The Ring will come to Gondor by Varda

The Ring will come to Gondor

by Varda

Chapter Twenty-seven: No Place to Hide

The Rohirrim charged down the hill towards the Ford of Isen, gathering speed as they went until the horses’ tails flew out behind them in the cold March wind like ragged banners. The chieftains of the eoreds rode in front, for in Rohan no leader could hang back when his men went into battle. The ground was gently sloping, but so eager were the riders that the line broke up and some warriors rode ahead of the leaders. Others strove to stay alongside their comrades and the men whom they knew they could trust in battle.

But ever out in front was Théodred, the King’s son, on his sleek black warhorse. The wind blew the green silk banner of the House of Eorl out sharp against the clear blue sky and behind him Éomer spurred his grey charger Liath in an effort to regain his place at the prince’s side….

Éomer had made many a battle charge, but none so steep, so swift or so reckless. Liath stretched his neck out and below them, growing ever closer, was the Isen, sparkling clear in the spring sunshine. As they thundered towards it, Éomer noticed frost lying in the hollows that the sun had not yet touched, and larks started up from the yellow winter grass. He could not hear; all around him the thunder of hooves shut out every other sound. Clumps of grass, small stones and dirt were thrown up by the horses and Éomer felt his mouth full of grit. Théodred screamed his war cry and the men replied with a hoarse shout, but the buffeting of the galloping horses knocked the breath out of many….

At the bottom of the hill, across the river, the small troop of orcs saw the Rohirrim and began to run as fast as their heavy, clumsy armour would allow.

‘They are making for the trees!’ shouted Théodred at the top of his voice, but barely audible over the noise of the running horses. He flung an arm out towards the line of willows that hid the upper bend of the river.
‘Stop them!’

Fast as the orcs ran, the horses were faster. They reached the river where it spread shallow across the wide stones of the ford, and splashed through it hardly slowing down. Éomer noticed, and would remember later, even years later, the sun dappling the cold clear water as it ran over the grey and white stones….

They rode into the orcs with the crash of armour against armour, breastplate against helmet, sword against lance, and bore them down in a storm of iron-shod hooves. Even the horses struck out, and the cries of the orcs were muffled under the charge of the Rohirrim….

Deep in the willows on the riverbank the only sound to be heard was the cheerful rippling of the shallow Isen over the stones. Squatting under the delicate, trailing branches were rank upon rank of dark-armoured figures. More massive than orcs, more collected and powerful, waiting and watching, only the whites of their eyes showing through the vizors of their high-crested iron helmets. They sat motionless in the green gloom under the canopy of trailing branches formed by the willows, and did not stir even when the screams of the orcs being ridden down and hacked to death reached their ears.

But one of them, larger and even more powerful than the rest, rose cautiously to his feet and looking back over the ranks of seated Uruk-hai he indicated one and nodded.

The creature rose without a word, picked his way through the ranks and loped off towards the battle. He ran swiftly despite his great size; through the curtain of willow branches, skirting a stand of alder and birch till he came out on a ridge overlooking the place where the Rohirrim were finishing off the last of the orcs.

He looked down at the scene, and his nose twitched; the smell of blood, even of orcs, roused his own blood. He growled….just then one of the Yellow-hairs looked up and saw him.

‘Éomer!’ said Suarachán urgently. ‘Uruk-hai!’
‘How came he there?’ exclaimed Éomer, then thought to himself; ‘We should have scouted before we rushed down into this valley, it could be a snare….’

And Éomer spurred through the throng to where Théodred was slashing at the few orcs not yet laid low in death. The trampled grass was soaked with their blood….

‘Théodred!’ shouted Éomer. ‘Look…Uruk-hai…’
‘Then we will destroy them too!’ shouted Théodred, carried away by the fury of battle. But Suarachán shook his head.
‘He is making for the wood. We cannot go in, it might be an ambush…’
‘Father of all doubters, Suarachán, you lost your courage when you lost your village. Let us follow him and avenge our folk!’

The grey-haired Suarachán went even paler than he already was; his face was taut and angry, but he said nothing. Éomer cursed his cousin’s rash words; Suarachán’s entire village had been attacked and put to the sword by orcs the summer before. Since then, he had been called Grudge, living only for vengeance, mourning his slain kin by killing…he said to Théodred in a cold, scornful voice;
‘I fear no orc or Uruk either, my Lord Théodred…’

And with that, not waiting for orders or heeding cries to come back, Suarachán dug his spurs into the flanks of his rangy bay and the horse leaped forward and he rode through the shallow water into the trees, shouting his war cry;
‘Ar Aghaid! Ar Aghaid!’; Attack!

Angry at being caught off guard, Théodred shouted his own war cry and spurred after him. His éored, and the rest of the Rohirrim, urged their horses forward in pursuit, even though they soon slowed down as the banks became steeper and the stream narrow and faster and their way was impeded by trees crowding close to the river….

Striving to regain his place beside Théodred, Éomer could not later remember the first sight of the Uruk-hai. It was a black blur, an armoured carapace tearing through the trees and throwing itself on a lightly armoured rider, flinging its black-mailed arms round him and bearing him backwards off his horse into the water. Then a lot of screaming and shouting, and Éomer finding his way blocked by Uruk-hai as tall as his own horse….
‘I must reach Théodred..’ he thought desperately. ‘I must find the king’s son…’

Just then an Uruk crossbow bolt struck his helm. It clipped the brass horse’s head on the noseguard and dented the side. The shock stunned Éomer for a moment and he swayed in the saddle and lowered his hands on the reins. The sound of battle receded and was replaced by a loud roaring in his ears.

His warhorse, Liath, sensing his master’s distress, checked and bore him carefully, seeking clear and level ground. But an Uruk-hai, rushing in for the kill, forced the gallant grey to gallop quickly on. Éomer, veering on the brink of unconsciousness, let go his reins and grasped a handful of Liath’s mane. He heard a terrible screaming as men were dragged from their saddles and hacked to pieces in the shallow water. Then darkness overtook him and the stony bank rushed up to meet him…

The sound of water woke him. He lifted his head with difficulty; his neck ached and the light hurt his eyes. He looked about as cautiously as he could….

The morning sun was gone, and the sky was cold and grey, with large drops of rain beginning to fall. He was lying on the river bank among tall reeds, with none of the other Rohirrim to be seen. A few paces away an Uruk-hai lay half in and half out of the water, his armour weighting him down. His long black dreadlocks streamed out in the current like water weeds and his blood stained the river.

Éomer struggled to his feet and looked about, rubbing the back of his neck. Where was everyone?….just then he heard a crashing through the reeds upriver and looking up he saw two Uruk-hai pursuing a warrior of Rohan along the steep bank.

Éomer put a hand to his empty scabbard and opened his mouth to cry out, but unarmed and still dazed there was nothing he could do to help. He had to watch as the two Uruk-hai, like monstrous black hounds pursuing a stag, overtook the lightly armoured warrior, his cloak torn and stained with his own blood, and pulled him down. The tall reeds hid the rest from Éomer’s sight, but he could hear the dying man’s screams and the shouts of triumph from the Uruk-hai….

At last silence fell, broken only by the patter of rain on the river. Éomer listened intently; the Uruk-hai were searching the reed bed. The prince of Rohan, now covered in mud and water-weeds, slipped lower down the bank, into the river, to hide himself. Icy water seeped between his armour and his skin and he gasped, but he stayed submerged for as long as he could. Just when he thought he could bear the cold no longer, he heard the Uruk-hai trampling through the reeds upstream; they were going away. He gave a shaky sigh of relief and with numbed hands he dragged himself from the cold water….

As he lay on the bank shivering, he heard the thump of a hoof on the ground behind him. He started up and looked round; there stood his charger, Liath, the reins held by a Dunlending, the same one that Prince Théodred had wanted to flog and throw into the river. The man, clad in a wolfskin kilt but naked to the waist despite the cold, was standing knee-deep in the water beside the horse. When he saw Éomer looking at him he held out the reins.
‘Come, Horse Lord. I will lead you out of danger….’

And before Éomer could speak he had waded forward and placed the leathers into his hand and before he could be questioned he turned and with a sign of his hand to signify ‘follow’ he plunged away into the river. Éomer noticed his lean sun-browned back was criss-crossed with the thin white scars of one who has been flogged, and Éomer hoped that it had not been men of the Mark who had done it…

Éomer stroked Liath’s neck and the horse whinnied, glad to see his master again. The Dunlending turned sharply and put a finger to his lips and frowned.
‘Quiet!’ Then he hurried on…

Éomer tugged at Liath’s reins and followed the Dunlending quickly, as he set a swift pace up the bank, across a wooded ridge, then through almost impenetrable thickets of alder and willow.

At last they came to a wide trampled patch of grass, and Éomer realised this was where the Uruk-hai had waited before their surprise attack. He remembered Théodred and felt sick…suddenly the Dunlending turned. He beckoned urgently.
‘Come, Horse Lord….’
‘My name is Éomer, and I am a lord of the Mark….’

The Dunlending looked him coolly up and down, then nodded as it this was not worth the debate. He pointed with his thin, sinewy arm. Éomer noticed that above his wrist bracer of rawhide, the Dunlending had a tattoo of a scorpion, its tail curling round his forearm. Then he looked where the man was pointing and saw a small group of horsemen, little more than an éored, combing the banks of the river. Éomer turned to swing himself into his saddle then stopped. He walked up to the Dunlending and looked closely at him.

The man had long tangled black hair and grey eyes, keen and watchful and not cruel as his kind was famed to be. On his bony chest was strung an amulet which close up Éomer could see was a tarnished silver coin with a star on it. Thin and weatherbeaten as he was the Dunlending was not old, and moved with the cautious grace of a wild animal. Éomer remembered suddenly that the Dunlendings came of ancient people of Gondor with perhaps some noble strain yet lingering in their blood…
‘What reward do you want from me?’ he asked him.

The Dunlending did not reply, just stared back at the lord of Rohan. Éomer remembered they had broken his bow and arrows, and noticed his only weapon was a flint knife with a horn handle. On impulse, he drew his hunting knife, a fine steel blade with a handle studded with garnets. He offered it to the Dunlending.
‘We of Rohan honour our debts…’

The man looked at the knife with a gleam of desire in his eyes. But then the gleam died and he said;
‘If I took it, your people would think I had killed one of you to steal it, and they would hang me.’ He looked up at the taller man and said in a low voice;
‘When it is taken, it cannot be given back’
‘What?’ asked Éomer.
‘The land’ replied the Dunlending, and he turned to go.
‘Wait!’ said Éomer.
The Dunlending turned.
‘What is your name?’

The man hesitated, as if afraid to reveal too much. Then he replied;
‘Luadar’ The name meant champion or winner in the debased Westron spoken beyond the mountains. He must be the leader of a clan or war-band, thought Éomer....

‘If I return safe to the Golden Hall…’ said Éomer. ‘I vow to deal fairly with your people….’
Luadar looked curiously at him, then gave a sort of bow and ducking down he disappeared in the long reeds that flanked the river as it curved down to the ford….

Éomer touched spurs to Liath’s side and and galloped down the valley to where the Rohirrim were gathered. As he came up to them he saw they were few, no more than about sixty, and his heart sank; where were the others? But before he could ask, Suarachán blocked his path.
‘My Lord Éomer!’ he cried. Éomer reined Liath to a halt.

‘We can’t find Théodred….!’

Boromir stepped forward and reaching out he grasped his father’s sword and with some effort pulled it out of the small inlaid table. The dark glass globe on the plinth on top rocked slightly. Then Boromir stepped back and looked round the small, dimly lit room. He spoke roughly;

‘Come, father. Give me the Ring. You are not armed now, I have your sword. I will find you in the end, do not make me pursue you…..give me the ring…’

From somewhere in the room a voice spoke, disembodied, hoarse, annoyed but not fearful;
‘And if I did, what would you do with it?’

Boromir leaned back against the wall and smiled grimly;
‘I would return it to Frodo, the one appointed by wiser men than I to take it to its destruction….’

‘A witless halfling!’ cried Denethor angrily. ‘You would put the destiny of Gondor into the hands of a foolish creature not half my height or strength…’
‘It is not strength of the body, but of the mind that is needed here.’ said Boromir wearily. ‘No-one but he can bear it…’
‘Bear it to its destruction! What wisdom is that?' demanded Denethor.
'This thing was given to us, put in our way, to save Gondor…’
‘It cannot save Gondor, father!’ exclaimed Boromir in despair. ‘Already it is destroying her….’

He looked about him. Once, long ago, when the Fellowship were journeying from Rivendell, Merry and Pippin, the younger hobbits, had fallen into some jesting and one had threatened to make himself invisible with the Ring…

Gandalf had sternly forbade the little ones to speak of such things. Rarely on the journey had anyone spoken of the Ring….but then Gandalf had said;
‘In any case, you could not hide by means of the Ring. It does confer invisibility, but not totally. There is some image left in the air, like a reflection on water. Those who wanted to find you could do so in the end….’

Now Boromir remembered the wizard’s words and he peered round the dim turret room. In the corner was a small brazier to warm the cold stone chamber. The coals were dying but gave a faint light by which the table and chair and tapestries on the wall were revealed. So too was the dark orb on the table. The light played on its surface, yet it did not itself glow. But Boromir had a feeling that it was in some way attentive, listening, not at all just an inanimate object.

Then he saw it; a ghostly outline, like a chalk drawing on black slate. He gasped; surely that could not be his father? Not Denethor? For the image he made out was merely bones and glaring, lidless eyes, its skin phosphorescent, like a corpse.

Boromir gave a cry of horror, and stepped forward. The figure retreated, and stood with its back to the wall. A look of sadness was on its emaciated face;
‘So, you would take this thing from me by force, which you gave me as a great gift for Gondor…’
‘I must take it, father, for your sake, and for the sake of all!’
‘For your own sake, rather….’ said the apparition sadly. ‘But how do you know you will be able to give it up for a second time?’
‘I must take that risk’ said Boromir grimly.
‘I thought….’ said Denethor sadly ‘that I had two sons and one was a traitor, to me and to his city, and one a loyal son of Gondor.’ He raised his hand to his chest and clasped a silver chain.
‘And so it was, one of my sons was a traitor. But the traitor was not Faramir…’
Denethor fixed his eyes on Boromir.
‘The traitor was you, Boromir….’

Every morning, at dawn in summer and an hour before in winter, Duairceas took a tray bearing a pitcher of wine sweetened with honey and a crust of white bread to the Steward’s bedchamber. Every day, whatever chanced to pass in the world outside. Duairceas was old now and stooped with years and wounds got in battle long ago, for he had served the present Steward’s father as well as Denethor.

Never had the Steward failed to be awake and risen from his bed when Duairceas knocked, for he was stern and did not tolerate luxury in others or in himself. Even on the night when his lady Finduilas died, the following morning as usual Denethor was up and dressed, staring out of his narrow casement, tight-lipped and ready for the morning audience and whatever decisions were needed for the governance of the city…..

This morning felt different, but Duairceas assured himself all was as usual. It was true that no-one had seen either the Steward or his son Boromir since the afternoon before, but perhaps Denethor had gone in disguise to inspect the defences of the city, a trick he had been known to play on his soldiers from his youth….Duairceas lifted his hand and knocked softly on the heavy oaken door.

‘Come!’

The voice was soft, hardly audible; it did not sound like Denethor’s. But Duairceas grasped the iron ring that served as a handle and twisted it and pushed the door open and walked in.

Then he stopped dead; his mouth gaped open in astonishment, and he stared in dismay….

Standing at the window, his back to the room, was Boromir. He did not turn when the servant came in. Duairceas looked from him to the bed; on it lay Denethor, the High Steward of Gondor, dead.

But for a long moment Duairceas could not believe it was the Steward. For the figure that lay on the bed resembled more one who had been dead for weeks than for less than a day. He was stretched out in the clothes of his rank, but they were limp and flat, as if enclosing only bones. His hands crossed on his breast were also only bones, his great signet ring fallen down to the knuckles. His head was propped up on velvet cushions but the face was like that of one of the newly buried in the Street of the Dead. White, paper-like skin was stretched over bones so sharp Duairceas wondered in fascinated horror how they did not break through. And the eyes, still open, were glazed and white. It was as if all life had been drawn out of the Steward by some hideous power…

‘My Lord Denethor…’ stammered the servant, the tray rattling precariously in his grasp.

At the words Boromir turned from the window to face the man. He fingered a chain round his neck….
‘The Steward is dead’ he said in a flat, expressionless voice. ‘Now I am ruler of Gondor.’
He held out his hand to the servant.
‘Kneel to your king, Duairceas….’

Duairceas stared in horror at Boromir, then at the outstretched hand. As Boromir reached out, the chain slipped from his tunic and Duairceas saw on the end a bright, golden ring. Boromir spoke again, a strange, cold smile on his face;
‘Swear allegiance to King Boromir…. ‘

But Duairceas was already running from the room, down the hall, escape his only desire. Behind him the silver tray rolled across the stone floor and came to a halt against the wall. Boromir swept up the pitcher before all its contents were lost and raising it to his lips he drained what was left. Then he threw it away and laughed.

‘Run away if you want, old fool. There is nowhere you can hide; this is my city now……’