WHISPERS OF THE RING
Star of the NorthThe room seemed chill, forbidding, even in its familiarity. Boromir paced its length quickly, measuring it out in a few strides. A strange desire to knock down the Eastern wall eventually possessed him and he forced himself to sit in the seat his father had once occupied.
"Where is this King?" he now said to himself, without regard for the guards who stood at the door and looked to him curiously. "Does he cower now in fear of being revealed, despite the false words of the Elf?"
But he had sent his man Beregond to fetch them, one of the few men he still trusted to follow his orders correctly; still Beregond had not returned, and his heart whispered words of doubt and anger to him. Ill it made him, ill to see the greed of others, seeking to steal his hard won triumphs. At times it almost appealed to him to have these men banished from his borders. Or better, perhaps, to put them out of their wretched jealousness for good.
Something crawled into his belly and grew there in the darkness, just beneath his heart.
The feeling had grown intense when Beregond cleared his throat, and for a moment Boromir was sure that the soldier was there to betray him as well. But he returned to himself, his mind cleared, and he straightened in his seat.
"My Lord," Beregond said respectfully, and stepped aside so that the strangers might be seen. "May I present to you, Legolas son of Thranduil once King of Mirkwood; and Aragorn son of Arathorn, the --"
Boromir had felt bile rise with the impending string of titles, but it was the man called Aragorn who stopped the recitation with a hand upon Beregond's forearm. "--Elfstone," the stranger supplied, and stood forth.
"He who would be King." Boromir did not hide his scorn as he studied Aragorn openly. No, at first glance certainly not of noble birth, this man-- a wanderer, a vagabond, in a rough cloak and mud-spattered boots well-worn with long days of traveling. A thin vest over an equally ragged shirt of mail-rings, patched and torn and patched again, with faintly cleaner areas where surely packs and weapons had been slung. Any man dressed as this would have been laughed out of any court that he strode forth to claim, with no shame to those who mocked him. In his more youthful days, Boromir would have cast him out without further word.
But the Steward of Gondor had deepened his perceptions since his childhood, though the pride in him remained. The stranger had a wisdom in his eyes belying the moderate days of his appearance, a pain and also something stronger that upheld him-- love perhaps? -- the depth of his thoughts seemingly bottomless in the way that Elves' were. Though Boromir would have gladly denied it, Kingly traits were in this man, and that thought disturbed him to the very heart of the knot that had wound itself in his belly.
And something more occurred to him in his study of the man. A nagging familiarity, gnawing on the edge of his perception like the dream of a memory or the memory of a dream. Something he had spoken to his brother once-- something shared --
"I did not come to make a claim for your city, Boromir son of Denethor." Aragorn took another step forth, but his posture was plain, casual.
Yet so subtle that a less perceptive man would have missed it, something akin to displeasure took the face of the Elf behind Aragorn, a bitter thing tainting the detached beauty. Boromir seized at the jealously mercilessly, catching the eye of the Elf.
"Your companion would have otherwise, I see."
Legolas did not speak to protest or confirm, but there was a tension in him that had not been in him before. That he wished to speak in his companion's defense could not be ignored, but courtly manners, or other honor, held his tongue.
In Boromir was born a curiosity, but he allowed it no voice. Instead he said, "You would send me a summons and put yourself on equal representation as the Council of the Wise, and now come to me as humble as a beggar? Surely you think me a fool, if you seek to disarm me through disgust or sympathy."
Aragorn drew himself up, and proud were his eyes, and Boromir recalled with sudden clarity a dream of a Man of the North, striding forth, a star upon his brow, his sword naked in his hand.
This dirty stranger, this Aragorn son of Arathorn, was certainly the man from his vision.
He felt a fury build in him, and clutched the fist that wore the ring to his side tightly. What did it matter? Dreams were no more than the results of an idle brain, restless even at rest. No strange force compelled him, Boromir of Gondor, a man reliant upon his own strength--
"I have more interest in your sword at my side than to disarm you, noble Lord of Gondor." A peacefulness and a strength endured in the voice of Aragorn, and his clear gaze held Boromir's for longer than the Steward wished. As with his brother and father both, he recognized the keen sight that would assess more than he spoke. Would it see his hate, Boromir wondered? Or the secret that he hid? "The Wise have spoken long, and a decision must be made; but we would not move without the approval of Gondor."
"The approval of Gondor?" Boromir's mouth tightened, and he grew bitter indeed. "You ask for the approval of Gondor, when the Wise are certainly behind your claims to the throne, when your summons was sealed with the sign of Elendil." He stood himself up as proudly as Aragorn did, closed the space between them with a few short strides. "For certainly if you are the heir of Isildur, is this approval not yours to give? Is this throne not yours to sit upon? Are these people not yours to rule?"
Aragorn merely looked at him, his eyes seeming wise to Boromir's motives; but behind him the Elf Legolas stiffened, and strode forth to meet him with his face full of defiance. "Well it should be, Boromir of Gondor! But the King has not yet been crowned, nor has the most noble Steward surrendered his rule in front of the people to the King as he rightfully should."
Their eyes held and met, Elf and Man, and Boromir felt some hatred so deep and old it was nearly not his own rise and grow and multiply within him. "Wise you are to fear that I have declared no such thing, Elf," he said hotly, "For the people of Gondor are loyal to me, and would accept no claims from a rag-tag wanderer such as this, would fear no order given, would cast you out as conspirators should I give such a command!"
"Peace, Boromir, Legolas," Aragorn murmured. His hand moved to rest on Legolas's arm with an old familiarity, and the Elf did not cast him off, a slow restraint easing over him once again, like a cat smoothing its hackles. "I did not come to raise trouble, as you doubtless suspect of me! You have misread my gestures, and I have misjudged your reactions. Against better counsel, I thought to approach you with no disguise as to who I am, that a Steward would welcome his King! But better that I had come to you as the humble Ranger, known by many names, Dúnadan with no threat behind his banner of the Star of the North."
"You admit you would lie to the Steward of Gondor!"
"Nay, for it would be no lie; long I have been a no-name, a wanderer, and even in my youth I did not call myself by this name, Aragorn."
Boromir looked at him then with a curiosity that overwhelmed his fears. Such openness was immediately suspect, but even in his heart he knew that it was truth spread before him with no evil intent. "Then no more sweet words and plays, Aragorn. Lay forth your true purposes: what you would demand of me, and allow me to say yes or no without threat of losing Gondor that I love."
Aragorn nodded once. "It is true that the Wise now suspect the One Ring of Sauron, a great source of his power, still resides in Middle-Earth; Gandalf the Grey whom you knew as Mithrandir suspected so before his disappearance. Many times has the Council of the Wise met since his loss, and it was found in his writings that he was greatly curious about the golden ring that a Halfling had possessed, one Bilbo Baggins, of the Bag-End of Shire."
It was with great difficulty that Boromir hid the madness that rose in him at the name of the Halfling. For suddenly he was seized with desire to cast them from the room, to take the ring that he had claimed and bury it in the deepest part of Mordor, where no man would follow to find it. He clutched at his control tightly, however, and merely smiled. "Yes, I had heard that a Halfling had come to Minas Tirith, for this was a strange event indeed."
"There is word about that you often spoke to him in his time here. Would we be so fortunate that Bilbo Baggins might have let fall where he intended to go after departing Gondor?"
Boromir's hesitation was brief, but he saw no perception of it in the face of Aragorn. "He often gazed East, towards the black land of Mordor. When I caught him at it once, I asked why he looked towards such a dark place, but he gave me no answer. I feared for his safety when he vanished one night with no word and no trace, but I have not seen him since. It may well be that he headed into that dark land, and was killed in the ensuing battle?"
Aragorn grew thoughtful, but of what his thoughts were he said nothing. "If it was indeed so, then his ring could have not been the One Ring; for if the One Ring came to Mordor, we would have not driven Sauron to retreat once again."
Boromir spoke his mind before he knew what it was that he said. "I doubt indeed that some simple magic ring such as the Halfling possessed was this One Ring you speak of. Its power was nothing more than a feasting-day trick, suited more for a thief than a Dark Lord."
"You knew of the Ring he wore? Of the magic it held?" Aragorn looked at him strangely.
Later he might have thought of a better thing to say, an innocent deflection of the truth; but instead he grew angry. "The Halfling's trick is what led us to our merry meeting-- a trick he thought to play upon the Steward's son, perhaps-- and he was forced to reveal the ring to me. But it was nothing! I thought nothing of it, of this ring, small and golden with such a ridiculous magic about it. Perhaps he thought it funny, but I did not! Sneaking about, surely to purloin some treasure from my father's coffers."
"And yet you feared for him when he thought of Mordor," Legolas said quietly.
"Yes, though he was a thief in the night, I pitied him!"
To all this Aragorn had said nothing, but the contemplative look grew deeper, and once again he raised one hand for peace. "I have faith in your word, Steward of Gondor, though strange is some of the news I have heard from you. Let us speak now of the other reason I have come: we wish to hold counsel with all the Lords of the Free Peoples of Middle-Earth, so that we might initiate a search for the One Ring and the Halfling, and we request a representative of Gondor to attend, and that we might acquire permissions to search within your now expansive boundaries."
Boromir grew silent with thought, though this was merely a repetition of the request in the summons he had already read. Why this troubled him so deeply, he knew not; certainly the ring he had acquired from the Halfling was no object of the Dark Lord; or even if so, was he not a master of it, directing it for the Good of Gondor? Still, he could not believe this "One Ring" was much more than a misdirected fear by fools and Wizards grasping for some reason for their failures. And the Halfling; he would not be found: of those who knew of his imprisonment, few had survived on the battlefields of the recent War, and those few Boromir had made certain would betray no word of it to anyone. He should have had no fears, yet fear gnawed at him deeply. It urged him to resist the will of the Wise, to send no man to this foolish quest.
"What worth was the effort of the Wise in this past battle against evil?" he said finally. "The old strength of Elves and Wizards fades; who was it that struck the Dark Lord most deeply if not the strength of Men?"
The face of Legolas the Elf grew dark, but Aragorn stopped his words with the touch of a hand once again. "Mighty was Man indeed in this last War, but to say the efforts of the Elves was nothing is unwise of you, Boromir of Gondor."
"And I say that you are unwise to support such a foolish quest such as searching for a Halfling, and bring it to me as if it were some great strategy against the Dark Lord."
Aragorn made no reply, but his eyes searched Boromir as if they sought to pierce his flesh and gaze upon his soul. "Though you think it folly, one man spared to sit upon a council would be nothing to you; and in your place I would think it wise to keep an eye even on the folly of my neighbors--"
"In my place?" Boromir spat, and straightened his back. "You are not in my place, no matter how much you covet it! Gondor would decline your invitation, and if you are wise, you would leave Minas Tirith before the rising of the sun tomorrow."
If he expected confrontation, he received none; proud though Aragorn was, he merely nodded his head to Boromir and withdrew. "As Gondor wishes."
Boromir looked after them darkly, but there was no haste in their retreat, no fear of his command. He sunk into his thoughts, disquieted, and when they had vanished from the realm of his sight, he sought out the room of his brother.