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Till We Have Faces  by Antane

In the days that followed, Bilbo and Boromir both witnessed a change in Frodo. Bilbo saw more than once the lad he had loved since birth. There would no true return of that boy, but there would be one in his place who was loved no less, whose light would be even more treasured because of the darkness it had had to come through and understand before it could shine again. There were still shadows but they were fading and no longer enshrouding the light that increasingly shone. There were still wounds but many were no longer bleeding, and scars that had not yet fully healed but they were mending as they were exposed to the light. Boromir who had not known Frodo until the shadows had already begun to gather celebrated the return of the light that only now he could truly appreciate.

But all the remembering and the cleansing that had taken place had also taken a toll on Frodo. Bilbo, upon seeing that his lad was paler than usual, suggested a rest from recalling further adventures. To fill the time, Frodo spent time with his uncle in Elrond’s library and lost themselves for hours in the tales of the Elder Days. As these were written in Quenya, the elder Baggins continued the lessons he had started when Frodo was just a tween. It was remarkable how quickly Frodo picked up the language well enough to haltingly at first, then with more ease, translate the tales into the Common Speech. The years fell away for them both as they absorbed themselves in being together and enjoying the old stories as they had decades before, when the Shadow itself was just part of a tale from long ago.

“Oh, I wish Sam was here!” Frodo sighed. “I remember him talking about Beren and Luthien on the Stairs of Cirith Ungol. He will love this library. It must be the first place I show him when he comes. To be so surrounded by Elves and their history!”

Bilbo chuckled. “I think maybe you should show him his bed first. He’s likely to be as tired as we were when we first came.”

“All right, the second thing. I wish you could see him again, Uncle. It would be then like no time had passed.”

“But pass it has. Even here. I am grateful enough for this time with you, my lad, but I’m afraid you will have to welcome Sam here for me.”

“I will and warm enough for both of us.”

Bilbo smiled. “I have no doubt of that, my boy.”

Frodo turned back to the tales. He did not want to think of his uncle’s passing. “Sam talked about being the same tale Beren was in, and his part was even darker than ours. But Luthien was just as loyal and devoted to him as Sam was to me. She wouldn’t leave him and braved the blackest powers and dungeons to save him, just as Sam wouldn’t leave me and dared to enter Cirith Ungol and go with me to Mordor. And the star of Earendil sheltered Sam and I there. I am glad that he got to see it. He was right. We are in the same story, even now. I am beginning to understand more of my part in it, thanks to the Lady who guides me with her light, just as Sam guided me the first time. I don’t know what I did to deserve such a blessed guardian.”

Bilbo kissed his head. “You were just yourself.”

Frodo smiled and Bilbo’s heart skipped a beat to see such light coming after such darkness.

Other days, Frodo and Boromir went on many tramps throughout the meadows and woods of the island.

“This reminds me so much of the Shire,” Frodo said. “The woods, the fields, the rivers. I could believe I was at home and just over the ridge would be Bag End, and Sam, and Rosie, and little Elanor. And if I walked far enough, I would reach Merry and Pippin at Crickhollow.”

Boromir marveled at the life in his friend’s voice. Certainly Frodo missed his kin, but there was not grief in his voice, but fond memories.

“I could believe this was Ithilien and my brother and his men are just beyond my sight.”

Frodo took Boromir’s hand. “It is good then that we are both surrounded by our families.”

Boromir squeezed his little brother’s hand. “In truth and in seeming.”

“No, not seeming. They are with us truly. We just can’t see them. But we can feel them and that is enough. Don’t you feel Faramir? I do. You are right. This is the Shire and Ithilien.”

“You and Faramir are so much closer to the land and the workings of the heart than I. I am a warrior and used to living among hard stone. I have not known softness except through the two of you and what I remember of my mother.”

“So you don’t feel him near you as he always has been and always will be?”

“I do not think I could bear this exile if I did not have some connection to home. You are that to me. I need the visible to believe in it.”

“Then let us keep walking until you can feel that he is near to us. He is here. You felt him here before, didn’t you? And my brothers are here too. I could not bear this either if I did not know they still surrounded me with their love.”

“I felt him from afar in Gondor, and I wonder even at that. I do not feel him here. He is in my thoughts and his wisdom and his love guide me. I appreciate that more than ever because I will not see him again, unless there may be some way beyond the circles of this world. He believed in such. It comforted him after our mother died. When I thought I was dying, Aragorn said I had conquered. I had a won a battle, not lost one. He had the same sight Faramir did. It must be a great aid for them to face such deadly peril, knowing the end is not the end.”

“I do not know much of such matters,” Frodo said. “I lost my parents so young and though the shadow has long departed from the terrible darkness of those days, I still miss them and have not thought to see them again. But your words comfort me. If such great men such as your brother and our king believe in a world beyond, then it gives me hope as well. Perhaps you will see your mother and father again too.”

“The men of Numenor believed such before the Nameless Enemy came and corrupted them and brought the fear of death to them, rather than the trustful surrender of life that their ancestors had before. I had not given much thought to it, but I know Faramir has, perhaps because he was younger than I when our mother died, though I was but a lad myself. But he had a more sensitive heart and was more attune to the invisible world than I. He believed in the Powers, but I truly believed only now, because I saw one of them in that Lady who came to you.”

“I knew of them from Bilbo telling me of the tales of the Elves. Before we left Middle-earth, he asked me to help him with arranging what he had managed to transcribe of them. It was a task still not complete when we left. Perhaps Sam will finish it. I am realizing now how much the Powers were part of the story that we were all in. We are lucky, Boromir, luckier than most any mortal that has lived, for they brought us here and we have seen them with our own eyes.”





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