This is essentially 'Kings and Sweetmeats', but told through the eyes of Sigrid, and therefore is more Fili centered. Despite that, it is a different story, with many different scenes. You can read this without having read Anne's and Bard's story but the two complement each other so it'd be worth your while to have a poke around Kings and Sweetmeats if you haven't read it. Enjoy!

.

TA 2942

The sun shining on Dale in the summer is nigh on unbearable. It is hot and sticky. It is oppressive. It smothers the streets with its sweltering heat, giving no reprieve. The only consolation is that we know that it will benefit us in the years to come; it will help to give us bountiful harvests, and it will counter the sadness that this city is being built on.

The sun is hot on my back as I work; I feel its heat seeping through my clothes until my neck is damp with sweat and my forehead is shining. I am a mess; I want nothing more than to run to the lake and throw myself in, dowdy dress and all. I rise from where I have been hunkered down in old, rotten flower beds and try to wipe my forehead with the back of my hand, though I soon groan when I catch sight of my hand when it falls. Both sides are covered in dirt. Of course they are.

I allow myself a minute to sag against the hard, stone wall behind me, and survey the work that is still only half completed. This is to be a home for a new widow with four young mouths to feed. Five, to be exact, though the fifth is still on the breast and young enough that he hasn't missed not having a few spoonfuls of gruel*. I saw the babe for the first time only yesterday - he has a head of black hair and bright green eyes that he inherited from the man who died in the fighting not far from where I am now, a few short months ago.

Da has tasked himself with the feeding of the family, as he has so many others, and the dwarves are coaxing a house for them from unforgiving stone. And what am I doing? I am gardening. No - I am not gardening; I am creating. My hands are pulling out the old, thorny past and leaving a blank space of fresh earth, ready for children's hands and kitchen herbs. I am creating a reminder of peace, for a woman who has lost too much.

My hands are red and sore, though that does not stop me from crouching back down and grabbing a small saw to begin hacking off the dead branches and roots of what I pretend used to be a rosebush, though the unfriendly trunk is dead and black and I fancy that not even one of the Elves could tell me what it was. I dig the blade into the dead limbs and pull with all of my might until it gives me one small sliver of a crack on the branch. My failure is enough to send me trying again, though I pull too hard and end up falling painfully onto my backside with a thud and the saw bounces off the stone with a clang.

I sit on the hard stone for long enough to begin feeling sorry for myself.

And then I hear it.

"'Ello?" A low voice calls, the sound muffled. Whoever it is must be inside.

I stay silent, glad that the garden bed is in a tiny courtyard behind the house, surrounded by tall walls. The only way in is by a door in the kitchen, and I am sure that no one will even think-

"Sigrid?"

"Fili?"

I stare at the fair-haired dwarf, and the shock must be evident in my face because he frowns and looks at me like I am a timid mouse that might scamper off at any minute. Well, appearing in thin white shirt-sleeves that are pushed up to the elbow, exposing tanned, hard skin that is damp with the fruits of hard work will do that to a girl. Wouldn't it? Perhaps it would just do it to me.

"What are you doing?" he asks and has the good grace to cross the offending arms at his chest, drawing my gaze to the bare skin at the nape of his neck that is glistening with sweat.

"Nothing," I reply, though my voice catches, making me sound guilty, as if he has caught me doing something that I shouldn't. He hasn't, of course, for thankfully my face is so red from the sun that not even dwarven eyes can see the blush that I feel burning my insides. He frowns again.

"The house is finished," he comments. I wonder if he is expecting me to agree.

"No it's not," I counter.

Fili is silent, watching me with an amused smile. If I pretend well enough, I think that there might even be a tenderness to the way his eyes take in the dirt on my hands and cheek.

He turns and looks at the garden, giving me a chance to study him. The months have barely changed him, though his beard is now at least the length of a balled fist under his chin. He's braided it, to match his moustache. He has tied his long hair back, though I think I can see a new braid or two at the sides of his head. He looks more… Regal? Or handsome, I add silently and bite my lip.

"No, perhaps it isn't," he agrees finally.

If I were a talkative person, I would rise to his bait and object to the 'perhaps'. 'Perhaps' it isn't finished? Of course it isn't finished. If I were a talkative person, I would say: 'You, sir, climbed out of my toilet and now you are presuming that a house is finished when there's nowhere for a mother's herbs that heal cuts, or soothe sore throats.'

Instead, I grumble inaudibly under my breath. Fili might be the most attractive man (or dwarf - what do I call him?) I have seen, but I am no wide-eyed milk maid. I am calm and collected, my words well thought out and ordered.

"…Sigrid?"

"Oh. What?" I turn to him, realizing that he has spoken and I have completely missed it, having been engrossed in thinking about how I am not thinking about him.

He ducks his head and grins, an impish, elfin grin. I like this grin, I decide.

"I said: shall I help you?"

At once I cross my arms and try to assemble a retort, something along the lines of 'I am perfectly capable of gardening', but suddenly he has crouched down beside me and all I can see are the golden hairs on his firm arms.

"If you want," I manage.

"I do," he looks at me sideways.

He does. Well, then. What do I say now?

"Hack these off." I hand him the saw and gesture at the trunk and its dead limbs. Good start, Sigrid.

"Hack it off?" he echoes and I shrug, aiming to project a no-nonsense air, but soon I have betrayed myself and my mouth is hanging wide open. Why? Because he tosses the saw aside and grabs the trunk with his bare hands and rips it right out of the earth with only the lowest of grunts rumbling from his chest.

"Where do you want it?" he asks, holding the trunk in one arm over his shoulder. The dangling roots shower us with dirt, and I hold my arms over my head. "Sorry," he adds with another grin.

I can't remember what he asked me; my thoughts have rapidly turned from wonder at his strength, to picturing me held in his arms like that. Surely I wouldn't weigh much more than the tree? I squint at the trunks, mentally comparing myself and the tree.

"Sigrid?"

Oh. Right.

"Over there," I wave a hand vaguely at one of the walls, hoping that there's somewhere that the remains of a dead tree can be suitably deposited.

Fili drops the charred, twisted thing and jumps up to grip onto the top of the wall. He pulls himself up until his palms are flat on the top, supporting his body, then he surveys whatever is behind the wall and hums. By this time, I have given up controlling my thoughts and am instead struggling to reign in a whistle of appreciation, like the boys in Laketown sometimes do when a top-heavy fishwife strolls by. Da always cuffs them on the back of their heads when he hears them, but even he can't quite stop his eyes from widening at such a sight, the way mine are right now.

"It'll do," he calls and I choke out a sound that is meant to be a 'yes' but instead sounds like I have been imagining him climbing up to my window in exactly the same way he's doing now.

He drops down to the ground and effortlessly picks up the tree again, then throws it over the wall. The movement covers the courtyard in dirt, though he doesn't hesitate and heads back through the door in the kitchen, coming back out with a stiff broom. Soon the courtyard is spotless and he has only been here for five minutes. I feel slightly overwhelmed.

"Ho," Fili huffs and sinks onto the ground beside me, stretching his legs out and leaning his back against the wall. I am relieved to see beads of sweat on his forehead, evidence that he is not a sledgehammer personified after all.

I mull over my options: I can keep on gardening, where I know that my backside will be in full view of his face, in this drab brown skirt that does me no favours. Or I can sit beside him. Or leave. I decide to sit beside him and, after a seconds thought, stretch out my legs, too. Sitting like this, we are the same height, though my feet touch the stone borders of the small garden and his do not.

"Hard work you're doing, lass," he comments blandly.

I turn to him with a frown but he is smiling again. I don't miss how his eyes take in my blouse that is slightly too small across the chest. I haven't yet had time to make up a new one, even though Da is repeatedly telling me to let myself rest for a change. Da doesn't quite understand that I'm not about to go and get measured by a seamstress who, no doubt, I've known since I had buds instead of breasts.

"Is it?" I challenge him boldly. Or it feels boldly, to me.

"It is for a princess," he counters, assessing how the word makes me turn away and stare at the opposite wall. It is a tiny courtyard, and our two bodies, plus the garden, almost fill it entirely.

"Yes, well," I say and shrug. I'm not Da's girl for nothing, and neither of us would be able to construct a flowery response to such a comment.

"Does the princess not wish to rest her tired hands?" Fili continues and I scowl at the wall.

"Why?" I grumble, still avoiding his gaze, even though I feel it like he's waving a white hot branding iron in front of me and not his ice blue eyes.

"You're a strong girl," he states. For some reason, I quite like the sound of the word 'girl' coming out of his mouth even though it makes me grind my teeth together if Da ever uses it. But Da says it when he wants to be stern, or worse, charming in the way only a father can be.

Fili says 'girl' like it could be replaced by 'woman', and I quite like that.

"But even a strong lass needs a rest, now, doesn't she?" he adds and all of a sudden, he picks up my hand from where it has been lying idly at my side and holds it between his two, larger ones.

This makes me whip my head around, until I am staring at our hands. His are hot and damp with sweat, something that I think I would find fairly revolting in another man, but because they're Fili's hands, I feel a strange twist in an unknown part of my body. I can't locate exactly what part it is – somewhere between my stomach and my… Well. There.

"Maybe," I whisper as he studies how my hand fits against his. Somehow, it's smaller.

"Look at that," he breathes. I can't – I'm looking at his beard instead. I am struck by the thought of how it might feel if it grazed my cheek. Soft, maybe, or hard like the coarse, rough wool that I used to use to make our winter vests. We will have better wool now, Da says.

"Your hands are tiny," he says next. "Like I thought."

I can barely breathe. Like he thought? Was he thinking of how our hands would fit together? Should I ask him? But he beats me to it.

"Your skin is soft," he says, his low voice so soft that I have to lean closer to him to hear it, until our shoulders are almost touching. I mean to move in the most innocent way that I can, all I want is to hear him better, but his head jerks up and then he is looking right at me, his eyes dark. I can smell his body – smell the effect the sun has had on him, as it has on me. It doesn't make me recoil. Somehow it makes me think that we might smell like this if we've been entangled with each other, our bodies slick and bare.

When did I even begin to have such thoughts?

He makes a strangled sound in his throat, and I see his chest moving faster. For a moment, he leans even closer and I think that he might kiss me. I feel such a mix of fear and desire that it must be painted on my face, and he moves back slightly, though he does not relinquish his hold on my hand.

I watch, transfixed, as he raises my hand and reaches over it to extend my fingers and flip it over. The next thing I know, his lips are pressed against my palm in a soft kiss.

His breath is hot on my hand, almost as hot as the scorching sun. If I could barely breath before, now I have completely forgotten how to, for his mouth has moved until he brushes it over each of my fingertips.

When he has finished, he closes my hand, finger by finger, then covers it again, until my fist is trapped between his hands. I exhale, then forget to inhale.

"Breathe, Sigrid," Fili says gently.

Oh, but I can't, Fili. I cannot.

"Breathe," he repeats and my lungs obey the commanding edge to his tone, though my mind is still far, far away, remembering how his beard feels like the belly of a kitten that my mother kept once, though I come back to earth when I remember that it drowned in the lake.

"Right," I nod. "Right. I am breathing, Fili. Thank you." My voice comes out harsher than I mean it to, and he lets go of my hand.

At the same time we both hear voices in the neighbouring house. Fili cranes his head to the side, as if he might see who it is, but he soon stands and turns back to the kitchen door.

"I…" he trails off, and looks down at his feet. "It was nice to see you, Sigrid. More than nice."

I smile shyly, pleased with the relieved look that flashes across his face in the split second before he mirrors my smile.

"It was nice to see you too, Fili," I admit, congratulating my femininity for automatically making me blush again. I like how his eyes focus on my pink cheeks, and I more than like how his face stretches into a grin that might just be a tad triumphant.

"I'll see you soon," he says and opens the door, then turns back to me again. "It would be a pleasure, to see you again."

He says the last words quickly, before he darts through the door and it swings shut behind him.

I look at the door for a long time, until I have memorized the flowing carvings around the borders. Then I turn back to my garden, and stick my hands in the dirt, daring to imagine a future that blooms the way I hope the new seeds in my pocket will.

tbc.