Overly Long Intro, Updated 6/21/14

Well, it's been 16 months, and this very long tale is finally finished. But, lucky you! You get to read it all through without waiting for new posts. Please, REVIEW along the way!

Now, let's get the disclaimers over with… I own nothing that is Tolkien's, obviously. He is the master, and we are the flattering imitators eager for adventure in the world that he created. All poems are original to me. Betta is an OFC of my own creation, and I hope that you like her. Ankor, its people and history are my own invention based on the history and themes in Tolkien's work, as are the Naug and the culture of the Lossoth tribes, but all is based on my interpretation of the appendices.

Because I could not find a definitive source, the Dwarf Home of Ered Luin is a few miles north of the Little Lhun River.

I hope that you enjoy reading this story as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Please leave a REVIEW and let me know! It is the food that feeds my hungry muse.

And now, on with the story...

-Paint

Fili leaned against the wall, mostly hidden in shadow. He wanted a full pipe and a quiet place to smoke it, but he stood where he was and waited. It wasn't long before the door opened and Balin emerged. The old dwarf's shoulders were bowed down under a weight and he sighed.

Fili stood up straight and Balin saw him. He shook his head, but approached the younger dwarf with a good natured smile.

"Lurking in doorways, lad," he said. "Did your mother teach you no manners?"

"She told me that her elder brother needs looking after at times," Fili said, "but that is not why I am here. I knew that you meant to leave early and wanted to say farewell before you did."

"Did you, now?" Balin looked at him from under bushy eyebrows. "Wasn't there perhaps something else that you wished to say as well?" When Fili said nothing, only shifted uncomfortably on his feet, Balin added slowly, his voice low, "Perhaps I already know what you would say."

"He is not well," Fili said. "He has been too quiet, hasn't spoken a word even when Kili runs uncontrolled through the mountain, causing mischief, and down into the town at will. There is a cloud that hangs over Thorin that I do not understand."

"No," Balin agreed, "you don't understand, but you can name it, can't you, lad? So can we all."

"Erebor," Fili muttered.

Balin nodded. "He's thought long on that mountain, and the treasure under it, and the guardian within it. I don't know yet what's brought the itch on him so suddenly, but it won't be long now. Has he spoken to you of the Lonely Mountain?"

"Only to tell the old tales, but I guess more than enough to know that he would retake the mountain if he could. You think that he would go, that he could convince our people to take on the dragon?"

Balin shook his head and patted Fili's shoulder. "I think that our people have waged wars enough and it will be long before we have stomach for it again. But Thorin means to attempt it and, like his Father and grandfather before him, I fear that in the attempt we may lose a great King."

"Then we must go with him, my brother and I, too. If he wanders alone, as Thrain did…"

"You can try. I think it would do your uncle good to know you're behind him on this, but I doubt that he'll agree to take you along. You can't help your age, but you've seen little of the world."

"I won't let him leave me behind. I know that Kili would say the same." Fili clenched his fist in his hand. "We will find a way…"

.

Betta sighed and stepped into the pub. It wasn't the sort of place she willingly frequented. It wasn't that she objected to the dirt or the smell, but it was not in her nature to go looking for trouble, and the hard-bred men of such remote towns as this one had a tendency to create trouble when they felt a woman was transgressing on their territory.

The noise of the pub had been loud and spilled out into the street, but as soon as she entered, it fell from boisterous laughter to a low, surprised murmur as a dozen or more grubby faces turned to have a look at her. She was not only a woman, but a stranger as well, and both things would work against her here, especially among the dwarves.

She had covered most of her appearence, at least. The clothes, cloaks and weaponry she carried covered her female attributes almost entirely. If the weather had been colder, she might have obscured her face and hair as well. As it was, her hair was so full of mud and her cheeks smudged with it, too, that most of the men turned away without noticing her womanhood. A few, however, especially among the Men, gave her more interest than she was comfortable with. Women did not simply walk into the beer-halls of a mining town.

Betta had only been in this particular town for two days, long enough to learn that what she sought would be found here. The pub was the largest in town and had been built out of the skeleton of an ancient barn in the early years when the dwarves were newly returned to Ered Luin. The back wall could still be opened onto the narrow alley behind and, even though winter was coming, the weather was warm and the large barn-doors stood open.

Betta scanned the afternoon crowd of men and dwarves and found the pair she was looking for. The old washer-woman had been right to say that they would be together: a blond and a brunette, two dwarves with thin beards and fine buckles. They sat at a table near the open doors at the back. Betta ordered a pint at the bar and paid with a coin that more than covered her drink; the rest paid for the delivery of a message.

She chose an empty table near enough to the dwarves, but far enough away as well. She swallowed the sour beer and stared down at her dirty hands. Her nails were broken and her knuckles bruised from the hard life she had lived in recent years. Her mother would have been proud and her father disappointed to see their only daughter working at hard labor to pay for her food; that is, when she wasn't forced into washing and sewing by her sex. It was a long walk from the mountains of Gondor to the Ered Luin, and not all needs could be fished or foraged.

Two mugs of beer were dropped onto the table across from her, and two bodies followed, dropping onto the bench. She looked up with a start.

"We heard you've got a job for us?" the dark-haired dwarf said cheerfully, but there was something sharp in his eyes, as if he were looking for a laugh at her expense. He would be Kili, if the washer-woman had told her right.

"...like we're mercenaries or something," the fair-haired dwarf, the elder brother who would be Fili, said. He spoke in the same joking manner as his brother, but there seemed to be more insult in his eyes and less humor. He glanced at his brother, and Betta had a feeling that it had been Kili who agreed to this meeting and Fili would rather have ignored her.

Betta looked at Kili, but he seemed only to be waiting curiously for an answer. She had given her speech to dwarves from one end of Middle Earth to the other, but those had been common dwarves. They had been proud, in their own way, but these two were considered royalty among dwarves, and it was clear in their eyes that they were only humoring her.

"I have no use for mercenaries," she said. She had been turned down by dwarves from one end of Middle Earth to the other, as well. "I need to have something opened."

"Opened?" Kili echoed.

Fili only stared at her, eyes narrow and the joke gone.

Reluctantly, Betta took out the box and set it in the center of the table. "I've asked this of Men from the Anduin to the Isen, and each one told me, go to the dwarves. And so, I've asked this of Dwarves across Eriador, and they all answered the same…" She saw curiosity in Kili's face, but nothing changed in Fili's expression.

She went on, "They told me, the Dwarves of Durin are the most skilled and knowledgeable when it comes to relics of the elder days." Kili picked up the box and turned it over. Betta felt a pull in her heart to see it in someone else's hands, but she reminded herself that that was what she was here for. "It came to me from my father's family. The key was lost many years ago."

Kili tossed the box to Fili, who glanced at it, and then tossed it back. Kili tossed it to Betta with a shrug. "You don't need a key with that," he said. "A bit of fire and a torch'll open that right up." He sat back in his seat with his mug happily nestled in his hand, and left it to his brother to give the final word.

"I don't know what's in it," she said. She set it on the table again but kept her hands around it. "If there's paper, or something fragile…" She shook her head. "No, I need it opened, not broken into."

"I could give you the name of a good locksmith," Fili said, sitting back with his mug and a smirk. Betta looked back and forth between the two of them, at their matching smiles. It was a dismissal if ever she'd had one, and she had never had one that felt so much like a slap to her face. "Alright," she said. "I suppose opening a box is beneath you… or you can't do it. Either way, there are plenty of dwarves in the mountains."

She stood up to go.

"Not so fast now, lass." Fili rose suddenly and took hold of her arm.

It was a reflex. That was the only excuse she could offer for the stupid thing that she did next, but he had put his hand on her and she had learned the hard way to allow no man to touch her. But this was not the place for a fight and before she could check herself, she had pulled the knife from under her coat and held it aimed at his throat. Kili drew his sword and pressed the point against her chest. His expression was no longer playful or curious. His eyes were deadly serious.

Well, how did I do so far? I know that I often hesitate when I find an OFC in fanfiction, but I am a huge fan of female protagonists in regular fiction, and that is pretty much all that I write. Please review! Constructive criticism is eagerly accepted.

-Paint