A/N: I have been wanting to write this fic for a long while. I hope that it is satisfying!
They are (they were) so young.
Gandalf remembers. He sees eager faces and sparkling eyes, and these are beardless hobbits, barely handy with a weapon—they come from hills, not from mountains—
(Yet much is the same. Gandalf has walked this path before, heard laughter not so very different, and Gandalf saw darkness fall on lives that had thrived on nothing but light.)
"Far too young for this expedition," he mutters to Elrond, and there is a curious look on the elf-friend's fair face.
"It is not the first time I have heard those words from your lips, Mithrandir."
(He had not thought it possible for them to seem younger, until he saw them as they lay upon their tombs, resplendent in mail not strong enough to save them, bedecked with jewels that shone not half so brightly as their smiles had.)
"Fool of a Took," he snaps at Pippin. "Throw yourself in next time!" And what he means is go home, little one, before the day comes when I cannot save you.
("They are dead," Bilbo said, and he pressed his battered hands against his mouth, stifling a sob. "They fell with him." And Gandalf knew—knew that this quest would end in bloodshed, but even he, the aged wizard…he had not let himself think that it would be them.)
"We're fighters, all of us!" Merry cries one day, when the road grows darker and their small fire is but little comfort.
(A noble death. Theirs was a noble death. But it did not seem so, when their mother fell to her knees by the stones that bore their names, and the halls of all their fathers echoed with her cries.)
"I didn't think it would end like this," Pippin murmurs, half a world later, and he is young, still, and doubtless he is reckless, but some of the light has faded from his eyes.
And Gandalf sighs. He has walked this earth longer than many can remember, but his words of comfort taste like sorrow in his mouth. "End?" he says, very softly indeed. "Oh, the journey doesn't end here…"
(They could see the Mountain. Thorin rose and led and spoke of bravery and mighty deeds, and their troubles seemed past. But Gandalf saw that Kili was pale, and his face was shadowed, even though the sun was warm on the Eagles' carrock.
Gandalf laid a hand on his shoulder.
"I thought…I thought—" and it was unlike Kili to stutter, to be uncertain of his words. He looked down at his hands, which were bruised from their recent skirmishes. "I thought it was the end," he whispered.
"End?" Gandalf said, and he shook his head. "No, the journey doesn't end, not like that. There is death—but death is merely another path, and we all find our way along it. It is not to be feared.")
(He had thought himself wise.)