Nine: Layers of the Universe

Daerwen found him in the Forest of Carnán, in the quiet under the leaves. Talion heard the Avari singing in their distant city and the snarls of caragors both wild and tame hunting somewhere in the brush, the roar of a distant graug, but even that did not intrude on the silence. The drake sniffed around, dragging long breaths in through flaring nostrils.

Up here, sweetheart.

She looked up, then purred in satisfaction when she spotted him leaning back against the tree trunk, legs stretched out and ankles crossed on the thick branch he was sitting on, half-hidden in the green leaves. The drake curled up at the base of the tree, and once she was settled, Talion climbed down to join her, letting her tuck him up against her side like he was her favorite toy.

She would be very upset if he decided to die on her again. So would everyone else, but assuming she lived long enough, and Men actually did return to fight in the Dagor Dagorath and not just Túrin Turambar, she would get very nasty with him before the final battle with Morgoth - perhaps nasty enough to earn her name twice over.

In addition, the wraith was certain (or as certain as he could get, hollowed out by Isildur's Ring) that he did not actually want to die so much as believe he needed to. He was weary down to the deepest chasms of his soul. Though the wounds of their murders had long turned to scars, he still missed his wife and son, now sixty years gone, and even though he forced himself to keep moving no matter how hard it became, all he wanted to do was go still inside and out and wait for the world to pass him by and forget about him. He could sleep and hope that would erase his exhaustion… or die, and know that it would.

But for now his people needed him - on both sides of the Mountains of Shadow. He could worry about living or dying when he finally had all Eight in hand.

Talion patted Daerwen's side, and she huffed quietly, shifting only enough to drop her head in his lap.

Oof! Thanks a bunch, sweetheart.

The drake just rumbled in response and told him to shift his legs to make a more comfortable pillow. He rolled his eyes but obliged her, stretching out and leaning back against her side, and by some miracle, he was able to quiet his mind in spite of the information Shelob had dropped on him, resting and recovering from the battle with the Nazgûl sisters.

When he stirred again, he and Daerwen were no longer alone. Maglor sat at a comfortable distance, cross-legged on the leaf litter with his sheathed sword laid over his thighs. The Elda woke from his own reverie when Daerwen lifted her head and yawned widely.

Ooh, a headsplitter.

The drake huffed, and Talion grinned, smoothing a hand over her scales. "What is it, Swinsere?"

"You didn't follow us in for the celebration. I was concerned," the Elf answered.

The Ringwraith got to his feet and stretched, working some life back into his cold body. "I am as well as can be expected," he replied to the unspoken question. "Shelob delivered a message of sorts that was… interesting."

On the way back to Sharkhburz, Daerwen padding along beside them, he told the Elf what the spider had said. Maglor's face flashed through a range of emotions before settling on faint apprehension and deep concern. "And?" the Elf asked, "What will you do when the time comes?"

Talion tried not to hear the voice of another Elf asking a different question of him so many years ago, even though his response to Maglor was the same as it had been to her. "I don't know."

How long can you fight this war before you Fall and join them?

"Well, I suppose that's better than 'I will accept my final death when it comes'."

"Swinsere."

The Elf raised an eyebrow at him, and the wraith sighed. Maglor sighed as well and laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Speaking as someone who has almost died on more occasions than I care to name, the absolute last thing I wanted was for my beloved people to follow me. I imagine that your wife and son would feel the same, especially now that we are finally free of Sauron's shadow and can actually build something new instead of just shoring up our defenses for the next assault," the Elf said softly. "If you truly want to die, I will not stop you. But... you should think about living, too."

Even though the Nazgûl knew he was long past a Man's natural lifespan, the Elf was not wrong. Talion nodded to acknowledge his words and followed the minstrel to the fortress, where the Orcs and Men and Avari were all celebrating that they only had two Ringwraiths left to kill.

Of course, those two were the most troublesome of them all, save for the Witch-king already slain.

Talion accepted the pint of grog someone shoved into his hand and nursed it slowly, even though he was more able to chug the stuff than the Orcs who made it, since he barely felt the burn. He had been told by other non-Orcs that it was akin to drinking lava, if such a thing could be done and survived, but for him it barely stung. Eating "proper food" was equally pointless; everything had the texture and taste of ash, and anything he drank had no flavor at all, whether the filthiest water or finest wine. To make matters worse, it sat like a lead weight in his stomach until he forced himself to throw it up, or he died and the problem fixed itself, or (if he could bear it long enough) his body remembered its natural processes and sluggishly digested whatever he had taken in, though there was never any waste to expel.

But when he wandered up onto the wall around Sharkhburz, the Sea of Núrn glittered in the moonlight like it was coated in diamonds, blankets of snow on distant peaks awash with silver light, and a low wind rustled through the long grass and stirred the leaves of Carnán's forest, branches swaying. Mordor was beautiful in its own way - some places, at least. A beautiful and harsh mistress. And when he looked back into the fortress, he saw all of his people laughing and feasting and drinking and celebrating, radiating joy so strong that it seemed almost a physical thing.

There was a low mrrr behind him, and Daerwen peered over the wall, crunching on the bones of another fish, her eyes shining with reflected firelight. Talion drummed his armored fingers along one of the bigger spikes flaring back from her head, and she squeezed her eyes shut, their bond aglow with her happiness.

The only people that were missing… were a particular pair of Elves, and there was no telling where they had vanished to. Eltariel had likely assumed that the Nine had been destroyed with the One and so gone home to her Lady, and with nothing to bind him here any longer, Celebrimbor had probably passed into the West, to meet whatever fate the Valar laid out for him.

On the House of Fëanor the wrath of the Valar lieth from the West unto the uttermost East… slain ye may be, and slain ye shall be: by weapon and by torment and by grief; and your houseless spirits shall come then to Mandos. There long shall ye abide and yearn for your bodies, and find little pity though all whom ye have slain should entreat for you… The Valar have spoken.

Talion shook his head, forcing Maglor's recitation of the Doom of Mandos from his mind. If Celebrimbor was gone, then he was gone; as much as it pained him, as much as he wished he could change it, there was nothing Talion could do either for or against him in Valinor as a Nazgûl bound to Middle-earth.

There was no sign of either Khamûl or Adûnaphel for several weeks, so Talion gave a tentative go-ahead to resume trade between lands via Mordor. Both Torvin and Idril reported that the Rangers had started trickling back into Ithilien to resume their posts and that the former-Rangers-turned-merchants in Minas Tirith were eagerly discussing logistics of shipping, cost and pricing of goods, what orders they might receive from the nobility and the new king and queen, and more.

There must have been enterprising individuals waiting just beyond Mordor's borders, because it seemed that the Ringwraith had barely given the word before the first ships arrived from the south.

Harad was luckier than Rhûn and further east in that respect. There was the Narghil Pass, in the lower mountains of the Ered Glamhoth, where snowmelt pooled year-round in a vast lake, and the lake there fed the Harnen River that spilled down out of the mountains and into Near Harad, emptying into the Bay of Befalas. Thus, through Mordor, if one was willing to chance the Corsairs, it was possible to travel by river to the Sea, and to Umbar and Far Harad, and to the Hither Lands thousands of miles away. The Easterlings and other peoples from the Orocarni and beyond had to either come entirely overland in a straight shot, or sail their rivers to the Sea of Rhûn and then go south around the edge of the Ash Mountains and down to the cheerfully-named town of Fatal Falls on one of Lithlad's rivers before sailing the rest of the way to Núrn.

Talion watched from the summit of Sharkhburz as the first few ships dropped anchor offshore and sent a few dinghies to the docks to buy and sell. One of the passengers he recognized, and he jumped from the fortress roof, hitting the ground with an easy roll and regaining his feet. "Masego! Your brother is here."

When Talion and Daerwen brought Masego to the docks, Dineo nearly threw himself out of the dinghy in his haste to reach the other man, sweeping his brother up into a fierce hug and holding him close for several long minutes while others unloaded and started paying trade tariffs and bartering for supplies to take them the rest of the way to Graveshadow. Talion looked away to give the brothers some semblance of privacy, which seemed to signal everyone else to do the same. They ignored Masego and Dineo - but heaped their attention on the Ringwraith instead. In the space of a quarter of an hour, he accumulated an armload of food and other assorted objects - delicate pottery, finely-wrought jewelry and metalwork, carvings in foreign woods, bolts of dyed cloth - in exchange for determining which of the giver's relatives had died in the War of the Ring and, if they were dead, calling them back long enough to bid one last farewell.

Both Masego and Dineo laughed at him when they noticed. The new arrival slapped him on the back in a friendly manner and said, "You may be one of the Black Horrors, but you still have a good heart, Gravewalker. It is good to have you back among us."

"It's good to be back. Anything I need to know?"

Dineo hummed. "Not particularly. We received your message about that one - the Quiet."

"Adûnaphel."

"Yes, her." The man nodded, but clearly the name of the Black Númenórean went in one ear and out the other, which was more than fair. She certainly would not have cared about their names; turnabout was fair play. "We have spread the word and are keeping a close watch, but there is no sign of her just yet."

"Small mercies, but that may mean she's gearing up for something big. How are your relations with the nations further south now that the war is over?"

"Most of the neighboring kings are the decent sort or got hit themselves, but some of the nobility with fifth and sixth children are eyeing us unpleasantly."

"If you need a hand…"

"We will let you know, but for now all is well. Do you need help carrying that?"

The food went straight into Daerwen's mouth, since she could eat most anything, and the rest of the Ringwraith's "payment" was taken back to his rarely-used quarters in the fortress. At some point he would sell or trade it on for good-quality leather and metal to make Daerwen a new harness. Though he had repaired it, the one she wore now was old and wearing thin, to say nothing of the extensions he needed to add to accommodate her continuing growth.

She sensed his thoughts turn her way, sticking her head through his window with an inquisitive mrrr? "You need to stop growing, sweetheart," he told her.

She snorted at him. No. I will be the second coming of Ancalagon.

"You'll have to go pretty far to hunt, then. The only things I can think of that will fill your stomach would be whales from the actual ocean. Unless you want to try for the giant squids in Núrn."

The drake grinned fiercely and licked her chops. I look forward to the challenge.

Talion rolled his eyes but did not gainsay her. She would do what she would do, and if she wanted to hunt, kill, and eat one of Núrn's giant squids when she was old enough and large enough, then more power to her. He rubbed her nose, and she purred. "I hope you're full," he told her, "because we're going to need to do a bit of flying over the next few days."

She tilted her head, and her spines and spikes flexed. Where to?

"Graveshadow, Darz-Gurum, and Minas Morgul. The traders want an escort, and we're hoping that their presence will be enough to bait at least Khamûl out of hiding."

It was not, but the caravan made it to Minas Morgul without being attacked on the river or the road, so Talion counted it a win. Ghûra and her underlings took up residence at Darz-Gurum, about five hundred Orcs all told, with enough supplies to get them started raising their own food in the valleys below the fortress. At least they would not have to wait for shipments from Núrn or immediately risk their lives hunting for caragors and graugs in the mountain caverns.

The traders had also brought a large deer-animal called a gnu with them from the far south, which they gave to Shelob as a meal and a sacrifice when they passed near to the entrance of her tunnels. Talion was relieved to see that the vision she had given him had not been a lie; she was healed from the halfling's Elven blade, though it had left an ugly scar on her abdomen and temporarily taken away her ability to make eggs and spider silk.

I will recover, Talion. Run along with your people, and think about what I said.

"It seems like I've done nothing but think about it."

And?

"I still don't know."

Then keep thinking, and then think again.

Talion huffed out a half-laugh and signaled Horza, who had been hovering near the entrance to Shelob's cavern. They departed her tunnels, returning to Minas Morgul.

The Rangers of Ithilien spotted Daerwen in the skies above the Morgul Vale, so a few patrols arrived at the city about the same time they did. Angreth was with one of them, and when she spotted him, she rushed to him and threw herself into his arms with a shout of "Grandfather!", both laughing and crying. From everything at once, he suspected, but mostly relief; it was one thing to hear from her parents that he had come back out of the dark, but it was another thing entirely to see him in the undead flesh with her own eyes.

He held her until her tears ceased and she stepped back to wipe them away, sniffling. "You've been missed, Grandfather."

"I can see that," he replied, but his voice was gentle. "I've missed you too."

There was a soft touch in the back of his mind, a brush as light as the slow sift of bones turning to dust, sighing against the part of him that was always listening to the whispers of those on the other side.

"Dirhael misses you also," the Ringwraith conveyed. "He's glad you're well, and hopes you have a long life ahead of you."

The smile she gave in response was distinctly watery. She had been very young when Dirhael had been killed, but still old enough to understand what had happened and be devastated by the loss. The Witch-king had doubled the wound by destroying her brother's body so he could not be resurrected. Fortunately he lacked the power to destroy souls as well, meaning that Talion could call Dirhael's spirit back to console his family.

It had not made his death hurt any less.

"Tell me about Minas Tirith," Talion requested, steering her deeper into the city to where they were setting up shop in the shadow of the citadel, "and the new king. What do you make of it all?"

"Ah!" she said in a shock of realization - or rather remembrance, because she immediately began digging through her pack. "Hithaer gave me a letter for you before I set out on patrol, in case we came across one another or I found an opportunity to send it. There are a number of newcomers from the north in our ranks, come down from Arnor with the king; it is no longer safe to speak openly in Henneth Annûn and the other outposts. I thought it better to deliver it directly to your hands than risk it getting intercepted."

"Thank you. I'll - Torvin, do not.I'm not afraid to hand you your ass in front of your favorite niece."

"My only niece, you mean, and I see comin' back hasn't improved your temper any, Cap'n," the dwarf said, and took a swipe at him anyway.

Against an ordinary Man, it would have been an even fight. Torvin was tough and stocky like most dwarves, strong and enduring to compensate for the greater speed and agility of Men. But Talion was not an ordinary Man, and the fight ended the same way as all the others before it, the two of them laughing together as the dwarf tried to escape the wraith's unyielding grasp by any means necessary.

Finally Talion released him and accepted a friendly backslap before the dwarf was roped into wrestling with Horza as well, and telling tall hunting tales with some Feral Tribe Orcs who had come to help secure the city. Angreth drifted over to listen for a moment, giving Talion time to read Hithaer's letter.

Grandfather,

Mother and Father have informed me that you have returned from the darkness in the furthest East at last, so I hope my sister and this letter find you in at least acceptably good health. I know better than to expect 'perfect' health, given all that has happened, so I suppose 'acceptable' will have to do.

Much has happened in my own life since your departure, but news of that can wait for another letter or an in-person meeting; I will get straight to business. I believe word should have reached you by now, but in case it has not: I have at last joined the Guard of the Citadel and now serve honorably under Gondor's new king, King Elessar, and his wife Queen Arwen. Word has also reached me about your concerns regarding the Quiet and her influence, and I can vouch that the queen is exactly who she appears to be, and what's more I have met much of her family besides. She is Peredhel, Half-Elven, of the House of Elrond, her father, and her twin brothers Elladan and Elrohir are skilled warriors and hunters of Orcs. Of her Lady Mother they have not spoken, but when I inquired if she would require an escort when she arrived in the White City, His Majesty sadly informed me that she was gravely wounded in spirit by Sauron's servants some decades ago and sailed into the Far West, for she could find no healing here in Middle-earth.

It is of Her Majesty's honorable grandparents that I am most wary: Celeborn and Galadriel, the Lord and Lady of Lothlórien. There was no sign of the Blade when they arrived for Queen Arwen's wedding, nor any passengers of spirit, and the only Ring of Power Lady Galadriel wore was her own. I did not dare inquire lest I make myself suspicious or otherwise of interest in their eyes, but no news is better than bad news, I hope?

So far, at least, King Elessar himself seems to be an honorable man. There was an incident during the Siege of Minas Tirith, as it is becoming known. Steward Denethor lost hope that the battle might be won and took then-Lord Faramir, still alive and gravely wounded but seeming dead or very near to it, to the Silent Street where past Kings and Stewards are laid to rest. He intended to burn together with his son like the heathen kings of old, but a then-Captain of the Guard of the Citadel, Beregond, pursued and slew several there in defense of Lord Faramir and in so doing saved his life, for he delayed Lord Denethor long enough for aid to arrive.

Of old the punishment for Captain Beregond's crimes - abandoning his post without leave, slaying many in the sacred Hallows - would have been death. Yet King Elessar waived such punishment for his valour in battle at the Black Gate, and instead banished him from the city - to serve in Emyn Arnen as the Captain of the White Company, the Guard of Faramir, now Prince of Ithilien, for whom he fought desperately and so saved.

I will leave it to you to decide how you feel about such action, given your own history. But I must confess that I am gravely concerned, though for a different reason. Emyn Arnen is a scant day's hard ride - two at most - from one of our most heavily-trafficked citadels in more normal times, and many of our closest friends and allies would be slain on sight if discovered in Gondorian territory. We may have some brief period of reprieve, but it will be a tenuous thing; the King has declared that Minas Ithil in the Morgul Vale is to be "utterly destroyed", and though someday it may be clean of the Witch-king's taint, "no man may dwell there for many long years". If it is your wish, I will do what I can to delay the razing of the city - I know it is a useful stopover for traders and other travelers passing through Mordor from the east and south - but I can make no guarantees that I or Mother or Father will make any significant headway. It may be safer for all involved to abandon Minas Ithil and move the citadel deeper into the mountains, where it may have greater assurance of safety.

Please let me know posthaste if I may be of any assistance, and feel free to call upon me at your leisure (so long as I am not on duty). You have been greatly missed, and it would be good to see you again with my own eyes.

Your loving Grandson

Talion's expression was grim when he finished Hithaer's letter. Galadriel as the king's grandmother-in-law, no sign of Eltariel or Celebrimbor in the West, and Minas Morgul to be destroyed. There was little enough any of them could do about any of those things; the king had the right to love whom he pleased, no matter how much the Ringwraith may have disliked some of his wife's family. In addition, even as only half-Elven, Queen Arwen could detect Adûnaphel's darkness and resist her influence. Short of actively hunting for the Elf-Blade and the Elf-Wraith, there was little enough to be done on that front also - assuming there was even something to find.

And Minas Morgul… Though he was now reluctant to give the city up after spending so many years defending the West from within her walls, closing the Morgul Vale to Sauron's armies, the land and the city were Gondor's by right, and he had no wish to provoke them by refusing to give her up, especially not so soon after the disastrous War of the Ring. He and Daerwen would simply have to scout for new sites for a citadel to guard the Morgul Vale deeper in the mountains - and as quickly as possible, since Hithaer's words made it seem like the king intended to act within the year.

That did not give them much time. The construction of Graveshadow and Coldharbour had gone quickly, but they had spent five years surveying, planning, organizing, and laying in supplies before they had even broken ground on one of the citadels. In addition, they had been able to transport the needed materials by water, via the rivers snaking down out of the mountains; here they could not afford to do the same, since the only way to reach this portion of the Ephel Dúath by river was the Morgulduin by way of the Anduin, with no way to conceal what they were doing from Gondor. All the stone would either have to be quarried on-site or shipped overland, together with any wood or metal similarly available or unavailable at the place they ultimately chose, to say nothing of everything the city would need to support itself once established.

This was going to be yet another expensive undertaking. He would have to return to Moria for more mithril sooner rather than later, to fund this and future endeavors - and reparations for Sauron's malice over all the known world.

Talion refolded the letter and tucked it into his armor to show Maglor and his Overlords later, or at least Ghûra and Skoth; as the citadel's closest neighbors, they had the need and the right to know what was happening to their allies further up the road. The traders would need to know as well, so they could adjust their routes and timetables when passing through the Ephel Dúath.

Daerwen nudged him through their bond, and he came over to join the group as they settled in, readying themselves for the merchants that were sure to start flooding in over the next few days, then just as swiftly flooding out to sell their newly-acquired wares to the West. Torvin was telling a heavily embroidered version of the Great White Graug, though he stuttered a little when he noticed the Ringwraith raising an amused eyebrow in his direction. But Talion let the dwarf have his fun, the Orcs crowing when he told them how he and Talion finally brought it down.

"Grandfather," Angreth said, leaning back on her hands around the fire lit in what had once been a plant bed in the center of a thoroughfare, the street's name lost to time, "you've got other Mordor hunting stories than that, right?"

"Aye," he answered, stretching one leg out but keeping the other bent with his arm draped over the raised knee, "but the only one that tops the Great White Graug is probably Tar Goroth."

"Tar Gor- the Balrog?! You're finally gonna tell the Balrog story?! Ooh, Hithaer's gonna be so jealous!"

"If you're going to taunt your brother with it, maybe I shouldn't tell it, then," Talion said sternly amidst murmurs from the others. The Orcs had known that he had fought a Balrog before, though perhaps not the specifics, but the Rangers had thought it a tale so tall as to be utterly unbelievable, if they had heard of it at all.

"I'll be good!"

"Hm. You'd better," he said with mock threat in his tone, then launched into the story, telling of his and Celebrimbor's first encounter with Carnán, then running to Gorgoroth to intercept the Balrog as he rose from his prison, running so fast that it seemed like they flew the length of Mordor to get there in time. From there they had pursued it to the bitterly cold mountains of Seregost, then been pursued themselves, finally burying the Balrog at the bottom of the icy lake where he ultimately died when Barad-dûr went down. Talion touched only briefly on Zog and his attempts at harming Carnán and pulling Tar Goroth back from the depths, preferring instead to forget the troublesome Orc necromancer and consign him to the grave he had tried so hard to escape.

It did sound mad in retrospect, but Talion had long since resigned himself to it. His life had become a bolted horse he could not escape eighty years ago when Celebrimbor possessed him instead of the Black Hand, and there was not much he could do about it - aside from die permanently. Yet as he looked around at his friends and allies gathered around the bright fire, sharing food and stories and laughter, that option seemed… less acceptable than it had even just a few days ago.

The hood of his cloak rippled as Daerwen exhaled over him. Then she nudged him insistently. Pet me!

Demanding little thing. He reached up to scratch her throat, and she purred, nuzzling him happily before laying her head in his lap.

Less acceptable indeed.