And whoa nelly, I wrote something that isn't hysterical. This is entirely the fault of my demented brain watching The Fellowship and wondering: what would happen if Aragorn hadn't shown up in time? As usual, riskyrevenge beta'd and such. This has been sitting on my hard drive for months and I was wavering back and forth on posting it, since it gets pretty graphic. In the end, I figured what's the worst that could happen? I'd get banned for a short while and get the story removed. Big whup. I haven't been on much lately and I feel like taking the risk to, hopefully, tide some people over.

WARNINGS: Dubious consent, gore, rather violent depictions, rather strange innuendo. Not for the light hearted folk, I assume.

Summary: "Then let me tell you a story, tiny creature. There were once four Hobbits..." The Witch-King tells Frodo a story. Dubcon, slash, gore
Rating: M
Pairings: Witch-King/Frodo
Universe: Movieverse
Disclaimer: Ahahahaha...if only Tolkien could see what I've done to his lovely gentlemen...

Steel and Corpse-Light

It had been days since Frodo had seen light, hours, perhaps it had only been minutes, mere seconds he had been trapped in this hellish room? Sun, moon, the torches of friend and foe, all were worthless in penetrating the haunting glow of the fallen city. Corpse-light, Gandalf had called it, a pale jade burning against the walls of the old city as it consumed the radiance of the outside world. Bilbo had wrenched the story from the old wizard one visit, having never been there himself, and Frodo had rested uneasily for many nights to come after the elder had finished. "Romantically spooky", Bilbo had praised their storyteller. The omnipresent pain in his shoulder suddenly lanced deeper, spearing an unholy agony through Frodo's chest dangerously close to his frantic pulse.

It mattered not. Even a second longer in the cage of a room would drive his mind further into labored madness, so what did it matter how long he had already been chained? The Hobbit struggled to stand up, the ache in his legs refusing but the anguish of his shoulder demanding. The bindings had obviously been designed with a human's stature in mind; even standing precariously on his toes as he was, Frodo's arms were stretched high and his shoulder wound twisted painfully against the cloth of his shirt. Pain was all he could remember and images defiantly fluttered out from his memories and before his eyes.

Hobbits and names he couldn't place. Wizards and swords. Dragons and fireworks. Warmth. Where was the warmth? Fire, light, Bag End, uncle, where was Uncle? The elves. The elves and trees and light and pain and he was back to the pain and was there anything else anymore?

Fire. Fire and eyes. One eye on fire. Sauron. Pain. Sweat and poison and cold, cold steel. Wasn't fire supposed to be warm, where was the warmth, why was it so cold—

There was noise, a crack of green lightning across his fevered mind, and Frodo turned his face towards the door. He immediately wished he hadn't. The ice-flame torture in his shoulder throbbed ecstatically, greeting its parent with agonizing glee, the Witch-King of Angmar.

The terrible silhouette stood in the doorway as if momentarily perplexed, abyssal black and just as all-consuming as the glow of his domain, before sweeping inside and slamming the iron-clad port shut. Dread poured over Frodo in palpable waves, the chill dragging forth more clarity than he had been able to muster in the past hours as the king of old drew forward to tower over him. An armored finger—steel talons, cold-cold-cold, it's not a bird it's a dragon—materialized from the swirling robe to drag down the side of the Hobbit's cheek.

"Frodo Baggins of the Shire," the Witch-King hissed, the words generating sibilant venom that seemed to drip from his talon-fingertip and soak into Frodo's head. Instinctively, he flinched away. His defiance was rewarded with a rasping chuckle. A second hand appeared and locked his head in place, clasping around his skull with an unyielding grip as the original finger retraced its original path.

"The poison is spreading quickly," the king remarked, wrenching the head he clasped indelicately to the side as a frozen talon twisted down the Hobbit's exposed neck. A small whine escaped Frodo's throat, hanging dead in the air as the wraith scrawled invisible, unfamiliar letters into his captive's skin.

"Don't you feel it," the Witch-King asked, his talon slipping lower and plunging almost gently into the open wound in Frodo's shoulder, "spreading further?" A scream tore from Frodo's self-imposed silence, raw and ragged as a mirror of his injury. The pain flared, exploring boundaries in his mind he had not known existed, pumping ice into his veins and snow into his heaving lungs as he felt muscle and tissue shift to give way to the veritable barb of armor piercing his flesh.

—went further, went further, deep, ran deep it was in his soul twisttwistTWIST—

Frodo could feel his shirt in the wound, spare threads grinding into the tissue and soaking in the blood, his blood, warm and clotting cold, and the rudimentarily protective clothing was suddenly an instrument of his own agony.

"It spreads fast," the Witch-King said, his terrifying rasp somehow echoing above Frodo's pitching cries. "All you have known will become hollow memories, devoured by the will to serve our Lord." The armor retracted from the wound a fraction and Frodo panted for air, the pain barely manageable in a wickedly relative manner. The Hobbit felt bone shift and he sobbed dryly, babbling what he hoped were words. The Witch-King gave pause, the faceless hood lifting to gaze impassively at his captive's face. The talon in his shoulder twitched, imperceptible by sight but excruciating by touch, prompting Frodo to repeat himself.

"W-What are you…t-t-talking about?" he ground out, air whistling as razors in his pain-desiccated throat. The raspy laughter, aged and terrible, filled the air again, making each breath an exercise to draw.

"The son of Gondor never told you," the Witch-King said, tone carrying humor even after his sinister amusement had finally left Frodo's ears. "Then let me tell you a story, tiny creature." The talon slipped further from the wound, retreating and replacing the tearing sensations—burning cold—with a dull, moist throb.

"There were once four Hobbits, who had no business beyond smoking and drinking and eating like the rest of their people and they practiced their routines as they were." The talon circled the ragged edge of the damage, seams of the frigid iron catching and shredding flesh indiscriminately; it seemed no matter how loud or high he screamed, Frodo could not drown out the Ringwraith's commanding voice.

"But then, one of those Hobbits came into possession of a ring, a rather powerful ring that could make him invisible to mortal men," the Witch-King continued, seemingly oblivious to the screams of his captive audience. "It was then he was told he would need to bring the ring to the elves, so they could take up the task of destroying it."

Ruthless, the talon jammed back into Frodo's shoulder, wrenching another lengthy shriek from the Hobbit's throat. Frodo felt the grin more than saw it, the expression sick with sadistic enjoyment as the poisoned wound's treatment radiated misery to the tips of his toes.

"That little Hobbit took his three friends with him and met with a human male, cavorting all over the countryside with him until they reached a landmark called Weathertop."

The Witch-King of Angmar retracted the talon surgically, barely giving pause before thrusting the weapon-like digit back into the wound. Frodo felt his throat give way as the demon king worked up a rhythm, unable to respond with much beyond choked gasps as he became dimly aware that the steely grip on his skull had vanished somewhere in the mist of all-encompassing torment.

"The man went out to scout around, because evil forces were after the little Hobbit with the ring. They wanted it for their master, because he had lost it very long ago." An icy grip suddenly formed on Frodo's hip to distract from the frozen burn of torture in his chest, a clawed hand scraping skin and bone where the second limb reappeared below. Frodo whimpered, a bubbling sound made wet by something, something had burst, something was wrong, where was the wet from, it shouldn't be—

"The man found one of the wraiths," the Witch-King added, voice patient as his piston finger increased its destructive pace, "and he fought valiantly. But other wraiths came. He did not last very long in the end and the wraiths cut him down." The second hand's talons scraped at Frodo's trousers, shredding cloth and carelessly scoring the sensitive skin beneath.

"No, no," Frodo repeated, finding the strength to vocalize at last. "No, nononononono…" mkHis protests went unheeded as the Witch-King of Angmar twisted the invading talon viciously. Aragorn, dark-light Aragorn, Strider, glinting steel and hidden smiles and exasperation and scruff…dead. Dead-dead-dead-deadwherewashe-whydidnthesaveus-HEWASDEAD.

"After the man breathed his last, the wraiths went to find the Hobbits and the ring," the old king continued as his second hand vanished from Frodo's skin momentarily, leaving behind the ice and the burn and the slow seeping red. "The wraiths found them quickly because one of the Hobbits, the Hungry Hobbit, had lit a fire in the middle of the night and the scent of meat and wood was on the wind. With a shriek, the wraiths descending on the Hobbits, sending them scattered and scared to the top of the hill."

—insert-pain-retract-pain-insert-pain, it was tolerable if he counted the motions but he lost track and it hurt so bad and then the second talon was dragging up the base of his cock to the tip, agonizingly slow, hurry up—

"The Gardener tried to protect the little Hobbit with the ring first and he was the first cast aside by the powers he foolishly defied," the Witch-King said, voice dropping a pitch to rumble in Frodo's chest with a dominating echo. He felt himself twitch, responding to the implied command, warmth spreading in his loins to compete with the invading frigidity on both fronts.

"The Hungry Hobbit and his twin came next, swinging daggers and praying for miracles they would not recieve." The talon in Frodo's shoulder curved impossibly deep, scraping raw nerves and digging into bone as the talon below inscribed runic scratches into the sensitive flesh it torturously mapped. "The Hungry Hobbit fell first and his twin soon after, both cut to ribbons for defying the wraiths."

—Pippin and Merry, Merry and Pippin, smiling laughing stolen vegetables and angry farmers in a blank field-oh god more please right there-dead bleeding cracked faces never smile again neversmileagain-DEADjustlikeAragonDEAD—

"The Hobbit with the ring knew better than to fight, but he tried to retreat. Foolish Hobbit should have stood still," the Witch-King whispered, words almost endearing with a warped fondness said so close to his ear and Frodo bucked forward, a sob moist with fluid ripping from his chest—shouldn't be wet shouldn't—pleading mutely for release, death, satisfaction, mercy, something. The talon twisted again, splashing crimson misery into a limb suddenly gone cold, and Frodo felt the talon below click against its fellows as it formed a loose fist.

"The leader of the wraiths came to the Hobbit, who had tried to make himself invisible with the power of the ring, giving him a chance to offer up the ring peacefully, to take a merciful path his fellows had forgone,"—it shouldn't feel good, all metal no flesh no warmth, there'd be nothing left but bloodandpulp—"but the Hobbit resisted again. So, the leader of the wraiths stabbed him in the chest." Anguish melted into pleasure into anguish as both armored hands thrust violently at once, delightfully close but so far away.

"But, just as the leader was about to finish the Hobbit off and take his ring, the Gardener attacked again. He had been stunned and now he launched, dagger in hand, straight at the leader of the wraiths," the Witch-King said. The demon king's hands stilled and the sudden loss of sensation, any sensation, drew a needy cry from Frodo. Apparently satisfied by the noise, the king continued his movements. "The wraiths were surprised and the leader felt the bite of steel but for a moment before he killed this Hobbit as well."

—Sam, oh god Sam, he was never supposed to have that kind of an end-thisshouldntfeelgoodwhy-he had been innocent, curious bumbling sweet Sam, bright light and smiles and comforting warm-wherewasthewarmthDEADLIKESTRIDER—

"The leader of the wraiths turned back to the Hobbit with the ring, intending to finish him off, but something stayed his hand at the last second. Do you know what it was?" The Witch-King froze his motions again, waiting until Frodo had found his voice enough to choke out a raspy "no!" before resuming. A haze began to settle over Frodo's vision, he was so close—

"The leader could feel the taint and he knew that if he waited patiently, not only could he return the ring to his master—"

The talon in his shoulder suddenly burned hot, supernova as lights winked behind Frodo's paling eyes, writhing left and right like a terrible metal snake from Hell as the talons around his cock flamed and steamed and heat was everywhere and the friction-the pressure-the HEAT—

Frodo's skull cracked against the wall when he came, spine bent at an unnatural angle as he screamed his release, a perfect mimicry of the Ringwraiths' bone chilling shriek as his eyes burned white and murky and the haunting images in his skull dissolved into an earth-shattering moment that the entire garrison had to be able to hear and the eye was back-the Eye was there and so was the Wraith King and he could feel the Others below! Should everything feel so dark and bright and -OHGOD—

Then there was nothing. Metals hands gone from skin already mending and a blank hood hovering close to an ear with a leering face and an unseen mouth whispering, hissing, blaspheming:

"—but he could also take back a new Wraith for his master."