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Title: Five things that never happened to Lily Proudfoot (#2704)
Author: Cuthalion
Chapters: 5
Archive: Tolkien
Category: Alternate Universe (AU)
Description: I have encountered the "Five things that never happened..."-idea several times in fanfiction. And after I had written "In the Darkness of my Dreaming", this hit me from behind, so to speak (and that after I had solemnly told everybody that I won't write any Lily/Frodo-tale anymore...). Well then... I guess this is what Aratlithiel really wanted when she asked for an alternate ending of my tale Before I go to sleep. For here Lily gets everything she ever wanted... even if this never really happened. (And the warmest thanks to my lovely, supportive beta Ariel!)
Published: 09 May 2006
Updated: 09 May 2006
Warnings: none
Type: Romance
Characters: Lily Proudfoot; Frodo Baggins
Chapter 1 - One
Five things that never happened to Lily Proudfoot
By Cúthalion
One
She stands in front of the mirror. The woman reflected in there is a stranger, clad in may-green, daisies woven into glossy chestnut tresses. She has not found the time to embroider her own bride bodice… other hands have decorated the smooth silk with pearls and lily of the valley-leaves.
She feels terribly unsure and ridiculously disguised. She feels helplessly exposed, after too many years of secrecy and silence. His family. His cousins. Meriadoc Brandybock… ‘Magnificent’ already, radiant hero and gentlehobbit. Peregrin Took, Knight of Gondor, friend of wizards and kings.
And - even worse – the inhabitants of Hobbiton. All the folks who’ve known her since she was a child.
This is madness.
Cool gems on her skin, warm hands, closing the amber necklace around her neck.
“Ready, my indil?”
He stands behind her and his voice alone is enough to soothe her panic. She turns around, held and comforted by the love in his eyes.
“Yes – of course.”
Chapter 2 - Two
Two
The Great Smials are crowded as always around Yule, but the rooms are filled with an odd silence, very unusual for this time of the year. Diamond, the young wife of the Thain, has been lying in labor for hours now and there is a hushed whispering among the goodwives that something must be terribly amiss.
Lily Baggins leaves her husband in the company of his cousins and a bottle of deep red Elvish wine (infused for the Thain to keep him from bursting into the bedroom after every single moan and scream). She enters the chamber, closes the door behind her and meets the gaze of Daisy Took, the old midwife.
“I don’t think that you’ll be of any help,” Daisy says, eyeing the Mistress of Bag End from head to toe.
“Amaranth Brockhouse would tell you differently.” Lily retorts with a small smile.
“Ammie?” Daisy Took gives a snorting laughter. “So you are her Lily? Now, that’s a surprise, it really is!” The tone of her voice warms notably. “Well, under this circumstances… the child comes with its feet first, and it is stuck. Any ideas?”
“One or two,” Lily says, rolling up the sleeves of her fine velvet dress. “Do you have an apron for me?”
***
Two hours later, Peregrin’s and Diamond’s son gives a hearty scream… a fine, beautiful Yule child, greeted by a cheering family and the stunned, tearful amazement of his parents. Far past midnight, Lily Baggins lies on the huge bed in their guest room. She smiles as long, strong fingers knead the rigid muscles in her bare back and falls asleep, surrounded by the scent of lavender oil and the sound of Frodo Baggins’ voice, singing a love song against her skin.
Chapter 3 - Three
Three
In May 1430 that certain time of the month comes and passes, but the familiar signs fail to appear. Lily has seen it hundreds of times before, happening to other women, but the fact that this time it is her own body takes her breath away.
She has carried Little Faramir around during enormous family feasts in Brandy Hall, and helped Estella when the milk didn’t flow after the birth of Little Gilda and her nipples were sore and inflamed. She knows what to do and what to say to all the mothers-to-be in Hobbiton and Bywater, and she has seen the babies in their care as a pleasant duty, as small beings to nurture and to attend. But the prospect of a new life, slowly growing in her belly, fills her with inexplicable fear.
She starts to wake late in the night, and Frodo – who is long used to insomnia – watches for a week or two, seeing what Lily tries to hide from everybody – dark rings under her eyes, clandestine yawns behind her hands and a growing restlessness and exhaustion. But he doesn’t speak; he knows her well enough to give her the time she needs.
Then, one morning at the beginning of July, he feels her slip out of the bed beside him. He follows her silently through the long corridors, past the bedchambers of Rosie’s and Sam’s offspring (two lasses and three lads so far), and past the parent’s bedroom. Finally he finds her in one of the storerooms, sitting on a low stool beside Belladonna Baggins’ old cradle.
Bilbo slept in it when he was a babe, and Elanor and Frodo, Goldilocks, Merry and Pippin. The old dark wood smells of bee wax and linseed oil, and while he stands on the doorstep, a dressing gown loosely over his nightshirt, he sees her hand, gently stroking the flower carvings and ivory inlays on the front end.
“Lily?”
She raises her head; her lovely face is tired and pale in the grey light of dawn.
“My indil… what’s wrong with you?”
She takes a deep breath.
“Nothing,” she whispers, “not really. I am afraid, my love. I really shouldn’t be, and I feel very silly, because I surely know enough about the whole matter, but I… I am with child, and I’m terribly afraid.”
He makes a few unsure steps and is suddenly on his knees, his head spinning, his heart stumbling in his chest. He wants to speak, but words fail him, and only when she leans over the cradle with a trembling smile and gathers him in her arms, does he realize that his face is wet with tears.
Chapter 4 - Four
Four
Nothing has prepared her for this – the beautiful tents, made of silk and fine linen, the ladies in magnificent gowns, the soldiers and guards in the black and silver garb of Gondor.
She walks along the paths with the widened eyes of a child wandering through a fairytale, and when the moment comes that she is expected to greet the King, her knees tremble under the abundant skirts of the sun-yellow dress she has chosen, and her hand shakes in the solid, warm grip of Frodo’s fingers.
Two thrones have been erected at the shore of Lake Evendim. The water shines like truesilver in the light of midday, and Lily blinks against the blinding brightness and lowers her head when she hears Frodo’s words: “Aragorn, my Lady Arwen… this is my beloved wife, Lily.”
“Lily?”
A cool, smooth touch against her cheek. Someone lifts her chin… and then she gazes into the face of beauty itself. Dark, raven hair, streaming like a river of night over shoulders as white and luminescent as mother of pearl. Grey eyes, shining like the stormy depths of an ocean Lily has never seen and yet recognizes with a sharp, painful yearning in her heart. She is not able to speak. She takes in those bright, beautiful features, and for the moment even Frodo and the King are forgotten. But then three things happen at once: Her husband clears his throat, pressing her fingers a little more tightly, the low, amused chuckle of a male voice reaches her ear… and a high-pitched crowing comes from behind them. Instinctively she turns around.
There comes Elanor – Elanor the Fair – unusually tall for a hobbit lass, with hair like pale summer wheat and slender like a willow twig, and she carries a small boy on her arm… a hobbit child with a rosy face under a mop of auburn curls. Once the baby fat is gone, he will have the high, elegant cheekbones of his father, and he gazes into the world with the same eyes of shining indigo.
“Mama!”
“I am sorry, Mrs. Lily,” Elanor says, bowing with easy, lithe grace before the King and Queen. “He didn’t want to wait any longer.”
“Aragorn…” Lily hears the deep pride in Frodo’s voice and her face relaxes to a smile. “May I introduce you to my son Fredegar?”
The King rises from his throne and Lily has the first opportunity to study the Man she only knows from Frodo’s countless stories. He has a good, clear face and she notices surprise and joy, softening the lines of experience around his eyes and mouth at the sight of the tiny child. Without hesitation, he reaches out and instead of flinching, Freddy gives a high, delighted giggle and buries five plump fingers in the neatly trimmed beard in front of him. The King laughs, a noble figure, arisen from half-forgotten legends and yet miraculously real, cradling the small body of Frodo’s child in both hands. And Lily forgets all her shyness and uncertainty and laughs with him.
“You may, my dear Frodo,” says the King with dancing eyes. “What a marvelous little boy.” He gently untangles a chubby hand from his hair, and she feels his eyes rest on her face, with kindness and a respect that warms her heart. “And a wonderful wife, too. Elen sila lumenn’ omentielvo, Lily Baggins.”
And to her surprised awe, he bows his crowned head and kisses her hand.
Chapter 5 - Five
Five
The older Lily gets, the more she likes the honeysuckle arbor in the back garden of Bag End. Sam planted it for her and it was finished and the wooden arch properly overgrown when she celebrated her 60th birthday. Frodo was nearly 84 at that time, and – given the circumstances and the occasional memories of his body in March and October – astonishingly well.
There have been bright years and dark years. When Elanor married Fastred Greenholm in May 1451, Frodo wasn’t able to be at the wedding; the “March illness” refused to leave in time, and he remained frail, pale and disordered the whole summer. But when winter came and the first snow fell, he had recovered enough to spend long evenings with Sam, playing chess and recalling those parts of their legendary adventure that left no dark shadow on his soul.
In 1465 Freddy visited the Great Smials and met Clover Took, a niece of Everard Took. A few days with her were enough to make him fall in love, and three months later he brought her to Bag End to introduce her to his parents. Frodo gave her a warm welcome, eyeing her red-blonde frizzy hair and the sun-speckled face with a mischievous curl of his lips, and congratulated his son. Late that night he told Lily with a chuckle that this was the second attempt of a Baggins to court a Took-girl of that name and with exactly those looks. Lily listened to the story of the “first” Clover and fell asleep, still giggling, her face buried against his chest.*
Freddy married Clover in summer 1466, and now, when Lily sits in the vivid shadow of the honeysuckle arbor, she often finds one of her grandchildren climbing on her lap and waiting for tales. She feeds them seedcakes and currant juice and after a while their grandfather approaches, his steps slow and careful, his hair completely white now and his eyes twinkling behind the round glasses Meriadoc Brandybuck sent him last year – the only reason that he’s still able to read properly. And together with the little ones he listens to her warm voice speaking of elves and dwarves, of a legendary White City and a noble and gentle King she once met. He keeps his own stories for himself these days, but Lily knows them all.
When she looks up, she sees him smile at her the way he has done for more than sixty years … and for her, he is still beautiful, he will always be. He will always be her master, her lover and her teacher, and she is his indil and his chestnut. She forgets her aching joints and swollen feet… she gets lost in his eyes and is young again once more.
FIN
*that story is told in Hay and Clover (also here on OSA)
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