CHAPTER 6
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After a few hundred yards, Frodo had to stop. Tears threatened to blind him, and he sat down on the silky needle-strewn ground between two huge, tangled yew trees, and wiped his eyes with his sleeve. His mind was racing. He understood now, understood what it was that had come between him and Aragorn. He didn't know what he could possibly do or say to undo the damage, but at least now he understood. He still could hardly fathom what Sam had said. What he had done. It was the last thing under the sun he would have expected from Sam. Sam had always been sensible and sturdy, mindful of what was appropriate. What had got into him? Had he lost his wits entirely? That night - he could remember it, he realised with a chill. He had been so tired, it had been a long day, several long days, and before he had known it he had dropped off. And while he had been sleeping, all this had been going on. It made his stomach turn, but for a second he couldn't stop the images from passing through his head. It would have been dark, and Aragorn would have been awake, waiting... what would he have done when he sensed someone near? What would Sam have done...? For a brief, vertiginous moment he rushed headlong into that thought, a reluctant but strangely excited audience to his own imagination, and what his mind showed him, enveloped him in, was not Aragorn's eyes and hands, but Sam, Sam in the dark, hot breath, soft hair, sharp-sweet scent, smoothskinsurehandssilkenmouth, and with a shock, he squeezed his eyes shut and blocked it out. Sam? Where did that come from? This wasn't about Sam. Suddenly he felt sick. Oh, Aragorn, Aragorn... he leaned his forehead on his knees and felt his heart crying out for the ranger's comforting and exciting presence. He squeezed his eyes shut and saw the lean and rugged face before him, the deep-set eyes. How thrilling it had been to see his smile and feel his favour. To see the sides of the stern and silent ranger than no one else ever saw. How could everything change so quickly? Surely it was not impossible to call back what had been there before... Never in his life had he had reason to speak to Sam like that, to be angry with him at all, and it had felt strange and unreal, like an upside-down world. But Sam's revelation, and his words, had hurt - if only Sam didn't know him so well! - and it was all Sam's fault, wasn't it. Nobody had asked him to - how dared he... Frodo closed his eyes and rested the back of his head against the yew. What was going on? How had it come to this? He felt small and powerless, like a pine cone floating down a powerful stream, thrown now this way and now that. He barely knew what was up or down anymore. In a world where *Sam*, of all people, could go behind his back and deliberately hurt him, how could he be expected to? He sat up. He didn't want to think about Sam and his bottomless and incomprehensible treachery, it was too exhausting and confusing, and he had more important things to do. He took a deep breath and got up, rubbing the tear stains from his cheeks as he began to walk. He had to find Aragorn. It was a long walk back to camp, and when he arrived there, he was sufficiently calm to be able to ask Legolas, who was the only person there, where Aragorn might be, and keep his demeanour casual. Legolas said Aragorn had gone to shoot at a target some little distance away. He offered to show Frodo where it was. 'I know the place,' Frodo said. 'I will find it.' 'Very well.' Legolas returned, without remark or further questions, to inspecting his arrows, and Frodo set off. He was fairly certain of the way, and he turned off from the clearing surrounding the camp tree, spotting two white-limbed saplings he recognised from the night when he had followed Aragorn. What would he say? How would the man react when he knew that Frodo was aware of what had passed between him and Sam? As he walked, Frodo knew that he had to find the right words, the ones that would set everything to rights. But his head crowded with thoughts. Why had Aragorn not told him what had happened? Did that mean that it was important or that it was insignificant? But why had it happened at all? Did Aragorn make assumptions as to what there was between Sam and Frodo? Oh, how complicated and impossible it all was. Frodo sat down on a fallen log and buried his face in his hands. For a long time he sat still, trying to empty his mind and regain some kind of equilibrium. He listened to his own breath until it became inaudible and he could hear the humming of insects and the sound of the wind in the trees again. One thought nagged him like a biting fly. Why had Aragorn let Sam...? Surely he must have known, from the first moment. there was no darkness so deep it could obstruct the man's keen senses, and Frodo knew it. So why...? It stung, whatever the reason, it hurt like the treachery it was. Aragorn, his own lovely Aragorn... and Sam. Sam, steady reliable Sam, who had never been away from home before...and Aragorn. It just didn't add up, and Frodo didn't know, in the brief moment before he stopped himself from brooding further on this particular and unpleasant reality, which end of that equation brought him the bitterest sting of jealousy and hurt. Frodo got up and trudged on in long tangly grass and prickly undergrowth that he hadn't even noticed the night before. Now it was mid-afternoon, and it was warm and close in the forest. He continued in the general direction he told himself he remembered - it couldn't be far. But half an hour later, he had to admit that he was lost. Either he was mistaken about the landmarks he thought he recognised, or he had been too deep in confused and frantic speculation, but however it had come about, he was nowhere near the archery clearing. There didn't seem to be any paths. He thought of calling, but decided that it would look foolish. Frodo sighed dejectedly. Some night vision, and even daylight didn't seem to be of any help to such a feeble talent as his. "You know I see well in the dark", he had chided the ranger, and now he couldn't even find a clearing close by, in full daylight, and large enough to build a house in. He slowed down. Something that was lurking in the back of his mind had been visible in a flash when he remembered those words, but now it was gone again. What had Aragorn said in response again? "You are not the only one who sees well in the dark", something like that. Their meeting two nights ago had been both unpleasant and puzzling, and Frodo hadn't had the strength to go over their conversation in detail - he had distracted himself by going walking with Sam - but now these words came back to him very clearly. What did that remind him of? He frowned, trying to put his finger on it. Something Sam had said. "...what with the dark and all, he thought I was you..." Frodo suddenly had a vague and uneasy sense of some unlooked-for and perhaps sinister convergence. Aragorn had definitely not been talking about himself - he must have been aware of his mistake. Who then? Sam, instigator of that benighted tryst? Forger of dark and deliberate plots? What, exactly, had Aragorn felt that Sam had seen so clearly? Aragorn himself? No, it didn't make sense. Something or someone else. "...sometimes we all need to have the obvious pointed out to us..." Frodo closed his eyes hard, trying to remember. Who needed? 'I didn't understand until I was shown.' Shown what? By whom? By Sam? He stopped, sensing that this was somehow important, was the heart of the whole matter. Aragorn had said that there was something "right in front of him," something very important. Something that Sam knew? Was it - no, it *had* to be - the same thing that Aragorn himself had been shown. Frodo walked on, aimlessly, unseeing, the archery place forgotten. He couldn't understand why he felt nervous, suddenly. If Aragorn had indeed been referring to Sam as the one who saw well in the dark, and who had shown him something that he himself had been too blind to see, then what was it? Was it an actual thing or idea or discovery - or was it in the very doing? Frodo's heart beat faster suddenly. Had Sam done what he had done in order to show Aragorn something? The meaning of Sam's seemingly irrational and senseless act had to be in his motivation. What had made Sam do it? That question, Frodo realised, was the true heart of the matter. Sam had protested that it was not out of jealousy, and Frodo felt certain, having seen Sam's face, that it had not been out of lust. Then what? Frodo swiped restlessly at some tall grasses. How had he not seen, when he had been talking to Sam - no, *yelling* at Sam - that the important thing was not *what* he had done but *why*? He hadn't really thought to ask, except in the most shallow and heedless way; he had been too upset. Now that anger, which had seemed so justified, seemed suddenly very misguided. This was a knot that couldn't be untangled in anger, its threads were too fine for that. And yet it needed to be untangled. He walked faster. He had to find... not Aragorn, he brushed aside the image, something more important. Sam. Had to find Sam. It was suddenly crucial that he talked to Sam and got this whole mess sorted out, before it drove him mad. Then, perhaps, it would be time to talk to Aragorn. However much it tested his patience, that was how it must happen. He frowned and turned back, walking faster. "It wasn't like that, Mr Frodo... It wasn't right..." Words ran through Frodo's head as he beat the lush, grasping leaves and vines out of his way. "He's a man, he doesn't understand... me having come all this way...he's not here for you, he's here for the sake of the Ring..." Surely Sam had not been suggesting that Aragorn's mind had been affected by the Ring? Or had he? Odd way to demonstrate it. And Sam, Frodo reminded himself, was most definitely aware that Frodo suspected that Boromir felt the presence of the Ring, they had even talked of it - why Aragorn and not Boromir, if it had been his intention to demonstrate that someone was not accountable, and thereby made a threat? No, it made no sense. Perhaps Sam meant that Aragorn really only cared about the quest, in the end. Frodo had to admit that that touched a nerve. Truly, the task before them weighed heavily on Aragorn's mind, the responsibility often showed in his face, lately. But weren't they all thus preoccupied? And why would that be so close to Sam's heart, that it made him do something so out of character? They had all had this burden laid on them at the same time - in a sense, of course, they were all here for the sake of the Ring, himself most of all. All except... Frodo frowned. Sam had come along all the way from the Shire, not really knowing much about the Ring, and certainly not aware of the true danger of the journey. And when he had learned of it, he had still wanted to come. He had not been chosen by the council; he had just refused to be left behind. Not, Frodo thought with growing amazement, because he thought he had some part to play in the destruction of the ring, not because he was eager for adventure or possessed by an idle wish to explore foreign countries. Because... Why had Frodo not seen this before? Oh, Sam, Frodo thought suddenly, stopping dead among the ferns. I was cruel to you, wasn't I? It was as if Sam had been invisible up until today, until this moment, even. But Sam had finally reached out, in his unerring way, and forced Frodo to see him, to take notice. And with a strange throb inside, Frodo finally dared to follow his thought to its end, and see that the truth of this strange matter was, had to be, that if it, in Sam's opinion, wasn't right for Frodo to become attached to Aragorn because Aragorn was there for the sake of the Ring, then it wasn't right for him to be attached to anyone, except... And standing there, Frodo sensed something that had lain asleep very near his heart for a long time awakening, slowly, and as he listened, breathless, for its presence, it began to ache like a starved thing. He sensed its name - oh, I know you - even as it was taking shape... ... and he stopped trying to think, and started running, crashing through the tangled undergrowth. He noticed, glancing up between the trees, that the sun had moved considerably since he left the camp, and that it was already late afternoon. He must have been gone for hours. Where might Sam be? What would he have done when Frodo had thrown out that last remark - oh, how horrible that remark had been, how could he have been so blind? - and walked off. Where was he now?
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