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Warrior Son, parts 3 & 4
Mar. 13th, 2015 06:26 pmWarrior Son
Parts 3 & 4
Word count: 2216 (4384)
It’s little more than a fortnight when Boromir arrives at Bag End for tea - a ritual that he appreciates more for the news he’s anticipating than any other reason - to find Bilbo agitated, and suspicious. He doesn’t seem to notice the rune on his door when he opens it to let Boromir in, nor mentions what has him troubled while he sets out the tea and cakes.
"Do you know a wizard?" It’s rather more blunt a question than Bilbo usually asks when seeking something interesting from Boromir, but the question itself is useful. A sign that Gandalf has been in the Shire, though Boromir hasn’t seen or heard anything else to suggest the wizard or the dwarves are present.
"I have met a wizard before, and heard of a second, but I would not say I know one." Boromir raises his eyebrows, giving Bilbo a curious look. "They are strange beings, often given to riddles and cryptic remarks, what little I know of them."
"Hmph." Bilbo wrinkles his nose a moment, a grimace crossing his face. "He threatened to get me involved in an adventure, though I told him I had no need of one. I’m afraid I neglected to point out he could have gone down to the Green Dragon to ask after you, if he wanted to find someone who might be interested in whatever adventure he’s arranging."
Boromir takes a sip of tea to avoid telling Bilbo that he’s intent on going on the journey to retake Erebor, and thus revealing he knows rather more about what’s going on than Bilbo expects him to. “Would it be rude to ask if I might join you for supper?”
Blinking, Bilbo frowns at Boromir. “Why are you asking?”
"Because you have a rune newly carved into your door, and I doubt the wizard would do so unless he intended to cause you trouble sooner rather than later."
"Carved into my door? I just painted it last week!" Bilbo leaves the table, and Boromir picks up one of the cakes while he listens to the door open, then shut again with perhaps a little more force than usual. "Do you know what that rune says? It’s not one I’ve seen in my books."
"I haven’t seen it before, but my brother was always more interested in the lore-books than I." Boromir shrugs, picking up his tea again to have something to do with his hands. "I’m curious to see who arrives that might know what it means, and why the wizard thinks you are in need of such an interruption to your life."
Bilbo snorts, smiling a little as he sits back down, taking a sip of his own tea after a moment. “I should like to see Gandalf’s expression if he returns to see his mischief, and finds more here than he expects. Do you have anything you particularly enjoy for supper?”
Boromir uses the rest of the afternoon to procure the supplies he’d had in mind, having secured a pack-pony soon after he’d determined when he was, as well as where. His horse - given him in the Havens along with coin in exchange for the boat and all that it contained beyond that which was his own - had not been entirely certain of the new neighbor in the field, but both have settled to watching each other from either side of the pasture rather than fighting.
"You’ll not be idle much longer, Celeg, neither you nor Madge." Boromir rubs the nose of his horse, keeping his voice low as he spoke. "We’ll be off tomorrow to the east, though how long you’ll prove useful, I do not know. The mountains are not the best place for horses, with orcs and goblins to contend with."
Celeg snorts, nudging at his shoulder.
"I know, first I have to convince Thorin that I wish to sign up for his quest, despite the dragon, and regardless of any reward that might be offered." Boromir watches the road for a long moment, thinking over the packs he has in his room to be loaded onto Madge in the morning. Field rations that would help keep Bilbo fed on the road, even boring as they’re likely to be. A sturdy oiled-canvas cloak to keep out water, sized for a hobbit. A few knives he might try to convince Bilbo to learn to use.
His own packs are far slimmer, though there is at least one new shirt in there, if in a distinctly hobbit-style rather than one he is more familiar with from home. It had been a pleasant surprise to find a seamstress willing to take up the challenge to make a few clothes for a Man.
Letting a quiet chuckle, Boromir rubs Celeg’s nose once more before heading into the Green Dragon to make use of their bathing room one last time.
"Supper will be just a moment more, I apologize for the wait." Bilbo sets a salt pot and bowl of lemons - a fruit Boromir is surprised to see so far north, as he does not recall them being a sort that kept well, certainly not enough to pack among army supplies - on the table near the honey-pot. "Fish, with carrots and potatoes and broccoli. Bread is there—," Bilbo looks over the table, and holds up a finger with a small grimace, "—and I’ve forgotten the butter."
Boromir suppresses a grin as Bilbo shakes his head, hurrying back to the kitchen to fetch the butter, and to check on the fish Boromir can hear sizzling in a pan. He rather hopes the dwarves are as rude now as they had been in the stories he’s heard, or he might well miss their arrival if they come in the morning.
Reaching for the bread, he breaks the loaf in half as Bilbo comes back in with two plates with the promised meal. He’s only just begun to slather honey on it when the bell rings, making Bilbo close his eyes for a moment.
"I do believe I will have to tell Gandalf it’s rude to be an uninvited guest to supper." Bilbo pushes away from the table, waving off Boromir’s not-yet-made offer to get the door. "I’ll see to this myself, thank you, it is my home after all."
Sitting back in his chair, Boromir takes a bite of his bread as he listens to Bilbo open the door. He hadn’t remembered who arrived first, and smiles a bit as he hears, “Dwalin, at your service.” If there had been a second hero in his eyes as a child, it was Dwalin, always at the side of his king, defender and brother in all but birth. A hero he’d wanted to live up to, who’d spurred on his defense of Faramir’s abilities even in the face of their father’s disappointment.
"Bilbo Baggins. At yours. Do we know each other?" There’s a pointed reminder in that question that makes Boromir bite back a chuckle. He might not have heard it even a fortnight ago, but there are some things he has picked up about hobbits in that time, and being an unknown, as well as uninvited guest to supper is considered quite rude.
"No." There’s a note to Dwalin’s voice that Boromir would call incredulous in most, and perhaps disdain in some. "Which way, laddie?" Dwalin clomps down the hallway as he speaks, the clatter of metal coming closer to the dining room where Boromir is sitting. "Is it down here?"
"Is what down where?" Bilbo sounds faintly amused underneath the polite confusion, and Boromir takes another bite of his bread to keep himself from laughing. It wouldn’t make a good first impression.
"Supper." The slap of something being tossed to someone follows. "He said there’d be food, and lots of it."
"He… he said?”
Boromir shakes his head, wondering just how Gandalf plans to explain himself when - or if - he arrives on Bilbo’s doorstep. Certainly he hadn’t been the one to invite dwarves to dinner, and no hobbit would have done so.
A moment later, Dwalin steps into the dining room, and stops to frown at Boromir. “And who are you?”
"Boromir of Gondor, at your service." Boromir inclines his head, though he doesn’t get up to bow properly, as he has to duck the ceilings as it is. He glances past Dwalin at Bilbo, who has a politely blank expression on his face. "I can eat later, if necessary, Mr. Baggins. I wouldn’t want to deprive you of your dinner simply because of an unexpected guest."
"Oh, no, that’s not necessary." Bilbo shakes his head, waving off Boromir’s offer. "You go ahead and eat, I’ll just go put this somewhere." He holds up the cloak in his hands, smiling briefly and tightly before he walks away, leaving Dwalin to take his place at the table.
"What is a Man of Gondor doing this far north?" Dwalin gives Boromir a suspicious look as he pulls the plate toward him, though how much of an answer he expects as he digs in, Boromir is uncertain.
"I was traveling." Boromir cuts into his own fish, using a mouth full of food to avoid the need to answer more questions. They eat in silence for a while, Bilbo slipping back in with a plate of rolls that he sets on the table before taking one for himself. At least he won’t be left hungry when the dwarves strip his pantry.
Boromir has finished his own meal, and Dwalin is reaching for a roll when the bell rings again.
"I can see who else is disturbing your dinner, Mr. Baggins, if you would like me to." Boromir gives Bilbo a quick smile, and Bilbo hesitates a moment before nodding.
There’s a dwarf with snowy white hair and a slightly expectant expression on the other side, who smiles briefly in confusion when he looks up at Boromir. The confusion doesn’t last, as he smiles again, and introduces himself with a bow. “Balin, at your service.”
"Boromir of Gondor, at yours." Boromir opens the door a little further, shifting to tilt his head in the direction of the dining room. "Mr. Baggins and Dwalin are through there, in the dining room."
He closes the door after Balin steps through with a genuine smile on his face, the short dwarf hurrying toward the dining room while Boromir watches him. He can see the tomb in the back of his mind, cold stone carved with a name and a title and little else. Gimli weeping for his lost cousin, the book with the last moments of the dwarves who had stood around their fallen Lord. He shakes his head slightly, promising himself that there would be no need for the Fellowship finding such a tomb, if that quest comes to pass.
Following behind, Boromir watches as Balin and Dwalin greet each other, Bilbo looking rather disconcerted by it from where he stands beyond them. Worried, perhaps, too, with a second uninvited guest, and not enough dinner laid out for four - and more, though Bilbo isn’t yet aware of that.
"Excuse me, but could you possibly explain what you are doing here, in my house?" Bilbo looks between the two dwarves, who look back at him for a long moment as he tries to keep up a polite smile. "It’s not that I don’t like visitors, I like visitors as much as the next hobbit. But I do like to know them before they come visiting, particularly for supper, and I don’t know either of you in the slightest."
"I would have thought Mr. Gandalf would have explained everything already." Balin glances between Bilbo and Boromir a moment.
"He did not, I’m afraid. Not even enough to tell me how many visitors I might expect to arrive." Bilbo smiles again, brief and nervous. "I don’t suppose you could tell me that much, at least?"
"There are eleven more, aside from the wizard." Balin looks over the dining room a moment. "I hope you have more chairs than this, and perhaps a slightly larger room?"
The bell rings again before Bilbo has a chance to respond, and Boromir meets Bilbo’s gaze over Balin’s head.
"If you will pardon me a moment, I’m afraid I shouldn’t be so rude to Mr. Boromir as I was by asking him to answer the door in my place." Bilbo doesn’t look terribly pleased at all, though he’s very careful not to be too demonstrative of that.
"We should see what is in Mr. Baggins’ pantry, to make sure there is sufficient food for everyone." Balin gives Boromir a brief, curious look before he moves past him, and Dwalin follows in his wake, the two going deeper into the smial toward the pantry. Boromir watches for a moment before he slips back into the dining room, to start making room for more dwarves at the table.
Soon. Soon he will have the chance to volunteer for the journey, even if Bilbo does not go - he dearly hopes the hobbit does, even as he fears what the journey might bring for Bilbo - and then he shall see if he has skill and knowledge enough to protect Thorin and his nephews from the fate Boromir remembers.
Parts 3 & 4
Word count: 2216 (4384)
It’s little more than a fortnight when Boromir arrives at Bag End for tea - a ritual that he appreciates more for the news he’s anticipating than any other reason - to find Bilbo agitated, and suspicious. He doesn’t seem to notice the rune on his door when he opens it to let Boromir in, nor mentions what has him troubled while he sets out the tea and cakes.
"Do you know a wizard?" It’s rather more blunt a question than Bilbo usually asks when seeking something interesting from Boromir, but the question itself is useful. A sign that Gandalf has been in the Shire, though Boromir hasn’t seen or heard anything else to suggest the wizard or the dwarves are present.
"I have met a wizard before, and heard of a second, but I would not say I know one." Boromir raises his eyebrows, giving Bilbo a curious look. "They are strange beings, often given to riddles and cryptic remarks, what little I know of them."
"Hmph." Bilbo wrinkles his nose a moment, a grimace crossing his face. "He threatened to get me involved in an adventure, though I told him I had no need of one. I’m afraid I neglected to point out he could have gone down to the Green Dragon to ask after you, if he wanted to find someone who might be interested in whatever adventure he’s arranging."
Boromir takes a sip of tea to avoid telling Bilbo that he’s intent on going on the journey to retake Erebor, and thus revealing he knows rather more about what’s going on than Bilbo expects him to. “Would it be rude to ask if I might join you for supper?”
Blinking, Bilbo frowns at Boromir. “Why are you asking?”
"Because you have a rune newly carved into your door, and I doubt the wizard would do so unless he intended to cause you trouble sooner rather than later."
"Carved into my door? I just painted it last week!" Bilbo leaves the table, and Boromir picks up one of the cakes while he listens to the door open, then shut again with perhaps a little more force than usual. "Do you know what that rune says? It’s not one I’ve seen in my books."
"I haven’t seen it before, but my brother was always more interested in the lore-books than I." Boromir shrugs, picking up his tea again to have something to do with his hands. "I’m curious to see who arrives that might know what it means, and why the wizard thinks you are in need of such an interruption to your life."
Bilbo snorts, smiling a little as he sits back down, taking a sip of his own tea after a moment. “I should like to see Gandalf’s expression if he returns to see his mischief, and finds more here than he expects. Do you have anything you particularly enjoy for supper?”
Boromir uses the rest of the afternoon to procure the supplies he’d had in mind, having secured a pack-pony soon after he’d determined when he was, as well as where. His horse - given him in the Havens along with coin in exchange for the boat and all that it contained beyond that which was his own - had not been entirely certain of the new neighbor in the field, but both have settled to watching each other from either side of the pasture rather than fighting.
"You’ll not be idle much longer, Celeg, neither you nor Madge." Boromir rubs the nose of his horse, keeping his voice low as he spoke. "We’ll be off tomorrow to the east, though how long you’ll prove useful, I do not know. The mountains are not the best place for horses, with orcs and goblins to contend with."
Celeg snorts, nudging at his shoulder.
"I know, first I have to convince Thorin that I wish to sign up for his quest, despite the dragon, and regardless of any reward that might be offered." Boromir watches the road for a long moment, thinking over the packs he has in his room to be loaded onto Madge in the morning. Field rations that would help keep Bilbo fed on the road, even boring as they’re likely to be. A sturdy oiled-canvas cloak to keep out water, sized for a hobbit. A few knives he might try to convince Bilbo to learn to use.
His own packs are far slimmer, though there is at least one new shirt in there, if in a distinctly hobbit-style rather than one he is more familiar with from home. It had been a pleasant surprise to find a seamstress willing to take up the challenge to make a few clothes for a Man.
Letting a quiet chuckle, Boromir rubs Celeg’s nose once more before heading into the Green Dragon to make use of their bathing room one last time.
"Supper will be just a moment more, I apologize for the wait." Bilbo sets a salt pot and bowl of lemons - a fruit Boromir is surprised to see so far north, as he does not recall them being a sort that kept well, certainly not enough to pack among army supplies - on the table near the honey-pot. "Fish, with carrots and potatoes and broccoli. Bread is there—," Bilbo looks over the table, and holds up a finger with a small grimace, "—and I’ve forgotten the butter."
Boromir suppresses a grin as Bilbo shakes his head, hurrying back to the kitchen to fetch the butter, and to check on the fish Boromir can hear sizzling in a pan. He rather hopes the dwarves are as rude now as they had been in the stories he’s heard, or he might well miss their arrival if they come in the morning.
Reaching for the bread, he breaks the loaf in half as Bilbo comes back in with two plates with the promised meal. He’s only just begun to slather honey on it when the bell rings, making Bilbo close his eyes for a moment.
"I do believe I will have to tell Gandalf it’s rude to be an uninvited guest to supper." Bilbo pushes away from the table, waving off Boromir’s not-yet-made offer to get the door. "I’ll see to this myself, thank you, it is my home after all."
Sitting back in his chair, Boromir takes a bite of his bread as he listens to Bilbo open the door. He hadn’t remembered who arrived first, and smiles a bit as he hears, “Dwalin, at your service.” If there had been a second hero in his eyes as a child, it was Dwalin, always at the side of his king, defender and brother in all but birth. A hero he’d wanted to live up to, who’d spurred on his defense of Faramir’s abilities even in the face of their father’s disappointment.
"Bilbo Baggins. At yours. Do we know each other?" There’s a pointed reminder in that question that makes Boromir bite back a chuckle. He might not have heard it even a fortnight ago, but there are some things he has picked up about hobbits in that time, and being an unknown, as well as uninvited guest to supper is considered quite rude.
"No." There’s a note to Dwalin’s voice that Boromir would call incredulous in most, and perhaps disdain in some. "Which way, laddie?" Dwalin clomps down the hallway as he speaks, the clatter of metal coming closer to the dining room where Boromir is sitting. "Is it down here?"
"Is what down where?" Bilbo sounds faintly amused underneath the polite confusion, and Boromir takes another bite of his bread to keep himself from laughing. It wouldn’t make a good first impression.
"Supper." The slap of something being tossed to someone follows. "He said there’d be food, and lots of it."
"He… he said?”
Boromir shakes his head, wondering just how Gandalf plans to explain himself when - or if - he arrives on Bilbo’s doorstep. Certainly he hadn’t been the one to invite dwarves to dinner, and no hobbit would have done so.
A moment later, Dwalin steps into the dining room, and stops to frown at Boromir. “And who are you?”
"Boromir of Gondor, at your service." Boromir inclines his head, though he doesn’t get up to bow properly, as he has to duck the ceilings as it is. He glances past Dwalin at Bilbo, who has a politely blank expression on his face. "I can eat later, if necessary, Mr. Baggins. I wouldn’t want to deprive you of your dinner simply because of an unexpected guest."
"Oh, no, that’s not necessary." Bilbo shakes his head, waving off Boromir’s offer. "You go ahead and eat, I’ll just go put this somewhere." He holds up the cloak in his hands, smiling briefly and tightly before he walks away, leaving Dwalin to take his place at the table.
"What is a Man of Gondor doing this far north?" Dwalin gives Boromir a suspicious look as he pulls the plate toward him, though how much of an answer he expects as he digs in, Boromir is uncertain.
"I was traveling." Boromir cuts into his own fish, using a mouth full of food to avoid the need to answer more questions. They eat in silence for a while, Bilbo slipping back in with a plate of rolls that he sets on the table before taking one for himself. At least he won’t be left hungry when the dwarves strip his pantry.
Boromir has finished his own meal, and Dwalin is reaching for a roll when the bell rings again.
"I can see who else is disturbing your dinner, Mr. Baggins, if you would like me to." Boromir gives Bilbo a quick smile, and Bilbo hesitates a moment before nodding.
There’s a dwarf with snowy white hair and a slightly expectant expression on the other side, who smiles briefly in confusion when he looks up at Boromir. The confusion doesn’t last, as he smiles again, and introduces himself with a bow. “Balin, at your service.”
"Boromir of Gondor, at yours." Boromir opens the door a little further, shifting to tilt his head in the direction of the dining room. "Mr. Baggins and Dwalin are through there, in the dining room."
He closes the door after Balin steps through with a genuine smile on his face, the short dwarf hurrying toward the dining room while Boromir watches him. He can see the tomb in the back of his mind, cold stone carved with a name and a title and little else. Gimli weeping for his lost cousin, the book with the last moments of the dwarves who had stood around their fallen Lord. He shakes his head slightly, promising himself that there would be no need for the Fellowship finding such a tomb, if that quest comes to pass.
Following behind, Boromir watches as Balin and Dwalin greet each other, Bilbo looking rather disconcerted by it from where he stands beyond them. Worried, perhaps, too, with a second uninvited guest, and not enough dinner laid out for four - and more, though Bilbo isn’t yet aware of that.
"Excuse me, but could you possibly explain what you are doing here, in my house?" Bilbo looks between the two dwarves, who look back at him for a long moment as he tries to keep up a polite smile. "It’s not that I don’t like visitors, I like visitors as much as the next hobbit. But I do like to know them before they come visiting, particularly for supper, and I don’t know either of you in the slightest."
"I would have thought Mr. Gandalf would have explained everything already." Balin glances between Bilbo and Boromir a moment.
"He did not, I’m afraid. Not even enough to tell me how many visitors I might expect to arrive." Bilbo smiles again, brief and nervous. "I don’t suppose you could tell me that much, at least?"
"There are eleven more, aside from the wizard." Balin looks over the dining room a moment. "I hope you have more chairs than this, and perhaps a slightly larger room?"
The bell rings again before Bilbo has a chance to respond, and Boromir meets Bilbo’s gaze over Balin’s head.
"If you will pardon me a moment, I’m afraid I shouldn’t be so rude to Mr. Boromir as I was by asking him to answer the door in my place." Bilbo doesn’t look terribly pleased at all, though he’s very careful not to be too demonstrative of that.
"We should see what is in Mr. Baggins’ pantry, to make sure there is sufficient food for everyone." Balin gives Boromir a brief, curious look before he moves past him, and Dwalin follows in his wake, the two going deeper into the smial toward the pantry. Boromir watches for a moment before he slips back into the dining room, to start making room for more dwarves at the table.
Soon. Soon he will have the chance to volunteer for the journey, even if Bilbo does not go - he dearly hopes the hobbit does, even as he fears what the journey might bring for Bilbo - and then he shall see if he has skill and knowledge enough to protect Thorin and his nephews from the fate Boromir remembers.