Of Enemies and Friends

A sunny morning has slowly clouded over, until this afternoon, a soft, silver rain falls down from the sky, adding to the music of the fountains, pattering on the leaves of the trees, dripping from the roofs. Most of the courtyard has emptied, those who were walking there having fled for shelter but some few found it beneath a tree.

Here is Farielle Girithlin, her green and gold cloak about her shoulders about her face, tendrils of her black hair faintly curling in the damp. Here also is her brother, Lominzil, in his uniform as squire.

\"My cloak is thicker,\" Lominzil says, shedding it. \"Take it.\"

Farielle accepts it, mutely, pulling it over her shoulders and quenching the colors of her own. After a while, she says in a voice barely audible, \"Thank you.\"

Her brother tilts his head, studying her face, and wordlessly reaches out a finger to pull away a damp lock of hair.

Eyes the odd shade of bluish grey that mark descendants of the House of Hador lift to his face. \"Oh, Lomin,\" Farielle says, a catch in her voice that she does her best to master, \"Be - be careful?\"

In some manner haggard, the Lord Isilrim belts hastily from the Lion Rampart\'s port, making deliberately across the Fountain\'s court. In stride, his left-hand combs victuals from his beard\'s brush while his right attempts to protect parchments by the fabrics of his cloak.

At the twain of Girithlin, however, he abruptly halts and scans the squire among them. \"You feel hale?\" he asks as kindly as his rushed demeanor might allow, offering a nod in turn to the young lady.

\"Always,\" he says, careful not to betray anything that would cause her to worry. The hand drops to a salute, made difficult by the blocky bandage across his chest.

\"I am hale, sir.\"

Farielle manages a smile, woebegone as it may be, for the knight, and nods her head to him in turn. \"Good afternoon.\"

Arathis ponders the salute, commenting then with an assured ease, \"It is a curious habit, Girithlin, befit more for the Hostmen. Yet here ye must prove more than a swordsman. If you would heed me, then, let it be not so martial.

\"Though,\" he adds with a heft of his parchment beneath his cloak, \"I did once rank a Captain to Denethor\'s men and, alas, must even now return to him.\"

Turning to Farielle, the Lord Isilrim bows his head lightly again in greeting, \"Your name, Lady? For ye have the gaze too of Thorondur\'s kin.\"

\"Yes, sir,\" replies Lominzil, supplanting salute with a courtly nod of his head.

He is quiet then, though eyes even from afar might tell of the uncanny resemblance between the young man and woman.

\"I am Farielle,\" the lady replies. \"Lominzil is my brother.\" She swallows, darts a glance at her brother, then draws a breath. \"You do not go south then?\" she asks, voice credibly steady.

A hurried gaze flurries past the twain the knight hides little that he means none to tarry.

Yet the lady\'s words re-fix his gaze, and he considers between the two Girithlin with narrowed stare. His feet come together, and Arathis has resigned suddenly to stay.

\"Farielle,\" he repeats, a hint of recognition weighting his brows, \"you would forgive me, but I have broken your brother\'s arm.

\"Nay, I would go south for little purpose other than battle. But have I heard wrongly that you, Lady Farielle, are recently returned thence?\"

\"Not wrongly, sir,\" Lominzil interjects quietly before Farielle must answer. \"She was taken by the Southrons at Caldur.\"

\"You are not the first, sir,\" Farielle answers, her smile gaining a little in strength. Until it is wiped away by his question. But Lominzil answers in her stead, and all she must do is assent, bowing her head. There is a long moment of silence, then the girl lifts her head once more.

\"I - I have tried to forget,\" she says quietly. \"I wished to put it all from my mind, as if it never happened. But I think that was foolish of me for I cannot.\" Her face, very pale her voice, steady and a distress in her eyes she cannot hide.

\"Forgive our Order,\" says Arathis, a shade taking to his features, \"for ye ought not to have been taken ye ought not to have been brought and we ought, alas, ne\'er to have first sailed.\"

His words continue encumbered, prefaced by a hand at Farielle\'s shoulder, \"Pray, Lady, tell the Prince\'s Herald -- whose ear as well as tongue means to haven -- of the fell Southrons, if they were not too cruel.\"

Lominzil stands still helpless.

\"For honesty, sir, none brought me save myself. And I - I know I should never have gone only I wanted to help the healers. My brothers were there, you see.\" Farielle seems to gain a little courage from his touch.

\"They were not all cruel,\" she says after a moment. \"Some, indeed, were kind to me. It distresses me to think of my kinsmen fighting against those few who were my friends.\" She says this without looking at Lominzil. \"I know not what to think. They have always been our foes, I know it, but ... What would you know? I will tell you all that I can.\"

The hand remains, though its hold loosens. A chastising look pauses upon Lominzil.

\"Friends, you say?

\"Aye, tell more.\"

Lominzil is staring away at the fountain, his eyes grey and stormy, frozen sea reflecting the rain. After a moment, he returns the look of Arathis, thusly chastised.

\"Some girls, and a boy near to my age. They tried to help me.\" Farielle blinks, and though her voice wobbles a little, the treacherous tears don\'t fall. \"I attended upon the Lady of Seaward Tower for a little while at first, I thought her terribly hard, but she - Alkhaszor said it was she who helped him see the path of honor was to bring me home. She has had two babies, twins, but her husband ...\" The words stick in her mouth, and she tries again, something else.

\"They wanted ...\" She darts a pleading look at Lominzil, not finishing that sentence either, but saying randomly, \"Someone is cheating Farside Tower\'s shipbuilders, giving them inferior materials. I think it means the ships will not last so long.\"

Displeasure has alit the Lord Isilrim he withdraws his hand.

Standing over the two Girithlin, he decrees flatly, \"There is no honor to Umbar. Their lord is the Deceiver, Fiend of Free Men, Sinker of Numenor, Servant of Morgoth. Their king claims you a subject. Heed it, lady of the blooded Girithlin, for they are your brother\'s Enemy by oath.

\"If you have not yet given statement before the Prince\'s scribes, I would have you tarry no longer. See to it, squire.\"

Whatever sympathy first advanced has been succeeded by taut cheeks and scorn. Thus departs Arathis, proceeding upon his former haste.

Lominzil\'s gaze follows the exit of the Isilrim, burning cold, and then he turns towards Farielle, and takes her by the hand.

\"Come,\" he says gently, and leads her into the rain and up the stairs to the Prince\'s Castle.

Farielle\'s face flushes and her eyes flare dangerously. \"Do I not know it?\" she says anger sharpening her voice. \"They took me to be his wife. I was there, forced to consort with servants of the Enemy. But speak not to me of what you do not understand, nor condemn children for the sins of their parents!\"

As he walks away, she spits after him, \"I have spoken to the Prince if you wish to know ought more, you may ask of him.\"

Lominzil takes her hand and draws her away, and she follows, saying nothing more, but going half-blindly, tears mingling with the rain on her face.

The Lord Isilrim halts and approaches again the Girithlin pair, meaning to hamper their movement.

\"Hold your hissing tongue, child. You speak in one sentence of friends and in the other of enemies, and then in confusion mark a Swansman the latter.

\"If you have given statement too to the Prince\'s scribes, and spoken there fully of this Pretender, whatever husband you mean, and whatever it is they wanted, then I forgive you your hawk. If you have not, then it is your brother\'s task to clean it ere Ulmo\'s rains should suffer to mix with it.

\"It is a foulness, lady, that you have suffered. But know they have released you for this purpose: to return and fiction honor amongst the Deceiver\'s servants to thus sow discord amongst his enemy, the Free Men of Gondor and, alas,\" in gesture towards the charged Lominzil, \"to weaken the ranks of our Order, forcing their duties vainly inward, when they might serve best in resolution outward.

\"Alas then, Girithlin.\"

Farielle looks up at him, her face tear-streaked. Wearily, she says, \"The two who were my friends, they were fourteen and sixteen. Do the Knights of the Swan now make war on children? I told the Prince all that he asked he did not speak much of that man who claims he is king.\"

She looks up at her brother, then back to the knight, and there is a spark of pride in her voice. \"If you think that Lominzil would ever remain here for me, when his duty is elsewhere, you do not know my family, nor my brother.\"

Lastly, \"They did not return me you misunderstand. The Lady said a man should think first of - of the welfare of his wife, and that I would be healthier and happier at home. Alkhaszor brought me at the risk of his own life, against the will of his lord. If in nothing else he has honor, in this, he does.\"

The Lord Isilrim smiles then at the girl, and means to wipe her tears once with the inside of his cloak. \"Mayhap the Herald asks then more of thee than his Prince for, heed, I enjoin that you meet with the Order\'s scribes to record all you have learned within Umbar\'s foul walls, if you have not yet. It shall aid us in our campaign to see these children do not mature into the Enemy\'s slavery.

\"The task remains upon your brother, if you have not yet. And though you would begrudge me for it, you shall in time come to understand its need.

\"And I would fain have ye speak no longer of a Southron\'s honor for you presume to know the will of a lord whose first blade is deception, and thus false knowledge.\"

Arathis readies then to depart, awaiting Farielle\'s answer before overseeing Lominzil\'s task and departing.

\"I know they are our enemies,\" Farielle repeats, nearly in a whisper, not moving away from him as he blots her cheeks dry. \"But - I imagined, before, that all Harad served...\" She darts a swift glance eastward, \"/him/. But they do not. They fear him, and cannot escape his hand, and many do serve him willingly. But not all.\"

Blinking rapidly to keep from weeping any more, she adds, \"Lord Alphros\' claim may be right, I know not. Whether or no, he would not be a good king for Gondor. Perhaps for Harad. I will tell you all I know of him. But I will speak of Alkhaszor\'s honor, however little or much it may be, for it is the truth. He had nothing to gain and everything to lose in bringing me home.\"

\"I have asked that you tell the scribes.

\"Tell them too of whom you believe to serve the Enemy, and whom you believe not.\"

Arathis nods in stress of his words ere departing.

Farielle nods, silently, and turns away once more to follow her brother.