Author's notes: I have "The Two Towers" but I was just too lazy to refer to it. So the conversations of Treebeard and some other information may be wrong. Sorry about that.
As always, please review.
The Fellowship Of The…Baby?
Thirteen: The Ents Of Fangorn Forest
Merry, Pippin and Gaelin, having escaped from Orthanc and Saruman, were unsure of where to turn, or where the rest of their friends would be, though they had no doubt that Aragorn would be chasing after them.
And having nowhere else to go—for they knew little of the world outside the Shire—they turned west and started on, constantly giving most of the little food they found to the babe.
After almost four days of traveling, the Hobbits found that they had traveled less than they had hoped, for the weight of Gaelin and the babe's constant need to explore things slowed them down.
The sight of a forest greeted them, and the Hobbits entered it, grateful for some shade from Anor. Yet as they trekked deeper in search of water, the air, though calm, became heavy, almost stifling so, and the Hobbits panted.
"Well!" Merry exclaimed once they had stopped for a rest. "There are no Orcs here, that's for sure! If this forest isn't so stifling, I almost felt that I could like it!"
And to their fear and surprise, a voice from behind them boomed: "Hoom! Well, almost, eh? Then I might almost feel as if I could like you! But let's not be hasty. Turn around slowly."
Merry and Pippin felt large but gentle hands turn them around, and they were afraid of what they would see, but Gaelin whirled around and stared, for he had not seen trees that could speak. His small mouth opened and closed wordlessly as he pointed and went, "Gaaaa!"
"Well now!" boomed the tree-like figure before them, and they could see that he was of a very old age indeed. "Who might this babe be? And what are you folks doing here?"
"This is Gaelin," Pippin said, gesturing at the baby. "This is my cousin Meriadoc Brandybuck, and I am Peregrin Took. Merry and Pippin will do."
"Now you are hasty folks indeed! But it is unwise to give your names so easily."
"We do not fear to give our names," said Merry. "And might yours be?"
"Ho, hoom! Well now, it wouldn't be very proper to speak of my real name so hastily, and neither could you speak it in your tongue…you may call me Treebeard, and I am an Ent."
"We're Hobbits," answered Merry, "from the Shire." He committed the Ent's name to his memory.
Gaelin tottered forward and hugged the leg of Treebeard, which looked as if it was smooth bark, and the Ent didn't seem to mind.
"Now tell me, what may you folks be doing here?"
"We were taken by Saruman, and we are now lost," Pippin spoke.
"The young Istari Curúnir?" Treebeard asked. "It has been long since I have last seem him. He was always polite to me."
"Polite?" Pippin exclaimed. "He took us as prisoners and might have killed us had we not escaped! And those Orcs of his…" The Hobbit shuddered.
"Curúnir is taking prisoners now, eh? Hoom!" Treebeard's voice became harder. "But come! Lost, you say? I will take you where you can rest, and you will tell me more of what goes on in Isengard, for I see smoke of black ever rising from it these days."
"Thank you, Treebeard!" Merry said. "We were in need of rest and food."
"Were you now? Ho! I will take you upon my shoulders, and one of you can carry the babe."
"Won't you be tired?" Pippin asked.
"Hm? No, hoom! You will be light as a leaf to me." With that, Treebeard lifted each Hobbit onto his shoulders, and reached for Gaelin who clung to him still, handing the babe to Merry. "Please watch the babe, young Merry, for he does seem to like to water me even as we speak."
***
Treebeard carried the Hobbits and Gaelin for over 2000 Ent-strides (that was what he told them anyway), but Merry couldn't judge how far they had traveled, for they didn't know how far one Ent-stride was.
As night fell, Treebeard set them down in a clearing where a river flowed. Mushrooms and flowers glowed green and yellow in the dark. The Ent gave them some cool liquid he had taken from a barrel set aside, and called it Ent draught.
Merry and Pippin took long gulps of the drink, and fed Gaelin a little at a time for fear that he would choke, except that he didn't, and it was the Hobbits who almost choked when Gaelin suddenly bounced on his bottom and startled them both. The draught was cool, yet a little spicy at the same time, and it was of a freshness that quenched their thirst and brought a coolness to their bodies.
And when they had finished the draught, Treebeard gave to them some food, and when all of them were filled, they lay down to sleep. Well, all except Treebeard, of course, who stood in a corner and slept like that.
***
Treebeard awoke ere dawn broke, and gave his arms a stretch, and felt small movement where his feet were, and looked down; seeing Gaelin curled up within the splays of roots he called his toes, he smiled.
Yet when the Ent tried to move to pick the babe up, he tripped over and almost fell on Gaelin, but managed not to with a desperate twist of his tree-like body. After he had hit the mossy ground, he saw what the cause of his fall was: his toes had been intertwined together.
A scowl formed on his face (he had not scowled for longer than his Entish memory could think of), and he glanced down at the just waking figure at his feet, having a feeling of whom the culprit was.
As Merry and Pippin awoke as well, Treebeard managed to shake Gaelin off gently, though what he wanted to do was to shake the babe hard. Yet, he had not the heart to do so.
"Come! I will take you to my home, and call for an Enting. If what you said about Curúnir is true, he is a friend no longer." As Treebeard once again picked them up and placed them upon his shoulder, he rumbled as if in embarrassment. "Hoom! And please keep the babe from watering me with his mouth."
***
Aragorn, Boromir, Legolas and Gimli had found the tracks of the Orcs in Rohan, and though they had not overtaken the foul creatures, they had recognized the White Hand of Saruman, and now hastened towards Isengard.
Yet when they were half a day from Isengard and rested in the wild, Legolas, ever the Woodland Elf, had spotted new tracks—those of Hobbits, he had claimed.
The tracks bewildered them, and it took the four a while of arguing for them to come to an agreement that Merry, Pippin and Gaelin had somehow escaped from Isengard.
Aragorn and Legolas led the way, for they knew how to look for tracks. The mud was soft, and the tracks plenty and relatively easy to follow. Yet, there was a point that confused them, and Aragorn was bewildered, for the tracks of a human babe (Gaelin, they guessed) rain in a circle continuously, with the Hobbit tracks overlapping them at many points.
The Ranger peered at the circular tracks, going a little cross-eyed trying to figure out what Gaelin and the Hobbits had been doing, for the ground hardened, and tracks were not there. Legolas called to him that he had found footsteps that led to the forest hither.
"That is Fangorn Forest," Boromir hissed. "We would do well not to go there!"
"Yet the tracks lead that way, Son of Gondor," said Gimli. "We must chance legends for our friends." The Dwarf started to walk off.
"Come, Aragorn!" Legolas called back to his friend.
"Hold a moment! Come here, Legolas." The Elf joined the Man. "What do you think Gaelin and the Hobbits might have been doing, running in a circle like that?"
"Confusing us, it seems!" Legolas said sharply as he also went a little cross-eyed staring at the imprints of footprints all messed up. "Now let us go!"
Aragorn rose and hurried after the three, shaking his head to uncross his eyes and trying to get Gaelin's tracks from his mind.