By: Dana
Summary: There was a crowd gathered on the far bank of the river...
Characters: Merry, Pippin, various Brandybucks
Pairings: None
Rating: PG/PG-13
Warnings: Angst, deathfic
Author's Notes: For Lindelea, because I said I would. There are further notes after the end, because I don't want to give away the point of the story before you've read it through; and please read it through before you start calling me mad. Beta thanks to Karri and Elly, who both just rock.
Disclaimer: The author makes no claim to owning the rights of anything to do with J.R.R. Tolkien or New Line Cinema. Any and all characters and situations that have been borrowed are for the author's personal use only, and for the entertainment of others.

There was a crowd gathered on the far bank of the river, a crowd that Merry could see from his place on the ferry. He lifted a hand up and shielded his eyes against the glare of the sun, squinting, but still he couldn't make out the details; the crowd was too far, and his sight was hardly that strong. Was it a welcoming committee? he wondered. His trip to Rushy had been anything but out of the ordinary, so he doubted it could be.

But then in turn, what else could it be? There was a boat out on the river, a fishing vessel by the looks of it, and there were two fishermen sitting in it, one at the oars, the other holding something in his lap something that was too far, something that Merry couldn't see. Peculiar, that. And frightening, all the same. Had someone fallen in? Some terrible accident? It happened, not often, but enough that Merry stood as close to the ferry's edge as he could, watching.

Closer to docking, and things were coming into focus. The fishing boat had reached the shore, and water lapped at its fine wooden hull. There had been an accident, Merry was certain someone had been carried from the boat.

That someone hadn't moved.

Merry jumped the last foot from the ferry, over the water, landing with a thump on solid ground. The crowd was not far away, not now no more than a hundred steps, and he hurried along, at first at a quick walk, and then, slinging his pack back over his shoulder, a jog, and then a run.

He stopped at the sight of his cousin Doderic. There he stood, with old Lily Sandybottom from Buckleberry and her arm around his shoulder. There were hobbits gathered thick and he pushed past them, not because he was the grandson of the Master, and they ought to move, but more because this was his young cousin, and there were tears on his face, spilling from bloodshot eyes. Doderic was a way away from the river, and Merry couldn't help but thinking the worst.

"Dod? Dod, what's happened? Have you hurt yourself? Did Beric?"

Doderic looked up, and old Lily frowned, shaking her head. Her hazel eyes were hard, flat, but somehow sympathetic. She squeezed Doderic's shoulder, and Doderic swallowed his silence, rapidly blinking his eyes.

"We told him not to," Doderic whispered, and Merry felt a funny feeling knotting down in his gut, "we told him that he couldn't, but he did it, he came back, and we didn't know. He didn't listen, Merry. I'm sorry."

Then Doderic was crying again, great gulping sobs, and Merry looked to Lily, and then down through the rest of the crowd. He heard Lily soothing his cousin as he pushed forward, seeing no sign of Ilberic had it been Beric? but then he saw the fishermen, and who it was, and Merry stopped in his tracks.

He could have doubled over from the force of that blow, intangible but physical, all the same, and Merry worked his mouth in empty air before he could drag out a name, heavy like lead.

"Pippin."

Merry felt rooted there, tied to the ground, tied to the sight of his cousin lying wet and pale and still, too still, upon the grass.

"Is he what happened? Why why isn't anyone doing anything for him?"

He took a deep breath, sought out the gaze of the elder of the fishermen, who shook his head, remorse written on flat, weathered features. Merry took another deep breath, feeling a hitch, numb. "I'm sorry, lad, we found him too late."

"That can't be," Merry muttered, shaking his head; it just couldn't be. He was quaking like a leaf out in the wind, trembling, but he didn't say anything more than just that, his words flat and unfeeling: "It can't be. It can't."

One of the watchers came up, who, Merry couldn't tell, and put their arm about Merry's shoulder, pulling him close. He opened and closed his mouth several times, as though there was something more that he wanted to say. But whatever it was, was lost, and Merry turned away from Pippin and the river moving sluggish in the midday light, unable to bear watching even one moment more.

It wasn't long until the riders came from Brandy Hall but to Merry, it was more than too long. He clung to a faded old jacket that smelled of earth and grass and pipeweed, the blood pounding in his ears, stuck amidst a mire of shock and disbelief.

There was a point where Merry became aware again, at least a little, hearing the firm comforting sound of his father's voice, and the Master's powerful tones, and Merry was taken by strong arms and guided with a hand on his shoulder. A hand was gripping his own and he couldn't see for the cloud of tears that blinded his eyes.

He hadn't even been aware that he cried, was crying still.

They rode from the river.

There was a crowd waiting out in the courtyard of the Hall. Merry heard the sound of his mother's desperate sobs at the first sight of Pippin, when they laid him out on the ground. There was the Hall's healer, Thistle was her name, and Merry was handed over, the muted sound of his father's voice.

It couldn't be, Merry told himself again; tomorrow would be Pippin's birthday, and he never had told Pippin what he had wanted as his gift. What would he do, now, with Pippin gone?

Merry knew the harsh taste of bitter draughts, then, but only that; he slept, and maybe he even dreamed.

"You're a fool, Pip, there's no one who could swim that."

Pippin gave Doderic a very serious look, somewhat ruined by the sharp curve of his grin; or maybe not, as it made him look mad off his hat. With that, he turned and looked out over the water. The Brandywine rippled like its namesake, gold and amber and honey-bright in the strong morning light.

"I'm quite sure I could make it," he said, as if to make it a dare.

Ilberic chimed in. "Dod has a point, Pip. Not even the best of the best swimmers could make the distance. You'd be a fool to even try." Hoping that that had been enough to detract him from this course of action, Ilberic had stood, followed by Doderic.

"Now let's get back to the Hall," said Doderic. "You know what they'll say if we're late again for tea."

The look that Pippin cast the river was a desperate challenge. "If you say so," he said, but still he rose to his feet. He followed them up from the river, back to the main path, but then stopped when he realized he'd left his best jacket behind.

"I'll catch up with you," he said, grinning. "Mum'll kill me if I ruin any more of my clothes."

The brothers had laughed, and waved, and turned to continue on to the Hall. Pippin had broken into a jog, back down to the water, with no one to see.

It was night when Merry came awake. Night, and Merry woke with a dry mouth, a pounding head, unaware of what had brought him to this place. He felt stretched too thin, tired after a long rest, a long rest that had been anything but restful, and he closed his eyes.

There was a candle lit upon his desk, but it was burning low; still, he could see the orange yellow of its glow through membrane of closed eyes.

He sat forward, and it came back to him, as he opened his eyes. He looked to the candle, watched the dance of the flame, an unsteady flicker in the dark of his room. It came back to him, yes, the sight of Pippin lying wet and still on the grass. And he tried not to look, then, but a sob lodged itself in his throat as the memory of Pippin, pale and grey, burned in his mind.

Pippin's hair had been wet, slicked back, though there had been tendrils of copper that stuck to his face. His eyes had been closed, and he had looked wrong; but Merry could not have stood the sight of Pippin's eyes, staring, blank, dark and dead.

Dead.

"It can't be," he muttered, crawling from his bed. His legs were not steady to carry him and he trembled, falling back on the bed. "It can't be," he said again, tired and worn, trying once more to stand.

He was dressed in a long shift and he still felt muzzy, the after effect of what he knew to be sleeping brews, and he stumbled from his room. It was night and it had been too long and Pippin was gone.

But it couldn't be.

He told himself that again and then again with each step, putting his hand up against the wall to guide himself. He wasn't sure where he was going, only that he knew where he needed to be, his mouth still sore and dry and his head pounding like there would never be any relief.

Pippin had left the jacket on the shore, diving into the water from a ledge in nothing more than his trousers. The water was cool and it had been long enough since they had finished their swim that it came as a shock.

He took a breath and braced himself, and started to swim, the far distant shore his far distant goal.

But he wasn't sure how far he had come, and he had started to forget the thought of telling Dod and Beric off, and his arms were growing tired and sore. But it shouldn't be much more. The far shore was still a blur but it was closer. It wouldn't be much more.

He steadied himself and took a breath and continued to swim.

And it was too late by the time he felt that his arms were heavy like lead. Too late, and he was too tired, and he hadn't felt it coming; and he could hardly even struggle, gasping instead, the taste of bitter cold river water in his mouth and down his throat as he was dragged down.

There was a certain parlor at the front of Brandy Hall that Esmeralda Brandybuck used for only the finest of guests. She would greet them there, and they would have their tea, and she had entertained high folk from across the Shire. So it had been that night, but the circumstances that had brought them to this point was nothing so ordinary, as a visit from some relation from afar.

Merry stood at the door and looked in on Pippin, lying still and pale on the bright brocade of the finest parlor's finest sofa. He took a step in, thinking for a moment that Pippin would sit up, smiling, laughing. Joking, that Merry had worried as he had. And that moment continued to stretch on, with each step he took.

Merry was shaking and he felt his stomach pitch as he fought to stand upright.

Peaceful. Pippin looked peaceful, and quiet, and Pippin should never ever be a combination of those two. When he was forced to sit in his finest clothing his father Paladin always wanting to impress the family that his sister Esmeralda had married into he would fidget and tug at his collar or his sleeves and he would complain perhaps that the cloth was too scratchy even when it was really quite soft.

But even at his father's stern glance, or his uncles (though at times the Ma?ter's, depending on who was around), Pippin would not be stilled. He would laugh instead and say something under his breath, and Merry couldn't help but grin, even as their parents frowned.

This was wrong. Wrong. He felt tears on his cheeks, hot and wet on cold skin. Merry took another step closer and looked down at Pippin. This wasn't right. This couldn't be. He knelt down, taking one hand of Pippin's in his own, and the feel of icy skin could only further the tears in his eyes and he sobbed, a wordless cry.

"Pippin," he said, shaking, collapsing before the sofa, when he could find his words, "stop playing, Pip. This isn't a joke, it's gone too far. I'm sorry for going off to Rushy and leaving you behind, I promise not to do it again. It's just that you'd have been bored and I promised you we could do something, just the two of us, when I returned. But I had to finish my chores, Pip. And you have to stop this play."

His voice was tired and broken but Pippin didn't stir. "Please," Merry begged, tugging on cold flesh, rigid fingers. "Please, Pippin, please. I'm sorry. Come back. I promise to be a better friend. Come back, please. Please."

He broke down into harder sobbing, then, harsh, choking and tight and making it hard to even breathe. "Please," once more, and he could hardly even speak, or think, and he bowed his head against Pippin's hand, trembling, wetting Pippin's chilly skin with the heat of his tears.

"Please."

But there was no motion, still, no breath, and no laugh, and how Merry wanted to hear that laugh, now that he would never hear it again. Merry closed his eyes tight and simply sat there, feeling life and the reality of the situation dragging him down, tired and sore, and he fell towards sleep as if he was falling into cold water, weighed down by his grief. The lingering effects of the sleeping draught clouded his mind, and for a time, Merry knew no more.

His lungs were burning.

It was too hard to breathe and he couldn't, and he couldn't hold his breath, either.

The world was dark and light up through translucent water, shimmering and flickering like the play of darting shadows. Pippin struggled, kicking and swimming, fighting against the pull that was dragging him deeper. He had held his breath as long as he could, the water pounding in his ears with his blood and his breath and the unsteady erratic beat of his heart. And his arms and legs felt like they were weighted down.

He lost his breath in a long string of bubbles and the light was further away and Pippin was tired, so tired. He only needed to closes his eyes, push the water from his mouth, and he could find his strength.

Fewer bubbles came as his struggles weakened and then at last stilled.

Pippin sank.

In the darkness, he could hear a song.

Merry woke with a ragged cry, heart pounding, feeling like he was being crushed. It was dark all around, and he was under heavy covers. Too much, too hot, and he didn't know if he could move. But he could, forcing himself, and he pushed the blankets off, sitting up, gulping down each breath like it was his last. His eyes burned and his throat felt raw from his tears.

He was already crying again.

"Merry-lad," and that was his father's voice, a sudden light in the dark. Saradoc came into view, and Merry's vision cleared, a lit candle with its dancing flame held in one of Saradoc's hands. He was sitting there, in the big chair that Merry kept near to the fire. But it had been dragged near to his bed, so his father could sit near him. And there he was, and Merry reached for his father's hands.

"Tell me it was all a dream," he whispered, his voice ringing harsh like something rusty, discordant, in his ears. But his father said nothing, only set the candle down on the nightstand, and Merry shook his head, not knowing if there was anything else he could say.

"It was too late."

"That's what they said," Merry said, bitter. He wiped at tears with his hands, still shaki?g his head. And there was nothing more his father could say, either, and Saradoc sighed, heavy, and Merry heard the shifting sound of the chair as his father stood.

"Paladin and Eglantine came while you slept," he said, because there was nothing more that he could. "They've been able to to say goodbye. We're going to have the farewell breakfast, Merry. I know how much you I there's nothing else left to do."

But Merry did not want to go to the farewell breakfast, did not want to see Pippin put into the ground, did not want to say good bye when good byes could never be taken back. His father left him in silence and Merry sat there, red eyed, miserable. He closed his eyes tight against the light of the candle and the light from the hall that leaked in from an open door.

It was a new day, Pippin's birthday, Merry reminded himself, his sixteenth, and there would be no celebration today, but a burial instead.

Are you sure that it will be all right? He had to be dreaming. Could it ever be all right?

But she said that he would, and she had to be right.

Breakfast had come, a sour, dark occasion. Almost like the greyest of rainy days, and the sun had yet to shine. Candles were lit and the residents of Brandy Hall, and those who had come from afar, those who lived closest, sat somber in their chairs. The Master sat at the head of the great table, speaking in low tones to Saradoc, his son, who sat at his side. Paladin and his family sat there, too. There were those who were crying, still, and there were red eyes from those who had. It had been a hard surprise, to come to the ferry, and meet the messenger that had awaited them there. Saradoc would not let his brother in love come to the Hall without first knowing the news of his only son's death.

No one knew what to say or to do though there had been one hobbit who had wondered what they would do with his cake.

The sun had yet to rise, and the darkness here reflected the darkness of the world beyond. And still not a hobbit spoke, until Rorimac himself stood, and the silence seemed to shift and stir.

"We are there this day to say good bye," he said, his voice carrying across the room. "To one Peregrin Took, who was taken before his time."

Weeping, so many were weeping, Pippin's mother and his sister's amongst them, and Esmeralda buried her face in her hands as she shed further tears for Pippin's loss. Rorimac was silent for a long time, and he only spoke again as the sobbing dulled to a roar.

"He will not be forgot."

What more could be said? They would have their meal, and they would go out and Pippin would be put in the ground, and then they would all stand at the river. Another hobbit had been claimed.

Merry was glad that Frodo had been unable to make the trip early; he would arrive later this day, or even the next. Better not to know, he thought, than to feel it in your bones. Feel it like... like something that could never be made better. Feel it, like something he could never forget.

But he stood, a ripple of whispers across the hall, the Master's eyes on his grandson as he stood, and what he said he could not expect at all, as he looked out across the hobbits who were gathered. "It isn't his time," he said in a plain-enough tone, looking up, his eyes clear and bright. "There's too much still he's yet to do. What will we do? What will we do, when Pippin isn't there?"

And silence fell for a long moment, and the air itself seemed to shift, and to stir, before some hobbit or another began to hum under his or her breath, and Merry sat back down, tired down to his bones. And then one more and another, and soon the great hall was filled with wordless song.

Silence fell, and they started their meal.

He felt like he'd slept for forever and it was odd enough to wake in his best clothes. And it had felt odd, too, to walk through cold, empty halls. Had he woken too early? This was his birthday, after all, but the halls were empty,?almost as if it this place was still asleep.

He felt a little stiff and sore like he hadn't slept well at all; or maybe it was instead because he had slept so hard that he couldn't even remember going to sleep. His bare feet were soft against the fine, if worn a bit, old carpeting. Brandy Hall, this place, that was where he was. It was his birthday, and that should mean something, and that was something he knew.

He followed the corridors down and back, knowing well the twists and turns of this place. He had spent more time here than at his own home, it felt, because at least here as a guest, he was given no chores.

And he had slept so much - had he dreamt at all? He didn't know.

Something was wrong, but with each step he took, it felt further from his mind, like that something had finally made its peace with the world, was moving on, had left him free. He took the turn that would take him to the dining hall, his stomach churning, chewing on itself, and he heard the low distant murmur of sound.

Wordless song.

He hummed under his breath, rising in fervor with each new step that he took, until he was sure that he could sing this song forever though he didn't know the words. But that was hardly what mattered, knowing it, instead, and he came to the great hall, looking in from the middle door. He had heard this song before, had played a great part in it; he was meant to have a bigger part, still.

He knew it well; knew her voice, too, how she had bid him to rest. And he had, hadn't he, and if he had dreamt, at all, then it would have been her lullaby song that had lulled him to sleep.

And then the great hall. A mass of eating hobbits why had he not been woken, had they forgotten him this day? and song had fled the room. He felt empty silence on his tongue, then, watching the hobbits he knew as they ate. Something here was wrong, too, and no one would speak.

What could it be? He took a step in, and then another, feeling light now and hungry, where it had only been a little irritant, before. Hungry, and he walked with his head high, watching, as he went to his seat.

But there was no room for him, there, and he looked for some explanation.

"Merry!" he said, snapping, and his cousin's back went rigid. "Where is my place?"

And it was odd, and wrong, and Merry suddenly laughed. "I can hear him still," he said, breathing hard, and the moment came down on Pippin, and Pippin frowned. A rush of murmurs swept across the room, the surge of the sea, and Pippin knew that sound well how, he didn't know, but he could feel it in his bones, could hear it, singing faintly, at the end of his days.

And that great voice had said to him, hadn't it? Too much yet to do, Peregrin Took, this isn't your time. Not your time, now, to be judged. And the the air cleared, and Pippin took a deep breath, and that distant voice faded, joining that resting song, and Pippin stood there, in the here and the now.

"Of course you can hear me," Pippin said, frowning, when that thought had passed, "you daft Brandybuck," and Pippin didn't care if they heard him, all of them, daft Brandybucks one and all, and Merry turned, slowly, and that wrong that Pippin had felt was beginning to clear.

Merry was red-eyed, as if he had been crying hard, and a light came suddenly to his eyes, suddenly, yes, and he shook his head as if waking from a dream. A secondary surge of whispers rushed through the room, ebbing and flowing, a whispered rush of water, and Merry cocked his head, looked at Pippin, really looked at him, that last moment when Pippin had the oddest feeling that Merry hadn't thought to see him at all.

And there was laughter and sound and cousins wishing him a happy birthday, and Pippin grinned. "Watch your words, cousin," Merry said, and his grin was wide, "or else I'll have to steal your cake as penance."

A chair was brought and Pippin sat next to Merry, and whatever it was that was wrong, seemed a wide world away.

"Happy birthday, Pippin."

"I think you'll love your gift."

And Merry stood there, hugging Pippin tight. "Believe me, Pip," he said, Pippin wrapped in his arms. His voice was distant, his intent unclear. "I already do."

Years later, a world away, when Pippin was ready to die, had laughed death in the face, he understood a little more what had happened on that long ago day. Who he had spoken to, who he had gone to, who he had stood before to be judged. Only to be sent away, for things to be put back the way as was right.

And he never did tell Merry when, after that, when he remembered again what it felt like to die; what Irmo and his vision had given him back, what Vaire and her unweaving had made them all forget.

End Notes: The Silmarillion content in this in a nutshell; Mandos judges those who have died; Vaire is the Weaver and she, as you might imagine, weaves; she can also unweave, and make it as it something never did occur; Irmo is the lord of dreams and visions. And Este, her presence here is implied, and she is Irmo's wife, and the Goddess of healing, especially weariness.

Thanks to Elly for helping with the Silm!lore, as I didn't have my copy handing during beta, and she is just a doll. *much love*