II

            Sam had gone to the kitchen for the guesthouse to fetch refreshments.  The bag Mistress Rhysellë had brought with her had contained fruit from her orchard, as well as strawberries from her garden.  Sam smiled as he washed them and cut them into slices appropriate to be eaten by hand, surrounding them on the serving platter with whole berries.  On a second platter he laid out seedcakes he’s made that morning as well as biscuits he’d learned were favored by the local elves.  He put pomegranate juice and water into two ewers and set them all on a serving tray, along with a number of goblets, and carried it at last into the living room and set it on the table before the seats on which Ir-Iorhael and his guests generally sat.  He poured water and pomegranate juice into some of the goblets, and looked enquiringly at Mistress Rhysellë for her preference.  At her nod, he gave her a goblet of juice and one of water to Frodo.

            “Or would you prefer a cup of your tea?” he asked.  “T’would be but the work of a moment to prepare some for you.”

            Frodo gave his sweet smile.  Oh, but this is enough for now, Sam.  Perhaps a time later.  Thank you.

            After presenting the platter of fruit to Frodo and Rhysellë and taking a seedcake and goblet of the juice for himself, Sam settled himself in his own chair and asked the question that was troubling his mind.  “Tell me, Master—how did you do that?  Make the books make themselves, I mean?”

            Frodo paused with a slice of apple near his mouth.  Master?  How many times must I tell you I am no longer your Master in any way?

            Sam was already shaking his head.  “But in this you are, for there’s no way as I could do any such thing, not less’n you should teach me first and school me hard on it.”

            Both their guest and Frodo laughed at that, Frodo fairly shimmering with amusement.  Ah, but only you could justify that properly, Samwise Gamgee!  He went still for a moment, then gave a smile that appeared sly to his friend.  You may not believe this, but I give Sauron the credit for this ability.

            Sam’s mouth fell open with disbelief.  “Sauron?” he finally managed.  “How in Middle Earth can you say that?  How could he give you the ability to make a book copy itself?”

            Frodo shook his head and went still for some time.  When he continued his face was almost expressionless.  There is a realm of…of spirit, of imagination, of mind.  Most Elves who are creators can enter it at will.  Artists, sculptors, musicians, writers, smiths, others.  Within it they can hear portions of the Song.  If they desire to create a specific thing, they can listen for the portion of the Song that concerns what they would wish to create, and carry it out of the Realm to bring it into being in this world.  The more clearly they can imagine what it is that they would make be, the more meaning they can bring out of the Song and the more easily they can create what they desire.  The more familiar they are with the process by which they would bring what they desire into being, the more swiftly and surely they can bring it to be.

            Again he paused.  He sighed, and his expression became somehow both stern and sorrowful.  Within the Realm of Possibilities is a—a blister, filled with corruption, filled with evil.  It contains the Shadow World in which the Nazgûl dwelt.  From what I have learned it was created by Morgoth himself.  Within it he imprisoned those he stole, at first Elves from about the Waters of Beginning.  There they were tortured both physically and spiritually until in they ended up as orcs, his slaves and servants.

            He taught some of his lieutenants how to enter the Shadow World, including Sauron.  They used it to make more orcs from other races.  You remember, Sam, that many of the orcs we saw in Mordor resembled Men of various sorts, Dwarves, and even a few who may once have been Hobbits.

            Remembering the snuffling tracker who’d complained that Gollum had destroyed the scents of their passage by dragging orc gear around their path as they’d fled the tower of Cirith Ungol, Sam nodded slowly.  It was one time when the miserable creature had saved them from discovery, although it was impossible to decide whether it was wilfully or inadvertently.  Perhaps it had been both?

            You remember that we were told that Sauron himself could not create aught of his own will, but must instead take what others had wrought and twist it to his will?  So it was that he took Morgoth’s blister and created within it the Shadow World.  The Rings of Power he helped to create were tainted by his will to draw those who wore them into the Shadow World as their bodies grew toward their natural end, making of them wraiths serving at his will.  It worked well with those Men to whom he gave them.  Wearing them, they lived longer than was their natural wont, and were convinced they’d been granted life unending—until what remained of their bodies could no longer sustain them and they found themselves now imprisoned.  As wraiths they could enter Middle Earth and work their Master’s will, but they had no true forms in the outer world, only what forms clothing and armour might give them.

            Again Sam nodded.  “I member being told of that.”

            Frodo took a deep breath.  The Rings for Dwarves did not work as intended.  They lived longer than Sauron could imagine, and were too stubborn to be easily overwhelmed by their power, and usually gave them over to their heirs before the Rings could take advantage of their physical deaths.

            Sam smiled.  “Seems as if Sauron outsmarted hisself with that one.”

            Frodo smiled.  Even so.

            “And he never touched the Elves’ Rings, so they didn’t get caught at all.  Was it ’cause of the Elves’ ability to enter this Realm of Possibility that he came to them to create the Rings of Power?”

            I suspect so.  Once he watched them create the Rings for Men and Dwarves, he could create his own Ring—the One Ring.

            They all paused to think on this.

            The Morgul knives worked by the same process as the Rings for Men—drawing their victims further and further into the Shadow World as the shards worked their way to the heart.  Once a shard reached the heart, the victim was finally within the Shadow World, and a wraith like—like them.

            “Only you was too Baggins stubborn to go easily, and it took over two weeks to reach the place where Lord Elrond could get it out.”

            A swift nod.  So it was I was drawn far into the Shadow World before Elrond brought me forth.  He drew me out by entering the Realm of Possibilities to find that blister.  I do not know how he opened it enough to bring me out of it, but it closed and kept its contagion within it.  And, having spent time within it as I did, I can enter the Realm myself and use it.

            I know the process of bookbinding well, as you know.  I could thus do the binding by using the Song, for that portion of it I know well enough.  Copying the text I had to draw from the Realm.

            He looked at Rhysellë.  I fear I did not feel I had the time to copy your story in the proper way, for it would take weeks at the least to do so, and it could take days to bind two volumes.  That is why I chose to copy it in this manner.  I hope you are not disappointed.

            She shook her head.  “And why should I be disappointed?  Both are in my own hand, and my sons and daughters will love them.  As for the illustrations—they are exquisite!  But each shows a dragonfly.  Why?”

            Frodo shook his head.  It is my signature sign.  My cousins made a game of finding the dragonfly in each picture I drew or painted.  My father used a beetle on the furniture he carved, and my mother a butterfly on the things she knit, embroidered, or otherwise wrought.  It became a family tradition.

            “There was a dragonfly on a walking stick the Brandybucks gave to Master Ruvemir’s adopted son Ririon.  They found it in a Mathom room.”

            They kept it?  I found out I did not inherit my father’s gift for carving, trying to make that.  I left it behind in my parent’s quarters after they died.  I was ashamed of it for it did not come out as I’d imagined it should.

            “The lad loved it, and was proud of it from the fact as you carved the worm upon it.”

            He is gone on now?

            “Men don’t tend to live as long as we Hobbits do,” Sam advised him.  “Ririon was a dear lad, and his adopted dad was a fascinating soul.  I think as you’d have liked them both.  His brother Samwise as was named for me kept it in his memory.”

            Frodo shook his head at the thought of that walking stick being prized by Men.

            Rhysellë asked. “But why might you not finish copying and binding the books?”

            Frodo and Sam shared a thoughtful look.  It was Sam who answered, “We’re both old for our kind, Mistress.  Were we back in the Shire it’s likely as neither of us would still be here.  We’d of been beyond the Circles of Arda by this time, as is my beloved Rosie and so many others as we’ve loved.  In fact, Frodo most likely would of died afore he could come here.  He says as he almost give over while he was aboard the ship as carried him here, and the same was true for me.  At least both of us was granted the grace to see this place and know the healing as we needed to appreciate it.  But our time is coming, and we’re gettin’ eager to get on with—with our final journey.”

            It was a long time since Rhysellë had known Men, or had seen them die.  She’d seen such things on her journey from Elrond’s lands to the Havens from which she’d sailed from Middle Earth to here.  Some Men had joined with the Elves who’d accompanied and guarded the children who’d been sent to Círdan’s care, and they’d been attacked several times along that road.  She remembered that most of the Men who’d died had fought their deaths, many afraid of letting go of their lives.

            Neither of these, however, showed any sign of fear, instead displaying—was it eagerness?