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silver bells	warm	chocolate orange	cardinal	decorating
carols	snow	travel	hearth	baking
cookies	cold	feast	icicles	Misrule
sacred	fruitcake	present	storm	igloo
prints in the snow	cousin	mittens	blue	Yule

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Chocolate Orange

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Smeagol poked at the box curiously. "Is being candy made of fruit?"

"Er, fruit made of candy." Sam managed a smile. "It's chocolate with juice mixed in, and then they molded it into a fruit shape."

This confused Smeagol for a moment, but then he grinned. "We is liking this idea, Precious. Is sounding much more tasty than orcses and things."

Sam just looked at him in vague horror for a moment, then sighed and gave Smeagol a ginger pat on the head. "Most things are, Gollum, most things are."

Smeagol laughed. "True, true. Fat hobbit not so stupid after all."

Yule

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"What is being Yule? We almost rememberses, but we cannot quite."

"Why, it's the midwinter feast!" Pippin grinned at Smeagol. "We have chicken and pie and mushrooms and soups and candy and carrots and fish and--"

Gollum rolled his eyes. "Yes yes, we knows what a feast is, my love. But why in winter, when food is being hard to come by?"

"I dunno. To show that we can? So that the food doesn't go bad? Because it's what we've always done?" Pippin shrugged. "It's fun, that's good enough reason for me."

"Hobbitses are silly, Precious."

"Best thing about us," Pippin agreed cheerfully.

Fruitcake

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Frodo glared at the fruitcake sullenly. "Has anyone ever liked fruitcake? Seriously, an orc wouldn't eat this stuff."

"I've heard that there's only ever been one of them," pipped up Pippin. "We just send it back and forth a lot."

"I wouldn't be surprised."

Smeagol sniffed at it. "Is not fruit, is not cake. We's not sure what it is.

"Still better than some foods we's had, but that not be saying much."

"What on Arda could be worse than that?" asked Fatty Bolger, who had never gone adventuring in his life.

Smeagol looked at him with pity for a moment. "You's not wanting to know."

Prints In The Snow

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Smeagol was often fascinated by small things. The tracks of dogs and cats and hobbits interested him endlessly, especially the difference between hobbit-tracks and his own. His feet were thin and clinging, with pads for climbing like a gecko, and his hands were uncommonly long and strong.

When the snow fell he would press his hands and feet into it, or lie in it and make snow Balrogs. He would run with the neighbors' dogs and study their gaits compared to his.

He was often faster than the dogs were, so when that grew tiresome he tried to sneak up on the dogs instead. He learned how best to move silently through snow, and examined his own footprints to improve on how he stood.

Before too long he was able to stand on the snow like an elf, and his glee was infectious--although he gave Farmer Maggot's dogs conniptions by tackling them out of nowhere and giving them unnervingly strong hugs.

Misrule

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Smeagol had ever been a creature of mischief, even in the long-ago days before the Ring was ever fished up from the Anduin. Now, with it nothing but a lump of melted gold, his sense of humor had returned to the cheerful, mildly irritating thing it once had been.

Being able to climb walls and see in the dark were fine skills for a prankster, he'd found. He could climb in through windows at midnight to leave pans of water by bedsides or tie shirtsleeves in knots just as easily as . . . well, other things. He tried not to think about the things he'd used that skill for once, but seeing babies made him feel slightly sick to his stomach even now.

But that was the past. Now his worst sins were banging pans together at five in the morning and helping Samwise's kids sneak extra treats while he and Rosie weren't watching. It was a good life, this life, even if he got 'you are 600 years old, don't act like a fauntling' lectures sometimes.

Decorating

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"No, dead animals are not decorative. Not even if you paint them bright colors." Sam groaned. "I know you mean well, Smeagol, but we have plenty of Yule decorations already."

"How about you help put the decorations up, instead?" Frodo suggested. "You can climb far better than the rest of us, can you put the star on top of the tree?"

Smeagol nodded and grabbed it, then scrambled up the wall, sat on a beam and set the star in place. "Tree star bes shiny, we like it! Bes there anything else yous wanting up here?"

"Just some streamers, we can reach the rest." Frodo grinned and tossed Smeagol a ball of shiny streamers, and Smeagol began to attach them to things. It was kind of haphazard, as one might expect, but all the more charming for it.

Hearth

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Fires were worrying to poor Smeagol. He had, after all, come very close to burning to death not so long ago. Unfortunately, the rest of Bag End got very cold on winter nights. So he tended to wind up huddled at the very edge of the firelight, getting the worst of both worlds.

This sad state of affairs continued for some time, but one day Frodo nearly tripped over him in the dark and saw the misery on that thin face.

"What's the matter, Smeagol? Why are you huddled in the shadows?"

"We's cold, Precious, but we's scared of fireses."

"Oh Smeagol, why didn't you tell me? We have extra blankets--even a spare bed, if you'd like."

Smeagol gave Frodo a horribly lost, blank look. "What is bedses, my Precious?"

"Oh. Oh Eru, you don't remember what beds are? Beds are . . . remember the nice things we woke up on when we woke up, after the Quest was won?"

"No, Precious. We was too busy being pokeded and proded by healerses to sleep."

". . . well, beds are soft things made for sleeping on." Frodo scratched his head. "Do you have a room? There should be one in there."

"We has nothing to keep in room, why bother?"

"Point. Well, we'll just find you one to sleep in, shall we?"

And so they did.

Free Square (Feast)

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Smeagol liked cider. He liked hot chocolate. He was less certain about the mulled wine, though.

He liked the rolls, the chicken, even the mashed taters with gravy--they were better soft, and the gravy gave them some flavor.

Everyone else thought that Smeagol would eat them out of house and home if he kept it up, and that it would be nice if he lets them finish cooking the chicken instead of eating it as soon as it was warm, but Smeagol didn't mind. They could think anything they liked, as long as they didn't try to take his nice food away.

Icicles

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Icicles, Smeagol had found, were poor knives--and while they did work as clubs, they tended to break in the process.

They were useful as spears in a pinch, though. And he'd managed to kill a rabbit by dropping a big icicle on its head, so they worked as boulders too. If there was ever another Fell Winter, he thought, this fact could prove quite useful.

Sadly, however, no one else seemed to share his interest--and dropping them on people just made said people mad, not more interested. So Smeagol sat alone, tossing icicles at trees and sighing when they splintered.

But eventually it began to get dark, and Smeagol-Gollum went inside.

Cousin

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"We miss Deagol, my love."

"Who is Deagol?" asked Pippin.

"Deagol was our cousin, Precious," said Smeagol. "He died long, long ago, for it was Deagol who first finded the One--we fighted to death for it, he and I."

"Well that's a right shame, I agree," replied Pippin sadly. "You didn't kill anyone else, though, right?"

"Just goblinses, Precious, goblins and orcses. Were times we tried to hurt people, but no other killing. We just took fishies and chickens and babieses."

"Er. You know the difference between babies and chickens, right?"

"Oh yes, Precious! Babies have no featherses, and are allowed indoors!"

". . . lets talk about your cousin a bit more, alright? I'll get Frodo to explain babies later."

Warm

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The cave had always been cold. Wandering in the wild wasn't much better. But now Smeagol had his own room in Bag End, with blankets aplenty and a soft mattress, and it was wonderful.

Sometimes Smeagol forgot, mind you, and then he would absentmindedly fall asleep on kitchen tiles or wood-plank floors. Once or twice he even fell asleep in a tree. But that usually happened on summer days, when it wasn't so bad to rest in the open air and he had no reason to be reminded of his new home. In any case, someone was always there to gently wake him.

So now Smeagol smiled and curled up tight and slept comfortably in the warm.

Carols

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"No, Smeagol, I'm afraid there are no carols about fishing." Frodo smiled. "There are ones about stars and deities and snow, but none about fish."

Smeagol sighed. "We's not knowing any carolses, then, Precious. Not unless riddleses about the dark are counting."

"I'm afraid not, but we could teach you a few if you would like."

"Wes would be liking that very much, my love. Or prapses we could be making our own. We does know a riddle about starses! At night they comes out without being fetcheded; by day they be lost without being stealeded! Now we's just needing more lyricses."

"More lyrics and better rhymes," added Pippin. "'Stealed' isn't actually a word."

"Well it should be."