Rating: G
Summary: Frodo’s world was slowly losing its colors, until spring came and turned the tide.
Disclaimer: Frodo and all recognisable characters are the property of the Estate of J.R.R. Tolkien. No offence is intended, nor profit made.
Frodo could not say when colors began to drain form his world. He thought that perhaps, if he had been paying more attention to the world around him, he would have been able to tell the exact moment the problem occurred. Perhaps if he had kept a sharper eye on his surrounding, he would have discerned the subtle dullness to the hues of the fallen leaves the previous autumn. Perhaps if he was more observant he would have noticed that the green and yellow ribbons that bedecked the Hall during the Yuletide revelry were not as festive as they usually appeared. Perhaps it was all due to the dampening effect of winter, when almost everything was black, white, grey, silver, or any of the myriad shades of wet brown. Perhaps it was the nature of overlooking a change that happened so gradually, so unobtrusively, like the weight gained or lost by a family member or a friend he saw everyday, and the leaching away of colors had happened long before without him being aware of it. Perhaps it had started in Minas Tirith, a city of old, graying masonry. Perhaps it had begun in Rivendell, where a lingering sense of withering grace permeated the air. Perhaps it had first happened in Bree, or on the night they arrived in Hobbiton. It could even have been a festering illness that started during the Quest: somewhere on the reeking, mist-shrouded Emyn Muil, or the rot-infested desolation beyond the gates of Mordor, or the wilderness of Ithilien… It could have been brought about by the venom of the spider bite, or the poison of the Morgul blade; each time Frodo thought about this, he shook with anger and dread.
But regardless of when it truly started, the affliction only came to Frodo’s attention in the spring of 1420 SR. He recalled standing at the top of a hillock overlooking a sloping meadow rippling with lush grass streaked with crocuses, daffodils and bluebonnets. He remembered other springs when the sight made his heart ached with the sort of joy that transported him back to his childhood days, drinking in the first frost-free sunshine, wading through a sea of wildflowers that came to his chest, sometimes to his face, watching clumsy, wooly lambs frolicking by their mothers. He remembered how heartbroken he felt the spring of 1401 SR, after one by one, events happened to corroborate his suspicion that Bilbo was planning on leaving the Shire for good. He remembered visiting each newly-thawed brook and pond, strolling through the familiar walks along the woods he was most fond of, torn between the devotion to Bilbo and the desire to remain in the place that he had come to see as his final, true home, not just a simple dwelling place.
But spring 1420 SR was another tale entirely. The grass field was there, the sky, the wild flowers, even the butterflies that spun drunkenly in pairs, and the occasional bees buzzing industriously from one swaying blossom to another, all the pieces that made up his picture of a perfect spring morning, were there. But they were all subdued, lacking that vivid brightness that came out pure golden sunshine siphoned off a sky of the deepest azure. It was as though the world had chosen that very moment to don a sheer shawl of woven ash, or mist—a coat that no amount of blinking seemed to be able to shed.
Frodo wondered if he had been working too hard on his book—if the hours he spent hunched over his notes, writing long into the night in the light of the candle and the fire, had taken their toll on his sight. So he discontinued his habit of returning to the study after supper. He deliberately set a solid hour of rest after every two hours of writing, and he spent the time taking walks in the garden, focusing his eyes on the flowers that frothed exuberantly under Sam’s care, willing them to glare back at him in unstinting red, yellow, blue, green, and purple. He also made a point of taking a brief nap after lunch, even if it was only half an hour spent with his eyes closed while his mind whirred incessantly, making notes of what to read next, revising what he wrote in the morning, what to add, and what to remove. The supply of carrots was low that spring, but Frodo made sure he ate a stick or two of them every day, remembering his aunt Amaranth, who claimed that her peerless eyesight, which allowed her to embroider even in the dim light of the dying fire, was maintained by a generous daily intake of carrots.
Perhaps he had taken the right steps, perhaps the warmer days and the time he spent outdoors helped, Frodo could not rightly say. He thought he was getting better. But on Sam’s wedding, to Frodo’s dismay, he found every guest was wearing drab party dresses, the feast looked overcooked and unappetizing, and all the sprays and nosegays seemed to have undergone slight wilting even though the flowers had only been picked the day before. He returned to Bag End that night feeling defeated, knowing that far from cured, his problem had only persisted, if not worsened, and it seemed he had merely learned to live with it.
Summer rolled in its own imperturbable, hectic, and prolific way, and everyone agreed that it was the sweetest, most fruitful summer Hobbiton had ever witnessed in almost a generation. Everyone except Frodo Baggins, of course, for whom the world seemed to slip away, kept farther and farther out of his reach by the thickening layer of gossamer haze that sapped the colors around him faster than the bleaching sunshine and wind. He had stopped taking measures to provide his eyes with plenty of rest and carrots. He resumed writing at night and dispensed with naps. He still strolled around the garden and frequented his favorite copses and brooks, but the walks became shorter and shorter with each passing month.
Over two empty tankards Frodo cautiously probed Master Brownlock the healer for possible insights to his problem. As he suspected, the healer never encountered any previous case of diminishing colors. Blurriness where there used to be sharply defined objects, seeing double or even triple, slowly clouded vision that had everything to do with age, those were the usual eye problems that Master Brownlock had treated in the past, sometimes with the help of those expensive bits of glass purchased from the dwarves, sometimes, when the afflicted hobbit did not have the means, with the usual tinctures and elixirs, which, sadly, worked no better than carrots. But what about eyes that could still clearly see that a watermelon was a watermelon even at a hundred yards away, that sunflowers were sunflowers, that strawberries were strawberries, and beloved cousins and friends looked the way they had always looked, except that the cool green of the rind, the stark yellow of the petals, the luscious red of the flesh, and the gold-green and indigo of the eyes, the copper-tinged brown of the hair had all acquired a thin veneer of dust that refused to be wiped clean? Brownlock clearly did not have the answers.
August slid into September, which was highlighted with the harvest bonfire and a more modest feast and merriment on the 22nd to celebrate Frodo’s birthday. Frodo was glad for the first inkling of autumn. He found himself curiously yearning for the deadening monochrome of winter. At least then he would not feel as cheated and beaten by the retreating, vanishing hues.
He had to admit that the problem weighed heavily on his mind, taking away the little joys that he used to derive from simple things like a meal, an afternoon walk, a day spent wandering in a bustling market or in the woods, picking berries. He was aware of how short-tempered he had become of late, how he scowled at Rosie when she came to the study with his tea, how he glared at Sam when he peeked around the door and told him that the Mayor had come to see him. He even shunned Merry and Pippin at times, when he could hardly stand the way they took for granted such small pleasures as the contrasting green orange and yellow on their dinner plates or the way their wine caught the light of the candles and turned a rich ruby red. He remembered that thinking the Shire was there waiting, its charms unsullied, was part of the reason he kept struggling to accomplish his quest. But now that he was back he found that he no longer delighted in the simple, familiar ways of the hobbits. Returning to the Shire had felt like falling back into a dream, a descent into slumber, but not the quiet, restful kind.
He realized that he was jealous, he was angry, but at what he could not pinpoint exactly. And, really, what could he possibly do? What help could anyone offer? He spent nights composing anxious letters to Lord Elrond, to Aragorn. My liege, my world is steadily turning pale and lackluster. My color vision is declining in a slow but relentless pace, and I fear that if measures are not taken, and this condition remedied, I shall be in danger of wearing mismatched breeches and waistcoats very soon. Please do come and counsel. It sounded ridiculous even in his head at three in the morning.
But the truth was, he was growing more afraid, wretched, and desperate. Worse, none of those feelings helped in any way with the mounting exhaustion, with the nightmares and flashbacks that kept him awake some nights, with his difficulty to concentrate on his book. It certainly exacerbated the horror and pain that came back to him on 6th October, while his mind and body relived Weathertop and the flight to Bruinen, and the world around him dissolved into swirls of fog and ice, the voices that spoke to him sounded so distant and erratic that he wondered if he had ever crossed the Loudwater at all and if the wound on his shoulder had poisoned his memory, tricking it into believing that he was still alive, safe and at home again.
It seemed to Frodo that there were even less color in the world after his illness, but he tried to convince himself that it was because winter was around the corner. He sat in his study watching the leaden clouds gather, shuttering the Sun, casting the empty garden outside his window, the denuded trees that flanked the road that led to Overhill, even the puddle-pocked slope toward the Party Field, in tired, dirty gray, and he wondered if the Nine felt that way as the Ring tightened the noose of Its power around their will and spirit. The thought frightened him, but it haunted him more and more.
In time the new year crept in, one that Frodo welcomed with dread and weariness. He did not know if he would be able to survive another lifeless, colorless spring. Oh, no, he laughed wryly to himself, this isn’t going to be last year; it will be worse.
A growing tiredness wrapped around him, weighting his limbs, as March drew near. He knew that the repeat of last year’s illness was inevitable, and the anticipation was bitter. One night he screamed at the silent walls of his bedroom, outraged with his own helplessness. He had carried the Ring to Mordor, had he not? He had managed the task against all odds, and lived to see the fruit of his labor, and he had returned home, had he not? But why did he have so little power over his own life and his own little world? Even his body was set on betraying him, denying him what comfort and pleasure that he thought was the least that he deserved for his efforts. But his little, pathetic rage against the mute shadows in his room was futile.
He devoted more and more time to his book. Paper and ink were soothing. If the cream-colored paper had faded to gray with a faint tinge of pale yellow, he did not notice it. And the ink was stolidly, reliably black, it was heartening. He slept as little as possible, because his dreams were traitors, tormentors. In his dreams all the colors were alive and vibrant, he woke from them with tears in his eyes.
He came to the Plains of Gorgoroth at the beginning of March, writing behind the locked door of his study to keep Sam and Rosie from finding out that his progress was intermittent, interrupted by frequent bouts of crying and shivering that were so violent sometimes he could not even hold his quill. For the first time in many months he had no trouble sleeping because writing a single page a day drained him completely of what little strength and spirit he started the day with.
Perhaps it was the Ring, he thought one night as he stumbled to his bedroom, after telling Rosie that he would retire early and please do not bother to wake him up for dinner. He undressed slowly his room, muzzy and swaying on his feet, remembering the moment when the Ring slid cool and heavy, whole and glorious and mighty, caressing the length of his finger, wrapping closely around his skin, embracing him, breathing a wave of clarity and vigor and unsurpassable power to flicker across his mind and body, to penetrate into the deepest reaches of his soul, surrendering to him a vision of supreme beauty and utter horror, painted in stark, solid colors, blue, white, green, gold, red, brown, all his, all his.
He stood there, gasping, staring at the gap between his right hand fingers and weeping, horrified at himself, because for a splintered moment he longed for the Ring again, he craved It, lusted for It, because It promised him colors.
Frodo heard the fretful mewling as he stepped into the kitchen. The door to the backyard was open and he could hear Rosie humming outside as she hung the laundry to dry. He put his tray, crowded with the remains of the first breakfast Sam had brought to his room earlier, then went to the basket by Rosie’s rocking chair in the corner, and peered in
“Hello,” he said, smiling and waving at Elanor. The baby’s face had been creased in what looked like the preparation for a full-blown howl, but when she saw Frodo, she seemed to change her mind and waved two pudgy hands and two chubby legs at him. Frodo laughed. His encounter with Sam and Rosie’s firstborn had so far been sporadic and each time from a distance, and always very brief. He had held Elanor for a moment when her proud father brought her to him the day after she was born. Then there had been far too many visiting aunts and uncles and cousins unnumbered, all wanting to see Elanor, so that Frodo decided to accept Merry’s invitation to spend a week or two in Crickhollow to allow the new parents time to fully enjoy their baby. Afterward Pippin insisted that he should come and stay a few days at the Great Smials, and in the end, more than a month had passed when he finally returned to Bag End. Meanwhile Elanor had done a bit of growing so that even though she was still very small and helpless, she no longer seemed extremely breakable.
“Lonely, are you?” said Frodo, stooping to tickle the baby’s face. He patted her blanket; it was dry. Elanor squealed, blowing spit bubbles, then grinned appealingly, her eyes wide and bright.
“Oh, all right.” Frodo yielded, grinning back. He reached into the basket and gathered Elanor, blanket and all into his arms. He kissed the top of her head, rubbing his nose on her lush, silky curls. She smelled of milk, Rosie’s floral soap, and that fresh, soft scent that only babies have. He closed his eyes for a little while, his lips on Elanor’s brow, her arms wrapped around her, overwhelmed by gratitude that this beautiful gift should belong to Sam.
“Where shall we go, my lady?” he asked eventually, when he had control over his voice again. Elanor cooed, burbled; her fists flapping excitedly. “That sounds like a very good idea. The garden it is then.”
They went out to the backyard.
Rosie turned when she heard the door whine open, then paused where she was busily pinning bedsheets to the clothesline, wiping her wet hands on her apron as she hurried toward Frodo. “Mr. Frodo,” she called. “Is Ellie troubling you, sir?”
“I’m afraid she’s waylaid me in the kitchen, Rose, and held me prisoner,” replied Frodo. “She promised to set me free after I take her for a walk in the garden. You don’t mind, do you?”
Rosie giggled. “Lawks, no, sir,” she said, beaming at him, then at her baby. “You might want to take off your fancy waistcoat first, though. She’s just been fed and she might… She can’t be too excited or she might be sick.”
“I’ll be sure to bore her then,” said Frodo, winking at Elanor who gave him a wide, toothless smile.
“There’s a towel on my chair, sir, you might want to bring it,” Rosie added.
“We won’t be long, Rose,” said Frodo, walking away. “Don’t fret. I’ve taken plenty of babies for walks before, and I survived. I’m sure we will manage splendidly.”
Frodo held Elanor closer as he climbed the two short flights of stone steps to the upper garden, which on that day toward the end of May was positively ablaze with flowers. “People think because I have no family of my own I cannot be trusted with babies,” he confided to Elanor, who watched him intently, gurgling with sympathy. “They cannot be farther from the truth. I’ve dandled babies before, and I did not break any of them.” He put Elanor on her blanket on the grass under the cherry tree, then bent over her, holding her fists in his hands. “It wasn’t my fault Pippin turned out the way he did. Just ask Merry,” Frodo said, swinging her little hands. She crowed delightedly.
The weathervane on top of the wood shed rocked a little in the easterly wind. Two kittens were gamboling near the clumps of marigold, another one was chasing and trying to bat a large butterfly, while their mother was licking her paw, stretched lazily in the shade of the rose bush. A lizard was sunning, stiff and still on a border stone. Higher up in the garden various birds were calling each other from the safety of the pear and apricot branches. Sunshine drizzled through the cherry leaves and fell on Elanor’s face. She was gurgling ecstatically, her arms and legs twitching.
Frodo put a finger on Elanor’s nose and she squealed. He traced her cheeks with the pad of his thumb, tickled her smiling lips lightly with the tip of his finger, then pinched her chin, and Elanor suffered the manhandling with aplomb, gurgling and blowing bubbles happily. Frodo could not resist the urge to bend down and kissed her.
“I’m glad your dada is not here to witness this,” murmured Frodo as he captured Elanor’s foot. “He might run me off with a pitchfork.”
“Ppwwt?”
“Yes, he would.” A kiss to the heel of the little foot. “He knows my reputation and he might not want to take chances with me.”
“Pbllt…pfft…heee!”
“Yes, you’re right. It isn’t as if I can help myself.”
“Pfft…pwee?”
“Why, thank you. I feel very flattered.”
“Goo…goo…pbllt.”
“And mwaa…waa… to you too…ow!”
Frodo pulled back, and then yelped again, because Elanor’s tiny fist had somehow tangled with the white jewel that dangled from the silver chain around his neck, tugging at it, and the chain, it seemed had ensnarled a few strands of hair.
“I see you’ve found me a leash, cheeky lass,” he chuckled. Carefully he eased the chain off, and held it out, wound loosely around his fingers. Elanor cooed and pulled again, and for a while they had a noisy game of tug-of-war, before Elanor’s fist unfurled, releasing the jewel. It swung gently for a moment. A shaft of sunlight splashed onto it, splintering into a star-like glitter, so piercingly bright it was almost blinding. Frodo blinked.
Then he noticed that one of the frolicking kittens had beautiful ginger fur, while its friend was a calico with large swathes of orange and brown. The large butterfly was black, edged in sapphire. The lizard had burnished bronze back and dark copper sides and tail. What remained of the cherry blossoms was pale pink, the grass screamed verdant, Elanor’s hair was fine golden silk.
He looked up, holding his breath. The sky was a deep, solid blue. “Oh,” he whispered.
He looked at Elanor, who waved and crooned at him. His throat felt raw and dry. Slowly he lifted her and held her, then stood up. He walked to the lower garden, and gazed hungrily at the neat row of onions, their leaves pointing up, profusely green. He walked as if in a dream, touching a tulip here, an aster there. He scaled the gentle incline toward the western slope of the hill, still looking around, greedily drinking in the varying tints of rainbow, until he suddenly froze.
He stood stock-still, tilting his head slightly to the left. But there was no mistaking it. There were voices of children, dogs, and a curious creaking. He moved toward the noise.
The garden on the western side of the Hill boasted a stout, sprawling oak tree. At least three swings were attached to its old limbs now, all of them being put to the test by children who shrieked as they soared, ponytail and apron bows flailing in their wake, their feet kicking. A tree house made of scrap board, ropes, and blind faith lurked among the branches, festooned with more yelling children. Three girls and their bunny rabbit had a tea party on the lawn. A small boy was trying to ride a shepherd dog, despite the dog’s obvious lack of cooperation. All of them looked healthy, happy, beautiful, if a little on the grubby side.
Frodo looked at them one by one. Mine? he wondered. But how could that be possible? He made his way gingerly into the garden. The children continued to play noisily, sometimes calling each other names that made him stop on his track. “Bilbo!” someone yelled from the tree house, “Mind the prisoner, will you?” “Don’t tell Frodo I took his catapult, Merry.” “Pip! It’s my turn!”
Then one of them squealed, “Dad!” and then there was a flurry of children shimmying down the tree trunk and rushing to the gate, waving and bouncing, the swings were callously abandoned, the bunny rabbit was unceremoniously shoved into a wicker basket and the dog was left to enjoy its well-earned rest. Frodo held his breath, his heart racing.
Then Sam entered the yard. He was stockier now, and much better-dressed, there was even a length of gold chain curving over his waistcoat, no doubt attached to an expensive pocket watch, but his laughter, and the warm happiness in his eyes were the same, if not deeper and richer, than what Frodo saw in his face each time he held Elanor in his arms. The children clung to him, climbed on him, tugging his hands, talking all at once. Some did address him as Dad, but there were others who called him Mister Mayor, sir, or Uncle Samwise, or plain Mister Gardner. Sam’s hand busily patted some of the children on their shoulders and backs, he tweaked a chin here, a nose there, he ruffled a few curls, bending this way and that to listen to several important secrets, even as he was seemingly being borne on dozens of little furry feet toward the smial.
Then he went in. Some of the children returned to their games, some departed, waving gaily and promising to return after lunch, some disappeared inside the smial. A girl came out of the door and fetched the basket of bunny, the dog followed her as she made her way back.
“Sam,” Frodo whispered, surprised, and yet glad to have beheld the happy scene by the gate. “You are very fortunate, my dear friend. Very fortunate.”
He realized that there were tears in his eyes. He walked slowly to the window, and peered in. The main dining room had been enlarged, it seemed, by tearing down the kitchen wall, so that the room was now a long, wide hall made up of a kitchen on one end, a very large drop-leaf dining table with many seats in the middle, a long sideboard against one wall, and what looked like the beginning of another pantry on the other end. Around the table sat Sam and Rosie, children of various ages, a few older hobbits, perhaps the kitchen help and gardeners, and they were all eating heartily, interrupted only by the attempt made by two boisterous boys to start a food fight.
Frodo went to the window of the study. The room, too, had changed, warmer somehow, brighter, perhaps because it looked a lot more comfortable, what with the colorful tapestry on the wall, the thick, lovely rug on the floor, and a child’s toy pony on the desk near the ink-stand. Another window looked into the parlor, which showed more lacy antimacassars, cushions with embroidered pillowcases, and flowery slipcovers, while lacking in the usual Baggins’ clutter: the books, the paper, the map and the empty cup and plate.
Frodo drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and felt his eyes fill. I’ll not be here then, he thought, curiously without heat or indignation. Have I passed on? he wondered, not without a suspicion of relief and resignation, as he walked slowly toward the front entrance. Where did they bury me? Or have I joined Bilbo in Rivendell? But Lord Elrond said I needed not come to Rivendell. They will meet me in the Shire. They are going, the elves. And Bilbo.
He found himself standing on top of a hill, overlooking a wide, green valley. There were copses there, with things resembling houses nestled amid the lush canopy; there were neat, colorful gardens spreading among and around the trees, and streams rushing beside white stone paths winding down to a sparkling city that hugged the curving shoreline of an inlet. He could see spires and gleaming white domes, tree-dotted lawns and little deep blue lakes, boats moored in the harbor, and ships scattered like white butterflies on the gold-speckled indigo of the sea. The sea. How did he know that it was the sea? He could not say how, but it seemed to him that he knew the answer: I know because I have seen it.
Two elves came riding from the bend on the far side of a beechen copse. The sight alone made Frodo gasp. He had never seen Elves out in the open, carelessly brilliant and graceful, no longer gliding hidden and unknown deep in the forest, like a fading memory, like a dying myth. And these were not the elves of Rivendell, who lived under siege in their keep-like valley, nor were they the elves of Lothlorien who retreated into the trees and languished into a legend. These were elves in their true home, carefree, vigorous and exultant, wearing their beauty and wisdom proudly and easily, like a gleaming raiment. Frodo wanted to run to them, speak to them, and find the secret to their happiness.
But something drew his gaze away from the elves. A figure sat hunched on the grass a little way before him. He walked to it, stopping next to it. It was a white-haired hobbit who was reading intently, while the wreckage of a picnic basket was strewn around him. Frodo reached out to touch the hobbit. “Bilbo?” he whispered. The hobbit turned to look at him and smiled.
Frodo opened his eyes and looked up at the cherry tree above him. He looked down at Elanor. Her face was puckered and she was whimpering, sleepily berating him for his lack of attention. “Oh, I’m sorry,” said Frodo, his voice shaky. “Shall we come inside?”
He picked up the baby, holding her close to his body, jiggling her a little and making soothing, shushing noises when she began to fret again. Elanor settled, murmuring tetchily though her eyes were beginning to droop. Frodo went to the door, vaguely noticing that he had gone long enough for Rosie to finish hanging her three baskets of laundry. He paused by the door and looked around once more.
The lawn still had a deep green-tinged gray, the roses a dusty red, the sky a blue-stained pearl-like gray. But there was just a hint of vividness, a thickening, deepening of hues. Perhaps, Frodo thought, it is because the sun was exceptionally golden today. He smiled, not knowing precisely why, not bothering to try to comprehend it. On the periphery of his vision he saw the cat and her kittens strutting and slinking under the hedge, the lizard scuttled across the lawn, disappearing under the primroses, while the weathervane rippled in the westerly breeze. He remembered the face he saw in his vision, his own eyes, full of smile, staring back at him, and he knew that the vast, profound lightening in his heart was, without a doubt, hope.
The End