In his dream, he was back on the pony, trotting through the forest east of the Brandywine, Ivy seated in front of him. He was gripping her hips, the cold, wet dress growing warm beneath his hands. He was trying very hard to keep his distance from her, so she wouldn’t feel what she was doing to him. The pony’s gait jostled them together and he had to work to keep his hips angled, to hide the growing erection that he most definitely should not be getting from his best friend’s daughter.
He was trying not to think about her, trying not to think about the scent of her, slightly earthy after being dumped in the creek. But that was turning out to be impossible. The smell of her damp skin warming in the sun was going straight to his groin. And it wasn’t helped by her warm body, so different now with her soft curves, pressed to his chest. He could feel her heart beating, as fast as his own, and her quickening breath, and he wanted nothing more than to get back to camp and off the pony and away from her.
He felt relief, just as he had a few days ago, when they reached the main road. Camp was less than a mile away and soon he’d be cringing under Merry’s dark glare as he slid from the pony and away from Ivy. But then everything changed.
They went down the small hill before reaching the East Road and their bodies slid together again. But instead of shifting away from her, like he had on that day, he kept her close. He couldn’t stop himself, couldn’t stop his hands sliding around to her stomach to pull her to him, pressing his erection into her back.
Ivy turned to look at him, and he prepared himself for her look of disgust, but instead she was smiling at him. “Pippin,” she sighed and she tilted her head back, her lips slightly parted. He leaned in to kiss her, pushing his hips against her, and then...
He startled awake, his sweaty body tangled in the blanket. He lay for a moment, heart racing, breath gasping. He’d been dreaming. About Ivy. Then he realized that his hand was wrapped around his erection, squeezing tight against the ache.
He yanked his hand away, the horror of the situation sending a chill through his body. He hadn’t just been dreaming about Ivy. He’d been about to get himself off while dreaming about her.
He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, disgusted with himself, feeling just a bit ill at the thought of what he’d been doing. How could he do this? How could he have these thoughts about her? His Ivy-lass, who he’s known since just minutes after her birth. The little girl he’d watched grow up.
But she wasn’t the same little girl, was she? She was grown up now. She’d even been seeing that lad in Gondor, something he still found hard to believe. She had left the Shire as a child and she’d come back a young woman. A very lovely young woman. He remembered his first sight of her, drawn to look up at her by Merry’s gasp. She looked even more like her mother now, except a bit softer and rounder than Eowyn. Sixteen-year-old Ivy looked like a hobbit lass in her late tweens. He’d only been able to just stare at her as she had greeted her dad, and then she’d turned to him and had flung herself into his arms. She’d kissed his cheek and there had been something different about it, different from the girlish pecks he’d always gotten from her before. And there was the way she smiled at him now, what was hinted at in her eyes...
His erection twitched at the memory of her, reminding him of his dream. It had been hard enough facing the feelings he’d had on that ride without having to relive them in a dream. He had tried to convince himself it wasn’t anything, just his body reacting as it would to any lass, that it was only disturbing because it was Ivy. But in the dream...in the dream he’d let it go farther, he’d given in to the feelings, and she’d responded...
His hips bucked slightly and he fought the urge to touch himself, to release the tension that gripped him. He couldn’t do this, he couldn’t give in to it. Not with Ivy. He squirmed at the tight, hot feeling in his groin, moaning softly when his nightshirt rubbed across the tip of his achingly hard erection. He couldn’t remember feeling this aroused in a long time, probably not since his tweens. Certainly not at any point in the presence of his wife. He felt the tension release a bit and rolled his eyes. Well, it seemed Diamond’s ability to kill his arousal had one good use.
He sat up, keeping focused on his wife, on her scowling face and harsh words. He suspected Sancho had been visiting while he was away in Buckland. He could always tell, because Diamond’s mood improved after she’d had a tumble with her lover. She’d been almost pleasant to him yesterday when he and Fari and arrived home from Buckland. He shook his head. He truly wondered what Sancho saw in her. He couldn’t imagine her being loving, but he supposed she was different with someone she didn’t hate. He sighed and glanced to his lap. His erection had softened considerably. He guessed she didn’t have the same affect on Sancho.
He managed to make it through the rest of the day without giving much more thought to the dream, too busy with Reg catching him up on things, and meeting with residents of the Smials and Tuckborough to consider requests, complaints and disputes of the hobbits in his charge. He wrote the dream off as being tired from his journey the day before.
He couldn’t stop it this time. His lips met hers, soft and warm and inviting. He held her tight to his chest, his hands clutching at her belly. He ground his aching erection against her until he was moaning into her mouth. He was close now, so close, and then she broke the kiss to look at him. He gazed back at that lovely smile and her eyes...he gasped as he felt his climax start, thrusting his hips hard until he released, moaning her name.
When he came back to himself he was in his bed in the Smials, alone. No forest. No pony. No Ivy.
He shuddered, overwhelmed by disgust and guilt. His hand and his nightshirt were wet and sticky from his seed. The seed he’d spilled for Ivy.
He stumbled out of bed and over to the basin on the dresser, his stomach threatening to rebel. He took a few deep breaths, calming his stomach but not his mind.
“Fuck!” he muttered, borrowing one of Merry’s stronger Rohirric curses. He cringed. Thinking about Merry made his stomach lurch again. Gods, if Merry knew what he’d done...
He clenched his fists and realized one hand was still sticky. He sighed and wiped it on his shirt, then stripped off the soiled garment and poured cool water from the pitcher into the basin to wash himself.
He collapsed back on his bed. The dream had been so real. He touched his lips. He could swear he had really kissed her. He groaned and slammed his fists into the mattress. He couldn’t just blame this on being tired anymore. He had to stop this. He couldn’t think these things about Ivy.
He got up and dressed. It was quite early yet, dawn just starting with a hazy glow in the east. He made his way down the dark hallway to his study. He went to his desk and lit a lamp. Maybe finding some work to do would distract him from his thoughts. But he was still too shaken by what had happened and instead of a ledger, he pulled a bottle of whiskey from the shelf.
“It’s not Uncle Pippin, anymore?” he asked her. He’d only just noticed she no longer called him Uncle Pippin.
“You’re not really my uncle, are you? It seems a bit childish to call you that, cousin.” She smiled at him and he was struck again by how pretty she was.
“I suppose so,” he started to say, but then it all changed again.
He was supposed to pull out his pipe, that’s how it had happened, but instead Ivy leaned towards him, staying his hand with a touch. She tilted her head and looked at him alluringly. “You don’t really want to be my Uncle anymore, do you?”
He knew what he ought to say, but it wasn’t what he wanted to say. As wrong as it was, he couldn’t deny the affect she had on him, how she made him feel. Her smile, her laughter, her cheerful teasing--no lass he’d ever met could compare to her. He reached out to her, but she faded away like mist in the sun.
This time when he awoke, it was not to arousal, but to an ache in his heart. Because he knew that no matter what his heart wanted, he could never have her.
“Why didn’t you tell us about Ivy?” Vinca asked, as he sat down to lunch.
“What?” He stared at his sister, confused. He’d had a rough morning. He’d dreamt of Ivy again, of their ride, and he hadn’t even tried to fight it this time. He’d been fully awake when he’d stroked himself to completion. Afterward, he’d wallowed in guilt. Both breakfasts had come out of a bottle this morning.
“I was in Hobbiton yesterday afternoon, and I stopped to chat with Rosie for a while,” Nel said. She leaned closer to him. “She said Ivy had matured while she was in Gondor,” she whispered.
He looked between his sisters, frowning. “You knew that. Fari told you that when we got home.”
“He just said she’d grown up. That can mean anything to a six-year-old,” Vinca said. “We thought he just meant she’d gotten taller.”
“I couldn’t imagine growing up so fast,” said Nel. “Big Folk have such awfully short childhoods.”
Vinca nodded her agreement. “I heard some of them let their daughters marry as young as fourteen.” She turned to him. “Do you think Merry’s going to let Ivy start courting now?”
He shrugged, not wanting to think about that too much. To the Big Folk, Ivy was old enough to marry. Hadn’t she mentioned she had a friend who had gotten married in Gondor? And he wanted her to find a lad and be happy, right? But he wasn’t quite ready to deal with losing her just yet. He didn’t want to think about her being with another lad...
Vinca touched his arm. “Are you all right? You look pale.”
He shrugged again. What could he say? That he was having arousing dreams about his young cousin and was suddenly jealous of the lad she would someday marry? “I’m fine,” he mumbled.
“You’re not fine.” Nel toyed with her fork for a moment. “I can smell the whiskey on you,” she said quietly.
He looked up at her, suddenly angry. “Don’t even start with me, Nel.”
“I know, I know. It’s just...” She sighed. “You know you can talk to us if something is troubling you, right? Or talk to Merry?”
He felt the twist in his gut. Talking to Merry would certainly solve his problems, because he’d be dead if Merry found out what he’d been dreaming about.
“I have to go,” he said, pushing away from the table. He truly wasn’t feeling well now, from the guilt and the whiskey on an empty stomach.
“You need to eat something,” Vinca scolded, but he ignored her and quickly made his way out of the hall and back into hiding in his study.
He didn’t dream the next night, but he payed for it with one of the worst headaches he’d ever had. And the headache wasn’t helped by Vinca coming into his room and opening the curtains.
He groaned and squinted at the sunlight, his head throbbing.
“You need to get up,” Vinca said. “I need you to put on your Gondorian livery so I can see if it needs any mending.”
“Now?” he groaned.
She glared at him. “It’s well past noon, if you must know. We’ve got plenty to do today to get ready for Columbine’s wedding tomorrow. The least you could do is try to be presentable for your niece.” She stooped and picked up the empty whiskey bottles from the floor. She didn’t say anything, though, just gave him a sad look and left.
He groaned again, head and stomach both threatening to give him trouble today. And he desperately needed the privy. He sat up, the room still spinning a bit. Getting stupid drunk every night was obviously not going to work as a solution to the dreams.
He grabbed his robe and stumbled down to the privy. When he returned to his room, a tray with a glass of water and some plain toast was on his dresser. He sighed. He didn’t deserve his sisters.
The trip to Buckland was unpleasant, as expected. He sat across the carriage from Diamond, doing everything in his power not to have to look at her. Luckily, she seemed to be doing the same, keeping her attention fixed on the embroidery in her lap.
Fari was curled up on the seat next to him, head on his lap, dozing. He rubbed his son’s back. For all the pain this marriage had caused him, at least he had Fari.
He tilted his head back, eyes closed, and sighed. If only he’d had a proper marriage, with a nice girl. One who didn’t hate him. One who didn’t cheat on her marriage vows and laugh about it behind his back. A lass who would be a real wife to him, so he wouldn’t have to take his pleasure from dreaming about...
His eyes snapped open. He’d dreamed again last night, had woken with his seed drying on his belly. But he wasn’t going to think about that now. Not today, when he was going to have to see her again. When he was going to have to face Merry.
He rubbed a hand over his face and looked around. Diamond was watching him.
“You look awful,” she said.
“I haven’t been sleeping well,” he said, keeping his voice neutral.
She raised an eyebrow at him. “Anyone I know?”
To his horror, he felt a blush warm his face, but he scrunched his face into a scowl, hoping she’d take the blush as a flush of anger. “I’m not the one breaking my vows,” he said coldly.
She smirked at him. “I don’t know what you’re implying,” she said sweetly, and turned back to her stitching.
He pinched the bridge of his nose, fighting off another headache. For years, his sisters and close cousins--even Merry--had as much as told him to take a lover, that they would not think less of him for breaking his marriage vows. And he knew it seemed ridiculous, to honor vows to a wife he didn’t love, a wife who hated him and had already broken the vows herself. But he couldn’t do it. He wanted to be a good example for his son, to live a life of honor where vows meant something. He was a Knight of Gondor and Thain of the Shire, and he wasn’t going to let anything prevent him from living up to that.
He drew in a shuddering breath, hating himself for letting this happen. He looked down at Ivy, asleep next to him, her head resting on his chest. He wasn’t drunk anymore, that was for sure. In fact, he felt far too sober to deal with what he’d just done.
She sighed in her sleep, the puff of breath warming his skin through the light linen shirt. He felt a twitch in his groin as he started to harden again.
He hated himself for letting this happen, but he hated himself even more because he’d enjoyed it. Because he’d suddenly needed her as much as he needed his next breath. Because when he’d been buried deep inside her it had felt so right, even though he knew it was very, very wrong. Because her gentle whispers of ‘I love you’ had gone straight to his heart and burrowed in and refused to budge.
He gently rolled her away from him, enough to slip away and out of the bed. He gazed at her a moment, at her beautiful, innocent face. She was so young, surely too young to really understand what she had been asking from him. And in his weakness, he’d given in to her. Would she hate him, when she realized what they’d done? When she realized what he’d taken from her?
He fastened his breeches and stepped back, his heel landing on the edge of his mail shirt. He stared at the armor a moment, at the white tree of the King. He’d broken many vows tonight. He no longer deserved to wear that uniform.
Ivy stirred a bit. “Pippin,” she sighed, and then settled back into sleep. He turned away, heading for the door. She’d used that same voice in his dreams once. But no matter how desperately he wished it to be, this was no dream.