Disclaimer: Nearly all of these characters were created by Professor J.R.R. Tolkien, whom I greatly esteem. No disrespect whatsoever is intended to Prof. Tolkien in anything I may write, and I make no profit from any of these stories.
CHAPTER TWO
SR 1484
Brandy Hall
We've been at it all day, Sariadoc and I, and I'd be quite willing to swear--on the Red Book, if necessary--that all we have to show for our work is a blistering headache (on my part; my son remains quite fresh and unruffled) and a teetering stack of documents grown several inches higher than when we began. Not for the first time in my life, I curse the Hobbit love of ceremony in all things: the ribbons, the seals, the seven signatures in red ink, all necessitating one of us to pop his head out the study door and nab whichever unsuspecting relation, lettered servant or unwary visitor happens to pass by at the given moment. Quite a motley assortment of witnesses we've acquired so far, and I do believe we've now managed to thoroughly annoy every Hobbit currently sheltering beneath Buck Hill.
Sariadoc remains serene through it all, which I might have expected, really. He has his mother's pleasant, useful nature. I was never exactly certain whether, in his teens and tweens, he was entirely devoid of my own youthful wickedness, or merely so innocent in appearance that he never caught the blame for any mysterious bit of boyish naughtiness that took place round and about the Hall..
My grandfather, Old Rory, often told me that if ever a boy was born to be whipped, it was I--though it must be said, he never raised so much as a hand to me. Actually, knowing Rory, the words may well have been meant as a compliment. As everything Rory said in his later years was delivered in a gruff, booming voice (my grandfather having grown rather hard of hearing), accompanied by a steely stare from beneath fierce, bristling brows, one could scarcely be sure.
My mum, Esmeralda Brandybuck, put things differently: she said that I'd been born with mischief on my face but goodness in my heart, and however many pranks I pulled in my younger days, I'd always tried to prove her right in that. Incorrigible I might have been, but never, I hope, unkind.
Esmeralda was a Took, and Tookish through and through, heart and bones. Her eyes were moss-green, as most Tooks' are, indeed almost the same color as Pippin's eyes, and her mouth was like his too, with the little bow in the middle part and the small curls at the corners, made for smiling. The resemblance isn't at all surprising really, considering my mum and Pip's dad were brother and sister, and alike as two peas in a pod. Sariadoc resembles them as well, I think, with not a trace of Bolger about him, and more Took than Brandybuck to his face, though with eyes of blueish-grey, like mine, and his hair like mine once was (and is still, for the most part), a honey- brown. Indeed, I was once considered inordinately fair, for a Hobbit, in those old days, before so many of our young ones were born golden-haired.
"Dad," a patient voice calls, and not for the first time, I suspect. A filled pipe--my good old one, with the pearl mouthpiece, that Bilbo gave me at Rivendell--appears over my shoulder, and I realize that Sariadoc has caught me out, writing in these pages when I ought to be working. Shamefaced, I accept the pipe from his hand, and the light he offers me as well. I'll return later, I think, after smoking a companionable pipe with my son to banish the dreariness of the past hours. No more business for today!
I've a story to tell instead, one Frodo gave me some parts of, and my dear mum others, and in which I do not appear, unless it is as a thought, or a hope, or a wish.
The Tale of the Master's Heir's Wife, and How She Did Not Run Away
21 Winterfilth, SR 1381
The Brandywine
When the time came near for Mistress Esmeralda Brandybuck of Brandy Hall to celebrate her forty-fifth birthday, she carefully reminded no one at all--in fact, she quite hoped, with every bit of Tookish contrariness in her soul, that not a one of the shirttail relatives or relations-by-marriage with whom she passed her days would happen to remember that the twenty-second day of the month of Winterfilth had, in the past, occassioned any doings of a celebratory nature.
Frankly, however, she doubted her ability to attract such good fortune. She was, after all, wife to the heir of the Master of the Hall, and as such a person of importance. At the very least, there would be feasting and music, dancing and merriment, ale quaffed and toasts given, the whole proceedings crowned by the appearance of a cake fairly blazing with its forty-five candles, followed by presents handed out by the bushel-load. Through it all she would be expected to smile, to laugh, to accept with every appearance of joy the kisses and complements showered upon her.
The twenty-second arrived tomorrow, in fact, and despite the whispers that ceased when she entered a room, the mysterious cracklings of paper behind closed doors and the secretive grins. Esme understood that plans had been made, and were she present, she would have to enjoy them. The festivities were meant well, she KNEW, and intended to make her happy, but she could not BE happy, not just then, despite all the tender looks, the gentle sighs of "Poor Esme, dear, it will be better soon," or all the parties in the great, wide world.
Sorrow was contrary to Hobbit nature, just as it's in the nature of those who love us to want to take our sorros away.. She made her family uncomfortable, and Esme regretted that it must be so.
She should not be outside at all just now. Not so soon, in the Autumn cold and damp, with her toes squelching into the mud of the riverbank as she shifted from foot to foot, trying to decide what in the Shire she ought to do.
"Lawks,:" she said, which was a low expression, a ridiculous expression, really, and one not befitting a gentlehobbit like herself (Mother Menegilda would say) picked up from her old nurse and never completely abandoned. "What will Saradoc think of me?"
And what indeed WOULD her husband think if he saw her now, shivering beside the Brandywine in a pair of his old breeches? As a lass, she'd often dressed in lad's clothes for a lark, the better to keep up with her brother Dinny on his escapades. And why not? She could run far and fast, climb any tree in the Shire, or toss a stone as well as any lad and better than most. She'd been the first one of their circle to smoke an entire pipeful of weed without going sick, the first to swim the Brandywine at that fast place and come out laughing on the other side. Saradoc had admired her very much, in those days before she'd failed him, and they weren't truly so very far behind her, were they? How could they be, when such emotions still crowded inside her?
How had she managed to wed her childhood friend, the boy who'd so hero-worshiped Esme the Strong, Esme the Fearless, and still wound up an old married lady, responsible for the welfare of a teeming (and ever increasing) swarm of Hobbit-folk? When had all the adventures ended and the dull rounds of responsibility begun? Why couldn't they all just be responsible for themselves?
Except that it wasn't the responsibility that troubled her, really. When had she ever shrunk from any challenge? It was that she'd tried, and failed, at the one thing in the world she and her Saradoc wanted most, the thing any grown-up Hobbit lass in the Shire could accomplish--tried and failed again, and again and again. Five times failed, until her confidence had broken and the sorrow swept in to overwhelm her, like the Autumn Floods swamping the banks of the Brandywine.
Esme wrapped her husband's old green coat tighter round herself, commanding her body to cease its shivering. She'd come near one of her favorite places on the river now: down below Buck Hill and out of eyeshot of the Hall's windows, tucked beneath an ancient willow whose foliage, in the Summer months, created a green cave filled with light, perfect for lying on one's back and eating apples, gazing up at the scraps of cloud and blue sky tossed between the rustling leaves.
In Winter, or almost-Winter, as it was now, the branches hung straight and bare, like some water-creature's drawn-out hair in one of the old stories. Still, Esme ducked beneath their curtain to step inside, her footsteps as soundless as any Hobbit's would be on a wet riverbank. All around her, the withies whispered softly in the wind, a curtain of secrets, ever-moving.
One secret hidden there, however, kept quite still, or as still as a little Hobbit can be, on a cold day, when weeping alone beneath a willow tree. Esme felt herself freeze, motionless as any doe of the forest scenting danger--but there was no danger here, only a small back curved over with sadness, shaking silently. The lad's dark curls had gone flat with the wet, and more damp crept up the back of his trousers, as it will when one plants oneself without protection on a sodden riverbank. On the whole, she'd didn't think she'd ever come upon a lad more miserable, or more lonesome.
Careful now, not wishing to startle the lad in his grief, Esme moved forward, but for all her care, it seemed the little one heard her approach. His head whipped round, a pair of eyes bluer than any she'd ever seen blazing out at her. "Why can't you just leave me a...?" he began, his voice sharp with anger and childishly high, as Esme, startled, staggered backward a step.
"Frodo?" she breathed. Indeed, she should have known him at once: this was Primula's lad, after all, and Primula Brandybuck had been her staunchest friend at the Hall. "Frodo Baggins?"
In a breath, all the fire seemed to go out of him. The startling eyes dropped, and in the soft, dull voice she only half remembered, on the edges of a hundred polite responses, he answered, "Yes'm. Cousin Esme, I mean to say."
Her own voice transformed to the voice of the almost-Mistress of Brandy Hall. "Frodo, what on earth are you doing out here? You'll catch your death."
The lad squelched up a handful of riverbank mud, then opened his fingers and let it drop. "Nothing," he answered, in the same dead, quiet tone. His nails, Esme noticed, were quite bitten down, to the quick and beyond, and now crusted with mud as well. Who looked after this sad little Hobbit? she wondered with a start. Menegilda? Someone amongst the aunts and uncles and cousins? Why should any child of Brandy Hall look so absolutely forlorn?
"Have the other children left you alone, Frodo?" she asked gently. Could it be she'd stumbled across some game of hide-and-go-seek?
She realized, then, that poor Frodo was, in absolute fact, the only actual child IN the family at this time. Yes, there was little Berilac, Merimac's boy, but he was no more than a baby, and the newest one, Merimas, even younger. Perhaps Frodo played with the children of the servants, or the artisans, or visited the farms round about, but somehow Esme doubted this was the case.
"Other children?" the lad echoed, in much the same tone he might have used if she'd asked if he wanted to go see a dragon next door.
"Ah." Nonplused, Esme took a seat beside Frodo on the bank, swinging her legs out over the water. The soggy mud quickly soaked through her breeches, just as it had through his, squelchily unpleasant against her skin, and even colder than she had imagined. The Brandywine swirled beneath her feet, dark and tempestuous.
"Do you know," she told Frodo, "That this spot is called 'the hole in the river?' I was warned against it as a child, when I first visited here."
"This is where my parents drowned," Frodo answered. "Or near here. Quite close by, I think. Something overturned the boat and my father fell in and my mum tried to save him but she got caught." His hand, delicate and pale, despite the grime, made a swirling gesture over the water. "Or her dress was too heavy. They tell the story a great many different ways."
"It's called gossip," Esme responded. "Only some of it's true. The rest..." She shrugged her shoulders. "Isn't. It's hard not to let it trouble you."
"Yes." Frodo nodded, though with which of her statements the lad was agreeing, Esme couldn't exactly be sure. A silence fell between them, but not an uncomfortable one.
"You were going to have a baby," said the lad at last, looking not at her, but out across the Brandywine.
"Yes," Esme agreed. "I was."
The blue eyes turned to her once more. "Are you sad?"
"Yes," she answered, around the lump that had formed, instantly, in her throat. "I'm very, very sad."
Frodo gave another nod. "So am I."
"I thought so," Esme said quietly. "Are you running away?"
"Yes," he told her, in a tone that brooked no argument. "Are you?"
"I thought I'd go to Bree." Esme dipped her toes in the icy river, feeling its chill currents catch and pull at her skin. "Or perhaps even further."
"I'm going to Rivendell," Frodo informed her. Slowly, his small, cold hand crept over, until it lay against her own. "To see the Elves. Like Cousin Bilbo."
Carefully, tenderly, Esme rubbed the half-frozen little fingers. "I think I should like that," she answered. "To see the Elves. May I come along?"
Frodo considered this. "Yes," he told her. "If you like. We might have great adventures." He climbed to his feet, his hand still clasped in Esme's, as warmly as it might be..
"We might very well," she agreed. "I am a Took, you know. We're known for adventuring."
"Are you?" The lad considered further. "That's all right then." He waited patiently as Esme rose, clumsier than he, and equally muddy. " Do you think we ought to have our tea first, Cousin?"
"I think, perhaps, that might be wise." Esme held back the willow withies to let Frodo pass below. "We ought to discuss our provisioning, as well."
"Yes," the lad replied gravely. "We ought. And it might be best to set out tomorrow, as it will be dark soon."
Hand-in-hand, they climbed the slippery path to Brandy Hall, pausing outside the East Door to brush the worst of the mud from one another's clothes. By the time they'd finished, Frodo was nearly smiling, and Esme found herself laughing aloud.
Frodo opened the door gravely, waiting until his cousin had passed through before he followed. Once inside, he hung his muddy coat gently on the peg. "I really will travel to Rivendell one day, Cousin Esme," he told her.
Esme brushed the wet hair back from his startling eyes. His face was fine and pale beneath her touch, as if Frodo were some changeling Elf-child, rather than a Hobbit lad. "I loved your mum, you know, Frodo," she whispered, like a secret. "She was my very dearest friend."
He nodded. "I remember, a little. I do. Only it gets harder. Do you think the Elves sail away because it hurts too much for them to remain here, Cousin? Do Elves hurt the way we do? I can't imagine they have gossip, or those LOOKS."
Esme closed her eyes, thinking of the five times now she'd felt so very, very sad, and wishing there WAS some safe harbor one could steer one's little boat to, in order to escape such pain. "I don't know, love," she answered at last. "Maybe they feel it more than we Hobbits do, and that's why they've been given such a special place."
Frodo's small, dirty hands reached up to touch the wetness on her cheeks. "When you have a little lad," he said, " I'll be his friend as well as his..." The lad's face screwed up in concentration, as he tried to work out the relationship. "...As his first cousin, once removed. I won't ever let him feel alone, or frightened."
For just a moment, their eyes met, and they understood one another very well indeed.
"I know you will, Frodo," Esme told him at last, softly, in that rare moment of silence within the bustle of Brandy Hall. "I know you will."
And Frodo kept his word.