Chapter 15 – The Gladden Fields
TA 2851
He Must Not Find It
Once Saruman knew Sauron was in Dol Guldur, he began to search for the Ring with an intensity approaching panic. They had to find the Ring before Sauron did.
Yet Sauron didn't know the Ring was nearby, and didn't appear to be looking for it.
Sauron returned almost four hundred years ago, Saruman reminded himself. That's a lot of time for a magical object to work its way out of the mud and sit on the surface with the current flowing over it, waiting to be found.
I'm surprised he hasn't found it already. I wonder why not.
Sauron must not find the Ring. If he did, they would have the horrors of the Second Age all over again, and the Free People would have lost.
The White Council must find it first. Saruman would enlist the aid of the entire Council to look for it.
But suppose one of the others found it first, and claimed it as his own?
Saruman didn't think it should be claimed. To claim it meant wresting control away from Sauron and becoming its new Master. It put too much power in the hands of one person. Besides, the Ring was toxic.
Saruman decided to search for it on his own. If all went well, he would find it and lock it up in a vault at Minas Tirith. It would be safe there, but still available if they needed it.
Then he would call a meeting of the White Council and tell them what he'd done. He'd be a hero. Even Gandalf and Galadriel would have to admire him for that.
Botanical Survey
Saruman had hiked through the Gladden Fields in the past, but he'd never searched them in a methodical way.
It occurred to him that if the Ring drew unwholesome things to itself, he might find it by looking for places that seemed more foul than usual. He decided to do a detailed survey, taking careful notes and recording everything he learned on a map.
He sent servants into the marshes and riverbanks, with instructions to note the places where poisonous plants and mushrooms grew. He also wanted to know where leeches and mosquitoes were particularly bad, or where marsh gasses bubbled from rot beneath the surface, and where stagnant water was choked with slime and mats of algae.
He asked them to draw sketches of the riverbanks, as well. If they were clothed with unhealthy things like thorn bushes, thistles, and poison ivy, he wanted to know that too.
There was so much ground to cover, he asked Radagast for help. But while Radagast's birds did find a few concentrations of poisonous plants, there was no one area that stood out.
Finally the survey was complete. But when he unrolled the finished map, nothing said 'Here is a place where the evil things are.' He rolled up the map with a sigh. Perhaps he would try the eastern bank next.
Palantir Addiction
Saruman believed, if he was patient and put in enough hours, the Palantir would show him where the Ring was.
It had been his policy to use the Palantir only in the small hours of the night, and only for a short time. But it wasn't long before his Palantir use became excessive.
The trouble was, the Palantir of Orthanc didn't behave like the huge Palantir of Osgiliath. Saruman could steer the Osgiliath Palantir easily. He could sometimes steer his smaller, less powerful Palantir, but it took an exertion of will that left him exhausted.
In the end, it was easier to spend long hours watching random images scroll by, and wait for the images he wanted to see. He saw amazing things, the Disaster of the Gladden Fields, the Battle of the Last Alliance, Celebrimbor's workshop. But so far, he hadn't seen the Ring.
The search of the Gladden Fields was taking over his life. He spent hours looking into the orb, hoping to see beneath the surface of the Anduin, looking at gravel and mud and weeds.
Once, he sat down in front of the Palantir in the hours before dawn, and had such a good run that he forgot to eat or even get up and stretch. Before he knew it, he'd been staring into it for almost fourteen hours.
One more image, one more image after that.
He couldn't stop. At some level, he knew he was losing control. But he didn't want to cut back.
If his fellow Istari knew, they would tell him to stop. He didn't want to stop. He just wanted to cut back enough that he could stop lying and being secretive about it.