his exception

chapter twenty-seven: sigrid

Fili stood at the edge of the lake, attempting futiley to pierce the fog with his eyes. After that last, particularly horrifying shriek, neither he nor the huddled townspeople at his back had heard anything more of Smaug. Bain arrived, sometime between dusk and dawn, shaking his head and unable to tell them anything beyond his last glimpse of Bard, preparing to face the dragon. Fili told Kili to sleep, but his brother only shook his head, and so they kept the hard vigil, Oin beside them, until the morning.

The surviving inhabitants fled to the outer shores of the lake using whatever boats were still intact. Tauriel kept close to Bard's daughters, Tilda and Sigrid as they called for their father. Fili caught a movement in the fog, and gripped the knife in his belt. "Someone coming!" He called, and there were gasps and murmurs as the others gather to look. Kili limped to his side. A shape emerged out of the fog, too tall to be a dwarf. As he approached, splashing through the shallows, Fili realised it is Bard, the longbow still strung across his back. "Bard! Bard the Bowman!" The people cry, and rush into the water to greet the dragon slayer, his children pushing ahead to embrace the Man as he arrived.

...

Sat upon the top of the hill, the forest lying behind her, Sigrid gazed upon the smouldering remains of the only home she'd ever known. Most of it was now flattened by the body of Smaug, but she could still make out small places.  She continued to laugh and sob and heave until a hand settled on her shoulder and she'd jumped out of her skin, automatically swinging a fist at the person behind the hand. "Ouch. Careful, I've just survived a dragon attack, please don't kill me now."

It was one of the dwarves they'd had in their house. The one who'd run at the Orc as it charged into their house, risking his life to save hers. She knew she should be angry, that his kind had bought this chaos and destruction upon their people - but she just couldn't find it in her heart to hate him. It had not been him, after all, who'd awoken the dragon. "Sorry." She smiled at him and went back to looking at the lake. "It's Sigrid, correct?" He asked. She nodded. "Mind if I sit and join you? My brother is still mooning over the elf, and everyone else is refusing to even talk to me. Not that I can blame them." He added "This is all our fault..."

"No it's not." She didn't look at him still, her eyes fixed on the burning town. "You didn't fly down here and breath fire and destruction on the place." She heard him chuckle next to her "True, but it was our fault that he came down in the first place. Your father was right. Maybe we shouldn't have tried to reclaim the mountain..." Sigrid turned to him now, an eyebrow raised, "If you don't think it should be reclaimed, why bother coming all this way to begin with?"

"Loyalty." He shrugged "I've a duty to my Uncle and our people. This is our birth right, our heritage. I'm honour bound to preserve it. I will be heir to the throne once Thorin is crowned..."

"You're a prince?" She said looking at him in astonishment. She'd never met any royalty before, but she'd always assumed they'd be more like The Master than anything else.  "Yep." Smiled the Dwarf, "Prince Fíli, son of Lady Dís of Erebor, Sister of Thorin, King Under The Mountain, son of Thrain, son of Thror, heir to the throne of Durin. At your service." He gave a dramatic bow followed but a snort of derisive laughter.

"Never felt like much of a prince. Uncle worked in a forge, making swords and horse shoes. Mum looked after us in a small house, about the same size as yours, well, as yours was." He added apologetically. "Me and Kíli used to help out Thorin out until we were old enough to find work for ourselves. Escorting traders from Ered Luin and the like. It's hard to feel like royalty when you're making soup in a forest surrounded by rabbit droppings and wearing second hand clothes. Sorry." He added again. "Sorry, you came up here to be alone no doubt and I've disturbed you. I'll go." He got up to leave but Sigrid put a hand on his knee, "No. Don't go. I mean" she sighed "I don't want to be alone. Not really."

Fíli sat back down again, but didn't say anything more. Just stared out at the lake, watching the reflection of the glowing embers. They sat in comfortable silence for a minute or two, before Sigrid began speaking again. "It's strange. So much destruction. I can't even begin to comprehend it, but, when I first came up here, all I could do was laugh..."

"Grief takes us in different ways. I was the same when Father died. I was only a child, barely 40."

"40!" Cried Sigrid in amazement "I wouldn't call 40 a child's age! You're pulling my leg, you can't be more than 28 surely?" Fíli chuckled "Dwarves live longer than humans, so we're slower to mature. I'm 84" Sigrid's jaw dropped open at that. "But in human terms, that's more akin to 25. My brother, he's 77- 21 I guess in your years?"

"Well, now I really do feel like a child." She smirked "I'm only just turned 19."  Fíli raised his eyebrows at this. "19? I had you pegged as being older..."

"Oh thanks." Laughed Sigrid, "That's what every girl wasn't to be told."

"No, I just meant, your eyes. They're much older. Not just now, with all that has happened, I think everyone has aged a decade at least, but you were older back in the house as well." Sigrid smiled. "Well. That's what happens when your Ma dies in childbirth and you're forced to become the mother to a newborn baby and an 8 year old boy when you're only 13. Motherhood tends to age people quite a bit. Da wasn't much help either. I could barely get a word out of him most days."

"Losing your One is a painful thing." Fíli nodded wisely "Mum was much the same, though I still don't think it fair that so much responsibility was down to you, wasn't there someone who could help?" Sigrid shrugged "People tried. We had a wet nurse to help with Tilda when she was a baby, but once she learnt to eat solids, it was down to me." Fíli put a tentative hand on her knee. "That's a lot of responsibility for one so young. I thought looking after Kíli was bad enough, but this..."

"You have to grow up fast round these parts."

"So it would seem. Did you not have any time for yourself."

"Not really. But it didn't really matter. There were dances and I'd sneak out at night occasionally to meet with friends, but for the most part, I was the Lady of the House."

"Soon to be Lady of Dale if the rumours are true." Sigrid rolled her eyes before she buried her head in her hands with a groan, "Oh don't you start." She laughed. "I've had enough of that from Alfrid! Plus two marriage proposals." Fili's eyes widened. "Marriage proposals?" Sigrid gave a look and muttered, "Oh yes. People want to get a piece of the pie now. Your Dad kills a dragon, and suddenly the people you've never spoken to want to be you best friend, and the boys who wouldn't give you the time of day and lining up to declare their love!" 

Fíli laughed at that, his moustache swaying "Surely no boy would have stayed away from you! You must have been beating them off with an axe long before Bard killed the beast."

Sigrid gave a small grin. "Teenage mother of two, remember? Plus, well. I'm no beauty. Not really. Not compared to girls like Elena and Morwen, though... I haven't seen them... I guess they must have perished as well. Serves them right. They were always picking on people." She clasped her hand to her mouth at that and Fíli roared with laughter. "Oh Sigrid. Don't let this change you." Sigrid blushed. "I can't believe I said that! That was so horrible! They were mean but they didn't deserve to die oh Valar oh no, I never" 

"Bless you, Pretty Sigrid." Smiled the dwarf, putting an arm around her and holding her close. "Horrible people die every day, sometimes suddenly, sometimes simply of old age. It doesn't mean you have to like them, or that you can't find whatever humour you can in such a tragedy as this." Sigrid grinned and leant her head against his shoulder. If her Da were to come across them like this, he'd throw a fit, but it felt right, somehow. She'd never felt more comfortable than she had with Fíli right now, right this moment. Being in his arms felt like being at home. She felt safe for the first time in so long, she felt as though nothing could harm her.

"Thank you, by the way. For saving us from those orcs." 

"Those orcs would never have come to your house had we not been there in the first place. It should be me thanking you for taking us in when my brother was sick."

"I couldn't turn him away, not when he was like that. I know what it's like to care for siblings, like I said, I couldn't turn you away." Sigrid smiled. "And I thank you deeply for that." There dwarf replied as the two of them continued to look around at the remains of Lake-Town.