The Feast of Light

"Fíli and Kíli, stop it!" Frerin shouted and jumped up from the table, almost knocking over the inkwell. The malicious duo ran across the room, tossing the scroll of parchment from one to the other as they went, depending on who the older Dwarf was closing in on.

"Your luscious beard as black as coal and your eyes the colour and clarity of the brightest emeralds..." Fíli read out.

"That is private, you pest!" Frerin roared, turning on the spot to attack him and to snatch the letter from his hand, but it had been thrown back over his head and Kili continued to read.

"I miss you with a fire as fierce as a blast furnace..." He broke off in a rather undignified squeal completely unworthy of a Prince of Erebor, as Frerin missed him by the breadth of a hair, and made a run for it, leading a merry chase down the corridors, still clutching the scroll the elder so desperately wanted.

Thorin chuckled at the younger Dwarves antics and Dwalin joined in. Those three were always up to some sort of mischief! Troublesome, but much beloved, that's what they were. He would not have changed them for the world.

"Ah, to be young and in love again..." Thorin mused.

"That much for keeping the Yule peace," Dwalin said and they both laughed.

"Not in this household," Thorin said good-naturedly. "There might be peace in all of Middle Earth now that the darkness has been defeated, but the day there isn't a fight between my sons, that'll be the day I know they are plotting to overthrow me!"

"They never would," Dwalin said with certainty. "They are good boys, all of them."

"I know," Thorin confirmed. "But even if they wanted to, as long as I have you to guard me, I have no fear, least of all of those three scions of chaos!"

Dwalin's mood darkened immediately.

"I have lost four kings in my time," he ground out between clenched teeth. Thorin put a hand on the armrest of his friend's chair.

"Through no fault of your own have you watched them fall," Thorin said. "You have served my father well, and my cousin before him, and you have only ever been the most trustworthy of warriors, of friends to me. You have lost four, but you have seen as many take up the mantle of leadership, and all of us would have been much worse rulers if it hadn't been for your loyalty and dedication."

Dwalin gave a small nod and continued to stuff his pipe. Thorin did the same. Together they sat in silence, staring into the fireplace, watching the dance of the flames that drove away the chill of midwinter.

The door burst open and a young dwarrowdam strode in, her thick auburn braid bouncing on her shoulders. She threw herself into one of the unoccupied armchairs.

"My brother is an idiot," she declared to the room at large.

"Which one?" Dwalin asked as Thorin tried to hide a laugh behind his teacup.

"Each one of them," the girl said with an exasperated sigh. "But Frerin in particular. He actually thinks he can woo Ǫlrún with his inane love letters." She turned her voice into a pathetic whimper. "Oh dearest beloved, your hair gleams like freshly polished boots..."

"He's certainly inherited your father's skill with words," Dwalin said. He grinned when he saw Thorin flinch and stare at him as if he wanted to strangle him. It was probably treason to unveil those memories of helping a young prince draft his own letters, but Dwalin was many decades beyond caring about such petty things as treason.

"He most definitely has," Thorin's wife spoke up from where she sat, seemingly engrossed in a book. "Your darling father once compared my nose to the snout of his favourite battle pig when we were courting. Took him a week to even realise what I was upset about."

The Yule celebrations were splendid as ever, with Erebor returned to its full glory, Thorin spared no expense to make it a formidable day for each of her citizens, as well as their friends from Dale and beyond. Foods, both familiar and exotic were being served on laden tables, and the wine and ale flowed freely. Dwalin leaned back in his chair, his appetite for both now diminished with age and looked about the dining hall, listening to songs, watching the general merriment, and enjoying every moment of it. Much later, they retreated to the royal chambers, the king and queen, their four children, and Dwalin, who was by now little use as a guard, but still a beloved honorary uncle, and advisor, and oft-times confidante to the younger ones.

"What is it about apples and Yule?" Kíli asked, plopping down in front of the fire and taking a bite out of a shiny red apple with an appetite only a growing boy could muster. "We eat them all year round and suddenly at Yule they become this big special thing."

"It's something to do with apples being a sign of life," Frerin said, tossing another apple to Fíli who ate it with gusto, one of the many small things that distinguished him from his namesake. "You know the whole light in the darkness thing... life returns even in winter... something like that..."

"They also remind us that we too regrew from very humble seeds," Dwalin said, stroking Dís' hair. The young girl had sat down by his feet, leaning against his legs, and was sucking on a piece of chocolate, that exotic new treat from the far south he wished her namesake had had a chance to discover.

"When we first settled in the Ered Luin, we were so poor, an apple was a kingly gift to any child," he continued. With every year of life that Mahal granted him, he became more aware of his role as the memory of his people, or at least the part of the memory concerned with things deemed to be too ordinary and mundane for the official chronicles. He had been destined for an early grave, a sudden death on the battlefield or a slower one from agonising infection and disease. He had come close so many times that he took his continued survival as a sign, a call to duty from his Maker.

"There were years when an apple was the only treat afforded to our children, when most meals consisted of gruel, or maybe some buckwheat if we were lucky," Dwalin continued his tale as the children crowded around him. At the mention of gruel, the twins reached for more chocolate.

"Thorin, your cousin Thorin that is, and I, we used to play Yule ghosts and hide apples in the dwarflings' boots. There was always great delight among them, even later when we passed that task on to Fíli and Kíli."

"Did they have fun playing the Yule ghosts?" Kíli asked, as always excited by the mention of his older cousins.

"Oh yes, they did," Dwalin confirmed. "Although Kíli almost got caught once and had to think on his feet to come up with an excuse for why he was digging around a family's boot cupboard."

They laughed at that and suggested all sorts of outlandish stories Kíli might have told. Dwalin looked at them fondly. They were good children, happy, and safe in the knowledge that they were loved and no harm would come to them.

"The greatest Yule surprise I ever got was an apple," he said.

"Oh but what about that great battle axe grandfather gave you?" Frerin asked.

"And don't forget the armchair," Dís added. "You love your armchair."

Dwalin smiled. "All great surprises," he said. "But none greater than that apple."

"What was so special about the apple?" Kíli asked, regarding the one in his hand critically as if it was about to reveal some special power.

"It was given to me by your cousin Frerin," Dwalin said. "We were all very young back then, just a little older than you are now, and we were in the war, the first War against the Orcs." He stopped to let Dís settle onto his lap, putting an arm around her. "It was a very hard time, we had little to eat and even less to laugh about. When Yule came, there was nothing special about it, it was just another day of fighting in the dark." They voiced their malcontent at that. "That night we sat together, Thorin, Frerin, Balin and me, and I was very sad that night." Sad about things he had done and seen that no grown Dwarf should have to suffer. He had been younger than Frerin was now. "Then suddenly Frerin got these four apples from his back, small and a little dented, but still the most beautiful apples I had ever seen."

They all had apples in their hands now.

"You must have been really happy to have something sweet," Fíli said. "Sweet things always make me happy."

"I was," Dwalin confirmed. "But do you know what really made me happy?"

They looked at him with big, questioning eyes.

"It was that somebody had thought me worth the trouble of getting me that surprise. That reminded me that I still had friends, that I was more than just another expendable soldier in that big war I did not comprehend. That little apple made me feel like I was alive again," Dwalin told them. "Every apple at Yule is a reminder that we are loved."

He had always loved fiercely, and had been loved by so many in his time. They would never be truly dead for as long as they lived on in his mind, and as he was spreading tales of their lives, they would survive for even longer in the minds of the next generation. Thorin had indeed consulted Dwalin before naming each of his children, and he had been glad to give his approval, delighted by the chance at a peaceful and prosperous life these children had. They might well be the first generation of their kind to be spared a war.

Every year they celebrated Yule, and every year, no matter how desperate the circumstances, it brought them joy. Every year the light returned, and this year it shone all the brighter for the promises it held.

This chapter concludes this little series, as we celebrate Christmas on the evening of the 24th in my culture and an advent calendar with 25 little surprises just feels decidedly wrong to me. I hope these stories brought you some joy this December, as they are my present to my old faithfuls and new readers alike. Despite certain comments, I'm far from having a heart of gold, but I do indeed enjoy spreading a bit of love and cheer through stories. I'm certainly no popular author, but it's quality over quantity and I truly treasure each and every review; to be honest, I even get excited about (and meticulously record) every view.

Wishing you all wonderful holidays! May they be full of light and magic and apples; may you have some dear people around you; may the memories be kind to you; and most of all, may you have the peace to enjoy the time no matter how imperfect the circumstances. Merry Christmas everyone!