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The air was biting, he realised distantly, in the midst of running to and fro, gathering this herb and fetching that person, and tending to that elf or rewrapping this dwarrowdams wounds.
Underneath all of that, he registered that the air was cold, stale and filled with the aroma of death and destruction. He had just left what was dubbed as the Council Tent. Intended for the leaders of all of the armies to hold gatherings every so often.
Not that that helped make sense of why him of all people was granted an established seat at the table next to Bard the Bowman and Dain of the Iron Hills.
But who was he to question that.
No one that was who, a small, oh so small being surrounded by far bigger and more important figures.
He sighed, and winced a breath later when the action pulled at his taught bruises and stitches.
He had been doing that an awful lot since the bloody battle that had occurred a precious few weeks ago. Two weeks and three days to be exact.
Sighing and worrying and wondering, over anything and everything, like about how long they could survive off elf given rations or how long the elves would keep giving them rations, how much longer they would be finding and identifying fallen comrades and how much more kindling could they keep using to burning the enemy corpses because they needed that kindling and they could just not use it but the burning would take longer and would be less affective and if it’s ineffective then their toxic blood could poison the soil and it wasn’t of good quality in the first place but—
“Bilbo!”
He blinked, sighed, winced, and looked to Dwalin, who had been calling him. And judging from the look on his face, had been for some time.
That too, he had been less… aware, as of recently, blinking down at his blood soaked hands after dealing with a patient one minute and the next leaving the food storage tent.
He wasn’t quite sure what it was but it was like he wasn’t himself, or he was, but he watching himself act from a distance. Aware of the outside world and functioning but just enough to be considered conscious.
According to Oin anyway.
“Bilbo.”
Ah, I did it again , he nearly sighed but refrained. Instead, trying to focus on the semi-bald warrior in front of him as best as possible. Which is how he realized that the dwarrow held a rather large bowl of hearty soup in his equally large hand.
The bowl was only so large, he knew, because of his metabolism. As after camping out at Beorn’s, his dwarves had realized how much food he actually needed, and they had endeavored to make him feel as welcomed as possible.
The thought still filled him with warmth where the air was frigid against his chest and he took the bowl gingerly. The man had led him to a seat around a an active fire at some point and he sat in a nearby chair.
Around him the company also sat, minus the Durins, around said fire eating smaller bowls of their meal, the midday one if the sky was to be believed.
As Bilbo took the first spoonful he realized he had not eaten, probably since the start of the day, and ate with gusto. Some of his dwarves cracked smiles at his reaction but most looked at him with concern. Not that he was ignorant to why.
He knew they worried for him and his health, between acting as some sort of regent of Erebor, taking care of said kingdom’s royal family alongside Oin, Balin, and Dori, and dealing with most other ill or injured persons has him run ragged. And it is quite visible to his family.
He does not sleep, he barely eats and he barely takes breaks to relieve himself. It was not a good situation. But what else was a hobbit, a traiter hobbit even, to do? It was necessary, and it was the only way to make it up to the Durins and the rest of his dwarrow, to show his guilt and atone for his sins.
It was what was deserved as far as Bilbo Baggins-Took was concerned.
“…-sn’t it, Bilbo?”
He jolted out of his thoughts to find himself staring into his empty soup container, and looked up to find the company staring back. He glanced at their faces quickly and determined that it had been Ori speaking, as his gaze was more expectant than the others.
“Ah, repeat that laddie?” he uttered quietly.
His eyes seemed to shine a bit brighter and he took joy in repeating what he had said. “I was simply saying that it was rather quiet, don’t you think?”
Bilbo glanced around and realized that the young lad was right, it was awfully quiet. He wondered how long it had been so quiet and if Bilbo just hadn’t noticed.
Over the year that he had been with the company, he had learned that above all else, dwarrow liked nothing else like their craft, their family, and their songs. So to here utter silence for what had to be quite some time, was incredibly odd.
Especially if someone was saying something about it.
“It very much is, Ori. Why’s it so quiet? Normally I would be begging for you all to shut your blasted traps by now.” he sniffed, watching as the light in Ori’s eyes dim a bit. “Well, I’m not quite sure myself, but I think it’s because no one can think of anything to sing of….”
Bilbo’s head tilted in confusion before he remembered something Balin had said in the first two or so weeks in the Mirkwood;
“After every battle?”
“Indeed my friend. After every battle, within three weeks of, a song is sung of the battle, whether victorious or in defeat. Without fail there is a song. It is an acient dwarrow tradition, started by Durin the Deathless himself and we are very fond of it.”
He hadn’t been thinking of it till’ now as he had been preoccupied, but now he realized that they had only four more days to fulfill this ancient tradition. Bilbo squinted, “Wait, so why is this fight any different from any other battle that you all have been in?”
Ori’s lips pursed, and he looked away. Many of his dwarfs also fiddled in what he realized was shame. “We, we aren’t quite sure, you see normally it all comes quite naturally to us. But for some reason… not this one.”
Bilbo straightened up and truly looked around, not just at his dwarves, but at the ones surrounding them and many eavesdropping. They all looked quite… lost. Ashamed, and suffering from pride.
But Bilbo looked even farther, and even closer and saw speckles or patches of… blood , on the freshly fallen snow from the day of the battle, and on and off since.
And if asked later what his thoughts were of what he was about to do, well… he himself couldn’t give a clear answer.
But in that moment as he gazed at the patches of blood soaked snow on the ground, he found the words flowing out with no hesitation or restraint.
To all things housed in her silence,
Nature offers a violence,
A bear that keeps to his own line,
A wolf that seeks always its own kind,
His dwarrow, and the surrounding, almost seem to stop completely, all eyes and ears turning to the lone hobbit in the east as the words of an unknown and unamed song continue to tumble out.
The world that hardens as the harsher winter holds,
The parent forced to eat its young before it grows,
Every bird, gone unheard
Starving where the ground has froze
The winter sunrise red on white,
like blood upon the snow—
At this point his dwarves chimed in, humming with their deep voices as they seemed to realize what was currently happening. Which was quite well as Bilbo himself was just incredibly confused. As engrossed as he would in his own ethereal words.
Like blood upon the snow,
Someone, most likely one of the Iron Hills men, started up with an interesting instrument off to the side, a sack with tubes sticking out oddly, but he didn’t question it, as it seemed quite fitting.
The ground walked here is a wonder,
It ceases never to hunger,
And all things nature’s given
She takes all things from the living,
He looked up from his staring towards his company of raucous, rambling, rambunctious dwarrow and smiled gently.
I’ve walked the earth and there a so few here that know,
How dark the night just how cold the wind can blow,
I’ve no more hunger now to see where the road will go,
I’ve no more, kept my warmth
Than blood upon the snow!
The dwarves truly seemed to understand and accept, even appreciate,what was happening now, as bashing, stomping and deep voices could be heard entering the newly forged harmony. And something in Bilbo slotted into place, content and happy as the rest of the song drew on.
Blood upon the snow,
Blood upon the snow,
Blood upon the snow,
It's not my arms that will fail me
But this world takes more strength than it gave me—
As the song started to wind to its end he could feel the static in the air, the pressure and the weight of what he was doing. What he was truly declaring , because yes, he might have been considered Dwarf-Friend but to partake in such an ancient tradition? That could be seen as declaring himself Dwarf-by-Heart…
The trees deny themselves nothing that makes them grow
No rain fall, no sunshine,
No blood upon the snow,
Blood upon the snow,
Blood upon the snow!
Blood upon the snow!
He thinks his passion can be heard past the Mirkwood and to Imladris but he did not dare to censure his voice as he gasped and said the last lyrics.
To all things housed in her silence
Nature offers a violence…
.
.
.
.
.
After, well, after could wait he thought, as from the tent to his left, just as the song came to a close, the royal medical tent was pushed open by a large, calloused hand, that belonged to an equally large arm and a barrel for a chest and eyes far too enchanting for anyone’s sake, so yes after could wait, he had a lover to scold.