Return to Me (Kili)

Chapter Two: A Merry Gathering

The entire group of dwarves, all twelve of them, began to ransack the pantry and the cupboards, taking out all the food they could find. The table was now pushed against another in the dining room in order for there to be enough room to fit everyone. Bilbo ran back and forth, trying to clean up and put the food back, but he was only ignored, which made him all the more frantic. 

"Those are my plates! Excuse me! Not my wine. Put that back. Put that back! Not the jam, please! Excuse me!" he rushed past Priscilla. By this point she had realized, and accepted, that they were going to eat all of their food. There was no doubt about it, especially with the fat one they called Bombur there. Bombur pushed past her with his arms full of cheese wheels, and Bilbo followed closely behind. "A tad excessive, isn't it? Have you got a cheese knife?" 

"Cheese knife? He eats it by the block," another dwarf with a flappy hat and a bright smile, Bofur, answered. Bilbo's face paled. 

"Oh, come on, Bilbo!" Priscilla smiled at him. "Have a bit of fun for once! You're so uptight it's making me wonder if I need to take you to a doctor." 

"If it keeps on like this, maybe you will have to." Bilbo said. "Wait, no, no, that's Grandpa Mungo's chair! No, I'm sorry, you'll have to take it back please. Take it back...It's antique, not for sitting on! Thank you! That's a book, not a coaster. Put that map down, thank you." He rushed off again, chastising a different dwarf every other step. 

"He's got a knot in his panties, that's for sure." Someone behind her said. She turned to find Kili with a mug of what looked like Bilbo's fancy ale in his hand, leaning against the wall.

"Oh, you don't know the worst of it. This will keep him riled up for ages." Priscilla laughed, stepping back a tad to stand next to him. "I'll never hear the end of it for letting the first one in." 

"Ah, no, it's been in the family for years. That's my mother's glory box, can you please not do that?!" Bilbo ran past again, stopping in front of Priscilla desperately. "Help!?" 

Priscilla only shrugged and stuck her tongue out at him. He groaned in frustration and hurried off again. "Oh, no, not the spoons, it's bad enough keeping them from Lobelia. Set those down, please." 

"He's awfully polite for one so frantic," Kili noted.

"I think it's the lack of etiquette that's put him off more than anything." Priscilla told him. "He can be awfully regal sometimes."

"I can tell." Kili said, eyes widening as he watched Bilbo give up completely on putting the food back and instead start to force the feasting dwarves to use napkins, pushing elbows off the table as he went.

"My goodness, I'd better stop him before he-" Priscilla moved to go to her brother, but as she did, Bombur stood up from his chair and accidentally knocked Bilbo over with his large belly. Bilbo landed with a thud.  She rushed over to help him up before he was trampled. The meal seemed to be finishing now, and more of the dwarves were getting up. 

"Excuse me, that is a doily, not a dishcloth!" Bilbo pushed Priscilla off of him and grabbed a doily from a dwarf with large points in his hair, Nori.

 "But it's full of holes!" Bofur, passing by, noted.

 "It's supposed to look like that, it's crochet." Bilbo said as if it were obvious. 

"Did he do it himself?" Kili said under his breath to Priscilla, amused at Bilbo's persistence.

"I never know these days." Priscilla said back, equally amused. She was going to get a good speaking-to from Bilbo later, but he was her brother, not her father, and she could do whatever she well pleased, and right now, that was enjoying the company of their guests.