Part XII

Imperishable

The waning moon rose near midnight. Pippin saw it through the bottom edge of his tent cloth. It came over the dunes like a silver bow, bright yet not bright enough to silence the stars. He went over rhymes of lore in his head:

Hungry was Tilion, a hunter
He sought Arien's bright smile
Their courtship was a chase
A secret kiss they share

He rolled onto his back and stared at the patterns on the roof of his tent, changing in the dim lamplight.

He sat up and told the tent, "I can't sleep." The tent did not reply.

He rose and donned his vest. He tucked his dagger into his breeches and his pipe in his vest pocket and went for a walk. As ever the stars shone with a clear light on the whitened dunes, and even the weak and wandering moon cast shadows in his eyes.

Pippin circled through the camp. He paused at a fire where some men were gathered, smoking and drinking, and gratefully accepted some pipeweed and a sip of coffee. He went to the physicians' tent, but Bangshar was sleeping, as were the nurses. Bangshar was almost well; he had walked about camp today, and hale enough to offer his services to Hoz for the coming war. Pippin wondered why Bangshar would do that. Hadn't he been through enough? He wanted to ask him, but not now.

He left the physicians' tent and walked long until he reached the Medzhai camp. He nodded back at the guards, and asked if Hoz was awake. No, he was told. The prophet's son was abed. Was there anything the traveler needed?

"No, thank you, I'm fine," Pippin replied.

He went further out to the paddock to see Swallow, but the willful filly was either deep in slumber or ignoring him. Pippin suspected the latter, but gave up trying to rouse her.

At the edge of the camp he paused, and then climbed a dune to its crest, and there plunked himself down, finding himself with a view north from horizon to horizon. The desert ergs that lapped up against the massif of Gar bet-Eria stretched north as far as he could see. Somewhere beyond the edge of sand was Umbar. In his imagination he saw himself flying over the great city's domes and minarets and over the bay of Belfalas, past Tolfalas with its granaries, Dol Amroth and the castle of the Prince upon the shore, past Pelargir on Ethir Anduin up the river and round the bend to the White City shining above the Pelennor. Under the bridge of Osgiliath, up the Falls of Rauros, to Lothlorien … across the Misty Mountains … Rivendell … the Lone-lands … Bree … Buckland. Would Merry be waiting at the Gate?

Across the Brandywine Bridge, and into the Shire. Taste the beer at Stock. Best in the Eastfarthing. Would Fatty be throwing a party at Budge Hall?

Would there be a party this year beneath the mallorn in the party field? Sam threw the best parties; or, rather, Rosie, at Sam's behest. When was the 22nd of September? Had he missed it? What month was it? How long had he been gone? How much longer would he be away? Was it months, or years?

Through the Green Hill Country, through Tuckborough with its many-colored shutters … to Great Smials, its windows glittering up the hillside. Would the Great Door open for him?

Would there be a puff of smoke coming from the Thain's study?

Would a little child be walking when he saw him again, and would he walk to him if he stretched out his hands; would he call him "dad" … would he ever again dance with a girl as hard and precious as a jewel …

Gandalf was right. He was a fool.

He saw Zeah walking up the slope of the dune to join him. She was in a loose robe and a long dress she used for sleeping. Her hair was lightly bound by a sheer veil.

"Is something wrong?" he asked first.

"I woke and now do not feel like sleeping," she replied. "There is lightning in the air—can you feel it?"

Pippin tried, but shook his head. "I guess I can't. I'd be happy to keep you company, though."

"Yes," she said simply. "Are you not cold?"

Pippin shook his head. "Not really." The air was indeed chill, but he liked it. "I've seen real cold," he said, thinking of the Redhorn Pass. "This is actually quite pleasant."

"Have you ever seen snow?"

He smiled. "Yes, I have. Many times."

"I see." She traced a shape into the sand between them, and erased it with her palm. "What is it like?"

He smiled and told her, "Like the fall of butterfly wings; that's the best kind of snow."

"Are there others?"

Hard snow, freezing snow, wet snow, slurries, sleet … "That's the only kind I care to think about."

"I have never seen it," she said. "My uncle used to say that the Grey Mountains to the west have snow in winter. Perhaps one day I shall journey there."

"Or you could come visit me." Pippin's hand drifted to hers and clasped it. "It doesn't snow often in my country, but when it does, it is something I think everyone should see."

Zeah looked down at him. Pippin's breath caught in his throat.

"I love you," he told her.

"Do not say that and then leave," she replied.

"Then I won't leave."

She laughed at him. "Would you stay?"

Pippin thought about his father, his wife, and his son. And he also saw Merry, folding his arms.

" … If I could," he answered.

She smelled of pepper and cinnamon. Her lips tasted like cucumber. With a small tug of her fingers, she let her veil slip down, showing her hair.

It was Pippin who chose to pull away before they went any further.

"Why does this happen to me?" he asked her with a pained laugh. "Why here? Why now? Why not there, and why not then?"

Zeah came up against him, resting her chin upon his head. Pippin leaned into her neck and pressed his cold cheek to her warm throat.

"I first met you in a dream I had," he whispered to her, "and I thought you were her. I thought you were Diamond."

A tremor ran through her. He looked up. She was smiling slightly, and shaking her head. "What is it?" he asked.

"Do you still wish to learn what 'Almas' means?"

He didn't know what this was about, but nodded. Of course he did.

"It means diamond," she said.

He backed away, his fingers digging into the sand, regarding her in confusion and wonder. "What?"

"Oh, Pippin," she said with a shake of her head, seeming both amused and aggrieved. "Do you not see?" She took his hand and pressed it. "You don't truly love me. Only how much you wish me to be her."

"That's not true! You're nothing alike!"

"No?" And for a moment, in her arch, knowing look and the way she held herself, he did see Diamond.

"No," he said, rallying. "You're a woman and she's a hobbit. You're dark and she's pale. You're …"

Proud, he found himself about to say, and there it was. Proud and cold and hard on the surface, because that was how she survived. With a sudden clarity Pippin finally comprehended Diamond of Long Cleeve.

"Oh," he said. "Oh."

He withdrew. Zeah wrapped her arm around his neck, her veil caressing the skin of his shoulders.

"No matter how you think you love me, you will always see her," Zeah said. "I don't want that, Pippin, for me, or for you. You must find where you belong."

"I hope it sends me directions," he joked helplessly. "Because I can't find it on my own."

"You will," Zeah answered firmly. "You will find it if you let it find you."

They sat with each other as the moon climbed over snow-white sands.

"What are you thinking?"

"Too many things. I shouldn't think so hard. I'm not made for it. I think my head is beginning to hurt."

"Poor thing."

"Don't make fun of me because I'm stupid."

Zeah laughed and began to hum, and sway, and sing. To their surprise, a voice answered her, taking up her melody and making of it a deep and special music full of longing and of beauty. Seeking its source Pippin spotted the black-robed figure of Maglor some distance away, his harp in his hand.

"Listen to that," Pippin said.

"The Elf?" Zeah asked, the first time she had used the word.

Pippin smiled. "Yes."

"It is wonderful," she admitted, and got to her feet.

She held out her hands to him. "Dance with me, Pippin."

"What, me? Now?"

"Yes, you. Now."

He took her hands and let her lift him to his feet. Then he let go and she flashed a grin and skipped ahead, dancing down the dune to the notes of the elven song. Her veil rippled in the breeze with her hair, and Pippin's heart quickened with delight, and he propelled himself down the slope, crowing as he leapt and tumbled in a sparkling avalanche of sand. Zeah took his hand again and they spun around, laughing, jumping, moving, to the melody. And then the wind shifted and somewhere nearby the dunes themselves began to chime.

2.

The next day Pippin was awoken by a messenger boy and told that Hoz sought his presence as soon as possible.

When he arrived at the chief's pavilion, the leaders of the tribes and Medzhai captains were dispersing with faces grave, troubled, excited, or fierce. Then Hoz strode out, looking serious, though he smiled as he saw Pippin.

"Ah, Pippin! I am glad you have come," said Hoz. "You have arrived at the right moment. We have just completed a council. Father has named me commander of the army." As he spoke, others emerged from the great tent: Zedek himself, followed by Zeah, and then, to his surprise, Maglor and Bangshar.

"Is the war starting soon?" Pippin asked, looking around.

"Indeed," said Hoz. "Before sunrise we received word from a scout. An army of Plainsmen march north along the course of the Longest River, in the desert west of the west bank."

"Plainsmen? Do you mean the Bani?" Pippin said excitedly. "They've come north?"

"Yes," Hoz replied. He took a stick and began to incise a map into the dirt. Pippin made out the course of the Longest River, Nekhet, the Mountain, and the Stairway. Hoz pulled a pebble into a spot south of Zet Pallan and equally distant from it and from Nekhet. "They have managed to make it to this point without being reported, and with the majority of their force still intact. It is a great accomplishment for those who have no knowledge of the desert."

"Their leader has some knowledge," Pippin said. "That would be Asouk. He's their chief now, and a mighty man and warrior. He's my friend."

"The first mate!" cried Bangshar. "You told me he had returned to his people and become a ruler, but you say it is he who leads this army?"

"I don't know it," Pippin replied, "but it has to be." He addressed them all. "He was very angry at how the Nekheti had turned slavers and attacked his people, being a former slave himself. He said if he had to cross the desert to bring justice, he'd do it."

"He has come close," Hoz said. "And he has brought almost a thousand men, and five mumakil with battle-forts. But he is now in danger."

He made another mark in the sand. "Our spies in Nekhet say the Plains army has now been marked. They are sending one of their regiments to attack it in the desert."

"Nekhet has ten regiments," Zeah explained. "Five scattered along the Valley from the Sixth Cataract to the Delta, and five within the city itself, including the Queen's Guards under our friend Mery, and the Temple Guards whom we also met." She winked and Pippin couldn't stop a smile. But his smile faded as Zeah continued, "Each regiment has from five hundred to seven hundred soldiers and as many as a hundred chariots."

"They will come upon the Plainsmen," Hoz said, "and seek to destroy them ere they come to the City of the Hawk."

"But we've got to help them!" Pippin exclaimed. "I'll go now. My horse is the fastest in the desert. I can go now and warn them!"

"No, halfling," said Maglor.

"But—"

"I am going," said Hoz, sheathing his sword. "And I will not be alone. The Medzhai will come with me, the seven swiftest companies of riders from our forces here. With haste, skill and the will of Er, we shall find the Plainsmen before Sehty's soldiers do."

Pippin nodded. "Great! I'm coming with you."

"No, you are not. The lord Maglor has requested you assist him in his own mission."

Pippin turned to the son of Fëanor. "You told them?" he asked, flabbergasted.

"I think it is a good idea, Pippin," said Zeah.

"Oh, now you're on his side?"

"The wizard's sole aim in all this has been to build his machine and use the Silmaril," reminded Maglor. "Taking it from him will lead to his defeat. You are our best hope."

"I'm your best hope, you mean," Pippin accused. "You don't care about the Bani or the Erites or that Nekhet will lose its Star. You don't even care about me."

Maglor's eyes flashed. "Silence, halfling. My brothers would not have suffered such insolence."

"I know. I heard the story. They all died."

"Pippin …" sighed Hoz.

Pippin turned on him. "I'm not going to risk my life for a bauble when Asouk is in danger!"

"A Silmaril is no mere bauble!" thundered Maglor.

"It doesn't mean more than my friend's life! Not to me!" Pippin shot back.

The others were shaken by the fury of the great Elf, and were just as speechless at the hobbit's fearless defiance. With a withering look at Maglor, Pippin turned to Hoz. "Let me come with you."

Hoz frowned. "No, I do not think so."

Pippin glared at him. Then he spun around and ran away.

Both Bangshar and Zeah started to follow, but Zedek broke his silence and raised his staff.

"Let him be," said the prophet. "He struggles with the choice he has yet to make. Our fates, though he knows it not, are now in his hands. He must decide himself. This have I seen."

"Let us hope the One gives you true visions, holy man," said Maglor.

Zedek nodded. "Let us hope."

Pippin thought first to go get Swallow and go find Asouk, wherever he may be. But in his anger and frustration he paid no attention to what path he chose, and he ran on and on, past tent and camp and booth and boulder, until finally, out of breath and shaking, he found himself in the hallow of Er. With the feast long over, there were no more pilgrims, nor any other Man there; all that was left of the great blaze was a patch of burning scrub, no smaller than a campfire, small and merry.

Before he realized what he was doing Pippin stepped past the bounds of taboo and set foot on the ground of the hallow. His bare feet pressed into the ashy sand as he paced in nervous anger, turning this way and that like an agitated bird.

He stopped before the little flame and sank into a squat, folding his arms and muttering. He demanded, "What am I supposed to do?"

He sprang up and resumed pacing. "I've got to warn Asouk," he decided. "I've got to go to him! I don't care where he is or how far. It's partly my fault he ever came back here. That he went home and found it in peril. He's doing this because he's a good man and because I led him to it. He's my friend. I've got to help him."

Then he turned again. "But Maglor's right! Alatar's the problem. The object of the war is overthrowing him and freeing the slaves, and the people of Nekhet itself. I've got to remember that."

He sighed and stopped and knelt again. The wee fire still sang to itself. "And I can't say it isn't the grandest thing to try," he said wistfully. "To see a Silmaril up close, the last one on earth—and to steal it, like Beren Onehand and Luthien Tinuviel. Oh!" he shuddered with temptation, "now that's something no hobbit has ever done!"

At length he shook his head. "I don't know. I don't know what to do. Maybe I should just forget all this and ride for Umbar right now. I don't need another battle. The edge of this one's just as sharp as that other." He sat on his ankles and folded his hands in his lap, and said:

"I wish Gandalf were here."

"Will I do?"

Pippin looked up, startled. Somehow the brightness of the morning had turned to twilight. The Mountain and the hallow still looked the same—but wait, was it Gar bet-Eria, or Meneltarma? Where was he? And who—?

Someone was warming their hands by the little fire. It was a hobbit, with dark hair and old-wise eyes.

Pippin gaped.

"Don't be scared, Pippin," said Frodo Baggins. "You're only dreaming."

Faintly Pippin protested: "But I'm not sleeping."

"But you're dreaming nonetheless," Frodo assured.

"Are you dead?" That was Pippin's first question to his cousin, or what looked like his cousin, a slender dark-haired hobbit with a perky expression and a bright eye and a cleft in his chin, taller than some, fairer than most, standing in the light of the fire. "Is that it? You're dead, and you've come to haunt me as a punishment for my wrongs."

"I assure you I am very much alive," said Frodo. "But I'm not really here. Neither are you, actually. I'm in Elvenhome, and you're somewhere in Far Harad, I think. How on earth did you manage to get yourself there, Pippin?"

"I haven't a clue," Pippin replied. "Things … happened."

"I'm sure they did," Frodo said fondly. "Still Pippin after all these years."

"Yes and no," said Pippin. "Sometimes I barely recognize myself as who I was. Sometimes I don't know who I was."

"Oh, you'll figure it out. Like you will your problem. It's not really a problem, you know."

Pippin blinked. "Ten years across the Sea makes you start talking like Gandalf?"

Frodo smiled wryly. "Olorin visits so often he practically lives with me. So, what have you decided to do?"

"Decided?" Pippin said. "My dear Frodo, have you lost your memory across the Sea? I'm Pippin. I seldom make decisions, and the ones I do make turn out to be wrong nine times out of ten. And the one time I choose right was nothing but blind luck."

"Don't be tiresome, Peregrin Took," Frodo scolded, immediately reducing Pippin to six years old. "You are among the great of the Age that has past, and in this Age that has come. You are wiser than anyone ever gave you credit for, especially yourself. Shame on you. Make your choice."

"My choice?"

"What to do today. Ride to your friend? Go with the Elf? Go home?"

"I don't know! You tell me!" Pippin got an idea. "That's it!" he exclaimed, snapping his fingers. "That's why I'm dreaming this. You've come to tell me what to do, haven't you? The Lords of the West have sent you as a messenger, to tell me what to do! Oh, Frodo, Frodo, my dear old Frodo!"

"What leaf have you been stuffing your pipe with, Pippin?" said Frodo crossly. "I am not here to choose for you. I am not even here. And even if I could, I wouldn't; beyond the Veil we only watch, we do not act. Acting is for you. Choices are for you."

"But I'll choose wrong!" Pippin cried. "Look at where I am, Frodo. I have a wife. I have a son. My father was teaching me how to be Thain and head of the family. And what did I choose to do? Run. To the ends of the earth. Ten years hasn't helped! It's only expanded the magnitude of my foolishness!" He moaned and covered his face. "Frodo," he said, thinking of the Fellowship, "I was the least of us."

"You were the youngest," Frodo corrected firmly. "Not the least."

Pippin felt a warm, dry hand touch his face, lifting up his eyes by a tug of his chin. It had four fingers. Writer's calluses marked its middle finger and thumb.

"My little cousin," said Frodo. "I love you in a special way, did you know that? You remind me of Bilbo, as I imagined him when he went on his adventure. Gandalf saw it too. You know how much he loved you, despite how much you irritated him. Maybe even because of it. He was always on the lookout for the Took in all of us, that spark he could kindle into greatness—but with you he found a firework waiting to be lit. I'm not excusing what you've done ill. But I want you to remember what you've done well: asking questions, following your heart. Being bold, and daring, and yes, even a little bit reckless. You are a good hobbit and true, Peregrin Took, with a kind heart. You care and you try, and that's all that can be asked of anyone, though it's done by all too few." Frodo smiled. "Now, now. What's these tears, then?"

Pippin realized he was crying, but how? He was smiling. He reached for the hand near him, the hand with three fingers, and oh, it felt real. Right. Warm and alive. Flowing with health, with light, with no trace of Shadow or pain, except for the mark of the freely and foolishly given pity that had somehow saved the world.

He asked, "Gandalf …"

"What about him, my dear?"

"Does he miss me too?"

Frodo gazed in sympathy upon him. "Of course he does. He loves you."

"Have I made him angry at me?"

"What do you think?"

"I want to make him happy with me."

"Then decide what to do with what's been given to you," said Frodo. "And decide well, little cousin!"

And then Pippin blinked in the hard sunshine of the desert, in the hallow of Er.

He looked around, but he knew the vision, or dream, or whatever it was, had ended. His cousin was no longer here. Just himself, in the dirt, before the merry flame.

Hoz and Zeah were saddling their horses. Maglor and Zedek were speaking intensely with each other. Bangshar sat calmly on the ground, sharpening his jagged-toothed fighting blades. They all turned to look at him as Pippin returned.

"All right," said Pippin. He went to Maglor. "I will help you. I will steal the Silmaril from the Stairway. You may not have a right to it anymore, but neither does Alatar, and I don't want him to do anything with it or to it, not after what I've seen him do for it, the slaving and the spells and Osyr."

"I am grateful," said Maglor.

"Wait," Pippin said. "I wasn't finished. But first, you will help me help my friend Asouk."

"What?"

"You heard me," said Pippin. "These are my terms."

Maglor looked furious. "Your terms?"

"You asked for my help," Pippin answered. "And you'll have it. But I do this first. Or, you can go try to steal the gem without help or hope. And we both know how well that went for you and your brothers."

"Halfling—"

"I told you: my name is Pippin." Pippin shook his head, shrugged his shoulders. "Maglor, I must do this, for my friend. There's a right way and a wrong way to do anything, especially burglary. I have a promise of my own, that I never told anyone, not even myself, but it's a promise I'll keep nonetheless. To be true to my friends. Of all your brothers, I thought you would understand. You're the only one who let a Silmaril go. This Silmaril, in fact. If you agree, then maybe you're not unworthy of it anymore."

He looked around. They were all staring at him, some agape. Did he sound that crazy? "Are you with me?"

"As you wish," said Hoz with a bow, seeing his father nod.

"So be it," said Maglor in resignation.

"I'm going with you," said Bangshar. "You'll need someone to watch your back."

"I shall come too," said Zeah, and Pippin beamed.

"Great," said Pippin. "Well then, what are we waiting for?"

As they went to prepare, Hoz stopped Pippin and asked, "How did you come to this decision?"

"Why, I went to your hallow of course," said Pippin. "I sat by the fire and, well, something came to me." He beamed at them and scurried off.

Hoz looked at his father. "We left no fire burning in the hallow …"

"No," Zedek nodded, "we did not."

Hoz had marshaled an army three thousand strong, resplendent in black and indigo. For the sortie south he summoned three hundred of the fastest riders. Hoz himself led them. With him at the vanguard was Bangshar on horseback; Maglor, armed with bow and sword, upon his own steed; and, riding together on Swallow, Zeah and Pippin. He caught Pippin's eye, and Pippin grinned.

Hoz took his falcon Serak from his shoulder onto his arm. "Go," he commanded, and the falcon took off, giving a keen cry.

"Eria ekkad!" Hoz shouted, the chilling war-cry of the Erites, "The One Is Lord"; and spurred his horse forward. Swallow followed, and the others, and then the hundreds of riders, heading south; but Swallow soon outstripped them all.

3.

The hunters had been two months traveling from the Plains to the Great Desert, and though they had brought food and water and were used to hardship, it was still a hard and suffering journey. The young men relied on their elders; the elders leaned on the young. They walked rapidly, in the morning and the evening and well into the night, even if they only had starlight to see by; they were Bani, lion-men who knew the night as well as the day. They numbered over a thousand, bearing spears in their hands and spears on their backs, twenty spears to a man, each tipped with leaflike heads of knapped flint as large as a man's foot; and clubs, and slings, and shields made of oxhide drawn wet over wet wood, bound with wet sinew, and all of it left to dry hard as drums and tough as bone. They marched in loose ranks, for they were not a warlike race, except those who came from the western jungle who had fought for the Eye in years past. But even these marched with their brothers of the east, summoned by the new headman of all their people, the king of Ngiranimo.

Asouk now looked out from where he stood at a great height at the sea of sand and the sudden cliffs, near and yet insuperable, of the Valley. He wore long breeches of Umbar, and his powerful shoulders were bare, but for the necklaces of gold and silver and teeth, and the single lion's tooth that named him a man; but around his waist he had wound a great crimson cloth, woven by his new-wed wife and her women, as a gift for the battle. For he had told her of the custom of the women of the far north-west of making banners for their husbands and loves ere they went to war. So beautiful Nibo wove a crimson sash for Asouk; and Asouk now wore it around his waist, its heavy weft lulling in the soft breeze, as he gazed upon the Valley of his enemies.

For many hundreds of leagues he had marched his hunters along the course of the Longest River, keeping it in sight, yet not daring set foot in the well-guarded vale for fear of alerting their enemies. But now the time for secrecy was drawing to a close.

It was the hour of the death of the cold night. In the far east, the Sun was speeding over unknown lands, and the line of her approach was racing to the horn of Far Harad upon the Bay of Ormal. The army had slept and taken breakfast of preserved melon, parched grain, and a sip of water from their waterskins. They had done so for many weeks now, rising before the morning, walking before the heat drove them to shelter under their shields and light cloaks and lion-skins. But those were not their only shelter. The hunters who came from the western jungles, those who had gone with the Haradrim of the coasts to the wars of the Eye, had brought more than spears and clubs with them.

Asouk stood upon the prow of a war-tower borne on the back of an oliphaunt. From its height he looked out over all but the highest of the dunes. Its rolling gait reminded him of a ship at sea. Behind him were fifty hunters, and those who needed to rest from marching; the beasts lifted up those who were weary with their trunks into the arms of his comrades, and returned the rested to the march. Unlike the war-beasts of the Haradrim, these had not been painted with symbols, other than the marks they would place on their own beloved cattle; and no unneeded spike or chain hindered their mighty feet, or bound their four spiraling tusks. Ten oliphaunts had gone north; five were left in condition for battle, but five mumakil in battle, it was hoped, would be enough.

From his height Asouk now saw his scouts returning at a run from their patrols. They shouted warning, and Asouk raised his horn from his side and sounded it for all the army. They had finally been seen. Nekhet was coming.

The eastern sky was paling. The stars were being quenched by the first fingers of the still-unseen Sun. As he looked into the east, Asouk saw a cloud rising from the Valley cliffs, a cloud of dust being raised by horses' hooves. He seized his battle-staff and observed from the cloud emerge the shapes of the enemy: chariots, dozens, scores of chariots, and men behind them running, and the arrogant gleam of bronzework and gilding over cold cruel blue. The Sixth Regiment of Nekhet was coming out of the shadowed valley apace with the searing dawn.

Asouk took up his horn and blew a new note. The army stopped its journey. Hunters formed ranks, took up spears, sped up the sides of dunes from where they could cast their weapons long and deadly into their foes. The oliphaunts were marshaled into a line for a charge.

The men were frightened. They were hunters, and herders, and could face down lions; each one of them had faced a lion, if not killing one, wounding one, or surviving another's attack; it was the mark of a man. They were all men, all the thousand of them. But they were men with flint-tipped spears, and clubs of animal bone, and hide shields, and slingshots, against the arced bronze swords of the Nekheti and their unstoppable chariots. The mumakil, and boldness, would have to do.

On the next oliphaunt to Asouk was Dyomu. The wise hunter looked to his chief and nodded. Asouk did too, and ran his free hand absently over the sash on his waist. Then he raised his voice in a long, wild, wailing call, like and unlike the roar of a lion. The men of his army responded with cries of their own, and leaping, and banging spears against shields. The mumakil-drivers responded by ordering their beasts to walk forth.

The oliphaunts did so, crossing over the dune toward the coming chariots. One stumbled in the shifting sand, trumpeting its annoyance; men were shaken from its tower and fell. But the beast mastered its footing and joined its kindred. Now they were strolling, their strides crossing many yards of desert; the chariots were coming. The oliphaunts began to hasten. The charioteers left the foot-soldiers far behind. Dyomu raised his spear and bellowed. The mumakil began to run, as the chariots rose over the last dune onto a flat gravel-plain. Now the oliphaunts were trumpeting, and a number of proven army-horses balked in terror at the coming behemoths. But only a number. The rest sped on, driven by loyalty or whips or fear, into the teeth of ivory.

A rank of chariots broke upon the tusks of the oliphaunts like sea-wreck upon the hardened bow of a Corsair ship. Others fell to the animals' feet, like forest-trees come to live and marching, crushing and stomping and grinding and swiping gore upon the sand. Horses and men were entwined in sapient trunks and hurled like chaff into the wind. Arrows and lances were cast knowing not how to wound the beasts; no oliphaunt had ever been seen alive in the Valley, certainly none at war.

But so big were the oliphaunts, and so few, that the greater number of the chariots passed through them like a stream passed boulders. And Asouk ran to the rear of the war-tower and saw his hunters face the coming of the chariots.

Spears flew and found marks, or bounced off bronze and wood. Arrows answered in reply, swifter and more accurate. Men died. Asouk told his driver to turn their steed around and go to the aid of the men, but then he saw the coming of the foot-soldiers of Nekhet, and rallied those with him to this new assault. For while slower and more vulnerable, the foot-soldiers were more numerous, and perhaps could lame or madden a mumak with their cleverer attack.

Men and beasts fought in the quickening heat of dawn. The Sun was coming. She was upon the horizon. The stars were guttering, dying, blinking out, as the sky turned blue over the desert. Hunters with wood and stone fought against wheels and sickles of bronze. Asouk leapt down from the war-tower to fight in the midst of it all, his battle-staff laying down enemies in a ring all around him. But all was going ill. An oliphaunt stumbled, its ankles cut by hundreds of slashes; its tower fell to the ground with a crash.

The scarlet sash was stained with blood. Asouk had his great knife out, and heads and arms fell at his blows. His staff matched it for deadliness, but while he survived and dominated, his men, his army of hunters and herders, whom he had led from their green and thriving plains into the desert, would they survive? Make sail, and run; that was how the Corsairs would do it, if an engagement went ill, or took too long. But he had not that choice. It was fight or die upon the dunes. Or, rather, it was fight, and die anyway.

So be it. Asouk was no coward. A pirate would have chosen the more profitable course. He was pirate no longer.

The blue day passed the height of the sky. For no reason at all Asouk paused for a breath, and looked into the west. Thence came a breeze, and upon that breeze was the sound of galloping hooves.

Suddenly over the crest of a dune shot a falcon, wild and reckless and impetuous and free, and its cry pierced the empty sky. Asouk wondered at it, before beholding, behind the falcon, what followed it over the sand.

The Medzhai of the Erites rode out of the west, sheathed in robes of black and indigo, twice as many as Nekhet had sent chariots, and descended like a storm upon the waterless plain. Before them all were a pair of horses, one dapple-grey, one silver-black. The black horse bore two riders, both smaller than the others, one very small indeed, and that one, Asouk realized, was Pippin, a red-gold head bright in the beam of the dawn.

Asouk threw up his arms in crazed joy. "O Sihorunebi m'Hobengo!" he shouted as the horsemen fell into the battle. The tide turned, the Erites and the Bani fought back and overwhelmed the Nekheti, as the Sun left the horizon and with her fingers smote the sands.

The Medzhai pursued the surviving Nekheti into the sands, hoping to leave no tale of this battle until they were prepared to strike. Asouk stood among the slain, many Nekheti, some Erites, but far too many of his own people, and he stood still as stone with his eyes filling with grief.

Hoz came now to Asouk.

"I regret we failed to arrive earlier," he said in Haradi.

"Your arrival was something I had not thought to hope for," Asouk replied, gazing upon hunters old and young who had followed him north. "This was a foolish action from the beginning, and I rue it now."

"Nay," said Hoz. "Regret not the courage of a heart that's true, fool though it be." He looked past Asouk and smiled. "Behold, now comes such a heart."

"Asouk!"

Later the injured would be succored, and the slain buried. Hoz would outline his plans to Asouk, and they would swear allegiance to each other. A meager meal would be shared, and Maglor the Elf sing a song, as Bangshar and Asouk were reunited, with tales told and friendships renewed. But none of what took place in that lull between the first battle and the great one still to come could have been as joyous as that moment, as Pippin crashed into Asouk's arms and spun giddy round and round.