Dunland, 3019, February
"Who goes there?" – came the challenge in Common.
Halbarad knew that he did not have to issue any orders. His men knew what to do. He eyed the challenger instead. The man looked like a typical - if less scruffy than usual - Dunlander which –considering that they were riding through Dunland - was not exactly shocking. What could be surprising was the asking first, attacking later. Dunlendings were nor exactly enamoured with Rangers.
"Rangers" – he replied in the same tongue.
"Show star!"
That was new! Halbarad pulled aside a fold of the cloak to show the emblem.
"Ride on. At fallen log turn right. Ride straight to the camp. The challenge is "Silent death", reply is "Helm".
That was shocking. Not the challenge and reply, but the invitation. Was this the war band of his eccentric cousin, Aravir? Now led by one of his half-breed sons?
.
"So you want me to ride with the Grey Company because my father was a Ranger, a Dunedain. So - if I ride with you - can I become a Ranger? Will I be accepted as one of the Dunedain? Would my sons be trained as Rangers? Could they court your granddaughters?"
"Aragorn needs you. The foresight of the great Elven Lords says this mission is of utmost importance to the whole of Arda ... "
"Elf talk. Twenty eight, thirty or thirty one - does not matter. I'm not going."
"You are denying your Numenorian heritage."
Thiriston exploded.
" How dare you! Get the fuck out of here! Be gone from my camp. You treat me like worthless orc filth, not fit to live in the Angle or be a Ranger, and yet you say I'm abandoning my "Numenorian heritage." He spat out the last two words.
"Maybe my bothers are too thick skulled to notice, but it is YOU who are denying us our Numenorian heritage. You are aware that by birthright I'm Aragorn's heir? That I have the right to show up at a Council meeting?"
He knew well that his father had renounced the claim. He understood the reasons. Even if he did not care much about the Dunedain that would die in the strife should he ever challenge for the chieftainship, he had no intention of getting himself killed in such a doomed-to-fail endeavour.
Halbarad's impassive face twitched as in physical pain .
"Would you stand by me then?! By my ... " – he was getting a rise from making Halbarad squirm – "my Numenorian heritage?"
"After this expedition many attitudes might change ... "– Thiriston interrupted the older man.
"This means you won't change! I'll still be a half-orc mongrel, a shame to the Dunedain!" The honker spat on the ground in front of the older Ranger.
He waved his hand at his band, the Dunlendings curious about the yelling in the elfish tongue.
"They stand by me. They hint at me taking their sisters as an underwife. That'd be an honour for them. They respect me. They don't care that my mother came from some cave near Gundabad. You care. You deny me my Dunadan birthright. You want a sword, a strong arm and no brain behind it. Once it's done I'll be told to get my stinking half-orc ass out of wherever you are going. Scoot!"
The Ranger turned and walked back to the Grey Company camp.
"And if my brothers won't come back I'll hang you by your guts!" – Halbarad expected this to be last thing he'd hear from Thiriston this day. He was wrong. A sarcastic sneer of
"Cousin!" – caught up with him.
()()()()()()()()()()
"Thiriston, we understand your reasons. Please understand ours. You were right saying that we'll never be accepted. But by going with them we get a chance to avenge ourselves on the Master of those who killed Father."
The eldest sighed.
"Still my brothers ... I still think you should stay in the North. But ride on with my blessing. Just don't let that stone faced piece of scum use you as arrow catchers to save "pure Numenor blood".
They hugged in a brotherly embrace before the younger duo mounted their steeds and rode south.
()()()()()()()()()()
"I keep on wondering if Thiriston wasn't right. This is not our fight. Do you think legend will speak of us?" he adopted the style of a bard -
"Lo and behold, the Grey Company rode from the North. Led by Halbarad, merry like a graveyard, where gallant Pig-Squeal shared the fire with Out of his Pants the Fair, and Squirrel-Foot of sword mastery vied for glory with Ass Crack the Unwashed ... " he stopped, while his bother snickered.
"Do you think the song would say something about heroic half orc brothers, strong of arm and keen of blade?"
"Meh" he spat into the fire.
.
"Now, if that wasn't a stink eye ... " Gronguron remarked.
"I fart in his general direction. Whoever it was." Hastogur yawned, his eyes still closed. "Who was it this time?"
"One of the sons of Elrond."
"Give me the creeps ... I feel them watching me, as if waiting for a wrong move and to pounce on me ... "
"Same here. Bonkers, the two of them. Ma was raped by Orcs and Haladin and we don't spend all our time with hands in orc or Hillmen guts. And they've been doing that for what – half a thousand years? Sweet Elbereth, nutters, if you ask me ... "
.
The mention of their mother made Hastogur make a connection with elves.
"Remember the elves that killed Ma? They were kinda .. shiny like ... and looked different. Fox like faces, not round mugs like those two ... and they've got more meat on the bones ... "
"They're mongrels like us ... we can't smell or see in the dark for shit, seems they didn't get the shininess thingy "– Gronguron twisted to find a more comfy position by the fire.
"Maybe they could scrimshaw ... soothes nerves, they say ... "
.
Gronguron and Hastogur – advised to give the other half-breeds a wide berth, slowly made their acquaintance with the Rangers. This was not so easy, as they got up in the pre-dawn murk of the short February day, rode all day in cloaks, and made camp in the post sunset murk of the short February day. Most were unhappy to discover that "Avarir's get" were as fluent in Sindarin as they were and – if they wanted to speak around them – they had to switch to Quenya. If they knew it, that is. Most of the Dunedain treated them with aloofness, making it clear that they wished to have the least contact possible with them.
"Imagine the shit Ma must have got ... "
Once their identity spread around the Company they were accosted by a giant of a man, a Ranger called Nightingale, or 'Nighty for short. He smothered them both in a hug.
"First orc I ever saw was your mum. My first patrol, she saved my ass more times than I count. Good old Ear put her on the "keep the greenhorn alive" detail. Meaning – me." He explained, clearly emotional.
He added that of the six boys he graduated with, three died on their first patrol. He firmly ascribed his survival to Ashtuzual keeping his back.
"You are as alive as the guy keeping your back" seemed to be a favourite saying of his, and he offered to keep an eye on theirs. He told them – and they hang on his every word – of his ranging with their mother. As this had been his first patrol he could give them an almost day for day account of events. They adored him for this. He, in turn, asked them about details of her further life. Not a letter writing man, and always patrolling somewhere else than around Bree, he rarely caught snippets of news about Lil'l Liver. And he kept on putting off a visit.
"Stupid elven like mentality. A body keeps on forgetting that not everybody lives over a hundred. I'll never forgive myself for not visiting... "
.
They spoke with 'Nighty on how they had used to go patrols with the Rangers for ten years or so. Of the hopes they used to have - that they'll be Rangers like their father. Even if their sire – gently – and older brother – flatly and venomously – said that it was very unlikely. Nonetheless their father had added them to Ranger patrols through the old boy network.
"We were kinda dense I suppose. We couldn't grasp that for the Numenors, err, the Dunedain there's a difference whether our mother was an Orc or Dunlander or Haladin or whatever. Tarkil's maternal grandfather ran with the Rangers, half breed he was, Tarkil's sons were in Ranger training at that time even though they had less Dunadan blood than us - or the Olwina and Beleguron's boys we've been told about. So why not us? After all the Dunlendings we grew up around us did not care. Or if they did, the fact that we are the sons of the Numenor Lord outweighed it. And from the Dunlending boys we got stories that either their grandpa looked odd, with pointed ears, or that family legend says that great-grandma had yellow eyes. That was our reference point. Not some pure blood shit."
"Thiriston was brighter than we are – Ma's death opened his eyes. The fact that she openly rode the breadth and length of Little Dunland was an accident - the outcome of this being Little Dunland and of her being the "friendly Numenor lord's" wife. It was the elf fucker and his arrow which are the norm, and not what we grew around with."
Nightingale could only nod.
"Sucks. As to the other thing - a pity you never got to patrol with me. Too young to be a patrol leader at that time- I had barely over twenty years of ranging at that time. Became a leader only a few years ago. Strawberry, now that's a high flyer, a wonder you didn't run into him. Made patrol leader the soonest possible and he's been given acting lieutenant posts already."
The giant was amused to learn that they were now kinsmen by marriage with Strawberry.
"Fancy that -he chuckled.
.
"We were on a patrol, '05 or '06 it must've been, the Rangers seemed friendly enough, we had liberated a wineskin, we were talking 'bout various things 'round the fire. This dreamy boy here" – Hastogur pointed his chin at his brother – "started waxing lyrical on the beauty of Dunedain girls. Elbereth, did the mood go to Mordor fast! We were immediately told that if we got our filthy half-orc cocks within sniffing distance of Dunedain cunny we'd be sporting our ripped off dicks out of our ears."
Nightingale nodded with sympathy. He himself was courting and was not approved off by the father. But now, his niece, Nimbes, with Gronguron or Hastogur ... a mental GULP ... he liked the lads well enough, but Nimbes and one of them ... Hastogur in particular, with his yellow eyes, pointed ears and flat nose ... he'd feel uneasy about it ... but if that was what Nimbes wanted ... he'd have to live with it, he supposed. But still he felt uneasy about it.
()()()()()()
3019 TA, 6th March, Hornburg Castle.
"Aragorn, I must speak with you".
"Uhm, Halbarad?"
"Why did you allow for things to come to this? For that half-orc to tell me that is your Heir?"
Aragorn had expected Aravir to have explained to his sons that he had renounced his claim to the Heritage of Isildur, so Halbarad telling him of Thiriston raising this question made him a bit worried. Was his dawdling over announcing this fact going to bite him in the arse after all?
He shrugged. There was nothing he could do about it now. The way things were going it would not matter either way.
"Honker. Not half-orc." – he corrected his interlocutor automatically – "He is and he isn't the Heir. It is complicated. It is not a matter for here and now. Doesn't matter – if the Ringbearer's quest fails and I fall, in two years time the Orcs'll wipe out the Angle regardless of who is Chieftain – or if there is one at all. If the Ringbearer succeeds, I will then have heirs off my own body."
"And what if the Ringbearer succeeds YET you fall? The Angle will reject the half-orc, the honker - as you call him - as Chieftain. And then what – civil war?"
Aragorn smiled.
"Have more faith in me, my friend." And patted Halbarad on the shoulder.
"I'm not called Estel for nothing."
.
"My brothers, please, give them peace." – Aragorn asked his foster-bothers. "We are on the same side. At least ignore them."
.
"Fifteen ... ten years ago we'd have kissed your boots. Today? Today we'll follow you as kinsmen, not as Chieftain, uncle."
()()()()()()
Gronguron was wounded at the Pellenor and stayed at the House of Healing in Minas Tirith. Hastogur rode on to the Black Gate.