After this, it was not remarkable that Frodo should dream of the tunnels. In his dreams that very night, he went along that same narrow and dark passage he had with Faramir, but in the opposite direction. Ahead of him, the figure of the Elf walked with sure and swift steps, as if the way was well-known to him. The Elf bore no torch, but he didn't seem to need one. A soft glow emanated about him.
They went up the stairs. While these were the same stairs that he and Faramir had walked down that day, Frodo saw that they were of newly cut stone and there was a dark, deep gap between them and the outer wall; in it lay an older, circular stairway, its steps worn to smoothness. More new stones had been raised to seal off this gap, just as Faramir had said, and on the landing above, he saw signs of fresh mortar-work and unused bricks stacked on the landing.
As the Elf approached the top, Frodo cried out, certain that he was about to witness the murder--but the Elf reached the upper landing without incident, then turned and went around the corner. Frodo scrambled up and ran after him, stumbling in the darkness.
By the time he caught up, the Elf had gone into the wide, central tunnel and was headed in the direction of the citadel buildings. The Elf ascended the stair that went up into the great hall, but Frodo remained below. He wanted desperately to follow, to see where the Elf was going and whom he was meeting there at this late hour, but he was oddly restrained. His feet felt rooted to the stone floor, and he couldn't take another step.
From above, he heard a voice say, "Ah! Welcome, Emissary! You've been expected."
"I'd understood that our business with the King was finished," a soft, melodious voice replied.
"It has, but there is another matter you and I must speak of, a matter most confidential..."
Frodo made a greater effort to go up the steps into the hall, and in his struggles to lift his feet, stumbled. As he fell forward, he awoke.
He was lying on the stone floor just where he'd been in his dream, in the tunnel beneath the great hall, at the foot of the stair going up into the westward tower. He must have gone through the tunnels, just as he'd dreamed... but how? And how was he going to get home? He didn't see how he could navigate the tunnels in total darkness, even if he had managed it before.
The only thing to do was go upstairs, cross the courtyard, and take the public passageway down to the sixth level. Frodo went up into the great hall, as the Elf had done centuries ago, but tonight it was dark and silent. He pulled open the side-door, stole out on the westward side of the building and crept as quietly as he could around the base of the White Tower. He was reluctant to let the guards that kept watch by the tunnel entrance see him, but knew there was no way to go past without drawing their attention, and having to explain his presence.
When the guards did notice him, they recognized him--the halflings were well known to everyone in the citadel--and came forward to see if he was all right. Beregond, who was out making the rounds of the citadel to see all was well before going to bed himself, was summoned immediately.
"How did you get here, Frodo?" the captain asked. "I didn't know you were in the citadel tonight."
"I wasn't. I came up through the old tunnel under the courtyard... I think." Frodo was aware that the captain and guards were looking at him curiously, for his nightshirt and hands were smeared with grime, and cobwebs hung in his hair. He must look as if he'd been crawling through caves. When he lifted his hand, he also realized that he still had the cord to Merry's dressing-gown knotted around his left wrist; the other end, which should be tied around the bed-post, had been undone. "I've been walking in my sleep lately," he explained. "This is to keep me from wandering."
"It doesn't seem to have worked," said Beregond, smiling. "Shall I take you home, Frodo? If Mithrandir and your kinsman Merry have discovered you've gone, they must be worried." He did not wait for an answer, but picked the hobbit up effortlessly. Frodo was too bewildered and weary to protest.
Beregond carried him out of the citadel and down to the street below, where Merry and Gandalf were both out of the house and searching for him. They looked extremely relieved when Beregond appeared, and set Frodo down before them.
"Are you all right?" Merry asked as he ran up to his cousin and hugged him hard. "I woke up, and didn't know where you'd gone. Gandalf and I have been looking all up and down the street." He plucked a thick strand of cobweb from Frodo's hair. "Where were you?"
"I'm not sure myself." Frodo told them of his dream, and how he had awakened in the passage beneath the great hall. "I've no idea how I came to be there. I'm sorry," he said sheepishly as he gave the dressing-gown cord back to Merry. "I must have unknotted it, but I've truly no memory of doing so."
"I've heard of your unusual dreams, Frodo," Gandalf said, and regarded the hobbits sternly, "but how long have you been walking in your sleep like this?"
"It's only happened once or twice before," Frodo answered.
"Twice," said Merry, "since he first saw the ghost of that Elf. But he's never gone so far from home before. I told Gandalf the last time, you'd gone up toward the street's end, Frodo--I thought you must've gone into through the tunnel." He held Frodo back at arms-length to look over his bedraggled nightclothes. "You did, didn't you?
"I must have. I can think of no other explanation for how I got into the citadel without being seen. I saw Faramir open the secret door from within. Perhaps I opened it from the outside."
"We were just puzzling over that ourselves," said Gandalf, and invited Frodo to give it try.
Frodo recalled which slab of stone within the archway concealed the entrance to the tunnel, but no matter where he pressed on the surface of the wall around it, he couldn't find the trigger that opened the door. At his suggestion, Beregond and Gandalf also tried the stones above the slab, as Faramir had from the other side, although these were far above a hobbit's reach. It was Beregond who found it: by pressing one hand on a stone above the upper right corner of the slab, the panel moved aside with a gritty rumble.
Frodo stared into the entrance of the tunnel beyond. "If I opened the door that way, I couldn't begin to tell you how I did it."
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