Merry’s unsure when it happened the first time, but when he looks at Pippin there’s a twist and turn of something that should be too big for him to feel all at once, but isn’t.

It might have been at the Green Dragon. Maybe he was laughing at something Frodo had said, sipping cooled ale, liking the way it fizzed when he swallowed it and propping his feet up on the bench across from him. He might have looked up then, turning to Pippin, wanting to tease him. And the light could have been just soft enough that he saw for the first time how Pippin’s eyes weren’t green at all, but filled with flecks of brown and gold. He might have seen the light dusting of brown freckles across the backs of Pippins hands then, too.

Or maybe they were outside, lying on the grass and looking up at the stars, eating plums they’d stolen. Maybe their fingers were sticky, and maybe there was juice on Pippin’s lips. He might have said something about how the grass was making him itch, or he might have been talking about something one of his sisters had done that absolutely required vengeance of some kind. Merry might have laughed, or nodded, or ignored him, but Merry must have been watching. Must have seen the way Pippin smiled, seen the wide mouth curling upwards into the grin that Merry’s never been able to resist. Maybe Merry stopped breathing for a moment, or maybe he whispered a soft ‘oh’ into the cricket filled night.

There are other ways it could have happened, Merry knows that but now, now it all runs together as he’s spent his entire life watching Pippin, his fingers curling into his palms, aching with the need to touch him softly – a violent kind of tenderness, a need that shouldn’t have stung so deeply. They’ve never been separate, and he knows that Pippin loves him more than any other, but this is something apart from that rough and tumble love of friends.

This is a love that creeps, quiet, all along the line of Merry’s back, tip toes up his spine and teases him into shivers at night when he curls beside Pippin.

He watches as firelight pierces the dark, looks at shadows flitting across the sharp lines of that dear face, and thinks that this should be easier. After all, there’s never been a time when Merry hasn’t loved Pippin, or Pippin hasn’t loved Merry.

It could be another adventure, another game they both like to play. He can see it easily; the tickling tangle of tongues, the sweet effervescent giggle, and Pippin’s happy smile.

He would make Pippin smile all the time, if he could. And maybe it wouldn’t be so wrong if he reached down, brushed the tawny curls back from Pippin’s brow, and learned the shape of Pippin’s sweet lips with a clever tongue. Maybe the curling lashes would sweep up, and Merry would see the green and gold darken, and maybe it would be Pippin’s turn to moan a soft, want-soaked vowel to be swallowed by the velvet black night.

But he couldn’t know for sure. He couldn’t know that he wouldn’t have to watch his finest dreams crumple in the face of Pippin’s distress. Merry could lose so much in seconds. More than the hopes he clutched in shaking hands, more than the trilling call of possibilities laid open before him in the gentle curve of a smile.

What he fears losing most is the soft comfort that lies between them, the careless affection that needs no tending. There would be hesitation, and he would miss the feeling of Pippin’s arms thrown about him without a thought, miss listening as Pippin tripped over words to find his meaning.

He loves Pippin brash. He loves Pippin incautious and reckless. He loves Pippin every way imaginable.

And Pippin’s so young, he thinks, a soft smile settling over his mouth. So young, and Merry could hurt him so much, so easily if they left this sweet contentment behind for something rougher, wilder, and that’s… unconscionable. He hates seeing Pippin hurt, and won’t allow himself to ever think of causing it.

Across the fire, he can hear Stryder sharpening his blade, and closer there are the soft sounds of Sam comforting Frodo, tending to the wound in his shoulder. Merry can see the linen-covered line of Sam’s shoulders, tense with worry as Frodo whimpers, and he aches for his cousin, and his friend. But, in parts of his heart that Merry can’t be proud of, all he feels is a tingling relief that it isn’t Pippin slowly fading.

They’ll make Rivendell in time. Merry’s sure, because the only other option is unthinkable and he won’t let himself panic, because Pippin needs him now.

It’s frightening here, outside the Shire. There are strange noises in the wood at night, and the pulling fear of pursuit, the fear for Frodo that’s wearing on all of them, and Pippin…he shouldn’t have to do this. He shouldn’t have to sleep on the cold rock, whimpering in his sleep, wondering if when he wakes in the morning his dear friend will be alive, or if they will be waylaid in the night.

They’re suddenly all so small, it seems to Merry, and Pippin’s smallest of all, although he’s the tallest. He has such delicate hands, fine-boned, thin, just like the rest of him. Merry’s imagined those hands pressed against his skin, wondered how they would taste were he to take them between his lips, but now, in the dark, they look so fragile. Merry can see the small bones of Pippin’s shoulders, the lines of his arm, and it all just looks so…breakable.

When he was just a boy, Pippin was like a little beam of mischief. All elbows, knees and sharp, bright smile. Such a bright spark in such a frail body, Merry thinks, a hand tracing along Pippin’s jaw unconsciously.

The fire sputters out as a sharp wind snaps out of the east, and Pippin shivers in his sleep. Merry pulls the blanket up further around him, scooting closer. He runs soothing hands over Pippin’s back, notices the cold feet, icy fingers. Unbuttoning one of the lower buttons on his shirt, he slips Pippin’s hands between them, pressing the cold fingers against his stomach for warmth and rubs his feet against Pippin’s.

He can’t see Pippin in the dark, but he doesn’t need to; he knows every line, every dip, every contour of the beloved face that burrows into his shoulder. Fierce tears clog his throat, and he realizes in a moment so cool, so calm that he knows he’ll always remember it. He will kill for Pippin, he will die for Pippin, and he will live for Pippin. And he’s been doing it all his life.

Merry brushes his lips against Pippin’s brow. Pippin stirs, and whispers Merry’s name, with a small smile that lingers even as he slips back into the depths of his dreams and Merry lies very, very still, letting his heart break and mend itself again in the space of a single beat.