Chapter Text
PROLOGUE: For the Burdens We Bear
THORIN
THE DOORS TO MAHAL’S KEEP were forged of iron and the brightest burnished copper, inlaid with runes of pure mithril. They stood tall, towering to the high ceiling, and bore no locks or bars, for they were said to open for no one but their creator.
The crown of Thorin’s head barely brushed the knocker, wrought in the shape of a massive boar’s head and set with jewels; two diamonds eyes the size of hen’s eggs glittered sullenly at him. Despite his haste in coming to the Keep, Thorin tarried in the silent hall, gathering his courage until he was at last able to grasp the knocker firmly and let it fall.
Scarcely had it struck before the doors creaked and swung wide, spilling orange torchlight and a low, rumbling voice. “Come, Thorin, son of Thráin."
It was not a voice to be disobeyed, and so Thorin came. The doors swept shut behind him.
This was no throne room, as he had half-supposed it would be. Before him was a vast forge, cluttered with anvils, bellows, piles of raw precious metals, and a dozen blazing fire-pits. Ash and oil stained the marble floors. The hot air was flavoured with smoke and iron and sweat, the comforting scent of the smithy. On every surface swords and axes and goblets and bracelets glimmered with precious stones, and Thorin knew not where to look.
At the largest furnace was the Maker, Crafter of the Dwarrows and Master of Fire and Forge, Lord of Metal and Stone. He was a striking figure, of a height with Thorin and yet seeming to tower far above him, his shoulders as wide as a tree trunk. A ruby-red beard lay in a complex pattern of plaits on his chest -- bare, as he wore only the vestments of a simple blacksmith -- and gems set in gold sparkled on every thick finger.
Thorin began to lower himself to his knees.
“None of that," said Lord Mahal, and Thorin hastily rose. “I have spoken to you in the Feasting Hall, son of Thráin, but only now have you sought my forge. What brings you?”
“A request, my lord.”
Mahal swung his hammer, casting a magnificent shower of white-gold sparks into the air. “Then speak.”
“I beg a boon of you,” Thorin said, "and your wife, the Lady Yavanna. It is said that she keeps watch over all green things and the creatures that tend them. I would ask your permission to learn the fate of one of those creatures. It would settle my mind to know what has happened to him.”
At first Mahal made no reply, dropping his hammer to the anvil to comb one hand thoughtfully through his beard. “This is all you would ask of her?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Then I shall bring her your request,” Mahal declared, “if only to stop your brooding. I have never known a dwarf so determined to make his afterlife miserable.”
Over a half-century dwelling in these halls had not been enough to accustom Thorin to their keeper. In his past life he had, like all his kin, upheld the Maker as a mysterious, austere figure of wisdom, power, and majesty, nearly incomprehensible to the mortal dwarf mind. Therefore it had been a trifle painful to discover that the Most Blessed Father reminded Thorin of no one so much as his Cousin Dáin.
“I make you no promises, for my lady wife knows her own mind.” Mahal hefted his hammer once more. “Begone now, son of Thráin! I have work to do.”
Nothing more of his request was said for a while, though Thorin did not know how long. Time was measured differently in the Maker's Halls, with no markers of the passage of the hours. It could have been days. It could have been years. Eventually, the Green Lady came to Durin’s Keep.
Thorin spent his mornings in solitude in his forge, and the day the Green Lady appeared was no different. He had been labouring for many hours on a circlet of mithril and pearl. While he had always preferred weapon-forging, for he was no jeweller, the urge to craft something peculiar had niggled at him relentlessly. So immersed was he in curling broad leaves into the band that it took him a moment to realize he was not alone -- still he did not look up from his work until his father called him.
Thráin was in the threshold, and he looked shaken. There stood at his side Lady Yavanna, wife of Mahal and keeper of all things good and green. Her eyes were pools of cool, mossy water, vines of coiled hair swayed around her face, and her skin was the colour of black, loamy earth. She was spring and growth and deep, ancient roots, and the sight of her struck Thorin dumb.
“I would speak with you, Thorin Oakenshield,” she said, with a voice like lilting, sighing wind. Thráin made a neat bow and left as swiftly as he could, giving his son one last glance of alarm before he retreated. Lady Yavanna drifted toward the anvil where the circlet lay. “Oak leaves and lily-of-the-valley. An unusual choice.” She fixed her gaze upon Thorin. “My lord husband says that you have a favour to ask of me.”
Thorin remembered himself then and knelt. “My lady, I have heard that you are the protector of hobbits.”
Her manner softened, and the warmth lit her countenance like sunlight on water. “They are kind to the earth. They do not treat it carelessly nor spill blood for want of it, and so it is kind to them. Yet few of your folk speak of hobbits with such high regard.”
“If it is your will, I would learn the fate of one of them.” The Lady's look was knowing, but she waited for him to speak. “There is a hobbit of the Shire of whom I was once fond. Bilbo Baggins is his name.”
“There is no Bilbo Baggins among those who sleep, but I know of whom you speak. The Ringbearer who cast away the Ring is dwelling now with the elves in Valinor, until he should be called away home.”
“My thanks,” Thorin managed to say.
Yavanna reached out to tip up his chin, and her eyes were piercing and terrible -- he could not have looked away even had he wished it. “Ah,” she murmured, and looked sorrowful. “Your grief has hardened your heart, son of Thráin, and nothing grows there. I will ask Sister Nienna to weep for you.” She inclined her head, and Thorin, shaken, could not compose himself to bid her farewell before she left his forge on silent feet.
No sooner had she gone before a handful of dwarrows took her place: Thorin’s harried father, and Frerin too, his dark hair a tangle about his head and his elaborate beard half unravelled. It appeared as though he had run from the farthest reaches of the Keep, and Dís, if her look of impatience and Frerin’s hold on her wrist were any indication, had been dragged along unwillingly with him.
Thráin seemed bewildered and nervous. The Green Lady seldom showed herself in the Halls, and no doubt to his father’s mind the visit spoke of some ill portent. “Whatever did she want with you?”
Thorin could not stand to look at him, at any of them. He only wanted, with sudden violent desperation, to be left alone. “Do not concern yourself. It is nothing important.”
“The Green Lady does not pay visits for the pleasure of it,” his sister said, with palpable suspicion. “She wouldn't have come for nothing. What did she say to you?”
“It's no business of yours."
His father's evident distress did not diminish. "There is no danger, Thorin? Nothing about the keep, or about the family . . . . ?"
"It had nothing to do with the family, Adad. It was only. . . . it was an idle curiosity on my part." He managed a thin smile to soothe Thráin's troubled brow, glancing over to his siblings. "All is well. You must trust me."
Dís's laugh was sharp enough to cut. "You know I don't, abnâthukraf."
“Dís!” Their father's exclamation was stern, as though the name had been a slap. It would not have been the first time. When Dís had arrived in the Halls after a lingering illness, she had reached for Víli and her sons, kissed her mother and father and Frerin, and struck Thorin soundly across the face. Things had not much improved since then.
"Easy, easy," Frerin murmured, his hands outstretched as though he meant to keep the two of them apart. "If you're going to have a go at each other, do it somewhere else. I have my glass-work in here."
At any other moment, Thráin’s look of exasperation might have been amusing. Dís snorted, gave Thorin a flat stare, and turned heel, disappearing down the long corridor to their grandmother’s chambers. She left silence in her wake.
“She will soften,” his father said at length, sounding as tired as Thorin felt. “Have patience.” It was meant to be reassuring, but this time Thorin had no smile to spare. Thráin was mild, conciliatory, and even-tempered -- his temperament had made him a kindly father but a rather cautious king -- and Thorin could not share in his optimism.
“What an orc," Frerin said laughingly. “And such a fuss over nothing! The lads had a grand adventure before they went. I'll wager they'd say so themselves.”
Thorin turned on him, speechless with anger. “Do not speak of what you cannot even begin to comprehend,” he snarled.
He left his forge without another word, all thoughts of the morning's work subsumed in melancholy. Dís's cold voice rang in his ears. What a pair they made, he and Dís, both of them carved from blunt strokes of the chisel, scarred and pitted by years of bitter hardship. Frerin -- golden, charming, careless Frerin -- seemed a relic of a childhood dream. For all the years they had shared in the Halls, Thorin despaired of them ever understanding each other. A chasm loomed between Thráin's children now.
He wandered aimlessly until his fury burned itself out, and thought to return to the forge to smother his disquiet in the flames. Yet he found himself climbing to the upper levels of the Keep, seeking his mother’s chambers.
Durin’s Keep was a honeycomb of vast halls, interconnected tunnels that seemed to have no end. Branches of families tended to choose quarters together. Thorin stayed in chambers connected to Frerin’s, across from their parents and grandparents, and next to Víli and Dís on one side and Fíli and Kíli on the other. Despite living close, they did not always see each other apart from meals, for they went about their business as they chose, working in the guilds or visiting other Keeps or dining in the communal Feasting Hall, where all the Keeps could gather together. Freís, wife of Thráin, could most often be found in the workshop attached to her rooms.
Thorin knocked at his mother’s door and entered when her low voice bid him. She sat at her work-bench, a jeweller’s glass perched over one eye, meticulously setting a row of pink teardrop sapphires into a ring. Her hands were as steady as they had been in her youth. Freís had been a jeweller of no little renown in Erebor. Several of her creations had been added to the royal treasury, and here she continued her craft devotedly, her pieces valued as highly as they had been in her past life -- Lord Mahal himself had complimented a diamond coronet of her design.
Freís cast a look over him, and Thorin tried not to wilt beneath her flinty gaze, amplified as it was by the looking-glass. Even as a stripling lad he had not been able to conceal things from his mother. “You look as though you’ve been scolded by your sister again,” she remarked as he settled next to her on the padded bench. When he said nothing, she smiled. “Dís and her tongue of dragonfire. Ach, but she always did have my temper.” Her strong brown hand, limned with rings of moonstone, settled on his head to smooth through the tangled waves. “She will forgive you, but you must be patient with her. It is not easy to be the one who is left behind to mourn.”
Thorin could not blame Dís. Sometimes he still looked at his mother and saw her as he had last seen her in another life: her elaborate braids and beard singed to ash, her flesh charred and dark eyes wide and unseeing. He sat across from his grandfather at the dining table and watched his severed head roll through the dust in his mind’s eye. Fíli leapt down a staircase, and Thorin saw him drop from Azog’s hand to lie broken on the rocks.
No, the breadth of Dís’s rage was not unreasonable. Fíli and Kíli’s inclusion on the quest for Erebor had been a point of friction between them; upon leaving Ered Luin, he had sworn on his honour to bring her sons safely home to her if she would entrust him with their care. If his sister now wished to punish him, he would bear it for eternity with no complaint, though it was painful to have her look on him with such hatred. To expect a dwarf to forget fallen kin was unconscionable, for their folk had long memories and remembered slights forever. He was an oath-breaker. That she acknowledged him at all was no small mercy.
His mother’s smile was rueful as she closed delicate prongs around another gem. “It seems to be the lot of this house, to make foolish choices and pay dearly for them.”
He huffed.
“We always settle our debts in the end,” she said, ignoring him. “Your grandfather lost his kingdom. Your father lost his senses. I lost my children.”
“You did nothing wrong, Amad.”
Freís laughed softly. “Always my staunchest defender, my little jewel.” Thorin felt himself colour, and was glad that Frerin was not there to tease him. “I claim my own share of the blame. I saw Thrór sicken and become corrupted, and I stayed silent. I did not counsel your father to take action. Instead I saw the gold and found it beautiful; I let my love of my craft overwhelm my duty. We all of us bear our portion of the guilt.”
“I forfeited the honour of our house,” he said dully.
His mother set her tools aside and turned on the bench to face him. “Stubborn lad. Yes, you did.” She gripped his chin and tugged him down til their eyes met. “And you reclaimed Erebor. You slayed the beast that killed your grandfather and drove your father to madness. You gave your life in the name of our home.
“Dwarrows are of stone, and like the stone, we are solid and steadfast. But even the strongest stone can be worn away by water and wind.” She touched her forehead to his own. “Do you still not believe us, Thorin, when we say you are forgiven?” He could not answer, and he knew that would be answer enough. His mother sighed and pressed her lips to his brow. “You have time. We have little else here.”
* Abnâthukraf: "oath-breaker"
FRODO
IF FRODO HAD HOPED that the Undying Lands would provide him with the peace that the Shire could not, that hope was soon extinguished.
The lands outside Valmar were beautiful beyond description. Frodo spent many hours wandering the southern shore, sweet songs in the air and the white sands soft as flour between his toes. Everywhere there was laughter and plenty, tables laden with fruit and flowers of every colour always in bloom. At nightfall, the stars turned the sand to silver-dust, and heavy perfumes in the air lulled them to sleep. He and Bilbo were given a cottage between a white-birch copse and the shore. It had a little wooden gate and a modest vegetable garden, and they tended the sprouts and roamed the woods and filled their home with sweet-smelling plants that never seemed to wither.
There was quiet and calm in the city on the sea of blue glass, but there was no peace for Frodo.
His thoughts turned again and again to the friends he had left behind: loyal Aragorn and gentle Arwen, unlucky Faramir and quick-footed Legolas and dear, laughing Gimli. He would not see them again, though he could remember them with all the love in his heart. He found himself wishing to view the splendour of Gondor once more, to see how the Greenwood looked in late summer. He wondered if there would soon be a young prince in the White Citadel, if the dwarves were resettling Moria, if Eowyn had accepted Faramir’s hand. Upon Sam and Merry and Pippin he dwelled constantly. Frodo could not regret leaving and felt he had made the right choice, but he worried for them. He worried that the Shire was no longer safe, or that they would come to resent him for sailing West without them. Bilbo assured him that it was not so, but there was a sickening doubt in Frodo’s heart that no amount of promises could banish.
Still, he did his best to mask his sorrow, and if his days were not joyful, they were not unhappy either. There were feasts most every night, and he ate and drank and sang with the elves, and watched their graceful, unearthly dances beneath the lanterns. His daylight hours were spent on rambling walks through the city, companionable afternoons with his uncle, and a steady stream of visitors. Lord Elrond and his sons often came to their little cottage, bringing friends and relations to meet the lauded halflings. Sometimes the Lady Galadriel accompanied them, and the glow of her hair seemed to fill their parlour with sunlight.
As was his habit, Gandalf vanished every few weeks without a word, only to return to sup and smoke cheerily with his favourite hobbits before going away again. “Are you well, Frodo?” he would say, again and again, and each time Frodo would assure him he was, to which the wizard would ‘hmmph’ and say no more. It was a welcome change, almost, when Gandalf’s discerning eye began to linger on Bilbo instead.
“Has Bilbo been resting well?” Gandalf asked, on one such sunny morning. He was watching Bilbo’s sleeping face as he tamped his pipe for an after-elevenses smoke. Frodo had fetched a rug and was settling his uncle more comfortably in his chair before draping it over his bony shoulders. “He does not look like himself.”
Frodo turned to him eagerly. “You see it too.” He felt something akin to relief when Gandalf nodded.
In the last months since they had sailed, Bilbo had grown pale and gaunt, the comfortable padding of old age and leisure quite worn away. With his wisps of snowy hair and dimmed eyes, he was a shadow of himself. He had begun to forgo their customary walks after dinner and could scarcely sit to read for a half-hour before succumbing to uneasy sleep. It was unsettling to Frodo, who had only ever seen Bilbo as young, no matter his age. Even as Bilbo stoutened and silvered with the passing years, his eyes had been unchanged, his spry liveliness giving him every appearance of health and vigour. But Bilbo was old now, and so frail that Frodo felt he might float away in the gentle sea-breezes.
“He sleeps constantly, yet he never seems rested. I've tried herbal teas and warm suppers before bed, but it seems to do little for him. Lord Elrond assures me he’s not ill.”
The lines around Gandalf’s mouth deepened. “He hardly ate anything.”
“He never does now.“ And what a shock it had been at first to see Bilbo, who had always had such a hearty appetite, regularly leave half his plate untouched, foisting the leftovers on Frodo with assurances that he was simply not very peckish today, thank you.
“Strange indeed.”
“He is over a hundred and thirty,” Frodo said reasonably, though the recollection of his uncle’s mortality pricked him unpleasantly.
Gandalf scoffed. “Bullroarer Took ate a full nine meals a day until he breathed his last. Mere age is not enough to put hobbits off their food.”
“Perhaps it’s the lack of exercise. Even in Rivendell Bilbo was always rambling about in the woods, and here he keeps mostly indoors.”
“Perhaps, my lad.” The wizard seemed disturbed, however, and over candied fruit and scones the next morning, he announced that he would be on his way.
“But you’ve only just arrived!” Bilbo said, accepting a second cup of tea from Frodo. “My memory might be failing, old friend, but I am rather sure you said you would be staying a fortnight with us.”
“My work is never-ending, dear Bilbo, but I shall be back presently. Frodo, might you accompany me out the gate?”
Bilbo frowned at the pair of them, not so doddering that he couldn’t tell when Gandalf was scheming (which was, in Frodo’s experience, nearly all the time), but he let them go without comment. Gandalf said nothing as they went out into the garden, his brow drawn thoughtfully. He pushed open the gate with his staff and stowed his pipe away in one of his many hidden pockets. “Look after him for me and keep him close. I shall not be gone long.”
“Gandalf?”
The wizard stepped out onto the lane. “Keep him close.”
Irritation had Frodo striding out into Gandalf’s path with an insolent determination that would have amazed his old self. “What’s wrong with Bilbo? Tell me at once!”
Gandalf mumbled something about Brandybucks under his breath before stooping down to grip Frodo’s shoulder. “Let me seek my answers first, Frodo, and then you will know everything. Do you not trust me?”
Chastened, Frodo moved aside. “You know I do.”
“I shall return soon.” With that, he set off down the lane, and Frodo watched him until the swath of his cloak vanished over the hill.
He returned to the cottage with a heavy tread, filled with trepidation. Bilbo was still at the table, leafing through a book with fingers that shook ever so slightly. Frodo sat beside him and reached numbly for a biscuit. It was Belladonna’s recipe, a treat he had often begged his uncle for as a fauntling, but this morning the sugary dough tasted of nothing. He wished, suddenly, for Sam to comfort him, and Merry and Pippin to tease away his fears. He wondered what they were doing, and whether they might be thinking of him. Time passed rather oddly in the Undying Lands, but he thought it might be spring back in the Shire. Sam and Rosie would be tending the budding flowers and preparing their prize potatoes to go to market. Maybe there were purple snapdragons sprouting outside the door of Bag End, with daisies along the fence.
“Do you think the flowers are in bloom, Bilbo?” he asked. Bilbo hummed in absent agreement and turned a page, and Frodo nearly smiled.
The days passed as they were wont to do. Frodo did his best to behave normally, but he was not very successful. His walks became shorter, his absences from the cottage less frequent, and he coaxed Bilbo to eat, wheedling until the older hobbit became quite cross with him. He took to sitting outside with a book, watching the road to their cottage with an expectant eye.
True to his word, it was not many days before Gandalf appeared on the path again. Frodo waved a hand in welcome, hopping down from the fence, but his relief was cut short as the wizard drew near; Lord Elrond was with him, and their manner spoke of some urgency. “Is Bilbo inside?”
“Yes, taking a nap.” He looked to Elrond, but the elf’s face betrayed nothing, and in desperation he reached over to catch Gandalf’s sleeve. “Please. Please tell me. Is he dying?”
Gandalf’s face did not soften, but his hands were gentle as he pried Frodo’s fist from his robes. “No, my boy. And that is precisely what troubles me.”
“I will speak to him first,” Gandalf declared as they shuffled inside the cottage, “and alone.”
Elrond, who had laid a steadying hand on Frodo’s shoulder, looked disapproving. “Perhaps if we waited until we had more information . . . . ”
“I will not keep this from Bilbo,” Gandalf said sternly. “I have hidden enough, and I fear even his great capacity for forgiveness would not abide any more secrets.” There was a weight of old guilt in his voice, and Elrond did not object again.
Gandalf went away to Bilbo’s bedroom while Elrond led Frodo to the parlour. “It seems the task falls to me,” he said, with a wry tone. “Listen closely, Frodo: When we spoke of bringing Bilbo to Valinor, and sought the permission of the Valar to sail with you both, Mithrandir and I expected two outcomes for our friend: either he would shortly pass on in peace, his time spent, or Valinor would renew his strength for a few final years.
“The Undying Lands cannot grant immortality to a mortal, but the sands and winds of Valinor have certain healing properties. You looked ill, Frodo, before you came here. Now your cheeks are full of colour, and your eyes have regained some of their light.” Elrond took up Frodo’s hands with care. “Bilbo grows weaker, but there is no shadow of death that Mithrandir or I can sense around him. We can only conclude that he is not dying, though he grows wan and worn. It is not natural -- in all honesty, it is an outcome that we feared. He will continue to fade, but death will not come for him.”
A great fog seemed to have filled Frodo’s mind, and he struggled to focus on Elrond’s voice, for his words were not making sense. “Why? I don’t . . . . Why?”
“I fear that dark things leave a residue even when they have been swept away.”
“The Ring?” Frodo choked. “The Ring is doing this to him?”
“Mithrandir suspects it is so, and I do not disagree.”
A sting of pain scattered his wild thoughts, and he looked down to find himself clutching his own hand, nails digging into the puckered space where his finger had once been. “But the Ring is gone.” It sounded too much like a question to his own ears, and a blind panic began to swell in his breast. “I saw it destroyed! I saw it fall into Mount Doom!”
“Frodo, calm yourself. The Ring is gone. Pray sit down, or I fear you shall fall over.”
Frodo sank onto armchair, cradling his hand to his breast. “Then how?” he begged. “It was destroyed.”
With an elegant flick of his robes, Elrond crouched beside him. “Bilbo bore the Ring for sixty years. His good heart was not corrupted, but to bear something so evil for so long . . . perhaps it bound itself to him, in some fashion.”
“But it was destroyed,” Frodo repeated, helplessly.
“We all of us bear things with us that ought to have been left behind.” He shook his head decisively. “We do not believe that what plagues Bilbo is an active malice. Perhaps it is like a shade, a shadow of darkness, a scar from a wound that has healed badly, and so the scar pains him.
“If we are correct, the shade of the Ring will continue to do as it has done for so many years: prolong his life, stretch him thin, but keep him tethered to this realm far longer than it ought. Immortality is perhaps too strong a word; likely his life will end naturally, but it could take years, decades, centuries for the Ring’s lingering influence to fade. You remember the creature Gollum -- I think neither you nor I wish to see him suffer through such a long and painful decline.”
He did not want to ask the question for fear of hearing the answer, but he knew he must. “Is there no hope?”
“Mithrandir and I will to seek more counsel among my wisest kin in the city, but for myself I believe there must be some way to cleanse away the shadow of the Ring. Do not despair, Frodo. We would not leave our friend to be caught between life and death, even if we must seek powers greater than our own.”
“Well said.” Gandalf’s voice startled them both, and Elrond came to his feet as the wizard drew near with Bilbo on his arm, looking pale but composed.
“Bilbo,” Elrond murmured. “Are you well?”
“I hear tell that I cannot die,” Bilbo said, rather accusatorially.
The elf’s face twitched with something that might have been a smile. “Only you, mellon-nín, could sound so unenthused by news of immortality.”
“Well, it seems like a very sorry sort of immortality,” Bilbo declared. His gaze fell upon Frodo then, and his bluster visibly gave way to alarm. “Oh, dear. Frodo-lad?” He shrugged off Gandalf’s hold and shuffled to Frodo’s side, sitting with him and reaching for his hands. Frodo gripped them with desperate strength. “Elrond, really, what did you say to him? Frodo?”
“He has had an unpleasant shock,” Gandalf said quietly, and Frodo blinked back tears. “I should like some tea right about now, Elrond. Will you have a cup?”
When the two had disappeared discreetly into the kitchen, Frodo buried his face against Bilbo's shoulder and made an effort to slow his hurried breath. “I seem to have a knack for trouble,” Bilbo mused, “and I suppose it was foolish to think that sailing West would rid me of it.”
“How can you be so calm?” Frodo groaned.
“I’m not. I’m quite afraid, really.” He gave Frodo's hand a firm press. “But what good will it do to wail and rend my waistcoat? I’m sure Gandalf has a few tricks up his sleeve. He usually does.”
Elrond and Gandalf stayed to supper, discussing where they might go about seeking advice next, and left soon after with a promise to send news as soon as they had some. Bilbo retired to the hearth to rest and was asleep before his tea had cooled. Frodo sat with him, cradling his own untouched cup, and stared into the fire. For the first time in many months, the Ring haunted his waking thoughts.
He had been lauded and praised as the Ringbearer who cast evil into the fires and spared Middle-earth from wickedness; ballads sung and toasts raised in his name had been the worst sort of torture. Frodo knew what had happened on the mountain. He knew how shamefully he had lost himself. But for Sam -- brave, steadfast Sam -- and pitiful Sméagol, the Ring would have won. He loved it jealously still, and hated it beyond passion and words. Bilbo had carried the Ring for sixty years and then let it go. Frodo had carried it and his heart had been blackened by its false promises within mere months. In his darker moments, he wished that the Eagles had taken Sam away and left him there to the fires.
For several hours Frodo lingered at his uncle’s side and thought and thought. He wondered whether even Elrond, with all his great knowledge, would be able to give them an answer. He wondered if the fading would pain Bilbo, if it would twist him into an unrecognizable creature as broken and wretched as Sméagol. Would he someday share Bilbo’s fate, ensnared and forced to live beyond his allotted years? He could not bear to think that the Ring would have its revenge on both of them.
But what could he do?
Frodo rose and bent to kiss Bilbo’s parchment-thin cheek, breathing in the familiar scent of Longbottom leaf and fresh ink. They had always been an odd pair -- a mad, lonely old bachelor and an orphaned fauntling -- but his uncle’s absentminded affection was as much a part of his life as the rolling green hills of the Shire. Out of duty and out of love, Frodo could not let the Ring torment them any further.
A familiar, calm determination thrummed through his bones. There was one thing to be done: he would go to the city and convince Gandalf to let him help rescue his uncle. His last journey had ended in a victory that he had not fairly won. Perhaps the Valar meant for him now to go, to break what remained of the Ring’s clutching hold over both of them.
Perhaps, if he could find a way to save Bilbo, he might even deserve it.