The Last Ringbearer

“Nothing is free, Haladdin. Wait; let me lean on you… like that… The time was almost up, but I made it. I did. The rest is not important. It’s you who will walk this path now…”

Sharya-Rana was silent for a while, gathering strength. Then he spoke again, and his voice was almost as even as before:

“I will now remove the spell from my ring, and… I will be no more. You will take it; it will empower you to act in the name of the Order of the Nazgul when necessary. Our rings are made of inoceramium, the most rare noble metal, a third again as heavy as gold, can’t confuse it with anything else. People fear those rings, with good reason; yours will be clean, free of all magic, but you’ll be the only one to know that. Will you be afraid?”

“No. I remember it well: nothing can happen to a person who is not afraid. Is this really ancient magic?”

“None more ancient.”

Suddenly he understood that Sharya-Rana was trying to smile but could not: the darkness under his cowl, alive and flowing like a spring in the night not so long ago, now resembled a brick of coal dust.

“Farewell, Haladdin, and remember: you have everything you need to win. Repeat it as an incantation and don’t be afraid of anything. Now, take this… and turn away.”

“Farewell, Sharya-Rana. Don’t worry, everything will be as it should be.”

He carefully accepted a heavy dim ring from the nazgul’s hand and stepped away obediently, so he did not see the wizard slowly push back his cowl. Only when he heard behind him a moan filled with such anguish that his heart nearly stopped (so that’s what “all the World’s pain, all the World’s fear, all the World’s despair” means!), did he turn around – but there was nothing except quickly melting shreds of the black cloak where Sharya-Rana just sat.

“Was that you screaming?”

Haladdin turned around. His comrades, up in flash (the baron was still whirling the wickedly glinting Slumber-maker over his head), were looking at him gloomily, awaiting explanations.

Chapter 19

Perhaps a clandestine operations professional would have done it differently, but he was not one, so he simply told them everything (save burdening Tzerlag with all the ‘parallel worlds’ stuff). He had a visit from a nazgul (here’s the ring) who told him that he, Haladdin, is the only human able to prevent the Elves from turning all of Middle Earth into their fiefdom and all Men into slaves. To do so, he must destroy Galadriel’s Mirror within a hundred days. He has decided to accept the mission, since there’s no one else to do it. So far, he has no idea how or what to do, but hopefully he’ll come up with something.

Tzerlag looked the ring over warily and of course refused to touch it (the One preserve us!); it was obvious that the doctor had ascended to stratospheric heights in his esteem – as opposed to the Nazgul, who had descended a similar distance. It’s one thing to send a man to certain death – war is war – but to give a subordinate an impossible task is quite another. A real frontline officer would never do that. To sneak into Lorien, where no man had ever managed to enter, to locate, in a hostile town, what is undoubtedly a well-guarded object, which for good measure can’t be destroyed on site, but has to be lugged a hell of a distance… In any event, he, Sergeant Tzerlag, scouting platoon leader of the Cirith Ungol Rangers, will not so much as lift a finger until he has a tangible job to do; all these ‘go there – don’t know where’ games are not for him. What? Well, that’s your problem, Field Medic, sir – you’re the senior officer here.

Tangorn’s statement was short: “I’m twice in your debt, Haladdin. Therefore, if the third sword of Gondor can help your mission in any way, it is at your service. However, the Sergeant is right – infiltrating Lorien directly is suicide, we’ll have no chance. We need some sort of a ruse; as I understand it, that’s your business.”

That’s how it came to pass that he went to sleep that night a leader of a company of three, with the other two (accomplished military professionals, unlike him) looking to him for a tangible task – something, alas, which he did not have for them.

Haladdin spent the next day sitting by the stream; he noticed that his comrades were gently relieving him of all housekeeping duties (“Your job now is to think”), and realized to his acute displeasure that he was incapable of thinking to order. The sergeant had told him a few things about Lorien (the Orocuen had once been in a raid near the edge of the Enchanted Forest): about the paths neatly lined with stakes bearing the skulls of would-be unwanted visitors; about the deadly traps and the roving bands of archers that shower you with poisoned arrows and immediately melt into impassable thicket without a trace; about brooks whose water puts a human to sleep and golden-green birds that gather around any creature that enters the forest and give away its location with their lovely songs. After correlating this information with what Sharya-Rana had told him about the mores and customs of the Forest Elves he saw clearly that the Elvish society was totally closed to foreigners and any attempt to get into the Enchanted Forest without a local guide would end within the first mile.

He spent some time considering using the glider that Sharya-Rana had left at Dol Guldur, the launch pad for Mordor’s infrequent flyovers of Lorien. Suppose he flies to the Elvish capital (or, rather, is flown there by someone who knows piloting) and manages to land in some inconspicuous clearing; suppose further that he actually steals or captures the Mirror; then what? How would he get it out? There is no glider catapult there, nor anyone to operate it, nor can any glider lift a thousand pounds. Another dead end. How about capturing an Elvish officer and having him guide their company through the Enchanted Forest traps? No doubt he’d guide them straight into a trap; if what he’s learned about the inhabitants of Lorien is true, an Elf would choose death over treason.

The notes found among Eloar’s belongings haven’t escaped his attention, either. Those were mostly travel notes; the only item with useful content was an unsent letter, beginning with ‘Dearest Mother!’ and addressed to ‘Milady Eornis, clofoel of the Lady.’ About half of it was a description, remarkable in its artistic expressiveness, of the valley of river Nimrodel – it seemed that both the Elf and his mother had special memories associated with that location. In general it looked like the memory of those glades with their mallorns reaching to the very sky, where bursts of golden elanors hide in the emerald-green grass, was what had sustained the Elf’s spirit among the hated sands of Mordor. Eloar expressed concerns over the rumored break-up between his cousin Linoel and her fiance, criticized his older brother Elandar for ‘encouraging futile hopes in the hearts of his proteges in Gondor and Umbar,’ congratulated his mother on the high honor of having been chosen to organize this year’s Festival of the Dancing Fireflies… plus much more of the same. They had already guessed that Eloar’s family was part of the highest elite of Lorien (Sharya-Rana explained that it was difficult to exactly translate the Elvish title clofoel – something between a lady- in-waiting and a royal adviser). That the Elves were secretly infiltrating all parts of Middle Earth and that one of those tasked with this covert activity was one Elandar undoubtedly