Frodo lost all sense of time.  He was back in the bathing room, hearing that noise in the cellar and staring at the open cellar door.  He suddenly knew what Sam had seen, and, more important, what he had likely heard.  He tried desperately to remember.  Had he?  Yes, he must've.  He knew he had said Sam's name aloud at a very critical moment.

Frodo knew he was blushing furiously.  He tried hard to control his reaction, but he knew his thoughts were clear on his face when Sam, who was watching him closely, suddenly went pale and looked as if he might become violently ill despite Daisy's dosing him with all manner of remedies. 

“I didn't mean ta.  I really didn't.”  Sam began.  “I mean, Mister Bilbo'd just gotten through telling us about you being off your feed an' upset an' all an' I decided somebody oughta be watching over ya since he weren't.  So I came up here, and I saw the steam and I knew you were in the bath.” 

Sam looked as if he was going to get up and run, and he was breathing as if he already had.  “I heard you groan and swear in that dwarf language and then a big splash of water and...and...and I just pushed the door open a bit to make sure, and I... Well, I couldn't help myself Mister Frodo.  I...I couldn't move.  I couldn't even breathe, seeing you like that.”

Frodo buried his face in his hands, realizing now what Sam had meant went he had said 'I've seen more of you than most'.  He didn't know quite how to react to this revelation.   Then he heard Sam move, attempting to rise.  Frodo rose to his knees quickly and reached out to grab Sam's sound arm.  He watched as the mathom slid, once again, ignominiously into the grass.

“Please don't leave, Sam.  I...I just,” Frodo managed, staring at the mathom next to his knees, unable to meet Sam's gaze.  “I don't know what to say.”

“Mister Frodo, I'm dreadful sorry.  I'm...”

Frodo realized the shaking voice had stopped in mid-sentence.  When Sam pulled his arm away, Frodo looked up to find Sam kneeling on his haunches in the grass, a look of steely resolve on his face.

“No.”  It was said with a determined tone that Frodo had heard before.  He had heard it those few times when Sam did decide to go against his gaffer or to defy Daisy or to tell the Master of Bag End that he was mistreating his Eniara plants.  “I'm not really sorry, Mister Frodo.  I'm not sorry at all.  You are the most beautiful thing that's ever been in my life, and...and seeing you like that just proved it to me.  And if you can't forgive me for that, and if you leave like Mister Bilbo said you might, well, at least I have that to remember.  That and...”  The gold eyes slid away from his, suddenly shy once more.  “And the kissing.   And, well, just the idea that you might...” the voice was just a hoarse whisper now.  “I mean, that you might feel about me, like I feel about you.”

Frodo moved quickly, without a second thought, kneeling before Sam and leaning forward to lift the downcast face. 

“If you hadn't seen -- and heard -- what you did, Sam, would you have come up the hill?  Would you have told me what you told me yesterday?”

Sam tried to look away, but Frodo held his face gently.  “No,” came Sam's whispered response.

“Then I am glad beyond all reason that you did see it,” Frodo said firmly. “Because I...I love you, Samwise Gamgee.  And if you hadn't said anything, I think I would have gone on for ages waiting and wondering and worrying, and never said a word.”

The gold eyes widened and lips parted in disbelief.  “You love me?”

Frodo's throat suddenly tightened painfully and tears stung his eyes as he watched that beloved face react to this pronouncement.  He knew his own features must reflect the joy and disbelief and wonder that he saw on Sam's.

“I was so afraid, “ Sam whispered.

“Afraid?  I think not.  I think you were the brave one, Samwise.”

“No, else I would have kissed you long afore now,” Sam retorted fiercely.

Frodo purposefully let go of Sam's face, letting his hands drop to his thighs and willing himself not to move as Sam delivered his promised kiss, but nearly lost his resolve when he saw Sam's eyes go dark and focus on his mouth.  His entire form began to tremble when Sam leaned toward him slowly and slid his fingers, almost reverently, through his hair until they rested at the nape.  He knew the stars were in his eyes then, because he saw them reflected in Sam's, then Sam's mouth was on his and he forgot what stars were because suddenly he was drinking undiluted sunshine.

Sam slid his tongue across Frodo's top lip, demanding entrance. Impatient when it wasn't immediately granted, he nipped at the bottom one.  Frodo gasped with surprise and Sam took advantage, delving into Frodo's mouth fiercely and holding Frodo's head tightly with his one good hand.  

They were on their knees now, only a breath apart as Frodo, unable to remain still any longer, slid his hands under Sam's shirt and skated his fingers across quivering muscles, pulling Sam's body closer.  Sam broke the kiss with a gasp, throwing back his head in response to the questing fingers, and Frodo quickly leaned down to nuzzle and lick at shadowy recess just under Sam's ear, then moved on to taste the salty skin all the way down the tanned throat until he was sipping from the hollow at the base.

Sam's head arched further, then he groaned and lost his balance, canting slowly back into the soft grass as Frodo went with him, making certain the injured hand was out of harm's way, sliding and scrambling, and finally coming to rest sitting firmly at the top of Sam's thighs.

Sam lifted his head from the grass, his eyes widening with awareness of exactly what Frodo was sitting on.  But brief embarrassment flared into pure heat as Frodo pushed Sam's shirt completely aside and reached out to run his fingers ever so slowly down the heaving moist ribs, then brush them back up and around the responsive dark circles of flesh there.  When Sam moved restlessly beneath him, his head angling back into the grass once more, Frodo leaned back to drink in the look on Sam's face, his hands splayed on the rapid rise and fall of chest.

Sam's uninjured hand was flung out beside him, his eyes shuttered, his mouth slightly open, and his tanned skin gleaming moist in the moonlight.  His injured hand rested above his head in the grass.  Some final barrier melted inside Frodo, as he looked down at that beloved gentle face, open and vulnerable below him.

And he felt suddenly like some plundering bee hovering over a rare flower on his hill, drinking in nectar that was beyond description.  He shifted ever so slightly, and unbearable desire stabbed through him as he saw Sam bite his lip and heard him whimper.  Then those eyes opened and gazed up at him with a look of pure hunger.  One strong hand reached swiftly up, ferociously pulling him down into an excruciating kiss, pulling him down into a cauldron of molten gold.   Flower indeed.

In the midst of drowning in that dark sweetness, Frodo felt Sam slide the cloth-wrapped hand down his back, cupping his hip and pulling him closer, desperate for more friction and contact.  As Sam squirmed beneath him, Frodo was suddenly all too aware of the layers of cloth between them.

“Oh, Sam,” he grated out as he pulled up and away to kneel in the grass, nearly bringing Sam upright. 

Frodo tugged impatiently at his own shirt, tossing it aside, and had begun unbuttoning his trousers when he looked over at Sam, who was holding himself propped on one wobbly arm, gazing at him as if he had lost his mind. 

“Why did we... Why did you stop?”  Sam managed. 

“I didn't stop.  This would just be much better with fewer clothes between us.” Frodo's hands stilled at his waistband, his breeches unbuttoned, but still securely on his hips.  “And you like me with less clothes, don't you Sam?” he offered with a slow, smouldering smile.

“Better?”  It was nearly a groan from Sam as his eyes widened.

“Better.  Slower.  Longer.  We've both waited too...” Frodo peered at Sam, realization dawning.  “You haven't...” he began, then took a shaky breath.

“What?”  Sam was breathless, and rather indignant.  “Haven't what?  What do you need to know?  I mean, right this minute?”

Frodo bent his head and found himself unaccountably torn between laughter and tears, then viciously controlled the impulse and looked up, his face impassive.

“Have you ever done this before, Sam?  With anyone else, I mean?” 

Sam seemed unruffled by the question, “No, just...” he stopped though, realizing where that was going. 

“Just yourself.”

Sam flushed a bright red, then suddenly lifted his chin, “And you?”  Then, as if he realized how far beyond his own sense of propriety he had just stepped, Sam looked down.

Frodo reached over and cupped that chin, forcing those eyes to meet his.  He searched that face, fearful of the response his next answer might bring.  “I have done this with a few, but never with anyone I have loved.”
 
There it was.  Frodo's heart stopped beating for a moment as the bright brow lowered and the lovely mouth flattened, considering this. 

“So.  You have something against doing this with one you love then?”  

That stopped Frodo for a moment, then he caught the slight quirk of lip and the betraying glint in those gold eyes.  He stifled a smile.  Two could play at this game.  He dropped his hand and paused, as if thoughtfully considering the question.

“Well, I really think that, if you truly love someone, you should take your time about these things,” Frodo began.  “ You know, have long talks and go on long walks, and discover special hidden places where you can take your time to get to know them even better mmrrphh...”  

Two very warm lips were pressed firmly into Frodo's and one strong hand held him securely by the nape as Sam's mouth thoroughly ravaged his.  After long moments, during which Frodo's hands fell limply at his sides and he lost the feeling in his legs, the fingers gripping his head gently released.  Sam leaned back before him, both of them pulling in rapid breaths of air, the sound harsh in the still moonlit night.

“Mister Frodo.  I mean, Frodo, meaning no disrespect, but I believe that I...I know you quite well already.”  Sam managed breathlessly.  “Although there are parts of you that I would like to get to know better, if you get my meaning.”  Sam looked around at the silver-white shimmer from the setting moon on the tall grass and flowers surrounding them, and then up at the stars flung across the heavens above them.  “And I can't think of any more special hidden place than here,” he whispered, looking back at Frodo as if he were some creature of the stars himself, sprung up from the grass.

Frodo leaned forward, tracing one finger down Sam's silver-shadowed cheekbone.  “My Sam,” he whispered, “Please know that since this is your first time, it will go by quickly -- far too quickly -- no matter what I do.  But then, we will take our time to get to know all those parts.”  He smiled.  “I promise.  All the time we need.”

Frodo stood up slowly.  Then, with his eyes locked on Sam's, he gradually pulled his breeches down over his hips and knees, letting them pool around his feet, and stepping out of them.  It was the most exhilarating feeling he had ever had in his life, watching that bemused expression disappear from Sam's face to be replaced with something that looked like a cross between exquisite pain and amazed delight.

After a long moment during which neither of them seemed to breathe, Sam shrugged out of the brace already dangling off one shoulder and fumbled with his shirt with one hand, only managing to get one arm free, the shirt tangling on the makeshift bandage. 

Frodo leaned over to help, but was surprised when Sam freed the shirt, which slid to the ground, and suddenly surged to his feet.  Sam nearly knocked Frodo down, but instead managed to lift him completely off the ground, sliding his arms around him.

“Oh, Frodo,” Sam breathed huskily.

Frodo managed to loop his arms around Sam's neck before his feet did briefly leave the ground. 

“Sam!” he protested, “Your hand!”

And as Frodo slid back down, his own rigid flesh skimmed over Sam's lightly furred skin and he threw his head back and gasped.  Sam buried his face in Frodo's chest, his lips and tongue working in the hollow of Frodo's throat, then up into the shadowy recess of Frodo's neck beneath his ear.  Frodo was held on his toes for a moment only by the undeniable strength of Sam's arms, dangling there shivering with need.

But Frodo managed to slip out of Sam's grasp, pressing searing kisses down Sam's throat then quickly sliding his mouth further down, across Sam's chest to his stomach, his lips following the wisps of gold arrowing down into the waistband of Sam's breeches as his hands skimmed slowly down Sam's bare sides.  Sam groaned and slid his fingers into Frodo's hair as he nuzzled enticingly at Sam's navel and moved his fingers to rest on Sam's hips.  Then Frodo slid his fingers slowly to the front of Sam's breeches to loosen the already untied laces, all too aware of the rigid flesh bulging at the cloth beneath those laces.

After a few frustrating moments of fumbling with the ties, Frodo pulled his mouth away and went down on one knee.  Sam's fingers clenched tightly at Frodo's head, not pulling him closer or pushing him away, just holding him there as Frodo struggled impatiently with the tangled laces.  Then suddenly Sam made a strangled noise and Frodo felt the fingers in his hair trembling as the muscles beneath his fingers quivered.  Frodo glanced up to see Sam's head thrown back, his mouth open, and realized that Sam was nearly coming undone just from his fingers fumbling with the ties.  Knowing he could not loosen the laces in time, Frodo reached out and firmly slid his fingers along the rigid flesh, still trapped in stubborn cloth and ties, and slipped one hand behind Sam's thighs, his hair tugging against Sam's grip painfully.

“Oh, Frodo!  I can't!”  Sam's hand suddenly pulled Frodo forward into the jumble of ties and cloth.  

“Oh, Sam,” he breathed softly.

Just the moist, hot touch of his breath through thin cloth was enough.

“Oh...oh...Frodo!”

Frodo felt Sam throb to completion beneath his mouth, his entire body shaking as he pressed Frodo even closer.  Frodo groaned and slid both arms around Sam's thighs, his cheek pressed to quaking flesh, holding Sam's knees firmly against him to keep the sturdy body upright as it shuddered with the aftershocks. 

“Oh, I...” Sam managed hoarsely, after a long moment.  “I didn't mean that to happen.”

Frodo nearly laughed at the apologetic tone.  It was so like Sam.

The hands gripping Frodo's head relaxed, but Frodo still held on, knowing that if he let go, Sam would topple without support. 

“I'm sorry, Mister Frodo.  That...that wasn't much good for you, I think.”

Frodo looked up.  Sam's face was glistening and flushed, his lips parted and swollen.  Frodo's breath caught at the sight of him and he felt himself tighten painfully in response.  He leaned his forehead into Sam's muscled hip and swallowed, smiling against the cloth.  “It was quite good for me, Sam, and will get even better in just a little while.”

“I think I need to sit d...down, Mister Frodo.” 
 
“I'll get these out of the way first, Sam.”  Frodo risked bringing his hands back to grapple with the reluctant laces, still making sure Sam's knees were pressed against him.  Sam, still shaky, held tightly to Frodo's head as the ties finally gave way and Frodo tugged at the reluctant cloth.  He pulled the breeches off Sam's hips, and let them slide down to bunch at his feet. 

“Let me go get my old blanket and you can sit on that,” Frodo said gently, and Sam's fingers finally released his hair.  He slipped back, moving into the shadow of the tree behind them on his hands and knees, quickly groping in the grass.  As Frodo had hoped, his old abused blanket still lay hidden there, crumpled and forgotten.  Frodo brought it back and shook it open on the grass close to Sam.  He turned, and couldn't find his voice. 

Sam still stood shakily amidst the blooming grass dressed only in moonlight and starlight, his face and body brushed with silver, staring dazedly up at the sky.  He looked like some ancient rune carved into ageless stone that was visible only on certain days in certain light. 

Frodo had never seen anything so beautiful in his entire life and likely never would again.  Perhaps like those old runes, Sam would disappear after this night.   Perhaps like others he had loved, someday Sam too would be gone.  But for now, under this sky and these stars on this night, Sam was his and he wasn't going anywhere.

He held out his hand, “Sam?”

Sam turned as if he was in a trance.  He sank onto the blanket with a sigh of relief.  Frodo pushed him slowly back until he lay unresisting on the blanket, his wounded hand above his head once more. 

“Sam, are you all right?” he whispered, sliding next to Sam and leaning over him.

The gold eyes turned to meet his.  “I'm afraid.”    

“Afraid?”

“Afraid I'll wake up.”

Frodo smiled and leaned further over, his hands on either side of Sam's head.  “Well, I think you'll want to wake up for the slower, longer part,” he whispered and kissed Sam, teasing his lips open with his tongue, then diving deep into well-remembered sweetness. 

At this Sam did wake up, his tongue coming to life and tentatively touching Frodo's, his good hand coming up in a now familiar gesture to tangle in Frodo's hair as he pulled him closer and explored his mouth in turn.  Frodo's hand skated across the still quivering chest muscles, lingering longer now over still-sensitive flesh, then down, barely touching, feeling the skin shiver beneath his fingers as he dipped to trace a lazy circle around Sam's navel.

Sam gasped as Frodo's mouth moved away from his and dipped lower, tasting his throat once more, nipping little kisses down the side, then further down, almost to Sam's shoulder before he stopped, suddenly biting and sucking in an unbearable sensation that had Sam whimpering and lifting his hips off the blanket in entreaty, his still-needy flesh beginning to quicken once more. 

“Don't...don't...” Sam's voice was breathless once more and Frodo pulled back to gaze at him. 

“Don't stop,” Sam whispered.  The intense, desperate look on Sam's face nearly undid Frodo.

“Ssshhhhh Sam,” his mouth was back over Sam's, kissing him to silence, then slipping away before Sam could capture him to bury his face in the sparse gold fur on Sam's chest and lick softly at sensitive nubs of flesh. 

Sam's hand found Frodo's head once more and held it there firmly.  Frodo smiled against his chest then reached around to capture that hand and bring it to his lips.  He kissed the palm, slowly and meaningfully, then licked one finger and pulled it softly into his mouth. 

Sam's head lifted off the blanket and his eyes met Frodo's with something between a groan and a whimper.  Then his head fell back and his neck arched as Frodo's hand slipped lower, across the hard line of hip to skim and encircle the silken hardness waiting there for his fingers.

“Oh, Frodo!” Sam gasped.

Sam was shivering and making incoherent sounds as Frodo carefully explored, sliding his fingers first along the top of the rigid flesh, then along the bottom, then encircling and stroking, then rubbing his thumb along a sensitive fold, then gliding lower to gently finger delicate tissue, then back to start again.  Frodo was watching closely as he nibbled and nipped at Sam's neck, drawing it out for as long as Sam would bear it.  And Sam began to move his hips unconsciously asking for faster, more friction, more.

Then suddenly Sam pulled Frodo closer, effectively stilling the slender fingers that were tormenting him, skimming his own broad hand over the moist slick skin of Frodo's shoulder blade, sliding down his back, stopping as if to count every rib, sliding down to the small of his back then lower to tug him even closer, to cup and caress, as if relishing the feeling of that skin.  And as Sam's skilful fingers slid between them, it was Frodo's turn to moan as Sam encircled and stroked. 

“Oh, Sam!  Yes!  There!”

He buried his face into Sam's neck as those clever fingers cupped and held slick flesh and moved in a maddening rhythm until Frodo felt frissons of white heat begin to swirl through him.  He gasped and shifted away. 

But Sam firmly reached out and levered Frodo over to lie sprawled on top of him, holding him there with one broad hand.  Sam buried his face in Frodo's hair, whispering into the dark curls.  Frodo managed to move ever so slightly and groaned to find his own hard need in unbearable friction with Sam's, both trapped now between sweat-slicked skin.  And Sam, somehow moving instinctively now, had thrown one leg over Frodo's, holding him firmly in place.

Frodo had barely managed to lift his head when Sam moaned and pulled him into a dizzying kiss.   Then Sam's lips were hot on his temple, then a moist breath was in his ear, and that voice was hoarsely whispering his name, just his name, over and over, like some strange sweet music.  And then Sam's hand slipped lower on his back and began rubbing a calloused thumb over one spot that made Frodo hum breathlessly, again and again, until Frodo turned back and captured Sam's mouth -- and Sam began to move.

Then it was all exquisite friction and heat and slick skin against silken hardness, and Sam's body shifting frantically beneath his and his shuddering in response.  He couldn't tell any longer where one of them ended and the other began.  White-hot stars were swirling under his heart.  

“Oh, Frodo.  Oh, I...I can't!” Frodo swallowed Sam's inarticulate protest in his mouth and felt the movement change and shift, so close.

Then suddenly Frodo was on his back and Sam was suspended above him, holding himself up on both hands, gazing down at him.  Frodo saw that the moon had set and the stars were a field of gold blooms in a vast landscape of midnight behind Sam's head.  And Sam's eyes looked like two more stars above him.  Until he realized they were brimming with tears.

He reached up, “Sam?  Sam, what?”

“I can't.  It's too much.  The sky above you.  I need you on the earth.  I need to keep you on the earth,” Sam whispered.  Then he wove Frodo's hands into his and held them gently in the grass on either side of Frodo's head, and began to move, lowering his head to capture Frodo's mouth and then slide down to his neck. 

And Frodo arched his neck to that mouth, “Oh, Sam.  My Sam.”  He felt the stars begin to spiral faster within him as Sam licked and kissed his neck, at times muttering Frodo's name into the skin, teeth bared against the slick hot flesh.

Then Sam lifted his head and began to move in a familiar cadence, suspended above the earth, hands clenched in Frodo's and in the soil.  Frodo shuddered, his hands quivering under Sam's tightening fingers as Sam whimpered and the slow movement slid into something faster and harder and more demanding.  The expression on Sam's face was intense, his skin sheened with moisture, and Frodo struggled to watch, struggled as the frissons of heat and sensation threatened to overwhelm him, struggled to stay with Sam.  So close, so close, so...

“Oh...oh...yes!  Frodo...Frodo!  Oh Frodo!”

Frodo felt Sam's body tremor with release and watched as Sam threw back his head with a strangled cry of completion.  Then that face was gazing down at his with an expression of fierce possession.  A million stars flared through him.  And Frodo's own keening wail was suddenly swallowed into Sam's mouth as he fell, with those million stars, into the sky.

 ***

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