Frodo woke and found himself lying in bed. He looked in a strange looking room. At first he thought that he had slept late, after a long unpleasant dream that still hovered on the edge of memory. Or perhaps he had been ill? But the ceiling looked strange; it was flat, and it had dark beams richly carved. He lay a little while longer looking at patches of sunlight on the wall, and listening to the sound of a waterfall.
"Where am I, and what is the time?' Frodo worriedly said to the ceiling.
"In the House of Elrond, and it is ten o'clock in the morning," a familiar voice answered. "It is the morning of October the twenty-fourth, if you want to know."
"Gandalf?" Frodo responded in confusion, sitting himself up. There was the old wizard, sitting in a chair by the open window.
"Yes," Gandalf said. "I am here. And you are lucky to be here, too, after all the absurd things you have done since you left home."
Frodo lay down again. He felt too comfortable and peaceful to argue, and in any case he did not think he would get the better of an argument. He was fully awake now, and the memory of his journey was returning: the disastrous 'short cut' through the Old Forest the 'accident' at The Prancing Pony; and his madness in putting on the Ring in the dell under Weathertop. While he was thinking of all these things and trying in vain to bring his memory down to his arriving in Rivendell, there was a long silence, broken only by the soft puffs of Gandalf's pipe, as he blew white smoke-rings out of the window.
"Where's Sam?" Frodo asked at length. "And are the others all right?"
"Yes, they are all safe and sound," Gandalf answered. "Sam was here until I sent him off to get some rest, about half an hour ago."
"What happened at the Ford?" Frodo asked. "It all seemed so dim somehow; and it still does."
"Yes, it would. You were beginning to fade," Gandalf explained everything about what happened. "The wound was overcoming you at last. A few more hours and you would have been beyond our aid. But you have some strength in you, my dear hobbit."
"You seem to know a great deal already," Frodo smiled.
"You have talked long in your sleep, Frodo," Gandalf gently said. "And it has not been hard for me to read your mind and memory. Do not worry, though I said "absurd" just now, I did not mean it. I think well of you-and of the others. It is no small feat to have come so far, and through such dangers, still bearing the Ring."
"We should never have done it without Strider," Frodo said. "But we needed you. Why didn't you meet us?"
"I was delayed and that nearly proved our ruin," Gandalf answered, looking a bit embarrassed.
"But talking would stop me thinking and wondering, which are quite as tiring," Frodo said. "I am wide awake now, and I remember so many things that want explaining. Why were you delayed? You ought to tell me that at least."
"You will soon hear all you wish to know," Gandalf promised on what he will say. "We shall have a Council, as soon as you are well enough. Frodo, war is coming and now, the Morgul-lord and his Black Riders have come forth."
"You knew of the Riders already-before I met them?" Frodo began to realize had known the riders in the beginning.
"Yes, I knew of them," Gandalf shook his head and explained what he knew of them. "Indeed I spoke of them once to you, for the Black Riders are the Ringwraiths, the Nine Servants of the Lord of the Rings. But I did not know that they had arisen again or I should have fled with you at once. I heard news of them only after I left you in the Shire with your friends, but that story must wait. For the moment we have been saved from disaster by Strider and his companion Lincoln Campbell."
"Yes," Frodo felt as he owed Strider and Lincoln everything for bringing him and his friends to Rivendell. "Strider and Lincoln saved us. Yet I was afraid of them at first. Sam never quite trusted them."
"I have heard all about Sam," Gandalf smiled. "He has no more doubts now."
"I am glad," Frodo smiled back. "For I have become very fond of Strider. Well, fond is not the right word. I mean he is dear to me; though he is strange, and grim at times. In fact, he reminds me often of you. I didn't know that any of the Big People were like that. I thought, well, that they were just big, and rather stupid: kind and stupid like Butterbur; or stupid and wicked like Bill Ferny. But then we don't know much about Men in the Shire, except perhaps the Breelanders.'
"You don't know much about them," Gandalf said. "For Strider, he is wise enough on his own ground, but there are few left in Middle-earth that who he is. It may be that this War of the Ring will be their last adventure."
"Do you really mean that Strider something else?" Frodo asked in wonder. "I thought they had all vanished long ago. I thought he was only a Ranger."
"Only a Ranger?" Gandalf asked, shocked and surprised, but then chuckled. "My dear Frodo, that is just what the Rangers are. They are the last remnant in the North of the great people, the Men of the West. They have helped me before and I shall need their help in the days to come, for we have reached Rivendell, but the Ring is not yet at rest."
"I suppose not," Frodo looked down, feeling a sign of worry in him. "But so far my only thought has been to get here, and I hope I shan't have to go any further. It is very pleasant just to rest. I have had a month of exile and adventure, and I find that has been as much as I want." He fell silent and shut his eyes. After a while he spoke again. "I have been reckoning and I can't bring the total up to October the twenty-fourth. It ought to be the twenty-first. We must have reached the Ford by the twentieth."
"You have talked and reckoned more than is good for you," Gandalf said. "How do the side and shoulder feel now?"
"I don't know," Frodo answered. "They don't feel at all: which is an improvement, but'-he made an effort-'I can move my arm again a little. Yes, it is coming back to life. It is not cold." He began to touch his left hand with his right.
"Good," Gandalf sounded pleased to here. "It is mending fast. You will soon be sound again. Elrond has cured you: he has tended you for days, ever since you were brought in."
"Days?" said Frodo.
"Well, four nights and three days, to be exact," Gandalf explained what had happened when Frodo was brought into Rivendell. "The Elves brought you from this where you lost count. We have been terribly anxious, and no one, but Samwise Gamgee, has hardly left your side, day or night, except to run messages. Elrond is a master of healing, but the weapons of our Enemy are deadly. To tell you the truth, I had very little hope, for I suspected that there was some fragment of the blade still in the closed wound. But it could not be found until last night. Then Elrond removed a splinter. It was deeply buried. and it was working inwards."
Frodo shuddered, remembering the cruel knife with notched blade that had vanished in Strider's hands. "Is it?"
"Don't be alarmed," Gandalf calmed quick. "It is gone now. It has been melted. And it seems that Hobbits fade very reluctantly. I have known strong warriors of the Big People who would quickly have been overcome by that splinter, which you bore for seventeen days."
"What would they have done to me?" Frodo asked. "What were the Riders trying to do?"
"They tried to pierce your heart with a Morgul-blade, a knife made out of pure poison," Gandalf told him what he knew about the Morgul-Blade. "If they had succeeded, you would have become like they are, only weaker and under their command. You would have became a wraith under the dominion of the Dark Lord and he would have tormented you for trying to keep his Ring, if any greater torment were possible than being robbed of it and seeing it on his hand."
"Thank goodness I did not realize the horrible danger," Frodo faintly sighed in relief. "I was mortally afraid, of course; but if I had known more, I should not have dared even to move."
"Yes, fortune or fate have helped you," Gandalf nodded. "Not to mention courage. For your heart was not touched, and only your shoulder was pierced; and that was because you resisted to the last. But it was a terribly narrow shave, so to speak. You were in gravest peril while you wore the Ring, for then you were half in the wraith-world yourself, and they might have seized you. You could see them, and they could see you."
"I know," Frodo nodded, understanding what Gandalf had meant. "They were terrible to behold, but why could we all see their horses?"
"Because they are real horses, just as the black robes are real robes that they wear to give shape to their nothingness when they have dealings with the living," Gandalf answered.
"Then why do these black horses endure such riders?" Frodo asked, confused of why these riders would ride on horses. "All other animals are terrified when they draw near. The dogs howl and the geese scream at them."
"Because these horses are born and bred to the service of the Dark Lord in Mordor," Gandalf answered Frodo's question. "Not all his servants and chattels are wraiths. There many different sentients that also pay homage to the Dark Lord and there have been and still are many others, warriors, lords, chieftains, and kings, that walk alive under the Sun, and yet are under his sway. And their number is growing daily."
"What about Rivendell and the Elves?" Frodo began to ask about this wonderful city he was in. "Is Rivendell safe?"
"Yes, at present, until all else is conquered, the Elves of the Light may fear the Dark Lord, and they may fly before him, but never again will they listen to him or serve him," Gandalf explained the power of the Light Elves of Alfheim. "And here in Rivendell there live still many of his chief foes: the Elven-wise, lords of the Eldar from beyond the furthest seas. They do not fear the Ringwraiths, for those who have dwelt in the Blessed Realm live at once in both worlds, and against both the Seen and the Unseen they have great power."
"I also heard tales of an ancient elf who was known to be the one of the most wisest of them all," Frodo recalled a tale Bilbo use to tell him back in the Shire. "Is that Glorfindel?"
"Yes, Glorfindel, one of the mighty of the Firstborn," Gandalf told him about the mighty elven lord. "He is an Elf-lord of a house of princes. Indeed there is a power in the great city of Rivendell to withstand the might of Mordor, for a while, and elsewhere other powers still dwell. There is power, too, of another kind in the Shire. But all such places will soon become islands under siege, if things go on as they are going, then the Dark Lord will do everything in his power to put forth all his strength." He then stands suddenly up and sticking out his chin while his beard went stiff and straight like bristling wire. "We must keep our courage. You will soon be well, if I do not talk you to death. You are in Rivendell, and you need not worry about anything for the present."
"I haven't any courage to keep up," Frodo sniffly sighed. "But I am not worried at the moment. Just give me news of my friends."
Gandalf moved his chair to the bedside, and took a good look at Frodo. The colour had come back to his face, and his eyes were clear, and fully awake and aware. He was smiling, and there seemed to be little wrong with him. But to the wizard's eye there was a faint change just a hint as it were of transparency, about him, and especially about the left hand that lay outside upon the coverlet.
"Still that must be expected," Gandalf murmured to himself. "He is not half through yet, and to what he will come in the end not even Elrond can foretell. Not to evil, I think. He may become like a glass filled with a clear light for eyes to see that can."
"What do you mean?" Frodo asked, wondering what Gandalf was talking about, even unaware that he was murmuring to himself like he always does.
"I will risk a brief tale without consulting Lord Elrond," Gandalf explained what he plans to do next. "But quite brief, mind you, you must sleep again. This is what happened, as far as I can gather. The Riders made straight for you, as soon as Lady Arwen fled with you to the river. They did not need the guidance of their horses any longer: you had become visible to them, being already on the threshold of their world and also the Ring drew them. Your friends sprang aside, off the road, or they would have been ridden down. They knew that nothing could save you, if the white horse could not. The Riders were too swift to overtake, and too many to oppose. On foot, not even Glorfindel, Strider, or your friends could not with stand all the Nine at once. When the Ringwraiths swept close to the Ford, there is a small hollow beside the road masked by a few stunted trees. There they hastily kindled fire, for Arwen and Glorfindel knew that they could summon great flood to wash out their enemies. If the Riders tried to cross, and then he would have to deal with any that were left on the other side of the river."
"And is that the end of the Black Riders?" Frodo hopefully asked.
"No," Gandalf shook his head. "Their horses must have perished, and without them they are crippled. But the Ringwraiths themselves cannot be so easily destroyed. However, there is nothing more to fear from them at present. Your friends crossed after the flood had passed. Elrond's folk met them when they entered the gates of Rivendell."
"Who made the flood?" Frodo asked.
"Lady Arwen, Lord Glorfindel, Lord Elrond, and the mightest elves of the Light were the ones to command its great power," Gandalf explained more on how the elves summoned the water horses. "The river of this valley is under their power, and it will rise in anger when they have great need to bar the Ford. As soon as the Ringwraiths rode into the water, the flood was released. If I may say so, I added a few touches of my own: you may not have noticed, but some of the waves took the form of great white horses with shining white riders. For a moment, I was afraid that we had let loose too fierce a wrath, and the flood would get out of hand and wash you all away. There is great vigour in the waters that come down from the snows of the Misty Mountains."
"Yes, it all comes back to me now," Frodo began to remember.
Gandalf looked quickly at Frodo, but he had shut his eyes. "Yes, you are all safe for the present. Soon there will be feasting and merrymaking to celebrate the victory at the Ford of Bruinen, and you will all be there in places of honour."
"Splendid," Frodo smiled proudly. "It is wonderful that great elven lords, not to mention Strider, should take so much trouble and show me so much kindness."
"Well, there are many reasons why they should,' Gandalf smiled back. "I am one good reason. The Ring is another: you are the Ring-bearer. And you are the heir of Bilbo, the Ring-finder."
"Dear Bilbo," Frodo said sleepily. "I wonder where he is. I wish he was here and could hear all about it. It would have made him laugh. The cow jumped over the Moon and the poor old troll.
Frodo was now safe in the Last Homely House east of the Sea. That house was, as Bilbo had long ago reported, a perfect house, whether you like food or sleep, or story-telling or singing, or just sitting and thinking best, or a pleasant mixture of them all. Merely to be there was a cure for weariness, fear, and sadness. Still, Frodo forgot to mention Gandalf about his dream that he had. However, he decided to wait and continued to rest since he still needed more time to recover.