'The last pages are for you, Sam..'
Sam sat under the mallorn tree, the Red Book in his lap. Across the New Row, the trees were bursting forth in riotous hues of red and gold.
The mallorn's foliage above him still retained its pale yellow hue, their shapely leaves unchanged by seasons. Sam smiled through tear-blurred eyes, laying a hand on its slender silver stem.
It marked Rosie's grave, the tree did. She had wanted no stone. She had laughed feebly in her last moments and asked that the mallorn tree would be hers.
The last…
She had died a fortnight ago. Sam swallowed and opened the book. As he flipped gently through the pages, the handwriting, from Bilbo's spidery scrawl to Mister Frodo's neat hand to his own careful writing, changed into long ago places and times and whirled before his eyes.
On the last page was a blot, mingled ink and tears, that had spread outward and soaked through the crisp, heavy paper. Sam would not tear it out, and he could not erase it. It remained there, a sad reminder.
A squirrel was chattering in the hazel thicket, and a Jay was scolding it. The bird was dancing from branch to branch, its bright blue feathers standing out from the yellow leaves.
There were hooves on the road, a long stride of a horse of the Big Folk. Sam looked up. It was a fiery chestnut, glossy in the paleness of the newborn autumn sun. Its movements were stiffened with age, but as it drew closer, Sam saw it still held a wild spirit. But its rider caught his attention. He was tall and slender. An Elf, Sam thought in surprise, and as the horse halted before the gate of Bag End, he knew who it was.
"Legolas!" he cried. "You've come!"
The Elf-Prince looked at the hobbit with a smile. "Yes, Master Samwise," he said. "It was the least I could do. It is the last."
He embraced the old hobbit warmly, and then turned to Arod, and murmured something in Elvish. The liquid fall of Sindarin resounded bitter-sweetly in the crisp autumn air, and Arod stood still, cropping at the dewy grass.
Sam led the Prince to the young mallorn, and there they sat in silence for a while, Sam holding the Red Book, Legolas cross-legged, staring up at the pale gold canopy of leaves. Finally, he spoke. "I am sorry, Master Samwise. About Rosie."
Sam swallowed, and his voice was thick when at last he spoke. "Yes."
Legolas sighed, grasping his friend's shoulder, and as Sam looked up, he saw a strange mix of abject grief and wild freedom in the blue eyes. "I bring ill tidings, Strider has followed the path of all mortals, and…" He paused, his throat constricted. "Arwen has passed with him. And with that last memory of Lothlórien, the golden leaves are falling for the last time." He looked up once more. "I fear that soon this will be the last mallorn east of the Sea, Sam."
"Everything is the last." whispered the hobbit. "The last pages, the last moments, the last memory, the last mallorn…."
Tears were glinting in Legolas' eyes. "That is because it is the last. The Elves are fading and with them, the old world is falling. Lo! The time of men is at hand. For long years, time withered all about is, and yet it passed us by. But now, at the last, our forest is dying, the leaves ripped from the trees by black winds, and whirled down the river of time, to the Sea. When the Ring was found, Sam, that was the beginning of the end."
"I'm sorry." murmured Sam, feeling the damp warmth of tears flowing freely down his cheeks again.
Legolas shook his head. "Do not grieve for us. For when we sail, our cares are forever forgotten. Ah, how I long to do so!"
Sam looked up again at the Elf, who was gazing West. "What was it like? When you sailed with Strider and Gimli to the rescue of Gondor, I mean."
Legolas drew in a hasty breath, releasing it slowly before he began. "The air was thin on the deck. I was surrounded by thickets of men. I was choking.
He had to get out. He had to breathe. He was stifled, clawing for breath. So he ran, leaped onto the rigging, up into the spar, drawing in the cool, sweet air in grateful draughts. The ship was rocking in the swelling of the currents.
Salt was in the air, spray mingled with sudden tears on his face. He had heard it.
It was the completing chord of Ilúvatar's Harmony, intrinsic to the Song of the Ainur, that deep, pulsing note, at one with the Harmony of Creation.
It was the Song of the Sea.
A gull screamed past him, flying up the river far inland, and he turned to watch it as it wheeled on black-tipped wings against the red flower of the North. His Elven eyes could see that fire, drawing ever closer, the flicker of flame in a city of stone, the cloud of blackened smoke against the sky,
But the gulls surrounded him, a beating whirl of wings, and it mattered not. It was only a passing shadow, a fleeting night, and it could never touch the West. This was good, this was right, and he was free, free from chains he never knew he had, and if the sea winds blew but a bit stronger, he would be taken away from these mortal cares.
The mast tip was swinging wildly, the canvas sail billowing, but he stood on the spar and cared not for the swell.
He was free. That was all.
The fragrance of autumn roses surrounded them, and after a long silence, Legolas murmured. "To the West shall Gimli go, to find the jewel he treasures more than gold. And thither shall go all the Bearers of the Ring, Master Samwise."
"Me?" whispered the old hobbit.
"You bore it, Sam. And in the darkest of times, you defeated it."
"I didn't want too. I wanted It!" Sam burst out. "When he-when that horrible Shelob-when I took It from Mister Frodo…." he stopped, drawing in a deep breath. "When I left him, it was wrong. I knew it was wrong. And when I took the Ring…." There was a long pause, as he struggled to speak, and Legolas watched him, as still as only an Elf could be.
"I wanted It." Sam finished, at last, his breath like a sob. "I left him, I broke my promise, and I wanted to do that-It."
Legolas swallowed. "And you defeated that evil…..alone, Master Samwise. But my weakness, I could do not do it on my own. I resisted the Ring, the fear, the evil, the Nazgûl…but show me one seagull and…"
The spray stung his eyes, and the wind whipped his hair about his face, but he knew it not. He was soaring, flying in answer to the Sea's call, and he spread his arms and laughed for joy, but his voice was swept away, lost to the roar of the wind.
Then it changed. Something rang false. The discord was strong, pulsing in him, as the oars swept him farther away. His heart twisted, an ache of longing that could not be filled. They had to go back, they had to change course! They had to turn the ship, turn the sails! He was leaping, sliding desperately down rough-hewn ropes. His feet struck deck.
Blind and deaf to all but the call that compelled him, he ran, slipping between the Men. Men alien to him, to the world which he now belonged. They were too slow to catch him, and he flashed through their midst as an arrow through a copse. Their cries were meaningless chatter, drowned by the Sea.
"Aragorn stopped me." finished Legolas with a shuddering breath. "Stopped me from causing a terrible wreck." He leaned his head against the slender trunk. "Have you ever heard the cry of the gulls, Sam?"
Sam shook his head. "No. At least, not yet, I reckon."
Legolas smiled faintly, resting a hand on the hobbit's shoulder. "You will, one day. And when you are them…they are the clarion cry of freedom, Sam. They call you away….towards home. They call you home."
Sam swallowed. "I used to think Bag End was my home."
"And I thought the Greenwood mine."
Sam nodded. "But it seems that home only lasts until…" He stopped, unable to say anymore. Memories hurt much, pale, floating wraiths, wisps he could never fully catch, and Bag End was full of them. Since Rosie's death, he had walked the balance between dreams and waking, never fully in either. The fresh clearness of life had turned pale, and the dreams were confusing whirl. Everything was surreal. Far away. Sam had berated himself, saying he was a ninny, but that vague sadness lingered on as if he was standing on a retreating shore, looking at his home through dream mists. Maybe it was time he actually stood on that shore.
"I think three could sail on the boat we built." Legolas' voice was soft.
Sam stood up stiffly, tears in his eyes as he murmured. "Thank you. I can leave now, everything is in order. I have a good pony too. Bill's colt, he is."
Legolas smiled. "Then, Master Samwise, it is high time we went home."