Chapter 53: Dies Irae

Chapter 53: Dies Irae

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Sam jumped out of his skin at the sound of the key turning in the lock. Each moment in Merry’s presence would be an opportunity to be found out. He must escape…somehow. He must somehow take the Ring beyond Merry’s reach or the world would come to darkness. Frodo had wanted him to escape, had in fact, begged him to go. But never with It. Sam shuddered, his mind obscenely focused on the Thing in his pocket. Never with It. He understood why now.

The door swung open and Merry stormed through the gap. Sam gave himself a moment to study his foe’s countenance. Eyes wild, hair disheveled, eyes swollen as if he had cried. Chin bruised. Chin bruised? By whom?Sam hoped for and yet feared the answer.

Merry’s eyes, however, immediately turned to Frodo, who was unbound, curled up in a fetal position as if he had fallen asleep that way under his own volition, as if he had not been posed like a glorified doll. Sam could not stop his own features from falling.

But now was not the time to mourn – it was the time to speak, and fast. Merry could not fail to notice that Frodo was unbound. He would need a good explanation, which for Sam was no more at hand than a tool to cut through his shackle.

“I found the needle,” Sam blurted out in response to Merry’s questioning look. “So I sewed up his shirt and cut him loose, as…as I reckoned you’d want. He’s been right calm,” continued Sam, now lying. “Sleeping like a bairn since just after you left.”

“All’s the better,” said Merry in a hurried tone.

Sam sighed in relief and tried to deflect attention from Frodo. “Estella?” he asked.

“Is gone,” answered Merry in curt tone, still staring at Frodo, his eyes wild with some indecipherable passion.

Sam felt fear rise up in his mind. “Gone?”

“Gone,” repeated Merry, turning on him with a rattled tone, crusted with anger. “Gone, left. Shan’t be back, and that is one less care for me, for I have other crucial matters I need to attend to.”

“You didn’t—"

“Harm her?!” cried Merry too loudly. “I am not a monster! I said I wouldn't hurt the lass and I meant it! Why this endless stream of useless, bloody questions?”

Merry had not expected an answer, and Sam did not wish to provoke his gaoler. He averted his eyes, preferring to keep them upon the slumbering figure on the bed.

Merry knelt down beside Frodo as if to examine him, and Sam held his breath. One cursory peek at the Ring and it would all be up. But Merry seemed satisfied with Sam’s answer, or at least, too preoccupied with other matters to press Sam further. He rubbed his fingers gently along Frodo's cheek, then without a word, Merry stood.

“I am glad that you untied Frodo,” said Merry at last. “It will make this easier. I do not wish to disturb him, but he must be present. The family must be present.”

Sam stood, and pulling up his chain, stepped over to the bed beside Merry. He dared a question. “For what?” asked Sam, trying to be conversational though his heart quailed. “Frodo’s fit wore him clean out, as you can see well enough. It would be dangerous to--”

“The sooner we get him up,” snapped Merry, “the sooner we can get this behind us and be a family again!” Merry absently ran his fingers though Frodo’s dark curls. “Frodo will understand.”

Frodo had not flinched when Merry touched him, and this concerned Sam. Was any part of Frodo at all aware of his surroundings anymore? Was Frodo still in there?

“Frodo, my love,” cooed Merry. “Wake up for a while. Just a while. Then you can rest.”

Sam watched in fear as Merry’s brow quirked. Frodo still did not flinch nor did he open his eyes, and as much as Merry’s one-sided conversations annoyed Sam, they were preferable to Merry thinking that something in Frodo had seriously changed.

“You must be tired if you won’t answer your Merry,” Merry whispered into Frodo’s ear.

"He is tired, very tired" Sam spoke quickly, taking a step toward the door. "Merry, let's just…"

“It would be a great comfort if I knew you forgave me for binding you. It was only for your own good and it shan’t happen again. I do love you so.” Ignoring Sam, Merry took in a deep breath, his eyebrows knitting all the more. "Do not torture me with your silence, beloved Cousin, I cannot live without your sweet voice." He leaned over further, staring at his cousin's gently closed eyes, his fingers threaded in his hair, his head tilting questioningly. "Frodo? What is it?"

Sam’s gut clenched when it occurred to him what was happening. The Ring! The Ring had somehow been speaking to Merry with Frodo’s voice. That was the only explanation that made sense, and even that was a far throw. Was it possible, really possible that Merry’s conversations were not just the product of a ruined mind? That Merry had heard “something” that spoke to him. But if it was the Ring, then Frodo would not “speak” to Merry again, not while Sam bore it. And that was a perilous possibility while Sam was still without a means of escape.

Sam seized the initiative. “Please, Mr. Merry. He is so tired, the fit and all. It would harm him to wake him now, I have not doubt of it. He’ll be chatting your ear off in no time."

"No," said Merry, turning to look at Sam. " This task demands that we all make sacrifices. He needs to rise.” Merry’s face was solemn as he reached to grasp Frodo’s shoulders.

"Wait!" shouted Sam. "Let me get him up then. Better to let him get annoyed at meself than yourself for waking him.” Sam did not wait for an answer, inserting himself between Merry and Frodo and pulling his master into a sitting position. Frodo was lifeless as a boned fish, his breath slow. Frodo’s head lolled upon Sam’s shoulder. Sam forced a smile and nodded to Merry.

“Open his eyes, Sam,” ordered Merry. “He will need to see this. Tired or no.”

Sam did not like the sound of these words. Nevertheless he pushed Frodo’s eyelids up with a gentle thumb as Frodo’s head lay supine upon his shoulder. Sam’s breath caught. He found himself looking into the blankest eyes he’d ever seen this side of death. Worse than ever before, if that were possible.Sam looked up to gauge Merry’s reaction but to his relief, he had stepped over to the bureau to draw out a coat.

“Put this on him, Sam,” ordered Merry brusquely. “We will be outside for a short time.”

Sam knew better than to comment or even to ask why. He proceeded to thread Frodo’s dough-like limbs through the sleeves and button the coat to the very top. Frodo’s chin fell to his chest as Sam finished. “Sit up, Master,” whispered Sam.

Frodo did nothing of the sort. But what he did do was even worse than before. With his legs over the bed, Frodo began to rock back and forth slowly, his own arms now clutched about him as if to ward off pain. He released a low sorrowful moan. It was a pitiful sight.

Merry tore across the room, his face distraught. “What’s wrong with him? When did he start doing this?”

Sam was equally dismayed, but determined not to show it. Merry must not think anything was wrong. Sam struggled to come upon an answer that might make sense. “Oh, he’s done this before,” lied Sam. “He does it when he is very tired, I think, yes…very tired. It has been a heck of a day for him, Mr. Merry. Yes, indeed." Sam sighed a little too loudly." A hard long day.”

“Poor love,” said Merry, his hand resting on at the rocking form below him. “And this day is about to get harder, my dear! But together we will get through it! Just one small thing now, and you may rest to your hearts content, at least for tonight. Tomorrow will be a big day, however, and you may as well know it. A big, big day, and one that we both have been waiting for. But there is no need to trouble your head about the details. Not until morning. Then we will talk together about our plans. All shall be made right and good very soon!”

The hairs prickled up at the back of Sam’s neck. A big day? What on earth could that mean? Frodo continued to rock and moan, no longer staring even at the fire but into some unknown distance. Occasionally he would twitch in abrupt movements that would not be taken as voluntary in any context. Merry’s eyes were full of pity and love.

“I wish you would stop that, love It does not become you. If something is amiss, please speak to your Merry. I am here for you. I always have been.”Without warning, Merry sat down beside Frodo and embraced him. Frodo did not stop moaning, but he did not flinch either. Merry took this for a breakthrough.

"Oh Frodo, Frodo, I knew you could not stay long angry with me. The others are angry…oh, Frodo, no one understands me." He put his arms around his cousin and hugged him, burying his face in Frodo's soft curls, his murmers almost unintelligible. “Why are you the only one who appreciates what I do? You are special, Frodo. You don’t know what it means to me to know that you, at least, love me. You love your Merry even when the whole world would turn its back on me."

Like a forlorn child, Merry clung his older cousin, as if seeking some manner of comfort from the damaged hobbit. Frodo rocked, and Merry rocked with him, placing his head on Frodo’s slumped shoulders and seeming as hurt and lost as his elder. Merry closed his eyes and wept.

Sam closed his eyes too for a minute, trying to make sense of Merry's breakdown. What on earth had happened in the parlor outside - with Estella? What had happened to make Merry so overtly vulnerable? These questions skittered through Sam’s mind as he took in the pathetic sight, all the while praying that Merry would not think of the Ring.

Sam’s heart fell into his stomach as Merry gave Frodo a forceful squeeze and kissed him upon the cheek. Merry rubbed his sleeves across his face, straightened himself, and taking Frodo’s cold hands in his own, raised him to unsteady feet. Frodo did not reach a center of balance as he usually did. He swayed, and nearly tumbled to the ground. Merry sucked in a breath, and grabbed his failing cousin quickly by the waist. But he was himself off balance and had to reach for one of the beautifully carved bedposts to keep them from landing on the floor.

“Sam, by the gods, don't stand there like boulder! I need your help here.”

Sam slipped his arm around Frodo’s back and steadied him on his feet.“Steady now, love,” said Sam gently. “Steady.”Merry took Frodo by the hands, giving Sam a questioning look.“He’ll walk, I think,” said Sam in a voice more confident than he felt. “If you lead him. But don’t touch him if you don’t need to. Frodo don’t like to be touched when he gets to humming.”

Sam watched in horror as Frodo was walked out, shuffling like the undead, now humming a discordant tune and twitching at random intervals. Merry soon reentered Frodo's room with an expression of bland expectation.“Walk,” said Merry. “I will lift the weight for you.”

Down the hall they lurched, Sam cursing under his breath and listening to the hated chain skidding across the floor. They were headed to the back door - that was clear enough. But why?

Frodo had been set on a bench just inside the door, still rocking, and whether he was moaning or humming, Sam could not tell.

“Sit down by Frodo,” huffed Merry, clearly winded by hefting the weight. “When I return, we may start.” He stomped out toward the parlor.

Sam leaned Frodo’s rocking body toward his own in what he hoped was a calming embrace, whispering “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Your Sam is so sorry.”

At the sound of Merry's returning steps, Sam jerked his head up and went silent. It was apparent from the weighted uneven footsteps and the strangely-shaped shadow moving down the hall that Merry was leaden with a burden slung over his shoulder. As Merry drew closer, Sam suddenly became aware, agonizingly aware of what the burden was. His heart plunged into despair.

“Oh no!” thought Sam as he watched in horror. “Oh no! By the stars, please no!”

VVVVV

Pippin surfaced to semi-awareness and complete agony. His head throbbed, his vision swam, and he was quite unsure of where he was. Then he forced his memories into an identifiable shape even as the world became a swirl of color and pain. What had happened? His memory resurfaced in broad strokes. Merry’s voice. Then pain. Then…nothing.

He’d been hit.

No--that was not the whole of it. Not the whole story. He tried to think…

He’d hit Merry.

Why?

No. No… that was simple. Self defense. Self-preservation. Self.

Self.

He had had the right to do what he did. He’d been given no choice.

Pippin rolled his eyes up and found himself looking into an expanse of grey haze, but recognizable as the sky.

Yes.

Storm clouds, but gilt with silver – the unfulfilled promise of sunlight. Cool grass tickled at his back, alternately soft and scratchy. He was outside sure enough and he’d taken off his shirt, he guessed.

No. It had been taken off. But…why?

Pippin made to right himself, to sit up. His hands did not work as he wished. Tied?

Yes tied. Even in his semi conscious state, he could recognize the feel of rope. It was now well known to him…His hands had been bound in front of him.

Why?

Pippin suddenly felt the weight of eyes upon him like a physical force. He fought to focus the motley colored blurs staring down at him until they coalesced into familiar forms.

“Pippin.”

He knew that voice. It was the last voice he had heard before it had all gone dark. Merry.

He blinked his sore and tired eyes into a reluctant focus--straight above now--his gaze not wavering for even a moment. And suddenly he was staring into the blazing eyes of his cousin leering over him. A shift of Pippin’s glance and a new face. Sam. Sad eyes. Worried. Sympathetic even. Eyes cut sideways again, looking for the one he knew must be near. Frodo. Empty eyed. Staring into nothingness.

They all stood over him as if he were a felled deer, injured, but not yet dead – ready to be dispatched or healed depending on the will of the hunter. Pippin tried to pull his thoughts completely free from the obscuring murk.

“Pippin,” repeated Merry with a voice like granite. His face was very close now. Pippin assumed that as he'd focused on the other hobbits, Merry had knelt down.

“Do you know why you are here?” asked Merry coldly. “Do you know what you have done? Do you understand the consequences of your treachery? Do you see the enormity of your transgression, little Cousin? The enormity of the pain you are causing your family? Do you?”

Sunk below the surface of Merry’s calm voice was an undertow of latent fury. Like a black volcano, that bubbled and frothed underneath, red and violet, ready to explode and destroy all that stood before it.

“Pippin!”

Louder now. Angrier. Pippin gave a low moan and rolled to his side. The shock of frigid water cascaded down upon his head like a savage downpour.

“For the love of--!”

Sam’s voice.

Pippin spluttered, gagged, and spat, his body desperate to rid itself of the unwelcome water.

“Wake up!”

Merry’s voice, as furious as Pippin had ever heard it. A sharp kick to his side and, “Wake up! We are waiting!”

“For what?” Pippin heard his own voice mutter.

Another kick, and Pippin gasped in pain, curling his stomach into a protective crescent.

“Can you not guess? If you do not know, you are dimmer than ever I imagined! Well, open your eyes then, and be answered!”

Pippin eyes burned, but open they did, the fog clearing from them as the morning mists when pierced by dawn's first sunlight.

Merry leaned back upon his haunches. Pippin felt cold merciless hands claw into his forearms and force him up into sitting position. A very uncomfortable sitting position, for Merry’s face was now very close to his own, his eyes locked squarely onto the younger hobbit’s. Pippin’s eyes then landed upon a painful-looking lavender shadow sweeping across his cousin’s jaw. The sight transfixed him.

He had done this. He had struck Merry. Pippin’s eyes hovered a moment too long at the manifest sign of his rebellion before a sharp slap tore his attention elsewhere.

Merry’s eyes, rage-darkened, pitiless.

“I see you have spotted your… handiwork,” snarled Merry, his nails plunging deeper into Pippin’s arm. Pippin felt a rough coil of braided cord caress his cheek. If it had been any other object than what it was, the touch might have been loving.

Merry whispered ferociously in Pippin’s ear, “I’m going to place my own handiwork upon your back in payment for this,” Merry indicated his damaged jaw with an outstretched finger. “And I won't stop until you are of a mind not to forget who is Master in Buckland!”

Though Sam had never truly forgiven Pippin for that one horrible slash across his master’s already brutalized back, he could not help but pity the half-naked hobbit, tied, wet, and shivering, sitting at Merry’s feet. He struggled to push down his desire to do something to help Pippin – a foolhardy proposition while the One Ring reclined in his pocket. Nor could he have done much anyway, with the chain at his leg fastened securely around a sturdy birch adjoining the smial.

Like a dog on a leash, and a damned short leash at that, thought Sam.

Frodo, standing slump-shouldered and glassy-eyed beside him showed no sign of being distressed by Pippin’s bonds, nor what should have been a familiar tableau unfolding in front of him – except this time without him being at the center. Sam was partially relieved. His Frodo seemed unlikely to disintegrate into the madness that was his most natural state now. But Sam could not avoid the somber thought, the horrid possibility that Frodo’s essence had at last been drained from him completely.

Sam grimaced as the shell that was his master began humming quietly again, the unearthly sound forming a discordant harmony to the hammer of Merry’s battering words.

And then it occurred to Sam that something was absent. Pippin was lying very quietly at Merry’s feet. Not calling out in fear. Nor begging. Nor crying. In fact, he was not making any reaction of any sort to Merry’s threats, one tied to the tail of the last, like a deadly snake about to strike, faster and angrier with every punishing word.

Sam wondered if Pippin was perhaps only half-conscious or had retreated into his own head as Frodo had done with such devastating efficiency. Pippin seemed to be awake, if not, even aware. Why did he not react? His punishment was only too obvious. Surely Pippin could see it. Surely he must be afraid.

Why don’t he react?

Merry wanted him to do something, too, that was clear enough. He seemed to be growing desperate to get a reaction, of any sort, from the younger Hobbit.

And then when he does react, Merry will come down on him all the harder. Sam knew the pattern too well. No. No escape for the lad. Not now, p’haps not ever.

Sam understood now and it harrowed him. Pippin would not respond, and Merry would not stop until he did. No sort of miracle could prevent it until Pippin’s back ran red with cross-stitched gore and blood. Sam had seen it before, and it sickened him to the depth of his heart that he was about to bear witness to it again.

The log, if it could be called so, was the corpse of what had been a young birch, not more than two dozen feet from the smial. Its spectral grey trunk lay tumbled down as if kicked over by giants, an uneven break at one end, with splintery sinews like jagged teeth still connecting the trunk to the stump that had been its foundation. The leaves on its once-proud grey-green crown were now wrinkled and desiccated, crackling eerily in the breeze. The ones that remained hung on a tangle of skeletal branches as if they might regenerate themselves by sheer force of will. But there was no hope for the leaves, not now. The cord had been cut, separating roots from branch. They could not be called back.

Sam bit his lip, reminded of Frodo somehow, until his eyes landed upon the rope snaking around the center of the trunk where it sagged closest to the ground. This cord was obviously intended to fasten Pippin’s wrists in place when the time for agony came.

And it had come.

Sam realized that he had had heard almost nothing Merry had been grinding out to Pippin, , not since the pail of water had splashed over the unconscious hobbit’s face. That had seemed so mindlessly cruel considering what Merry was going to make his young charge endure. Frodo had been strong and he’d scarcely borne it, so how would someone as young as Pippin do so? How could Merry expect the young lad to survive in body, let alone in mind? Or would this break his body to the point where his mind would have nothing to come back to? Or break his mind, so his body was naught but the empty shell he saw even now in his master? Perhaps both. Perhaps Pippin would not survive, leaving Merry with no satisfaction at all. And that was the scariest thought Sam had had in a long time.

Sam entwined his fingers in Frodo’s limp hand and turned his attention to Pippin, who now sat with disconcerting serenity, eyes downcast, his bound hands resting in his lap, docile as a rag doll. Droplets of water plunked down upon his trousers from wet ringlets of his hair, giving the general appearance of a drowned rat.

Merry stood, grim and without mercy. Sam felt his stomach clench as Merry reached a demanding hand down to his cousin, clearly intending to raise him to his feet and drag him kicking and screaming to his torment.

But then… something unexpected happened. Something Sam would never have anticipated from the limp hobbit that had been sitting at Merry’s toes. Pippin jerked away from the hand--in a movement less like an involuntary flinch of fear, and more like a conscious avoidance rife with suppressed anger and a lingering sense of self. Sam was not sure what he saw in Merry’s face, but he could swear a look of pain swept across it.

Before Merry could react in any more physical way, Pippin got to his feet with an incongruous calm. Without being ordered and without being dragged, Pippin, slowly, but with calm self possession, stepped toward the fallen log. Merry did not move or call out, as it was obvious from the steadiness of Pippin’s gait that he was willingly approaching the spot Merry had expected to have to drag him. Merry and Sam both stared at Pippin, Merry in wonder, Sam in dread mixed with a bizarre sense of curiosity. What was the lad doing?

Pippin stood before the log for a moment, as if contemplating a place to kneel. Choosing the dead center of the trunk, at the rope, Pippin lowered one knee, then the other, steadying himself on his bound hands, until his was kneeling upright. Sam saw from the Pippin’s back that his breaths were steady, and that he had not begun to weep. Pippin reached up over his head, stretching, , as if making an elaborate bow to a monarch and as he bent forward, his wrists came to rest upon the top of the trunk directly upon the rope meant to bind them. Then he stopped, waiting in that position, his white back offered up in willing sacrifice to whatever righteous anger Merry would inflict upon it.

Merry did not move for a long moment. Sam held his breath. He grasped Frodo’s hand with renewed firmness. This display did not seem to anger Merry; nor did it please him. Sam wondered if Merry had been depending upon Pippin’s pitiful resistance and pathetic cries to diffuse whatever demons had lately invaded his mind. Perhaps he had wanted the chance to overpower that which he was destined to overpower. Sam was not sure. But whatever Merry had expected from Pippin, it was clear he had not anticipated this.

Looking into Merry’s face, Sam could see the lack of emotion bloom into something else. Something akin to hope, as though he was glad. Sam could almost see it, agitation transforming to rationalization. Perhaps he thought that Pippin had agreed, however silently, to this punishment. Like a child who knew he had done wrong, Pippin was being submissive to Merry, or so Merry believed. Even now, Sam was not so sure. The blue-pink bruise on Merry’s jaw swelled with its own truth and told another tale entirely.

Merry however, did not seem to see this mixing of emotions. Instead he acted as if he simply saw a sorry Hobbit, doing what he felt he must for the forgiveness that only Merry could give. Merry saw what he wanted to, and nothing more. And so, Merry said nothing.

Merry seemed to have forgotten that he and Frodo had been brought out to behold this travesty, like an unwilling audience called to witness the execution of an innocent prisoner.

Slowly, Merry sidled up to where Pippin awaited, bent, supplicatory, and silent. To Sam, it seemed as if Merry whispered something in Pippin’s ear as he knelt down to loop the rope through Pippin’s bound wrists, but whether they were words of comfort or castigation, Sam could not guess. Having given the ropes one more steady tug, Merry leaned down and kissed Pippin’s bowed forehead, an act that made Sam’s stomach churn.

Merry stood now, his face drained of anything like emotion, his eyes like slabs of stone. Sam shivered. Merry drew up the whip in a high arch, mumbled something unintelligible under his breath, and swung down with a savage strength that cut the air like a hot knife through butter. The world seemed to go silent in the small moment between the whip rising until it landed with a sickening crack across Pippin’s now tightened back.

Pippin’s body jerked up in shock, as an angry pink stripe now seared upon his back, and yet… Pippin made not a sound. Not one of agony, nor of sorrow. But Sam felt Frodo’s back under his own arm tense violently at the sound of the first strike. On some level, this scene dredged up memories at least his master’s body understood. Sam drew Frodo into a closer embrace and continued to bear witness to Pippin’s ordeal.

Again. Whistle and crack. Another jerk. Another stripe. Another expanse of silence for which neither Merry nor Sam could account.

Something ugly flowed into Merry face as he lifted his arm skyward again, as if Pippin’s silence smacked of will, as if Pippin’s wails, cries, and pleas had been expected on some subliminal level, to draw the poison from his own mind. And it wasn't happening.

Whistle and crack, this time with more violence.

Sam cringed as he watched Pippin's thin body spasm and jump up in response. Clearly these next blows would tear into existent weals, piling pain atop pain, scar upon scar. Frodo frame tensed and shivered with each blow.

This one drew blood, which came up in droplets as it followed the whip, splashing onto the front of Merry’s clothing. Sam cringed with the sickening sound, a reverberation out of his nightmares, one that preceded only pain. But Pippin did not scream. Sam thought he detected a violent sucking in of breath, nothing more. Perhaps that was the scariest part of it all. To know he hadn’t escaped into his mind like Frodo had. To know, from that slight sound, that Pippin hadn’t escaped into his mind like Frodo had. To know he was completely conscious of everything that was happening to him. And yet, to stay silent. What had pushed Pippin so far as to make him give up his own voice?

Whistle and crack.

More blood, and now Sam could detect an angry dip in the flesh where Pippin’s back had torn open. Even through the obscuring glaze of red, Sam could see that Pippin’s breath had now gone shallow. So, for that matter, had poor Frodo’s.

Whistle and crack.

A barely audible whistle with air sucked down after it. Merry read this reaction as his invitation to speak. He lowered the whip, breathing hard himself with the exertion. “You have had a part to play throughout…this ritual Pippin. A part far too large it seems. You could not deal with it…as you should, and I realize that. Perhaps… perhaps this is almost my own fault as well. To expect you to handle matters obviously too large for you,” Merry spoke harshly, loud enough for Sam to hear, even at a distance. “But I did not force you to strike me. That was your own choice. Your own mistake. You had not the chance to apologise for it, but now…now I give that gift to you. I give you the opportunity to apologise to me, cousin, for your arrogance and your transgressions.”

Pippin said nothing.

“Speak!” cried Merry, still panting, but not from exertion anymore. “I have stopped…so you may find your voice through the pain. That perhaps…you can forgive yourself as well! You need only…but apologize!”

Pippin did not speak. Merry laid down another blow, far harder than the first ones. Sam swore he heard Pippin grinding his teeth, followed by a sharp intake of breath and a soft, involuntary grunt of agony. But still Pippin did not speak.

“Say it! Surely you feel regret for what you did! For hurting a dear cousin! For hurting me! Now is the time to make amends, Pippin, as you could not before!”

Silence.

Whistle and crack. Sam was sure this one would leave Pippin scarred for life. The young hobbit bit deeply into the bark of the log, clinging to his silence, his frame shaking, his eyes squeezed tightly closed.

Speak lad! Sam thought desperately. Oh speak and make him stop!

“Say something!” cried Merry, tears welling up in his eyes. “You did not mean it, I know. You do not mean to create these hurts and emotions in such a dear family member! One who only wants the best for you! You were afraid, of course. I know that! But you won't recover until you make amends. Your family is here before you and will bear witness. Apologize to us all!”

Silence.

Two strikes in quick succession. Sam could see Pippin starting to sway against his bonds, as if kneeling upon the deck of a rolling ship. But he continued to fight Merry, if only through his quiet will, pushing the only weapon he had against his cousin. But Merry was desperate for some kind of reaction and horrible as it may be, he would have it.

A fey look came into Merry’s eyes as he raised the whip again. “Speak while you still can, Cousin! Speak and be forgiven! For if you do not ask for it, I can not give it! This shall not end, Pippin, I promise you, until you give in to me! Realize this, and everything will be all the better”

Slamming the whip down on the already bloodied back seemed to do nothing. He cried Pippin’s name, trying to force a reaction of some kind. Of any kind. Sam felt his teeth plunging into his bottom lip hoping against hope to hear Pippin’s voice. Instead he heard low haunted moans coming from his master’s throat. Frodo would have begun to rock again had Sam not been holding him still in a vice-like grip.

Merry waited a few moments, his face twisted in emotional agony as Pippin remained silent. He sidled closer to his cousin, stopping down to confirm that he was conscious, trying to peer down into eyes that would not lift, but stared stubbornly into the grass below.

Merry took his position again, his eyes filling with tears. Whistle and crack! Pippin's reflexes had slowed by this point, and all Sam could see was a ripple down his cross-stripped shoulders and all he could hear was Pippin's increasingly uneven breaths and Frodo's ever more insistent moans.

“Sweetest Pip!" Merry's voice droned on. "Don’t you know there is nothing you could do that is truly beyond my forgiveness! Speak to me, and this ends now!”

But as nothing came, he spoke again, slowing the whip as he did, “I realize you don’t think you deserve it… but I am willing to give it to you anyway, Cousin. I am willing to give you what I feel you deserve, even if you seem to think you don’t. I see that your anger at me was misplaced, and that you feel guilty for it, but heed that naught! Simply say it, Pippin, and it will be over! You will stand and walk again, though your back will hurt, knowing that your conscience is clear!”

But still Pippin did not speak, and Merry continued on with his whip until even Sam cried out in pain for the younger one. “Just say something, Pip! Apologise! Mutter it if that’s as far as you can speak, but do it now, lad!”

But Pippin gave Merry nothing save involuntary jerks and ragged breaths until Merry, crying out up to the sky, raised the whip and slammed it down one after another after another, raining out his own despair, desperation, isolation, and loneliness upon his cousin’s brutalized back. He cried out Pippin’s name through his rage--his baleful keening now mingling with the ceaseless crack of the whip, the hollow sound of Pippin’s labored breaths, and Frodo’s discordant moans. It was a tableau of pitiful, helpless insanity that could come to no good ending.

Sam's leg was bleeding where he had pulled on the shackle and still he bellowed his throat raw, yelling for Merry to “come to his senses” and stop before he killed Pippin. Merry’s sobs had become so heaving and wild, that Sam was not sure he could stop even if he’d had a mind to. Blood and gore flew through the air, a grotesque black paintbrush upon a blood-red canvass. Sam thought the madness would never stop, and that Pippin would indeed perish.

At last, Pippin's body gave one final spasm before he went limp and keeled over upon his side, swooning senseless.

“Pippin!” cried Merry in anguish.

Merry threw the whip from his hands and sprinted over to Pippin as if his cousin had been hurt by an outside force, and he’d come upon his injured body unawares. Merry tore through Pippin’s bonds with a short knife held by quaking fingers. Still sobbing frantically, Merry gathered Pippin in his arms and kissed him frantically all over his sweat-drenched face, paying no head to the blood now saturating his own clothes.

“Why?” sobbed Merry into his cousin’s chest. “For what purpose do you goad me to such a degree? For what good? Do you not care for me, as I care for you, Cousin? Talk to me, Pippin! Tell me why! Explain as you will, for I love you and need to know your mind! Pippin! Why must you break my heart with your cruelty? Why must you treat me with such disregard, when I have done nothing but love you and care for you as best I can? Don’t you see what this does to me?”

“You need to treat his back,” said Sam softly. "Or the wounds will go rotten and he’ll die.”

“I know this!” snapped Merry, eyes red-rimmed with pain. “Do you think I would bring harm upon my precious Pip?"

Sam knew better than to answer. He watched Merry sob with crazed fervor, resting Pippin’s lolling head upon his shoulder, muttering Pippin’s name and begging him to open his eyes so that he might see how deeply this ordeal had cut him. Sam stared incredulously as Merry began to rock Pippin, all the while crying for him to wake up and be comforted.

“All over,” cried Merry. “It’s all over, love!" Merry ran his fingers through Pippin’s sweat-drenched locks, occasionally lifting the lolling head to see if Pippin had yet roused. Disappointed, he continued softly to call out his cousin’s name, each time with more jagged urgency. “Speak with your Merry a while!” he pleaded, his voice still torn with emotion. “All your doubts shall be soothed away. Do not fear me! Open your beautiful eyes, Pippin. I forgive you. You are so sorry, of course you are! Too sorry to speak, even. I know that's what happened. I want you to come back now so we can work with common purpose. Please, come back.”

After a few minutes of this pitiful show, Sam began to seriously fear that Pippin had expired. When Pippin at last groaned into consciousness, both Sam and Merry sighed in deep relief.

“Pippin!” exclaimed Merry. “Pippin, my love! There you are! Please open your eyes now and let me look at you so that all may be made right between us.”

Sam watched in rapt attention as Merry raised Pippin’s chin with a gentle finger. Sam could not see Pippin’s face, but guessed from the quirk in Merry’s brow that he was not getting what he wanted out of the exchange.

“I know you are awake in there,” pleaded Merry. “Please, open your eyes now, so we may have a nice talk while I tend to your wounds.”

A few more moments of silence. Sam kept his ears skinned but only heard the chirping of faraway birds and the soft rustling of leaves. Merry’s face suddenly filled with delight and Sam guessed Pippin’s eyes had fluttered open.

“Very nice, my sweet. Now look at your Merry.” Pippin's head still drooped on his neck like a wilting flower. He did not look at Merry. “Pippin?” Merry’s voice had begun to tear with emotion again, and it was obvious to Sam that Merry was sincerely distraught. “Will you not look at your Merry? Will you not speak? You have not lost my love, even now.”

Merry heaved a heavy sigh and kissed the top of Pippin’s head, his tears falling upon Pippin’s crown like Spring rain. “Alright then, I see. Perhaps you need some time to come to terms with your actions. I understand. I always understand. But Sam is right. Your weals must be tended to.”

Merry carefully balanced Pippin’s body into a tenuous sitting position as he stood. He leaned down with outstretched hands, obviously intending to lift Pippin into the house. Pippin did not look up. Utterly ignoring Merry’s proffered hand, Pippin rolled onto his knees, raising himself, one leg at a time, shakily to his feet, his back toward Merry. He stood silently for a moment, gathering his balance and rubbing his wrists with quaking hands. Then he began to move, slowly and unsteadily at first, but gaining strength and momentum with every step. Pippin walked with trembling dignity toward the spot, less than two dozen feet away, where Sam stood holding his glassy-eyed master.

Merry stood rooted in place, the agony coursing through his being at watching his cousin, his companion, his everything, his only thing, step purposefully away from his benevolent presence.

Sam squinted his eyes against the encroaching sun, trying to read Pippin’s expression as he approached. Pippin’s eyes, so carefully shielded from Merry, were wide open now, and set….Upon Frodo. Frodo still trembled, making small sounds drafting between a moan and a cry, his back still as tense as an oak board. Frodo seemed not to notice as Pippin stepped up to meet him.

“Pippin,” said Sam quietly, a foreshortened expression of empathy and regret.

Pippin made no reply, but lifted his head so it sat straight and strong on his shoulders, standing tall despite obvious pain. He turned to Sam and they locked eyes. In those eyes, Sam saw a new strength, sparkling green, but hard like marble and filled, at long last, filled, at long last, with rage, and the adamant strength of a Tookish will. In that eternal moment, that endless second, not only their eyes, but their minds met. And Sam knew. Merry has lost him.

Reckless and improvident, hope surged through Samwise Gamgee, gardener of the Shire. Perhaps a fool’s hope, but hope just the same, and it glittered like a Silmaril in the unfathomable blackness that had been Sam’s world. And hope unquenchable returned also to his soul as his arm tightened around his beloved master while the fingers of his other hand brushed against the heavy, heavy presence in his pocket.

Pippin rewarded Sam with the flicker of a sad smile before turning to Frodo. Slowly, he placed kind hands on either side of Frodo’s face and, leaning in, kissed his elder cousin on the forehead. It was an act that spoke volumes, both an apology and an affirmation.

I love you and I won’t betray you ever again.

Pippin drew back, his eyes shining with tears like a dew-kissed garden. Another meaningful glance at Sam, and seeing that Sam understood, Pippin pulled open the door to Crickhollow and shut it quietly behind him.