Evil Times
By Pipspebble
Rated PG-13, for disturbing images
Thanks to super beta provided by Marigold and Nickey
Genre: Angsty Merry and Pippin hurt/comfort, a continuation of the story begun in Tears and Fears

Merry woke to the pleasant sound of water dripping, dripping, tinkling into the basin by the arch in Treebeard's Ent-house. He opened his eyes to find sunshine filtering through the trees outside the bower, casting upon the floor a pale green, almost golden light. The dewy scent of early morn was in the air, and a slight breeze stirred the leaves outside.

Pippin lay snuggled into his side and Merry was reluctant to move, though the continual sound of water splashing into the basin served as a painful reminder that his bladder was full and could only be ignored for so long. Clearly he must extricate himself in order to tend to business, but his cousin was so relaxed, and seemed to be sleeping so peacefully after the difficult night he had had that Merry was loathe to disturb him.

He resolved to take his mind off the relatively minor discomfort of having to answer nature's call and put his mind on other things. His chief concern being Pippin, as always, Merry decided to take advantage of his cousin's somnolence to do a quick visual inventory of the hurts he knew had been inflicted upon him.

He had already seen the rope burns around Pippin's ankles, yesterday, when they had stopped to dabble their feet and hands in the Entwash. Though his wrists bore obvious signs of having been tightly bound, they were nothing like the angry red lines cut deep into Merry's own flesh. But Merry had also seen the mark of a lash across Pippin's calves and suspected more lay beneath his clothing. He knew that Pippin had suffered at least one, and probably more, whip lashes from the brutal Uruk-hai on the seemingly endless march across the Plains of Rohan. And these were only the injuries that Merry knew about. He shuddered to think of what might have happened to Pippin during the time Merry had been unconscious, struck down by a blow to the head shortly after they were taken.

The fingers of his left arm twitched, the arm on which Pippin's head lay, so close to Merry's eyes that he could see every fleck of dirt or twig or leaf that had caught in his curls during their ordeal. Merry itched to touch him, but contented himself instead with raking his fingers lightly through the messy hair, clearing away as much debris as he could without waking Pippin.

"Merry?" Well, he thought, so much for not waking Pippin. He looked down into wide-open green eyes.

"Yes, dear one?"

"Do you think it would be all right with Treebeard if we took a bath?"

Merry smiled. How convenient for the bath-loving little Took that they just happened to be guests in an Ent-house with a perfectly hobbit-sized basin near the arch outside. "I don't see why not," he said, absently continuing his ministrations to his cousin's hair. "I saw him standing beneath the water last evening as if he was having a bit of a fresher himself. I don't think he would mind if we got ourselves clean."

Pippin wriggled out of his embrace and sat up, sniffing under his armpits, scratching at his now riotous curls. "I can't stand myself, Merry. I want to get clean. I want to get clean right now!"

Before Merry could respond Pippin had hopped off the bed and run outside to dart behind one of the sentry trees and relieve his own morning discomfort. Merry followed suit and almost before he could finish Pippin had turned and made for the basin, dropping his filthy coat, scarf and shirt in his wake so that they littered the floor of the clearing in a path to the water.

Merry watched and tried not to make any noise as Pippin divested himself of his clothing, but when he removed his shirt Merry could not stifle the gasp that escaped his throat. There, across the smooth expanse of Pippin's skinny back, not one, not two, but three long red wheals stood starkly against the once flawless skin. Interspersed here and there were bruises in various shades of healing, and cuts and scratches were scattered over his entire back. The mark of the lash around his calves flared briefly before being obscured by Pippin's trousers as he wriggled out of them before stepping into the pool in just his smallclothes. Merry closed his eyes, stifling a groan of equal parts rage and regret over what had happened to his young cousin while in his care.

Pippin turned his head slightly to one side and called to him. "Come on in, Merry. The water is fine."

Merry mustered a smile and started for the basin, removing his coat, weskit, shirt and trousers and setting them aside in a neat little pile, though they would get wet soon enough when they were able to wash them. For now, Merry wanted to concentrate only on getting their bodies clean for he felt as if he was crawling with filth and vermin from being among the Uruks for he knew not how many days and nights, and he suspected the same was true for his cousin. A bath would do them good.

He stepped into the basin, where Pippin already stood with his back to him, the water not quite reaching his hips, swirling about him as it circulated in the little pool and washed back out into the stream. Pippin bent at the waist and dipped his head into the water, scrubbing at his scalp, his elbows sticking out as he washed the filth from his hair. His wet pants were stretched tight across his backside and Merry could not help smiling at the sight.

Merry doused himself and scrubbed at his arms, his chest, and splashed water onto his face so that the filth of their ordeal washed away at last. He ducked his head under the water and scrubbed at his curls until they were honey-colored again, the dirt drifting away on the stream.

He came up behind Pippin and gingerly trickled some water over the thin shoulders, noticing as he did that the wheals did not appear to be infected; in fact, there seemed to be a thin layer of new skin growing on the marks already. His own hands were in front of him and Merry noticed the marks around his wrists appeared to be much better today. He wondered if there was something in the Ent-draught that Treebeard had given them the night before that could have brought about this rapid healing. He rubbed gently along the sharp planes of Pippin's shoulder blades, being careful to avoid the lash marks, the bruises, the worst of the gouges.

"I'm sorry, Pippin," he said quietly, and Pippin turned his head to look over his shoulder at his cousin.

"Oi, Merry, 'tis no fault of yours I've got these marks. They were well earned, I must say. And I know you have your own hurts, so don't go feeling too sorry for me. I've borne up all right."

Merry nodded, fiercely proud of him. "Aye, that you have, Pippin."

He moved around in front so that he could look full at his cousin, and his own eyes grew large at the sight of new outrages against Pippin's person. His wiry arms bore deep bruising all up and down them, and a deep gouge marked his collarbone, likely made by a great Orc claw. His entire torso bore signs of an abuse that Merry did not want to think of, but knew that he must, for this was Pippin. His Pippin.

He continued to study the dripping form, his eyes drawn to a long, angry scratch on Pippin's side, from his hipbone downward in a slant, a scratch that disappeared beneath Pippin's pants, but the general direction of which could not be misinterpreted. Merry's heart leapt into his throat as he pondered the origin of the wound.

"Pippin?" He flinched at the sudden pain in Pippin's eyes as he realized where Merry was looking and turned away. But Merry would have none of this and caught the younger hobbit's face in his hand, turning his cousin back to face him. "No, Pippin, don't turn away from me. You can tell me anything. You know that, don't you?"

Pippin nodded, his eyes growing misty and again Merry's heart cinched in fear. He forced his mouth to form the question his heart dreaded to hear answered.

"Did anything happen, Pippin, while I was unconscious?"

Another nod, another tightening of his heart. Merry gripped Pippin by both shoulders, forcing his eyes away from evidence of violence done against the one he loved most in all the world. "Who hurt you, dearest?"

Pippin looked miserably up at his cousin, and a tear formed at the corner of one green eye, breached the dam of his lashes and travelled down the side of his nose to linger on a trembling upper lip, a moment only before being swept away by Pippin's nervous tongue. Finally he spoke again, and Merry's world shattered with the words.

"All of them."

He very nearly fell down, right there in the water and would have done had he not been holding onto Pippin's shoulders so tightly. He felt as if all the air had been knocked out of him with one swift kick and he stared back hard at his cousin, until finally he managed to gasp one word. "How?"

Pippin looked down again and the tips of his ears grew pink. "They hit me and they threw rocks at me and they picked me up by my hair and then when I fell down they all laughed and laughed because they thought it was so funny that I couldn't stand, and then they tossed me around between them, and the whole time I was carried after that they talked amongst themselves about the fun they were going to have when they got us to Isengard. They were going to do terrible things to us, Merry. Terrible, terrible things."

Merry forced himself to take regular breaths during Pippin's elaboration, and a tiny spark of hope grew in his breast. Perhaps he had misinterpreted Pippin's first words, and what he had feared most had not happened to his young cousin after all. There was only one way to find out.

"What happened here, Pip?" he asked gently, dropping one hand down to the mark on the young hobbit's side, his finger hovering just above the skin, tracing it along its dangerous path. "Did any of them hurt you? There?"

Pippin's ears flamed bright red and his eyes sparkled with unshed tears. "He tried to."

"Who, Pip?"

"Grishnákh," he whispered, ducking his head again, blinking so that his tears fell from his eyes, hitting the water in tiny droplets of pain and fear.

"Pippin, what did he do to you? Please, dearest, you must tell me."

The young hobbit sniffed mightily and Merry wished he had a handkerchief to offer, but there was none, so he lifted Pippin's chin with one hand and wiped at the tears with the other.

"'Twas just before I tried to trick him into thinking we had the Ring. He ran his nasty hands all over me, pawing and poking and groping." His Tookland accent was growing thicker, a sure sign of agitation, and no wonder.

Merry forced himself to keep his eyes open and on his cousin as Pippin went on with his story, no matter how much he wanted to close them in pain as Pippin's words poured forth.

"He pinched and he pulled and his long nails scratched me everywhere and all the time I could feel his horrible, foul, hot breath in my face. I didna want you to see what he was doin' for fear that it would drive you into a rage and then he would kill you. So I stayed still, though it was the hardest thing I've ever done in me life. 'Twas when he tried to put his hand down me breeks that I struggled. I wasna goin' t' let him touch me there."

Merry smiled sadly at his sweet young cousin's outraged modesty. Hope took root in his heart and he relaxed his grip on Pippin's chin, caressing his cheek instead. "Is that all, Pippin?" he asked quietly, praying fervently that the abuse had gone no further. To his endless relief, Pip nodded.

"Aye. 'Twas then that the riders came upon us and Grishnákh dragged us away and when he drew his sword I thought he was going to kill us right then and there, Merry, I did!"

Merry nodded, remembering that he had thought so, too. He firmly believed that Grishnákh had intended to slay them rather than risk their escape. But if those unknown riders had not come upon them when they had, who knew what that hairy little villain would have done to his Pippin? The images that popped into Merry's mind did not bear hanging onto, and he let them dissipate as he took a deep breath and met his cousin's liquid green eyes.

"But you're sure nothing else happened with the Orcs, none of them touched you in any of your private places, they didn't hurt you in that way?"

Pippin's entire face exploded with color as he finally realized exactly what it was that Merry was asking. He shook his head, slowly at first, then faster, almost violently, as if to dislodge the very notion of what could have happened. "No, Merry," he said, quite forcefully. "No, they didna hurt me, not like that."

Merry let his breath go in a rush and pulled his cousin into an all-encompassing embrace, relief flowing through him as his heartbeat returned to a steady rhythm. He could feel Pippin's own thumping heartbeat against his chest as they stood locked in each other's arms, Merry rocking him gently from side to side.

He closed his eyes and rested his cheek atop Pippin's wet curls, grateful beyond words that his cousin had been spared. He resolved to keep an even closer watch on him, to be alert to signs of distress over the ordeal they had just been through, and to keep him safe from harm to the best of his ability. Though he had made this same vow on the day Pippin was born, when he had first held him in his eight-year-old arms and vowed to one and all that he would protect his Pippin for all the days of their lives, somehow, things had not worked out quite so well as he would have had it. He had not been able to protect him, no matter how much he wanted to. He prayed that neither of them would ever have to know that pain again.

"Hoo, ho! Good morning Merry and Pippin!"

Treebeard's voice startled them apart and they looked up to see the old Ent striding toward them. "You sleep long," he said. "I have been many a hundred strides already today. Now we will have a drink and go to Entmoot."

The hobbits quickly gathered up their clothes and scrubbed them as best they could before draping them over a couple of low-hanging branches off one of the trees near the arch, where they would hopefully catch a bit of the breeze that swept down the court and caused goose bumps to form on their bare chests, where a bit of moisture still lingered.

"I really am fine, Merry," Pippin said as they started back to the Ent-house. "And I think there was something in that drink that Treebeard gave us last night that is making me better. And you, too, I hope."

"I think you're right, Pippin," Merry agreed. "Why don't we go see if he will give us some more?"

Pippin quirked a brow at him, grinning. "I'll bet you that I can finish all of mine before you do," he challenged.

"You're on, you cheeky little Took!" Laughing, Merry put his arm across Pippin's shoulder and pulled him against him, into his warmth, and together they followed Treebeard back into the bay.