It’d take some time, I think, for her to get to the stage of teasing and chasing again. My version of old!Dis is not cheery and brisk and sassy, after all… she is grim and hurt and hard hard hard, turned very nearly to ice by everything she has lost. Song of Steel, her Dark-name means. It suits her.
I think she would need to learn to smile again, to laugh and tease freely without bitterness. She has been alone so long, and that doesn’t just evaporate… She should never be left alone, not ever.
Her boys staying close, their heads resting on her knees or lying on the floor as they read or play a game or talk… her brothers always flanking her as they show her the Halls together… Hrera working beside her at her jewellery-table, Thror bringing her meals… Dain plopping a sweet and sleepy piglet into her lap… Thrain kissing her brow and never letting go of her hand, Fris always humming so that Dis can hear her, stroking back her hair…
Vili, holding her tight at night, so that she never wakes and thinks herself back in her huge and cold bed in Erebor, so very alone, always alone.
So here I go, throwing my crap onto the pile of amazingness and shaming myself.
I wrote this with the mental image of Fili and Kili’s much (MUCH) younger days as little dwarflings in Ered Luin, being cheeky and causing just enough trouble to their uncle to be exasperating but endearing little scamps.
I wanted for it to invoke that feeling of winter days, when it’s far too cold to be outside, so they have to turn their energy and antics onto their favourite target uncle.
Well. Here’s hoping!
determamfidd listen to this! MOAR CUTE LIL NEPHEW MUSIC.
OH MY WORD OH MY GOSH OH GOOD GRAVY
WOWWWWWW
oh, it is like icicles! It is so beautiful and atmospheric – ahh, did you play this? I am in jaw-droppingly breathless awe, I love the hopefulness of it, the playfulness! Oh my gooddddddd this is beautiful! I LOVE IT, so so so much!
Whatever you do, don’t imagine her reunion with her parents. Thrain running his thumb gently across her face, across her cheekbone and stroking the side of her beard. Don’t imagine him smiling at her with trembling lips, telling her that he is so proud, nathith, so proud. Don’t imagine Fris wrapping her arms around her last child and holding her to her heart; don’t imagine Thrain tugging them both close and tight, cocooning them with his body, pressing whiskery kisses to his daughter’s temple. Don’t imagine the words they would say. Don’t imagine the tearing sound of Dis’ sobs.
Don’t imagine her grandfather kissing both her cheeks and her forehead, and then gathering her close. “Sparrow, our little sparrow,” he would murmur, and she would remember what it cost to lose him, what it cost all of them. Her grandmother’s clever hands stroking Dis’ hair, her soothing, no-nonsense voice, calling her “Dis, darling,” as she did, so so long ago. They have the same hands.
Whatever you do, don’t imagine her reunion with her (little) big brother. It has been centuries, she can’t even remember him clearly, but at the smell of his hair and the sound of his voice, it comes rushing back, so fast and powerful it is nearly a physical blow. His weight against her is so small, so slight.
Whatever you do, don’t imagine her reunion with her sons, her madcap bright-eyed darlings. Don’t imagine her crying into their hair. Don’t even entertain the idea that she cannot stop kissing them even for a moment, her grasping hands frantic, her eyes half-blinded by her tears, gripping their clothes so tightly that her arms shake. I’d advise against dwelling on the whiteness of her knuckles, the tenderness in her kisses, how her head bows and her shoulders shudder at the sound of those voices calling her ‘Amad’ again, at long last: Amad, Amad, we missed you Amad.
Whatever you do, don’t think of her pressing her forehead against Dain’s, her cousin, her borrowed-brother, and cursing him for leaving her as well as he throws his arms around her and rocks her back and forth. The last one, she was the last one. Don’t think of Dain gently prying free and wiping her eyes (hopeless, a hopeless task) before turning her around to face the one standing behind her. Don’t picture him giving Dis a little push towards her eldest brother.
You definitely shouldn’t visualise the look in her eye as she stares at Thorin, stricken. It’s not a good idea to imagine the harsh rasp of her breathing as she curses him and curses him, twice as hard as she ever did Dain, all the while stumbling over to him and throwing herself at him with outstretched arms. Don’t imagine how she clings to him as though he is a tree against a storm, how she buries her head against his shoulder and cries and cries, her whole body wracked with it, and he too smells just the same.
And the last thing you should ever do is imagine her greeting her husband.
(Ahhhh! Thank you for reading it! I am so so proud of Yours Faithfully, tbh. I think it is the best thing I have written all year, it feels like I got what I was aiming for, with that fic. Not a feeling that always occurs!)
TOO DAMN MANY.
(aaaaand now I am imagining that Dis would have found the letters from their childhood in Thorin’s old rooms, after Erebor was reclaimed. Sitting down and reading over Dain’s childishly large, uneven scrawl, Thorin’s rather more formal handwriting, drilled into him by his tutors… a frozen moment in time of two children who both had to give up their childhoods far too soon.
and of course she would be thinking of two other lost children, in such a rush to grow up, to make others proud of them, to be worthy of the tales they had been raised on
Fili and kili raiding the pantry feat. baby Gimli harvesting the goods and the royal cookie monster guarding the exit.
I haven’t drawn dwarves for aaaggeess but I was determined to have at least something lotr/hobbit related to sell at Tracon so I whipped this out super quickly! (as if I ever spend time on anything *snort*)
Aw Yiss 