When Pippin had woken up that afternoon to find the king sitting beside him, and listened to Aragorn’s idea, Pippin’s initial shock had given way quite quickly to curiosity and a strong desire to put it all behind them.

He wasn’t even sure exactly what he had dreamt about when he woke up in tears to find Merry holding him, a dull sense of dread settled around his heart and his pulse racing with fear – if it was the memory of what he had seen in the palantir, or the awful, sudden parting with Merry. At any rate, if looking in the stone again could somehow replace the memories of that night with different, better ones, then Pippin wanted to do it.

More than anything about the dim recollections he had of their night terrors was a feeling of great loneliness, as though they were all still scattered about in far-flung lands, lost and frightened. Like Pippin, Merry often dreamt that he was alone and searching for the others, and it broke Pippin’s heart to hear Merry calling out for him when Pippin was right there next to him, holding his hand, certain that it was all his fault.

Now, though, the four of them were gathered in a small room in the king’s chambers, and Pippin thought he might have changed his mind, sitting miserably as he was on a chair between his cousins, watching intently as Aragorn lifted the palantir from the swathes of black cloth in which it was wrapped. The sight of it alone made him feel twitchy and guilty and frightened. Surely it wouldn’t help anyone if he looked in the wretched stone while he was in this state.

"I told Gandalf I’d never look at it again," he said nervously, attempting a smile as he glanced from Frodo to Merry and back again. His hands were shaking, so he sat on them firmly. "I should have listened to him, and you, Merry, the first time. I don’t think I will look. I don’t even want to think about it."

He glanced up at Aragorn standing beside them, and felt thoroughly ashamed of himself. "I think you must believe I’m braver than I really am, Aragorn."

Aragorn frowned and knelt down in front of him, studying him intently for a moment. "You’re uncommonly brave, Peregrin Took," he said softly, "and I’m proud of you. I will remain just as proud of you if you choose not to look in the palantir, and so will Frodo and Merry. This is entirely your choice."

But I’ll be ashamed if I don’t look in it, he thought. If I could look when I wasn’t supposed to, I can look now. He held out his hands tentatively to take the ball from Aragorn.

"Just let your thoughts go where they wish," Aragorn told him softly, smiling at him.

Pippin nodded, suddenly unable to look at his cousins, and gazed into it carefully, watching the pale light flickering in the centre of the stone.

Suddenly he glimpsed Merry move out of the corner of his eye, and looked up sharply when his cousin let out a low cry. "I don’t think I can bear to look," he murmured shakily. "I suppose I was hoping you wouldn’t do this, Pip."

"Merry!" Pippin exclaimed, nearly letting the ball fall to the floor as he turned to take his cousin’s hand desperately. "Please don’t turn away from me." He couldn’t bear that. Better to leave the memories as they were than to let Merry down all over again, and disappoint him so much. "You said you wouldn’t be upset," he whispered, meeting Merry’s eyes anxiously.

Merry held Pippin’s hand tightly, tears in his eyes. "Sorry, Pip. I just can’t believe I’m letting you do this again."

"It will be all right, Mer," Pippin said, certainty rising up in his heart as he said it. "I’m going to look, and you’re going to stay here with me, and so are Frodo and Strider."

With one quick squeeze of Merry’s hands, Pippin looked into the stone again while he still had the courage. The pale light expanded and Pippin felt as though he was being drawn inside the glass again, just like before. He swallowed and tried to do as Strider told him, to let his thoughts wander wherever they would, but he could not let the images he had last seen in the palantir out of his mind.

The battlements of Minas Tirith, the white tower of Ecthelion so familiar to him now… and creatures in the air, wheeling in the starlit sky – three of them, no six…

At first he thought his own imagination was somehow being reflected in the glass, and then he realised with a sickening lurch of his stomach that he really was seeing the same vision playing out in the stone before him. He swallowed, his heart beating even more quickly as he watched the creatures flying towards him, dark wings blotting out the stars, and he couldn’t look away.

Then he looked closer and saw with joy that it wasn’t a winged wraith at all, but an Eagle! The Eagles were flying over Minas Tirith, and Pippin watched them in delight as he swooped down toward the city with them. Suddenly it was day, and there was a small figure watching the great birds with his face lifted and sunlight shining down on him. It must be his dear Merry, he thought, but he couldn’t see his face clearly… he stared intently, trying to see better, but the vision had already shifted again.

Now the white tree appeared, dead and withered, just as it had been before in the stone, Pippin saw with a jolt. He opened his mouth, confused, and then gasped as he saw a figure kneeling beside it. Boromir… his friend, younger than Pippin remembered him, but just as stern and strong. He looked as though he was making a promise, but then he bowed his head, defeated, and Pippin wanted to reach out into the glass and touch him, tell him all the things he had long been wishing he could say.

But he vanished, and there in his place was a new tree, wreathed in flowers, and two more figures beside it, fair and young and full of joy. Faramir, with Eowyn beside him, and Pippin smiled, tears starting in his eyes, watching as others gathered around them. He saw himself there, with Merry beside him; watched Faramir stoop to embrace him and Eowyn hug Merry fiercely, making him blush.

He was still smiling as the vision faded and the ball sank into darkness again, and then Pippin came back to himself, holding the ball against his body with one hand as he scrubbed at his damp cheeks with the other.

Gentle hands took the palantir away from him, and then there were smaller hands on each arm. "Pip?" Frodo whispered.

"What did you see?" Merry asked, a tremor in his voice.

All of them were staring at him in intent concern, and Pippin took a very deep breath and took Merry’s hand and smiled at Frodo, not knowing what to say or how to describe what he’d seen. "I saw good things," he said simply, after a moment. "Reasons to be glad things worked out the way they did."

"Really?" Merry asked, as though afraid to believe it.

"Really," Pippin laughed, and kissed him soundly on the cheek. "Thank you, Strider," he said, jumping down and hugging the king, who laughed and hugged him back warmly, and lastly he embraced Frodo, who hugged him tightly, relief and pride in his eyes. Pippin paused, looking at him deeply for a moment without knowing why, and kissed him on the nose. "Thank you, Frodo," he whispered, and hugged him again.

"I didn’t do anything," Frodo smiled, bemused.

"Of course you did. You are daft sometimes, Frodo," Pippin grinned, shaking his head. "Now, shall we go?" He felt like he’d been put through no less than an encounter with Sauron, a trial and a scolding from aunt Esme all at the same time. "My nerves are all jangly. I need some ale and a nice, quiet smoke. Strider? Will you join us?"

He and Merry were halfway out the door before they realised that Frodo was hesitating, looking up at Aragorn in anticipation. "I – I’ll see you lads down there," Frodo said. "I just wanted to ask Aragorn something."

Pippin frowned, opening his mouth to ask what in the Shire could be more important than getting a table at the tavern, and then thought better of it. Frodo looked relieved, and Pippin raised an eyebrow, impressed by his own restraint. "See you there, Frodo," he replied impishly, and closed the door behind him.

Before the door had even shut, he realised exactly what Frodo wanted to do and grabbed Merry’s arm, ready to swing the door open again indignantly, and demand to know why Frodo would want to look in the stone without them.

"Pip," Merry said quietly, stopping him with a look. "Let him be, dearest. I think he just wants to share it with Strider."

"Why?" Pippin whispered, letting Merry pull him away from the door. "Doesn’t he want us to see?"

"I think we would know, if he did," Merry replied with a sad smile. "He’ll tell us later if he wants to."

"But what if he sees something terrible," Pippin asked, still hesitating. "He was there for me, Merry—"

Merry pulled Pippin close. "He wanted to protect you, Pip, and so did I. But I don’t think he needs us at the moment… I suppose there must be things we don’t know about him now, and however much we love him, we can’t change that."

Pippin looked up at Merry; the matter-of-fact Brandybuck tone of voice was not enough to disguise the pain in his cousin’s eyes. He hugged him tightly, and decided not to protest about it anymore, for Merry’s sake. Since they’d been reunited, Pippin had thought that sharing everything with the other three would bring them as close as they had been before, but he supposed now that they were all keeping things from each other, whether unconsciously or on purpose. There were things he didn’t even know about himself, after all, and if it were not for the dreams, he would never have voiced how much that night at Dol Baran had hurt him.

"All right, Merry," he replied, kissing his brow. "Let’s go."

***

Frodo looked up at Aragorn once the lads had left, and the king passed him the palantir. "I’m glad they’re all right," he murmured. "But somehow I wanted to do this without them. Just in case it is frightening, after all."

"I will take it from you if that happens," Aragorn replied quietly, "but I don’t think you need worry." He smiled at Frodo, clear sight shining in his eyes, and Frodo relaxed, not realising he’d been frowning.

"Right," he whispered, and looked into the stone tentatively. He hadn’t noticed the white flame before, when Pippin looked into the ball, and now he found himself transfixed by it, not realising it was expanding until the swirling colours were already filling his vision. And then he saw…

Water… endless water, stretching out around him until it touched the sky, rising and falling in calm, ceaseless waves.

The sea, Frodo realised, utterly entranced, watching as a rising sun gradually lit the dark waters, gold glinting across the rippled surface, changing colour a thousand times.

It was an impossibly beautiful sight and Frodo’s heart yearned for it, feeling it slip away from him even as he tried to remember it, to capture every detail. The palantir went dark again and Frodo looked up, bewildered. "I saw the sea, Aragorn. But that was all. Why didn’t it let me see more?"

"I don’t know, Frodo." Aragorn shook his head. "As I said, it is not always possible to understand what you see."

Frodo looked down, remembering the way the sea rose and fell, and closed his eyes, the sound of the waves still an echo in his memory; like a glimpse of some truth he did not yet understand. "I think I will see it again, someday," he sighed, his heart aching even as he smiled.

Aragorn smiled, and reached out to take the palantir and wrap it up once more. "Curiosity is never fully satisfied, is it? There are always more questions to be asked." He stopped then, and took Frodo’s hands in his. "You and your cousins have shown remarkable foresight at times," he said quietly. "I believe that you will find the sea again, if that is to be your path."

They shared a long look, and Frodo wasn’t sure what he saw in Aragorn’s gaze, but he felt tears start in his eyes at the sorrow he saw there. "Strider," he said, using the old name his cousins still preferred to use, knowing it would make the king smile. "I think it’s time we stopped thinking about what has happened and what might happen. I’m a hobbit after all, and we like to enjoy the present. Merry and Pippin will have found Sam and Faramir and Eomer, and they’ll surely have a table in the tavern by now. I really think we should join them."

Aragorn bowed his head in agreement, and looked up, his eyes lit up with a warm smile. "Very well, Frodo. But I should warn you; if Pippin falls asleep on his feet tomorrow, I shall not be nearly so lenient with him."

Frodo laughed. "You’d better tell him that. Tomorrow, he’s on his own."

***

The next morning, Frodo half-woke when he heard his cousins get up and fumble clumsily for their uniforms, pale faces and bleary eyes reminding him of the long night they had just been through. Watching through half-closed eyes, he saw Merry fuss over Pippin’s sleep-rumpled curls, Pippin twisting out of his grasp and muttering irritably, holding his head and rubbing his eyes.

As they left for duty, Frodo mumbled a vague "goodbye, lads" into his pillow, lifting up his hand weakly and letting it fall back to his side. His eyes drifted shut again and he heard Sam snore and sighed, settling more deeply into his bed, sparing a last sympathetic thought for his cousins before letting himself slide back into peaceful dreams.