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Fíli had imagined the first time he'd make love to the woman of his dreams plenty enough over the years. There would be soft music, champagne, rose petals, lit candles, silk sheets, a wonderful view over the city skyline by night from the large windows of a luxurious hotel suite, slow sexy stripping, long slow lovemaking… the works.What he hadn’t imagined was the bloody bouncy castle of an air mattress, his brother being right there helping himself to her lovely breasts… and her laughing herself to tears while they were all at it. Neither had he imagined the cool draft from the leaky window hitting him right in the ass, the buzzing mosquito light on the dusty floor, nor the sound of bats screeching outside in the darkness.He wouldn’t have changed any of it for the world. Though he had to say, what a journey it had been to get to where they were. And all because Kíli couldn’t read. - “I found an ad in the paper! They're looking for handymen to help with a renovation!” Kíli hollered excitedly the moment he stepped through the door, waving a newspaper around even as he followed the grunt to where his brother sat at the kitchen table, going over their finances.“What kind of handymen?” Fíli gurgled around the pen between his teeth, offering his sibling a dry glance as he removed it. “Because last time you found an ad, they were looking quite specifically for electricians and plumbers, which neither of us are.”“Doesn’t say, but it does say ‘chateau’ so I'm going to assume they need everything.” Kíli grinned, not bothering with the eyeroll. “Hey, it’s worth a shot! If we get work, we’d actually earn some money rather than either of us wasting more of our savings to get by.”Fíli eyed the newspaper in his brother’s hand, then glanced at the spreadsheet on the laptop. While they had plenty savings enough, he didn’t want them to live up that money any more than Kíli did. And to stop wasting, they really needed an income, of which there had been little lately.“Where is the chateau?” he finally asked, closing the laptop with a sigh.“Uhm… gimme a minute…” Kíli muttered, burying his nose in the paper to check. “In… Loire Valley.”“That’s a four hour drive away from here.” Fíli deadpanned.“I don’t see you drowning in work either.” Kíli muttered sourly. “What harm can it be? We’ll call and ask! We can’t get more than a no?”“You call them then!”“Yes!” Kíli was way too excited as he fished out his phone and dialled the number. - “She said she’d meet us somewhere around here.” Kíli murmured, squinting at the map in his hands. The GPS had been useless as the place she’d mentioned didn’t even exist according the darn thing and thus, the brothers were reduced to using a good old paper map. Not that that seemed to help much.“Her description was fairly good, didn’t you say?” Fíli eyed another sideroad, completely lost in the landscape. It was beautiful no doubt, but they'd been driving for over an hour already just trying to find the spot, and that was without counting the 4 hours they'd been driving just to get to the Loire Valley. They really were late and being late didn’t make for a good first impression of professionals.“Aye, it was, but I don’t think she took all these fields into account.”“I think that’s her.”Kíli's head snapped up to peer towards where Fíli was steering. Further up ahead a bright red Citroen 2CV was parked, and as they approached, a small woman rose from her seat in the grass, putting a book away as she did so. She waved at them, smiling as they finally parked and got out.“Bonjour!” she called. “I figured you’d get lost but I didn’t think it would be that bad!”“This place is like a maze!” Kíli grinned, leaning forward to press his cheeks to hers in greeting. “So many roads and none of them lead anywhere.”“Welcome to the countryside.” she grinned, greeting Fíli as well. “After a while, you kind of learn the landscape by pure osmosis. This way please. I’m Bilbo Baggins by the way.”“Fíli,”“And Kíli,”“Durin, at your service.” The brothers bowed in the way they had done ever since they were old enough to know what they were doing, earning a delightful laugh in return. “I can’t imagine how long it must've taken for you to nail that stunt as perfectly as you do.” Bilbo chuckled, leading them to a spot in the shade where she had spread out a large blanket. From a cooler she brought out cheese, fruit and crackers, and a nice bottle of wine, which she corked up with efficient skill.They blinked down at her from where they stood, confused at the proceedings. Bilbo shot them another smile.“Do sit down, there’s plenty of room for all of us.”“Uhm…”“We came in response to the ad you put in the paper?” Fíli asked unsurely.Green eyes blinked a them.“Yes?” she answered, clearly not following.“The ad for a handyman?” Kíli tried clarifying.“…yes?”“So uh… what do you need done?” Fíli frowned. “Aside from electrics and plumbing, we can do just about anything?”Again, green eyes blinked at them. Bilbo suddenly took a generous mouthful of wine, blushing slightly.“Oh wow… you uh… you didn’t read the ad properly, did you?”Fíli and Kíli both frowned, having no idea how similar they looked when they did so.“The ad?”“Yes, the personal ad.” Bilbo cleared her throat. “I did wonder why there were two of you.”“The personal-…” Fíli squeaked, turning to his sibling who had already raced back to the car to fish out yesterday’s newspaper from the back. Blue eyes watched the strong back tense as he found the right page and read the ad more closely… and how he crumpled with a whimper, burying his face in his arms.Clearly, Kíli hadn’t read the full ad, only seen ‘handyman wanted’ and gone from there.“Excuse me.” Fíli muttered, ignoring the lowly muttered ‘aaakwaaaard’ behind him as he went up to grab the paper. “Handyman wanted to build a future. Has to have a sense of humour, be willing to take on a real renovation project, and enjoy cooking together. Life is an unexpected adventure. Only serious callers please.”Fíli screwed his eyes shut, too scared to turn back to where Bilbo was sitting, putting a piece of Brie on a cracker. They'd come thinking she was offering work, while she had expected a first date. And all because Kíli hadn’t finished reading the bloody ad! Well, being the older sibling, Fíli decided to take the bull by the horns. He marched back to the small woman on the ground and apologised profusely.“I am so sorry, Miss Baggins-,”“Bilbo.”“We genuinely thought you had work for us, so we never intended to waste your time.”“No such thing!” Bilbo waved it off, sipping wine from a plastic wine glass. “Personally, I find this hilarious though I'm sure you're bummed.”“I'm so sorry, Miss Boggins,” Kíli muttered as he came up to them. His face was still burning with shame.“It’s Baggins, and call me Bilbo.”“I clearly didn’t read it properly so this is all my fault.”“No harm done. You want some cheese?”They blinked at her, once more not sure they were following.“Pardon?”“Unless you're busy and have to rush elsewhere? It’s a nice day out and I brought plenty, might as well enjoy ourselves?”Kíli belly chose that moment to rumble, earning them another wide smile. - Bilbo Baggins turned out to be delightful company. She never had far to a smile and once they'd calmed down a bit, and dug into the cheese plate she’d brought, they laughed heartily at their mistake. All three of them.“Talk about unexpected adventure.” Kíli muttered into his glass, still feeling rather stupid about the whole thing. They'd driven for four hours just to end up munching cheese and drink wine.“Excellent point! But can you really say you haven’t had a nice time so far?” Bilbo winked at him over the edge of her glass, looking positively cheeky. And she wasn’t wrong. They'd had a lovely time, sitting in the shade having a light lunch while there were bees buzzing around, birds chirping and wind rustling through the leaves. The fact that Bilbo was very easy on the eye didn’t hurt. Her honey coloured curls were caught in a messy bun on top of hear head, her green eyes sparkled with the same joy her full lips displayed, the summer jumpsuit with large purple orchids she wore, did nothing to hide the sensually curvy body underneath and her sun kissed skin bragged with freckles. Why a woman like her needed to put a personal ad in a paper was beyond either Durin at that point. “Can we see it?” Fíli asked suddenly, interrupting the conversation between Bilbo and Kíli about good wine.“See what?”“Well, you said you wanted someone who was willing to take on a real renovation project, right? Can we at least see what this project of yours is, that you want to date a handyman for?”Bilbo laughed out loud.“Sure, but don’t tell me I didn’t warn you!” She got up, quickly put the remnants of their meal in the basket, and started walking. “See, the thing is, I have always loved this place, ever since I was a little girl. I told anybody with ears that one day, I’d buy it and turn it into my dream home.” Bilbo smiled as they made their way down a lush forest road. “However, as much as I worked and saved up, and worked some more, I couldn’t afford it. So when I turned 30, my parents bought it for me.” They came around a bend and there it was. The chateau was massive, and in need of a lot of work. There were cracked stone walls, huge chimneys, vaulted doors and windows, a curved double stair case and turrets.The two brothers stared at it in horror.“Your parents bought you a medieval ruin!” Kíli pressed out, staring wide eyed at what he could only describe as ‘toil’.“Mhm!” Bilbo chirped happily, stepping in through the beautifully carved stone doorway. The door was long gone but the craftsmanship was still visible in all the masonry around them. At least on what was still standing that is. Part of the roof had caved in, taking one small corner of the building with it and when they peeked up through the hole, they were met with sky four floors above them. There was a truly spectacular curved staircase inside the hallway, snaking around a pillar that blossomed into a tree at the top where the ceiling flared into stunning arches, once decorated with paint. The floors on the bottom floor were solid stone tiles, many beautifully chiselled with Fleur-de-lis, even if some of them were cracked. And there, somehow completely unharmed and untouched by the hands of time, a huge stained-glass window, delicate, magnificent and intricate, of a beautiful maiden, carrying a lute and descending the very staircase in the room. Once, this chateau had been breath-taking, but since then it had been abandoned and stood unloved for much too long. “I'm going to assume this is a listed building?” Fíli asked hoarsely.“Ruin.” Kíli corrected again from where he had ventured further in, scrutinising the remaining wooden beams and a narrow stone staircase leading up to… nowhere. The stone walls were so thick that even without most of the roof, they still managed to keep the space cool on a warm summer day. Granted, part of that was probably because of the invading greenery growing over the walls. And quite possibly the larch leaning in through the one collapsed wall.“Of course! And I know it looks bad, but it’s actually only this corner that needs rebuilding.” Bilbo's eyes sparkled with excitement. “I've been upstairs and most of the building is actually intact! There's even wallpaper in some of the rooms, and furniture too!”“You’ve been upstairs!?” Fíli pressed out, images flashing by his inner eye of her falling through rotten floorboards down to the stone basement.“Naturally! I came here as soon as my parents told me it was mine!” Bilbo spun around happily. “I have so many ideas! Sure, there's going to be hard work what with restoring that one wall, and the oak floors, and of course plumbing and electrics, heating, making this place water tight again, the chimneys and flues and windows. The garden. And that’s not even counting turning this place into a home, but its going to be glorious, every sweaty minute of it! And that’s why I want to find myself a handyman, someone who can work on this with me, who sees the same potential I do, and is willing to put in the time and effort, and love.”“You're gonna need a lot more than just love to restore this place, Bilbo.”“This place, and the stables, forge, and other outhouses. Not to mention the moat and bridges… and park.”Blue eyes damn near boggled.“How big is this property?”Bilbo shrugged.“About 600 hectares, give or take a few.” When they stared at her, she frowned. “What? It IS a chateau in the Valley of the Kings!”“So you want to renovate a listed castle, and all the buildings that belong to it?”“I doubt I'm going to own horses so I had planned on turning the stables either into a studio, or perhaps into housing and rent them out. As for the forge, if it gets used, awesome. If not, then I’ll find a use for it.” Bilbo shrugged again as she picked her way across the floor and out through a door in what had once been a large castle kitchen. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not blinded by dreams. I know this will take a large amount of money and time, I’m not whoring myself out just for the sake of labour. I can do a lot by myself, I can tile, paint, knock down walls, put up plasterboard and mend mullioned windows. And while I can do this project on my own, I don’t want to. I want someone here for all the madness of it, I want someone who mixes their ideas with mine and make them better, who makes this their home along with me.” She flashed them a smile over a freckled shoulder. “I want to wake up next to someone who grumbles about mending the moat, but who kisses me good morning before we both get to it, someone who laughs at the sheer lunacy that taking this project on is, but who wants to do it, every day. Together.”“If you expected a date, why didn’t you say anything when we both showed up then?” Kíli raised a dark eyebrow, following her through a wonderfully cool corridor, essentially untouched by time.“Oh, I didn’t think too much on it.” Bilbo sniggered. “With the right cock attached to the right partner, and plenty of lube, I do enjoy anal.”For once Fíli wasn’t the graceful one, for he missed the brick Kíli stepped over, and damn near beaned himself on the stone floor. While the Durin brothers blinked, completely speechless, and oddly embarrassed, the sound of Bilbo's laughter echoed at them from down the hall. - “You're thinking about it, aren’t ya?” Kíli murmured later that night after dinner. They'd returned home after their little tour of Chateau de Rêves, and wasn’t it ironic that it was called the ‘castle of dreams’? Bilbo's property was massive. There was the castle itself, and the surrounding park, the moat, which was more a swamp these days, the stables, the forge, and a few other outhouses. It all needed work. But it hadn’t fazed Bilbo. She’d talked about stripping lead paint, about replacing broken roof tiles, about ordering new windows, about re-enamelling an old bathtub she’d found on the third floor, about radiators and wallpaper and sweeping chimneys, of polishing floors and re-establishing the flowerbeds. She wanted chickens and pigs and geese and she talked about it all with such passion, that there was no doubt she’d manage it mammoth task of restoring her dream house into a proper home if only given enough time! And as she’d shown them around the grounds, Fíli had seen it too. He had seen her visions before his mind’s eye even as they walked around, he could see the restored gargoyles, the cypress trees, the polished shining wooden floors, beautiful windows and restored fireplaces. He could smell the foods from the large kitchen and the AGA cooker, the homemade scented candles, smoked sausages and bread hanging to dry in the pantry… he could see her in the middle of it all, tending her greenhouse and garden patch, smiling while picking ripe tomatoes. Bilbo would restore that old dilapidated manor house and once done she would have turned it into her own piece of paradise on earth. And Fíli didn’t have to struggle to see himself right there with her. He could help her make her dream come true, and she could help him-… she could help him settle down and become whole. Bilbo Baggins could help calm his anxious soul. Blue eyes glanced towards where Kíli was sprawled out in the only stuffed chair they had. His brother may look relaxed and carefree, but the dark eyes met his without doubt, or hesitation. They read him easily. Fíli watched silently how a dark eyebrow rose. “Good. Because I am too.”“Then we need to have a conversation.”“That we do, Fee, that we do.” - Bilbo blinked comically at the two men standing outside her caravan.“Did you forget something yesterday?” she asked unsurely. “I haven’t seen anything laying around?”“We have come in answer to your ad in the paper.” Fíli replied calmly, earning another blink from green eyes.“I already told you that I'm currently not in a position to hire any handymen?”“Your actual ad.” Kíli clarified just as calmly as his sibling.Green eyes kept on blinking, slender eyebrows frowning when the two men each revealed a handful of pretty wildflowers from behind their backs.“We want this, Bilbo.” Fíli offered a little smile. “We want to share in your dream about this place, we want you.”“You're… brothers though?” Bilbo squeaked, only hanging out from her doorway just because her hands had an iron grip on the doorframe and the handle. Fíli and Kíli glanced at each other and whatever discussion they quickly held, Fíli lost it. He rolled his eyes, sighing at his cowardly younger sibling.“We don’t mind if you don’t?” he finally muttered in answer.“See, our mother always said that the only way we’d ever be happy was if we’d find a woman who would take us both?” Kíli clarified when Fíli wouldn’t. “We always refused to believe it, denying it… until early this morning.”“So you two, have come to the conclusion that you want to date me? And renovate my ruin?” Bilbo wasn’t entirely sure whether to laugh or not. They were nice enough lads, she’d gotten that much from meeting them the previous day. And they sure were handsome, the pair of them, in their own rugged, unpolished way. Suddenly she couldn’t help laughing after all, carefully leaning against the doorway while crossing her arms before her. “And what if this whole dating thing doesn’t work out? What if I only end up liking one of you?”“Then you will have gotten some free labour from Kíli who can find love elsewhere.” Fíli deadpanned.Years of previous experience made him sidestep the shove gracefully. Ignoring his furious sibling, Fíli held out the flowers to the woman he knew was his future. His reply had earned him a smile though, and Bilbo did accept the flowers.“So it really doesn’t bother you at all? Two brothers sharing me?”“Well, you did say that you didn’t mind anal.” Kíli piped up, still shooting Fíli a filthy glare. “And one of us definitely munches rug better than the other.”“Kíli!”All Bilbo could do really, was to accept the second bouquet and laugh. It was crazy, completely irrational and illogical, to even think about it let alone do it, but maybe that’s why she suddenly had utter faith in this working out perfectly. She had a really good feeling about this lunacy.“Alright then, gentlemen.” she shook her head smiling, as they both lifted her hands to press kisses to her knuckles with identical impish sparkles in their eyes. “Before we tackle the chateau, let’s at least have another proper date and discuss the logistics of all this. Hm?” And that’s how their new unexpected adventure in the Loire Valley began, with Fíli and Kíli finding themselves moving house into a caravan, four hours away from where they’d initially set up base when they first moved from Erebor.That’s how all this started indeed. It would be an adventure of a derelict French castle with unfathomable amounts of work needed done, a beautiful smile to lead them, and two idiots following. But oh, what an adventure!