His youngest child to Bóurr son of Bíld of Erebor greeting.
This letter I pen many weeks later than I ought to have, to my shame; I apologize profusely, but I will be consoled that my winter letters are like to pile up on the western side of the Misty Mountains regardless.
I write between seams on a weather-proofed capelet that I sew for a Woman here in Bree-town. In truth there has been very little of which to write you and Mother, save the safe arrival of Rofda and me here in town and my acquisition of this little job — at very cheap rates, but the Woman is blind and recently bereaved, so I could not bring myself to ask the proper fee of her, and few Men in Bree know what it means to hire the needle of Hróda Hárul's child, besides.
Otherwise most everything continues as it has: Master Kveldun's nephews are still missing, and Maurr is with Arlis in the Shire lending his aid to that search; I still wait to see if a friend will allow me to lend her assistance; passing Elves still utter things vaguely offensive.
The repair of the little windmill on my honor-sister's property is now underway; in Bree-land the winters are so mild that the mason expects to work straight through. Scaffolding is up and he and his associate have begun the early stages of tearing out rotted materials and removing broken machinery. I still must make arrangements for workshop space; I had planned originally to rent in the Stone Quarter, but I think now I ought to find an alternative so that he need not go there again. In a way it is convenient that he has been able to begin work while Arlis is away from Bree-land, as apparently it was long ago a snuff-mill, and the smell of pipeweed — which is noisome to her — stinks on him every day. But he believes the deodorization will be done by the time she returns, which I hope shall be a suitable Yule present to my sister in affection.
As winter deepens I think ahead to the spring and the journey for then promised, on which that honor-sister has pledged to escort me (so although I think it shall not be an issue, pray remember that aversion to pipe-smoke of hers). Rofda and Maurr of course will come, and in caravan will most like travel Lady Cyanite and one Erlingur of the Grey Mountains we met at Thorin's Hall. When the frost just begins to gentle — before the equinox, most like — we will go east first to Rivendell and wait for the High Pass to open. After that crossing we will pay the toll of the Beornings, ford the Anduin at the Carrock, and then hopefully skirt around Mirkwood's northern edge. I am loath to pass through the Forest Gate; I would not even think of it without an Elvish guide, something I would have considered an impossibility a year ago — but given our stay in Rivendell, I suppose it might prove not to be, and it is true that might be faster, and we ought to return to your side with haste.
I intend also to bring with me my dearest friend, Finnric, who is closer to me than any other soul I have met in the west, even my honor-sister. He is also a Hobbit, and I wish not only to show off to him the splendor of Erebor and introduce him to my beloved family, but to keep him close to me for the rest of his life or at least as long as I am able, and likewise to bring him into the mountain and into Dwarvish society as much as I am able, as much as is possible.
That wish I would have stated boldly, shamelessly, a season ago. I did not then fail to understand its unconventionality, nor the sacredness of our Dwarvish secrets, nor the practical barriers to intimacy between peoples of such different habits and lifespans. But none of that would have prevented me from earnestly wishing my wish, nor from confidently believing that with commitment and effort and conscientiousness and advocacy it would be possible to achieve. I believed in his willingness to compromise and learn and in my own ability to teach and protect, and I dreamed happily of a friendship that would flourish and endure between a child of the mountain and a child of the hill, such a pretty picture of amity and kinship by hard work unearthed.
I am not so sanguine now, nor so naive. I have come to understand, I think, that it is not so easy, and that good intentions and wholehearted love do not suffice to bridge all chasms. I understand better that it is not easy to be a Dwarf-friend, in the senses both that it is difficult to carry that responsibility, with its great weight and intricacy, ethically and correctly — and indeed, even I who was born a Dwarf and have lived as one all my life struggle yet to know exactly how to behave — and that it is also a painful, awful, lonely fate. It is the fate of the eternal outsider; not only is it like that he shall never be accepted by the whole of the mountain, no matter how he struggles and struggles every day of his life — even if he discharges his duties perfectly, even then he shall never be one with the mountain, never truly a Dwarf. And so much it requires to sacrifice — the society of his own people, the pleasant ease of a conventional life — for such shabby reward: to live forever on the periphery, a satellite to someone else's happiness, compensated with nothing more than friendship.
Even so, I still wish it. But more soberly do I wish it, and I think I gaze on that future with wiser eyes. If I truly love dear Finnric as much as I say, I cannot wish that heavy fate on him without sorrow at my own selfishness. And yet — despite what I have learned, I do not yet think it impossible, and I still dream.
When my Hobbit comes before you, Father, I hope you will be to him both fair and kind. I desire you to receive him with all the love due to one who may be a companion in my heart forever, even after his soul passes out of Arda. I also desire you to treat with him honestly, that on his visit to Erebor he may come to understand what it shall truly be to be the friend of a Dwarf, and all the joy and sorrow therein.
To your wise guidance, Father, I trust myself and him.
I know of one more who may join our caravan to the east. Maddoct is his name; his father is Haddoct of the Iron Hills, his mother Marlynn of the Red Mountains, and I believe he is fewer steps removed from the kingship of the Blacklocks than we are from that of the Longbeards. Yet while loftily bred, he is warm and humble, generous, even-tempered, and kind. Healing is his craft, as is the setting of jewels and the making of medical devices, and he is truly one of the best, most wonderful Dwarves I have ever met. We are all three fond of him, I especially as he has been to me a sort of mentor during my stay in the west — but Maurr most of all, who has in the short time of their acquaintance forged with him a deep and tender friendship.
It is my anxious hope that he does decide to accompany us, so that not only may he meet Bóurr, the finest of all fathers, but that you may meet this Dwarf who has become such an important companion to Maurr — during this painful time as his healer and the maker of his prosthesis, but also, I think, quite possibly the rest of his life. But he is uncertain of it, and I fear one reason may be that he expects judgment from our family, as he has received much of it from other Dwarves, simply for being different.
While I am blessed with the most wonderful of fathers, not every Dwarf is so.
Therefore I entreat you, o Father who has loved me unfailingly and whom I so love in turn, to do what you may to make our friend Maddoct feel at ease. You and Mother raised four Dwarves who were all different — even more different than you expected, it turns out, which I still regret a little even though you commanded me not to — and yet never treated us as though our differences were anything to be shamefully corrected, instead attributes to be embraced as part of what made us each exceptional. And even so I still struggle to believe that in my heart; and so I weep all the more for our dear friend, who does not even think he should believe it. I would be so happy, tearfully happy, if you were able to make him feel accepted and welcome in our hall.
And I dearly hope that he, by introducing himself, may set your heart at ease and assure you that Maurr will be warmly loved after you are gone ahead of us.
I have run both out of words to write and stitches to stitch on this capelet, so I shall go now to deliver it to its new mistress. I really do promise to write more frequently this winter, so that when the snows melt Mad will have much to dictate.
With the warmest love to both you and her,
Your child,
Bíld.
