A/N At the end.

Everything changed after Smaug.

It would not be possible, Sigrid supposed, for such a thing as a dragon to not irrevocably alter their world. It was a thing to be expected, like the sunrise after the sky turned the color of slate, or evening to fall as the lands to the east of the Lonely Mountain fell into shade, or the musty smell of the smokehouses, when the wind shifted to the west.

There had been occasions of great turmoil before – when Mother had died, after Tilda. And when Father had been made captain of the bowmen, and when he had lost the captaincy.

And there were times, after, when tensions between Dale and the King Under The Mountain were at a head, or the New Town grew wealthy and waxed impatient with Dale's rule, or even when Bain took a wife, that Sigrid found herself pausing and wondering, is it this, then? The next thing? The next destroyer of the world?

None of it, in the end, ever compared to the dragon.

Before, they were a family, among many in Lake-town. They were cold in the winter, like everyone in Lake-town. They were hungry, and their teeth hurt, in the early spring, before the greens came. The storms shook the buildings and the water lapped at the pilings and always, always, there was the patter of waves against the foundations of the town. They celebrated the new moon and the equinox and listened to tales in the market of elves and dwarves and wizards.

Only tales, before the dragon.

After the dragon, there were dwarves under the Mountain, and elves close in the forest, and Sigrid herself had seen Gandalf the Grey, walking through Dale in the late evening. Their father was no longer the late captain, but the Bowman Who Saved Lake-town. Then he was the captain of the archers at Dale, and then, almost by accident, Sigrid woke and found that her father had become King of Dale, and none of the boys she fancied would talk to her any longer, and many strange men courted her, and all the girls of her childhood spoke about her behind their hands to each other.

They were rich, now – wealthy beyond anything she could have imagined. Their home was always warm, even in the deepest of the winter snows, and they always had enough to eat, and someone else to fetch the water when the air was cold and biting and the pool held a thick rim of ice. Tilda grew tall and straight and never had chilblains on her face.

Tilda had never stopped believing in the marketplace tales – of magical deeds of wizards, of the wondrous craftsmanship of dwarves, of the starlight beauty of elves. Sigrid had – after Mother died, and Father had grieved, and they had gone on, sad and quiet, and there was no miracle to heal her, or to take away the weight on Father's shoulders, and Bain joined Father on the boat, returning weary and with frost-bitten hands – then, Sigrid set aside the tales as the falsehoods they were. They had, she decided, nothing to do with life in Lake-town.

After the dragon, after Lake-town burned, their lives were full of magic.

The King Under The Mountain traded honestly with Dale, and Dale protected the southern entrance to the Lonely Mountain, and grew rich from it. They had a home with thick walls, that no wind ever blew through, and dry land under their feet, and all the tools and implements a person could ask for. Hammers, nails. Fishhooks. Gillspars, anchors, oarlocks. Marvelous ovens that could be set upon a plank floor and not scorch the wood. And swords, and shears, and sickles, and wheel rims, and a thousand thousand other items of wealth and a life of ease. Metal bucket handles.

All of it for Dale's growth, if only they would manage the sacks of grain and bundles of mustard and barrels of beets for the kitchens of the dwarves. Transport the casks of ale and haul bundles of bow staves and ax handles, all carefully bound in oilskin, up the road to the Lonely Mountain and then bear away arrow heads and ax blades and pulleys and brasswork bells.

She never learned what they did for the elves.

The barrel trade continued, as it always had, but before the dragon, Sigrid had never seen one of the elves herself. Now they were often in the House, in Dale, both those of Mirkwood and the elves of Lothlorien, and more than once, even travelers from far off Rivendell. Sigrid would wake, and dress, and come into the Hall to find the doors open and a score of tall, golden beings encamped in the courtyard, with shimmering armor and evening eyes and hair of spun moonlight. She would stand there, in her new dress and carefully combed hair and feel the coarsest, foulest mouse to invade their company.

Tilda never noticed. For Tilda, the tales had never not been true. She had seen a dragon fall from the sky and Lake-town burn and heroes die to save her.

Tilda had seen elven magic heal the dying.

When the elves came, Tilda threw herself among them, as if greeting family, and bestowed upon all the travelers, familiar and strange, all the greetings her heart could muster. And in return, they gifted her with smiles, and quiet words, and treasures.

King Thranduil himself – who was a visitor to the House even before it was a House, before Father was King Bard and Dale was a city again – would seize her as she ran to the Elf Lord, and bear her up, and toss Tilda up to float down like the leaves of Mirkwood. And then when he had set Tilda down, giggling and staggering, Thranduil would call forward one of his couriers, bearing a case. From this he would bring forth tiny trees with limbs of golden wire and leaves of green jewels, silver birds with feathers tipped with mithril, and silken veils woven from mist and dew-touched linen. For Bain, there would be maps of far-off lands, books bound with rare leather, and ivory-handled knives in sheathes of mahogany.

For Sigrid, Thranduil brought out cups of delicate crystal, the thickness of a fingernail, and colored like all the flowers of spring. He set before her tiny weights in gold, silver, and ebony, all nestled in gold-encrusted silk. Long tapestries of complex knot work were spread on her lap, and then he gestured forward a lady elf, who bore a packet of needles and threads of a thousand shades of sky and sunrise and fire and the sun.

The elf-lord would linger for an hour or a day or a week – ride out with Father and a host of mounted guards, feast on the best of their stores, and sit, late in the night, with Father in his chambers, drinking dark wine from New Town barrels and talking in words she did not understand. And then he would be gone, taking his guards and horses and shining light away with him.

Leaving behind no promises, only a heap of finery that seemed to diminish with every passing moment.

Tilda never grieved that the elf-gifts seemed somehow lesser, once Thranduil and his kin had departed. Perhaps, for her, who never doubted that the elves would return, they never faded.

Sigrid lay in her wide warm bed, and listened for the footsteps of her mother, echoing on the plank floor in the next room, and wished for the return of the tide.

end

A/N: Set post Battle of the Five Armies. Sigrid and her family, and the elves. Rated G. From a prompt by The Readers Muse, who wanted "Thranduil spoiling the Bardlings." Concrit and feedback of all sorts greatly appreciated.