(no subject)

[claudia603]

AND next fic...Written "fro" periantari!!!

Title:Lost
Rating PG
Pairing None
Summary The fellowship faces a big challenge.



A shadow had eclipsed Frodo’s heart. This darkness that dampened his spirit and caused his shoulder wound to ache happened with more frequency since they had left Rivendell last week, but this morning it was particularly bad, digging deep into his heart with cold claws. A filmy darkness clouded his vision, separating him from the others. A chill that the campfire could not warm seeped under his skin.

Hollin was an ugly, barren land -- cold and gray and hopeless. Frodo sat on the edge of a frigid boulder, hunching forward. He tried to think back to Rivendell and the pleasant little fireplace in Bilbo’s room. How he wished he were back there!

His cousins jested and ate the roasted fish that Aragorn and Merry had caught early that morning when they had first stopped to set up camp. The fire crackled, spitting embers toward the gray, sullen sky. Aragorn grinned and puffed on his pipe. Boromir laughed in his low, booming voice in response to something Pippin had said. Gandalf‘‘s eyes twinkled with merriment. The fire was the first they had been allowed to have since leaving Rivendell, and the warmth and hot meal had put everyone in good spirits. Even Legolas and Gimli were less argumentative than usual.

Frodo had swallowed just one bite of the fish, and it had been tasty, but it stuck in his throat and he could not eat any more. He held his tin plate on his knees.

He was not hungry for food, but a different craving consumed him. His fingers ached to touch it. Just once to ease the throb. If the pain and longings for the Ring were this painful already, then how did he expect to go forth, beyond, all the way to Mordor? His quest seemed an impossibility, something foolish and thoughtless he had agreed to. Even the great ones and warriors had refused. And here he was a little halfling from the Shire, a simple hobbit of the quiet countryside, expected to find a way where the great ones could not go, or dared not go. It was an evil fate. But he had taken it on himself in his own sitting-room in the far-off spring of another year, so remote now that it was like a chapter in a story of the world's youth, when the Trees of Silver and Gold were still in bloom. This was an evil choice. Which way should he choose? And if both led to terror and death what good lay in choice?

Right now no choice existed. Not yet. There was only following his guides while he had them and placing one foot in front of the other one day at a time.

Sam glanced at Frodo’s uneaten fish with concern. “You all right, Mr. Frodo?”

Frodo clenched his fists. His fingers trembled. Only touching the chilly gold that lay under his mithril shirt would ease the itch.

Mine……

“I’m all right. Just tired.”

“But you’ve hardly eaten anything,” Sam said. “And I cooked the fish up just the way you like it.”

“I know.” Frodo swallowed. He wished Sam would leave him. He needed to be alone. There was an urgency in his desire to touch the Ring this evening, one that he had not experienced before. He had a strong craving to make certain the Ring was safe. He wriggled his shoulders in hopes that in doing so, he would jiggle the Ring and thus feel the cold metal brush his chest.

He felt only the mithril.

His throat dried. Why could he not feel it?

“Mr. Frodo?”

“Leave me be,” Frodo said, harsher than he intended to sound. “I need to be alone.”

He set his tin plate aside and climbed to his feet. He strode away from the campfire out of sight from the others. Sam followed him.

“Leave me be, Sam.”

“You can’t just go wandering off here in the wilderness.”

“I won’t go any farther. Just go!”

Sam nodded, looking a little wounded, and left him. Frodo breathed a sigh of relief and sank to his knees. With trembling fingers, he unfastened the button at his throat and let his cloak fall behind him. He peeled off his jacket. The wind was cold, and it ripped through his linen shirt, but a growing panic clutched his throat and sent a wildfire down his limbs. He unbuttoned the first few buttons of his shirt.

He thrust his hand under his mithril shirt, groping all around his neck and chest. No Ring. He felt not even the chain. He froze with disbelief. There was nothing. Nowhere.

This could not be.

empty……

He clasped his knees, breathing hard.

It could not be. The Ring could not be missing.

Frodo had tugged at the chain many times, making certain that the clasp was secure, that every link was strong.

Gone. It could not be gone. He struggled to catch his breath.

Frodo glanced back at the others, still jesting and poking at the fire. All of them were unaware that the quest had just ended, that everything had fallen into ruin. He looked at Gandalf and his heart sank. How in the world would he would tell his oldest friend, the wise and dear wizard, that the one hope to save Middle-earth was no more?

Ice seeped over his heart, and his shoulder wound ached. He rubbed it, but it did not ease the chill.

Lost……lost…

Frodo gathered his cloak and jacket and stumbled back to where he had left his bedroll. He knelt beside it, patting and pinching every inch of it, looking inside and on the surrounding ground around it. He ran his fingers over icy pebbles and frost-laden blades of grass in the immediate area surrounding the bedroll. If the chain had broken since they had set up camp, the Ring would have rolled somewhere nearby. No glint of gold caught his eye. If it had fallen some time during their nightly march, then there was no telling where it was.

It was fastened securely on the chain…it shouldn’t have slipped off……couldn’t have…And now it’s lost forever.

He bowed his head and darkness filled his heart until he had no strength to do anything else.

“Mr. Frodo?”

Frodo cracked open his eyes. Sam knelt beside him.

“Mr. Frodo, you need your jacket on. It’s bitter cold. Where‘s your cloak?”

Frodo looked at him, unable to move or speak. The last time he had touched the Ring was during the break in their nightly march when he sat beside Aragorn and smoked a pipe in companionable silence. He had not touched it since then. After that, the company had walked hours and hours in the dark. He closed his eyes, his heart drumming in his ears. It could be anywhere in the wilderness, anywhere.

“We must go back.”

“Mr. Frodo?” Sam pulled Frodo’s cloak over him. “What’’s the matter? Are you ill?”

"Sam." Frodo’s throat closed. He clutched his chest where he had felt cold metal for so long, where now only existed a gaping emptiness.

He did not know what he expected Sam or anybody else to do for him. The Ring had been entrusted to him, to him alone. He had failed. He should have felt for it every minute, every second. He should have carried it in his hand if necessary. Bilbo had cautioned him of how slippery the Ring was. He should have taken that warning more to heart.

Frodo tried to speak, but only thin air came out of his mouth. His arms fell to his sides and became icy, useless appendages. Everything slipped into shadowy silhouettes.

"Mr. Frodo,” Sam said from far away. “You lie right down. You’re pale and clammy." He touched Frodo’s hand, which warmed it just a little. Everything flickered a moment like a dying lantern and then fell into darkness.

Next Frodo knew, he was lying on his back, a bedroll under his head. Aragorn leaned over him. “Frodo?” He touched Frodo’s brow and cheek with the back of his hand. “You are ill?” The others hovered around him.

“He ain’t right,” Sam said, but Frodo heard him only from a great distance.

The company should not treat him with such kindness. He was no longer the Ring-bearer, no longer in need of their protection.

It was all for nothing. Frodo shut his eyes. Everything was cold.

"Is it his old wound?" Pippin asked from far away.

“Frodo,” Merry said, taking his hand. “Speak to us.”

His friends showed concern for him now, but when he uttered the truth, that he had lost the Ring, it would all change.

“Perhaps the halflings are not built for this terrain,” Boromir said under his breath to Aragorn. “I am concerned about their feet being so exposed.”

Gandalf peered at Frodo with a hard gleam.

Could he guess? Did he know?

"Frodo?" Aragorn’s voice was far away but kind. He squeezed Frodo’s hand. When he discovered what ailed Frodo, his face would turn to stone and Frodo would not be able to bear what he and Gandalf would have to say about it. Aragorn pushed aside Frodo’s cloak and jacket and shirt, touching the scar on his bare shoulder. A bolt of pain shot down Frodo’s arm, ripping him from the fog. He yelped, arching his back. Aragorn pulled his hand back.

“Put a kettle on the fire to boil,” he said to Pippin. “Quick.””

Frodo lifted his head and looked around at the others. The faces of his travel companions swam into sharp focus.

“Lie down,” Aragorn said, pushing his shoulders down.

"Gandalf. It's gone." Frodo put his hand over his chest. “Gone.”

Gandalf’’s lips paled, but he said nothing.

“The Enemy’s Ring?” Boromir asked. His jaw clenched.

“Yes.” Frodo forced himself to look at the others. “The Ring. It is gone.”

The company fell into a stunned and devastated silence, and there was a long silence. Some turned away from Frodo and sat on the ground or on boulders, each in shock. Frodo’s heart ached with crushing grief. He had let Gandalf down, Bilbo, his friends, his Shire, Middle-earth.

“Lost it?” Boromir asked. He hurled a stone at a nearby boulder. ““Lost the weapon of the Enemy. Folly, folly to put it in the hands of a witless halfling!”

“Watch your tongue,” Aragorn warned.

“Take it back!” Merry leaped to his feet.

But Boromir is right, Frodo thought.

“Hush, all of you,” Gandalf said. “We have much to decide.””

“Decide?” Boromir turned to him. “What is there to decide? We do not have that which the quest is founded upon. What can we do?”

“When did you last see it?” Aragorn asked Frodo, keeping his voice gentle.

"Last night.” Frodo faced the others. “We must find it. We must go back.””

“Yes, of course we must,” Gandalf said, gesturing in barely held back fury. “There’s no point in going on without it.”

Aragorn nodded. “But let us look around the camp first. Think of everywhere you might have trod since we made camp.”

Frodo climbed to his feet. He winced at the pain in his shoulder. “I must look for it.”

The wind whipped his cloak around, but this time he did not shelter himself from the cold. He kept his eyes intently on the ground, watching only for a gleam of gold, a twinkle in the faint daylight.

He saw a gleam of gold, and joy filled his heart. He pounced on it, only to find a glimmering stone. He fell to his knees, shocked by the devastation that consumed him. A strong arm wrapped around his shoulder and Aragorn said, “Do not lose hope.””

Frodo forced himself to meet his eyes. “Do you despise me?”

Aragorn looked surprised. “Never.” He released Frodo’s shoulder and sat in front of him. “Do not place the blame on yourself. The evil of this thing is very strong. The Enemy is putting forth all his power to find it.””

“But it was my burden and now - I fear it is truly lost forever. And I cannot- I cannot bear it.”

“Do not despair yet,” Aragorn said. “We’ve not looked for long and it is likely that we will find it close by.”

“But anything could have happened. A bird might have flown off with it. A spy of the Enemy.”

“Forget not.” Aragorn grasped Frodo’s shoulders. “There was a reason the Ring came to you. It was not in vain that you got it as far as you did.”

Frodo’’s nose had begun to run and he stuffed his hand inside his pocket to pull out his handkerchief -- and his hand hit something cold and metal. Not daring to hope, he slowly pulled out the chain, with the Ring still on it. He gasped with joy. He met Aragorn’s gaze, and Aragorn grinned in stunned relief.

“It’s here, it’s here!” Frodo jumped to his feet. ““I found it!” He could hardly breathe. Strength poured down his limbs, warming the wound in his shoulder, giving him strength. He collapsed to his knees in joy, rocking to and fro, holding the Ring to him, murmuring, “Found it, found it, it’s mine, mine again.”

The others, who had been searching the campsite, came running, full of hope.

Pippin tackled Frodo to the ground and cuffed him in the side. “Don’t you scare us like that!”

Sam pulled Pippin off Frodo. “Enough of that. He’s had a time of it already.”

Frodo sat up, clutching the Ring in one tight fist. He met Gandalf’s inscrutable gaze. “You knew it was here all along.” He was too overjoyed to have the Ring in his hand again to feel even the smallest twinge of annoyance. “You let me believe it was gone.”

“I didn’t know anything for certain,” Gandalf said. “But I sensed it was not far. Perhaps that is a lesson to you, to all of us, of how the hope of Middle-earth dangles always by a thread.”

Boromir cleared his throat and stepped forward. “I owe you an apology, Ring-bearer. I was rash with my words.”

Frodo offered him his forgiveness with a trusting nod. “All that matters is that the quest has not been in vain. There is still hope.” He smiled at Aragorn. “Hope.”

“Let us get some sleep then,” Gandalf said. “We set forth again at sundown.”

END