A/N: Here is another chapter. It was pointed out to me that I had added some wrong chapters, fifth chapter was from another story and Moira's chapter was the same as Into the darkness, it is now fixed. I am sorry that I did not answer to your reviews quicker. I discovered that I do not get notifications to my email if I get a review, follower to the story or some one has added it to their favourite list. I contacted the support, but I do not know if the fixed the problem, because I have not heard back form them. But I hope it is fixed.
But now read an enjoy.
Shadow, death, fire. Everything was burning. The great grey wave was making its way from the sea to the beach. Whisper came from behind it:
Reach out thy hand and soon thou shall understand,
what is the worth of a dying man.
He came out with a start, if strong hands would have stopped him, he would have fallen on is back.
"Easy Faramir," It was Aragorn who had placed his hands on the younger man's shoulders. "What happened?"
"A vision." Faramir stumbled a little, then caught his balance again.
Aragorn helped him sat on the wall. That moment they heard running footsteps. Legolas and Gimli stood beside Aragorn.
"What happened?" Gimli grumbled.
"Is it his wounds?" Legolas knelt and looked franticly into Faramir's eyes.
"Peace my friends, it was only a vision." Faramir waved their concern away.
"Only a vision?" Aragorn chided, "if I would not reached you in time, you would have fallen down from the wall, gwador."
"It was not…" Faramir wanted to argue but he was stopped at Aragorn's look.
"What was the vision about?" Legolas sat beside Faramir.
So, he told his friends what he had seen and heard.
"That poem again." Gimli said as he sat on the other side of the wall.
"What poem?" Legolas and Aragorn looked quizzically at their two friends.
"The one Gandalf gave to him privately, when he returned to us, a poem from Galadriel." Gimli grumbled, he looked at Faramir with accusingly.
Faramir sigh:
"Step out from the shadow's ranger,
embrace the warmness of the sun.
Long and hard is the road thou have taken,
but remember hope never leaves thee behind.
Reach out thy hand and soon thou shall understand,
what is the worth of a dying man."
"Faramir told me it right before the battle. That is why I know it." Gimli continued. Faramir knew that they all wanted to help him, but Gimli…
"Gimli, do you have siblings." He asked with little smirk.
"Beside you, no." Gimli was little confused.
"That explains why you are ratting on me; you could not do it enough when you were younger." Faramir's smirk grew larger.
"I had cousins." Gimli spluttered, then he saw Faramir's smirk and laughed loud.
"And we can see that you are a younger sibling and are trying to change the subject." Legolas raised his brow.
Faramir frowned at the elf, kept himself from muttering about pointy-ears and answered. "Gandalf told it to me in private, he told me that I needed to figure it out myself. The first part was simple. I needed to leave behind the sadness, the disappointment I had made to my father, see what was in front of me, that I was not worthless, sufficient, like my father had always made me feel. The fourth line was the one I needed to figure out myself. And it hit me right before the battle. You Aragorn are hope – Estel – thinking farther than that, all three of you are hope. And I know you would never leave me behind." He took a breath and looked them all. "But the last part is lays heavily in my soul. Who is the dying man? Is it me, or is it Boromir? I came to Rivendell to save him, but I am afraid that I may have delayed inevitable. Patterns of the future are always changing, some have not been weaved, some change, some stay the same. I have seen some many different things. I have seen Minas Tirith burn, Boromir and my father dead and then I have seen you Aragorn sit in the throne. You will become a king, but what comes with that I do not see."
"The future is ever changing, Faramir. Do not trouble yourself with the words Galadriel sent you. You will understand when time comes." Gandalf had joined them, his eyes, that had seen so many representatives from the house of Hurin, watched Faramir with kindness. "We all will die, at some point. When you came to Rivendell you may have saved Boromir and contemned your own life. Or you did not change anything in long scheme of things, or you both will live. Do not let your mind wander on the things that you cannot change just yet. We live in the time we must look forward as kingdoms, as armies. But as a person we must live a one day at a time."
The men, elf and dwarf exchanged glances. "Yes, men always will die, it is a gift of Ilúvatar, so we could do remarkable things in our lifetime. And if I should die in a battle, I know that I died among friends, brothers." Faramir placed his hands on Gimli's and Legolas' shoulders.
"Let's hope this day wound come just yet." Aragorn placed his hand on Faramir's neck, brotherly gesture, what gave comfort to the younger man.
"Well, if we must live a day at a time. Legolas lets us have a drinking game." Gimli grumbled.
"A drinking game?" Legolas was confused.
"A drinking game." Gimli had rose and headed back to the halls, Legolas followed him. Gandalf Aragorn and Faramir looked at each other shrugged and followed them. "We can talk Eomer to pour the ale and Faramir and Aragorn can be the judges."
"Why, must I always be the judge." Faramir's brows furrowed.
"Because you are more honest than the lot of them." Legolas explained, "and I would not trust Aragorn to be the judge alone."
"Why cannot I be the judge alone?" This time Aragorn was confused.
"You cheat." Came Legolas' answer.
"When did I cheat." Now Aragorn was really confused.
"Remember that game we played at Rivendell."
They all could see how Aragorn went to deep of his mind to find memory of the game what Legolas was talking about. "I was ten." He exclaimed when he remembered.
"Once a cheat always a cheat." Came Legolas singsong answer. There was laughter all around.
"Where is all the snowballs when you need them." Aragorn whispered
"You see there is much more in this world than doom." Gandalf said, when three of their companions walked a head bickering.
"I know, it just sometimes sneaks on me, most of the times after vision, what I cannot explain."
"Valar ways are strange, to not think on them now, let's join our friends."
"Gandalf, something strange is going on, I have had too many visions in short time, usually have had maybe five in a year, now I had two at the battle of Helm's deep and now?"
"Hmm." Came Gandalf answer, his brows knitted together, "I do not know the answer, maybe the Valar want to show you something. As I said their ways are strange."
Faramir stopped everything was so confusing.
"Do not think about it know. Enjoy the evening, the answer will find you at some point." Gandalf placed an arm around Faramir's shoulders and led him inside.
Gimli, Legolas, and Aragorn had already disappeared into the hall. When they caught-up Gimli had already badgered Eomer to pour the ale.
Eomer lead them all to the kegs, he gave an order to find all mugs that were not in use. Aragorn and Faramir sat near the table, to have a better look at the show.
„No pauses. No spills." Eomer fills the first mugs and hands them to the elf and dwarf.
"And no regurgitation." Gimli announced. Aragorn and Faramir both made faces, they were used to drunk men, but imagine Legolas or Gimli doing that, was little disgusting. Gandalf made his way little bit farther down the hall, where he stopped next to Theoden.
"So, it's a drinking game?" Legolas asked for confirmation, it seemed like the elf did not know what was going on. But Faramir right at that moment could read him like an open book. "Ai!" came from around them.
"Last one standing wins." Gimli confirmed. And they began. Gimli with enthusiasm, Legolas with hesitation.
"Doesn't Gimli know that only thing that gets elves properly drunk is Miruvor?" Faramir asked from Aragorn.
The other man smirked. "If he does, then he has forgotten it."
"Legolas is playing with Gimli." Faramir muttered, but he knew well, that Legolas could hear them.
"Oh, yes he is, but Gimli himself put himself to that position." Aragorn snickered. They looked on, Gimli was getting drunker and drunker.
It their fifteenth mug when Gimli proclaimed: "Here, here. It's the Dwarves that go swimming with little, hairy women."
"Could you imagine what overly drunk elf would say about female of their kind?" Faramir wondered.
"There are songs that praise the beauty of elven female." Aragorn answered, he himself had written some of those songs.
"I asked about a drunken elf, not about love struck man." He smiled warmly at Aragorn.
Aragorn laughed, they got looks from the near standing men, but they did not care.
"They would say they are fair."
"All the elves are fair, even the male."
"You got me there."
There was sly smile on Legolas' face, what disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. Faramir was sure that the elf had heard their conversation.
Suddenly he said. "I feel something. A slight tingle in my fingers. I think it's affecting me."
"What did I say? He can't hold his liquor." Gimli got it out, then his eyes went back of his head, and he fell onto the floor.
"Game over." Legolas only said. Faramir could see the mischievous glint in the elf's eye, he had enjoyed getting one upon Gimli.
"Let's get him to the room." Aragorn went and grabbed Gimli's arms and Faramir his legs.
They got Gimli into the room and on his sleeping mat.
"I will go and try to find myself some quiet corner to sleep in, I am afraid that drunk Gimli snores worse than sober one." Faramir nodded to Aragorn and Legolas.
"Good idea. Go and sleep, I will see where Gandalf is." Aragorn patted his back.
"Good dreams." Legolas said looking smilingly at sleeping Gimli, then smiled at Faramir and walked out. Gimli started snoring, no Faramir definitely was not going to sleep in that room.
The corner that Faramir found was near the door of the room, thankfully the rooms door was made from oaks and was thick enough that Gimli snores did not reach him. Faramir's dreams were unrestful, full of fire, blood, and death. Voices whispering in dark. It was hot, it felt like he was burning, there were shadows creeping around him. Then it changed he was in Minas Tirith in the Stewards office.
Boromir and his father were there. Denethor sat at the desk and Boromir stood in front of it. "I do not believe you. It explains so much." Boromir sounded like he was going out of a haze, like he just learned something he should have known before.
"What?" Denethor was confused.
"You blame him? Your youngest son, I did not believe him, when he told me that you did. It was almost ten years ago. After one of your rows, I found him in mothers garden, the garden you let everyone to abandon, to let it over grow. He told me then that you blamed him for mother's death, I laughed it off, but he was right. Now I see it. You did not even need to say, that he was blame of everything."
"Boromir," Denethor tried to interrupt his son's tirade, trying to explain, but he knew that he did not have an explanation.
"Do not father, you cannot talk your way out of this. You have been cruel, dismissive to your youngest son. Faramir loves you, cares for you, he had always been loyal to you and Gondor, whatever you did or said. Mother died when Faramir was five, his birth was nothing to do with it. You call him wizards pupil, but you do not understand why he turned to Mithrandir, uncle Imrahil or grandfather Adrahil, because all of them gave him what you did not, love and attention, when he went to Dol Amroth for a year when he was fifteen, I was afraid that he would never return, because of you" Boromir took a breath and looked Denethor with determination, "from now on, you will not blame him for things that are out of his hands. Is that clear father? Because otherwise you will not lose only him but me as well."
Denethor looked at his eldest and read from his eyes that Boromir meant it. "Yes, it is clear."
"Good, now you want me to go on a suicide mission."
He was dragged out of the dream by yells, heart piercing screams, he was on his feet when Aragorn and Legolas ran pass him, he ran after them, he knew those screams: "Pippin." The name came out more like a breath.
When he stepped into the room, Aragorn had crabbed palantír from Pippin's hands and he was falling to the floor like a puppet. Pippin laid on the floor, still. Pippin was never still, even in his sleep he moved around, now he was still. Faramir took step to the hobbit, Gandalf placed a hand on his chest. "Stay back."
He knelt beside Pippin, closed his eyes, and muttered something what Faramir could not understand. "It is not for you, Saruman!" Pippin cried in a shrill and toneless voice shrinking away from Gandalf. "I will send for it at once. Do you understand? Say just that!" Then he struggled to get up and escape, but Gandalf held him gently and firmly.
"Pippin what did you see."
"Forgive me Gandalf." Pippin whispered.
"First tell me what you saw?" Gandalf commanded gently.
"I, I took the ball and looked at it," stammered Pippin; "and I saw things that frightened me. And I wanted to go away, but I could not. And then he came and questioned me; and he looked at me, and, and that is all I remember."
"That won't do," said Gandalf sternly. "What did you see, and what did you say?"
In a low hesitating voice Pippin began again, and slowly his words grew clearer and stronger. "I saw a dark sky, and tall battlements," he said. "And tiny stars. It seemed very far away and long ago, yet hard and clear. Then the stars went in, and out-they were cut off by things with wings. Very big, I think, really; but in the glass they looked like bats wheeling round the tower. I thought there were nine of them. One began to fly straight towards me, getting bigger and bigger. It had a horrible - no, no! I cannot say.
"I tried to get away, because I thought it would fly out; but when it had covered all the globe, it disappeared. Then he came. He did not speak so that I could hear words. He just looked, and I understood.
"So, you have come back? Why have you neglected to report for so long?"
"I did not answer. He said: "Who are you?" I still did not answer, but it hurt me horribly; and he pressed me, so I said: "A hobbit."
"Then suddenly he seemed to see me, and he laughed at me. It was cruel. It was like being stabbed with knives. I struggled. But he said: "Wait a moment! We shall meet again soon. Tell Saruman that this dainty is not for him. I will send for it at once. Do you understand? Say just that!"
"Then he gloated over me. I felt I was falling to pieces. No, no! I can't say any more. I don't remember anything else."
"Look at me!" said Gandalf. "There is no lie in your eyes."
Gandalf rose and left Pippin to Faramir and Merry.
"I just was curious." Pippin gulped trying to stop tears from running.
"You know what they say about curiosity." Faramir murmured.
"I know, but…" Pippin did not finish the sentence. Faramir shook his head placed his hand on Pippin's neck and gave little squeeze.
"I know, you could not resist, and now harm came from it." He did not say "not jet," but he knew Pippin and Merry knew he had not. He sighed and moved to Aragorn, Gandalf, Legolas, Theoden and Eomer. He saw how Gandalf handed palantír to Aragorn.
"We must move. I ride ahead and take Pippin to Minas Tirith. Rest of you go Dunarrow, collect the army." He looked at Aragorn. "You must be wary; you cannot be hasty looking at that thing." Gandalf spat the last word.
"Whenever I have been hasty or unwary?" Aragorn smiled; he did not take Gandalf recommendation as an insult.
"I know. But I must head out."
Packing and preparations started quicker than Faramir had ever seen. Gandalf went and took Pippin and started to head to stables to Shadowfax. Faramir followed them with Merry.
"I will come with you."
"No, Faramir, your time is not yet come."
"Mithrandir!" It had been a long time since the last time when Faramir had used that name.
"You will have a sign when you must come, you will have it soon."
"You know something." Faramir pointed accusingly at Gandalf.
"Me? I am just an old man."
"A wizard you mean."
"Everything has its own time. Right now, you must ride with Aragorn and Theoden. When the time come, you will definitely know." Gandalf patted Faramir's shoulder, and he rose onto Shadowfax and took Pippin from Faramir's hand.
"We will see soon Faramir." Gandalf said, looked as Merry gave Pippin last of their pipeweed.
"We must go." Gandalf spurred Shadowfax on, and odd they were.
Faramir looked on as Merry ran to the walls to look their departure, he would have run after him, but saw Aragorn follow the halfling.
He let Aragorn to take care of Merry and started to saddle the horses. And then he remembered the dream, was it only a dream or a vision, what the Valar want from him, was it a sign, Gandalf would have taken him along, if it was. What was going on in Gondor, what suicide mission, damn everything.