So Comes Snow After Fire

5.i If Wrath Be to Seek, Do Not Lend Her Thy Cheek

Kíli was relieved when the gate wardens admitted him to the mountain with nothing more than the usual greeting. It meant that Thorin had not yet formally disinherited him before all of Erebor. His own words last night, Kíli knew quite well, would have fully justified such an action.

"If being your heir—if being a Durin—has to mean more than the people I love, I renounce my claim! I don't want to be a prince!"

He wasn't entirely sure if, when he had said those words, he had meant them as a true renouncement of his birthright, or merely as the proof of what he was willing to lose if he must. Yet having said them, he knew he no longer had the right to expect he could walk through the gates as if, well, he might someday own the place.

The main hallways were all empty. Everyone would be at supper in the dining hall, and Kíli went there, as well. He needed to present himself to Thorin immediately, and as awkward as it would be to do so in front of everyone, it would also be better that way. Though his trespass had been private, Kíli knew that a public acknowledgment and apology would make the gesture a renewal of fealty, as well.

He paused for a moment outside the dining hall. The usual hubbub of conversation and clattered dishes did not feel welcoming tonight. Kíli could only imagine all the eyes that would soon be on him, questioning him, judging him.

Maker give me courage, he breathed, and he went in.

No-one noticed him at first, and he hoped for one desperate moment that maybe, just maybe, he would make it to the high table unremarked. Then one conversation stilled, and then another, as diners nudged their companions and nodded to him. Kíli didn't allow himself to look aside, but kept striding down the room.

People were whispering. "Not so much a fool as I thought," and "brazen nerve," though none of it irritated him half so much as hearing someone say, in a voice that was hardly a whisper, "Pray he's broken free of her spell at last." Such a remark might well have cost its speaker a bloody nose, had Kíli not been painfully conscious at that moment that he was must act both fully grown and a prince.

As he neared the high table, Kíli watched to see what his uncle's and brother's reactions would be. Thorin's face was unreadable, though Fíli was clearly surprised. Daín, at his uncle's left, seemed somehow disapproving and reassured at once, if such a thing were possible. Kíli saw that his own seat, two places down from Thorin's right, next to Fíli, was still empty.

Thorin was watching him steadily as he halted below the table.

Kíli knelt.

"Your Majesty. Uncle," he began softly, his eyes on Thorin's. He forced his voice louder so that the rest of the room might hear. "Forgive me for what I said last night. I spoke out of anger, and I am sorry." Thorin's expression did not change. "I promise I shall endeavor, as I have always done, to behave worthily of you." Kíli bowed his head.

Those next moments of waiting were the hardest of all. He had submitted himself and there was nowhere to run.

"Rise, Kíli, my sister-son, and resume your place," came his uncle's voice at last.

Kíli waited another moment out of humility, and then stood. As he made his way round the table to his seat, he glanced up at Fíli once more. His brother's face was blank, and Kíli felt suddenly hurt. He wasn't sure exactly what he had expected: encouragement, sympathy, relief, perhaps? No, he was a fool to expect Fíli wasn't injured by what he'd done. Yet as Kíli slid into his seat, Fíli shoved his own full tankard towards his brother, and Kíli accepted it with a grateful nod.

The dwarves at the tables below them reluctantly turned their attention back to their neighbors, and conversations slowly resumed.