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He told himself it was for Sam’s sake that he kept silent.
In the dark, in the Emyn Muil, when Sam was asleep, his hand sought the Ring on its chain. His palm ached without its touch. But his hand scrabbled about to find a small stone to squeeze in its place. He found one, and squeezed hard enough that the edge of the rock bit into his skin. A line of blood welled up, slick and sticky.
In the morning, it was not long before Sam noticed the red across Frodo’s palm in the pale dawn light. He sucked in a breath and got out his water bottle and set to cleaning the cut properly before he would allow them to start on again.
“What happened?” he asked.
Frodo kept his voice light. “Well, I don’t know. We get scratched enough out here, don’t we? I can’t remember every injury, can you?”
Sam finished cleaning the cut and wrapped a spare scrap of cloth around it. “Very true, sir, very true.”
Sam smiled up at him, and he smiled back. He did not want to see the confusion in Sam’s eyes.
~
At night, on the Stairs, when Sam was keeping watch, Frodo dreamed. Sometimes he dreamed of the Shire. Some sweet memory with Bilbo, or simply of himself lying in the sun in the grass. Sometimes he dreamed of the horrors of the Quest. The Barrow-wights, the wolves howling in the night, Gandalf falling, the change in Boromir’s face at Amon Hen.
And sometimes he dreamed of the Ring. He was trailing behind Sam in some dark land, and his eyes were forward, making sure that Sam was not looking back, and his hand found the chain around his neck. He felt each individual link, cool to the touch against his skin. He slid his hand along to the chain to the point where the Ring hung heavily at his chest. He brushed its smooth surface.
Then, quite without any intention on his part, the Ring slipped onto his finger.
It was not so terrible.
Not much changed, really. His vision sharpened and the world softened beneath his feet, and that was that. There was no Eye piercing clouds and veils to see him; there was no voice in his mind taunting him.
He simply felt…different. Larger, more powerful, more certain, more steadfast. He saw the path clearly ahead of his feet, and when Sam cast him a fearful glance, he was able to smile reassuringly, and the fear faded from Sam’s eyes. And oh, with a single word, he changed Sam’s fear to joy.
And with a word, he cast aside Mordor’s shadows hanging overhead.
And with a word, he broke the foundations of Barad-dûr.
He was named among the great and the wise, and people across the world sang stories in his honor, and the hobbits of the Shire were raised from their rustic obscurity and transformed into a people noble and magnificent, and he—
He woke with a gasp to find himself clutching the Ring through his shirt.
Sam’s hand was immediately on his shoulder from behind. “Mr. Frodo? Are you all right?”
Frodo’s fingers sprang apart as if the Ring had turned to fire. He caught his breath but could not yet slow his racing heart. He turned his heated face away. He felt sick.
But Sam moved around to face him, crouching in front of him. “It was a nightmare, wasn’t it,” he said softly. “Maybe it would help to talk about it.”
Frodo shuddered and did not speak. He did not want to see the fear in Sam’s eyes.
~
One step more. And another. And another.
He shivered in his stolen orc gear. Never had he imagined Mordor would be so cold. It made the wound from the witchking’s knife throb. But he was almost thankful for the pain. It gave him something to concentrate on besides the Eye straining to see him through the thin veils that remained. It gave him proof that he was not the mighty hero of legend he was so tempted to believe he would become if he but set the Ring on his finger.
All the evils he would undo—all the wrongs he would right—all the justice he would decree—
No, no. Such matters were too big for him. He gritted his teeth and tried to shove the thoughts away.
But Elrond and Gandalf and the others chose him, did they not? Those great ones did not think he was too small—
No, they chose him to destroy the Ring, not to wield it.
But only because they were content to use others as their puppets, and it wasn’t fair that they should send Frodo and Sam to face such dangers, but that didn’t matter now, not anymore, because Frodo had withstood those dangers. He was grown, he was more than the small hobbit he had been in Rivendell. If the Wise had known then who he would become—
Clenching his jaw, he pressed his hands to his head and groaned, a wretched, guttural sound that failed to drown out the endless debate in his mind.
“Frodo?” Sam’s hand on his shoulder seemed to be touching someone else. “Are you all right? What is it?”
Frodo fixed his gaze on the ground at his feet. He did not want to see the judgment in Sam’s eyes, judgment that was a mere echo of his own, judgment that he could not withstand.
He did not want to reveal himself by speaking the words aloud.
He told himself it was for Sam’s sake that he kept silent, but it was not for Sam’s sake at all.
Not anymore.