May I return to my utterly essential history lesson?" asked Thorin gravely, but there was laughter lurking in the depths of his eyes. When Bilbo waved at him to proceed, he cleared his throat and continued: "Galadriel could see the untruth at the heart of Annatar, but his real nature was hidden from her. He was one of the greatest of the servants of Morgoth, the Enemy of All, called by his foes Sauron, the Abhorred. But his fair guise and flattering tongue won over the hearts of many of the elves, and he convinced them to rise up against Galadriel and Celeborn and drive them from Eregion. Then were Galadriel and Celeborn sundered for a time, for Galadriel went to Khazad-dum and took shelter there before passing to Lothlórien in the east, but Celeborn would not enter the halls of the Dwarves. But Galadriel was a guest in Moria for many years, and great was her friendship with the dwarves in those days gone by."
"Oh," said Bilbo. "She...she seemed to like you," he remembered.
"She is unusually wise and sagacious, for an elf," Thorin agreed, deadpan. "But here she passes from our tale, for now Sauron, under the guise of Annatar, had sway over the smiths of Eregion. Working with them, there were made twenty rings of great power. Nine of them he gave to human kings, and seven to dwarves. The elven smith Celebrimbor made three rings for the elves, and Sauron's hand never touched them. But lastly, deep in the heart of Mount Doom in his kingdom of Mordor, he made one final ring. And this ring focused all his power, and bent its will upon the sixteen rings he had forged. The humans who held the Nine were enslaved to him utterly, and though the dwarves proved impossible to enslave, the power of the One Ring twisted the seven dwarven rings in ways more subtle and yet still baneful. And that One Ring gave Sauron immense power, until the day it was cut from his hand and he was defeated--for a time."
The shadows beyond the little campfire were deepening; Bilbo glanced at them nervously and then back at Thorin. "I'm--I'm guessing that you didn't drag me from my home in the dead of night to give me a history lesson," he stammered. "Is my ring connected to this somehow? Did Sauron make that one too?"
"Show it to me," said Thorin.
Bilbo reached into his pocket and drew it out. It had been quite a while since he had really looked at it, he realized, and as he saw it now he was enchanted anew by its beauty: so simple, yet every curve seemed so utterly right and soothing to gaze upon. He felt himself smiling as he held it up to let the firelight glint on it.
Then he caught a glimpse of Thorin's face, trapped within the golden circle, and blinked in surprise, for Thorin's expression was stiff with loathing, as if staring at a deadly snake or a handful of maggots. "What--"
He never finished his question, for Thorin reached out with a stick and flicked the ring from his hands into the fireplace.
"No!" cried Bilbo, leaping forward. He felt Thorin's hand holding him back, and realized he had been about to reach into the fire to save his ring. It lay there in the fire, reflecting the flames all around it in golden glory, and Bilbo ached to seize it back.
"It will not melt," said Thorin's voice in his ear. "It is heavier than even the purest gold; why did I never realize that in all the time I carried it?" His voice was thick with disgust. "Blind fool."
He reached out once more with the stick, spearing the golden circle and drawing it unharmed out of the flames. "Put out your hand," he said.
Bilbo hesitated, his hand trembling and uncertain, torn between his terrible desire to have his ring back and fear of being burned.
"It will not harm you," said Thorin. "Do you trust me?"
Bilbo swallowed and nodded, and the tremor left his hand.
"Truest of hearts," murmured Thorin. He let the ring fall into the palm of Bilbo's hand and turned away as if he could not bear to see it touch Bilbo's skin.
It felt heavier than before, somehow, as if it had absorbed the heat of the fire and turned it into gold; yet it was only warm to the touch. He held it up, looking at it--and caught his breath.
"There are words engraved on the inside," said Thorin without looking at it, and his voice was a dead thing, filled with bleakness.
"Yes. How did you know?" said Bilbo. He stared at the exquisite letters of flame twining and untwining along the gold.
"I have found...documents, deep in Erebor, that told me of this," said Thorin. "I cannot read the letters on the ring, but I know what they mean." He snapped the stick over his knee with a sudden, savage movement, and hurled the pieces into the dark. "Put it away," he said, and Bilbo blinked, for his voice was gentle and filled with pain, at odds with the fury of his actions.
Bilbo tucked the ring back in his breast pocket. "Tell me what they mean," he said, but somehow he already knew.
"You carry the One Ring of Sauron," said Thorin. "The essence of his corrupting power, the item that could give him total sway over all of Middle Earth. He seeks it now, Bilbo, with an unsleeping malice. He will not rest until it is his once more. He has sent out--"
He broke off suddenly, staring into the shadows beyond the campfire, which seemed pitifully small in the vast darkness. Bilbo started to say something, and Thorin made a brusque gesture to keep silent. Bilbo swallowed his words, feeling sweat prickling his skin even in the cold. Thorin motioned for Bilbo to stand against the largest of the boulders, then placed himself in front of him, barring the way, his hand on his sword hilt. An eerie silence seemed to fall across the clearing, and for a long moment they stood without moving as the fire crackled and Thorin's eyes scanned the shadows.
Then Thorin unsheathed his sword with a grating of steel and bent to seize a burning brand from the fire, all in one fluid motion. "Show yourself!" he cried into the night. "And know well that before you touch a hair on his head, you must first spill my heart's blood onto the earth!" There was a desperate ferocity in his voice as he brandished his sword, standing between Bilbo and the darkness. "And the blood of the Line of Durin shall cost you dear!"
For another long moment nothing happened. Then from the darkness came a wry chuckle. Beyond the fire a form stepped from the shadows, coalescing into a figure in a gray robe with a smile on his familiar face.
"Tharkûn." Thorin's growl mingled relief and exasperation in equal measures.
"Gandalf!" squeaked Bilbo.