Chapter Text
The halls of wood and stone, encompassed now by darkness and solitude, had in the past been ones he had known, some well, others not (in fact, he'd wished to forget many), and now in the hazy world of the present where time seemed to both slip away from him as sand through fingers, and yet also move as a glacier, he learned these halls better than he ever wished to know.
With a glittering glass star in his pocket (the light of the brightest Elven star, bottled in glass, and bestowed upon him by the fairest Lady of the land) from the start, this journey had begun in a nightmarish copy of the great smial (the dwellings of halflings: warrens dug in hills, lined luxuriously with wood and filled with fine furniture) of Brandy Hall from his youth, the winding burrows and great halls exact replicas from his younger days, save for the lack of any living creature, himself besides. It had begun at the front door, on a shadowy evening where the moon did not shine, and immediately he had known he must run, but whether to look for something or to escape it, he did not know. Unaware of the star in his pocket, then, he had begun a fearful pace through the round wooden rooms, first calling in fear for his parents, for he was frightened and all alone in the dark, only to later recall with cold remembrance a veil of water had sundered them from him. His next resort was to call out for his aunts, uncles and older cousins, running from the abandoned, simpler apartments of the smaller families, to the larger, grander ones of the Master of Buckland and the Mistress and their closest relations.
Again, he found not a fiber of dust he himself had not disturbed, and feeling so small and alone, he at last began to search for even his peers and younger cousins, and finally for anyone as he ran through the larders and dug through broom closets, crying until even his voice left him. Until, after a long, fruitless search for any living creature, he had collapsed in his own old room, pressed close upon by shadows from every side. It took him much time to resign himself - but only following a final, desperate attempt to explore every cranny of the smial – to realize that he was indeed alone in the darkness.
It was only after he had begun to wander the halls in more calm resignation that he eventually noticed a light glimmering from his pocket, and upon withdrawing it, in his hands he held a star - the light of Eärendil, the brightest and dearest star of the Elves, given to him by the Lady Galadriel. He held it aloft, the purity of its white light piercing through the solitary darkness surrounding him, and before him he found illuminated a door he had not known before. Knowing there was nothing left for him in the home of his childhood, he gripped the handle - in the center of the door, in true hobbit fashion - and passed through, the star-glass glimmering brightly in his hand.
He had then found himself in the smaller, but more familiar and beloved halls of his favorite uncle's estate, Bag End. It was as he remembered from the days before he came of age, and Bilbo had left to fulfill his longing for the road once more. Yet despite these comforts, he was possessed again by a drive - but to flee or find, once more he could not discern.
As he searched the rooms with a sense of desperation, pawing through trunks filled with artifacts and knick-knacks from his uncle's adventures, he felt somehow decidedly aware he was looking for something. Eventually, after scouring the interior, and finally passing by the windows of the smial, he saw the darkened garden beyond, withered and strangled with harsh, thorn-covered plants, and knew he would not find it here.
Feeling a pull deeper into the earth of the Hill, he went to what had been fashioned as Bag End's cellar, though when he passed the threshold of the door, he found no beer barrels nor wine casks: only a deep pain in his left shoulder, the stale stench of death, the pungent odor of orc, and the overwhelming loss of all hope.
He knew this next place, though he had seen it but once with waking eyes - the cavernous stone halls, the ornate statues and carvings in the floor and walls, the winding maze of tunnels and passages, the reek of black-landers, and the armor-clad skeletons of dwarven warriors that had fallen long ago.
He had first begun at a frenzied run, feeling a desperate urgency to escape from this lightless realm, but the floor was no longer smooth with occasional cracks; it was broken rubble and sharp, cutting his bare feet and leaving them slick with blood as he ran. He lost himself countless times as he tried to recall the way a bent old wizard had lead the Fellowship through the massive labyrinth, stumbling more than once and bloodying his knees, forearms and palms upon the unforgiving stone below when he fell.
For once, he found some relief in a lack of company, for he found no orcs and no skeletal dwarves rising from the dead to meet and torment him - but he was followed, not only by the urge to run, in spite of his desire to slow and make more calculated movements, but also by an old melody echoing from the heart of the mountain. It was the voice of Gimli, it seemed, murmuring indistinctly about the forefather of all dwarves, and his emergence into a yet unstained world.
It felt to be ages before he finally found the sarcophagus of Balin, Son of Fundin, Lord of Moria, the several adjoining chambers Gandalf had once defended from a demon of earlier ages of the world, and finally to the Bridge of Khazad-dûm. Once, he had run across this bridge in a terrified flight for his life, and then watched a dear friend and mentor make a bright stand against shadow and darkness, only to be drawn down into the abyss by it. Now, holding up the smeared phial, his crossing of the unbroken bridge was slow and weary, bloody footprints marking his path as he passed over the chasm.
The smell and sights that had greeted him beyond the halls of Moria had been no more pleasant, for the foul, sickly-sweet odor of the Dead Marshes pervaded his nostrils, and above, it seemed as though the sky had been blackened completely, or had been taken away altogether.
The murky water that sloshed over his bloodied feet had been bone-chilling cold, but even with the light of the star-glass, he could not find a way that avoided it - indeed, many times he discovered deep pitfalls concealed by the water, and ended up soaked sometimes to the shoulders before he could climb out again.
The ghost-lights that flickered from pool to pool - manifestations of the spirits lingering, entombed for eternity in the fetid waters here - glimmered like to the star-glass, only dimmer, and these lights danced upon the water in a thin mimicry of a star-filled sky, and gave him no comfort.
Much of his haste had been sapped as his goal approached - whether from behind or closing in ahead - and so the journey through the marsh was much as it had been long ago: a slow, exhausting, excruciating trudge. It was worse than before, however, for he was alone, and had not moon, stars nor sun to comfort him; only the Lady's glass, and the spirit lights that beckoned him to a watery grave.
When his mind had passed from spite and anger of the trek, to eventual acceptance as he plodded along, the ground beneath his feet began to solidify, first to firmer, dryer soil, and then at last to stone, as a cavern closed up and around him once more, but this time, there were no songs to guide him, and no sword in his hand. Only a path to follow, with wide, yawning openings in the walls that ate up the star-glass's light, and webbing that clung to him as he passed beneath and through it. The smell here was even worse than the halls of Moria, for the stench of death and rot was far fresher, and a fouler smell of evil pervaded through it all.
He hurried at a brisk pace, but did not run, holding in one hand the light, while the other traced along the wall as his guide, for he had no other company. The back of his neck had begun to sting as he pressed on, anxiety alighting within him as it felt many pairs of foul eyes were boring in to him.
He lost his way several times in his haste, and only upon slowing and making his way carefully through the frightening cavern - in spite of his fears of pursuit and desperation to escape - did he find the exit, now without barrier. He hurried out of the dreaded tunnel and whirled about, expecting to see the massive, grotesque form of a giant spider creeping out of a higher tunnel to come and claim him, with a single sharp kiss into unconsciousness. To his surprise, he caught only a glimpse of the cavern behind him, before it vanished, and in its place a flat, though no less harsh and cruel landscape rose up, covered in scraggly plants desperate to survive, with massive forge-fires flickering in the distance, and an empty sky overhead.
Exhausted, weary, and no small bit of frightened, he turned east, and allowed the star-filled hand to fall to his side as the spitting light of the mountain of doom danced and crackled in the distance. A tear glistened upon the lashes of one eye as he took his first step towards the Mountain, and fell harshly to his knees.
--
He awoke with stinging knees to an insistent rapping upon his door, and the soft, ever-present rolling of the ocean on the edges of his hearing. "Come now, Frodo-lad, you've slept in quite enough to let me fix breakfast alone! The least you might do is eat it with me!"
A crack of sunlight peeped through the drawn curtains as Frodo Baggins reluctantly pushed himself into a sitting position on his bed. With the heel of his palm he rubbed the sleep from his eyes and reflected for a moment on the latest stage of this reoccurring dream of his; it had been the first time he had passed Shelob's lair, and made it to the Plateau of Gorgoroth. Once, he might have felt fear at the dryness of his mouth and throat and hunger in his stomach when he awoke - so much what he had felt when upon crossing it before - but it was something he had risen to many times in the years this dream had pervaded his sleeping mind, and now it bothered him little. Any weight upon his neck felt blessedly lessened that it had once been, and the wounds to shoulder and neck had begun to hurt less with each morn he progressed, and so these reminders of his discomfort in the mornings were fair trade for less pain upon his injuries.
"Yes, Uncle. I'm coming. I apologize leaving all the preparations to you." With a bit of reluctant effort, for the bed was so invitingly comfortable, Frodo pushed away the sheets and bedspread, touching his unmarred feet to the floor and stood.
"Ah, just having a go at you, lad. I'll see you in a few minutes." Bilbo replied through the door, his footsteps barely audible as he shuffled down the hall.
With verging on dull routine, Frodo cast off his nightshirt and dressed himself in embroidered, velvety robes more expected of an Elf than a hobbit, cleaned his face and arranged his unruly hair - which now fell beyond his shoulders in an ebony tumble of curls - with a few select braids to keep the more troublesome hair out of his face, if he should be buffeted by a particularly strong wind.
In the passing years since crossing the Great Sea to the Blessed Realm, when he was accompanied by Bilbo, Gandalf, the Lady Galadriel and the Lord Elrond, to land upon the Lonely Isle east of the mainland - Tol Eressëa - Frodo had progressively begun adapting more and more to Elvish culture, far more than his devotedly-hobbit uncle ever had or would. It had begun with the elegant, but simplistic furniture that served as decor in his room, fine paintings depicting Elvish history on his walls instead of cluttered maps, ordered books on shelves and neatly arranged parchment and quills upon his desk, as opposed to the messes he'd always kept back in Bag End. While this villa overlooking the rolling waves of the Great Sea was meant to be as accurate to a genuine hobbit hole as possible, Frodo's room was a jarring distinction from the rest of Bilbo's clutter, appearing more the residence of a minor Elf-lord than a homely halfling.
After spending long enough in this Elvish room and with Elvish company, the adaption to the clothing and style of hair had been in some way natural, and in a small way a welcome change, as well - a manner of shedding an old skin Frodo could not quite stand to look at anymore.
With a sweeping motion, Frodo disembarked from his room, robe billowing a little behind him as he strode down the hall to breakfast with his uncle. Bilbo - who was fiddling with the floral centerpiece on the dining table (in the accurately hobbity-style room) - had changed in his time in the Blessed Realm as well, but not so as his nephew did. Instead of taking steps to become something new, Bilbo had managed a miraculous, rejuvenated reversion to a younger, keener hobbit, the grey in his hair and wrinkles seeming to have receded to a point where he appeared sixty or seventy at most; surely not his true age of nearing one hundred and thirty-six. Inversely, the effects of the One Ring that staved off the ravages of time, had begun to wear off of Frodo, and in but (approximately) one decade he appeared to have aged nearly three, the youthful face of his thirties melting away to deeper wrinkles, sorer joints and thinner hair, with streaks of silver running through it. This had once horrified Frodo, but in the more recent years, he could find less and less reason to care about it.
"Good morning, Uncle." Frodo greeted, arranging the last few plates and utensils needed to begin breakfast before he sat down.
"Morning, lad!" was the chipper reply, as Bilbo gave his nephew a sunny smile, and seated himself, reaching first for a bit of toast and next a helping of scrambled eggs. "How did you sleep?"
Frodo idly grabbed a slice of toast for himself, accompanied by a bit of jam. "As ever. Yourself?"
"Fine, fine - better than in years."
This was the usual course of their mornings; a routine greeting, idle chatter about this book or that, a festival the Elves were preparing to throw in the near future, amusing anecdotes Bilbo had managed to stubbornly weasel out of Gandalf recently, and other such small talk. Nearing the end of this particular breakfast, however, as the last of the bacon disappeared and Frodo commented they'd soon need more jam, Bilbo leaned back and gave a contented sigh. "You know, my boy, I think my feet are beginning to itch for the Road again."
Frodo stilled his inspection of what remained in the jam jar, and looked up to his uncle with more intensity in his gaze than he had expressed in quite some time. "You are?"
Bilbo nodded rather cheerfully, ignoring or simply oblivious to much of what could be discerned in Frodo's eyes. "Quite so; this Blessed Realm is surely as it advertises, but I can't help but want for another adventure. A new road to follow, if I can." the old hobbit chuckled.
Keeping his uncle's gaze, Frodo set the jar upon the table with a quiet clink. "You know no roads lead out of the Blessed Realm, and we aren't meant to reach the mainland of Aman."
"No, not even the Hall of Mandos." Bilbo agreed. "Unlike the Elves, we don't stick around here in the afterlife, of course; we go... Well, no one really knows. But I fancy to!" A sparkle of excitement glittered in Bilbo's eyes as he leaned forward. "At least one last adventure for this old burglar, and the greatest adventure of them all!"
Glancing away, Frodo laced his fingers and brought them beneath his chin, settling to contemplate. "If you're ready, Uncle." he said at length.
Frodo received another nod, and Bilbo leaned back again. "Not quite yet, I don't believe, but soon. It's rather that I've run out of things to do, I think; so much seen and done, so much read and written, so much heard and said.... So much love given, and received." Reaching across the table, Bilbo managed to find and grasp one of Frodo's hands, squeezing it tightly as he smiled warmly at his beloved nephew, eyes glittering now with the hint of tears. "It's not my wish to leave you again, my boy, but I need new mountains to climb and new stories to tell."
Frodo placed his free hand - and also his left, and maimed, for it lacked its index finger - over top of his own and Bilbo's. "I've been thinking much the same, as of late. The Elves and Gandalf are boundless in their generosity and guidance concerning- concerning the Ring," Frodo looked down upon his missing finger, "but I find as well that there is little left to do..."
Bilbo squeezed his nephew's hand again, and smiled wistfully. "Ah, but lad, you're not half my age! There's still so much life yet for you to live! No need for you to go tramping after your mad uncle just yet." Bilbo did not mention his wish that Frodo had remained behind in the Shire, just a little longer, before going to the Blessed Realm himself. "After all, why, your Samwise might still yet come! Might take a bit of waiting, but I remember you saying he could-"
Frodo abruptly slid his hands free of his uncle's, his already alabaster face fading to a snow white, and setting firmly. "Sam- Samwise has a family; many-a-faunt by now and- and a lovely wife that much need him." Frodo's voice was dispassionate, lacking any emotional inflection; if anything, it sounded as though he were calmly reciting facts from a history book. "I don't doubt he'll be mayor soon, if not already. His life is rooted firmly in the Shire, and he is meant to stay; his heart is whole, there. Even- even if he were to come, it would require a great deal of waiting, Uncle." Those massive, rare blue eyes of Frodo's, which had once held admiration and mockery in equal in the Shire, seemed to dull even more than they already had these days. "A great deal. And I think I have done my fair share of waiting: nine years for you take me in after my parents' deaths; only twelve before you left me; seventeen for Gandalf to arrive and tell me of the Ring's true history, and what must be done with it; two years for passage here to the Blessed Realm; and finally, nearing five, for my promised healing. ... I believe I have done quite enough waiting for a lifetime, Uncle. I will not wait for Samwise, who should not and will not come."
With a courteous nod, Frodo pushed back his chair, sweeping out of the room and the smial in a billow of velvet, the door closing with a deep reverberation into the silence of the morning.
Bilbo was left with the dishes, and a broken heart. That seemed all to be left of Frodo, now, he was realizing: dull eyes, nods of courtesy and Elvish departures. Why, anything hobbity and uniquely Frodo seemed to have been washed away in this Blessed Realm; there were flickers, now and again, of the excitable little lad that had begged Bilbo for more stories when he had visited Brandy Hall half a lifetime ago, and also of the noble Ringbearer Bilbo had been proud to help raise, and yet... It seemed now Bilbo had to remind himself that Frodo wasn't an Elvish statue that was enchanted to mimic life; he was still Frodo, and yet... Pieces of him were no longer anywhere to be seen.
Swallowing a lump that had risen in his throat, Bilbo went about cleaning up the dishes, mourning the fact that while it seemed Samwise was one and whole back in the Shire, Frodo was unquestionably not - and if Samwise had followed his master so doggedly into Mordor, of all places, whyever should he not follow on the gentle sail to the Blessed Realm?
Bilbo was left to wonder for the rest of the morning, if this healing of the Ring was truly worth it, and how different things might be for his nephew, if different decisions had been made by them both.
--
That evening, upon Frodo's return from a lengthy walk along the beach, and a visit to the Cottage of Lost Plays to hear recounted a few tales he had heard, and some he had not, he apologized for his outburst that morning, and insisted upon doing the dishes alone for the next few days as a part of his apology. Bilbo attempted to insist this was unnecessary and of course Frodo was forgiven, but Frodo would have none of it.
Thereafter, the following days blurred into weeks and months of the same routines for the Ringbearers, of rising, eating, and wandering with some varied paths across Tol Eressëa, talking to Elves they came across and listening to what tales they could. Bilbo still dabbled in writing, experimenting with new poems and songs and taking critique from the Elvish residents, while Frodo typically read what new material he could find, and did little more than take notes of what he found interesting.
The dreams that caged Frodo's mind nightly had in some ways become even calmer than they had before - he knew the paths to pass easily through Brandy Hall and Bag End; the Mines of Moria no longer cut his feet so, and he remembered the way; the Dead Marshes began to seem just a bit smaller and shallower; and Shelob's lair he knew well, and it certainly held nothing of malice. He had not, however, succeeded in crossing the Plateau of Gorgoroth before waking, either with a start or due to Bilbo rousing him. He had gotten within relative distance of the base of Mount Doom several times, but no closer. It was... Immensely exhausting, and cripplingly lonely, and Frodo feared at times that he might never even reach the mountain. With a touch of guilt, he appreciated now more than ever that Sam had been with him on the Quest proper; if Frodo could not cross the Plateau alone, lacking the Ring in his sleeping mind, he could not have done it in the waking world, with the Ring, had Sam not been with him.
And Sam was a more constant consideration of Frodo's mind than he had been in years. It was an early evening, seated upon a rock on the beach, as the eastern sky was shaded violet and indigo with the approach of night, that Frodo could be found contemplating the gardener and the life he had left behind across the Sea. Bilbo's words from months ago had settled into his thoughts like an itch that Frodo could not scratch - the concept of Sam's absence had stopped bothering Frodo long ago, and he saved himself unnecessary stress by putting the Shire out of his thoughts almost all together; he knew no longer of any goings-on in the Shire, and never would. When he first realized this, there had been a sense of loss, but it had numbed with the passage of time. If his nightly dreams advised him of anything, it was that he was to leave the Shire behind, and whatever awaited him at Mount Doom in his dream was the ending point of his journey.
Yet Bilbo's words still bothered him - of course, on the journey to the Grey Havens, Frodo had offered to Sam the idea that, perhaps, in time, Sam might pass over the Sea as well, but only after Sam had fulfilled his life in the Shire, and done everything Frodo knew he could and ought. The concept of Sam ever leaving the life he had built... Frodo would not at all have said it angered him; instead it felt much... Much like a puzzle piece that, despite all appearances and process of elimination, did not fit in the place it should have. It was slightly off, and bothered Frodo in a way he could not quite articulate.
Idly toying with one of his braids, he sat upon this rock by the Sea, eyes blank and unseeing as he prodded at the idea from several angles in his head. The results he kept circling back to included his discontent that after all the work to save the Shire, Sam would leave it; that the Shire was Sam's home, and everything for him was there, as opposed to nothing in the Blessed Realm; and lastly that Frodo did not think he could bear seeing Sam again.
On this evening upon the lonely shore, the shining white figure of a particular wizard approaching his side, and sitting next to him upon the rock reminded Frodo of every reason why. "Good evening, Gandalf." Frodo murmured, mind still partially absent in his thoughts.
Perhaps, once, when he was younger, Gandalf might have jested whether the evening was good, it was an evening to be good on, or some combination of that and more, but now, older, with his mission fulfilled and ready for his due rest, the wizard replied in quiet simplicity, "Good evening, Frodo."
The two old companions sat together in a shared silence, disturbed only by the rolling of the azure waves, and the crying of the gulls. Time did not seem to pass as it did in Middle-earth, here in the Blessed Realm, and perhaps it was an eternity before Gandalf pulled out his pipe and began to blow smoke rings into the darkening sky. Frodo himself no longer smoked - he had inhaled quite enough smoke in Mordor to satisfy him for a lifetime - but did not mind it when others did, and found it a curiosity when he recognized the scent of Gandalf's smoke. "Old Toby?"
Exhaling a cloud through his nostrils in a slow sigh, Gandalf nodded with a solemn smile. "Indeed it is. Some of the last authentically grown in the Shire."
"I thought you only smoked it on special occasions, and with Bilbo at that."
The wizard chuckled. "Bilbo won't mind; we both smoke it outside each other's company, when we long for those green hills and simple folk, and don't wish to weary one another with our nostalgia."
Frodo's gaze glanced east, before it returned to Gandalf. "You miss it, in spite of being home after those long years away? And now being hailed as the only Istari to have fulfilled his mission?"
"I do, at that." Gandalf exhaled another smoke ring, and sat back for some moments in a reverie of contemplation. "I could not walk the lands of Middle-earth for two thousand years, and not grow attached to the people and places I visited so often. The Shire I was especially fond of, the sheltered little bubble it was; ignorant, perhaps, of those keeping that bubble from bursting, but I believe that ignorance was part of the charm. Everyone was so busy going about their merry business, they hadn't time to grow weary or somber. It was very refreshing to be surrounded by, after spending so much time sorting out such grand troubles... And you Shire-folk were the only ones who ever truly appreciated my fireworks." Perhaps with purposely dramaticized hurt, Gandalf gnawed on the stem of his pipe, and appeared to pout the tiniest bit.
"Its ignorance of world affairs is what made it special." Frodo agreed, oblivious to Gandalf's playful pouting. "Even if it remains as such for all of time, I'm glad it's safe. ... Fully enlighten it of the world, and it wouldn't be the Shire any longer... ... I am still surprised you miss it, I must say."
The wizard's gaze fell from the first emerging stars, down to the small, brave creature beside him. In some frame of time, neither long nor short, Gandalf studied the charge he had been first given to guide and protect, and now to heal, intently and scrupulously. In varying ways, the wizard had observed both before and now, time in Aman had been kind and unkind to the Ringbearer; a light like the Lady's phial seemed to indeed shine through or from him, and it had grown stronger in the years since his arrival on this western shore. But it had concerned Gandalf on this journey of healing with Frodo, that perhaps the light had always been so bright, wherever it came from, but before, Frodo had not been so transparent. There were times the wizard could nearly swear to Manwë that Frodo was no longer living flesh, but chiseled of liquid marble and given a unique luminescence to both mimic life, and yet also display something above, or simply separate from it. He certainly was not the hobbit he used to be, but not in the manner Gandalf had once observed with a chuckle about and to Bilbo, as they returned to the Shire from Erebor. Frodo had done his best to step away from being a hobbit, it seemed, discarding so many of the customs typical and dear to Shire-folk (even at times donning Elvish moccasins), in an attempt to envelop himself in a new life that abandoned his prior. And yet, he was caught in an awkward middle ground none had ever entered before, caught between what he still unchangeably was, and what he now wanted to be. "Do you miss it, Frodo?" The query was posed with a solemnity Gandalf could not be sure Frodo acknowledged or ignored.
In either case, Frodo leaned back and smiled a bittersweet smile, looking to the east as the wind whipped off the water and buffeted his hair. "It wasn't for me any longer, Gandalf. I saved it as I set out to do, and I could not return to it. ... Now, I am here, and know this place is not for me, either." Finding a noticeable comparison in color, between the Sea and Frodo's eyes, Gandalf was brought to study the latter, and found to his displeasure that the supposed windows to a soul were no longer shining with a unique light within; they were dulled and only reflective, like a mirror forgotten and coated with lifetimes of dust. "I know what the Ring has done to me, Gandalf, and I know what the healing has done, as well; rotted parts within me as like an infection, and then the corrosion was burnt away." Frodo touched his unmaimed hand to his chest, gazing sightlessly across the water, vacant amusement on his face. "It is only that nothing is sown nor grows to replace what has been taken away." He smiled again, dully, but with a hint of pleased understanding beneath it. "This is peace, as I wanted when I crossed the Sea. Bilbo has long found his, and speaks of itchy feet and a want to walk the Road again - to see what lies beyond the light of this world. I have nearly found my peace, Gandalf, and my time is soon to come, as well."
Sorrow entered Gandalf's heart, as he had not felt since the deaths of Thorin Oakenshield and his young nephews, and observing the withering state of Bilbo's mind in Rivendell, before they had all departed for the Havens. "Will you not wait for Samwise, Frodo?"
"He is Master of the Hill and has surely dug his roots deep. He is home and whole, Gandalf, as I will never be. I will not wait for him to dock and catch sight of me, only for his healed heart to break at all I could not have, and became without."
"Your absence from this world will break his heart all the same."
"It is better he remembers one who was once young and whole, than reunite with a specter that has lost all that made him himself."
"Is it for you to decide what is best for him, without his council?"
Touching the phial of Galadriel, which lay in a pocket of his robe, against his heart, Frodo considered. "If it spares him undue pain."
"... His love for you carried you both to the forges of Mount Doom."
"His love for the hobbit I was, then. Of which I am no longer. ... I will not let him grieve for a living ghost, when the departed are far easier to mourn." Mind set, Frodo slid down from the rock, and bowed to the wizard. "I thank you for your council, Gandalf."
"Perhaps you are not so changed as you believe." Gandalf offered, before Frodo could turn away.
"I am near at peace. When I come to it, there will be nothing left."
The stars glittered overhead, in quiet observation of the world below them. Gandalf, at last, bowed his head in uttermost respect. "I wish all the best for you, Frodo Baggins. May peace and contentment everlasting grace all of your days and journeys."
"And yours as well, Gandalf. ... ... If... If Sam should come... Will you watch over him for me? And care for him?"
"Until the world is unmade, I will, Frodo."
The two shared a final smile, before they parted, Frodo returning to the smial, leaving Gandalf alone with the ceaseless tide, and the tears that glittered on his proud, sorrowful face.
--
He did find what he had been running both from and to the entire journey. It was not the entryway to the forge, as he had expected upon ascending the side of Mount Doom - in fact, what he saw in its place nearly brought him to his knees in shock, for it wrenched his heart so.
It was not a fearsome, evil archway he beheld, illuminated from within by the fires of the heart of the mountain, calling him deeper with the allure of utmost power.
It was a chipper, round green door, made of wood, with a sparkling brass handle in its center. On either side of it, a small, round window, looking out to the front gardens and the lane of Bagshot Row.
From beyond it, he could hear little ones playing and giggling, gaffers and gammers affectionately getting after them, lively music as one would have during Over-Lithe, and an indistinct swirl of voices. Stumbling to the door and nearly collapsing against it, he gripped the handle and pressed his ear to the door, eyes glittering with tears for the first time in a very long while. He could hear Merry and Pippin jesting about something or other and getting themselves into trouble with their parents, and there was Merry's mother Esmeralda and Pippin's father Paladin getting after them, then praising them for their deeds on the Quest; he could hear his own parents sharing words of affection with one another before calling out to find him- and such a swirl of other voices of family and very old friends that he'd once known so well, in that far green country.
After lengthy minutes of listening to these voices and his heart breaking, Frodo caught one voice that made a distinct pain well in his chest, and the gathering tears finally fall from his lashes. First it had been little Elanor, grown enough to speak with her mother and father, annoyed by all the bother her brothers were giving her. Rosie assured her she was the prettiest maidchild in the Shire, and her little brothers were simply being silly lads, as they were wont to be at their ages.
And then Sam. Sam, simply promising his little girl he'd give his sons a stern talking to about teasing their big sister.
Frodo's grip about the doorknob tightened until his knuckles became white, and his face was contorted in pain. After Elanor departed, the Master and Mistress of the Hill exchanged a few sweet words between each other, Rosie remarking she was very pleased that Bag End's many rooms were finally being filled, and Sam did agree, albeit with some hesitation, confessing he felt something was still missing.
If there were ever a thing to make Frodo turn the handle of that door, it would have been that - in fact, forehead pressed against the green wood and snow-white hand gripping the knob so tightly, he nearly did. But, in spite of his tears and almost unbearable longing, he did not.
When Rosie remarked that he was surely happy across the Sea, and that she needed Sam more anyway, Sam agreed with her affectionately.
Silent in his anguish, Frodo remained pressed against the door as other snippets of his home touched his ears, until his grip upon it began to lax in acceptance, and a cool breeze out of place in Mordor brushed past him.
Turning from the door, red-gold leaves tumbled past his bare feet as the lava-rock around him was replaced with soft, rich earth, and a magnificent deciduous forest grew up around him, the leaves all colors of autumn as they danced in the wind.
There was a path beneath his feet that went on before him for a short distance before it made a bend and hid behind the trees, and from somewhere not far down it, a melody sung by a familiar voice touched his ears.
"The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say."
The breeze played gently with his ebon curls - now short and braidless - and to guard against the autumn nip in the air, he pulled his old velvet jacket tighter around him, before shouldering his pack. He glanced once more to the door behind him, the voices beyond now faint and indistinct. He felt a tug upon his heart, but which way, he could not say. His gaze lingered there beyond the door for some moments, shedding more tears, before a thought of old returned to him. It is not for me any longer.
Thinking this, and knowing it to be true, Frodo turned from the land and lives he had saved, and looked headlong into the growing wind and sound of his uncle's singing. He tasted the salt of the Sea on the air for only a moment, before he broke into a run, crying ahead of him, "Uncle, I'm coming!" and falling into tune with Bilbo's song.
Neither Ringbearer West of the Sea was ever seen or heard from again in that world, and they passed then into only memory and legend.