Disclaimer: I own none of this.

Warning: Refers to past rape and torture.

Only the Spider

March 13th, 3021. Two years after the Quest. Sweat drenches me and I shiver, shiver as I had when they'd locked me in the tower... Nightmarish memories overlap with reality. A huge orc, reaching down for me as I huddle on the floor... I scream! Suddenly Sam is there, holding me, rocking me as though I'm still only a teen... I bury my face in his chest. I can't stop sobbing.

"It was only the spider, Sam, only the spider..."

The orcs had stripped me bare and just sat there, watching me, questioning me. I wouldn't answer, at first, so they beat me and whipped me as I curled up on the floor. Then – oh, Eru, no, don't even think about it – don't even think... "STAY AWAY!" I shout, only to find myself in Sam's arms again – or is it Sam? An orc? I can't tell anymore! Is Bag End reality or is it this nightmare! So frightened, so frightened, nonononononononono...

If only for a few moments, I am lucid again. There are tears on Sam's face. I think about what I have actually said over the course of this day and realize that Sam still doesn't know the truth. Only Aragorn does, perhaps Gandalf. I lie upon my own bed once more, panting, unable to stop the tears. Or the memories.

They had come with whips and knives and brands and all manner of other atrocities. I was tortured, tortured until I hardly even knew my own name, much less my own cause. I told them my purpose and when they threatened Sam's life, I told them Sam's name. They laughed at me, told me I had just resigned my friend to his doom. Then they had taken the Cat and beaten me, beaten me until I had fainted. When I awoke, it was to find that more orcs were... were...

I am awake again, if only for the purpose of my own sobs and screams. "No!"

I await the next nightmare. It doesn't come. Realizing that I haven't had another flashback for almost five minutes, I turn to look at Sam. "Is it morning?" I croak, my throat hoarse from screaming and sobbing. He nods, grabs my hand and kisses it.

I pull my hand away, feeling unworthy of such a sweet kiss. I was too weak in the tower. Aragorn insists that "understanding will come, in time," that it wasn't my fault and that I can eventually heal... I'm just not sure I'll ever believe him.

Sam has yet to find out the full extent of what happened to me in the tower. If it were up to me, he would never find out. Sam has an innocence about him that even Mordor could not erase. If my own words were to harm that innocence, I could never forgive myself. That's why no one but Aragorn, who was my healer in the Fields of Cormallen, knows fully what the orcs inflicted upon me. He, too, kept it from Sam, fearing that little Samwise would be close to hysterics if he learned that his Frodo was tormented in such a way. He thinks it's his fault, you know. Thinks that because he took me for dead and left me alone, he was the cause for all ills which befell me in the tower. I couldn't let him blame himself for... that.

So on this anniversary, just as I did on the year's past, I will only allow myself, when lucid, to repeat this one lie to my dearest friend, in hopes that it will mask the truth that could break his heart.

"It was only the spider, Sam, only the spider..."