Grey Wonderer provided the prompt: the first Yule that a lad with serious intentions gives Marigold a gift.
 

Marigold’s Yule

Robin is 32, Sam and Tom are 31, Rosie, Jolly and Marigold are 28.
1 Yule, 1411 SR

They should have seen it coming. Hamfast in fact had but that didn’t make it any easier. Marigold was his last child, his youngest daughter, his glowing flower with the golden locks. She was also the spitting image of her mother, and Bell had always had plenty of suitors. Hamfast never realized before just how lucky he was to have pinned Bell down, and he wondered if any of these lads now knocking upon their door like so many determined pecking birds would be the one to pin down his Goldie. He hoped not.

Marigold had blossomed over the past year, like a seedling after a hearty spring rain. The lads had noticed immediately and she was never shy with her smiles, though she was shy with everything else. Sam had told him there was a swarm of lads eagerly awaiting Goldie’s twenty-eighth birthday. Hamfast hadn’t wanted to believe it, and her birthday the other day had come and gone pleasantly enough. One thing he could say for the lads: they at least had patience and some sense of courtesy. Not enough to allow them a peaceful First Yule morning together though.

The first to come had been none other than Robin Smallburrow. He came knocking just after first breakfast with presents for all. He pretended he was there to see Sam, but Sam had given him a frown that made the lad step back a pace. Robin’s face lit up though when he handed over Marigold’s present. His hand shook ever so slightly and he had to clear his throat before squeaking out a tentative, “Merry Yule, Goldie.”

“Thank you, Robin,” Marigold said with that stunning smile of hers. Did she know what effect she had on the lads when she did that?

Goldie unwrapped the cloth to reveal a pair of marigold hair clips. She gasped and bounced on her feet in her excitement. “Oh, thank you, Robin! They’re lovely!” She then startled the poor lad with an enthusiastic hug and a quick peck on the cheek. “Stay right there, I’ll get you yours,” she ordered, though in truth Hamfast doubted the lad could make his feet work even if he’d wanted to leave.

Sam and Hamfast shared a glance and Sam huffed. He shook his head and drew the lad into the kitchen for a seat. “Want some cider?” he asked. Politeness was as politeness did, after all.

“Um, yes, I mean, no, I mean… Da wanted me back right away,” Robin dithered. He fingered the tablecloth, sneaking peeks down the hall in the direction of Marigold’s room.

“Here, I’ve somewhat for you too,” Sam said and handed his friend a small earthenware pot packed with fertile soil. “That’ll bloom come spring. It's not needing water ‘til then. Just put it out on your sill come the Clearing.”

“Thank you, Sam,” Robin said, taking the little pot in hand. “What kind of flower is it?”

“Not the kind you’re hoping for,” Sam muttered under his breath.

“What?”

Hamfast ribbed his son and lifted his brows, his eyes glinting with a command for manners. Marigold could do a lot worse than Robin, and there weren’t many who were better, come to that. Robin was of good family and was a steady, hard-working lad.

Sam nodded. “It’s a daisy,” he said and settled in the chair next to his friend. He had to admit his father was right. If Goldie chose Robin, she’d be doing fine for herself, but he knew something his father didn’t know. Robin was restless. He worked as hard as he did to keep his mind from dashing away, but Sam knew that strategy wouldn’t work forever. Robin had already admitted to wanting to be a shirriff as soon as he came of age next year. Such a life wouldn’t give him much time at home.

Marigold returned then, her hands behind her back. Robin all but jumped to his feet, and Sam followed suit. Goldie smiled again – oh yes, she knew all right – and with a dramatic flare brought her hands forward. She held out a small basket of scones and sweet cakes, which Robin took with a blush and a nod.

“I remember you said like blueberries,” Goldie said. “Happy Yule, Robin.”

“Thank you, Goldie,” Robin said and commenced to stand there, wavering between trying to say something clever and needing to leave.

Sam, ever the beneficent friend, put a helpful hand on Robin’s shoulder and steered him towards the front door. “Merry Yule, Robin,” he said and took his friend to the garden’s edge.

Robin cast one last glance through the open door before stepping onto the lane. “Merry Yule, Sam,” he said and with a whistle and a skip, he made his way up the Row.

Sam returned to the smial, shaking his head. He went to Goldie’s room and picked up the clips that Robin had given her, which she had placed on her side table. “That’s a courting gift, that is,” he said.

Goldie came into the room behind him. “Oh, it is not,” she said, blushing herself.

“You know well and good it is,” Sam said. Anything a lad gave to a lass that could be worn for all to see was considered a courting gift, if the lad had such intentions, and Robin clearly did. “You mean to court him then?”

Goldie shrugged. “I don’t know. He’s a nice lad,” she said. “He’s your best friend, so that says something.”

“I suppose,” Sam said. Should he tell her about the shirriffing? Before he could make up his mind though another knock sounded on the door.

“More presents!” Goldie said with a clap and grabbed more baskets of baked goods to take to the kitchen. She left Sam in her room with a swish of skirts and a bounce of her curls. 

So began the near constant stream of visitors, most of them lads and all of them come to see Goldie. Hamfast and Sam watched with a growing sense of dread and dismay as lad after lad came knocking upon the door. Some were more confident than poor Robin had been, and these Sam made certain to escort to the lane as quickly as possible if Hamfast didn’t beat him to it. Others could barely squeak out a ‘Merry Yule’ before handing over their gift and fleeing in terror of some imagined embarrassment.

Marigold and Sam did manage to get out of the smial after elevenses to make their own rounds. Looking back, Sam figured they would have been better off staying inside. At least at home, the lads only had one point of entry. Once outside, they seemed to come from all over, like a drone of bees sniffing out the last fertile flower of the season. They returned to Number Three bogged down with more gifts than they had left with, Sam’s head reeling with the prospect of beating back these potential suitors day in and day out until Goldie eventually settled on one, and Marigold blushing with embarrassment and no small amount of surprise. She couldn’t seem to understand just what the lads saw in her.

The visitors ceased just before tea, thank the stars. They spent a peaceful evening bundled up by the fire in the parlor, reminiscing on Yules past, but Marigold wasn’t really paying attention. She was in a mild state of shock, a pleasant sort of numbness she had never felt before, and she kept seeing the faces of all the hopeful lads who had approached her today. Most of them she had never spoken more than a ‘hullo’ upon passing on the road. Some she would rather have never noticed her; she shuddered thinking about Ted Sandyman’s gift, a pretty little bauble for pinning to her shirt collar. He had given her such a look of rapture that she had almost hidden behind Sam for protection. Thankfully, the Cottons had shown up at that moment, and that was the end of that.

“Don’t worry about him,” Tom had said, throwing a cousinly arm about her shoulders. “We’ll put the fear of the Witch-Lord into him if he ever so much as glances at you again.”

“Which lord is that?” Marigold asked, which Tom had found immensely amusing.

“Of Angmar,” Tom said. “Don’t you know your history? You ought to, living with Sam. Unless you know some secret to shutting him up, and if you do, you’d better share. If Robin and I have to sit through one more recitation of Elven lays, I truly think we’ll go deaf.”

“Hey now!” Sam protested but was quickly distracted by Rosie handing over a basket stuffed with cheeses and meats. Sam all but drooled at the sight, but whether that was due to the basket or Rosie, Goldie couldn’t tell.

“Are one of those wee baskets for me?” Tom asked, releasing Goldie from the half-hug.

Goldie handed over a basket of raspberry scones and sweet cakes, which Tom held to his nose and inhaled deeply. “Merry Yule, Tom-lad.”

“Merry Yule, Goldie-mine,” Tom said and picked out a scone to nibble on.

“Don’t I get something?” Goldie asked with a laugh.

“Well, you’re family, so I was going to give you your gift tomorrow, unless you’re suggesting that you deserve two?”

“Don’t I?”

“I suppose you do at that,” Tom said. He put the scone back in the basket, gave it over to Jolly for safe-keeping, glanced around the market, spotted something and dashed off. He came back some minutes later with a small wreath of furze and viburnum, which he placed smartly on her head. He sucked on a bleeding finger where one of the furze thorns had cut him as he was removing the prickly nuisances and nodded approvingly at his handiwork. “There you are. Do you like it?”

“You made it yourself?” Goldie said. She removed the wreath to examine it more closely before putting it back on her head. “I didn’t think you knew how.”

“Tom learned how to do that years ago,” Jolly said with an impish grin. He bit into a sweet cake and continued, “Soon as he realized that it impressed the lasses, that is.”

“I’m full of such surprises,” Tom gloated with a wink. He took Goldie’s hand and placed it in the crook of his arm, and the friends spent a happy hour going around Bywater and Hobbiton. Both Sam and Marigold noticed that Tom’s presence kept the other lads at bay, and Tom was watched by jealous eyes everywhere they went.

When they parted ways on Bywater Road, Tom took Sam aside and whispered, “Am I missing something? I could have sworn I heard Gorse Willowmere growling at me, and Sid Hardtack and Jed Mugwort looked ready to throw daggers at me.”

“You’ve missed everything, Tom,” Sam said, “and I thank you for it. Though if you keep it up for much longer, you might just miss out for good.”

Sam and Goldie left their cousins with cheerful waves. As soon as they were out of earshot, Tom said something to Rosie that made her throw up on hands in exaggerated disgust and made Jolly bend over with laughter.

Marigold still wore the wreath as she sat by the fire and she reached up to finger the blooms, a bulb of golden furze gentle to her touch. Did the furze mean anything, or had Tom only picked it because it blooms all year? Surely he knew it was a bridal flower… But no, he couldn’t possibly think of her that way. Maybe she should ask him about Robin. If she married Robin, then they could all be family, and surely Sam and Tom would like that.

“Goldie-lass,” Hamfast said, breaking into her thoughts. “Is the cider ready?”

“Oh yes!” she said, jumping to her feet. She went into the kitchen, her head full of confusion and wonderment. She removed the pot of cider from the hearth and placed it on the stove, and felt in the cupboards for some mugs and a ladle.

No, she decided, Tom didn’t feel that way about her. He was simply being a terrible flirt like he always was. She knew he had stepped out with a handful of lasses, though none of them seemed to hold his interest for very long, and he always had a line of eager dancing partners at socials and fairs. If he paid her any mind at such functions it was only because they were family, as he said. But then again, he had given her a wreath, in the middle of the market square, in full view of everyone.

But what about Robin?

What about him?

He’s a good lad, and he likes you. He’d do right by you.

Aye, he would at that. But could I ever love him? Not that I don’t love him now, just not in that way. He’s more a brother to me really.

Well, you can’t marry your brother.

“No, I suppose I can’t.”

“Can’t what?” Sam asked, coming into the kitchen to help her carry the drinks.

“Can’t live peacefully with a spy for a brother,” Goldie said. She took off the wreath and placed it on the table. “What do you think of Tom?”

“He’s a fool and a dolt and possibly brain damaged from being dropped on his head too often as a bairn,” Sam said, “but you could do worse.”

“Do you think he likes me? I mean, to court me?”

Sam knew quite well what Tom’s feelings for Marigold were. He also knew that Tom was, as of that afternoon, completely unaware that the hunt for Marigold’s hand had already begun. Rosie had undoubtedly corrected that error by now, and come Second Yule morning, the Cottons would be arriving at Number Three and Tom would be more on his guard. “I think you shouldn’t be worriting about this just now,” Sam said. “It’s Yule. Let the new year work itself out when it comes.”

The next morning, Tom brought Marigold a wreath of furze and mistletoe, along with his gift of hair ribbons. He placed the wreath upon her head and kissed her gently. He stepped back, a brief look of panic in his eyes, which vanished immediately when she kissed him back.

By that night, all of Hobbiton and Bywater knew that Marigold Gamgee was courting Tom Cotton, and the disappointed lads had to search for another lass to set their sights upon.

Rosie Cotton really was a lovely lass.

GF 12/20/09