The cave on the shore had been his first home. It gave him an uninhibited view of the sea at all times. It also allowed the wind and rain to buffet him at will, so he had built the shelter in the trees. Now he was back in the cave on a sunny day, baking bread. It was a tricky operation over an open fire. It had taken him months to perfect the process, and even then the bread had gone bad within a week. Now he knew just the proper amounts of the wild grasses and herbs to mix. He knew how to turn them into a think paste and spread it over a white-hot rock. When the bread was cooked he would hang it from long strands of seaweed on a pole, allowing the salty air to cure the bread so that it would last him many months.
The elf lifted up one of the heavy loaves and tied the seaweed around it. It was a charred black color, flat to the sight and dull to the taste. His mind travelled back to bread he had once eaten - Long crusty loaves of bread at his home in the forest cave, the sweet manna from Imladris that melted on his tongue and left him hungering for more, dried biscuits as he ran across many lands, lembas that could last forever, hearty wheat breads in the house of Theoden, full-bodied herb breads in the great house of Gondor and....
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He took the round loaf from the cook's hands. He had watched her pull it from the oven and brush it with a buttery glaze. Then she had wrapped it in a thick cloth and silently handed it to him. The heat even penetrated the cloth and he shifted the bread from hand to hand to keep from being burned. Bowing politely to the group of hard-working women he swiftly left the kitchen and sped through the maze of marble hallways. He hurried in part from the importance of his mission, in part because the hot bread was burning him. A delicious smell rose from the wrapped bundle, and many of the people he passed, important emissaries and lowely serving women alike, stopped their comings and goings to sniff the air as the elf passed.
At last he came to the room and pushed through the door. It was an unpretentious chamber, not many feet in diameter (for it was a round room) and unadorned except for the thin white draperies that covered the doorway to a balcony and for a bed against one wall, piled high with white pillows and blankets. Three figures hovered around the bed and the elf gave them a slight nod as he approached. At first glance one would have thought that a child was sleeping amidst the downy covers, but a second glance would make one think that a child should never look that old. The one in the bed was in fact a male hobbit. The hobbit had silver curls and lots of wrinkles, yet when he opened his eyes to see the newcomer there was a youth and a mischevous twinkle in their bright depths.
Pulling himself up and resting on his elbows he croaked, "So you'd try using food to bribe an old hobbit into living, eh?" The elf smiled and unwrapped the loaf. The top of it was a lovely golden brown, and he was sure it would tempt the appetite of the aging elder. But the hobbit just shook his head. "It's no use, you know. I can't eat anything now. I'm just too old." He leaned back on his pillows and stared at the faces around him. One was a nurse who had waited on him for the past two months. The other three were of different races. One was a dwarf, hardened by war and time, his grey beard hanging to his knees. The next was a man, kingly. Age rested on his shoulders, but it had not yet touched his face. The last was the elf, and his face seemed out of place among the rest. His hair was still as golden, his eyes still as bright and blue, as they had been all those years ago when the hobbit had first laid eyes on him. The elf would never change.
The old nurse sensed that the friends wished to be alone. "Master Peregrin, will you be needing anything else?" she asked. At the hobbit's small guesture of dismissal she curtsied to them and left the room. Now the hobbit looked at his companions lingeringly, letting his eyes touch each face. "We're the very last, you know. The last of the fellowship." The man knelt and took one of the frail hands in his. The hobbit continued, "One by one they've all left. First Gandalf, him that was so close and never cared to answer questions. I can still hear him scolding me now - "
The man broke in softly, "Fool of a Took!"
The invalid laughed, "Yes, that is what he called me. I can see his eyes glaring at me from under those eye brows. Such a loss..." His voice trailed off and he almost seemed to be asleep, but after a moment he roused himself. "Of course Gandalf came back later. What a good joke that was. Poor Boromir never came back. The last I saw him - it's burned into my memory forever - he was leaning against a tree plucking one of those great black arrows out of his chest. He saved me and Merry. I wish I could repay him."
The man put his hand on the troubled brow, "You offered your services to his father in repayment of that debt."
The hobbit sat up straighter. "And yes how terribly cross Gandalf was at me for that!" Suddenly he lay fully back on his pillows. "Old Strider would never have been angry at me. I remember the first time we saw him, standing in the shadows of that room at the Prancing - what is the word?" He looked to the man for an answer.
"Pony." The man supplied.
"Ah yes. The Prancing Pony. And old Barliman who didn't remember the letter until it was useless. Except it told us who the stranger was." He turned to look at the man and the light of recognition was in his eyes. "Do you remember it, Strider? There was that little verse what old Bilbo had made up for you. How did it go?"
Strider, for it was he, quoted the verse softly. "All that is gold does not glitter, not all that wander are lost."
The hobbit nodded. "Yes that was how it went. And Sam staring at you so suspiciously. Sam always was the suspicious one. We were so glad when we knew that he had gone with Frodo." His eyes closed softly and he mumbled, "Ah well, they're all gone now." A tear leaked from beneath his eyelid. "Gandalf and Elrond and the Lady Galadriel came for Frodo. They brought old Bilbo with them. To the Grey Havens they were going, and they had to take Frodo with them beyond the mist." He sighed. "Then the three of us rode home together. Me and Merry and Sam. Sam left too, though. But it was a long time before he did. And then when Merry - " Here he clinched he teeth hard and a tremor passed over him. After a moment he opened his eyes and the grief was not in them. "Do you remember when we were captured by those horrid orcs?"
The dwarf spoke for the first time, "You young rascals led us on a merry chase across field and mountain. When at last we found you you were smoking the best pipe weed if I remember correctly." All four of them laughed at this, remembering the sight of the two hobbits speaking so grandly and eating away at Saruman's food store.
The elf finally spoke, "We four have seen much." The others nodded in agreement and a silence fell on them as they thought of the past and friends long gone.
Suddenly the hobbit sat bolt upright, planting his right hand through the loaf the absent-minded elf had left lying on the bed. "Say Strider, where's Merry? He should be here by now. I only sent him for my pipe." The three friends exchanged alarmed looks. Strider gently pushed the hobbit back against the pillows and smoothed the unruly curls. When he spoke his voice was strangely hoarse. "It's all right, Pip. I'm sure he'll be here soon."
Pippin smiled softly and closed his eyes. "Yes, I can hear him in the passage now." The dwarf wiped his eyes and the elf looked at his old friend with wonder. The hobbit kept rambling, "Gandalf with that red ring on his finger. Wise Elrond smiling as he entered the boat. And the Lady Galadriel, all in white... a glisten on the water as she flashed her ring in farewell...." His voice trailed off and he was silent for so long that his friends thought he was asleep and rose to leave. He smiled suddenly and said in a clear voice that sounded like the old Pippin they had known. "Well Bilbo may have beat the Old Took, but I'm sure Merry and I are the only hobbits ever to beat the BullRoarer." He laughed his merry hobbit laugh then promptly fell into a deep sleep from which he never awakened.
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The elf wrapped a flat black loaf and hung it on the stick for the salty breeze to cure.
The elf lifted up one of the heavy loaves and tied the seaweed around it. It was a charred black color, flat to the sight and dull to the taste. His mind travelled back to bread he had once eaten - Long crusty loaves of bread at his home in the forest cave, the sweet manna from Imladris that melted on his tongue and left him hungering for more, dried biscuits as he ran across many lands, lembas that could last forever, hearty wheat breads in the house of Theoden, full-bodied herb breads in the great house of Gondor and....
***********************
He took the round loaf from the cook's hands. He had watched her pull it from the oven and brush it with a buttery glaze. Then she had wrapped it in a thick cloth and silently handed it to him. The heat even penetrated the cloth and he shifted the bread from hand to hand to keep from being burned. Bowing politely to the group of hard-working women he swiftly left the kitchen and sped through the maze of marble hallways. He hurried in part from the importance of his mission, in part because the hot bread was burning him. A delicious smell rose from the wrapped bundle, and many of the people he passed, important emissaries and lowely serving women alike, stopped their comings and goings to sniff the air as the elf passed.
At last he came to the room and pushed through the door. It was an unpretentious chamber, not many feet in diameter (for it was a round room) and unadorned except for the thin white draperies that covered the doorway to a balcony and for a bed against one wall, piled high with white pillows and blankets. Three figures hovered around the bed and the elf gave them a slight nod as he approached. At first glance one would have thought that a child was sleeping amidst the downy covers, but a second glance would make one think that a child should never look that old. The one in the bed was in fact a male hobbit. The hobbit had silver curls and lots of wrinkles, yet when he opened his eyes to see the newcomer there was a youth and a mischevous twinkle in their bright depths.
Pulling himself up and resting on his elbows he croaked, "So you'd try using food to bribe an old hobbit into living, eh?" The elf smiled and unwrapped the loaf. The top of it was a lovely golden brown, and he was sure it would tempt the appetite of the aging elder. But the hobbit just shook his head. "It's no use, you know. I can't eat anything now. I'm just too old." He leaned back on his pillows and stared at the faces around him. One was a nurse who had waited on him for the past two months. The other three were of different races. One was a dwarf, hardened by war and time, his grey beard hanging to his knees. The next was a man, kingly. Age rested on his shoulders, but it had not yet touched his face. The last was the elf, and his face seemed out of place among the rest. His hair was still as golden, his eyes still as bright and blue, as they had been all those years ago when the hobbit had first laid eyes on him. The elf would never change.
The old nurse sensed that the friends wished to be alone. "Master Peregrin, will you be needing anything else?" she asked. At the hobbit's small guesture of dismissal she curtsied to them and left the room. Now the hobbit looked at his companions lingeringly, letting his eyes touch each face. "We're the very last, you know. The last of the fellowship." The man knelt and took one of the frail hands in his. The hobbit continued, "One by one they've all left. First Gandalf, him that was so close and never cared to answer questions. I can still hear him scolding me now - "
The man broke in softly, "Fool of a Took!"
The invalid laughed, "Yes, that is what he called me. I can see his eyes glaring at me from under those eye brows. Such a loss..." His voice trailed off and he almost seemed to be asleep, but after a moment he roused himself. "Of course Gandalf came back later. What a good joke that was. Poor Boromir never came back. The last I saw him - it's burned into my memory forever - he was leaning against a tree plucking one of those great black arrows out of his chest. He saved me and Merry. I wish I could repay him."
The man put his hand on the troubled brow, "You offered your services to his father in repayment of that debt."
The hobbit sat up straighter. "And yes how terribly cross Gandalf was at me for that!" Suddenly he lay fully back on his pillows. "Old Strider would never have been angry at me. I remember the first time we saw him, standing in the shadows of that room at the Prancing - what is the word?" He looked to the man for an answer.
"Pony." The man supplied.
"Ah yes. The Prancing Pony. And old Barliman who didn't remember the letter until it was useless. Except it told us who the stranger was." He turned to look at the man and the light of recognition was in his eyes. "Do you remember it, Strider? There was that little verse what old Bilbo had made up for you. How did it go?"
Strider, for it was he, quoted the verse softly. "All that is gold does not glitter, not all that wander are lost."
The hobbit nodded. "Yes that was how it went. And Sam staring at you so suspiciously. Sam always was the suspicious one. We were so glad when we knew that he had gone with Frodo." His eyes closed softly and he mumbled, "Ah well, they're all gone now." A tear leaked from beneath his eyelid. "Gandalf and Elrond and the Lady Galadriel came for Frodo. They brought old Bilbo with them. To the Grey Havens they were going, and they had to take Frodo with them beyond the mist." He sighed. "Then the three of us rode home together. Me and Merry and Sam. Sam left too, though. But it was a long time before he did. And then when Merry - " Here he clinched he teeth hard and a tremor passed over him. After a moment he opened his eyes and the grief was not in them. "Do you remember when we were captured by those horrid orcs?"
The dwarf spoke for the first time, "You young rascals led us on a merry chase across field and mountain. When at last we found you you were smoking the best pipe weed if I remember correctly." All four of them laughed at this, remembering the sight of the two hobbits speaking so grandly and eating away at Saruman's food store.
The elf finally spoke, "We four have seen much." The others nodded in agreement and a silence fell on them as they thought of the past and friends long gone.
Suddenly the hobbit sat bolt upright, planting his right hand through the loaf the absent-minded elf had left lying on the bed. "Say Strider, where's Merry? He should be here by now. I only sent him for my pipe." The three friends exchanged alarmed looks. Strider gently pushed the hobbit back against the pillows and smoothed the unruly curls. When he spoke his voice was strangely hoarse. "It's all right, Pip. I'm sure he'll be here soon."
Pippin smiled softly and closed his eyes. "Yes, I can hear him in the passage now." The dwarf wiped his eyes and the elf looked at his old friend with wonder. The hobbit kept rambling, "Gandalf with that red ring on his finger. Wise Elrond smiling as he entered the boat. And the Lady Galadriel, all in white... a glisten on the water as she flashed her ring in farewell...." His voice trailed off and he was silent for so long that his friends thought he was asleep and rose to leave. He smiled suddenly and said in a clear voice that sounded like the old Pippin they had known. "Well Bilbo may have beat the Old Took, but I'm sure Merry and I are the only hobbits ever to beat the BullRoarer." He laughed his merry hobbit laugh then promptly fell into a deep sleep from which he never awakened.
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The elf wrapped a flat black loaf and hung it on the stick for the salty breeze to cure.