Fic: The Warning (Gen) for Evocates
Title: The Warning
Rating: Gen
Pairing: n/a
Summary: Boromir finds himself in a race to right a wrong.
Warnings: Boromir!lives AU
Disclaimer: The originals of these characters belong to their copyright holders. I borrow them for fun.
Prompt: This is written for evocates, who asked for a quest-fic for Boromir, Merry and Pippin. Season's Greetings!
Galadriel’s gaze could pierce him to the core, like an eagle stripping the flesh from his heart still beating, and Eowyn’s straight look could bring a blush to his cheek, but at the moment he was being skewered, run through by the brightest dark eyes he had ever seen and the Steward of Gondor was glad he had thought to kneel before the lady with his request.
“You will bring him home safely,” Diamond of Long Cleeve said firmly.
“My sword arm is his shield, lady,” Boromir said quietly. Diamond looked at the floor for a moment and then pursed her lips.
“I know that you have risked all in his defence before now, Lord Boromir,” she said, “but then Peregrine was not mine. I want him to return to me and preferably,” she added, “before his babe is born.”
Boromir’s jaw dropped slightly and he could not stay the spark of joy that made the corners of his eyes crease. Diamond thought then how much a smile changed the man’s face.
“I will tell him before you leave,” she said mildly.
.......................................................................................................................................
It had been a source of amazement to Boromir on his return that folk in Gondor spoke of Annuminas, no more than a name out of ancient history to the Steward’s son, as a place where the King’s writ ran and trade began to flourish. Elessar would rebuild the city as his Northern capital; bringing the two parts of the Kingdom closer together by journeying there for half of each year. But for all that skilled masons and carpenters were sent regularly from Minas Tirith and graceful towers and broad streets were beginning to spread along the lakeside, much of the old city lay in ruins, in some places barely one stone upon another and all buried in silt and sand. Digging away the mud would take many years and privately Boromir wondered whether at some point men might leave be, let the past decay into new dust beneath busy feet that had other paths to tread.
It was a note from the Shire to the King which had set him on this search for something that even the Queen was unsure would still exist, but Merry and Pippin had asked for help and Boromir knew very well that Aragorn was only sorry he could not join in the adventure too, as they looked over old maps and discussed where the party could make camp along the way. These were lands that Strider had roamed freely, long ago, and Boromir was anxious to take advantage of his knowledge of paths and fords. He also wanted to know anything that Aragorn could tell him about the cause of Pippin’s urgent missive.
“You found the barrow-blades and returned them to Merry and Pippin,” he was saying, as Aragorn rolled up one of the maps to stow it in its canvas bag away from the light.
“I was fortunate, Boromir, or perhaps,” he paused a moment in tying the drawstring, “they called to me. They were forged by the Dunedain, created to fight the Nazgul, lost for generations before Tom Bombadil took them from the barrow to arm the hobbits. Merry’s sword was destroyed when he stabbed the Witch-King but Pippin’s blade was in the Battle at the Black Gate and gained the name Troll’s-Bane.”
“And it has hung peacefully on Pippin’s wall...” Boromir continued.
“...until now,” said Aragorn quietly, dropping the bag into an open chest.
“And you think that the answer to the riddle lies in Annuminas.”
“That is almost certainly where they were made. The Cardolan sword-smiths settled in a part of the ruined city where they could be private.”
Aragorn turned towards him.
“There are few of the true Dunedain blades left now Boromir, forged with an old knowledge, made strong to face evil beyond men’s imagining. Narsil was broken and lost its link to the old way. Anduril was re-made for a new age.”
......................................................................................................................................
Boromir was standing far enough back that any stray sparks would not strike him. Pippin had taken him to the Great Hall of the smial where, hanging above the fireplace, Troll’s-Bane glowed white-hot around the edge of the blade. Every-so-often, a small blue flame would seem to race around the metal and sparks would fly off at its passing.
“Sting would glow when orc were near,” Merry said grimly. “Is Aragorn sure that there are no enemies close-by?”
“There have been patrols scouring the borders of the Shire and no word from Arnor of any hint of trouble.” Boromir stepped a little closer to peer up at the sword. The metal brackets on which the blade lay seemed to be untouched, but a sudden shower of sparks covered his boots and the smell of singed leather made him retreat once more.
Pippin had been strangely quiet and Boromir thought he looked a little distracted, until Merry jabbed his cousin in the ribs.
“Have you thought how we might carry it with us, Pip?” he asked.
“Oh,” Pippin said, hastily, “it’s not so difficult after all...well, it worked this morning,” and he climbed up onto a stool and reached out towards the blade, which gleamed in the torchlight. “We’re going to Annuminas,” he announced and lifted it off its rest.
The blade was still pale at the edges, but the grip was cool and Pippin stepped down onto the floor and laid it on a table.
“I doubt it would be so kindly in any other hand, Pippin,” Boromir said gravely and saw Pippin flush.
Whilst he fetched the scabbard, Boromir looked at the graceful lines of engraving along the blade. He could see the sword’s name, Troll’s-Bane, which had been added by Elrond’s smiths after the fighting was over but there was also a thin line of flowing script along one edge that looked to be a curious mixture of Westron written in Elvish characters. Faramir would have liked to see this, Boromir thought, but already the lines were fading and so he peered intently at the script, dredging up all he could remember of both languages. The two hobbits watched as he closed his eyes tightly and seemed to mouth a few words over and over.
“What does it say, Boromir?” Merry asked.
“I think,” Boromir replied slowly, “it says, ‘Feed me and I will work for you, but fear to disturb my rest.”
There was a moment’s silence.
“Perhaps it wants to be in battle again?” Merry suggested.
Pippin shook his head as he slid the sword into its scabbard.
“That would disturb its rest,” he said quietly. Then he looked a little anxiously at Boromir.
“Do you know what it means?” he asked.
“I do not,” said Boromir regretfully, “but Aragorn is sure that the answer lies in Annuminas.”
Pippin shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “So we’re off again,” he said stoutly.
“It’s a riddle, Pip,” Merry said, grinning, “and you know how much I like riddles!”
Later, as Boromir was going over his gear, he had heard the commotion along the corridor and Merry’s voice raised in a joyful shout and knew that Pippin and Diamond had told him their news. There was the sound of running footsteps and the door had burst open with Merry clinging to the latch.
“Did you know? “demanded Merry and then before Boromir could answer, he continued, “Of course you knew! It’s wonderful! Oh, but should he come with us? It could be dangerous!”
“No more than ‘stepping outside your front door’,” Boromir said laughing. “Troll’s-Bane is his blade and this quest has come to him first. I think he might object to being left behind. Actually,” he said, remembering dark eyes that sparkled even as they skewered him, “I think that the lady might object too.”
They had ridden north, the Hobbits on their ponies with bulging saddlebags before them. Pippin had the sword at his side, the scabbard mostly hidden beneath his long grey cloak and once or twice as Boromir had chanced to pass them he thought that he heard Pippin talking low to it.
The way had been plain; they had crossed the border of the Shire, picking up the Steward’s escort, and joined the road towards the North and the second city of the King. Once or twice they had met with merchants returning southwards with fat purses who had been glad to know that the King’s men rode this way, and would have stood their guard a pint if there had only been an inn nearby. Boromir had listened with as much patience as he could muster to their complaints about taxes upon trade and the need to circle the Shire rather than going through it. At this Merry had cut in with a brief, sharp, lecture on trade tariffs throughout Middle Earth and the merchants had to acknowledge privately that these slight figures around the Steward’s fire were not children at all.
After that, Boromir insisted that they follow some of Aragorn’s old byways and camp off the track where they could not be disturbed. They were making good time, but he had an uneasy feeling in his stomach and found himself, more and more, looking to the sky on the far horizon, which seemed alternately dark and then split open by lightening that forked downwards.
They were packing up the camp on the final morning with no more, Boromir judged, than a couple of hours’ riding before reaching Annuminas, when there was a whispering and a rustling that began in the grass around and became like a rushing stream as a mass of mice and rats poured through the camp.
The men shouted and the horses spooked, swinging about at the ends of their tethers as the creatures ran across their feet.
“Mount up! Mount up!” Boromir roared, catching up Merry and Pippin unceremoniously by the collars of their tunics and throwing them across their ponies’ backs, where the Hobbits scrambled to right themselves and gather up their reins as the ponies sidled and stamped.
Some of the horses were panicking; one had torn its tether rope free and was backing towards Boromir and through the fire, kicking over the empty kettle and throwing its head about wildly. Dodging its swinging quarters, Boromir threw an arm over its neck and hung on to the plunging beast with one hand, whilst he plucked furry bodies that shrieked and skittered from out its ears and mane.
“I have it!” Merry cried as he kicked his pony alongside the larger horse and leant out to catch a rein.
Boromir, struggling on the other side of the beast, heard Pippin call Merry’s name and half saw the pony swing away and the hobbit fall between the sets of hooves and heard him cry out.
Then as suddenly as they had arrived the creatures were gone and Boromir was shouldering aside the trembling horse to reach the hobbit, who was sat on the ground, supporting one arm with another, his palm cradling the elbow.
“Have they gone?” he said, looking up at Boromir, white-faced.
“Yes, they’re gone,” Boromir replied quietly. As he knelt down beside Merry a stray mouse dropped out from his sleeve, squeaked and vanished into the undergrowth. Merry tried a laugh and a shrug, but could only wince and Boromir saw at once that his collarbone was broken.
“I’ve done this before, Boromir,” Merry said, “once when I fell off a wall and again when Pippin decided to go scrumping in Farmer Maggot’s orchard.”
“I think you’ve been kicked in the head, Merry,” said Pippin sadly, “it was definitely your idea about the orchard.”
“It was not!” Merry spluttered indignantly.
“I’m not that fond of pears,” insisted Pippin
“Says the hobbit who had seventy casks of perry at his wedding!” shouted Merry.
Whilst the patient was suitably distracted Boromir gently undid Merry’s shirt, felt for the break, which caused him to draw a sharp breath in mid-sentence but not to lose his thread, now expanding on all the times he’d taken the blame for something that Pippin had done, and began to fashion a sling into which he carefully placed Merry’s arm.
“All done, Merry,” he interjected and the hobbit flashed him a cheeky smile.
“Yes, we are, Boromir,” he said, “it will fix in a few days,” and with Pippin’s arm about his waist Merry scrambled to his feet, took a moment to stop his head spinning and then was lifted up onto his pony. Pippin gathered up his reins and put them into Merry’s good hand.
Merry leant gingerly forward on his pony’s neck, watching as the others gathered together the gear that had been scattered across the camp.
“Where did they come from, Boromir?” he asked, “all the mice and rats? And where were they going?”
“They weren’t seeking us, that’s certain,” said Boromir briskly, as he checked his girths once more and mounted. “We were simply camped in their path. Where they were going to, I could not say, but my guess,” he added, waving on the soldier riding ahead of the main party, “would be that they have come from the city; there’s nowhere else between here and Annuminas that would support so many creatures.”
They were close enough to Annuminas now to see the spread of the city and the lake glinting beyond it. The road wound across an expanse of grassland, a little like Rohan, Merry thought, and then there appeared on the road ahead their scout riding back towards them with some urgency.
The man wheeled his mount up alongside Boromir and leant in close to deliver his report, at which Boromir signalled them to canter on and the party made haste to the top of a small rise where they halted and Merry heard Pippin gasp at the sight before them.
The road to the city was crowded with a long line of people and carts, livestock and children running alongside, coming towards them. At irregular intervals Boromir could see the odd soldier trying to keep order, keep the column moving, but they were hard-pressed and all the while, behind them the clouds lowering around Annuminas’ towers, rumbled with thunder and crackled with lightening.
“Sweet Arnor!” Boromir muttered and urged his horse on towards the head of the line.
There was a young officer in attendance on two very elderly men in the leading cart who could never have been so glad to see anyone as Lord Boromir and he held up his hand to signal the halt as they approached. He could hear the order being passed along behind him as the Steward brought his horse alongside the cart and sketched a salute as best he could whilst managing the restive horses.
“You look to be emptying the city,” Boromir said sharply.
“Aye, my Lord,” the young man said. “The earth has been shaking for some days and cracks were appearing in new walls. The councilmen decided yesterday that all must leave.” He indicated the old men, lying still in the cart. “That was before the ceiling of the King’s Hall came down. The ground is turned to quick-sand in some places, swallowing up houses. I am to take the people to safety. My Captain has stayed behind with a few men to see what can be saved.”
For a long moment, Boromir stood in his stirrups surveying the crowd. Then he turned to the officer,
“I’m leaving you my sergeant and men,” he said. “You will lead the people over this ridge and then set yourself up a camp. Make sure that all your stragglers are gathered in.”
The hobbits had brought their ponies up to them and Pippin was peering into the cart. One of the elders, a bandage roughly tied about a head-wound, stretched out a thin, knotted, hand to him and Pippin took off his glove to clasp it warmly.
“Welcome to Annuminas,” the old man said slowly.
Boromir wheeled his horse about and joined them.
“Is this all about my sword?” Pippin asked softly.
“I do not know,” Boromir replied, “but it seems that at the very least Troll’s Bane knew something was afoot. Why now?” he muttered.
He turned to the elder and leant in to place his hand over Pippin’s, enfolding them both.
“What has passed in Annuminas this season, sir?” he asked and although the tone was gentle, Merry could hear the command in his voice.
“We’ve done well, Lord Boromir, very well,” the man said, and tears seemed to gather in his cloudy eyes. “We’ve cleared more of the old city, uncovered squares and fountains, alleys and workshops…made good use of all we’ve found.”
Boromir could feel a small hand tugging at his cloak.
“’…and fear to disturb my rest,’” Merry hissed.
“I know, Merry,” Boromir muttered, but before he could say more, Pippin had pulled at the old man’s hand.
“What kind of workshops?” he said urgently.
“Oh, I don’t know…just workshops,” the elder seemed to be becoming bewildered and now his other hand was flapping anxiously.
“We think they were metal-workers’ places,” put in the young officer. “There was slag from the fires in piles everywhere.”
Boromir had made haste then to see his men put to work along the column before he set out for the city. Only for the most fleeting moment did he consider leaving Merry behind. The hobbit would not have agreed in any case.
They had barely passed the tail of the line, when ahead Boromir could see a knot of soldiers barring the road. When they rode up, the Captain came forward to receive Boromir’s hand as he leant down from his horse.
“Ho, Clermon,” Boromir said, “is the way still clear? We need to go into the city.”
“I doubt your mounts will go much further, my lord,” he said, “beasts sense the shaking ground.”
Boromir nodded and signalled to the hobbits to dismount. As a guard led away the horse and ponies, he explained to the Captain that he needed a guide to take them to the part of the old city that had just been cleared, at which a veteran stepped forward to say that he had been on light duties, guarding the diggings at night.
“Can you find the metal-workers’ shops?” Pippin asked urgently.
“That I can, Sir Hobbit,” the man replied.
They had walked and sometimes run in the middle of roads, clambering over piles of rubble and staying as far as they might away from high walls. Above them the dark clouds had growled and spat fire. Once the earth had shaken so that they had been thrown to the ground and as Boromir knelt up and spat out a mouthful of dust, a baker’s shop crumbled before them.
Although some streets were blocked, the way a puzzle of fallen stone and timber, the old soldier had led them straight towards the eastern lake-shore. There were few new structures here, but everywhere evidence of digging through different coloured layers of earth and clay.
They had run down a narrow alleyway, with rough stone walls standing to shoulder height on a man and come out into a small paved square. The ruins of a dozen or more workshops, or dwelling places, stood here. A few were still recognisable as smiths’ or armourers’ shops with the remains of the chimney breast, forge and floor still standing. In other places the city’s scavengers had been at work and whatever had been there had been dismantled, piled into heaps of fired brick or worked stone that could be used elsewhere.
Merry sat down abruptly on the edge of an empty stone trough. With an arm that could not balance him, he had stumbled more than once until Boromir had picked him up and carried him over the roughest places. The run through Annuminas had tested the hobbit’s mettle and he was breathing heavily
“Which one forged our blades, Pippin?” he gasped.
Pippin was drawing Troll’s-Bane from its scabbard and Merry could see that the edge of the blade had begun to whiten.
Boromir was going from one stack of bricks to the next.
“The fired bricks at each workshop have runes pressed into the clay when wet,” he said. “They may be the craftsman’s mark.”
“Like a seal on a ring?” Merry asked.
“Here, Boromir!” Pippin exclaimed and he let Boromir see the pommel of the sword, where there was set an oval gem, cut with a single character like a curving serpent.
“Look for this mark,” Boromir ordered and they fanned out around the site, turning over discarded stones and all the while the sky was darkening.
It was the old soldier, who had shouted and beckoned them urgently across to the far corner of the square, where three or four courses of chimney bricks and the base of the forge were all that remained of what had once been a large shop. There was a scattering of stones and a larger pile of bricks, taken from the dismantled forge in the corner of a stone floor and Boromir had picked one up and compared the mark impressed there with the cut gem that was beginning to sparkle with the white fire running around the length of the blade.
“I wonder, does it know it is home?” Pippin said gravely.
“’If you feed me, I will work for you, but fear to disturb my rest’,” Boromir said grimly.
“Well, they’ve disturbed this place, all right,” said Merry, looking around at the rubble.
“Can we rebuild it?” Pippin asked, raising his voice against a rumble of thunder. “I know that it was a ruin, but all has been quiet till now.”
“We can try, Pippin,” said Boromir, nodding to the soldier, who laid aside his staff and began to rummage around in the brick pile, turning them over to show the impressed mark and starting to sort them into sizes and colours. Boromir was on his knees, clearing away dust and rubble with his hands to reveal the footprint of a hearth, cut into the stone floor.
“We can’t put them back exactly,” he said, “but we may be able to do enough. Look at what’s left and you can see that all the bricks are laid with the seal showing at the right.”
The soldier straightened with a brick in each hand.
“The colour of the bricks will tell which went into the chimney, my lord, and which were closest to the heat!” he said. Just then, there came a crack of thunder and the ground shook, so that Merry had to sit down again.
For the next few minutes they worked feverishly. Merry had taken over sorting the bricks and Boromir, Pippin and the soldier hastened to try to rebuild the skeleton of the forge. Gradually a square brick platform with the beginnings of a chimney behind it, started to emerge. Merry had found a series of fan-shaped bricks that formed the arch of the chimney above where the hearth would have been lit and they had warily put them in place, unsure that the bricks would hold without mortar. But now they were running out of the bricks with the serpent mark and at last Merry scrambled to his feet and they stood back to see what they’d done…and all the while the thunder crashed and lightening forks seemed to skirt the square.
“What do we do now, Boromir?” Merry shouted, above the din.
Boromir was about to admit that he did not have another plan, when Pippin strode forward and laid Troll’s-Bane on the forge, its blade thrust into the unlit hearth. As he stepped back, a small flame ran around the metal and he turned to them with a look of wonder.
“It’s not the sword,” he cried, “in the riddle, it’s the fire that made the sword!”
“’If you feed me…” began Boromir.
“’…I will work for you!” Merry exclaimed and he clapped his cousin on the back.
“The mark isn’t a serpent, it’s a flame. But what about the second part,” Pippin said, as the sky crackled above them. “We’ve not returned it to its rest.”
“Maybe men took away some of the bricks,” Boromir said grimly, “and if so…” and he stopped abruptly. “Fool!” he exclaimed and slapped his fist to his head. “’…fear to disturb my rest’ - where do you rest?” he asked and the hobbits could see him looking urgently about.
“In a haystack?” suggested Merry.
“In a bed,” Pippin said.
Boromir had gone to the scattering of small stone blocks and was turning them over.
“What’s the part of the hearth beneath the fire called?” he said.
“It’s the hearth-bed, my lord,” the old soldier answered and he hurried to Boromir’s side, to take up an armful of the little blocks.
Pippin had lifted Troll’s-Bane from the brick platform and Boromir had begun to place the stone blocks into the hearth-bed. He very quickly realised that they were like a puzzle, no two cut exactly the same and fitting together closely.
“We must find all of them!” he said urgently.
They went on hands and knees, feeling in the dust and rubble for more of the worked stones and all the while the earth trembled and thunder rolled around them. Suddenly, there was a flash of light and a crash and the chimney arch cracked sending one or two loose bricks tumbling from the top onto the hearth-bed and striking Boromir, who was bent over, fitting in an awkward block.
Pippin heard him grunt, and slump forward momentarily, before reeling back with blood running on his face from a head-wound.
“Go on! Go on!” he urged them, dashing a hand across his eyes and Merry, feeling about under a stone trough, exclaimed as he pulled out two of the small blocks. Pippin snatched them from him and the old soldier clasped him about the chest and lifted him up to the hearth-bed where Boromir, still dazed, pointed to two small gaps.
It was as the last blocks fell into place and Pippin replaced the sword on the hearth-bed, where the flames along the blade flickered and flickered and gradually went out, that the sky began to clear.
“Thank-you,” Pippin gasped as the soldier set him down.
“I was my pleasure, Sir Hobbit,” the old man said. “I was one of your guard at Elessar’s crowning and it’s good to know I can still be of service.”
They had sat for some time quietly on the ground that was solid beneath them, whilst the clouds above them faded into the blue and sunshine of a still morning. They had torn a strip from the hem of Boromir’s shirt to staunch his wound, which was not deep but bled freely. It was as Pippin began to hear the sounds of birds high above them, a skein of geese flying over to land on the lake, that Merry turned to Boromir.
“It was a trap, wasn’t it?” he said.
Boromir stared up for a moment at the geese, travelled from cold lands to winter on this kindly lake. Then he turned to the hobbits.
“We must remember those dark days,” he said quietly. “The Dunedain sword-smiths who settled here had been driven from their homes once before when Cardolan fell and now they were using all their knowledge to forge weapons that could fight the Nazgul. Such blades were powerful beyond what most men knew and the power to make them was both precious and dangerous. So I think you are right, Merry, they set a trap for any as would seek to disturb their work, or to carry away this forge for their own ends.”
............................................................................................................
Boromir was dozing before the fire in the smial, sat in a low chair and with his long legs stretched out before him. The ache at his temples was almost gone now. The Lady Diamond had skill as a healer, although he had to admit that her raised eyebrows as they had ridden back into the yard, Pippin jumping down to envelope her in a hug, whilst he and Merry dismounted more slowly, made it clear that she thought them a little careless.
They had left Annuminas, with folk returning to see what was left of their homes and to begin to rebuild. He had set an absolute ban on anyone going further into the old city and certainly a ban on disturbing anything of the old city they might come across. It would be for the King to decide its fate. Personally, he favoured burying the old places again and letting grass grow over them, a barrow-mound for the past.
Pippin had brought Troll’s-Bane home and now it hung, in its scabbard, in its old place. Boromir heard the soft sound of hobbit feet on the flagstones and opened his eyes to find Pippin standing beside him with a tankard in his hand.
“I thought you might like to try this,” he said, “Diamond says it can’t hurt now.”
“What is it?” Boromir asked.
“It’s very good,” Pippin replied, grinning, “It’s my best pear perry.”
-oo0oo-