Sam woke slowly the next morning, and as he did he realized he felt better rested than he had in weeks- he was certain he had not dreamt of anything, and for once it seemed he had actually slept. The aches and pains that he had become accustomed to over the quest had faded, if not outright disappeared. There didn't seem to be anything at all around his neck.

For a moment, this worried him, so Sam fished out the chain from under his clothes to look at it- but sure enough, the Ring was there, small and dull in the faded morning light. It really did seem like such an innocent thing. He supposed the world had good reason to be scared of it, but what that reason was Sam didn't really know, his understanding of the old myths muddled and incomplete.

Sam tucked the Ring away again, comforted, and noticed that atop his blanket there lay something strange- a wilted flower. The petals of the thing were dry and deformed, curled in on themselves, no longer holding any healthy colour. Decayed. Sam wondered for a moment where it might have come from, and then realized it was about the same size as the flowers Frodo had picked from the statue the other day- so that was that, then.

Sam brushed away the flower and forgot about it, his mind already moving onto the most important thing in the world: Frodo. Sure enough, he was there, standing a few feet away from Sam's camp, looking up at the sky.

"Good morning," Sam called, sitting himself up and finding the air outside his blanket not quite so uncomfortably cold as it had been for the last few days. Frodo looked back at him, startled, and then smiled.

"Good morning," he said. "How do you feel?"

"Good," Sam replied. "Better. Really, I feel quite fine, Mr. Frodo."

"I told you so," Frodo said, sounding satisfied. How natural he looked in this environment- just like the elves had been passing by the Shire, he seemed both otherworldly and perfectly in place.

"I would have made you breakfast," Frodo continued, looking back up into the air. "but I don't think we should light any fires here."

"That's alright," Sam said, and he began to fish through his bag, even though he (strangely) didn't find himself very hungry. "I'm used to this Lembas bread by now. It's probably very convenient, not having to eat."

Frodo hummed, and as Sam found his meal he looked up at the sky as well- but there didn't seem to be anything there, only clouds, some darker than the others.

"What are you looking for?" Sam asked, and Frodo shrugged.

"Nothing," he replied. "It doesn't matter. You know, we're very close now- I think we might make it to the road this evening."

After breakfast (which had tasted more bitter than normal, for reasons Sam couldn't say) Frodo took his hand and they walked again, the landscape changing from half-dead trees to heavy black rock, joining a road that wound into a great line of mountain. Sam knew, in a background kind of way, that these sights were foreboding and unpleasant- but he didn't really feel these things, not even slightly. Beneath his feet the path felt so soft it was like he walked on clouds, and the air to him smelled sweet, all was weightless and time seemed to pass very quickly. In truth, it was rather like he was dreaming, nothing existed as clearly as it was supposed to, and though he was aware of these things they didn't bother him.

Before long (in a time that might have been a few hours, or maybe several sleepless days) they came to a great fortress, marking the end of the road they had been following, with gates lined by statues of beasts and an incredible green glow in its walls. Sam had to stop and stare at this fortress, for the sight of it took his breath away, much like Rivendell- the world was so full of things he never could have dreamed of back in the Shire.

"What is this place?" Sam asked, his own voice muffled in his ears, for only Frodo's was clear.

"Minas Morgul," Frodo said, his voice containing a few metallic hints of laughter. "It used to belong to Gondor, but it doesn't anymore. Do you want to go in?"

Frodo's hands rested on Sam's shoulders as he said this, his touch the only really tangible thing in the world, the light from the fortress the brightest thing Sam could see. Dizzily, he supposed he would like to- it would be lovely, wouldn't it, to go inside. There would be a place to rest with comfy beds and warm food, something better than bitter Lembas bread. The image bloomed in his mind- he could see it, a quaint wooden interior not unlike the Green Dragon, could smell a roast with potatoes and cake for dessert, could almost taste these things...they would be well cared for, said a voice in his head, for Frodo was one of their lords-

Then, something about this made Sam cringe, and the impressions vanished, leaving him clear-headed for just a moment. This place suddenly did not look comforting, it looked evil, and how had Sam gotten here again? Hadn't he just been back in the forest-?

"No," he said out loud. "We can't go there. It's not safe!"

"...alright," Frodo replied, and it was impossible to tell whether he was disappointed or not, his voice little more than a breath of winter wind. "That's fine. We can go up, like we originally planned."

Then Sam was guided out of the light, the world fading into comfortable blurriness again, the faint lingering feeling of doubt in his insides the only unwelcome presence. As it turned out, there were stairs to climb, and they might have been very steep or maybe not, he barely felt the rock beneath his fingers. Frodo glowed very brightly, just as brightly as the fortress, though his colour was perhaps a little nicer.

Sam was sure days passed on the stairs, he just didn't feel them. The air grew thin, and more than once he thought he should stop to eat or sleep, but Frodo always encouraged him to keep going. The sky never changed, so what did he know? Maybe no time had passed at all. But the dream was becoming more uncomfortable- Sam always felt hot, and he couldn't tell if they were making progress, and every now and then he forgot completely where he was, and what he was doing.

"Here we are," Frodo finally said at some point, and Sam realized vaguely that they had reached the top of the stairs, and he almost looked back to see how high they had climbed but didn't, because he didn't know where the edge of the mountain was. He somehow felt both fatigued and weightless, which was an odd combination, and Frodo glowed brightly at the mouth of a cave.

"Where is...here, exactly?" Sam asked from outside his body, and Frodo smiled, showing his sharp little teeth. He hadn't done that before- hadn't he been keeping them hidden? Maybe he didn't care anymore…

"I told you already," Frodo said. "If you wanted to come this way, we would have to go see my friend, the old seamstress."

"Oh," Sam said dumbly, because he remembered that but also he knew he had felt apprehensive at the time, but now he didn't know why. The only image his brain could conjure was that of a little old hobbit lady, curled in her seat before the fire, winding out white silk into shirts and trousers and dresses by the dozen, but even in this imagining he somehow couldn't see her face. "Do we have to go in there?"

"Yes," Frodo said, beginning to sound impatient. "You want to get to Mordor, don't you, Sam? We have to go in somewhere…"

"Sorry," Sam said. "It just looks so dark."

"You'll be fine," Frodo said, and he moved behind Sam to push him forward, hands cold on his back. "I'll take care of you, like I promised."

The black engulfed Sam entirely. In a moment, he went from seeing well enough to not seeing anything at all, and it shook him from the dream feeling entirely.

"Frodo-!" he called, and he was hushed, but he couldn't feel Frodo's touch anymore, so there was nothing to ground him in space.

"Take it easy, Sam," Frodo called from somewhere up ahead (how had he gotten there?) his voice echoing strangely. "Just follow me. Try not to touch anything, okay? You don't want to get stuck…"

Sam could hear his own breathing, and the sound of faint wind from somewhere far away, and when he stepped forward his footsteps on the stone. His mind was hyper-aware of these things, for he could see nothing at all save the yellowish waves of sparks that appeared as illusions in the dark, effort from his eyes straining.

Another step, and something under his foot crunched.

"What was that?" Sam whispered, shuddering all over, and Frodo said lightly from far ahead:

"...nothing important."

The next step was the same, and the one after that. Morbid images filled Sam's mind- he imagined the worst of things, that he was walking on bones. What else would it be, in so horrible a place like this? He couldn't remember how he had let himself come so far, so blindly. He had kissed Frodo back in the woods, and that had been his last clear memory, everything else was a fog. Had he been enchanted? Oh, he shouldn't have trusted the apparition, but how could he not, it was too much for him, he shouldn't even be here-

Sam knew he was crying, could hear the strain in his shuddering breaths bouncing off the tunnel walls, but it was mostly drowned out by the cracking of the uneven terrain beneath his feet. His arms and shoulders were hunched, drawn in as close as they could to his body, afraid of reaching out, equally afraid of running into something. He felt something trail across his face, and almost screamed then, the sound barely held in as a gasp.

"You're doing fine, dearest," said Frodo's icy voice from somewhere ahead, but the echoes made it hard to tell exactly where, and the tone of those words didn't sound genuine. Sam reached out then, grasping for a cold hand to hold, because even if he knew he had probably been betrayed that kind of guidance would be better than being so lonesome in the dark.

Then, Sam suddenly remembered something- something he hadn't thought of in some time; back in the forest of the elves (a place so unimaginably distant from where he was now) the lady Galadriel had given him two gifts- the rope, which he had found decent use for climbing about in the labyrinth (though that had come to nothing) and the little glass vial, which he had been keeping in his pack, largely unthought of. Hadn't she said something about how it contained the light of a star-?

Sam shrugged his pack from his shoulders, fumbling through to try to reach it, because even if he didn't know how it worked he desperately needed to see.

"Don't," said Frodo right before him, his voice harsh enough to cause Sam to start. "You can't touch that, Sam. I told you to follow me."

Sam didn't know how Frodo had learned what he was thinking of, nor did he really care to find out; that this Frodo should be able to read his mind seemed perfectly plausible just then. But his reach faltered only momentarily at the cruel tone of Frodo's voice, and then it spurred him on. Maybe if sunlight was too weak to keep Frodo away, elven starlight would do better.

Frodo hissed, a sound which seemed to come from everywhere in the dark, and worse Sam heard something else, from further away- something moving, deep in the tunnels, the sound of many legs running towards him…

Sam scrambled desperately through his things, uncaring of whatever was knocked out on the way, for the fear in him overpowered every other sense. He was blind, and he felt he might die if he didn't find this thing, that he would be caught and as in any nightmare, that catching would be the worst fate of all fates.

Finally, Sam's hand closed around the vial, the smooth glass somehow welcoming against his palm. He lifted it out just as the sounds of the approaching things were becoming deafening, holding it up- wait, why was it still dark? Where was the light? Oh, no, it wasn't going to work, his entire body froze in utter horror-

"Please," Sam choked, and he shook the little vial, and for the magic that governed such things- a magic that was, by nature, good- this was enough.

A brilliant white light bloomed in the cave, a clean light, and though it may have been comparable in colour to what the dark Frodo emitted it was somehow immeasurably different. This light felt soothing where it bathed Sam's body, easing the ache of his strained eyes, filling his heart somehow at the same time, the way the sun hadn't been able to do in weeks with its absence from the sky. Frodo made a pained noise somewhere off to the side, and automatically some part of Sam hurt to hear that, but most of his attention was taken up by the return of his vision. He could see everything now- the walls of the cavern were lined with bodies, it had indeed been bones he had been walking upon, and some hung from the ceiling with their remains twisted out of shape-

-and standing before Sam, cringing away slightly into a nearby tunnel, was unmistakably a tremendous, monstrous spider.

Sam did scream then, a little scream, knowing now that this was what he had heard, and brandishing the light before him like a shield he swung his pack back over his shoulders and stumbled clumsily away. He could see all eight of the thing's eyes, and huge dripping pincers below them, every hair on the monster's body thick and upright and clear as day under the light of the star.

This, then, was Frodo's friend the seamstress? That was a horrible thought, but it must be so. How had things ended up this way? Frodo never should have died, but he had, and as such it would have been better if he'd just stayed dead. He should have stayed dead. What he had become now was so distant from Sam's pretty, clever, bright, good, perfect master who never could have loved him back, it was an abomination.

Unable now to contain his sobs (of fear and horror and pain), Sam ran away from the spider, holding up the light as he did so, all of his focus on ensuring it wouldn't slip from his sweaty palm. He had to hold the thing at bay, but he also had to see where he was going, and so the next moments were something of a blind panic, running through caverns with dimensions unknown to him, fingers of the dead and old spiderwebs catching at his clothes and skin. The Ring was burning on his chest, digging into him there like claws, and bile rose high in Sam's throat, his body both too cold and too hot and shaking. He couldn't fall down. He couldn't drop the star. He couldn't slow. If he did any of these things, he would surely die, yet he didn't even know where the exit was…

"Let him go," said a terribly cold voice, one that came from everywhere and which Sam didn't even recognize. "I know he looks sweet, but he's important...I'll bring you something later, alright...?"

The voice faded, Sam not really understanding the words, still darting back and forth in an effort not to get trapped in the webs. More than once they caught on his foot or elbow, viciously seizing him there, and only the sudden strength of fear was enough to tear him away.

But there came no sounds of pursuit, and before long another light found its way into Sam's vision, a shift in the black ends of the tunnels to something paler. Breathing high in his chest Sam forced his way over to this light, which really was an exit, and Sam tore his way free from the last of the webs, thrust onto a rocky path under a dark, ashen sky.

Sam's first thought was to look back at the tunnel, not fully realizing what had happened- but nothing emerged to follow him. Still, he kept running despite the growing pain in his chest and the trembling heat in every limb, following the path through rough-hewn rock walls. These opened up and he saw what was likely a guard tower, huge and black and arching hideously into the sky, but this barely stopped him for more than a second- all the worst things were behind him, in his mind, and so he veered around the tower with hardly any mind for it, slipping into little paths that were barely paths at all, with shards of black rock that hurt his feet. He heard voices once- ugly, painful sounding voices, and the clanking of metal on metal- what were these, orcs? He crouched behind a boulder until they passed, still looking in a panic behind him, the starlight (which had faded back to looking like simple water once outside) still clutched to his chest. The moment it seemed even slightly safe enough he began running again, hardly hearing the sounds his own body made, certain still that at any moment cold hands would take him from behind, or the piercing grasp of those filthy pincers, and he would hear not-Frodo laughing at him. But this didn't happen.

He didn't know how long he ran like this, but at some point, he had to stop. His mind may have kept going, but there was only so much the body could take, and so when he reached a quiet place deep in the rocks he fell upon himself, collapsing into a ball. He had to heave a few times, bringing up nothing but thin streams of acid, and when he was done he wiped his mouth and sat there shivering, the sweat on his body turning to ice despite the incredible heat in the air. He closed his eyes like this, a wave of exhaustion so complete it made his head spin taking over, but he didn't succumb to it. The glass of the magic vial was slippery-slick with his sweat, and indeed his entire body felt that way, despite how cold he had become.

His ears strained, just in case, but there were no sounds of pursuit. No voices. How long would that last?

When Sam could at least breathe without pain, he opened his eyes again, and from his hiding place he saw the mountain of fire. There it was, his destination- closer than it had ever been before. He could see the individual pillars of black smoke that rose from it, the cracks in its dark foundation. He could see beside it a tower, upon which sat the unimaginable, a twitching fiery eye.

Sam was almost sick again for a moment, but he was too exhausted to quite make it, and he remembered the statue back in the forest that Frodo had called a good likeness. This must be the worst place in the world.

The weight of the Ring was excruciating around his neck, sinking far into his chest, but he knew that here of all places he shouldn't take it off. This was the last leg of the journey. To make any small mistake and fail here, that would be unbearable.

But Sam knew he couldn't manage the trek across those plains, not yet. They were sprinkled with tiny flecks of light, light which surely came from campfires, and he knew the only things that could be camping here were evil- orcs or Urukhai or giant, monster spiders.

He needed to sleep. Sam dragged his pack closer for warmth and tucked himself deeper inside a crevice of the rock, supposing that this would be enough to hide him from all things except Frodo, who he couldn't bear to think of just then. This would have to be enough.

Then, the moment he closed his eyes his mind turned into a void, and he fell asleep for what felt like the first time in weeks.