West of the Moon
A Tolkien Fanfiction Archive
Before I go to sleep
This is a lovestory between the Ringbearer and a girl from Hobbiton. It's obviously AU and a tale about what might have been if Frodo had ever found a love of his own. What would happen when the danger of the ring is revealed and Frodo has to leave? Would she wait for his return? And how would she handle the fact to be left behind again - and this time forever?
Author: Cuthalion
Rating: NC-17
Category: AU-Angst/Drama
Chapter Twenty-two
Sunstar and Sunrise
Rosie started her investigations in late January. With a pang of guilt, she remembered that she'd already planned to ask some questions last October when Lily fled from Bag End after the night of Mr. Frodo's illness, but during the next months she'd seen Lily on a regular basis as the young midwife had come to examine her, and she seemed to be perfectly normal... a trustworthy friend, well-tempered and even with a gentle humor. It had been quite easy to fancy that Lily's shock had been nothing more than the result of an exhausting night with too little rest.
Lily had told her to take as many walks as possible, and Rosie decided to kill two birds with one stone. She followed her advice and connected her walks with various visits. She saw the Hornblowers, the Grubbs, the Chubbs and the Beechleafs. She met many of the mothers Lily had cared for during the troubles, and she shared many stories and memories of the dark and bitter months before Sam and Frodo came back. She heard of girls being ambushed by some of Lotho's Men, getting away by a hair's breadth, and of one young lass that wasn't lucky enough to flee in time, over in Needlehole. She was found dead three days later in her own father's trout pond. Rosie heard her cruel tale from her aunt Daffodil Greenmoss, a sturdy goodwife with a grim face. That evening she returned home, Daffodil's voice and words still lingering in her mind, and when Sam asked her if she was well, she burst into tears.
In March she couldn't walk anymore; her body had become too heavy and her legs tired and swollen. Lily gave her nettle tea and made marigold-wrappings, and still Rosie hadn't found the result of the mystery she promised to solve for Frodo. But in the forenoon of March 24th, Rosie was surprised by a visit from all her friends (with the exception of Lily who was in Bywater, looking after a baby with a bad colic), and showered with many useful gifts to please a young mother: tiny jackets, trousers, embroidered blouses and shirts, piles of clean nappies (which she joyfully added to the huge piles already stored in the cabinets of Bag End) and pretty bonnets. Sam and Lily Cotton served cherry tea and nut cake, and Rosie and her guests enjoyed themselves very much.
There was only one small incident; Pansy Boffin stumbled over the edge of the carpet in the huge dining room and emptied her mug of tea all over her upper body. Rosie offered her help and a blouse, but Pansy insisted that she needed no assistance with the dodgy clasps of the bodice. Rosie left her alone in one of the guest rooms and when she returned with the blouse, she saw Pansy's bare bosom. It was only for a few seconds before Pansy covered herself, barely more than a glimpse, but it was enough. The scar was so similar to Frodo's description of Lily's scar that Rosie made a fast decision. She knocked at the door of the guest room, refusing to go away, and persuaded Pansy to let her in. Two months of walks and visits had trained her well in the art of making people open their hearts and Rosie's gentle kindness and compassion did the rest. After half an hour, she knew the whole story.
Sam discovered his wife a few minutes later as she sat on the edge of the bed in the guest room and rocked a sobbing Pansy in her arms. Rosie looked as pale and disturbed as her guest, and instead of offering an explanation she asked her husband to send everyone away except for her mother. At the sight of the expression in her face, Sam decided he'd better not to object. Goodwives and lasses left Bag End after a friendly and very polite farewell and ambled down the Hill, discussing the pleasant morning, and Sam went into the stable, patted Bill's back and harnessed the new pony Morning Glory. He had promised Rosie he would drive Pansy home to the Boffin smial and he hoped to get a satisfying answer for what all this was about when he got back.
But whatever Sam might have wanted to know or thought about the earlier incident was completely forgotten when he returned. His mother-in-law surprised him with exciting news and sent him away again to fetch the midwife. Rosie was in labor.
*****
March, 25th, 1421, in the middle of the night
"It will not take long now."
Lily knelt in front of the bed; one hand slid across Rosie's high curved belly with soft pressure, the fingers of the other hand felt inside her body for the child's head. Barely an inch deep she found the delicate little skull; her fingertips touched wet skin and fine hair.
"How long?"
Rosie's voice panted and her face was streaming with sweat. As he had earlier this evening, Sam sat behind her, leaning back against the headboard He had been stroking his wife for hours now, holding her hands and kneading her aching back and he looked almost more exhausted than Rosie. Lily gave him a sharp glance. Hopefully it will not very long, the way your are looking, Sam Gamgee. But she remained silent. If the last year had taught her anything, it was to keep her thoughts to herself.
"Soon," she replied instead after a moment. Her warm voice was soft and soothing. "You've nearly made it, Rosie... no one would believe that this is your first."
She felt Rosie's legs tensing; her back arched. The bed creaked as she tried to press the child out of her body with all her might. Lily supported her with strong pressure against the abdominal wall and felt how the small being was pushed downwards with a jerk...and slid back, as if being held.
"Once again, Rosie."
The next attempt, Lily frowned. Again, she felt for the child's head. She slid her fingertips over the tiny face, felt the brow, the nose, the chin... and then the twists of the umbilical cord, wrapped tightly around the baby's neck. Once? No... twice.
"Stop, Rosie. Breathe flatly, like I've taught you, will you? Don't press anymore."
The thoughts were scurrying around inside her head. Somehow she had to manage to loosen this malicious noose; if Rosie, tensed and cramped in her labour pains, or pushed further, the child would be strangled.
She sat up. Rosie's eyes were closed, she was breathing in short, shallow gasps. Sam held her with both arms; Lily could see how pale he was.
"Sam?" she said quietly. He startled and stared at her, and she noticed the panicked fear in his face.
"Your wife needs a little break," The lie came to her lips easily, fluently; during the last year she had learned that, too. "And she's not the only one - you look as if you are about to faint too. I want you to go out and have a sip of wine. Or a mug of beer. Wash your face and comb your hair, please, be so kind. Or you will look like one of Lotho's ruffians when your daughter is born, and the poor thing will be scared to death." Her voice created the perfect deception; light, sweet and with a barely hidden laughter. "Perhaps you can sit down in the study for a moment."
"Good idea."
She winced violently and fought the impulse to turn around to him with all her might. She hadn't heard him coming in. How long had he already been here?
"Off you go, Sam. We'll fetch you at once when the time has come... isn't that right, Lily?"
"Surely."
"Yes, go outside, Sam, please... take a rest."
Rosie's whispered comment turned the balance. Sam kissed his wife and let her slide from his lap onto the crumpled bed. He stumbled across the room and from the corner of her eye Lily saw how Frodo laid an arm around his shoulder and guided him towards the door like a tired child. She heard him talk softly to Sam, but she didn't understand what he was saying. And now was not the time to trouble her mind about it.
She could feel Rosie cramping under a new wave of pain. This time the child only stirred a little, before the small body was stuck again. She was endlessly thankful that she had sent Mrs. Cotton out half an hour earlier, to "prepare a fine meal for the young mother".
The door closed softly, then, for a moment, everything was quiet.
"Frodo?" she said without turning.
"I'm here." His voice was very near and she noticed that he stood behind her, leaning in. For a moment she felt his warm breath on her cheek, then regained her composure, sat up and gazed at the woman on the bed. Rosie's eyes were closed and she lay very still; the labor pains seemed to have lessened for the moment. Good. She had to take matters in hand, and she had to be fast.
"Listen," she said very softly. "The umbilical cord is wound around the baby's neck. If I don't do something very quickly, it will be strangled. I have to turn it's body slightly to remove the loop, but that will only work if Rosie is able to relax. She mustn't press again until I have loosened the cord. Do you understand?"
"Yes," he replied in the same tone. "But I don't understand what I..."
"Very simple. You sit down beside her. You hold her hand. You tell her that she doesn't have to be afraid. You tell her everything will be fine."
The body beside her tensed in tired defense.
"I don't know if I can do that. Shouldn't I better fetch Sam?"
"Sam is spent, Frodo! He has simply no strength left, and you know that."
She turned to him, directly for the first time, and she looked into his eyes.
"I don't care if you tell her the pure truth of if you lie straight to her face... as you have to everyone these last months, telling them that you are fine even though you were not. I don't care how much hope you have, Frodo Baggins... but you will give Rosie hope now! You will encourage her or you will have to deal with me. It is time to carry him and his burden on your shoulders - instead of the other way round."
She saw the twitch of a muscle in his pale cheek and noticed with grim satisfaction that she had broken his armor. He bowed his head, then he straightened and went to the head of the bed. Rosie had opened her eyes, turned her face in his direction and smiled weakly.
"Mr. Frodo, what are you doing here?"
"I'm replacing Sam." Lily saw how he took Rosie's hand and placed a feather light kiss on the palm. "Have I ever told you what a marvelous mother you will be?"
The sound was absolutely light-hearted and tender; with a short, vertiginous shock, Lily recognized the voice that had told her Elven tales... when in tepid summer nights she lay naked in his arms, in this very bedroom.
Over. This is over and I will never come back. She bit her lower lip and tasted blood, but the brief pain was enough to allow her to regain her composure. In the background, the voice spoke further, cheerful and merry, as it painted the picture of a healed Shire with playing children and everlasting peace.
"Fortunately Bag End is really big enough..."
The head, the chin, the neck with the umbilical cord. Thumb and forefinger closed around a delicate shoulder, she pushed and pressed carefully and felt the small body turning in the narrow channel.
"Do you want more boys or more girls? Imagine that - half a dozen small gardeners..."
There... she had managed to slip two fingertips under the loop which wasn't so tight anymore, now the position of the child had changed. She pulled carefully... very carefully... the head came free...
Lily raised her head. "Frodo, fetch Sam - quick!"
Frodo jumped up and hastened out of the room.
"Rosie." She took a deep and shuddering breath. "Now you may press. Now. Now!"
Rosie gave a deep groan, made a last great effort... and the child slid out easily, directly into Lily's waiting hands...just at the moment when, behind her, the door flew open. Sam rushed past her and sat down on the edge of the bed with an impetus that made the whole frame shake alarmingly and caught the exhausted Rosie in his arms.
Lily held the child close, laughing under tears, gently drying the small body with a soft cloth. The baby's chest rose and out came an astonishingly forceful cry.
"Congratulations, you two," she said. "It's a girl!"
*****
Before sunrise she stood in the garden of Bag End, the sky in the east was rose tinted and the dew wet spring flowers smelled spicy and sweet.
It was quiet inside, after the first outburst of joy and excitement. Lily had bathed, swaddled and dressed the child and laid it in the arms of it's proud parents; at the thought of the stunned awe in Sam's eyes when he found out that the hair of his daughter was golden, a smile slid across her tired face.
"Lily?"
She closed her eyes. No, please. Don't do this to me. Let me go.
"Lily, I have to ask you something."
She sighed. ?Frodo, I'm tired. It was a long night. I want to go to bed. This was certainly not the last baby this week, and they tend to be born when I would like to sleep."
"Lily, you said something to me before..."
"I was rude and impolite. I beg your pardon, but... I needed your help."
He was not so easily distracted. "You said, Sam bore my burden on his shoulders. Did you mean that literally?"
"Why?"
"Because it's true. Nearly the whole last part of the way up on Mount Doom Sam carried me on his shoulders."
Lily froze.
Sulfury smoke in her nostrils and her lungs, making her cough, even though she knelt in front of her garden bed on a clear sunny spring morning exactly two years ago. Her body, crooked on the bed, while she gasped in panic for air and an unexplainable, terrible heat singed her skin and dried her mouth.
"How did you know? Did he tell you?"
I was as if suddenly something broke inside her. She turned to him and looked into the tired face, marked by exhausted lines. She saw the silver speckled curls and his eyes, sad and dark.
"Have you really forgotten everything?" Her voice was very soft, but the exasperation and the desperate rage ringing in it hit him like a blow. "Did you forget that I sometimes feel things that happen somewhere else?"
When she saw understanding and remembrance moving slowly into his gaze, she clenched her fists.
"The day you finally got rid of that horrible...thing, I inhaled the stench of that cursed mountain and I thought I would die. I thought you would die. I felt you so close as if you were directly beside me... no, as if I were a part of you. My finger..."
She heard him fiercely gasping for air, but she went on.
"... my finger hurt as if I had gripped into broken glass, I didn't know where you were. I couldn't be with you. I couldn't help you..."
"I'm so sorry... I didn't know..."
She could hear the shock in his voice and a part of her told her to be silent, but still she went on.
"What did you not know? That I was still here, waiting for you? That I held on in Hobbiton with my father, while my mother fled to Aunt Esmeralda with the boys... and someone had to take care of him with his bad cough that didn't get better - not to speak of the women in need of a midwife in spite of Lotho's mean tyranny and his brute ruffians?"
The images of all those agonizing months rushed past her inner eye; they stood vis-?-vis in the morning-silent garden and the words, held back for so long, came out in a bitter stream.
"The world kept turning while you went out to save it, Frodo Baggins!
I have helped children into the world, and I fought for each cabbage and each carrot when food got scarce in Hobbiton, because Lothos men robbed the people and sold everything. And every time I went home on my own, I had to reckon that he might ambush me somewhere, or that he might send his ruffians after me."
"Lily..." Frodo stepped forward automatically and reached out for her. She shook her head and flinched back.
"He knew of us... he has watched us. He sneaked after us, during the spring dance. He told me that once, right to my face, when he... when he..."
Her voice broke. She looked into his eyes, struggling for composure, fighting the violent urge to hit him with the horrible truth about her shame and with her deeply hidden rage. She clenched her teeth so hard that her jaw hurt.
"I endured the pain and the fear, and I visited the mothers and thanked fate that they still gave me whatever they could to help me fill our pantry... and I held on and somehow managed to wait. Then you finally came back, and within a few weeks all the hopes I had managed to keep were burnt to ashes. I can bear it no more! If you still feel anything for me, leave me in peace."
She stopped, breathless from her own outburst. His face was deadly gray and the pain in his eyes woke an echo in her heart, cramping her chest. Her breath came as a panting and she violently fought down the sob rising in her throat.
"I'm going now. Tell Rosie and Sam that I will come tomorrow. Until then Mrs. Cotton will surely manage everything very fine."
Lily turned around, stepped through the garden gate and walked down the hill. She heard him calling her name, but she didn't look back.
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