"Ill Omens" by Tialys

Frodo’s childhood nightmares may hold the key to his future. Written for Marigold’s Challenge #6.

It was starting again. He tried to scream out and pull himself from the nightmare, but his eyes were already closing in the unavoidable pull of exhaustion. He would sleep – and he would dream.

It always began the same way; becoming such a repetitive sensation that he had to wonder why he could not predict the slips into nightmare by now and stop them from coming. The faint cold would tingle at the back of his neck, then creep over his limbs until he could not even raise a finger in protest. Only after its captive was numb would it crawl into his eyes, kiss them coldly and command its prisoner, ‘Sleep’.

The nightmare would then run its course. The dark, velvet-black cave of midnights past would waver into focus and the small gasp of a breeze would brush his cloak in tender farewell. Following the beckoning echo of a tiny voice before him, he would stumble deeper into the blackness, mind afire at the hidden knowledge that he was walking further into hell.

This time, and all times, though he tried to forget them, he knew he was followed. Even the first time the nightmare visited his dreams he could sense the giant hulk creeping along the cave floor behind him. As the nightmare commanded, the ability to turn and face his stalker fell beyond the movement of his freezing limbs and he could only stagger forward in the swaying march the nightmare set for him.

He winced in the anticipation of the pain to come, curling up tighter in the sweat-soaked sheets and clamping his eyes shut. It always happened like this, a realization that dawned anew on him each time the dream reached this point.

The expected, acid-like gurgle sounded quietly behind him, purring gently into his ear as he grimaced and tensed, and then it came.

The sharp pain at his nape blinded him for a moment. Springing up in his bed, fumbling for something solid to grasp and free himself from the nightmare, a sharp, high scream ripped from his throat as 10 year-old Frodo Baggins called blindly into the night.

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"You called for someone, dear," Primula Baggins pressed, "just before you woke up. Do you remember?"

Frodo shifted uneasily in his chair and resolutely shook his head ‘no’, his eyes failing to rise and meet the gazes of his parents.

The family was seated at breakfast, an array of dishes laid about the tablecloth in hopes of tempting Frodo’s rather picky appetite – though the talk of his latest nightmare was rapidly driving the desire for food from the poor, squirming hobbit. Drogo Baggins turned in question to his wife, as he had slept blissfully through his son’s latest nightly screams.

Primula shook her head in warning and focused back on her son and the awaited answer to her query.

"Frodo?"

"I don’t know who he is, really!"

Frodo had shouted the words so suddenly that both his parents jumped in surprise.

"I heard myself say it before but I don’t know him! I don’t know anyone named that!"

Desperately trying to comfort her child, Primula slid quickly off her chair to kneel next to Frodo but her son was already panicking and paid no attention to his mother.

"I’m sorry!" He wailed, tears pricking his eyes, which were locked on Primula in desperation, pleading for her to understand. "I tried to stop, but I keep calling him when I have that nightmare and I don’t know who he is!"

At a loss for another course of action, Primula wrapped her arms tight around her son, burying his face in her shoulder and continuing her feeble attempts at calming him until his sobs ended. Over Frodo’s shoulder, Primula caught her husband’s eye in an exchanged look of wonder and loss.

His voice breaking tediously through the sudden silence of the room, Drogo cleared his throat softly and whispered, "Who, son?"

Frodo shook his head, burying it deeper into Primula’s shoulder, and finally sighing in defeat, whispered the last word he would speak for the remainder of that day.

"Sam."

June 15, 2004