Chapter 2 - Hobbiton

The hobbit who had been arranged to meet them at Sarn Ford beams up at them as they cross the shallow water. The Rangers do not smile at all and confiscate their weapons with grim thoroughness. “You will get them back when you leave,” a ranger tells them.

“Of course,” Sauron says, “I understand.”

“Interesting, that traveling minstrels have such weapons,” the ranger continues, eyeing their craftily-made swords and knives, then eyeing their simple peasant attire, as well as the darker man’s great height.

“The new King may have united all the kingdoms and brought peace to the realm,” Rick says, not unkindly and without threat or defense, “but there are still thieves. We who travel through empty lands must be cautious.”

“Of course, of course,” says the hobbit impatiently. He is a short fellow, even by hobbit standards, with brown curls tinged grey at the roots and bright blue eyes that twinkle as sunlight on water. “You have the weapons, all is well. What need is there to talk about it?” he says cheekily to the ranger. He turns to the minstrels and smiles toothily at them. “I am Pepper Broadback, but most folk call me Tiny. I must say, we were very excited to hear of your interest in performing in the Shire, at our very own Ivy Bush no less. What an honor to finally meet you.” He looks at Sauron and nods. “You must be the master, Bob Apples, and this is your apprentice, Tom Crumble?”

Sauron startles slightly at the announcement of his pseudonym and turns a leveling eye towards his friend. “That’s right,” Rick jumps in when Sauron fails to reply right away. He takes the hobbit’s hand and continues. “We’ve heard so many stories of your famous Travellers and their peaceful realm to the north. We’ve been equally anxious to see this land and meet its people ourselves, and we’re delighted that our invitation was so readily accepted. I hope we don’t disappoint. It is so easy to do so, once expectations have been mounted.” 

“We’re easily entertained, I assure you,” Tiny says. “So long as you can carry a tune and turn a fancy tale, we’ll be happy. We might even have to talk you into staying longer, but we’ve got to get you there first. Come on then.” He waves his pudgy little hand and leads them away from the ford.

Rick and Sauron follow him away from the rangers and towards a waiting pony-trap. The rangers watch them as they go but do not heed them further; they have the weapons and that is the main thing, as the hobbit had stated. 

Once the rangers are far behind, Sauron yanks Rick to a halt and allows the hobbit to trot off ahead of them for a few clicks. Then he leans towards his friend and hisses indignantly, “I’m Bob Apples?!”

“Next time, you think up the fake names,” Rick whispers back, shaking away Sauron’s hand and continuing after Tiny before they can be noticed lagging. 

“Oh, I will,” Sauron promises.

They reach the trap just a few paces after Tiny. The hobbit busies himself with checking the halters, leaving Rick to load the trap with their bags. Sauron meanwhile takes Brego’s reins and ties the horse to the lead pony. Brego snorts with indignation at the notion of having to be led by a pony, not even a stout and hearty Rohirrim pony but a docile, plaintive Shire pony at that. The stallion flattens his ears and glares at his master. Sauron pats Brego’s snout affectionately and whispers a few reassuring words into the horse’s ears to soothe his wounded ego before joining Rick in the back of the trap. 

His guests settled in for the ride, Tiny clicks the ponies into motion and Brego follows along reluctantly.

The journey to Hobbiton takes a day and a half by the road, which Tiny insists on following. “The Captains have long ago chased off those ruffians,” he tells his companions as they leave the ford behind, “but you never can be too careful. All sorts of places for folk to hide in the Southfarthing, there is, what with the woods and all. I suppose you know, or mayhap you don’t, but it was through the ford and the Southfarthing that them ruffians got into the Shire in the first place.”

“The captains? You mean the rangers?” Rick asks.

Tiny snorts. “Them rangers like to keep a lookout on the bridges and fords into the Shire. Don’t know why. We’ve Bounders as do that, and if them rangers were there before the Troubles, as the Captains say, well, they didn’t do a very good job of it, did they? Though I reckon they’re surly enough to keep away most bad folk.

“Nay, the Captains would be Mr. Meriadoc Brandybuck and Mr. Peregrin Took. They went off to foreign parts and come back tall as a house! Picked up some queer habits out in the Blue but they’re getting back to practical ways.”

“Those would be the cousins of Frodo the Nine-Fingered,” Rick says. “Do they live in Hobbiton as well?”

Tiny shakes his head. “Tooks live down in the Green-Hill Country mostly, but Mr. Peregrin is keeping himself away in Buckland with Mr. Meriadoc. Who are you knowing as Mr. Frodo only has the nine fingers now?”

“He’s only the most famous person in all of Arda,” Rick says. 

“Is he?” Tiny asks but his tone doesn’t hold interest. Rather, he sounds worried, as if this statement confirms something he long suspected to be true. “He always was one to talk to elves and dwarves and such. An odd one, he is. You’ll meet him, maybe, once we get to Hobbiton. Depending...”

“Depending on what?” Sauron asks when Tiny lapses into silence.

“Oh, just depending,” Tiny says and starts humming a traveling song. Soon, he and Rick are trading songs, and this leads to swapping stories. By the time they stop outside Waymeet for the night, Tiny has told them nearly the entire history of Hobbiton and its inhabitants. All that is except for the two that Rick and Sauron are most eager to learn about. 

“What do you think it means?” Rick whispers to Sauron after Tiny has gone to sleep. The little hobbit snores peacefully on the other side of the fire from them. 

Sauron shrugs. “That they protect their own. He seems to know who we are really interested in and so in keeping mute on the subject, at least for now. His tongue may loosen once we arrive.”

They reach the Hobbiton marketplace near noon the following day. The marketplace is crowded with shoppers and vendors of all sorts. Rick spies out the lay of the shops and stalls as Tiny drives them through the market. Once they reach the inn and Sauron is seeing to the stable arrangements for Brego, Rick slips away and wanders into the market. He browses the stalls and examines the small, almost child-sized versions of cookery, wares and goods. They are amazingly similar to what can be found in Rohan. He plays with a bellows that the blacksmith hands him and feels almost like a giant. He picks up what he is told is a quilt but looks more like a bath rug to him and examines the weaving. In turn, the hobbits that are musically inclined attempt to strum a few chords on Rick’s tambour, which is twice the size they’re used to. A pair of determined young boys finally settle on an arrangement of sorts, one fingering the neck, the other plucking the chords, when Rick hears a familiar holler easily rise over the din of the bustling market.

“Tom!” Sauron calls and beckons to Rick. He and Tiny have finished stabling the ponies and Brego, and they are waiting for him outside the inn.

Rick says a quick good-bye to his new friends, retrieves his tambour and runs towards The Ivy Bush, which sits in the very center of the marketplace. At the door next to Tiny is an older, portly hobbit with grey curls and a cheerful face. He takes Rick’s hand for a firm shake, then claps the lad on the arm and leads him inside, still holding his hand. “Welcome, welcome!” he says. “I am Geranius Brooklane, the innkeeper here at the Bush. Watch your heads now.”

They duck their heads obediently, Sauron nearly doubling over completely, and step through the little door into the sunlit common room. There they find a small party of hobbits sitting in the middle of the room, lingering over their luncheon, or what remained of it. The hobbits hail cheerfully to Tiny, who regularly works as an ostler for the inn. They look curiously at the Men but nod cordially all the same. They wish fervently that Tiny will join them, but they are disappointed. Tiny steps into the kitchen, where he will eat his meal before returning to his regular duties in the stable.

“These are some of my regulars,” Geranius says. “They’re here more’n they’re at home.” He introduces them all by name, then introduces the so-called minstrels. The hobbits warm to them instantly upon hearing their appropriately hobbit-like names, and Rick gives Sauron a small, smug look before sitting tailor-fashion on the floor at the bar. Sauron concedes the point and sits next to him. The innkeeper hollers into the kitchen for food for the guests.

“We don’t get professional minstrels here very often,” Geranius goes on then. “What brings you to the Shire? It can’t be our accommodations. Oh, don’t get me wrong. We’re as hospitable as they come, but we don’t got no lodgings for your sort.”

“We’ll camp under the stars,” Sauron says. “We’re quite used to it.”

“Oh, of course you are, that makes sense enough,” Geranius says. 

“We’ve come to see for ourselves the legendary holbytlan,” Rick says. “Tales tell of small magical creatures that live to the north, half the size of men, but quick of feet and wit, who can disappear at an instant and leave no trace behind them. We always thought they were old wives’ tales. You can’t imagine our shock when we found out that such creatures really do exist, and that they call themselves hobbits no less.”

“Is that so?” the innkeeper says, impressed. “You have tales of us away where you come from? When word of that gets around, you might just have more than the Hobbiton-Bywater folk coming to hear you. Everyone’s here already, just waiting for tonight, but the word’ll reach Overhill and the Tooklands lickety-split, you just wait and see. They’ll be listening at the windows, mark my word.”

“Everyone’s here?” Sauron repeats. 

He had noticed the large number of hobbits in the marketplace earlier but had not been able to determine if the crowd size had been anything other than normal. He now realizes that the market isn’t usually so crowded during the mid-week luncheon hour, and that the hobbits they had seen had simply been waiting for their arrival. Curiosity about the Big Folk had brought them out of their homes, despite the ruin that Men had done to their homeland just a few short years ago. 

He glances at the patrons sitting around the common room and is not surprised when they all quickly jerk their heads and eyes away, as though they had not just been studying him and Rick just a half-moment before. He senses a few chords of underlying apprehension, but curiosity and excitement far outweigh it. He wonders what they would feel if they the truth of his identity. 

He wonders also if the hobbit he’s seeking might have been one of the many hobbits outside in the marketplace. He had not felt the Ring-bearer’s presence but that does not mean he hadn’t been there. He meets Geranius’s eyes. “Are there any authorities to whom we should report our presence?”

The innkeeper shakes his head as the cook brings out the food. Rick has to double-check that he is seeing correctly. All that food can’t possibly be for them? Yet sure enough, the cook sets two plates piled high with food before them. Rick remembers the sizes of the cooking pots he had seen in the market, and he wonders how so much food came out of it. “It smells wonderful,” he says, somewhat intimidated by the portion size. Sauron simply shrugs and sets to eating.

“It tastes wonderful too,” Sauron says and swallows his food, following it with some ale. Then he asks his question again.

Again, Geranius shakes his head. “No authority in these parts, leastways, not the way you’re thinking, I’m betting. No kings or stewards or anything of that sort. I did go up the Hill this morning just afore you arrived to let Mr. Baggins know that you’d be here today, in case he had forgotten.”

“Baggins?” Rick says. 

Geranius nods. “Mr. Frodo Baggins is the head of the Baggins clan. They’re the principal family in these parts, so that makes him the closest thing to authority that we got, for what it’s worth.”

“So he’ll be here tonight?” Sauron asks. “It would be quite the honor to perform for him. He is well-renowned in our lands and is considered a lord among Men.”

“Aye, he is a strange one, wandering off for foreign parts a few years ago and coming back even stranger,” the innkeeper says lightly, but the cheer in his eyes is gone. He discreetly checks to make sure the patrons are no longer listening in, then he leans over the bar and whispers near-silently, “I doubt very much he’ll show tonight. He’s a right enough fellow, I’ve always said, but even I can’t deny that he’s gone a bit soft in the head of late. He keeps to himself most days, don’t hardly ever step out of Bag End to blink at the sun. When he does, he’s more a ghost than a hobbit and he gets to mumbling to himself a’ times, or so I’ve heard told.” The innkeeper leans in further, and Rick and Sauron meet him halfway. “Why, just the other day, young Nibs Cotton was walking late one night as he does sometimes when sleep ain’t coming to him, and he saw Mr. Baggins at the Bywater Pool, standing up to his kneecaps in the water! And that’s not the half of it: he was talking to himself again, but the words were right odd, they were, didn’t sound like naught Nibs ever heard afore, and he was—”

The inn door opens then and a young hobbit with golden curls walks in. The patrons greet him with raised mugs, and Geranius dashes off to serve him a tankard. When the innkeeper returns, he leaves his gossip untold and goes about wiping the counter and polishing the glasses to a sparkling shine as though he had never been whispering secrets.

Rick glances over his shoulder at the new patron, who is sitting with the others and just now seeming to notice the presence of the Men. The hobbit returns Rick’s regard with a curious tilt of his head before speaking to the fellow next to him, clearly asking the names of the Men. 

Rick turns back to his food. “I wonder who that is,” he says and only then realizes how still and quiet Sauron has become. Rick looks at him questioningly. 

“I know exactly who that is,” Sauron says.

“Who?” Rick asks.

Rather than answer, Sauron says, “I’m going to check on Brego.” He leaves quickly, his food unfinished for a change, and Rick notices that the golden-haired hobbit watches him with narrowed eyes as he leaves.

“Excuse me,” Rick whispers to the innkeeper. “Who’s that hobbit who just came in?”

The innkeeper continues polishing the glasses so intently he almost appears not to have heard, but he answers the question just as quietly, from the corner of his mouth so his lips don’t move, “That’d be one of them; one of the Travellers. That’d be Sam Gamgee.”

A half-hour passes before Sam stands up to leave. Sauron still has not returned, so Rick makes a quick decision. He waits until Sam is out the door, then quickly pays the innkeeper and follows the hobbit. He looks around once he gets outside and spots Sam making his way through the marketplace and out of the town. Rick hurries to catch up, but a loud “psst!” from the direction of the stable catches his attention. Sauron beckons to him from the shadows.

“Where have you been?” Rick says, coming over. “And why did you stop me going after him?”

“It’s not the right time,” Sauron explains. “It’s best if we wait until tonight.”

Rick nods, but has to try again. “You wanted to talk to Frodo, and there just went our best chance. You heard the innkeeper; it’s going to be crowded tonight, too crowded to get close enough to Frodo to speak to him. That’s if he even shows up.”

“He doesn’t have to show up,” Sauron says. “In fact, I’m counting on him not to.”

“So this is part of your plan then?” Rick asks with a shake of his head. “You know, if you explained these things to me beforehand, that would really help.” He looks up the Hill where he last saw Sam headed and observes the smial at the very top. “Well then, in that case, we better warm up and prepare.”

“Right,” Sauron says, then grins at Rick. “So, what you going to sing?”

“W-what?! Me, sing?!” Rick panics. “I- I thought you would be singing!”

Sauron laughs, a surprisingly full-throated and infectious sound. “Easy, Rick. I was only joking. All you have to do is strum those chords I showed you. You’ll do great.”

“Mr. Frodo,” Sam calls through the smial, closing the door behind him. 

All the windows and shutters are closed again, though he had left them open when he went into town that morning. It takes his eyes a few moments to adjust to the dimness surrounding him. He heaves a sigh, bracing himself for what he might find in the smial proper, then walks down the tunnel to the study. Empty. He then checks the parlor, kitchen and bedchamber, but sees no sign of his master. 

“Mr. Frodo?”

He hears the sound of glass breaking in the cellar behind the pantry. Sam quickly makes his way there and finds Frodo drinking directly from a bottle of fortified wine, a goblet shattered on the floor at his feet.

“Mr. Frodo?” Sam gently takes the bottle from Frodo and wipes his master’s sweaty brow with a handkerchief. “You had another dream,” he states matter-of-factly. 

Frodo looks at him with glossy, unfocused eyes and nods as one in a daze. He reaches for the bottle again but Sam holds it out of his reach. When Frodo reaches for another bottle from the wine rack, Sam takes his fragile hands and holds them to his master’s side. Frodo struggles against him but soon gives up the fight to slump weakly against Sam. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Sam asks.

Frodo shakes his head. “Too many things. Too many hands and feet. They scream and run but it doesn’t help. Nothing helps. They all go away.”

Sam sighs. He’s become far too familiar with such senseless ravings over the last few months. He tries not to scream with hopelessness and frustration, forcing himself to concentrate on his master’s needs. 

He keeps his voice light and calm. “I guess this means we ain’t going to see them minstrels perform tonight,” he states. “I saw them while I was in town. I guess traveling minstrels have it pretty rough compared to the minstrels we saw and heard in Gondor. They’re dressed just like humble folk, none of the fancy garb as the Citadel minstrels wore. Makes sense though. No point in wearing such garb to travel and it means less things to carry and wash.” His tone of voice has the effect he’s looking for; Frodo is still slumped against him, but he’s calmed down considerably though Sam can still feel him trembling.

He steers Frodo out of the cellar, through the pantry and into the kitchen, and sees him seated at the table. He pours a cup of tea and places it in front of Frodo, then stoppers the wine bottle and stores it in the larder. Next, he fixes the tea as his master likes it and pushes the mug up to Frodo’s hand. “Have a drink, Master.”

“No,” Frodo shakes his head. He looks at Sam suspiciously. “I know what it is. It’ll make me sleep and I won’t be able to wake up. I’ll be trapped in the dreams.”

“Maybe you won’t dream this time,” Sam says, not denying the accusation. He desperately wants to see his master get some much-needed rest. 

“I always dream now. Dreams of death and madness and loss. So much loss. The only way to stop them is to stay awake. Please Sam. Help me stay awake.” His eyes plead with Sam as tears stream down his pale face. Reluctantly, Sam nods and takes the tea back.

The next day is as cool and grey as the one before. Rick exits The Ivy Bush with plates of breakfast in each hand and carries them to the field next to the inn where he and Sauron have set up camp. Sauron is rolling up their sleeping rolls when Rick returns, and they sit down to eat.

“Did you know that they have first and second breakfasts here?” Rick says with amusement. “No wonder everyone’s always so happy.”

Sauron lifts an eyebrow at this.

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” Rick elaborates. They eat in silence for a moment before Rick continues. “So Sam wasn’t there last night, and neither was Frodo. What’s the next part of your plan?”

Sauron glances solemnly up the Hill towards the smial beneath the oak tree. “We make a home call.”

To be continued…

GF 4/27/06