Chapter 26: Rohan Calls For Aid

The Shieldmaiden (I)

It was a simple ceremony that marked the passing of King Théoden, Son Of Thengel, from this life into the next. There was little time for extravagance and great fanfare that could be spared in these days, but a King of Rohan was still a King, and the entirety of Edoras and the surrounding holds and hamlets had turned up on that day in their thousands, lining the road as the solemn procession wound its way from Medusheld, down to the Barrowfield. Even with the impending invasion only days from crossing the Isen, Éomer and Grimbold and several other prominent captains and nobles among the host had momentarily broken from the mustering to make haste to Edoras as soon as they heard the news, to come to honor their fallen King.

No-one said a single word, save for only Éowyn herself; at long last they reached the freshly dug barrow when, unable to contain herself, she burst out with song – a traditional funerary lament of the Rohirrim – in a final farewell to the uncle who had been as a father to her. Whatever he had become in his last years, Théoden would be forever remembered as the strong but kindly man he had once been, his long golden hair and beard billowing in the winds that blew across the plains of Rohan.

Or at least that's how she would try to remember him. If she was being honest with herself, it would be hard to rid her mind of that horrid sight of him last night, in his bed, his once-handsome face, already wrought and rutted with the ravages of age and disease, now bloodied as well. It was of little comfort to hear from the healer that it had at the very least been a quick and painless death.

It still filled her with unspeakable rage to think of that traitor Grima, first Wormtongue, now Kingslayer. After they had seized him at the scene of his deplorable crime, the King's body still warm, and after the Prince had finally calmed down having taken out the better part of his rage upon the Kingslayer's back, that was when they had proceeded to search him and his quarters too. The articles they had found, the numerous letters and the seals and other implements that bore the mark of the White Hand, was damning enough evidence, even when the Wormtongue denied that any of it was his at all.

Even those men in the Golden Hall who had been known to have been in Grima's employ were shocked and appalled at this revelation, and Théodred had angrily summoned them all before the court this morning and commanded that they, as penitence for not knowing of their master's treachery, now join the host that was being hastily marshaled at Edoras. For having served the man who had left the realm bare and without shield, it was the least they could do now to give their lives for her defense.

The sun was now setting over the White Mountains to the west, but it would be as yet a few hours before darkness fell. Éowyn, still dressed in her black gown of mourning, came out once more to pay her final respects to the King, and it was there that she found her cousin, standing alone by himself, beside the tomb. He noticed her as she approached.

"Simbelmynë," began Théodred quietly, fondling one of the small, delicate white flowers in his hands, "ever has it covered the tombs of my grandfather, and his father before him. Now it will cover my father... and perhaps, myself too soon enough." Abruptly, he opened his hand and let the little flower fall to the ground. "At least he did not live to see the final days of our House," he continued, bitterly, "no, that burden now falls upon my shoulders."

"Even in his final years, your Father was beloved by us all," said Éowyn, stepping forward, "his death was not of your making."

"No, but it was!" blurted the Prince, "I failed to see Grima's treason for what it was. I should have found out about his dealings with the White Wizard long ago. I should have seen through his deceit and manipulation, through the poison he was feeding father day after day, year after year!"

"Then we all are to blame, each of us in equal part," she replied, sternly, "you, myself, Éomer, Háma, Grimbold and Elfhelm and everyone else in Edoras as well. We all knew of Grima's lies, knew of him as Wormtongue. But none of us could have known that he would have gone so far as he did."

Théodred, however, did not seem to hear any of these words as he slowly sank to his knees beside the tomb, one hand clutching the epitaph that marked the entrance to it. "Father," he began, the tears now pouring in small rivulets down his cheek, "I know what I must do... but... but I do not know... if I have the... the strength to do it."

Éowyn stepped forward and knelt beside her cousin, laying a hand upon his shoulder. "Théodred, brother, listen to me. Let us not remember how he died. Let us remember how he lived. Your father's spirit will ride eternal, resplendent and golden, through the halls of our forefathers. All that matters now is what we few who remain here choose to do with the rest of the time we have upon this earth. And there is much left to be done. I need you. Éomer needs you. We all need you more than ever before, King Théodred, Son Of Théoden!"

She bent down, and picked up the small white flower he had dropped earlier. It had landed on the grass and not on the mud, and so it was still clean and perfect. She gently placed the Simbelmynë back into her cousin's hands. "If these truly are to be our final days," she began, "all I ask of you is that you make Isengard pay and pay dearly... for every step they take into our land, and for every son or daughter of Rohan whose blood is on their hands."

The King Of Rohan stood there silent for a moment, looking into her eyes. And then, he stood up, and wiped the tears from his eyes with his other hand. "Saruman will pay for this treason," he growled, as grief and misery slowly seemed to fade to solemn determination and sense of purpose.

"Yes, that I promise you we will," she replied rising to her feet, "now come; my brother needs to speak with you at once." And with that, she led the King back up the path to the waiting gates of Edoras.

Faramir (I)

"FORWARD, MEN! FOR GONDOR!" shouted Faramir, astride his horse, as he pointed his sword forward.

"FOR GONDOR!" came the call as two hundred other men ahorse followed his lead, and set off at a gallop, hundreds of steel-shorn hooves pounding the earth beneath it in a thunderous clamor that could have shaken the walls of the Rammas Echor behind them.

"Ready..." muttered Faramir under his breath as he saw the target coming up, "ready... HALT!"

At his command, the trumpeter who rode beside him blew as hard as he could the signal to halt, and two hundred horses began to slow down, first to a canter, and then to a complete halt.

"DISMOUNT!" shouted Faramir. The trumpeter relayed the command to the rest of the column. Within moments, hundreds of men were rushing to slide off their mounts, and then hurry forwards to a spot some twenty feet in front of them. With the discipline that was characteristic of Gondor's professional armies, they quickly formed two ranks, the first kneeling in front, and the second standing just behind them.

"PRESENT ARMS!"

Each of the men wore simple boiled leathers, light and functional, atop of which was a green and brown cloak, and a thick leather belt from which hung a longsword. But these were not the arms to which Faramir was referring to, but actually the ones they carried slung to their backs with a leather strap. Upon his orders, the men all reached behind, unslung these long-arms from their shoulders, and, gripping them tightly in both hands, presented them.

"TAKE AIM! ... FIRE!"

Click-click-click-click-click-click-click came the response. Two hundred men pulled back the triggers on their fire-arms, but not one shot was fired. There were no bullets being used in today's training exercise.

"STOP!" shouted the captain who stood beside Faramir, a fellow Ranger by the name of Mablung. He took a close look at the small, round, mechanical time-keeping device he carried he held in his right hand, yet another gift of the Sky-Peoples. "Thirty seconds between the order to dismount, and the volley," he muttered, "that is our best time yet."

"Well done, men," spoke up Faramir, raising his voice so all nearest him could hear, "at ease. We shall break for five minutes and resume after then. Dismissed."

The training of the Dragoons so far had been going as well as could be hoped. Many of them, Faramir himself included, were Rangers Of Ithelien selected to help train the rest of the dragoons in the hit-and-run tactics that prior to the reformation and reorganization of the First Army Of Gondor, only the Rangers were known for. Due to the pressing need for both skilled horsemen and experienced officers among the ranks, a number of Dol Amrothi knights had also been transferred to the Dragoons; these mounted nobles had taken issue to this at first, complaining about being made to fight among many commoners, and using most inelegant and uncivilized weapons and cowardly tactics. But the General Boromir had been clear and firm in his decisions that few were prepared to challenge, and many a voice were quietened down once the full power of these weapons had been aptly demonstrated on the firing range.

Gondor had given much to the Sky-People and their new colony they named Beautiful Horizon over the last few months, in terms of yeomen and craftsmen to work their forges and fields, food provisions, and knowledge too, but the exchange had at least been two-ways, and they had received much in return: there were of course these rifles that were called the "Martini-Henry" and all the boxes filled with the bullets for them, various forms of footwear and articles of clothing, various mundane but useful tools and implements, medicines, detailed maps and regular exchanges of information on Mordor's latest movements, and various small but contraptions like that boxlike device that could enable one to speak across great distances to another similar box that was called a "radio".

Of course, at first, they had had little to no idea on how to use many of these items properly. To this end, the Sky-People had sent a few of their own to the White City, including a couple of their warriors to help train and show a handful of men how to use them. Once these few men were adequately trained, they would then go off and train the rest of the army themselves. Faramir had had numerous occasions to sit and dine with these men, like the one named Sergeant Esteban, Son Of Rico, and Frank, Son Of Harris, and to talk to them and trade many great tales. He would tell them of Gondor and its glorious history, and they in turn would tell him of their own homelands, the one they called simply "Earth". Faramir had to admit he had found some of their stories of the sheer scale and devastation of the wars they fought back on their world to be simply unbelievable, on the level of the legends told of the First and Second Ages, except that the weapons that fought these wars were the works of mere ordinary Men...

"My lord!" called out a courier, riding with haste up to Faramir's side, "Sir! The general has ordered your immediate presence."

Leaving command of the Dragoons under Captain Mablung, Faramir remounted his steed and galloped off back towards the city in the distance. Just within the eastern Causeway Gate of the Rammas Echor was located the main camp of the First Army Of Gondor (though there were three smaller satellite camps – one at the North Gate, facing Anorien, one at Harlond to the south, and one back at the city of Minas Tirith itself).

In all, some ten thousand men had been raised for the First Army, mainly from the Kingdom's prior hosts in this region, as well as several thousand new levies raised from the citizenry of the surrounding area. Separate from the First Army, the Southern Army Of Gondor was also undergoing a program of reorganization, although nowhere near as extensive as the one Boromir was pursuing; that task had been left jointly to Prince Imrahil of Dol Amroth and to the Lord of Pelargir.

In the distance, he could hear the dull pom pom pom of the artillery company who were busy training with one of those cannons called a "12-pounder Napoleon", named after a certain king of the Sky-People who had once been a mighty but ambitious conqueror. There had been some considerable resistance at first to the adoption of the Napoleons, especially from those who found the new weapons to be ugly and noisy and lacking in any of the grace and finesse of the trebuchets of Minas Tirith. But the General and the Steward Of Gondor both had been firm in their decision that there was to be an artillery corps, and as had been the case with the rifles, resistance and resentment gradually subsided as the gun crews settled into their new routine and everyone grew accustomed to the sight and sound of them.

It was a large and crowded camp that required some navigation to make his way through, but at last he arrived at the main command tent. Two pikemen stood guard at either end (even with the latest shipment of rifles and cannons from the Beautiful Horizon, the bulk of the army was still composed of spears and swords and would likely still remain so by the time Mordor finally made its move); these men saluted Faramir as he entered. Inside, he found his brother, seated at the table, looking over the various letters and maps spread out before him. He looked so different from the brother Faramir had known for years before; it seems that the last few months had really changed him.

"His Majesty King Théoden lives no more," began Boromir, grimly, "his son, the Prince Théodred, has assumed the kingship of Rohan."

"May his soul rest with his forefathers," said Faramir, bowing his head in respect, "how did it happen?"

Boromir frowned as he read over the letter. "King Théoden had taken sickly as of late, but from what it appears, the final blow came about by the hand of a traitor from Isengard." He looked up to look directly into his brother's eyes. "How do you find the Dragoons Of Ithelien?"

"We have been able to bring our maneuver to just about thirty seconds," he replied, "do you mean to send us to Rohan's aid?"

"Aye," replied Boromir, "according to Lord Teller, Isengard is marching against Rohan as we speak with an army numbering about 15,000 or so. They will make the Fords Of Isen in three days' time, and from there it's an open march straight to Edoras."

"And what forces has King Théoden mustered to meet this threat?" asked Faramir.

Boromir shook his head. "Thanks to Isengard's treachery and influence from within, Rohan has been able to muster hardly a tenth of their total cavalry forces. They may be able to raise another thousand or so horsemen and a few thousand peasant levies in what little time they have left, but that's not the worst of it. The White Wizard has been developing fire-arms of his own – nothing like ours, they are non-rifled, muzzle-loading, and fire a simple lead ball, but they have many of them, and the Rohirrim are ill-prepared to face such a force."

"If Isengard has this technology, then it stands to reason that the White Wizard may have shared it with his new master as well," cautioned Faramir. They were already terribly outnumbered by the forces of Mordor as it was; the thought of those endless hordes brandishing fire-arms of their own was not a particularly pleasant one, even if they were far weaker in firepower and range and accuracy than the ones the First Army had acquired in great number from the Sky-People.

Boromir nodded grimly in agreement with his brother's assessment. "But whether or not that is the case, that will have to wait. The situation in Rohan is far more pressing at this time. I have spoken with the Sky-People, and they have agreed to lend us the use of one of their great flying Valkyrie-ships to transport five-hundred men and their weaponry to Edoras. We cannot take horses, however; one horse takes the space of six men, and may be prone to panic during the sky journey. You will have to acquire new mounts in Rohan."

"Brother, the Rohirrim have the finest horses in all the earth, but they are not trained to be accustomed to the smell and noise of gunfire, as ours have been carefully over these last few weeks."

"Which is why you will need to appoint riders of Rohan to join your force and keep the horses in check whilst your men fight on foot," replied the General of the White Tower, firmly, "you must be ready to leave by tomorrow at dawn. I have already spoken to the quartermaster, and munitions and other supplies will be taken care of."

"It will be done, brother," replied Faramir, "I will inform the captains. The Dragoons shall be ready to depart at dawn. I will not fail you, brother... nor our father."

Boromir stood up and laid his right hand upon his brother's shoulder: "this decision was mine and mine alone. Your force is the best prepared we have at this moment. Worry yourself not about impressing myself or father; you are my brother, and whether or not father shares this view, that matters little to me. No, worry instead about failing the people of Rohan; it's their lives that now depend upon you."