lost in the fire

the snuggle circle

A/N: warning! As the title of this chapter suggests, the following chapter contains depictions of cuddles, snuggles, hugging etc. Viewer discretion advised ;)

After a few days, I begin to realize how dirty we are. Some of the dwarves even smell, the smell of sweat and manly odours hanging in the air. Some of them smell downright disgusting, but I have found myself lingering around Thorin for a bit too long, his manly scent doing things to my stomach. What mostly bothers me is that I'm smelling myself now, and that my hair is dirtier than it's ever been in my life. Ew.

"I need a bath." I say in the evening, when we finish dinner. They all turn to look at me at it, seeming to realize the problem.

"It's not safe for you to be out there by yourself." Thorin states, blue eyes meeting mine.

"We'll join her!" Kili says teasingly, making Fili grin.

"Enough, boys. You will not join her." Thorin interrupts them, and I shake my head with a smile when I hear their "aww".

"I need a bath, I smell terribly. As do you guys." I state, drawing the attention back to the matter at hand. Some of the dwarves protest at that, but Thorin quickly shuts them up.

"Then what do you suggest? You're not bathing together with all of us." He asks, raising an eyebrow at me.

"One of you can come with me and keep watch. I'm sure you won't look. You can even switch up who does it, because I can understand that it's not very nice to have to babysit me." I suggest, smiling innocently at him.

"Fine. But the youngest aren't doing it." He agrees, earning him groans from Fili and Kili. Ori, on the other hand, seems actually quite relieved.

"Thank you. So, who's first?" I chuckle when Bifur stands up immediately, a smile on his face.

"Great! Let's go then." I say to him, taking the towel and soap that Bilbo hands me. Bifur offers his arm for me to take, how sweet, and we walk over to the river that wasn't very far away, actually. I put my towel down near the water, when he grunts something in Khuzdul.

"What is it, Bifur?" I ask, turning my attention to him. He motions from me, to the water, to him, to a tree a bit away, saying something in his language. I really need to make work of learning the language.

"You're waiting there for me?" I ask, a little uncertain, and he nods at it, glad that I understand. After that, he points to his eyes, than to me, and shakes his head at it, a reassuring look on his face.

"I know you wouldn't peek. Thanks, Bifur, you're very sweet." I answer with a smile and I place a hand on his shoulder to give him a gentle squeeze, making him smile as well before he wanders off to the tree, sitting down there before covering his eyes. I strip out of my clothes and get into the water, which is cold but bearable.

"I'm in the water now, Bifur, so you can check if I'm still alive." I call out, making him slowly look up at me. I wave at him briefly, the water reaching up to my shoulders, and he waves back at me. I softly begin to hum a song as I wash my hair and body, and eventually Bifur begins to hum along, despite him not knowing the melody at all. After a while, he actually seems to get the hang of it.

"I'm going to get out now, okay?" I call out, making him nod in understanding before covering his eyes once more. I quickly get out and dry myself off, then slip back into my clothes, happy to feel clean again after so many days.

"I'm done!" He opens his eyes at that, stands up, and leads me back to the camp.

When Bifur and I reach the camp, I can't help but smile at the sight in front of me. All the dwarves and Bilbo are huddled closely around the fire, most even cuddling to keep warm enough. Despite it being still rather warm during the day, it had been getting freezing cold at night, and cuddling seemed to be the only really effective solution. Most of the time, I slept against Bilbo or Fili and Kili, which was fine with me.