Chapter 30. Disaster at Crickhollow

Merimac was at something of a loss. Fredegar Bolger was obviously at his wits’ end – worse, driven out of his wits by fear – and grief. The grief was perceptible through the overwhelming fear. What had happened at Crickhollow?

He had been crouching in front of the stricken hobbit, trying to reason with him, trying to make heads or tails of the broken bits of words that had been all they’d been able to coax from him, while the mug of tea Berilac had poured sat cooling on the table beside the chair.

Now the older hobbit stood to his feet. ‘I can’t make out what he’s on about,’ he said helplessly. ‘I’m going to go over there and see… Beri, you send to the Hall…’

But Freddy staggered to his feet and threw his arms about Merimac, shouting. ‘No! Don’t go! Don’t let Them take you!’

‘Them, again,’ Berilac said with a frown. ‘Who are they?’

‘Who are They?’ Merimac echoed. ‘Tell me, lad. What is it they’re after?’

Freddy buried his face in the shoulder of Merimac’s dressing gown, and now he whimpered, ‘Frodo…’

‘Frodo!’ Merimac said, startled, and Freddy cried out and shook all over.

Merimac looked around the circle of staring faces. ‘Truth be told,’ he said slowly, the pieces starting to fit somehow in his sleep-fogged brain. The mists were clearing, and he didn’t like the implications that were staring him in the face. ‘Truth be told, I thought Freddy, here, was Frodo, when I opened the door and saw him huddled there…the two do share a strong resemblance…’

‘…and I could swear he’s wearing Frodo’s favourite shirt,’ Berilac said. ‘I remember it well; Auntie Ally had it made for his Coming of Age, it’s old, but he’s kept it all these years, what with the same fancy stitching on the cuffs he’d admired in one of Merry’s shirts.’

‘Merry!’ Merimac said in dismay. ‘He’s at Crickhollow with Frodo!’

‘Old Forest,’ Freddy whimpered. ‘Old… Forest.’

And suddenly the pieces fell into place. ‘The Old Forest!’ he said. ‘Of course! It’s some sort of attack by the Forest, or some sort of invasion from that accursed place! No wonder the lad is out of his wits! Here, care for him, Priss… Do what you can!’ Merimac eased the weeping Freddy away from him and held him upright by the arms until Prisca could put an arm around the poor fellow’s shoulders and guide him to sit down once more. All the while Freddy wept, his hands over his face, seemingly hopeless, while Merimac thought furiously.

He made up his mind and looked to his eldest. ‘Berilac! Run to the Hall for help! Don’t stop for anything or anyone, and no matter what, don’t look behind you!’

And Berilac, thoroughly alarmed, was off in a flash, still in his night clothes, running for all he was worth.

Merimac ran to the front door. There, hanging from a sturdy strap, was his horn. He took it with him when he went out to a dig, whether it be as small as a smial or as extensive as a mine. Shire engineers had worked out a series of signals over time: shift change, summons for a foreman or engineer deep in the diggings, warning of danger. He’d even used the horn, upon a time, to summon aid from all the hobbits living in the area when a mine had collapsed and urgent action was needed to rescue the survivors. The horn had a loud voice that could cut sharply through underground echoes, or could be heard for miles in open air.

He knew what to blow. Fear! Fire! Foes! Awake! Awake!

***

Saradoc Brandybuck, Master of Buckland and Head of the Brandybuck family, sat up in bed.

‘What is it, my love?’ his wife, Esmeralda said sleepily. ‘Surely it’s not quite time to waken yet?’ She yawned. They’d sat up rather late the evening before, making plans for a grand house-warming for Frodo, and discussing whether Merimac might spare Berilac to escort young Pip homeward again, for Merry was wanted to oversee aspects of the harvest. With his love of apples, his father had thought he’d be a good candidate to take over management of the orchards when he'd come of age, and he’d made several innovations already that had increased the quality and yield of fruit. Apple harvest was at hand, and Saradoc wanted his son to be able to bask in his achievements, to be on hand and see the fruits of his labour at first hand.

‘Something,’ he said. ‘I don’t know. Something’s amiss.’

‘Are you well?’ his wife said, coming awake and sitting up herself. Her husband had been unusually weary of late. He was overdoing, she thought, especially with Merry spending so much time over the summer helping Frodo with his plans and removal to Crickhollow. She sighed. It would be good to have their son at home again, not distracted, but available to take some of Saradoc’s load. She hadn’t shared her concerns about Saradoc’s health with Merry, but she would, just so soon as a quiet, private moment presented itself.

‘I don’t know,’ he said, the far-away look still on his face, but then he came to himself and patted her hand. ‘Naught’s wrong with me,’ he said, and then made a sweeping gesture. ‘But something is amiss… I thought I heard…’

And then there was a rapid, urgent knocking at the bedroom door, and the door was thrown open in the next instant, and one of the night servants was there. ‘Beg pardon, Sir, but young Mr. Beri’s here, ran all the way, it seems, and something’s dreadful wrong…’

‘Merimac!’ Saradoc said, springing from the bed with some of his old vigour. ‘Rocky! Something’s happened to my brother?’

‘Don’t know,’ Rocky said apologetically. ‘But Mr. Beri’s in the courtyard – practically fell into the stable hobbits’ arms when he arrived – must’ve run all the way – and someone’s sounding the Horn Call of Buckland – you can hear it on the breeze…’ And as he spoke, he crossed to the window and threw open the sash, and the voice of the horn could be clearly distinguished, distant and faint, but urgent, answered by other horns close at hand as the alarm spread.

‘That call hasn't sounded in an hundred years!’ Saradoc said in consternation.

‘Not since the Brandywine froze over, in the Fell Winter, and the wolves crossed over...’ Esmeralda said faintly. ‘Old Bilbo used to tell the tale.’ She hugged herself tightly, her eyes wide with fear. ‘O what can it mean?’

‘More's joining in the call,’ Rocky said, scanning the horizon.

Saradoc joined him in short order, but the window faced in the wrong direction. He leaned out and shouted to the hobbits in the courtyard, clustering around a ghostly figure – Berilac, his white nightshirt billowing about him, was bent over and gasping for breath, held up by helping arms. ‘See you fire, or smoke, to the northeast?’

‘Nay!’ came the answering shout. Saradoc saw Berilac push against the hobbits supporting him; evidently he gasped out a few words, for there were shouts of dismay and then one of them called to the Master. ‘Foes! Old Forest!’

‘Sound the Muster!’ Saradoc snapped, filled with energy at this emergency. ‘To arms! Axes and torches and bows! Form up and be ready to march on my order.’

‘Sir!’ the stable workers chorused, and scattered, leaving one of their number to help Berilac into the Hall.

‘Find my nephew some clothes, and a glass of brandy to restore him,’ Saradoc said to Rocky in dismissal. He threw off his nightshirt and began to dress as rapidly as he could, all the while snapping orders to Esmeralda, as to the Hall’s defence whilst the body of armed hobbits went out to meet the emergency.

***

Some time later, Saradoc and Merimac stood in the yard at Crickhollow, stunned and sick at heart. The doors to the smial gaped wide, broken open; the garden gate hung from one damaged hinge. An abandoned cloak – Frodo’s, they deemed – lay upon the doorstep. Inside the smial were signs of a hasty, vicious search – drawers pulled open and their contents scattered, shelves thrown down, trunks overturned, cushions violently slashed with a sharp blade.

A rider on a lathered pony pulled up short at the gate; the rider jumped down and ran to the Master. ‘Attack at the North Gate, sir! I rode first to the Hall, and they told me to find you here.’

Saradoc simply stared, a private horror gnawing at him, but Merimac stepped forward. ‘What sort of attack?’ he said. ‘Who are they? Did they come out of the Forest?’

‘Men, tall Men in black cloaks, on black horses,’ the messenger said, and shuddered. ‘Rode down the guards at the gate, and passed out of Buckland. One guard dead, and too soon to tell for the other that couldn’t get out of their way in time.’

Saradoc bowed his head at this, and then raised it again, his eyes glittering with tears. ‘How many?’ he asked. ‘Did they carry any hobbits away with them?’

The messenger shrugged helplessly. ‘I’m sorry, Sir, I was in the gatehouse at the time and only heard and felt their passing.’ He shuddered. ‘Awful, it was. Some sort of black sorcery, I should say. Rode down the guards at the gate and left them for dead.’ His eyes were haunted with the memory. ‘Howling, they passed, like a cursed wind…’