The dark shape descended on Frodo and sank its talons into his shoulder.
Above him great black wings shut out the moon.
‘Sam! Help me!’ screamed Frodo...
‘Mr. Frodo!’ shouted Sam, coming awake and leaping to his feet.
There was nothing there. All around the dreary marshes stretched
away into the mist, deserted, silent. Overhead the moon, ridged and
pitted like an old skull, leered down on the empty land. A few feet
away Frodo slept quietly. Sam looked anxiously to see if he had woken
him, but finding him still asleep he sighed with relief then sank back
onto the ground and shivering drew his mist-soaked Elven cloak tightly
around him.
The wings of the nightmare still beat in his ears, then resolved into
the pounding of his heart. Like the ripples in a pool when a stone is
thrown the weight of fear spread out and away until Sam breathed easily
again. He rubbed his hand across his eyes. Never had he had bad dreams
at home in the Shire; he could sleep through a thunderstorm, and snore
too. Even when they had set off to Rivendell, and beyond, he had been
able to rest. His dreams had been of home, of The Shire. Again in sleep
he took familiar short-cuts through summer fields, and passed favourite
trees reaching out to touch their bark as if greeting an old friend.
But not any more. Now that thing that was poisoning their days was also
invading their nights, pursuing them even into the land of dreams.
Sam rolled over onto his back and looked up at the sky. The foul mist
exhaled by the rotting weeds and rushes of the marsh obscured the stars
and Sam, deprived of their light, felt a weight on his heart.
‘Things are never as bad as they seem, Samwise!’ said his old Gaffer to
him, when an unexpected frost nipped some cherished cutting Sam had
planted out too soon.
‘Next time cover it with sacking, ninnyhammer!’
‘No amount of sacking will protect us now.’ thought Sam, wondering what his Gaffer would think of this swamp.
‘I always said that lad would come to a bad end!’
‘And I have’ thought Sam ‘in a stinking swamp! Speaking of stinking, where is Stinker?’
Sam sat up and looked around for Gollum.
‘Gone again!’ he thought in exasperation. ‘Off looking for some slimy
crawling thing to eat, no doubt. He’ll be the death of us, I just know
it. But there’s no telling master....’
Sam looked at Frodo and a struggle began in his heart; he knew his
master wanted to be merciful to Gollum, but every day Sam thought he
saw some dangerous glint in the creature’s eye, or an unguarded smirk.
He knew with every fibre of his forthright hobbit nature that this
creature would harm his beloved master. And there was nothing he could
do about it, because Frodo was bent on drawing Gollum to him in
kindness. A bitter flash of envy passed over Sam; he saw clearly in his
mind’s eye Gollum kneeling to Frodoand chanting in that whining,
wheedling voice of his;
‘The Master! The Master of the Precious...’
Then the feeling faded and Sam felt ashamed. After all Frodo had gone
through how could he be jealous of such a miserable creature...
Frodo turned restlessly in his sleep and Sam reached over to pull his
cloak up against the chilly damp. Frodo’s face, pale and wasted, looked
deathly in the white moonlight and the sight of it was like a red hot
blade in Sam’s heart. Tears sprang into his eyes and he dashed them
away impatiently but they came back. Hardly knowing what he was doing
Sam reached into his pack and pushing his hand down to the bottom he
found Galadriel’s gift, the little wooden box of earth enclosing the
Mallorn seed.
At once he felt his grief ease. The wood felt cool at first then warm,
just like a living tree. Without taking it out Sam traced with his
forefinger the raised letter ‘G’ on the lid. He thought, just for one
moment, he heard the West wind in the tops of the Mallorn trees…
Something blotted out the moon. Sam looked up, for a moment confusing
dream and reality. But this was no dream; above, wheeling ponderously,
filling the sky, was the great winged beast of his nightmare. Only this
was no dream...
‘Black Riders!’ shouted Sam in spite of himself, leaping to his feet.
As if it heard the cry, or took it as a summons, the great winged
creature seemed to check its flight and hover, its long neck and small
horned head sweeping the land below as if seeking or smelling out its
prey.
‘Black Riders!’ Sam shouted again but this time to himself as he
scrambled over to Frodo, who seemed unable to wake up. Sam seized his
arm and began to drag him away across the bog, looking wildly about for
some shelter. A long thin cry echoed across the marshes, and as if
roused by it Gollum’s gaunt yellow face appeared above the reeds,
screeching wordlessly at Sam.
‘Shut up, Sneak!’ muttered Sam to himself savagely. He looked down at
Frodo who seemed paralysed and unable to get up and throwing his weight
forward hooked his fingers in Frodo’s Elven cloak and dragged him
towards the only tree in sight, a stunted elder half drowning in a wide
stinking pool.
With his hand on Frodo’s shoulder Sam noticed, despite their danger,
that his master was now little more than bones. His clothes seemed
strangely empty, like graveclothes or the clothes of one who has
recovered from some long illness. Bracing himself for his master’s
weight Sam almost stumbled for Frodo weighed little more than a stand
of wheat hauled at harvest time long ago in that other life in the
Shire.
‘Wraiths!’ wailed Gollum ‘Wraiths on wings!’
‘And you had nothing to do with that, I suppose...’ snarled Sam to
himself. He at last got Frodo under the sparse cover of the elder and
threw himself down beside him. Frodo seemed dazed, only half awake.
Then the Wraith let out a piercing cry and Frodo too cried out and
clutched his shoulder and Sam realised with horror that he was feeling
again in his mind the Witch King of the Nazgul plunge his notched,
poisoned blade into his shoulder. Sam watched helplessly as Frodo saw
once more the tall iron-crowned shapes surrounding him on Weathertop,
their rotting graveclothes billowing out to enclose him as they bore
down to seize the Ring. A pain, like fire in ice, stabbed into Frodo’s
shoulder again. Lord Elrond had healed him, had drawn out the evil from
the wound along with the tip of the broken knife, but such was the
power of this poison that something had remained in Frodo, waiting to
claim him when the dark powers surrounded him... Despite himself Frodo
clutched The Ring and drew it out from under his shirt, his forefinger
seeking the relief of the enchanted space within its gleaming circle...
Elrond ascended the stone staircase silently. His long heavy gown,
brocaded with silver upon deep purple velvet, swept the patterned
pavement of the Observatory. He walked across the inlaid floor to the
viewing balcony where the Seeing-glass stood. He was alone. No-one
sought to read the skies any more; the oncoming doom of Middle Earth
was only too clear to see in the daylight all around. Reluctantly he
looked up; there, where it always was, in the Southern sky, stood the
red star that had shone through Frodo’s window when he had sheltered in
Rivendell. Now the hobbit was gone, but the Red Star shone ever more
bright and baleful, a herald of the doom of men.
Elrond turned away. He clasped the stone rail and looked down into the
dark courtyard far below. The endless music of the fountains of
Rivendell continued, but the great hall was dark; no music played and
no voice recounted in poetry the story of Tinuviel. In the hearts of
all his Elves was only sadness, and the expectation of imminent
departure from Rivendell, the Last Homely House on earth for their kind.
With a sigh Elrond turned back to the lighted room. Spread out on the
map table was the map of Middle Earth, made by the Elves to mirror
their great Map of the Stars. Now it lay in the clear golden light of
the Elven lamps and on it Elrond saw the red line he had drawn with his
own hand marking the route of the Ringbearer into danger. Few knew of
this route, or understood the spidery scratches that were imprinted on
the map. Now Elrond studied the lines and wondered. He grew oblivious
of the room, and the lamps and even the map, smooth and cracked with
age under his hand. He closed his eyes and his lips moved as if he
spoke to himself. Then he put his hand into his gown and drew out a
piece of cloth, black as a night without stars. He placed it on the map
and unrolled it. Inside, dark as the material but glinting
malevolently, was a tiny triangle of metal.
This was the tip of the knife that Elrond had withdrawn, with all his
Elvish healing skill, from Frodo’s shoulder. Sam, watching anxiously,
had seen it disappear into a twist of blue smoke. But Elrond knew that
this was also a weapon of the mind and although it had disappeared it
had not ceased to exist. Elrond had wrapped up the cloth with the dull
mark and kept it. Now, here, even here in the Elven heartland, it had
come to life again. As if unwilling to touch it, Elrond laid it down on
the map, close to the Dead Marshes, and stretched out his hand over it.
Glittering on Elrond’s hand was a great ring, of gold set with a
sapphire whose depths were the blue of the deepest lake and the shining
silver of the brightest fountain. It was the Ring of Air, Vilya,
greatest of the Elven rings. Elrond put his hand out with care, aware
of the power and danger of the Ring. But he had decided, and closing
his eyes he allowed its strength to flow out spreading radiance
throughout the room and beyond..
When Sam threw himself down on the ground he could not move. Terror
fixed him in one place. He tried to look up but the shadow of the
wraith and its winged steed seemed to press him into the earth. Behind
him he heard Gollum whimpering but he had no time to think of that
because beside him on the ground Frodo was losing his fight to stay in
the present. Sam could see his eyes gaze on things invisible to
himself, and then he drew out the Ring and went to put it on.
Sam fought with his own fear, and in desperation thought of the box in
his pack, and of the Lady, and then of Rivendell, and Lord
Elrond..suddenly a shiver passed through him and he felt his strength
return. At once he reached out and seized Frodo’s hand and held it. At
first cold as ice, it grew warm in Sam’s grasp, and then Frodo opened
his eyes and looked up, and around, as if realising where he was.
‘Hold on, Mr. Frodo!’ whispered Sam. Frodo grasped his hand and hung onto it as if it was life itself.
Gradually the great shadow receded, and with a cry flew away towards
Mordor. Sam relaxed his iron grip on Frodo’s hand. His master lay as if
dazed and Sam wanted to leave him there to rest and recover his
bearings, but he knew they had to get away from this place. Gollum
scrambled over to them and gazing at Frodo’s deathly face he put out a
long yellow hand to paw Frodo’s cloak.
‘Master!’
‘Leave him be!’ shouted Sam knocking his hand away and helping Frodo
up. As he did so a voice spoke inside his head, and to his horror Sam
realised it was his own;
‘You can’t save him.’
