WHISPERS OF THE RING
The Ring Leaves Minas Tirith
How long he thrashed against them, Boromir did not know. Though he had once been a noble and admired Captain of the guard, the men he had formerly commanded felt no apology as they dragged him like a dog to his captors.
He snarled at the pleasure that danced through that wretched elf's face to see him bound and subdued; but strangely it was with shame, and fear, that he turned his face from the filthy Ranger when Aragorn knelt before him, to assess any injury. He felt sudden fear for the ring, then, and slipped it under his tongue, but the Ranger merely took out a knife, and despite his momentary fear, sliced through the ropes binding him.
His men handed a small pack to Aragorn. The ranger glanced inside it, and then handed it to Boromir. "Your brother has an eye out for you," Aragorn said, and Boromir examined its contents: a fur-lined cloak, his favorite for travel; a plainer but heavier shirt than he wore now; and strangely, the thin gold chain he had worn before he had become Steward. Faramir had never known what had hung on the end of it, tucked beneath his vest and shirt, only that he had always considered it a bringer of luck.
The chain he palmed, but the rest he hurled to the ground, lifting his chin proudly. "I do not need a traitor's charity," he spat. He turned his back on the ropes that had bound him, tangled on the ground and muddied now, a sight to repulse and infuriate him. "I will not leave this city unless I am dead!"
"We could fix such a thing, if you wished it," the elf said, and there was a disconcerting playfulness in his voice.
"Legolas," Aragorn said quietly. But when he turned and spoke to Boromir, his voice was hard. "We will bind you like a dog, if we must, though I would prefer to spare you such indignity."
It seemed the ring burned against his inner cheek, urging him to retaliate. "You would not dare!"
The cold blue eyes of the Dúnadan met his own, gaze unyielding. "Would you put me to the test, Gondor? For though I would not wish it, I would not hesitate, even in the presence of your men."
Boromir laughed aloud at this. "MY men? My men! Yes, such loyal men shall be the rot that causes Gondor to fall! And my brother will be at the heart of it."
"Your brother," Legolas the elf said quietly, "Will be the solid core that saves Gondor from the disease you have afflicted it with."
Boromir lunged after the elf, but Aragorn stepped between them, and gripped his shoulders painfully. Boromir threw him off with a shake of his arms, stepping back quickly to put distance between them; though behind him he was aware of his own guardsmen stepping in close, hands on their swords. He narrowed his eyes, blood roaring in his ears, flexing his fingers.
"How long have you been plotting this, with your claims that you did not wish the throne?" he accused, his voice harsh even in his own ears. "For surely my brother will surrender his rule without the difficulties I would have posed to you. This is a clever game, man of the North."
Aragorn dignified him with no answer, only shaking his head, and turned to Legolas. "Fetch that fine length from Lórien. You do not want him to stab you in the back while he is riding behind you."
"I will not--!" Boromir protested, but he found his words drawn up short by a dark look from the Ranger. He fell back a step, and caught himself only because of the armed men behind him. Why this man filled him with such dread and hate, he did not know. But it was obvious he would not escape from this situation easily. He could not return to Minas Tirith such as it was, a serpent's nest of traitors and greedy men. The prospect of riding to Imladris with the Ranger and his elf was not much more appealing, however.
Legolas returned with a length of rope, grey-hued and with a shine like silk. Boromir recoiled, looking about him for some escape; but he was surrounded.
"If you are well-behaved, perhaps you will ride unbound in the near future," the elf laughed, reaching after his hands. Boromir would have drawn away, but the grip of the fair creature was stronger than he would have guessed.
"A... Allow me to put on the cloak my brother gave me," Boromir said suddenly. "For it is chill."
"You were quick to reject it before," Legolas answered him. "Why should you need it now?"
But Aragorn would not be found without manners, it would seem, even for his prisoner. "We will not be unkind to our guest, though he spits in our face." He retrieved the pack that Faramir had made for Boromir, and handed it to him.
The man of Gondor retrieved the cloak, and threw it about his shoulders, turning his body away from them as if to fasten it. Quickly, so that they might not see it, he spat out the ring and strung it on the golden chain; and when he closed the clasp on his cloak he hurriedly closed the clasp on the chain as well, and tucked the ring under his shirt.
When he turned back towards them, Legolas dangled the rope before him. "Come, my fine cur. I've got a leash to fix about your neck, still."
The ring seated safe against his chest, Boromir managed only a scowl, planting his feet and waiting for the elf to come to him. He would not retreat, but neither would he surrender. Legolas did not miss his subtle assertion of pride, but crossed over to the man so smoothly that only Boromir knew he had intended otherwise.
The elf's hands were quick and sure when he knotted the rope around Boromir's wrists. On his skin, the length felt smooth as silk, and he drew his hands back hurriedly, as if repulsed by the very touch of it. elf-wove, this, laced with some fey magic, surely. But Legolas merely cinched the knots tighter, and caught his eye. "Do not fool yourself with dreams of escaping, Man of Gondor, for the rope is a gift of the Lady of Lórien, long and strong and light; and I have known the workings of a good knot since my childhood in Mirkwood."
Boromir spat at the elf's feet, but Legolas stepped out of the way without anything but the selfsame pleasure he had worn since the man's arrival. "Aragorn would wish you well-treated, but I would not be sorry if you fell from my horse, and it will be mine which you will share in our long journey. It is only out of respect for him that I do not leave you here for your own people to deal with."
Legolas finished the knot with one more tug, and left a length of it hanging, like a lead rope on a horse-harness. He kept this end in his hand, and tugged at it sharply. Boromir's fury tripled at this indignity, but he held himself in check, and resisted the urge to rip the rope from the elf's hands. Though the fair-folk's strength was great, in anger Boromir was sure in his belief that his own greater.
He was helped onto Legolas's great grey steed like a woman; and once he was settled, the elf sprang lightly in front of him as if the distance was not much higher than a shallow step. Underneath the new weight, the horse danced lightly, but Legolas touched its neck once and it settled, nostrils flaring expectantly.
"Shall we pass through Lórien?" Legolas said, and there was a touch of eagerness in his voice. Boromir shuddered. He was no stranger to the tales of the elf-Witch of the Golden Wood. "I should like to see the mellyrn again."
But Aragorn shook his head. "It is through the Gap of Rohan for us, my friend. I wish to pass by Isengard, and perhaps Saruman will know quicker than Rivendell if there is any darkness on the heart of our friend here."
"I am under no sorcery!" Boromir said hotly, but Aragorn acted as if he had not spoken. Legolas merely laughed.
"Perhaps only the sorcery of greed," the elf replied gaily, and turned his horse away from Aragorn. "Navaer, Minas Tirith, Barad 'lain! Govaded vedui aen immen!"
Boromir, who understood the noble tongue as well as any who had pride in his Númenorean blood, could not hold his tongue. "Ir edhel ú-minnatha Minas Tirith, arad dhaer aen."
Legolas's laughter drifted back to him, carried on the wind, as the elf spurred his horse to turn round and take the path departing the White City. "I had meant only because perhaps I would finally find the Sea, Man of Gondor, for I find the White City is beautiful in the strange way of Men. But if you should have your way, I think few Elves would be sorry, though Minas Tirith would be a darker place for it."
Boromir said nothing, the steady heat of his anger diminishing none despite the flush of shame that filled him.
They rode in silence for some time, and Aragorn kept the pace quick, as if some urgent errand bid him. Sometimes Legolas would sing a snatch of elf-tune that seemed to cling to Boromir's heart and alternately ache and revolt him, other times there was a comfortable silence between ranger and elf, with only the sound of hoof beats a steady rhythm in the back of his mind.
As they drew farther from Minas Tirith, it seemed that something eased in Boromir's mind, though the ring sometimes seemed heavier on its chain around his neck. He wished that he could clasp it, to reassure himself that it would not escape once again, but in his heart he almost felt that though they left his beloved city, some fate beckoned to him from the same places where Aragorn and Legolas would take him.
For the first night they stopped, Legolas did not free Boromir's hands, and gave him only waybread and water that he could easily eat with both hands bound in front of him. Though it would have been easy for Aragorn or Legolas to shoot some small game such as a coney or a pheasant, they ate only what the Steward of Gondor ate, as if to offer him no further insult. Why they chose to respect him mystified the man; Legolas's resentment he could understand, and return in equal measure, but this dignified treatment he found even more insulting that had they bound him hand and foot and beat him.
Legolas's bedroll they gave to Boromir, and elf and man shared Aragorn's, one using it while the other sat up and kept watch. In the morning they ate the waybread again, and Aragorn took Legolas's horse to rest it, while his own carried the elf and the Steward. At midday they switched mounts once more, when they paused to eat.
Such was the ritual for several days, and they passed through the land quickly, riding at a fair pace, but not taxing the horses. Quickly they approached Dunharrow, and Boromir dreaded that they would pause in the city which had once been the heart of Rohan. For now it was the stronghold of men who had refused the protection of the White Tower, when Théoden-King and his chosen heir, Éomer, had fallen to the War of Shadow. The Lady Éowyn resided there, and scorned the authority of Gondor, who now held the rest of Rohan under sway as it had not been since Cirion had gifted the land to Éorl in days long past. That Boromir had taken Rohan under the protection of his men for her own good was no comfort to the Lady who had lost both brother and mother's father. She had gathered men to her and ridden against the new crown, and caused trouble for Boromir's garrisons endlessly.
On the fifth night he sat scowling and thinking of her scorn, considering what way he might escape his captors, when he felt the eyes of Aragorn watching him.
"Am I so fine to look at that you stare at me unabashedly, ranger?"
Aragorn did not laugh, but a smile drew itself across his face. "In you I see the ghost of Denethor, though you are as different from him as Faramir is from yourself. And yet I wonder what drove you so hard these years, if it were not the spirit of that proud man."
"My father... would have been proud to see what Gondor has become."
Aragorn stirred, to coax a better flame from the fire. "You were always the light in Denethor's eye, Boromir."
Boromir turned his face away. "And how great his shame, now that I have been cast from the city by my own brother, who schemed against me in the night, while playing at sickness and playing the foolish softness in my heart."
Aragorn said nothing for a long while, but studied him obviously. "I remember once, when I came to serve your father in an errand for Mithrandir, how you stood up to him, beloved father though he was to you, for Faramir; I thought that if I had children, I hoped they might be so close."
Boromir made a half-attempt at laughter. "You are not so much older than I. How could you remember such things?"
"I have seen much more, and many more years, than you would believe, son of Denethor." Aragorn rose, then, and crossed over to Boromir. Patiently, he set to the arduous task of untangling the knots that Legolas had made and freed Boromir of his bonds. "Will you escape, now afforded some freedom?"
Strange though it was, though he should have made his bid for freedom then, thrust Aragorn aside and fled into the night and done just as the ranger had spoken, he felt no inclination for these things. Against his breast the ring seemed warm, and leant him some strength, as if this hardship were a test he must endure. "Where should I go? To raise men against my brother, and tear Gondor apart with kin-wars? Or is that your aim, that you might sweep in after the Stewards are slain at each brother's hand?"
The so-called heir of Isildur did not rise to the challenge in Boromir's words, but merely looked at him levelly. Boromir dropped his eyes, thinking to bide his time.
"I... shall not run. I give my word. When I reclaim the rule of Gondor, it shall be with the pleasantry of my brother pleading for my return; not crawling on my belly with shame or sneaking in the dark to stick a knife in his back."
Aragorn drew his hands back to his sides. "I trust your word, Man of Gondor."
With awe, Boromir watched the Aragorn rise and go to Legolas, to relieve him of the watch. "You are strange indeed," Boromir said to himself, and he could not reason out for himself the motives of the man called Elessar.
----------------
Mini glossary
Navaer, Minas Tirith, Barad 'lain! Govaded vedui aen immen. - Farewell, Minas Tirith, White Tower! May this be our last meeting. (literally: Farewell, Minas Tirith, White tower (a name for Gondor)! Last-meeting may it be between us.)
Ir edhel ú-minnatha Minas Tirith, arad dhaer aen. - It will be a happy day when elves no longer enter Minas Tirith. (Literally: When elves won't enter Minas Tirith, a great day [it will be]!) I'm not overly fond of using "aen" because it is of uncertain meaning, but sometimes its a necessary evil, I guess.
As always, corrections welcomed.