Chapter 8: Darkness and Light

Bilbo was already waiting anxiously when Arwen carried Frodo in and placed him on a bed in a large, circular room. Immediately Elrond moved forward, with Bilbo like a shadow beside him. The hobbit looked stricken at his nephew’s condition. Frodo was very pale. His breath came in short, desperate gasps. His eyes were wide open but stared into nothing but horror and terror. His entire body shivered violently.

“Hold on, Frodo,” Bilbo begged softly. “You have to. You just have to.”

“What can I do?” he said, staring up at Elrond as the Elf lord started his examination.

“Take off his cloak and shirt,” Elrond instructed as Arwen stoked a fire that was already burning.

Bilbo did as he was told, frightened by the cold of Frodo’s body. He stopped short when he saw the Ring around his nephew’s neck. Mesmerized by the allure of it and hearing its whisper again in his mind, all other concerns faded. Almost involuntarily, Bilbo reached out for it, but then Elrond took it from around Frodo’s neck with a cloth in his hand to keep from touching it and placed it in a small black box. The elderly hobbit had to restrain himself from lunging after it.

“I need your help, little master,” the Elf lord said not unkindly as Bilbo continued to stare after his prized possession. “Frodo needs your help.”

Bilbo tore his gaze away and looked into the stern eyes of the ancient Elf and nodded. He kept Frodo in an upright position as Elrond pressed his hands against the injured hobbit’s chest and spoke softly, but forcefully, in the Elvish tongue. Slowly, much too slowly for Bilbo, Frodo’s breathing eased some. It was still labored, but he was no longer in danger of suffocating. His eyes closed and he sank back against Bilbo’s arms, still shivering.

“Put this on him and get him under the blankets,” Elrond said, handing Bilbo a long, loose nightshirt.

After removing his nephew’s breeches, Bilbo put the nightgown on him and then piled him under as many blankets as he could. He touched Frodo’s cheek and squeezed his hand. “I’m so sorry, my dear boy, so sorry,” he murmured. “But you’ll be all right. You have to be.”

Arwen returned carrying a hot, wet cloth to bathe Frodo’s wounds.

“He is going to be all right, isn’t he?” Bilbo asked fearfully. “I will never forgive myself if he dies. I should have never picked up the Ring.”

“Have faith, little one,” Elrond said as he removed the binding around the wounds and made his initial examination of the injuries. Both were closed and very cold, the shoulder white, the thigh red and blackened. “Elven magic, as you call it, lives still and we must trust it will be enough or we will all be lost.”

“It will be enough,” Bilbo said, then he moved far enough away not to interfere with the Elves, but close enough to be near his nephew.

As gently as he could Elrond opened the shoulder wound and probed it with his fingers. Frodo tossed his head back and forth, moaning in pain. Elrond nodded to his daughter and she cleaned the wound with water from a spring that was renowned throughout Elvendom for its healing properties. Frodo murmured further as the water spread into his wounds. Once they were done, Arwen took the cloths that had been used and burned them, then returned.

She stared up anxiously at her father who glanced at her for a moment before continuing his work. Arwen saw how grave he looked, the fears in his eyes that he rarely showed, then she looked back to Frodo. She knelt down at the stricken hobbit’s side and stroked his forehead as he continued to toss in his delirium. “Shhh, mell min,” she said softly, trying to calm him so her father could work better. She spoke and sang soothingly to him at length in Sindarin, trying to defeat her own fears through comforting her friend. The mere sound of her voice seemed to bring some peace to Frodo, even if he couldn’t understand all the words, or even be fully aware who was speaking to him. It comforted Bilbo as well, who was soon asleep in a chair next to his nephew.

Shortly before dawn, she fell asleep at Frodo’s side, her head against the side of the bed, his hand in hers. Elrond stopped his work for a moment, loving his daughter more than ever for how devoted she had been throughout the night and lifted her gently from the floor, murmuring for her that it was time for her and Bilbo to go to their own beds for a while. She sleepily replied, took the slumbering Bilbo in her arms and went off only a few minutes before there was a commotion outside the door and Elrond looked up from his work to see three very anxious hobbits crowded at the threshold.

“How is he?” asked all three breathlessly at once.

Elrond stood. “The shoulder wound is deep, but not so much his leg. Once the tips of the blades are found, he should recover. I’ve been able to stop the damage to his lungs from growing worse.”

The three exhaled a joint breath in relief. “What can we do?” they asked, again in unison.

Elrond smiled faintly. “The darkness still draws him as long as the tips remains in him. Right now, just be with him, keep him anchored in the light. I will tell you more as I need you.”

Sam pushed forward first, dropped to his knees at his master's bedside and took one of Frodo’s hands. It was so cold, but Elrond watched as Sam held it against his heart as though that alone could warm it. Against all the Elf lord knew, he had no doubt it would. Merry and Pippin also crowded close, Pippin taking Frodo’s other hand.

Sam leaned near his master’s ear. “I’m here, dear,” he said. “Merry and Pippin are too and though I haven’t seen him yet, I don’t doubt Mr. Bilbo is too. Just stay with us. Please.”

Frodo murmured and tossed in his delirium. Sam bit his lower lip trying to keep from crying, but soon gave it up. Merry and Pippin hadn’t even tried. Elrond continued his ministrations, gravely noting the words that Frodo spoke, though no one else understood the Black Speech.

“Please come back,” Pippin said. He stroked his cousin’s cheek. “Please, Frodo, come back.”

Frodo did not respond. “He’s so cold,” the tween said and looked up frightened at Merry who looked nearly as scared.

“Just keep talking to him, Master Peregrin,” Elrond said. “You, too, Masters Meriadoc and Samwise. Such beloved voices will help him find his way back.”

Pippin bit his lip to keep from crying. He continued to stroke Frodo’s cheek. “You have to come back, Frodo. You wouldn’t want to miss my party when I’m of age, would you? We’ve been planning it for years and you’ve already promised that it would be even better than Cousin Bilbo’s eleventy first. And then there’s Gandalf’s fireworks and Sam’s flowers and Merry’s...” His voice broke off. Pippin took a deep breath to calm himself, then started again. “And Merry’s hugs. They can choke the breath right out you, can’t they? But aren’t they wonderful? You wouldn’t want to never feel those again, would you? The best hugs in the world, besides yours, of course. I want to be hugged again, Frodo. Please wake up. I need you.”

No response. Pippin looked up at Merry again and the elder hobbit held the tween around the shoulders.

“I need you, too, dear,” Sam told his master. “Please come back. Don’t leave us here alone. This is a most marvelous place, but I will hate it if you die here. It’s not right for you to be like this, not again. Please, you have to be all right.”

The hobbit looked up the Elf lord for confirmation. “Keep talking, Master Samwise. You have ever been his guide throughout this. Be a light for him to follow in his present darkness.”

So Sam talked about his wonder of the Elves, recited entire poems and sagas he had memorized as a child or heard from Bilbo, recounted stories of adventures that he and Frodo had made up as children while walking around the Shire, pretending to be great knights fighting dragons, pretending to be Bilbo, anything he could think of as he gently stroked his master’s forehead, to let him that he was not alone, that his Sam was near. He kept talking as cheerfully as he could as Elrond worked around him silently, to give his beloved master some grounding, a way back from whatever held him bound. When the gardener couldn’t hold back the tears that sometimes threatened to choke off his voice, he stopped speaking so Frodo wouldn’t hear his fears and instead stroked his friend’s face, hands or arms, all the while trying to ignore how cold Frodo was, so that the elder hobbit would know that even if his voice had stilled, his Sam had not left him.

Aragorn came in quietly and stood at the door, just listening to Sam. Merry and Pippin were resting in a corner. The king smiled at the tenderness of Sam’s words and touch. “Why don’t you sing to him?” he suggested.

Sam looked up, startled, and blushed. “I don’t know if I could sing here,” he said. “I’m just a simple gardener. These Elves have much grander voices than I do. Have you heard them, Strider? The most beautiful sounds you have ever heard.” He looked back to his beloved master. “Besides his, of course.”

The king smiled. “I have heard them,” he said softly and Sam knew many memories had been evoked from that simple question.

“You may think you are nothing, Sam,” Aragorn said when he returned from his memories, “but you are everything to Frodo and your voice would be the most beautiful one for him to hear, as I am sure he is already listening to you, if only a-far off. Go ahead, let him hear that lullaby again and know that there is nothing to be afraid of.”

Sam looked down at his silent, still master and at Elrond who looked up at him briefly. “My foster son is right, Master Samwise. I would be pleased to hear your song as well.”

Sam blushed deeper. “Well, a lullaby wouldn’t be quite right now. Maybe one of Bilbo’s songs or one Frodo himself sang.” He thought for a moment then began softly,

“O! Wanderer in the shadowed land

despair not! For though dark they stand,

all woods there must be an end at last,

and see the open sun go past;

the setting sun, the rising sun,

the day’s end, or the day begun.

For east or west all woods must fail...”

When he was done, Elrond looked at him. “That was very good,” he said gravely and Sam blushed to the roots of his hair. Aragorn smiled in quiet pride. To cover his embarrassment, Sam looked hopefully at Frodo’s face for any sign that he had been heard. He thought he saw Frodo’s eyes move slightly under their closed lids, and his heart grabbed at that tiny hope, but then Frodo was still again.

Sam longed to take him into his arms, to give him some extra warmth and comfort. He looked up at Elrond with pleading eyes. “Please, Mr. Elrond, sir, could I hold him? He’s so cold. Maybe...”

He broke off as Elrond looked up from his work and Sam had to fight not to squirm under that uncompromising gaze. “I’m sorry, Master Samwise, but until those shards are found, he shouldn’t be moved any more than necessary.”

Merry and Pippin came to their cousin’s side in time to hear that. Sam bit his lip in sudden fear. “We held him the whole time getting here. Did we hurt him?” Pippin asked in a very small, frightened voice.

The Elf looked sympathetically at the worried hobbits. “No, you didn’t. But I’d rather he be still.”

The three hobbits released one unified breath of relief. “But that’s the problem, isn’t it?” Sam asked, looking down at his master. “He’s so still.”

Elrond’s features softened further, trying to calm the fears that rose again in the three. “He’s fighting a great battle and he needs to concentrate on that.”

“Then should we even be talking to him?” Pippin asked.

“Keep talking,” Elrond encouraged. “Remind him why he’s fighting. As soon as you can hold him, I will tell you. I’m sure he would welcome that.”

The three hobbits smiled at that and they all started talking at once. Elrond smiled faintly, Aragorn more widely.

After some time, Elrond looked at Sam. “Why don’t you get some sleep, Master Samwise?” he suggested gently.

Sam looked up at him. He felt deadened by exhaustion, held up just by sheer will, but he didn’t want to leave his master’s side. Merry touched his shoulder. Sam looked at him.

“I will make sure nothing happens to him, Sam,” he promised. “He will be, I hope, in even better condition when you wake.”

Sam looked at Merry hopefully, then at Elrond. “Thank you for all you are doing, Mr. Elrond, sir,” he said.

Elrond nodded with a grave smile. “Sleep well.”

Sam wearily propped himself up alongside Frodo’s bed and closed his eyes. His head drooped and he began softly snoring almost immediately. Merry and Pippin kept their cousin company, talking, singing, holding Frodo’s hand, trying to keep their tears and fears at bay as Elrond continued to work.

Aragorn listened as his foster father spoke the Elvish healing invocations that made Elrond the foremost healer among his people. The king smiled as he remembered much less potent ones being spoken over himself in his childhood for the occasional broken bone or other mishap. His smile become more wide and tender as he watched the hobbits at their vigil.

Elrond looked up gravely and looked at Pippin. “Master Peregrin, Frodo needs to be kept hydrated. Estel can help you.”

Aragorn stepped forward. Merry looked up at him quizzically. “How many names do you have?”

The king smiled. “I’ve worn many masks in my life,” he said. He came to Frodo’s bedside and gently lifted the stricken hobbit to a sitting position. He placed a towel over the nightshirt to protect it from spills and looked at three hobbits. “Now one of you sit behind him to support him so you can give him a drink that he won’t choke on.”

Pippin rushed forward. He held his oldest cousin tenderly in his arms, holding Frodo’s lolling head against his shoulder and holding a cup of water to the unconscious hobbit’s lips. Merry opened Frodo’s mouth gently and Pippin slipped in the water. At first, it only dribbled out again, dripping down his chin onto the towel.

“Stroke his throat, Merry, that will help stimulate swallowing,” Aragorn suggested.

Merry did so gently as Pippin tried giving more water slowly. Frodo coughed a little but it went down and thus encouraged, Pippin poured more in. When Frodo had successfully swallowed the whole cup after several minutes and only one more spill, the two cousins smiled.

“Lay him down again, Pippin,” Aragorn said after a look at his foster-father nodded in response to the question in his eyes.

The tween looked beseechingly at his friend. “Can’t I keep holding him? He’s so cold.”

“Elrond knows what is best, Pippin. You can hold him again later if you wish when he needs to have another drink.”

The youngster looked disappointed, but kissed Frodo’s forehead then gently laid his cousin back down and pulled up the covers as far as he could and still give Elrond room to work. “You’ll get better, Frodo,” he said softly. “I know you will.”

* * *

Over the next two days, each morning and each night, Frodo’s head received four separate kisses in greeting or farewell and looked for any response and turned away in disappointment, biting lips to keep from crying or not even resisting the tears at times. Elrond continued to probe the stricken hobbit’s shoulder for the shard he knew was steadily working its way to Frodo’s heart.

Merry and Pippin slept on a separate bed, out of the way, unwilling to leave their beloved cousin, but having been gently told to get some sleep from Elrond who saw how tired they were. Sam remained kneeling at his master’s side, just as exhausted, but even more unwilling to leave Frodo’s side. Bilbo dozed on and off in a chair near the bedside.

“It’s all right, my dear, it’s all right,” Sam said over and over again, at times stroking his master’s forehead which remained frighteningly cold, but he thought it was warming slowly as was the hand he still held. “Just hold on and everything will be fine.”

He wasn’t sure whether Frodo could hear him or not or whether he was saying it more to convince himself. His master still looked very pale. He opened his eyes sometimes, but didn’t seem to be aware of where he was. He continued to moan and murmur in a language that Sam didn’t understand. The young hobbit sang softly as he wiped at the tears that slowly tracked down Frodo’s cheeks.

“Sleep now, master dear,

Close your weary eyes;

Soon night will be o’er,

And the sun shall rise.

Fear not, for I am nigh

To dry all your tears.

“Sleep now, and when you wake,

I will be here.

Rest now, master dear,

Do not be afraid;

All the dark night through

Beside you I will stay.

Lie still, safe with me

While I my vigil keep;

I’ll be here till you wake

To watch while you sleep.”

The younger hobbit looked often at Elrond for clues to Frodo’s condition, but the Elf looked as grave as ever. Well, he always looks that way, Sam told himself in an effort to comfort himself and allay his fear. He didn’t look much at Bilbo’s face whose grief-stricken features only magnified his fears and pain.

Bilbo woke at Sam’s soft voice and he and the Elf lord exchanged a faint smile and then Elrond went back to work and Bilbo moved his chair closer to Frodo and took his hand.

“Hold on, Frodo,” he said softly. “Just keep fighting and come back to us.”

 * * *

Sam woke in the morning shortly after dawn when he heard his master moan.  He saw that Elrond had his fingers deep into Frodo's shoulder wound. The skin around the area was stained brown which Bilbo said quietly was from a liquid that was supposed to help deaden the pain, but Sam wondered how much it was working since Frodo continued to moan and toss his head, occasionally whimpering in pain. Sam bit his lip against that heartache and the plea to stop hurting his master that instinctively rose from his throat. He knew the Elf wasn’t deliberately hurting his friend. He resumed his vigil on his knees and held his master’s hand. He was frightened by what he saw, Elrond’s bloody hands probing an even bloodier wound, but Sam was determined to be there for his beloved friend. As the probing continued, Frodo’s hand tightened painfully around Sam’s, but Sam did not let go. He blinked back tears as his master’s moans and soft cries became more frequent, then with a liquid sucking noise, Elrond pulled out the bladetip. Frodo arched his back and gave a great cry as it was pulled out. His eyes opened for a moment, looked around frantically and found Sam looking at him. Frodo looked at him fearfully. “Sa...”

Sam laughed and cried to see those pain-glazed, but aware, eyes look back at him. “It’s all right, dear,” he said as he stroked his master’s forehead and wiped at the tears that streaked down Frodo’s cheeks. “It’s all right. You’re going to be fine.”

Merry and Pippin woke at their cousin’s cry and ran over to him. Bilbo was already beside his nephew. The tween paled and turned slightly green at seeing the bloody tip that Elrond had placed on a cloth, then swallowed loudly seeing Frodo’s even bloodier shoulder. Merry held his cousin’s arm, ostensibly to steady him, but since the Elf noticed that he looked only little less pale than Pippin, he wondered who was really steadying who.

Frodo didn’t seem to be aware of any of them. He continued to look at his friend. “Why are you laughing, Sam?” Frodo whispered as Elrond re-bandaged his shoulder.

“Because I’m so happy to see you awake, me dear.”

“I’m very glad to see you, too, Sam. Why are you crying then?”

Sam laughed a little more. “Because I couldn’t decide which to do after seeing you open your eyes after I was so afraid you never would again, so I decided to do both.”

Frodo would have laughed if he had had the strength, but it came out only as a sigh and a quick twitch at the sides of his mouth. “My dear Sam...,” he murmured.

At that Sam cried again. “I was so afraid I would never hear you call me that again.”

Frodo started to raise his hand to wipe at his dear friend’s tears, but didn’t have the strength to continue. Seeing that, Sam took his master’s hand in his, kissed it and raised it to his face. Frodo’s fingers lightly brushed away the tears.

“It’s all right, my Sam,” he said softly. “I’m not going to leave you. Who would take care of you if I did?”

Sam smiled, laughed and cried all over all again at his beloved master’s reassurances and gentle teasing. Frodo closed his eyes again.

Elrond approached with a small liquid-filled bowl. “He needs to eat,” he told Sam. “Can you feed him? You can hold him now.”

The young hobbit looked up at the Elf. “Yes, sir!” he said eagerly. He crawled onto the bed and very gently took his master into his arms, supporting Frodo’s back against his chest. “Can you stay awake a little longer, dear, so I can feed you? Please? You need to start getting your strength back.”

“I’m so tired, Sam,” Frodo said, his words slurring in his fatigue.

“I know, dear, I know. I’m that ready to drop off myself. But we’ve got to get something into you so you can start to recover more quickly.” Sam bit off the thought of what they had to do once Frodo did recover. “Just a little bit longer, then you can sleep. All right? Just a little while.”

Frodo nodded and Sam smiled. With one arm supporting his master, he reached with the other for the spoon in a bowl on a table next to the bed. It was a warm broth with crushed lembas bread. Frodo didn’t open his eyes, but Bilbo, Merry and Pippin watched with growing pleasure as he obediently swallowed each spoonful that Sam brought to his lips until after a quarter-hour, he couldn’t fight his fatigue anymore. He closed his mouth and turned his head when he felt the spoon against his lips again.

“Come on, dear,” Sam encouraged gently. “You’ve done so well. Just one more sip. And then you’re all done. Just one more for your Sam. Can you do that? Please?”

“Yes, Sam, for you.”

Frodo’s mouth opened slightly and Sam tipped the last spoonful in, then wiped at the edges of his master’s mouth.

“All right, that’s it.”

“Thank you, Sam,” Frodo breathed, then surrendered to his fatigue. He curled around his guardian as a child would around his parent.

Sam looked up at Elrond, his eyes seeking permission to keep holding Frodo. Elrond nodded and Sam carefully lay down with his beloved master. "Sleep well, dear," he murmured as he kissed Frodo’s forehead and then closed his own eyes. "You’ll be better in no time."

Elrond looked at the other three hobbits. "We’ll let him sleep for a few hours, then we must open his leg and find the shard there. He is not out of danger out yet."

A/N: The first song Sam sang goes once more to the credit of the master who translated those songs for us, from Fellowship of the Ring. The second is courtesy of Queen Galadriel. Thank you, my dear!