Co-authored by Raksha; this story is AU and blends LOTR movie-verse and books.

Thank you everybody for your wonderful reviews and comments, we appreciate them enormously.

Authors' Notes:  The Anor-stone is a term for the palantir of Minas Tirith; originally there were seven palantiri, called Stones, or Seeing Stones; and referred to individually by the names of their locations, such as the Orthanc-stone.  The palantir set in the White Tower of Minas Tirith is called the Anor-stone because Minas Tirith was originally named Minas Anor.

CHAPTER 12

Memories

"Faramir, you must remember that it was not precisely the palantir that drove your father mad," Aragorn said as he led the way up the stairs that wound up to the top of the White Tower, the highest point of Minas Tirith.  "The palantir is only a tool.  The visions that Sauron sent through it to your father were deceptive.  Denethor was strong enough to resist his evil for many years.  He despaired only after Boromir‘s death and your own injury, and was finally goaded into that final madness by the images Sauron showed him. " 

"So I have been told."  Faramir replied, his stiff leg forcing him to move more slowly than he would have liked.  Now that he had sworn to gaze into the palantir, he wanted to accomplish the deed as soon as possible.  Mithrandir had told him something of the palantir’s role in his father's decline.  Faramir had read the scrolls and tablets, handed down from his longfathers, which provided some knowledge of the Anor-stone‘s use.  He had prayed that he would never have to put them into practice.  Aloud, he said: "I have seen the instructions, my lord.  I wanted to be ready, in case it became necessary that the palantir be surveyed in your absence.  Thankfully, we never came to such a pass during those times that you journeyed forth and I remained in the City."

"But the instructions will not prepare you for the first thing that you will see," Aragorn said quietly, pausing to look down at Faramir.  "It will trouble you.  It troubled me and I was not his son."

"Does my father's ghost haunt the Anor-stone, then?"  Faramir asked.  Mithrandir had implied that there was something in the palantir that had not been there before Denethor's death.  "He could not kill me while he lived," he continued, with a mirthless chuckle.  "I doubt he will accomplish it now, when he is dead."

"No, not a ghost".  Aragorn gave him a long look that was both gentle and searching.  "Your father is at peace in the halls of Mandos.  It is more of an echo of his presence, not your father himself.   It must be swept aside to use the palantir properly, but ‘tis no easy task to accomplish. . ."  He stopped.  Faramir beheld the unusual sight of the King of Arnor and Gondor turning pink with embarrassment.  "Forgive me, mellon-nin, I did not mean to say that anything of your father's should be swept away.  I would have gladly held him in honour as my Steward, had he lived and agreed to it."

"There is nothing to forgive, my lord," Faramir replied.  "You have preserved the best of Denethor's Stewardship in continuing the care he had for Gondor."

"And in you, Faramir.  You must never forget; you were the best legacy he could have left this realm."

Faramir looked down, feeling rather embarrassed himself.  This was a night for unusual occurrences.  While he was creeping up the stairway to look into his father's secret device, the lord who had replaced Denethor as ruler was praising him.  He half-expected to hear the deep, commanding voice of the twenty-sixth Steward of Gondor asking Faramir what he thought he was doing there. 

"Thank you, my lord" Faramir replied.  For one fey moment, Faramir could not tell to which lord he spoke; the last ruling Steward or the returned King. 

"Faramir, are you sure you wish to proceed?"  the King asked.  "You need not do this.  You have already proved your courage to me many times."

"I gave you my word; and I will keep it.  Boromir taught me that a dare must be upheld when asked.  Take me to the Seeing Stone." 

"If you are sure, then. . ."  Aragorn answered and took step once more.  "I signaled the guards to evacuate the Tower in preparation for our inspection."

The concern in the King's voice made the hair on the back of Faramir's neck prickle.  It also made him want to flee down the stairs and then as far away from the palantir as he could go. Instead, he squared his shoulders and resumed the climb.

The staircase reached the summit.  The King and the Steward climbed into the Chamber of Guard, the highest room in the tower as far as most men knew.  Aragorn located the secret door behind thepainting depicting the nine ships of Elendil and his sons escaping the Downfall of Numenor.  He opened the door, stood back, and gestured for Faramir to precede him.  Faramir ascended the small flight of stairs, and unlocked the second door at its height, and stepped through it, Aragorn a silent sure presence at his back. Now there was no barrier between Faramir and what he had come toconfront.

Faramir advanced into the small chamber.  In its center stood a heavy table of marble and stone on which was inset a globe of dense, gleaming black material.  The globe was the size of a large melon.  It looked crystalline, but was darker than any crystal Faramir had ever seen. A red light flickered in its obsidian heart. 

He paused at a point about a foot from the table's edge, then took a deep breath and stared into the Stone of Anor.  For a few moments, nothing happened.  Then the air around the stone seemed to chill slightly.   The light at its center brightened.  The stone appeared to grow larger and larger, until it occupied most of Faramir's field of vision.  The red-gold light flashed and coalesced into a small fire.  Flames leapt up and filled his sight. Behind them, he saw a pair of hands, the trembling hands of an old man.  He knew whose hands they were even before sighting the Steward's Ring on one thin finger, shining hideously as it reflected the glow of the fire. 

The hands began to burn, the flesh curling and the hands crumpling like old parchment.  Faramir thought he might die of the horror of it.  But he did not.  He held onto both the palantir and his resolve.  And he prayed that whatever conceit had ruled his father's mind at the time this echo was embedded in the stone it had dulled the pain of the fire.  "If I could have spared you this end, I surely would," he said to the father who had sent him across the Pelennor that last time.  The image of Denethor's burning hands changed to that of his father's head and shoulders, mercifully still whole, pride and sorrow etched on the cold planes of his face.

 "See me, father" Faramir entreated, whether aloud or to the figure before him he did not know.  Since he had been a boy, he had silently said the same words, while watching Denethor gift his golden brother with praise and unstinting love.  Boromir had always deserved their father's regard; Faramir would never have begrudged it to the big brother he adored.  But he could not help wanting a portionthat was his alone.

 "See me, father" Faramir called again in his thoughts.  "Gondor is safe.  The realm you protected has flourished.  The White City did not fall.  I am its Steward, and your grandson will be Steward someday, and so on until the end of our line."  The vision in the palantir was a reflection of Denethor rather than the true Steward.   But these words were the closest Faramir would ever come to the farewell he had been unable to give his father.  The figure in the palantir turned, and Faramir looked directly into his father's proud gaze one last time.  "See me, Father; I am here!” he cried silently.  The flames roared up again, as if to ring them both once more.  Faramir could not truly tell where he was, in the secret chamber atop the White Tower in the spring of year 16 of the Fourth Age, or in Rath Dinen on March 15, 3019.  Faramir had been unconscious throughout that terrible day.  Yet he still recalled a brief moment when he had awakened to see his father and call for him.

"Do not take my son from me!" Denethor seemed now to plead.  "He calls for me. . ."  And Faramir knew, in a strange connection to a dead man's memory, that his father had seen him at the end. The love and sorrow in Denethor's falcon eyes resounded in the twenty-sixth's Steward's voice.  Was it a memory or the vision of a memory that spoke to him?  He could not tell, and it hurt to think on it.  But he had heard his father's voice from somewhere...

Be at peace, Father, Faramir told the memory.  His own heart was far from peaceful, but he knew that he had to move on from this moment.  Then he watched, his hands clenching into painfully tight fists, as the flames and smoke veiled, then consumed, the remnant of his father. 

Faramir forced himself to continue watching.  He knew that the palantir held more than a single memory of one Steward's death.  He looked deep into the flames and something deep and cold within him told them to still.  The fire died.  Faramir moved back a bit, as the scene changed.   He viewed his father's fearsome last vision; that of the black-sailed Corsair fleet coming up the Anduin.  Denethor believed that those ships brought a final invasion to the beleaguered City; but they had actually ferried the returned King to end the Enemy's siege.  More scenes passed before Faramir's eyes: Mithrandir and the Rohirrim meeting Aragorn at Helm's Deep, and, earlier, Boromir on the Great West Road as he began his last journey.  His eyes burned with tears at the sight of his lost brother,riding bravely into the destiny that would take him from all who loved him.  Faramir quelled the sorrow rising in his heart.  Now was not the time to falter!

He reached again from within himself, and willed order upon the chaotic processions from the past.   The stone cleared.  Faramir drew back again, standing perhaps a foot and a half from the stone, the better to seek the southeast.  He would have what knowledge the Anor-stone could give him of his own land, beginning with Emyn Arnen.  He perceived a forest covering rolling hills and a village, then a great house of white stone, surrounded by tall trees and gardens just waking to bloom.   It was his home, Tham Fain, “White Hall” in the common tongue.  He could see figures; real people!  He took another step back, since it was easier to make them out when he physically moved away from the stone. Two guards in the livery of Faramir's White Company circled the gardens.  He wished he could return home now with Eowyn and the children.  He wondered if his father would have been happy to retire there.  Probably not.  Denethor would have taken scant pleasure in the proximity of six lively children running at large rather than tiptoeing with downcast heads through the corridors.  He might not have appreciated their beautiful Rohirric mother who never failed to speak her mind.  Yet Faramir could not imagine his proud, obdurate father serving Aragorn as Steward or living in the City of which he was no longer Lord.  The notion that even if his father had survived the War of the Ring, there would be no place for him in the new world that Faramir loved, hit him like a blow. 

Now the world within the palantir seemed to buck beneath his very hands as he sought other sights.  It felt rather like he was handling the tiller in one of his uncle's pleasure-boats in a storm; but the pictures did shift as Faramir surveyed other parts of Ithilien.   He looked down upon the stream that traced a silver ribbon from the Anduin, just above Cair Andros in his sight, and followed it like an airborne raven to Henneth Annun.  He could not see beyond the Window of the Sunset into the cave, there was too little, or no light within the refuge.  He looked slightly southward, to Eryn Gelair, Legolas’ forest domain.  A few of the elves were awake, dancing on the  Field of Cormallen in the glow of lamps and moonlight...Dancing and perhaps other couplings under the trees...He pulled his sight farther south, to Minas Ithil, the stronghold he was helping the King reclaim from Sauron's long grasp.  The ruined fortress slumbered peacefully under the moon for which he had renamed it.   All was well.  His land appeared to be safe, unthreatened by Easterlings or any other invaders.  His field of vision lurched, as a wave of exhaustion broke through him.  Time to retreat, Faramir resolved, return to the world of actual sight and touch.  He would have to disengage from the palantir's grip. 

Faramir lowered his eyes and stepped back, and back again, almost stumbling.  The sights of past and present reeled around him.  He could not attest which were memories of visions and which visions were new.  There was an appalling wrench, then he found himself looking up at a vaulted ceiling.  Faramir's knees buckled; his arms flailed uselessly.  His strength was gone and he was falling....But strong arms caught him, guided him back several steps, and eased him down slowly against a wall.  The table with the palantir set within it stood above him.  The King was with him, holding him as a father holds a son. 

"Easy, Faramir.  Try to take some water."  Aragorn said a few long moments later, and pressed the flask to Faramir's mouth.  The water tasted good, even if his hand so trembled as he took it that Aragorn had to help him hold the flask.  The room was still rolling; though he was not on a boat.

"The first time is exhausting," Aragorn said in a matter-of-fact voice, as Faramir gulped down more water.  “I never told anyone, but after I used the Stone of Orthanc for the first time, I threw up and could not keep solid food down for two days.   Do you need to be sick?"

"No..." Faramir breathed.  "I am well...That is, I will be...when the room stops spinning."   He had to close his eyes; they stung with sudden weariness.

"Rest now, your head will clear soon.  Make no sudden moves as yet."

"I saw it all!  I saw...him, my father, his hands, his face, in the fire.  Then I made it change, and looked at Ithilien.  It seemed peaceful there.   Emyn Arnen was quiet and to the north, the elves were dancing." He opened his aching eyes, wishing to avoid the dark visions roiling behind them.

"You saw the vision of your father's hands? Ah, Faramir, I had hoped you would be spared that sight."  He rubbed Faramir's forehead with two fingertips, in a circular motion.  "Just stay still."

Under other circumstances, if he were injured and the King were comforting him, as he had long ago in bringing him back to a world that no longer held his father, Faramir would gladly welcome such paternal solicitude from Aragorn.  But the knowledge that his King did see him gave him little ease.  As much as Faramir found such comfort to ease his tired spirit, as much as he had wished that Aragorn could truly be his father, he knew that he was Denethor‘s son.  Denethor had never given him so much of himself.  Denethor had rarely seen Faramir, either when Boromir was present or when his brother was gone.   For too long a time, especially that last year, Faramir had tried to love his father enough for the both of them.  Faramir knew now, from having beheld his father's dying mind and his eyes, preserved in the palantir, that his father had died with just enough love towards his second son in his broken old heart to see him at last and try to take him into a shared death.  That was all he could remember receiving from his father; just enough love, measured out in small dollops, just enough, 'sufficient' as the meaning of Faramir's name.  And he would have to be content with that for the rest of his life.  The chance that his father could see him for a time longer than that last day was gone, gone forever.  

The pain was too much.  He could no longer fight back the tears.  This old grief should not hurt him like this, after many years had passed, but it did. Faramir wept, his body shuddering with successive waves of sorrow.  If Aragorn had not held him, Faramir would have surely sprawled weeping on the cold floor.  He did not think he could speak, it was taking all his strength merely to breathe.  But then the words started to tumble out of his mouth, as if a stranger was saying them.

"Fathers and sons...I have been told how my grandfather did not care for my father, or at least could not give him what he needed.  I believe that my father had some love for me at the last, but it had dried up inside him in his sorrow and he could not, would not see me to show it.  We had grown so far apart.  It started slowly, when I began to have my own opinions, he thought I took them all from Mithrandir and had become his puppet; and I did not know how to convince him otherwise.  And we ended so badly...we could not even unite in grief when we knew that Boromir was lost to us.  Perhaps I did not reach towards him hard enough.  Perhaps there was no bridge long enough to span the gulf between us...My lord, please forgive me; but I know too well how such a divide may start with what seem to be small resentments.  Your son...deserves to be seen...as himself, as well as the heir to Gondor.  You can still reach him before he turns away."  Then Faramir realized again that he could never reach Denethor; even if Eldarion was restored to health and his father's love.  And the tears drowned out all words.

Finally, the pain subsided enough for him to stop crying and master himself once more.  Faramir felt drained of thought and strength, as he had on surviving many battles.  He was too weary to be abashed at having wept in Aragorn's arms like a child. 

Aragorn gave Faramir another of those soft but searching looks of his; he could read the truth in men's hearts as well as Denethor or Faramir himself.  "Faramir" the king said quietly.  "You can still surprise me."

"My lord," Faramir asked hoarsely, while moving himself up so he sat shoulder-to-shoulder with the King, "By any chance, would you have something stronger than water on your person?"

Aragorn opened his belt pouch, and withdrew a smaller flask than the one that had held the water.  "Miruvor is an excellent restorative for strength expended in attempts to heal...or the use of a palantir," he said, handing it to Faramir.  The Steward gratefully quaffed the Elven cordial.  A bit too sweet for his taste, but it certainly felt good at this moment. 

"If you choose to look again into the Anor-stone, it will be easier," Aragorn said.  "You probably will not see anything of your father's last moments, and the experience will be less wearying.  Still, I am always careful, if I know I need to survey from either the Anor-stone or the Orthanc-stone, not to eat much before I look into it."  He took some miruvor from the flask that Faramir proffered, then handed it back.  "Take a little more, Faramir.  You are still too pale." 

"I will use the palantir again, another time.  You need to be able to trust your Steward to watch the approaches to the City when you cannot."  Faramir vowed, after a last sip of the cordial.

"Fathers and sons..." Faramir mused again.  “...They have such power over each other."  The words that had escaped from the depths of his own sorrow had given him an opening that he would not waste.  It did not really matter that Eldarion's restorationto his fatherwould not change Faramir’s own past; it had to be attempted, for the sake of the King as well as the boy.  "It is sad that you never had the chance to know your father.  Was Elrond good to you?  He seemed to be a most wise and gentle lord."

"He was the only father I remember.  I still miss him." Aragorn answered softly.  "Yes, he was very good to me."

"He would have doubtless been proud of his grandson.  Do you remember the day Eldarion was born?"

"How could I forget?"

"Indeed not," Faramir continued.  "We had to cut the hunting trip short; and Eomer was most displeased that he missed his chance to slay a buck.  We both feared that you would hurt yourself or Roheryn, so great was your haste to return to Minas Tirith."

"But we arrived unscathed.  Roheryn was a fine steed."

"When we came home, we all sat and waited for hours until Eldarion was born.  And he was a most beautiful babe, shining as if with the light of the Eldar, not red-faced and wrinkled as most mortal children are.  I never told you that Eowyn was jealous; for despite Bron's having been a fine healthy boy, he was neither as fair nor as strong as your son at his birth."

Aragorn visibly relaxed, years of care seeming to leave his brow.  He smiled as he remembered.  "He looked like his mother.  He still does."

"You were so pleased with him," Faramir reminded him. "You laughed with joy when he lifted his head only an hour after his birth, and later, when he opened his eyes and looked at you.  Eomer couldn't stop laughing; he said you must have never seen a baby before.  Are you ready to try to bring Eldarion back to the life he deserves?" 

Aragorn sighed, then nodded.  "I accepted your challenge.  I cannot think of any other, safer or more reasonable way to revive him.  Think you that Pallando can be trusted with my son's life?  Gandalf told me that the Blue Wizards were most loyal to each other above all else, but that Pallando would help me if I ever needed it."

Faramir thought back on his short acquaintance with the boisterous wizard from the East, all that Pallando had said and the things he had not said.  "I think he has his own plan for the future, and that Eldarion's welfare is part of that plan.  I do believe that he truly wants peace between Gondor and the Easterlings, at least for now.   It will be me, not Pallando, holding the stone that Saruman used.  I know no more than you of the method Pallando described.  Yet it put me in mind of how you healed me, and Eowyn, and all those others who suffered from the Black Shadow.  I know that you can accomplish it.  You healed us; you made our entire Realm whole again.  You can bring back one lost boy." He handed the flask back to Aragorn.

Aragorn finished the miruvor, then looked again at Faramir.  "I had never thought that I could become to Eldarion what Denethor became to you."

"Nay, my lord; you are stronger than Denethor," Faramir assured him.  "You would never go mad and try to hurt your son, even out of twisted love.  I meant that the disappointment you seem to feel in Eldarion can easily turn to bitterness, bit by bit.  You both deserve better than to turn away from each other and never really understand why.  Eldarion is a good boy."

"You are not just trying to keep my hopes up, Faramir?" 

"I would never lie to you."  Faramir replied.  "An untried lad who fears to fight, but manages to keep his wits about him when facing an Uruk-hai attack without a weapon, that is the kind of boy who will be able to conquer his fears and be a great King.  He is still very young, Aragorn.  I was frightened of fighting and battles too at that age.  I nearly got Boromir and myself killed in my first skirmish, and only managed to strike at the enemy out of sheer instinct to survive.  But Boromir was patient with my weakness; so that I could go on, and fight again, and improve my skills.  And though I never loved war as some fighters do, I was able to do my part in defending this Realm.  Boromir never forgot that I was his brother, who he loved, as well as a Guard, and later a Captain of Gondor."

Aragorn sighed again.  "I have seen what a good father you are, Faramir.  Your children adore you; and Elboron and Cirion are strong, brave lads who will surely grow to be fine men.  You truly believe that I have been too hard on my boy?"

"It is not that you are too hard on Eldarion.  You are our King; and the Realm has ever been your first care, above the duties of a husband and father.  Heirs to kingdoms and princedoms, indeed any lordship, must be taught to become strong yet honorable men.  But you have tried so hard to make Eldarion into a perfect young prince that I believe you have stopped seeing that he is also your son.  Eldarion is only now leaving childhood, a thirteen-year-old boy raised in a land secure in the peace and hope that you fought to give us.  He is not the Sword of Elendil to be hammered and re-forged into a warrior's tool."

Unexpectedly, the King chuckled.  Reaching out his arm behind Faramir's neck, he gripped the younger man's shoulder.  "Faramir, you do give me hope.  I can try to see all of him.  I truly do want to see my son...it is just that I am not sure I know where to look.” 

"I know that you have never stopped loving him.  Just make sure that Eldarion knows it as well, even when you have to be stern with him or punish him.  And do not expect him to be as you were at his age, at least not in all respects.  The poor lad is probably daunted enough to be the son of the greatest King this realm has ever known."

"Now you flatter me!  Are you planning to write another history?"

"I prefer to write of those who have gone before us, my lord.  You are still writing your own legend upon the world."   

Faramir noticed that the floor was flat under him and the room only seemed to wobble a little.  He supposed he had better start to move, or he would surely lose all dignity and fall asleep on the King's shoulder.  Eowyn's shoulder, and their warm bed under her, would please him far more.  The moon had not yet set, there was still time to go home and sleep for a few hours.  Surely Aragorn needed his rest as well.

"I think I can stand now, my lord."

"Very well.  Let us leave this place."  The King returned the empty flask to his belt pouch.  He rose up easily in a fluid stretch, and held out his hand to Faramir.  The Steward stood up with somewhat less grace and more effort, grateful for the King's assistance.  The floor still did not feel as solid under Faramir's feet as he would have preferred.

TBC - In Chapter 13, where it is proven that Faramir's route to Eowyn and their warm bed is neither simple nor painless.

***

MORE AUTHORS' NOTES:  The Sindarin names for Faramir's home in Emyn Arnen and Legolas' domain in northern Ithilien are of our own invention; with the help of Ithildin, our friendly Sindarin interpreter at HASA.  Tham Fain means White Hall; and Eryn Gelair means Bright (or Brilliant) Wood. 

Unlike Faramir, we found most of our information on the palantir of Minas Tirith, and the other Seeing Stones, in one place - "The Palantiri", in Tolkien's UNFINISHED TALES.  It's about as easy to figure out as how to use a palantir in the first place, but we did our best to figure out the details; and unlike our poor Steward, we didn't feel sick afterward.

Minas Ithil, the city Faramir renamed and is helping Aragorn restore, was formerly Minas Morgul, the stronghold of the Nazgûl.  But before that, it was Minas Ithil, Tower of the Moon, an outpost of Gondor, captured by the Nazgûl in 2002 of the Third Age.  In ROTK (the book), King Elessar swore to destroy the place before it could be “made clean”; it was implied that one reason he ordered Faramir to live in Emyn Arnen was so that Faramir could take charge of guarding and clearing out the Morgul Vale.