Disclaimer: I don't own The Hobbit or any of J. R. R Tolkien's works. Nor do I own the Walking Dead. Everything belongs to whoever owns them, my wishful thinking aside.

Authors Note #1: This is a Caryl crossover with the Lord of the Rings/Hobbit universe (with a bit of the Soul Bond/Soulmate trope thrown in for good measure) for whowhatsitwhich who was feeling unwell and is apparently a masochist and wanted angst on top of it. The prompt was: "wait." I have had the Hobbit and LOTR on the brain lately, so after a quick double check of her blog, I decided to run with it.

Warnings: This is set in the time period just after The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings and it set mostly in Mirkwood before the remaining darkness has been fully cast out by the destruction of Sauron and Mordor. Expect canon appropriate violence, mature language, allusions to domestic violence, child abuse, age difference, minor sexual content, angst, angst and also angst.