9 |
Dinner And An Outing With Friends |
Beregond's house stood in the fourth circle, in the shadow of the great crag that divided the City. Built of white stone, as were all the houses in Minas Tirith, and backed right up against the circle wall. There was a shop on the ground floor with racks of jars and bottles and boxes on display in the arcaded porch and a spicy jumble of delightful smells coming from the open doors. Pippin sniffed appreciatively. "My wife is an apothecary," Beregond explained, "a maker of medicines, perfumed essences and other concoctions." They didn't go into the shop but instead climbed a flight of stone steps at the side of the house to a first floor door that opened onto a stair hall. The anteroom beyond it had two sets of double doors standing open; one pair leading to a porch overlooking the street and the other to a large, bright room full of tall, dark haired Big Folk. Beregond introduced his wife, Hiril, a green eyed lady with curly tendrils escaping from her tight braids; her brother Iorlas, a young Man wearing a loose gown with a plaster covering half his face and leaning heavily on a stick; his own twin sisters Baradis and Berethil, as alike as two peas with Beregond's grey eyes; and their mother, Anguirel, shorter than her children, her hair laced with silver. Finally he presented his own four children: the very pretty but very serious girl in her early teens with a large book cradled in the crook of her arm was Beleth, his eldest. Then there was a young boy almost a head taller than Pippin called Bergil. A small girl with enormous blue eyes and an even tinier boy, Bronwen and Borlas. All four stared at Pippin in open wonder. "How old are you?" Bergil demanded. Adding proudly; "I am ten years already and will soon be five feet." "Bergil!" his father and mother chorused. But Pippin just grinned. "I am nearly twenty-nine, so I pass you there; though I am but four feet, and not likely to grow any more save sideways." Bergil gave a low whistle. "Twenty-nine! why you are quite old! As old as Uncle Iorlas." "Thank your very much, nephew." Iorlas said drily. "But I don't feel quite ready to be classed among the greybeards yet, do you Master Peregrin?" "No indeed." Pippin agreed. "In fact I'm still little more than a boy as my folk reckon such things and won't "come of age" as we say for another four years yet." "Bergil," said his father with resignation as well as reproof, "this is not the kind of courtesy I would have you show an honored guest." "Oh I don't mind." Pippin said hastily as the boy's face fell. "Nothing wrong with an honest question." The Gondorim didn't seem to go in for dining rooms, a long table had been set up under the arched windows at the end of the parlor, as Pippin thought of it, and spread with what even a Hobbit would regard as a good dinner; jellied brawn and jellied beef, roasts of pork and mutton, and spitted fowl of all kinds from a large goose to a plate of dainty capons, hot and cold vegetable dishes, an apple custard and mince pastries. The tensions swirling around his new master had robbed Pippin of all appetite while in Denethor's presence, but now it came back with a rush. His mouth watered and he set to with a will. The children stared in open astonishment as plateful after plateful vanished. Bergil opened his mouth to comment but closed it, words unsaid, at his mother's gimlet look. "At table small men may do great deeds." Beregond observed lightly, an eye on his son. "And Peregrin has had hard duty today, waiting upon the Lord Steward." "I remember the pair of Halflings we met in Ithilien ate enough for two Men apiece." Iorlas said. Pippin turned to him eagerly. "You saw Frodo and Sam?" The Man nodded. "Only from a distance, I fear. I can tell you no more than they looked well and were determined to continue their quest." Pippin wondered if Iorlas had any idea what that quest was. Something in his eye and carefully neutral tone suggested that he did. "I am one of Captain Faramir's company of Rangers." he continued. "If not for these wounds of mine, got at Osgiliath, I would have ridden with him this morning. "I am grateful you could not!" Hiril said firmly. "A foolish waste of Men's lives - what Lord Denethor was thinking to order it or Lord Faramir to agree to it I cannot imagine." "They think it worth the sacrifice and we must trust their judgment." Beregond said firmly. Changed the subject. "The reason for this early dinner, Peregrin, is that the Captains of the Outlands are expected at the usual dinner hour and we intend to go down to the Great Gate to watch them march in. You are welcome to join us." "I'd love to." said Pippin. "But I have duty again the second hour of the evening." "No doubt the Lord Denethor wishes you to attend him when he greets the Captains. You will have time and to spare." "In that case I accept with pleasure." Pippin said politely. "How are you faring in the Steward's service, Master Peregrin?" Hiril asked. "Well enough," Pippin answered, perhaps a little doubtfully. "I'm getting used to it, and Lord Denethor has been very kind." he sensed skepticism and added, a bit defensive on his master's behalf: "Of course he has a lot on his mind these days." "He does indeed." Beregornd agreed grimly. "I am truly glad I do not have to bear such a burden." Iorlas nodded firm agreement. The Women seemed less convinced. Which reminded Pippin. "Lady Idril doesn't approve of this attack on Osgiliath either - or so Beregond tells me. I couldn't see any sign of it myself." "She wore the colors of the Telemmirioni to farwell the troops." the Man explained. Everybody but Pippin seemed to understand what that meant. "Who are Telemmirioni please?" " Descendants of Telemmaite who was one of those who claimed the crown after the death of Mardil, the first Steward." young Beleth piped up. "and the only one who refused to accept the decision of the Council and swear to Mardil's son Eradan." "Idril is descended from them on her mother's side." Beregond continued. "To wear their colors is accounted a challenge to the Steward's rule. But as the heiress of that House Idril is entitled to do so and has done from time to time to show her displeasure with father or brothers." "But why wasn't this Telemmaite made king?" Pippin asked. "Because he had Northman ancestors," Beleth, a learned young lady who liked to show off her knowledge, replied "and so his blood was not pure." That just didn't seem right. "I'm sorry." Pippin said. "But I don't understand why that should make such a difference. You're all Men aren't you?" Beregond smiled a little bleakly. "We are indeed, Peregrin. And if we Dunedain have greater gifts than other Men it is purely by the grace of the Valar. But pride, alas, is our abiding fault and we do hold ourselves better than other Men, as we should not." "Especially as there is, these days, little difference between us and those we call 'Lesser Men'." his wife agreed somberly. "The race of Numenor fails, and Lady Idril, for all her mixed blood, is the last of the line of the Kings." "Not quite the last." said Iorlas very drily. "The last of noble rank at least." said Beregond, then explained to Pippin; "there are a few commoners with a thin strain of the Blood Royal but they are of no account." "Would that the Lord Steward agreed with you." said Mistress Anguirel from her end of the long table. *** After they had eaten all save Iorlas, Dame Anguirel and little Borlas, walked down the circles of the city to join the throngs gathering in the square behind the Great Gate. Beregond looked at the tightly packed backs between them and the open pavement and said: "Let us try outside the gate, the crowd will be less there." It was, or perhaps strung as they were along the roadway they just seemed less. Pippin and his companions worked their way to the front and waited. After a few minutes horns sounded in the distance, echoed by trumpets from the rampart above the gate. The people began to cheer, calling "Forlong! Forlong!" "What's that they're saying?" Pippin asked Bergil, beside him. "Forlong has come." the boy explained. "Old Forlong the Fat, the Lord of Lossarnach. That is where my grandfather lives -" he broke off to shout; "Hurrah! Here he is. Good old Forlong!" Pippin saw am enormously fat old man encased in mail, with a long grey beard showing beneath his black helm. Mounted upon a big, thick limbed horse with a scarlet and green banderole flying from the spear in his hand and leading a dusty line of of grim, swarthy Men, broad in the shoulders but shorter than the Dunedain, armed with great battle axes. Over his head he heard Hiril mutter; "So few! a mere two hundred or so." And Beregond answer; "We hoped for ten times that number. No doubt Forlong has heard the tidings from east and north and dares not strip Lossarnach of its defenders. Still every little is a gain." Forlong was followed by a Lord Devorin of a place called the Ringlo Vale with a following of three hundred Men. Then the Lord Duinhir of Morthond and his sons, Duilin and Derufin, and their company of five hundred archers. A very large, if ill equipped, force from Anfalas, far away on the western coast, was led by their Lord Golasgil. Then came a few score grim looking hillmen from Lamedon who didn't seem to have a leader any more than did the hundred or so Fisher-folk from the mouths of the Anduin. Finally there came another well appointed company; three hundred green clad men-at-arms led by a handsome golden haired lord riding beneath a green banner. Followed by the largest and grandest of the forces consisting of both mounted knights and tall men-at-arms, about a thousand in all, under the golden banners of the Prince of Dol Amroth. "Three thousand all told." Beregond said quietly. "Not enough, not nearly enough. But with the Black Fleet raiding at will can we blame them for putting the peril to their own homes and families first?" By now the sun had vanished behind the mountain of Mindolluin and it was outlined in in fire, but the city below was drowned in shadow. Pippin shivered for it seemed an omen, and a dark one. The children ran ahead at the heels of the Men of Dol Amroth and he said quietly: "Wouldn't it be as well to get the little ones out of the city? And Mistress Anguirel and Iorlas too?" "I agree." said Beregond drily. "But my good wife does not." "Minas Tirith will not fall." Hiril said with calm confidence. "They are safer staying here at home than they would be as prey for raiders on the long road to Lossarnach." Beregond shrugged and gave Pippin a half-smile. "You see? I can do nothing with her. Are Halfling women so stubborn?" Pippin thought of his mother and sisters and aunts and cousins, and nodded. "Oh yes." *** They left Baradis and Berethil at their own little house in the second circle, and Hiril and her children stopped at home too, but Beregond continued up to the Citadel with Pippin to hear the news the new levies had brought. "I'm more than a little nervous," Pippin admitted to his friend as they walked up the near empty road, lit by lamps, "I've done some fighting but never been in an actual battle before." "Nor have I." said Beregond. Startled Pippin looked up at him and he smiled wryly. "I have been in the service of Gondor all my life but never yet lifted a sword in her defense. I was chosen early for the Citadel Guard and never had the fortune, or misfortune, to be sent on campaign. So I am even less experienced than you, Peregrin, with your many adventures." "That's very odd." Pippin said, trying to be tactful. In fact it struck him as very strange indeed given what Boromir had said about Gondor's danger. There couldn't be anything wrong with Beregond himself or he wouldn't have been chosen for the Fountain Guard. "Oh there is a reason." the Man said. "A foolish one in my opinion, but not alas the Steward's." His mother had said something like that too, then Pippin remembered in what connection and came to a full stop at the entrance to the tunnel leading up to the Citadel. "You're descended from the Kings too, aren't you? and Denethor doesn't trust you because of it." "Alas yes. And unecessarily - I know my place very well and will keep to it." the Man laughed briefly. "Don't look so amazed, Peregrin, the blood is old and thin and means nothing." *Maybe.* Pippin thought. *And maybe Beregond reminds Denethor of Aragorn too.* |