Played Out
This was originally written from a challenge on the LOTRImprov
list on yahoogroups.
Author: Andraste
Author's Email: vanessa@brandyhall.net
Improv: #4 (dust - shake - lithe - rest)
Rating: PG
Type: Gen
Disclaimer: I don't own them, I'm just borrowing them for
a bit, and I'm making no money from it; I do it for love
alone. These words in this order are mine though; please
don't put them anywhere without my permission.
Author's Notes: A bit dark, no happy ending
Pippin
The worst thing was to feel Merry shake with fear - Merry,
who had always been so strong and sensible and calm.
Pippin bore the marks of battle with pride, although he
was weary of the band around his ribs that made it painful
to breathe, the bruising that made his flesh tender, the
aches and knifelike stabs that made it difficult to sleep
at night. He was glad that he had slept while the worst
of his injuries mended, because there were times even now
when he thought he would break apart from the pain.
The pain in his body was difficult, but he could bear it
because he understood it; he knew the cause, knew that there
were remedies. Knew that he would eventually be whole. He
did grieve over Frodo's haunted face and lost finger, over
the brown scar on Merry's forehead and the occasional stiffness
in his cousin's sword arm, but they did not distress him
as much as Merry's dreams. And he would never have known
that Merry suffered so, if he had not happened to share
a tent with him.
It happened almost every night. He would awaken knowing
that something was wrong, and would hold his breath for
a moment until he heard more of the sounds that made him
sure he was needed, and then he would leave his bed and
quietly slip into Merry's. The noises varied, and he guessed
that the evil dreams that produced them did too. At times
Merry would be moaning quietly; or he would call Pippin's
name, or Frodo's, or other words which Pippin did not hear
because by the time he was awake, heart pounding, the words
had slipped out of the tent and away into the night. Occasionally
it was a scream which awakened him; the first few times
Pippin needed to reassure others who had been disturbed
that all was well, it was just a nightmare, but now it had
happened enough that the others left them mostly alone,
and in any case Merry's was not the only voice which haunted
Ithilien at night.
Sometimes Merry would be sobbing or whimpering, so softly
that Pippin could scarcely hear it; these were the worst
of all the nighttime awakenings, because Pippin never knew
how long Merry had suffered alone before his soft sounds
were loud enough to disturb Pippin's slumber.
The only thing that did not vary about the nights was that
when Pippin crawled into bed beside his cousin, Merry would
be shaking. Merry, who had always been as solid and comforting
as a tree-trunk, trembled in his sleep like a sapling in
a high wind. Pippin had been terrified when he had first
felt it. He was used to a Merry unaffected by the terrors
of the night, a Merry who in years past would soothe a young
cousin's nightmares by stroking his hair and holding him
close, whispering jests and tales until Pippin fell asleep
nestled in strong arms. This new Merry who trembled and
cried out and woke with a face wet with tears was someone
Pippin didn't know how to deal with, and it felt as if the
earth had fallen away beneath his feet.
All Pippin could do was to crawl into bed beside his cousin,
burrowing down under the blankets and holding Merry close.
Sometimes that would be enough; the trembling would gradually
abate, the sounds of distress cease, and Merry would fall
into an easier sleep without ever having woken. Sometimes
Pippin would have to hold Merry's shoulders and softly call
his name, trying to draw him back from whatever horror had
him in its grip. Sometimes even that would not be enough
and Pippin would have to roll on top of Merry, pressing
him down into the bedding, wincing at his own painful bruises
as he laid his hands on either side of Merry's head and
spoke his name softly until at last Merry woke.
The most sensible thing would be for Pippin to sleep in
Merry's bed from the very beginning; he was waking up there
most mornings anyway, so what difference would it make?
Yet somehow he could not bring himself to suggest it. He
clung to the fact that Merry had never yet woken him with
a nightmare while Pippin slept beside him; but there was
a whisper of dread in his mind that his presence would not
be enough to prevent Merry's suffering, that he would lose
his effectiveness if he were there when the nightmares started.
That he would no longer be able to help Merry, even a little
bit. And Merry himself would not ask; he never mentioned
the nightmares, during waking or sleeping hours, except
in those few startled moments after he woke from one. Once
Pippin had woken him and said "You were moaning," and Merry
had responded, dazed, "I was trying to scream". But most
of the time there were no words between them, and once they
woke in the morning, limbs tangled heavily together, it
was as if the reason for Pippin being there had completely
vanished.
Pippin wondered whether the healers could prevent Merry's
dreams, but he felt it would be a betrayal to ask them;
so he held Merry close at night, wishing that the love in
his bones and blood were enough to heal his cousin's troubled
mind.
Sam
There was a place to rest, and yet no rest to be had, for
Frodo was not content.
It was in his eyes that Sam could see it. Frodo joined
in meals and conversation with the same mannerisms he had
always used, told jokes and smiled and listened, but his
eyes were vague and his smiles automatic. He was the same,
and yet not the same, and it was in his eyes that the difference
showed. No longer pools of hope or deep pits of despair
and pain, they were now as clear and undisturbed as still
water; but they seemed to always be focused on a point somewhere
behind Sam, as if Frodo was moving through the world unseeing.
He was attentive now, touching Sam gently on the arm, smiling
at him often, making sure that he was comfortable and had
the best of everything; he hugged Merry and ruffled Pippin's
curls with the same tenderness, but it was a tenderness
from which something was missing.
At first Sam tried to get him to enjoy their surroundings,
the luxury of soft bedding, the taste of the food, the simple
joy of being alive and together with those he loved; Frodo
smiled, serene and endlessly accepting, but Sam could sense
no joy in him, and it bruised his heart.
After supper, but before the sun went down, Frodo would
become restless. It took him when they sat talking after
the meal, breezes smoothing silky over their skin, while
Pippin described the encounter between Gandalf and Denethor,
or Merry spoke with wonder of Treebeard, or Sam himself
told of his chase through Cirith Ungol while Frodo lay prisoner
and the Orcs killed one another in a frenzy. Sam would look
up and see Frodo's pale face, his eyes drifting to the dark
woods, his fingers tapping restlessly on the table with
the missing one making the rhythm discordant; he could scarcely
wait to be gone and Sam knew that he was not invited.
He would watch Frodo's back disappear among the trees,
hoping that the drooping of shoulders he saw was just a
trick of the dying light. Frodo's head would be bowed, the
trees slicing him with shadow, and a moment later the woods
would swallow him completely. The moon had drained the colour
from the trees and would be painting the landscape unearthly
white before Frodo would reappear, heavy-eyed and subdued,
as close to content as Sam ever saw him now. The evening
walks were the only occasions upon which Sam felt any kind
of spirit in Frodo; during the daytime and at night he let
the pace and direction for the day be set by others. Sam
longed for something to startle Frodo out of his passivity,
but even Merry's night terrors and Pippin's wordless gasps
of pain seemed to evoke nothing more than a remote kindness
in him, like a farmer tending to injured sheep; what else
could wake Frodo from this numb gentleness, if love and
pain were both powerless?
At night they lay in clean pavilions, beneath a sky so
high and clear that they could have slept outside and never
been touched by dew. Frodo slept heavily, his head turned
away from Sam, his breathing so soft that Sam would creep
close to be sure he could hear it, close enough that Frodo's
breath feathered over his skin. So soft and slow, another
thing making Sam feel as if Frodo wasn't really there at
all.
In the daytime, it was worse. The sunlight carved hollows
under Frodo's eyes and threw the unnatural thinness of his
face into prominence; the skin of his face was taut, almost
translucent, the colour washed out. As if his life were
ebbing away, leaking out into the earth which he had made
safe. Sam would watch him holding his thin hands before
him in the sunlight, turning them this way and that as if
he was not sure that they belonged to him. As if he could
not believe he was there, in his flesh, in the warmth of
the sun with the love of his companions around him. As if
he were scarcely there at all. As if he were a ghost walking
in Frodo's guise, and the real Frodo had slipped away through
the trees soft as a sigh, leaving Sam with naught but an
empty shell with Frodo's smile and touch and voice.
Sam felt a fierce hot protectiveness as he listened to
Frodo's quiet breathing, crouched alone in the dark beside
his master, friend, saviour. Hot protectiveness, and cold
despair.
The harvest could stroke the fields of the Shire with colour,
the scent of roses infuse the air with velvet and the sun
could warm the earth until it pulsed beneath Sam's hands
as he coaxed it into growth and green; but what would that
mean if Frodo could not share it?
He crouched in the starless dark, wishing for Frodo to
cry out or moan or shed tears, and hating himself for it.
Merry
To see Pippin, normally lithe as a cat, stiff and pale
with pain was almost more than he could bear.
As a child Pippin had been impulsive and joyously physical,
loving to chase and climb, able to wriggle unexpectedly
out of an older sister's confining arms like a little eel.
He was always in motion, feelings passing swiftly over his
mobile face, quick to laugh or weep, with nimble fingers
and strong arms; he was quick to bestow hugs and kisses
and caresses, carelessly sprinkled among those he loved.
As a grown hobbit he moved with a swift unconscious grace
which made Merry's breath catch in his throat at times.
When Pippin had been brought in to the City, bruised and
bloodied and barely alive, Merry's insides felt as though
they had sunk through the floor and through the ground and
deep into the earth, a cold claw gripping his heart, his
legs turning so weak that he had clutched blindly for support;
a thundering sounded in his ears and a black mist descended
over his eyes. He could scarcely form words, could barely
breathe, there was nothing in his mind except not Pippin,
not Pippin, no no nonononono
He was never sure whether he had just thought the words
or cried them aloud. And then Pippin had moaned and Merry
had awoken from his cold grief, only to find it replaced
with a terrible sinking fear which slid into his heart like
a splinter and stayed there.
Because it hurt to see Pippin so still and silent, oh,
it hurt. There had been many days during which Pippin lay
in the healing sleep, unable to feel the pain from his injuries.
Merry had been assured that he would recover, and believed
it; he had sat every day in between Pippin's bed and Frodo's,
waiting, holding Pippin's hand (the one with the unbroken
fingers) and trying not to think. Trying not to think about
anything, trying to will Pippin better with everything in
his mind and heart and soul, trying to pour his love and
his hope for healing out through his fingertips and into
the pores of Pippin's skin.
Then there had been the days when Pippin was awake but
still abed, not permitted to get up. In childhood, or even
a year ago, a stay in bed would have seen Pippin restless
and protesting eagerly that he could walk, that he was perfectly
well, that he didn't *need* to stay in bed and would get
better much more quickly if he sat outside in the sun. Instead,
Merry was faced with a pale and silent Pippin, whose smiles
were as brilliant as ever but whose eyes were sheeted with
pain, whose steady stream of bright speech and laughter
had dwindled to a trickle because it hurt his broken ribs
to draw deep breaths.
Now out of bed, Pippin moved slowly and uncertainly, hesitant
and careful where once he was swift and agile. There were
bruises on his face and body, abrasions where the troll's
bulk had pressed him into the ground, and the unseen injuries
which turned him white and gasping when he moved the wrong
way. Merry stayed beside him, or a few steps behind, hiding
the sick feeling which squeezed his insides every time he
caught Pippin in pain; he learned to watch for the times
when Pippin's lip was bloody because he had bitten it to
keep from crying aloud.
Merry began dreaming every night, evil dreams. Sometimes
they flung him back into events which had already occurred,
and he found himself holding Frodo's cold hand as the Morgul-blade
smoked away in Strider's grasp, or standing on the Pelennor
Fields. Most dreams, though, were about Pippin: Pippin injured
and bleeding, trying to drag himself from the great black-cloaked
riders bearing down upon him; Pippin trapped in a pit, taunted
by orcs prodding him with spears and jeering; Pippin sliding
over the edge of a precipice, bloodied hands scrabbling
for purchase, face anguished, screaming to Merry for help
as he lost his grip on the rough stone and plummeted from
Merry's sight. In every dream Merry was just too far away,
just too late, just too slow to save him.
The dreams disturbed his sleep, and he knew they disturbed
Pippin's also; sometimes he would wake enfolded in warmth
and tenderness as Pippin, heedless of his own injuries,
held him tightly and hummed or crooned or murmured loving
nonsense until Merry fell asleep again. At other times they
would wake wrapped around one another in the morning. Merry
was ashamed and distressed; he wanted desperately to ask
Pippin to sleep with him from the beginning of every night,
but he worried that he would hurt Pippin, was already hurting
him, rolling on top of him during the night, holding him
too tightly, or crushing his bruised and broken limbs. And
while he was sure that he could sleep undisturbed with Pippin
wrapped in his arms, that the knowledge of his cousin's
safety would sink into his dreams and sweeten them, he would
not let himself speak about it. If it hurt Pippin just to
breathe, it would surely be even more painful to be jostled
by Merry's restless sleep; and Merry did not want to burden
his cousin with the knowledge that his distress was the
cause of Merry's painful dreams.
Every night, before the darkness closed over his head,
he fortified himself with the sight of Pippin's face and
form, a tender ritual, wondering if one day Pippin would
be whole enough for both of them to sleep in peace.
Frodo
He was dust inside. Dry and cold, drifting, weighing almost
nothing, and scarcely able to feel.
There was every opportunity to experience and enjoy everything
he had once loved. There was good food, as much as he could
eat, and no need to hoard or to choke it down dry. They
were in a sweet safe place that smelt of herbs and sun-warmed
earth and fresh growing things, and there were streams to
bathe in and soft towels, and even soap, but he could never
be clean, because the dust was inside him. The smell was
in his hair still, the dust on his skin, his own clotted
blood in his fingernails; and he could not remove any of
them, for they were all there was left of him now.
For how could he be happy, when he had failed? How could
he take pleasure in a world which he had not been able to
save, which he had actively fought against saving, at the
end?
He kept it from the others as best he could. By day they
sat on grass as soft as velvet, talking or laughing or weeping,
and there was time to do all those things as well as time
to merely lie back and close his eyes under the gentle caress
of the sun. Once Frodo had loved to stretch out on the grass
on a summer day, one arm over his eyes, floating gently
through the haze of warmth and light. He would hear Merry's
gentle murmur and Pippin's scattered laughter and would
let them flow over and around him, waiting for a particular
sound; the slight huff Sam would give as he dropped to his
knees on the grass beside Frodo, sleeves rolled up and skin
slightly damp from the heat.
The sunlight still fell over him, and he could see that
it was the same sun; it threw Pippin's face into angular
shadow and reddened Merry's cheeks, but it had no power
to warm Frodo's flesh or bring colour to his face. He held
his hands before him, and could see the light on them, and
he knew his skin was warm, but he could not feel the pleasure
any more. He did not tell them that he was afraid that the
sunlight would expose him, shining through his frail outer
shell to reveal him hollow, old, empty within. Like a plump
pie with nothing inside the crust when you sliced it; like
an apple with rot beneath its healthy skin.
Evenings in Ithilien were exquisite; the air was like honey,
warm and smooth and rich-scented, and the colours when the
sun set were so vivid that Frodo knew they would once have
made his breath catch at the sight, but now he watched them
without joy. He exclaimed over their beauty, he observed
it, but he did not feel. He took to walking alone every
evening, when the others sat drowsy and sated with good
food and drink; he would walk and walk in the darkness of
the woods, letting himself be filled with the stillness
of the trees, the hardness of the earth under his feet,
the cool of the evening. Walking gave him a solidity and
stability; when he returned, to find the others talking
softly under the huge glassy globe of the moon, he no longer
felt as if he would flake into dry dust before their eyes.
Heavy with weariness and with the ache in his legs, he could
pretend to be a real hobbit again.
He worried that he would not be able to keep the pretence
up before the others, although the Men and Elves and Dwarves
were easy because their experience of hobbits was limited,
and he did not spend as much time with them. Merry and Pippin
were more difficult. He knew that they were concerned for
him, that his pretence was not perfect; he could see in
their faces that they knew something was wrong, but he smoothly
ignored their concern, and it became easier and easier.
They had their own battles to fight, and he watched their
struggles with a remote detached love which seemed to come
from somewhere outside himself, as if his beloved cousins
were characters in a story.
Sam was what joined him to the world now - Sam, with his
protective glances and caring hands and slow wistful smiles
all hooked into Frodo's soul and weighing him to the earth.
He could feel Sam's eyes following him, hungry for Frodo's
happiness; Sam wanted him to enjoy the peace he had brought
about, to take rest and food and be blessed with the company
of his friends. Sam was wisdom itself in his simplicity,
but Frodo knew that this state of emptiness was something
Sam could never understand. Sam longed to give his master
every comfort, fought fiercely to make Frodo accept the
honour bestowed upon him, and Frodo could not deny him these
pleasures; but nor could he be at ease.
I am no hero. The Ring has carved me hollow, and dried
up everything that was good in me, and made me fight against
what I knew was right. If love and life and joy are to grow
in me again, then that goodness must be renewed. And I do
not think it can be done.
