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Wherever You Are Is Home Chapter Fourteen - "Truths Stranger Than Fiction" It is 1408 in the Shire Reckoning Pippin is 20, Pervinca is 25 and Merry is 28 and Pimpernel is 31  "Husband, I must speak with you." Eglantine Banks had not spoken with the Thain before dinner. She had meant to, and had walked towards his office upon parting with Nel, but had ended up there. Instead, she had wandered back to her own rooms, shaking and on the verge of tears. Merry and Pippin she had been prepared for, in a way, because some small, depraved part of her mind had been expecting it. She had seen it coming, over the years, though she had chosen to ignore it. The Thain would have seen it, too, had he had the sense that the Lady gave most barnyard animals. But this new development scared her. Coupled with Merry and Pippin, if terrified her. Once, Merry and Pippin had been an odd echo of events from over thirty years ago, and a painful reminder of old wounds that were only partially healed. But when Nel had told her secret, Eglantine had felt a crushing tightness in her chest, and she had found it difficult to breathe. History was repeating itself, nearly to the letter. "Wife?" Paladin asked, raising an eyebrow at his wife. Eglantine snapped back when she heard his voice, realizing that she had been standing there staring at him. "You look as if it is dire." He pressed. "Is everything well?" "Far from it." Eglantine muttered, taking a seat in the chair in front of his desk. He frowned at her, searching her face. She took a deep breath, and murmured a quick prayer to the Lady. "There is no easy way to say this, so I will tell you plain." Eglantine said, trying to force her voice steady. "Nel is with a bairn." The Thain's features turned to stone. "By who." He hissed through his teeth. "Berilac Brandybuck." "No." The Thain said quietly. His eyes flashed as the information settled in. "No." He said hotly, slamming his fist on the table so hard that the items on the top danced. "She is a month gone." Eglantine continued. She had to talk quickly, before he lost his temper well and truly and she could not get a word in through his ranting. "We will have to speak with Berilac's father about a wedding soon, if there is to be any hope of……" "Absolutely not." The Thain shouted. "My daughter will not marry a Brandybuck. I would wish a pox on that entire family, if I thought that the Lady was in a giving mood." "Paladin." "No, Eglantine." He spat, waving his arms wildly. "It is too much." He shouted. "Too much." "First, Saradoc toys with you." The Thian continued, favoring his wife with a curled upper lip. "Then his son toys with my son, and probably my daughter, the way she sighed and wept after he took of with Peregrin. And now, another accused Brandybuck has gotten that same daughter with a bairn." Eglantine bristled at the mention of her and Saradoc, and frowned at her husband. "I am not seeing as we have a choice." "I will not marry her to a Brandybuck!" "And I will not allow her to live with the embarrassment and dishonor of bearing a child unmarried!" Eglantine back shouted hotly, leaping from her chair and waving her hands frantically. She snatched a small ceramic vase up off a nearby small table and hurled it at her husband. Her aim was bad, and it sailed over Paladin's head, shattering on the wall behind him. She reached to hurl something else, a small clay ash-bowl, but her hand went slack and the thing clattered to the floor. Then she started to cry. "I am sorry, Egg." Paladin said quietly, leaving his desk to approach her where she had sagged back into her chair. He crouched down at her knee and took her hand. "I would spare her the fear and worry I felt." Eglantine said softly. She had been three months gone with Pearl when she married the Thain, three months fraught with anguish and uncertainty, until the Thain had learned of her condition and traveled to Brandy Hall at once. The argument between he and Saradoc had been fierce. She had laid in her bed weeping, listening to the muffled sounds of angry shouts. Then it had gone quiet, and then Paladin had been at her door, barking for her to pack her things. She had left Brandy Hall on the back of Paladin's pony, and they were married the morning after they reached the Smials. "Everard and Melilot are to marry at the end of the month." He mused. "That is about three weeks." He sighed heavily, unhappy with what he was saying. "Perhaps I could entreat Adelard into a double wedding." "If anyone asked me, I'd say it runs in the family." Adelard said. "Both the families." Danelle gave Pervinca a sheepish face, and blushed to the hairline. Adelard was in the middle of a dissertation on Merry and Pippin, whether anyone wanted to hear it or not. Pervinca shot Adelard's back a sour look from her seat in the back of the cart. Adelard was sitting in the driver's bench with his son Reginard. His conversation was plainly meant for Reginard's ears, but he was speaking loud enough to be heard in Bree. "Both their father's were lad-fanciers." Adelard continued, with no regard to the daughter of one of the alleged lad-fanciers sitting in the back of his cart. "Really." Reginard muttered noncommittally. He twisted around to favor Pervinca with an apologetic look, and twitched the reigns to urge the ponies faster. "That's right." Adelard said, nodding curtly to Reginard. "I caught your Took and Thain in a hayloft with Odovacar Bolger. With their pants down, thank-you-very-much, and both of them trying to tell me that they were only drinking." "Horrible." Reginard said absently. Pervinca rolled her eyes at Adelard's back. "And that Saradoc." Adelard threw up his hands and whistled through his teeth. "I have heard stories about him and lads from Michel Delving to Bree." He said. "Uh-huh." "I'd be willing to bet that the two of them took a tumble once or twice, the Master and the Thain." Adelard remarked. "I never heard nothing about it, but it wouldn't surprise me if they did, the way they were both tumbling lads right, left and center." Pervinca made a strangled sound, making Danelle look up. She looked abashed for her father's sake, then blushed and resumed her study of the cart's plank floor. "Of course, Saradoc had it in for the ladies, too." Adelard said. "He wasn't picky, that one. Anything in a skirt or breeches, as long as it stood still long enough." "Scattergold, they call him in Buckland." Adelard snorted. "Scatterseed, I say. He has children all across the Shire, that one. It's no surprise that he and the Thain's sister only have the one. Like as not, he had run out seed by the time they got hitched." "I am sorry." Danelle whispered with a grimace. "I had hoped he would behave himself for your sake." "He has probably forgotten I am here." Pervinca whispered back. "It is no matter, Danelle. It is nothing that I haven't heard anyway." "And that business with Eglantine." Adelard said. "That was foolishness, even for a Brandybuck." Danelle opened her mouth, but Pervinca waved her off with a sharp gesture. She leaned forward, trying to hear Adelard better. "Of course." Reginard muttered. "She was too young for him, if you ask me. Too young for either of them, though Saradoc got to her first." Adelard said. "She couldn't have been more than fifteen when he started tumbling her." Pervinca went white as a sheet and made a loud choking sound. "And he kept tumbling her, even after he got married." Adelard said, ignoring Pervinca's inability to breathe. "I never will understand how Esmeralda didn't catch wind of it, especially after the he moved the lass into Brandy Hall." "Uh-huh." Reginard twisted around, shooting Pervinca a glance that was both apologetic and mortified. "The Thain was a fool, too." Adelard commented. "Going off the Brandy Hall and kidnapping her like he did. And then he married her as quick as you please. I don't think they had even washed up from the ride, before he had her speaking her vows." "Probably better he didn't wait, seeing as she had that bairn so soon after." Adelard continued. "Likely would have started having birthing pains at the ceremony, had they waited any longer." Adelard chuckled as his own wit, and nudged Reginard with his elbow. Reginard gave a perfunctory laugh, and eyed his father sideways. "It does make me wonder, where her and the Thain's first bairn really came from." Adelard said. "She must have been pretty far gone, to have the lass so soon, and I don’t recall the Thain leaving the Smials that year at all." He shook his head and laughed ruefully. "I'd lay the blame to Saradoc for that one, if anyone was asking." Adelard's next comment was cut off by Danelle screaming at the top of her lungs. Reginard brought the ponies to a skidding halt, and he and his father turned around. Danelle, red-faced and close to tears, pointed to the cart's floor. Pervinca had fallen in a dead faint. "Sirs?" Merry and Pippin were having tea in their normal fashion, curled up in the stuffed armchair with Pippin in Merry's lap. A small table had been pulled close to the chair, with the meal laid out on it, but as usual, the pair was paying more attention to each other than to the food. "Beggin' your pardon, sirs." Mattias Bolger tried again, a bit louder, and cleared his throat in embarrassment. Merry had been feeding Pippin a slice of honey-cake, offering it to Pippin from between his teeth. This had quickly dissolved into kissing. Sloppy kissing, in Mattias' opinion, and he thought he had heard one of them moan. "I am sorry, Mattias." Merry mumbled. "I did not know you were here." "I won't be stayin' long." Mattias muttered, a bit uncomfortable. Sometimes the pair showed a bit more affection than a gentlehobbit could take, especially for being two lads. "I've a letter from you sister, Mister Pippin." Mattias said with a start, realizing that despite being uncomfortable, he had been staring at Merry and Pippin in rapt fascination. "Pervinca!" Pippin exclaimed. He jumped out of Merry's lap and ran over to Mattias, crushing him in a hug. The gardener went stiff, and patted Pippin's back haltingly. Merry felt a slight twinge of jealously, seeing the Mattias' arm around his lover. But as soon as the thought formed, Pippin tore away from Mattias and bounded back across the floor to Merry, waving the now crumpled envelope. "What does it say?" Merry asked as his cousin read the letter, finding himself almost excited as Pippin. Aside from the occasional visits from Frodo and Sam, and the small tidbits they got from Mattias, Pervinca's letters were all the news they ever received. "Oh." Pippin said quietly, his eyes scanning the paper. As they traveled further down his brow furrowed, and he gave a small gasp. "Well?" Merry demanded. "Da is still not talking to Pervinca." Pippin commented. "And?" Merry asked. He was sure Pervinca had not spent the time and effort to send a letter that told them something they already knew. "Da means to make Pearl the Took and Thain." Pippin said carefully. "What?" Merry squawked. "He can't do that!" "Pervinca says that he seems to think that he can." Pippin said. "He has written some letters that pass the Smials to her on his death." "But she is married." Merry complained. "The property will pass to her husband." "Pearl's got a bairn." Pippin said, waving the letter as evidence. "From what Pervinca says, if it is a boy, the Smials would go to him." "But what about you?" Merry asked, completely befuddled. "You are his son." "I guess I am not." Pippin said petulantly. "I guess he doesn't want me to be." "Oh, Pip." Merry said, as tears welled in Pippin's eyes. He caught Pippin's face in both his hands. "I am so sorry." "No." Pippin said, shaking his head dumbly. "I am, Pip." Merry said. "It is my fault. If I wasn't for me--" "No!" Pippin said violently. "If my Da can't accept us, then he can have his stupid Smials." Pippin smiled weakly, and fixed Merry with wide, green eyes. "I would rather be with you." Merry sank back into the chair bonelessly, overwhelmed, tears streaming down his cheeks. He pulled Pippin to him, and wept quietly into his hair. Pippin had just tossed his birthright to the wind, for him. "Oh." Pippin said suddenly, hefting the letter again. "I forgot." Merry groaned. "What?" He asked grudgingly. He did not think that he could handle anymore of Pervinca's news. "Nel's got a bairn, too." "Pimpernel?" Merry choked. Pippin nodded, grinning wickedly, his tears almost forgotten. "But she is not married." "No, she is not." Pippin said with amusement. "Not yet, anyway." "Oh, Lady." Merry said. For all his having kissed Nel in the woods that one night, he could not picture her taking a tumble with some lad without being married to him. "By who?" "Your cousin." Pippin giggled. "Berilac." "What?" Merry coughed, and dissolved into laughter of his own. "There is something I can't picture, her and my cousin." "Its true." Pippin said, wiggling the letter. "Pervinca overheard her confessing to Ma." After a pause, Merry shook his head. "I don’t know who I pity more; Nel, or Berilac." "I'd pity the bairn, myself." Merry and Pippin looked up suddenly. They had forgotten that Mattias was in the room. He winked at them, and all three laughed until their sides hurt. Pervinca's eyelids felt heavy and leaden, and seemed to resist opening. And her head ached, a dull, throbbing pain that spread from the back of her head to the nape of her neck. She opened her eyes slowly, gazing groggily at the almost familiar surroundings. She was not home, but she was in a place that she had been before. Pervinca struggled to sit up, finding her limbs clumsy and thick, and gave a groan as a wave of dizziness passed over her. "Pervinca!" Pervinca turned at the sound of the voice, groaning as the quick movement brought another wave of dizziness. She eyed her cousin Danelle, who was laying in the bed next to her, with confusion, and made a pained face, bringing a hand to her head. "Brandy Hall?" She asked thickly. "Yes." Danelle responded. "Head hurts." Pervinca said. "I think you hit it when you fainted." Danelle said carefully. "Fainted….." Pervinca repeated dumbly. She looked at Danelle questioningly, who smiled weakly and looked very uncomfortable. Slowly, she tried to piece together the ride to Brandy Hall. They had been in the cart, and Uncle Adelard had been talking, talking like he always did. He had been talking about Merry's father, and her father, and her mother. Merry's father and her mother. "Oh, Lady." She croaked, remembering what Adelard had been getting at. "Your father….." She started. "My father is a useless old talker." Danelle said, a bit sharply. "You shouldn't take on over what he says." She smiled thinly at Pervinca, softening her tone, and tucked a stray curl behind her ear. "Half the time he is misinformed, and the other half he is plain telling tales." "No." Pervinca shook her head, and then immediately regretted it. "I think he is right." "About what?" Danelle asked incredulously. "That ridiculous notion that the Master and your mother were…" She trailed off, frowning. "That Pearl is……" "Yes." Pervinca said. "Ridiculous." Danelle insisted, throwing up her hands. "Not anymore ridiculous than anything else I have discovered to be true in the last two years." Pervinca muttered quietly. "What?" Danelle asked. "Nothing." Pervinca said, waving her off. Danelle knew about Merry and Pippin, but Pervinca was not about to tell her about her father and Saradoc. Not yet, anyway. "You do think it is true!" Danelle exclaimed, her mouth dropping open in shock. "Possibly." Pervinca ventured. "You want to know what I think?" Danelle asked, tapping a finger on Pervinca's forehead. "I think you hit your head to hard. You are starting to sound as daft as my father." "Pip?" Merry asked quietly. Pippin looked up at him blankly from where he was laying on the bed. Merry studied him, frowning. Pippin was trying to act like he was unconcerned about his father. He had not mentioned it since reading the letter, instead making more of a fuss over the news about Nel, but Merry could tell by the quiet, pensive mood Pippin had slipped into that it was weighing on his mind. "Maybe you should talk to your father." Merry said, sitting on the edge of the bed. "No." Pippin said. He rolled to face Merry, and glowered at him. "I don't want to." "But, Pip." "No!" Pippin said sharply. He frowned at Merry and set his jaw. "He is going to make Pearl the Thain." Merry reminded. "I don't care!" Pippin insisted. "It doesn't matter. I want to stay here with you." "And I want you to stay here with me." Merry said, squeezing his cousin's hand. "I am just afraid that you will regret it, if you don’t at least try and talk to him." "Why?" "You are his son." Merry said. "And you are supposed to be Thain after him, not Pearl." "I told you, I don't care." Pippin snapped. "I want to stay here with you. If I go talk to him, maybe he will change his mind about Pearl, maybe he won't. But either way, I will have to go back to the Smials." Merry paused, knowing that Pippin had a point. If Pippin did go back to Tuckborough, he might not be able to leave again. Merry doubted that the Thain would make the mistake of letting his son slip away from him, again. "I'll have to go back to the Smials." Pippin said again. "You might." Merry admitted. The thought galled him, and he shivered thinking about it. "Is that what you want?" Pippin asked, his eyes flashing and his tone growing irrational. "Do you not want me here, anymore?" "Pip." Merry started, reaching for him. "Are you tired of me?" Pippin shouted, batting Merry's hand away. Tears welled in his eyes, and his bottom lip quivered gently. "No!" Merry shouted back. He felt his anger rising at such a ridiculous accusation, but he shoved it away. He moved to lay down next to Pippin, and wrapped his arms around him. He looked at Pippin, realizing that in many ways he was still half a child. Pippin had grown so much over the last years. Sometimes, it was hard for Merry to remember that Pippin had only passed into his tweens a few short months ago, and still had a lot of growing to do in some ways. He was not yet the adult that he tried desperately to be, the adult that he thought Merry wanted him to be. Because you stole his childhood, Merry thought, bitterly. "I love you so very much." Merry said softly. "So very much." "Then why are you trying to send me back to my father?" Pippin demanded. "You need to talk to him about this." Merry said. "I already told you, I don't care." Pippin replied. "I don't care about the Smials, and I don't care about being Thain." "But, Pip." "Merry, I told you. I don’t care. I want to stay here with you." He said, giving Merry a defiant look. "Why do you care so much?" "Because you are giving it up for me, and I can't ask that of you." Merry said, stroking Pippin's cheek lightly. "It is just not fair. You have given up so much for me, already." "I have given up nothing!" Pippin said, growing agitated again. "There is nothing I want more than to be with you." "How do you know that?" Merry asked. "You have been with me all of your life." Pippin's eyes flew open, and his jaw dropped in shock. Then he snapped it shut and stared at Merry in stony silence. "Do you regret that?" He asked finally. "No." Merry answered. "I have cherished every day of it. I just worry that I have taken too much from you." "What?" Pippin asked hotly. "What have you taken from me?" "Your childhood." Merry replied quietly. Angry, furious silence crept through the bedroom. Pippin pulled away from Merry's embrace and sat up on the bed, studying Merry with eyes that were both angry and hurt. "You did not take it." Pippin said threw his teeth. "I gave it freely." "You were so young, Pip." Merry whispered. "Not too young to know what I wanted." Pippin responded. "And I am not too young to know what I want, now." "But, Pip." Merry started. He reached for Pippin, almost desperately, but his cousin shied away, and slipped off the bed. "I am old enough to make my own decisions, Meriadoc Brandybuck." Pippin said softly. "And I do not need you to make them for me." He gave Merry a look, more sullen than angry, and snatched one of the blankets off the bed. "Where are you going?" Merry asked him, when he started for the door. "To sleep." He said, giving Merry a pointed look. "Alone." She needed her wits now, more than ever. Maybe Adelard was a useless old talker. Maybe Adelard was telling tales, but she needed to know. She could not put her finger on it, but she had this vague, nagging feeling that if she could put all of it together, fit the pieces together just right, she could mend a friendship thirty years dead. And she had another feeling, that if she could mend that friendship, her father would give over about Merry and Pippin. Pervinca was starting to think Frodo had been right, that her father had not been mad, but worried that Pippin would suffer the same heartache that he had. Frodo had to be right, because nothing else made any sense. Her father could not call Pippin wrong for doing something that he had done himself. He could not be angry for it either, except because Pippin was doing it with the son of a man he loved himself. And his nattering on about Pippin and Merry being too close of kin was pure nonsense, except for one, new, hideous possibility that was to horrifying for words. Of course, Danelle could be right, too. Maybe she had hit her head too hard when she fainted. Once she located the elusive office, she pushed open the door without knocking. Saradoc was seated behind his desk, shuffling through paperwork and humming to himself tunelessly. He looked up as the door creaked, and eyed Pervinca in confusion. "Pervinca?" Saradoc asked. "I did not know your family was visiting." "They are not." Pervinca said. "I came with Adelard." "Oh, yes." He said, wrinkling his nose at her choice of traveling companions. "Everard and Melilot's wedding." Melilot, she thought wistfully, but she shook the thought away. She did not have time for that, now. She paused, trying to think of a way to approach the topic, but found nothing. She took a deep breath, and asked him straight out. "You were with my father." She stated flatly. Saradoc froze, papers in one hand and a teacup half-way to his lips in the other. His expression reminded Pervinca of a cornered animal, unsure of how to proceed and desperate for means of escape. "What are you talking about?" He asked, less shaky than he looked. "You were with him." She said again. "When we were talking about Merry and Pippin, you told me that it would ruin their friendship." She continued. "You told me that you knew what you were talking about." "That is not what I meant, Pervinca." He replied. "Did you love him?" She asked. Despite her current opinions on her father, she found herself growing angry with Saradoc for hurting him. "Did you love him, or was it just for play?" He studied her in silence for a long time. "I loved him." He said finally, with a resigned sigh. "It was just not meant to be. We had duties, Pervinca, just like my son and your brother. Responsibilities." " I loved him, dearly." He continued. "But it was doomed to fail from the start." "It failed because you were bedding half the Shire." She said hotly. "Including my mother." Saradoc had not been prepared for that. His eyes grew even wider, and he gave a nervous swallow so loud that Pervinca heard it. "I was young." He said. "Younger than Pippin was when he and Merry started carrying on." "My mother was young, and she managed to be with only you until my father came and took her away." Pervinca put in. She did not know if it was true, but she was hoping to the Lady it was. "I loved your father more than anything, when it began." Saradoc said softly. He took a long draught of tea, meeting Pervinca's gaze. "I loved him desperately, but as I grew older, I started to wonder if he was what I really wanted. He was all I had ever known." "And what about my mother?" She asked. "I loved her, too." He said. Pervinca gave him a disgusted look, and rolled her eyes. "I'll admit, I didn't at first." Saradoc said. "Your father and I had drifted apart…." "You were lonely." She said, cutting him off in disbelief. He certainly shouldn't have been, if Adelard's estimation about half the Shire was not far off. "We met her at a wedding." Saradoc explained. "She was so young, and so beautiful. Your father was enamoured with her." "So you took her because my father wanted her?" "I was angry at him." He replied. "Angry at him for liking her, angry at him for not loving me anymore." Saradoc gave a sigh, and Pervinca thought he sounded like he was going to cry. "I was angry at him for stealing my childhood." "So you stole my mother's." Pervinca snapped. Saradoc threw up his hands. "Done is done, Pervinca, and I cannot change it now." "Is Pearl your daughter?" She asked quietly. "Yes." Pervinca shivered, despite the fact that she had figured it was true, already. She found herself wondering if Pearl knew, or if anyone else in the Shire knew. "What about the rest of us?" She asked, afraid of the answer. "Me, or Nel?" "No." He said, shaking his head wearily. "It ended between your mother and I the day your father took her away." "Pippin?" She asked. "Absolutely not." He said. Pervinca breathed a sigh of relief. Her father's drivel about Merry and Pippin being too close of kin was nothing more than that. "How many children do you have?" She asked, out of nothing more than perverse curiosity. "Six." He muttered. "Including Meriadoc and your sister." Pervinca was unmoved. At this point, she did not think anything woould shock her ever again. "And how did my aunt fit into all this?" She asked. "Your grandfather knew about me and your father." Saradoc said. "I think when he offered her to me he was trying to distract me from your father." Like my father tried to do to Merry with Nel, she thought. He must have known that Merry and Pippin would have it for each other all along. "But do you love her?" "I did not, at first." He admited. "But I finally realized what a fool I had been, after your father took Eglantine away. I had not seen what I had, right under my nose." "Esmeralda has been a gift." Saradoc continued, almost wistfully. "And I thank the Lady every day for her." Just then, the sun dipped in the sky, peeking through the window of Saradoc's office. The light washed over him, giving his sandy curls a golden glow, and bathing his face in the warmth. Saradoc looked different then, younger and more beautiful. He was almost more stunning than Merry. Pervinca's breath caught at the sight of him, and she felt like she was looking nearly forty years onto the past. Suddenly, her heart grew tight, and she thought she would weep, for something that could have been so beautiful, but ended so bitterly. Thus ends Chapter Fourteen, as Pervinca tells it. Chapter Thirteen | Chapter Fifteen Back to the Blue Book | |