When Sam woke the next morning, Frodo (the thing that wasn't Frodo) didn't greet him. The air was empty of any spectres, even though the sky was dark and the walls of the labyrinth stuffed with wet gray mist. No voices called out to him.

At first Sam was uneasy as he set out for the day, expecting at every turn for the world to turn cold, to feel unkind eyes on the back of his neck, or for an icy hand to take his. But nothing happened. Frodo did not appear. There was no indication that he was even there invisible, watching.

By nightfall with no visitor, Sam found himself more stressed than relieved, even though this change should have been welcome. Where had Frodo gone? Had Sam managed to scare him off? He didn't understand how that could be. The burst of victory he had felt the night previous had faded to ash, leaving him with an empty feeling in his stomach. Every hundred breaths or so a vision of the creature Gollum would spring into his mind, entirely unbidden, and Sam would feel sick and frightened once again. He desperately didn't want to think about that. If he had to consider what had happened back there too deeply, he was afraid of what conclusion he might come to. It had all happened so fast-

"Enough of that," Sam said out loud, and even though he knew no one was listening, he regretted doing so instantly. He needed to sleep. It was more difficult to sleep that night.

The next day was no better. Time seemed to become purposeless beneath the sleety face of the sky. It was all hauling himself up one cliff and down another, breathing, sweating, in pain. Worrying. Sam's mind was all twisted into knots, trying not to think about Gollum- what he had done to Gollum- but the only other thing to think about was Frodo's absence. What did it mean? The silence had, in the passing of just a few days, become worse than his eerie voice. The worst possibilities reared their heads. Maybe, frustrated, he had gone ahead to Mordor, and would tell the evil powers there where Sam was. Maybe he was fetching one of the terrible Black Riders at this very moment, who could catch Sam, and do unthinkable things to him, and take everything away, destroy all that mattered in the world. The powerlessness of his position (the powerlessness of not knowing, which can affect even the mightiest of beings) bored deeply into his heart and mind, cutting holes, leaving weeping things that would be hard to heal even under ordinary circumstances.

And through all this, the Ring sat hot and heavy on Sam's chest, throbbing in a deep pulse, infinitely slower than his own heartbeat. What it seemed to promise, though he couldn't even fully articulate it, filled him with dread.

It was a good thing he couldn't truly listen to it. Good that he wasn't going to be tempted. Unlike the others on the quest- like poor Boromir- he wasn't going to fall prey; it would be safe with him.

On the fourth day of silence, Sam broke down. The final straw had been a simple thing- he had come around the bend of a particularly challenging stone path, and found there tucked behind a rock the remnants of his previous camp. He had been walking for hours, only to find himself back where he had started. Almost an entire day put to waste. The only piece of optimism he had left- the idea that every step, if nothing else, brought him a little bit closer- scattered like grains of sand between the fingers. The despair that set in upon his heart was doubly heavy, for it too carried the weight of the Ring, and was blackened by it.

So Sam sat down by the rock, each limb seeming to ache as though he had been carrying packets of stone for every one, and once collapsed he cried.

The tears didn't come out at first. He didn't have enough in him to produce them- they had to be pulled out from somewhere very deep inside, dragged up dry tear ducts until they could well in his eyes. It was too much. He couldn't do it. He was going to fail. There was no point. It was all over…

Vaguely and distantly, some buried, untouched part of Sam knew that the intensity of these dark thoughts was unlike him, and that they didn't entirely make sense. But he didn't have the heart to listen to that little voice anymore. There was too much evidence to the contrary, even if his eyes had been shaded by the weight around his neck. So he cried, cried until he couldn't breathe, and the whole world seemed to spin around him, so pure and complete was the exhaustion that had taken ahold of his body. He cried until he couldn't cry anymore, and all that was left was a dull gray pain in every bone, and a distant knowledge of his own breathing, of the tears drying on his cheeks.

Only when he fell this far, did Frodo appear again.

"Oh, Sam," he said, and Sam heard him, the clear voice like something from a dream he might have had in another place. "Look what you've done to yourself."

Sam didn't truly understand these words at first, his conscience too deeply buried in depression. But the feeling of death-cold fingers carding through his hair sent a shock down to those aching bones, tearing through the fog that had settled over his body, and Sam forced himself to crack his swollen eyes open again.

Frodo was back to looking pretty, instead of frightening, that soft glow that clung to his skin not unlike an elven halo.

"I'm sorry I left you like this," he said. "I didn't really mean to."

Sam just shook his head, though why he did this it was hard to say, forcing himself to sit up again and wipe his face. Frodo knelt close- and horribly, to some part of him this was still comforting. Perhaps he was simply too tired to feel unrest. And while he couldn't bring himself to say anything back to not-Frodo, he made no move to push away his touch. To Sam's overheated body, the cold was almost welcome.

"I know you're lost," Frodo continued. "That's my fault. I really am so sorry, dear."

Sam didn't say anything. Not only did he not know what to say, but he was afraid of what might happen if he spoke- as though some tenuous thread hanging in the air would break, and he would be forced to make some kind of decision. To stir himself. The effort seemed like too much. He would much rather sleep again.

"I'll show you the way," Frodo said, distantly. "When you wake, I'll be here. I know the path."

Sam didn't hear anything after that, but it was easy to drift away, for just by hearing those words the Ring had managed to become lighter on his chest.