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Their paths had crossed very little in the Blue Mountains, what with Bofur being a miner turned toymaker and Nori. Well, Nori being a thief and a liar and a scoundrel.
There had been that one time they’d met, Nori had come by his stall and bought toys, no doubt with someone else’s hard earned money. Three toys, some of Bofur’s best work actually, if Bifur was to be believed.
Bofur was a little sad to see them go, there had been a young dwarf that’d had his eyes set on them. Little did he know that the young dwarf in question was in fact the received of the toys.
Nori had seen the way his brother had looked at them, but their mother just couldn’t spare the money and he heard Dori telling their younger brother that he was too old for toys, and it was time for him to grow up.
It was all very contradictory in Nori’s opinion, since Dori insisted on babying him all the time. However the toys were of good make, Ori liked them, Nori felt it was the least he could do for his younger brother.
He placed them on Ori’s nightstand, without a note, and turned to leave again. He thought he heard his mother sigh, but couldn’t make her out in the dark.
He left and thought little more of the toys, or the toymaker he had got them, from until years later when they were sitting around the fire and Bofur picked up a piece of wood whittled to look like one of the shieldmaidens of yore. Nori thought it looked quite familiar and Ori nearly screeched and grabbed it from the toymaker’s hand, the behaviour causing quite a few stares from the members of the company, having gotten used to Ori’s rather gentle demeanor, when he wasn’t drinking.
Ori quickly noticed the looks and turned a very bright shade of red.
“Uh. That’s mine. I’m just. I’ll be over there.” He stammered and pointed over to the side of the camp and walked quickly away from the gaping toymaker.
The other dwarves, sans Dori, grew bored and went back to what they were doing and some started getting ready for sleep. Dori clucked about rude young dwarves and went towards Ori, while Bofur turned around to look at Nori.
“You bought that, from me.” Bofur stated, lighting his pipe and looking at Nori.
They had interacted of course, Bag End was rather cramped with 13 dwarves in it, and on the journey everyone got pushed together somehow, but this was the first time Bofur had truly tried to see beyond the facade that Nori had built up for himself.
Nori in turn shrugged, “He’s my brother.” He said, as if it answered everything. Bofur nodded and offered Nori his pipe. Nori raised an eyebrow before accepting.
And if they sat a little closer than usual after that, or shared some looks over their siblings behaviour, it wasn’t anyone’s business but their own.