A Not So Unwelcome Journey

Chapter 1: The Dwelling under the Hill

Bella Baggins buried her longing for exploration and excitement when her father fell ill all those years ago and so, when the adventure she always dreamed of came knocking on her door, she almost let it pass her by. Almost.

This is my first fanfiction and with my computer-skills, spelling, and grammatical genius, it's likely to go ends up. But hey, I'll give it a go. The story will probably follow a mix of the book and the film. If you recognise something I don't own it.

~NOTE FROM 4 YEARS IN THE FUTURE~ while this is still unfinished, it is not abandoned. I am working on new chapters, just veeery slowly. Also on edits because I like to think my writing has improved (probably not). Apparently it does get better as it goes on...bear with it?

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.

Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.

It was a quaint dwelling, that one lying under the hill: with a perfectly round green door and matching round windows. With floors tiled and carpeted, and a large number of rooms more spacious and light than outside appearance would have anyone believe.

Furnished with rather high beamed ceilings, polished wooden furniture and beautifully intricate rugs. Bedrooms and bathrooms, pantries and dining rooms, wardrobes and kitchens: this was the house of a well to do hobbit. A very well to do hobbit indeed.

This was the house Bungo Baggins had built for his wife, Belladonna Took, and this was where their only daughter, Bella Baggins, had been born and brought up.

The Bagginses had lived in the surrounding area for as long as anyone cared to remember, and long before anyone remembered had cared. There would always be a Baggins living at Bag-End, Bungo had decided as he had led his wife's first steps into their new home. It was a house he had built to endure, like all things in the Shire were built to do. This house he built to be the house of his family - of the family he would see come into the world over his life-span, and the family he would never know but would still very much be part of.

It was a very respectable house and the Bagginses were considered a very respectable lot: not only were they rich, but they never had any adventures or did anything unexpected. The same could not be said for the Tooks. Despite being more wealthy than the Bagginses, or any other family in the whole of the Shire for that matter, they were simply not respectable. The Tooks were trouble, there was no denying that. And while the Old Took, the head of the family, was undoubtedly most famous for his goings in his youth, it was no odd occurrence for any of the Tooks to disappear off on an adventure. This was not how hobbits were suppose to act, was the general opinion (an opinion at which members of the Took family would grin and laugh at in a most unbecoming way, before disappearing off for a week adventuring in spite).

Belladonna Took was one of the three daughters of the Old Took. She was, in short, everything Bungo Baggins's mother had warned him against. He was enthralled with her personality, captured by her mannerisms, too deeply and utterly in love to care.

She had had her fair share of adventures, and had no intention staying put; of settling for a simple life. Bungo would not hold her back. He loved her for her life and spirit and he told her so. He had thought that she would never want to marry him, and so he had never asked her. Tooks just loved to be unpredictable. One day she had asked him.

They were opposites. He had no great desire for adventure himself, even if he treasured her for hers. He was content to stay at home while she was out visiting new places. He worried, yes. He missed her in her absence, but she had promised: she would always come back to him, whether it be a day, a week, a month. She was never away for more than half a season for she missed him also, and soon she found herself venturing less often and for less long.

When they found that Belladonna was to have a child he was overjoyed. They were not young in their years and Bungo had always wanted a family, more than anything. Belladonna found that though she loved to explore, she had a husband and unborn child that she loved more and for a whole seven months, she stayed. He had never been happier than in that time.

But Bungo Baggins had been sadly wrong that day he had shown his wife their house. He had seen himself on that day, having grown old alongside his wife, surrounded by his many children, his grandchildren and great grandchildren running through the halls...but that would never come to pass. There would not always be a Baggins living at Bag-End.

Bungo's life was to be a sad tale, and it would begin, and end, with the death of his wife.

Belladonna Took died in childbirth late one autumn eve in mid September.

The stars shone clear that night and Bungo, clutching the small miracle that was his daughter to his chest and crying openly in grief, cursed them, because they shone as if nothing had changed, but everything had.

He was left to bring up his only child alone.

Bella.

There really was no other name he could consider giving his daughter. No other name could be as beautiful to him.

She was just like her mother, he saw it more and more as she grew. Her appearance held such a likeness: her golden hair, the shape of her face, everything but the colour of her eyes. They were the only thing of his. Belladonna's eyes had been blue, his daughters were brown.

He did not stop his daughter from wandering, not within the bounds of safety. She was a Took at heart, much more so than she was a Baggins. Though she did, as he, appreciate the comforts of a cup of tea and a good book.

He told her tales of distant lands. Of tall folk, great battles and kings of old. Every night he would read to her from the books his wife had left behind.

Her games made him smile. One day she was a traveler, meeting new lands and friends, another day she was a warrior fighting against evil foes, then she was King, protecting her people from harm.

King? Bungo had laughed as he plucked her up into his arms and spun her around. Boys are called Kings, Bella. Girls are Queens. His six year old daughter had been slightly put out, because the book they were reading was about a King, and that day she wanted to be him. Queen, then.

Oh? And how will you become Queen?

Sometimes Bungo would feel guilty for the dreams he gave his little girl. Belladonna had once confined in him that her adventures were rather shielded by her family. She had often felt her freedom restricted by the simple fact that she was a woman - seen by some of her male relatives as a burden to their travels, for some Tooks believed that adventures were no place for women.

He loved his daughter, but sometimes thought that for her happiness she would have been better off born a son, for it was not just the view of a few hobbits that women were not meant to go out into the big wide world; it was a view share by most everyone.

Women featured very little in those great stories. Bella seemed to realise this as she got older. When she played she was no longer 'Bella the Great', but 'Bilbo the Great'. She had pulled the name from the family tree - her great great uncles name, and she played her character very well indeed.

Well, that's it for now. This will most probably be Bella(Bilbo)/Thorin.

Please review, I've never had an opinion on my writing before, help me improve!