The king and the hobbit

Summary

Where the people of middle earth bare the names of their soul mates on their wrists, Bilbo unknowingly bares the mark of Thorin but doesn't know it, when Kili and Fili force Bilbo and Thorin to meet, they slowly come to realise that they are each other's soul mates but when trouble happens back at the blue mountains and Thorin has to leave Bilbo in the shire to take care of it, Bilbo doubts that Thorin will return to him. Happens before the quest and builds up to it. Happy ending I promise, with slight angst.

Chapter one

Bilbo Baggins had always been considered odd for a hobbit, after all not all hobbit children would go wondering around in the woods of the shire looking for elves and dwarfs that may be passing by. He became even odder after the deaths of his parents and he stayed in Bag End all on his own. Bilbo sighed as he sat in front of the fire in the lounge, tomorrow would be his 33rd birthday, and he was finally coming of age. Normally for hobbits this was a big happy occasion but Bilbo had no one to share his birthday with.

Tomorrow when he awoke, his soul mark will have appeared; the soul mark will be the name of his one and only love and will be marked on his left wrist. Bilbo was both excited and deeply terrified of this idea. He was happy that he will finally know who his soul had chosen to love, but what if they didn't return his affection? What if their soul had chosen another rather than strange Bilbo, as the other hobbits had taken to calling him, although this wasn't a common occurrence but not unheard of. What scared him most was the idea of waking up in the morning to have o soul mark at all.

Bilbo stood from his soft cosy armchair and walked into his kitchen to grab a snack before bed, whatever happened tomorrow would happen no matter how much he fretted over it.

The sun shone through a gap in the curtains of Bilbo's bedroom, frowning Bilbo opened his eyes, after blinking a few times he realised what today was. With shaking hands he raised his left sleeve of his bed shirt to reveal his soul mark which was unreadable to him. Bilbo stared at his wrist in horror; he might as well have had no soul mark at all. The mark was written in some of ruins, he had never seen anything like it. This made Bilbo quite confident that it wasn't any form of elfish as he had learned some elfish and it looked nothing like that. 'Which I should feel lucky about I suppose, considering the height difference' Bilbo thought with a small chuckle.

Trying not hard to sob Bilbo thought about the years of loneliness he had ahead of him now, surely he'll never meet the one who's name he now wore. Even if he did meet them how would he even know they were the one? And even if he did why would he want him? A hobbit that was odd by hobbits standards didn't stand a chance with someone from another race.

A knock at the door brought him out of his thoughts, shrugging off the bedding Bilbo quickly dressed in annoyance at being disturbed this early. Despite the increase in volume of the knocks, Bilbo made sure he was presentable and his mark was hidden from view of whoever was at his door. What Bilbo expected when he pulled open his front door wasn't to come face to face with a pair of smiling dwarfs. 'Young ones by the looks of it' he mused.

"Good morning! Master…"the dark haired one cut himself off waiting for Bilbo to give his name.

"Baggins" Bilbo supplied as he looked over the two dwarfs one was blonde haired and already had quite an impressive beard grown, while the slightly shorter of the two had brown long hair but only slight stubble in place of a beard. Bilbo was pulled out of his observations when he realised they were talking again.

"Ah master Boggins, I am Kili-" from the mischievous grin on his face Bilbo knew that he hadn't misheard him and correcting him would be pointless.

"And I am Fili" the two bowed low to Bilbo "At your service!"

Bilbo looked at the pair for a minute before straightening his back and asking "at my service for what exactly?" twin grins answered him for a few minutes.

"You see master Boggins"

"Out uncle has come to your town"

"After hearing that hobbiton had an unmanned blacksmith forge"

"So we came around to tell you…"

"And many other hobbits, although we haven't even managed to get past introductions before having the door slammed in our faces"

"Kili shh, as I was saying, we have come to spread the word that the forge is open for business and should you require anything making I' sure our uncle can make it"

"Aye, he can make all sorts, locks, silverware-"

"Excuse me but do you always speak like this?" Bilbo asked his neck was starting to strain from going back and forth between the two dwarfs, Kili and Fili his mind supplied for him. The two dwarfs nodded smiling at Bilbo which caused the hobbit to sigh loudly causing the two to frown.

"If you would like us to leave you in peace master Baggins we can take our leave" Fili said nodding towards his brother who after pouting nodded his head in agreement.

"Nonsense, now I believe you said something about your uncle being able to put in locks, I have some terrible relatives that persist on trying to steal family heirlooms from me, could they keep them out?" Bilbo asked thinking of all the times Lobelia Sackville-Baggins had attempted to claim something from his home.

Looking at the two Bilbo saw their grins return before they started to speak again. "Aye no one can break into a dwarf lock"

"And we've seen uncle make loads"

"We could fetch him if you like"

"So he can see what type of lock you would need and price it up for you"

"That would be lovely. But first would you boys want to come in for breakfast? You could fetch your uncle while I cooked if you like it's been awhile since I had guests to cater for." I t seemed as if their smiled couldn't get any bigger until Fili frowned at the hobbit as if a dark thought had occurred to him.

"We don't accept charity master Baggins" he muttered darkly which caused Kili to deflate as we before he nodded sadly at his brother.

"It's not charity, you both and your uncle will be doing me a great service at keeping my greedy relatives at bay and I don't much fancy eating breakfast aloe on my birthday but if you don't wish to stay for breakfast then I would at least appreciate it if you would fetch your uncle to assess the work needed at some point today" Bilbo huffed. 'The nerve of some people, I try to offer food out of appreciation and they knock it back.'

Fili and Kili had the grace to look slightly ashamed of themselves but mostly shocked at being berated by the young hobbit. "We did not mean to upset you Master Boggins, especially on your birthday"

"It's just that our uncle is a very proud dwarf and he doesn't like thinking that he is being pitied"

"And we didn't know if it was pity that caused you to ask us in for breakfast"

"But we would be honoured to share your breakfast with you."

"Especially on such an occasion!-"

"-If we are still welcome to?" At Bilbo's nod Fili continued "I shall go and collect our uncle and my little brother shall stay with you and help in any way that he can"

Bilbo smiled at the both of them, "of course the door will be unlocked when you and your uncle return" Fili bowed low before heading down towards the old forge while Bilbo showed Kili into his home.

While his brother stayed with the rather nice hobbit Fili headed down to the forge were Thorin was cleaning away the dirt and setting about starting the fires t start work. 'Uncle Thorin didn't even know we had gone to spread the news, I hope he's not angry' Fili shuddered at the idea of his uncle being mad at him and Kili. They were not yet of age and shouldn't have wondered too far away from their uncle never mind speak to strangers. If they had still been in the Blue Mountains they would have been punished already for leaving their dwellings.

Fili paused at the doorway of the forge looking at his uncle and couldn't help but feel guilty. If Thorin didn't have to care for him and Kili then he wouldn't have had to leave his friends and people to work as a general labourer and blacksmith in the shire to spare the two younglings from yet another harsh winter.

Thorin noticed his nephew at the door and frowned at Fili, "where is your brother? Is he hurt?" Fili shook his head at his uncle. "Are you alright? None of the locals have upset you?"

"No uncle, although m and Kili did tell a few hobbits that the forge is open and a young hobbit- a Master Baggins, has asked for some locks to be fitted ad offered us breakfast. Kili is with him now. When we told him we didn't need charity he scolded us and said that he didn't want to be alone on his birthday so I came to collet you." Fili rushed to say all that he had wanted to before his uncle could interrupt us with anger.

Thorin sighed at his nephew's obvious nervousness, after looking around the forge one last time he nodded to Fili. "It was a good idea to go around the dwellings of the hobbits. And breakfast would be appreciated, we had better go and make sure your brother hasn't eaten the poor hobbit out of house and home." Fili sagged in relief before turning to lead his uncle to Bag End. He missed the way his uncle rubbed his left wrist that which had a significantly darker soul mark on than the night before when Thorin had gone to sleep.

Etched into his skin was the Khuzdul name of his newly come of age soul mate, his soul mate which was of no dwarvan name known the Thorin.