"OWWWWWW!"

"All right, all right, just wait still a moment while I pull the stinger out." Rosie pinched her fingers carefully around the sharp bee-splinter in Frodo-lad's arm and pulled sharply, extracting the painful little dagger from his soft childish skin. "You'd think nobody was ever caught pilfering a hive before."

"We were careful, too. Merry smoked the bees out an' everything, and Elanor got a whole big sticky comb out without a single sting." Frodo-lad pouted, snuggling in against his mother's lap. She was getting round with another baby, and it wouldn't be too long before she didn't have enough lap to sit on for a while, and by the time she got it back Frodo-lad would be ten and that was much to old for lap-sitting.

"Our El's got a touch most hobbits aren't blessed with, my boy. As you grow up, I think you'll find she's got a lot of talents with natural things that you and your other sisters and brothers will have to work doubly hard for."

"But we're a gardener's children, same as she is."

"You only have to look at her to see that she's got an Elvish grace to her, Fro. I think it was The Lady's gift to your Dad, a special extra present because she loved us hobbits so."

"Don't see why The Lady couldn't have made me good with bees too, then." Frodo-lad wriggled grumpily.

~

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