1.  Hollow

Weathertop
The wind blows cold here,
Setting the ruins to a lonely moaning.
A tower falls, drawn back into the forgetful earth slowly,
Yellow grasses clinging, climbing the grey stones,
Older than old, desolate watchpost to the sky.
These wild lands; this empty stillness
So breathless under unseen eyes.

Silently
They lie in waiting
Beneath these ragged, windswept trees.
Cold and unseen, as ancient bones within a burial mound
Lie covered by thatch and mouldered leaves.
Gracious autumn has turned ice-deadened,
Sodden leaf-drifts no sounds make,
Only the still movements of the dead.

Fading sun
In setting, pulling down
The last shredded remnants of peace.
Shivering innocence curls around its impotent fire,
Willing small flags of light to protect.
Another flame, cold, smoulders near.
Black is the night beyond the hollow;
Black the dell beneath

Weathertop.

-

2. Dark Under the Dell

"I durst not go beyond this dell for any money..."

My hand aches;
Trembles flames before my eyes,
Bark crumbling from the brand beneath my fingers.
Sparks shatter over my arm, yet I feel so terribly...terribly cold.
Our watchful ring of fire faces outward under this pale sliver of moon.
A meaningless boundary, this dell...
Our only hope a frail boundary of fire.

Beyond the frail touch of light, they drift up... shadows;
Dark holes torn in the warm fabric of night.
Unnatural. Drawn from another age, another war.
Desolate and malignant,
They are coming
For me.

Fear assails me, returning to clutch at my throat,
Pounds in my chest.
Suddenly alone, all illusive comforts swept away in a maelstrom.
Foreign to mine, another Will forces me down,
Drags me down to a fearful place.
I cannot do
Otherwise
Than to obey its
Desires,
And if it desires
My death,

Even to that end I am taken, slowly,  inexorably.
My own will scrabbles in vain for shreds of sanity with bloodied fingers,
I would defy them, I must.

Fire of brand behind me, fire of blade before,
Yet no light of living world can reach me,
Neither
Could they help me now.

-

3. Put It On

Pressing in upon me, a will bids me
Obey.
Put on the Ring.
No;
I remember
The barrow was dark,
I know
My counselor was wise...
Put it on.
No;
I should not,
Cannot, will not...
Put it on.
My eyes close against this darkness,
But it is inside me,
Behind my eyes.
In my mind, beating at my heart.
The pressure is
Unbearable.
My hand moves -
Strangely detached, slowly
I feel the tug of the chain being
Drawn out.
No!
Put on the Ring.
No, you will not...
I...mustn't...

I...

Put

It

On.

-

4. The Glory of Shadows

Such a terrible glory, the glory of shadows;
The glory of unending death.
Standing before me with burning empty eyes
Insatiable desire consuming;
The bondage of Tantalus,
Its own hated covenant signified upon my hand.
To Mordor they will take me.

Such a terrible glory, the glory of shadows
The glory of unending death.
It glints upon the blade; and though
My own blade flickers with fire,
This cold it cannot touch.
Blackness presses in upon mind and soul,
Blackness shines about me.
A silver crown mocks the brevity of
Living power and authority, a silver be-ringed
Claw to hold the imprisoned, tormented shreds of
What was once a man.
He also bore a Ring.

A terrible glory, the glory of shadows
The glory of unending death
Burning golden upon my shaking hand.
No! I will not stay to be slaughtered,
Taken like some unthinking animal, trapped.
My will surges up within me,
I awake from black dreams as
Every fiber of my being rebels against it.
To strike at my death before it claims me, I move,
Though my blade burns away in black shadow and smoke.

The hands of the king are the hands of death.
And though he pierce me,
I will clench my fist upon our treasure and
Will not let go.

-

5. Fading Away

Where has he gone, the Pale King?
Where has he gone?
An empty cloak;
Gone into shadow.

Your master soon will follow him, Sam;
Pierced he was by a
Cold that fire cannot warm, an
Ice that eats as acid to the depths of his soul.

What will become of my Master?
He is silent, shivering in the dark.
Life has drained from his arm and he
Fades away by my side.
Each day straying a little more
In emptiness.
Each night he tells me it
Grows a little darker,
Tells me he prefers the night, which is
Less empty.
He is leaving me, pulled into this
Mist alone.
Pulled by some evil tide
To some terrible place where I cannot follow.
My hand steadies him,
And I feel him tremble under it.
Closing his eyes in vain against
Some horror carried within
.
Another day is ending,
Where will we find our hope?

-

6. Becoming Like Them

My heart beats too slowly in the cold emptiness.
How I hate this twilight mist
Bleeding all color from the world.
Such an empty meaningless death,
A winter with no hope of spring.
The frost lies so heavily in my arm and side.
This sharp, killing frost.
All life will lie twisted and limp under the dull glitter
Of its embrace
Until all warmth is but a memory.

It is trying to claim me.
Under this frost the ember of my heart yet flares.

Grant that I may have
Courage beyond duty, valor beyond fear;
To die fighting, to spend my last fading strength
Striking out at sure death
Even as it closes in to cage me.

This cold burning;
Far more terrible than fire.
Metal burns away as wood;
My life will burn away, is burning away -
Until I am only smoke.  They are burning me away
With ice, my body falling away like ash
To leave naught but mist,
A grieving, sorrowing winter breath upon the wind.
Drifting into the darkness.
Can any man recall his breath?
Once spent, it slips away on the night wind
Forever.

I tried, Gandalf. I tried, Strider.
I tried, Sam....
Dear Bilbo....
But all of you are lost to me in this unreality.
Lost...
Only they are real to me anymore.

I am becoming
Like them.

-