Moria's Revenge, Chapter 17: Interludes
Authors: Kookaburra & Llinos
Boromir sat watching Pippin and Icicle. In the moonlight, the warg truly looked her name, with her white coat turning sparkling silver. After Aragorn had finally succumbed to weariness (and the other's pleas) he and the rest of the company had retired for the night, with Boromir taking first watch.
Pippin whimpered in his sleep, and Icicle woke, nuzzling and licking him until the hobbit settled with a sigh. Boromir smiled to himself. The periain woke protective urges in everyone and everything they met it seemed. When Boromir first came across the halflings in Rivendell he was inclined to judge them by their appearance, treating them like children rather than adults. Indeed they sometimes seemed to behave in a childish fashion, loving to eat and play and so naïve and trusting.
Of course as he travelled with them he came to realise they were full- grown adults - except little Pippin. He had not yet reached his majority and in him the wide-eyed innocence was even more apparent. Which made what had happened even harder to bear. However good the healing, whatever charms the elves could weave, the little one had lost his pure and simple innocence forever.
Boromir hoped fervently that Pippin could at least find his trust in people again. The man of Gondor looked up at the moon, vowing to her that the trust would not be misplaced.
Pippin whimpered again, and this time Icicle could not comfort him, though she licked him and curled around him tighter than ever.
Boromir eased himself up, and walked over to the unlikely pair. Patting Icicle on the head, he lowered his muscular frame down on the ground beside her. Then, in what he knew to be a calming feeling for all species, he began to stroke Pippin's ear. In moments the hobbit had calmed down. Boromir looked back up at the silver orb in the sky and recalled a lullaby from his childhood long ago.
On a sea of dreams
your ship gently sails,
Softly it glides,
as the moon above pales,
O'er the mirror-smooth tides
cross the star-studded mere.
Your galleon glides,
to a land without fear.
As stars blend with the sky
there you will go,
Where you no longer cry
and no tears will flow.
****
Frodo stirred in his sleep. He opened his eyes a crack. Something had disturbed him. He looked at Sting, and the blade was dull. Yet he had heard something. Or thought he had. The night-shadows had fallen about him, and the clearing was dim. Often on the road away from Moria he had thought he heard the quick patter of feet. Even now he heard it. He turned his head swiftly. There were two tiny beams of light at the forest's edge, or for a moment he thought he saw them, but they turned aside at once and vanished.
-J.R.R. Tolkien (mostly)
****
Legolas shifted position on his perch. He was seated on a rock above Pippin, where he could easily reach the sleeping perian if need be. For the moment, Pippin was quiet. When Boromir had woken the elf, he warned Legolas that Pippin had become restless several times during the night.
The elf slowly became aware that he was being watched. After scanning the forest eaves, but seeing nothing, he finally looked down at his feet. A pair of golden eyes looked up at him. Legolas smiled to himself. //So it's just you, Milady.// Feeling in need of some comfort himself, he decided to enter her mind again. The protectiveness the warg felt for them all was a soothing balm on Legolas' soul, and he longed to feel the motherly tenderness after such a trying day.
Anchoring himself in his body, he sent out a tendril to Icicle, while at the same time blanketing her mind with calmness. Though at first he had thought her animal mind disorganised and confusing, he now felt relief in its simplicity.
:?: She sent.
Legolas formed a picture of himself snuggled up to her. A sense of amusement manifested. Legolas was startled; he had never thought animals to be capable of that. Yet he remembered with chagrin some of the falls he had taken when he first learned to ride, and some of the whinnies the horses would sound in his direction. He decided that it was time to see where her loyalties lay. Though he trusted her with Pippin, or with any of the Fellowship, he wondered what would happen if her old masters, the orcs, were to show up. Which would she choose? He formed an image of an orc.
The change in the state of her thought was immediate. Her hackles rose, and all of her senses seemed to kick into a full gallop. Then another image passed from Icicle to Legolas. OF an orc and Pippin. The orc was coming at Pip, but then Icicle herself was in the picture. Icicle jumping at the orc and...
Legolas had to close his mental "eyes" at the warg's vision of what she would like to do to the ones that had hurt her "cub".
Pippin began to stir at Icicle's low growling. Legolas quickly soothed her mind, and sent an image of Pippin safe and sound, in an underground den such as wolves used. Icicle's thoughts calmed down immediately and she curled back around Pippin to resume her interrupted slumber.
Legolas looked at the moon, which was now high above the southern horizon, and began to sing softly.
Dream sweet dreams
and while you do
I'll be watching over you.
A lasta quettanya (Hear my words)
perian tithen muin (dear little halfling)
losto nûr (sleep deep)
îdh tûr (you won rest)
elenath hodo nuin. (lie still under the stars)
nin si mellon (Here is a friend)
nai tiruvantel (to watch you)
ar varyuvantel (to guard you)
anann naer Pippin (long time, sad Pippin,)
oltha mell. (dream sweetly)
****
Gimli stomped over to Legolas batting his arms about himself to keep warm. "How's the little hobbit?" his gruff tone hiding his real concern.
"Restless," Legolas climbed down from the rock. "The hurt of his mind and body keep him from sound sleep, but it is not to be wondered at."
"Hmmph." Gimli dropped his rolled up sleeping pack next to Pippin and sat on it. "I would like to go back to Moria now and cull a few orc heads for what they did."
"That will not help the perian now, friend Gimli," Legolas smiled a little at the dwarf's desire to cleave heads to make things right. "He needs gentle care, not retribution."
"I understand, Master Elf," Gimli snorted, "but I am no nursemaid."
"He needs to rest." Legolas put his hand gently on Icicle's head. "The mother warg helps greatly, but there is only so much she can do."
"What are you suggesting?" Gimli harrumphed a little embarrassed at the idea, "that I sing him a lullaby?"
"If he becomes restless, that seems to help." Legolas did not catch the note of irony in Gimli's tone. "Talk or sing to him - you have dwarvish lullabies I take it?"
"We.. um I don't recall any, but I'm sure." Gimli never liked to confess to the elf there was anything the elves could do that dwarves could not.
"You'll think of something." Legolas, with one last pat to Icicle, stood to go to his bedroll, "But call me if you cannot sooth him." and with that the elf was gone.
He looked at the hobbit; he seemed peaceful enough at the moment. But then the sad face twitched in pain and hurt and Pippin tried to balk against the bandages holding his legs together. Icicle whined a little, looking up at the dwarf.
"Hmmph! Lullabies indeed." But the thought made Gimli stretched his mind back to long ago and far away. He remembered the dim light of a cavern, safe, protecting and a deep voice singing.
Gimli settled a little closer to Pippin and moved a stray curl out of his eyes. Icicle licked the dwarf's hand as he touched the hobbit's face. Pippin trembled at the touch and made a small hiccupping sound which gradually turned into a sob.
"Hush, hush, little one." Gimli soothed Pippin's curls and stroked the still bruised little face. The dwarf glanced surreptitiously around and when he decided the others were asleep, put his face closer to Pippin's and, in a deep baritone, half in Westron and half in Dwarvish sang Pippin back to sleep.
Deep in the caverns
All is calm
Too deep for dragons
safe from harm
Peidio phoeni (do not worry)
bakhgen bakh (small man child)
sefyll wrth ti (stands by you)
Baruk Khazâd (the axes of the dwarves)
Under the stone
where diamonds grow
Nothing is known
for naught will show
Cwsg yn dawel (sleep quietly)
milwyr bakh (little soldier)
noddi yr cawell (protects your cradle)
Baruk Khazâd (the axes of the dwarves)
Dug and delven
are our halls
Devices elven
protect the walls
Credu mewn fi (trust in me)
annwyl bakh (small dear)
perthyn i ti (to you belongs)
Baruk Khazâd (the axes of the dwarves)
**** Pippin looked up at the orc faces above him. There were so many, no, please, he couldn't take that amount. The orcs reached for him, and touched him, using and using and using him, never stopping. Pippin cried out for someone to help him, anyone, just make the pain and humiliation stop.
A bright light made his eyes hurt. The weight on his back and the thrusting between his legs vanished. The harsh, mocking voices had stopped too. The light no longer hurt his eyes, but became a gentle ambiance, clean and soft after the dirty darkness of the orcs and their prison.
A pair of gentle arms encircled him and held him close to a warm, comforting body, rocking him as if he was a newborn babe. Pippin looked up at the face of the one who held him. He saw a long white beard, bushy eyebrows, and a pipe.
"G-g-gandalf?" He said in a whisper. The wizard smiled sadly down at him, and one hand began to stroke Pippin's curls.
"Yes, dear Pippin. It is I." the gravely bass that was so familiar after the long road seemed to echo up from Pippin's head, and Gandalf's mouth did not move. Pippin's mouth worked open and closed in wordless astonishment several times before the dam broke. He buried his head in the soft white beard and howled. He sobbed brokenly, and Gandalf just rocked him to and fro, speaking soft words of comfort into the little pointed ear. They stayed that way for a long while, until finally Pippin had no more tears. He turned his little face up to Gandalf again, his swollen eyes taking in every detail. "Shhh, little one. I know it is hard, and that you blame yourself for many things which were no fault of your own."
"B-but Gandalf, aren't you angry with me?" Pippin asked fearfully.
"Dear little Took, why would I be angry with the sweetest hobbit I know?"
"B-but the, well, an-an-d the s-s-stone, it made the fire thing c- come, and," here Pippin's voice threatened to break into weeping again "th- then you fell, and it's all my fault and..." before Pippin could say more Gandalf put a finger to his lips.
"No more blaming yourself for anything. You were not sent to the orc lair as a punishment. Evil had you in its clutches, but you were plucked from its claws." Gandalf lifted Pippin up a bit and gently kissed his brow. Pippin felt a warmth surge through his limbs, and his hurts vanished, although he still felt pain in his heart.
"Oh Gandalf, you don't know what I did. I did v-very b-b-bad things, a-and I shouldn't be with you or the Fellowship..."
"I know what was done to you, dear Pippin. Done TO you. You had no choice in the matter and are not to blame."
"B-but then why does it hu-hurt so much? Why d-did they do those things to me, I don't understand, please Gandalf why? I must have done something very bad..." Pippin began to sob from the depths of his little broken heart burying his face into the wizard's beard. "Please tell me what I did? Please, I want to be better, please." he clutched hold of Gandalf's cloak as he pleaded for an explanation.
"Poor little Pippin." Gandalf held him close and rocked him again. "There is no explanation, what happened was bad and wrong. But the Valar decreed you should survive and now that is what you must do."
Pippin looked up at the kindly face in panic. "I can't, I can't. I don't know how."
"You have to trust in the others and in yourself, believe in the power of good." Gandalf pulled the little one in close again. "Sleep now Pippin, I will come to you again at need. Sleep now."
After the emotion of seeing the wizard, the little hobbit was completely spent, and fell asleep to Gandalf's soft song.
Through the night,
I'll hold you tight
When things unseen
Give you fright
I'll be here
Don't you fear
Through the darkness
Through the night
Go to sleep,
I will keep
you safely here
Through the night
Pippin whimpered in his sleep several times, always to orcs surrounding him and touching him, but Gandalf was immediately by his side, driving them away and comforting Pippin back to safer dreams.
***
Sea of Dreams © Paula Berry & Liza Jones 2002
A Lasta Quettanya © Liza Jones 2002
Caverns © Liza Jones 2002
Through The Night © Paula Berry & Liza Jones 2002
A/N (Llinos)
The lullaby Gimli sings is rendered in English to represent Westron and in Welsh to represent Dwarvish. The format and spelling of the Welsh used has been altered somewhat to conform more with Dwarvish language structure, together with the use of some actual Dwarvish words.
The Elvish is probably just bad - for which I apologise, but all the poetry in this story is original, written by either Kookaburra or me.
Llinos
*** A/N: Kookaburra-
Llinos is much too modest. She pretty much wrote all of the poetry. I tried, but we decided it would be best for me to stop before I hurt myself. ;-)
Authors: Kookaburra & Llinos
Boromir sat watching Pippin and Icicle. In the moonlight, the warg truly looked her name, with her white coat turning sparkling silver. After Aragorn had finally succumbed to weariness (and the other's pleas) he and the rest of the company had retired for the night, with Boromir taking first watch.
Pippin whimpered in his sleep, and Icicle woke, nuzzling and licking him until the hobbit settled with a sigh. Boromir smiled to himself. The periain woke protective urges in everyone and everything they met it seemed. When Boromir first came across the halflings in Rivendell he was inclined to judge them by their appearance, treating them like children rather than adults. Indeed they sometimes seemed to behave in a childish fashion, loving to eat and play and so naïve and trusting.
Of course as he travelled with them he came to realise they were full- grown adults - except little Pippin. He had not yet reached his majority and in him the wide-eyed innocence was even more apparent. Which made what had happened even harder to bear. However good the healing, whatever charms the elves could weave, the little one had lost his pure and simple innocence forever.
Boromir hoped fervently that Pippin could at least find his trust in people again. The man of Gondor looked up at the moon, vowing to her that the trust would not be misplaced.
Pippin whimpered again, and this time Icicle could not comfort him, though she licked him and curled around him tighter than ever.
Boromir eased himself up, and walked over to the unlikely pair. Patting Icicle on the head, he lowered his muscular frame down on the ground beside her. Then, in what he knew to be a calming feeling for all species, he began to stroke Pippin's ear. In moments the hobbit had calmed down. Boromir looked back up at the silver orb in the sky and recalled a lullaby from his childhood long ago.
On a sea of dreams
your ship gently sails,
Softly it glides,
as the moon above pales,
O'er the mirror-smooth tides
cross the star-studded mere.
Your galleon glides,
to a land without fear.
As stars blend with the sky
there you will go,
Where you no longer cry
and no tears will flow.
****
Frodo stirred in his sleep. He opened his eyes a crack. Something had disturbed him. He looked at Sting, and the blade was dull. Yet he had heard something. Or thought he had. The night-shadows had fallen about him, and the clearing was dim. Often on the road away from Moria he had thought he heard the quick patter of feet. Even now he heard it. He turned his head swiftly. There were two tiny beams of light at the forest's edge, or for a moment he thought he saw them, but they turned aside at once and vanished.
-J.R.R. Tolkien (mostly)
****
Legolas shifted position on his perch. He was seated on a rock above Pippin, where he could easily reach the sleeping perian if need be. For the moment, Pippin was quiet. When Boromir had woken the elf, he warned Legolas that Pippin had become restless several times during the night.
The elf slowly became aware that he was being watched. After scanning the forest eaves, but seeing nothing, he finally looked down at his feet. A pair of golden eyes looked up at him. Legolas smiled to himself. //So it's just you, Milady.// Feeling in need of some comfort himself, he decided to enter her mind again. The protectiveness the warg felt for them all was a soothing balm on Legolas' soul, and he longed to feel the motherly tenderness after such a trying day.
Anchoring himself in his body, he sent out a tendril to Icicle, while at the same time blanketing her mind with calmness. Though at first he had thought her animal mind disorganised and confusing, he now felt relief in its simplicity.
:?: She sent.
Legolas formed a picture of himself snuggled up to her. A sense of amusement manifested. Legolas was startled; he had never thought animals to be capable of that. Yet he remembered with chagrin some of the falls he had taken when he first learned to ride, and some of the whinnies the horses would sound in his direction. He decided that it was time to see where her loyalties lay. Though he trusted her with Pippin, or with any of the Fellowship, he wondered what would happen if her old masters, the orcs, were to show up. Which would she choose? He formed an image of an orc.
The change in the state of her thought was immediate. Her hackles rose, and all of her senses seemed to kick into a full gallop. Then another image passed from Icicle to Legolas. OF an orc and Pippin. The orc was coming at Pip, but then Icicle herself was in the picture. Icicle jumping at the orc and...
Legolas had to close his mental "eyes" at the warg's vision of what she would like to do to the ones that had hurt her "cub".
Pippin began to stir at Icicle's low growling. Legolas quickly soothed her mind, and sent an image of Pippin safe and sound, in an underground den such as wolves used. Icicle's thoughts calmed down immediately and she curled back around Pippin to resume her interrupted slumber.
Legolas looked at the moon, which was now high above the southern horizon, and began to sing softly.
Dream sweet dreams
and while you do
I'll be watching over you.
A lasta quettanya (Hear my words)
perian tithen muin (dear little halfling)
losto nûr (sleep deep)
îdh tûr (you won rest)
elenath hodo nuin. (lie still under the stars)
nin si mellon (Here is a friend)
nai tiruvantel (to watch you)
ar varyuvantel (to guard you)
anann naer Pippin (long time, sad Pippin,)
oltha mell. (dream sweetly)
****
Gimli stomped over to Legolas batting his arms about himself to keep warm. "How's the little hobbit?" his gruff tone hiding his real concern.
"Restless," Legolas climbed down from the rock. "The hurt of his mind and body keep him from sound sleep, but it is not to be wondered at."
"Hmmph." Gimli dropped his rolled up sleeping pack next to Pippin and sat on it. "I would like to go back to Moria now and cull a few orc heads for what they did."
"That will not help the perian now, friend Gimli," Legolas smiled a little at the dwarf's desire to cleave heads to make things right. "He needs gentle care, not retribution."
"I understand, Master Elf," Gimli snorted, "but I am no nursemaid."
"He needs to rest." Legolas put his hand gently on Icicle's head. "The mother warg helps greatly, but there is only so much she can do."
"What are you suggesting?" Gimli harrumphed a little embarrassed at the idea, "that I sing him a lullaby?"
"If he becomes restless, that seems to help." Legolas did not catch the note of irony in Gimli's tone. "Talk or sing to him - you have dwarvish lullabies I take it?"
"We.. um I don't recall any, but I'm sure." Gimli never liked to confess to the elf there was anything the elves could do that dwarves could not.
"You'll think of something." Legolas, with one last pat to Icicle, stood to go to his bedroll, "But call me if you cannot sooth him." and with that the elf was gone.
He looked at the hobbit; he seemed peaceful enough at the moment. But then the sad face twitched in pain and hurt and Pippin tried to balk against the bandages holding his legs together. Icicle whined a little, looking up at the dwarf.
"Hmmph! Lullabies indeed." But the thought made Gimli stretched his mind back to long ago and far away. He remembered the dim light of a cavern, safe, protecting and a deep voice singing.
Gimli settled a little closer to Pippin and moved a stray curl out of his eyes. Icicle licked the dwarf's hand as he touched the hobbit's face. Pippin trembled at the touch and made a small hiccupping sound which gradually turned into a sob.
"Hush, hush, little one." Gimli soothed Pippin's curls and stroked the still bruised little face. The dwarf glanced surreptitiously around and when he decided the others were asleep, put his face closer to Pippin's and, in a deep baritone, half in Westron and half in Dwarvish sang Pippin back to sleep.
Deep in the caverns
All is calm
Too deep for dragons
safe from harm
Peidio phoeni (do not worry)
bakhgen bakh (small man child)
sefyll wrth ti (stands by you)
Baruk Khazâd (the axes of the dwarves)
Under the stone
where diamonds grow
Nothing is known
for naught will show
Cwsg yn dawel (sleep quietly)
milwyr bakh (little soldier)
noddi yr cawell (protects your cradle)
Baruk Khazâd (the axes of the dwarves)
Dug and delven
are our halls
Devices elven
protect the walls
Credu mewn fi (trust in me)
annwyl bakh (small dear)
perthyn i ti (to you belongs)
Baruk Khazâd (the axes of the dwarves)
**** Pippin looked up at the orc faces above him. There were so many, no, please, he couldn't take that amount. The orcs reached for him, and touched him, using and using and using him, never stopping. Pippin cried out for someone to help him, anyone, just make the pain and humiliation stop.
A bright light made his eyes hurt. The weight on his back and the thrusting between his legs vanished. The harsh, mocking voices had stopped too. The light no longer hurt his eyes, but became a gentle ambiance, clean and soft after the dirty darkness of the orcs and their prison.
A pair of gentle arms encircled him and held him close to a warm, comforting body, rocking him as if he was a newborn babe. Pippin looked up at the face of the one who held him. He saw a long white beard, bushy eyebrows, and a pipe.
"G-g-gandalf?" He said in a whisper. The wizard smiled sadly down at him, and one hand began to stroke Pippin's curls.
"Yes, dear Pippin. It is I." the gravely bass that was so familiar after the long road seemed to echo up from Pippin's head, and Gandalf's mouth did not move. Pippin's mouth worked open and closed in wordless astonishment several times before the dam broke. He buried his head in the soft white beard and howled. He sobbed brokenly, and Gandalf just rocked him to and fro, speaking soft words of comfort into the little pointed ear. They stayed that way for a long while, until finally Pippin had no more tears. He turned his little face up to Gandalf again, his swollen eyes taking in every detail. "Shhh, little one. I know it is hard, and that you blame yourself for many things which were no fault of your own."
"B-but Gandalf, aren't you angry with me?" Pippin asked fearfully.
"Dear little Took, why would I be angry with the sweetest hobbit I know?"
"B-but the, well, an-an-d the s-s-stone, it made the fire thing c- come, and," here Pippin's voice threatened to break into weeping again "th- then you fell, and it's all my fault and..." before Pippin could say more Gandalf put a finger to his lips.
"No more blaming yourself for anything. You were not sent to the orc lair as a punishment. Evil had you in its clutches, but you were plucked from its claws." Gandalf lifted Pippin up a bit and gently kissed his brow. Pippin felt a warmth surge through his limbs, and his hurts vanished, although he still felt pain in his heart.
"Oh Gandalf, you don't know what I did. I did v-very b-b-bad things, a-and I shouldn't be with you or the Fellowship..."
"I know what was done to you, dear Pippin. Done TO you. You had no choice in the matter and are not to blame."
"B-but then why does it hu-hurt so much? Why d-did they do those things to me, I don't understand, please Gandalf why? I must have done something very bad..." Pippin began to sob from the depths of his little broken heart burying his face into the wizard's beard. "Please tell me what I did? Please, I want to be better, please." he clutched hold of Gandalf's cloak as he pleaded for an explanation.
"Poor little Pippin." Gandalf held him close and rocked him again. "There is no explanation, what happened was bad and wrong. But the Valar decreed you should survive and now that is what you must do."
Pippin looked up at the kindly face in panic. "I can't, I can't. I don't know how."
"You have to trust in the others and in yourself, believe in the power of good." Gandalf pulled the little one in close again. "Sleep now Pippin, I will come to you again at need. Sleep now."
After the emotion of seeing the wizard, the little hobbit was completely spent, and fell asleep to Gandalf's soft song.
Through the night,
I'll hold you tight
When things unseen
Give you fright
I'll be here
Don't you fear
Through the darkness
Through the night
Go to sleep,
I will keep
you safely here
Through the night
Pippin whimpered in his sleep several times, always to orcs surrounding him and touching him, but Gandalf was immediately by his side, driving them away and comforting Pippin back to safer dreams.
***
Sea of Dreams © Paula Berry & Liza Jones 2002
A Lasta Quettanya © Liza Jones 2002
Caverns © Liza Jones 2002
Through The Night © Paula Berry & Liza Jones 2002
A/N (Llinos)
The lullaby Gimli sings is rendered in English to represent Westron and in Welsh to represent Dwarvish. The format and spelling of the Welsh used has been altered somewhat to conform more with Dwarvish language structure, together with the use of some actual Dwarvish words.
The Elvish is probably just bad - for which I apologise, but all the poetry in this story is original, written by either Kookaburra or me.
Llinos
*** A/N: Kookaburra-
Llinos is much too modest. She pretty much wrote all of the poetry. I tried, but we decided it would be best for me to stop before I hurt myself. ;-)