Chapter Text
For the second day the dawn brought no light.
Darkness from the east was spreading, so thick that it blocked the light of the sun. The winged shadows were abroad, their piercing shrieks from the skies sending fear straight to the hearts of all who cowered below.
And Faramir, son of Denethor, was riding to his doom.
His thin face was grim, and the grey eyes that looked warily out at the gathering crowd were stony. The last exchange with his father had left no doubt in his mind as to what he was fit for, and the cold words had followed him down through all the seven circles of the city.
I do not oppose your will, sire, he had said. Since you are robbed of Boromir, I will go and do what I can in his stead – if you command it.
His father had not even looked him in the eye.
I do so.
Then fare well! But if I should return, think better of me!
A pause, then the words that had struck at his heart.
That depends on the manner of your return.
A cold wind swept short tendrils of dark hair around his neck, and he shuddered. He was not riding to victory. Rohan had not answered the call to arms, and Gondor’s only hope lay with the remaining men defending the river and the fields of the Pelennor, far too few against the numbers of the enemy he had witnessed amassing at the Black Gate. His father had sent him to his death.
The wizard whom all called the grey pilgrim, though he now wore white, had counselled Faramir not to throw his life away by blindly following Denethor’s orders. He was needed, Mithrandir had said, for other things than war. But what had he meant? Now Boromir had fallen surely it was his duty to fight, to lead?
He was no coward. He would rouse his men, fight to the last breath to defend his home, though he could not help but wonder if he would feel much fear, much pain, before the end came. The silence of the crowd was enough to unsettle even the bravest of his men, but he knew what he had to do, and now he was resigned to it. Indeed a strange calm was upon him.
Some of his company had a flower or token held in their hand - gifts of love, of hope, from mothers, little brothers, wives, children. But there was no-one to weep for Faramir, no tokens of love or protection for him to clench in his fist. He held the reins of his horse tightly instead, fixing his eyes on the edge of the city, concentrating on the sound of his beloved Celtir’s hooves, clip-clopping out a regular rhythm, though he could not ignore the cries from the guard as he neared the great gate. Steel and iron protested as the great doors opened, the dull screech unwelcome in the silence.
Beyond the gate his path lay clear ahead of him, straight across the fields, towards the river and Osgiliath. Far beyond that ruined place the mountains of shadow rose on the very edge of the horizon. He shuddered, realising that he would be riding over the green fields of the Pelennor for the last time, carrion for crows likely to be his fate, along with all those that followed him - followed him willingly, he knew. They surrounded him now, trying their best not to appear afraid, mouths set in grim lines. He spoke softly to those riding closest to him, his friends.
“Look upon our city, and these fields,” he said quietly to them. “Hold them in your mind, until the end – whatever that end may be. Remember what we are fighting for. And perhaps, somewhere, there is hope."
A flash of colour off to the left stopped him in his tracks.
He brought Celtir to a halt, held there by a rich shade of green shining amongst the drab greys and blues of the crowd, and became filled with the very thing he doubted. The colour of cool grass and shining leaves, of new life in this broken city, made him remember what it was – to have hope.
He was about to look away, taking the feeling with him, when he realised the wondrous colour was the silk fabric of a simple yet finely made gown, and he had been staring rather too hard at a young woman’s body. Tearing his eyes away, meaning to look to the fields, he looked instead at the girl’s face.
Afterwards, for his entire life, he could never say why he looked at her then, and he always said that perhaps things would have been very different if he had not. But, unaware that he was doing so, he had smiled at her.
He put her as younger than himself by more than a decade. She was small, with long, brown hair and a solemn face. At first sight she appeared frail, but meeting her eyes – large, and a deep, dark brown – he knew that was not the case.
She was crying, for him as a man rather than for the noble and distant son of her Steward. He did not know how he knew.
She looked relieved that he had caught her eye. A tiny smile, as if in recognition, raised the corners of her mouth very slightly, although he was certain that he had never seen her before in his life. Tears ran silently down her face, but she made no move to wipe them away, holding his gaze with her own, steady and gentle. He was conscious that he was still, unmoving, and that his company had halted behind him, no doubt wondering what the delay was. And yet he found that he could not look away.
She mouthed something he did not catch. He looked at her questioningly, but she shook her head slightly and looked down.
The spell was broken, and he looked away, clicking to Celtir to walk on. The sound of hoof beats as the company moved off again was almost deafening after the silence.
He did not know who she was, but he suddenly felt an overwhelming sadness at the thought that he would never see her again. Despite her tears, hope seemed to spring from her, and he knew it would be her face he saw as he rode into battle.
He looked back over his shoulder, wanting another glimpse of her, half expecting her to be gone, vanished away into the air like the dream she had seemed to be. But no, she was still standing there, although a little obscured now by the people closer to him. She was still looking down, and seemed to be weeping silently in earnest now, her shoulders slightly bowed, her lips shut tight in a grimace of pain. He did not understand why she was crying just for his sake, but it grieved him, and he wanted to comfort her. He thought about turning back, but knew he could not. Instead he willed her, with all his might, to look up, to look at him.
Ignoring his second-in-command calling his name, he remained looking backwards as he passed through the great wooden doors of the gate, through the thick walls of the city. He didn’t care that all the crowd were watching him and the girl with wide eyes and murmurs, didn’t care that there would be gossip. Soon she would be out of sight, and he would be alone again.
Look at me, he begged her silently. Look at me.
As if she had heard his thoughts, her head snapped up in surprise, and her eyes immediately found his. He raised his hand, a farewell gesture. She mirrored his movement, then as he turned away for the final time, he saw her close her eyes and tilt her head back slightly, as if she had just heard the sweetest strain of music, or felt the sun unexpectedly warm her face. He smiled to himself as he passed through the gate, and remained smiling until an ominous thud told him it had closed behind him, shutting him and his men out. Leaving them to the enemy.
Farewell, he thought, to the city, to his father, to any real chance of return. And to her.
But his task was at hand, and he could not shirk it.
“Come!” he cried, rallying his men. “Ride with me, to fight, to die, for the greatest city of men in this age! Ride now, for the people of Minas Tirith, for our fair country, for Gondor!”
He raised his sword, and his men yelled behind him – cries of “to Faramir!” and “for Gondor!”
But he was still distracted. Had she heard his words? Who was she? Why had she even been there? She had not been wearing the strict garb of a healer, and all other women had been ordered to flee the city.
Why had she been crying for him? And not just crying – it looked as though her heart was breaking. But how could that be? She was a total stranger.
And yet a stranger that seemed to know him, when he did not even know her name.
Perhaps that was what she had tried to tell him.
He did not understand it, any of it, but he cursed the battle to come, for taking him away from her too soon.
Alas, her fate lies not with me, he thought. My life ends in Osgiliath.
As soon as the last echo of distant hoofbeats had faded away beyond the gate, the girl raced away from the staring crowd, ignoring their whispers. Avoiding anyone’s inquisitive gaze, she walked the long way back up to the Houses of Healing within the sixth circle. Rushing as quietly as she could along the corridor to the healer’s tiny bedrooms, swiftly changing into her uniform, she caught herself in the glass, and immediately felt inconspicuous and ordinary again. She doubted the folk down by the gate would ever associate her with the strange woman in green who had so affected the young Captain of Gondor. She barely did herself.
Two days passed, and in that time she had not allowed herself time to stop and think about what might be happening out there beyond the Pelennor. It had been two days of small, hurried meals and very little sleep, the wounded survivors of the stand at Osgiliath pouring in, keeping her and the others busy. Some had grave wounds. Some had died.
He had not yet appeared amongst them.
So either he is uninjured, or he is...
She shook her head, knowing that if her thoughts followed that course she would go under.
She headed for her room, about to finally retire, when she saw a messenger from the citadel heading to the Warden’s office. The idea of sleep fled, and she followed him. No news of the stand had come through, and she was desperate to know what had occurred, for the wounded in her care were either unconscious or not speaking of it, and she could not bring herself to press them.
She stood with her ear to the Warden’s door and listened, everyone too busy to notice her eavesdropping.
“‘Tis grave tidings I bring, sir.” The voice of the messenger was muffled through the thick wooden door. “Lord Faramir’s men were outnumbered ten to one, they had no choice but to retreat. The Rammas Echor was breached, and they fled for their lives. Lord Denethor did eventually send out a sortie to come to their aid, and the Prince of Dol Amroth sent his men in to protect the retreat. But there were orcs, and Southrons, and... worst of all, sir, those great winged shadows.”
The messenger’s voice halted and she almost screamed with frustration. What did this mean?
His voice picked up again, but was so quiet in the telling that she could not hear properly through the door.
“...wizard came and sent the dark shadows away... gained courage and fought bravely...but Lord Faramir was struck...a poisoned arrow...Prince Imrahil bore him home…”
Keren clung to the door handle, trying to keep her legs from buckling. It had happened then. He was dead, and the prophecy had been wrong.
She did not know what to do other than to collapse, but she would not allow herself to do that. It seemed the only way to keep herself from sinking to the floor, a heap for the messenger to stumble over, was to run.
She ran straight out of the Houses by the quickest route, following the well-worn paths that led to the gardens, overlooking the lower levels of the city. Always a place she had retreated to, she took deep, shaking breaths as she passed the trees in the dark, the moon barely giving off any light, and leant her hands on the old stone walls, trying to find strength from them.
She looked out over the Pelennor, but she was to find no solace there, for the fertile, green fields could no longer be seen. A complete darkness lay over them, more than the black of night, hiding any horrors that could be creeping furtively across the plains. A total dearth of light had been slowly creeping from the Black Land for days, and now it had reached its target. The great city, the home she loved, was blind.
In the terrifying darkness she wondered at how she had the strength to still be standing, but stand she did, for the remaining hour before daybreak, looking out over the walls into the nothingness, her arms wrapped around her waist, as if holding herself together.
Dead. He’s dead.
It was only when the weak semblance of a Mordor dawn broke, bringing a sickly yellow half-light to her eyes, and she had begun to shiver from the cold, that she even realised what she was now looking at, what the blackness had previously hidden from her. The Pelennor was filled with a new kind of darkness.
The army of the enemy, as far as she could see. Tents were pitched, trenches were dug. The mountains of the Black Land stood threatening, far off in the distance, but seeming larger now, closer than they truly were. And over all this several shadows moved in the sky, emitting shrill cries. Minas Tirith was totally besieged.
Terror filled her, and she felt an old longing for her mother's arms and her soft bed in the house of her childhood. But another family lived there now, and her mother had been dead for nine years.
That was when the tears finally came. Her body suddenly realised it had had no true rest, and very little food, since the day he had left.
And it had all been for nothing, all those years. He truly was dead. And the hope she had felt by the gate...
“Gone,” she heard herself whisper into the air.
Exhausted, defeated, she turned her face away from the desolate scene and stumbled her way back into the Houses.
“Keren?”
A familiar voice.
An elderly face swam into view through her tears – Ioreth. “Whatever have you been doing outside? We’ll soon be overrun with folk from the lower circles, and you have not…” The old woman tailed off as she saw the girl's tears.
“Oh, child,” she said. “I know these are frightening times, but we have a job to do. Forget all that is happening outside the walls and concentrate on healing the poor souls who will need your help before the day is out. Come on now, wash your face, and then away to the Warden for your duties.”
Keren nodded blindly, and rushed back to her small bedroom, knowing the old healer spoke the truth. Ioreth was known for wittering and rambling on, but none could deny her skill, and she always seemed to produce good advice just when it was most needed.
Keren’s fear of death was not strong, but her fear of pain was. Having worked as a healer since she was a child, she knew what pain looked like. But she had a job to do. If she could save lives this day, then, no matter how much her heart was aching, she would.
She grabbed the bucket from the floor, already filled with water. Palen must have prepared it.
Keren had expected her sister to be here, sleeping in one of the two small beds, resting before her work began again at midday. The water was still warm, so she could not have been gone long, and Keren assumed she must have been called by Ioreth to work early. She was slightly relieved – she could not bear it if her older sister were to see her like this.
Keren had to be alone to grieve, as she had been when their mother died, letting no one even come in to her room for three days. Hopefully Palen would remember that and leave her alone, should she hear the news of Faramir.
Not that we will have much time to be alone, Keren thought, knowing the days ahead were to be filled with constant work. If they survived.
All day, even with no rest the night before, Keren worked tirelessly. She had no idea what was happening outside the Houses of Healing, nor did she want to know. Occasional shouts and screams were heard close by, and sometimes the screeches of the winged shadows would pierce their hearts, and cause all to stop and stare upwards in fear. Loud booms would sometimes make the Houses tremble, and Keren could only imagine that the lower levels of the city were being gradually destroyed.
The sickly light of false day turned into the total darkness of night once more, and folk were still being brought in. They had run out of beds and were now having to treat people on the floor space between, and in the corridors. The Houses were supposed to be a place of peace and respite, but at this time they were hell. Men were dying even as Keren held their hands, some calling for their wives or children. Some of them, younger than she, called for their mothers.
But she did not break, nor did any of the healers who, young and old, were working constantly. Occasionally Keren’s path crossed Palen’s, and the looks they shared said more than any words ever could.
Through the night they worked, and some of the men they were tending stayed alive, and some did not. Keren had given up washing the blood off her arms, for no sooner had she done so then the next casualty was brought in. Before long the blood of many men was caked into her skin, wiped on her clothes, on her face, in her hair. She had no time to stop and think of grieving for Faramir, or how hungry she was, or how tired, or how much more of her strength she could give.
She was stitching up the side of a man of about her father’s years when suddenly it happened – a great shaking and a boom, far louder and more powerful than any before. All stopped in their work. A pause, then three times more it came, and with the final great boom lightning split the sky, so the candlelit ward was for a moment filled with a stark white light, and all the fear and dread on the faces of those in the room was laid bare.
“The gate!” someone cried. “They’re trying to bring down the great gate!”
The voice was quickly silenced in order for panic not to spread, but the seed was sown. If the main gate, the city's last defence, had been breached then there truly was no hope. If the enemy could bring down the gate that legend said could not be brought down, then how easily could they break through the smaller gates of each level until they were upon the sixth, where the Houses stood? Keren felt a moment of utter terror, but she forced down the bile that had risen in her throat, and smiled at the man she was tending.
“Your wound is clean. All should be well,” she said quietly.
“But to what end?” he replied. “The city is taken.”
So cast down was he that she could not reply, but set to the last of the stitches, her hand shaking only slightly. As she snipped the thread and tied the ends she noticed how silent the ward had fallen. The sounds of the battle seemed distant and vague after the attack on the gate which had shaken the whole city, perhaps even old Mindolluin himself.
But then, as another dim, grey dawn broke, there came an unexpected sound, one Keren could not believe she was hearing – the rousing cry of many horns from a great distance. She ran to the small window at the southern end of the ward, and stared greedily at the sight that met her eyes.
A great host of men on horseback were charging at full pelt towards the army of the enemy – so many men and horses that it looked as if a whole country had been mustered. And then she remembered – Rohan. They had finally answered the call.
Swiftly the horsemen went flying down the hillside from the Rammas Echor towards the enemy, and golden they looked as they were lit by the rising sun.
The sun! Keren belatedly realised what she was seeing. A real dawn!
The darkness was weakening. She opened the window wide and leaned out, feeling warmth on her face, looking on in wonder. The sun, red and angry, blazed down on the riders, lighting their path. So fierce and terrifying they looked as they clashed with the enemy that she almost looked away, but found she could not. Arrows and spears were flying, swords and helms, all adorned with horse hair flying behind, were glinting. She felt tears of awe grow in her eyes.
“Keren!” A shrill shout tore her gaze away. “Away from that window and back to work! How dare you?”
But she had to smile at Ioreth in her joy.
“Rohan has come!” she cried.
A great shout of wonder and hope went up from all those who were able. Old Ioreth, with a tear in her eye and a smile, just nodded and said, “Back to work though, child.”
The wounded were still being brought in thick and fast as the sun climbed in the sky. Keren and the other healers still had not stopped for rest or refreshment, for the need of those in their care was greater. The pile of dead, for a sadly disordered pile it had become, was growing, but some men who had only minor wounds had already been released to fight again. Since the arrival of Rohan it felt to Keren that sometimes the air in the wards was less foul, and she finally made time to fetch water to clean the blood off her arms and face once more.
Just as she leant over the bucket an unearthly scream went up from the battlefield, causing her to look across to the windows, but all she could see from where she knelt on the floor was sky. No one could escape the sound, and it rent the hearts of all. The distance must have been great, but the scream was heard and felt within all the walls of the city, high or low. Keren felt dizzy with panic, and could not breathe. All of her fears for Faramir were pulled to the surface, all of the memories of her mother’s last days were brought to the fore, threatening to overwhelm her with sorrow. She shut her eyes and clenched her teeth against the pain.
But then the scream faded, and straight away hope kindled in her heart. The sun seemed yet brighter and warmer, and a feeling of calm descended. Those who were dying felt at peace, and those who were healing felt new energy rising in them.
Keren again began to wash the blood from her arms, but at that moment a frantic hammering began down the hallway to her right – someone was banging on the main doors. She was the only one not busy with a charge, and so made haste to answer, running out to the hall. With a turn of the large metal ring-pull and a great heave she threw open one of the huge wooden doors, old and heavy, designed to keep any unwanted visitors away. A wave of nausea went over her as the effort took its toll on her lack of food and sleep. She swayed a little and leant on the door frame for support.
“Are you alright?” a young, male voice asked, pleasant and concerned.
She nodded, eyes closed, taking a deep breath to steady herself.
“I’m well, thank you,” she said, feeling the faintness pass. “How can I help…”
She looked up to see who had spoken to her, but at first saw only stone walls, before noticing the small figure looking up at her. He was no bigger than a ten-year-old boy, though he had the face of a young man.
“…you?” She stared at him.
There was a tut from behind him.
“This is no time for an introduction to hobbits,” a man’s voice said. “Allow us to pass, Keren. I’ll explain all as we walk.”
“Beregond!” Keren said in recognition, as she tore her eyes from the strange creature in front of her.
The guard of the citadel, her friend, regarded her with anxious eyes. She looked as bad as he felt.
“Bergil isn’t here,” she said, “I haven't seen him for days.”
“My son is safe and well, Keren, I thank thee,” he said quickly. “I do not seek him. We must enter, and swiftly.”
She nodded. “Of course.”
No doubt he had another message for the Warden. Perhaps the battle was won? But he turned his back to her and stooped to pick up something that had previously been hidden behind him and the strange little man – a body laid out on a bier. No, not just a body, for why would he bring a body to the Houses to be healed? They must still live, still and silent as they were.
As Beregond and another guard lifted the prone form, Keren saw it was a man, pale and unconscious, but alive, just. And then her heart lurched. The winged helm was gone, and the fine armour. But his black hair, his thin face, his rich clothes...
Her face must have shown her shock.
Beregond looked at her grimly.
“Now you see why there is need of haste.”