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Counterpoint, Movement XIX
Interpretation: the expression the performer brings when playing his instrument.
* * *
If you want something badly enough, believe in it hard enough and pretend relentlessly that it's so, there is always the chance, however slim, that it will, eventually, be true. Merry had seen magic at work and though it was almost disappointing in its near-mundanity, it was also revealing in its ordinariness… its failure to effect those things that really mattered.
Frodo had not been saved by Elvish magic in Rivendell; he had been saved by the barrier that love placed between him and forever, and by scalpel and skill. The Witch had not died by the hand of any great magician; he had met his end at the hands of two desperate mortals who had placed themselves before death, given the courage to do so by their love and the knowledge that there are things greater than themselves. And the world had not been saved by some Power stepping forward to right the horrific wrongs it had allowed to be perpetrated; it had been saved by one hobbit refusing to give in, even when giving in was the only thing possible, and another loving him enough to believe in him and watch it happen.
The only magic that really mattered, to Merry's way of thinking, was the love that moved an ordinary person to do an extraordinary thing, and no spell or quick-flash of blue-white flame impressed him nearly as much. Yes, he believed in magic, but he believed in the kind that could heal a scrape with a kiss to the knee, heal a heart with patience and unwavering love… make a thing real just by pretending it was so.
It was… anticlimactic.
Things change, always, and don't ever stop changing. It can be beautiful, it can be ugly, it can fill you with awe or dread, but whether you want change or no, whether you respect and acknowledge it or deny it and rage against it, change comes and does not ask for your blessing. Slow and rolling, maybe, or quicksilver and sharp as a thorn. Sometimes you notice it right away and sometimes it lurks in the Known, waiting to rear up and blindside you when you're not paying enough attention to the right things.
Merry was a creature of habit and change rarely sat easy with him unless he was the one initiating it. Yet he had never really feared it, never really thought much about it – never had to. Life was life and you simply lived it, made what you could out of it and accepted its flow because you had no choice. And when you wanted that choice, you made your own changes, altered the flow and used whatever tools you had within yourself to shore up the dam you'd built around that surge and flux, strengthened the levees and plugged the holes until you ran out of fingers.
Merry had changed but his fundamental 'Self' was still the same; he still wanted the same things, feared the same things, though his fears had grown along with his new, broader knowledge of the World and those who live in it. Change had not come gently for Merry; change rolled over him like slow-moving thunder over darkened plains where lightning strikes quick-burning brushfires – there and gone before you've even had the chance to grab yourself a bucket to douse the blue-white flames – and leaves only smoking ash behind. You can turn the burnt earth, mulch it with your grief, feed it with your tears, and perhaps something new will grow, who's to say? But the scorch-marks never really fade and you never stop mourning the remembrance of what was.
In some ways the changes are blunt and heavy and plain enough to set you staggering if you aren't very careful to keep your feet. In others they are sly and sneaky and creep up on you when you aren't looking, rearing up and snapping their teeth in your face, and you have no choice but to acknowledge them, confront them… live with them, if you're smart enough and lucky enough.
But sometimes, if you're very lucky and very persistent, and if you love hard enough, you can pretend those changes away, believe them into submission… love them into a brighter reality.
The days in Minas Tirith stretched out into one long canvas of almost-contentment, almost-tranquillity, almost-happiness. Once you got past all of the feasts and people bowing in the streets and the children inching close then closer for a good, hard look before the inevitable broad, bright smile, life seemed almost easy, laconic, tranquil.
Merry's arm hardly ever pained him, so he was more than happy to take up whatever tasks there were at-hand for his new status as Knight of the Mark. There weren't many, which suited him just fine, and what few duties were assigned to him were all relatively easy enough, which suited him even better. The occasional call to stand in formation with the rest of the company when some diplomat or other arrived, or the even more occasional call to escort some stray distant-relative of the Steward to a formal dinner -- these were the only real demands placed on him and he found they were just frequent enough to keep him occupied, while not frequent enough to make him chafe when he donned his formal attire.
Pippin took his duties very seriously, though always with a bit of a twinkle in his eye. He still claimed himself 'Prince', much to the rolling of eyes from the other hobbits and the sincere amusement/agreement of most of the rest of the Guard, but there was a gravity about him now that hadn't been there before. Or perhaps it was more that it had been there but he'd never really let it show 'til now. Every time Merry looked upon Pippin outfitted in Silver and Sable, it was almost as if this was the way Pippin had always looked, should look. This was the Future Thain, a hobbit who would lead his people with wisdom and courage but would probably keep them endlessly entertained whilst doing so.
Sam seemed… content. He spent his days puttering, whether on day-trips with Legolas to one garden/glade/forest or another, or about the tiny bit of yard that encircled the small house they shared with Gandalf. He'd been reluctant to leave Frodo at first, but he eventually did, as always, what Frodo asked of him and what Frodo asked was that Sam see the world around him – visit with a new friend (Sam always seemed to make at least one on every trip), wander about the massive Library, exchange ideas with the farmers and labourers… Sam had an easy way about him and was sought out frequently by children wanting to hear about the Great Spider and just as frequently by landowners wanting to know about this 'pipeweed' they'd been hearing rumours about.
Frodo spent his own days doing exactly what one would expect him to do: gathering notes, recording accounts of the events of the War and interviewing anyone who would sit with him for a few hours and recount their experiences. After the stiff soreness in his hand had ebbed, he'd begun practising his penmanship relentlessly until he could once again write with ease, and he rarely ever wandered from the house without his blue-bound book of notes and a goodly supply of charcoal pencils. He'd never really lost the circles beneath his eyes and 'weary-looking' was the rule, rather than the exception, but he seemed determined to pretend at his old vitality. Perhaps it was the hope that pretence would eventually turn to reality that kept him pushing himself, but Merry too often noted a desperation in his eyes and suspected that Frodo's obsession with dates and names and places was just another way of putting off recording his own journey… running away while standing still.
He never spoke of the Mountain, nor the Ring, and would quietly excuse himself on those occasions when either subject arose. Nothing dramatic or anything – in fact it was made all the more apparent by the very lack of drama. Pippin had tried once in his own way to reduce the significance of the Ring by remarking to Frodo that he was actually somewhat fortunate, since now he had one less finger to coordinate when flipping someone off. Merry had gasped, came close to launching himself at Pippin and throttling the cheeky smirk off his face, but Frodo's laughter stopped him, turned him stupid for several surprised seconds. Merry had only shook his head then, and tears had crowded behind his eyes, warmed the corners where they crinkled with his own broad, surprised grin. He might have allowed the hope that rushed through him then to cloud his concerns, had he not noticed in the days immediately following that, though Frodo stopped leaving when the Ring came up, he did not stop disappearing and that it was an enormous and very obvious effort for him not to leave. And knowing Frodo as he did, Merry knew that Frodo had caught onto the fact that they all noticed his abrupt departures and so made an effort to stop them, tried to pretend so that they stopped worrying. Merry then had to wonder how sincere Frodo's laughter had been and he worried even more because Frodo somehow had got so good at pretence lately that even Merry couldn't always tell when he was employing it.
Merry worried and he knew Sam did, too, and though they never spoke of it together, they often found each other's eyes over Frodo's bowed head, worried glances exchanged between each other and a four-fingered hand scritching ink to parchment by the sputtering light of a candle burnt too low.
The nights they all spent together as often as they could. Once they'd arrived in the City and Gandalf had the house outfitted, they'd made themselves at home easily, though Sam had a bugger of a time getting used to having to walk up the stairs to get to his bedroom. 'Ain't natural,' was the oft-heard mutter and it took some time for him to stop accidentally glaring at Gandalf for subjecting him to it. When Gandalf had observed that first night that Bag End had no less than eleven steps leading down to the cold-pantries and wine cellar (not to mention the beer kegs) and Sam never seemed to have a problem with those, Sam easily retorted that those went down and even if they didn't, he'd never had to sleep there. Hobbits were not, according to Sam, meant to sleep with anything more between them and the ground than a good solid floor and a nice, soft bed. Gandalf – very wisely, in Merry's own opinion – never brought up the flets in Lothlórien.
Merry had had very different concerns that first day and all of them rather self-centred, he must admit. But he is a creature of habit and he'd had just about enough of change by then and things had been going relatively well, or at least they were all pretending they were, so he couldn't really help the bit of nervous hope that shimmied through him when they began selecting bedrooms.
There were four bedrooms in the house, plus a small anteroom off of the largest, which Merry guessed had been meant as a nursery at one time. Gandalf had claimed the largest room, reasoning that it had the largest bed, which it did, and none of the hobbits disputed his claim. The beds in the other rooms were all large enough to sleep all four hobbits if one didn't mind the odd elbow to the teeth during the night, so there was no point in having a snit over the largest. So, unless one of them wanted to sleep in the anteroom adjoining Gandalf's room (and no one did), two of them would have to share. A small problem, one would have thought, since none of them were much used to privacy anymore and no one really had qualms about sharing. It was who would share with whom that stopped all their mouths, made them peer at each other a bit nervously, shift about with their packs still hitched on their shoulders and ponder three empty rooms, each making arrangements and excuses in his head, and all, at one time or another, shooting awkward glances towards Frodo… waiting.
There was a time when there would have been no question. Merry and Frodo would share a room and it would have happened easily, naturally and no one would have even really had to think about it, make a decision, because the decision would have already been understood. But here was yet another of those changes that crept up and slammed you to the floor when you weren't paying attention. Merry had not slept beside Frodo since… Hollin was the last time he could recall curling up next to Frodo and not feeling an instant stiffening, pulling away. He still didn't have a satisfactory explanation for it all but blamed it on the Ring, as he did most everything else, and the Ring was gone now, wasn't it? Since the Mountain had come down, where Merry slept was not really an issue; he had quarters with the other soldiers of the Mark and it was a tacit expectation that he utilise them. And anyway, what he had said to Sam was sincere: Sam was better qualified to care for Frodo at that point and Merry well knew it – relinquishing that care to Sam had not been an issue and so neither had the sharing of quarters. Now it was.
They had stood there that first day, bright sunlight streaming bands of prismed beams through leaded glass, spilling out through the airy rooms and onto the polished wood of the floorboards. They'd stared at each other – Merry, Pippin and Sam – all of them with wide, surprised eyes and the realisation on each face that this most simple of things threatened to rock the flimsy foundations they'd all begun to build since being reunited. Frodo, as was the unsettling norm lately, didn't notice, only peered into each room, remarked on the workmanship of this carving or the interesting colours of that painting and wandered about until he'd slowly noticed the awkward silence. He'd stopped, blinked at them all then, in obvious bewilderment, frowned. When his gaze met Pippin's, Pippin shifted uncomfortably, turned apologetic eyes to Merry – Sorry, you're on your own – cleared his throat.
"Right, well…" He hitched his pack up, pointed to the room on his right. "I'll just be over here, then." And he turned quickly, stepped through the door and shut it.
Frodo looked at the closed door for a moment, turned back to the other two, stared… "What…?" And then Merry watched it dawn on him. Slow understanding rolled over his face, and then a pang of guilt, and Merry couldn't stand it anymore.
Don't say it out loud, don't make it real, don't set it in stone before I've had the chance to fix it, make it better, just don't turn me away, not yet, I need time!
Merry looked away quickly, brightened with an effort. "Why don't I just take—" he started to say at the same time as Sam's, "I should go—"
"Sam."
Both were halted by Frodo's quiet voice… quiet choice. Merry wasn't really surprised, he supposed. Things had, after all, changed, and he'd had an opportunity to work his own changes, turn this choice into his choice, and he'd stood there and stared that opportunity in the face, his own face wide-eyed and slack-jawed, until it was too late. It was his own fault, really. Still, his stomach clenched and his heart felt heavy in his chest. This was a change he hadn't quite been able to bring himself to think about, believe, telling himself that things would go back to at least a close imitation of what used to be and the rest would work itself out in time – he would work the rest out in time.
Take it back, please, I wasn't ready, wasn't wishing hard enough, believing hard enough, let me at least try, just turn back the clock ten seconds and I'll be ready for it this time, can stop your choice by making it my own and there will be another day, another chance to hear you speak a different name.
His ears were buzzing and so he almost didn't hear when Frodo went on:
"I wonder if you'd mind if Merry and I took this room?" He gestured over his shoulder. "I'm quite taken with the way the light comes in through the painted glass and it's the closest to the stairs, so Merry won't disturb the house when he has early duties."
Two silent seconds that seemed to stretch into an eternity of words coming together, forming themselves into a statement that was at once unbelievable and entirely right and the heavy slip-thud of Merry's heart in his ears. And then: "'Course not, sir," Sam replied and it was done; Sam smiled at them both, took himself to his own room, and Merry was left blinking at Frodo, trying not to make too much of it and helpless not to make it everything.
He'd learnt a lot about Frodo since then: he didn't like to be touched, really, and that was not so much new as unexpectedly still there. That stiffening of the spine, that instinctive curling himself away, even at the most innocent touch that Merry had first noticed after they'd left Rivendell, still lingered, though you could tell that he tried very hard to cover it, amend it, will it away, maybe. He accepted Merry's touch with a conscious submission and Merry tried not to notice, told himself it was yet another thing that would change in time, and so he did not stop reaching for Frodo when the night came to a close, did not stop curling close and extending gentle caresses to skin that he mapped anew with slow fingers beneath thick goose-down and soft linen. With patient stroking, the hard tension in the muscle and tendon beneath his fingertips would eventually runnel away and Frodo would sigh a little, curl in rather than inward, return the touch with careful hands. And then Merry would let himself smile, lay a chaste kiss to a warm mouth and let his body meld with bed and blanket and warm skin, close his eyes, surrender to sleep with changed-but-still-familiar comfort wrapped about him, guiding him towards yet another new day carrying the promise of hope in its gentle gold-flushed-rose waxing.
Give him time, let him recover his strength and then get him home, he needs to be home, where he cannot see the Mountain smoking when he forgets himself and turns his eyes the wrong way, where 'Ring-bearer' is not shouted in the streets every time he steps out the door, where attending a feast means someone is having a birthday and dressing for dinner means buttoning your cuffs so they don't dip into the soup. Take him home, where people have no wish to know what happened inside that Mountain, where he is not placed on display at one banquet after the next and whispered about and goggled at.
Things were different – changed – and Merry continued to amaze himself with his capacity to accept it, adjust himself to it, push his fear of it aside and remake himself a little bit at a time with each individual change, whether it be one of those sneaky, subtle ones or the kind that shamelessly announced its arrival and intention to stay with all of the subtlety of a horn-blast to the ear. And with every one that showed itself, Merry would observe, analyse, make his own adjustments and… accept. Nothing, he reasoned to himself, could be worse than what might have happened, very well could have happened, and in some cases perhaps should have happened. And so any new realities that might present themselves – good or bad – were just small bumps in the road and he either slipped quietly around them or adjusted his steps to accommodate them. The larger bumps he navigated with belief and an open-eyed faith that love would wear it away, erode it with patient care and tender touches.
He was not a patient person but he loved fiercely, deeply, and that love now required patience and in no uncertain terms. And Merry would give it. Slow and gentle but relentlessly steady was what Merry offered and Frodo accepted his subdued attentions with barely-concealed relief. And though Merry's fingertips sometimes tingled with the need to grip, take, have and he literally ached with greedy want, he would take his time with this, wait patiently until Frodo looked to him with his own want kindling. Merry would not rush this, would not risk even a small push for fear it would push away. Frodo was still not himself, needed time, and Merry would give it and look on it as the smallest of gifts and be grateful that it was his to give.
Get him home, he needs green grass beneath his feet, not white stone on grey. Too many remembrances here, too many people who won't let him forget. Get him home, let him write it all out, push the daemons from heart to ink to page then close the book, hand it all to Bilbo and let him forget.
'Much changed' still hunched uneasily in Merry's mind and it was true: Frodo was much changed in some ways, yet still the same in others, and the two people he had become tolerated an uncomfortable truce between them. He was very much himself in a lot of ways and the times when that's all you could see were those times when Merry's belief and faith were strongest. He could believe that time, rest and yes, even the obsessive compulsion to write it all down, reduce it all to small, understandable bits of word and phrase, were all tools to be used in securing his faith, filing down those bumps in the road and turning wish, belief and hope into reality.
There were those times, though, when someone else looked at Merry from behind Frodo's eyes, someone who couldn't seem to remember who you were or what you were supposed to mean to him. Merry could see that being watching him, looking for cues on how to respond to a private joke that he wasn't quite getting, a touch of the hand that he seemed to know should be welcome but which he had to stay himself from flinching away from. This was the being that lived within the pages that came from Frodo's pen; this was the ghost who walked between the words scribbled sharp and black to ivory vellum. This ghost walked Frodo's steps, spoke with Frodo's voice, but wandered through Frodo's life with the detached indifference of an observer not quite sure how to react when asked to participate. These were the times when Frodo would almost fade from view, when his edges would blur and blend with his surroundings, when you could almost look right at him and only see a vague mist where he should have been.
Merry always saw him, though – trained his eye to draw Frodo into focus, look into eyes that were distant and flat and make Frodo look back, see him and remember him and what they had been, what they were and would be to each other again. Merry never stopped looking, never stopped seeing and never stopped forcing Frodo to look back. And Merry had faith, Merry had belief, and he had the love that would turn those things into magic. And, most importantly, he had the hope that after all was said and done, if he pretended that all of it was so, that he would wrest the magic from reality and make it so.
Because Merry, for all his hard-won cynicism and the harsh truths of the terrible realities he'd had to face, still believed in magic.
* * *
PART TWO
* * *
Frodo flung the pen to the desk, cursed and rested his head to his hand. His eyes were squeezed tight, his right hand by turns flexing and fisting and his shoulders were slumped as he sat muttering softly in the dim-lit room, dressed only in the previous day's trousers and a rumpled shirt, unbuttoned and the sleeves rolled up. He ran both hands through his hair, scrubbed at his face and sighed. Merry watched from the doorway as Frodo shook his head, took several deep breaths then opened his eyes, resolutely picked up the blotter and began cleaning up the droplets of ink, tracing a trail across the desk from notebook to dripping pen. That done, he retrieved the penknife, set the blade gently to the parchment and began carefully scraping ink from the page.
He looked exhausted, perhaps even a little wild. Even from here and without decent light, Merry could see the circles under his eyes. He shifted his gaze to the window, judged it to be maybe two in the morning at best, which meant Frodo had only slept for an hour or two, depending upon exactly how long ago he'd slipped from the bed and made his way here. Dreams of which he refused to speak had been haunting him lately and Merry wondered if he'd slept at all.
What do you see behind your eyes when you close them against the night? And how can I help you to drive it away if you won't trust me enough to know that nothing you could do or feel or say or think would be enough to make me turn from you?
"Frodo?"
A slight flinch and a pause of the knife were the only telltales of Frodo's surprise. He was still for a moment, save for a slight tremor in his hand, the miniscule flash of candlelight to the razor-edged blade the giveaway.
"I thought you were sleeping."
He didn't turn, in fact hunched over his work a little more and resumed scraping away at the page. Merry took a cautious step into the room.
Which Frodo are we dealing with tonight, then?
"I was," he answered. "I missed you."
Frodo laughed, hoarse and a little hollow. "You haven't had time to miss me; I've not been up five minutes."
Merry's eyes went to the teacup at the corner of the desk, half-full and most likely cold.
Ah, the one who lies so that he doesn't have to talk about anything real. Haven't quite figured out how to deal with this one, yet. But I will.
"Frodo--"
"Go on back to bed, Merry," Frodo said quietly. "I'll be up soon."
A dismissal, clear and cold. Merry almost acquiesced to it, almost let it go, saved it all for another day. But he'd been letting it go for weeks now and nothing was getting better, Frodo was not getting better, was in fact perhaps getting worse, and Merry decided that the slow and gentle approach may have some serious flaws.
Without even knowing he'd done so, Merry reached a decision, and the night felt suddenly colder with the resolve, the silence of it pounding out a thudding rhythm in his chest, through his limbs. He felt all at once weak and heavy, dragged down to the muck and silt, dark water rushing over his skin, pushing itself into his mouth and down his throat. It was too big for him, too much, and he knew it, yet he would not let it overwhelm him, would not let it all weigh them both down until they'd sunk so far they couldn't see the weak sunlight filtering down through the deceptively calm surface, hiding the roiling tumult just beneath. This was his life before him, sitting rigid and brittle, hunched in a borrowed study, recording histories that were not his own.
Kings with their potions, wizards with their spells; useless and this thought came with surprisingly little bitterness. Their magic was a different sort and Merry had already seen how it could darken, turn stars to cold fire, turn poetry to lament. Merry's magic was the kind that came from long years of love, and faith in the knowledge of another's heart. Merry's was the one he believed in.
He moved closer, slipped a hand to Frodo's shoulder; Frodo flinched again and the muscles beneath Merry's hand bunched and twitched, but he did not pull his hand away; instead, he swept it over the base of Frodo's neck, pressed and kneaded gently. Frodo remained tense beneath Merry's touch but stayed where he was.
"I think…" Merry began, paused, licked his lips and plunged headfirst into the deep end. "I think you need to talk about it, Frodo."
For weeks they'd slipped around the subject, brought it up then quickly put it away again, and Frodo had made it clear – whether he'd meant to or not – that it was as he wished. Not surprising, really; getting Frodo to talk – really talk – about anything that had to do with himself had always been akin to trying to bring down a mountain with a spoon. Merry had become very good at guessing and reading Frodo's face, his eyes, and had learnt to trust his own instincts where Frodo was concerned, for they hardly ever failed him. And yet now, though Merry knew without doubt that Frodo wished to push it all away, avoid thinking about any of it for as long as he possibly could, perhaps forever, Merry was resolutely and blatantly going against that wish. Still, he did not waver in his belief that what he was doing was right.
It seemed that Frodo stopped breathing for a moment then he cleared his throat, said, "Talk about what?" and replaced the knife, picked up his pen.
About why you can't look me in the eye sometimes, about why you need to bleed yourself with that pen until you can barely even move your fingers, about whatever it is that you won't say out loud and you won't write in those notes but that is so there in your eyes that sometimes it's all I can see.
About why you keep going away, even when you're standing right in front of me.
Merry forced himself to think clearly, calmly. 'Take your time,' he told himself. 'This may well be the only chance you'll ever get.'
Merry took a deep breath, asked, "What are you writing?"
Frodo shrugged, rolled his neck a little beneath Merry's hand, dipped the pen into the inkwell. "Notes," was all he said.
Notes that help you to escape into someone else's story, notes that help you to pretend that the only things that are real are what you write on those pages, and if you never write down your own…
"You spend an awful lot of time and strength on just 'notes'," Merry told him. He applied both hands now, digging into tight sinew, manipulating the coiled stress out of rigid shoulders. "There won't be anything left for Bilbo to do, if you're any more conscientious about it."
The pen hovered, dipped down to the blotter and rested there. "As I said, it's no good writing a thing down--"
"Unless you get it right," Merry finished, smoothed his hands down Frodo's arms, pulled back and pressed gentle fingers to the base of his skull. He leaned down, placed his mouth close to Frodo's ear, whispered, "Then why aren't you writing it all down?"
A jolt beneath his fingers, like a bolt of lightning jagging through Frodo's spine. Merry kept his hands moving slow and firm, pushed softness into a body grown hard and lean with privation and hard use, strove stubbornly against the tension writhing for purchase beneath his hands.
"I…" Frodo's eyes were closed and his breathing had become faster, deeper. "I don't know what you mean."
Ah, but you do, and you know full well that I know you do. It's just a question of which of us has more faith right now. And I think that would be me.
Merry ran his thumbs down Frodo's spine, said, "They are your notes and yet…" Spanned his hands over the breadth of Frodo's back, pushed them up his sides and over his ribcage. "…there is nothing of you in them."
Frodo's neck stiffened and he whipped his head to the side. "Have you been--"
"I don't need to," Merry said, his voice just as soft as it had been, and he swept his hands down Frodo's arms again, kneaded at them softly on the way back up to his shoulders. "I know you and I know that you are – as you always do – seeing to everyone else's stories first before tending to your own." He stopped, pulled Frodo's chair from the desk, turned it and knelt in front of him, ran his hands firmly up and down Frodo's thighs. He peered up with sombre eyes, said quiet but firm, "You need to talk about it or else you need to write about it and you're not doing either."
"I don't need--"
"Then I need you to talk about it; I need to hear it from your mouth because I've heard the tale, Frodo, and I can't say that I understand why it is you seem so willing to let it all take you away from me – from us." Merry's voice was calm, his hands still moving firm and steady up and down Frodo's thighs; his eyes bored into Frodo's, insisted on seeing him and letting Frodo know that he saw him and Merry watched Frodo try but he could not pull his own eyes away. "You cannot blame yourself for this," Merry went on softly, felt Frodo go rigid in his hands again. "It's no good thinking you could--"
"Blame myself?" Frodo's eyes narrowed, pierced right through Merry, and Merry was suddenly… It took him a moment to realise that he was afraid. "For what?"
And here it was. Merry shook his head slowly, used all of his resources to keep himself steady, to keep his hands moving, gentling.
"For whatever it is you're blaming yourself for, Frodo," he answered evenly. "For not throwing It into the Fire, for--"
"And should I blame myself?" Merry was caught off-guard, faltered for a moment, and Frodo swooped in like a hawk to the scent of blood. "You've heard the tale, have you?" His voice was as steel, thin-edged and hard. "Do you blame me?"
Merry sat back on his heels, his stomach flipping up into his throat.
'He will blame himself – whether he failed or not, he did not throw It in and he will blame himself.'
Please tell me, he thought frantically, willing himself to remain where he was, keep his head, that I have not got it so completely wrong that I have just pushed us both into the abyss.
He shook his head slowly. "No, I--"
"Is that why you… I'd thought it was…" Frodo bowed his head, closed his eyes. "You can't even--" A bitter little laugh and Frodo opened his eyes again, turned a look of something dark and knowing on him. "That's why you won't-- Save me, I've been such a fool! I've been seeing it in your eyes all along and I didn't know what it was and--"
"Seeing what?"
"--I knew but I'd thought… I didn't really want to believe, you see."
"Believe what, Frodo? What are you talking about?"
Frodo turned his head against the back of the chair, tipped it back and stared at the ceiling. "I should have guessed. You've always been too kind to me and I'd thought… thought it was just your way of…"
Frodo was quiet for a moment, blinking into darkness. Merry kept his mouth shut, forcing himself to simply stay where he was and wait calmly, for opening his mouth on the wrong words again held far too much risk.
"Leave it to you," Frodo finally said, his voice soft and dull, "to think yourself duty-bound even for a thing such as this." He closed his eyes. "I abhor pity," he furthered in that same dead tone. "You should have… I apologise – I misunderstood. I presumed." A shaky sigh and Frodo's voice dipped low and rough. "Perhaps it would be best if you moved your things to Pippin's room."
And Merry suddenly understood, came too close to loosing a shocked, jittery laugh, or perhaps a sob – he didn't know if he could tell the difference anymore. It was sudden and complete overload and it was almost beyond him to wrap his mind around it.
Stars above, he thinks I don't want him!
He kept himself calm, rested his hands to Frodo's knees, steadied his voice, said softly, "I believe you once accused me of being blindingly stupid. I should like now to return that favour."
Frodo frowned at the ceiling, turned his head slowly to meet Merry's eyes, his own flat and unreadable. His hands clutched onto Merry's wrists, tried pushing him away, but Merry wouldn't go.
"The only thing you see in my eyes," he told Frodo steadily, "is my heart and it is yours as it always has been. If you can't recognise it, it's because you are so often hiding away inside yourself and sometimes I can't find you."
Frodo's jaw clenched and he turned his face away.
"I have never blamed you, Frodo, though, oh, I did try so very hard, because it would have been so much easier than understanding that in some things, I cannot help but fail."
Frodo turned back to him. He looked unsure now, bewildered; his grip on Merry's wrists loosened.
"Fail at what?"
Merry looked away, shook his head. "Nothing, really; only at being more than I'm meant to be and… and invincible and stronger than I'd a right to expect and it isn't important anymore." He turned back to Frodo, who peered at him now with concern… perhaps a bit of sorrow. Merry shrugged it away, swallowed, took hold of his courage, said slowly, "Now, why don't you tell me what it is I see in your eyes?"
Even in the flickering dim, Merry could see Frodo pale. His eyes clamped shut and he jolted in his seat, tried to twist away, but Merry gripped his arms, held him still.
"You keep pushing and I keep not going," Merry told him, his voice steady, though his heart was performing amazing acrobatic feats within his chest. "When will you ever learn?"
"I…"
Frodo licked his lips, sucked in one shaky breath after another. He gave his head a quick, negating jerk. He positively writhed within his own skin, though he did not pull away, just sat there and shook and Merry couldn't bear to watch it for another minute.
"Hush, now," Merry soothed then he leaned up, laid a soft, slow kiss to Frodo's mouth. When he pulled back, Frodo's eyes were still closed and his brow was drawn down. "Tell me," Merry pressed.
Frodo shook his head slowly. "It isn't... isn't that easy," he breathed then frowned deeper, reached his hand out blindly then quickly snatched it back, but Merry took it up with his own, twined their fingers together.
"Tell me what you need," Merry whispered, reached up with his free hand and slipped it into Frodo's hair, stroked softly against his scalp. Again, he kissed Frodo, gentle and chaste, and drew their joined hands to rest over his breastbone. Frodo kept his eyes closed, his breath ragged and his face pulled into something that approached pain. "I will give you anything you need, I will hear anything you choose to speak, only please…" Merry closed his own eyes now, bowed his head, squeezed Frodo's hand. "Please stay with me. Don't turn me away, don't…" He sucked in a heavy breath, blew it out slowly. "Don't go away from me."
A pause that stretched into eternity. Merry could hear the windows shift in their casings, could hear the flame hiss and the wax drip down the side of the taper. His entire body was alive with tension, his skin shifting over his bones with each breath he took, his head pulsing with each beat of his heart.
I've been waiting oh-so-patiently all this time and for nothing more than imagined grief! Fool! I've got it wrong yet again and what if… What if he sends me away? What if I have just spent the past precious weeks writing 'The End' with my own hand?
Merry squeezed his eyes tighter, locked his jaw over the pleas he dared not speak then…
Frodo's hand lifted Merry's chin and Merry opened his eyes, got caught in Frodo's own, and they were Frodo's eyes, with Frodo's heart looking out from within them. Frodo stared at him long and hard.
"I don't mean--"
"I know," Merry told him and smiled a little.
Frodo shook his head, tried again. "I don't know how--"
"Neither do I." And Merry's grip on Frodo's hand tightened. "But if you tell me what you need, I will give it to you. And if I haven't got it to give, I will search the world until I find it or die along the way." Frodo tried to pull his hand away but Merry tightened his grip yet further until the fingers of both their hands shone white, refused to release Frodo's gaze from his own. "It's what I want. It's what I need."
Frodo closed his eyes, took a shaky breath, said, "I know," so softly that it was but a skirl of breath against Merry's skin.
A tiny little give in resistance, a hairline crack in the façade; Merry's throat felt tight and hot, and relief swept through him in a warm rush of gratitude. He leaned farther, rested his brow to Frodo's.
"Tell me," he said.
"I…" Frodo shook his head, loosed a small, dry sob. "I can't…"
Please tell me, please let me in, please just… trust me.
"You can, Frodo," Merry whispered. "Please. Tell me and I'll do it, whatever it is."
Frodo didn't speak – only looked at Merry with eyes that were somehow defeated and hopeful at once, and silently waited for him to understand. And without question, without hesitation, Merry did. He leaned in, covered Frodo's mouth with his own, slow and tender, and forced away the tears that were scorching hot behind his eyes. Shaking fingers traced the curves of his face, slipped against his temple and slid into his hair. Frodo's mouth was hesitant beneath Merry's own, cautious, but Merry put all of his love, all of his belief and all of his faith into the kiss, willed the magic from his heart to Frodo's.
Frodo pulled back slowly, kept his eyes closed, asked, "What did you see?"
Merry blinked, tried to make his mind work. He shook his head.
"What?"
"What did you see?" Frodo repeated, softer now, his voice shaky and diffident.
He still did not open his eyes, only kept sitting there, hanging on and waiting for an answer that Merry knew he had to give, knew he had to get right, or this small step forward would turn into a freefall, spin out of control with no hope of stopping until everything they were or might be was lost within the depthless eyes of a stranger. So Merry squared his jaw, threw himself into the magic of truth and blanked his mind, let his mouth speak his faith.
"You."
Now Frodo looked at him, looked at him hard, leaned in, narrowed his eyes. "But… tell me what."
And Merry might have laughed, might have wept, because this he understood. He took up Frodo's right hand, held it between them.
"Not this," he said then pushed aside the open shirt, ran his fingers slowly over the scar at Frodo's shoulder, furthered, "Not this," and ran his palm up the twist of flesh from Frodo's hip to his ribs, "And not this." He paused. "And yet…" He turned thoughtful, nodded a little. "Yes, none of it and all of it, too."
Merry traced his fingertips feather-light over the straight line of Frodo's jaw, the tender curves of his mouth. "This," he said. He placed his hand flat to Frodo's chest, felt the beat of his heart thumping beneath his palm, said, "This. All of it." He looked straight into Frodo's eyes. "I know it; I know you – all of you. And it is all I see and all I've ever…" he leaned in, kissed him again, "…ever wanted."
It was easy, really. Awkward at first, yes, and it would have been odd had it not. And changed, too, because the canvas of skin beneath his fingertips had altered: bumps and rises where once had been smooth valleys; hard corded sinew where lean, pliable muscle had held a softer strength.
But their bodies each knew the other, sank into familiar heat. Fingertips traced altered curves, re-mapped and acknowledged those things that had changed, re-learned those that had stayed the same. Slow and smooth and achingly sweet, they moved together to silent music that both hearts had learned too long ago to rest easily within the prison of patience.
It had been easy to pull Frodo to the floor, to still with urgent kisses and the skilful use of tongue and teeth the broken, half-hearted protests that a bed would be a wiser choice than the napped wool of the carpet. It had been easier still to pull away the barriers of button and linen and slide his hands over skin heated with want, pulsing beneath his fingers and surging up to meet each touch.
He'd not forgotten, never that, but perhaps he'd not admitted to himself that it might be possible to have it all again, perhaps he'd been so caught up with the patient waiting that he'd refused to remember exactly what it was he'd been waiting for. But his bones had never really stopped the remembering and his blood thrummed beneath his skin with a passion that had slept, perhaps, but never easily and never wholly.
Frodo's touches were slow and sure, his skin not quite as smooth, his limbs not quite as limber, but just as sure of purpose as Merry remembered. Still Frodo could enthral him. The whisper-soft touch of fingers to slow-burning heat, the sudden grip and quick jerk of a hand, and Merry was gasping into Frodo's hair, closing his eyes and blanking his mind, feeling everything and letting it swallow him.
He let Frodo set the pace, let Frodo decide how much and how far, and Frodo wanted it all, everything, and Merry had no inclination whatsoever to deny him. Slick and sweated, they moved against each other, with each other, Merry larger now and stronger, yet powerless against the gentle onslaught of fingers slipping through damp hair, teeth and tongue swiping and nipping, pulling cries from deep within his chest, hoarse whispers breathed hot against his skin.
Want you, want you and… Oh, I've
missed you so.
Warm-soft pressure and limbs enwrapping him, taking hold of him, and the heady feel of possession and Merry fell hard, fell deep, blinded to anything but the need to pull everything remembered into an iron-fisted grip then learn everything new, meld them together into the tender urgency strung out then pulled close and shared between them. Slow, yes, and rolling like a wave over his senses, pulling him under with its unrelenting grip, and Merry moved his hips to its flow, let the warm rush of it stretch up his spine and unfurl itself through his body.
He refused to close his eyes, kept them fixed to Frodo's face, watched him relentlessly, saw him, and sometimes Frodo would turn from that seeing, his own eyes drifting away, and his breathing would quicken, his brow crease. But Merry would whisper to him then, "Stay with me," and Frodo's eyes would clear and he would smile a little, pull Merry into a kiss and surge against him, push his hips up and let Merry move them both a little farther into the tide, let the ebb and swell move over them both, until knowing and seeing and staying were the only truths that mattered.
It pulled Frodo under first and Merry watched, rapt as he always had been, as only a few strokes of his hand sent Frodo toppling, and Frodo tossed his head, a breathless silent cry rolling up from his chest, dragging across Merry's skin with heated moisture from Frodo's mouth. Merry fought to keep his eyes open, strained to keep them from closing of their own will, even as the slick heat about him pulsed and constricted and pulled a shout from within him that rattled his teeth. He stared down into a face soft with love, and oh, stars save him, all of it for him, and he at last closed his eyes, trusted Frodo to stay while his body jerked and the tide rushed over him, threw him about with tender ferocity and left him panting, nearly weeping with its rolling intensity.
* * *
The dawn found them still wrapped about each other, their sweated bodies cooling and burrowing one into the other to keep the precious heat between them. Merry's hands never stopped moving, never stopped tracing curves and dips and relearning every inch of skin that met his fingertips. And Frodo accepted every touch, returned each one with loving strokes of his own.
"We need to go home," Merry whispered into hair still damp and curling at the ends. "I need to get you home." He kissed Frodo's temple, stroked his fingertips down his spine. "It will all be better once we're home, you'll see."
A long pause then: "Maybe," Frodo said. He shifted a little, laid a small kiss to Merry's collarbone. "I want to see Bilbo first. I need to… I thought he'd have come for the wedding but…"
Frodo's voice was distant and quiet and Merry could feel him drifting. Only a little but he tightened his arms about him, slipped a knee over Frodo's hip.
"Of course," he answered softly. "Anything you need." He closed his eyes, tucked Frodo's head beneath his chin. "We should go soon. We've stayed away long enough, I think."
Another pause and then a slight nod against his throat. "I'll speak to Aragorn in the morning."
Merry almost protested that it was already morning and they would do well to steal upstairs before Sam's early-morning habits proved their undoing. Instead he only smiled, sighed and let himself drift.
This he could see to: Frodo needed Bilbo, needed perhaps to speak to the one person in the world who could come close to understanding what it had been like to carry a weight so heavy, and this Merry could help with. To speak with Bilbo, yes, it made so much sense, and Merry was a little surprised that it hadn't occurred to him before. Perhaps then Frodo might be able to pull himself out from beneath the burden of the past, free himself from memory and tuck it all away, just another page in the book of notes he would hand over to Bilbo. Perhaps another visit to Rivendell would give them all more pleasant memories to carry away with them this time.
And then… home.
* * *
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