Chapter 34. You Towers of Heaven, You Shining Light

'Lift his head,' Fastred said to Frodo, and as the younger hobbit did his bidding, he held the water bottle to Ferdi's lips, only to have the chancellor throw up an arm to knock it away.

'Ferdi,' Fastred soothed. 'It's all right. Drink.'

'No Ent-draught,' Ferdi moaned feverishly. 'I'd rather do without.'

'It's not Ent-draught,' Frodo said. 'Just water. You need to drink.' He nodded at Fastred, and they tried again, only to have the chancellor push the bottle away. Frodo tried to hold Ferdi's hands down, but the delirious hobbit turned his face aside when the bottle touched his lips.

Fastred sat back. 'What are we to do?' he asked in dismay. 'He's out of his head.'

'The King has healing hands,' Frodo said. 'I've heard about them often enough. He brought my dad back from the brink of death, you know.'

'Elanor told me,' Fastred said absently, only to see Frodo bristle. 'Give over,' he said wearily. 'You're not going to start that again. Nothing happened between us.'

'You kissed her,' Frodo said truculently.

'Yes, I did,' Fastred admitted, surprising himself. 'And a very nice kiss it was, too, and I wouldn't mind another, at the end of a wedding ceremony.' He looked up and laughed at Frodo's expression.

'You mean...?' Frodo said slowly.

'Well, I'd have to ask your dad first,' Fastred answered, '...but, yes.'

'And Ellie?'

'Well, she already said yes, if your dad agrees,' Fastred answered. 'I couldn't very well have asked him, not knowing her feelings.'

'Usually it's done the other way around,' Frodo said dryly.

'Well pardon me for loving your sister,' Fastred said, irritated. 'If she didn't want me, I didn't want to ask your dad and have him jolly her into something she didn't want.'

'You still don't know him, do you?' Frodo said slowly. 'He wouldn't do that, at all.'

'I've heard a lot of stories,' Fastred admitted, 'but I still don't know the hobbit.'

'We'll have to change that,' Frodo said. 'But if you want to go and marry my sister, you're going to have to live a bit closer.'

'The Thain's offered me a position, working for him,' Fastred answered. 'Is the Great Smials close enough?' Frodo's words struck him. 'You mean... you don't object to me marrying Elanor?'

Frodo started to shake his head with a grin, but both were brought back to their present predicament by a moan from the chancellor. Fastred got up suddenly.

'I'm going to go and have a look, see if I can see them coming,' he said. 'You stay here, try and get some water into him if you can.'

'Very well,' Frodo said. 'Be careful. Don't want to have to drag you in out of the rain.'

Fastred grinned, and crept from the cave. Once outside, he slipped from rock to rock, seeking cover as he moved. They still did not know who had made that campfire...

He worked his way to the top of the hill, throwing himself down to gaze over the Westmarch. Looking to his right, he could see one of the towers from where he lay, on the next hilltop. He wondered how much he could see from the top of that tower, but of course, such exploration would have to wait until they took care of the present situation.

Rain trickled through his hair and down his face, and he wiped the moisture away impatiently, staring again out towards the plain. He stiffened, then, seeing antlike figures crawling towards him. The King was coming!

***

Frodo tried to coax Ferdi to drink, but the feverish hobbit knocked the bottle aside each time, shaking his head and protesting bitterly, and finally the tween decided that trying was doing more harm than good, using up energy that Ferdi could ill afford to waste.

He put the bottle down and took Ferdi's hand. 'I'm here,' he said. 'Steady, now.'

'Pippin?' Ferdi moaned, trying to open his eyes.

'Frodo,' the tween corrected.

'Frodo...' Ferdi said, dissatisfied. 'What're you doing here? I thought you sailed in an elven ship all these many years ago.'

It wasn't worth explaining, for with the hobbit out of his head he probably wouldn't understand anyhow. So Frodo just soothed Ferdi with soft words, as if he were sitting bedside watch for a feverish brother, and of a wonder, the chancellor calmed somewhat.

'That's right,' Frodo was saying softly, when suddenly the chancellor jerked alert, eyes open.

'What's that?' he hissed.

For a moment Frodo thought it was the fever talking, but then he heard rough voices outside the cave, and he froze.

Ferdi looked to him, his eyes, of a wonder, aware and alert. 'Ruffians,' he whispered. 'They mustn't find you. Hide. Quickly.'

Without stopping to think, Frodo grabbed up his bow and the quivers, his and Ferdi's, and scrambled behind the rocks they'd propped Ferdi against, pulling his cloak over him, and just in time, for he heard Men cursing, the scraping noise of their crawling, and then the stomp of their heavy booted feet as they stood up inside the cave. Frodo thought of Ferdi, dreadfully exposed, but there was no way he could have dragged him to cover...

'Look here,' one of them said. 'Not only a nice little hidey-hole to get out of the rain, but someone here to greet us in the bargain!'

'What is one of the little rat-folk doing here?' another said sharply.

'Dying, from the look of it,' another joked. He nudged Ferdi's bad leg and the hobbit groaned. 'Might be some good sport here,' he added.

'You and your games, Brant, I tell you, there's trouble afoot. Why would one of the Little Folk be here? What if they discover our hiding places, and send word to those guardsmen of the King's, eh?' The speaker bent down to shake Ferdi roughly. 'You, there, what are you doing here?'

'Elessar,' Ferdi said. 'Keep your hands off, or King or no King, I'll...' his voice trailed away. The ruffians were instantly sober and grim, no joking now. One of them swore.

'Elessar,' the leader gritted. 'The King? Coming here?'

'I told you I saw tracks headed over the plain towards the rat-folks' diggings.'

'Yes, but that was days ago,' the leader said.

'Which means, whoever it was had time to get across the plain, and lead a party back. What if they discovered sign of us here, and sent word to the guardsmen? The King could be on his way even now!'

'Brant!' the leader snapped. 'Go up top and look out over the plain, then hurry back and tell me what you see.'

The ruffian named dove for the entrance of the cave. The leader then turned his attention back to Ferdibrand.

'Let us see if we can waken this little one, persuade him to tell us more,' he said.

'Bucket of water in the face?' one of the others suggested.

'No,' the leader mused. 'No, but I've heard of a trick they used to use, questioning these folk when Sharkey was boss, and no effort needed at all...'

Frodo crouched behind the rocks, huddled under the cloak, cringing as he listened to the ruffians interrogating the chancellor.

'You didn't just crawl in here, not with that leg, you didn't, so where are the others?'

The chancellor cried out, but gave no answer.

'When is the King coming?'

'Why did you come to the Tower Hills?'

'How many of you are there?'

'Where are the others? Tell us!'

Frodo cowered beneath his cloak, helpless, listening to the bursts of laughter from the ruffians as each "neat trick" brought a reaction from the chancellor. In desperation he stuffed his fingers in his ears, but he could still tell when the ruffians stopped asking questions and merely caused pain for their own amusement, laughing at their prisoner's pleas, for the chancellor had been driven beyond pride or stubbornness.

'What, you beg for death?' the leader laughed hoarsely. 'Don't you worry, little rat, we'll give you your death, soon enough.'

'Not soon enough for his liking, I warrant,' another ruffian quipped, and they laughed again.

At last Ferdi moaned, 'No...' and his voice trailed off into silence.

Frodo wondered if he'd died, but then one of the ruffians said, 'Well, that's that. He's too far gone, we'll get nothing more from him.'

'Bring that torch closer,' another ruffian said, 'I'll look through his clothes. He might have some papers on him, a map or something.'

Suddenly one of the ruffians swore. 'Do you know who this is?'

'You know him?'

'Know him? I nearly hanged him upon a time! This here's the Fox, the one as set all those traps to keep us out of... what was it they called the place? Tickland, or some wild name like that.'

'The Fox...' the leader mused. 'You nearly taught him to dance at rope's end?'

'Yes, we'd caught him, or one of the rats had caught him and turned him over, and we took him to the main road to hang him up to show the other rat-folk what happens to troublemakers. Scar, he was the leader of our gang, he tapped my brother to help with the hanging, sent the rest of us ahead to Stock... and we never saw them again.'

'You think he had something to do with it?'

'Look at the rope scars on his neck! They hanged him, all right, but he didn't stay at the end of the rope long enough to learn to dance, it looks like.'

'Well we can remedy that,' one of the ruffians said nastily.

'No trees nearby,' the leader mused. 'Guess he wasn't born to hang.'

'No, but if this is truly the Fox...' another said.

'What is it, Gimp?' the leader asked.

'I used to drink at that place they called the Cockerel,' the old ruffian said, 'afore we closed it down, good beer there. Anyhow, I heard talk about this Fox. He's not affrighted by much, but he's afeard of fire, they said.'

'Fire...' the leader said thoughtfully. 'I think we could do something with that.'

'What did you have in mind?' someone said.

'O, douse him with lamp oil, leave a candle stub nearby to burn down, something like that perhaps...' the leader said slowly.

Frodo shivered as with a sudden chill, and huddled deeper into himself, but he couldn't shut out the voices of the ruffians, and the horrifying pictures their words conjured in his mind.

Brant scrambled into the cave again. 'Riders, a group of them, coming over the plain!'

'How soon will they be here?' the leader snapped.

'Three, maybe four hours,' Brant gasped.

'Good,' the leader said with satisfaction. 'Enough time to lay a trap. With luck they won't be expecting trouble, and even if they are, there's cracks and crevices to hide in, they won't see us until we rise up to strike them down.' The leader paused. 'Is it still raining?' he asked.

'No, it must have stopped right after we found the cave. There's a brisk wind blowing, and things are starting to dry up already.'

'Dry up already? Good. Take the rat,' the leader said. 'I've got a nice game in mind for him.'

'What's that?' Brant asked eagerly.

'You know that old shed we built against the tower? It's falling down, we don't need it anymore, with this lovely cave to put our supplies in. Why don't we put him inside it, set it afire and see how far this rat can crawl with his broken leg? Do you suppose he can make it all the way out of the shed before the roof falls in on him?'

'I don't know,' Gimp said. 'He looks pretty far gone to me...'

'Maybe his fear of fire will wake him up a bit,' the leader said. 'It's worth a try. And if he doesn't, no great loss. If he were to crawl out we'd just have to toss him back in anyhow.' There was a great guffaw from the other ruffians at this idea. When the laughter quieted, the leader spoke again. 'Brant,' he said, 'you and Gimp take care of this little one, while we take care of the guardsmen.'

The one called Brant laughed and said, 'Now that's the best order you've given all day!'

'What about smoke?' Gimp said sharply. 'Won't that warn off the riders?'

'Naw, if they even notice it, I imagine it'll distract them,' the leader said. 'It'll be up at the top of the hill, by the tower, so they'll be looking for trouble there, not down where we plan to waylay them.'

Gimp nodded, satisfied.

'Seml, you and Ged hide yourselves outside the cave, set a watch. Someone left him here, and they'll be coming back for him, I'm sure. You can give them a nice surprise when they come.' Two voices murmured assent, and Frodo heard them crawling out of the cave.

Frodo heard Ferdi grunt as he was lifted from the cave floor, and then the voices of the ruffians receded.

***

Fastred went to earth behind a rock as he heard the approach of booted feet. A Man appeared--a ruffian! He panted to the top of the hill, throwing himself down in nearly the same spot that the hobbit had just vacated. He looked over the plain and swore, arose quickly, and slipped and slid his way down again, towards the cave.

Fastred had little doubt, now, as to who had made the campfire.

***

A/N: If you thought the name of one of the ruffians sounded familiar, yes, he returns in As the Gentle Rain.

Notes from original posting follow.

Notes to Readers:

The Muse is plugging along at Merlin. The wedding on the Far Downs is written, can you believe it? ...in rough draft, at least, so stay with us through these current difficulties, the reward is coming...

Thanks for the reviews! Very helpful, quite motivating.

PansyChubb, I admit I hadn't thought of that! It was entirely possible for ruffians to get Leotred, but I think I would have written myself into a corner had I done that... the kinks in the plot were hard enough to hammer out as it was... Whew. Sure glad he's safe with the King's Men now.

Xena, will miss you and your thoughtful reviews! Have a nice time on vacation. I must admit, the "Wakey, wakey" exchange was one of my favourite parts in chapter 33. And I am very glad that Pippin can lean on Merry a bit without the same worries he had in "At the End of His Rope". Everyone should have an older, wiser cousin to go to for advice. Sure wish I did.

Oooooo, FantasyFan, as usual you hit the nail right on the head! Reading your review got *me* quaking all over again. (But what did you mean by the dead parrot? Ooo, another story I haven't read yet...)

Aemilia Rose, *sigh* ruffians. Can't live with 'em, hard to write without 'em. They make such wonderfully convenient villains.

Dana, very insightful comment about luck! It is not that Tooks have bad luck, it is that they have so much luck that they can actually survive the situations their relative boldness (compared to most other hobbits) gets them into. Nice. I nearly snorked when I read your comment about Pippin's gnats... but the Muse glared at me, pointedly crimped the little finger on the hand holding her glass of pina colada, and raised an eyebrow. Whew. Manners firmly in place again.

Hai, yes, for once, Pippin's problems are the least of the problems in one of my stories... and Ferdi's idea *did* work, it seems...

runaround, *gasping* with you...

Aratfeniel, (what does that mean? I assume it is elvish. It does roll nicely from the tongue) Ferdi thanks you for your support.

Look for a new chapter to this story, if (the host) agrees, in two days. Warning: we have entered rough waters, and more breakers are ahead!

Look for the newest chapter to "Flames", in case you are following that story, on the morrow. And thank you for your patience.