Disclaimer: J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Peter Jackson, New Line/Warner - they own it all.
Warnings: *Spoilers for The Hobbit: BOFA - if you don't know how the book ends. Major character deaths. All-round angst.
A/N: For a little HKM prompt wherein Frodo becomes the reincarnation of Thorin Oakenshield - only here rather ambiguously filled. Bagginshield, if you squint. Hope you all enjoy this!
There is nothing more to say when the last words are breathed into the space between them on the end of a choked off gasp. Death had come for claim, and time is a serpent's tail winding tight, inexorable as only the constant can be.
Hands claw and arms tremble, and blood gurgles up a ruined throat in one last fight for breath. There are smears all over the both of them, dark red and grey grime, but wearied eyes flicker open and they reflect in that summer sky blue, only now a sea of pain and loss.
It's all right, he thinks to say, it's all right, I'm here, I'm right here.
But no words form, as cobalt eyes dim and slide shut.
If more of us valued food and cheer and song, above hoarded gold.
No, no more words.
Instead, he hums into the silence the tune of his childsong, that sung at his birth, an autumn song for a faunt born to russet trees and harvest fields.
Farewell.
He cradles the body close until the blood warmth leeches out and turns to cold stone, crimson to alabaster, flesh to rock.
Then, into rock, and under rock, to slumber evermore in grey veil and shadow.
He decides that he has had quite enough of mountains.
There is nothing more for him here; his world now lies ahead, there, over to the kindlier West. The roads may go on, but he has wandered far enough, strayed close enough to the edge, looked for and found more than he had ever wanted to. It is time to stop now, and to turn back.
He is quite ready for home.
And your memories never fade.