"-. .-"
Bilbo wandered the hallways and rooms for a long time. The smial had the same style, the same proportions, the same number of rooms and corridors, the same kind of candelabra hanging from the ceiling, and Bilbo knew Bungo couldn't have made those, he was no smith. Neither was Tom, technically, but surely he could do anything he put his mind to. Or did they just get them on order, from Bree or some other place?
Maybe it was all done in Buckland and nobody saw fit to tell Bilbo. Or they didn't know? Or pretended to? Gorbadoc Brandybuck, you sly old cat. Bilbo was going to have words next time he stopped by, if the dragon didn't eat him.
Bag End didn't have any of the newer additions or changes to the amenities. It didn't have any crockery or cutlery, for example, besides the most basic sets lovingly carved from apple wood. Nor any of the books and pictures. It certainly had none of the touches of a lived-in home, despite Bungo Baggins having arguably an even greater right to the place.
But for all that, here it was. Home. And here he was too, Bilbo Baggins. He'd traveled to the liminal boundary of the Eldest's realm, delved into the deepest depths of the Old Forest that he'd not been given leave to delve before, and now that he had, here he was. In Bag End.
There was wood already collected, so he lit fire in the hearth and watched the merry blaze. He was satisfied to see that the flame caught quickly. The smoke fled through the chimney just as well as ever too. His father had even recreated the old rocking chair, so Bilbo climbed in it and sat there. Thinking. Wondering.
He played mindless tunes on his flute. He plucked at his lute. He rubbed at his fiddle strings. He strung and hummed and plucked while wondering at what new song to sing for the occasion. He wondered about that for what felt like an entire day and night, despite that the sunlight in the windows didn't seem to move more than a foot.
Finally, he decided he could come up with no new song that was fitting. He decided new songs didn't fit the occasion at all.
It wasn't new tunes he needed, but the old.
So he sang those instead. Every song that was sung in Bag End, those were the ones he played, in the exact same order that they were first heard within the smial's walls the first time around.
The music sprung from him. Songs were sung anew, in perfect pitch with not a note out of place, save when he'd done something different the first time around. He didn't remember many things without writing them down on a schedule, but for music his memory was perfect. Sad songs, merry songs, slow ones, fast ones, and everything in between. They came in the same order that they had been played in Bag End the first time, on big occasions and small occasions, and most often on no occasion at all. When his fingers tired, his voice lulled the rooms and hallways awake. When his voice tired, he plucked and ran his bow over strings while eating and drinking from the meal he'd intended for another.
His fëa spread alongside his songs, infusing the walls, the roof, the floor and the earth beyond them, then further. Up through the grass and flowers to bask in the light of the sun. Wide along the roots of trees and shrubs to entertain the gnats and worms, and the moles that couldn't see but paused in their digging to listen because they could hear very well indeed. Further still his spirit unfolded, down the tunnel leading from the pantry into the earth beneath the brook and onwards from there.
It was a mirror of his own underpassage, which he'd dug and appointed all by himself all the way to the Took Hobbit-Home. This one led not there, but to Tom's home, and Bilbo sensed the underground water pooling and flowing just in reach of a good shovel and pickaxe, if he but put his back into it for a few months and weeks. Just below the spot where Belladonna's memorial would be, if this were the Shire.
Bilbo sang and played and sang and played until his fëa finally reached as far as the edge of the Forest to the west. Buckland. The Shire. And, through that, he touched the sleepy, probing regard of Bag End the First and Only, who always kept its mind aimed at the Old Forest after Bilbo Left. Always Bag End's own fëa wandered where its mind wondered, thinking and singing with Tom, and Goldberry, even Bungo when he wasn't haunting someone else half-way across the world, if he truly did as he boasted. All the while looking forward to the day of its own Master's return.
Bilbo could feel all their spirits now. He felt the traces of Bungo's fëa as he'd worked on the home but did his best not to leave more of himself behind than he should. He sensed the lively and pure tinkle and crinkle of the River-Daughter in every puff and whisp and vapour and trickling raindrop, in the streams flowing through wood and hill. Amidst and throughout all of them, the fëa that was Tom Bombadil was positively radiant and immanent, suffusing every last nook and cranny of the Old Forest and well past it. Even those spots and places that flowers, birds and animals held for themselves, and the trees that Old Grey Willow-man's presumed to claim as his own.
Deep beneath and within and around all, the light of the Secret Fire blazed and coaxed all living things to live their dreams as real as they were themselves. As they will be real, once the Music has run its course and a new, purer one may finally make a world unmarred spring forth.
Would it be presumptious of him, to bring one of those distant future notes into the Music of the now?
Even decades after he'd first wondered at that question, Bilbo still didn't have an answer.
But he still had precisely no qualms about doing it anyway.
What'll it be, home mine? Bilbo thought where Bag End thought, so far and yet so close. Will you dwell where I dwell, as before?
Bag End was shocked. Startled. Amazed.
It was disbelieving, hesitant, suspicious when probing at him, at the edges of Bilbo's spirit and mind, and then deeper.
But when Bilbo opened himself to it, his home joyously leapt forward and embraced him. It didn't even need to rely on the mighty and merry spirit all around that was Tom, and it didn't leave Bag End any more than it arrived to the new one. It was Bag End and Bag End was always Bag End, the one and the same and only, as sure as the Secret Fire blazed below and above and all around them.
Bilbo felt its mind connect with his. He felt when the tunnels of Here became the same as the tunnels of Back. He felt it when Back became one and the same with Here and Back again. He felt the fëa that was Bag End engulf his surroundings until it was as if Bilbo had never stepped out of his door at all.
Bilbo sagged in breathless wonder as Bag End nestled around him, in and through and all beyond the tunnels, walls, floor, roof, and all throughout the hill.
His fiddle trailed off, but the song continued. It picked up over in his music room, where Bag End sometimes played with him and for him on all manner of pipes and strings and drumbeats, because Bilbo had made it a point to collect at least one of every instrument he could find out in the world.
The furnishings moved and settled in their proper places. The crockery and cutlery was now all in their correct locations throughout the home, filling the desks and cupboards. With sudden clarity, Bilbo knew he would be able to walk to his office and find his desk right as he'd last seen it. His paper and books and inkpot, too, were right where he'd left them.
Most amazing of all, he sensed his pantry. And his larder. They were full.
Now what's that about?
He'd told the Gaffer and Fortinbras and everyone else with a nose in his business, to take what they wanted from his larder so at least the perishables didn't go to waste. Bilbo now knew, as he always knew everything in and of Bag End, that the Gaffer and Fortinbrasm and everyone else other than the Sackvilles had instead decided to regularly restock his larder and keep it that way, just in case.
Could Fortinbras finally be warming up to the idea to 'house sit' Bag End while Bilbo was away, as he'd offered?
How fortunate that is the case, Bilbo thought dryly as Bag End finally began to think past its all-new homecoming bliss to pay heed to what was happening outside. I don't suppose you can pretend we're not home?
Bag End didn't hear him. It was too excited. As a matter of fact, it swooned.
Bebother and cofusticate, why are you like this? Who sowed their oats around my hill when I wasn't looking? You certainly don't get this from me!
There came a tremendous ring on the front-door bell.
Bilbo hopped out of his chair, strode over to put on the kettle, put out a second cup and saucer, was most conflicted at seeing the plate of cakes that Bag End had rustled up from somewhere – even though it was too busy doting on the ruffian outside to even hear Bilbo thinking at it – and went to the door.
"I am sorry to keep you waiting!" Bilbo was going to say, when he saw that it was not any sight he expected at all. Or, well, it was, except instead of the drab and rough appearance of before, the dwarf before him had a long, well brushed beard tucked into a golden belt, and very bright eyes under a large, magnificent dark-green hood. Its collar was so wide and the back trailed so far down that it was practically a cloak, reaching all the way to the dwarf's ankles.
"Dwalin at your service!" he said with a low bow.
"Bilbo Baggins at yours!" said the hobbit, too surprised to say anything else in the moment.
Dwalin's beard…
It was blue.
When the silence that followed threatened to become uncomfortable, Bilbo shook his head clear. "I hope you appreciate what a heartfelt marvel you're wearing there." A little stiff perhaps, but he meant it kindly. What could one do, if an uninvited dwarf came and knocked on one's door wearing not just accoutrements most ancient, but also a large, pristine hood woven out of-
"Oh, believe me, we know," Dwalin harrumphed, walking in when Bilbo stepped aside and hanging his hood in the nearest peg. He grabbed his new belt, then let go as if he was embarrassed at being caught in the act. "This is a princely gift, it is. Dwarven craftsmanship like this hasn't disappeared, exactly, but it's up there, and the maker's mark is my great grandfather's."
"Princely in more ways than you know." Bilbo said, motioning for the dwarf to follow him. "What you have there probably didn't come from the tomb of the Prince of Cardolan, but it was undoubtedly from one of his prime retainers. They had many dealings with your kin in those days. I am not surprised Tom was able to find the perfect one for you, even in his whimsies he is most considerate. But that wasn't what I was talking about."
"Your meaning?"
"The hood," Bilbo said, stopping to look the dwarf in the eye. "The fabric is made of wool freely given by wild landraces fed exclusively on what Tom gives them by hand, it is dyed with the essence of the most verdant spring flowers, and it was sown together by Godlberry with string from her own hair."
Dwalin's eyes widened, and he looked furtively in the direction of the door they had left behind three turns ago. "I will cherish it like it was my own child."
"Let's not go quite that far," Bilbo shook his head, smiling. "I am just about to take tea. Pray come and have some with me."
"Don't mind if I do." Dwalin gladly accepted. "… Did your old man really just build a new Bag End here? It looks literally the same, same door and walls, even the fireplace mosaic is the same, and the curtains…"
"That's Bungo Baggins for you," Bilbo shrugged, choosing not to elaborate on everything that hadn't been present a while and a half earlier, including the curtains. He glanced at Dwalin as closely as he could without giving himself away, but the dwarf didn't seem to feel Bag End's spirit any more than he did before, without Bilbo to make the bridge. The house was carefully not doing any of the things that had disturbed the dwarf during his first visit.
Dwalin's hair was as blue as his beard.
They had not been at the table long, in fact they had hardly reached the third cake, when there came another, even louder ring at the bell.
"That'll be the boys, no doubt," Dwalin grunted. "They couldn't wait to be the first to clean up after they saw me do it. Well, one of 'em anyhow."
"It's not them," said the hobbit, and off he went to the door before he was asked to explain.
It was, indeed, not the princes. Instead, it was a certain contract drafter with his same long and white beard. Covering his head was again a cloak-with-a-hood, this one colored scarlet – no, no, still better to call it a hood-with-a-cloak, them dwarrows had wide shoulders. And big heads.
"Good afternoon!" Bilbo greeted the figure at the door.
"And so it is, though I think it might rain later."
Bilbo nodded. "Quite right, it's not Goldberry's washing day yet, but some things she likes to keep especially clean and sparkling throughout, and dew just isn't enough for some things."
The dwarf blinked at the information he had no way to understand, but decided not to ask. He caught sight of Dwalin's green hood hanging up. "I see the others have begun to arrive already." He hung his red one next to it and put his hand on his breast. "Balin at your service!"
"Bilbo Baggins, at yours," Bilbo replied, happy to find the words were all honest. He generally liked visitors, but these ones had been a notable exception. He was glad to be able to like them this time, even if he'd have preferred to know they would arrive beforehand. And to have asked them himself. Also, depending on how much more unrestrained they were this time, the cakes might actually run short, unlike before. If that happened, then he, as the host, might have to go without. How dreadful. "Come along in, and have some tea!"
"A little beer would suit me better, if it is all the same to you, my good sir," said Balin. "But I don't mind some cake – seed-cake, if you have any."
Oh dear, I'm not the only one acting more familiar and unapologetic about all this. "Amazingly enough, both seem to be available."
Bilbo led Balin to the dining room and left him with his brother to marvel over Bag End's second coming, while he scuttled off to the cellar to fill a pint beer-mug. He also went to the pantry to fetch two beautiful round seed-cakes which – he smelled them – ah, the Gaffer had baked them just that afternoon, and given them to Bag End because it looked lonely.
Those Gamgees, honestly.
When he got back, Balin and Dwalin were talking at the table about the exalted nature of their new hoods. Bilbo plumped down the beer and the cake in front of them, and the two brothers both opened their mouths at once – perhaps to vow all over again that they would care for their new cloaks like they were treasures instead of things to keep off the rain – when loud came the bell again, and then another ring.
Now it was the princes at the door, and while Fili looked the same save for his new garb, Kili could not have looked more different. Different from his old self, but almost identical to his brother, save for the shorter beard. The dwarves both had blue hoods, silver belts, and hair of a clear yellow like the flowers of a camellia tree. Each of them carried a bag of tools and a spade. And as soon as Bilbo had opened the door, they hopped in without prompting as if they'd been invited. Bilbo was hardly surprised at all.
"What can I do for you, my dwarves?" he said.
"Kili at your service!" said the one. "And Fili!" added the other, and they both swept off their blue hoods and bowed.
"At yours and your family's," replied Bilbo, making a vain attempt to cover his smile. "Not going to sully the glory box this time, I hope."
"Surely not!" Kili scoffed, and he sounded like an indulgent ancient king more than a mere boy, for a moment. Knowing whose dreams his odd luck had made him live out the day before, Bilbo wasn't really surprised by this either.
"Dwalin and Balin here already, I see," said Fili. "Let us join the throng!"
Bilbo followed after them and leaned against the frame to the den to watch them. The four dwarves soon were snacking and talking, about Bag End just for a little while, then about mines and gold and troubles with the goblins, the depredations of dragons, and how their new hoods were made by the Missus' own with her own hair so you two rascals had better not use them as wipers, you hear that?
Bilbo felt oddly like the talk should have been a tad bit more adventurous, when, dong-a-ling-dang, his bell rang again, as if little Hamfast was trying to pull the handle off. He actually felt like he was back in Hobbiton for a moment there, that's how faithfully even the bell had been recreated. Or was that just more of Bag End bringing itself over?
"That'll be three more," Bilbo said, blinking, looking outside through Bag End's eyes to figure out if it was the Ri or Ur brothers.
"And a fourth, I should say by the sound," said Fili. "Besides, we saw them coming along behind us in the distance."
Bilbo shook his head as he left for the entrance, pretending not to know what Fili was talking about. He also didn't let them know it wasn't four, but five now.
This time, Bilbo made sure to jump aside lest the pileup succeed in killing him like it failed the first time. Mercifully, however, these dwarves managed not to crash all over each other, never mind on top of him. Also, it wasn't the Ur brothers that accompanied Dori, Nori and Ori, but Oin and Gloin this come-around. Very soon, two purple hoods, a grey hood, a brown hood, and a white hood were hanging on the pegs, and off the dwarves marched with their broad hands stuck in their gold and silver belts to join the others.
The throng was more than half-way complete, and they were not shy of taking Bilbo up on his hospitality. Some called for ale, one asked for porter, one for coffee, and all of them wanted cakes. Needless to say, Bilbo was kept very busy for a while. He was rapidly reaching the limit that a single hobbit could do when playing host.
Before he could summon up one or three of the dwarves to help, however, a particularly loud knock sounded. Bilbo had to look out through Bag End's eyes again, just to make sure it really wasn't a hard hat that was banging against his beautiful green door.
It wasn't a hard hat. It was a long, gnarled, familiar staff.
Bilbo practically flew through the hallways to the door and pulled it open. This was where the world showed that the Music still had some bad turns to toss at the little people – Bifur, Bofur and Bombur fell forward in a heap all over again, just as they had the first time. Thankfully for Bilbo's life expectancy – and his back – his sense of self-preservation did make sure to have him out of reach of the pile-up this time around. He merely stood aside the door, altogether exasperated.
And there, behind the three groaning dwarrow, who else would be leaning on his staff and laughing?
"Gandalf," Bilbo harrumphed. "You better not have put a dent in my door, it's brand new!"
"All over again and also old at the same time, yes, I can well see," said the wizard. "Peace, peace! It is not like you, Bilbo, to keep friends waiting on the mat, and then open the door like a pop-gun! Now let me just pick up these three, let's see, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur-"
"At your service!" said Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur standing in a row. The happy smiles as they looked at each other for speaking all at once, all together were practically blinding. No, really, Bag End couldn't see anything for several seconds after it happened, that was how bright the unseen world blazed with their combined cheer.
The three hung up two yellow hoods and a pale green one next to the others.
"Now, almost all of us are here, once again!" said Gandalf, looking at the row of the twelve cloaks that also doubled as the best detachable party hoods. The wizard hung his own hat next to them, though with a peg left free between them, as they were still missing the thirteenth. "Quite a merry gathering! I hope there is something left for the late-comers to eat and drink! Is that tea I smell? No thank you! A little red wine for me, I think."
"You think," Bilbo echoed as he walked in step with the wizard to see to his guest right. "Where did you even sprout from, wizard? I didn't want to think you'd just abandoned this lot in a huff when they didn't wait for you in their rush to catch up with the princes. But you also never showed up at Tom's doorstep either, so I wasn't sure what to think."
"That I didn't show up at the door of Bombadil until now was not for lack of trying, I assure you." Gandald grumpily accepted the carafe of wine, settled on a chair near the window and took a long chug. "I was just behind this silly lot, up until they entered the Old Forest ahead of me. By the time I traced their steps, what should have taken me ten minutes ended up lasting nigh on two days! I know many queer things occur around this spot, but for time to go all wizened and senile is a first, even for this old wizard."
"I am relieved to learn it was such a silly predicament."
"That makes one of us," Gandalf huffed, taking another long drink before setting the wine aside to light his pipe. "If I did ought to annoy the Master of these lands, I'd appreciate not being kept in suspense so I may make whatever amends he requires, however unjustified."
"Tom's not that kind of Master," Bilbo said mildly. "I doubt he was thinking about you at all, when he did – well, what Tom does."
"My dear hobbit, that does not reassures me at all, why I've a mind to-"
The door pounded with the strike of a closed fist, once, twice, three times.
Like the first time, everyone else trailed after Bilbo as he went to greet the king of Durin's Folk. As before, the round, green door opened inward. Unlike before, however, Bilbo Baggins leaned against the edge as his eyes finally landed on the dwarf beyond the threshold, and he stared. There he was, Thorin son of Thrain, son of Thror, King of Durin's folk. Strong, wide, haughty, and wearing the most beautiful of all the hooded cloaks of all, a sky-blue one with a long silver tassel.
Bilbo didn't spare his attire the slightest glance. "What the devil happened to you?" he blurted instead. It was terrible manners, but what else could a hobbit do? All he had eyes for was Thorin's beard. It was so big and thick and long that it reached all the way to the ground. Also, it was snow-white.
Thorin glared. "I do not care to speak of it."
Bilbo covered his smirk too late. "You went to bother Tom when he was singing at Goldberry's window, didn't you?"
"I said," Thorin ground out through his clenched teeth. "I do not care to speak of it."
"Of course," Bilbo nodded agreeably, trying and failing to conceal the fact that this was the funniest thing he'd seen all year. "I understand the feeling well. The Master doesn't just serenade his Lady in the mornings, he does what he wants when he wants how he wants."
Thorin looked like his eyes might burn Bilbo to a crisp right where he stood. Considering that his eyes were blue instead of gold or red, that was quite the achievement.
Bilbo cleared his throat. "I assume that making even the most oblique suggestion that a dwarf might want to, say, trim his front hairs a little remains the utmost sacrilege?"
Now the only thing missing was the spitting lightning. Perhaps Thorin had a heretofore unknown affinity for it, rather than just flame? Poor dwarf wouldn't have any way to know, what with living under a rock all his life. Bilbo would have to ask Elrond about checking for it somehow, when they passed through the Last Homely Home. "Right then. Do come in, if it pleases you. Would you prefer tea or some other drink?"
With a visible effort of will, Thorin stopped frowning. Finally, he stepped inside the door. Unlike the first time, he forewent his bid for the title of the worst guest in the history of Hobbiton, placed his hood on the free peg near the door, and said: "I will have wine."
"And I'll have raspberry jam and apple-tart," said Bifur.
"And mince-pies and cheese," said Bofur.
"And pork-pie and salad," said Bombur.
"And more cakes and ale and coffee, if you don't mind," called the other dwarves from behind him.
"And maybe put on a few eggs, there's a good fellow!" Gandalf added glibly as Bilbo turned around to give the throng a flat stare over his crossed arms. "And just bring out the cold chicken and pickles while you're at it!"
"Well now!" Bilbo drawled. "Since you all seem to know as much about the inside of my larders as I do myself, how's about you come and lend a hand?"
"Way ahead of you, Your Highness!" Fili called from a bit further in, waving in the direction of the kitchen. "See?"
Sure enough, Balin and Dwalin were already at the door of the kitchen when he got there, though they didn't dare go in without permission. Bilbo supposed his performance the first night had stayed with them.
Good.
And so the dwarves helped the hobbit be a proper host. As well they should, the least an uninvited guest could do was not be a bad one on top of it.
The rest of the day was most good, full of light talk and grim talk, casual words and serious words, and soft words and merry shouts, and all the while good drink and fresh food sprang from Bag End's generous larders.
Bilbo got to sit at the head of his own table without any oblique snipes or slanted eyes from the thirteen dwarves all round. Gandalf sat at the other end of the table, then the sofa near the wall, then the second of the rocking chairs in front of the fire. The dwarves ate and ate, and talked and talked, and time got on. Until, at last, they pushed their chairs back, sung their cleaning song before Bilbo could even make a move to collect the plates and glasses, and everyone took to chairs and armchairs and lounges to be calm and at ease.
Even Thorin let himself go a little, making a fair bid at competing with Gandalf in the honoured art of blowing smoke rings. Bilbo decided not to poke him, but he did get Fili and Kili to prod their uncle about his uncannily permissive mood instead. It took some doing, but they made him admit he didn't want to impinge on the joy brought by Bifur's good fortune. Making him admit that was like trying to rip an osier out by the roots bare-handed, but prod they did and admit he did.
Bilbo was quite proud of those two.
And Thorin too, he supposed. A little.
Alas, Thorin inevitably lost the competition, as Gandalf sent smoke rings of his own to pierce and pop all of Thorin's one after another. The king put out his pipe with a grunt.
Then, to Bilbo's complete shock that everyone was likewise too stunned to notice, Thorin shouted. "Now for some music! Bring out the instruments!"
There was silence most stupefied.
Thorin scowled at the disbelieving stares of everyone around him and decided, for some unfathomable reason, that Bilbo would be the most reasonable choice of who to address next. "Master hobbit! Your kin close and distant boasted about you having every possible instrument there is. Care to show proof of claim?"
Bilbo, wonderingly, began to smile. "It would be easier to tell me what instruments you want, because you'll all fall asleep before I finish espousing them all." Which was not the same as listing them, the world didn't have that many different instruments unfortunately, it was why he'd made it his life's work to create an all-new one. But if they weren't going to make too big a fuss over it…
"You heard the hobbit, you lot. Get to it!"
The other dwarves sent Bilbo amazed looks, so he shrugged and motioned that they follow. Which they all did like big, loud, tromping ducks.
"And bring me a harp while you're at it," Thorin's voice followed them.
When he showed them into his music room, the dwarves filed in one after another and stopped to stare. Then, Kili and Fili to pick up little fiddles. Dori, Nori, and Ori went to the flutes, Bombur chose a drum, Bifur and Bofur went for the clarinets, and Dwalin and Balin waited for last, at which point they both chose viols as big as themselves. Dwalin offered to carry them both, so Balin went in one last time and, with Dori's help, picked up the massive harp and carefully carried it to Thorin while the rest of the company followed in their wake like a respectful fanfare.
It wasn't the most beautiful harp Bilbo had ever seen, in fact that honor belonged to Thorin's own harp, either made or plated wholly in gold. Bilbo had witnessed him play exactly once, that year when finally made it to the Blue Mountains, though for the sake of Gloin's son no one would ever be told. The only reason he got to see the performance, despite Thorin only playing in private settings, was because Gimli had secretly led him in through a service passage to listen in. He'd not expected that hiring the lad to figure out how to make his very specific steel cords would earn him that sort of favor, but that was a story in and of itself.
Right now, all that mattered was that Bilbo's harp, though not made of gold, produced, as all his instruments did, the perfect tune.
When Thorin struck the strings, the music began all at once, so sudden and sweet that Bilbo forgot everything else, and was swept away into dark lands under strange moons, far over The Water and very far from his hobbit-hole under The Hill. Bag End itself responded to the shift in mood, and though the dwarves experienced in unison the realization that this Bag End was every bit as Bag End as the other Bag End, they only sang and played along all the more keenly.
The dark filled the room, the fire died down, the shadows were lost, and still the dwarves played on. And, finally, first one, then two, and then others and more, added their voices to their strings and woodwind and drumbeats, until Bag End rumbled with the deep-throated singing of the dwarves in the deep places of their ancient homes.
Far over the misty mountains cold
To dungeons deep and caverns old
We must away ere break of day
To seek the pale enchanted gold.
The dwarves of yore made mighty spells,
While hammers fell like ringing bells
In places deep, where dark things sleep,
In hollow halls beneath the fells.
For ancient king and elvish lord
There many a gleaming golden hoard
They shaped and wrought, and light they caught
To hide in gems on hilt of sword.
On silver necklaces they strung
The flowering stars, on crowns they hung
The dragon-fire, in twisted wire
They meshed the light of moon and sun.
Far over the misty mountains cold
To dungeons deep and caverns old
We must away, ere break of day,
To claim our long-forgotten gold.
Goblets they carved there for themselves
And harps of gold; where no man delves
There lay they long, and many a song
Was sung unheard by men or elves.
The pines were roaring on the height,
The winds were moaning in the night.
The fire was red, it flaming spread;
The trees like torches blazed with light.
The bells were ringing in the dale
And men looked up with faces pale;
The dragon's ire more fierce than fire
Laid low their towers and houses frail.
The mountain smoked beneath the moon;
The dwarves, they heard the tramp of doom.
They fled their hall to dying fall
Beneath his feet, beneath the moon.
Far over the misty mountains grim
To dungeons deep and caverns dim
We must away, ere break of day,
To win our harps and gold from him!
The lines and rhymes continued well and long, deep into the evening, and then night. The dwarves sang the full history of the Lonely Mountain and its loss, and their hopes for reclaiming it and the wonders it would once again see and make. They plied their instruments and sung with their rumbling voices until the sounds of the forest faded, the fire burned to embers, and the stars came out in the dark sky above the trees.
In his chair across from Thorin, Bilbo watched and listened, even as Bag End followed the song, and the thoughts and dreams and memories of the dwarves, all across the water and land and forests and mountains, through old tunnels and new ones, and a kingdom built into a distant, lonely mountain hollowed out by hand.
The love of dwarves was fierce and jealous, but the love of beautiful things made by hands and by cunning was as pure as any magic Bilbo had ever witnessed.
Or worked.
When the song finally ended, none seemed inclined to break it. They all sat and waited, in the dark. A dark room for business not nearly as dark as the one that had so harshly tainted it before. The business was still grim, however, as Bilbo was loath but resigned to see coming from miles off, though the dwarves clearly didn't share his view.
"Bring out the contract," Thorin commanded.
Bilbo sat forward in his chair and continued to meet Thorin's eyes as Balin and Ori rose, briefly exited the room, and returned with a large scroll folded up like a fourteen-segment accordion. Meanwhile, Nori produced and lit Bilbo's lantern, which the hobbit often used when going around at night, and which, unbeknownst to any of his guests save maybe the wizard, had been all the way back in Hobbiton until that very moment.
Bilbo accepted the new contract and read.
"Thorin and Company to Master Bilbo of Bag End, Kin Once Removed to his Royal Personage, Isumbras Took the Fourth, Thain of the Shire,
Greetings! For your hospitality our sincerest thanks, and for the honor of your professional assistance our sincere request. Terms: cash on delivery, up to and not exceeding one fourteenth of total profits (if any); all travelling expenses guaranteed in any event; funeral expenses to be defrayed by us or our representatives, if occasion arises and the matter is not otherwise arranged for.
"We have the honour to remain
"Yours deeply,
"Thorin & Co."
Bilbo looked up from the contract. He looked at Thorin, who was inscrutable. He looked at Gandalf, who had the grace not to look as if he thought Bilbo's agreement was guaranteed. He looked at the other dwarves, who were hopeful. He looked at Kili, who made no effort to catch his attention but nonetheless got it, because he was the only one among the dwarves who seemed to know what he would say.
Bilbo folded the paper back up, stood from his chair and gave the contract back to Balin, unsigned.
"Ask me again in Rivendell."
"-. .-"
That night, when the dwarves and Gandalf were all asleep, Bilbo Baggins rose from his bed and set out, at long last, on his own errand. His one, big, most brazen, most important self-appointed errand since he finally made it to Ered Luin years ago, to get help making reality out of his big, all-new design for a never-before-seen music instrument.
He paused at the door. He listened to the dwarves' loud, rumbling snores. He looked at the instruments arrayed along the hallway wall. He looked at the blue wizard's hat and thirteen colorful hoods hanging by the door.
Bilbo Baggins left Bag End feeling like something that had long been broken in the world was now mended.