"'These truths are too strong, the myths and lies around them too great. They are surrounded on all sides by walls...You must see them and you must understand for yourself'" (Williams, 506). Memory, Sorrow and Thorn: To Green Angel Tower Part 2

The Strength of Truth and Shadow

-Nuriko Kamaji

(3/4/03)

Whenever the words try to form, to make sense of my muddled thoughts I can make no more, nor take, any more meaning in them then the throb of feelings they give to me. They are thoughts but undefined without words, as though something is struggling to be heard through the cloudy haze on my coherence thoughts.

Or perhaps, I wonder distantly as I stumbled for a moment then continue on without a thought, it is the struggling, writhing thing that coats my consciousness with these foggy unclear perceptions.

I wonder on this as I lay my back against the warm stone behind my chilled back. The bitter fumes float out from the deep bowls of the earth, choking my breath. I feel peculiarly chilled even in the staggering heat and exhaust. I can no more shake the gripe of cold clutched to me than my bubbling runaway thoughts.

It is hard to think completely clearly, but I struggle to keep my mind on one thought and not stray. Could my chill and unreasonable thoughts be due in part to the red, writhing form at the corner of my mind, as though squirming in an unending torment?

An uncomfortable feeling began to settle itself in my churning stomach at the thought. The burning, black form had haunted my dreams for nights uncountable now. Sometimes it seems as though it is calling to me, other times it seems to be burning inside my head, a howling pain, while yet other times it feels as thought a part of me is burning with it, with this dark painful form.

Feeling an odd rage rise in my throat, I lurch to my feet continuing on without a second thought as to where I am going.

The Ring, I murmur to myself. That is why you're here...

I shudder a moment as the dark flaming thing seems to reach out to me, trying to caught me like a fly in a trap and trying to win me to its side like a long lost lover. I struggle against the unseen grip, anger at my own weakness, my own confusion, coursing through me, clearing my thoughts. The vision fades. I shudder once more, feeling my lifeless body sink to the burning floor.

That's all I seem to have now, this writhing, beckoning flame thing and my unaccountable anger. I physically hate that dark thing, hate it more than I thought I ever could before I was given this cursed thing, which I hate even more, yet can not seem to get my mind off.

I hold it out on my hand watching the golden band flicker in the false firelight, seeming to dance evocatively in my hand.

I want to rip my eyes away from its beckoning call, but I can not do that now, not anymore than I can remove my hand from my arm. It is too much a part of me now. And I hate it.

I hate it more than the shadow in my head, burning in cold emptiness, because it is real, something I can touch and see, while the shadow form is nothing than a half-dream. Yet I can not keep its words out of my head. Those sweet, painful whisperings that echo in my head make me weak, make me want to fall to my knees and weep for it to open up, to show me what it knows, to tell in meanings clearer than words what it has been trying to whisper to me.

My thoughts ran away again. Something is nagging at my tired mind when all I want to do is stay here, watching my golden treasure with horrid fascination.

But the thought is growing stronger, as though another part of me is scratching through the cloud in my head. It is trying to tell me, to warn me.

You cannot just stay here; it seems to say to me. You came here to destroy it! The voice seems to shout in my head.

I sit up with a start, memory ringing in my head. The Ring, yes, that is why I am here. And Gollum, my hand clutches my treasure in my hand as though in anger but I feel nothing, tried to take it from me.

I feel a peculiar but undeniable swell movie inside me, beating against my chest at the thought. As though I hate that pitiful creature just for trying to take a treasure that does not belong to me, and even fear him. Fear of that look in his hollow, bright eyes, wide and strained as a hunted beast fearing capture. He feels the black flame thing's pain and anger and the whispering promises of the gold treasure clutched tightly in my hand. He wants its promises as much as he hates it.

Just like me...

I drive the thought away with a hiss of annoyance, refusing to look any farther at this wayward thought. I will not deny the feelings I have for the wretched thing or the unquestionable connection he has to me but right now it is of little importance.

Remembering my task I stumble onward, feeling my senses chilled by the blazing heat and smoke swirling and beating against my chill-boned body.

With a start I realize I stand before a vast opening, a great heart rising from below, steaming heavily.

I chock down a cough, wipe my dry eyes, and peer into the fiery pit. As I do I wonder carelessly how I found my way here. I shake my head to focus my senses but to no avail.

The depths below me bubble like water, red flamed in the deep light. Before me the fiery blaze bursts and rumbles gently, like a lullaby playing in my muddle head. The fiery colors grow brighter to my eyes, yet at the same moment the shadows turn deeper, darkness creeping through my vision like a twisted mutilated hand, reaching out for revenge.

I desperately want to ignore these images floating before my eyes, but I cannot rid myself of the flaming shadow wreathed in fire, nor the fear it feeds to me, the unmistakable wrongness of its presence scathing my open eyes. My eyes see nothing but the shadow in my mind's eye.

Before I realize what I am doing I have pulled the Ring out again. The shadows seem to clear yet focus on the tiny band laying like a tine golden star in the palm of my hand.

I want suddenly to keep it with me, to treasure its beauty, to wallow in its secrets. Surely that cannot be wrong, can it? I realize with a thrilled feeling that I partly think should be horror, that I want this small shining thing badly. I need it. I feel weak to think of life without its shadow whispers in my ear. I would surely go mad without this precious thing. For surely I reason the writhing black flame cannot touch me once I take this golden treasure as my own and lay open the secrets that lay within.

I know suddenly it is mine to take with a small squeak of delight that no on else can take it from me. It is mine now.

I hear its words grow stronger, louder. Feeling propelled I open my closed eyes again. I calmly rest my eyes on his now distant face. Sam is yelling something, but I cannot hear. The Ring's voice has risen in my shadowy head resounding through me like chimes to a great swinging bell.

I hear my own calm, clear voice, strangely loud suddenly, speaking openly over the hiss of steam and fire. I do not hear what I say but the words it is mine echoes in my heart, clear and cold, like a black blade.

Without thinking, without caring anymore, I slip my beautiful prize on my finger, going forward toward the lights and shadows flickering in my cloudy head, pushing anything that stands in my way. I do not know where I am going, I do not care. Nothing can take away what I have gained.

With a start, I feel a wriggling hole burning its way into my head. I fight against it. What is this small wriggling form to me that I should worry? I want to fight against it, yell at it to leave me be, to let me search out these answers that I saw shining in the echoic whispers. I do not want to hurt it but it is struggling so hard. I want to cry but the tears will not come. What is this?

The dark hole begins to grow, beginning to burn at the center, a small light it a sea of darkness. I can make nothing else. I am swimming in this cloudy darkness vainly trying to see pass the single light, trying to see the truths my treasure was trying to tell me. But there is nothing there except scorching pain and obvious hatred, leaking out like cold steam, burning my mind. I refuse to accept it; I will not die this way, for surely what else could be happening.

I hold the memory of the shimmering light I saw in the golden reflection of my precious treasure before my mind like a sword to cut through the dark fire of the growing shadow. It is met with a fiery brand, burning brightly, brighter than the sun, flittered with darkness. It strives to strike me dead I realize. It...this shadow wants what I have claimed.

I try to hold it back, to fight it back, but I cannot. I am too weak. I laugh bitterly at myself as I feel the darkness swallowing me up, for surely once the shadow takes away my treasure I will go mad with the lost. The lost not of the treasure itself but the mysteries and truths it could have unveiled to me.

For an instant in my mind I see the creature Gollum, withering as a dying flower without it, his need just as great. His need for the precious' secret ways and hidden paths. He does not want to use it to learn, he wants to use it to live. He knows no other way. He cannot live without it, and neither can I.

I know suddenly that that is its pull, the secrets not of the world, but the secrets of the individual's own heart. I want to weep at my own folly but I do not care anymore. Perhaps Gollum and I will meet again in a better place and talk of the great mysteries and hidden secrets we saw. I sigh heavily, finally giving in to the shadow's pull. I have nothing left to lose. I have already lost it all. I came to destroy a great weapon but failed just as I failed to empathize with it completely.

Abruptly I feel as though I am looking through crystal glass, my sight is so clear. Clearly I recognize that that was all I was suppose to do. I was not meant to destroy this great evil, this great treasure, I was only meant to understand it. There was something I was suppose to see, something that no one else had seen because none had borne this evil treasure long enough to see this far. Not even Gollum, nor even Bilbo. Oh I could see that they had had their parts in it, but this was my time. It was my turn to see what I would.

The shadow grew closer, wrapping around me and throttling my life. Dark flaming eyes burned into my mind, making me flinch, but I refused to turn away. The fire raced through my blood and bones and body, yet I knew that I was in fact far away from my body though I could never say why. It hurt so much as though great waves of ice was cutting throw my body, sending streaks of blood and fire running into the dark void. A voice was laughing at me and it hurt. It sees me as such a worthless piece of the world. This thing, this dark shadow with the fiery eye was the master and it would break him to pieces.

Sauron...

With a numbing thought I was stunned to realize whose presence burned cold in my ethereal body. But there was something so familiar about it...something so cold...as cold as I had been for so long.

In my mind's eye I saw oddly the small golden ring that Sauron himself had forged to create all the misery everyone was not suffering, not to mentions countless others' who had suffered ages before. But I could not work up any anger anymore. I could not feel anything for Sauron...for the great dark Lord...nothing more than bitter pity. The ring was burning I noted, burning like Sauron's writhing eye.

With a start I was dazed to comprehend that Sauron himself was in pain. All these long years while he had been rebuilding his power he had been suffering in dark, cold burning pain. That pain had never left him, the pain he had experienced when he had been forever marred for eternal. For an instant I saw him as he once had been, fair to look upon and wise to some. He had lost those things, the things he treasured, and even now he howled in injured pain for what he had lost. He was nothing more than a wounded child crying for his lost dreams. He was surely not without fault, but he was nothing more than anything else. He wanted revenge for his misfortune; he wanted his treasure back because he believed he could build himself up from the writhing shadow he had become. He hated and feared himself as much as those fighting him did. He did not want to believe he had lost what was dear to him. He was fighting for what he wanted just as he had learned. He was just trying to survive.

I was struck by the simplicity of our great enemy. The enemy was not a force to be fought, but to be understood. Surely that was what we should be meant to do? He was just as weak as we are.

The revelation left me feeling that I should be stunned but peculiarly I felt nothing much except a strange calmness begin to seep into my dismantled body.

He was not evil, but he was not good either. He could see nothing beyond his own pain, a pain I hurt to see him suffer, feeling nothing but for himself. That was what evil usually was. It was pain and sorrow and loneliness, but more than that it was the unwillingness to let go of the lies and see the truth, to let go of the hatred and shame, to face the reality of the situation. Every living thing had evil inside them and Sauron was not different, he had just fallen farther than the others, fallen so far.

Gandalf had misjudged I realized, oddly drowsy, as though I was being lulled to into an eternal sleep.

But there is still so much more...I thought dully as the unwilling arms of slumber took hold of me.

I watched with a blend of sorrow and enthrallment as the fiery shadow of Sauron faded away like breaking dust, along with his precious Ring, burning into darkness. I did not really mind anymore...I had seen enough now...it was enough...

As my otherworldly eyes began to close, I saw vast paths winding before me, like cracks in deep white ice, twisting and changing. I saw for a moment what may have been the openness of eternity and with it the lives of my loved ones unraveling before my eyes. I felt myself smiling as I fell quietly into silent, oblivious stillness.

I knew quietly in my own soul, the way I had known before, that I did not need that precious treasure. I may hurt from it, but I knew I would not need it...though my loneliness may become sharper than any wound I had ever born.