"Famous for Its Weddings"
(A thousand thanks to Serai, beta and inspiration.
This story, in five chapters and an epilogue, was inspired by and includes references to the "Pretty Good Year" cycle by Mary Borsellino, especially "Prologue: 1420," and "Blindfold" by Singe. A thousand thanks to you.)
Chapter 1: Eve of May
(PG. Slash theme, Frodo/Sam. Also Sam/Rose.)
by Princess of Geekland
1420
Bag End had not been this full since Bilbo?s farewell party. Women from the Cotton and Brown families bustled in and out, some cooking, some decorating with garlands and greenery, some unloading and arranging Rose?s things in the big cupboard in the master bedroom. Frodo floated in and out of the bustle, glad of the company but looking a bit lost. He sat down on the bed in the second-best bedroom, which would be his after today, and turned over a pile of shirts and trousers. They needed to go somewhere; they couldn?t stay on the bed. It seemed so overwhelming a task. He pushed the piles aside to make room to lie down, and his fingers touched a grey silkiness. At the bottom of the pile was his elvish cloak, rescued from the wreck of Mordor in the very teeth of the armies of Sauron. Why had Gandalf done that? Why had he thought it worth the risk?
He picked it up and buried his face in its folds for a minute, leaning back against the headboard.
He let the fabric slide across his lap, and his fingers touched the brooch at the neck of the cloak. His fist closed around the beautiful thing, leaf shaped, golden and green.
Sam surprised him there, bustling in, beaming, "Mr. Frodo, the lads from the Dragon want to know where to put the wine cask...I thought...."
Sam trailed off. Frodo hadn?t moved, but his eyes steadily regarded Sam and a slight nostalgic smile played on his lips. His friend stepped closer, reached to stroke the folds of the cloak.
"Some treasures we?ve kept, aye, Frodo?" Sam said gently, worried to find the other hobbit in this mood.
Frodo straightened, stood. "And you are bringing home the best treasure of all, tomorrow!" Leaving the cloak on the bed, he put his arm around Sam?s shoulders and guided him out of the room. "I think we can put the wine under the back porch roof," he said heartily. "It should be out of the sun there, but easy to get to. What do you think?"
When Sam had gone off to help unload, Frodo slumped against the doorway of the study for a moment. He closed his eyes. I will not give in to this. I really am happy for them. I am, he admonished himself.
The elven cloak. Lorien. Galadriel. Their boats had slipped down the Silverlode and into the Great River, and it had seemed that they were standing still while she and her enchanted land were receding into time, slipping away.
He felt Sam -- his dear Sam! -- and Rose were doing the same -- fading from him into a strange place where he could never follow.
Angry at the potential he had for spoiling the wedding, he vowed again to get hold of himself. Sam knew him too well. He would know Frodo was upset, and would definitely not draw the correct conclusion. He would worry until he got to the bottom of it, and Frodo would never forgive himself if he ruined Sam and Rosie?s day.
He stood up straight, and went out into the garden. Surely there was something he could do to keep busy.
***
That evening after dinner, everything organized and ready for the morrow, Sam and Frodo stepped outside for a smoke. Several sets of chattering Gamgees and Goodchilds, as well as Merry Brandybuck and Pippin Took, were staying at Bag End for the night and the two resident hobbits felt quite suffocated.
Strolling through the garden, smelling the flowers and the grass, they talked of trivial things related to the party. After a pause, Frodo said, "I am so very happy for both of you, Sam. Rosie will be a very lucky woman."
"I hope so," Sam said. "I hope I?m doing the right thing. It?s a lot to take on -- family life. I hope she?ll find me tolerable day by day. You know courting is not the same as chores and laundry and fixing breakfast -- having a routine. But I still don?t feel I?ve thanked you properly for what you?re doing for us."
"Sam, you?ve thanked me over and over. Besides, I?m not doing it for you," Frodo grinned, "I?m doing it for me!"
"Well, it does seem right, somehow, coming home here." Sam smiled at his dear friend, put a hand on his shoulder. Something seemed to crackle in the air between them for a moment. Frodo stepped close and hugged him. Without hesitation, Sam hugged him right back.
"Congratulations to the groom, in advance," Frodo said into Sam?s hair, and released him.
Frodo turned to walk toward the door, knocking his pipe against the heel of his hand, and Sam followed after a moment, dimly sensing that words hung in the air, unsaid and unheard, but not unfelt.
***
Under the new arbor, twined with flowers, in the back garden of Bag End, Rose?s parents and Sam?s father were saying the traditional words of welcome to the new daughter and the new son.
Eyes shining, yet looking so shy and overwhelmed, Sam and Rose joined hands and gazed at each other.
Certain that he was the very last person anyone would be looking at, Frodo sat to one side, near the front of the crowd but not in the first rows. It was only Merry who caught a glimpse of his face and wondered what in the world could be making Frodo so sad on this day.
Benches and tables had been set up on the lawn for the noon meal. There was singing and cheering and toasts for the husband and wife. As the ale and the wine went round, the younger friends and relations began joking and making ribald suggestions. As was only right, because the custom in the Shire was for the bride and groom to leave the feast for their own private feast of one another, while their guests to reveled through the afternoon. Then, the suspense over for the restless and impatient couple, the tradition was that they join their guests once again for an evening of dancing and more feasting.
Everyone was laughing and drinking the health of the bride and groom, and urging them to get on with it -- hadn?t they had enough lunch? The ribbing was innocent and bawdy, all at the same time.
Merry, at Frodo?s table, was laughing with the rest. "You could give him some advice, now, couldn?t you, cousin? As I recall, you kissed her first!"
"Yes," Pippin put in, "and Sam practically killed him!"
"You remember," Merry went on. "It was the same Yule party, the winter before we left, where you destroyed Stella Bolger?s reputation."
"`Too easy,? I believe your words were," Pippin guffawed. "Oh, she?s never lived it down -- has she, Merry?"
The cheers began again, louder, and at the head table Sam and Rose got up, hand in hand, laughing and bowing.
Frodo was on his feet, too. "You?ve reminded me that this belongs to you," he said, pulling something from his pocket and draping it over Merry?s shoulder as he hurried away.
Merry turned, puzzled. Pippin saw, lying over his cousin?s shoulder, a blue silk handkerchief.
Their eyes met.
Frodo had slipped out of his garden and walked up the path away from Bagshot Row, grimly joking with himself that it would have been a perfect opportunity to use the ring and disappear.
He had bespoken a room at the Green Dragon, feeling it would be best to leave the newlyweds to themselves for their first night and day together. No reason he couldn?t leave, go on down there now for a quiet drink. The party was getting so loud. It hurt his head.
As he stalked along the path, Frodo gave in, putting into words the plain fact that had been crashing through his emotions for weeks. He was jealous. But of whom? He trudged on, out of place and not at home.
***
Giggling and breathless, Sam and Rosie shut the door behind them and stood in the hallway of the grand hobbit hole, kissing again. Rosie laid her bouquet on the table as Sam pulled her down the hall.
In the master bedroom, they sank into the big bed, still in all their finery.
"How did I get so lucky?" Sam said, pushing the garland of flowers up from her brow, and kissing her again.
"No, how did I get so lucky," Rosie corrected him, hands on his cheeks.
Suddenly impatient, they undressed each other, so happy to have no constraints, to not have to stop themselves from all they had wanted to do for so long, so long.
Afterward, Sam leaned on his elbow and pushed the bedclothes away, wanting to look at Rose?s lovely body, the sun-browned skin and the hidden white, moving his hand across her in long strokes. She smiled into his eyes.
"My wife," he said. "Rosie."
There had been another bed, not quite as big as this, and a cold room in the dead night of winter, instead of a sunny day on the threshold of summer. Rosie, next to him under the quilts, had been so close, so tantalizingly close, yet somehow not tempting him. He was so glad she was there, such a comfort. His happiness even outweighed his surprise that she would do something so bold, coming to him despite Frodo?s presence and the threatened wrath of her imposing father. All that winter, their first back home in the Shire after their great journey, was spent at Rosie?s family farmhouse in Bywater. Sam had been weighed down by fear and his focus on Frodo. All those nights, Frodo had lain just as close to Sam as Rosie in that bed, sleeping uneasily, sweating, crying out. No such joy as this for Sam that winter, but he had felt peace -- both his beloveds so near, as the black hours went by. Sometimes he had waked to find his arms wrapped around her, his breath warming her ear. Sometimes he had waked to find himself holding tight to Frodo, Rosie pressed against his back.
He closed his eyes, shocked at the wave of longing and sadness that moved through him -- on his wedding day -- his wedding day to Rose! What was wrong with him? Frodo, he thought, where are you? He realized he was out of Frodo?s call, not certain where Frodo was. Sam had not felt this separated from Frodo since ... well, it was a memory he certainly did not want to revisit on his wedding day; the memory of the worst day of his life, his worst failures. Far away from his beloved master, too far.
Frodo, where are you?
Rose, ever sensitive to his mood, snuggled closer, hugged him tight. "I?m so glad, so glad, you came back to me Sam. I love you."
"I love you too, Rose -- dearest Rosie," Sam whispered back, kissing her. She wouldn?t wonder why there were tears in his eyes. She would see them, and then tenderly kiss them away.
***
Frodo sat at the bar of the Green Dragon, another tankard in front of him. He really wasn?t well enough to get this drunk and he was a little afraid of what it might do to him, but it was so nice to be numb, to not think.
Yes, it was so nice to not think about what Rose would look like, sprawled in the big bed, his bed, naked, with Sam enjoying her, his skin so golden in the afternoon sunlight, smelling of good red wine and pipe smoke. It was just wonderful to be drunk enough to blot out their faces, to stop feeling the hole in his heart and the ache in his groin. Ale was, indeed, a wonderful thing. He took another drink, and fumbled for the chain at his neck.
Later, Merry and Pippin found him slumped in a corner of the common room and helped him get to his rented bed. They talked it over and decided it would be best if Merry stayed with him.
Late-lingering regulars watched the scene with great interest.
"I always said he was sweet on her. Well, he didn?t speak up, and his gardener got the Rose," one said to the other, and got a big laugh.
***
After dances and supper and many, many bad jokes, Rose and Sam were back in the big bed, exhausted and tipsy. Sam reached up for the candle snuffer and his hand touched something cold. His eyes widened.
He pulled his hand out of the niche in the headboard, and in it was a cold phial of priceless crystal.
"What did you find, love," Rose yawned.
Sam turned toward her. "It?s something of Frodo?s. The Lady gave it to him; like she gave me the box of earth for the gardens." Rose reached for the heavy thing and Sam found himself hesitant to give it to her.
But she touched it reverently. No glimmer of light, no wisp of star- silver did it offer in her hand. It was dark and solid, keeping its secret. She looked up at Sam, only a little curious, started to hand it back to him, ready for sleep and not explanations. Sam stared down at the phial.
..."May it be a light for you in dark places, when all other lights go out...."
"The star-glass?" muttered Frodo, as one answering out of sleep.... "Why, yes! Why had I forgotten it.... And now indeed light alone can help us...."
...He was still in the same place, and still his master lay beside him dead. The mountains had not crumbled, nor the earth fallen into ruin. What shall I do, what shall I do, he said. Did I come all this way with him for nothing?
Sam covered his face with his hands and burst into tears.
Rosie, shocked into wakefulness, hugged him close, comforted him as she would a frightened child. "There, there, dearie, it will be all right. It will be all right."
Sam could not stop sobbing for a long time.
When he found his voice again, he said, "Oh, Rosie, I am so sorry. So sorry, my love. What have I done, what have I let you in for?" He clung to her, ashamed of himself.
She knew better than to try to solve anything then. She knew she was seeing the aftermath of their terrible journey, memories that had waked into nightmares, like looming monsters, in Sam?s mind.
"Just rest, Sam. It will be all right. I?m right here, I?m not going anywhere. It will be all right."
***
Frodo woke to the late sun in an unfamiliar window and his heart skipped and raced, as his eyes found no familiar thing to rest on. Memory pieced back together. He was at the Green Dragon. Who was that snoring?
Frodo sat up and saw Merry, then slowly lay back down. He groped again for the gem at his neck, found it, sighed. He held it tight in his wet palm until he felt the muscles of his neck and shoulders start to ease, his breathing slow to what he called normal, his heart stop hammering.
He stared at the ceiling beams for a long time, until he realized he was shatteringly empty from hunger, and nauseated with his hangover. Merry kept snoring.
Blessed be, the wedding day is over. Soon he could go home. He had gotten through it. The wedding day was over at last. Go home. He didn?t know whether he felt relief or fear. Tears squeezed out of the corners of his eyes.
~
Pretty Good Year