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When Winter Fell  by Lindelea

Chapter 34. A Dusting of Snow

Bilbo slept well that night, his parents not quite so well – for it seems, the older we get, the more used to our own beds we become, such that we notice somehow the strangeness of a strange bed, no matter how comfortable. Of course, Bungo had paid well for the best room in the inn, and all the comforts that could be provided. As a result, the travellers were so very snug, it was a surprise to waken to see a dusting of snow had fallen in the night.

‘Winter is upon us at last!’ Belladonna said, sitting up and pulling the bedcovers to her chin. ‘Will we be stranded here, do you think, my dears?’ She shivered. ‘Oh, now I wish we’d stopped at home!’

For though they travelled every Yuletide to the Great Smials, in varied weathers from sun to snow (driving a sleigh over the snowy fields) to pounding rain (snug inside a cosy coach, taking the safer, long way round by road), Belladonna was quite spoilt by the comforts heaped upon her by her doting husband. Though in her earlier days, she had braved hardship and discomfort, even danger (though such is not commonly spoken of in polite society), she was older now, wiser, and more steady in her ways. If the Old Took had married her off to a Baggins to settle her restless spirits, as some had whispered, well, the plan had been successful.

Belladonna was as content as a soul could be, and had settled nicely, so far as polite society was concerned.

The others quickly pulled on their clothes and gathered by the window to confer. Isen pulled at his lip as Bungo studied the dusting of snow on the ground and asked, ‘What do you think, Brother? The Road is easy enough, in this part of the country. But might it be more treacherous, when we reach the Green Hills, in the last part of our journey?’

Bilbo held his breath. The little bit of snow he saw on the ground seemed but a trifle – why, he wouldn’t even be able to gather enough from the whole courtyard of the inn for a decent snowball, to cast at a mark, or another young hobbit, say, his cousin Siggy, and certainly there wasn't enough snow to be had for Siggy to form a snowball to cast back in Bilbo's direction!

He understood that his father was giving his uncle one last chance, to turn aside from their journey, to put off visiting the Great Smials – with a plausible excuse! – for at least a little longer. But how he longed to see his best friend!

Isen pursed his lips in a thoughtful manner and stroked his chin. At last he nodded, and Bilbo’s heart sank. But then he spoke.

‘The roads are well-kept by my father, the Thain,’ he said, and nodded again. ‘And while the snows may heap themselves high atop the Green Hills, it may not be so in the valleys through which the Stock Road weaves its way. The Wood,’ – and here he meant that part of the Shire marked on maps as “The Woody End” – ‘is more or less low-lying land, at least the eastern stretch of woods, sloping gradually to the River, and so should be passible. I see only a problem there, if we should have a great storm with high winds to bring down limbs or even trees across the Road, but,’ – and here he lifted his half-crippled arm – but improving! with patient work on his part, with Bungo's help, and Belladonna's, and even Bilbo's – ‘if such a storm were on the way, I think I should know it.’

He meant a weather ache, Bilbo supposed. He’d heard his elders discuss such things – his mother had a weather ache in one of her feet, from a bone that had been broken in the distant past. (A part of him, in the far back corner of his mind, wondered… had it been on one of the “adventures” Uncle Isen had hinted at? But then his good sense reclaimed him, for he could not imagine his staid, settled mum having such a thing as an adventure.)

‘And the western part of the Wood?’ Bungo asked humbly, of his far-travelled brother in love. ‘Where the Green Hills begin, and mount nearly to the sky before you come to Tuckborough?’

‘We’ll be out of the woods well before Tuckborough,’ Isen said with a twinkle in his eye for the play on words. ‘And I think, while the snows may drift high at the top of those great hills, the valley should be clear,’ he reiterated. ‘And if it is not…’

Bilbo held his breath again, though his heart was light now, and he had complete confidence in his uncle.

‘Why,’ Isen continued, ‘we’ll send word to the Thain, and he’ll send a sleigh for us, to take us the rest of the way.’

‘Why so he will,’ Bungo said, a smile lighting his face. ‘If only to keep his dear wife happy, in gathering all of her chicks about her once more…’

Peep, peep!’ Isen said, in creditable imitation of a new-hatched chicken. And to Bilbo’s astonishment, Belladonna cheeped as well, and then all of the adults had a hearty laugh.

***

Please see Author's Notes in the last chapter of this story for a word about updates.





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