Hello!

I am a fan of Tolkien in all his different aspects and influences – the didactic professor passionate about languages; the ponderous writer-historian-translator of the Silmarillion; the archetypal narrator in the Lord of the Rings; uncle-ish storyteller in the Hobbit; the reproduction and reinterpretation of his works through Peter Jackson's trilogy; the ideas he inspired in fanfiction; the hilarious 'Hobbit Production Videos' on yourtube; list goes on. The release of the Hobbit movie was truly a joyous occasion for me, and although I have a list of nit-picky criticisms, I loved PJ's dwarves and young Bilbo in particular.

Summary :

Gimli the young dwarf bids Fili and Kili farewell the night before they leave for their great quest, and wishes he were a little older. Takes place a few weeks before the Gandalf's meeting with Bilbo Baggins in the Shire.

The nephews of Thorin spot Gloin and his mighty fire touched beard from a distance, and through the throng of men Kili gives a great shout of greeting.

"Uncle Gloin!" The enthusiastic young one wants to run to him, but Fili maintains a cool measured stride, and Kili never contradicts his brother's lead.

Looking up at the familiar voice, Gloin nods and raises a burly arm. Not for the first time he admires the elder's comeliness and collected, composed authority. Gloin does not say it, but even at his age he respects Fili already – and yet not in the way that he respects Thorin. In Gloin's mind Thorin is more of a warrior-king, a fierce and demanding battle commander, while is Fili a scholar-ruler, with a more nuanced way of seeing things. And Kili?

Gloin smiles at this, and hopes that Kili will never have the weight of kingship passed to him, for it would mean the passing of the older brother without the younger…and Gloin guesses, rightly so, that such separation would be too cruel.

"If you'll stop ugly-fyin' your trinkets for awhile –!" Gloin called through the house, and Oin looked up in annoyance, having been startled into making an erroneous dab with his paintbrush.

"Outta my way, oaf, the lads don't need to see you," Oin retorts as he stomps from his working bench, not before carefully putting his half-painted toy down. He isn't always quite as deaf as he pretends to be, which is just as well, because he and Gloin often insult each other in brotherly contempt.

Fili and Kili reach Gloin's doorstep and bow deeply.

"Uncle Gloin! Uncle Oin! Well met, and greetings from our uncle Thorin!" Kili says with his usual fresh beam.

"We meet at the Shire three weeks from tomorrow, where Gandalf the Wizard will have picked the last member of our company," Fili says to his elders.

"We will be there," Gloin replies. "You will be expected for meals here! My lady wife is now at her sister's, but she'll be back in a while. As always, our house and hearth are yours."

"The young Gimli can be found at the forge," says Oin, and Gloin frowns at this. "My dear brother thinks his son wants for solitude, but I! I am not so old and age-addled, and I remember well what youth is like. He will do well with your company."

"He is furious about the exclusion," Gloin rumbles. "But there is nothing for it. This is not a quest for untempered steel." Quite by unspoken agreement Fili's fair eyes meet Gloin's unwaveringly, and a silent exchange is understood :

You are yet untempered as well, young one.

I am young, it is true, but remember that I am a prince of the line of Durin.

Yes. And…your brother?

My brother…will be my charge.

Fili's eyes twinkle conspiratorially and he smiles his secretive dimpled smile; to this Gloin's mouth quirks under his beard, both in agreement that Kili is quite a handful of…Kili.

"What are you smiling about?" Kili asks, tugging Fili's arm.

Fili gives Gloin a last quirk of his brows and turns away, saying,

"Come! We go to cousin Gimli."

"But what were you smiling about? You're keeping a secret from me, brother!"

Kili's pestering lasts the length of the jaunt to the forge, but when they open the door he inhales a billow of smoke and is overcome by an enthusiastic fit of coughing – everything Kili does positively brims with zealousness. Fili waves the smoke aside.

"Cousin Gimli!" he calls.

"C-cousin – wheeze - G-Gimli!" Kili echoes brightly.

When the smoke has cleared they see a chubby, red cheeked almost-dwarfling with an envious abundance of healthy red curls, made bushier than usual with smoke. Gimli, they can see if they peer, is working on the head of a hammer.

"Cousin Gimli!" Kili calls again, cluelessly cheerful and expecting an equally cheerful return. Another beat of silence, and then to Fili – "why isn't he responding?"

But Fili is already moving ahead and making his way to the working bench, and Kili hurries along, stumped.

Gimli is glowering, and not just from the heat from the forge. Instead of saying anything else – for it is generally agreed that Kili is a dwarf of too many words – Fili sits himself on the working bench and fixes his steady blue eyed gaze on his younger cousin, waiting instead for the younger to make the first move.

Kili looks from his brother to his cousin, and ends up copying his brother's silence, folding his arms and glaring demandingly at Gimli. Fili sees his brother's posture out of the corner of his eye and wants to laugh.

After a while Gimli cannot concentrate, not with Fili's calm eyes on him, and he puts his steel aside.

"What?" he growls to the brothers, sounding remarkably like his father. Before Fili can say anything Kili has reacted. Because Gimli's expression is wide eyed and challenging, Kili schools his expression into something less light hearted.

"We brought you a goodbye present, youngling," says Kili solemnly, and presents to the redhead a finely made gift with both hands. It is a very delicately made hair piece.

For a moment Gimli the almost-dwarfling looks like he is about to bawl, like he used to when he was no bigger than a pumpkin. Kili looks alarmed at this unexpected reaction and almost drops the present in lieu of covering his ears, for Gimli is a very vigorous, barrel chested almost-dwarfling with a formidable set of screaming apparatus – lungs, voice, and the like. The present is dropped anyway, because Gimli actually bellows, a full throated bellow which could fell a small bear, and shoves Kili hard into the bench.

"I'm – not – a – youngling!" Gimli shouts at Fili while Kili sputters. "Father going! Uncle going! Cousin Fili and cousin Kili going! Everyone on an adventure except me!"

For a moment Fili thinks Gimli is so upset he is going to fall face first into his lap, obese dwarflet-style, and Fili nearly spreads his arms to catch him – although the hefty redhead outweighs him by now. But Gimli turns away from the brothers. In a softer tone, with child-like mournfulness, he murmurs again, "father going! Uncle going! Cousin Fili going and cousin Kili going! Everyone on an adventure except me!"

Nursing a sore backside, Kili looks at his brother for guidance. Fili is unperturbed by Gimli's outburst, having babysat both Kili and Gimli since they were born.

"Come to the barn-attic with us," Fili finally says.

"Yes, do!" Kili chimes in, feeling helpless.

Gimli glowers, shrugs, and follows his cousins into Oin's barn.

The barn-attic, which they reach using a ladder, is sweet with the smell of hay and old wood. There the cousins sit facing one another, and Fili, the most mature in mind by far, marvels at how both Kili and Gimli are wavering between boyhood and manhood, and how the redhead's title teeters between the affectionate "cousin Gimli" and the more formal "Gimli son of Gloin."

"This adventure will be much the poorer without you," Fili says in his quiet manner. "Thorin would have taken the Mountain back with all our loved ones, all our women-folk, and all our child-folk if he could, but where peril reigns, our leader's decisions must be harsh. Kili and I follow him as is our right and responsibility, but Thorin will not risk more lives of our precious few young."

Kili nods admiringly. This way of Fili's, to state things as though Gimli had already come to terms with his own exclusion, sobers his cousin visibly. Still –

"I fight well," Gimli mutters thickly.

"Yes indeed! You may outmatch us even with our different ages! But skill will fail one out of a hundred times to keep death at bay," Fili replies. The compliment was not an unrealistic one, for already Gimli had weight and strength the slighter brothers did not, even if Fili was the faster and Kili the distance-fighter.

"Aye, and uncle Thorin once said, even for Dwalin, he fears that they fall," Kili adds. Dwalin was to all the cousins a source of great awe, being immeasurably fierce, even unstoppable; none in their minds could stand against Thorin's powerful lieutenant.

"If my father falls, I will be shamed to not have been beside him," Gimli says plaintively, and suddenly Fili realizes Gimli's real fear is not that he would miss out on glory and honor, but that his father might not return.

"He won't," Kili says confidently. "Not with such a wife as your mother, and such a son as you! And for the same reasons, neither will uncle Oin, nor my brother and I!" He grins at Gimli, cocksure and naïve, and even Gimli has to be pulled out of his unhappiness. "Our Great Gorilla Gloin will be the bane of our foes! You'll see," Kili continues with a growing playfulness. It is an old game of Oin's, who has an extensive knowledge of and fondness for animals and likes to affectionately and humorously characterize his friends. Kili loves to imagine each of them and describe them with much laughter and delight.

"Such a formidable, doughty, worthy company will be assembled as never has been seen!" Kili is afire with animation, waves his hand for emphasis. "Thorin the majestic, like the Wild Buffalo of the South with its flowing mane and glinting horns! Dwalin the Elephant, tall as a house, thick of hide and thicker of sinew! Balin the Ram, hoary yet sprightly, and wise beyond all! Gloin the great Gorilla, and Oin the rampaging Rhinoceros! Bifur the deranged Badger, deadly beyond compare! Bofur the Skunk – don't let his smile fool you! Bombur the Bear! Dori, the Ox, with nigh implacable strength! Nori the Pangoline, fast, vicious, and wily! Ori the Hare – packs a surprising punch! Fili the Falcon, unswervingly fast and deadly accurate! And I, Kili! Kili the –"

"Nonstop yapper of a snub-nosed little wolf puplet," Fili deadpans. Gimli lets out a tremendous snort and Kili thwacks his brother in good-natured indignance.

"Well, there you have it, cousin Gimli! Our company will want for nothing," says Kili with satisfaction. He grins expectantly at Gimli, who has to accede to Kili's contagious excitement.

"I wish you ninety-nine fierce and rousing battles!" he says, at once hearty, envious, and reluctant.

Sometime later, as Kili is regaling Oin nineteen to the dozen with his latest stories, Gimli approaches Fili in the guest room, where Fili is methodically sharpening his sword.

"Cousin Fili," Gimli greets, and Fili marks immediately that something is troubling the younger.

"What is it, stout one?" Fili asks, his eyes expansive and searching.

Gimli seems to be second guessing himself now, hesitating between speech and withdrawal, and Fili pats the ground in front of him in a gentle prompt.

So Gimli takes a seat, thinks, and finally,

"I learned from men of the village about the way men please other men with their bodies," Gimli half-blurts.

Fili raises his eyebrows at the statement in general, then one thing in particular narrows his sky blue eyes.

"What do you mean, 'learned' from men?"

"Not like that!" Gimli reassures him. "We talked about it, is all. Nothing actually happened."

"A relief! I see." Fili pauses. "And?"

"And – would you like me to – !" Gimli jerks his eyes away and colors. Fili's brows raise further.

"Are you making me an offer, Gimli?"

"Ye-es." A gruff mutter.

"What ho," Fili murmurs to himself, and as he observes Gimli's downturned eyes some levity comes into his own.

"I thank you sincerely, Gimli, but no," Fili finally says. At that Gimli's eyes flash –

"N-no?! Is it because my body is –"

"Nothing of the sort, and quite the contrary," Fili says firmly, man to man. "But rather because your love is already impossibly strong and clear to me, and I have no need and no desire of proof! I can see in your eyes that although your heart is willing, your body is not so willing, for we are both men, and you are not so inclined.

"It is not a light thing, Gimli son of Gloin, for a body to be taken and used in love. Couples lie together and guard each other jealously and with much commitment, as a smith his tools, as a warrior his weapons. And I am not a lord, to demand comfort from my men, or -" Fili waited to let Gimli understand his words, "- or so at my wits end that I will expire my lust in a body which is unwilling."

"There will be a day that you love someone with mind and heart and body, and I am not that person! But that does not in any way weaken our bond. In fact, I am very touched with your offer. Thank you."

Gimli harrumphs gruffly again, and they smile at one another.

A knock on the door, and Gimli's mother asks from the outside if there is anything the brothers would like to request for before they leave tomorrow.

"I know for a fact that Kili will have nothing to wash, but he will want something special to eat," she says, peering around the door with a twinkle.

"Don't give him the raisins I bought special this morning, Ma!" Gimli growls, by which he means, be sure you make the raisin buns that they like, I bought the special raisins!

"And if your blades need some sharpening, or your boots want for a scrub -"

"Oh don't fuss, Ma!" And then - "hide the special apples, remember!"

His mother smiles, bustles out and leaves the boys be.

"Your boots do want some scrubbing," says Gimli.

"I'll make Kili do it," Fili shrugs with a grin.

Gimli snorts. "I'll do it, you lazy lunk."

The cousins bid Gimli goodbye the next day, and to nobody's surprise it's Kili who's the tearful one. They hug long and hard and it's all Kili can do to not start wailing, because now that they are truly about to go, away from Home and into the Shire, he is really terrified on the inside, and it's only because Fili is there, looking so strong and calm, that Kili can hold his emotions back. Gimli is squinting badly, and he lifts both brothers up with the strength of his hug, first the older then the younger.

"May your forge burn ever bright," says Fili, and the other two nod, unable to unstick the words in their mouths.

Gimli watches their backs long after they have turned around, one blonde and one brown, the first his idol, his leader, the one who always had wise and understandable advise; the second his playmate and companion, his fierce and erstwhile competition –

While they are within his sight they make sure not to show any sign of weakness by turning back. Gimli is proud of them.

"Nephew!" Oin calls, when their backs are no longer visible. Gimli sighs, his heart heavy.

END

So I actually have every dwarf's personality sketched out in my mind, which is how I took liberties with Oin's animal characters. Any ideas on what sort of animal Gimli could be? He doesn't look to me as big and burly as either Oin, Gloin or Dwalin, so I'm thinking something smaller than a bear but still substantial...if capybaras were fierce, he'd be a capybara...

Thoughts, comments, anything? You make my day!

Much love, Cockerel