Rosie's Year, 4/9. PG-13
Apr. 21st, 2005 08:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
browngirlTitle: Rosie's Year
Chapter: Four of Nine
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Rosie/Sam, Tom/Mari, Jolly/Buttercup, Nick/Andy, others discussed
Warnings: Across the course of the story, slash, het, and a threesome will all be present. So will nonexplicit violence and occasional angst, as will original characters and fleshed out "just-a-name" characters.. Also, poetry
Disclaimer: These characters and their setting belong to the estate of Professor Tolkien. This is an avocational work written only for love, not profit.
Rosie's newfound surety was soon and sorely tested. In early April, Freddy Sandheaver came to call, by himself this time, with a feather in his cap and a package beneath his arm. Rosie's father gave him a sidelong look, but her mother smiled as she ushered him and Rosie into the parlor.
"Hullo, Freddy," said Rosie neutrally, hands folded in her lap; Freddy gave her a bright smile. "It's good to see you, Rosie."
"And you, Freddy. How did you come by here? Idle travel's not allowed under the Rules, I hear." Freddy's smile widened at the question, as if he didn't notice Rosie's coolness, but then he seemed to have enough warmth for them both. "Oh, I'm a Shirrif now!" he said cheerfully, pointing to his cap. "I can travel as I like. I would have come by before, but I've been busy."
My luck then, she thought, and shushed herself. "Yes, you must be busy. Shirrifs have much work these days."
"Indeed, there are more Rules to keep folk to, and Redistribution to organize, and an awful mess of disagreements to calm down." Freddy chatted on about his duties as a Shirrif, and Rosie politely listened, thinking ruefully of all the weeding and collecting she'd intended to do that day. After a moment or three of this woolgathering she shook herself and smiled more honestly at Freddy, reminding herself that it wasn't his fault he wasn't the lad she wanted. It is his fault he's gone and become a Shirrif, with what they do now, said a voice in the back of her head, but for the moment she ignored it.
Freddy held out his gift; it looked ominously large. "What's this, Freddy?" Rosie asked as she took it; it was heavy, too. Freddy merely grinned, so she unwrapped it, and found an exceedingly large loaf of sugar. "Sugar's dear these days," he explained, "and it's sweet, like you."
With an effort, Rosie did not roll her eyes. "Thank you, Freddy," she said as sincerely as she could. "I have much preserving to do, it'll come in right handy." She wrapped up the sugar and laid it aside; he immediately reached for her hands, and his own were trembling and damp. "Rosie, Rosie Cotton," Freddy said, leaning forward. "I've come to ask you sommat important."
Here 'tis, Rosie thought with weary relief. "What would you ask me, Freddy?"
He took a deep breath. "I've missed you, Rosie. I've missed you since Yule. Dancing with you was the finest ever." Rosie recalled Yule rather differently, but held her tongue. "You're a fine lass, fair and full of spirit, and I'd like it, very much, if you'd wed me."
Rosie looked into Freddy's eager face and sighed and closed her eyes; she had entangled him beyond his peace after all. When she opened her eyes he looked puzzled; she winced and shook her head. "Thank you, kindly, Freddy, but no."
"No?" Freddy echoed disbelievingly. "No? But, Rosie, you're of age and you're fair and you haven't a lad, why not me?" She shook her head, trying to reclaim her hands, but he clutched them. "Why not?"
"Freddy, Freddy, please. Please let go of me." He shook his head, his fingers dented hers; Rosie winced and tugged. "Freddy!"
"Rosie, I can't see it. Why not wed me? Is it Sam Gamgee? I don't mind if you love him."
Rosie could stand Freddy's hurting her, but not this outrageous generosity. "You don't mind?" she cried, so indignantly that Freddy startled, then clutched her wrists so that she yelped. "Freddy Sandheaver, d'ye think to make me love you by force? Is that what you've learned as a Shirrif?"
That made him blink, and let go, and sit back; Rosie chafed her aching hands and scooted away from him. "Freddy, I love Sam, and I'll wait for him till he comes back."
"And if he never comes back, Rosie?" She had never seen such a glittering-eyed glare on Freddy's face; it made her heart ache far worse than her hands. "Will you spend all your nights in a cold empty bed?"
If elsewise your bed, then yes, Rosie did not say; it wouldn't help that glare off his face nor him out of the parlor. "Thank you kindly, Fredegar Sandheaver, but I can't take this gift." She held out the sugar-loaf, but he stood, still glaring at her, and straightened his weskit. "Keep the sugar," he snapped, and left.
Rosie held her breath and listened till she heard the front door slam, along with a surprised grunt from one of her brothers. She looked at the sugar, and did not throw it into the fireplace. She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, picked up the sugar and carried it into the kitchen, put it on the table, sat down, and began to weep.
"Rosie!" her mother bustled over to lay a hand on her shoulder and press a handkerchief into her hand. "Did you and Freddy have a falling-out?"
Rosie hiccupped, and laughed bitterly, and cried harder. "It'd seem so," her father observed.
"'Tis a pity, he's a nice lad," said her mother. Rosie shook her head, crying too hard to reply, but her father patted her other shoulder as he answered, "Aye he may be, but Rosie don't want him, and it's her choosing, not ours."
Rosie scrubbed at her eyes and gave her father a grateful look; her mother snorted and shook her head. "She's near thirty-five, Tolman."
"Which ain't an old maid. She'll be fine, Lily."
Rosie drew a deep breath and managed to say, "She's sitting right here." Her parents laughed, and she managed to laugh with them, and felt a little better.
*
Rosie sat slumped over a cup of tea at the kitchen table, her basket forgotten in the corner, Buttercup shaking in the next chair beside her. Now Rosie was a fair lass, and knew it, but her parents had always taught her pretty was as pretty does, and her brothers were always there to keep her head from swelling. This bright day, for the first time in her life or nearly, she found herself wishing she were plain; poor Buttercup, even more shaken, had said as much, scrubbing at her face as if she could push the bloom from it.
That morning, the lasses had gone out together, to run a few errands and visit a friend or three. It had been Rosie's birthday the week before, so they gave out a few small gifts and collected many hugs and kisses, and overall had such a bright day that Rosie, not wanting to end it, had asked Buttercup to come back to the Cottons' with her. Buttercup had agreed, and they'd walked singing down a sunlit road through a spring afternoon that seemed a world away from all the recent Troubles.
Then a Man stepped out into the Road ahead of them, and leered, and his shadow fell across them as if he blotted out the Sun; clutching Buttercup's hand, Rosie's first thought, chide herself as she might for it, was to be glad that she wasn't alone with him.
"Just forget what that ruffian said, my dears," Rosie's mother advised them, holding their hands, but how could Rosie forget his glittering eyes and snaggletoothed grin, forget how he'd speculated, "little chits like you, bet you'd be tight in the tupping, eh?", how his laughter had echoed behind them as they fled, as if he could catch them if he but chose to bestir himself? Rosie nodded dumbly, and tried to comfort herself with a thought of Sam, but the only face that came to her mind was that Man's, and all the others like him swarming over the Shire.
Across the table sat Rosie's father, lips a tight line. "It ain't right," he said in a quiet firm voice. "It ain't right for lasses to not even be able to walk the paths of their own town. It ain't right, these Men, coming in as if they own our land, own our goods, own us. It ain't right."
"What's to be done?" asked Rosie's mother wearily. "Rally the Hobbitry-in-arms? The Thain's too busy digging in to protect the Tookland, the best he's done is to shoot a ruffian or three."
"Even the Thain can't raise the whole Shire himself," replied Rosie's father, and the note in his voice made her look up at him. "But if sturdy hobbits would rise, he'll have sommat to work with."
"Tolman." Rosie's mother flicked her gaze to the lasses; he looked at them as if just seeing them there, and after a moment smiled reassuringly and reached out to pat their hands. "It will be well," he said, and Rosie nodded, knowing full well it wouldn't. "For now, we'll send the lads with you on errands. At any rate, there's much to do in the house and farm, isn't there, Lily?"
"That there is, but the doing can wait. You could both use a rest." Rosie's mother got the unresisting girls up from the table, led Rosie to her room and took Buttercup on down the hall to the guest-room. Rosie lay down on her bed fully dressed, bodice laced and all, found her book with one hand. Looking out the window at her rosebush, now covered in little dark green leaves and swelling buds, holding the book, Rosie was finally able to put the Man's leering face from her mind; she turned to the front of the book, and traced Mr. Frodo's writing with her fingertip, bringing him and then Sam to mind. Do you know what's being done to your Shire? she thought, and closed the book, and closed her eyes.
*
Rosie used the sugar for preserving. The bees in the garden and orchard hives were working hard, but it was still a bit early for honey harvest, while the garden was growing as if to make up for Lotho's depredations, so full of flowers and leaves and life that Rosie and her mother took to just sitting in it and breathing in the flowers' perfumes and forgetting for a moment or three the dark present days.
Only for a moment, though; then they always rose and returned to work. With food getting scarcer and sugar especially dear, honey and preserves traded well, so they strove to put up all the garden and the bees gave them. Still, it was pleasant work, picking in the sunshine, hanging herbs to dry in the shady back rooms, filling the house with sweet scents, stacking the finished jars in the back cellar room or in baskets. Rosie made some oak-gall ink and proudly labeled each jar with its contents and her and her mother's names; the jars she was proudest of were the small red pots of rose-petal preserve made from the lovely white-dipped-in-red petals off of Sam's rosebush.
When Rosie's brothers returned from trading they brought not only goods but news. The Men had begun turning hobbits out of their holes "in the name of the Chief and for the use of the Shire", as Nick recited sourly. Just in time for this, a Rule appeared that hobbits might only house their families and employees. Some hobbits were already stranded, and it was a troubling question as to what would happen when winter came.
One morning Tom came home at a run, got the wagon, and set out again so fast he was a blur. He returned at tea-time with three bedsteads and five straw mattresses, all piled pell-mell, and the poor ponies looking exhausted. "Young Tom," called their mother from the top of the steps, "what have you there?"
"Beds for the back rooms, Mam!" Tom looked quite proud of himself; Rosie came down to unhitch the ponies and wondered to herself if her brother had cracked. "The Neatfoots've gone with Mrs. Neatfoot's brother, and they sold their furniture, and you'd talked of having us build some beds, so..."
Rosie's mother blinked and then laughed. "That's my quick lad!" she said proudly, coming down the steps to kiss him on his brow. As Rosie stabled the ponies and fed them old apples she heard her mother rounding up her brothers to carry the beds in. Jolly made jokes about firewood, but now they had four spare beds all told, and even extra mattresses. As Tom told his father over supper, "Rules or no, we could help folks, and in happier days we'll have guests, won't we?"
"May those happier days come, lad," replied their father, as he patted Tom's shoulder.
*
By May Rosie had taken to spending her free moments sitting by her window and looking up into the sky, remembering the day it had shone above her and her heart had shone with joy. She itched to wander down the Road to see friends, to take a trip up to Overhill to see Daisy and Mari; however, it wasn't safe, as she saw nearly every day when Men strolled up the Road, laughing and swinging their cudgels. So she went no further afield than the garden and the orchard, and read tales from her book in the mornings, and pushed her wanderlust into aiding Tom. He'd heard down at the Green Dragon that travel could be eased by a coin or three in the right Shirrif's hand; the price was far too high for them to have kept the Hobbiton farm, but it did well for a visit every few weeks to Overhill and Hobbiton, to see Mari and check on Gaffer Gamgee for her. So Rosie did up his pack for him, including gifts from the garden and the farm, and sewed the cloth Daisy and Mari sent with him on his return into clothes for them all, and struggled not to envy him.
Which was rather more than Nibs and Nick did, complaining of not being able to go. Their parents told them that they had no reason, with Nick's sweetheart in Bywater, and that Tom was the eldest and steadiest; the lads replied with elaborate pouting that went on for days, and Rosie watched it all and laughed behind her hand. Besides, Tom brought back news, much of it unfortunate but still useful. A group of Men had settled at Waymoot, destroying the trees there to build themselves horrid tarred shacks, and terrorizing all the neighboring villages, including Overhill; hardly any hobbits went out anymore besides older children and older folk, as tween lads and lasses alike were in danger of being harassed and molested. "Daisy and Mari're more shut in than you," Tom said sadly to Rosie, who squeezed his hand. How, then, could she begrudge them the occasional visit from Tom?
Meanwhile, Rosie's dad and Jolly and sometimes the younger lads went down to the Green Dragon and the Ivy Bush of evenings; the ale was getting shorter, and the tales of theft and hassle and even outright assault were getting longer, but Rosie could tell by her Da's face when he came home that no one would actually put their hands where their mouths were and join him in rising up against the self-styled Chief and his Men. She looked at him, and looked at her mother, and didn't say anything.
One bright June day Tom came home at elevenses, looking disgruntled. "I thought you were off on one of your holidays," said Nibs thoughtlessly, and Tom actually lunged at him so that Jolly and Nick had to leap from their seats and catch him. "Tom Cotton!" cried their mother, coming round the table. "What's got into you?"
"They're not letting me go, Mam!" Jolly and Nick deposited Tom on his feet, not least because he looked cross enough to possibly take them both on. "The Shirrifs won't let me travel to Hobbiton again, let alone Overhill. They say the Rules have got stricter."
Everyone sucked in their breath at that news. "Oh, Tom, I'm sorry," said Nibs, and Tom let out a long breath and smiled at his brother. "I know, Nibs. I'm sorry I nearly clouted you, but, well..."
"You didn't need a tease right then." Their mother laid a hand on Tom's arm. "I'm sorry too, my lad." Tom folded his arms tighter, his hands clenching. "How will I see my Mari now?" he asked, and no one had an answer for him.
He made his own answer, however. That night, Rosie woke to darkness and an insistent scratching at her bedroom door; she clambered out of bed, groped for her robe, and settled for wrapping the sheet round herself as she opened the door, to find Tom with grass in his hair and a ridiculous grin on his face. "Hullo, Rosie," he said, voice loud in the nighttime smial.
"Tom! Hush!" Rosie pulled him into the room where she could see him by the starlight through her window. "Where've you been? You're grinning like a tween."
"To Overhill." He sat down on the chest rather wearily, but still grinning so that he nearly glowed. "She said yes, Rosie, she said yes!"
"Of course she said yes," Rosie replied, rubbing her eyes, before the full impact of his words hit her. "You walked to Overhill and back, tonight? With all those Men about?"
"I told Mari I'd see her today," said Tom, and Rosie couldn't help but smile as she sat beside her brother and took his hands. "And I did. And I asked her to wed me, and she said yes."
"Took you long enough!" Rosie threw her arms round him. "Oh, well done, Tom, well done. But you should go to bed, the night's almost gone."
Tom nodded, but returned her squeeze for a long moment before he let go. "Mari sends her love to you," he told Rosie, "and I had to tell someone afore I could sleep." He looked up out the window, at the rosebush and the stars. "Overhill's not so far, less'n ten miles, but right now it seems far as the Moon."
Rosie thought of how far away Sam must be, and Mr. Frodo if he still lived; Tom looked at her and saw the thought in her face, and squeezed her again. "I should hush. And Mari wants to wed me, that's all I could wish for."
"And a finer sister by marriage I could never wish for." Rosie couldn't help but smile.
*
That morning their father took one look at Tom, smiled broadly, and sent him back to his bed; that made more chores for the rest of them, but for such good news they didn't mind. Even so, Rosie looked out across the Road as she carried pails of milk to the springhouse, and wanted to be out and about for even one day. After supper she asked her father if a couple of the lads could be spared to go with her to pick brambleberries; he looked at her as if he'd rather she didn't go, but said yes, and Nick and Andy didn't object to the trip, and letting Tom do their chores, at all.
So, two days hence they took six baskets, one filled with elevenses and the other five waiting for brambleberries, and set out. Nick and Andy sang together as they walked, but, remembering her last time on the Road, Rosie couldn't be quite so cheerful, spending her time looking about. On their way they passed two Men cutting down a lovely tall beech tree, and that stopped the singing; Nick opened his mouth when he saw, and Andy and Rosie grabbed his arms and tugged him along before the Men took notice of them, so they were a good ways away when Nick finally asked, "what're they doing that for?"
"What cause do they do anything for?" Rosie replied. "Come on, we're nearly there." When they arrived at the Bramble Banks they found several neighbors, if fewer than they might have seen in past years; still, they spent a cheerful sunlit morning picking berries, and at elevenses everyone shared and praised Rosie's violet jam till her cheeks turned as red as her namesake flower. When they set out for home with all six baskets full of berries Rosie was singing along with the lads.
Then they rounded a bend in the Road, and found five Shirrifs and Ted Sandyman, lounging and smoking. Nick stepped around to the front and they kept steadily walking, but when the group spotted them Ted jumped up to stand in their way and a couple of the Shirrifs followed. Rosie regarded them with narrowed eyes; they were all new Shirrifs, and the only one she knew was Fastolph Chubb, who stood to the back with a sour look on his face.
"Hullo, Master Sandyman," said Nick, "ain't you got a Mill to be running?"
"I'm a friend o'the Chief's," Sandyman replied, puffing out his chest like a rooster about to crow, and Rosie's heart sank; she laid a hand on Nick's shoulder to remind him not to start trouble. "I can do as I please. And this here's a Toll Road."
"Is that so?" replied Nick, fists clenching round the basket's handles, but his tone was even. "And what would the Toll be, so's we might go on home and not stand idle in the Road?"
Ted grinned, and so did the Shirrifs nearest him. The other three, to their credit, looked ill. "A basket of berries and a kiss from your pretty sister there."
Rosie's stomach heaved, and Andy growled behind her; feeling Nick's shoulder tense beneath her hand, she dug her fingers in. Facing down Sandyman wasn't worth a thrashing, and these days, he'd likely end up in the Lockholes. "And what call have you to ask a kiss of me, Sandyman?" she retorted, head held high, but he had lads behind him, he was in his element, and he grinned all the wider. "Those're the terms," he insisted. "Or we arrest you lot for disturbin' the peace, and seize the berries."
Rosie sighed, and stepped around Nick; he caught her wrist, and she smiled at him with reassurance she didn't feel and patted his shoulder. Andy came up beside him, and she handed him the larger of her two baskets, bringing Sandyman the smaller one. His two Shirrifs guffawed and elbowed each other as he grinned at her and grabbed her upper arms. "Sam's lass," he gloated. "But he ain't here now, is he?" Rosie set her quivering jaw, and stared back up at him, and he jerked her in and mashed his mouth to hers.
Well, she hadn't expected it to be pleasant, but he kept working his mouth over hers, trying to convince her to part her lips, until she had to clench her toes on the cobbles of the Road to keep her foot from rising to kick him. He began sliding his hands up her arms, as if he would sink them into her hair, and she made a protesting noise and tried to pull back, and he chuckled in his throat.
"That's enough, Ted." An arm pushed between them; Fastolph's arm, and he stood beside them glaring at Sandyman, who merely grinned that infuriating grin as he uncurled his fingers from Rosie's shoulders, one by one. She jerked out of his grasp, scrubbed her mouth and face with her handkerchief, straightened her sleeves and stepped backwards towards Nick and Andy, who came up beside her. "I thought you ain't sweet on her no more?" Sandyman retorted to Fastolph, who clenched his fist but pulled his arm back to fold it across his chest, repeating "that was enough."
"That's your berries and your kiss," said Rosie, cursing her voice for shaking and her cheeks for flaming, but keeping her head up. "And that's our way you're still standing in." Sandyman and his two Shirrifs grinned, and the other two shook their heads, and Stolph looked sad, but didn't say anything. They parted a bit, and Rosie and Nick and Andy hurried through and took to their heels as soon as they could.
No one said anything till they were nearly home; then Rosie glanced up and noticed the lads' white faces. Halting them, she patted Nick on his shoulder. "Thank you, Bowman," she said, using his given name as their mother might have.
"Thank me for what, Rose?" Nick still trembled beneath her hand, his face still pale and downcast. "For what? I wasn't a lick of use, I couldn't stop him. You should rail at me."
"You could be on your way to the Lockholes now. We all could. But you held your hand, and you did too, Andy. You kept your heads, my lads. Thank you both." Rosie pulled them in and held them until their shaking eased a bit. "You remembered what Dad told us."
"I don't know if he meant it for when a ruffian and his popinjays lay hands on my sister," said Nick sullenly, still not looking her in the eye; Andy leaned reassuringly against his side, and Rosie took a steadying breath. "Most of all then," she said, and Nick finally looked up. "I'd not be any better off if we were arrested. None of us would. Besides, 'twas just a kiss." Her shudder belied the last words, and Nick put his arm round her.
"D'ye think Stolph would've let us be arrested?" Andy asked, shoving them gently to get them moving again. Nick snorted. "He let that lot do as they pleased."
Rosie shook her head. "He did what he could. At any rate, we're home now. I suppose I'll be home for awhile," she said ruefully, looking up at the front door.
When they got in, Rosie let the lads bring in the berries, while she drew her mother aside. On the trudge home she'd thought of not telling her, not telling any of her family, and had realized it wouldn't work. "Mam, we lost a basket," she said, and told of their trip home as her mother's arm tightened round her shoulders.
When she was done, her mother held her and stroked her hair. "You're not going out again for awhile," she said.
"I know, Mam." Rosie folded her arms round herself and told herself there were no bars on the windows, no matter how much she felt them. "It ain't Nick and Andy's fault. They were outmatched."
"It ain't your fault either, Rose." She looked up at that, and her mother was smiling, if sadly. "You are fair, but that gives no one call nor cause to force you to anything, to lay hands on you. Those new Shirrifs are abusing their place, and they know it, and the Sandymans have been louts three generations running." Rosie nodded, feeling a great knot undo within her that she hadn't realized was there. "Thank you, Mam," she whispered, and now, of all moments, was when her eyes began to prickle. "Oh, Mam." Rosie bit her lip, but the tears were building, and her mother saw them and stroked her hair again. "The Men are bad enough, but what will become of the Shire if hobbits turn against hobbits? We'll never be free." That was all she managed before she buried her face in her mother's shoulder and wept in earnest.
*
A few days later, Rosie's father set out for the Green Dragon, and came home again unexpectedly early and quite noisily; hearing her father shouting amid deep coarse laughter, she ran out to the kitchen, but Buttercup caught her before she could head to the hall, and shook her head silently as she drew Rosie into the parlor. There they could hear through the window the altercation on the front steps.
Rosie hadn't heard her father so angry in years. "Let me go! I could thrash the lot of you!" A thud, and more laughter. "Yes, you could," came a smooth, self-satisfied gentlehobbit's voice, and Rosie's heart stuttered in her chest as recognized that voice, as she clutched Buttercup's hand. "But then it'd be the Lockholes for you, my good hobbit." Rosie heard her father growl, but say nothing. "And who would watch over your passel of lads, your fair round wife, and that pretty lass of yours?" Buttercup turned wide eyes on Rosie. "Yes, Farmer Cotton, I remember you and your litter. You've the daughter who can read well above her station, don't you? I could use a secretary who's so easy to look at." His laugh was high and nasal above the Men's deep guffaws.
Rosie's father's voice was tight and cold, but controlled again. "She don't need a position. Thank you kindly. There's plenty of work here."
"Then you shouldn't be idling in inns, should you? Stay home, Cotton, and keep out of trouble. Next time, the Lockholes." The laughter trailed off, down the Road; Rosie peeped over the windowsill and saw four Men heading off down it, and at their head Lotho Pimple riding on a pony and wearing a wide cap with several feathers in it. Then Rosie turned away, hearing her parents coming down the hall, and it was her turn to catch Buttercup, because she could hear her mother weeping. "Tolman, Tolman," Rosie's Mam repeated between sobs. "Tolman, I might never have seen you more."
"Shh, Lily, it's all right. It's all right. I'm safe, I'm here." Rosie heard them go down the hall to their bedroom, her mother weeping the whole way; when they'd shut their door she emerged from the parlor, feeling shaken head to toe.
Andy met them in the hall, all Rosie's brothers but Tom with him. "Rosie! Buttercup! They've closed all the inns!"
"What?" Rosie led everyone into the kitchen and fetched some barley-water, it being too hot for tea and there being no ale in the house. "All the inns?"
"Every one," Jolly confirmed, too shocked for joking. "Nibs and I were at the Ivy Bush when a great squad of Men came and told us all to clear out or face the Lockholes; Pimple don't hold with beer nor idleness, they said, so the inns are closed. When we looked back they were pasting a notice on the door and tossing the staff out on their ears, poor lads."
"Andy'n I met Jolly and Nibs on the way home," said Nick, looking shaken as Rosie felt; Tom appeared in the doorway and stood quietly to listen. "We're at the Dragon with Dad, when our Chief Pimple himself graced that one. He said he wanted a word with Da, and his Men patted their cudgels. Da made us go on home. I'm worried after him." Andy nodded, putting his arm round Nick.
"Da's here," Rosie said, glancing at Buttercup, who nodded. "We heard him come in. He's with Mam."
"So, Pimple's closed the inns," said Tom slowly, coming to sit at the table, "and between the Shirrifs and the Men not a hobbit will stir from their hole. The Thain's dug in; so's Brandy Hall. We're as pinned as rabbits in burrows. How will we ever shake these ruffians off now?"
To that, none of them had any answer.
*
Lithe, of course, was not danced that year, not with travel forbidden and the Party Field owned by the Sackville-Bagginses. Sitting out in the orchard at dusk with his sibs, Jolly pinched his nose and did a very funny imitation of Miz Lobelia's likely reaction to being asked to host "unseemly drunken carousing", before tugging Buttercup up and trotting off with a wink to the fields. Nick and Andy looked at each other, and Tom and Rosie laughed and shooed them off to go dance their Lithe as well.
After a moment, a nightingale began singing, as blue and silver quiet descended upon the orchard. Tom and Rosie sat together and sipped hard cider and just breathed for awhile, listening to the stars and the wind and the nightingale, and some giggles in the distance from one or the other couple. At length, Tom whispered, "you must miss Sam."
"And you must miss Mari." Rosie reached across to pat Tom's shoulder; he shook his head and smiled. "I know where she bides, though, and one day I'll have her home. But Sam---"
"Sam's coming back," Rosie insisted stoutly. "He is."
"I hope so, Rosie." Tom patted her hand. "I do hope so."
[the last scene is in the first comment]
Chapter: Four of Nine
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Rosie/Sam, Tom/Mari, Jolly/Buttercup, Nick/Andy, others discussed
Warnings: Across the course of the story, slash, het, and a threesome will all be present. So will nonexplicit violence and occasional angst, as will original characters and fleshed out "just-a-name" characters.. Also, poetry
Disclaimer: These characters and their setting belong to the estate of Professor Tolkien. This is an avocational work written only for love, not profit.
Rosie's newfound surety was soon and sorely tested. In early April, Freddy Sandheaver came to call, by himself this time, with a feather in his cap and a package beneath his arm. Rosie's father gave him a sidelong look, but her mother smiled as she ushered him and Rosie into the parlor.
"Hullo, Freddy," said Rosie neutrally, hands folded in her lap; Freddy gave her a bright smile. "It's good to see you, Rosie."
"And you, Freddy. How did you come by here? Idle travel's not allowed under the Rules, I hear." Freddy's smile widened at the question, as if he didn't notice Rosie's coolness, but then he seemed to have enough warmth for them both. "Oh, I'm a Shirrif now!" he said cheerfully, pointing to his cap. "I can travel as I like. I would have come by before, but I've been busy."
My luck then, she thought, and shushed herself. "Yes, you must be busy. Shirrifs have much work these days."
"Indeed, there are more Rules to keep folk to, and Redistribution to organize, and an awful mess of disagreements to calm down." Freddy chatted on about his duties as a Shirrif, and Rosie politely listened, thinking ruefully of all the weeding and collecting she'd intended to do that day. After a moment or three of this woolgathering she shook herself and smiled more honestly at Freddy, reminding herself that it wasn't his fault he wasn't the lad she wanted. It is his fault he's gone and become a Shirrif, with what they do now, said a voice in the back of her head, but for the moment she ignored it.
Freddy held out his gift; it looked ominously large. "What's this, Freddy?" Rosie asked as she took it; it was heavy, too. Freddy merely grinned, so she unwrapped it, and found an exceedingly large loaf of sugar. "Sugar's dear these days," he explained, "and it's sweet, like you."
With an effort, Rosie did not roll her eyes. "Thank you, Freddy," she said as sincerely as she could. "I have much preserving to do, it'll come in right handy." She wrapped up the sugar and laid it aside; he immediately reached for her hands, and his own were trembling and damp. "Rosie, Rosie Cotton," Freddy said, leaning forward. "I've come to ask you sommat important."
Here 'tis, Rosie thought with weary relief. "What would you ask me, Freddy?"
He took a deep breath. "I've missed you, Rosie. I've missed you since Yule. Dancing with you was the finest ever." Rosie recalled Yule rather differently, but held her tongue. "You're a fine lass, fair and full of spirit, and I'd like it, very much, if you'd wed me."
Rosie looked into Freddy's eager face and sighed and closed her eyes; she had entangled him beyond his peace after all. When she opened her eyes he looked puzzled; she winced and shook her head. "Thank you, kindly, Freddy, but no."
"No?" Freddy echoed disbelievingly. "No? But, Rosie, you're of age and you're fair and you haven't a lad, why not me?" She shook her head, trying to reclaim her hands, but he clutched them. "Why not?"
"Freddy, Freddy, please. Please let go of me." He shook his head, his fingers dented hers; Rosie winced and tugged. "Freddy!"
"Rosie, I can't see it. Why not wed me? Is it Sam Gamgee? I don't mind if you love him."
Rosie could stand Freddy's hurting her, but not this outrageous generosity. "You don't mind?" she cried, so indignantly that Freddy startled, then clutched her wrists so that she yelped. "Freddy Sandheaver, d'ye think to make me love you by force? Is that what you've learned as a Shirrif?"
That made him blink, and let go, and sit back; Rosie chafed her aching hands and scooted away from him. "Freddy, I love Sam, and I'll wait for him till he comes back."
"And if he never comes back, Rosie?" She had never seen such a glittering-eyed glare on Freddy's face; it made her heart ache far worse than her hands. "Will you spend all your nights in a cold empty bed?"
If elsewise your bed, then yes, Rosie did not say; it wouldn't help that glare off his face nor him out of the parlor. "Thank you kindly, Fredegar Sandheaver, but I can't take this gift." She held out the sugar-loaf, but he stood, still glaring at her, and straightened his weskit. "Keep the sugar," he snapped, and left.
Rosie held her breath and listened till she heard the front door slam, along with a surprised grunt from one of her brothers. She looked at the sugar, and did not throw it into the fireplace. She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, picked up the sugar and carried it into the kitchen, put it on the table, sat down, and began to weep.
"Rosie!" her mother bustled over to lay a hand on her shoulder and press a handkerchief into her hand. "Did you and Freddy have a falling-out?"
Rosie hiccupped, and laughed bitterly, and cried harder. "It'd seem so," her father observed.
"'Tis a pity, he's a nice lad," said her mother. Rosie shook her head, crying too hard to reply, but her father patted her other shoulder as he answered, "Aye he may be, but Rosie don't want him, and it's her choosing, not ours."
Rosie scrubbed at her eyes and gave her father a grateful look; her mother snorted and shook her head. "She's near thirty-five, Tolman."
"Which ain't an old maid. She'll be fine, Lily."
Rosie drew a deep breath and managed to say, "She's sitting right here." Her parents laughed, and she managed to laugh with them, and felt a little better.
*
Rosie sat slumped over a cup of tea at the kitchen table, her basket forgotten in the corner, Buttercup shaking in the next chair beside her. Now Rosie was a fair lass, and knew it, but her parents had always taught her pretty was as pretty does, and her brothers were always there to keep her head from swelling. This bright day, for the first time in her life or nearly, she found herself wishing she were plain; poor Buttercup, even more shaken, had said as much, scrubbing at her face as if she could push the bloom from it.
That morning, the lasses had gone out together, to run a few errands and visit a friend or three. It had been Rosie's birthday the week before, so they gave out a few small gifts and collected many hugs and kisses, and overall had such a bright day that Rosie, not wanting to end it, had asked Buttercup to come back to the Cottons' with her. Buttercup had agreed, and they'd walked singing down a sunlit road through a spring afternoon that seemed a world away from all the recent Troubles.
Then a Man stepped out into the Road ahead of them, and leered, and his shadow fell across them as if he blotted out the Sun; clutching Buttercup's hand, Rosie's first thought, chide herself as she might for it, was to be glad that she wasn't alone with him.
"Just forget what that ruffian said, my dears," Rosie's mother advised them, holding their hands, but how could Rosie forget his glittering eyes and snaggletoothed grin, forget how he'd speculated, "little chits like you, bet you'd be tight in the tupping, eh?", how his laughter had echoed behind them as they fled, as if he could catch them if he but chose to bestir himself? Rosie nodded dumbly, and tried to comfort herself with a thought of Sam, but the only face that came to her mind was that Man's, and all the others like him swarming over the Shire.
Across the table sat Rosie's father, lips a tight line. "It ain't right," he said in a quiet firm voice. "It ain't right for lasses to not even be able to walk the paths of their own town. It ain't right, these Men, coming in as if they own our land, own our goods, own us. It ain't right."
"What's to be done?" asked Rosie's mother wearily. "Rally the Hobbitry-in-arms? The Thain's too busy digging in to protect the Tookland, the best he's done is to shoot a ruffian or three."
"Even the Thain can't raise the whole Shire himself," replied Rosie's father, and the note in his voice made her look up at him. "But if sturdy hobbits would rise, he'll have sommat to work with."
"Tolman." Rosie's mother flicked her gaze to the lasses; he looked at them as if just seeing them there, and after a moment smiled reassuringly and reached out to pat their hands. "It will be well," he said, and Rosie nodded, knowing full well it wouldn't. "For now, we'll send the lads with you on errands. At any rate, there's much to do in the house and farm, isn't there, Lily?"
"That there is, but the doing can wait. You could both use a rest." Rosie's mother got the unresisting girls up from the table, led Rosie to her room and took Buttercup on down the hall to the guest-room. Rosie lay down on her bed fully dressed, bodice laced and all, found her book with one hand. Looking out the window at her rosebush, now covered in little dark green leaves and swelling buds, holding the book, Rosie was finally able to put the Man's leering face from her mind; she turned to the front of the book, and traced Mr. Frodo's writing with her fingertip, bringing him and then Sam to mind. Do you know what's being done to your Shire? she thought, and closed the book, and closed her eyes.
*
Rosie used the sugar for preserving. The bees in the garden and orchard hives were working hard, but it was still a bit early for honey harvest, while the garden was growing as if to make up for Lotho's depredations, so full of flowers and leaves and life that Rosie and her mother took to just sitting in it and breathing in the flowers' perfumes and forgetting for a moment or three the dark present days.
Only for a moment, though; then they always rose and returned to work. With food getting scarcer and sugar especially dear, honey and preserves traded well, so they strove to put up all the garden and the bees gave them. Still, it was pleasant work, picking in the sunshine, hanging herbs to dry in the shady back rooms, filling the house with sweet scents, stacking the finished jars in the back cellar room or in baskets. Rosie made some oak-gall ink and proudly labeled each jar with its contents and her and her mother's names; the jars she was proudest of were the small red pots of rose-petal preserve made from the lovely white-dipped-in-red petals off of Sam's rosebush.
When Rosie's brothers returned from trading they brought not only goods but news. The Men had begun turning hobbits out of their holes "in the name of the Chief and for the use of the Shire", as Nick recited sourly. Just in time for this, a Rule appeared that hobbits might only house their families and employees. Some hobbits were already stranded, and it was a troubling question as to what would happen when winter came.
One morning Tom came home at a run, got the wagon, and set out again so fast he was a blur. He returned at tea-time with three bedsteads and five straw mattresses, all piled pell-mell, and the poor ponies looking exhausted. "Young Tom," called their mother from the top of the steps, "what have you there?"
"Beds for the back rooms, Mam!" Tom looked quite proud of himself; Rosie came down to unhitch the ponies and wondered to herself if her brother had cracked. "The Neatfoots've gone with Mrs. Neatfoot's brother, and they sold their furniture, and you'd talked of having us build some beds, so..."
Rosie's mother blinked and then laughed. "That's my quick lad!" she said proudly, coming down the steps to kiss him on his brow. As Rosie stabled the ponies and fed them old apples she heard her mother rounding up her brothers to carry the beds in. Jolly made jokes about firewood, but now they had four spare beds all told, and even extra mattresses. As Tom told his father over supper, "Rules or no, we could help folks, and in happier days we'll have guests, won't we?"
"May those happier days come, lad," replied their father, as he patted Tom's shoulder.
*
By May Rosie had taken to spending her free moments sitting by her window and looking up into the sky, remembering the day it had shone above her and her heart had shone with joy. She itched to wander down the Road to see friends, to take a trip up to Overhill to see Daisy and Mari; however, it wasn't safe, as she saw nearly every day when Men strolled up the Road, laughing and swinging their cudgels. So she went no further afield than the garden and the orchard, and read tales from her book in the mornings, and pushed her wanderlust into aiding Tom. He'd heard down at the Green Dragon that travel could be eased by a coin or three in the right Shirrif's hand; the price was far too high for them to have kept the Hobbiton farm, but it did well for a visit every few weeks to Overhill and Hobbiton, to see Mari and check on Gaffer Gamgee for her. So Rosie did up his pack for him, including gifts from the garden and the farm, and sewed the cloth Daisy and Mari sent with him on his return into clothes for them all, and struggled not to envy him.
Which was rather more than Nibs and Nick did, complaining of not being able to go. Their parents told them that they had no reason, with Nick's sweetheart in Bywater, and that Tom was the eldest and steadiest; the lads replied with elaborate pouting that went on for days, and Rosie watched it all and laughed behind her hand. Besides, Tom brought back news, much of it unfortunate but still useful. A group of Men had settled at Waymoot, destroying the trees there to build themselves horrid tarred shacks, and terrorizing all the neighboring villages, including Overhill; hardly any hobbits went out anymore besides older children and older folk, as tween lads and lasses alike were in danger of being harassed and molested. "Daisy and Mari're more shut in than you," Tom said sadly to Rosie, who squeezed his hand. How, then, could she begrudge them the occasional visit from Tom?
Meanwhile, Rosie's dad and Jolly and sometimes the younger lads went down to the Green Dragon and the Ivy Bush of evenings; the ale was getting shorter, and the tales of theft and hassle and even outright assault were getting longer, but Rosie could tell by her Da's face when he came home that no one would actually put their hands where their mouths were and join him in rising up against the self-styled Chief and his Men. She looked at him, and looked at her mother, and didn't say anything.
One bright June day Tom came home at elevenses, looking disgruntled. "I thought you were off on one of your holidays," said Nibs thoughtlessly, and Tom actually lunged at him so that Jolly and Nick had to leap from their seats and catch him. "Tom Cotton!" cried their mother, coming round the table. "What's got into you?"
"They're not letting me go, Mam!" Jolly and Nick deposited Tom on his feet, not least because he looked cross enough to possibly take them both on. "The Shirrifs won't let me travel to Hobbiton again, let alone Overhill. They say the Rules have got stricter."
Everyone sucked in their breath at that news. "Oh, Tom, I'm sorry," said Nibs, and Tom let out a long breath and smiled at his brother. "I know, Nibs. I'm sorry I nearly clouted you, but, well..."
"You didn't need a tease right then." Their mother laid a hand on Tom's arm. "I'm sorry too, my lad." Tom folded his arms tighter, his hands clenching. "How will I see my Mari now?" he asked, and no one had an answer for him.
He made his own answer, however. That night, Rosie woke to darkness and an insistent scratching at her bedroom door; she clambered out of bed, groped for her robe, and settled for wrapping the sheet round herself as she opened the door, to find Tom with grass in his hair and a ridiculous grin on his face. "Hullo, Rosie," he said, voice loud in the nighttime smial.
"Tom! Hush!" Rosie pulled him into the room where she could see him by the starlight through her window. "Where've you been? You're grinning like a tween."
"To Overhill." He sat down on the chest rather wearily, but still grinning so that he nearly glowed. "She said yes, Rosie, she said yes!"
"Of course she said yes," Rosie replied, rubbing her eyes, before the full impact of his words hit her. "You walked to Overhill and back, tonight? With all those Men about?"
"I told Mari I'd see her today," said Tom, and Rosie couldn't help but smile as she sat beside her brother and took his hands. "And I did. And I asked her to wed me, and she said yes."
"Took you long enough!" Rosie threw her arms round him. "Oh, well done, Tom, well done. But you should go to bed, the night's almost gone."
Tom nodded, but returned her squeeze for a long moment before he let go. "Mari sends her love to you," he told Rosie, "and I had to tell someone afore I could sleep." He looked up out the window, at the rosebush and the stars. "Overhill's not so far, less'n ten miles, but right now it seems far as the Moon."
Rosie thought of how far away Sam must be, and Mr. Frodo if he still lived; Tom looked at her and saw the thought in her face, and squeezed her again. "I should hush. And Mari wants to wed me, that's all I could wish for."
"And a finer sister by marriage I could never wish for." Rosie couldn't help but smile.
*
That morning their father took one look at Tom, smiled broadly, and sent him back to his bed; that made more chores for the rest of them, but for such good news they didn't mind. Even so, Rosie looked out across the Road as she carried pails of milk to the springhouse, and wanted to be out and about for even one day. After supper she asked her father if a couple of the lads could be spared to go with her to pick brambleberries; he looked at her as if he'd rather she didn't go, but said yes, and Nick and Andy didn't object to the trip, and letting Tom do their chores, at all.
So, two days hence they took six baskets, one filled with elevenses and the other five waiting for brambleberries, and set out. Nick and Andy sang together as they walked, but, remembering her last time on the Road, Rosie couldn't be quite so cheerful, spending her time looking about. On their way they passed two Men cutting down a lovely tall beech tree, and that stopped the singing; Nick opened his mouth when he saw, and Andy and Rosie grabbed his arms and tugged him along before the Men took notice of them, so they were a good ways away when Nick finally asked, "what're they doing that for?"
"What cause do they do anything for?" Rosie replied. "Come on, we're nearly there." When they arrived at the Bramble Banks they found several neighbors, if fewer than they might have seen in past years; still, they spent a cheerful sunlit morning picking berries, and at elevenses everyone shared and praised Rosie's violet jam till her cheeks turned as red as her namesake flower. When they set out for home with all six baskets full of berries Rosie was singing along with the lads.
Then they rounded a bend in the Road, and found five Shirrifs and Ted Sandyman, lounging and smoking. Nick stepped around to the front and they kept steadily walking, but when the group spotted them Ted jumped up to stand in their way and a couple of the Shirrifs followed. Rosie regarded them with narrowed eyes; they were all new Shirrifs, and the only one she knew was Fastolph Chubb, who stood to the back with a sour look on his face.
"Hullo, Master Sandyman," said Nick, "ain't you got a Mill to be running?"
"I'm a friend o'the Chief's," Sandyman replied, puffing out his chest like a rooster about to crow, and Rosie's heart sank; she laid a hand on Nick's shoulder to remind him not to start trouble. "I can do as I please. And this here's a Toll Road."
"Is that so?" replied Nick, fists clenching round the basket's handles, but his tone was even. "And what would the Toll be, so's we might go on home and not stand idle in the Road?"
Ted grinned, and so did the Shirrifs nearest him. The other three, to their credit, looked ill. "A basket of berries and a kiss from your pretty sister there."
Rosie's stomach heaved, and Andy growled behind her; feeling Nick's shoulder tense beneath her hand, she dug her fingers in. Facing down Sandyman wasn't worth a thrashing, and these days, he'd likely end up in the Lockholes. "And what call have you to ask a kiss of me, Sandyman?" she retorted, head held high, but he had lads behind him, he was in his element, and he grinned all the wider. "Those're the terms," he insisted. "Or we arrest you lot for disturbin' the peace, and seize the berries."
Rosie sighed, and stepped around Nick; he caught her wrist, and she smiled at him with reassurance she didn't feel and patted his shoulder. Andy came up beside him, and she handed him the larger of her two baskets, bringing Sandyman the smaller one. His two Shirrifs guffawed and elbowed each other as he grinned at her and grabbed her upper arms. "Sam's lass," he gloated. "But he ain't here now, is he?" Rosie set her quivering jaw, and stared back up at him, and he jerked her in and mashed his mouth to hers.
Well, she hadn't expected it to be pleasant, but he kept working his mouth over hers, trying to convince her to part her lips, until she had to clench her toes on the cobbles of the Road to keep her foot from rising to kick him. He began sliding his hands up her arms, as if he would sink them into her hair, and she made a protesting noise and tried to pull back, and he chuckled in his throat.
"That's enough, Ted." An arm pushed between them; Fastolph's arm, and he stood beside them glaring at Sandyman, who merely grinned that infuriating grin as he uncurled his fingers from Rosie's shoulders, one by one. She jerked out of his grasp, scrubbed her mouth and face with her handkerchief, straightened her sleeves and stepped backwards towards Nick and Andy, who came up beside her. "I thought you ain't sweet on her no more?" Sandyman retorted to Fastolph, who clenched his fist but pulled his arm back to fold it across his chest, repeating "that was enough."
"That's your berries and your kiss," said Rosie, cursing her voice for shaking and her cheeks for flaming, but keeping her head up. "And that's our way you're still standing in." Sandyman and his two Shirrifs grinned, and the other two shook their heads, and Stolph looked sad, but didn't say anything. They parted a bit, and Rosie and Nick and Andy hurried through and took to their heels as soon as they could.
No one said anything till they were nearly home; then Rosie glanced up and noticed the lads' white faces. Halting them, she patted Nick on his shoulder. "Thank you, Bowman," she said, using his given name as their mother might have.
"Thank me for what, Rose?" Nick still trembled beneath her hand, his face still pale and downcast. "For what? I wasn't a lick of use, I couldn't stop him. You should rail at me."
"You could be on your way to the Lockholes now. We all could. But you held your hand, and you did too, Andy. You kept your heads, my lads. Thank you both." Rosie pulled them in and held them until their shaking eased a bit. "You remembered what Dad told us."
"I don't know if he meant it for when a ruffian and his popinjays lay hands on my sister," said Nick sullenly, still not looking her in the eye; Andy leaned reassuringly against his side, and Rosie took a steadying breath. "Most of all then," she said, and Nick finally looked up. "I'd not be any better off if we were arrested. None of us would. Besides, 'twas just a kiss." Her shudder belied the last words, and Nick put his arm round her.
"D'ye think Stolph would've let us be arrested?" Andy asked, shoving them gently to get them moving again. Nick snorted. "He let that lot do as they pleased."
Rosie shook her head. "He did what he could. At any rate, we're home now. I suppose I'll be home for awhile," she said ruefully, looking up at the front door.
When they got in, Rosie let the lads bring in the berries, while she drew her mother aside. On the trudge home she'd thought of not telling her, not telling any of her family, and had realized it wouldn't work. "Mam, we lost a basket," she said, and told of their trip home as her mother's arm tightened round her shoulders.
When she was done, her mother held her and stroked her hair. "You're not going out again for awhile," she said.
"I know, Mam." Rosie folded her arms round herself and told herself there were no bars on the windows, no matter how much she felt them. "It ain't Nick and Andy's fault. They were outmatched."
"It ain't your fault either, Rose." She looked up at that, and her mother was smiling, if sadly. "You are fair, but that gives no one call nor cause to force you to anything, to lay hands on you. Those new Shirrifs are abusing their place, and they know it, and the Sandymans have been louts three generations running." Rosie nodded, feeling a great knot undo within her that she hadn't realized was there. "Thank you, Mam," she whispered, and now, of all moments, was when her eyes began to prickle. "Oh, Mam." Rosie bit her lip, but the tears were building, and her mother saw them and stroked her hair again. "The Men are bad enough, but what will become of the Shire if hobbits turn against hobbits? We'll never be free." That was all she managed before she buried her face in her mother's shoulder and wept in earnest.
*
A few days later, Rosie's father set out for the Green Dragon, and came home again unexpectedly early and quite noisily; hearing her father shouting amid deep coarse laughter, she ran out to the kitchen, but Buttercup caught her before she could head to the hall, and shook her head silently as she drew Rosie into the parlor. There they could hear through the window the altercation on the front steps.
Rosie hadn't heard her father so angry in years. "Let me go! I could thrash the lot of you!" A thud, and more laughter. "Yes, you could," came a smooth, self-satisfied gentlehobbit's voice, and Rosie's heart stuttered in her chest as recognized that voice, as she clutched Buttercup's hand. "But then it'd be the Lockholes for you, my good hobbit." Rosie heard her father growl, but say nothing. "And who would watch over your passel of lads, your fair round wife, and that pretty lass of yours?" Buttercup turned wide eyes on Rosie. "Yes, Farmer Cotton, I remember you and your litter. You've the daughter who can read well above her station, don't you? I could use a secretary who's so easy to look at." His laugh was high and nasal above the Men's deep guffaws.
Rosie's father's voice was tight and cold, but controlled again. "She don't need a position. Thank you kindly. There's plenty of work here."
"Then you shouldn't be idling in inns, should you? Stay home, Cotton, and keep out of trouble. Next time, the Lockholes." The laughter trailed off, down the Road; Rosie peeped over the windowsill and saw four Men heading off down it, and at their head Lotho Pimple riding on a pony and wearing a wide cap with several feathers in it. Then Rosie turned away, hearing her parents coming down the hall, and it was her turn to catch Buttercup, because she could hear her mother weeping. "Tolman, Tolman," Rosie's Mam repeated between sobs. "Tolman, I might never have seen you more."
"Shh, Lily, it's all right. It's all right. I'm safe, I'm here." Rosie heard them go down the hall to their bedroom, her mother weeping the whole way; when they'd shut their door she emerged from the parlor, feeling shaken head to toe.
Andy met them in the hall, all Rosie's brothers but Tom with him. "Rosie! Buttercup! They've closed all the inns!"
"What?" Rosie led everyone into the kitchen and fetched some barley-water, it being too hot for tea and there being no ale in the house. "All the inns?"
"Every one," Jolly confirmed, too shocked for joking. "Nibs and I were at the Ivy Bush when a great squad of Men came and told us all to clear out or face the Lockholes; Pimple don't hold with beer nor idleness, they said, so the inns are closed. When we looked back they were pasting a notice on the door and tossing the staff out on their ears, poor lads."
"Andy'n I met Jolly and Nibs on the way home," said Nick, looking shaken as Rosie felt; Tom appeared in the doorway and stood quietly to listen. "We're at the Dragon with Dad, when our Chief Pimple himself graced that one. He said he wanted a word with Da, and his Men patted their cudgels. Da made us go on home. I'm worried after him." Andy nodded, putting his arm round Nick.
"Da's here," Rosie said, glancing at Buttercup, who nodded. "We heard him come in. He's with Mam."
"So, Pimple's closed the inns," said Tom slowly, coming to sit at the table, "and between the Shirrifs and the Men not a hobbit will stir from their hole. The Thain's dug in; so's Brandy Hall. We're as pinned as rabbits in burrows. How will we ever shake these ruffians off now?"
To that, none of them had any answer.
*
Lithe, of course, was not danced that year, not with travel forbidden and the Party Field owned by the Sackville-Bagginses. Sitting out in the orchard at dusk with his sibs, Jolly pinched his nose and did a very funny imitation of Miz Lobelia's likely reaction to being asked to host "unseemly drunken carousing", before tugging Buttercup up and trotting off with a wink to the fields. Nick and Andy looked at each other, and Tom and Rosie laughed and shooed them off to go dance their Lithe as well.
After a moment, a nightingale began singing, as blue and silver quiet descended upon the orchard. Tom and Rosie sat together and sipped hard cider and just breathed for awhile, listening to the stars and the wind and the nightingale, and some giggles in the distance from one or the other couple. At length, Tom whispered, "you must miss Sam."
"And you must miss Mari." Rosie reached across to pat Tom's shoulder; he shook his head and smiled. "I know where she bides, though, and one day I'll have her home. But Sam---"
"Sam's coming back," Rosie insisted stoutly. "He is."
"I hope so, Rosie." Tom patted her hand. "I do hope so."
[the last scene is in the first comment]
