Chapter Text
As a lad, Bilbo’s favorite time of the year was the Harvest Festival.
He didn’t know at the time how busy many of the Hobbits at the festival were: the farmers presenting their best goods for inspection and haggling prices; the buyers doing the inspecting and trying to get a fair deal; the merchants and craftsmen taking advantage of the gathering crowds to sell their wares; and everyone stocking up on certain goods to cover them for another year. More money exchanged hands at the Harvest Festival than the rest of the year combined, and livelihoods could be made or broken in only a week’s time.
To Bilbo and the other children, it was all about the fun and sweets. Treats of all kinds were baked and sold, blacksmiths set up small shops, musicians played at every curve and corner, traders and shopkeepers set up booths for kitchenware, art, books, toys, and trinkets. Autumn flowers were sold in bunches and pots, and many an engagement began at the harvest festival dance.
A field was kept open for team sports, but there were also game booths with prizes that varied from sweets to small sock toys to wooden puzzles. Children were allowed to run throughout the fair, as all adults considered children in their care and would keep an eye on them. Such glorious freedom went right to the heads of all the preteens, used to being under their parents’ eyes until the advent of that magical thirteenth birthday.
There was only one thing better than the regular harvest festival, and that was the dwarf festival, as the locals called it. This was when the dwarves from the neighboring Blue Mountains came down, every three years, to participate with booths and blacksmith services.
Bilbo had seen the Blue Mountains once when his mother had taken him for a long walkabout Michael Delving, including up one of the mountains (mountains his mother assured him were actually quite small, more like hills than mountains; while his father had assured him he would not be climbing anything so “unnaturally high” and instead stayed at the base cooking dinner). He’d been tired and slightly bruised when he reached the top, but thrilled at the sight of the distant mountain range, dark blue-gray against the summer sky.
“I’m going to visit the dwarves one day,” he announced breathlessly, and his mother had laughed and hugged him and made him promise to take her along.
This year, the year of Bilbo’s ninth birthday, was a Dwarf Harvest Festival. Even more exciting, the festival was to be right by his home in Hobbiton for the first time since he was far too little to remember it. Bilbo, whose mother raised him on more stories of the outside world than your average Hobbit, was quite possibly the most excited lad in all of Hobbiton.
“I’m going to meet dwarves!” he informed his mother excitedly as she ran a comb through his hair the morning of the festival. “I’m going to bow and say, ‘Bilbo Baggins, son of Bungo and Belladonna, at your service!”
His mother laughed, ruffling her fingers through his now tangle-free curls. “You only have to say son of Bungo, my love, because you’re a boy.”
Bilbo shook his head so hard his mother nearly dropped the comb. “No, no, I want to say both of you,” very firmly indeed. Because of course it was his mother who made friends with dwarves and all of them would know her name, he was sure of it. But his father was the one who baked and kept everyone at the festival fed with the very best sweets in all of Hobbiton!
Belladonna turned her son around and kissed his forehead. “Well,” she said with a warm smile, “I’m sure they won’t mind, and they’ll like that you’re greeting them their way. Just keep in mind, darling, that you are to be polite to the dwarves at all time.” She hesitated a moment before adding, “Their prince has come with them, and he will probably walk through the fair at times. So even though we are always polite, it’s extra important this year.”
Bilbo’s hazel eyes flew wide as his mouth dropped open. “Really?! A prince?! Like in the stories?!” he all but squeaked, ideas already flitting through his head of white ponies and great quests. “Oh, oh, oh! Can I give him one of the scones Papa and I made? Can I? They have cinnamon! I bet dwarves love cinnamon! And maybe some flowers?!”
“Now darling, I don’t think you’ll meet the prince, he’ll be busy with your grandfathers, talking about their order from the harvest-”
“I helped make the blackberry crumb cakes, too! I could give him one of those!” Bilbo darted down the hallway, unheeding of his mother’s gentle words. “Papa! Papa! I need a box for the prince!”
---
Bofur had never been to the Shire before.
Miners, as a rule, weren’t much for traveling out of the mountain. Most dwarves were homebodies, preferring rich, deep stone to the open emptiness of the sky, and miners most of all. Bofur’s own parents had never left the depths of the mountain and extolled the healthy virtues of proper mountain living at every opportunity. His mother had been horrified when their son, one year from his majority, had put in a request to be a member of the party going to the Shire.
“You’ll catch your death!” his mother cried, horrified, and no amount of argument that dwarves didn’t get sick and they were travelling safe, established roads constantly run by Rangers, and they would have a full dwarven guard led by the formidable Dwalin, son of Fundin, did anything to assuage her fears. She’d even managed to get his little brother Bombur worked up over the whole thing, and Bombur was not a dwarf who got worked up easily. “Sleepy” was often a preferred adjective for Bofur’s sibling.
His father, however, had hugged him and sent him on this way. “Let the boy have a bit of adventure!” he’d chided Bofur’s mother (though fondly). “He’ll be hard at work next year.”
Bofur was thrilled to be accepted into the party, even though it wasn’t unusual for dwarves near their Coming of Age to get a spot. Their prince was a stoic dwarf, but he was also kind and fair in unexpected ways (and Bofur had not, he was pleased to say, made a complete fool of himself during his five second introduction to Prince Thorin, who would be leading the party; only a tiny bit of one, babbling his hello and garbling his father’s name “Kefur” as “Kofur;” it could have been worse).
The trip took only three days, and then – the Shire.
Bofur thought it was beautiful.
But he’d always had a bit of an odd aesthetic.
Little green hills rolled everywhere, dotted with bright flowers and round doors he could only think of as “cute” (an adjective not much embraced by his culture as a whole). The residents were even more so: soft and round, with curly hair, bright, colorful clothes, and scandalously bare feet he’d been sternly warned not to stare at. The fair was fun as well, noisy and colorful but not as . . . well, less ale flowed than at a dwarvish fair and he’d yet to see a single fistfight. In fact, Hobbits were the most amiable people he’d ever met, constant knots of gossipers notwithstanding. And the children – well.
Those were the cutest living beings he had ever seen, and he’d seen Bombur as a wee one.
His favorite, though, was a light-haired, hazel-eyed youngling with two missing teeth who introduced himself on the first morning out. Bofur had been assigned as an assistant to one of the shop sellers offering gardening wares. Bofur knew nothing about gardening, but he was friendly and outgoing (rare for a dwarf), and knew good craftsmanship and how to sell it, so the job went well enough.
He’d just finished selling a set of hand tools when a high, piping voice sang out, “Mr. Dwarf!”
Bofur looked down at a curly mop of hair and big eyes that were wide with barely-contained excitement. The cheeks were rosy, the nose was small, and the hands were full.
Adorable, little Hobbits.
“Aye, lad, what can I do for you?” he asked amiably, and shifted down to one knee for a better conversation.
“My name,” the little Hobbit continued, and his voice took on a careful , practiced tone, “is Master Bilbo Baggins, son of Bungo and Belladonna Baggins, of Bag End.” He took in a little gulp of air in deference for such a long introduction. “At your service.”
And then he executed a sharp little bow.
Bofur grinned.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Master Bilbo Baggins, son of Bungo and Belladonna, of Bag End.” What a lot of B’s, he thought, though really, he couldn’t say much. “My name’s Bofur, son of Kefur, at yours.” And he bowed as best he could from a half-kneeling position.
The mite beamed at him. Then, he took a deep breath – and started talking.
“I’ve never met a dwarf before, you’re my very first, though my mama likes the dwarves a lot and writes letters to them. Mama said this year the prince would be here, and I was looking around because I’m not sure what a prince is, but Papa said the prince is the son of a king and a king is kind of like the Thain and the Thain is very nice so of course the prince must be very nice and of all the dwarves here you’re the nicest. You smile the most.”
Bofur blinked. Did this child think-
“And since you’re the prince, I brought you a present.” He lifted the little box in his hands, which showed signs of being carried about a bit too tightly by small, slightly grubby hands.
“Ah,” Bofur said, sorting through the babble and greatly amused by the reasoning. No Dwarf would assume the nicest person in the room was a prince; more likely it would be the stiffest, most uptight one. “I’m not-“
“It’s pastries! I made them. Well,” he looked at the box, then at Bofur, and allowed full disclosure, “Papa helped. A little. Well. A lot, because I can’t do the stove yet, but I did lots and lots of mixing and I helped put them on the sheets and I took them off the racks and I folded this box myself and picked special things to put in it. There’s a crumb cake and a scone and a tea cake and a slice of pound cake because that’s Mama’s favorite.”
“Listen, I’m just-”
Bilbo Baggins of Bag End shoved the box into his hands with a beaming smile that showed both missing teeth to full advantage. “I promise you’ll like it! Papa is the best, the best,” he said this with something like a tiny growl, “baker in the whole Shire.”
Baking was clearly serious business when one was a tiny Hobbit.
“Laddie, it’s kind of you to give me this-”
“You’re welcome!”
“But you see, I’m not-”
A hand thumped the back of Bofur’s head and he looked up, startled.
“Get up,” Torgan the shopkeeper hissed urgently. “The prince is coming. You need to look like you’re selling something, not communing with babies.”
“I am not a baby!” Bilbo gasped, horrified, “I’m nine!”
Torgan was a fierce female (though Bofur had been warned not to expect Hobbits to recognize her as such), famous for her lovely beard and powerful demeanor. She was not cowed by a hobbitling. “Be that as it may, young master,” she informed him, “I’ll have Bofur looking his best.” She grabbed one of Bofur’s braids. “Up lad, up, up! We stand before the prince!”
Bofur saw the moment it sunk in to Bilbo’s little head exactly what Torgan was saying. “The prince?!” he demanded, little hands flying to his hips.
Bofur nudged him a bit out of the way. “Aye. You didn’t let me get a word in edgewise-” he muttered out of the side of his mouth.
“You said you were the prince!”
Torgan shot him a sharp look. Bofur raised one hand defensively, not in the mood to be arrested for impersonating royalty on such a fine day. The other hand still held the box of pastries. “I didn’t! He assumed and wouldn’t let me say anything!” A beat, then, “Please don’t call Dwalin, his hands are bigger than my entire head!”
“Shush!” Torgan turned her fierce glare on Bilbo. “And you too!”
Bilbo, erring on the side of caution, shifted a bit behind Bofur, but he still glared up and said, “He took the treats I made for the prince!”
“You shoved them at me-!”
Another thwap to the head, this one hard enough to sting, and Bofur snapped to attention as Prince Thorin and his party appeared around the bend in the booths. Thorin looked tall, strong, and composed as ever, talking quietly with each craftsman as he passed. To Torgan, he wished a good morning and inquired after sales, before offering Bofur a nod (Bofur did not blush), and letting his cool eyes flicker over Bilbo before he continued to the next booth.
There was silence a moment.
Then:
“Gimme back my box!”
Bofur felt a grin tug at his lips. Such righteous indignation. Bilbo was glaring at him, and his tiny fingers were wiggling as he held his hands out imperiously.
“You,” Bofur informed Bilbo Baggins, son of Belladonna and Bungo, “ are a bit of a prince yourself. Very bossy.”
“I’m not bossy. These were for the prince and you’re not the prince you lied.”
Bofur rolled his eyes. “You assumed and wouldn’t let me set you straight.”
“Give the bratling his food and get back to work!” Torgan snapped. “There’s always curious Hobbits following along after the prince, and we want them to shop here!”
Bofur handed over the now slightly-more-squashed box, this time by the large, nervous hands of a dwarf about to meet the prince for a second time. “My liege,” he said.
Bilbo hugged the pastries to his chest and eyed Bofur suspiciously. “What’s a liege?” he asked, eyes narrowed.
“It’s what we call our king and our prince,” Bofur said, “when we want to kiss up a bit.”
Bilbo considered this. Then he opened the box and pulled out a triangular pastry Bofur had never seen before. “You can have the scone,” he declared, “even though you lied and aren’t the prince, because it’s mean to give a present and take it away.”
Bofur bowed deeply, as befitted a spoiled princeling (they had a couple of those running around the mountain), and accepted the gift with all the gravity he could muster. “Thank you, Master Baggins.”
Bilbo nodded. “Don’t lie to people anymore, though,” he admonished, and waggled an index finger at him. “It’s not nice.”
“Yes, sir.”
Bilbo nodded once, smartly, and took off at a run after the prince’s party.
Bofur laughed, low chuckles in his chest, and took a curious nibble of the pastry. It was dry, and crumbled into his precious mustache, but the cinnamon gave it a lovely bite.