Dáin's Saga by bunn

It was in the days of Dáin of the Grey Mountains, now called First-Dáin, son of Náin the Careful, son of Óin the Delver, son of Glóin the Prosperous, son of Thorin the Wanderer, son of Thráin the Exile son of Náin the Doomed of the House of Durin, who was born to be Lord of Khazad-dûm, that Durin’s Folk were driven forth once again from their halls.

A great Cold-drake came into the Grey Mountains, and killed Dáin and his second-son Frór beside him.

Thrór, first-child of Dáin was strong in the arm, but he was filled with dreams of old peace and plenty. He went away to the Mountain of Erebor with all the people who would follow him, to set up his golden throne there.

But Grór, third-child of Dáin, said: “Ill-fate dogs the House of Durin. I will not make treasures for worms or men to steal. I will make hammers, mattocks, and axes of steel.” He went to the Iron Hills, and set up his seat there.

Grór Dáinson was ill-tempered and sometimes foul of tongue. But he was bushy in the beard and well-known to be a cunning one, and so some of Durin’s folk chose to follow him instead of his older brother.

And the Grey Mountains stood empty and lone.

In the great halls where the Longbeards had lived, and made treasures to match the works of lost Khazad-dûm, dragons brooded. In corridors too narrow for the drakes to pass, orcs crept from the ruins of Mount Gundabad, and began to breed.

The heathland where men had raised pigs and sheep and gathered sweet berries for the Longbeards were withered by ice and dragon-fire.

Men called it the Withered Heath, and they fled from it.

Years passed. All thought Thrór had made the wiser choice (though saying so in the Iron Hills would be brave to the point of foolhardiness). The Mountain was rich in gold and gems, and busy with craftsmen. Soon there was much profitable trade with the Men of Dale, some of whom were Men who had fled the dragons of the Withered Heath, and even with the Elves of the Wood.

In Erebor, it was said, there was no need to till the land, for food, ale and all good things could be bought with their skills and treasures. Thrór married a woman of high standing in the Mountain, for her family had been priests when Gundabad was a holy mountain, long ago.

Their child was called Thráin, after the last king born in Khazad-dûm before the fall.

In the Iron Hills, Grór and his folk made steel. The land was at peace. Few Men came up the river Carnen to sell grain and leather in the Iron Hills, when they could travel to Erebor, and Grór’s folk made shoes of iron for lack of leather, ate the oats they grew in the thin soil and herded sheep.

There, Náin, the heir of Grór was born, even bushier and angrier than his sire, to Helgisdaughter, who had married Grór not long before the coming of the Dragon to the Grey Mountains. She was cold and bitter, remembering the life that the Dragon had ended, and resenting the change.

But Náin did not inherit his mother’s gloom. He was a great fighter, but bore no malice: his anger was a fist and a great rush of sparks, but soon over, and he soon gained a reputation in his own country as a lucky one as well as trouble in a quarrel.

Náin married a woman who had come from Erebor, because she had fallen in love with Thráin Thrórsson, and he would not have her so she had resolved to live life alone.

But Náin saw the enamelwork of Ranndaughter, colours bright as flame, and he set himself to win her heart, even though that was against all the customs.

Náin was a very fine poet, and he was as determined as he was fierce. In time, Ranndaughter’s broken heart mended and she became as fierce as he was himself.

Together they strove mightily to make the Iron Hills prosperous, and there was a good deal of shouting spent on that, and later, on the making of an heir.

They called him Dáin, in memory of his grandfather First-Dáin, who was slain by the cold-drake. And his mother said: ‘His voice is loud enough that even the dragons will take fright at him!”

Dragonfire and slaughter

It is true that no Dragon ever came to the Iron Hills.

But when Dáin was only three years old, Smaug, the Worm of Dread, came to Erebor, where his grandfather’s brother had made his home.

When word of the disaster came to the Iron Hills, Grór took Dáin upon his knee to receive those who had escaped the dragonfire.

First came some Men who had been from Dale, and Grór stamped his iron-shod feet and gave them welcome to the lands along the Carnen: the more willingly since some of their cattle-herd had escaped the dragon. “These will make fine allies,” Grór told his grandson.

“Will my cousins come?” young Dáin asked his father, in excitement. For he was too young to fear dragons, or to understand the wailing in the halls.

Dáin had heard much of his cousin Thorin, who was twenty-one years older, and already making a name for himself as both a smith and a fine player on the harp. Thorin also had both a brother and a sister, for which the young Dáin envied him mightily.

“They will not come here to work iron,” Helgisdaughter said, bitterly, and she turned away.

But Grór shook his head. “Wait and see, lad.” For there was no word yet of Thrór, nor of any of the House of Durin. Grór feared in his heart that his brother had met a fate like that of their father, and though they rarely agreed on any matter, he loved his brother still.

But he knew too that Thrór was proud, and much in love with the old glory of his house. Thrór would find it hard to come to his brother’s house as a beggar.

Only after months of doubt did word come to the Iron Hills that Thrór, Thráin and Thorin too had escaped the Dragon and fled. But instead of heading east to the Iron Hills, they had made a great journey westward, to Dunland, and there they lived with a few of their folk, among Men, just a little way south of the old limits of Khazad-dûm.

Now Náin and Grór took council together in Hill Hall, at the heart of the Iron Hills.

If that hall was not as tall as the halls of Erebor, nor as busy and rich as the halls of the Grey Mountains, it was warm and bright and well stored enough, while the wind howled wild over the heather hilltops, chasing away the smoke that came from chimneys buried deep in the rock. Dáin and his friend Vili played by the fireside with many-coloured stone blocks.

“It’s a pity that my brother didn’t come to stay with us,” Grór said, for now that Thrór had lost almost everything, he was inclined to feel more warmly about him.

“Why would you say that?” Náin replied. “Did you forget that my uncle’s the older of you two? If he came here with his son and grandson, who are older than me and Dáin, they would soon be taking over everything we’ve worked so hard for! Besides, have you not forgotten that I won my wife from cousin Thráin?”

“You’d do better not to boast about that,” Helgisdaughter reproved him. “That’s not the custom, and you know it!”

But Grór, Náin’s father, said: “It’s good news that they are making their own way in Dunland. I’m sure they’ll do very well there once they have had a chance to get established.”

And he sent a messenger to Dunland the next day, with gifts for Thorin, Frerin and Dís, a small amount of money, and a letter offering an invitation to stay in such polite unpressing terms that he knew Thrór would never accept it.

To Thorin, he sent a new board game that Grór had invented and of which he was very proud, with coloured stone counters representing each of the Seven Houses of the Dwarves.

To Frerin, he sent a book of verses written by Náin, and to Dís, he sent a very fine steel dagger, of a size suitable for a child of her age.

In time, a reply came back with the messenger that had travelled all the way to Dunland, full of thanks and gracious language that said nothing very much at all. And with it, was a gift for Dáin: a small, lightweight pendant made of pure gold, marked with the anvil and hammer surmounted by seven stars of the House of Durin.

It said, without words, and more clearly than anything in the letter: we need no charity from you.

“A kingly gift,” Ranndaughter said, looking at it in wonder hanging around her child’s neck.

“I wonder what they had to melt down, to make it,” Helgisdaughter said, cynically.

******

Dáin makes a name at wrestling

Twenty years passed, and Dáin had grown nearly to his full height, though his beard was short and scruffy, and his shoulders still narrow. He was known in those days as a miner more enthusiastic than skilled, with a way of wielding his hammer in a manner that sent shards of rock flying.

But he was less angry than his father or his mother, and already had a name as a welcome guest and generous host.

Not only among his own folk. The Ravens of Erebor had fled the Dragon to the lands around about, and they still visited the Iron Hills on occasion, and they came most willingly to Dáin, bringing news.

Dáin still had never met in person his three cousins exiled from Erebor by dragonfire and ruin, nor his uncle Thráin, nor his great-uncle Thrór. But from time to time, young Dís, only six years older than Dáin, sent him a letter with some traveller who was going eastward.

Dáin’s replies were always brief and occasional, not least because not many folk travelled often to Dunland. Even the Ravens found the flight too far for their black wings.

From Dís’s letters, when they came, they learned that life among Men in Dunland was hard.

The family had not turned to farming, as Grór had done in his own early days in the Iron Hills — or at least, if such indignity had ever been considered, Dís never said so — but there was little more dignity in working as a blacksmith or tinsmith for hire in the poor wood-built villages of Men.

Thrór’s family could not afford the materials to set up in business working with gems or gold or even the fine stonework and polished steels now produced by the Iron Hills.

*******

It happened that one day Dain and his father made a journey down the Red River in a ship that Náin had made for trading. It had fourteen oars, a shallow keel to pass the river shoals, and could carry a deal of goods as well as passengers. With them went Vili, who was a good friend of Dáin’s and a year or so younger.

Grór did not go with them, for his eyes had long been weak, and now they saw almost nothing. Náin went out to do business for his father, while Gror ruled from his chair in his hall.

They travelled south for many days and across the Sea of Rhûn. On the eastern side of that sea they left their ship and went on, all the way to the Red Mountain halls of the Ironfist folk.

They arrived just as the horns were being blown to declare the summer festival, and since the place was bustling and there was no time for introductions, Dáin went straight away to take part in the wrestling-competition all alone, leaving even Vili with Náin.

There Dáin met with an old person called Sigtrygge, who was arranging the bouts. He was a white-beard, but he had never travelled into the West, and he did not recognise Dáin, or know who Dáin’s family were, for Dáin in his eagerness had not said he was a Longbeard, or mentioned the name of Durin.

Sigtrygge took a good long look at Dáin and said: “There’s no point matching you with anyone of note, stripling! There’s no more to you yet than a peg!”

“None the less,” Dáin said, “I am a peg that wants to wrestle.”

So Sigtrygge grumbled, and he matched Dáin with a young Ironfist dwarf, called Narfi, and Dáin won the match. Narfi was not pleased, and he sneered at Dáin, pointing to his iron shoes, and calling him Ironfoot.

“None the less, I won,” Dáin said smiling, and went back to Sigtrygge to ask for another match. This time he fought an old dwarf who was called Hepti. He was one of the Stiffbeards from the distant north-east, and had been a great wrestler in his youth. Dáin won again.

Sigtrygge muttered into his white beard, and he matched Dáin with Jari Longarm, who was well known in those parts as a fine wrestler at the height of his powers, and was also renowned as a great poet.

Then Vili who was Dáin’s friend came, and counselled Dáin to leave the match, for he had heard Jari was a hard man to beat.

But Dáin said “None the less, I have matched with him, so I shall wrestle.”

So they wrestled, Dáin and Jari, and at first they were well-matched, though Jari was the older.

That match Dáin lost, but he was thrawn and nimble, and it was far harder for Jari to beat him than anyone had expected.

When Náin came to find out where his son had got to, he found that he and Jari had become good friends, and that Jari had composed a lausavísa in Dáin's praise.

Náin said angrily that Dáin was too young for such matters, and waved his fists.

But everyone could see that Náin was very proud indeed that Dáin had won so many bouts and had a lausavísa* made for him without even his family being known.

Even though he could not find the words to say so. 

(*A lausavisa is a single stanza composition, usually introduced into a saga with the words 'then said'. Sadly the words of this particular composition have been lost.)

*******

Azog

Not long after they returned to the Iron Hills that autumn, a messenger came from Dunland. Grór received him at once in Hill Hall before the bright council-fire.

“I come from Thráin, son of Thrór,” the messenger said. His coat was worn and his boots patched, but his voice was urgent. “Your brother Thrór is dead.”

“That’s sudden news, and dark,” Grór said to him. “We had not heard that he was sick.”

But the messenger shook his head. “He was not sick, except in heart. He went away with only one companion, his old friend Nár, to Khazad-dûm. There he died, slain by the orc Azog.”

Grór wept. Náin put his hands on his hips. “That’s bitter news. Thrór my kinsman was of full age, but that is a bad death at any age.”

Helgisdaughter demanded: “But how is this known? Did Nár survive?”

“Nár is old and weak,” the messenger said defensively. “There was nothing he could do. He watched Thrór walk into the open East-gate, heading for the Bridge, saying that he was the heir of Khazad-dûm, and would see his inheritance. Then, some days later Azog came and... and threw his head at him. Thrór’s head. He had branded the word ‘Azog’ across Thrór’s forehead, so we would not forget who did it.”

Grór put his head in his hands in grief, remembering the brother of his youth. “We will not forget.”

“A bitter end,” Náin said. All around the hall, Longbeards were shaking their heads at the tragedy. A few, who had come from Erebor, began rocking from side to side, keening.

Helgisdaughter muttered darkly under her breath.

Náin said: “To walk alone into Khazad-dûm! That’s brave, but I can’t call it wise. Our folk left the place for good reason.”

“Thráin has declared war on Azog,” the messenger said, raising his voice and making it ring across the room. “He says: we have endured too much. This insult cannot stand. He calls on all seven Houses to avenge his father’s death, and make war on the orcs until Azog is dead. We will march on Gundabad, on the orc-strongholds of the Misty Mountains, and at last on Khazad-dûm itself.”

Hearing this, Dáin leaped up in excitement. He was a young dwarf and had never been to war. “We will prepare at once!” he cried.

Náin looked at his father, hunched miserable in his chair, and around the room. “I say we won’t. Thrór chose his death. We all know that Khazad-dûm is a place of death. Durin died there, long ago, and Náin, my namesake, after him. Thrór was mad to go there at all, and madder still to walk in alone!”

“Yes, but...” Dáin said.

Náin raised his mighty voice. “All of us here have lost enough. We have fled from home to home, and now, here, we have a place where we can raise our families and go about our own business in safety. Why should we gamble what little we have, all that we have, on this war?”

“Durin’s heir calls on you...” the messenger began, raising his own voice in answer.

“Durin’s heir by accident of birth,” Náin shouted, his great shoulders coming up about his ears and his thick eyebrows bristling. “My father Grór is as much First-Dáin’s son as Thrór, and clearly he’s the wiser of the two.”

“But...” Dáin said.

“Quiet, lad,” Náin told him. “You’re far too young for this business. I won’t have you involved.”

The messenger turned to Grór. “Surely you won’t allow your son to speak for you in this?”

Grór looked at Náin, and Dáin, and Ranndaughter, who had come to stand beside her son, looking troubled.

“You know what I think,” Helgisdaughter said bitterly. “Nothing has gone right since the Dragon came to the Grey Mountains.”

Ranndaughter reminded Grór : “You’ve said to us many times that Thrór wished he lived in some old tale of heroes, where the heir of Durin is deathless, beloved, and always right.”

Gror scowled, but did not deny it.

Náin grabbed his wife in a fierce approving grip and held her close. “Didn’t you tell me, father, many times, that to have bread and ale and good roast pork, we have to grow it, or find a way to buy from those that do? We live in the world as it is. We can’t go mooning after kings.”

He glared at the messenger, who took a step backward. “What right does Thráin have, to call us out to die for him?” Náin demanded.

Slowly, Grór nodded. “Náin is right. My brother always looked backwards, wanting to be the gracious heir of Durin in times of peace and plenty. He died as he lived. But these aren’t times of peace, and neither orcs nor dragons can be wished away. A war for vengeance is exactly what this Azog wants.”

He looked around the hall, where the leaders of all the main families of the Iron Hills by now had gathered, listening. “What do you say, O folk of the Iron Hills? Do you want to answer Thráin’s call?”

Most of the people there looked away, but one or two were bold enough to call out ‘No!’

Even Dáin said nothing.

“Are you sure?” Grór said to them again, raising his voice so that even the people at the back could hear him. “I’ll hear from anyone who wants to speak.”

“It’s bound to go badly,” Helgisdaughter said. But she always said that.

At last, Dáin stood up, and he said, slowly and reluctantly: “I agree with my father. Azog is trying to bait us. He must have a reason. Strike too fast and you will only hit your own foot, the saying goes. If we take Azog’s bait, we will regret it.”

Grór turned to the messenger. “You have our answer.”

The messenger’s mouth twisted as if he had a bad taste in it. “My lord thought you might refuse. I must go on. Thráin is rallying all of our folk, even to the uttermost east. You can refuse to join us, but the Iron Fists, the Stiff Beards, and the Blacklocks have a keener sense of honour. They will avenge this insult to the Eldest House.”

“Maybe they will,” Náin said. “And maybe they won’t. They don’t know him as we do. You can have a bed for the night, and supplies for your journey. But we won’t go out to die in Thráin’s war.”

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The first Houses of the Dwarves to join Thráin’s new war were the Firebeard and the Broadbeam dwarves of the western mountains.

“Well, they would, wouldn’t they?” Náin demanded, when Dáin brought him the news. “They don’t have dragons nor orcs to worry about over there in the west. Thorin’s been visiting there for years.  No doubt he’s talked them into it.”

The next House to join Thráin was the Stiffbeards. They came marching past the Iron Hills on their long journey west.

From the northernmost hilltop of his home, Dáin saw them pass in the distance, a long grey glinting column, driving forward over the cold plain that lies between the Iron Hills and the Withered Heath. Their banners were red and gold.

Ravens swooped above their march, and Dáin thought of Hepti, the thrawn old Stiffbeard that he had thrown in the wrestling. Had he marched out to join Thráin’s war of vengeance?

The Iron Hills only heard that the Iron Fists and the Blacklocks had joined the fight later. 

Dáin’s old wrestling enemy, Narfi of the Iron Fist brought the word, coming home from the war. He had taken a goblin-dart to the ear, and though he had recovered from the poison, he was deaf, and afflicted by ringing sounds that no-one else could hear. Narfi was no longer proud, and he begged Dáin’s pardon for having been a sore loser in his youth.

Dáin shook his head smiling, and gave Narfi the honour due to an old friend, for he was not one to hold a grudge.

Narfi did not only tell that the Iron Fists and Blacklocks had come out to war.

For the great news he carried was that Mount Gundabad, the Holy Mountain, which had been infested with orcs for an Age, had been retaken.

Now, the battle was moving east, to the goblin-tunnels of the Misty Mountains.

Náin shook his head. “It makes a good tale, all the Houses coming together to free the holy mountain,” he signed, so that Narfi could understand. “But how many will be left to hold it afterwards, that’s what I’d like to know.”

But Narfi said, seeing Náin’s hand-speech: “Fine story, but half truth. Thráin promised us the riches of his House, if we could only help him win them back. That is why we came, for we have had our own griefs, and our own losses, we of the Iron Fist.

“Once we had a Ring that bred gold, or so the tales say. Men flocked to our halls then, to bring us in trade all we might wish. But we lost such riches long ago, and thought, perhaps, that the House of Durin might still know of such old spells.”

“There are no great spells and mighty treasures any more,” Náin told him.

For in those days in the Iron Hills, all believed that the Ring of Eregion, that long ago the Ringmaker of the Deep-elves gave to Durin, had been lost with Thrór when he went unwisely into Moria.

Last of all the Houses came the Stonefoots, though nobody in the Iron Hills was sure if that was because they had set out last, or because they had a long way to come.

Nobody had met a Stonefoot. It was said that the spoken tongue they used in public was different to the common speech that the Longbeards mostly used. The word was that Thráin had learned the language of the Stonefoots’ distant home.

“That’s just the sort of thing that Thrór would have done. Learn a whole new language because he thought it made him look good, instead of just employing a translator!” Grór said. And he wept a little more for his lost brother.

*****

For five years the war went on in the dark places deep beneath the Mountains, moving southward as the orcs of the Mountains gave up their secrets one by one and fled southward through the mountain-tunnels.

After them came the might of the Dwarves, hidden from Men and the watchful eye of the Sun as they marched through the mountain-roots. 

Battle after battle they fought, pursuing an elusive foe that could never quite be pinned down.

Dáin followed news of the war eagerly, whenever he could get it: in letters from Dís, which still arrived from time to time, and from occasional Iron Fists and Stiffbeards, injured in the fight and travelling home, who stopped at the Iron Hills to break their journey.

And all the while, he grew broader in the shoulders and stouter in the chest, though he was not yet of full age. Dáin like all the Longbeards was handy with both hammer and battle-axe, though he had not yet used either in war.

******

In the sixth year of the war, Thráin sent another message to the Iron Hills. This time the message was brought by Thráin’s eldest son, Thorin himself.

He arrived with a small company, all of them armed with axes, bows and daggers, and dressed in mail that had clearly seen battle. 

Their battered sky blue shields were marked with the anvil of Durin, and the end of Thorin’s long golden beard was tucked into his belt.

Grór got up from his tall chair, frowning darkly as Thorin's name was called.

Thorin bowed deeply, in a courtly manner. He was well-spoken and made a fine impression on those who stood nearby.

He spoke for some time about how pleased he was to visit the Iron Hills, and to meet his great-uncle’s grandson Dáin for the first time, and to meet again with Grór, and Náin and Ranndaughter.

As he turned, tall and elegant as he was, to give his greetings to Náin, his words ran short, and he came to a stuttering stop, for Náin was smiling broadly, and holding in his arms a tiny child, born only a few days earlier.

“You can meet another member of your family too,” Ranndaughter said, with the smug expression of someone who has successfully sprung a surprise. “A very new one, just hatched.”

“A child! A new child of the House of Durin!” Thorin was delighted by this. He abandoned his previous formal and rehearsed speech to greet the infant in more suitable language. “Have you given a name?” he asked the proud mother.

Náin shook his head. “Not yet. Time enough for names when the child is older,” he said, for the custom in the Iron Hills, as in the Grey Mountains aforetime, was that a child was given an outer name only on the twelfth birthday.

The child took hold of Thorin’s finger with a tiny hand. “Already the grip of a warrior!” Thorin said, with obvious delight.

“Thorin,” Grór asked, “Why have you come here? Didn’t you understand our message? I’ll be clear. We aren’t joining your father’s war.”

“We hoped that you might think again,” Thorin replied. “The war is going well. You surely must have heard that we have cleared the orcs from Mount Gundabad, and from all the orc-holds down the Misty Mountains, so far that where our host lies now is in sight of the peak of Barazinbar himself.”

“In sight of Baraz the Cruel?” Grór said. “It’s a long dark fight you have fought. We have heard a little of it, yes. How many have you lost, Thorin?”

“Death cannot be escaped in war,” Thorin answered swiftly.

“I know that as well as you do, lad. I asked how many.”

“I am not sure of the exact count...” Thorin admitted, removing his finger from the grip of the newest member of the House of Durin.

“No? Not even a number for the fallen of the Longbeards, for your own people?”

“Many,” Thorin admitted, still without giving a number. “Many have fallen, more have been injured. My father would greatly value your strength to bring this war to a swift and final end.”

“A final end? There’s no such thing,” Helgisdaughter said.

“He’s got all Seven Houses,” Grór grumbled. “What does he need us for?”

“To retake our ancient home,” Thorin told him. “To re-take the great Dwarrowdelve of our fathers: Khazad-dûm. My father thought that might tempt even your caution.”

Grór grimaced without speaking, and Thorin went on smoothly “But whether it does or not, I have brought with me my father’s youngest child, my sister, Dís.”

The next tallest of the blue-shielded warriors beside Thorin himself put her shield on the floor, and bowed. Like him, she had a golden beard, though she was not as broad of shoulder as Thorin.

“Dís Thrainsdaughter, at your service,” she said, her face grim and set.

“My father asks a favour, as kin to kin,” Thorin said. “He wishes that you would take Dís to foster, here in the North, far from the war. She is not yet of age, and... we would all sleep better, knowing that she is far from the battlefront.”

Grór nodded slowly. “I see. And the war is going well, you tell me.”

He fell silent. Thorin said nothing. Dís shuffled her feet, and the baby began to wail.

Dáin stepped forward smiling. “Welcome, Dís, to the Iron Hills. It’s good to meet you at last after so many letters: I am your cousin Dáin. Is it your wish to stay with us?”

Dís gave Thorin a brief sideways glare, but she nodded. “So my father and mother have ordered.”

“It’s not your own wish?” Dáin, several years younger than Dis, was not of age any more than she was. But he was well known as an agreeable person to everyone thereabouts, and so his father and grandfather let him speak for the household.

“It is my own wish.” She did not sound eager, but she had answered. That is all that law demands of a child counted battle-ready but not yet of age.

“Welcome, then, Dis, to our household,” Grór said.

Thorin bowed and thanked him.

“But we won’t be going to war,” he snapped, before Thorin’s effusive thanks had ended.

*****

Dís

It was strange to have Dís living in Dáin’s home. The person who had written the letters and the person who ate breakfast and grumbled about the baby crying seemed two very different people.

The long gossipy letters about ball-games, brothers, wrestling and arguments had made Dis seem a familiar friend. Now she was not.

Dáin was used to setting his hand to whatever task was needed, even if that was helping with the pigs or the harvest.

His father had always done the same, and was praised for it: Náin, everyone said, would always tackle the hard work. Moreover, Dáin’s best friend Vili was not of high family, and Dáin would not set himself apart from Vili.

Dis was not used to such a life at all, and said so loudly.

Dis had been born among the glories and comforts of Erebor, and had lost her home to the Dragon when she was ten years old.

Since then, she had been travelling with her parents: to the Blue Mountains, to Dunland, into the far east to the Blacklock home, and back to Dunland again before the war took her to Gundabad and the chill slopes of the northern Misty Mountains.

She had rarely lived in one place for long, and this meant, it seemed, that she had never had anything to do with pigs, or the growing of oats, nor spinning and weaving wool nor tanning pigskins or working leather.

There were, in fact, an astonishing number of things that Dis did not know and refused to learn.

Everyone found this annoying, apart from Helgisdaughter, who took to Dis as if she were her own child, and grumbled along with her, and Dáin, who had resolved to like Dis from her letters and was not about to give up on her.

Dáin’s friend Vili was doubtful about Dis. But since he was not prepared to lose Dáin, his best friend in all the Iron Hills, he decided to like Dis too.

They discovered that Dis didn’t know much about smelting. Dáin and Vili were astonished. Everyone in the Iron Hills knew about smelting.

But Dis settled in her new place, and they found some things she did know well : forging, poetry, casting, axe-work, and politics.

Above all, Dis knew about war.

Dís had travelled and fought with her father’s host. Nobody in the Iron Hills knew more of the progress of Thráin’s War.

She had seen Gundabad, the holy mountain, the very waking-place of Durin himself.

She had entered into the holy halls, as no-one had seen them for thousands of years.

She told Dáin and Vili , as they listened in fascination and the pigs snouted in the paddocks, of the endless filth of the orc-tunnels, the long ruination.

It was hard to tell, she said, where the original roads and pathways of the temple had run, she said, so many goblin-tunnels had scratched their way through the rock. But the great hall still stood, carved and worked where the goblins could not easily reach.

It was impossible to tell now, exactly where Durin had awoken. But she had seen ancient graves there, their seals still unbroken, despite the scars and desecration.

She told, too, of the deep battles, far beneath the Mountains, in the places where orcs and goblins had squeezed and chipped their strange erratic routes into natural caverns. Dáin listened in fascination as Dis explained how they had followed their enemy through rough crevices in the rock, oozing with foul water, foul air.

Where the enemy might bring down the roof to cut you off, to be left hungry and thirsty at the roots of mountains, until you were too weak to fight off the reaching hands, the whispering voices.

Vili shuddered and stopped his ears.

Then they learned that was why her father had sent Dis away. She had been caught in the deep tunnels, lost for a day and a night. She had only been found again by chance.

“It isn’t fair,” she said, angrily, at supper one evening. They were eating good pork sausages and pickled cabbage and yet she was not content. “Our other cousins are there. Dwalin, Balin and Gloin are all years younger than me.”

Náin frowned. “Young Dwalin is with your father’s army? But the little lad must be years short of his majority: he was born after the Dragon came to the Mountain! Is he even battle-ready?”

Dis shrugged. “Who isn’t battle-ready, nowadays? Even cousin Glóin is there with the host, and he’s a child. They only sent me away because I’m a girl. It isn’t fair.”

“No,” Náin said, looking at his eldest son. “Few things in life are fair.”

“It’s against all custom for the women of our house to march to war,” Dáin’s mother added, coaxing. “By all accounts you have done a fair share of soldiering. It’s not what I’d wish for my own daughter.”

Dis glared at her. “If more women of the Mountain had been outside it, then the Dragon wouldn’t have killed so many of them,” she said, sticking out her beard pugnaciously.

For she was a woman of the line of Durin, and one of great spirit. None of the customs applied to Dis, unless she so chose.

Her outer-name will be long remembered among Durin’s Folk, and among Men and even among the Elves.

*****

Tharkûn

It was about this time that the Grey Wanderer, Tharkûn the Staff-bearer, came to the Iron Hills.

Grór screwed up his dim eyes when he heard Tharkûn’s voice. “Why have you come now?” he demanded of the wizard. “When last I saw you, I was a youngster. You spoke to my father of some dark hidden threat. But it was a Dragon that killed him.”

“The First-Dáin was a great loss to us all, in these darkening days” Tharkûn replied. “I knew that some evil was stirring: I knew, as I told your father, that the Iron Mountains were in peril. I did not know that the Cold-drake was on the move, not until it was all over. It has been long since evil moved so openly in Middle-earth, and so I looked for some more subtle threat. Too subtle.”

“There’s nothing much that’s subtle about a Dragon,” Grór said, and laughed bitterly. “I hope you haven’t come with some new warning, Tharkûn. There’s no gold here, only hard work.”

Tharkûn shook his grey head. “I know of no direct threat to the Iron Hills, Grór. I happened to be passing, and thought I might look in to see how things are going with the House of Durin.”

“Well enough,” Grór told him, with a definite note of pride. “You’ve met my son Náin, haven’t you?  Two children he has now!” He turned as the cheerful voices approaching were suddenly hushed, as they noticed Grór was speaking to a visitor.

Grór smiled. “Here he is! This is my grandson, young Dáin, a promising lad, and his cousin Dis. This is Tharkûn, a Wizard out of the west, who knew my father.”

Dáin, Dis and Vili bowed, and Tharkûn inclined his grey head, removing his tall blue hat.

“Dis... now on what side of the family would you come, my lad?” Tharkûn asked.

Dis stood up very tall and straight, lifting her beard. “I am Dis, Thráinsdaughter, of the House of Durin,” she said.

“Great Elephants!” Tharkûn exclaimed, though nobody present knew what he meant by that. “I am delighted to make your acquaintance, Princess Dis. I thought all of your family was with the army.”

“She was,” Dáin assured him quickly, “And she is battle-tested,” he said proudly.

“Yes, well. My brother’s family were all a little eccentric sometimes,” Grór muttered.

“My family asked me to come here for safety,” Dis told the wizard reluctantly. “But I think they were wrong. I should have stayed with them. I don’t usually do what people tell me, and I’ve resolved to do it less in future.”

“It is your father’s war that concerns me,” Tharkûn said. “Thráin has taken a great revenge for your brother’s death, but... has it occurred to you, Grór, that he may have overcommitted himself?”

“What do you think?” Grór snorted. “Why do you think I send him no help?”

“A time is coming,” Tharkûn said, “When you may have to choose. The Houses of the Dwarves are falling, Grór . Of the Seven Houses, Firebeards and the Broadbeams are a fragment of what they once were. This latest war will see an end to their people, save in memory: they will be part of the House of Durin, and no more — if they are lucky enough to survive at all.”

“They have fought nobly in our war,” Dis told him, proudly. “The Blue Hills knew my grandfather well: they came at once when my father called for aid.”

“I don’t have any doubts about that,” Tharkûn said “But still, most of the Dwarves of the Blue Hills went to Khazâd-dum long ago, and neither Tumunzahar of the shining pillars, nor Gabilgathol of long memory is what it was in the morning of the world.”

“Thráin has the aid of all seven Houses,” Dáin pointed out.

“He had that for a while, but perhaps, not much longer. The east is no longer at peace. The Stiffbeards have long fought the Goblins of the far north-east. I hear they have recalled their warriors, for they are needed now at home. The Stonefoots and Blacklocks are far away: they have sent all the help to Thráin that they will offer, and they too have misfortunes of their own.”

“You think we should march out to help Thráin,” Dáin said, coming to the conclusion as he spoke.

“I think they will need your strength, before the end.” Tharkûn said. “There are grim rumours spreading about the House of Durin, Grór. A price has been set on Thráin’s head, or so I hear, no less than the price upon the head of Elrond of Rivendell.”

Grór grunted and turned away. “You’d think even orcs would have the wit not to strive for a reward offered by Azog.”

“Not only Azog,” Tharkûn told him. “There is a Necromancer in Mirkwood, and his power and influence is reaching out across the land. The word is that he would see an end to the House of Durin. And this war has not been easy on Thráin. When last I saw him, he had lost an eye.”

Dis gasped. “Is my father... no, he must be well. You would have said before if he was not.”

“When last I saw him, he was well,” Tharkûn agreed, “and the eye well on the way to being healed over, though it will not see again.”

Grór narrowed his eyes, which now saw no more than a blur of light. “Young Dis here would have me march out to war,” he said. “And so would Dáin, for young hearts are eager, and don’t reckon well with risk. But I am too old to go to war.”

“Náin is not,” Tharkûn said. “Your people are well-equipped and well-seasoned, O Grór. Náin could lead them to victory.”

“Maybe,” Grór said, and he refused to discuss it any more with Tharkûn at that time.

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“Azanulbizar,” the Raven croaked, from the back of Grór’s high chair where he had landed. “Thráin marches up Silverlode towards the Eastgate.”

It was early in the day, but late in the year: the sun rose late, her dim face rarely seen through grey clouds. The cunningly-wrought steel mirrors set high in the hills brought little light and grey into the hall of Grór.

“How many does Thráin have with him?” Grór demanded of the Raven.

“How many of them are left?” Náin said almost at the same time. It was the same question.

“They march through the woods,” the Raven answered. “I cannot say. Fewer than marched on Gundabad. Many fewer.”

The wind wailed with a cold voice in the chimney-vent above the fire, and the flames leaped.

“The year wanes to its end,” Grór said in a low voice. “The winds are dark, the sun is almost asleep. And Thráin’s army is full of children, motherless, stirred up with hot words.”

He stood up, looking around the hall where his family were breaking their fast. “Could he not wait?” he cried. “The sky itself will fight against them: there will be no sunlight to turn back Azog’s legions!”

Náin stood up, and his face behind his great beard was full of anger. “Thráin will lead them all to their deaths,” he said. “Father, I want to take a force to Azanulbizar. If I go, I might be able to turn the tide of battle.”

Grór glared at him. “Or you might add to the tally of the fallen.”

Náin glared back at him. “If I go, I could help them! Glóin is a child, he’s only seen sixteen summers! Who knows how many other children are with them?”

Grór huffed into his beard. “You have a young child of your own to think of,” he said.

“And that’s why I’m not happy in my mind about Glóin!”

“Some would say that Glóin is his father’s responsibility. And his king’s,”

“And if neither of them has the common sense of a three-day piglet?” Helgisdaughter asked him cuttingly.

Grór threw up his hands in despair. “Very well then! Go! But... take Dáin with you.”

Náin puffed up his beard angrily. “Dáin is not of age.”

“He’s near twice young Glóin’s age, and he gets on with his cousins, unlike you,” Grór told his son firmly. “He won’t get into a fight with Thráin. If he’s with you, then you might think twice about it too. Take him!”

*******

The Iron Hills were well supplied with weapons. Food supplies, and all that people might need if ever they had to leave in a hurry, were kept ever packed and stored near all the doors.

So it was not long before Dáin and his father marched out, at the head of a strong, well-armed company.

They crossed the River Running at the old bridge, and passed through Mirkwood on the old trade-route, south of the Elven-lands. The forest was dark and grim, and they rested only twice, marching at top speed.

They had no trouble, for they were many and well-armed, and though the Anduin was full, it being winter, they floated their arms across on rafts easily enough.

They came at last to the Vale of Azanulbizar, late in the day. The sky was iron-grey, and the mountains loomed dark around them. Náin had urged them on to make great speed that day, around the long reaching arm of the foothills of Bundushathûr.

They found bodies beside the trail: orcs at first, with wounds from axe and warhammer. After a while there were dwarves, and many spent arrows with dark feathers lying like autumn leaves around them.

Náin would not delay to help the wounded, nor to attend to the dead.

With him were Alfr and Bildr, Buri and Bruni. Grer was there and Grimr his brother. Vili stood by Dáin, though both were young. Móin and Thóin were not shy of the fray, they were there with their hammers. Bufur left his dinner behind, so great was his speed to the war.

Tóki led his five brothers: all were dressed in fine mail with helms cunningly wrought: it was their first battle and their last. All would weep for them.

And with them also was Dis, for she was of the line of Durin himself, and would not be gainsaid.

Now they could hear the cries of battle ahead of them over the voice of the cold river Celebrant. The great peaks were lost in dark cloud as if the mountains turned their face away.

The land was wet, gloomy and comfortless in the wide valley, Azanulbizar, of which many songs are sung. 

  On that day, the host of Thráin had twice advanced up the long slopes towards the Eastgate of Khazad-dûm.

Each time they had been beaten back with great losses.

And not the first losses, for this was the fifth day of the battle.

When Náin found Thráin, his host had been forced back to the cover of a wood of twisted oaks beside the Mirrormere.

There were many wounded and dead among them. It was no longer clear who was Blacklock and who was Longbeard: Stonefoot stood beside Iron Fist, equally mired with blood and sweat.

Thráin One-eye was wounded in the leg. His son Frerin lay dead beside him. Thorin’s armour was rent and torn, and he had snatched up a fallen branch to use as a shield, for his own had shattered.

Balin and Dwalin, blood in their short beards, still stood to defend their king, but Orcs were carrying off prisoners bound, towards the open mouth of Moria above them.

Náin was overcome with rage and shame. He had seen the trap that Azog had set, and he thought, had come too late. He could not see all the way to the doors, for Grór ‘s blindness was approaching him too, but he could see his enemies.

Overcome with fury, Nain rushed into the battle.

Dáin was behind him, every step, though the numbers of the orcs and goblins were uncountable, and this was his first great battle.

The orcs turned, and with a shout they drove down into the valley. So many of them there were, pouring out from the old East-gate, that they filled half the valley.

But Náin’s anger blazed bright within him and he wielded his great mattock like Mahal himself in the wars of the dawn of the world, when even the Elves slept.

None could stand against them. Up the stony slopes they leaped. The orcs abandoned their prisoners, as Náin and Dáin charged up to the shores of Mirrormere.

Past the twisted trees where their cousins had taken refuge.

“ Azog! Azog! Azog !" Thorin began the cry, as he saw the orcs waver and begin to turn before Náin’s assault, and the whole host took it up, as Náin led them onward and upward.

Up, past the stone of Durin. Alfr died there, proud was his ending.

Up the ancient road above the lake that their ancestors had made.

Buri and Bruni fell there: long will they be remembered.

Náin rushed up the last slope to the Gate. Dáin and Dís, Grer and Grimr were behind him in a point like a spear. None could withstand the axes of Dáin and Dís. Vili was at their heels, guarding their backs.

Náin reached the gate, and he was winded. He stood near the gate, breathing hard, and then he cried out: “Azog! If you are in, come out! Or is the play in the valley too rough?”

There were few who stood with Náin by the Gate, when Azog came forth, and with him were many great orcs clad in iron.

Azog said: “What? Yet another beggar at my doors? Must I brand you, too?”

And with that he threw himself at Náin with all his might. His goblin-guard followed him, and Dáin and Dís were hard put to it.

Vili broke the spear thrown at Dis. Grer and Grimr slew many. Tóki and his five brothers came to their aid: hard fighting was there beside the dark threshold of Moria.

Náin was worn with the effort of his great charge up the mountain, overcome with rage, and his eyes were weak. He dealt Azog great blows with his mattock, but Azog was fresh, and he was faster too, and full of guile. He darted aside.

Náin’s blows did not land on Azog. Azog’s guard kept back Dáin and Dís, Grer and Grimr and Vili. There, Tóki was slain, and his brothers beside him. Bufur was there: he carved through the orcs, but could not save Tóki.

At last, Náin lifted his mattock, and gave one great blow with all his last strength. But Azog leaped aside, and as he jumped, he kicked Náin’s leg, so that he stumbled forward.

Náin’s mattock hit the stone and splintered, and Azog’s blade came down upon his neck.

Now, so strong was the mail of the Iron Hills that it withstood even such a blow. But Náin’s neck was broken and he fell.

Dáin cried out, as he saw his father fall. Azog yelled in triumph.

But even as he yelled, Azog looked around at the battle, and Dáin saw his face change.

He could see the darkling dusk that the orcs were fleeing across Azanulbizar. Thráin’s host had burst from the woods beside Mirrormere to hunt them here and there across the vale.

And on the road to the Gate, his guards lay dead, and Dáin stood over them, his bloody axe in his hand.

Azog shrieked and turned to flee.

But Dáin was after him, following him up the steps, and right upon the threshold he caught Azog.

With one blow, Dain took Azog’s head, and it rolled away back down the steps, and away over the icy rocks towards Mirrormere.

But Dáin stood with his bloody axe upon the threshold of Moria. He looked down into the dark: into the First Hall, where the last afterlight of the dusk through the high windows lingered, and into the dark that lay beyond.

The dark that hid the stair that Thrór had taken, down to the slender bridge. All know of that bridge. Since the days of Náin the Doomed, none of the House of Durin had crossed that bridge by choice.

And far off in the dark beyond sight he knew it: Durin’s Bane, the doom of his ancestors. Shadow wrapped around a dark flame, waiting.

Dáin knew the darkness of the mines, but the breath of Moria was beyond him.

He turned away and went down the steps to his father’s body, where Dis was waiting, wide-eyed and pale, her mattock red with blood.

There Dáin wept. His father had fallen before the great gate of his fathers that none could enter, and he was not alone.

They had won the day. But the dead were beyond the count of grief, and of those that lived, barely half could stand or had hope of healing.

Azog’s head was brought to Thráin, and set upon a stake.

That night was dark, and filled with weeping. The survivors gathered near the Mirrormere, in the shelter of the oakwoods, and they made fires to hold back the night, while all around the dead slept, unburied.

Above them, the gate gaped dark, and behind it was a shadow and a flame.

Dáin and Dis, Grer and Grimr and Bufur shared their fire with Thorin Oakenshield, and with that Jari Longarm of the Iron Fist, who long ago had wrestled with Dáin, and had written a lausavísa in his honour. He was Longarm no longer, for he had lost his left arm to the shoulder to a goblin-blade, and he would wrestle no more.

Together those heroes shared bread and wept for Frerin, brother of Thorin and Dis, and for Náin son of Grór, and for Tóki the beloved, and many others.

When morning came, the winter sun reached long red beams under the lid of grey-blue cloud that sat above the mountains, dying the snowy peaks as with blood.

A red light lay on the doors of Moria and on the silent steps where the dead still lay thick, while in the valley-shadow, dark blood froze on the stones.

And Thráin, heir of Durin, stood before the host, halt in one leg and blind in one eye, with his son Thorin beside him, and he said: “Good! We have the victory! Khazad-dûm is ours!”

But the host was silent, until Dáin stepped forward, and beside him was Dis, who was Thráin’s own daughter, and Jari Longarm.

And Dáin said: “Durin’s Heir you may be, but even with one eye you should see clearer.”

And Dis said: “We fought this war for vengeance, Father, and vengeance we have taken for my grandfather, Durin’s Heir, and rightful Lord of Moria. But this vengeance is not sweet. If this is victory, then our hands are too small to hold it.”

Then Jari said : “We of the Iron Fists, and all the other Houses, we have fought for you and we have paid a great price. But Khazad-dûm was not our father’s House. What is it to us who are not of Durin’s House, unless a hope of treasure?”

“Well then,” Thráin said, pointing to the Gate. “The wealth of my house lies thither. Come with me and take it!”

But Jari held out his remaining hand, indicating the fallen who lay covered in hoar-frost across the valley, and he spoke this verse:

“Sindri is fallen.

The prince steel-handed

We followed to far lands.

He slew many, ere his song ended.

Now his sharp sword, his shield and byrnie

Lie in the valley. Ice lies over him.

Who shall pay the price of his death?”

Thráin could not answer.

Jari said: “If we must go without the rewards and the weregilds that are owed to us, the sooner we return to our own lands, the better pleased we shall be.”

Then Thráin turned at last to Dáin, and he said “But surely my own folk will not desert me?”

For the host that Náin had led to battle from the Iron Hills was now the greatest part of the host of the House of Durin.

“No” Dáin said, and his voice was strong and confident, despite his youth. “You are the Father of our folk, and we have bled for you, and will again. But we will not enter Khazad-dûm. You will not enter Khazad-dûm. Only I have looked through the shadow of the Gate. Beyond the shadow, it waits for you still: Durin’s Bane.”

Thráin looked with regret and longing up at the dark shadow of the gate, but there was fear in his face.

“So be it,” he said. “But if we are not to enter Khazad-dûm, what shall we do with our dead? We cannot bury them all, here in the open valley. There are too many, and we may soon come under attack again.”

“We must burn them,” Dáin said, and his voice was steady, though he was speaking of burning his own father, who should by every custom have slept quiet in the rock.

“Sindri was Prince of the Iron Fist,” Jari said. “I alone remain of all his hirð, for all his other guards died around him. I live, and I will not see him burned, not unless the Longbeards too will give their lords to the fire.”

Then Thráin One-eye quailed, for he loved his children dearly, and he had dearly hoped that the body of his younger son Frerin might lie beside the tombs of his forefathers in Khazad-dûm.

Then Thorin Oakenshield stood beside Dáin, and he said to his father: “We cannot carry away even a tenth part of all the fallen. It would be shameful to burn some and not all. We must burn the bodies, even Frerin my own brother, though he be of Durin’s line. The names of the Burned Dwarves shall be remembered as long as our houses stand. Their names will be held in honour among our people.”

And Dis said : “We’d best take their arms and armour safe away with us. If we don’t, we’ll soon see orcs coming against us in stolen armour, wielding our own steel.”

To this, after some argument, all agreed. So it was done.

All the woods around the Mirrormere were felled for the burning, and the smoke of the dead rose high, even to the peaks of the mountains that still stand tall in our dreams.

Baraz, Zirak, Shathûr.

Chapter End Notes

At the time of the Hobbit, 2941 TA, the Old Forest Road is reported by Beorn to be overgrown and disused at the eastern end and led to impassable marshes near the River Running where the paths had long been lost. Beorn instead recommended they use the Elf-path, a secret path made by the Elves of Mirkwood.

However, the battle of Azanulbizar is 150 years earlier, only 20 years after the fall of Erebor and Dale, so I think it’s reasonable to assume that there could still be a bridge in use on the 'Old Road' which would later fall into ruin. The old forest road was perhaps used by Dale for trade with the Woodmen of as well as still in use by the Iron Hills to take goods to the Anduin for trade down to Gondor.

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Thrór had been avenged by the late-comer of his own house.

The looming defeat had become a narrow, uncelebrated victory.

For six days, they wept, felled trees, stripped the dead and burned them. But Azog’s head they took, and they set it upon a spike where it could look out and behold the ruin of Azog’s plans.

When Dáin’s host was ready to march for the north, every one of them was bent and laden with armour and weapons.

Dáin said to Thráin: “You are the Father of our folk, and this war was wrought at your command. Will you come with me to the Iron Hills, where my grandfather sits and waits for tidings of his son?”

“Nay,” Thráin said proudly, though his leg wound was troubling him, for the work had been long and hard, and he had worked as hard as any. “I owe you thanks for your aid in war, and for your care of my daughter. But I will not trespass on your grandfather’s hospitality. I will return to my lodgings in Dunland.”

“Dunland lies beyond the Misty Mountains. It’s mid-winter,” Dáin said in surprise. “The mountain-passes are closed. Surely you will not linger here beside the gate of Moria, knowing what waits within it?”

“I will linger where I please,” Thráin said peevishly. “But not here: I have heard your warning, Dáin.”

Dáin turned to his cousins, Dis and Thorin. “Will you come with me to the Iron Hills? You would both be made most welcome.”

But Thráin said to Thorin, “Will you beg for your bread at proud doors, or come back with me to the anvil?” For in Dunland, Thráin and Thorin had worked as smiths for Men.

“To the anvil,” Thorin said, for he was ever loyal to his father. “The hammer will at least keep arms strong, until they can wield sharper tools again.”

Dis looked from Dáin to her father and back again, without answering.

“You should go with Dáin,” her father said. “I would know my daughter is safe in the Iron Hills.”

“I’m sure that would be reassuring for you,” Dis said, “ But not for me, Father! You’d have me leave you here before the gate of Khazad-dûm and go to the Iron Hills, not knowing if you or Thorin still live, or if you have marched into the mouth of Durin’s Bane, or died together in the snow? I will do no such thing!”

Now, Dis was a woman of stern will, and so it was agreed that Thráin would travel with Dáin as far as the Great River.

There Dáin left them, heading north.   Thráin and Thorin and the remnant of their people set up camp by Anduin, in the shelter of the River-vale, to winter there. In spring they would take boats and travel south at ease by river, then in time, cross the mountains at the Gap of Rohan, which was then at peace, to Dunland.

With them stayed Vili, who had been Dáin’s old friend from the Iron Hills, for he had gained a great liking for Dis. He went with her to Dunland, and on to the Blue Mountains afterwards. 

This was little to the liking of Thráin, for he would have rather Dis wed some prince of the Eastern Houses. But Dis knew her own mind.

Now, it was told in later days that it was while Thráin was encamped on the banks of Anduin, near to the Gladden Fields, that Sauron learned that the Ring of Durin had not been lost with Moria.

For Sauron had disguised himself in the form of a Necromancer, and made his home in Dol Guldur.

The account of this matter came from Tharkûn, to Gimli, son of Glóin.

Tharkûn believes that Sauron the Deceiver came to Dol Guldur to search for a certain Ring of his own, that long ago had been taken from him by Isildur of Arnor, and lost in the Great River.

It may be, Tharkûn guesses, that while Sauron’s agents were searching the Gladden Fields,  they became aware of the Ring of Thráin, that later was taken from Thráin with torment in Dol Guldur.

We cannot know the truth with certainty. It is true that Thráin was cursed with ill-luck from that time forward. Wolves pursued him, and dark wings shadowed his path.

******

Great was the grief in the Iron Hills when Dáin returned from Azanulbizar. Great was the mourning for Náin son of Grór, for Tóki the beloved and his five brothers, and for many another, dead and burned under mountain-shadow.

They said, in the Iron Hills, that Dáin seemed older than his years when he returned.

Dain, alone of the House of Durin, had looked into the face of Durin’s Bane, and lived.

Dáin had seen his father fall, and avenged him.

There was a distance around Dáin, in the years after the great battle.

Dain was still well thought of, still admired by all. But he was set apart, as one fated.

Vili, the companion of Dáin’s youth, was gone away, and many of his greatest friends were burned.

Grór died only four years later. Dáin became lord of the Iron Hills, and the people of the Iron Hills counted themselves fortunate, for they had a home, and a lord to envy.

But Helgisdaughter wife of Grór lived on, complaining at length about everything. Indeed, she lived long enough to hear the news that Dis had born a son.

Dis had named her new son as soon as he was born, and she had chosen a name that did not echo any great king of old. His name was Fili.

*******

It was forty-five years before Tharkûn passed through the Iron Hills once more.

When the wizard appeared at the iron gate of Hill Hall, it was in the company of several of Dáin’s kinsmen: Balin, Dwalin, Óin and Glóin.

Dáin had last seen all of them at Azanulbizar. Their beards were longer now, but tangled, and their cloaks and hoods were battered and torn. Their boots were shabby, and Dwalin’s left boot had a tear in it that showed a very old and holy sock, and a glimpse of toe. Glóin had a bandage on one leg that was stained with old blood.

Dáin happened to be going out of the main doors when they arrived. He looked at them in astonishment. “Welcome, kinsmen!” he said, “Whatever happened to you?”

“Have you seen anything of Thráin?” Tharkûn asked urgently. “I know you two don’t entirely get along, but...”

“That was my grandfather’s quarrel,” Dáin told him firmly. “My grandfather Grór and Thráin’s father were rivals in their youth, Tharkûn. Thráin didn’t want to live here, in my grandfather’s house. That’s fair enough! But Thráin is the heir of Durin. I’ve fought for him, and I would again, and what’s more, I told him so under the shadow of Moria-gate.”

“My apologies!” Tharkûn said. “It seems I was misinformed: I meant no offence, please be assured of that! But in that case, I am sure you will be just as concerned as I am myself to learn that Thráin has gone missing.”

“Missing?” Dáin ushered his kinsmen and Tharkûn together into his hall, where a bright fire was burning as usual. They set down their tattered packs, and stretched out their hands gratefully to the warmth. Dáin called for ale.

“I thought Thráin was in Dunland,” Dáin told Tharkûn. “Dis mentioned he had left the Blue Mountains in the last letter I had from her, but there’s nothing strange about that: he often travels to Dunland, as I understand it.”

“We left the Blue Mountains five years ago,” Balin said, wearily. “But not for Dunland.”

Dwalin nudged him, but Balin shrugged. “It was supposed to be a secret. But that doesn’t matter now. We were heading for Erebor. It didn’t go well.”

“Five years ago?” Dáin asked, astonished. The way from the Blue Mountains to Erebor is long, but not that long.

“There were wolves,” Balin said.

“And orcs,” Dwalin added grimly.

“And shadows in the night, and paths that led only into bogs,” Glóin said, shaking his head as he accepted a flagon.

“And rain, and fog. So much rain.” Oin added and he sat down on a bench and pulled off his boots. “My socks have rotted through!”

“In the end, we came to the edges of Mirkwood,” Balin took up the story. “It was pouring again, a black rain and a dark night. We could barely see each other, but Thráin said there was no point setting up camp. It was too wet to make a fire, and if we kept going, we’d be under the eaves of Mirkwood. Shelter from the rain and firewood... He was in front of me. Only a few steps in front, though the rain was lashing down. Then he wasn’t.”

“We got under the edge of trees, and made a fire, but he was gone,” Glóin said miserably, and sneezed. “We searched for days...”

Tharkûn took off his tall blue hat and took up the tale. “And after a while, I ran into them, or rather, they ran into me. I was on my way from visiting a kinsman of mine who lives thereabouts. His name is Radagast; you may have heard of him.  We searched together, all along the woodland verges. I see further than most, though I say it myself, but we had no luck. Not a hood nor a hair did we find. So I suggested that if anyone this side of the Misty Mountains had word of Durin’s Heir, it would probably be you, Dáin, and so we came here.”

“But,” Dáin said, “If you are here, Balin and Dwalin, Oin and Glóin... then where is Thorin? Did he not come with you?”

Balin said, slowly and reluctantly: “Thráin... he wouldn’t have it. We left in secret. He told us we mustn’t drop any hints to Thorin about Erebor. Nor Dis. He didn’t want either of them to know.”

“He expected danger, then,” Dáin said. “And rightly so. Did he think he would win back Erebor from the Dragon? Just him and the four of you?”

Balin shrugged, then he held up his hands. “I have no idea, Dáin. I truly have not. He didn’t share his plans with us. But what else could we do? We couldn’t let him go alone. Thrór only took Nár. At least there were four of us.”

“He must have known that tackling Smaug would be a matter of considerable difficulty,” Tharkûn pointed out. “Surely he had made some kind of plan, even if he kept it to himself.”

“If Smaug is still there,” Glóin said quietly. “He’s not been heard of in years.”

Oin nodded. “We thought... me and Glóin, anyway... we thought perhaps he’d gone.  Or died.”

Tharkûn bristled his long eyebrows reprovingly. “He has the Mountain and all the treasure of Thrór,” he said. “It’s most unlikely that he’s upped and left. Dragons live long and wicked lives, and Smaug is not an old worm, not at all. But I’m surprised and concerned to learn that you had such troubles even before they reached Mirkwood. I travel this way now and again, across the Mountains and east as far as Rhosgobel, so I’d say I know the land as well as any.

“Most of the goblins of the North died in the retaking of Gundabad, or in the battles of the Misty Mountains, or at Azanulbizar. The roads from the Sea to the Mountain have been safer than they used to be for the last forty years or so, at least as far as Mirkwood. Or so I thought.”

“I’ll have words with the Ravens at once,” Dáin said. “We should organise search parties.”

“You don’t think...” Glóin said, almost in a whisper.

Dáin frowned at him. “ I don’t think what?”

“Durin’s Bane,” Glóin said in a quiet voice. “You said it was waiting for him. What if...”

“What if it came out?”

Dáin felt a cold finger of ice creep up his spine. He remembered the distant shadow with a heart of flame, and the chill that had run through him then. It was a memory he held with him always, though he did not like to look at it.

“It has been nearly a thousand years since the days of Durin the last,” Tharkûn said. “Drink up your ale, Glóin, and don’t go looking for doom and gloom. We’ll get that leg of yours patched up, and some new socks for Oin, and perhaps new boots all round would be in order too, don’t you think, Dáin? And then we’ll get out and find Thráin, wherever he’s got to.”

Now, at those words Dáin lifted up his heart, for although the shadow of Durin’s Bane haunted him still, he was no craven.

“We will send out search-parties,” Dáin said. “I will lead them myself. And we will ask the Ravens for help, for their eyes see what our own people miss.”

But the Ravens brought no word of Thráin, son of Thrór.

Nor did Dáin find him, nor Balin and Dwalin, nor Oin and Glóin, though they searched.

Radagast with all his wood-craft and his friendship with the creatures of the great wood could find no trace of him.

It was three years later that Tharkûn found Thráin at last, in the dungeons of the Necromancer in Dol Guldur, that later was known to be Sauron the Cruel.

By then, it was too late to save Thráin son of Thrór, son of First-Dáin, son of Náin the Careful, son of Óin the Delver, son of Glóin the Prosperous, son of Thorin the Wanderer, son of Thráin the Exile, son of Náin the Doomed, who was Durin’s son of Khazad-dûm.

For Thráin had been tormented long, and his Ring, the Ring of the Deep-elves, inheritance of Durin, had been taken from him, along with his health, and his wits.

He could not remember his own name, nor Thorin’s. But he still held the Key and the Map, and he gave them to Tharkûn before he died.

Now, it had not been the custom of Durin’s Folk to have much to do with Wizards. Tharkûn was known in the Grey Mountains, and in the Iron Hills. But when he was seen, it was often bringing news of doom and darkness. He was not entirely counted as a friend.

But this we remember: Tharkûn sought for Thráin son of Thrór, Heir of Durin. 

When Thráin died in torment, Tharkûn was beside him to ease his pain.

Tharkûn carried his last words to Thorin.

This friendship we do not forget. 

The Quest of Erebor, and the Five Armies

When Thorin Oakenshield began to think of retaking his grandfather’s throne, he sent out messengers, as his father had done years before, and he himself travelled far, seeking alliances in his desire for vengeance against the Dragon.

But this time, he had set his eyes on a foe too great.

The Stiffbeards, Ironfists, Blacklocks, and even the Stonefoots remembered Thráin’s war, when they had bled, and got little recompense.

Even Thráin’s great triumph, the re-taking of Mount Gundabad, had achieved nothing.  The small force that Thráin had left there had been called away, later, when Thráin needed every axe.  Now it was once more an orc-hold.

None of the other Houses offered Thorin help.  Even in the Blue Mountains, where Thorin lived, and led the remnants of three Houses, few were eager to march out to face Smaug.

Thorin turned to Tharkûn, asking for advice.  This he did, even though he did not know at first that Tharkûn had the Key and the Map, and had heard the last words of his father.

Tharkûn himself did not know that Thráin was the name of the dwarf he had seen in the pits of Dol Guldur, for Thráin himself had forgotten it. Yet fate drew Thorin to Tharkûn, though both were strong of will and quick-tempered, so theirs was not an easy alliance.

Thorin spoke of war and heroes and revenge, but every plan he thought to put to Tharkûn failed against the might of the Worm. Smaug in his youth had brought even Erebor to ruin, and Thorin had no strength to come near that of Thrór the King, even if he had called on Dáin and begged for his help.

Dis was very much against doing that.  For, she said, “Thorin, you cannot risk drawing down the wrath of the Dragon on the Iron Hills.  They are only a short flight on dragon wings from the Mountain.  There’s little else left. The Iron Hills is a shield to all who live nearby.”

To this much Thorin agreed, though also it suited Thorin’s pride, not to call upon his cousin Dáin except with victory in sight.

But he would not agree to stay in the Ered Luin, far from Erebor and the dragon sleeping, though Dis his sister begged him. For Dis had seen enough of war and flame. In the Blue Mountains, she said, there was peace, and they should be content.

But Thorin, like his father and his grandfather, could not be content. 

In this, Tharkûn said, much later, there was wisdom, for Smaug was a threat to all, one that Sauron the Necromancer could have used with terrible effect as he rose to power once again in Mordor.

Wizards are strange folk, and given to the taking of strange risks, and gambling all on slim chances.

But that was when the thought came to Tharkûn that the dwarf he had met, though changed by long suffering, was Thráin son of Thrór, and he took out the Key and the Map, and he counselled Thorin that stealth and cunning might find a way.

Then he introduced Thorin to the most esteemed Bilbo Baggins of Bag End: an alliance that proved, in the end, unexpectedly lucky, though at first Thorin thought little of it. 

So it was that Dáin was not called to fight, while still Smaug slept on the treasure of Erebor.

Instead, Thorin set out with the children of Dis; Fili and Kili beside him. Dis begged them to stay, but they would not.  For they were of Durin’s line. Thorin was their lord and their uncle, and his tales of the treasures of Erebor quickened the blood and sent them out singing.

With Thorin’s small company went the esteemed Bilbo Baggins, and Tharkûn the Wizard. If their journey was not entirely straightforward, it certainly went faster than Thráin’s journey to Erebor, owing to the considerable luck of the esteemed Mr Baggins, and the expertise of Tharkûn.

Indeed, Tharkûn, as it was later known, left Thorin’s Company to lead an attack against Sauron the Necromancer himself, driving him out from the pits of Dol Guldur into the East.  By such methods, did Thorin reach the Mountain, escaping his father’s fate.

*******

In the hall in the Iron Hills, Dáin, son of Náin, son of Grór, sat in his great chair. Before him, dwarves of the Iron Hills and Erebor, united by time, sat at table, eating good bread and beef with berries.

A bird slipped through the high rock-window above the table, and came circling down out of the dark into the light of lamps and the warmth of the fireplace.

The raven landed on the back of Dáin’s chair, as once a raven had come to announce that the army of Thráin was coming to Azanulbizar.

The Lord of the Iron Hills turned, frowning, to look at it.

“Your cousin Thorin sends word,” it croaked. “The Dragon is dead, and he has taken the Mountain. Will you help him defend it? Will you come?”

Dáin leaped to his feet. “Thorin has slain the Dragon?” And within him a wild hope kindled. For he had ever admired his cousin Thorin, and saw in him a hope for a brighter future, if only he could have better luck, and perhaps a little more gold to work with.

“No,” the raven croaked, “The Dragon fell to the archer of Laketown. Smaug is dead. Thorin holds the Mountain, with only twelve kinsmen beside him.”

And it listed the names of all of Thorin’s company, including Fili and Kili, the children of Dís, who had long been Dáin’s friend. Balin and Dwalin, Oin and Glóin, kinsmen and friends, beside whom Dáin had sought vainly to find Thráin.

“Thorin is beset,” the Raven croaked. “He bid me tell you that the Men of Laketown and the Elvenking are advancing upon him. They would take the treasure of the Mountain for themselves.”

Dáin stood up, and he put both hands down heavily on the table, making the platters jump, so that everyone in Hill Hall turned to look at him.

“Thorin needs us,” he said, and though battle lay ahead, he smiled. For he had promised Thráin long ago under the shadow of Moria Gate that the people of the Iron Hills would bleed to aid the Heir of Durin.

Now the time had come. “Our kinsmen call us!” Dáin cried out. “Thorin Oakenshield has freed the Mountain! To arms!”

********

Now, when Dáin came to Erebor, he found the Mountain besieged by a strong force of Elves and Men. He had marched through the night, so urgently did he desire to come to Thorin’s aid, though his force was carrying supplies for a siege. .

Dáin was not seeking trouble with the Elves, for he knew of their strength, though he had never fought with them himself. But nor was he inclined to be pushed about. 

He sent out envoys, trusted people of his own house, to demand that the Elves clear the path to the Mountain, for they were encamped all around.

The Elves refused.

This put Dáin in a hard place. His force was overlooked by elven bowmen, and he had seen at Azanulbizar the risk of fighting an enemy that held the higher ground.

But he had found a tactic then that had won him the battle, and to Dáin, it seemed likely that the lightly-armoured Elves and unarmoured Men of the Lake might fall to the same strategy. For they knew nothing of the speed and weight of a strike force of the Dwarves, and relied over-much on arrows and spears, just as Azog’s orcs had done in Azanulbizar. A fast and heavy blow might end the war before it could begin, Dáin thought.

So, reluctantly, Dain prepared a sudden charge to take the leader of the enemy, relying on the unrivalled chain armour of the Iron Hills for the weight to form a spear-head that could not be turned aside.

Things might then have gone ill for the Elven-king, when all at once the skies darkened, and all at once, Tharkûn stood before them, crying a warning that Bolg son of Azog had come with his armies, and above them there were stormclouds and many bats and wolves were with them out of Gundabad and the North.

Instead of a swift thrust through the Elves to the Mountain-Gate, Dáin found himself in war council with Bard, who was later King of Dale, and the King of the Elves, and Tharkûn himself. Well it was that Tharkûn was there, for Dáin was sorely in need of a friend in that debate.

But alliance they made against the forces of Bolg.  A forced alliance, but one that held true through many long years thereafter. 

Many songs are sung of the Battle of Five Armies, where Fili and Kili, children of Dis and heirs of the House of Durin, fell defending their uncle and their lord under the shadow of eagle’s wings.

Thorin Oakenshield, escaping at last the dark doom that had stalked his father and grandfather, fell also in honorable battle. He had won back at long last the honour and the treasures of the  House of Durin, and died cleanly and at peace.

His name echoes down the years: King under the Mountain restored, if only for a brief time.

Thorin lies now in stone, as befits a king, with the heirloom of his house upon his breast.

Dáin wept for him, and for Fili, and Kili, for they were his kin, and he was sore to lose them.

Then, as all urged him to do, Dáin took up the crown, taking upon himself the duties of the Heir of Durin. Long and gloriously he reigned as King Under the Mountain.

His lands spread from Dale to the Iron Hills, and he was a friend and ally of many Houses, of Men and even of Elves, until at last he fell in the War of the Ring.

When she heard from Dáin that her brother and her sons had fallen, Dis spoke this verse:

I wish my children still alive,

Yet this was better than my fear,

They died free under open skies.

Free of chains, not doom-ensnared,

No shadowed grief, no dragon-gold,

They won renown, died honourably,

Last of the treasures of Durin’s House.

The House of Durin wanes

But we will not forget.

Dáin had these words set in stone beside the graves of Fili and Kili.

But Dis, Vili and their daughter remained in the Blue Mountains, and the windows of their high halls looked out over the Sea.

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