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A Long and Weary Way  by Canafinwe

Chapter XXI: The Safer Path

Progress through the mountains was slow. Though the pain in his arm was lessened and his other limbs were no longer so unsteady, the fever still smouldered in Aragorn's breast, threatening at any moment to flare up again and overcome him entirely. He could not walk more than four or five hours without a halt, and his pace was not what it ought to be. Every hour's delay filled him with dread: he had counted on the passage of the mountains to give him a strong lead over an enemy that would either have to toil behind with less-than-Elven agility, or else circle around the Emyn Muil – a journey of five or six days at least. Now he feared there was little hope of avoiding an encounter with those who pursued the creature in his keeping: inevitably they would close the gap and overtake him.

Despite this mounting fear, Aragorn took some small comfort from the fact that he seemed to be making progress with his captive. Want of food and water was beginning to tell on Gollum. There was a glassy look to his great eyes now, and the hollows of his face seemed more pronounced. More telling still was his behaviour. He no longer fought when his keeper bound his hands and feet, and though he obdurately refused to offer assurance that he would not bite, his rejection of Aragorn's oft-repeated offer to remove the gag grew slower every time.

He seemed to be near to capitulating, and Aragorn hoped that he would do so soon, while there was still something to give him. Thought the occasional north-flowing spring kept the Ranger well supplied with water, the dried meat of the Men of Ithilien was all but gone. Aragorn had little appetite, for fever quelled the desire for food, but even so he had to eat a little each day. His stores would not last long.

Dusk was gathering over lands deeply shadowed by gravid clouds when Aragorn came at last to the summit of the last great foothill of the Emyn Muil. He halted, breathless from his climb, and as his arm eased its throbbing and his chest stopped its heaving he looked out across the land. Below him lay low, rolling humps of earth covered over with last year's grey-hued grasses, now dead and withered. Beyond that, dun-tinted plains stretched out to meet the horizon, North, East and Weest. Here and there a scrubby clutch of trees could be seen, black blotches on the winter landscapes. There was a stream like a pale ribbon in the distance, running doubtless to Anduin far away.

The time had come to choose his course. Eastward Aragorn sent only the most cursory of glances. There was nothing at all in those empty lands until one came at last to the borders of distant Rhûn. Then away to the north he cast his eyes. There the plain stretched off towards a fading horizon, upon which Aragorn half imagined he could see the first dark fringes of Mirkwood. That was impossible, he knew, for the forest lay yet many leagues from where he now stood.

Perhaps it was an irrational anxiety born of the lingering fever, or merely the unhappy construct of a weary spirit over-burdened with sights of darkness and dread, but it seemed he could feel the oppressive shadow of Dol Guldur bearing down upon the land. A cold shiver coursed up his spine. Four hundred miles lay stretched between this stony hill and Thranduil's halls: all the length of Rhovanion. Pursued from behind and hobbled by his conspicuous prisoner, Aragorn could scarcely hope to escape the notice of the servants of the Nazgûl. In some lonely place he would find himself caught between the huntsmen of Mordor and the sentries of Dol Guldur. What fate would then await him he dared not guess.

With a shudder he turned to the West. Thither lay the safer path: over Anduin and north in the shadow of the Hithaeglir, fording Limlight and Celebrant and Gladden until he came at last to the Old Ford. Then finally a desperate push eastward again, in the hope he could reach Thranduil before his enemies overtook him. Once he was across the river he had little to fear from the Ringwraiths, at least, for they would not risk its crossing to pursue a nameless vagrant and a craven escapee. Orcs would find a way if so driven, but that would take time. Provided that Aragorn could coax a faster pace out of his body and his prisoner once they reached less hostile terrain, he might stand a chance of reaching more familiar territory.

Despite its merits, the plan filled him with a sinking dismay. Safer that road might be, but it would double the distance he had to travel. Eight hundred miles made an onerous journey to cover under the best of circumstances. Weakened as he was, wounded, feverish, exhausted; clad in rags and without supplies, the thought of dragging an uncooperative captive over such a vast distance into winter weather was a task bordering on the impossible.

Aragorn had to fight the urge to sink to his knees, knowing how hard it would be to rise again. He had no choice. The shorter road was fraught with peril. Only if he could disappear into the woodlands and hills west of Anduin did he have any hope of reaching his destination. Looking down at Gollum, who was glaring at the dirt beneath his long toes, Aragorn swallowed painfully as if by doing so he could beat back the mounting despair. There was nothing to be gained from dwelling on the enormity of the task at hand. If he was going to survive, he had to control himself. He had to focus only on today's struggles, and let tomorrow bring what it may. Therefore he did the only thing that he could do, in the circumstances.

Nudging Gollum so that he moved into a position conducive to forward movement, Aragorn began to walk.

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That day and the next, Aragorn moved at a marginally faster pace. He was too weary and ill to accurately gauge the distance he was covering, but he knew that he was still moving too slowly, for Gollum had no difficulty keeping up. At dusk on the second day he reached the banks of the west-flowing stream, and there he halted, easing his tired body down beside the water. Gollum, making eager, unpleasant noises through his nose, scrambled down the bank and plunged his face into the brook, sucking and slurping as he tried to drink in spite of the gag. Watching him numbly, Aragorn felt a tug of guilt before he reminded himself that Gollum had been given ample opportunity to cooperate.

While his prisoner was thus occupied, Aragorn drank a little and bathed his face. Then he unwrapped his arm and examined the bites. The wounds were still suppurating, but the inflammation was much reduced and the pus was not so purulent. Satisfied, he washed them and cleaned the strips of cloth, and then bandaged his hurts again.

The effort proved less exhausting than he had feared, which was a sign that his health was improving. Indeed, he could feel for the first time in many days the restive stirrings of hunger creeping through his viscera. Though he had a few strips of meat left in his pack, Aragorn cast about for signs of edible fauna among the scant vegetation that clung to the creek bed. There was nothing within arm's reach, and so he crept a few yards downstream, dragging a reluctant Gollum after him. There, in the mud by the water-side, he found the toppled stalks of a clump of bulrushes.

A ghost of a smile tugged at Aragorn's lips and he did not doubt that his joy showed in his eyes. The rushes were rotting in the river mud, and the brown seed heads that tasted so sweet in early summer lay dry and useless on the rocks, but as he dug hastily into the river bed his fingers closed upon the head of a root. Eagerly he unearthed it, and then sought for the next one. The soft, sodden earth gave way with little difficulty, and his small heap of treasure grew. He was aware of Gollum's perplexed gawking, but he heeded it not. He worked with more fervour than he would have thought himself capable of, and he had to make a conscious effort to stay his searching hand before he had denuded the patch entirely. He left half a dozen of the plants where they were, to grow and reseed the river bank against the need of some other unhappy wanderer, should any chance this way in later years.

With greedy eyes he surveyed the fruits of his labour. The spindly, fibrous tangles were choked with mud, and did not look especially appetizing to the untrained eye, but the sight of the amassed roots eased Aragorn's anxieties considerably. Bulrush roots contained a starchy pulp that could be gnawed from the heavy fibres, or soaked out of broken pieces. It could even be made into a flour of sorts, though that was a labour-intensive process that was not worth the effort – especially when one had no fat for baking, nor safety enough to chance a fire. These roots would sustain him for a week or more, he thought triumphantly. Then he cast a sidelong glance at his prisoner and amended his estimate. It was enough to keep two fed for four days.

'Are you hungry enough to behave yourself?' he asked, trying to ignore the harsh timbre of his voice. Fever and disuse had worked their evil on his throat. Gollum did not seem to care: he merely scowled back, intractable as ever. Wearily, Aragorn repeated his offer of truce. 'If you promise not to bite, I will remove the gag.'

Gollum hesitated, and in the pale eyes the Ranger could see hunger and defiance at war within the creature's heart. Then Gollum looked at the heap of bulrush roots, and with a disdainful sniff turned his face away.

Aragorn sighed. He was beginning to suspect that Gollum knew how difficult this was for him to witness the self-inflicted suffering of the starveling wretch. 'So be it,' he said, with more apathy than he felt. 'It is your stomach that will suffer, not mine.'

With Gollum glowering at his back, he bent over the water to wash his harvest. He picked away the stringy hairs that were too new to afford any nourishment, and separated the slender, softer roots from the thick, woody cores. The former he wrapped in a scrap of cloth, tucking them carefully into his pack. Using a flat stone as a cutting surface, he split two lengths of root, and chopped them into small crescent-shaped pieces. Filling his mug with water, he let the pieces soak. He waited patiently for a while, and then restlessly, and at last when he could bear it no longer he raised the cup to his lips and drank the slurry that had formed in the water. It felt gritty in his mouth and the fluid was tasteless but for a faint bitter tang, but almost at once the snarling in his stomach was eased and his head felt less giddy. He filled the cup again and set it aside, so that whatever nourishment remained in the root fibres could be drawn out while he took his rest.

Tonight, rather than truss up his prisoner like a slaughtered pig, Aragorn bound only his hands. Gollum had made no attempt to interfere with his bindings in several nights, and the Ranger was beginning to hope that the taming process was at last progressing as it ought. It was impossible that Gollum should endure much longer without food, and if Aragorn showed a little trust now he might find it later repaid. With a word of encouragement he gently knotted the strip of wool about his captive's wrists, and with Gollum secured he stretched out on the ground, casting his eyes towards the ragged clouds above.

He did not sleep that night, but rested his mind after the fashion of the Elves, lying flat upon his back with his long legs bent. Now and then through the clouds he could catch sight of a star, and he drank in each glimmer of light as if it could nourish his lonely soul.

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The next day, Gollum refused to move.

Aragorn rose before the dawn, to wash his face and fill his bottles and drink his cold bulrush tisane. The tugging of the binding cord earned him several unpleasant looks from his prisoner, who was lying curled on his side, but Gollum seemed no more uncooperative than usual, even scrambling to his feet before Aragorn's boot found leverage to raise him. They started off well enough, following the creek-bed westward as the sun rose behind. It promised to be a bright day, and Aragorn's spirits were lifting considerably when, as the last hints of night vanished behind the horizon, Gollum flung himself upon the ground, cringing and weeping and covering his eyes with his wounded hands.

Aragorn halted immediately, kneeling swiftly and trying to divine the source of the creature's distress. He had done this before, in the mountains, and then Aragorn had assumed it to be a reaction to pursuing orcs. Looking behind him now, he saw no sign of any living thing as far as the eye could see.

Gollum was making horrible sounds behind the gag, and his body was arcing and contorting in the most improbable of ways. Fearful that the creature was going to do himself an injury, Aragorn gripped the bony shoulders. 'Gollum! Be still!' he said urgently. 'What is causing you such distress? Gollum! Listen to me!'

The whimpering and writhing only grew more intense. It was a dreadful sight. Aragorn had witnessed bodies wracked with torture, and the horrible death-throes of men felled by swift-bleeding wounds, and children seized by fits of convulsions, but none of those things quite compared to this. Gollum's agility and malicious strength gave his motions a surreal and terrifying quality.

There was no other recourse: Aragorn seized the knot at the base of Gollum's skull and wrestled it loose. Away came the gag and with fingers that were hopefully nimble enough to escape any snap of the bony jaw, Aragorn plucked the plug of wool from the creature's mouth. Golllum scarcely seemed to notice. As if pouring uninterrupted from some bottomless well within him, words tumbled from his pale lips, beginning in mid-sentence.

'... it does, my preciouss! Burns us, shows us up! Nassty, hateful manses drives us on, on, gollum! Must hide, my preciousss, must hide from Yellow Face! Oh, poor preciouss, poor preciouss, gollum!' Here he let loose one of his shrill shrieks, and the hairs on the back of Aragorn's neck stood on end.

'What burns you?' he asked, unable to mask his concern as Gollum continued to sob and thrash and claw at his head. Was the creature rapt in some memory of the torture he had endured while in the clutches of the Enemy? Though he knew it would undermine his attempts to be a stern and indomitable jailer, Aragorn could not keep from saying; 'I will help you if I can. Let me help you.'

Gollum, it seemed, could not hear him or would not heed him. He continued with his wretched moaning. Aragorn cast anxiously about. If there were any watchers in this land, his prisoner now made a most eye-catching sight. This place was too open by far. Yet a few yards away a clump of barberry bushes clung to the edge of the stream. Aragorn looked at Gollum, wondering whether he could pick up the creature with his left arm and carry him so far. He decided he might have managed it had Gollum proved likely to be still and allow himself to be borne, but twisting and flailing as he was, Aragorn could not hope to succeed. He took hold of the creature's shoulder and shook him insistently.

'Stop this!' he commanded. 'We must take cover before your antics draw the attention of every beast, bird and goblin within a hundred miles!'

At the words 'take cover', Gollum fell instantly silent. He twisted his neck to look at Aragorn, who pointed towards the bilberry thicket. So swiftly did the creature spring into a loping run that Aragorn scarcely had time to snatch up the rags lately stuffed into his mouth before he was obliged to spring after his prisoner, lest Gollum should strangle himself upon the rope.

When they reached the edge of the brook, Gollum dove amidst the bushes, seemingly untroubled by the grasping thorns. Near the edge of his lead he halted, squatting by a thick stalk and staring out at Aragorn with enormous, glinting eyes.

Nonplussed, the Ranger sat, keeping safely out of the way of the woody spines. Gollum's reaction perplexed him. After such a performance, his fresh silence was all the more astonishing. Had this whole incident been nothing but a ploy to induce his captor to remove the gag? But no, Gollum had been seized by true panic, and that could not lightly be laid aside.

'What distressed you so?' Aragorn asked, trying to keep his voice impassive but nonthreatening.

Gollum glared at him, looking for all the world as if the incident had never occurred.

'Not good enough,' said the Ranger, sternly this time. He fixed his eyes on Gollum's, foiling the captive's attempt to look away. 'What is a yellow face? A man in a mask? Some strange breed of orc?'

Gollum's lips moved as if they were entirely disconnected from the rest of his face. 'He knows, he does, preciouss,' he muttered. 'Hateful trickses. He knows it, pretends he doesn't, gollum. We know he knows it, precious. Eye in a blue face, eye in a green face. Knows it, he does, wicked manses.'

Realization came with quiet relief as Aragorn recognized yet another of the riddles from Bilbo's tale. 'Sun on the daisies,' he murmured. 'You fear the Sun. It burns; shows you up... after so long in darkness you dread the sunlight.'

Too much gentleness drifted into his tone; too much pity. Gollum closed his mouth with a snap, and stared at his captor with cold, calculating eyes. Cognizant of his lapse in judgement, Aragorn set his face into a stony mask.

'So be it,' he said. 'I cannot carry you and I will not drag you. We will rest here a while, until the Sun is past its zenith. The rest will do me more good than it will you, I think.'

He settled into a more comfortable position, one eye still fixed on Gollum while the other searched the bushes for any sign of fruit, however withered. There was nothing. Birds, perhaps, had long ago picked the bilberries clean – or perhaps these sorry shrubs had never borne fruit at all.

A thought occurred to him. He knew such a show of deference was unwise, but he was already compromised and the gag was already removed. Aragorn dug in his pack and drew out the remaining strips of meat. He held them on an upturned palm, turning again to look at Gollum.

'Are you hungry?' he asked.

Gollum did not answer, but he hopped nearer, eying the food greedily. Aragorn waited, like a child holding seed in the hope of coaxing a redwing to land on his hand. Quick as lightning, Gollum reached out and snatched the meat, then retreated to the end of his leash. Turning his back and casting a suspicious glower over his shoulder, he tore off a piece and began to chew. A shudder of revulsion coursed up his spine and he spat out the half-ground meat. Aragorn's jaw tightened. After such a long fast, if Gollum was going to waste this food—

But he plucked up the cast-off plug of dried flesh, and though he shuddered and whined he ate it. The rest was soon devoured, and then Gollum edged nearer to Aragorn, skirting around as he crawled towards the water's edge. Greedily he drank, muttering maledictions to himself. Then he returned to his hiding-place among the thorns, eyes still smouldering with hatred.

When he was certain that Gollum was not looking at him, Aragorn allowed himself the luxury of a tiny, triumphant smile. His prisoner, it seemed, was tamed at last.





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