Fic - A Kingly Gift - 1/1

[evandar]

Title: A Kingly Gift
Author: Evandar
Fandom: The Hobbit/Lord of the Rings
Rating: G
Genre: Gen
Pairing: Implied Thorin/Bilbo
Disclaimer: I do not own The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings and I am making no profit from this story.
Summary: No one in the Fellowship knows the true meaning of the mithril shirt, save for Gimli.



When Frodo staggers to his feet, carefully supported by Sam, and opens his shirt, gasping that he isn’t hurt, Gimli cannot help but let his lips part and his eyes widen in shock and awe. He labels the mithril shirt that glitters brilliantly in the gloom “a kingly gift” before he can stop himself – and tries not to wince as generations-old secrets weigh upon his shoulders and stick in his throat.

Not that anyone bar the elf pays attention to his comment, and all the pointy-eared princeling does is roll his eyes. He thinks, no doubt, that Gimli is merely a dwarf sighing over precious metal – and perhaps he is right, though he has no idea of how precious the metal is.

Or what it means.

Mithril, the rarest of metals, is only worked on by the line of Durin. Only those of direct lineage – the kings, the lesser lords, their children – may shape the metal as they please. It is part of why the cost of mithril is so high – and why it was only ever sold to those who were kings or princes in their own right.

He has known almost his entire life that Thorin Oakenshield, King Under the Mountain, presented Bilbo Baggins with a mithril shirt, and he has known for almost the same amount of time what exactly that presentation meant. It is another thing to actually see it, see its lustre and its quality peeking out from under stained cotton and Aragorn’s splayed palm. It is the greatest treasure forged within Erebor, and it was intended – though Gandalf’s claim that Bilbo had not known its worth rings horribly true in more than one way – as a betrothal gift.

The line of Durin only gift mithril to those who will be joining it.

Comments

[zedille.livejournal.com]

This is really excellent work -- I love how understated it is, but you manage to convey so much in the few words there are. And you include all this extra character narration and worldbuilding in -- we really get a sense of how much there was going on behind the scenes, that we're not privy to since it's only dwarf culture. So effective, and you take us to this inevitable conclusion that is so heartbreaking in how much it leaves unsaid (since we all know how the earlier events went, too). Really liked the LOTR-era callback to The Hobbit!

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Aw, thank you <3

Tolkien never says much about dwarf-culture in the books, really, and I've always felt a little sad about that since Gimli's my favourite LotR character hands-down and what we are told implies that they've got a whole lot of culture going on there in the mountains. So. World-building. Because that's totally not a hobby of mine, right?

And yeah, the Thorin/Bilbo-shipping reeeeeeally breaks my heart all over the place. Watch this space. There will be more. And more from Gimli, because yeah, I fangirl.

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Worldbuilding is the best, especially in fic! And especially with Tolkien's world there's just so much going on all the time and so much to explore. Tolkien himself focused mostly on the elves (and he didn't finish with them, at that) so that leaves us with all the realms of Men and Dwarves and so on. There was absolutely stuff going on there even if we don't really see it that much!

(Ooh seeing Thorin/Bilbo from Gimli's POV sounds lovely, it's not something I've seen too much of previously :D)

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Not that the elves weren't awesome as well *cough*Glorfindel*cough*, but they did take up most of Tolkien's writing and leave little room for anything else. Even with the men, he mostly talks about the ones of elvish descent or the people of Numenor.

(There might not be more of this one since I don't want to spoil it, but I have plans *cackles*)

[zedille.livejournal.com]

I have to admit Elrond is my favorite xD but yeah, it's so easy to get caught up in the scope of Tolkien's writing (especially in the Silmarillion) and the quantity of cultures and places he writes about, that you end up forgetting that there were people and things going on besides what Tolkien writes about, too. Even among the Elves, the story doesn't really focus much on the Avari who didn't go to Valinor, or the Vanyar or Teleri beyond their interactions with the Noldor. It's like Wicked's tagline, "so much happened before Dorothy dropped in" -- we don't see any of it in canon but it is there for us in fic!

Sorry, I have Tolkien feels :D and all fic will be happily contributed to those!

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Nnn, I really want to read The Silmarillion again, (haven't read it for almost a decase) but I'm not entirely sure I could justify buying a new copy. (The copy I have is in a box on the other side of the world, and asking my family to ship it over would get a resounding 'wtf no'.)

But you're right. Tolkien wrote so much - an absolutely unbelievable amount - but there's still so much that he didn't write, which makes it the ideal playground, really.

Soooooo many Tolkien feels. :D

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Hm, there are probably copies of the Silmarillion (of dubious legality) floating around online? Or I think I have an ebook version of it I could upload for you, if you like :)

(On that note, I'm on vacation now I could certainly do a spot of re-reading myself! Time to hit up the library :D)

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Oh, I gave in to the temptation and bought the Kindle version shortly after I posted that. XD Not that it's managed to download yet...crappy New Zealand internet *grumbles*

I just know that I'll end up with Celebrimbor-feels again. And Glorfindel-feels. And then I'll be a mess all over the place. XD

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Let's have feels together! There are feels to be had about pretty much everyone in the Silmarillion even if right now I'm mostly focusing/flailing over Elrond and his family line. (And Eärendil. And all the descendants of Finwë. And everyone.)

Good luck with your internet!

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

It's all just so tragic, isn't it. I'm pretty sure there's even Sauron feels tucked in there somewhere...but like I said, it's been a while. I'm really looking forward to reading it now!

And yeah, thank you. I need it. XD

[zedille.livejournal.com]

I think the Valar probably have Sauron feels! But really if you think about it, he could probably have been this terrifically productive force for good if not for Morgoth's influence. Like Fëanor and the Silmarils, really. The entire Silmarillion is just like feels-in-a-bottle, or essence of condensed tragedy. I swear it's the one fandom that actually gives me angst overdoses, and considering how much I like that genre, that's saying something :D

Oh and to bring the conversation back to your fic, its origins, I was poking around the Internet and stumbled upon this guide to Fellowship of the Ring (they have similar guides for the rest of the trilogy and The Hobbit.) It had this to say about Frodo's mithril coat:

Mithril is an incredibly strong, light, and beautiful metal...
So, that’s what mithril is. But what does it symbolize? Well, if we look closely, it appears to represent hidden (Hobbit) potential. When Bilbo passes his mithril coat on to Frodo, he tells him to keep the armor under his clothes. In other words, Bilbo encourages Frodo to let himself be underestimated: it's always easier to defeat people who don't take you seriously. When Frodo first wears his mithril-coat (again, in secret), Gandalf looks at him penetratingly and comments, "You take after Bilbo [...] There is more about you than meets the eye, as I said of him long ago" (2.5.61). The mithril-coat reminds us not to judge a book – or a Hobbit – by its cover. Underneath a lowly Hobbit's ordinary exterior, you may find a mithril-coat waiting to surprise you.

And I read that and remembered the original fic and almost burst out laughing ;) Sadly the site doesn't have a guide for the Silmarillion, I'd absolutely love to see them try and reduce that to a "high school English class" level of analysis...

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Condensed tragedy is definitely a good way of describing it.

And lol. "High school English class" level analysis never lets you down. XD

What I was thinking while writing (if you don't mind the blather) was along the lines of 'What do we know about mithril? Okay, it's really light, really shiny, really strong and very rare. Very very rare, and valuable. And valuable metals often turn out as status symbols (e.g. bronze and iron (back in the day) and gold)so if mithril as as epic as Tolkien says it is, then it would be right up there as royal property. BUT. We know that dwarves traded it, even with elves - *insert Celebrimbor feels here* - but Celebrimbor was (kind of) a prince, and definitely a lord of a city (ruler in his own right) so maybe they would have let him have it for a huge price. And dwarves are a race of extremely skilled craftsmen, so...what if mithril is so important that they only let the most important dwarves work it. Royal dwarves, maybe some people who've been lucky enough to earn the honour somehow... Back to the coat. It's valuable (have you seen the maps of the shire? It's actually a fair-sized, fertile bit of land, and that coat could buy it? Right...) but it's also protective. Bilbo isn't all about the fighting, true, but Thorin is giving him something that valuable to protect himself? When one of the (few) things we do actually know about dwarves is that they are jealously possessive of their treasure? *insert expression of stunned disbelief here* And fair enough, it's not the Arkenstone, but chainmail is fiddly as all fuck to make and would take a lot of skill, which would up the value yet again, and if we look at forging mithril as a status symbol...'

And a new headcanon was spawned, lots of feels were felt, and a very short fic was written. According to that guide, I'm too anthropological to be an ex-literature student. *cries

[zedille.livejournal.com]

If we're going for "valid and internally coherent logic that Tolkien nonetheless did not think of when writing," I rather prefer your logic! It fits so much better with Tolkien's universe, after all, and the chain of logic is very solid, which is why the fic itself was so brutally effective! I think the biggest leap you made was the one about how only kings/royalty would be able to work the metal (and I found that a bit of a leap only because I think I've read somewhere that there was mithril in Valinor, or other places besides Moria? And I'm pretty sure elves -- like Celebrimbor -- would have been working with it too. Of course they would restrict the metal to people of high rank but is it necessarily as codified as that, to be so very directly linked to status?) but even that was pretty solid logic. And Thorin giving it to him -- yeah, he was in a ~fit of generosity~ when he gave it to Bilbo, life seemed pretty good with all the treasure in Smaug's lair -- though I guess I always assumed that Thorin was only so generous because that coat wasn't really worth that much in relation to some of the other treasure there. The Hobbit sustains that interpretation but then comes LOTR to enlighten us on the true value of the coat (and then come feels after....) There's more stuff like that, I think, where reexamining Hobbit in light of LotR turns up some pretty interesting stuff.

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

I should probably point out that that train of thought was solely for dwravish culture. Men and elves would probably only let their most skilled smiths work mithril (again, value) and only the most wealthy would be able to afford it. So it would mostly end up with royalty anyway - particularly with Men, I think - but only the dwarves would make sure that it stayed that way.

At least, that's how it worked in my head. XD

Yeah, I didn't really get the whole coat-thing either when I first read it (ooooh, so long ago XD) but ended up with insta-feels as soon as I read LotR and realised how important/valuable it must have been. That's one thing I love about the scope of Tolkien's universe: sometimes things like that pop up to whack you with a bat mid-story.

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Okay, replying to this comment because of space. Yeah.

I meant the time he spends onscreen in Unexpected Journey. If there has been footage released for Desolation of Smaug then I haven't heard of it...and I'm fairly sure that it would send the fandom corner of the internet into some sort of meltdown.

I think Smaug was the last, but it is possible he was related to Ancalagon. He's definitely of the same type. Wasn't the first dragon (forgotten the name) wingless?

And I got so confused and frustrated with all of the 'fin' names. And the habit of having more than one name, or aliases, and by the end I was a ball of fourteen-year-old frustration. It took me about three months to get through it the first time, and I'm a fast reader.

And the more I talk about The Silmarillion the more I want to read it again, and the more I dread it, because yikes. It's a big universe to take in, let alone dabble in. But I have to now, because of tolkienbigbang and oh god what have I got myself into...

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Ahah, I just follow the link in the notification emails, so in theory I know my comment conversations with people go on and on and the space gets narrower and narrower, but yeah. Here we are.

Ah right, got it! I've seen gifs of behind-the-scenes Dwarves In Barrels on Tumblr, like I mentioned, but that's it, nothing else, and certainly no more Thranduil or Legolas. And I guess it wouldn't make sense to release any footage before even a trailer, either...

[moves dragon speculation to other comment]

It's even worse when you consider that the names we see the Noldor presented with are mostly in Sindarin so then there are all the Quenya forms of things to be messing around with, too. Thankfully the habit of having multiple names died down by the Third Age (could you imagine the narrative if Legolas had three interchangeable names?) though Aragorn/Strider/Elessar/Telcontar/what am I even missing certainly revived the habit with a iwll.

The first time I read the Silmarillion I got super confused by the Ainulindale -- I was like "this has nothing to do with Lord of the Rings!", and I stopped reading it entirely. Thankfully my second shot was rather more successful!

My goal someday is to read through more of the supplementary material for myself, but since so much of it isn't in a coherent narrative idk how likely that is. And ooh did you sign up? Good luck, I'll be here for cheerleading if you'd like :D I wish I knew how to finish things....

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

I've seen a couple of images of Legolas, like the one where he's talking to Bard and one where he looks like he's carrying Orcrist, but nothing about the Elves other than that. Dwarves in Barrels is going to be a thing, isn't it. Those pics are everywhere.

Aragorn was certainly going for some kind of record there, I think. How many names does one guy need? And then there were the titles!

Mm, I was a bit confused by the Ainulindale - like, "why is this here?" - but I got through it okay. I did get through The Silmarillion far quicker the second time around, about two weeks, but then I put it aside and left it there for a very long time because my place as 'nerdiest nerd in the family' was cemented and I didn't have the strength to go through it again.

I've tried reading some of the Histories, but the lack of coherent narrative was a bit of a sticking point. Some of Tolkien's letters have interesting snippets in them, but I didn't manage to finish them before I started travelling and had to leave the book at home.

And I signed up twice. One fic will be Thorin/Bilbo, and the other Celebrimbor/Narvi, because apparently I'm a masochist fan of dwarf/other species relationships.

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Legolas and Thranduil, how are we going to be able to take the perfection? (And the moose. Though do moose even live in forests?) And yeah iirc there was some speculation about if the dwarves-in-barrels were covered, like in the book, or if Thorin & co. were just floating around with their heads sticking out. Though if it's the latter surely the elves would notice?)

We thought Fëanor's kids were bad with names, but Aragorn really gave them a run for their money, didn't 'he?

It's funny because of course, after having gone through the Silmarillion, the Ainulindale is so simple and easy to get through, since the narrative is so coherent. That really is the problem with the Histories -- they really are Tolkien's notes, with various versions of things presented with commentary, and not "Extra Finalized Bits Of Canon Material We Couldn't Fit In The Silmarillion." I've tried flipping through them but I don't know where to start? How do people index things? (I cheat and rely on Wikis, etc.)

Those two fics sound fascinating -- you've already demonstrated you can do Thorin/Bilbo believably, and I am curious to see how you write Celebrimbor too! I am here to cheer you on :)

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Not to mention Kili, Thorin and Bilbo as well and Benedict Cumberbatch's voice. We're all just going to sit there hyperventilating from too much pretty.

Wiki says they live in "boreal and mixed deciduous forests of the Northern hemisphere in temperate to subarctic climates" so I suppose they do. And we now know what kind of habitat Mirkwood is, beyond 'damn scary'.

Maybe they take the lids off once they're in the river? They don't seem to be being rafted... And yeah, I think the elves would notice a bunch of dwarven prisoners in their barrels no matter how drunk they were.

Rereading it, he just seems to pick up another name every other chapter or so. Hell, he's got two in the first chapter he's in!

I wish they'd turned out as extras that couldn't be fit into The Silmarillion rather than the jumble that they actually are. I mean, in a sense it's very interesting to see which bits were edited from what and how they differ, but actually trying to read them is...yeah. Wiki is your (and my) friend.

Thank you! I think I'll definitely be needing those cheers. :)

[zedille.livejournal.com]

I'm hyperventilating already at the thought! It'll get me through this year though, it has to. O,g.

Look at Peter Jackson, sneaking in worldbuilding even in his choice of animal life!

Aragorn even ends up saddling his royal house with "Strider". Quenya or not, he couldn't have picked a more impressive-sounding name?

Regarding Tolkien's notes, I've also found that you can also get a lot by reading the fanfic of authors who have actually done the research -- it's almost the same, but considerably easier to follow. I mean, in a way since even in-universe the historiography is kind of doubtful, we're doing just more of the same, right?

If you need a sounding board or anything I'm here! :)

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

So am I! The sheer amount of pretty might actually be fatal. The third film will be made entirely of feels and I'm fully aware that I'll be a sobbing wreck through most of it.

Peter Jackson has epic skills, got to admit. I'm so glad he came back to do The Hobbit as well!

Maybe he chose it because it was one of the ones that meant the most to him? After all, being a Ranger took up a good part of his life and was something that a lot of his ancestors did as well - very important...or at least, that's why I hope he chose it.

What if you want to be one of the authors that actually does the research, though? Lol. Screwed...

Back to an earlier point, though because I just read this part last night, in FotR Gandalf says that all the mithril does come from Moria, which - I suppose - gave the Dwarves a free-for-all on potentially stringent trading standards (which possibly exist only in my headcanon) since apparently everyone in Middle Earth was after the stuff.

Oh hell yes, I'm claiming you as a sounding board. You make me actually write things!

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Although Peter Jackson might take a somewhat free hand with plot and characterization (or at least, "not entirely faithful to the books" which obviously has some canon purists up in arms) his vision of Middle-Earth -- the production values -- is just without peer. Casting! Costuming! Etc. (Well, I didn't think Celeborn and Haldir felt too Elf-like to me, but anyway.) I disagree with some of his choices but that is what Middle-Earth looks like to me. Which is also why I'd kind of love to see PJ do a Silmarillion thing -- I know that the plot would be impossible to make a movie out of, and it would certainly get bastardized in any adaptation, but it would be so pretty and tragic! (I harbor vague hopes maybe of someday a Game of Thrones type show. maybe.)

I'm sure there's some deep meaning to be had in the "Strider" title, something about how that was what his line-of-unbroken-descent-from-Isildur actually ended up doing, but even so. He had all the lineages of the First Age, ALL the fancy titles, and that's what he comes up with? (Is Arwen now "Arwen Telcontar"? or "Arwen Telcontári"?)

I may compromise and just look at the bits of things that people tend to cite a lot. Apparently there are certain essays and things that have large amounts of information and lists of things. I want to do the research, I think things are fun that way, but... how?!

I swear some Wiki said that there was mithril in Valinor? Though of course that was Valinor and this is Middle-Earth. Though id the Elves just not have a ready source of mithril until Moria happened? Though of course apparently Khazad-dum has been around since the First Age or something, according to something else I read (which may or may not be true), so I guess the Elves would have had some source of mithril even then. Do we ever see the stuff mentioned in the Silmarillion? Or I'm sure we do, but in what context?

You know where to find me! :D

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

A Silmarillion TV series would be a thing of beauty and joy and OMG I need it in my life. (Though even as a series it would be seriously hard to pull off and would need a huge budget and therefore will probably never happen. But. Yessssssssssss.)

I always thought she would remain Undomiel since that was her title?

There probably was mithril in Valinor, and the Noldor probably brought some of it along with them when they sailed East. And Khazad-dum was around in the First Age, at least in some measure, since that was when the Dwarves awoke and it was supposed to be Durin than founded it after looking in the Mirrormere. (At least, that's what I gathered from FotR.) I can't remember any Silmarillion references at the moment - still need to start rereading.

I'm probably send you a PM then, when I'm up to the plot development stage. :D

[zedille.livejournal.com]

Even if we never got an actual movie/tv series (I am also half convinced they'd ruin the plot irreparably), just the production values. Baby Galadriel and baby Elrond and Fëanor and everything. Well, apparently the Tolkien Estate didn't like the LotR movies because of how they changed some of Tolkien's messages (I shudder to think of what they must think of the Hobbit movies), so apparently they're never letting the rights pass to PJ. But it would still be so pretty.

I imagine that in practice, yes, she would remain Arwen Undomiel, because she had that going for her before she became queen, but technically in the historical records-based sense surely she would have joined the House of Telcontar and it would have become one of her afternames?? I don't know, that's assuming the names of royal houses even work like that. It's hard to know since a) we don't hear much about queens and b) royal lines seem to generally be "of the House of [person's first name]", not with a Random Quenya Word like Aragorn did.

Speaking of rereading, I finally obtained my own paper copies of the Silmarillion and the trilogy from a book sale today!! I am super excited :D (The Silm is the same edition and cover as the one I first read, but the trilogy's covers are just hilariously old, I should take a picture...)

I'll be happy to natter at you when the time comes! This will be fun :D

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

I hadn't heard that (though I'm not surprised) and yeah. The Tolkien Estate must be absolutely frothing by now. But even if it wasn't PJ directing it, it would still be something I would love to see. Because the shiny and the pretty would be incredible, and even though a ton of it would have to be changed, it would be worth it.

What we have to go on for royal names and titles doesn't add up to much at all. And what might be commonplace for royalty in our world doesn't necessarily hold for those in the Tolkien-verse. Though I suppose Aragorn's Random Quenya Word eventually evolved into "of the House of Telcontar" rather than having all of his heirs named (for example) Eldarion Peredhellion Telcontar etc.

Lol, you should! My paper copy of The Silmarillion is a fairly ancient hardback that I inherited off my Dad. (Apparently he didn't make it past page two of the Ainulindale XD) I miss it so. Reading on Kindle is kind of weird.

I know, right? I'm really looking forward to it now. It seems so less daunting now that there's a person I can bounce ideas off. Now I just need to actually have the ideas... XD