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Great, this was just great! What better way to start your week than walking around with blood staining your skirts for all to see.
Your day had started off as most days do, with your usual unwillingness to get out of bed. The sun shone through your windows, but you hugged your pillow to your chest and burrowed deeper under the covers. Why did morning have to come at all when the only place you wanted to be was your bed?
Eventually you mustered enough energy to get up and make your way to your wardrobe, where you began readying yourself for the day ahead. There was nothing altogether special about your morning routine, you did much the same things as the other dams of Erebor. But it was the little rituals you had—brushing your hair with the brush your mother got you, tying your hair back with your favourite ribbon, using that delicious lavender soap—that really made you feel like you were truly ready for the day.
As you strolled down the corridors to the library, you still did not sense anything amiss, that is besides the pesky headache that had been bothering you all morning, but that was nothing out of the ordinary. Entering the library, you greeted Ori before making your way to the pile of scrolls that awaited sorting and classification. The pile seemed to only grow larger day after day as Balin uncovered more and more ancient documents in the sealed off sections of the mountain. However about half of the scrolls he returned with were always moth-eaten and damaged, so you and Ori were tasked with recopying them as best you could.
The few scrolls that were unsalvageable always made you incredibly sad, that was a piece of history that could never be recovered. You imagined how many old tomes had been completely incinerated by Smaug and a shiver ran down your spine before you snapped back to yourself. You couldn't let yourself dwell on the past right now, you had a job to do.
It was late afternoon when you finally realized, only, that wasn't the whole story. Kíli had come to visit Ori and you in the library and the three of you were engaged in a conversation about the superiority of a bow and arrow as supposed to a slingshot—with Ori and Kíli arguing vehemently for opposite sides—when Bilbo sidled up beside you.
He interrupted their conversation with a clear of his throat and passed on Thorin's request for a tome on the old structure of the workers' houses before Smaug. Taking the paper with instructions, Ori went off into the shelves to find the book with Kíli trailing him, still prattling on. (Something about aerodynamics?)
When the sound of their ruckus had finally dimmed you turned to Bilbo with a grin. "It's great to see you again Bilbo! How are you?"
"Good. Good," the older Hobbit replied with a pat on your arm. "It is good to see you as well dear."
"While you're waiting would you care for a cup of tea?" you offered, gesturing to the pot you and Ori had just made.
"No that's alright," Bilbo replied, before quietening his voice to a whisper. "Though, now that they are gone I wanted to ask you something? Are you aware that you've bled through your skirts?"
"What?" you chocked out, ears turning red before your entire expression shifted to one of mortification.
"It's alright." Bilbo tried to comfort you, rubbing your arm soothingly. "I'm sure no one has seen it–"
But you didn't let him finish, hiking up your skirts and running out of the library before he could get another word out. As you left you heard Kíli and Ori return as Bilbo gave the excuse that you weren't feeling well. How long had the blood been there? How many people had had seen? Had Kíli seen? Had Ori? This was all too embarrassing. Your cycle wasn't supposed to come for another five days at least! It was hard enough fitting in in a mountain full of dwarrow and now there was this too!
You were running, at a sprint now, down the mercifully empty halls back to your rooms. Tears streamed down your cheeks as you rounded another corner, hurdling face first into a certain crown prince.
"Ibrizinlêkh!" Fíli exclaimed, holding your arms to steady you both. "Are you alright?"
You clearly were not alright, but you couldn't stay and talk to him. Right now your only goal was to make it back to your chambers so you pushed Fíli away and continued your sprint down the hall.
When you finally made it inside your rooms, after humbling with the key for far too long, you closed the door behind you, the exhaustion hitting you all at once. You managed to summon enough energy to make it to the bathing chamber before collapsing on the floor, curling in on yourself your tears now soaked your skirt just as much as the blood, but you couldn't find it in yourself to move.
Lying there on the cold marble floor, it began to make sense as the first twinges of your cramps set in. As it turns out, the headache and tearing up over ancient documents were not simply normal emotional fluctuations. You should have known earlier! Maybe then you would have saved yourself from this very situation–
Your spiral was interrupted by several, very insistent, knocks at your bathroom door.
"Are you in here?" Fíli's worried voice carried through the door. "Amrâl, your door was open so I let myself in. Are you alright?"
Hearing the concern in his tone made you cry even harder. No matter how disgusting you felt right now, you could not let him worry over you, especially not over something as stupid as this.
You still didn't have the energy to move from the floor, but you called out to him, voice hoarse from crying, "You can come in. The door is unlocked."
Slowly the door swung open and revealed to you a panting Fíli. He must have run after you, despite you having pushed him away. He immediately dropped to his knees before you, holding out a hand, as if hesitant if he should touch you. When you nodded he pulled you into the tightest embrace you can remember, heedless of the tears and snot that streaked your face.
"What happened," he whispered, pulling back to look you in the eyes as you held your knees to your chest.
"It's nothing," you murmured, unwilling to meet his gaze, but Fíli wasn't taking any of that.
"This is not nothing, Ibrizinlêkh. You know you can tell me anything, right?" He rubbed calming circles on your back. Your dignity was damned anyway so did it really matter if one more person knew? You sighed.
"My cycle started today. I wasn't expecting it and I… I bled through my skirts." You waited for Fíli to pull back in disgust, waited for him to sneer at the mention of your cycle, but strangely the opposite happened.
"Oh, Amrâlimê. I'm so sorry." And for some reason that made you cry harder, all the while Fíli just sat there rubbing your back. "You know this is nothing to be ashamed of right? Your cycle is perfectly normal and no one should look down on you for it. Especially no dwarrow."
"It just hurts so much," you gasped, clutching Fíli's arm.
"I know, amrâl. I know," he said softly. "Let me take care of you."
Still not fully letting go of you, Fíli moved to your bathtub and began preparations to run a bath. Once he was satisfied with the temperature, he let the water run as he turned back to you.
"Would you like me to help you get out of your bloody clothes?"
You closed your eyes and grimaced against the pain, which had really set in now, but nodded. Fíli didn't waste any time in delicately peeling your clothes off, layer by layer until you were sitting on the cold bathroom floor in nothing but your undergarments.
"May I?" Fíli asked tentatively.
You nodded. As soon as all of your bloodied clothes were piled on the floor and no longer covering you, you really started to feel the chill of the mountain.
Fíli noticed you shivering and went over to check the water in the tub. "I think the bath is ready now. Would you like me to help you get in?"
You couldn't imagine standing on your own right now, so you nodded again. Soon enough, Fíli's strong arms came around you, one under your knees and the other against your back as he lifted you against him before gently depositing you in the warm water. Nothing about the way he touched you felt sexual, for which you were glad. All you felt was the reassuring embrace of someone who loved you enough to be here with you in such a vulnerable moment.
"I'm just going to go get your clothes dealt with, I will be right back," Fíli said with a kiss to your forehead as he bundled up the discarded fabric and closed the door behind him.
You'd just barely begin to miss his comforting presence when he returned and instead of your bloody garments in his arms, it was a pile of towels, some strips of linen, and your hairbrush. Setting the towels and linen down on the counter he passed you your lavender soap from its tray on the counter before turning back to you.
"I was thinking that I could brush out your hair for you," he said, holding up the brush.
"That would be nice," you responded quietly, sinking even deeper into the water.
Fíli moved to perch on the stool beside the edge of the tub and ran his fingers through your hair once. When that elicited a pleasant shiver from you he redoubled his efforts, but first he gently untied the ribbon that had been keeping half of your hair out of your face and set it on the counter. Then he picked up the brush.
"My 'amad used to always brush my hair when I was upset," Fíli said, running the brush through your now damp hair. You sighed into the motion. "It always calmed me down quicker than anything else could, that and singing, and it seems it's the same for you."
"That brush was actually my mother's," you replied, sniffling despite your tears having long since stopped. "Using it reminds me of her."
Though you couldn't see him, you could feel Fíli pause behind you before he continued the brush strokes. "It must be nice having something of hers."
You let out a hum of ascent. As Fíli kept brushing, a comfortable silence fell between the two of you. As he worked, de-tangling your hair, Fíli began to sing a slow dwarven song under his breath. You couldn't understand the lyrics, but the low timbre of Fíli's voice made up for that.
You felt much better now and while the cramps still ravaged your body, your mind was at peace. Your small rituals helped—the soap and the brush and whatnot—but deep down you knew that this comfort was not due to any inanimate objects. No, this calm was all Fíli's doing.
"Thank you for this," you murmured to Fíli, eyes heavy.
You felt him cup your face. "No thanks necessary. I will be here as long as you need."