A Ruby's Shine (Thorin Oakenshield X OC)

137. Change

I felt like I was intruding upon something, but I imagine Bilbo feels the same. Gandalf decided to not be present for his, honoring dwarf tradition and tying up some loose ends before he and Bilbo leave upon the morning. I looked around these catacombs that felt really eerie, yet, at the same time, are probably the most intricately designed part of Erebor I have seen. The giant, deep underground hall didn't have gold along the walls or anything, no, it is simple yet well done, the low hanging roof overhead of flat cut rock was surprising for Erebor, but I could understand, it being this deep underground. Apparently it is a dwarf tradition to be buried in an emptied point of the mines. I guess, for dwarves, it makes sense.

I don't exactly feel comfortable this deep underground, the air is stale and stagnant, and the pressure down here feels like weights on your shoulders and I don't know how a person can deal with being this far from nature.

I know my room even makes me uncomfortable with no life in it. I don't know how I will find a balance between living in Erebor and being among nature.

I watched, feeling uncomfortable being here, even with being accepted among the dwarves, as one by one, heavy stone slabs were lifted over square stone boxes, candles inside them glowing before vanishing out of sight and locking away the fallen dwarves in their tombs of stone. I found it to be a bit of an unsettling fact, learning that dwarves, when they die, do not slowly get absorbed by the earth like the rest of us creatures on Middle-Earth. No, slowly, fallen dwarves turn back into the material from which they came, stone.

Very unsettling to me, a person with such love for the sun, the sky, the sounds of birds in the trees and nature all around me. I hope that, when it is my time to go, I will be buried out among nature. But, I have my life ahead of me. I don't know how long I will live, but I know that, by my kind's terms, I am just beyond being a young adult, having reached being adult my Narthualian terms 20 years ago, which is suspiciously not that different from dwarves.

It makes me wonder, if our two races are connected along some distant bloodline. I can't remember anything on it, so, if we are, it is generations upon generations ago, so far back in time that neither Narthualian now dwarves remember it.

I haven't... told Thorin, or anyone, that I remember every single bit of my past, my people, and who I am. I don't know if I will ever be ready to tell anyone those painful memories that feel like knives being stabbed into my gut, but, maybe one day, I will tell someone of my past.

I just can't yet, the pain of each individual memory that returns to me day after day only feels like someone pushing that knife in my ribs deeper, twisting it to just give me even more agony. The pain, grief, and horror of knowing you were the cause of your people's death... I don't think I can ever fully overcome that.

I bowed my head as the last stone slab as lowered in place and, though it is not a dwarf tradition, wished the dwarves safe passage into the afterlife after all they have given for us. So many died in the battle, but we still remain, living, with a future ahead for all of us, human, elf, dwarf, hobbit, and even the last living Narthualian.

The last of my kind.

I understand Beorn's grief and hatred, why he stays alone in his hut and hates outsiders. If I didn't have the dwarves...

I don't know what the truth's of my past would have done to me, and I hope I will never know.

I lifted my head and followed the dwarves, keeping to the back of the group because I still felt like, as a person who is not a dwarf, I shouldn't be here, but the dwarves of Erebor wanted me to be so I was.

We all ended up in the Grand Hall, which I found for a short period in all my exploration of Erebor before but it was so dark I couldn't see the place. Now that it has been, somewhat, cleaned up, I cannot deny it is the most defining feature Erebor has to offer, far outstanding the horrid and somewhat creepy throne room. The massive hall had a roof so high the light of the braziers nearly did not touch it, what light did touch the roof reflected off of the crystals harvested from the mines, somehow placed together in such a creative way it was awe inspiring as the light of braziers made the crystals cast faint straight beams of light, crisscrossing over each other to from one intricate giant geometric symbol on the roof I am told is the symbol of Durin's Folk.