Desecrated Laughter and The Torment of the Guilty
The soft warmth and gentle mirth of voices rumbled like a deep curl of thunder rolling beneath the earth, over hill and plane. Deep among the bones of the earth and rearing up to take hold of Frodo's heart, this beloved, innocent laughter threatened to strangle Frodo. He stumbled, reaching out a hand to clasp the edge of the table in the kitchen and the other hand clutching his trembling heart. His throat closed as if the sounds of joy itself had wrapped cruel fingers about it and tears sprung to his eyes.
There had been a time when hearing his most near and dear wrapped in the warmth of gaiety and innocent joy would have made his heart leap and his eyes sparkle and a joyful smile of his own appear, unbidden, on his lips. But now it was a torture, an actual, physical pain that thrust deep into him and made him wince.
Once he checked himself he moved silently, sliding amongst the shadows as if he were one of their own. The sharp contours of his face caught soft glimpses of light before he ducked his head and his gleaming eyes peered around the doorframe. There sat his nearest and dearest, sitting amongst the golden glow of the hearth, laughing and talking of times long past... times of carelessness and sweet joys. Frodo winced again, almost hissing in pain.
Sam sat on an amply stuffed armchair with his sweet wife upon his knee, giggling as he stroked her soft hair. On one of the finer couches Pippin lay, sprawled on his stomach, a pipe between his teeth and his arms folded beneath his chin. His eyes sparkled with delight. Merry sat, on another, smaller armchair (or perhaps it looked smaller due to the hobbit's unnatural height), his head thrown back in laughter.
There had been a time when such boundless joy was all he ever wanted. There had been a time when he heard his friends laughing in the other room and he would pour a few ales and enter with such a smile playing on his lips his eyes were nearly blurry with mirth. There had been a time when he stayed in that very same doorway, but not hunched in the shadows wincing at every note of laughter as if it had been a blow. No, he would stand in that same doorway, unnoticed, leaning against it and reveling. Relishing the very sight, drinking it in like a deep draught that warmed his bones and made his eyes shimmer. Times like those were sweeter than any honey and deserved to be devoured with careful delight. And now it was a pain.
A pain because Frodo knew with boundless shame that, for him, that laughter may not be ringing through the halls of the smial. A year ago he had made a decision that he and he alone should bear his inheritance. A year ago, when Gandalf first lay the unspeakable terror of the truth of the Ring upon Frodo's heart he had decided that he should not unleash its horror upon the land he loved and his closest kin. Frodo set out on the quest, willing stood before the council and knew full well that with his words "I will take It" his very life would be forfeit. He did not do this because the wise had insisted it must be done, nor for the sake of any other but preserving the lives of the ones he loves. This and this alone spurred him along such a treacherous path and had he succeeded? Nay! The very laughter was testimony to that! He had failed! Failed miserably in all he had set out to do!
Frodo felt tears trail down his neck and turn cold on his shuddering chest. If he could do naught else, the least he could do was weep quietly and choke down his sobs. The laughter he now heard was not the laughter that had once sang in the halls of Bag-End. This gentle sound was almost frail as a once endangered creature would be. It was no longer fearless, no longer full of innocent, sweet joy that was boundless and pure. A laugh that knew no fear or despair, a laugh untouched by the shadows of war, a laugh that did not tremble with the knowledge that it could be smothered.
And Frodo was responsible for that. Because of the pitiful, sniveling coward he is. Because he was unable to leave everything he loved in safety and take the doom far away from them. No, he carried them to it! He had vowed that he would save the Shire, keep any evil from treading upon its green lawns. And he failed. Not because of Saruman and his uncouth doings but because in that very fire lit room was the whole Shire. Those few hobbits, of gentle spirits, noble hearts, valiant courage, kind voices and deep love made up the entire Shire to Frodo. And they were the ones that were placed in the very danger Frodo attempted to steer away from them.
Frodo ducked his head and choked silently. He could hear Merry speaking.
Merry lifted his head and sighed, smiling. "Would there ever be a Shire without Peregrin Took to terrorize it?"
Of course they had been talking about the latest scandalous sport Pippin had indulged in and with the lad there to verify every fact proudly. But Frodo did not spend much thought on this. No, there was something that caused him further pain right then. As Merry turned his head Frodo could see the firelight dance on the dark shadow the passed over his forehead. Frodo felt it like a knife within him. He winced again. Such a wound should not be scarring such young flesh. And it was there, a glaring proclamation of Frodo's cowardice.
Frodo winced again and leaned against the doorframe. The bold child that grew with him sat on that chair as he had that year ago. His arms lay on the arms of the chair as he leaned forward, his eyes boring into Frodo with a cunning light that suggested he knew more than he let on and he was just about to reveal the extent of his knowledge. "You can trust us to stick to you through thick and thin – to the bitter end. And you can trust us to keep any secret of yours – closer than you keep it yourself. But you cannot trust us to let you face trouble alone, and go off without a word." Sweet Meriadoc with heart so bold and spirit so strong, one would think he'd be a hard immovable warrior, valiant yet unreachable. But Merry had a soft compassion, a deep love for hearth and home, for close companions and a sweet lass.
Frodo turned his gaze away from Merry, shamefully. And had Frodo not been so afraid to go off alone, he would not have led such a hobbit into shadow and darkness. But he did, and for that Merry's laughter was not the same. It trembled just a little more, faded a bit too early, and carried a soft breathy sound with it that was almost like a sigh.
Frodo clung to the doorframe as his knees began to feel weak. And the youngest of his cousins was still not saved from Frodo's doom. Peregrin Took, lying there, stretched across the couch with his arms folded under his chin, eyes glittering and a broad grin sparkling. He was a lithe and slender hobbit, his back arching to a graceful curve as his feet dangled off the edge of the couch, still as stone. Pippin's feet had never seemed to stop, Frodo knew. From when the Took was just a lad, running about without tire Frodo knew the spark within him. As he grew older and learned to sit still (just a little bit more) his feet still bounced and shuffled beneath him. He was a bright, extravagant creature, who was not meant to be pinned in one place. The endless dance of his feet as they swerved in the air was testimony to the fact that he was an excellent dancer. Such a spirit could fly to the greatest reaches of joy. And his laugh was just as flighty, just as colorful and musical.
Yet even such a spirit could not escape the chains of Frodo's doom. Frodo did not blame Pippin's love and loyalty for the losses he was forced to suffer. Pressed and crushed beneath the hulking corpse of a hideous creature, pinned to the ground, snuffed like a once brilliant flame. Such was Pippin's fate and Frodo did naught to prevent it. He could have insisted the youngest Took stay. He was not even come of age yet! And yet Frodo dared to allow him to follow the path to doom. To have his bones and body smothered by foulness and drowning in gruesome black blood.
And now Pippin's feet were not so eager to dance in the air. They swayed from time to time, like the slow march of a soldier to the beat of a steady pendulum. There was not an eager flutter or a playful wiggle of his toes. His voice was more shrill, as if he'd never stop attempting to penetrate the thick troll hide with his cries. His laugh was more fragile, worn thin and tremulous. It rose to a high note too soon and remained in a quivering descent too long. It was not the bubbling, dancing giggle of youthful innocence it had once been.
Frodo slid down the wall and took a deep breath. All this lost to Frodo's fear of being alone. Because he could not, would not, give them up in the end, as he could not give up the Ring. But the Ring was destroyed and the goal accomplished whether Frodo had done it or not while his friends were not wholly saved. He had not done what he set out to do.
Then there was Sam. The sweet, shy gardener that Frodo had not known so well before the Journey. He knew he was a gentle boy, one easily hurt but not easy to show it. Little did Frodo Baggins know of the vibrant spirit that lie behind that shy, blushing face. When he heard Sam laughing outside the windows on Spring afternoons, his courageous voice filled the smial with a gentle glow that never ceased to bring a smile to Frodo's face. It was always kind, without a trace of cruelty or deception. His laugh always seemed not to be at anything particularly funny. It was often soft and momentary. A musical chuckle that only crept from him when he seemed most joyful or his song most silly and sweet.
Frodo knew what Sam had seen, what Sam had suffered. Sam was forced to suffer most of all. He followed the path Frodo's own feet trod. He paved the path for his master, led him by the hand, lifted his feet off the cruel stones and carried him. Frodo hung his head in the bitterest shame he had ever known. When his own feet had refused to go on it was Sam's that saw the quest was done. It was Sam's heart that was torn when he thought his master dead and yet still he carried on. Sam's courage, his loyalty and devotion, his sense of duty was what saw the quest to its end and the Ring to Its pyre.
Had hunger, thirst, despair, and torment severed the kindest laugh in all the Shire?
No.
Frodo felt his heart grow cold. Of all things he'd thought Sam would never laugh again. It was his dying thought (as, at the time, he thought he was to die). As he lay beside his loyal gardener, feeling his tainted life seep away he thought of Sam's youth, the joys he had not yet known, and his dear laugh that would never again brighten the halls of Bag-End like the sun. Sacrificed so that he may not be alone in his final moments on that accursed mountain in that hellish land of torment and death, of black skies and starless evenings, of boundless despair and deep, black fear. To drown the purest laughter in all the Shire amongst sulfuric pools and liquid fire so that the miserable shadow that was left of a cowardly hobbit would not die alone.
Frodo's shoulders shook with noiseless sobbing. The least he could do is not disrupt their moment of joy by his weakness. But what struck him with a greater knife of guilt than all the rest is that Sam had come out of that nearly unscathed. Surely there was a small difference, a slight difference but it astounded Frodo, struck him to the very core. Sam's laugh was more cultured, touched with a bit of wisdom and a savoring quality as his laughter clung to the air, making the joy last. Sam had gained an understanding of how fleeting such innocence could be yet he did not lose the innocence.
Clutching himself and shivering, Frodo pressed his lips to his knees to smother his soft whimpers. He could not fathom it, he could not accept it. Despite his own foolishness, his own selfish cowardice, Sam was spared. And it only made him grieve more. By rights Sam should be weighed down with weariness and despair, crushed beneath horrifying memories and terrifying sights. And Frodo would have been dead in an instant to see it. And that was the fate Frodo Baggins deserved. Yet Sam remained Sam and therefore Frodo could not suffer as he thought it was necessary to suffer. His heart leapt for Sam yet sunk down again as he felt he had gone unpunished.
There was another note to the laughter. A higher, sweeter note that was somehow more wary, a little uncertain. Frodo wept for this as well, for this was Rosie. A lass Frodo had not even thought he could have hurt. He had taken the hobbit she loved from her into lands unknown and unto a fate uncertain. She had waited a year, an entire year in doubt and despair for the hobbit she had loved. She did not know where he had gone or if he'd ever come back. Yet she still waited and her heart was still true. Had Sam never returned, how long would she have waited? Would she watch the years drift by and the dust settle before her until she wasted her life away? Frodo shuddered and this time a small, weak whimper crept between the fabric of his breeches. He bit down and felt that he would soon choke and drown in his own guilt.
"Master Merry you ought to be easier on Mr. Pippin, you were a bit of trouble yourself if I reckon rightly," Sam admonished.
"Have I told you how much I admire you, Sam?" giggled Pippin, cocking his head to the side and smiling sweetly. Rose giggled and Sam rubbed her shoulder lovingly. Merry chuckled and shook his head.
Sam's laughter stopped abruptly and he turned to the shadows by the doorway.
"What is it, Sam?" asked Merry already sitting up in the chair. Pippin swung his legs down and turned towards the doorway expectantly.
Rose looked warily at Sam. "Dear, what is it?"
Without a word Sam shifted his wife onto the chair and stood up. He stepped silently out of the room and the three hobbits within sat in uneasy, expectant silence.
"Frodo."
Frodo gasped and looked up. In the shadows he could still sense the warmth and concern that was so distinctly Sam. Frodo seemed a little dazed, his eyes were red with tears, his throat could not have uttered words if he tried, so sore was it from swallowing sobs. Sam bent down and covered Frodo's trembling form with his embrace. "Master, I thought you were tired and wanted to go abed early. Sh, come with me." He half lifted Frodo to his feet and helped him to his room.
Once Frodo was again in bed he refused to lay down. He sat up, clutching a pocket handkerchief that Sam had given him to sop up his tears. His hands were trembling and he was staring at the fire Sam had recently lit. The loyal gardener took a seat beside his master and reached for his quivering hands. "Now, sir, I should say I know you and you are not so easy to figure out sometimes because you think you got to keep everything to yourself. I don't know why, sir, I really don't but you don't never ask anything of anyone and that's a fact. Truth is, sir, you can't do everything on your own, no one can. I tell you, you keep doing this to yourself, not to mention us all, we'll all be going crazy."
Frodo winced again and took a shuddering gasp. "Now what was that, I wonder." Sam leaned forward to look Frodo in the eye. "Looks like someone took a blow to you. You're not having another anniversary, I know that." Frodo shook his head. Sam stood up and he seemed to be growing angry. "I see what you're doing, sir! And I don't like it, not one bit. Don't think you can hide nothing from old Sam, because you never could and you never will. Why you are torturing yourself, aren't you? Oh why, Frodo! Why would you do such a thing? You haven't hurt enough? Well I tell you I don't like no one hurting my master even if it is you! Now you quit it, hear?"
Frodo looked darkly at Sam. "You don't-"Frodo's voice was thick and scratched.
"No, sir I do! You think you're sparing the lot of us whenever you do this but you're not. And it's awful of you, sir! It's right awful of you to do something like that to us!"
"Sam!" Frodo cried painfully, clenching his eyes shut as if the knives within him had twisted. He shrank into the sheets as if Sam had hit him with a horrible blow.
"Stop it!" Sam ran over to Frodo and held him close. His voice was without cruelty, without accusation, just pain and compassion and Frodo wept more. "Oh my dear master, you're doing this to yourself. You don't deserve none of this. Oh Frodo don't you see. You could have never stopped us."
Frodo looked up. "How-"
"You know you can't keep anything from me, or your cousins for that matter. You know sir, you were never a demanding master. You did not treat me like some dog to command. You knew I was free to think on my own. It's awfully cruel of you to think you could take that away from me, as well as your cousins, in a decision so big as that."
Frodo shook his head. "No, Sam. I didn't want you hurt. I didn't want-"
Sam smiled and pressed his forehead against Frodo's. "That's why we followed you, sir. You must think we are pretty stupid little fools to follow a hobbit that you consider a failure. If you are a failure, sir, then what does that make us?"
Frodo closed his eyes and felt tears spring to them anew. "Oh Sam I never meant-"
"It don't matter, sir. If you were doing this to anyone else but yourself what would that make you? You're near stabbing yourself with every guilt ridden thought that goes through your head. You blame it all on you and that isn't fair one bit. If you were this hard on anyone else... well you'd be a wicked tyrant at no mistake! A cruel, wicked creature that I would have no doing with."
"But Sam it's not so easy. I set out to do something, keep the Ring and all Its evil from those I loved most. And I failed in that, Sam!"
"Frodo, if you'd gone off alone you'd be dead now and causing the lot of us a great more suffering than any wound we've ever suffered. We knew what we were doing, sir, and we knew what might happen. But we also knew what we would not let happen. We would not let you go alone. Maybe I should blame myself for letting you get hurt. You got stabbed and bitten and taken from me when I had sworn to protect you. Aren't I a failure, master! Aren't I a rotten, miserable-"
"Sam! Sam! Sam!" Frodo hunched over and wept. "Alright, please stop! Oh please don't say that! Oh please don't ever say anything like that again!
"So you know what you do to me every time you think that about yourself."
Sam knelt on the bed and allowed Frodo to press his head against his shoulder. There was a long moment of silence before Sam felt Frodo sigh and the younger hobbit smiled to himself. With that soft breath he knew Frodo was letting out all that had been bottled up within him, ready to burst. He felt Frodo press his head gently against his shoulder before leaning back against the pillow and closing his eyes. Sam bent forward and laid a kiss on his master's forehead. "You sleep well now, me dear, and if you go hurting my master again I'll throttle you."
A smile crept onto Frodo's lips and he opened his eyes slowly. A soft laugh escaped him and it was sweet and relieved as warm sunlight on a cool spring.
The soft warmth and gentle mirth of voices rumbled like a deep curl of thunder rolling beneath the earth, over hill and plane. Deep among the bones of the earth and rearing up to take hold of Frodo's heart, this beloved, innocent laughter threatened to strangle Frodo. He stumbled, reaching out a hand to clasp the edge of the table in the kitchen and the other hand clutching his trembling heart. His throat closed as if the sounds of joy itself had wrapped cruel fingers about it and tears sprung to his eyes.
There had been a time when hearing his most near and dear wrapped in the warmth of gaiety and innocent joy would have made his heart leap and his eyes sparkle and a joyful smile of his own appear, unbidden, on his lips. But now it was a torture, an actual, physical pain that thrust deep into him and made him wince.
Once he checked himself he moved silently, sliding amongst the shadows as if he were one of their own. The sharp contours of his face caught soft glimpses of light before he ducked his head and his gleaming eyes peered around the doorframe. There sat his nearest and dearest, sitting amongst the golden glow of the hearth, laughing and talking of times long past... times of carelessness and sweet joys. Frodo winced again, almost hissing in pain.
Sam sat on an amply stuffed armchair with his sweet wife upon his knee, giggling as he stroked her soft hair. On one of the finer couches Pippin lay, sprawled on his stomach, a pipe between his teeth and his arms folded beneath his chin. His eyes sparkled with delight. Merry sat, on another, smaller armchair (or perhaps it looked smaller due to the hobbit's unnatural height), his head thrown back in laughter.
There had been a time when such boundless joy was all he ever wanted. There had been a time when he heard his friends laughing in the other room and he would pour a few ales and enter with such a smile playing on his lips his eyes were nearly blurry with mirth. There had been a time when he stayed in that very same doorway, but not hunched in the shadows wincing at every note of laughter as if it had been a blow. No, he would stand in that same doorway, unnoticed, leaning against it and reveling. Relishing the very sight, drinking it in like a deep draught that warmed his bones and made his eyes shimmer. Times like those were sweeter than any honey and deserved to be devoured with careful delight. And now it was a pain.
A pain because Frodo knew with boundless shame that, for him, that laughter may not be ringing through the halls of the smial. A year ago he had made a decision that he and he alone should bear his inheritance. A year ago, when Gandalf first lay the unspeakable terror of the truth of the Ring upon Frodo's heart he had decided that he should not unleash its horror upon the land he loved and his closest kin. Frodo set out on the quest, willing stood before the council and knew full well that with his words "I will take It" his very life would be forfeit. He did not do this because the wise had insisted it must be done, nor for the sake of any other but preserving the lives of the ones he loves. This and this alone spurred him along such a treacherous path and had he succeeded? Nay! The very laughter was testimony to that! He had failed! Failed miserably in all he had set out to do!
Frodo felt tears trail down his neck and turn cold on his shuddering chest. If he could do naught else, the least he could do was weep quietly and choke down his sobs. The laughter he now heard was not the laughter that had once sang in the halls of Bag-End. This gentle sound was almost frail as a once endangered creature would be. It was no longer fearless, no longer full of innocent, sweet joy that was boundless and pure. A laugh that knew no fear or despair, a laugh untouched by the shadows of war, a laugh that did not tremble with the knowledge that it could be smothered.
And Frodo was responsible for that. Because of the pitiful, sniveling coward he is. Because he was unable to leave everything he loved in safety and take the doom far away from them. No, he carried them to it! He had vowed that he would save the Shire, keep any evil from treading upon its green lawns. And he failed. Not because of Saruman and his uncouth doings but because in that very fire lit room was the whole Shire. Those few hobbits, of gentle spirits, noble hearts, valiant courage, kind voices and deep love made up the entire Shire to Frodo. And they were the ones that were placed in the very danger Frodo attempted to steer away from them.
Frodo ducked his head and choked silently. He could hear Merry speaking.
Merry lifted his head and sighed, smiling. "Would there ever be a Shire without Peregrin Took to terrorize it?"
Of course they had been talking about the latest scandalous sport Pippin had indulged in and with the lad there to verify every fact proudly. But Frodo did not spend much thought on this. No, there was something that caused him further pain right then. As Merry turned his head Frodo could see the firelight dance on the dark shadow the passed over his forehead. Frodo felt it like a knife within him. He winced again. Such a wound should not be scarring such young flesh. And it was there, a glaring proclamation of Frodo's cowardice.
Frodo winced again and leaned against the doorframe. The bold child that grew with him sat on that chair as he had that year ago. His arms lay on the arms of the chair as he leaned forward, his eyes boring into Frodo with a cunning light that suggested he knew more than he let on and he was just about to reveal the extent of his knowledge. "You can trust us to stick to you through thick and thin – to the bitter end. And you can trust us to keep any secret of yours – closer than you keep it yourself. But you cannot trust us to let you face trouble alone, and go off without a word." Sweet Meriadoc with heart so bold and spirit so strong, one would think he'd be a hard immovable warrior, valiant yet unreachable. But Merry had a soft compassion, a deep love for hearth and home, for close companions and a sweet lass.
Frodo turned his gaze away from Merry, shamefully. And had Frodo not been so afraid to go off alone, he would not have led such a hobbit into shadow and darkness. But he did, and for that Merry's laughter was not the same. It trembled just a little more, faded a bit too early, and carried a soft breathy sound with it that was almost like a sigh.
Frodo clung to the doorframe as his knees began to feel weak. And the youngest of his cousins was still not saved from Frodo's doom. Peregrin Took, lying there, stretched across the couch with his arms folded under his chin, eyes glittering and a broad grin sparkling. He was a lithe and slender hobbit, his back arching to a graceful curve as his feet dangled off the edge of the couch, still as stone. Pippin's feet had never seemed to stop, Frodo knew. From when the Took was just a lad, running about without tire Frodo knew the spark within him. As he grew older and learned to sit still (just a little bit more) his feet still bounced and shuffled beneath him. He was a bright, extravagant creature, who was not meant to be pinned in one place. The endless dance of his feet as they swerved in the air was testimony to the fact that he was an excellent dancer. Such a spirit could fly to the greatest reaches of joy. And his laugh was just as flighty, just as colorful and musical.
Yet even such a spirit could not escape the chains of Frodo's doom. Frodo did not blame Pippin's love and loyalty for the losses he was forced to suffer. Pressed and crushed beneath the hulking corpse of a hideous creature, pinned to the ground, snuffed like a once brilliant flame. Such was Pippin's fate and Frodo did naught to prevent it. He could have insisted the youngest Took stay. He was not even come of age yet! And yet Frodo dared to allow him to follow the path to doom. To have his bones and body smothered by foulness and drowning in gruesome black blood.
And now Pippin's feet were not so eager to dance in the air. They swayed from time to time, like the slow march of a soldier to the beat of a steady pendulum. There was not an eager flutter or a playful wiggle of his toes. His voice was more shrill, as if he'd never stop attempting to penetrate the thick troll hide with his cries. His laugh was more fragile, worn thin and tremulous. It rose to a high note too soon and remained in a quivering descent too long. It was not the bubbling, dancing giggle of youthful innocence it had once been.
Frodo slid down the wall and took a deep breath. All this lost to Frodo's fear of being alone. Because he could not, would not, give them up in the end, as he could not give up the Ring. But the Ring was destroyed and the goal accomplished whether Frodo had done it or not while his friends were not wholly saved. He had not done what he set out to do.
Then there was Sam. The sweet, shy gardener that Frodo had not known so well before the Journey. He knew he was a gentle boy, one easily hurt but not easy to show it. Little did Frodo Baggins know of the vibrant spirit that lie behind that shy, blushing face. When he heard Sam laughing outside the windows on Spring afternoons, his courageous voice filled the smial with a gentle glow that never ceased to bring a smile to Frodo's face. It was always kind, without a trace of cruelty or deception. His laugh always seemed not to be at anything particularly funny. It was often soft and momentary. A musical chuckle that only crept from him when he seemed most joyful or his song most silly and sweet.
Frodo knew what Sam had seen, what Sam had suffered. Sam was forced to suffer most of all. He followed the path Frodo's own feet trod. He paved the path for his master, led him by the hand, lifted his feet off the cruel stones and carried him. Frodo hung his head in the bitterest shame he had ever known. When his own feet had refused to go on it was Sam's that saw the quest was done. It was Sam's heart that was torn when he thought his master dead and yet still he carried on. Sam's courage, his loyalty and devotion, his sense of duty was what saw the quest to its end and the Ring to Its pyre.
Had hunger, thirst, despair, and torment severed the kindest laugh in all the Shire?
No.
Frodo felt his heart grow cold. Of all things he'd thought Sam would never laugh again. It was his dying thought (as, at the time, he thought he was to die). As he lay beside his loyal gardener, feeling his tainted life seep away he thought of Sam's youth, the joys he had not yet known, and his dear laugh that would never again brighten the halls of Bag-End like the sun. Sacrificed so that he may not be alone in his final moments on that accursed mountain in that hellish land of torment and death, of black skies and starless evenings, of boundless despair and deep, black fear. To drown the purest laughter in all the Shire amongst sulfuric pools and liquid fire so that the miserable shadow that was left of a cowardly hobbit would not die alone.
Frodo's shoulders shook with noiseless sobbing. The least he could do is not disrupt their moment of joy by his weakness. But what struck him with a greater knife of guilt than all the rest is that Sam had come out of that nearly unscathed. Surely there was a small difference, a slight difference but it astounded Frodo, struck him to the very core. Sam's laugh was more cultured, touched with a bit of wisdom and a savoring quality as his laughter clung to the air, making the joy last. Sam had gained an understanding of how fleeting such innocence could be yet he did not lose the innocence.
Clutching himself and shivering, Frodo pressed his lips to his knees to smother his soft whimpers. He could not fathom it, he could not accept it. Despite his own foolishness, his own selfish cowardice, Sam was spared. And it only made him grieve more. By rights Sam should be weighed down with weariness and despair, crushed beneath horrifying memories and terrifying sights. And Frodo would have been dead in an instant to see it. And that was the fate Frodo Baggins deserved. Yet Sam remained Sam and therefore Frodo could not suffer as he thought it was necessary to suffer. His heart leapt for Sam yet sunk down again as he felt he had gone unpunished.
There was another note to the laughter. A higher, sweeter note that was somehow more wary, a little uncertain. Frodo wept for this as well, for this was Rosie. A lass Frodo had not even thought he could have hurt. He had taken the hobbit she loved from her into lands unknown and unto a fate uncertain. She had waited a year, an entire year in doubt and despair for the hobbit she had loved. She did not know where he had gone or if he'd ever come back. Yet she still waited and her heart was still true. Had Sam never returned, how long would she have waited? Would she watch the years drift by and the dust settle before her until she wasted her life away? Frodo shuddered and this time a small, weak whimper crept between the fabric of his breeches. He bit down and felt that he would soon choke and drown in his own guilt.
"Master Merry you ought to be easier on Mr. Pippin, you were a bit of trouble yourself if I reckon rightly," Sam admonished.
"Have I told you how much I admire you, Sam?" giggled Pippin, cocking his head to the side and smiling sweetly. Rose giggled and Sam rubbed her shoulder lovingly. Merry chuckled and shook his head.
Sam's laughter stopped abruptly and he turned to the shadows by the doorway.
"What is it, Sam?" asked Merry already sitting up in the chair. Pippin swung his legs down and turned towards the doorway expectantly.
Rose looked warily at Sam. "Dear, what is it?"
Without a word Sam shifted his wife onto the chair and stood up. He stepped silently out of the room and the three hobbits within sat in uneasy, expectant silence.
"Frodo."
Frodo gasped and looked up. In the shadows he could still sense the warmth and concern that was so distinctly Sam. Frodo seemed a little dazed, his eyes were red with tears, his throat could not have uttered words if he tried, so sore was it from swallowing sobs. Sam bent down and covered Frodo's trembling form with his embrace. "Master, I thought you were tired and wanted to go abed early. Sh, come with me." He half lifted Frodo to his feet and helped him to his room.
Once Frodo was again in bed he refused to lay down. He sat up, clutching a pocket handkerchief that Sam had given him to sop up his tears. His hands were trembling and he was staring at the fire Sam had recently lit. The loyal gardener took a seat beside his master and reached for his quivering hands. "Now, sir, I should say I know you and you are not so easy to figure out sometimes because you think you got to keep everything to yourself. I don't know why, sir, I really don't but you don't never ask anything of anyone and that's a fact. Truth is, sir, you can't do everything on your own, no one can. I tell you, you keep doing this to yourself, not to mention us all, we'll all be going crazy."
Frodo winced again and took a shuddering gasp. "Now what was that, I wonder." Sam leaned forward to look Frodo in the eye. "Looks like someone took a blow to you. You're not having another anniversary, I know that." Frodo shook his head. Sam stood up and he seemed to be growing angry. "I see what you're doing, sir! And I don't like it, not one bit. Don't think you can hide nothing from old Sam, because you never could and you never will. Why you are torturing yourself, aren't you? Oh why, Frodo! Why would you do such a thing? You haven't hurt enough? Well I tell you I don't like no one hurting my master even if it is you! Now you quit it, hear?"
Frodo looked darkly at Sam. "You don't-"Frodo's voice was thick and scratched.
"No, sir I do! You think you're sparing the lot of us whenever you do this but you're not. And it's awful of you, sir! It's right awful of you to do something like that to us!"
"Sam!" Frodo cried painfully, clenching his eyes shut as if the knives within him had twisted. He shrank into the sheets as if Sam had hit him with a horrible blow.
"Stop it!" Sam ran over to Frodo and held him close. His voice was without cruelty, without accusation, just pain and compassion and Frodo wept more. "Oh my dear master, you're doing this to yourself. You don't deserve none of this. Oh Frodo don't you see. You could have never stopped us."
Frodo looked up. "How-"
"You know you can't keep anything from me, or your cousins for that matter. You know sir, you were never a demanding master. You did not treat me like some dog to command. You knew I was free to think on my own. It's awfully cruel of you to think you could take that away from me, as well as your cousins, in a decision so big as that."
Frodo shook his head. "No, Sam. I didn't want you hurt. I didn't want-"
Sam smiled and pressed his forehead against Frodo's. "That's why we followed you, sir. You must think we are pretty stupid little fools to follow a hobbit that you consider a failure. If you are a failure, sir, then what does that make us?"
Frodo closed his eyes and felt tears spring to them anew. "Oh Sam I never meant-"
"It don't matter, sir. If you were doing this to anyone else but yourself what would that make you? You're near stabbing yourself with every guilt ridden thought that goes through your head. You blame it all on you and that isn't fair one bit. If you were this hard on anyone else... well you'd be a wicked tyrant at no mistake! A cruel, wicked creature that I would have no doing with."
"But Sam it's not so easy. I set out to do something, keep the Ring and all Its evil from those I loved most. And I failed in that, Sam!"
"Frodo, if you'd gone off alone you'd be dead now and causing the lot of us a great more suffering than any wound we've ever suffered. We knew what we were doing, sir, and we knew what might happen. But we also knew what we would not let happen. We would not let you go alone. Maybe I should blame myself for letting you get hurt. You got stabbed and bitten and taken from me when I had sworn to protect you. Aren't I a failure, master! Aren't I a rotten, miserable-"
"Sam! Sam! Sam!" Frodo hunched over and wept. "Alright, please stop! Oh please don't say that! Oh please don't ever say anything like that again!
"So you know what you do to me every time you think that about yourself."
Sam knelt on the bed and allowed Frodo to press his head against his shoulder. There was a long moment of silence before Sam felt Frodo sigh and the younger hobbit smiled to himself. With that soft breath he knew Frodo was letting out all that had been bottled up within him, ready to burst. He felt Frodo press his head gently against his shoulder before leaning back against the pillow and closing his eyes. Sam bent forward and laid a kiss on his master's forehead. "You sleep well now, me dear, and if you go hurting my master again I'll throttle you."
A smile crept onto Frodo's lips and he opened his eyes slowly. A soft laugh escaped him and it was sweet and relieved as warm sunlight on a cool spring.