He dreamt that he was surrounded by darkness, except for a knife on the ground between him and Rathien. She stepped on it, and he was wrenched out of her arms, sailing away backwards through the air until he hit something cold and hard with his skull. Then he woke up.

Rathien was in the room, frantically shaking Boromir. Hedregon knew that he and his brothers were practically identical, but this would be too comical to pass by, so Hedregon quietly watched the scene from across the room.

"Hedregon," Rathien was saying, "I had a terrible dream." By now Boromir was awake and looking at the shadow in front of him. None of them could see that well in the dark. "You were there," she continued, "but you kept telling me to break something, and when I did you flew away!" She threw her arms around Boromir's neck and wept.

Now Hedregon pitied them both, so he pretended to yawn and wake up from the noise. "Rathien?" he questioned.

Rathien jolted, suppressing a scream. "Hedregon . . . you . . . who is that?" She finally said, pointing at the bed.

"Hedregon?" Boromir gasped, "I though I would never see you again! How are you?" Then he remembered. "Hedregon . . . you shouldn't be here. It isn't safe! And who is she?"

"This is Lisiael," Hedregon introduced. Rathien looked horrified at what had just happened. "And, Rathien, this is my other brother, Boromir."

"Aha!" Boromir breathed, "So it was Faramir who brought you here. I suppose you have heard the entire account of my meeting with Bevolen?"

"What else would have brought me into this trap of a city? Oh, never mind all of this. I want to go to sleep."

In the morning, Boromir woke Hedregon up early, inviting Hedregon to join him on his rounds. Hedregon accepted, but inquired where Rathien was.

"She has been up for quite some time now," Boromir explained, "with Denethor. He enjoys her company, and she his. It is actually quite comical to see the two together."

Hedregon laughed and followed his brother to his post. "What drove you to the extreme measure with Bevolen?"

Boromir sighed, "He was pushing around his younger sister, as usual. She works in the palace, so I ordered her inside as an excuse for her to get away from Bevolen. She actually didn't seem that happy about it, but obliged. Bevolen was furious. He called out, and Sircyn and he cornered me by the gates. Then they started telling me things about you, things I don't know are true and if they are I didn't know."

"What things did they say?" Hedregon urgently interrupted.

"I do not wish to repeat them here."

"Boromir!"

"Bevolen told me that his sister was going to have a baby, and that it was to be yours."

"What?!"

"He said that before 'you' killed all of those people you planned on killing his sister so that no news would get around."

"What?!"

"His sister hates you, Hedregon. There is no doubt she would stand by whatever her brother said. She has more than one reason to do so."

"Who is this girl?"

"A servant in our house. I take it then that this is not true?"

"Boromir!"

"Pardon my asking, brother. I shall at least tell you the rest of my tale, then. Bevolen started telling me about two children, two brothers. He said that they had been pupils of yours and that you had betrayed them; their parents were murdered in the massacre last year. He laughed, saying that he was raising them on his own now, and that they would grow up to hate you and find you and kill you."

"Gediwer . . . Rojwer." Hedregon breathed. He had to get them away from Sircyn and Bevolen. No wait, Bevolen was dead; just Sircyn.

"Hedregon are these children real? Are you acquainted with them?" Boromir asked sternly.

"Pardon, brother, but I must leave!" Hedregon cried, and ran off towards the city.

Too late; he knew he was from the time he started running. Through the streets and alleys, back to the one place he had never wanted to go again: the house of Sircyn. Bevolen would have taken great pleasure in shaping Gediwer and Rojwer into hateful minds and powerful bodies, but Bevolen was dead.

The house was still as if nothing could breathe in it. Hedregon felt as though every time he exhaled, he brought fresh air into the stale air that already occupied every corner of the house. Old, rotting wood made up the entire structure, including the furniture and every object in it. Hedregon entered the bedroom.

Rojwer was in the middle of the room, sprawled out across the straw mattress and Gediwer was on the floor next to him; both of them, dead.

Hedregon knew it was the inevitable. All the same, he bent down and picked up each boy, one in each arm. Gediwer was ten years old when Hedregon had left; he must now be eleven. Always trying to make people laugh, never taking anything seriously and loving his life the way it was; the only thing Gediwer had ever taken seriously was taking care of his older brother. Rojwer was handicapped, fifteen - sixteen now - but with a child- like mind. He saw what was true in everything, and although younger in thoughts than his brother, he was much more serious. He rarely spoke, and when he did it was brilliant. Most people, including his parents, had thought that Rojwer was an idiot, but he saw and understood more than anyone Hedregon knew.

In a robotic state, Hedregon carried his two young friends far out of the city, and there he dug them a hole where they would hopefully be safer from this cruel world. He laid their small bodies down into it, and noticed that Rojwer's shoulders had been broadening. He was turning into a man without even knowing it, probably. Rojwer had rarely noticed himself. Hedregon covered the grave with dirt, and watered it with his tears as if it would bring them back to life.

It wasn't even until Hedregon had gone back into the palace through Faramir's tunnel that he thought how mechanically he had preformed the task of burying Rojwer and Gediwer. He didn't weep any more, though. He did not want for Lisiael to see him and he wanted instead to repay Sircyn for the horrifying murder of two innocent boys. This was unlike Hedregon to no extent, to want revenge, and he couldn't figure out why he did now.

He went into the washroom and took off his shirt, throwing it into the fireplace before submerging his arms in the water basin and swirling them around. He didn't want dead boy on him. He didn't want to be able to carry around the fact that he had barely any friends, and now two of them were dead.

Hedregon found a new shirt and put it on as Boromir entered the room.

"Who are these children, Hedregon?" Boromir asked.

"They're dead."

"Dead?!" Boromir exclaimed.

"It's all your fault, you know," Hedregon said, trying to make it a joke.

"My -"

"I'm kidding. Sircyn poisoned them. I don't blame you."

"Hedregon," Boromir said, reaching to put his arm around his brother's shoulder, "I am so sorry. I didn't think that killing Bevolen would hurt you."

Hedregon shrugged away from his brother's embrace and mumbled "it's fine," before leaving the room.