Muindyr Duirr i Edhellen Sinnern În by herenortherenearnorfar

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On Fairy Stories

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“... The brave Goldilocks didn’t cower before the Great Slug! He took up his sword once more and held the vicious beast at bay as Princess Silverfoot led all the people out of the Flower Kingdom.

“Once the elves would have thought it impossible to slay such a garden demon. Goldilocks was already heavily wounded from the battle. In the face of the great, slimey body of the monster, its acid breath and heart of shadow and flame, he felt afraid. 

“Despite the terror, he knew he had to fight. Though the Good King was dead, Princess Silverfoot, Man Tuor, and their son Earendel still lived. If he could cover their retreat, the people of the kingdom could still survive, find other gardens and plant new flowers there. 

Remembering his brave friends, Tell, Penleaf, Rock, and Eaglemoth, who had already proven the impossible could be done by slaying monsters of their own that day, Goldilocks ran forward. The buttercups braided in his hair had been crushed by the battle, so yellow petals fell around his feet as he held his sword aloft and stood firm against the advancement of the Slug.”

Young Peregrin Took, who turned four just last month and was quite loud, cheered at that. Bilbo motioned for him to stop and then, gravely, continued.

“Its huge, fleshy feelers reached him first, stretching out to knock him off his feet. In a show of strength few elves have been able to match, Goldilocks slashed out at the stalks, meeting force with force and stopping the Slug in its tracks. 

“So the battle began. Whoosh! Swish!” You could never go wrong with sound effects with this crowd. “Every second Goldilocks held back the beast was another second bought for his friend’s escape. But the great power of the Slug, and the sticky slime it exuded were slowly beginning to wear him down. His limbs grew heavy with exertion and the corrosive mucous the Slug exuded. Though he did not doubt his own determination and chivalry, he worried his power would give out sooner rather than later. Were another one of the Dark Lord’s Great Slugs to come upon him, his guard would surely break. 

“He needed to finish the fight, whatever the cost, and close off the tunnel out of the Garden. Remembering how his clever friend Tell had baited the King Slug into his seawater fountain, Glorfi- that is to say, Goldilocks alit on a plan. 

“With taunts and stabs, he lured the Slug up a hill near the entrance to the tunnel. This was not any hill, however. Beneath it was a mine, dug by the wicked Moleglint to find rare metals under the earth. Around the mouth of the mine lay the results of miners’ labors— precious silver, copper, and gold. Being a gardener Goldilocks knew many ways to kill slugs. For example, he knew that the strips of metal laid around a planting bed could drive them away. He was uncertain if Great Slugs were deterred by this trick as well, but he had few other choices. 

“Driving his sword one final time into the fleshy mass of the monster, he snatched up a bar of copper in each hand and stabbed them like daggers into the wall of pest in front of him. The Slug reared back, as if branded, and Goldilocks struck again, driving it to the edge of the hill. Below he could see the evil army of the Dark Lord approaching the tunnel his friends and princess had fled down. Mice and mites, sapsuckers and weevils, all the fiends that had destroyed the Flower Kingdom, seeking out the last survivors. With a great leap, he landed on the Slug’s back, pressed the protective metal into its skin, and held on as it bucked wildly under him. Finally, its flailing brought it too close to the edge of the slope, and it tumbled down the steepest part of the incline, down onto the approaching army. 

“Goldilocks was quick and clever, and though he’d seen many of his dearest friends brought low this day, he did not wish to die. Before the Great Slug fell he leaped from it, landing on the very precipice of the hill.”

Bilbo paused and his captive audience held their breath.

“Ah, he landed, but could he keep his footing?”

There was an outcry from the listeners, quickly silenced by the older and wiser who knew that old Bilbo would not go on speaking unless people were paying attention.

“For though he was nimble— elves always are— he was now covered head to toe in snail slime that burned his skin. As he dropped to the ground, he slipped, feet sliding out from under him, unable to find purchase in a world covered in goo.” 

A few of his spellbound watchers were fairly gooey themselves, this late in the day. Birthday desserts and the dirt of the Great Smials were well ground into the childrens’ Party Best.  

“Already in free fall, missing most of its feeler, yet still full of malice the slug grabbed him by his beautiful long hair, once braided in flowers, now free and flowing in the wind, and pulled him down. Already unsteady, the warrior could do nothing to prevent himself from being dragged off the hill, down the same long fall as his opponent. And so they landed, the Slug and the Golden Flower, and their bodies protected the last escape from the Flower Kingdom.”

“What about Princess Silverfoot?” demanded Estella Bolger. 

“She saved her people,” Bilbo said. “They found a home by the sea and her son had a story of his own.”

Doderic Brandybuck grabbed at the hem of his trousers. “Tell us that one!” 

“Please!” agreed one of the little Tooks— Basil, Bilbo would have guessed, though the faces changed so quickly these days it was hard to keep track. 

“Hmmm? No, no more stories for today. You’ve already won two out of me.” The first had been the tale of his escape from Mirkwood, always a favorite. Then, in the face of so many little hobbits who had heard all his stories before, he’d improvised a rendition of the Fall of Gondolin. 

It had needed heavy editing to make it suitable for small ears but he was quite proud of his work. Elven texts were heavy on the valour and tragic falls, not the sort of thing children liked, so he’d updated the names and monsters, been a little loose with some of his translation choices, and added a moral about the importance of keeping moles out of your yard. Even the most disapproving hobbit parents couldn’t argue that it was a good, clean, Hobbit story.

Apparently the children could. 

“That wasn’t even a good story,” complained Pervinca Took, who had been listening absolutely entranced not three minutes before. “There was too much blood getting on the gardening equipment.”

Her distant cousin Ferdibrand (also a Took) nodded. “There weren’t any riddle games, just swords.”

Pearl, who was 19, considered herself too old for fairy stories, and had been pretending not to listen, scowled. “I don’t see why Moleglint was such a bad guy— he was in love.” The morality of young people, Bilbo thought fondly.

“I don’t know why he didn’t just tell his uncle about the evil plan,” Mentha Brandybuck (11 and three quarters, emphasis on the last part) was scattering grass from her skirt pockets on the floor with the intention of an artist. “He didn’t have to be a traitor.”

Bilbo had felt pressured to leave the torture out of this story, after complaints from frustrated parents about the last Baggins story (the rescue from Thangorodrim was perhaps suited for slightly older children). He didn’t mind being a bit of a bad influence, but too much and you stopped getting invited to the good parties. Now he wondered if it had been necessary for narrative cohesion. 

Hmm, parties over accuracy in storytelling, as he'd always said.

Take this party, for example, the absolute event of the year. Lalia Took was mostly wheelchair bound and half blind. For her 111th she’d still pulled together one of the biggest shows of food and fun that Tuckborough had ever seen. The Great Smials danced with light and noise, hundreds of hobbits from all across the Shire roaming through the mansion and surrounding grounds. Some young troublemakers had already broken into the wine cellar and been chased out by Paladin, over enthusiastic dancers had trampled a bed of heirloom tulips, and all the children sitting with Bilbo by the fire were undoubtedly up past their bedtimes. He’d personally taken the chance to break into the library and note down some books he wanted to bother Lalia into letting him borrow.

All in all, it was excellent fun, an affair that well lived up to the reputation of eleventy-first celebrations. 

“Wanted more dragons,” Sancho Proudfoot decided, with all the gravity his three years lent him. Reluctantly, Bilbo turned his mind back to the story, and decided that he was beset on all sides by critics. 

“Oh, shoo, shoo!” he insisted, waving them away from his armchair with sharp arm motions. “Or I’ll send a dragon after you!” The children, who bore a healthy fear of Mad Old Baggins, scattered like giggling mice, disappearing back to the pantries they’d been raiding and grass they’d been uprooting before Bilbo had started his stories.

Only a few of the older ones— Merry, Everard, Dahlia, and Pimpernel— stayed, lingering in the hopes of a special, frightening tale from Bilbo. When it became clear that he intended to smoke a pipe and nothing else, they too wandered off. 

Soon it was just the two of them in the corner of the crowded room. Party guests milled around and yet next to the roaring fire it was quiet. It was early summer. Even well into evening there was a damp heat all about that drove all but the elderly away from the dry warmth of the hearth. 

Bilbo was certainly elderly. Even if his face didn’t show his age, he’d been feeling it in his bones as of late. It was a cold ache. Some days he thought he might throw himself into the flames to be rid of it. 

Next to him, young Frodo was showing some signs of overheating. He’d taken off his party jacket and popped the top two buttons of his shirt. His hair was plastered against his forehead, gleaming. 

“Do you have criticism too?” Bilbo inquired after the first few draws on the pipe. He might actually accept them from Frodo, who had an eye for stories and who had read books that didn’t end with riddle games or brave bumblebees marrying princesses as small as a pin. 

“No, I thought it was quite good. It came from the elven history books, didn’t it?” 

Bilbo gave his ward a thoughtful look. Most of his elvish texts were still in the original Sindarin, and Frodo’s grasp of that language was far from fluent. “Yes. Do you know which event?”

“Silverfoot, Silverfoot,” Frodo clicked his tongue then jumped, spry as a young hobbit in his wild twenties ought to be. “Gondolin!”

“Good work, my boy!” Though they’d only come to live together five years ago, Frodo was bounds cleverer than Bilbo had ever hoped. He’d been a wild rascal upon arriving in Bag End and now he was a scholar, one of the more learned ones in Hobbiton. 

“You know,” Frodo said thoughtfully. “I don’t think there were slugs in the original story.”

Many concepts from the age of elves and heroes could be grasped by Hobbits. Though they had little use of swords, they understood the theory behind them. They knew what dragons were, had a passing acquaintanceship with kings, and could even conceive of castles, mountains, and the unending sea. 

Bilbo was not about to try to teach them what a Balrog was. He wasn’t even sure what a Balrog was, the descriptions of Penlod being full of vaguery. 

“Translator’s privilege,” he claimed and took a puff on his pipe. Frodo, dear Frodo, young and a little tipsy, neglecting his friends to sit with his uncle too close to the fire, took one look at Bilbo’s stubborn expression and burst out laughing.

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Chapter End Notes

I spent far more time making sure the timeline for the little hobbits and Lalia's birthday lined up than I did writing the story. Translating the title alone took at least an hour (it ought to be Brothers Grimms' Fairy Tales in Sindarin)

For the record, the citizens of the good Flower Kingdom are:
The Good King
Princess Silver Foot
Man Tuor
Earendel
The White Lady
Moleglint of the House of the Mole
Goldilocks of the House of the Golden Flower
Tell of the House of the Fountain
Eaglemoth of the House of the Rainbow
Penleaf of the House of the Pillar
Gallant of the House of the Tree
Salon of the House of the Fiddle
Dellin of the House of the Sparrow
Rock of the House of the Spade
Vonnie the Sailor
Innhill the Smith
Bilbo is very tired and so am I.