By: Dana
Summary: This place doesn't feel like home.
Characters: Merry, Pippin, others
Pairings: Merry/Pippin
Rating: PG/PG13
Warnings: Slash, angst, light sexual content
Author's Notes: Written for repentantkisses for the Lord of the Rings FPF Secret Santa; she wanted Merry/Pippin, and angst. Post-quest fic is what followed.
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.

This place doesn't feel like home. It should, but it doesn't. It just isn't home to this Merry, even though it had been more than perfectly right for the Merry that had been left behind.

It is a new year, and a new day. Rethe sings, though her voice is not yet fully clear, rough and raw from the harsh, bitter strain of Winter's chill. They are busy often, yes, Merry and Pippin - riding out on their ponies, setting right wrongs that have been committed, and Pippin has taken to spending his nights, as well as his days, at Brandy Hall, but there seems to be something missing, something that Merry can't quite place.

There are dreams, of course. Dark dreams, nightmares that haunt him as he sleeps and when he wakes, images that make him feel like less than a full hobbit and more like some other else - they fill up something Merry wishes didn't need filling, and his heart and his arm and his hand all ache.

It isn't that he thinks that there's something wrong.

No, Merry doesn't think, he knows, instead, but still, that doesn't mean he knows what to do.

He doesn't feel like the hobbit that he once was, and he doesn't quite feel like the hobbit that he ought to be. There are lines blurring, all around, and the past and the present and the in between are slipping into each other. They are tangled, like spider webs, or a skein of thread, all knotted together, and they are all indistinguishable in the late night blackness of a frigid Rethe night.

Merry still feels as if he dreams. He is not quite awake - he cannot be, not to feel as he does - but he does not still sleep, and fragments of something else seem to creep at the edges of his vision. Lying in bed, he thinks - this is not the first time that he has woken with a warm body curled against his. But it is not something that he can clearly recall in recent history.

He lays there. He thinks.

(The bed is too small. The halls are not as long, with his legs feeling double their length. Even the grand front doors, far taller than any hobbit, more than the height of even a tall Man, do not seem so grand as they once had been.)

They are happy for him - his mother, and his father. Happy, at least, to see him come home.

"Merry," Pippin's voice, thick and sleepy, rises in the dark. In this mostly quiet blackness, Merry cannot think of a time when he had not loved Pippin with all the force of his heart - not then, not before. Pippin's voice is low, and breath tickles the shape of Merry's ear like the very softest caress. "Stop twisting about, you're keeping me awake."

"Pip, you sound as though you've had no problem finding asleep," Merry says, turning one last time, pulling Pippin close, burying his face against Pippin's bare shoulder. If not for their travels, there would be no this: no scent of sweet skin, no shared bliss in his memory. Merry clings to that, because he does not think he could live, or go on, or be, if not for this.

"So, if that's true, then I couldn't have been keeping you awake."

"Well, I'm awake now," Pippin says, his voice losing its edge, irritation turned to something else - comfort, Merry thinks, it must be comfort, and he well knows the sound. How many times has it been, now, that Pippin, or some other hobbit, has found him wandering these halls, lost and alone? How many times has Pippin been the one who has taken him by the hand, and guided him back to the familiarity of a bed, like childhood, and the years between, that he has long outgrown?

(How many times, now, has he held Pippin as Pippin dreamt dark things that even Merry, waking, could not chase away?)

"I'm awake now, and you are, too," Pippin says, again, stroking back curls that have tumbled onto Merry's brow, kissing him - it is no lover's kiss, or even a cousin's, chaste yet somehow hard, reminding Merry that they are something that shares more than just blood. "I'm here now, Merry," he says, but then, he speaks again, and the tone of his voice has shifted: "Merry, you're cold as ice."

"I can't sleep," Merry whispers, clutching at Pippin, clutching at him hard, and Pippin makes a soft sound of protest, rubbing at Merry's back. "I've tried, but I can't. When I do, I - I can't - "

He says no more.

"Merry, you're cold." Pippin tries to shift him, but Merry holds tight. Merry thinks of shadow, and ice, and fire, and water, all bitter cold, and Pippin lightly - so lightly - touches his brow. Merry lifts his gaze. "Here, let me up, and put another log or three on the fire."

The fire, yes. Merry nods, only faintly seeing Pippin in the gloom. It must be later than he'd thought it was. Merry loosens his hold, settles back, and Pippin moves, feet first, sliding from the bed.

Merry lies flat on his back, staring into darkness, imagining that fire sparks overhead. He is cold, and his hand is aching. No, his full arm, and Merry turns onto his side, clutching his bent arm close.

When Pippin returns, Merry only hears his voice; nothing more, only sound, and shifting darkness. He closes his eyes, and though he does not sleep, he cannot say that he truly sleeps.

- pain and despair and sorrow and he can feel it in his blood clawing at his skin tearing him apart and it is too much too much too much and he cannot bear it cannot not now not then not ever again and not now not now please make it stop -

Everything is dark.

(Merry.)

So fair, she should not die alone.

- not die alone not die alone I will be with you my lady you will not die alone -

(M -

It burns. Like fire, like ice.

- erry!)

Tears. He should not weep. Not alone. Darkness.

(Come back to me. Please.)

Merry wakes. Light burns his eyes. He groans, closing them as quickly as he had opened them. A hand is holding his, a familiar hand, a light scar across the palm from a cut that had happened when a tricky lad had been peeling his apple and had not known how to properly handle a knife, warm calluses, the constriction of fingers that are as everyday and right as the simple task of drawing breath.

"There you are, Merry. You worried me, you know."

Merry opens one eye. Candlelight dances. He cannot ever having seeing Pippin's eyes, so - so dark, and shining, red-rimmed even as his mouth smiles. "You shouldn't go worrying those who love you, Meriadoc. Your mother was in a state, and your father - well, there wasn't a thing that the healers could do. I told him - well, I'd thought of the day - and I told him, well, if the King were here, then he could help, but unless you have a?helas - that is, kingsfoil, somewhere handy, then there isn't a thing we can do."

Pippin says nothing of himself.

"But you did - "

"Well, Merry, I did what I could. They kept you bundled, warm, and I stayed here at your bedside, I held your hand, and I told you stories, at least, to pass the time. You ought to have seen your parents, Merry, they were frantic - poor aunt Esmeralda had no idea what to do. But I said - well, I said what I could. You were out - well, you were out, Merry, for a very long time."

Merry blinks slowly, letting this truth settle against his brow. "What is the day?"

"The 18th, now," Pippin says, and kisses Merry's hand.

Merry closes his eyes. He thinks of Frodo, of Weathertop, of wounds that do not fully heal, and his arm and fingers tingle. "I think I can sleep now, Pippin. Will you join me?"

"My pleasure," Pippin whispers, loosening the grip on Merry's hand, as he crawls from the seat, and up into bed, settling next to Merry. Merry feels a smile on his lips, and smiles back at the gentle touch of Pippin's mouth, closing his eyes as they kiss. There is a lifetime in that kiss, a lifetime remembered, a lifetime relived.

"Oh, Pip."

Merry settles back, his eyes closed, and Pippin's lies against him. Merry, though his right arm is still somewhat sore, wraps that arm around Pippin's waist. Pippin, fully dressed, is too warm, and his breath against Merry's chin is low and deep.

"You ought to not worry me, so," Pippin says, and Merry feels a smile on his lips, his own smile, as he holds onto Pippin as though he is clinging to warmth, and light, and life.

Please, he almost hears Pippin say, don't do it again.

"I'll try my very best not to, Pippin. I promise you that."

"Good," Pippin says, and a grin quirks on his lip, just as age shines in his eyes. Merry presses his mouth to Pippin's, drawing him closer. Pippin makes a soft, distracted noise, in his mouth, a mouth fully occupied now with Merry's tongue. Yes, Merry thinks, this is right. This is - this is something, and it catches, and holds Merry tight, and somehow the moment is suddenly not so aching, so slow. They pull at clothing, feeling for flesh, and Pippin's cries of pleasure can only be right.

They curve against each other, bodies pushing against bodies until there is nothing but heat, and Merry clutches at Pippin, even as Pippin, frantic just as Merry is, clings. His body tingles - his arm does not ache - and Merry gasps, mouth on Pippin's shoulder, fingers clutching at Pippin's arms, as he finds his pleasure, his release.

They slow, no longer moving, skin sweaty, damp, but warm. Pippin rests a damp brow against Merry's, whispers something, something soft, a something that Merry only half recognizes. The words aren't as important as he'd thought they'd be, and Merry, seeking the unaware, sinks into blackness, and warmth, and sleeps.

It is a good sleep - the very best he has had, in at least three months. He does not ache when he wakes, and Pippin is curled against him, less than fully dressed. There is a knock at the door, and Merry rubs at his eyes with the back of his hand, careful not to move Pippin, lest he wake, though he does reach for the coverlet, pulling it up.

Another soft knock, and then the door opens, and autumn leaks in, as does the smell of good, hot food. Merry opens his eyes, tilting his head. His mother stands there, awkwardly, as though uncertain what to do or to say.

"Good morning, son."

Pippin sighs softly, pressing closer, and Merry's hand burns where it touches against Pippin's bare hip. That is a physical jolt, and then Merry is looking back at his mother as she crosses the emptiness of the wide bedroom, a tray laden with food in her hands. Of course, she has closed the door. Merry knows that he is fortunate, to have such a mother - there are others, he knows, that would not be so accommodating. But it had been Esmeralda, herself, who had first said that love is love, and let us no? forget. His father, more than not, is more likely to act as though he doesn't know, and that doesn't hurt as much as it could. For the most part, Merry is perfectly content with being a secret, set in plain view.

"We couldn't get you to keep down anything more than broth, while - well, before," she says, setting the tray down lightly upon the bedside table. She turns, and with a wry grin, as if to hide the sorrow that is still floating in her eyes, she says: "Pippin's grown himself better bed-manners than I remember. When he was very little, don't you remember how he was wont to kick?"

Merry winces, and his side does, too, in remembrance, but Pippin is warm now, and right, and perfectly still, so Merry can't say that he minds having Pippin pressed so close. "I do. And yet he insisted on sleeping with me, though I never understood why."

Esmeralda touches her nephew's cheek, and Pippin sighs, saying something quite unintelligible in his sleep. She looks at Merry then, and Merry, tired still, yawns. "Well, I'll leave you two," she says, standing at her full height. Merry nods, drowsy, and he isn't sure of remembering his mother having wrung her hands in worry, until she was already long from the room.

Pippin is warm, still, and sleeping, and Merry gives his right ear a twist. Pippin breathes in sharply, and his head lolls back, eyes blinking slowly as he wakes. His expression fades to blank, and he smiles. "G'morning, Merry," he says, and lays a kiss first upon Merry's cheek, and then his lips. "Mmm. Something smells wonderful."

"Mum brought us breakfast. Well, I suppose it's for the both us, Pip, as there's far more there than even I could eat alone."

Pippin grins, slowly stretching, wincing at the loud pop of his back. "I'm too young for these aches and pains," he frowns. "They'd better fit a gaffer, and I'm less than half that age."

Merry wants to do - something, he isn't sure - maybe push Pippin back against the covers, cover him, forget that there was ever pain, or reason for it, and the haunting images that dance behind the darkness of his eyes - but he pushes against Pippin, instead, urging him to sit. Pippin does, reaching for the tray, and he sits there, with it flat against his legs, rumpled and mussed, looking at the food that has been presented.

"Pippin?"

"What is it, Merry?"

Merry blinks, unaware that he'd spoken, perhaps thinking that that had only been thought. "I - thank you, Pip. What would I do without you?"

"Oh, let's not think about that," Pippin says, smiling. "Anyway, I love you too." He offers Merry a fried sausage link. Merry sits, accepts it, and, only talking lightly as they do, they continue to eat.

The day is fresh, and Merry feels as though he is charged, like the sky before a storm. He rides out from Bandy Hall, and though Pippin rides with him, Merry still feels that he has, somehow, been left behind.