Frodo was tired, among other things, and he knew that no rest on these shores - save death - would relieve him of the burden. Arwen had said that her place on the ships sailing into the Far West was open to him, but there was one last thing he wanted to do first.
Very, very few people would ever say that they actually wanted to meet a Nazgûl, and fewer still would say that it was the last thing they wanted to do before passing from the world, but that was what he wanted. He wanted to meet this "Talion", the Gravewalker and Wind-Rider, Last of the Nine and new Lord of Mordor - he wanted to see with his own eyes that it was possible to pass into darkness and yet return to the light.
(He wanted to believe that his own soul wasn't irreparably marred by choosing to take the Ring for his own.)
At last he heard that Middle-earth was finally stable enough that the kingdoms of the west - Gondor and Rohan at least, and perhaps more - were coming together to negotiate with Mordor for lasting peace. He had long ago decided that he wanted to be there, so he sent letters to his friends in Gondor, asking if he might attend, to at least hear what was said and take the news back to the Shire, if not speak on behalf of the hobbits.
Aragorn sent an escort fit for a king to collect him, and Sam, Merry, and Pippin if they wished to come.
(Merry and Pippin did at least, and Sam consented to be dragged along.)
It was pleasant to walk the land at their leisure, no longer pursued by the Shadow in the East now banished forever from Middle-earth. They joined with Gandalf and Elrond and some of his people when they passed by Rivendell, and Celeborn and Galadriel and some of theirs when they traveled through Lothlórien, now just beginning to fade.
It was with this grand party that they came again to Gondor, and found that Gimli and Legolas had arrived in Minas Tirith as well. The Fellowship was gathered together once more, for one last time. They spent a few days telling each other of their doings since they last saw one another nearly two years ago. Then they left the city again, following the path east once more.
The Morgul Vale was no longer deeply shadowed, barely lit by the corpselight from Minas Morgul. Now she was bright and clear, and though she was still half in ruins, the city was Minas Ithil once more.
The delegation from Mordor had arrived ahead of them, to no one's surprise, but Talion himself was not yet present. His adjutant was, though, and Idril greeted them gladly.
"It is good to see you again, Cousin," said Faramir, embracing her warmly, "It has been many years since we last spoke."
"Too many," she agreed with a smile, "But please, be welcome. Minas Ithil has been made ready for you."
As they made their way to the tower nearly scraping the sky above the city, Frodo asked her, "Where is Talion?"
"Seregost," she answered him, "North and east of here, together with the spirit of Carnán. Tar Goroth was not content to stay sleeping in his frozen lake, so they are dealing with him again."
"'Tar Goroth'?" Elrond repeated with a frown, "I cannot say I have heard that name."
"And with any luck, you never will again," Idril replied, "He is a Balrog of the First Age. Before - everything, really - Talion and Carnán worked together to freeze him in a lake in Seregost, but now that Sauron's clouds are gone, the area is warming, and the lake melting. There are others who have gone to support them, and hopefully this time they will put him down for good."
"That sounds like quite a tale," said Frodo, remembering all too well how he had been able to do nothing but watch when Gandalf faced off against Durin's Bane.
"Oh, it is," Idril laughed, "I saw it from a distance, though I didn't know what was happening at the time. Once you are settled, I'll gladly tell it to you."
At the hobbit's request, she started from the very beginning of what she knew. Talion was once a loyal Ranger of Gondor, banished to the Black Gate for killing a nobleman he caught in the act of assaulting his wife. There he rose through the ranks to become captain of the garrison - before it was slaughtered by Sauron's Black Captains: the Tower, the Hammer, and the Hand. The Hand sacrificed him and his family - his wife and son - in an attempt to call forth the Elven Smith Celebrimbor as a wraith and use his spirit to bring Sauron back into the world early, even without the One Ring. But Talion wasn't quite dead when Celebrimbor appeared, and the Elf was able to possess Talion instead. Together they were banished from death and went on a crusade against the Black Captains, killing them one by one, before turning their wrath on Sauron himself.
Over the years they had accumulated a wide variety of followers, Orcs who didn't want to follow Sauron for one reason or another, and Men who had been his slaves and the odd soldier from Gondor, and even a few dwarves and the Avari Elves who had lived in the forest of Carnán. As time continued to pass, their numbers grew greater still. Eventually, news of Minas Ithil's struggle came to them through their network of spies and informants, and they came to their aid. Talion and Celebrimbor fought hard to protect the city and her inhabitants, but it wasn't enough; Castamir surrendered Minas Ithil to the Witch-King, and their war continued, now with even more Gondorians on their side. Each had their own agenda, their own missions and methods, but they helped each other when they could, however they could.
Idril heard as region after region fell to the Ranger and Elf-Lord's growing army - Núrn, Cirith Ungol, Lithlad, Seregost, Gorgoroth - and their fights with Carnán against the Orc Necromancer Zog and the Balrog Tar Goroth, and with Eltariel against the Ringwraiths, until finally they marched on the Dark Tower itself.
"Only Talion, Celebrimbor, and Eltariel know what transpired that day on the bridge to Barad-dûr," Idril said softly, "and of those, one has been missing since then, and the other two aren't talking. All we know is that Celebrimbor was lost, trapped together with Sauron in the Great Eye, and Talion freed one of the Nine but was cursed to take his place.
"With the power of a Ringwraith behind him, Talion went and retook Minas Morgul by himself, and eventually our forces came together and never parted. We kept up the fight for as long as we could, holding as much of Mordor as we could against Sauron, until finally, about ten years before the end... Talion Fell." She shook her head. "Without his power, we couldn't hold Minas Morgul, so we decided to surrender the city. He ordered us to evacuate the day before it happened. You should have heard Daerwen scream… and we knew. We were almost into Núrn by then, so that was how we knew he was gone.
"We retreated but continued doing what we could to sabotage Sauron, killing his troops where we could but mostly plundering and burning the fields and storehouses; he couldn't exactly build a huge army if he couldn't afford to feed it. And then… the Dark Tower fell, and Talion came home."
"What became of Celebrimbor?" Elrond asked, concerned for his "cousin".
"We don't know; there hasn't been any sign of him since. With nothing to bind him here, maybe his spirit has passed into the West… or maybe he was destroyed together with Sauron. We just don't know. It hasn't stopped Talion from searching for him, though."
A cry of "Daerwen!" went up outside, followed by cheers - and the fwap of leathery wings like distant thunder.
They emerged to see a handful of fire drakes land in the courtyard in front of the Tower - including one half again the size of the others, red as blood, her rider in familiar black and gold armor. She lowered herself to the ground to let him off, same as the other drakes, then curled up on the stones, golden eyes taking everything in.
Talion was somehow everything and yet nothing that Frodo had expected. His armor and hooded mantle were the same as it had been two years ago, but now the hobbit could actually see his face. He looked like a Man, just a Man, but one who had been through hell. His aura was still black and fell, and he was pale, almost unnaturally so, almost corpse-gray, his skin blitzed with veins of darkness, slowly fading. But his eyes - they glowed blue, bright and clear, and there was no malice in him.
There were two Elves with him, just as beautiful as their kin, one female, sharp and golden, the other male, soft and dark.
But for the second time in as many years, Elrond inhaled so sharply he almost choked. "Ada?!"
The male Elf winced and whipped around as if to remount his drake and depart, but Talion caught him before he could do so. "You knew this day would come at some point," the Nazgûl rumbled, and the Elf's shoulders slumped.
He turned back around, but by then Elrond had abandoned decorum and strode quickly over to pull the other Elf into a fierce hug. After a moment of surprise, the embrace was returned amidst murmurs in Quenya.
"Maglor Feanorion," Galadriel said softly to the others, "Last surviving son of Fëanor, the legendary Elven Smith who made the Silmarils and also grandfather of Celebrimbor the Ringmaker." Then she too stepped forward to greet her cousin - and Eltariel too, whom she had sent to Mordor so many years ago, welcoming the other Elves back among friends and family.
All sides were reasonable and genuinely sought peace, but even so it took many days to hammer out not just a peace treaty, but also trade treaties and matters of inter-realm law and other such documents and terms. Frodo found that when not in meetings, he enjoyed flipping through the books in the library and walking through the city's still-ruined streets, watching the people. It was easy to tell the difference between the native Gondorians and those Men born in Mordor under Talion, purely because of how they interacted with the Orcs. The Gondorians were still hesitant, wary, eyeing the Orcs with badly disguised mistrust, but the Men of Mordor worked with them in easy harmony, laughing and joking and scuffling together, calling to one another in both Westron and a particular dialect of Black Speech.
Now at last it could be clearly seen: the Orcs were people too, and with Sauron banished, they were finally free to live on their own terms.
Their last night in the city, Frodo found himself wandering the streets after dark, committing as much to memory as he could. The city still glowed faintly at night, enough that he didn't need a lantern to see as he padded through the alleys and thoroughfares.
But he wasn't alone.
"You're up late, Master Baggins."
The hobbit's head jerked up to find Talion sitting on the wall overhead, leaning up against one of the towers with Daerwen stretched out half on top of him, her great head in his lap. "You should be resting," said the Ringwraith, "You have a long journey ahead of you."
"It's true I am weary," Frodo said, "but I do not think there is any rest to be had for me. Not on the shores of Middle-earth, at least."
Talion seemed to understand, because he nodded sadly. "In a way, the Elves have it easy in that respect. Their rings may be a burden, same as ours, but they are more than able to bear the weight. For those of us who are mortal… carry a Ring of Power too long, and it will break something inside that will never recover."
Frodo nodded vigorously in agreement, and carefully climbed his way up the stones to sit by the Gravewalker, accepting a helping hand when he neared the top. "Even Sam does not understand so clearly," he said, after he settled, "He carried the Ring for a time, yes, but only for a few moments - or so it seemed, to him and to me. Not months that seemed as years, and years before that that seemed an eternity."
"It did not have time to break him down," the Nazgûl said quietly, "or wear away pieces of his soul and devour them to fuel itself."
"Is that what yours did?"
"Near enough," he sighed, "I did not have the option of not using my Ring, the way you did. In all my time here, Sauron never relented; it was stand and wield it to fight... or die."
Frodo fell asleep against the Ringwraith, and woke in his own bed, more rested than he had been in a long time.