The Ballad of an Ent
After the battle of Isengard, a giant tree-like creature sat by the ruins of the industrial tower gazing at the horizon, while his companions kept watch of the besieged treacherous Saruman and his assistant Grimma Wormtongue. His yellow eyes were full of memories and a deep longing that had been dormant until the day he met a pair of creatures, whose questions awakened that ache in his heart...
He remembered his slumber disturbed by the feeling of an unfamiliar creature climbing him up. He blinked twice, yellow eyes fixed on his tiny intruder, who gasped in terror and lost balance. Wouldn't it be for his hand of interlaced branches, the little one would have found his death from a high fall to the ground. Each of his steps provoked tremors on the ground as he stumped to move around. On his way, he realized there was three intruders. He squashed the one that smelled the most with his rooted foot and then swept his hand to grab the other. He stopped to glare upon his captives for a moment.
"Little orcs, booraroom!" He bellowed. That was his conclusion after smelling them.
"It's talking, Merry. The tree is talking!" Said Pippin, one of the captives, half frightened to the gigantic creature that held him.
"Tree?! I am no tree. I am an Ent." clarified the giant indignantly.
Merry, the other captive, smiled widely to know face to face one of the creatures he heard tell of only in childhood tales of old, "A tree herder! A shepherd of the forest."
"Don't talk to it, Merry. Don't encourage it." recommended Pippin, fearing a worse fate.
"Treebeard, some call me." said the tree herder deep in thoughts while holding them in his hands.
Pippin quickly forgot his own advice to not encourage the Ent, as curiosity became him, "And whose side are you on?"
The question brought the Ent back from his meditating state, "Side? I am on nobody's side because nobody's on my side, little Orc. Nobody cares for the woods anymore." The more the Ent spoke, the more irritated he became.
Merry felt insulted, "We're not Orcs. We're Hobbits!"
"Hobbits? Never heard of a hobbit before. Sounds like Orc mischief to me!" he felt like he was being played for a fool, so he tightened his grip on the halflings, making them groan with pain, "They come with fire, they come with axes. Gnawing, biting, breaking, hacking, burning! Destroyers and usurpers, curse them!" growled the Ent.
"No, you don't understand. We're Hobbits... Halflings! Shirefolk!" said Merry, struggling with the squeeze to reason with the tree herder.
"Maybe you are and maybe you aren't. The White Wizard will know." obviously Treebeard was not buying their story.
"The White Wizard?" wondered Pippin.
"Saruman..." whispered Merry.
Before long, the halflings were abruptly released to the ground, where they lifted their eyes to see the white wizard face to face...
That was the first time Treebeard learned of halflings, three feet tall mortals with hairy feet that resembled human children at first sight. And those particular two certainly behaved like children. The Ent took a liking for them and protected them for the rest of the journey. His approach changed from threatening to caring for the rest of his time with them, reciting his poems like a loving old man that treated his grandsons to bedtime stories. They sat on his shoulders as he walked them though the Fangorn forest.
"O rowen mine
I saw you shine
Upon a summer's day
Upon your head
How golden-red
The crown you bore aloft"
Treebeard remembered his gentle whispers and the long journey made the halflings doze off, hardly paying attention to his poems. But he recited them anyway, not for them, but for him as he took them to his home where he told Gandalf the white he would keep them safe.
"Beneath the roof
of sleeping leaves
and the dreams of trees unfold,
when woodland halls
are green and cool
and the wind is in the West,
Come back to me,
Come back to me,
And say my land is best."
He placed the sleeping halflings gently on the ground to go tend to other matters that needed immediate attention. Next day, he returned just in time to see his guests entrapped into the roots of an enraged tree that mistook them for intruders.
"Away with you. You should not be waking. Eat earth. Dig deep. Drink water. Go to sleep. Away with you" bellowed the Ent as the tree released the hobbits. "Come, the forest is waking up." Treebeard placed the halflings on his shoulders to walk away with them. "It isn't safe. The trees have grown wild and dangerous. Anger festers in their hearts. Black are their thoughts. Strong is their hate. They will harm you if they can. There are too few of us now. Too few of us Ents left to manage them."
"Why are there so few of you when you have lived so long? Are there Ent children?" asked Pippin.
"Broo-ra-hroom. There have been no Entings for a terrible long count of years. We lost the Entwives." said Treebeard regretfully.
"Oh, I'm sorry. How did they die?" Pippin was concerned.
"Die? No. We lost them. And now we cannot find them." Treebeard was indignant, "I don't suppose you've seen Entwives in the Shire?" He said, half hopeful.
Both shrugged their shoulders and shook their heads, "What do they look like?" asked Pippin.
"I don't remember now." The Ent whispered softly, growing silent with an air of melancholy.
Gandalf the White did not take long to arrive with his friends. He took care of the besieged foes, and therefore Treebeard knew the halflings would be safe. His guarding was no longer needed, so he walked for days until he reached the brown lands that were once a rich forest, where the Entwives used to live. Now it is no more than a wasteland deserted area. Treebeard sat at a large boulder, eyes cast down as he longed for the life that once filled that vast field. A sigh escaped his mouth, one that took a long time to be exhaled.
At the distance, the unusual sound of bark snapping echoed nearby. But he paid no heed, for he thought it was probably his mind recreating the sounds to fill the unbearable silence. He wept the passing of the ancient trees that Saruman murdered in his thirst for power and his mind of metal. His heart ached deeply with guilt that there was not enough of Ents to protect them from their fatal fate. They were his friends since they were but mere saplings, and now they were gone.
Treebeard set out to fall into a deep slumber to deal with the pain of impotence. Again the snapping sound of bark got his attention; it was too lively to be a mere memory. He turned his head but saw nothing. With eyes cast down, he accepted his defeat with resignation, when he saw a pair of rooted feet before him. Treebeard lifted his head just to face a pair of large amber eyes that blinked twice as they were fixed on his. That amber gaze was one of wondering. The head tilted sideways slowly to the sight of an exhausted Ent that looked back hopelessly. Rooted feet paced back to give Treebeard some breathing space. It took him a long time to realize there was another Ent before him. He rose from his boulder to take a better look of his companion, eyes narrowed with disbelief.
The other Ent had a body of interlaced branches, just like himself. But it had long leaves, like those of weeping willows, that cascaded down from the head branches, forming a veil of long foliage that looked like hair. The face looked like it was carved on the bark and perfectly polished to resemble the face of elves. The eyes, however, were large like Treebeard's but amber in color.
They stood in front of the other, staring at each other with curiosity for a long time. Then the other Ent finally spoke.
"I lost my husband many ages ago. I come here every month, hoping to see him. But I cannot find him" said the beautiful Ent.
"The same thing happened to me" Responded Treebeard.
"That is very unfortunate. What did your wife look like?" She asked.
"I don't remember. All I know is I used to call her Rowen" Treebeard nodded thoughtfully.
"Rowen... I know a Rowen" she was lost in thoughts, "Hmm... That's how some call me"
"It is a beautiful name to have." Treebeard did not connect the facts presented to him right away, "Do I know your husband?"
"Possibly. He was known as Treebeard" she said.
"That name sounds familiar... Come with me and I will help you find him"
The two Ents walked through the vast field of the Brown Lands to Treebeard's home, where they spent an entire month speaking in Entish, after which they both concluded they were Ents. So they had a long way to go before concluding that Rowen was an Entwife. But knowing Ents as we do, it takes them a long time to say anything in Old Entish. And they never say anything unless it is worth taking a long time to say. So hopefully after a year, they might conclude they are spouses.
The End