"Good luck, Sam!  Many have received worse than this in payment for the slaying of their first orc.  The cut is not poisoned, as the wounds of Orc-blades often are."

Aragorn, tending Sam after leaving the Mines of Moria.

Title:  Unlucky

Author:  rabidsamfan

Chapter one:  On the mountainside

Summary:  AU diversion – what if the cut Sam got in the Mines of Moria had been poisoned, after all?  Version 2 (minor corrections)

Disclaimer:  None of this belongs to me, but rather to J.R.R. Tolkien -- and several lines are quoted directly out of the chapter "Lothlorien."  (Although I confess to shifting the timeline, and changing a few lines of dialogue to suit this version of events.)

********

For some time Frodo and Sam managed to keep up with the others; but Aragorn was leading them at a great pace, and after a while they lagged.  They had eaten nothing since the early morning.  Sam's cut was burning like fire, and his head felt light.  In spite of the shining sun the wind seemed chilled after the warm darkness of Moria.  He shivered and pulled the hood of his cloak a little tighter to keep the wind off his sore head, concentrating on following the backs of Frodo's heels.  His poor master was breathing hard, like it hurt him, and no wonder after being struck by that great horrible orc.  It was hard to walk straight here.  The ground was full of small stones, and hard, dry tussocks of grass.  Sam wished he could go more carefully.  He was making too much noise.

Frodo stopped of a sudden, and it was all that Sam could manage not to stumble into him.  He looked up, blinking, and saw Strider and Boromir running towards them.  Strider looked worried;  Sam wondered how badly Frodo was hurt to make Strider worry so.

**

Aragorn looked from one small pale face to the other, berating himself.  "I'm sorry, Frodo," he cried.  "So much has happened this day and we have such need of haste, that I have forgotten that you were hurt; and Sam too.  You should have spoken.  We have done nothing to ease you, as we ought, though all the orcs of Moria were after us."  The very lack of response from either hobbit made his fears grow.  "Come now!  A little further on there is a place where we can rest for a little.  There I will do what I can for you.  Come, Boromir!  We will carry them."  He did not like to be so careless of the hobbit's dignity, but he judged that neither Frodo nor Sam were in any state to protest.  Indeed Frodo rested his head against Aragorn's shoulder and clung to his coat, whispering thanks between harsh breaths.

Boromir gathered up Sam, but after a moment put him down again and stripped off the little gardener's pack, slinging it back onto one shoulder before picking up Sam again and resting him on the opposite hip.  As they caught up to the others he let the pack slip down his arm to his hand.  "Gimli," he said.  "Can you carry Sam's pack?"

"I'll help!" Pippin offered eagerly, tugging at the straps.  His face changed as the weight nearly overset him.  "What have you got in here, Sam?  Rocks?"

Sam didn't answer  and Frodo twisted in Aragorn's arms, turning his head to look at his servant.  "Sam?" he said, and his voice cracked with effort.

Sam stirred on Boromir's shoulder, "I'm all right, Mr. Frodo," he said sleepily.  "Just cold."  Boromir shook his head and met Aragorn's eyes over the top of Sam's head, shaping the words "He's hot," with his mouth.

Aragorn frowned and considered best how to proceed.  There was no cover here, and nothing with which to make a fire.  It was best to go on, but he could send ahead.  "Legolas, a league onward another stream joins the Silverlode and they make a little waterfall together.  At the bottom of the fall is a fir wood, and then a clearing where we can stop and tend our injured.  Go ahead to build a fire and heat water for us.  And be careful."

"You'll need these," Gimli said, extracting two of Sam's cooking pots from the top of the pack.  Legolas took them and nodded to the party.  "All will be in readiness when you come," he promised, and darted away.

"Here, give me his blankets," said Boromir to Gimli, "that will lighten the load a little more."

"You should feel it, Merry," said Pippin, who in helping Gimli had missed Boromir's words to Aragorn.  "I think it weighs as much as I do.  I didn't know Sam was that strong."

"He will need that strength," Aragorn said grimly.  "Wounds from orc-blades are too often poisoned."  The young hobbits looked so stricken at his words that he gentled his face and voice to reassure them.  "I have dealt with such wounds before, many times.  And I have athelas still, which I gathered near Weathertop.  Do not let your fears slow your footsteps."

"Right," said Merry, gathering his younger cousin by the arm.  "Come on, Pip.  Sam and Frodo will be fine once Strider gets a proper look at them.  And maybe we can have a bite to eat, then, too."

"Oh, I'd like that," Pippin said, letting his cousin lead him after Legolas. 

********

Boromir's arms were aching and his back was sore but he followed after Aragorn as readily as tired feet would allow him, wondering at the Ranger's still steady pace.  In Rivendell he had asked many questions about Isildur's heir, and many had been answered, but still he had carried more questions in his heart.  And now he had a new question which was its own answer.  How could a man nearly the age of Boromir's father carry not only Frodo, but Frodo's pack as well as his own?  A broken blade might last to be reforged without the strength of blood to go with it.  But Aragorn, son of Arathorn had strength.  Boromir had seen him in battle now against warg and orc, and his heart was glad.  Denethor his father would be hard pressed to deny  the worth of so doughty a warrior, no matter how much he had lingered in the libraries of  Rivendell.  And Faramir his brother would love such a king, so strong of arms, and learned too.

He shifted his burden, and Sam squeaked, stuffing his knuckles into his mouth to muffle the protest.  Boromir slowed.  "Easy, Sam Gamgee.  Only a little farther now."  He could see the glitter of sunlight on the stream Aragorn had mentioned half a mile before him, and the tops of firs behind the fall of land just beyond.

"Sorry, sir," Sam gasped.  "It's just it feels like the top of my head is coming off, and I wish it would."   Sam's face was pale under the tan, and rivulets of blood had worked out from under his hood, smearing his cheek.

"What is it?" Aragorn had paused too, and Frodo was alert in his arms.  The Ringbearer's color was better, and he was breathing easier, but his eyes were worried as he stared at Sam.

"The pace jars him," Boromir said.  "How much farther beyond the stream?"

"Not a quarter mile," Aragorn said.  "If the land were level we could see the fire now."

Boromir turned his gaze back up the mountain, but the sun was still bright, and there was no sign of pursuit.  "Go on ahead and see to Frodo, and Sam and I will follow.  Even if we go slower now we won't be many minutes behind you."

Aragorn smiled and nodded and the approbation warmed Boromir's heart as it might not have before the mines.  "Keep him awake, Boromir, if you can," Aragorn said.  "Pippin, you stay with them, to be a runner at need.  Merry, Gimli, come with me."  He set off, and if anything he was going faster and Merry and Gimli were running hard.

Pippin drew his sword while he waited for Boromir to settle Sam again.  "Don't worry, Sam," he said staunchly.  "I'll protect you."

Sam smiled fondly at the young hobbit.  "I'm sure you will, Mr. Pippin," he said, leaning his head on Boromir's shoulder.  "But mind the rabbits."

Boromir was alarmed, but Pippin laughed.  "Now I know you'll be all right, Sam,"  he said.

"Rabbits?" asked Boromir. 

"You tell him, Sam," Pippin said, "since Strider wants you to stay awake."

Sam's eyes were fever bright, but he opened them obediently.  "Well, sir, it was the summer before Mr. Bilbo's party, and I'd been a-haying at Farmer Cotton's with my brothers," he said drowsily as Boromir's long legs took them forward.  "And after supper my old Gaffer remembered that he'd been called away before he'd finished weeding Mr. Bilbo's vegetables and gone and left his trowel and all out where the dew would fall on it.  And I said I'd go and fetch them, and finish the weeding since it was near the solstice and there was still light."

"But he fell asleep in the potatoes," Pippin contributed, when Sam hesitated longer than was comfortable.

"I did," Sam confirmed.  "I was that tired."  He was tired now, and fighting sleep, but he kept his eyes open.

 "And Merry and I were visiting Frodo and Uncle Bilbo, and I couldn't sleep," Pippin went on.  "They'd made me take a nap after the ride from Buckland.  I was only ten, you know.  So I went outside when I was meant to be in bed and I found Sam.  And he was so tired I didn't want to wake him up, so I sat down and dug a hole with the Gaffer's trowel, because he never let me play with it.  Isn't that right, Sam?"

"It wasn't meant for playing, Pippin-lad," Sam said.  "And didn't I give you one of your own my next birthday?"

"Yes, but the Gaffer's was big and heavy and sharp.  And I needed it," Pippin winked up at Boromir, "because as I was sitting there, I heard something in the dark.  Something eating."

"Something eating?" Boromir asked, although he could guess the end of the tale by now.  It was keeping Sam awake, and more alert than he'd been, and Boromir thanked Pippin's cleverness in bringing it up.

"Oh, yes.  Trolls crunching bones, I thought, after listening to Uncle Bilbo's tales all evening.  I wanted to run back to the hole, but I couldn't leave Sam."

"So he gives a yell, and charges into the lettuce, waving that old trowel around like it was Sting from over the mantelpiece.  Woke up all the neighbors he did.  And all for rabbits."  Sam chuckled and then winced and closed his eyes.

"Well, I wasn't all that much bigger than they were, then, so it was a fair fight.  And they didn't come back, did they," Pippin pointed out.  "Not for a few nights, anyway."

"Nevertheless it was valiant of you, to dare a foe at such a young age," Boromir said, thinking how small the hobbits were, and how much smaller they must have been as children if even rabbits seemed large.  "I will sleep better when you are on watch, Master Took, and guarding us from the perils of the night."

Pippin blushed happily.  "It was only rabbits," he said.

"Wish they was all rabbits," Sam muttered, turning his face to hide it from the light.

Legolas came to meet them as the forded the stream, and took Sam from Boromir, leading them lightly down through the fir wood to the dell where Aragorn was carefully scooping water from the pot and laving it over Frodo's bruised sides.  A pungent, fresh scent filled the air, easing somehow the aches of the body.  Boromir and Pippin sat by the fire while Legolas settled Sam onto a bed of fresh cut fir branches and Aragorn wrapped soft padding over Frodo's hurts.

He picked up the glittering corslet that he had left by Frodo's side.  "The mail is marvelously light.  Put it on again, if you can bear it.  My heart is glad to know that you have such a coat.  Do not lay it aside, even in sleep, unless fortune brings you where you are safe for a while; and that will seldom chance while your quest lasts."

Sam blinked where he lay, trying to see Frodo through a heat haze.  "Isn't that Mr. Bilbo's coat, what was in the Mathom house?" he asked.   

Frodo would have got up to go to him, if Aragorn would have allowed it.  "Yes, Sam.  Bilbo gave it to me in Rivendell.  And I wish he'd had a helm for you while he was at it."

"Don't know as I would have said yes then, but I might now," Sam's voice trailed off and he shifted uncomfortably.  "Can't I sleep yet, Mr. Strider?"

Aragorn signaled to Merry to help Frodo back into the mithril coat and shifted over to Sam.   "Let me see your eyes first," he commanded.  Then he moved back the hood of Sam's cloak to examine the wound.  It was not deep, but it was ugly, and the edges of it were swollen and angry.  Fresh blood and pus oozed out as the wool was pulled away.  "It is as I feared.  Orcs do not clean the filth from their swords, and some has been left in the wound.  I shall have to open it and clean it all out, Sam, and cut away some of your hair."

Sam didn't flinch.  He'd seen hurts go sour before, though never his own, nor this quickly.  "Thought you might," he mumbled.  "There's scissors in my pack, on the left near the needle and thread.  And soap's on the right."

"No wonder it weighs so much," Pippin said to Gimli, "he's got half the Shire in there."

Strider's hands were gentle, but Sam's head was very sore, and he had to bite hard on a folded bit of blanket to keep from shouting as the Ranger washed his head first with soap, and then with the athelas-water.  The second washing soothed away much of the pain, however, and Sam was able to sit up and take a bite of bread and some tea while Strider ate and the others put out the fire and hastily hid all other signs of their halt.  He would have liked to help, but Aragorn forbade it.   "Three days rest you should have, Samwise Gamgee, were it in my power to give them to you."

"I don't mean to be a burden to you," Sam said.  Boromir, coming to take Sam's cup and stow it away overheard and bent down to place a hand on Sam's shoulder.   "Your pack is a greater burden than you are, Master Gamgee, and we are fortunate that Gimli has the strength of his kind to carry it a little longer.  Do not fret at being tended for your wound.  You fought well there under the mountain."

Sam blushed and looked down.  "I should have ducked faster," he said.

"And next time you will," Strider assured him.  "A burned hand teaches well."

"The sun will be behind the mountains soon," Boromir observed.  "And true dark will follow soon after.  Whence from here, Aragorn, and how far?"

"We go to Lothlorien, and if we were all unhurt it would take us three hours yet, just to reach the eaves of the wood,"  Aragorn replied.  "Five leagues beyond that is the Gate, but we will not reach that safety tonight, although we must go as deep into the forest as our legs are still able to carry us."

Boromir stood irresolute,  "Is there no other way?" he asked in a low voice.

"What other fairer way would you desire?" asked Aragorn.

"A plain road, though it led through a hedge of swords," said Boromir.  "By strange paths this company has been led, and so far to evil fortune.  Against my will we passed under the shades of Moria, to our loss.  And now we must enter the Golden Wood, you say.  But of that perilous land we have heard in Gondor, and it is said that few come out who once go in, and of that few none have escaped unscathed."

"Say not unscathed, but if you say unchanged, then maybe you will speak the truth," said Aragorn.  "But lore wanes in Gondor, Boromir, if in the city of those who once were wise they now speak evil of Lothlorien.   It would be folly indeed to go back to Moria Gate, or swim the Great River, or climb the trackless mountains when we can find healing for our companions and sanctuary from our pursuers in the Golden Wood."

"I will follow where you lead," Boromir said.  "But it is perilous."

"Perilous indeed," said Aragorn.  "Fair and perilous; but only evil need fear it, or those who bring some evil with them."  Sam looked over to Frodo, who was helping Merry set the turves into the firepit. 

"Do you think they'll want us then, Mr. Strider?" he asked softly once Boromir had moved away.  "With the evil we're bringing?"

"The Lord and Lady of the Galadhrim will understand, Sam," Aragorn told him. "We bring the hope of Middle Earth."

******