Golden Age
a Lord of the Rings fanfic

"Once upon a time which was a really long time ago since my dad and mum weren't even born yet, or were children, I don't remember which. But my mum wasn't born because my grandad and grandmum weren't married yet. There was a party in the beginning, big big party, everyone was there, there was even a big man and dwarves, maybe, or then they just were around at the same time. But the big man was secretly a wizard, so he told Bilbo he had to go away because he had this ring, and it was an evil ring that drove people mad."

"You're telling it all wrong!" cried Verity Bracegirdle from her perch on the lowest thick branch of a maple tree.

"Am not!" said her sister Lo, tho she wasn't at all certain if she was getting everything right.

"I want to hear about the dragon," said Tomba Turnhatch. He was over a year younger than Lo and in the habit of following her around, and he was her intended audience.

"That's in the other story!" chorused Lo and Verity, and then looked at each other and laughed. Lo hopped up and offered her thumb to be pressed against her sister's for luck.

"No, it isn't!" Tomba insisted. "The dragon came down to the battle and Meriadoc the Magnificent killed the ghost that rode it."

"That wasn't a dragon," Verity corrected. "That was a... uh..."

"A fell beast!" Lo concluded.

"But isn't a dragon a fell beast?"

"No!" Lo stopped. "Well, maybe it is. But it's just a fell sort of beast. It's not a fell beast. That's something completely different."

"Oh," said Tomba, and didn't insist, tho he wasn't sure he understood.

"What are you children arguing about?" asked Daisy, Lo and Verity's mum, as she came down the path to the riverside with a laundry pail at her hip.

"Lo was telling the big story all wrong."

"Was not!"

"Well, if Lo had breath enough to try and tell that story, she has breath enough to run up to the workshop and tell her dad he's needed at the mill." Lo crinkled her nose at the prospect as her mother set the pail down. The miller's boy was a nastyhead who threw wet leaves and mud at her.

"Don't amble, hop hop!" Daisy turned her daughter around firmly and gave her a little push. Lo sprang up the road without a word; Daisy only wished she was going so fast in order to get the errand done, and not, as she suspected, in order to run and hide until evening again.

Verity had hopped off her branch. "There's some potatoes needing peeling up at the smial," her mother told her.

"But Mum, I did that yesterday!"

"And you did it well, too, sweetheart," her mother smiled. "That's why you're best for the job. Go on, you can play afterwards!"

As Verity followed her sister up the path somewhat more reluctantly, Daisy turned to Tomba. He put his hands behind his back and stood a little taller. "You're the blacksmith's boy, aren't you?"

"Yes ma'am," he replied quickly as Daisy knelt before the river and set the washing board into the water.

"Don't have any errands today, then?"

He did, but he wasn't going to say that. "Ma'am, was your Dad really Samwise the Stout-Hearted?"

Daisy snorted. "My dad is Mayor Samwise of Hobbiton, aye. And my uncle is old Frodo Baggins, and my mum is Rose of Bywater, and they still live up in Bag End with some of my brothers. They come down here every now and then, but they're not so young anymore, so it's more us that go to them. They're as batty as tweenagers, the three of them, especially Dad and Uncle Frodo, and Sam-dad don't need to be no braver than brave enough to drive the occasional spider out of the broom closet, these days."

"You mean they're still alive?" Tomba said, eyes round as saucers. Daisy laughed, an easy light sound.

"Aye, that they are. And do you want to know how the big story really goes?"

"Yes, ma'am!"

"There was a war, which is like a fight in the same way that a midwinter storm is like a child's breath on a feather. Some hobbits went to the heart of it, with death all around them, but they survived. The war was won, and the hobbits came home. Then they all settled down and had children." She pulled a sheet from the pail and dunked it in the water.

"But that's not all of the story!" Tomba complained.

"It's enough of the story. Run along now, before I think of something for you to do."

The threat worked well enough, and the lad sprinted up the path after Verity and Lo. He took a shortcut through the trees towards the mill. Maybe he could find Lo, or maybe the miller's son would like to play frog-racing. If he was bigger they could race with ponies. There were a million things he could do when he was all grown, and he wasn't going to waste the time on settling down and having children until he'd tried at least a few hundred thousand, that was for sure.

The sun was high, and the day was warm, although some trees were already turning red and yellow. The light shining through the foliage turned the ground green, and the leaves above glowed golden.