Ch. 8 ~ The Rising of Bread, Pt. II
Threshold ~ by Mechtild
Chapter 8 - The Rising of Bread, Pt. II
Rating: Adult
~ ‘Cupid and Psyche’, by William Page, 1843, detail.
~ The night of July 14, Rosa's cottage, cont’d....
"Check the fire, would you, Frodo?” Rosamunda said. “You could help with the bread, if you would like."
Rosamunda lifted the dampened cloth and examined the state of the dough.
Frodo prodded and stirred the fire in the box, adding a bit more fuel.
Rosamunda was aware that Frodo knew his way around a kitchen, but Bilbo took charge of all the baking at Bag End. Bilbo had insisted, however, that Frodo help him at every step, so that he might learn. Rosamunda knew from humorous tales that Frodo was an indifferent cook who had to be prodded.
Pressing a finger into the risen round, Rosamunda checked its progress. It sighed and did not return the imprint.
"It is ready," she said. "There is enough to make two. Would you like to do one of them, Frodo? Or would you rather not?"
She thought he might acquiesce, simply to be polite, but he actually looked pleased.
"Yes! I enjoy making the loaves," he answered, smiling brightly.
She knocked it down and cut it in two, handing him a half. On the dusted table they set to work. Frodo pressed and pummelled his portion out flat, then tucked it under into a round, very neat, pinching the overlaps to seal them well.
Rosa was taking her time with hers, the handling of the finished dough being her favourite part.
"I want to see you make a long one, Rosa," Frodo smirked, sending them both into snorts of mirth.
She arched a brow but, grinning, did so - stretching and rolling and squeezing the dough - punctuated throughout with moans and sighs interspersed with giggles in which Frodo joined. He added a few groans and yelps when she pinched it under, at the ends.
The atmosphere seemed quite relaxed again. What sort of mood had he been in, she wondered?
Carefully, Rosamunda laid her loaf down one side of the tray she had buttered and dusted with meal, inviting Frodo to do the same. She covered them both with the dampened towel.
"It's not quite so warm now - but they should be ready in another hour or so," she said, straightening the corners of the towel. But even as she glanced up, Frodo had already slipped behind her, pulling her to him in a close embrace.
"Oh, Rosa!" Frodo sighed into her ear, kissing her in earnest up and down her neck, while his hands travelled up over her breasts and down her belly with fluid motions, leaving trails of effervescent sensation everywhere in their wake. She felt herself melting into him, so closely pressed behind her, as if the intervening hour had not happened.
She gave herself up to whatever he might do to her.
Off came the apron, which Frodo tossed on the table. Then he began to unbutton her bodice - he was much better at this now. His motions were not hampered by his usual haste; soon he had them easily undone. Reaching inside he touched the cloth of her shift. She felt a disappointed snuff of warm air behind her ear but then a grunt of satisfaction when he found the little ribbon ties that went all down the front. The shift was one she had worn when nursing Estella - or perhaps it was as old as Freddy - for Rosamunda never stopped wearing the things that she loved. These shifts had long plackets down the front, tied together with ribbons.
Leisurely, Frodo pulled each tie undone, assailing her neck and shoulders in a most delicious manner as he did so. Rosamunda felt herself swaying and listing, becoming altogether soft and pliant as she yielded under the barrage of his hands and delicate, succulent kisses. The dough must feel like this, she thought. When the ribbons were all untied, Frodo slid his hands inside the placket. Lifting out her breasts, first one and then the other, he hefted them as if testing their weight. She felt the wafting heat of the lamps upon her skin but warmer still was his touch.
Such limited access wasn't enough to satisfy Frodo. Pulling the sleeves, he drew the bodice off, kissing her bared shoulders as they were revealed. With a few gentle tugs, he pulled the bodice out from under her waistband and dropped it in a chair. Rosamunda leaned back into him, luxuriating in the softness of his cheeks and lips and the moist warmth of his breath. Next he dispensed with the top of her shift by drawing it down over her shoulders, first one side, then, the other. Still cinched in by the waist of her fastened skirts, it draped down over her forearms. She felt like a child being prepared for bed as Frodo lifted out her arms, kissing the palms of her hands as he did so.
Rosamunda thought the skirt would go next; she trembled with anticipation as she felt his fingers brush the buttoned tab. He was being so patient! - far more patient than she. But Frodo was not yet ready for the removal of skirts; she felt his hands slide around her waist and up her ribs to capture her breasts again, this time to knead and squeeze and pinch and roll. Oh, it was beyond delicious! Trying to touch him, too, she reached up behind her to twine her fingers into the loose curls she loved which tumbled down his neck.
Rosamunda heard sighs, high and breathy - they were her sighs, threatening to become moans. She made an effort to restrain them, as if holding them back might contain the mounting excitement she felt. She might stifle her cries, but the unconscious rhythmic rolling of her hips as she arched against him betrayed the state of her desire.
"Oh, Rosa!" Low and throaty was Frodo’s voice this time, more like a heated panting than speaking, just beside her cheek. When suddenly he released her breasts and loosed her hands from around his neck, Rosamunda squeezed her eyes shut and nearly cried out, so bereft of him she felt. But then, her eyes still shut, her ears and skin prickled to hear the whispering slide of his brocade waistcoat, then the rustle of the linen shirt. She opened her eyes in time to see both of them flung into another kitchen chair.
When Frodo slid his naked arms around her again she felt herself enveloped in pure warm silk, his bare chest and stomach sliding over the skin of her back, making her shoulder blades quiver from the feel of it. But then he left her cold once more.
Rosamunda closed her eyes and held her breath, listening. She felt a yank as he undid her waistband buttons, followed by further fumbling about behind her. Her heart leapt when she heard the slap of his leather belt hitting the floor, then, the whispery sound of soft twill sliding down his legs. She heard the breeches scuff across the stone flags.
She couldn't wait; she reached behind to touch him but what she touched was the top of his head - he was crouching down behind her. Before she could open her eyes to look, she felt the cooler air from under the table upon her legs. Frodo was pulling up her skirts, hoisting up fabric in handfuls, the long loose shift caught up in its folds.
"Lift up your arms," he breathed near her ear, his voice charged with desire. Up and over her head it went, skirt and shift, air rushing over her skin where layers of cloth had been. She heard the sound of the heap of fabric as it hit the floor.
Though Rosamunda knew what was coming, she gasped when she felt Frodo’s nakedness against her, hot and hard as a burning brand, which torched a firestorm within her.
"Oh, Frodo!" she heard herself cry out, loudly, this time. She was all aquiver, her strong legs turned to jelly. Rosamunda didn't resist when he pulled her with him in a downward slither of limbs, her feet tangling in discarded skirt and shift. As she fell, she managed to lodge a protest, weak but plaintive, "Not the floor, Frodo! I hate the floor!"
He paused in his execution.
"Oh, very well!" Frodo sighed, with just the hint of a chuckle.
Standing up again, Frodo took Rosamunda’s arm and pulled her up.
She had a stunning sight of him for only a second, before he heaved her up over his shoulder, knocking the breath right out of her, bearing her off to the bedroom.
Rosamunda barely had leisure to marvel at this, before she was dumped upon the bed, her legs sprawled over the edge, her presence of mind knocked out of her more than her wind.
The light from the lamps in the kitchen spilled in through the doorway. Even though their light was little at this distance, in the black of the room on this moonless night, the light they made seemed greater.
Raising her head, Rosamunda could see the tops of her breasts and the rounds of her belly and thighs, but she could not see Frodo. He was a dark shape silhouetted against the doorway behind him. She pushed herself up to sit. The shape advanced at once. The edges of his body were illuminated like the rim of the moon in a full eclipse.
He didn't speak but the faint light that traced the edge of his jaw showed her he was smiling.
"Come here," he said.
She moved forward, but did not touch him, suddenly seized with a frisson of apprehension, mixed with desire. Who was he?
Mesmerized, she watched his arms and hands, edged with gold, as he reached for her. Cupping the tops of her shoulders, he ran his hands down her arms until he'd reached her wrists. Deftly, he laced her fingers into his, easing her backwards until her thighs touched the edge of the mattress. He did not urge her down. Instead, he stretched their interlaced hands up and out, bringing his chest to hers, just touching, as he leaned into her. If there had been no bed behind her, Rosamunda would have fallen. Arching his neck to the ceiling, the light shone through his suspended curls. While he slid his chest and torso over hers in an undulating pattern, his raised fingers twined with hers in some secret dance of his own devising.
Rosamunda wanted the rest of Frodo, too - she ached to feel him up against her. Arching her own hips forward, as much as she might without losing her balance, she sought him out. But Frodo kept her back.
"Not yet, Rosa," he said.
She was sure that he was smiling. Was he drunk after all?
Rosamunda wondered no more when he took her shoulders and, in a quick succession of movements, sat her down and toppled her back upon the bed.
At last, she thought. She had begun to make her way further onto the bed when, taken by surprise, the darkened shape that was Frodo intercepted her. Hooking his hands behind her knees, he gave her a good tug. She could see the edge of light outlining the bunched muscles of his shoulders as he did so.
With another yank and a shift he had pulled her hips to the edge of the bed. He stood poised before her.
Here, then, she thought. She closed her eyes in anticipation, a new a wave of heat washing over her. She closed her eyes in anticipation, a new a wave of heat washing over her. She had not been positioned like this since she had been big-bellied with Estella. It had felt unimaginably exquisite those times. But, she remembered, she always had been filled with desire when she was carrying a child.
Her eyes snapped open again when she felt herself being grasped by the legs. The dark shape had descended, leaving the top of her body glowing with light from the lamps on the kitchen table, except where the outline of tousled curls blocked it.
Frodo urged her legs back and apart.
She gasped even before his mouth touched her.
"Oh! Oh! Oh!"
Rosamunda's stifled cries rose in inflection, louder inside her head than in the room, as she began to sink into a pool of pleasure. From Frodo, she heard only breathing and the wet sounds of his chosen task. Every pull of his lips and every lap and flick of his tongue sent out pleasure as if in concentric rings, like a stone might, dropped into a still pond. Frodo had become so accomplished at pleasing her in this way it wasn't long before the pond was still no longer still, but roiling and frothing. Rosamunda was close - so very close - to being pulled under to drown in cataracts of sensation.
She wanted, she needed to hold him. She tried to reach for his shadowy shoulders but they were too far away. The fingers gripping her legs were close enough, now flexed back as far as they could go, but just to touch them wasn't enough to satisfy. Flailing her arm about, she found a pillow to clutch. Against its softness she clenched her teeth, smothering the groans which yet felt to her so unseemly.
Heavens, he was killing her! But not quite enough. She was just at the edge; buffeted, stripped; ready to fall but left to teeter, her fate uncertain. She beat her arm upon the mattress, the torment was so exquisite.
When Frodo slipped his fingers inside, too, pressing his finger tips just along the top, smooth and strong, the way he knew she loved, she fell. But Rosamunda brought her foe down with her, locking his fingers in the embrace of her prolonged agonies.
"Oh, Rosa!" Frodo softly exclaimed. In his voice there was a touch of marvel. He left his fingers where they were - stilled, now - while the spasms subsided. His other hand, spread upon her stomach, just above her navel, felt warm and soothing to her.
His heated cheek he laid upon her loins, gentling her. For the first time since they had come into the bedroom, she could see his face, if only one side of it. Light shone through the wings of his lashes.
When she was quieted, she saw him lift his head and his face became darkness once again. Revived, she expected him to rise and take her, for she was ready. Instead, Rosamunda felt his fingers awaken inside her. She trembled.
As Frodo let them begin to stir, she felt his thumb creeping up through the silky folds.
She held her breath in trepidation.
"Again?" he asked.
Frodo did not wait for her answer; her body had already done so, embracing the enemy before it had advanced.
* * *
Rosamunda was dealt another mortal blow, only to be dragged up off the arena floor to be vanquished several more times, before Frodo finally stood up.
The sight of him standing there against the light focussed every ounce of her desire on just one part of him, although she could not see it. Oh, how she wanted him! She would die in earnest if he did not help her now. All of the deaths Rosamunda had died were for her always only preliminary to this one. It was this death for which she longed, every time, from his very first glance or touch.
Glistening with sweat, her breath in tatters and her entire demeanour that of one lost to shame, she clasped the sides of her lover's waist with the curving arches of her feet, pulling him to her.
"Oh, Frodo," she panted, "Don't make me beg."
Frodo let himself be drawn to the edge of the bed.
She saw his hands reach out before she felt them, clasping her hips as he shifted himself between her aching legs. When he brushed up against her she felt herself respond inside with immediate, involuntarily clutching.
"I want you higher up," Frodo said, moving about, as he considered.
Oh, she could scream! Rosamunda threw the pillow she had used to smother her groans at his chest.
Frodo laughed as he caught it.
"Can you reach another, Rosa?" he asked.
She reached and flung it, too, but could not help laughing herself.
"Lift up," Frodo said in a more tender voice.
Bringing her feet down upon the mattress edge, Rosamunda pushed up, raising her hips while Frodo pushed the stack beneath her.
"I'm sure this will be better, Rosa," Frodo said, very sweetly, moving back into position. Sliding his hands up the backs of her raised thighs he gripped her, leaning his weight a little forward.
Rosa was held in suspense only briefly before she felt him and the fatigue of her trembling muscles instantly drained away. She shuddered down to her bones as he entered her.
She heard him groan as well, for he had made himself wait so very, very long.
Their juxtaposition forced him to slide into her just as his fingers had done, pressing along the top of her, inside. From the first stroke, Rosamunda found it so exciting she knew it hadn't been because she was carrying a child that she had loved it this way so.
Gathering himself first before he proceeded, Frodo then began to penetrate her with long, slow strokes, nearly pulling out between each one. Clearly, he was using all his restraint - Rosamunda could feel it by the tremble in his hands as they pressed into the backs of her legs, and in the quiver running through the iron muscles of his thighs as they pressed against her, at the deepest part of each stroke.
When Frodo suddenly let go her thighs, Rosamunda cupped her feet around his waist, eager to keep him close. She could see the outline of his hands reaching towards her before they gently seized her breasts. Stroking them tenderly, he continued to move within her, increasing the pressure as he deepened the strokes.
"Oh, Rosa…so beautiful!" he said. His voice was low and soft.
She thought she would melt away to nothing, to hear him say it, at that moment. It added immeasurably to what was already almost too much sensation to experience at once. The squeezing and rolling between his fingers sent bolts of fire straight to what now seemed to be the centre of her being, gathering and clamouring around him, hot and fierce, exulting in near-triumph over the invader.
"Oh, Frodo," she gasped, "I almost cannot bear it!"
"Nor I," Frodo confessed, breathlessly.
"Now, Rosa?"
"Now!"
Rosamunda felt the great bed jarred as Frodo anchored his knees against it. Gripping her thighs, he began to move, leaning into his hands, all of his concentration focussed in his deliberate, sinuous thrusts.
Slowly, he let the tempo build. Every stroke massaged but also abraded the core of bared nerves in Rosamunda, sending sheets of fire to shake themselves throughout her. Showers of sparks whirled and swirled around and through her. At every stroke, she thought she would die from pleasure. At every stroke, she imagined Frodo writing his name within her, inscribing himself indelibly, upon her body and upon her mind.
Frodo stooped over her now. The edges of light traced his chin and mouth as he dropped his head. Sliding his arms under her, he pulled her back, one last time. Widening his stance and bracing himself against the bed, he clung to Rosamunda's fair flesh and gave himself up to the apparent desire to pound her to dust and ashes.
But Rosamunda was not reduced to ashes. Instead, she curled her hips up, utterly open to him, receiving him so that every pounding thrust reverberated, sending shocks and tremors shooting through her; tremors of such intensity, she felt herself arching and straining - up, up, up - until she heard a voice crying out, "Frodo!" and the voice was hers! The sound of it seemed to reverberate off the walls of the room. She was sure it could be heard at Overhill, but she did not care. Her echoing cry mingled with that of Frodo's and, together, the rising sound of their voices winged up and up like a covey of birds flushed out of concealment.
Frodo shuddered and quaked, pulsing into her as she felt her own muscles and
flesh throbbing around him, seizing and clutching in witless spasms. Frodo
fell upon her, sprawled and shaking. Rosa did not even embrace him. Her arms
were flung out upon the bed beside her; her legs hung limp.
"Oh, Frodo," she sighed at last. "Do you mean to kill me with happiness?"
* * *
Shortly thereafter, in the midst of languorous meldings of lips and bodies, Rosamunda remembered the bread, so long in preparation. Putting her foot down, she freed herself to see to it. The loaves went into the oven, but had nearly over-risen.
Directly after the loaves went in, Frodo excused himself. Naked, he ventured out to use the privy. Well, not precisely. In such an isolated situation, and at night, Rosamunda knew he long had ceased to bother with this formality.
Rosamunda had not poured herself a cup of water before he dashed back in and seized her arm.
"Come outside, Rosa! Come out!" he cried.
Frodo tried to pull her outside with him, bodily, but Rosamunda balked. She would not - not until she had found something to put on. Taking an old cloak from a peg by the door, she pulled it round her and let him lead her out.
Stepping outside with Frodo into the mildness of the summer night, she stood under a vast, deep sky - a canopy of jet - except for the stars. There was no moon at all.
Frodo drew her away from the cottage to the grassy slopes to the west. The noise of frogs and crickets increased as they went, immersing them in a pulsating chorus only made louder by the darkness all around.
"Look!" Frodo breathed, pointing into the sky above them.
Rosamunda could sense more than see the direction of his hand.
"There is Soronúme! The eagle of the West swooping down!"
"Where?"
Except for Eärendil and the great Wain, Rosamunda could not name the stars, though she recognized many shapes.
"The star that glitters blue? Just there? That is Luinil. See how it shines like a sapphire!"
Rosamunda stared up into the night sky without the urge to identify which star was which. She wished only to behold them. So drenched in blackness was the sky the stars gleamed out with pointed brightness, the densely clustered belt directly overhead suffused with milky radiance. So vast was it, as she turned herself to take it all in, it made her dizzy. Frodo sensed this too, perhaps; she felt the tug of his hand, to pull her down beside him.
"Wait - here," she said. Taking off the cloak she had worn, she drew it along the springy turf she could not see, to make a blanket.
Laying upon their backs, they gazed at the sky above them.
"Isn't it beautiful, Rosa?"
Frodo's voice was filled with awe.
Though she plainly heard his voice beside her, it sounded far away, as if he were suspended up there somewhere, too … high, pure and remote. The stars seemed close - suspended from their ceiling of velvet blackness - as if she could reach and touch them. But she knew that she could not. They were high and far away. So very high, so very far.
"Yes, it is beautiful," she said.
"You are shivering, Rosa! Are you chilly? Come, I will keep you warm."
Frodo turned to pull her to him and she nestled closer. While his closeness was reassuring, it was the sky full of stars which held his gaze, spread vast and brilliant above them, not she. Rosamunda could feel his cheek settled up against hers as he turned his face to see it.
What did she care for the stars? At that moment, nothing at all. Not one was as beautiful as he.
Her shivering subsided as Frodo embraced her more fully, covering her with his body. She quieted beneath his solid warmth.
Raising himself upon his elbows, Frodo took her face between his hands. He could not see but could feel the wetness upon her cheeks.
"Tears? What is it, Rosa?" Frodo asked, drawing his thumbs across her cheekbones.
"It is just the beauty," she murmured.
As she lay there, Frodo seemed to loom above her, a dark shape silhouetted by the massed stars behind him. Did he block the stars from view, or did he make a hole in them? He did not seem real without a face, yet Rosamunda could hear his breathing; she could feel the warm weight of his body. He was real.
But when he bent to kiss her, the blackness grew as he drew nearer. It was as if a hole in the night sky was gaping, widening, through which she might be drawn into whatever lay behind the edges of the world.
Her stomach lurched and she closed her eyes to shut the vision out.
"Come," Frodo whispered, and pulled her up. "We'll go in. I'm hungry, aren't you? The bread will surely burn if we do not."
They were in time.
But many another loaf was spoilt in this way - burnt or never baked - and many a pot of honey or jam went uncovered. They would find them later, studded with hapless flies and bees, drowned in the sweetness.
* * *
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Chapter 8 - The Rising of Bread, Pt. II
Rating: Adult
~ ‘Cupid and Psyche’, by William Page, 1843, detail.
~ The night of July 14, Rosa's cottage, cont’d....
"Check the fire, would you, Frodo?” Rosamunda said. “You could help with the bread, if you would like."
Rosamunda lifted the dampened cloth and examined the state of the dough.
Frodo prodded and stirred the fire in the box, adding a bit more fuel.
Rosamunda was aware that Frodo knew his way around a kitchen, but Bilbo took charge of all the baking at Bag End. Bilbo had insisted, however, that Frodo help him at every step, so that he might learn. Rosamunda knew from humorous tales that Frodo was an indifferent cook who had to be prodded.
Pressing a finger into the risen round, Rosamunda checked its progress. It sighed and did not return the imprint.
"It is ready," she said. "There is enough to make two. Would you like to do one of them, Frodo? Or would you rather not?"
She thought he might acquiesce, simply to be polite, but he actually looked pleased.
"Yes! I enjoy making the loaves," he answered, smiling brightly.
She knocked it down and cut it in two, handing him a half. On the dusted table they set to work. Frodo pressed and pummelled his portion out flat, then tucked it under into a round, very neat, pinching the overlaps to seal them well.
Rosa was taking her time with hers, the handling of the finished dough being her favourite part.
"I want to see you make a long one, Rosa," Frodo smirked, sending them both into snorts of mirth.
She arched a brow but, grinning, did so - stretching and rolling and squeezing the dough - punctuated throughout with moans and sighs interspersed with giggles in which Frodo joined. He added a few groans and yelps when she pinched it under, at the ends.
The atmosphere seemed quite relaxed again. What sort of mood had he been in, she wondered?
Carefully, Rosamunda laid her loaf down one side of the tray she had buttered and dusted with meal, inviting Frodo to do the same. She covered them both with the dampened towel.
"It's not quite so warm now - but they should be ready in another hour or so," she said, straightening the corners of the towel. But even as she glanced up, Frodo had already slipped behind her, pulling her to him in a close embrace.
"Oh, Rosa!" Frodo sighed into her ear, kissing her in earnest up and down her neck, while his hands travelled up over her breasts and down her belly with fluid motions, leaving trails of effervescent sensation everywhere in their wake. She felt herself melting into him, so closely pressed behind her, as if the intervening hour had not happened.
She gave herself up to whatever he might do to her.
Off came the apron, which Frodo tossed on the table. Then he began to unbutton her bodice - he was much better at this now. His motions were not hampered by his usual haste; soon he had them easily undone. Reaching inside he touched the cloth of her shift. She felt a disappointed snuff of warm air behind her ear but then a grunt of satisfaction when he found the little ribbon ties that went all down the front. The shift was one she had worn when nursing Estella - or perhaps it was as old as Freddy - for Rosamunda never stopped wearing the things that she loved. These shifts had long plackets down the front, tied together with ribbons.
Leisurely, Frodo pulled each tie undone, assailing her neck and shoulders in a most delicious manner as he did so. Rosamunda felt herself swaying and listing, becoming altogether soft and pliant as she yielded under the barrage of his hands and delicate, succulent kisses. The dough must feel like this, she thought. When the ribbons were all untied, Frodo slid his hands inside the placket. Lifting out her breasts, first one and then the other, he hefted them as if testing their weight. She felt the wafting heat of the lamps upon her skin but warmer still was his touch.
Such limited access wasn't enough to satisfy Frodo. Pulling the sleeves, he drew the bodice off, kissing her bared shoulders as they were revealed. With a few gentle tugs, he pulled the bodice out from under her waistband and dropped it in a chair. Rosamunda leaned back into him, luxuriating in the softness of his cheeks and lips and the moist warmth of his breath. Next he dispensed with the top of her shift by drawing it down over her shoulders, first one side, then, the other. Still cinched in by the waist of her fastened skirts, it draped down over her forearms. She felt like a child being prepared for bed as Frodo lifted out her arms, kissing the palms of her hands as he did so.
Rosamunda thought the skirt would go next; she trembled with anticipation as she felt his fingers brush the buttoned tab. He was being so patient! - far more patient than she. But Frodo was not yet ready for the removal of skirts; she felt his hands slide around her waist and up her ribs to capture her breasts again, this time to knead and squeeze and pinch and roll. Oh, it was beyond delicious! Trying to touch him, too, she reached up behind her to twine her fingers into the loose curls she loved which tumbled down his neck.
Rosamunda heard sighs, high and breathy - they were her sighs, threatening to become moans. She made an effort to restrain them, as if holding them back might contain the mounting excitement she felt. She might stifle her cries, but the unconscious rhythmic rolling of her hips as she arched against him betrayed the state of her desire.
"Oh, Rosa!" Low and throaty was Frodo’s voice this time, more like a heated panting than speaking, just beside her cheek. When suddenly he released her breasts and loosed her hands from around his neck, Rosamunda squeezed her eyes shut and nearly cried out, so bereft of him she felt. But then, her eyes still shut, her ears and skin prickled to hear the whispering slide of his brocade waistcoat, then the rustle of the linen shirt. She opened her eyes in time to see both of them flung into another kitchen chair.
When Frodo slid his naked arms around her again she felt herself enveloped in pure warm silk, his bare chest and stomach sliding over the skin of her back, making her shoulder blades quiver from the feel of it. But then he left her cold once more.
Rosamunda closed her eyes and held her breath, listening. She felt a yank as he undid her waistband buttons, followed by further fumbling about behind her. Her heart leapt when she heard the slap of his leather belt hitting the floor, then, the whispery sound of soft twill sliding down his legs. She heard the breeches scuff across the stone flags.
She couldn't wait; she reached behind to touch him but what she touched was the top of his head - he was crouching down behind her. Before she could open her eyes to look, she felt the cooler air from under the table upon her legs. Frodo was pulling up her skirts, hoisting up fabric in handfuls, the long loose shift caught up in its folds.
"Lift up your arms," he breathed near her ear, his voice charged with desire. Up and over her head it went, skirt and shift, air rushing over her skin where layers of cloth had been. She heard the sound of the heap of fabric as it hit the floor.
Though Rosamunda knew what was coming, she gasped when she felt Frodo’s nakedness against her, hot and hard as a burning brand, which torched a firestorm within her.
"Oh, Frodo!" she heard herself cry out, loudly, this time. She was all aquiver, her strong legs turned to jelly. Rosamunda didn't resist when he pulled her with him in a downward slither of limbs, her feet tangling in discarded skirt and shift. As she fell, she managed to lodge a protest, weak but plaintive, "Not the floor, Frodo! I hate the floor!"
He paused in his execution.
"Oh, very well!" Frodo sighed, with just the hint of a chuckle.
Standing up again, Frodo took Rosamunda’s arm and pulled her up.
She had a stunning sight of him for only a second, before he heaved her up over his shoulder, knocking the breath right out of her, bearing her off to the bedroom.
Rosamunda barely had leisure to marvel at this, before she was dumped upon the bed, her legs sprawled over the edge, her presence of mind knocked out of her more than her wind.
The light from the lamps in the kitchen spilled in through the doorway. Even though their light was little at this distance, in the black of the room on this moonless night, the light they made seemed greater.
Raising her head, Rosamunda could see the tops of her breasts and the rounds of her belly and thighs, but she could not see Frodo. He was a dark shape silhouetted against the doorway behind him. She pushed herself up to sit. The shape advanced at once. The edges of his body were illuminated like the rim of the moon in a full eclipse.
He didn't speak but the faint light that traced the edge of his jaw showed her he was smiling.
"Come here," he said.
She moved forward, but did not touch him, suddenly seized with a frisson of apprehension, mixed with desire. Who was he?
Mesmerized, she watched his arms and hands, edged with gold, as he reached for her. Cupping the tops of her shoulders, he ran his hands down her arms until he'd reached her wrists. Deftly, he laced her fingers into his, easing her backwards until her thighs touched the edge of the mattress. He did not urge her down. Instead, he stretched their interlaced hands up and out, bringing his chest to hers, just touching, as he leaned into her. If there had been no bed behind her, Rosamunda would have fallen. Arching his neck to the ceiling, the light shone through his suspended curls. While he slid his chest and torso over hers in an undulating pattern, his raised fingers twined with hers in some secret dance of his own devising.
Rosamunda wanted the rest of Frodo, too - she ached to feel him up against her. Arching her own hips forward, as much as she might without losing her balance, she sought him out. But Frodo kept her back.
"Not yet, Rosa," he said.
She was sure that he was smiling. Was he drunk after all?
Rosamunda wondered no more when he took her shoulders and, in a quick succession of movements, sat her down and toppled her back upon the bed.
At last, she thought. She had begun to make her way further onto the bed when, taken by surprise, the darkened shape that was Frodo intercepted her. Hooking his hands behind her knees, he gave her a good tug. She could see the edge of light outlining the bunched muscles of his shoulders as he did so.
With another yank and a shift he had pulled her hips to the edge of the bed. He stood poised before her.
Here, then, she thought. She closed her eyes in anticipation, a new a wave of heat washing over her. She closed her eyes in anticipation, a new a wave of heat washing over her. She had not been positioned like this since she had been big-bellied with Estella. It had felt unimaginably exquisite those times. But, she remembered, she always had been filled with desire when she was carrying a child.
Her eyes snapped open again when she felt herself being grasped by the legs. The dark shape had descended, leaving the top of her body glowing with light from the lamps on the kitchen table, except where the outline of tousled curls blocked it.
Frodo urged her legs back and apart.
She gasped even before his mouth touched her.
"Oh! Oh! Oh!"
Rosamunda's stifled cries rose in inflection, louder inside her head than in the room, as she began to sink into a pool of pleasure. From Frodo, she heard only breathing and the wet sounds of his chosen task. Every pull of his lips and every lap and flick of his tongue sent out pleasure as if in concentric rings, like a stone might, dropped into a still pond. Frodo had become so accomplished at pleasing her in this way it wasn't long before the pond was still no longer still, but roiling and frothing. Rosamunda was close - so very close - to being pulled under to drown in cataracts of sensation.
She wanted, she needed to hold him. She tried to reach for his shadowy shoulders but they were too far away. The fingers gripping her legs were close enough, now flexed back as far as they could go, but just to touch them wasn't enough to satisfy. Flailing her arm about, she found a pillow to clutch. Against its softness she clenched her teeth, smothering the groans which yet felt to her so unseemly.
Heavens, he was killing her! But not quite enough. She was just at the edge; buffeted, stripped; ready to fall but left to teeter, her fate uncertain. She beat her arm upon the mattress, the torment was so exquisite.
When Frodo slipped his fingers inside, too, pressing his finger tips just along the top, smooth and strong, the way he knew she loved, she fell. But Rosamunda brought her foe down with her, locking his fingers in the embrace of her prolonged agonies.
"Oh, Rosa!" Frodo softly exclaimed. In his voice there was a touch of marvel. He left his fingers where they were - stilled, now - while the spasms subsided. His other hand, spread upon her stomach, just above her navel, felt warm and soothing to her.
His heated cheek he laid upon her loins, gentling her. For the first time since they had come into the bedroom, she could see his face, if only one side of it. Light shone through the wings of his lashes.
When she was quieted, she saw him lift his head and his face became darkness once again. Revived, she expected him to rise and take her, for she was ready. Instead, Rosamunda felt his fingers awaken inside her. She trembled.
As Frodo let them begin to stir, she felt his thumb creeping up through the silky folds.
She held her breath in trepidation.
"Again?" he asked.
Frodo did not wait for her answer; her body had already done so, embracing the enemy before it had advanced.
* * *
Rosamunda was dealt another mortal blow, only to be dragged up off the arena floor to be vanquished several more times, before Frodo finally stood up.
The sight of him standing there against the light focussed every ounce of her desire on just one part of him, although she could not see it. Oh, how she wanted him! She would die in earnest if he did not help her now. All of the deaths Rosamunda had died were for her always only preliminary to this one. It was this death for which she longed, every time, from his very first glance or touch.
Glistening with sweat, her breath in tatters and her entire demeanour that of one lost to shame, she clasped the sides of her lover's waist with the curving arches of her feet, pulling him to her.
"Oh, Frodo," she panted, "Don't make me beg."
Frodo let himself be drawn to the edge of the bed.
She saw his hands reach out before she felt them, clasping her hips as he shifted himself between her aching legs. When he brushed up against her she felt herself respond inside with immediate, involuntarily clutching.
"I want you higher up," Frodo said, moving about, as he considered.
Oh, she could scream! Rosamunda threw the pillow she had used to smother her groans at his chest.
Frodo laughed as he caught it.
"Can you reach another, Rosa?" he asked.
She reached and flung it, too, but could not help laughing herself.
"Lift up," Frodo said in a more tender voice.
Bringing her feet down upon the mattress edge, Rosamunda pushed up, raising her hips while Frodo pushed the stack beneath her.
"I'm sure this will be better, Rosa," Frodo said, very sweetly, moving back into position. Sliding his hands up the backs of her raised thighs he gripped her, leaning his weight a little forward.
Rosa was held in suspense only briefly before she felt him and the fatigue of her trembling muscles instantly drained away. She shuddered down to her bones as he entered her.
She heard him groan as well, for he had made himself wait so very, very long.
Their juxtaposition forced him to slide into her just as his fingers had done, pressing along the top of her, inside. From the first stroke, Rosamunda found it so exciting she knew it hadn't been because she was carrying a child that she had loved it this way so.
Gathering himself first before he proceeded, Frodo then began to penetrate her with long, slow strokes, nearly pulling out between each one. Clearly, he was using all his restraint - Rosamunda could feel it by the tremble in his hands as they pressed into the backs of her legs, and in the quiver running through the iron muscles of his thighs as they pressed against her, at the deepest part of each stroke.
When Frodo suddenly let go her thighs, Rosamunda cupped her feet around his waist, eager to keep him close. She could see the outline of his hands reaching towards her before they gently seized her breasts. Stroking them tenderly, he continued to move within her, increasing the pressure as he deepened the strokes.
"Oh, Rosa…so beautiful!" he said. His voice was low and soft.
She thought she would melt away to nothing, to hear him say it, at that moment. It added immeasurably to what was already almost too much sensation to experience at once. The squeezing and rolling between his fingers sent bolts of fire straight to what now seemed to be the centre of her being, gathering and clamouring around him, hot and fierce, exulting in near-triumph over the invader.
"Oh, Frodo," she gasped, "I almost cannot bear it!"
"Nor I," Frodo confessed, breathlessly.
"Now, Rosa?"
"Now!"
Rosamunda felt the great bed jarred as Frodo anchored his knees against it. Gripping her thighs, he began to move, leaning into his hands, all of his concentration focussed in his deliberate, sinuous thrusts.
Slowly, he let the tempo build. Every stroke massaged but also abraded the core of bared nerves in Rosamunda, sending sheets of fire to shake themselves throughout her. Showers of sparks whirled and swirled around and through her. At every stroke, she thought she would die from pleasure. At every stroke, she imagined Frodo writing his name within her, inscribing himself indelibly, upon her body and upon her mind.
Frodo stooped over her now. The edges of light traced his chin and mouth as he dropped his head. Sliding his arms under her, he pulled her back, one last time. Widening his stance and bracing himself against the bed, he clung to Rosamunda's fair flesh and gave himself up to the apparent desire to pound her to dust and ashes.
But Rosamunda was not reduced to ashes. Instead, she curled her hips up, utterly open to him, receiving him so that every pounding thrust reverberated, sending shocks and tremors shooting through her; tremors of such intensity, she felt herself arching and straining - up, up, up - until she heard a voice crying out, "Frodo!" and the voice was hers! The sound of it seemed to reverberate off the walls of the room. She was sure it could be heard at Overhill, but she did not care. Her echoing cry mingled with that of Frodo's and, together, the rising sound of their voices winged up and up like a covey of birds flushed out of concealment.
Frodo shuddered and quaked, pulsing into her as she felt her own muscles and
flesh throbbing around him, seizing and clutching in witless spasms. Frodo
fell upon her, sprawled and shaking. Rosa did not even embrace him. Her arms
were flung out upon the bed beside her; her legs hung limp.
"Oh, Frodo," she sighed at last. "Do you mean to kill me with happiness?"
* * *
Shortly thereafter, in the midst of languorous meldings of lips and bodies, Rosamunda remembered the bread, so long in preparation. Putting her foot down, she freed herself to see to it. The loaves went into the oven, but had nearly over-risen.
Directly after the loaves went in, Frodo excused himself. Naked, he ventured out to use the privy. Well, not precisely. In such an isolated situation, and at night, Rosamunda knew he long had ceased to bother with this formality.
Rosamunda had not poured herself a cup of water before he dashed back in and seized her arm.
"Come outside, Rosa! Come out!" he cried.
Frodo tried to pull her outside with him, bodily, but Rosamunda balked. She would not - not until she had found something to put on. Taking an old cloak from a peg by the door, she pulled it round her and let him lead her out.
Stepping outside with Frodo into the mildness of the summer night, she stood under a vast, deep sky - a canopy of jet - except for the stars. There was no moon at all.
Frodo drew her away from the cottage to the grassy slopes to the west. The noise of frogs and crickets increased as they went, immersing them in a pulsating chorus only made louder by the darkness all around.
"Look!" Frodo breathed, pointing into the sky above them.
Rosamunda could sense more than see the direction of his hand.
"There is Soronúme! The eagle of the West swooping down!"
"Where?"
Except for Eärendil and the great Wain, Rosamunda could not name the stars, though she recognized many shapes.
"The star that glitters blue? Just there? That is Luinil. See how it shines like a sapphire!"
Rosamunda stared up into the night sky without the urge to identify which star was which. She wished only to behold them. So drenched in blackness was the sky the stars gleamed out with pointed brightness, the densely clustered belt directly overhead suffused with milky radiance. So vast was it, as she turned herself to take it all in, it made her dizzy. Frodo sensed this too, perhaps; she felt the tug of his hand, to pull her down beside him.
"Wait - here," she said. Taking off the cloak she had worn, she drew it along the springy turf she could not see, to make a blanket.
Laying upon their backs, they gazed at the sky above them.
"Isn't it beautiful, Rosa?"
Frodo's voice was filled with awe.
Though she plainly heard his voice beside her, it sounded far away, as if he were suspended up there somewhere, too … high, pure and remote. The stars seemed close - suspended from their ceiling of velvet blackness - as if she could reach and touch them. But she knew that she could not. They were high and far away. So very high, so very far.
"Yes, it is beautiful," she said.
"You are shivering, Rosa! Are you chilly? Come, I will keep you warm."
Frodo turned to pull her to him and she nestled closer. While his closeness was reassuring, it was the sky full of stars which held his gaze, spread vast and brilliant above them, not she. Rosamunda could feel his cheek settled up against hers as he turned his face to see it.
What did she care for the stars? At that moment, nothing at all. Not one was as beautiful as he.
Her shivering subsided as Frodo embraced her more fully, covering her with his body. She quieted beneath his solid warmth.
Raising himself upon his elbows, Frodo took her face between his hands. He could not see but could feel the wetness upon her cheeks.
"Tears? What is it, Rosa?" Frodo asked, drawing his thumbs across her cheekbones.
"It is just the beauty," she murmured.
As she lay there, Frodo seemed to loom above her, a dark shape silhouetted by the massed stars behind him. Did he block the stars from view, or did he make a hole in them? He did not seem real without a face, yet Rosamunda could hear his breathing; she could feel the warm weight of his body. He was real.
But when he bent to kiss her, the blackness grew as he drew nearer. It was as if a hole in the night sky was gaping, widening, through which she might be drawn into whatever lay behind the edges of the world.
Her stomach lurched and she closed her eyes to shut the vision out.
"Come," Frodo whispered, and pulled her up. "We'll go in. I'm hungry, aren't you? The bread will surely burn if we do not."
They were in time.
But many another loaf was spoilt in this way - burnt or never baked - and many a pot of honey or jam went uncovered. They would find them later, studded with hapless flies and bees, drowned in the sweetness.
* * *
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