In His Worst Nightmare
frodo
In his worst nightmare he was still in the red chamber up in the turret of the Tower of Cirith Ungol. He lay on his side, gazing listlessly at the undulating shadows on the wall, his whole body throbbing in the raging fire that surged from the back of his neck, his mind writhing in a far deeper, far darker agony. The Ring. He had lost It.
Maybe he should weep for his failure; maybe he should mourn his choice. But he could only think of the Ring and what Its loss entailed. In the absence of its voluptuous songs he felt an isolation so absolute that not even the orcs tormenting him seemed real. Without its fiery caress, he felt so cold that he could only swallow with difficulty when the orcs forced their foul, fiery draught down his numb throat. There was an unfamiliar silence where echoes of his defiance faltered and withered away, and in the utter darkness that Its brilliant glow left, he groped blindly, wildly, for traces of his scattered soul, for remnants of his will, and, to his horror, for Its comforting, albeit painful, caress.
But the most excruciating pain, he realized with despair, lay not in the torture of thinking that the Ring was no longer in his possession, that It belonged to another now. It was in the knowledge that he had failed. He had endured torment and loss only to bring the Ring where It sought to be. He closed his eyes tightly, but even in the abysmal darkness he could see the river of blood flowing across dark deserts where hope would never again grow. No more grass and woods and gardens, laughter and songs and love. He could see hobbits bowed and crushed by slavery and torment; proud men groveling for mercy; elves stripped of their innate beauty and grace, preyed upon by leering hordes of orcs. The horror, and shame, and guilt—beyond tears, beyond pain—descended mercilessly upon him, drowning him in tears that could no longer speak for his anguish and pain, and he let himself sink into eddies of blood-red shadows, willing death to hasten.
Then he heard Sam singing. He closed his eyes in wonder and felt tears pool in his eyes. The song reminded him of something: a vague, hazy, calming memory that slipped through his fingers before he could hold it and look at it more closely. But he still remembered Sam's voice. A stubborn streak of hope trembled in his heart, and his soul cried at the sudden stab of emotion. For a while his mind was wrenched away from the Ring and he silently, anxiously, berated Sam for being so reckless as to enter an orcs' lair instead of running away to safety, though whatever safety there was left out there with the Quest failed, he could not conceive. Another part of him wished desperately for Sam to find him. Then maybe he did not have to die alone. The thought revolted him and he furiously tried to quell it.
Then Sam came up the trap door, slew the orc wielding the razor-tipped whip and told his master that, far from gone, the Ring was with him, safe around his neck.
He did not know what he was thinking and why he did everything that followed, only that at the sight of the Ring dangling on Its chain in Sam's hand a sudden flood of rage welled from within him, pulling him under, overpowering him. After he snatched the Ring from Sam, a crimson veil fell over his sight and he picked a rusty old blade lying nearby and with a single sweep, struck Sam… He leered in satisfaction at the gurgling sound of dying breath; and a sickening sensation of triumph unfurled in his heart. Blood splashed from Sam's slit throat, thick and red…and he fell, lifeless golden-brown eyes staring accusingly at the hobbit who was once his master.
He killed Sam… The Ring made him slay Sam; It had commanded, and he had obeyed, unthinking … Sam's blood webbed the floor in dark red rivulets … Sam's blood…
At this point he always woke up wailing, gasping and drenched in sweat, before hanging over the edge of his bed, retching violently. He used to have Sam rushing to his side at such times. But there was Rose now, and a child on the way, and Sam no longer slept in the room adjoining his master's. So he tightly clutched the white jewel dangling from the chain round his neck, bit his lip and tried to be as quiet as possible, shivering in the warmth of his room till morning brought a glimpse of pale blue sky outside his window, something he could fasten his gaze onto to remind him that Cirith Ungol and the red chamber were things of the past. It was never easy and with the passing of seasons, became increasingly more difficult.
Yet he found that some nights he dreamed of mornings filled with birdsong, when the wind seemed to be singing as it wove playfully among the high branches of murmuring mallorn trees and the dew was cool on his bare toes. In those dreams he stood on top of a hill and wherever he looked he saw the Sea, a deep shade of blue, tinged with gold where the newly awakened Sun kissed the waves. Best of all, Bilbo was there, and they had breakfast, talked, laughed and sang together.
The place was not Bag End. It was nowhere in the Shire for that matter, and Bilbo looked much older, so it could not have been a memory from the times when they still lived together. But it also could not have been Rivendell, for the beauty of it surpassed even the loveliness of the Last Homely House. There were wide open spaces splashed with wild flowers and drenched in sunshine, something of a rarity in the fortress-like landscape of Rivendell. It was a strange place that he had never before seen. Yet he had no doubt that there he would find rest. There the nightmares would never find him.
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