Chapter 44: On the Inside Looking Out
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A flash of worry flew across Merry’s face before he broke into a tender smile. He reached up, drew Frodo’s hands back down to his sides, and very carefully rebuttoned Frodo’s shirt.
“Are you hungry, Frodo dear?” asked Merry, and receiving no answer, poured more words into the void. “We will eat like kings, tonight to celebrate your homecoming. You are far too reduced, Love, and its time we fatten you up like a proper hobbit.”
Merry cupped Frodo’s cold cheeks in his hands and stared into his cousin’s empty eyes, hoping to find a spark of recognition in those black pools. Nothing. Merry felt his stomach clench and smiled sadly at his cousin, a grin pregnant with pity but bereft of remorse.
“Perhaps, Love,” said Merry, “You could say my name once more.”
Frodo stared through Merry, showing not the least curiosity about the world that surrounded him, nor about the pleading face of his cousin.
“Perhaps later then,” sighed Merry. “A little sleep will be just the thing. Then you will be in a better place to speak with me. Come now, to bed with you.” Merry reached for Frodo’s shoulder, and felt an inner thud as Frodo flinched at his touch. “Come now,” soothed Merry. “We are going nowhere any more frightening than to bed.” And turning his head toward Pippin, called, “Pip--!”
Merry’s words caught in his throat as he saw his younger cousin crumbled upon the floor behind him. “Pippin!” cried Merry, and letting go of Frodo’s hands, which he did not even remember grasping, said, “Frodo, dear, stay for a moment! I must tend to our cousin.”
Frodo’s face remained impassive, his body motionless. He stayed.
“Pippin! Wake up!” Merry knelt down and slapped Pippin softly in the face until he stirred.
Pippin flinched as his eyes fluttered open, then mumbled, “His eyes. His eyes.”
Merry knew better than to ask Pippin what he had meant, as he had seen them too.
“Up you go, Pippin,” said Merry. “I don’t want to lose you now.”
Pippin looked up in dismay to see Frodo staring into the mirror, now absently fingering a lump under his collar. “Has he,” asked Pippin quietly, “said anything?”
Merry darkened. “Course he has! You heard him! He said my name!”
“I mean,” mumbled Pippin, “said something all on his own.”
“What are you getting at, Pip?” spat Merry with unexpected ferocity.
Pippin sucked in a breath of air, again glanced over at his cousin, steadied his small frame, and spoke in a clear voice. “Has Frodo said something all on his own….that made sense?”
The next moment Pippin was flat on the ground, bleeding at the mouth, his jaw numb with fresh impact. He rubbed his throbbing jaw and turned his eyes upward to look into his cousin’s rage-reddened face. But again, he threw a hasty glance back at Frodo and, beyond all reason, pushed on.
“You are afraid to answer, aren’t you?” said Pippin, barely above a whisper.
The fire in Merry’s eyes suddenly went out. Pippin’s gentle honesty had disarmed him. Merry stared at his bloodied fist as if it were a foreign object, and then back at that object’s latest victim. Merry drew a ragged breath, covered his eyes against his own violence, and cried, “What have I done,” into his sheltering palms. He sank down to the floor, brushing a fallen candle out of the way and listening to the sound of it rolling across the floor and splashing into a small pool of water. Merry - encircled Pippin’s abused face in his quivering hands. “Forgive me for sullying this blessed day with my accursed temper, Pip. But, Lo! How you try me with your questions and doubts! I see it now! I have neglected you! Though, with Frodo being so difficult, I suppose there was nothing for it. But, Pip, Frodo lessons are done, and now he will be happy. So now that Frodo is as he should be, I may work on you, Pip! You are a work of beauty, but an incomplete work. Your Merry will teach you too so that you can be just as happy as our dear, dear Frodo.”
Merry cupped Pippin’s face with more urgency as he rambled on, and by the time he had reached his vow to teach Pippin, his nails had begun to dig into Pippin’s already tender cheeks. Pippin blanched, both because he feared Merry’s lessons and because his Merry sounded insane. But the state of Frodo struck him at his core and he chanced another question while it seemed that Merry was inclined to be patient with him.
“How do we know that our Frodo is happy?” asked Pippin, softly placing his soft hands over Merry’s in a gesture intended to sooth. “How do we know when he will not speak?”
The pale blue flame leapt up in Merry’s eyes again for a split second, rage flitted over his face, then was gone. Merry again smiled sadly, a tear falling down his face and onto his collar. Merry gave Pippin a pitying look as he stood.
“Pip, oh Pip,” Merry sighed, offering his hand. “If only I could make you understand.”
Pippin took the proffered hand, feeling its soft, kind warmth soothing, and tried to force the image of the lovely, kind cousin that he had grown up admiring to the forefront of his mind. Pippin forced a smile, all the while feeling his heart breaking to pieces. He stood on shaky legs.
Merry gathered Pippin in his arms, and for a moment, to Pippin, it felt like home. Tears filtered through the veil of Pippin’s lashes and down his face and he realized that he cried as much for Merry as for Frodo.
Merry noted the alteration in Pippin’s breathing and held him at arm’s length, smiling tenderly. “My love,” he cooed. “This is not the time for tears, it is time for celebration. We are together, and our Frodo has come home for good.”
Pippin nodded weakly, craned his neck back, and gasped. Merry let go of Pippin and spun on his heel. Frodo, still staring ghost-like into the mirror, had freed the Ring from the prison of his shirt, and, in fondling It, had placed the hole comfortably over the very tip of his finger, balancing it upon his fingernail, perilously close to slipping it on.
“NO! Frodo! NO!” Merry flew across the space that separated them, tackling Frodo by the hips with enough momentum to send the two of them sprawling into the wall and finally to the floor beneath. While still in flight, he had grasped Frodo’s hands, squeezing tightly until the Ring dropped down upon Frodo’s chest with a surprisingly solid thud.
Still lying on the floor, Merry pulled at the chain, and without touching It, dropped the Ring back down Frodo’s shirt. He pulled Frodo into a sitting position and stared at him in delayed terror, all the while breathing in deep jagged bursts. A pale glint came into Frodo’s eyes, lingered for a second and was gone.
Merry let go of Frodo’s hands, breathing even harder as he pulled Frodo up onto his feet. His cousin stared blankly ahead, unperturbed and seemingly unaware of anything that had happened. Merry frowned, thinking that they would both be bruised and sore. Then he watched as Frodo’s hands fell back to his sides, his fingers clenching and unclenching in what might even have been a purposeful reflex of longing and need.
“Frodo!” breathed Merry frantically, but not in anger. “Frodo—you must not scare us like that! You must never do that again!”
Frodo made no move aside from his twitching fingers. Merry took him by the hands and led him toward the door, stepping over a few fallen candles as they went. Frodo did not resist, though he walked slowly and as if in a dream state, letting Merry lead him where he would.
VVVVV
‘Mine,’ he had said and he felt the word fall heavy and cold as it left his lips, heard it drop to the floor and shatter in his ears. His gaze falls like a dead thing upon the phantasms that surround him but he sees nothing. He is aware that he has spoken, but he no longer grasps the meaning of it, though he knows that it made perfect sense only a moment ago. But he clenches his teeth when the voice of the pretender burrows into his ears and thinks, ‘MINE.’
Soft as a song it whispers to him and drowns out the pretender, coaxes him back to the black He remembers fearing the darkness, remembers screams tearing from his throat. Now he lusts for the dark, wraps it about himself as a shield. For only the dark offers solace now, only the dark can take away the pretender’s voice, the pretender’s hands.
Gone, the soothing whispers are trampled beneath the grating voice of the pretender that drags him back to where the light burns his eyes and the air is heavy and choking. Voices fall about him and he recognizes the tone, recognizes the timbre. It demands something and here without his dark shroud he is vulnerable. Here in the light, pain is but a breath away. Words tumble, falter through his mind and he should be able to hear, should be able to understand, but the light is like daggers to his eyes, trying to pierce his fragile shield and turn the comforting black to brighter shades of grey. Hands upon him and they burn his skin in their cold grasp, wanting, demanding. They will strike soon if he does not obey but he cannot. For the black calls to him and that is the only one he’ll surrender to.
Exquisite silence, welcome emptiness. He tumbles through it and in his mind, he smiles. He is falling, but he knows what waits to catch him and so there is no fear. He closes his eyes and lets the darkness take him.
Silent. Still. Safe. Nothing can touch him, nothing can hurt him and most importantly, nothing can be taken from him but that which he gives freely. No hands harsh and punishing upon his body, no lies that play his heart til he nigh screams with the agony of the sundering of mind from spirit, no bonds that trap his soul just as surely as they trap his body. Nothing, there is nothing but the void that sings its sweet call to his heart.
Yes, there it is. Calling him, reaching for him. It promises silence. It promises oblivion and he has never wanted anything so much in all his life. It makes its promises, whispers with warm, moist breath in his ear and… He believes. He follows.Ah, yes – there it was. The call swirled about him, echoing sweetly in his ears. It wants him and he must follow. It is time.
Bliss!
Hands grasping, hands denying, stopping, preventing… NO!! He retreats to the edges of the void, seeking the oblivion that the hands have again denied him. He waits for the hands to begin their punishment.
Gone, the void has retreated from him, taken its promise of silence and left him here in this world of light and sound. He shrinks from his own senses, cowers within himself.. A little more light moves through him, a little more sound seeps into his ear. Helplessly he peers through the last of the darkness and into the eyes before him.
He mourns the loss of the black, but resolves himself to wait for the darkness to return. He sees the world of light through a heavy mist and moves sluggishly through it, obeying the will of the hands upon him, for he has known pain from them. He moves slowly in the direction he is pushed and waits for the darkness to find him.
VVVVV
“Pip!” called Merry. “Pippin! Help me tend to Frodo. It is quite obvious that he needs rest - yes, more rest.”
Pippin wrapped his arm around his cousin's wasted middle and helped Merry lead him back to his room. Frodo slogged along with slow, dragging steps, out of time with both of his cousins, still staring into space.
As they entered the room, Merry rushed to the bed, and frantically ripped down the sheets. “Sit him here,” said Merry, patting the bed and punctuating his remark with a discomfited smile.
Pippin eased Frodo down, and Frodo sat, eyes again drawn to the embers of the dying fire. Pippin instinctively grasped Frodo’s hands and folded them in his lap, for no other reason than it seemed more natural than their former pose, twitching and clutching agitatedly at his sides. Pippin turned to note Merry staring at Frodo, his chest still rising and falling with unnatural speed, right hand grasping his chin as he fell into deep thought.
“No, he can’t. It can’t happen again,” muttered Merry.
Pippin snaked his arm around Frodo and pulled him protectively toward him, waiting impatiently for Merry to speak. Minutes went by, and finally Pippin broke Merry’s line of mumbling. “Shall I lay him down?”
“Shhhh!” breathed Merry. “I must think! What happened back there was serious, Pip. Frodo might have disappeared! And in his state---"
“His state?” questioned Pippin, eagerly latching on to any possibility that Merry finally understood Frodo’s terrible condition.
“His exhaustion,” continued Merry. “How would we find him? He would not run, but he might wander. How would he find us again? Pippin, can you imagine how traumatic that would be for our Frodo? We need---"
“Surely you don’t mean to bind him again!” cried Pippin. “You promised not to!”
“No,” answered Merry, “But I must keep him safe, keep him from bringing harm upon himself. He is my responsibility. I promised to protect him.”
“Then…” began Pippin.
“No,” said Merry sharply, silencing his cousin. “I have it. Pippin, bring me a needle and thread. There is some in the bureau in the parlor.”
Pippin looked confused.
“Move!” ordered Merry.
When Pippin returned, Merry sat down beside Frodo and whispered something in his ear before stitching up the collar of his shirt so that it could not be undone. Merry then leaned down and carefully attached the shirt to the trousers with a number of strategically placed stitches so that Frodo might not reach underneath.
“That should do it!” smiled Merry, but it wasn’t a happy smile and his hands still shook. “Just while he is alone.” Merry shook out the blanket and pulled it, along with the covers, up to Frodo’s chin in an abrupt, panicky motion. “Rest and awake a new hobbit! Then we shall feast as a family. I have some wine I have been saving for this occasion! I am so proud of you Frodo!”
Frodo’s eyes remained flat, open disks. Merry laughed uncomfortably and closed Frodo’s eyes with his fingers. Pippin pushed back the vision of his father doing this same thing to Old Rory after his very last fit. Pippin stood and ran toward the door as fast as his legs could carry him, feeling the walls in this room close in on him.
“Pippin,” called Merry by way of halting his cousin’s progress.
Pippin stopped, did not turn.
“Pippin, we have done a great thing today, you shall see!”
Pippin, still facing the door, nodded, unconvinced.
“Come, you need to rest as well. Come, let’s get you to bed.”
“I’d rather—“
“Come!” repeated Merry, now stern. It was no longer a request. “When your Merry says you need rest, you shall rest, for your own good. Come now, and leave your tired cousin be. Time to listen to your Merry as you used to do, for he knows best.”
Merry wrapped his arm around Pippin, ushering him out gently and rubbing his hand tenderly up and down Pippin’s tensile arm. Pippin felt uneasy, sensing his Merry was teetering on the edge of a dark terrible chasm from which there was no possible recall. Pippin willed himself to calm, consciously slowing the tempo of his breathes in vain attempt to quiet the pounding of his heart. Pippin approached Merry as one would counter a feral and unpredictable hound, calmly, apologetically, and with a fevered desire not to provoke or incite.
Merry halted before stepping through the door into the dim corridor, turning his head to take in Frodo’s still form – his eyes closed, perhaps peaceful. Merry could not know of the whirl of doubts, fears, and temptations that wrested with one another in the tempest of Frodo’s mind, for by all outside appearances, he slept.
After an overlong pause, Pippin glanced up at Merry and saw a strange glimmer in his eyes as he stared at Frodo. It seemed to Pippin that he saw lust in their depths. It was not a lust borne from the pleasures of the body, but an inexplicable longing that made it well nigh impossible for Merry to tear his gaze away.
“Merry?” whispered Pippin after another minute had passed. “IS everything alright?”
Merry blinked his eyes as if rousing from a dream and smiled at Pippin with a radiance that stole Pippin’s breath away. His pupils retracted like dark seas pulling back with the tide.
“Alright?" said Merry as if speaking from a great distance, and casting his glance back to Frodo, continued, "it is more that alright, Pip. It is perfect.”
VVVVV
Sam’s head snapped back at the sound of Merry’s footsteps, as he tried at once to disguise the nauseating eagerness in his eyes. Sam, truth be told, was more than angry, more than sore, more than anxious, and more than sad. Sam, so often cloistered away from the others and removed from his master “for safety” was lonely and had to buttress his mind constantly to keep the looming depression from closing in and suffocating the last parcel of his hope. Merry, though a malignant presence, was a presence just the same, and one who formed a critical link to his dear, abused master. For this reason alone, Sam was desperate that Merry continue to speak with him.
“Where’s Frodo?” asked Sam to the approaching footsteps. “I want to see him.”
Merry sat in the chair across from Sam. Merry’s face was open and kind, and this unnerved Sam. He did not trust it. “Frodo,” said Merry as he lit his pipe, "is resting comfortably.”
“Resting comfortably,” echoed Sam. “Tied to the bed?” Sam said the last phrase in a growl.
“No, Sam,” answered Merry – relishing the glimmer of surprise that flickered up in Sam’s eyes. “He is not bound. Nor shall he ever need to be bound again, I deem. Your master has learned to appreciate my devotion to him and is no longer intent on escaping our loving care. In fact, dear, dear Samwise, if you stood outside the door with a team of fresh ponies to bear him to Rivendell, I wager he would not go. He has learned to be happy just where he is. And, despite all your attempts to sever this bond of kin, Frodo is now happy in the bosom of his family.”
“He told you this, then?” asked Sam suspiciously, raising an eyebrow as he spoke. “All I’ve heard are Frodo’s cries after you hurt him, and none of them sounded like, let me stay.”
“He said it, Sam, but not in words!” answered Merry, visibly perturbed. “No –but in actions, Sam, actions! He is compliant. Frodo is a little weary, perhaps, and who would not be after d fighting me so hard. But it is over, Sam, and you shall see how serene your Frodo has become!”
“Yea,” said Sam, “that is indeed what I want. I want to see him. If what you say is true, then you’ve naught to fear. Bring me to him. Let me see meself.”
Merry leaned back in his chair before giving Sam an appraising look. "I've naught to fear in any case, Sam, certainly not from the likes of you." He took a long drag off his pipe, and holding it up, wordlessly offered Sam a puff. Sam nodded, hoping that his acceptance might bring him closer to seeing Frodo.
“There now,” said Merry, placing the stem in between Sam’s lips and watching with a sense of victory as Sam closed his eyes in pleasure on the inhale. But by the exhale, Sam had come back to himself, his anger intact.
“Well?” said Sam harshly. “You talk real pretty, but I want to see some action on your part. Surely you don’t reckon that I will take your word he’s happy after what you done to him. And a soft bed and hot bath today don’t make it good again, so I’m asking nice-like. Please let me see Frodo!”
Merry waited patiently for Sam to stop speaking, a small smile tugging at the ends of his mouth as one watching the petulant storming of a toddler.
“Sam, Sam,” said Merry. “You deserve nothing that I haven’t given you. Patience! Have I not explained that Frodo is resting? You wish to see him, and see him you shall, but later. I thought to surprise you, but now that you have pushed, I suppose I’ve no choice but to open out. We will be having a grand dinner this afternoon to celebrate Frodo’s homecoming and the change of heart that’s come with it! I know Frodo would very much enjoy seeing you there too. Shall you come?”
Sam burst out in an abrupt explosion of sardonic laughter. “Shall I then? You know well as me that I do or don’t by your leave. Or have you not noticed that I’m bound to a chair?”
Merry grinned, and without a word, stepped behind Sam. Anticipating some retribution for his cheek, Sam braced himself for the blow but to his amazement, the only sensation he had was the feel of cold metal grazing against his wrists. His bonds were being cut.
Merry stepped in front of Sam wearing an impish grin. “So do I have your attention now?”
Sam brought his rope-deadened hands to his chest, rubbing the life back into them and staring back at Merry with confusion. “Aye,” said Sam at last. “You have it. Though it seems you forgot the cords round my feet.”
It was Merry’s turn to snicker. “I’m generous, not a fool. But--,” Merry reached into his pocket and drew out a second pipe. “I can be even more generous if we might speak together…like normal hobbits.”
Sam nodded, reaching out for the proffered pipe and allowing Merry to light it. Lords, it tasted fine!
Merry’s eyes caught upon the torn and bleeding skin around Sam’s wrists – the inevitable result of Sam’s interminable but hopeless struggle against his bonds. “I can get you a poultice for that,” said Merry. “And if you’d stop struggling when bonds are required, the burns would heal.”
“They’d heal,” snarled Sam as he blew out a puff of smoke, “if you’d not bind me at all.”
“Which brings me to my first point," said Merry.
Sam stared straight into Merry’s eyes, searching for deception, and finding none, turned his gaze into the fire.
“I don’t like keeping you bound any more than your unfortunate master.”
“Great!” said Sam with artificial exuberance. He stuck his pipe in his mouth and leaned down to unfasten the cords attaching his legs to the chair. Barely had Sam’s hand made contact with the hemp as he felt the cold edge of a knife against his throat.
“Sit up,” ordered Merry, not angrily, but in a tone that brooked not resistance.
Sam straightened, impressed by his own pluck.
“Which brings me to my second point,” said Merry, sitting back down and leaning forward. He began toying absentmindedly with the knife on his palm, turning it over and over, sliding it between his forefinger and thumb. “I can’t trust you Sam, not yet. Not after all that has happened. But I can trust Frodo now, and that will allow changes for you, Sam.”
Sam quirked up his eyebrow, not sure if what would come next would bode good or ill.
“Good changes,” clarified Merry, “granted that you stop resisting me at every turn. You see, Sam, Frodo is home for good, and the sooner you accept that, the sooner you will be content, both with your place here and your appropriate role in Frodo’s life.”
“Which is?”
“His servant, of course,” answered Merry. After a moment he shrugged. “And his friend.”
Sam inhaled a long puff from his pipe and blew the smoke into the air between them. "And if I refuse?” he said evenly, his eyes fixed on Merry like a steel beam. “Will you let me go home?”
Merry leaned forward, his glare equally sturdy and unyielding.
“This is your home now, Sam,” he said with a sudden ferocity. “What we are discussing, or perhaps negotiating, is how pleasant your home shall be, that is, according to your actions. And Sam, that was really an empty question, for I see in your heart that you could never leave Frodo.” Merry’s expression lightened as he gazed now at Sam with something approaching respect. “You could have left Frodo a number of times, escaped, got away. But you did not. True, I drew you back the best way I knew, by the skin off my cousin's back, but you came. Your blind loyalty impresses me, Sam, it touches me. Perhaps that surprises you--though it shouldn’t. I know the depth of your love for my cousin, and if I could draw the influence of Gandalf from your mind, you would be the best friend Frodo could ever hope for." Merry stopped toying with the knife and leaned over further "But for now I may depend on this." He slid the dagger between his first two fingers, pointed directly at Sam. "– that you would leave with him or not leave at all.”
Sam was more curious than confrontational. “You no longer worry I’ll take him away then?”
“I do,” said Merry. “But I no longer worry that he will go willingly. The ponies are locked tight, and you can’t carry him far.” Merry then leaned in very close and dropped his voice to a menacing tone. “And you know that should you EVER try, that I would risk EVERYTHING in my power to drag both of you back, and that even if Frodo resisted you, it would it be himself who would pay with his blood and his spirit for your folly."
Sam’s eyes burned as Merry voiced these last statements. But Sam was still bound, and Merry was armed, and it wouldn’t go well for either himself or Frodo if he struck now. Wait, he told himself. Your time for vengeance will come.
Merry leaned back again, and smiled with self-satisfaction before standing up and removing a pouch from a small green box upon the mantle. “I hope, Sam, that when you see Frodo this afternoon, you will understand that he no longer wants to escape, and that your place, your destiny, is here by his side. I know that having you here would add to his happiness and I sincerely…" Merry sighed, "I sincerely hope that you will see this for yourself, Sam; that is, if you care about him.” Merry held up the leather pouch. “Here.”
He dropped the sack in Sam’s palm where it landed with a loud jangle. Its unexpected weight forced Sam’s hand to his lap. He looked quizzically at Merry, opened the pouch, and gasped. It was filled with gold coins, more gold than Samwise had ever seen in his whole life held at one time.
“What’s this then?” asked Sam.
“Your monthly pay,” answered Merry. “You told folk that you were coming to Crickhollow to ‘do for Mr. Frodo’ and that is precisely what you shall do. I shall pay you well, Samwise, better than any other master you could wish for." He laughed softly. "Probably more than Frodo himself pays you, if I take my best guess. Anyway, you can care for his clothing, help around the smial, with cooking, cutting wood, and, of course, planting the type of garden that will best please our Frodo. And as you prove your loyalty, you will earn your freedom, leastwise freedom of movement on these grounds. And I’d hope you would keep Frodo well cared for. All I ask, or rather demand, is that for the time being you will consider me your employer and follow my desires on any and all matters touching Frodo. What say you?”
Sam could contain his wrath no longer. He balled the pouch in his fist and with a malignant glare, announced, “You may take these damn coins,” he flung them into the fire, “and follow them into the flames! You ain’t my employer, you are my gaoler! And you ain’t Frodo’s keeper and this ain’t our home! Indeed, you hit true when you said I weren’t going to go without my Frodo, but I'll not work for you, not of my own will. And if you lay a hand on my master ‘cause this talk didn’t go the way you hoped, I will make you pay! Now let me see my master! Let me see for meself how “happy” he is under your care!’
Merry’s face flushed with rage. “You obviously care nothing for your master!” cried Merry. “And by all rights I should lean him up against the tree again for your impertinence!”
Sam grabbed the arms of his chair and tried to stand. “Don’t you--!”
“But I won’t!” yelled Merry, and clouted Sam close-fisted upon the jaw with all his might. Sam’s pipe flew from his hand and shattered to pieces near the fire. White spots danced before Sam’s eyes, yet he rejoiced that Merry was taking this out on himself and not upon his master.
“Let me see my “happy” Frodo!” repeated Sam from the pillow of his palms. “Unless you are afraid of what I might see!”
“You shall see him, Sam!” screamed Merry, his composure utterly gone. “If only just to see that I am right! I am not unkind! But by the gods, you will not rile Frodo--not if you value the skin on Frodo’s precious, battered back! And happy he shall be, despite all you have done to undermine my hard work!”
Merry bound Sam’s wrists once again before punching Sam in the gut and raging out.
VVVVV
Merry stormed down the hall to find Pippin, his own emotions in disarray. He burst into his room, expecting to find his pliant cousin asleep. But in the very spot where he’d ordered Pippin to stay, Merry saw only an empty bed with covers drawn back.
“PIPPIN!” cried Merry, seething now. Why must they all disobey me?
Merry immediately ran into Frodo’s room, pushing the door open with a hand tensed and ready for violence. Pippin was there, on the bed by Frodo, now running his small fingers through his cousin’s hair, tears streaming down his face. Pippin did not even look up to acknowledge Merry’s presence or show proper deference. Merry’s attack was ruthless and immediate.
He yanked Pippin off the bed by the hair, throwing him with disgust upon the ground. Pippin shrieked with pain and looked up in terror into the baleful eyes of his attacker. Merry's breathing was hard and ragged, but he said nothing. Instead, he glanced down at Frodo, and noticing his eyes had opened, closed them with a disquietingly gentleness. “I said sleep,” he said.
Merry pulled up by the collar and with strength unknown, dragged him from the room. Pippin neither kicked nor screamed, but went completely limp. His instinct told him to remain still and quiet until Merry’s fury played itself out. If Merry let go, he might try to make a run for it, but not now--not with Merry’s claws digging into his neck and chest not when the terrible light burned at the back of his eyes. Pippin shut his own eyes tightly, willing himself to faint. What madness had made him go into Frodo’s room and stoke Merry’s wrath?
Frodo.Yes, it was Frodo. Pippin had been curled up on Merry’s bed, just as Merry had ordered, but then, beyond hope, Pippin had heard a faint voice rising above the din in the parlor. Frodo’s voice. His fears and doubts were melted by hope as he rushed to tend his cousin. Perhaps Frodo had woken to a conscious state. Perhaps his eyes would open now and show the clear light of recognition.
Pippin had skidded through the door and hopped on the bed. Frodo, propped up on pillows, had woken, or rather his eyes had opened. But they were terrible to behold, now staring at the fire, blank, cloudy and dead, reflecting the flame that seemed to beckon to their owner.
“Frodo?” Pippin had called.
“Mine,” said Frodo tonelessly, fingering a lump under his shirt.
“It’s Pippin.”
But Frodo spoke no more and seemed to fall back into waking dreams.
“Are you cold, Frodo?” asked Pippin. “Cause if you are, I’ll fetch a blanket."
It was no use, and Pippin had found himself running his fingers through Frodo’s hair, humming nonsense tunes he thought would be soothing and, finding those ineffective, repeating Frodo’s name like a mantra while he cried.
He’d not heard Merry come in until the agony of fingers pulling out his hair and dragging him away.
Now, as his feet skidded across the floor, dragged to certain punishment, Pippin wondered if he’d do it again, useless as it had been.
Yes. For Frodo. To bring him back.
But now he’d been dumped on the bed, waiting, shaking in horror.
“Please no!” shrieked Pippin in terror. “Don’t hurt me!
Merry did not relent. His eyes narrowed and bore into Pippin, who felt that he might shatter, body and soul. Merry’s face contorted with rage, and eminently dangerous.
“I told you that you were NOT to touch Frodo!” yelled Merry in a voice shot through with barely contained fury. “I told you that you were to stay in our room and that you were to sleep!”
Merry seized Pippin’s trembling form by the forearms and threw him against the wall. Pippin shook like a leaf, cut his eyes toward the door, and let loose a shrill strangled whimper as Merry closed in on him, his hand raised and prepared to extract payment.
Pippin sank to the floor by way of avoiding the onslaught, bringing shielding hands to his face to ward off the blows that surely would come. He felt claws digging into him, wrenching him up roughly off the floor onto barely functional legs. Pippin took one furtive look into those terrible eyes and the raised fist. He quickly slammed his own eyes shut before the stroke fell, and cried out: “I DON’T DESERVE THIS!”
To Pippin's utter astonishment, he felt himself tumbling to the ground unharmed, discharged by stern, tense hands suddenly gone quite limp. Pippin dared to blink his eyes open, peeping through his lashes, and saw Merry gazing awestruck down at him, his expression complex.
“You don’t deserve this?” Merry echoed, breathing hard, his face bathed in confusion, his hands now hanging benignly at his sides.
Seeing his cousin disarmed, the words of Frodo and Sam now propelled again, desperately through Pippin's lips. “No, Merry, I don’t deserve this.”
For a moment that bordered on the magical, the old Merry seemed to drift back into Pippin's vision. His cousin sagged and seemed to shrink, dissolving from complete rage to abject confusion, as if awakening with one foot still immersed in a nightmare. Slowly, tentatively, Pippin rolled to his feet and stood beside his cousin, painstakingly moving his small hand to pat Merry, now looking forlorn, diminished, and utterly lost. Pippin felt the beginnings of a cry ripple up Merry’s spine before it burst out of his throat in a wracking torrent of sobs. Pippin stood, transfixed by his erstwhile attacker’s sudden yawning vulnerability. With a great effort of will, Pippin broke through his own stunned trance and lead his inconsolable cousin to the bed, gently sitting him down.
“I’ll fetch some tea,” said Pippin awkwardly through his cousin’s pitiful keening.
“No,” said Merry in a voice shredded by tears. “No Pip. Stay. Please.”
“I shall be right back.”
Merry voice harshened, almost automatically, but lost none of its pathos. “Stay!”
Pippin sat down heavily beside Merry and, not knowing what else to do, stared at his hands. There they sat, two damaged beings, side by side, listening to one another’s breathing as it sank from ragged gasps to a slow and steady rhythm. Minutes passed and finally Pippin spoke.
“Merry?”
“Yes, love?”
“Merry, if I wished to return home to the Smials, would you let me?”
Pippin could hear and feel Merry’s breath catch and felt Merry’s whole body tense.
“Do you wish to go? To leave me?" asked Merry in a voice so filled with sorrow that it almost sounded childlike.
“I didn’t say that,” sighed Pippin. "I just wanted to know if I ever did, if you’d allow it.”
“Are you so unhappy here?”
Pippin steadied himself, amazed at his own blunt honesty in the face of so much latent rage. He waited a few moments before answering. The silence thickened the air, making it difficult to breathe but finally, Pippin lifted his head, raised his eyes to meet those of his cousin, and spoke in a quiet but unfaltering voice.
“I am afraid of you, Merry.”
Merry’s face fell as he gathered Pippin in his arms, feeling the tautness of his muscles, the quivering of Pippin’s small body, and the unavoidable knowledge that Pippin now flinched at his touch. How did it come to this?
Merry felt Pippin begin to pull away, but Merry would not have it. He continued stroking Pippin’s curls, nuzzling his face, and whispering soothing endearments in his ear. He would do this until the end of time, until he could force serenity upon Pippin’s unwilling body, inject affection back into his blood, and suckle him back into his own controlling sphere. For an endless time, so it seemed, they sat huddled together, until at last Pippin's mental and physical exhaustion, along with his overwhelming desire to trust Merry again, compelled his tensile body into boneless relaxation.
“Dear Pip,” cooed Merry. "You’ve no need to fear me. That was never my intention.”
Pippin gingerly broke the embrace and with due caution moved away from Merry, as he found his mental clarity to be in direct proportion to his physical distance from his cousin.
“Is it your intention to answer my first question, Mer?” asked Pippin boldly but without malice. “If I did choose to go, would you give your blessing?” Pippin gasped as Merry seized his face in his hands, his eyes filled with desperate longing and more than a hint of danger.
“You can’t mean to leave, Pip! Frodo needs you, the Shire needs you. And I need you.”
“But you never seem to be satisfied with me, Merry. And apparently I haven't taken to your guidance. You’ve said it yourself! Why not let me go home for a spell now that Frodo is obedient.”
“Because you are still needed!” cried Merry, now visibly shaking. “You are my rock, and despite your mistakes, I could not carry on without you by my side. When all is closing in around me, your love and devotion are the only two things I may count on! You can’t leave me alone, Pip!”
He finger combed his cousin's hair past the point of pain, interspersing these ministrations with rib-cracking embraces.
“Pippin, dear Pippin! If you left me, I’d come undone. You'll see, Pip, I am the only thing standing between the Shire and certain doom, and it is such a lonely place!”
Pippin did not speak, but his gaze fixated up at his cousin, now cuddling him against his chest in pure, utter desperation, holding onto Pippin as if he were a lifeline amidst a cascading torrent. And Pippin felt his heart once again trump his head as he realized beyond any doubt that Merry was in deadly earnest. As his cousin continued, though, Sam’s voice surfaced in the tumult of Pippin's thoughts. Pippin, you are just as much a prisoner as we are.
“A visit, then!” said Pippin. “A short visit to let my family know that I am well.”
“No!” cried Merry, and he cradled Pippin’s face in his hands again, this time for the purpose of forcing eye contact. Darkness, sorrow, and anger battled for dominance in those gray eyes, and once again, Pippin was afraid.
“Pippin, I did not mean to scare you, but now you force my hand. I must reveal something so that you may understand what exactly is at stake here.”
“What?”
“In order to keep Frodo safe with us, I have,” Merry sucked in his breath as he hesitated. “I have betrayed some people. Some of them powerful. Some of them dangerous.”
“Dangerous?” said Pippin. “Who?”
“I cannot say!” snarled Merry in a surly tone. “You need not know! And it would make you feel no better if you did! Suffice to say that I had no choice. It had to be done! It was hard, and filled with peril, what I did. But it was for the sake of the Shire. And to save Frodo’s life – for he was not equal to the dark forces that stalked him. You will never grasp, Pippin, the heavy, hard choices that your Merry has had on his plate!”
“Will these people,” gasped Pippin, “Will they come for us?”
“They may,” said Merry flatly, and seeing the color drain from Pippin’s face, added, “But do not despair, lad!”
“But, Merry—“
“We are protected, Pippin.”
“Protected? How can you say that, Merry? We are four hobbits. What can we do against all the forces you conjure with your terrible words?”
“We have Frodo, Pippin! And therefore, we have the Ring! And nothing can harm us while we are in possession of the Ring of Power! Can’t you see, now, why it was so important to keep Frodo with us? To keep him and his gift in the Shire? To bring Frodo around, kicking and screaming if need be, to his true destiny, and to do so quickly? Frodo will be powerful, more powerful than all of our enemies combined. And as Frodo comes back to himself with a clear, unfettered mind, I shall help him wield It. But for now, Pippin, we keep It here and make our dear, precious Frodo as comfortable and happy as we may--until his time comes. Do you see now why we cannot allow ourselves to be separated? It is to save us all!”
Pippin stared at Merry, who, speaking in his wild and grandiose voice, seemed again to grow larger and more ominous as he spoke. Pippin’s eyes widened in terror, and however discomfited he had been before, newborn dread surged through him like an icy river rose and flooded his senses. Oh, Merry, Pippin’s horrified mind whispered. What have you done?
“So I need your help, Pippin. And I need your companionship, as I am so utterly alone in this. You are now my only friend of real consequence, the only one on whom I may unburden myself. I love you and I must trust you if I am to succeed in saving the Shire.” Merry, his face now glistening with sweat, his eyes nearly savage with emotion grasped onto Pippin’s shoulders and spoke with frantic urgency. “May I trust you to be loyal, Pippin, to Frodo and to me?”
Pippin stood rooted in place and made no answer. Merry shook him violently and repeated. “May I trust you, Pippin?”
Pippin nodded meekly and found himself surrounded by a crushing embrace, Merry’s tears dripping warm upon his neck. And when Merry stood, his face cleared at bit, he smiled at Pippin as a parent would, doting upon a dutiful, obedient child.
“For today,” said Merry, “I will give you a small outing, as you are the only one who can do this without compromising the lot of us.”
Pippin noted that his cousin still exuded a frenetic, nervous energy, as if his mind was still on the same tear. Pippin nodded, not having the slightest idea of what he might be agreeing to.
“I need you to go to the marketplace,” ordered Merry in quick, nervous speech, “and bring back some essentials that we need to stock up on, as we may not be able to leave here freely for some time. And, of course, I need you to shop for Frodo’s feast tonight, as I would have us celebrate with all the delights that the occasion merits! Only the best for our dear Frodo, and I will give you enough coin to buy it.”
With that, Merry stepped over to his writing desk. He reached in the desk drawer and tossed a cloth pouch, heavy with coin, to Pippin. He caught the bag with awkward hands and nodded, the pallor still hanging heavily upon his face.
“Good lad!”
Merry sat down and scratched out a list on a piece of parchment, all the while wearing a look of intensity upon his face, his hands shaking as he wrote. He folded the parchment hastily and stuffed it indecorously into Pippin’s coat pocket. “Now, come! We have no time to sleep! Get your cloak, and I shall fetch the pony trap. Go and come back as quickly and unobtrusively as you may!”
Pippin watched Merry dash out the bedroom and through the front door, giving Sam no more than a cursory warning glance before slamming the door behind him.
Pippin stumbled on after him, pulling his cloak over his head, and attempting the same maneuver past Samwise. Sam, seeing that Pippin was being allowed to leave Crickhollow, cast the hobbit a pleading, desperate glance. It was a glance that begged Please! Tell someone! Get help!
Pippin met Sam’s eyes, his own filling with tears. He knew what Sam would ask of him, and and on the surface it seemed so simple, so safe. But Merry’s words had injected the outside world with a peril that seemed to leer down from the clouds. Powerful people. Dangerous people. And though Pippin, while he locked eyes with Sam, tried to convince himself that he planned to return out of loyalty to Frodo, he know this was a lie. He would return because he was horribly terribly afraid.
In Pippin’s fear-rounded eyes, Sam was confronted with a bitter despondency that, even through the worst of their trials, he had not yet seen. Pippin paused, and with an abject, spiritless expression, jerked his head miserably from side to side, mouthing “no” before bursting through the door and leaving Sam in silence.
VVVVV
Pippin sat uncomfortably in the cart, his mind whirling with dark thoughts, as he stared into the trees. Merry climbed up beside him, and taking both of Pippin's cold hands in his own, gazed firmly into his eyes. Pippin shuddered, as the flame was back in Merry’s eyes and it seemed that Merry’s face was closed to him again, stern and unfamiliar.
“Pippin,” said Merry, his voice intimate, yet at once glacial and remote. “Answer no questions. Tell no one your destination. And by the stars, say nothing of Frodo, Sam, or myself. Understand, lad?”
Pippin nodded and felt his stomach clench. He again looked down at his own hands to avoid Merry’s eyes. Merry let loose Pippin’s hands, gripped his chin, and forced eye contact. Those eyes made Pippin feel as if he were being stabbed with daggers.
“And, Pip, I shall remind you that if you should entertain the idea of fleeing and leaving us twisting in the wind, I will have you hunted down like a coney. Just as I have enemies that are unknown to you, so I also have allies, some more savory than others. And when they find you, and Pip, they would find you--they will drag you back to me where you will face wrath, pain and despair as you cannot dare to imagine. You lost the ability to abandon me the moment you signed on to our conspiracy! And you have Frodo’s blood on your hands, just as I do – thus you share my responsibility for him as well. You are indeed a part of me, and I have no intention of letting that part of me go, ever.”
Merry punctuated this last chilling statement by tracing Pippin’s pert nose with his finger. Pippin quaked helplessly in his seat, gooseflesh erupting along his arms as he remembering a night long before when Merry had rubbed his nose the same way. But that had been from affection, or so he had thought. What Merry's motivations were now, he shuddered to think.
“See how important I deem you, Pip, that I would go to such lengths to keep you by my side? I will make you happy, if you would have it so, but I must keep you obedient at all costs. I will not hesitate to hurt you to save you, just as I have done with Frodo. So have a care, Peregrin!”
Pippin fought to keep himself upright as Merry leapt down, slapped the pony to spur him on, and ran to open the gate. As the gate closed behind him, Pippin pulled to the side of the road, leaned over and vomited. Later, as his pony trotted cheerfully down the road, Pippin wondered when the ground below him might open up and swallow him whole.