Chapter Text
The day Thorin, son of Thrain, grandson of the King Under the Mountain was born, the kingdoms of Erebor, Dale, and even the Woodland Realm came together in celebration. The news of the young prince’s birth brought joy throughout the lands, uniting the allied kingdoms as one.
But that joy was not to last.
For during the pregnancy, Thrain’s wife had fallen ill. Thror had called on all of Erebor’s allies to search for a cure, and eventually, one had been found- a magical starflower hidden deep in the Mirkwood, with incredible healing abilities. The medicine made from the flower had saved the princess’s life, and allowed her son to be born safely.
But unbeknownst to the elves, they were not the first to find the starflower. For hundreds of years, a Man known as Smaug had been using the flower to keep himself eternally young, and he was not happy to part with it.
But though the flower was gone, its power lived on in the young prince.
And so, Smaug disappeared into the night with the child, and celebrations of joy turned to mourning. Dwarves, Men, and elves searched, but no sign of Thorin or his kidnapper could be found.
But the royal family of Erebor refused to give up hope. And every year, on the prince’s birthday, the three allied kingdoms would send floating lanterns up into the sky, to remember him and to tell Middle Earth that they were still looking.
Little did they know that far away, beyond the Mirkwood and all the way in a deep cave in the Misty Mountains, a young dwarf snuck to the surface every year to watch the lights float over the distant forest.
Thorin had been fascinated with the lights since the first time he saw them.
He’d never known what possessed him, the first time, to sneak out of bed and up to the surface, but he couldn’t help but be enchanted by the lights that lit up the sky in the distance. They floated above the Mirkwood, coming from the forest… and beyond. He’d snuck up every night for months after that, but after a few years, he’d come to the conclusion that they only appeared on his birthday.
Thorin didn’t know what to make of that, but it felt… special.
But while the lights were beautiful, they were also incredibly far away, separated by the long distance between the Misty Mountains and Mirkwood. And he couldn’t help feeling that they would be even more incredible in person.
Only… Thorin never left the Misty Mountains. He never even left the cave that he and his father lived in. It wasn’t safe out there in the world, his father told him. It was barely safe in their little hidden cave- goblins lived in the Misty Mountains, and if the goblins knew what Thorin’s hair could do…
Well, suffice to say, his father would never allow Thorin to go. He’d absolutely forbid it. And Thorin understood that it would be dangerous. But he had to go. He had to see the lights in person, for reasons even he didn’t fully understand.
And his father wasn’t always home. Sometimes, he had to go out into the other caves in the Misty Mountains to make sure no goblins would find where they were hidden away. And so Thorin was left alone.
And when that happened? He planned.
Thorin would find a way to see the lights. No one and nothing was going to stop him.
Bilbo Baggins of the Shire, the best burglar in all Middle Earth, may have bitten off a bit more than he could chew. And because of this, he was currently running from a bear.
It had seemed like a good idea at the time, which was how he should have known something would go horribly wrong. But when he’d pickpocketed that secret dwarvish map and key that would allow him to break directly into the treasure vault of Erebor off of that wizard… well. The prize had been too tempting to resist.
And so in Bilbo’s coat pocket now rested the prize jewel of Erebor- the Arkenstone.
It would have been quite a successful theft, if only it hadn’t brought the combined wrath of Erebor, Dale, and Mirkwood down on his poor little head. It felt like Bilbo had been running for ages- from the dwarves that had chased them all the way to and into Mirkwood- and then, of course, there was Mirkwood. Bilbo had had quite enough with just the spiders trying to web him up and eat him, not to mention that definitely cursed magic sleep river- although that, at least, had taken care of the dwarves for him, because apparently ‘don’t just jump in the cursed river’ was not common sense to dwarves, and in any case, Bilbo wasn’t complaining about that.
Of course, it had done nothing to stop the elves that were also in pursuit, and, well. Then there had been the incident with the Elvenking’s elk.
And now, because fate was definitely having a good laugh at Bilbo’s expense, the biggest bear he had ever seen was chasing him too, for apparently no reason at all.
Well.
It was chasing them.
Because the runny icing on this ill-fated Brandybuck cooking experiment of a cake was Bilbo’s long-term, rather unfortunate partner in crime.
“It tries to eat us!” Gollum shrieked, scampering along beside Bilbo. “It tries to eat us!”
“Well maybe we could lose it so it stops trying to eat us,” Bilbo gritted out, “if you would be quieter.”
Really, while it had started out a profitable partnership, he was starting to lose patience. He couldn’t help it. Gollum was just such an irritating creature, with his somehow both menacing and childish ways, with the way he would just go off arguing with himself, with the raw meat. Bilbo might not have been the most respectable of hobbits anymore, but eating raw meat was something he just could not abide. And that was just a taste into all the ways that Gollum made Bilbo want to scream in frustration at all hours of the day.
And so, Bilbo was beginning to come to the conclusion that it was high time they parted ways.
Finally, likely because Gollum actually had stopped screeching, they were able to duck into some bushes to hide, and all was blissfully quiet.
“Okay,” Bilbo said, once he was certain that a bear wasn't about to lumber out of the bushes. “Okay. You stay here for a moment, I'm going to scout ahead and make sure it's safe to keep moving.”
It was, all in all, quite a reasonable suggestion, Bilbo thought. But his partner was eyeing him suspiciously. “Give us the precious first,” Gollum hissed.
Bilbo blinked. “What? No. That makes no sense. I’m going to scout ahead, I should take the precious.”
Gollum hissed. “No, no, no! The Baggins gives us the precious, and takes the pretty stone, and so it has to come back to us.”
Bilbo rolled his eyes. “Well in that case, it makes much more sense for me to give you the stone, and take the precious, because I don’t exactly need the Arkenstone for going scouting.”
“It makes sense, my love,” Gollum's more pleasant (low as the bar was) half declared.
“No!” the other half snarled. “It will abandon us!”
“No, my love!” the first half protested. “It leaves us the pretty stone, so it must come back!”
“It wants the precious!”
“But it also wants the pretty stone! That's why it brought us all this way!”
“It lies! It tricks us!”
“Then we keeps the pretty stone, and it doesn't get what it wants!”
“Fine, fine,” Gollum hissed. “It gives us the pretty stone, and it brings the precious right back.”
“You have my word,” Bilbo said.
He was, of course, lying through his teeth. But Gollum didn't need to know that.
And so, Bilbo reluctantly handed over the Arkenstone, which slipped into Gollum’s pocket- which looked rather comical, given that the stone was almost larger than Gollum’s loincloth. And then he slipped the small golden ring out of his pocket and onto his finger, and disappeared.
Or, at least, that’s how it would appear to Gollum. To Bilbo, it looked like the world took on a strange, muted tone, but to the rest of the world, he was invisible. Just like he wanted.
He made sure to make some noise when he left, so that Gollum knew he was leaving. And then, once he was far enough away, he turned around and returned with silent steps.
Gollum was right where Bilbo had left him, talking to himself as usual. Bilbo didn’t pay much attention to what Gollum was talking about, because he didn't care, and Gollum was always babbling on about something. Fish, probably. It was usually fish. Or his precious. Or Bilbo. None of which Bilbo particularly cared to hear Gollum’s thoughts about.
What Bilbo did care about was the Arkenstone, sitting there in Gollum’s pocket. Unfortunately, Gollum was pretty much always wriggling about in some way, which made picking his pockets rather tricky.
Still, Bilbo had gotten rather good at it over the years, out of necessity. Gollum did not like to give up his treasures, his precious most of all, and sometimes, you had to resort to underhand tactics. Bilbo was a professional burglar, after all. One had to be prepared for him to simply acquire certain things that he wanted when the occasion called for it. Or simply when he felt like it, at that.
In any case, after some creative maneuvering, Bilbo was retreating silently back into the bushes, taking the Arkenstone with him.
Once he was a safe distance away, Bilbo pulled off the ring, becoming visible to the world once again. Chuckling to himself, he flipped the ring in the air before pocketing it and setting off in the vague direction to the Misty Mountains. “Very good,” he declared. “Very good indeed.” It had been quite clever of him, really, devising that little plot. And now, now, he was finally free of the old goblin. Or, well. Not a goblin, though he was certainly as ugly as one. Bilbo didn’t really know what Gollum was, nor did he particularly care to. He’d be perfectly happy to never run into anything like him again. Which he could do now, because he’d tricked his way free of the creature.
It was just at this moment that an ear-splitting screech rang out.
“Empty!” A familiar voice shrieked, and Bilbo sighed. “Our pocketses are empty! Thief! Baggins! Curse it! We hates it! We hates it forever!”
That, Bilbo decided quite firmly, was his cue.
Not least because of the angry roar that echoed through the surrounding area, which most certainly did not belong to Gollum.
Bilbo sighed, straightened his jacket, and ran.
It was not Gollum or the bear that reached him first, however- that would be the elves, who appeared from the trees riding fine horses, and led by an unfortunately familiar, incredibly furious face.
It appeared the Elvenking was not happy about the incident.
And, well. Bilbo might be a fast, sneaky hobbit, but he was still a hobbit, with rather short legs. There was only so much he could do when it came to outrunning elves on horseback. Which was to say, he couldn’t. So, Bilbo did the next best thing.
He ran straight for the next rocky outcropping and leaped from it.
Now, Bilbo had intended to perhaps fall a short ways, tumble a bit, and then hide while the elves took the safer way around, slip on the ring, and be done with it. If the elves were a bit more reckless than he anticipated, he might have to do some more fancy maneuvering, but he was small and they were big, and sooner or later he’d find somewhere they couldn’t follow him.
This would have been a very good plan, if Bilbo had not landed on something soft and furry instead of the cold, hard ground.
For a moment, Bilbo kept his eyes clenched tightly shut, even as his hands scrambled to grab on to the fur beneath him. Then he opened them again.
Yep. Exactly as he’d feared.
“Hello there,” Bilbo managed to say to the bear he was currently, quite accidentally riding.
The bear, naturally, did not respond, because it was a bear. It did, however, shake itself quite harshly in an attempt to dislodge Bilbo from its back. Bilbo hung on for dear life. Much as he wasn’t thrilled with his current position, it was keeping the bear from eating him just yet, and Bilbo would like to postpone such an occurrence as long as possible. When this didn’t work, however, the bear’s next course of action was to take off running at full speed, Bilbo still on its back.
The elves chasing him didn’t seem to know what to do with this. To be fair to them, Bilbo didn’t much know what to do with it either, besides think oh dear and hold on as tight as he could. In fact, the only person who didn’t seem to care about Bilbo’s new situation was, well…
Thranduil, King of the Woodland Realm and owner of the elk involved in the incident. Naturally.
Bilbo was beginning to think that this entire operation might have been a mistake. Still, it was too late to do anything about that now- indeed, it was too late to do anything at all except hold on with all his might and try his best not to scream. Where was this bear taking him? The Misty Mountains loomed overhead, and while that was the general direction Bilbo was heading in, charging straight through on the back of a giant bear while being chased by the Elvenking had not exactly been the plan. At all.
And then the bear proceeded to charge straight through a thicket of tightly packed trees with low hanging branches, and Bilbo hastily flattened himself to the bear’s back and decided that screw the plan, he’d just like to get out of this alive, thank you very much.
It took him another moment to realize that the bear’s latest plan to get rid of him came with one fortunate benefit- unlike Bilbo, Thranduil was rather tall. Too tall, it seemed, to follow Bilbo and the bear. Indeed, when Bilbo glanced behind him, the Elvenking had stopped, and could only glare furiously after them as they escaped his clutches.
From the looks of that glare, Bilbo should probably avoid the entire North for a very, very long time. A vacation in Rohan sounded like a good idea. Gondor. Bloody Mordor.
Unfortunately, to do that, Bilbo first needed to get off this bear.
The bear, it seemed, did not agree with this course of action. Bilbo was pretty sure they had reached the Misty Mountains at this point, and were starting to climb. What the bear’s plan was, Bilbo didn’t know, but at this rate, he was starting to worry that it wasn’t going to stop any time soon.
This was, of course, when it stopped. Specifically, when it skidded unexpectedly to a stop, apparently not noticing the cliff it was heading toward until the last possible moment. And it was at this point that Bilbo went flying off.
Not off the cliff, which was good. That was a point in this event’s favor. Unfortunately, he did go flying right into a hole. A very deep hole. A cave, really, with a steep enough entrance that Bilbo tumbled down, and down, and down, until finally, he rolled to the stop at the bottom of a long tunnel, the sunlight so distant it barely reached him.
For a moment, Bilbo held very still, preparing for that light to disappear if blocked by a very angry bear that was preparing to follow Bilbo down into this cave. Fortunately, no such even occurred, and after a moment, Bilbo let out the breath he was holding, stood up, and straightened his waistcoat.
“Very good!” he declared firmly to no one in particular. “Yes, quite right. Very good.” He had successfully, it seemed, shaken all pursuit- dwarves, elves, bears, and old partners alike. And here he was, in the Misty Mountains, exactly as he’d wanted. Very good indeed. All in all, a quite excellent result.
It was at this point that something heavy collided with Bilbo’s head, and he tumbled to the ground unconscious.
Thorin stared at the creature that he had just hit in the head with a frying pan, and then turned to his friend Roäc, who was of course a raven. “He’s cuter than I thought a goblin would be.”
Roäc let out what everyone knows is the raven sound of a snort. “Well, what do you intend to do with him?”
Thorin shrugged. His dad usually handled goblins. He’d never actually seen a goblin before, and he certainly didn’t know what to do with one. “I could hit him again?”
“I don’t see how that would do much good.” Roäc hopped over to examine the creature. “You’d need something pointy, probably, to actually- Thorin, look at this!”
Thorin bent over to examine the creature- and the thing that Roäc was trying to nudge out of its pocket. He picked it up. It was a rock, but not like anything he’d ever seen- for one thing, it was much shinier. It was actually quite beautiful. “Pretty,” he declared. Then he turned back to Roäc. “But what about the goblin?”
Roäc tilted his head in his version of a shrug. “Your dad might want to see. He’ll want to know goblins found you.”
Thorin’s head shot up. “And then I can tell him I knocked him out! Defeated him without even a fight! Then he’ll have to see I can handle myself. Just for a short trip to that mountain on the other side of Mirkwood. Just to see the lights.” Thorin’s birthday was coming soon. That meant it was almost time for the lights. And maybe finally, finally, he could go to see them in person.
Roäc made a dubious noise but didn’t protest more than that. “So, what do we do with him until then?”
Thorin shrugged, picked the goblin up, and carried him over to his closet. Along the way, he paused, and thinking for a moment, dropped the pretty rock in a pot, putting the lid on and nodding to himself.
Just in case.
The intruder properly stowed, Thorin turned back just in time to hear his father’s voice. “Thorin! Thorin, let down your hair!”
There was a hole in the bottom of the cave where Thorin and his father lived, and Thorin’s father went down into it in order to make sure no goblins found them. But to do that, he needed something to climb on, something no other creature could use. And this was where Thorin’s long hair came in handy.
It was kind of uncomfortable. But it allowed Thorin’s dad to keep them safe, which was more important.
Roäc thought Smaug could probably just use a rope, and had been unimpressed when Thorin pointed out that he’d never seen a rope long enough for that. There was just no pleasing that bird, sometimes.
“Father,” Thorin began, carefully picking his words to broach the topic of the goblin.
“Not now, Thorin,” his father said. He barely even glanced Thorin’s way as he went to set down his pack.
Thorin frowned. That… wasn’t exactly the response he was hoping for. Maybe he should try a different angle. “About my birthday…”
“Tomorrow, I know. We’ll do something special.”
“Yes! That’s what I was thinking of,” Thorin said quickly. “You know, I’ve been thinking, and I was wondering if we could maybe take a trip.”
Smaug did turn to face Thorin then. “A trip.” His face was unreadable.
“Yes,” Thorin said quickly. “Nothing too big, of course, just to the other side of Mirkwood-”
Thorin’s father let out a barking laugh, interrupting him. “Just to the other side of Mirkwood? Do you know, Thorin, what it takes to get to the other side of that forest? What darkness lives there, ready to swallow you whole? That forest is populated with spiders three times your size, always looking to prey on unfortunate travelers. Elves that will slit your throat and leave you to die. The forest itself works against you, leading you further and further in, playing tricks on you until you lose your mind.” He scoffed. “But of course you don’t. You know nothing of the world.”
“But surely if you were there-” Thorin protested, but he didn’t get to finish.
“Thorin,” Smaug said lowly, his voice coming out in a hiss. “Listen to me carefully. You are not leaving this mountain. Ever.”
The finality in the words sank into Thorin. And despite the fear that his father’s words about Mirkwood had produced, he knew what he had to do.
“I had just thought to get a sword,” he said, lowering his head. “One forged by the dwarves of the Iron Hills, known for their excellent craft, or so the books say. If I am not to go, perhaps… perhaps you could still retrieve one for me? So that I could learn to defend myself, in case our home were ever attacked by goblins?”
Smaug studied him for a long moment, and sighed. “Very well,” he said. “But you must stay here and be careful while I am gone.”
“Of course,” Thorin lied.
The Iron Hills, according to his maps, were beyond even the mountain that could be seen beyond the Mirkwood. And that meant that, if Thorin were careful, he could make a trip to that mountain and back to see the lights, and his father would never have to know.
And so Thorin helped his father pack, and sang for him, and watched him disappear up towards the sunlight.
And then, when he was sure his father was gone, Thorin went and got the goblin out of the closet.