The Ring will come to Gondor
by Varda
Chapter Sixteen: Funeral in Rohan
There are no funeral rites for the Elves, for they were never meant
to die in Middle Earth. But Legolas had fallen to Nazgul in Rohan, just
inside the border with North Ithilien, within the lordship of the Mark.
And so when Éomer and Prince Théodred at last returned
and found Pippin kneeling in tears beside him they debated between them
how to bury their Elven ally. They decided, not knowing any different,
to give him the funeral rites of a Prince of Rohan…
At home they would have had the services of many strong men to raise a
grave-mound, but here they had to set aside their fine cloaks woven
with gold thread, remove their mailed gauntlets and helms, and start
digging the barren steppe with their swords.
The land here rose towards the foothills of the White Mountains and was
broken into escarpments and scoured by bitter winds from Mordor. Too
rocky for cavalry the Riders of Rohan avoided it, but it was too open
and unsheltered for orcs, so it was an empty land, watched by hawks
motionless in the grey sky and shadowed by the distant line of snowy
peaks to the south.
Pippin wanted to help, but he was weak and tired from walking all
night, and Éomer gently sat him down to rest while they dug the
grave. Seated on a stone, Pippin gazed at the still form of Legolas,
wrapped in his grey Elven cloak, the gift of Galadriel…Pippin had never
felt so far from the light-filled woods of Lothlórien as in this
barren place.
When the people of Rohan buried a valiant warrior, they first raised a
great grave-mound. About it they placed lesser mounds, containing the
bodies of warhorses slain in battle, or hoards of enemy weapons as
offerings. All about the mound were planted a thicket of javelins, to
ward off foes, real or ghostly. Finally, a pennant was placed on the
fallen Rider’s lance and set atop the mound. Sometimes silver or even
gold was interred with the dead.
Before the fallen warrior was covered with earth, he was laid on the
mound in his war-gear, strewn with flowers, his face uncovered, for the
people to see and mourn him. So Éomer and Théodred at
last turned from their labours and with great care they lifted the dead
Elf and bore him to the top of their meagre grave-mound and placed him
on the newly dug earth. Pippin got to his feet and followed. No-one
spoke for some time, as the three gazed on Legolas’s fair, pale face.
Then the two princes of Rohan stepped back and the hobbit knelt and
arranged his friend as best he could. He straightened out the
silver-grey folds of the Lórien cloak and settled the leaf clasp
over the Elf’s heart. He smoothed the long fair hair, no longer bright
but dull and lank. He brushed the dust from the pale features, hoping
against hope that the eyelids would flicker and open. With his pocket
handkerchief he dabbed the blood from the white cheeks and finally,
murmuring a heartbroken farewell, he kissed the cold brow.
When the hobbit had stood back, Éomer went up and placed his
sword on the Elf’s breast, wrapping his cold fingers round it.
‘Take my blade with you to your eternal halls, bravest of the Fair Folk’ he said.
‘For they say that among the Elves are many great warriors, and by this they will know that you have conquered in war….’
Then Théodred stepped forward and unclasping his long black
cloak, richly embroidered with the emblems of the royal house of Rohan,
he laid it over the body. ‘This garment is sewn with golden horses, the
symbol of my line, the ruling house of the Mark. Wear it that even in
undying realms you will be known as a friend of the kings of Rohan….’
And at last Pippin stepped forward and holding out a handful of tiny
white and yellow flowers that he had found clinging to the lee of a low
cliff he said;
‘Take these with you, Legolas my dear friend, for they are something
like the flowers that grew in Lothlórien when we departed from
its shores. Farewell….’
Then Pippin placed the flowers on the Elf’s hands and turned away,
unable to see for his tears. After standing with heads bowed for a long
while, Éomer and Théodred stepped up and began the
laborious task of piling the earth on the corpse by hand….
‘No!’ screamed Aragorn, coming awake and leaping to his feet.
‘It isn’t true! It can’t be! Legolas can't be dead..!’
The dark woods that clothed the slopes of the Emil Muil gave back his
voice in a mocking echo. Aragorn looked round wildly; nearby, on the
other side of the dying campfire, Gimli had started to his feet, an axe
already in his hand. But Frodo, listless and sick, slept on despite the
disturbance.
‘What is it, Aragorn?’ whispered Gimli, unwilling to waken Frodo but throwing off his cloak and hastening to Aragorn’s side.
‘Pray tell me it is a dream, for I fear to meet a living thing that could cause you such terror…’
Aragorn realised he was standing holding his sword, which he had
snatched from its sheath. His face was streaked with sweat and deathly
pale. His eyes were still haunted by the terrible dream he had endured.
The moonlight falling through the trees showed up silver scar lines on
his bare arms and shoulders, old wounds suffered in a long life as a
warrior. Gimli bent down and picked up his cloak and threw it round his
shoulders.
‘Come!’ said the dwarf. ‘You will take cold. Step over here where Frodo will not hear us and tell me what you saw….’
Aragorn shook himself and pulling the cloak round him with a shiver he
walked away towards the river. When the sound of running water hid his
words he turned to Gimli and said in a shaking voice;
‘I saw a terrible vision, Gimli…’
He gazed at the dwarf with horror in his eyes. Gimli said quietly;
‘Go on’
‘I saw Legolas dead, raised on a grave-mound of Rohan, then buried in the freshly dug earth….’
Aragorn stopped, overcome by the horror of his dream.There was the hiss
of indrawn breath from the dwarf, but Gimli recovered quickly and said;
‘The Emyn Muil is a place ruled by sorcerers, Aragorn. Both the
servants of Sauron and Saruman claim this land. This dream may prove
false. Remember what the Lady, fairest of Elven queens, told us; the
only evil is in ourselves. Perhaps this is naught but a warning!’
Aragorn nodded eagerly as if trying to believe then after a few moments he put a hand on Gimli’s shoulder and said;
‘You are right, good friend. There are many visions in this earth. Perhaps this dream was sent to help me avert what it showed!’
‘What did it show?’ said a voice behind them.
They both turned round quickly; there stood Frodo, white-faced as one
just woken from a fever-sleep. But his eyes were clear and he looked
sternly from man to dwarf.
‘What was this dream, Aragorn?’ he repeated.
Gimli went towards him at once;
‘Nay, Frodo, you must rest….’
‘I have had enough rest’ Frodo replied impatiently; ‘I want to know what you saw, Aragorn.’
Aragorn thought for a moment then nodded and said;
‘You are right, Frodo. You should know all that is to be known, for only then you can decide what to do….I saw Legolas dead…’
Frodo stared up at him, horror in his face. Aragorn went on; ‘I saw his funeral in Rohan….’
There was a long silence, then Frodo said;
‘I believed Legolas had gone to slay Boromir, and get back the Ring.
But perhaps he was waylaid. Aragorn, we must help him! It might not yet
be too late…’
Aragorn smiled bitterly; alone he could put up a good fight, even in
the wilds. But he could not fight with Frodo in his charge. However,
the hobbit read his thoughts…
‘Do not trouble yourself about me!’ he cried. ‘For a start, I do not
have the Ring any more, that has passed to another. If you wait Legolas
will die…’
‘Perhaps what the dream showed has already come to pass…’ murmured Gimli sadly.
‘The Lady Galadriel told me…’ said Frodo half to himself ‘that we might
often see things that will not come to pass, if people turn aside to
avoid them…so let us do just that, and turn aside to find Legolas on
the plains of Rohan…’
‘Frodo!’ said Aragorn sharply. The hobbit looked at him.
‘What about Sam?’
In the grey dawn light filtering through the trees Frodo’s face took on
a greenish hue. He seemed for a moment not to hear the question, for he
stood still, his lips parted as if in mid-sentence and his wide blue
eyes fixed on a point in the distant forest.
‘Saruman has him, remember.’ urged Aragorn.
Frodo said in a low voice;
‘Sam is in Isengard by now, but the Ring is in Gondor.’ He looked up at Aragorn and went on;
‘I am still the Ringbearer, Aragorn. It is my task to try to get it
back. Sam is in Isengard, but the Ring is not. We must find Legolas,
and continue to Gondor. I should have decided this days ago, my delay
may have cost Legolas his life, and perhaps others too….’
Pippin knew nothing of the arts of healing, even such simple remedies
as were common in the Shire. He knelt beside Legolas and looked for
signs of life, but there were none.
He ran back to the horse, grazing quietly in the grey light that comes
before dawn, and undid a leathern water flask and bore it back to where
Legolas lay. He ran some of the cool liquid on his hands and washed the
dirt and blood from the Elf’s face. Looking about he saw one of the
white Elven knives Legolas had fought with lying on the wet grass. He
picked it up and cut a swatch from his own cloak and tried to bind up
the Elf’s broken wrist. All the time he said over and over to himself;
‘Not dead, no, not dead. Only sleeping. Oh please wake up, Legolas!
It’s Pippin, and I don’t want to be left alone! Please wake up….’
The hobbit dressed Legolas’s wounds as best he could, but the Elf’s
face remained still and white. Pippin covered him warmly with his cloak
then and rested, tired and sick at heart. He looked down at the Elven
knife in his hand; the hilt was of some hard white wood, inlaid with
gold and there was likewise gold lettering on the blade.
‘I wonder what it says?’ he thought.
He looked about for the other and saw the handle gleaming in the grass,
but when he went to pick it up he was astonished to see the blade was
missing. Around where it should have been was a wide scorched area and
in the middle a tiny triangle of black cloth….
Wise enough not to touch it, Pippin bent low and studied it. Close up,
the hobbit could see it was sewn with black beaded thread entwined with
silver. There was lettering, and Pippin at once thought;
‘These are spells!’ and he would have backed away but just then the
first rosy light of morning flooded the plain and the fragment of black
cloth suddenly began to smoulder. Then it burst into flames and in a
second was gone.
Pippin stared open-mouthed but before he could even think a voice behind him said;
‘It is well for you, Peregrine Took, that you did not touch that fragment of the Dark King’s robe…..’
Pippin spun round and saw Legolas looking at him. He jumped to his feet and ran to the Elf’s side;
‘Oh Legolas!’ he said, crying with joy and relief.
‘I thought you were dead!’ He wished to embrace the Elf but feared to
hurt his wounded arm. Legolas attempted a smile and looked down at the
clumsily bound wrist. He touched the rents in his tunic; other wounds
were hidden under the torn material. But he said to Pippin.
‘Do not fear, Peregrine Took. I am not slain, and you dressed my wounds well…..’ then his gaze fell on the scorched ground.
‘But I fear I have taken other hurts that will not heal so quickly….’
Pippin gazed at the Elf but said nothing. He had fled from the Black
Riders before, but did not know of their most feared weapon, one which
caused dismay and death to all races; the Black Breath. Nor did he know
that the Witch King had breathed full upon Legolas before leaving the
Elf for dead. But as Pippin watched, Legolas closed his eyes and turned
his face away from Pippin, and slipped into a deep, unnatural sleep….
‘The Ring! Denethor has the Ring!’
Saruman leaped back from the Palantír, almost losing his footing
on the smooth marble pavement of the Black Observatory of Orthanc. For
all his power he trembled from head to foot, and his black eyes blazed
in his white face. He gripped his staff, and steeling himself for what
he might see, he advanced once again to the dais, and gazed into the
depths of the dark orb…..
He saw a room, not large and grand but small and with narrow corners
and bare stone walls. He knew it was in a tower, for a long thin beam
of light fell from a height. The air flickered as the vision floated in
the glass before his eyes. Saruman held his breath, and concentrated.
None but the Kings of Gondor or their descendants were permitting to
use the Seeing Stones, and Saruman required all his skill and craft to
see without being seen, and now his anger threatened to give him
away…..he bit back his rage and looked again…..
A man with white hair and beard and a fierce, hawklike face stared
back. He too was searching, and as if trying to penetrate the globe
with his hand he passed his fingers across the glass, and Saruman saw
it again, suspended on his chest on a silver chain; a ring. No, THE
ring. Saruman could see letters of fire on it. It burned his sight.
Unable to bear the vision, he sprang backwards and taking a black silk
cloth he cast it over the Palantír and ran from the Observatory
as if blinded……
Out on the balcony Saruman at last caught his breath, feeling the
night-wind cooling his fevered skin. Gradually he regained his
composure. All was not lost; Gondor was not unassailable. He might yet
win the Ring. But what a pity he had let it slip away at Parth Galen!
Those stupid brutes the Uruk-hai! And how long now before Sauron found
out about this? Saruman shivered in spite of himself; he knew the Nine
were seeking on the plains…..suddenly a wry smile lit up his face.
‘Well, if the Ring is no longer in the possession of a hobbit, there is
no reason to keep that tiresome little peasant alive…..’ Saruman
thought of Sam’s set, defiant face.
‘But just in case he might tell me something of use, we’ll question him again. Not so gently this time…..’
