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A wisp of steam rose slowly from between Sam's hands as he gazed out of the kitchen window. He lifted the mug after a moment, wrapping gnarled and callused fingers more tightly around it to enjoy the warmth, pleasant in the cool breeze that fluttered the curtains on this first day of autumn. The moon was just setting behind the clump of tall young oaks across the lane, conjuring sweet night-smells from the garden outside and blanketing the distant hills in silver. It was there that his eyes rested, his mind looking beyond the dips and swells of the land to the point where the Mariner's star had gone to rest an hour or so before.
Rousing himself at last, he lifted the mug in quiet salute to the
western horizon. "Your birthday tomorrow, Mr. Frodo," he said
softly. "A hundred and fourteen, you'll be. Right good old age.
And old Mr. Bilbo, he'd be..." Sam's fingers flickered slightly
against the earthenware, "one ninety-two. That'd be something to
celebrate, if he were here. I don't suppose they make much of
birthdays where you are."
"No. Not much."
Sam jumped, sloshing tea over himself and the table. Setting the cup down with a bang, he spun round and stared wide-eyed into the darkened hall, where he could just make out a slim figure standing in the shadows with its hands in its pockets. It took a step forward so that the light fell onto its face. "Hullo, Sam."
He blinked and shook his head, but the figure was still there,
watching him with grave blue eyes and a faint smile. Sam's lips
moved soundlessly before he managed, "M... Mr. Frodo?"
"Yes, Sam. It's really me."
"You've come back?"
"I left something important behind."
"Oh. Of... of course, Mr. Frodo. I'll fetch you whatever you need,
right away, sir..." He began to stand up, but stopped when he saw
that Frodo hadn't moved, but stood looking down at him with the same odd half-smile. Slowly he sank back into his chair. "Oh. You mean I... I'm to go with you?"
"If you're ready."
He hesitated, then nodded. "I'll get my things."
"It needn't be tonight, Sam. Tomorrow morning will be soon enough."
"Oh. All right." He watched Frodo warily for a moment, then
suddenly blinked and shook his head. "Oh, I'm forgetting my manners, after you've come such a long way and all. Won't you sit down, sir? Can I get you anything? Some tea, perhaps, I was just havin' some--" Again he began to stand up, but again Frodo stopped him.
"No, thank you, Sam. But I will sit with you, if I may. Only for a
little while, mind you, and then you ought to go to bed." He slipped
onto the bench opposite Sam.
"I don't expect I'll sleep much, sir, but I suppose you know best,"
Sam answered with an uneasy smile, which Frodo returned just as
nervously, and they sat in silence as Sam mopped up the spill with a napkin and the remaining tea cooled between them. Frodo glanced around the room, taking in the changes that sixty years and a large family had wrought, then pulled his eyes down to the table, trying not to stare. He picked at his sleeve.
Sam gave him a curious look, his brow furrowed. "Isn't that the
shirt my Rosie made for you?"
Frodo ran a finger lightly over the fine embroidery at his cuff with
a soft smile. "My wedding present. Yes."
"She'd be pleased to see you've kept it all these years. She always
did think highly of you."
"No more highly than I thought of her."
There was an uncomfortable pause before Sam answered, looking
carefully out the window. "Mr. Frodo, Rosie... you know she..."
"I know, Sam. I'm sorry."
Sam nodded, accepting the sympathy, then took a sip of his now-cold tea. "Aye, well. She'd a good life, I believe. I did the best I
could by her, leastways, and she always said she was happy."
"I'm sure she was." Frodo's voice was warm, and Sam found when he glanced up that he could not hold his gaze for long without
blushing. He opened his mouth to speak just as Frodo did.
"Sir, I--"
"Sam..."
"Who're you talkin' to, Dad?"
They both turned, startled, at the sound of the third voice, and
Frodo stared as its owner shuffled out of the dark bedroom-hall
towards them. He could almost have believed it was Sam, only a few years older than he had left him, but fairer, and with a trace of
Rose about the mouth and chin.
Sam sputtered for an instant before he found his voice. "Tom! Come and meet... this is Mr. Frodo, Frodo Baggins. Mr. Frodo, this is my youngest, Tom-- Tolman Gardner as he is properly."
Tom peered sleepily around the room. "You been drinkin,' Dad?" he asked, eyeing the teacup with an affectionate chuckle.
Sam stared in consternation as his son poured himself a glass of
water from the pitcher that stood on the sideboard, drained it, and
shambled back toward the table.
"You ought to be gettin' on to bed, anyhow. It's late, and you'll
not be wantin' to miss the festivities tomorrow."
"I... I'll be along."
"You sure you're all right? I don't mean no disrespect, Dad, but you
always do get a bit funny this time of year."
He managed a weak smile. "I'm fine. Just finishing my bit of tea,
and then I'll be off. Off to bed, I mean," he added suddenly.
Tom gave him a hard look of concern, then nodded. "Right. 'Night,
Dad." Dropping a quick kiss on the top of Sam's head, he padded back into the hall and disappeared into the gloom.
Frodo waited for the soft click of the closing door before letting
out a shaky breath. "Oh... oh, Sam!" His eyes were bright as he
dragged them away from the dark hallway to find Sam staring at him in white-faced dismay.
"He acted as though he couldn't see you!"
"No. There are few eyes now that can, save yours. The Elves might, perhaps, though not many of that kind now remain in Middle-Earth. But I'm afraid your children... Sam, your children! How many are there?"
Sam smiled in quiet pride, though the lines of worry lingered around
his eyes. "Thirteen, sir, all told. And twenty-nine grandchildren.
Your Elanor, now, she's got four of her own. And my Goldilocks
settled with Pip's son Faramir, so their oldest'll be the right Took
and Thain one day. Not a bad crop for an old gardener to call his
own."
Frodo smiled. "Gardener. Gardner," he mused. "You've made a name for yourself in quite a literal sense, I see."
"Aye, well, it weren't exactly my doing... just seemed to stick,
somehow," Sam muttered, abashed.
"I can imagine. You have a great deal to be proud of, Sam Gardner.
I..." he seemed about to say more, but stopped himself, staring at
his hands as they lay spread out on the table before him. "I think
Tom was right," he finished when Sam looked at him. "I've kept you
up far too late. We'll need to leave early, if... Sam, are you
certain you want to come with me tomorrow?"
Sam considered his answer carefully. "I've been wanting to come with you these sixty years, sir, and I'm as certain of that as I can be of anything," he said slowly. "As for the tomorrow bit, well, now it's
come to the point it's right hard leavin' all sudden-like and without
saying goodbye, but I can't see as it'll get any easier the longer I
put it off. It's the job that never gets started as takes longest to
finish, so I reckon we'd better start." His chin lifted a little
with these last words, and his eyes held a glint Frodo remembered
from the beginning of another journey long ago. He hadn't been able to refuse it then, either.
"All right. If you're sure."
"I'm sure. 'We must away, we must away! We ride before the break of day!'" he quoted suddenly, with a lightness that made him look almost young again.
"Truly? You won't be wanting to wait and... say goodbye?"
"No," Sam answered with a long, lingering glance down the hall. "I'd like to see 'em all again, and I'd like more to see you see 'em, but
I expect that would only make things harder for everybody. No, I
reckon I'd better just leave a note and slip off quiet again. I've
said all that needs sayin' over the years, and I can't see a need for
any fine last words, even if I could think of some. And truth is,
I've half been expectin' to leave soon, one way or another. I've had
everything in order since Rose..." He looked up, saw understanding in Frodo's eyes, and nodded tightly. "So that's settled then. Will
you be wantin' me to air you up a bed, sir? Frodo-lad and Pansy,
that's his wife, Pansy Goodbody she was but a Gardner now nigh on twenty-six years-- they've got your old room, and Tom and the childer are in some of the others, but we keep a guest-room or two laid ready yet."
Frodo shook his head. "I'd rather just... look around a bit, if you
don't mind."
"Mind! Bless you, sir, you look as much as you like. It's your own
home, after all, of course you'll be wanting to see it after all this
time. I'll shake out the bed in the room nearest the second pantry
just the same, you remember the one, the blue room with the roses
carved over the door, in case you should change your mind. I don't
want to wake up and find you sleeping at your desk again."
"Not even for old times' sake?"
"Maybe so... just so long as you don't put your face in the wet ink
this time!"
"Not to worry," Frodo replied with a laugh. "That's a mistake I've
taken care never to repeat. I can only wonder what folks might have said, had there been any but you about who could read backwards."
"They said plenty as it was, as I recall. You always were one to
stir up talk among those as hadn't enough to keep themselves
occupied. Still are, truth be told. They've not forgotten... the
tale's gotten a bit twisted round over the years, more a fairy story
than anything else now, but folks still know it and the little ones
still ask for it round the bonfires, just as we said."
"It's as it should be, then. People need to remember what happened, but they shouldn't be afraid to tell it for fear of not telling it right. It's their story, after all-- the tale's going on yet, Sam."
"But our part in it's nearly over, I suppose. I wonder how it'll all end?"
"Not even the Elves know that," Frodo answered, looking away. "You ought to go to bed, Sam. It's quite late."
"Oh. That's right, I was headed that way, wasn't I? Seeing you
again has got me that distracted, sir. I'll be off then, before I
forget again. Good night, Mr. Frodo."
"Good night, Sam."
Closing the window and getting up, Sam glanced around, making sure everything was in order and ready for the night. There were no lights to blow out, so after a moment's awkward silence he headed for the door, where he paused and turned back. "Mr. Frodo?"
"Yes?"
"You'll... you'll still be here come morning, won't you?"
Frodo smiled. "I promise. Sleep well, Sam."
"I'll do my best, sir." He smiled back nervously, quite forgetting
to air the spare bed, and Frodo watched as he finally disappeared
into the room that had once upon a time been Bilbo's. He'd never
used it himself, preferring to stick to the smaller, cozier one he'd
slept in since his arrival as a tween, but he remembered fixing it
up, ages ago, using the finest fabrics and furnishings and a bit of
help from his cousins to transform the old room into a veritable
honeymoon bower. He remembered the looks on their faces on the night of the wedding when he had escorted the newlyweds home and thrown open the door, Sam's expression a mixture of gratitude, awe, and unspoken reproach and Rosie's eyes perfectly round with wonder. He remembered smiling as he closed that door firmly on their halfhearted protests, their kisses burning through the ice in his veins as he walked through the warm spring darkness to spend the night at the Cottons'. He remembered pacing outside it with Sam almost a year later, the two of them pale with worry and excitement, attempting to distract one another with cups of tea and quick walks about the garden, jumping at every sound that had come through the dark old wood until they'd heard the one they were waiting for: the high clear wail of a baby. Elanor's first cry had heralded the instant when Frodo suddenly knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that all they had done and all he had lost was completely and utterly worth it.
And Elanor was a grown woman now, with children of her own. Grown children, most likely, he realized, tweenagers or perhaps even older. Soon there would be another generation in Sam's line... and if his daughter had married Pippin's son, then Pip must be a grandfather as well. He smiled, trying to picture the baby-faced
little Took he had known-- he never had gotten used to Pip's being
taller than he was-- as a grey-haired old gaffer and failing miserably. He wondered if Merry had ended up losing his hair like Old Rory Brandybuck, and if the two of them had been run ragged by their own children in cosmic justice for the holy terrors they had once been themselves. A thrill ran through him, half joy and half shock at the realization of how much time, and still more how much life, had passed since he had gone away.
He sighed, wandering slowly out of the kitchen and into the front
living-room. Bag End too had grown and changed over the years, in spirit if not in size. For the first time that he could remember, the hole did not seem too large or too grand; for the first time since its excavation, it had at last been filled with the loving family it had always been meant to hold, and the very walls seemed to be permeated with an air of contentment.
He made his way into the library, where the two desks still stood back-to-back beneath the window. Without disturbing the papers that lay scattered on its surface, he trailed his fingers over the smaller one, tracing new names and patterns that had been scratched into the wood beside his own, now dark and almost illegible with age. He wondered how many small fingers had left their mark there, how many feet had been twined around the table legs in youthful restlessness during lessons. How many chairs could be squeezed around the desk at once? Two fit nicely, he remembered, thinking of schooldays long past when he had sat there himself with Bilbo at the large desk and a little boy with sun-bleached curls and serious eyes at his side.
The moon had set, but the stars gave light enough for him to circle
around to the other desk. Its smooth rich darkness shone with lemon oil and beeswax where it was not hidden by the blotter, and the inkstand was well stocked with bottles and pens-- some new, some old, and some of a design he had never seen before. This desk had obviously been as well-loved as the other, though in a different way. A gleam of red leather caught his eye: the Book, still in the corner where he had been wont to keep it long ago, though considerably more worn and with its silk ribbon marker, now frayed and faded, peeping out from nearly the very last page. Without thinking he reached for it, then drew back his hand with a sigh. Turning from the starlit window, he melted back into the darkness of the hall without a sound.
*****
Despite his words of the night before, Sam slept deeply, and awoke to a sky just beginning to lighten to grey and to a vague sense of undefined longing. It seemed to him that he had been lost in the most beautiful dream, and he caught vainly for some memory of it, but it eluded him. Rolling over with a yawn of philosophical regret, he groped for matches to light his bedside candle, squinting sleepily against the sudden tiny flare. He pushed himself fully upright, scratching absently as he flipped back the covers and swung his feet over the edge of the bed. At last he opened his eyes, turning automatically to the window to check the weather, and bit back a gasp at the dark silhouette interrupting the circle of pale light just outside the candle's glow.
"It wasn't a dream!"
"No," Frodo answered as he stepped forward, the candlelight sparking in his eyes. "It wasn't a dream." He smiled, and after a moment's silence Sam sprang from the bed with a speed and agility he hadn't shown for years. He flung out his arms to catch Frodo in them, then stumbled forward, banging his knee on the dresser.
He turned around slowly, rubbing the bruised joint in shock and bewilderment, to find Frodo looking at him in pained apology. "I'm sorry, Sam. I should have warned you."
He hobbled back to the bed and sat down heavily. "You're a... a wraith, then."
"Something like that. Sam, I--"
"Explains why Tom couldn't see you. Then you're... you're not..."
"Dead? No. I don't think I am, anyway, though I can't be sure precisely what the difference is. None have ever returned from the Undying Lands."
"From the tales I've heard, none would ever want to."
"No. It is beautiful... like Rivendell, and Lorien, and all the beautiful places of the world all at once. It's a place made for happiness."
Sam looked at him carefully, taking in the edge of sorrow in his voice, the faint shadows beneath his eyes, the slight air of a frailty he had hoped never to see again. But you're not happy there, he thought suddenly, but all he said was, "Then we'd best be on our way."
He dressed quickly in a set of well-worn traveling clothes and dropped a few small articles into a pack, made the bed, and with a last look round, followed Frodo out of the bedroom and closed the door. They stopped by the library and Sam opened the Red Book, showing Frodo the pages he'd filled.
"I don't know as it's what you'd call finished, sir, but I did the best I could. I've added a good bit, not near as much as yours, of course, but some little bits of things as happened after you went away. And I added some tales that seemed to fit with the others, too, or other bits of the same tale, if you will; some history and things about the Shire and some romance about the King and Queen that Ellie brought back from Gondor. She was a maid to the Queen for a while, you know-- went there as a lass and came back a lady. Elanor the Fair, they called her, and so some call her still. Prettiest thing you ever saw, Mr. Frodo, just as we always said."
"I'm sure she is, Sam. I wish I could see her."
"You just might, at that. She and Fastred, that's her husband, settled out at Tower Hills west of here. We'll be going right by there, sir, it'd be a simple enough thing to stop in along the way. You could see her, even if she can't see you, and I'd not be sorry for the chance to say goodbye. I could take the Book to her, too-- I always meant it to be hers, anyway. Frodo-lad and his lot are to have Bag End after I'm gone, but the stories... the stories are Elanor's inheritance more'n anybody else's, I reckon. She always believed..." His words trailed off, and he busied himself with closing the book and tucking it away in his pack.
"Believed what?" Frodo asked gently, following him into the kitchen.
"This. That I'd find you again." He opened the pantry door and added a few apples and some cheese to the bag, then made a wide circle around Frodo to avoid touching him accidentally on his way to the breadbox.
"Then we shall certainly have to stop."
Sam gave him a quick smile as he took out a loaf of fresh bread, then stopped and put it back. Closing the breadbox, he opened a cupboard and took out several small packages, round and flat and golden-yellow in the candlelight. Frodo glanced at them curiously, then stepped closer with an incredulous stare. "Sam, is that..."
"Aye. Or as near as I can make it. I've been trying these sixty years, and thanks to the Lady's gift I've even got the *mallorn* leaves to wrap 'em in, but I've never yet been able to get it quite right. I think there's some elf-magic to it, or something in the water maybe. Still, it beats Shire-bread all hollow for taking on a journey, and I like to keep a bit on hand."
"I seem to recall a time when you swore you'd never eat another bite of waybread as long as you lived."
"So I did," Sam replied loftily, setting the pack on the table and taking out a skin to fill with water. "And for a good while I stuck to it. But after a few years I got to missing it, and since I was traveling a good bit, well, I thought I'd try my hand at baking some myself."
Frodo didn't answer, but his eyes were shining when Sam turned around, giving him a shy glance as he tucked the filled water skin into the pack and tightened the straps. "That should do it," he muttered, half to himself, casting an anxious eye at the ever-brightening window. "Just have to... leave a note..." He hurried away to the library and came back a moment later with a scrap of paper and a pen. He sucked on the nib for a moment, lost in thought, then carefully traced a few words on the sheet, folded it, and tucked it under the vase of flowers that stood on the table. He straightened up slowly, staring at the little white rectangle, then sighed. "That's it, then." He shouldered his pack and the two of them walked out into the hall. A soft grey cloak hung from one of the pegs, surprisingly little changed after sixty-three years of wear, and Sam fastened it carefully around his neck with its leaf-brooch of silver and green. He gazed back into the hall, where the first faint stirrings of his awakening family could be heard, then turned resolutely and set his hand to the doorknob, where he paused once again.
"The tale goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began,"
he quoted softly. "It all begins and ends right here, doesn't it, Mr. Frodo? Here at this old green door. Mr. Bilbo's part of the tale, and yours, and mine. Just... here." He looked up, and his eyes and smile were bright as he opened the door and stepped out into the dawn.
*****
They went quickly at first, Sam riding on his favorite old pony and Frodo walking alongside, through streets that were almost deserted in the golden sunlight of early morning. One or two other hobbits were up and about along the Row, farmers getting an early start on a long day of harvesting and housewives beginning the day's chores, and as they reached the center of town, the first shopkeepers were sweeping out their stores and setting up displays. Each one had a smile and a wave for Sam, and most called out greetings and good wishes as they went by. He waved back and greeted each one by name, and once they were out of earshot, he filled Frodo in on the details of who each one was, what they did, and who they were related to. Many of them had been children when Frodo went away, and he was awed to find in the faces of those dignified matrons and fathers the eyes that had once grown round at the tales of his adventures.
They passed the Party Field, where the *mallorn* stood tall and proud with its silver trunk and leaves just beginning to turn to gold. They walked along Pool Side under an avenue of oak and elm with boughs interlacing overhead in a vaulted arch, and every dooryard and crossroads was graced by at least one tree, apple and plum and cherry and almond. Frodo's eyes grew misty remembering them as seedlings, some of which he had himself helped to plant in the ravaged soil, and Sam's glance reached out to embrace each one as an old friend and say farewell. Now and then his hand went out of its own accord to touch a leaf-tip or caress a late blossom by the roadside, and almost it seemed to Frodo that the plants returned the gesture, stretching out green fingers towards them as they passed.
Eventually they came to the Stock Road on the outskirts of town and turned west, leaving the last holes and scattered farms behind them. By midmorning they had reached a copse of trees far older than Sam's planting where they had often picnicked in days long past, before they had ever heard of Rings of Power or Dark Lords or even much of Mordor. The trees had been far enough from town to escape being cut down by Saruman's ruffians, and they judged that they were far enough to avoid detection in case anyone had decided to follow Sam. Here they stopped, and Sam made up for the breakfast he had forgotten to eat before leaving home.
Frodo sat in an old favorite spot beneath one of the trees watching Sam and looking around at the world he had known, so familiar and so changed. They had spoken little since leaving Hobbiton, though the silence had not been awkward as they both absorbed the sights and sounds and the pleasure of being once again in one another's
company. Now he stretched luxuriously, looking more at peace than Sam had yet seen him. "It's so beautiful," he said softly.
"Aye," Sam replied, glancing up at the leaves overhead and then back down the road they had followed with pleasure and a pride more paternal than proprietary. "The Shire's always been as lovely as any place I've seen, I think, in its own way. It's not so grand as some, to be sure, but I reckon there have to be some homely places to make the grand ones stand out more. I don't suppose you could grow taters in a place like Lothlorien, now. And as Mr. Merry always said, it's best to love first what you're meant to love, and the rest will follow after."
Frodo smiled. "I believe you have a gift for loving, Sam." His smile grew pensive, and after a moment Sam finally spoke.
"What's wrong, sir? Begging your pardon, you've not seemed, well... quite right, since you came. Here I've been thinking when I finally found you again you'd be well and happy as anything, and you've hardly said two words together and you're sighing like your heart's fit to break."
"I'm sorry. I am... happy," he answered, stumbling over the word and earning a skeptical look from Sam. "It's just a great deal to take
in all at once. We ought to be on our way." He stood up, his face shuttered, and after a moment's hesitation Sam followed.
"Are you well, sir?" he asked later, when they were back on the road. He was letting the pony amble along as it liked, with Frodo keeping pace easily beside them.
Frodo stuck his hands into his pockets and considered his answer carefully. "I am healed," he said finally. "There was... another shard. They cut open my shoulder and found it, just a tiny thing, Gandalf said, but very deep. It-- Sam?"
Sam had pulled the pony up short and was staring at him, horror-stricken. "I knew it. I saw... but... oh, Mr. Frodo, I couldn't... you'll never... I can't..."
"Sam, what are you talking about?" Frodo asked, reaching out to lay a hand on his arm in concern before remembering that he couldn't.
Sam sat with his eyes closed in misery, but he managed to regain mastery over his tongue. "I... I saw it, sir. The blade I mean, what that Rider stabbed you with. The point was snapped off, and that's the piece they took out at Rivendell. But there was another piece out, a little chip out of one side. I saw it clear as I'm seein' you, sir, and I ought to have remembered, but I was sick with all the blood when they took the first one, and then, then you seemed well, so I didn't think... oh, sir, this has all been my fault--"
"Sam--"
"I can't ask you to forgive me--"
"Sam..."
"I shouldn't blame you if--"
"Sam Gamgee, would you listen to me?!" Sam opened his eyes painfully to see Frodo looking up at him, hands on hips, shaking his head in fond exasperation. "I'm not entirely sure what you're blaming yourself for, but I am fairly certain that it's more than you deserve."
"This here is more'n I deserve, sir," he replied bitterly. "Goin' with you an' crossin' the sea an' all. After what I've done... I've gone and messed things up proper, far worse'n even my Gaffer ever would have thought. Sixty years! Sixty years wasted."
"Wasted? Sam, you've done so much! Your children, grandchildren, the Shire-- everyone we passed this morning loves you, and the trees... Sam, the seeds you've planted here will live on for generations! It's I who have..."
He trailed off, and Sam, who had been shaking his head in silent, tight-lipped protest, finally burst out: "That's what I mean! You might've stayed, been well, if I'd just remembered that second bit of blade."
"Or if Strider had, or if only Elrond had cut a bit deeper the first time," Frodo said gently. "Or perhaps if I'd been a bit faster on my feet that night and avoided being stabbed in the first place, or if Mr. Butterbur had sent Gandalf's message along in time, or better yet, if Bilbo had never picked up the Ring to begin with. You take too much on yourself, Sam." He cocked his head and began walking again, and Sam nudged the pony with his heels and followed.
"And... I don't believe I would have been able to stay in any case," he continued softly, after a long silence broken only by the crunching of leaves and gravel underfoot. "The shard... I've not been ill again since its removal, but I've not been well, either. The poison is in me, Sam, and no surgery can remove it."
"But surely the Ring--"
"It isn't the Ring. It has no hold on me now, not since it went into the fire."
"Then what?"
Frodo didn't answer, and they covered many miles without another word.
*****
They camped that night in the Green Hills, in a little dell well off the road. Sam built a small fire, more for the pleasure of watching the flames than out of necessity, for the night was warm and his supper needed no heating. The conversation had picked up again slowly along the way and now flowed easily, though an undefined barrier still stood between them. Sam lay wrapped in his blanket beside the embers of the fire and gazed up at the stars.
"Where do you suppose they go, Mr. Frodo? Those as don't cross the Sea, I mean."
"I don't know," Frodo answered. "The tales say they leave the world. Some say they depart from the farthest shores of the Blessed Realm, but I've heard none that tell where they go after that."
"Do you suppose we'll ever see them again?"
Frodo rolled up on one elbow. "Perhaps. Even the world won't last forever."
"So you think we'll follow, then, when it's all over?"
"Maybe. Or maybe the world will be remade without evil and they will return. But I think we'll all be together again in the end, even if
no one knows exactly when or where."
Sam sighed. "I'm glad. I'd like to see Rosie again, and all the others... I'm sure it's more my fault than any, but it just don't make sense sometimes, how some go and some stay behind. Why don't we all just go to one place together, if that's the way it's to be in the end anyway?"
"I don't know," Frodo said again. "I'm afraid I don't have any answers, Sam, only bits of legend and my own guesses."
"Maybe so, but your guesses are likely to be a sight better than mine."
"I doubt that. You've a way of seeing straight to the heart of things sometimes that never ceased to astonish me back in the Shire, and I'd be very surprised indeed if you'd lost it since. But if you like, I will tell you what I think, and you may make of it what you will."
He rolled over onto his back again, pillowing his head on his arms, and his voice changed slightly, growing somehow more remote and formal as it often did when he spoke of legends. "You recall, Sam, that the Ents are called the shepherds of the trees? I think... I think the Elves are the shepherds of the world, in a way. They have been here from the beginning, and I think they are bound to it until the end. They say that even when they are slain, Elves do not die as mortals do, but that they go to the Halls of Mandos to await the end of the world. Only Luthien, alone of that race, has ever truly died."
"And the Queen," Sam put in. "Queen Arwen, I mean. She hasn't yet, and I wish no harm to her, but she will one day, won't she? Since she married King Elessar."
"Yes. One day."
"So they're leaving as wouldn't have, and we're staying as shouldn't be. It evens out then, I reckon, though I don't see precisely why it's us that stay... or maybe I do, at that. We were the Ringbearers, you and me and Mr. Bilbo, though I had it scarcely a day, and I reckon... I reckon we got ourselves mixed up in something a mite too big for us, sir, and now we're to stay and see it through."
Frodo turned to face Sam and smiled at him. "There now. You've just put it better in three minutes than I've been able to say it in all
of these years."
Sam smiled back shyly and after a moment returned his gaze to the stars. "I guess the Quest ain't over yet, then. I wonder what it is we've yet to do."
"I wonder." Frodo was also looking upward once again, absorbing the brilliant sky overhead. They were now far from the fires and
lamplight of Hobbiton, and their own fire was nearly ash. Only a few wisps of thin cloud veiled the brightness here and there, framed and accented by the boughs of overhanging trees. They lay quietly, each lost to the view and his own thoughts, until Frodo spoke again, haltingly.
"The stars... are the same there, Sam. Sometimes... there was little else that seemed like home. It's very beautiful, of course, and everyone is very nice and does their best to make Bilbo and me feel at home. But there were nights when I missed... when I missed the Shire, and then I could go outside and look up at the sky and know that the same stars were shining down on you."
Sam's hand itched to reach out and take his old master's, but touch could offer no comfort here. His fingers twisted reflexively in the blanket and he tried to find words instead. "I'm glad, Mr. Frodo. And I'm glad that-- that we'll be together, you and I. At the end of all things."
Frodo's sad little smile was lost in the starlight, and if he recognized the reference he gave no sign. Sam too fell silent, and eventually drifted off to sleep.
*****
He awoke to find himself alone, wrapped in an old blanket beside a dead fire. The sun looked to be about an hour past rising, and the only sounds were the morning-song of birds, the drum of a woodpecker somewhere off to his right, and the snorting of the pony tethered nearby. The grass beside him was unbent.
His heart beat wildly as he untangled his legs from the blanket, cursing the stiff joints and aching muscles that slowed him down. At last he struggled to his feet. "Mr. Frodo? Frodo!" He staggered up the nearest small rise and had nearly reached the top when Frodo came running into sight.
"Sam?"
He drew a shaky breath and closed his eyes briefly, clutching at a convenient branch as relief ran hot and cold over him. "I thought--"
"There's no time. There are riders on the road."
"Riders!" The word brought with it an instant flood of remembered terror, and his hand flew to his side where no sword had hung in sixty years.
"Hobbits, Sam. Two of your sons, I think. I saw Tom, and another, a bit older, who looks just as I imagine you must have at that age."
Sam smiled a little, relaxing. "Ah, that'll be your namesake, then. Always did favor me quite a bit-- time was, once he'd grown old enough and I was still young enough, Rose-lass said she had quite a time telling us apart in a bad light. I'd enough trouble when he was young, sir, learnin' to call a babe by your name. Gave me a right turn when I had to start answerin' to it."
Frodo smiled back in spite of his worry. "They looked as though they'd been riding all night looking for you."
Sam's face fell. "Aye, I was afraid they'd do something of the sort. I know they mean well, but I think... I think our story's just that to 'em, no more than a tale. I don't mean they doubt it really happened, you and me and Merry and Pip and the wars and the ruffians in the Shire, but I think they've some trouble with the more magical bits, if you understand me." He began walking back down into the dell, casting an anxious glance over his shoulder in the direction of the road. "Times have changed, Mr. Frodo. The Elves have nearly all gone, and folk have grown more practical than ever. You recollect how there weren't many as liked to hear about adventures and dragons and things once they'd grown up, don't you? Well, it's nearly all like that now. Folk still like a good song or a tale as much as ever they did, but you mustn't go makin' out like it's real. There's many as won't believe a thing unless they've seen it with their own eyes. They can't seem to just believe in something because their heart tells 'em it's so."
"Times haven't changed that much. Our generation was just the same, as I remember, until they had a rather rude awakening."
"Aye, maybe so, but it seems different somehow. But then I reckon I've changed considerable myself." He had reached his pack and lowered himself heavily beside it, brushing away a curious ant making its way around the edge of the flap. "I hate to do it, but I'd best not let them find me here. They'd think I've gone daft and try to take me home and keep me tucked up safe and snug with a cup of tea and a nice book."
Frodo sat opposite him, wrapping his arms around his knees and resting his chin on them. "I'm sorry."
Sam waved this off, busying himself with packing up his small camp. "Well. They love their old Da, I know that well enough. And I reckon I ought to be glad they've never known trouble of a kind that'd make 'em need to put all their hope in something they can't understand."
"But you wish they could."
"Aye." He smiled ruefully, tucking away his neatly rolled blanket. "I've always fancied the world was a sight more interesting if you didn't imagine you knew everything that was in it." He yawned, and it turned into a sigh. "Well now. Were they coming this way, do you think, or...?"
"No. They were going on up the road, westward, moving rather quickly."
"We'd best wait here a bit longer then, and let 'em go on ahead." He took a long drink from his water-skin and made a face at the old-leather flavor. "Though a cup of tea don't sound half bad about now." Sam closed the skin and reached into his pack, unwrapping a cake of waybread and breaking off a piece. "Don't folk eat, then, sir, over there?"
Frodo laughed, stretching out his legs and leaning back on his hands. "Yes, Sam. Life goes on much as it ever has. We eat and sleep, and the sun rises and sets, and gardens grow, and I understand that once or twice an age there's even a wedding or a new baby born."
"Once or twice an age!"
"Perhaps it's a bit more often than that. But not much more; you could hardly expect that there would be children born every week in a land where no one ever dies. We'd soon be quite overrun." Frodo's lips twitched as he watched Sam, who was shaking his head and blinking in disbelief.
"I suppose not. It's a bit hard to get my mind round it at all, sir, truth be told. Of course the Elves must have children, but it's hard to imagine... well, the lady Galadriel, for instance. Queen Arwen's descended from her, I know, but I can't rightly see her sneakin' out of bed to polish off half a cherry pie in the middle of the night, or calling Lord Celeborn by some of the names Rosie had for me when she was birthin' ours. Where she picked them up I'll never know..." He stopped his musing and looked up, red-faced, and Frodo finally collapsed backward into the grass and gave in to laughter. Sam smiled back uncertainly, then slowly joined in.
"Oh, Sam," Frodo said at last when he'd caught his breath, "I've missed you so."
"And I've missed hearing you laugh like that, sir. You've had me right worried, being so serious and sad since you've come."
"Then you needn't worry any longer. But if you've finished breakfast, your sons ought to be well ahead by now. It would be best to keep alert, though, and be ready to hide if you truly don't wish to meet them. They may double back when they don't find you further on." The words were spoken lightly, without the flat finality of the previous morning, but Sam still felt the faint rebuff, the shying away from a difficult subject. He hid his sigh in picking up his pack, fastening it carefully to the pony's saddle and kicking dirt over the ashes of the fire. Whatever was bothering Mr. Frodo, he would deal with it with a gardener's patience. Some weeds, he knew, couldn't be pulled until the time was right: too early and you uprooted the good plants along with them, and left some of the root behind besides. He could wait. He mounted in tacit acceptance of Frodo's words and they set off.
*****
In spite of their worries, they saw no one on the road that day, nor the next. There were plenty of birds busily stripping the roadside elderberries and rosebushes of their purple and scarlet crowns of fruit, and autumn-sleek squirrels scolded them noisily from overhanging branches, and once they saw a deer in the road ahead, stopping to look at them with curious eyes before bounding off into the trees. But few others, hobbits or Men, used this road with any frequency, and it was not until the afternoon of the fourth day that they heard voices and the sound of ponies' hooves coming towards them around the next bend.
They hurried off the road, Sam dismounting and leading the pony away between the slender tree trunks, choosing a path carefully through the fallen leaves where their feet would leave no marks. They took shelter behind a mound of raspberry canes, and Sam held his breath while Frodo stepped out to watch. It wasn't long before the clipping of horseshoes was mixed with the creak of wagon wheels, and Frodo shortly slipped back to confirm his guess.
"It's a wagon. A farmer, I'd think, with two or three lads and a dozen baskets of apples in the back."
"Green ones? And the farmer a stout red-haired chap with a wide blue hat?"
Frodo nodded, peering out round the brambles once more as the wagon creaked past. "Yes. Do you know them?"
"Oh, aye. That'll be Will Bolger and his lot. Cousins of yours, in fact, a few times removed-- Will's married to your cousin Daisy's granddaughter, Peony I think her name is. Doesn't come to town much since she and Will moved out to the Westmarch back in... oh, fifty-eight I think it was, not long after it was opened. Will and the
lads, though, they come in pretty regular to do a bit of trading, mostly apples and gossip. Nice folks, those, and good apples, too, at that. Brought the stock back myself from Gondor when Rosie and I were there, but I couldn't get them to grow right back in Hobbiton. Seem to need the sea air-- I nursed 'em along for a while, then sent 'em out when folk started moving west. Will's done right well with 'em, he's always been a good hand with the trees. Got a whole orchard now."
Frodo shook his head with a smile somewhere between amusement and amazement as he stepped out to check the road again. "They've gone," he reported. "Do you know everyone in the Shire, Sam?"
Sam grinned as he began leading the obedient pony back out of their hiding place, carefully freeing himself from a thorny branch that had entangled itself in his hair. "Seems that way sometimes. It's an
odd thing, being one of the old Gaffers, and Mayor at that. I've been there since most of these folk were born, seen 'em grow up from wooly-headed rascals to tweens to respectable old folks with kids of their own. I've married 'em and buried 'em, helped 'em out of troubles and been to the parties in the good times. And now that mine are of age and nearly all married off, it seems I'm related to half of 'em, too. Takes a deal of remembering at times, but then I reckon it would take a deal of forgetting, too."
They had traveled nearly a mile further down the road before either of them noticed that Sam had not bothered to remount. He was walking easily, untroubled by stiff hips or an aching back or the nagging cough that had made him throw away his pipe years before, effortlessly keeping pace with Frodo and the pony. It wasn't until he stubbed his toe on an errant root that he stopped dead, staring first at his feet and then back down the road they had covered. "Mr. Frodo!"
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing, sir-- that is, that's just it. I feel... oh, is it true, then, sir, that I'll be young again there? That's the one thing that's been worrying me. The tales don't say anything about it, and you yourself don't look much different than when you left, only a good bit healthier. But then, you never did exactly look your age, so I didn't know, and I didn't dare ask 'til now, but... I don't know if I could bear it, sir, you always so young and me always so old. But, oh, sir, will I...?" He stammered his way to a halt, faced with Frodo's smiling eyes.
"You needn't call me that, you know," he said casually, beginning to walk again and motioning with a slight inclination of his head for Sam to follow, which he did. "But as for age, I expect you'll be like Bilbo. He's lost his age but kept his years, if that makes any sense. He's like the Elves, neither old nor young... at a glance he looks no more than forty, but if you look closely it's still all written in his face, all the places he's gone and all the things he's seen and done and been. I imagine that's part of what makes the Elves so beautiful. And you, Sam," he added, half-turning his head to glance at him quickly. "I can see all of your children in your eyes, and Rose, and the Shire... and our journey, too, Lorien and Rivendell and Gondor and..."
"Mordor," Sam said quietly, when Frodo didn't seem inclined to continue.
"Yes. Sam, I wish..."
"Don't." Frodo looked up, surprised at the soft authority in his voice. "Don't wish it away, or that I'd not come with you. I don't."
"But Sam, surely you wouldn't... if you'd known..."
"I don't know, sir-- sorry, Frodo. I reckon it would have been a sight harder setting out if I'd known how it would be, but if I'd have chosen differently then I'm glad I didn't know. I've had my nightmares same as you have, but when all's said and done we got home safe, and they're nothing compared to what I'd have if I'd stayed at home and let you go off alone."
"No," Frodo agreed softly, kicking at a pebble in the road without moving it.
Sam turned, wrinkling his brow at Frodo's tone. "Sir?"
"It would all have ended very differently, wouldn't it, if you had let me go alone." Frodo's reply was all but inaudible, and it was not a question.
"What's this, now?"
"Sam..." Frodo stopped, his eyes closed tight in anguish. "How can you not hate me? You were there... you saw..."
"Saw what, Mr. Frodo?" Sam had stepped closer, only a breath away, his eyes gentle.
Frodo looked up for a second, then down at his hands. "Saw me claim the Ring," he answered finally.
"Aye, and I saw you offer it up a half dozen times before that," Sam said. "You tried giving it to Gandalf, and Strider, and Lord Elrond at Rivendell, and the Lady Galadriel."
"And they all refused it. They knew, but still I... I had the presumption to think that I could bear what they dared not."
"I don't see who else was to do it," Sam interrupted. "We all knew well enough the Ring couldn't just be tossed aside, buried under a shrub somewhere and forgotten about. Somebody had to get rid of it properly. You didn't take that Ring, Mr. Frodo, it was given to you and you just had to do the best you could, same as all of us. I can't see as anybody would have done a better job of it."
"You would."
"Me!"
"You gave it up freely when I asked-- when I demanded it back. It was only thanks to you that I made it there at all. You would have thrown it in."
"I bore it a day, sir. You bore it a year, and seventeen more before that besides. I did my part, and you did yours. You resisted it right up until the end. I saw what it did, how it ate at you until there wasn't nothing left--"
"No," Frodo broke in. "No. You're wrong, Sam. There was something left." He turned, and there was something in the intensity of his gaze that made Sam shiver. "It took almost everything from me, all that was good and pure and true. But it left... I claimed the Ring, Sam. All that was left of me wanted it more than anything else in the world. I would have seen you dead, and the Shire destroyed, if only I could have that. I was him, Sam-- I was Sauron."
Sam blinked, absorbing this and choosing his words with the care that had carried them through Mordor itself and soothed the crises of thirteen adolescents since. "But you're not him," he finally answered calmly. "Maybe that bit of you was right then, but that was just a tiny little piece of you, a little core that was left after everything else was gone. And don't you forget how much digging it took before it got there, neither. But that's all Sauron was, nothing but that core all blown up without a bit of good fruit left on it."
"But it's there. I can still feel it inside of me."
"Aye. I reckon there's a bit of that in each of us, Mr. Frodo, or else there wouldn't have been no call to destroy the Ring to begin with," Sam answered, starting to walk again. "If it weren't so, there'd be nothing for it to work on, nothing to get hold of, so to speak. I guess that's why the others wouldn't take it, Elrond and Gandalf and Galadriel. They've got it in them too."
Frodo didn't answer, and when Sam looked over he saw that his eyes were bright and he was biting his lip, his shoulders shaking silently with either tears or laughter, or perhaps both. "Is that what's been troubling you, then?"
The trembling resolved itself into a soft laugh. "I might have known. You're like the Sun, Sam, shining in and turning nightmare shadows into a cloak left hanging on the bedpost." He smiled, but it darkened suddenly as though a cloud that had been lifted for a moment had fallen upon him once again. "But I am afraid I cannot believe so easily."
He walked a few strides in silence, his head bowed. "If they knew and feared the same thing in themselves, why didn't they see it in me?"
"Who's to say they didn't?"
"But they trusted me with it. They believed that I could do it."
"I don't recall as anyone ever said that," Sam said, "Begging your pardon of course. Near as I can recall, they mostly said you could do the job if anyone could. Having the best shot at a thing doesn't mean you're sure to do it, sir. Which you did, and with that bit of knife in you no less. Who's to say you'd not have raced right up the mountain and chucked it in if not for that?"
"Sam..."
"It weren't just chills and fever it gave you when you took your turns, Mr. Frodo. I remember well enough if you don't, how you'd go
all cold and... and lost-like, hunting for that Ring. You clawed yourself 'til you bled once. I'd stepped out to get you a bit of tea and when I got back I thought your throat'd been cut."
"I remember," Frodo interrupted softly.
"Well, if it could do that to you then, who's to say what it might have done before? It was meant to turn you into a wraith, after all, a slave to that Ring like they were. Maybe it did just a bit, more'n we knew?"
"Maybe it did."
Sam glanced over, perplexed. Frodo was still walking with his shoulders hunched over, staring at the ground, his face drawn. He sighed in exasperation, stopping in his tracks and whirling to face his old master. "Glory and trumpets, Mr. Frodo, now who's takin' on more blame than's fairly due him? The Ring went in the fire, sir. You did your bit, and quite a job it was, and I did mine and old Gollum his, and Merry and Pip and Gandalf and all the others did theirs. You're no worse than anybody, and a good deal better than most. Now why can't you accept that?"
"I... I want to. But it took everything I had, Sam. All my hope, all my happiness. Everything except... I'm like Mordor, Sam, a land dried up and barren and befouled."
"Aye, just like Mordor. He scraped you right down to the rocks, he did, right down to that last tiny bit of you you've found you don't care for. But he's gone now, and the fire's been cold a good while, and the cloud's been all blown away and let the sunlight in and the water's washed away all the muck. Did you know there are trees in Mordor now, sir?
Frodo stared at him blankly.
"Oh, it's no garden yet, noways. But Legolas and his folk've been at it, and those Ents, sir, I heard tell they went in and broke up a good bit of the stonework and turned the rivers to give the place a good washing. I've not been back myself, but they say there's grass now, and scrub such as comes in after a bad fire. I believe they'll make a go of it yet, sir. Merry says old Treebeard himself goes there from time to time, hoping the Entwives might even come put a hand in. Says it's the kind of job they'd care for, fixin' up a bad bit of ground to their liking and pullin' up a crop to spite it. That'll be Mr. Merry's words, I'm guessing, and not Treebeard's, but you see just the same."
"Everything is coming together at last," Frodo said faintly.
"Exactly," Sam answered. "All but you, it seems, and all those folk over the Sea are going to have to answer to Sam Gardner for not makin' you see it, sir, and lettin' you go on believin'--"
"I never told them."
"What?"
"I never told anyone, Sam, about the Ring. None but you. Gandalf knows, of course; I couldn't hide it from him, and I expect some of the others do too, but we've never spoken of it. I wouldn't."
"Whyever not, sir?"
Frodo's cheeks were tinged pink with embarrassment. "I didn't want to trouble them."
"Particularly seeing as how it was only your own happiness at stake?"
Frodo nodded, and Sam sighed. "Begging your pardon, you really ought to look out for yourself a bit more, sir. I can't recall the last time you did a thing just because you wanted it."
"I can," Frodo said darkly.
"Frodo Baggins--"
"I'm sorry, Sam. I suppose I've gotten into a habit of dwelling on it."
"Aye, so I see, pickin' at it like an old scab and not lettin' it heal properly. No matter. Your Sam's here now, sir, and he'll take care of you."
"Oh, Sam, that's not what I want. This should be your time. You ought to be resting and enjoying yourself, not looking after a foolish old hobbit like me."
"And so should you be, sir. And if I might make so bold, well, I've always rather enjoyed looking after you, sir, and I'd be right pleased to keep on doin' it until the end of the world, if only you'd be happy, sir."
"Dearest Sam." There was real warmth in Frodo's eyes this time as he smiled and began walking once again. "And I told you you needn't call me that any longer. It was never very necessary, you know."
Sam followed suit, sticking his hands in his own trouser pockets and keeping his eyes carefully on the road ahead as they walked. "Well. So you did, at that. I reckon we've both got habits that'll take a bit of breaking, then." He glanced over nervously, and they smiled shyly at one another. They had traveled on in silence for several minutes when Frodo suddenly chuckled.
"What's this, now?"
"You sounded exactly like your Gaffer a moment ago, Sam. More specifically, you sounded exactly like your Gaffer on one of my earliest visits to Bag End. I was quite young, no more than fourteen or fifteen, and he found me sitting in the middle of the strawberry patch with bulging pockets and juice dripping down my chin. I'd been led there by Wilco and Eddy Proudfoot, but they knew the area better than I and had both taken off when they heard him coming. That was the exact same 'Frodo Baggins!' you just used, right down to the hands on your hips and the bewildered pony, though his was hitched up for plowing. I half expected you to follow it with 'If you were one of mine I'd put you over my knee right here and now and thump some manners into you.'"
Sam grinned. "I nearly did, at that. Though it would've been sense and not manners I was going to say."
Frodo laughed again, a warm glad sound in the quiet lane. "I imagine I would have deserved it. You must have been a wonderful father. I wish I'd been here to see it."
"So do I, sir. But I reckon I've got tales enough to tell you'll soon think you were there and wish I'd leave well enough alone."
"Never. I want to know everything that's happened since I've been away." He was still pale, but the sparkle had come back to his eyes and the Sun seemed to shine more brightly all the rest of that afternoon as it led them ever westward, and as they walked they noted the miles no more than she.
*****
They reached the beginning of the Tower Hills on the evening of the sixth day. By late afternoon they had begun to pass a few scattered farms, some with fields heavy and golden and ripe for harvest, others already mowed to stubble, the trees surrounding their long low houses still too young to offer shade. Now as the ground began to rise, doors began to appear in the hillsides, and it was increasingly difficult for Sam to avoid being seen by folk going about their daily business. They halted and sought shelter in a wooded hollow off the road about a mile outside of the settlement proper, and Sam took a few hours' rest in the gathering dusk. Once it was fully dark they set out again; Sam cast his elven-cloak around him and drew up the hood, and they passed through the center of town like shadows and footsteps in a dream.
About the third hour they came to the western edge of the Hills. Here, unlike the gradually increasing development to the east, both the land and the signs of habitation fell off abruptly into undulating dunes of sand, and beyond into a vast glimmering darkness that here and there reflected the light of the stars. Since it was night, the breeze was blowing westward off the bluffs, but in the deep silence they could still make out the distant sigh and murmur of waves against the shore, and the air held a faint tang of salt.
"Ellie lives up there," Sam whispered, pointing away to the right where the land rose to a point overlooking the dunes. A slender spire rose from its peak, and light shone from the top, clear and bright and unwavering. "They keep the fire burning all night as a waymark for ships, to guide them to safe harbor as might founder in the dark."
"Like the Tower of Avallone," Frodo whispered back. They were beyond the westernmost smials and the need for silence had passed, but like Sam, he was loath to disturb the stillness that lay on the land about them. "A beacon for travelers. You'll see it, Sam, when you come; a bright point of light on the horizon far in the West, when all else is yet hidden. They say they will keep it burning as long as any are left to cross, to guide them safely home."
Tethering the pony to a gnarled tree at the edge of the bluffs, they walked far over the dunes to where the waves washed silver and blue over the beach, shining faintly with the phosphorescence of myriad tiny sea creatures. They wandered for miles along the cool wet strand, the water lapping at their ankles, and Sam bent and ran a hand through the damp sand to watch the sparks light under his
fingers, tracing swirls and patterns to glow for a moment before melting away with a hiss and a trail of bubbles in the endless rush and flow of the waves.
At last they turned back to face the Tower and found its light pallid and dim against the eastern sky, and they began to make their way back toward the rising dawn. "The wind is changing," Frodo said softly, pausing at the top of a dune.
"So it is." The shore breeze had died down to a calm under the rising sun, and now gently it turned and began to blow again, a sea-breath fresh from the west.
Frodo stood with eyes closed and turned his face into it, a bright figure like slender flame in the ever-growing light. "Sam..."
"Frodo!"
They turned, startled, as the woman's voice came again over the sand. "Frodo? Have you found him?"
"Ellie?" Sam called, hurrying toward the figure that now appeared over a swell of the sand, running lightly from the direction of the Tower.
"Sam-dad?" They came together and he caught her round the waist, but she pulled back, framing his face with her hands. "You're here? You're all right? Frodo was here, Dad, and Tom. They said you'd disappeared without so much as a word to say goodbye. We've all been so worried... oh, but you look fine, Sam-dad, better than I've seen you in years. I took you for Fro at first. You must tell me what's happened-- oh, but not here. Come along back to the house and have breakfast, and your companion... where has he gone?"
Sam stared in shock, first at Elanor and then at the empty dunes around them. Frodo was nowhere to be seen, but he did not dare call out. He turned back, taking Elanor's hands in his own trembling
ones. "You saw... what did you see, Elanorelle?"
She frowned slightly, her brow wrinkling in concern. "A young man." She felt Sam's fingers clench in hers and his gaze burning upon her with an intensity she did not understand but dared not question yet. She closed her eyes, willing back the image so quickly passed over a moment before in her concern for her father. "Or an Elf perhaps, fair-skinned but dark-haired. You were standing together, and he turned and looked at me with eyes like stars, and he smiled... who is he, Sam-dad? And where has he gone?"
"I don't know, Ellie."
She looked at him carefully for a moment, then reached up a hand to wipe away the tears that were flowing unchecked down his
face. "Perhaps it was a trick of the dunes," she said lightly. "I've seen many things here, particularly in the morning when the wind first turns from the sea. In Gondor they say it brings visions. Queen Arwen used to say that she could see Elvenhome sometimes, and that it brought her comfort when she longed for her father and brothers."
They were walking slowly now, hand in hand, back toward the bluffs where Sam had left the pony. The sea-breeze caught in Elanor's fair hair as it hung long and loose down her back, its gold now lined with threads of silver, shining in the full light of morning. Sam looked back often, but the dunes were empty, save for sandpipers hunting the tiny crabs that burrowed in the strand and gulls wheeling overhead, crying a summons and a warning as they swept out over the waves.
Sam allowed himself to be led back to the tower and given tea and a hot breakfast with Elanor and Fastred and their children, listening to the news of the family and the doings of the Hills and saying nothing of his journey. At last, with many hugs and kisses and cheerful words, the others dispersed to begin the day's work, leaving Sam and Elanor alone together once more. They talked of many things of little consequence, but at last the conversation stilled and they sat in silence for a moment before Sam cleared his throat and pushed back his chair.
Getting up from the table, he went to the corner where his pack had been laid and drew out the Red Book. He cradled it as a precious object as he carried it back to the table and laid it gently in front of Elanor.
"I want you to have this, Elanorelle," he said as he lowered himself back into the chair. "The tale's yours now. My bit's finally done with, and it's time I moved on."
Elanor caught his hand as tears started in her eyes. "Oh, Sam-dad, no! You've years left, I'm certain of it--"
"Aye, lass, I hope so," Sam said fondly, with a sad smile. "But not here, Ellyelle. I've got to go."
"You mean to cross the Sea."
Sam nodded. "I've got to try, even if..." He looked out the window and down at the beach, where a few hobbit-children now ran, playing tag with the waves and chasing after the flocks of resting gulls so that they rose with a screech and a flurry of wings to settle again a few yards further down the sand.
"When?" Elanor's voice broke into his thoughts, gentle and accepting.
"I don't know. I ought to reach the Havens tonight, to see... if there's a boat..." Fear clenched suddenly in his heart. He had not dared to think until that moment that there might not be a boat, or of what he would do if there was not.
"I'll drive you. I don't expect Fastred will be needing the carriage today, but I'll check, and if he does, then we'll ride." She drained the last of her tea and rose from the table. "If there's anything you need..." she waved her hand vaguely to indicate the kitchen and the rest of the house. Sam smiled and shook his head.
"I've everything I need, Ellie. Thank you."
She paused and stood in the doorway looking at him, and her lip trembled briefly, and then she smiled, turned, and was gone.
Fastred did not need the carriage that day. He hesitated when Elanor asked him about it, then slowly nodded and kissed her goodbye. "Take good care of him, El," he said, clasping her tightly to his chest and pressing his lips into her hair. "I hope he makes it."
*****
Sam and Elanor reached the Havens late that afternoon and found the place a flurry of activity. A tall ship stood ready at the pier, rising and falling with the swell, and Elves hurried up and down the loading dock carrying crates and barrels and coils of rope. The hobbits stood quietly by the harbor rail and watched, joy and hope and sorrow mingling in silent tears until one of the company happened by, nearly tripping on them as he carried a tall bundle that blocked his view. He turned to see what stood in his path and set down his burden in surprise.
"Here is one who wears the tokens of Lorien!" he cried, bending to speak to them directly. "Who might you be, my little ones?"
Sam stared, then bowed awkwardly. "Well, sir, my name's Samwise, Samwise Gardner, and--"
"Not Samwise of the Ring?"
"I... I suppose so, sir. And this here's my daughter Elanor."
"The sun-star. Thou art as lovely as thy name, lady," the Elf said, taking her hand and kissing it. "And now, what boon would you ask of the Elves? Ask quickly, for we sail with the dusk, and the tide does not wait."
"Well, sir, I... that is..." now that it had come to the point, Sam's courage nearly failed him, and he struggled for words to frame his request.
"He means to cross the sea," Elanor said suddenly.
"If... if I may, sir," Sam added, twisting his hands nervously.
The Elf sank to one knee, his eyes troubled and his voice grave. "We can bear you thither, sir, but none may land on those shores unless they are given leave that we poor sailors cannot grant. But perhaps one who has borne the Ring may obtain such grace?"
"I hope so, sir. But even if I can't, I've got to try. I've got to chance it, even if I can't get in at the last. And if they turn me back, well, I'll be no worse off than I am now, will I, sir? Oh, please, I've got to try. Please don't leave me behind."
"The tales have not said falsely. You have a noble heart, little one. We shall bear you as far as we may, and pray that your hope shall not prove vain. But if I am given any foresight in these matters, I think that you shall find what you seek." He turned to Elanor. "And you, flower of the Periannath, do you sail with us as well?"
Elanor was silent for a moment. She looked at Sam, remembering a candlelit evening in his study and childish promises spoken long ago, but he gave her no sign, either of encouragement or refusal. She sighed, looking back over the way they had traveled together that afternoon to where the Tower stood in the distance, shining like a pillar of gold in the light of the westering sun. Soon it would be
time to light the fire. "No," she said finally, pulling her eyes from the western horizon with regret. "Such grace is not for me."
And turning once more to her father she laid her hand on his cheek. "I won't forget," she whispered.
"I know. I love you, Elanorelle. Keep the light burning."
"I will. I promise."
There was little else that could be said. Kissing her, Sam picked up his pack and followed the Elf up the ramp and onto the great grey ship. He went to the railing and searched the shore until he found her again, a tiny point of green and gold already high on the bluffs, climbing the narrow path to the top where they'd left the carriage. She reached it just as they cast off, and turned to watch as the broad white sails unfurled, swelling as they caught the wind and the ship began to move. She raised one hand in a gesture of farewell, which Sam returned, and there she stood until they were lost to sight in the gathering darkness down the gulf.
Sam, for his part, stood at the rail for a long time. Their course took them past the Tower Hills, and the light was already burning as they went by. He gazed at it, calling a silent farewell to those within, but he did not know that five pairs of eyes marked their passage from the tower windows, watching as the ship's lights swung slowly westward and listening for the sound of carriage wheels, wondering if Elanor would return and whether she would come alone.
*****
The passage was long and seemed longer than Sam would ever have thought possible, even in a boat. As time passed and the miles slid away beneath their keel, he came to know the Elves who traveled with him, all of whom seemed already to have heard of him and to know the tale of his adventures with Frodo and the Ring and much that had happened since. They spoke long and often as the days passed, and Sam began to learn their ways, taking a hand in the daily life of the sea and doing such small tasks as they allowed him. In the evenings he sat on the deck with his cloak wrapped tight around him, listening to their singing and watching the stars. At first his eyes clung to the East, where the light of the Tower had long been visible across the water that, strangely, never seemed to bend with the curve of the Earth. But then they turned to the West and the waves they had yet to cross.
He had quite lost track of the days and weeks when a new light appeared there, shining like a faint star hanging just above the horizon. It did not move as the other stars did, but grew steadily brighter as the nights passed, until at last the wind from the West brought to his ears the sound of breakers on an unseen shore.
Dawn came quickly, revealing green hills and a tower that shone like silver high above them. As he watched, its light flickered and went out, and the ship drew up into a waiting harbor. The elves sang merrily, casting ropes over the side to be caught and made fast by others who came to meet them, their voices blending with those of the travelers in a morning song of greeting.
Sam hung back as the ship was unloaded, sitting still and quiet in a forgotten corner, unnoticed in the bustle of activity. At last it was over, the task abandoned for the time being as the newly-arrived went ashore with those who had waited, disappearing over the hills in search of breakfast or worship or some other errand Sam knew not and leaving him alone to face his fears.
He stood slowly, pacing the deck until the stiffness left his legs, and at last he sought the ramp. Step by step he made his way down it, forcing his feet to carry him as hope and terror struggled in his heart. He reached the pier and found its wood solid beneath his feet. Hope surged, propelling him forward toward the shore. At last only one step remained, and he held his breath as he placed one foot carefully on the waiting grass, then the other. With a cry of joy he tried to run forward, then fell hard with a gasp. The ground would not remain still beneath his feet! It swayed and rolled like the deck of a ship, whose motion he had long since ceased to notice.
Joy turned to despair in an instant, and he collapsed onto the ground, burying his face in his arms. They would not let him stay.
How long he lay there he did not know, nor did he notice as the swaying gradually grew less and then stopped altogether. He lay nearly senseless in his grief, hearing nothing but the crashing of the waves, now a hateful chorus that taunted him, deafening him to the song of the birds in the nearby trees and the soft pad of approaching footsteps.
"Sam?" Dimly the sound of his own name broke through into Sam's mind, and with an effort he forced his arms to obey his will and roll him over. He opened his eyes slowly, scarcely caring what he saw, and it took a moment for him to make sense of the images that met him.
A bright shadow knelt beside him, dark against the eastern sky and yet shining with a faint light of its own. His clouded mind made out worried blue eyes, dark curls that caught the gold of the morning light and turned it to copper and russet, and a smile that outshone the Sun itself. "Mr... Mr. Frodo?"
"Sam. You've come at last. Are you all right? Can you walk?" He stood up, offering a hand for Sam to take, but Sam shied away, fresh tears starting in his eyes.
"Oh, that's hard, Mr. Frodo, cruel hard."
Frodo let his hand drop, falling to his knees again in instant concern. "Sam? What is it?"
"I... I can't stay, Mr. Frodo. The ground won't hold me. When I tried to come ashore, it... it tried to pitch me off. It don't like me bein' here, sir. And then you holdin' out your hand like that, when you know full well I can't take it..." He stopped short, looking up in shock and hurt at the sound of Frodo's laughter.
"Sam, you dear old ass," he said, reaching out and brushing away a tear with his thumb and burying his fingers in Sam's hair. "Of
course you can stay. It happens to everyone after a long journey. Is the ground still moving now?"
Sam shook his head, then froze as the motion met resistance. He raised his hand slowly to cover the one that cupped his cheek, his eyes drifting closed as he traced the contours he had once known better than his own. The nails were still close-bitten, a habit of which Bilbo had evidently had no more success in breaking him here than he had long ago in the Shire, if indeed he had not long since given up trying. There was the writer's callus on the long second finger, and there... his breath hitched involuntarily as his own dipped into the space where Frodo's third finger should have been. "Sir," he breathed, opening his eyes.
Frodo smiled at him, then drew back, standing and offering his hand once more. This time Sam took it and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. The ground was steady beneath him, the grass cool between his toes. He glanced back at the harbor, slightly embarrassed to find that he had been lying no more than ten feet from the edge of the pier and that his clothes, already somewhat the worse for their long sojourn aboard ship, were now quite liberally spattered with mud and other unidentifiable muck from the shore. Frodo did not seem to mind, however, and giving a tug to the hand to which Sam still clung he pulled him into an embrace, wrapping him in arms which Sam was delighted to find were as warm and solid as his own, and when they let go at last he kissed him gently on the cheek.
"Welcome home," he whispered, and slipping an arm around Sam's shoulders they set out together on the broad path that the Elves had taken, meandering through the trees and rising slowly and steadily over the green hills to the West.
*****
EPILOGUE
*****
It was evening when Frodo and Tom returned to Bywater, and a warm yellow light shone from the windows of Bag End as they rode up the Row. They dismounted at the bottom of the grounds, and Tom took the ponies into the stable as Frodo walked back alone through the garden, fingering the much-folded bit of paper in his pocket. There was no need to read it again; he knew what it said.
The road goes ever on. Follow yours, if you can. I love you all.
Supper was on the table, and Pansy was waiting for him when he came to the door. "Did you find him?"
Frodo shook his head. "He's sailed, just as he always hoped he would. I spoke to Ellie. Frodo of the Ring came for him. He's not coming back."
"But you have."
"Aye, lass," he said, putting his arms around his wife and kissing her. "I've come back."
~~~END~~~
BOOK OF DAYS
by Enya
One day, one night, one moment,
my dreams could be, tomorrow.
One step, one fall, one falter,
east or west, over earth or by ocean.
One way to be my journey,
this way could be my Book of Days.
No day, no night, no moment,
can hold me back from trying.
I'll flag, I'll fall, I'll falter,
I'll find my day may be, Far and Away.
Far and Away.
One day, one night, one moment,
with a dream to believe in.
One step, one fall, one falter,
and a new earth across a wide ocean.
This way became my journey,
this day ends together, Far and Away.
This day ends together, Far and Away.
Far and Away.
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