††Chapter Twenty††

397 18 15
                                        

Chapter Twenty

‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡

"Wake up little halflings." someone said gently.

Cody and Frodo stirred from under the scratchy blankets and Frodo let out a small groan. Under different circumstances Cody would have laughed but they were in an unfriendly world where no one laughed. Frodo did, however, give her a small smile when he looked into her clear, sleepy eyes.

"Good morning." he whispered.

"We can only hope it will be good." she replied sadly.

"It's always good with you."

"That was the most corney thing you have ever said." she said with a small smile and pulled him into a short hug. "Time to go." she said and rolled off of the cot.

Frodo sighed and threw off the warm blankets. When the fabrics were off the cold cave air bit his skin and caused gooseflesh to appear on his arms. He swung his feet over the side of the cot and slowly touched the stone floor; it was cold and felt as if it were made of ice.

≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

Cody sorted through their supplies and found an extra pair of clothes that the elves had fashioned for her. The ones she had on were filthy and had a hole in the middle of her stomach. She fingered the hole and remembered how she just wanted to end it all that night. She had no idea why she did it, maybe it was because the Darkness had driven her mad, she didn't know.

Tears swam in her eyes as she recalled the night the Darkness had entered her body. How it had made her believe Frodo had done something horrible to her and left her in the tree. That horrible illusion stayed in her mind like an actual memory and at times it felt like it had actually happened.

She quickly wiped away the tears as she heard someone approaching and continued to go through her supplies. She saw out of the corner of her eye the feet of Faramir as he watched her. He didn't move or say anything to her and she acted as if he weren't there. Finally, she couldn't take the silence anymore and decided to say something.

"How may I help you Lord Faramir." she asked with emphasis on the word 'lord.'

"You do not have to call me lord and I know that you are angry with me." he replied.

"Angry? I am more than angry at you!" she spat at him and stood up. She tried to stand tall and threatening but it was hard for she only came up to his hip. "All that we ask from you is that you let us go! Is that too much to ask from someone as powerful as you? Or is that why you have come over here, to come and gloat about how you have power over us?"

"You know that I cannot let you go, just as I have told you before."

"Then why have you come over here?" she glared at him. He seemed taken aback at how much force was behind every word she said. He stared at her with wide eyes and was unable to say what he had been able to tell her.

"I was um, just saying that we don't have enough supplies so you will have to eat your own."

"Very well." was all she said and began to dig through her supplies for the elvish lembas.

"Here." someone said and shoved a handful of smelly plants in front of her face. The stench made her eyes water and she wanted to plug her nose.

"Samwise Gamgee, get these onions out of my face." she gagged and shoved the plants away.

"But I wanted you to put them in your pack." he said.

"Why cant you put them in your pack? I don't want mine to smell like onions." she teased.

"Fine, you win." he put his hands in the air as a sign of surrender and turned to walk away.

"Wait." she called. She grabbed one of the lembas wafers and broke some of it off. "Breakfast." she said and tossed the gardner the elvish bread.

"Thanks." he said when he had caught it.

"Where is Sméagol?!" Frodo yelled at Faramir. His shout echoed off of the walls and slowly faded away. Cody whipped her head around to see that he was stalking after the Captain.

"He's fine." Faramir reasured.

"He's not fine until I see him."

"And you will see him shortly. But, in the meantime, you need to pack for we have a long journey ahead of us." without saying anything else, Faramir disappeared down one of the tunnels.

"Frodo," Cody hissed and ushered him over to her, "What was that all about?" she asked when he knelt down next to her.

"He tried to kill him last night, Cody." Frodo said, "He had archers lined up all along the hill and he was going to give them the signal to shoot."

"So why didn't he?"

"Pity." was all he said.

"Pity from him, or from you?" she asked. She then grabbed her extra clothes and tossed him a piece of lembas, "Breakfast."

"Pity from me." he mumbled before taking a bite from the wafer.

≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

Cody went down the tunnel that she and Boromir had gone through the night before and into the small bowl shaped valley. She loved the way how the soft grass felt under her sore feet and how the air smelled fresh and clean. She listened as the small birds sang their sweet songs to one another as if they didn't have a care in the world. She closed her eyes and imagined that she was back in the Shire. For a split second it felt as if she were home but it was interrupted when two men came out one of the tunnels and went back into another.

She sighed and began to change out of her dirty clothes and into her clean ones. Her trousers were the color of the sand that rested on the banks of the Brandywine river but were soft to the touch. Her shirt was a plain, button down, white shirt and the sides were shorter than the front and the back. She pulled her suspenders up over her shoulders and wrapped her grey cloak around her. She fastened the green leaf brooch on the fabric and made her way back through the tunnel.

----------Hey guys sorry this took forever (you can hate me go on) and, I know, the ending was really bad but the next chapter was going to be in this one but I figured it would be very long (I don't want a random long chapter) and it would take longer to update. Sooo, I hope you enjoy this! ~God Bless----------

The Two WorldsWhere stories live. Discover now