Disclaimer: I am not profiting in any way from my use of J.R.R. Tolkien's world and characters, nor do I have his permission to use them in my own writings, as he is dead.
Author's Note (first publication): My 4th grade Sunday school teacher said once that the best ideas come to him either while he is sitting on the toilet or in the shower. That was possibly a bit too much information from a fat, ugly, middle-aged man, but it's true. Don't worry, this was a shower idea, not a toilet one. I am in the middle of The Return of the King for the first time reading it, and I do not know what happens next after Faramir is grievously injured and Denethor is convinced he's dead and is mourning full-time at his bedside. I could very easily find out what happens next, but this is an interesting little vignette of "what if" imaginings that I really wouldn't write if I knew the course of events after where I am in the book. I know perfectly well it doesn't work this way; I'm just having "what if" fun.
Author's Note (second publication): Well, I reread my story – having finished the books and appendices, reopened them and reread several parts, and flipped through The Silmarillion – and realized that a) Elbereth is not an Elf, but one of the Valar and b) that Pippin wouldn't have known that the "Elbereth Gilthoniel" poem thing happened to Frodo or Sam several times. Well, there was little I could do to repair that particular inaccuracy without losing the story. I made some fixes, but left the middle-of-the-book-shower-idea vignette mostly the way it was.
Pippin's Song
Pippin, as usual, felt very shunted aside. He was always standing in the corner and waiting for Denethor to tell him to do something or another; although he could summon servants and tell people to go away (what authority!), he felt, as always, quite helpless.
He didn't want to give up, as Denethor had, on Faramir. Denethor, naturally, felt very guilty about his favoritism toward his older son now that his younger, wayward son was dying. Pippin sort of knew how the old, haggard, weary man felt. He felt very much responsible for Boromir's untimely death, because he knew that the courageous Man, though distrusted by the other members of the Fellowship because of his obvious interest in the Ring, had died defending Merry and Pippin, his only real friends in the Company. Pippin had felt far more comfortable with Boromir than with any of the other Big People in the Fellowship (save Gandalf) because though lordly and dignified, Boromir was very charismatic…and human. Pippin and Merry could tackle him in play because they did not risk the wrath of Isildur's heir, the True King of Gondor, the Elvenly angelic Elessar (etc., etc.); and one simply does not gang up on an Elf such as Legolas; but Boromir was a kind man, the sort of ruler who would feel for the lowliest of peasants. Boromir must have felt that he had failed in even the last task he had undertaken: attempting to save his small, clueless, hopeless friends from capture.
Boromir had died because of Pippin, and there had been nothing he could do.
He did not want to repeat the experience with Faramir.
So shunted aside, as always, in the corner, Pippin strove silently for a way to help – to do something – anything. A miracle was what he needed, the sort that even Gandalf could not provide.
Frodo got miracles every once in a while. The Ring-bearer, of course, was entitled. He had said something on Weathertop just before the Lord of the Ringwraiths stabbed him with the Morgul knife, and Frodo had needed his dark enemies thwarted…the name of a deity of some sort…what was it?
"O Elbereth Gilthoniel,"
Pippin whispered, inaudible to the bent old man by his son's side. The hobbit waited for the rest of the words of the prayer in Elvish to come, unfamiliar and meaningless to the lips that uttered them, but sounding right, somehow, able to drive away darkness with the pure light and goodness of the Valar – though the enemies that Pippin now fought may need more than just the utterance of the name of a goddess to be foiled.
No words came.
Maybe you have to be burdened with the One Ring, Pippin thought frantically; he was not ready to despair but extremely close to needing to. Maybe you have to know some Elvish. I do! he replied to himself, half-angrily. I can say 'A star shines on the hour of our meeting.' Ellen see-la loo-men something-or-other.
What's so special about Elvish, anyway? I can make up my own miracle. And Westron will have to do, he added irritably to the spirit of Elbereth; it's what we hobbits speak.
O Elbereth Gilthoniel,
he began again, silently. A rhyme…
Wherever it is that you may dwell…
Help me now with more than just your name.
What rhymes with 'name'? Shame, blame, tame, game, same… He wasn't going to get anywhere with that line. Oh, he wished he could rhyme as effortlessly as Bilbo.
A Elbereth Gilthoniel,
Wherever it is that you may dwell,
Help me now with more than just…
A poem? Nothing rhymes with poem. A song? Hmm…long, strong, dong (?). Nah. A rhyme!
A Elbereth Gilthoniel,
Pippin invoked silently, calling to the great Lady only with his mind.
Wherever it is that you may dwell:
Help me now with more than just a rhyme.
Help me heal him now…it's not his time.
Author's Note (not tired of hearing from me yet, are you? At least I don't insert them uninvited in the middle of the fic): If you enjoyed this story, I recommend that you sample some of my other contributions to the world of fanfiction, because I desperately need reviews. For adorers of the Merry-and-Pippin Dynamic Duo, I suggest "Meant to Be," a terminally cute vignette (and an idea I did not have while sitting on the toilet, incidentally). I specialize in hobbit-angst, so if you also like Frodo- or Sam-angst, you might peruse some of my works. Thank you for your – ah – consideration and/or tolerance.