Tertius
They called him The Haradrim. Haradir. Southron. Scum.
More accurately, his name was Castos, son of Lord Castamir of South Ithilien; and he was Castamir's oldest son, although he was not Castamir's heir. This last fact was essential to understanding his character. In fact, he had been a stranger to his father ever since his humble birth in a Haradic whore's cabin.
Perhaps he himself would never have known his father's identity but for his remarkable resemblance to the great marcher magnate of the South. He had his piercing eyes, aquiline nose and strong chin exactly, his height and build as well. All that was lacking was similar birth. Castamir could trace his lineage on both sides back through twenty generations of legitimate, Numenorian lords. In ancient days, Castamir's ancestors had been lesser advisors of the kings. In later years, they had achieved and maintained great prominence in Southern Gondor. They had escaped the troubles with Sauron by retreating to Osgiliath, and then to Minas Tirith, but all the while they managed to preserve the family fortune. Most recently, Castamir had pledged fealty to the King and to the Steward in exchange for their renewal of his ancestral claims in the south, then relocated his entire household. In all of Ithilien, only Prince Faramir was greater.
Castos, by the cruel lottery of birth, had been raised destitute, had learned his father's identity at the age of seven, and spent the remainder of his life searching for his father's acknowledgement, which had thus far not been forthcoming. As he knelt upon the stiff hay lining the slats of the scaffold, he thought about how it was unlikely he would ever receive his father's approval now.
It didn't matter. He had earned the favor of one person in his entire life, and she had given him everything. She had given him a position in her stables, had acquired for him a rank in the White Company, then a small piece of land for himself and all the heirs of his body.
"My heirs? I shall never have them, my lady...and it is because..."
He remembered the feel of her finger pressing over his lips. And a desperate, whispered, "Please don't."
That was the only time she had ever touched him. It hadn't been nearly enough. Nor was the land she had bestowed on him nearly enough. It was a plot for a yeoman farmer, not for the son of a nobleman. It was a plot for a beneficiary of a Princess, but not for a favorite.
He had tried to move up in the ranks. The Prince had given Lord Beregond the whole of Cair Andros for his loyalty. And to Mablung he had gifted an estate large enough for a city. But he, the son of Castamir the Bold? Nothing.
Not an inch more land. Not one higher rank. No favors, no handkerchiefs, nor loving gazes exchanged in crowded halls when no one was looking. No gentle caresses in the shadows or frenzied lovemaking behind closed doors.
For the amber tint of his flesh he was distrusted: a shade just dark enough that it could not be mistaken for a soldier's tan. And in his soldier's garb he had been dressed too poorly to be mistaken for a nobleman, and too richly to pass for a decent, hardworking laborer.
Once he had tried to go to the lower circles of Minas Tirith, and they had eyed him warily. Him in his fine clothes with his steel sword polished like the finest silver hanging by his side. They had thought he was there to spy on their revels.
Usually he went to the taverns in the upper circles, where the Prince's guardsmen go. But there the women stared at his amber flesh and made sport of him with their conspiring, female eyes.
Always, almost close enough to pass, but never close enough. If he had been born a nothing, he might have turned out a good man.
Perhaps he could yet be saved. The White Lady was the only woman in his life to look on him without judgment. She had offered him his position in the guard. She had given him his land. He was sorry to have betrayed her trust...he hadn't meant it. Not really, but he had been so angry. And just to feel that neck between his hands...
She understood the loneliness of being unwanted. Now she had come to grant him one more kindness. Whether it were from love or pity or empathy he cared not so long as he could escape from dying disgraced upon his knees.
Even when they pushed his neck down onto the rough wood block, he tilted his neck so he could see her. His eyes nearly rolled back into his head in an attempt to find her again. He raised himself up a little, only to be met with curses and to have his head shoved roughly down again.
"Accept your fate and die like a man," advised the executioner.
Castos could no longer see her, so he imagined her. He spat upon the block beneath him. "I spit on your Fate," said he, seeing only the gold of her hair and the steady rise and fall of her bosom. "It was not of my creation."