Co-authored by Raksha

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Chapter 9

Accusations

“Faramir!  At last!”  The King did not trouble to conceal his annoyance.

“My lord?” Faramir questioned, concerned by his reception and far more by the King's mood.  Aragorn's deep blue-grey eyes were shadowed by lack of sleep; and he paced nervously about his Chamber of Audience.  Faramir prayed that Aragorn's obvious irritation and fatigue would not make his lord snap during the long hours of the Great Council's session. 

Ordinarily, the King strode into the Council with the air of a lord of Eagles; regal and calm, yet watchful.  Faramir had often suspected that Arwen had much to do with Aragorn's composure on such occasions, for his lord enjoyed not the long byplay of governance, despite his considerable talent for it.  Still, it would not hurt the Council to feel the crack of the royal whip when petty grievances threatened to drag on too long.

Aragorn glowered at him.  “The Council sits in an hour.  We need to discuss our most important concerns before we enter it; and I have to be arrayed in the usual foolishness, which they tell me must take longer today, because I have lost flesh and the cursed robes have to be altered!”

Faramir was not pleased to see that his King and friend was not only weary and unusually tense, but visibly thinner.  Did the King not know how important his health was to the Realm, not to mention all who loved him?

“My King, I apologize for my tardiness" Faramir addressed the Lord of Gondor.  I have been conferring with a very important visitor all morning.  Someone who has news and may be able to help us with our riddles.”

Aragorn's eyes hadnot left his Steward since Faramir entered the room.  But now as the younger man indicated his companion, the King shifted them to look at the stranger.

Pallando inclined his head.  “Greetings King Elessar,” he boomed in Quenya.

Aragorn looked closer at the stranger.  He was no Elf, yet Elves were the only people east of the Blessed Realm to remember the time when Quenya was habitually spoken; and most of the Elves who had done so were gone.  This visitor's garments were blue; as was the stone in the tip of his staff.

“And you are?” he asked.

“You may call me Pallando!” the man proclaimed with a smile.

Aragorn felt a rush of excitement course through him.  He leaned forward in his chair, shaking off the weariness of another sleepless night.

“Pallando the Blue, of the Istari?” he queried.

Pallando’s smile widened.  “You have heard of me?”

“Yes,” Aragorn responded enigmatically. “I have.”

Suddenly a young page bustled into the room through a side door.

"My lord; the tailor and his assistants have returned.  They await your pleasure," the lad reported breathlessly, somewhat frightened by the King's expression.

Aragorn turned a molten stare towards the boy.  He opened his mouth to speak but Faramir, noting the King's barely restrained anger, was quicker.

“Thank you,” he said firmly to the boy.  “Tell the tailor that the King shall be ready for his assistance in a few minutes."  Faramir was grateful that he had put on his formal attire before Pallando's arrival; all he had needed to do was run a comb through his hair and throw on his black and silver robe, then seize his documents and the white rod of Stewardship.  As Steward of Gondor, Faramir was expected to appear stately for the duration of the Great Council's traditional four sessions. As Lord of Gondor and Arnor, King Elessar Telcontar was expected to look resplendent.  Not only resplendent, but wearing raiment from different parts of the Reunited Kingdom. Normally, Aragorn tolerated the chore with resignation. He had even joked sometimes with Faramir about preferring to face another Balrog than the ministrations of the royal tailor.  This fit of sullen anger was new to the King.   Faramir hoped that it would not last long.

The page nodded and made a hasty retreat.  Faramir ignored the King’s annoyed stare, now levelled at him, and turned back to the wizard.  Pallando watched the exchange with an amused expression on his face.

“I am sorry,” Faramir began, shouldering the blame in order to focus the King's attention on the Council instead of his imminent ordeal in the tailor's hands.  “I had completely forgotten about the Council.”

“I wish I could!” Aragorn snapped. 

“Do you wish me to go in your stead?” Faramir asked.

Aragorn’s hand went to his head and he sighed.  His voice, when it spoke, had lost all of its anger and was weary once more.  “No, the Great Council convenes but once a year for these sessions.  We both need to be there, Faramir,” he said.

Pallando laughed.  “I can remember a time when we feared that an heir of Isildur would not even survive to one day plant his backside on Gondor's throne; and now you fret about enduring the trials of Kingship."

"Pallando..." Faramir said quietly and coldly.  "You know very little about what the King has endured."

Aragorn stood.  “It is alright, Faramir.  I have been warned of this wizard's manner of speaking.  I would hear your counsel, Pallando,” he began.  “Can you wait for me here in my chambers until I am available?  Please take your leisure. I shall return after Council is finished for the day.”

“I will do so,” Pallando’s aspect suddenly grew more serious.  “But before you open this Council session, you should know that an army of ten thousand Easterlings and mercenaries now gathers and prepares to march on Gondor.”

“Ten thousand . . . !” Faramir hissed.

"There might be more, depending on how many orcs and trolls Alatar's generals have managed to train in the last year," Pallando added.  "Do you have anything to eat in here?"

Aragorn curled his mouth in a humourless smile.  “Then it is even more important that we speak.  You say that ten thousand Easterlings march on Gondor?  Let us hope they will wait for my tailor to finish his alterations!"

He strode out of the chamber.  Faramir leaned back against the King's table.  He hoped that the rest of the day would bring no further surprises than an Easterling invasion led by a renegade wizard or Pallando's personal invasion of Minas Tirith, but anything could happen in a Great Council session.  Nodding to Pallando, he followed his King.  Given Aragorn's mood, the tailors might need some help!

Emptied of King and Steward, the chamber seemed to lose its lustre.  Pallando sat in the chair vacated by the King, put his feet up on the table, and helped himself to an apple from the bowl in its centre. 

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The Council had been in session for over an hour, quarrelling over tariffs with great fervour.  Faramir tried to remain calm.  His head still rang with the news that an army ten thousand strong was marching towards Gondor! It was not the greatest number ever to threaten his land, but by all the stars, it was a number to take seriously!  Aragorn had bid Faramir keep secret Pallando's sudden news, at least until the tally of the realm's armed forces could be given. 

Finally they had reached the important part of the proceedings.  Elboron gave his father a knowing and supportive glance as Faramir rose from the Steward's chair.

“My lords and friends,” he began.  “We agreed during the last Session to retire and contemplate King Elessar's order to provide him with men for the Kingdom's army.  It is now time for us to pledge men to defend the realm.  Ithilien pledges 500 men of the White Company and 100 armed additional armed men.”

There was a ripple of applause from the Guild-masters and the City Marshal's deputation, men who had worked with Faramir in the rebuilding of Minas Tirith. Faramir returned to his Chair. 

Prince Imrahil, newly arrived in the City, rose from his seat.  He bowed to the King and held his nephew’s welcoming stare for a second before his voice boomed out over the chamber.  “Dol Amroth pledges a company of 400 Swan Knights and 600 infantry for the King.”

And so it was that the Lords of Gondor stood one by one and pledged their men to their King.  Elboron kept a running count.  As the last man stood, Faramir glanced down to see that the total approached nine thousand men, including the Ithilien Rangers, the new royal army and other troops pledged by the King himself.

He looked over to the King sitting high on his throne. The royal tailor's work was well finished.  Aragorn wore a black tunic covered by a dark red robe and a mantle of silver-grey with black and white tracery along its edges.  The King's clear green elfstone glimmered at his collar. The Elendilmir,the mithril fillet worn by Aragorn's fathers for generations as rulers of Arnor, circled his brow like a strand of moonlight.  He looked magnificent in his finery; as if he had worn it every day of his life.   The King's face was serene and majestic as the statue of Isildur.  Yet Faramir, who knew Aragorn fairly well, noticed tension in the hard set of his mouth.  And the King was tired; too tired for Faramir's liking. 

Faramir was so taken with his concern for the King that he listened with only half an ear to the final pledges.  He only realised that something was wrong when he heard his son's sudden intake of surprised breath. 

Faramir looked down at his son’s reckoning again.  At the bottom of the evenly spaced column of figures, Elboron wrote a large round zero.

Faramir bit back his own gasp.  Beside him the King leaned forward on his throne.  The Tower hall turned cold and silent, all eyes in the Council turned to the last lord, who stood defiantly before them, bristling with anger.

It was Ingold, Lord of Pinnath Gelin, a normally quiet man some ten or twelve years older than Faramir.  Ingold had never before hesitated in his duty to the King.

Puzzled, Faramir stood up.  “No men, Lord Ingold?  I … .” he began.

The other man turned his grey gaze toward the Steward and stared at him with such pure hatred that Faramir momentarily hesitated.  What had he done to provoke such bitterness? He hardly knew Lord Ingold.

“Steward,” the man leapt on Faramir’s hesitancy, his words dripping with scorn.  “I hardly think it appropriate that you should question my loyalty.”

Elboron shifted uncomfortably at his side.  Faramir felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.  There was something here that he did not understand.

“Lord Ingold,” he began again.  “I have never questioned your loyalty.”

But the man gave free rein to his obviously long controlled anger and talked over him.  “Indeed I find it highly distasteful that you walk free behind our City's walls after what you have done!”

Faramir felt his colour rise.

“You are speaking of history,” Aragorn addressed Ingold.  “Things that are long in the past. You would do well to leave them there.”

“I speak of today!”  Ingold retorted, his anger making him bold before his King.  “I speak of the pain in my heart that will never leave me.   The pain that increases as I witness this exhibition.”  He nodded with derision towards Faramir.  “Faramir sits there pledging his men, with his son at his side, his younger children all safe at home.  Faramir's only action of note throughout his pitiful life was an attempt to kill the King he pledged to serve.  And Faramir is rewarded with a place of honour and power!  While I, who have ever been loyal to the crown, who pledged my men and arms whenever asked, who watched their broken bodies come home to their grieving families, what do I have now?  There is no honour left when traitors sit at the King's side.  I will send no more of my men to their deaths to secure a traitor's plans! ”

“Ingold!”  King Elessar’s voice was uncharacteristically loud.  “That is enough.  May I remind you that this is theGreat Council of Gondor.  It is no place for personal attacks of this nature!”

“By your leave, My King,” Faramir’s firm voice rang out through the Hall.  “I would hear what the Lord of Pinnath Gelin would say of me.”

“’Tis not only I!” Ingold snapped, eyes hot with contempt.  “I only voice concerns stated by many other Lords of Gondor outside this hall.  It is my own hopelessness and fear that gives me strength to say such things inside the White Tower. I know very well the Council’s purpose.”

The King and his Steward exchanged a heated stare.  Aragorn was aware of the unrest that Faramir’s reinstatement as Steward had caused among some of the nobles. Aragorn had hoped the younger man’s obvious commitment to his duty, along with his own support would allay the suspicions.  He could not force Faramir's critics to see his true worth.  And the only living witness to Faramir's courageous stand against Saruman in the tower last Spring was Eldarion, who slept on unaware of the complaints against the man who had saved his life.  Eldarion . . . He must try again to wake the boy, so much depended on it.    Aragorn forced himself to concentrate once more on the battle between Faramir and his accuser. 

 “I would hear what is said of me,” Faramir repeated simply.  He had been in this position before. He could endure such contempt and prevail.  He was well practised.  His father had been a master in the art of censure, particularly in the last years of his life.  Faramir had learned to shield himself from Denethor's excoriation, and often parry or even repel it.

The Steward reasoned that he must face the angry man's tirade, for it would do more harm to the King and ultimately to Gondor, if it was ignored.  Wounds that were left to fester never improved of their own accord.  No, it was better to treat the cause no matter how severe the immediate pain.

Faramir flashed an insistent look up to the King, then shook his head very slightly, signalling his resolve to hear and answer Ingold's charges.

Aragorn answered with a small incline of his chin, but his eyes still gave warning.  “Very well,” he stated.  “Continue Lord Ingold, but remember where you are.”

“Strange is it not,” began Ingold, who had taken the delay as time to gather his emotions.  His voice was now cold and controlled.  “That ten brave soldiers of Gondor rode out but seven short months past to escort the King's young son to to Rohan.  Two of those gallant men were my fair sons Huor and Herion.  Strong were their arms and their hearts proud.  Brave sons of Gondor were they, my hope, my life.  Who knows what became of them?  From that day they left the White City, none has laid eyes on them.”

“I remember your sons and I grieve for them,” Faramir said.  “As I honour all our valiant fallen warriors, including your elder brother and mine.”

“Do not cheapen their memory!” Ingold's voice rose in pitch, his control slipping.  “It has been noted that the only one to return from Mordor unharmed was you, son of Denethor!  The King's son lies senseless and no one can reach him.  My sons and their comrades never came home.  You have told us that Saruman the White was responsible for their deaths.  But you, Faramir, a man who has already confessed to trying to kill the King at Saruman's command, you walked free from the wizard’s very grasp straight back into the Stewardship.”

“If I could, I surely would have brought Eldarion out hale as well as alive,” Faramir said softly.   But the words of the embittered man touched him more painfully then he had thought possible.  Had he not pondered the same doubts that Ingold now spoke?

“How was it then, traitor?” Ingold mocked.  Behind him a number of other men appeared to nod in agreement.  “It appears very simple to me.”

“Everything I have ever done I have done for Gondor,” Faramir said.  “If you accuse me of what I think, I would ask what my motive would be?”

“Do not try to trap me with fair words.  I am an honest man.  I ask you a simple question that any loyal subject of our King could answer with ease.  Where does your loyalty lie, Steward?  Are you a traitor?”

“No,” Faramir answered earnestly.  “I am not.”

Ingold snorted and a number of men around him actually guffawed.  “Easy to say, Steward, but the facts belie your words and reveal your true intent.  Those of us of this Council who remember the old times know the disdain in which your father held you.  The Lord Denethor was a shrewd man who could read well the hearts of his inferiors.  I begin to believe his assessment of you was more correct than even he imagined.”

“My father!” Faramir was losing his control.  “Do not dare to mention him.”

“The truth hurts!” Ingold's bitterness was fast turning to victorious smugness.

Faramir shuddered. He fought down his fury, seeking still to resolve the question through logical argument.  “If all you say is true, what is my motive?  Why do I pledge my men in aid of my King?”

“You want to overthrow the King.  You have ever coveted the power!”  Ingold spat back.  His companions shouting their agreement.  “You were jealous of your brother Boromir when you thought he would be ruling Steward and now the King has returned and legitimately taken what you want.  You will wait until the King marches out with his army and then you will seize control of Minas Tirith."

Faramir shook his head with shocked incredulity.  How could anybody believe he could plan such base treachery?  How could anyone think he would seek to take power that should not, could not ever be his? He had never been jealous of Boromir's place as the heir to the Stewardship, never thought of himself as a future Steward of Gondor even after he had realized that Boromir was gone forever.  There had been no time for that!  Faramir had been occupied with men to lead, the Enemy's unbeatable forces circling his people like wolves harrying rabbits, and the astonishing appearance of two small hobbits who carried the hope of his world on their fragile shoulders.  Then he had returned to Minas Tirith, been sent out again to battle, and brought what remained of his men back from the Causeway Forts to make that last, desperate crossing of the Pelennor.  And he had fallen. When he had awakened, gladdened at the return of Elendil's heir, he had learned that his father was dead, and he was now the Steward of a still imperilled realm.  Since the day he had left the Houses of Healing to assume leadership in the King's absence, not even knowing how long the White City would stand but vowing to hold it as long as he yet breathed, Faramir had looked on the Stewardship as a duty.  A welcome duty, but never a prize or a means to greater power. 

And yet even as he thought it out, Faramir could see clearly that the events of the last seven months could be seen in such an unforgiving light, particularly by a man driven to bitterness by his own loss.    Ingold had lost two sons, lost for no good reason, fine young men just a few years older than Elboron. Neither of the young men's bodies had even been returned for proper burial.  How would he feel if Elboron and Cirion were taken from him in such a way?  And the evidence of his own treachery of seven years ago was undeniable. Even if his had not been the will behind that treachery, his hands had held the dagger that had drawn his King's blood. Of course there would be some who would still believe him to be a traitor, particularly a man whose own loyalty had cost him two sons.

All these thoughts chased across his mind in the moments following Ingold's accusation of treachery.  Before Faramir could even begin to frame a response, his son leapt to his feet, quivering with rage.

“You lie!” Elboron spat, looking very much like Boromir advancing on an unlucky orc.  “I will kill any man who questions my father’s honour so!”

Ingold laughed without mirth.  “At least the boy has enough fight in him to argue.  What say you Steward? Does your silence not betray your guilt?  Are you prepared to hide behind your young son’s declarations and the protection of his unblooded sword?”

"My son's sword is not unblooded" Faramir replied.  "He faced Saruman's Uruk-hai last year in his first battle and killed, as a soldier of the Guard.  My silence came in memory of all who I too, have lost; a father and brother whose power I never coveted.  And I do not forget what Saruman the White drove me to do.  If there were any way to change the past, change the day when fate delivered me into his power all those years ago, I would buy it with my life.  I did not surrender to his will without struggle or pain. "

"Was that the first or the second time that fate delivered you to him?" The merchant Aradan, predictably, chimed in from behind Ingold's elbow.  "If you endured such torment at Saruman's hands, why did you return to him last year?" 

"Because I sought to take back from him what he had stolen from me" Faramir answered in utter truth and some ire.  "That is why I sought the White Wizard.  Think, my lords!  If I had truly desired to overthrow the King, then I would have not have risked my life to kill Saruman, I would have sat back in the comfort the wizard offered me if I joined him, and let those plans proceed as the wizard willed.  And the King would not be here now!  I would be Steward and ruling in Eldarion's name, and Saruman would be lurking about the Citadel. Think you, my Lords, that I would have lost the full use of my leg in battle against Saruman's Uruk-hai, if I were in league with him?"   Faramir hated to mention his wound, but it was a valid point of argument, and he had few other tangible proofs of his loyalty. 

"And how do we know that the wizard is not lurking about the Citadel, or in the City, or hiding in Emyn Arnen" challenged Ingold.  "Your word, I suppose? Bah!  I know how your father used to call you a 'wizard's pupil'!  I think you are still a wizard's pupil, you have just changed wizards!

“What can he say?”  Aradan spoke again.  “Faramir must think us fools that he could cozen this Council with flamboyant words.  He should be chained in the dungeons, not first under the King in this Hall!”

“Yes!” one, then two, and finally three others took up the cry. 

“My nephew has ever been loyal!”  Imrahil raised his deep voice above the tumult, trying to be heard.

"I did not see you, Lord Ingold, or you, Master Aradan, bringing the King's son out alive from Saruman's tower through fire and peril" shouted Bergil, son of Beregond, second-in-command of the Ithilien Rangers.  Bergil attended Council in place of Captain Anborn, who now commanded the garrison in Mordor.  "Lord Faramir has served Gondor since he was a child.  He is innocent and loyal!"

Faramir cleared his throat and shot a cool stare at his challengers.  "My Lords, I will remind you that were it not for the leadership of Mithrandir, the wizard who tutored me with my father's full knowledge and consent, this City would probably have fallen before the Rohirrim and Elessar could arrive to succour it.  I have suffered for Gondor, as has Ingold and many others here today.  I would die for our realm and our King.  Anyone who believes otherwise should prove it or cease to trouble the Council with such divisive calumny."

Everyone in the Council seemed to rise and spit out accusations or counter them.  Faramir supposed he should be grateful that so many men supported him.  He sat back, and waited for the storm to pass. 

Imrahil and Elboron were both on their feet.  Faramir's son was shouting across the room, standing as if on the verge of battle, fists clenched.  While Prince Imrahil was more controlled in his protestations, he was no less committed to his argument than his younger kinsman.  Others stood and argued back, emotions rising like a bitter winter wind. 

Unfortunately, the storm of anger was fast rising rather than diminishing.  Faramir looked up at the King, surprised that Aragorn had not responded to the noise.  The King was talking, or trying to talk, to a young man wearing the garb, stained now with mud and old blood, of a messenger from the Ithilien Rangers. 

Faramir had put up with just about enough.  It was time to bring the pack to heel!

He stood up suddenly; raised the white rod of his Stewardship high above his head,then rammed it down on the back of his stone chair.  The resulting sound rang as loud as he had expected.

"Enough!"  Faramir said sharply and quickly as the shouts stopped in momentary surprise.  "Cease this clamourat once!  Can you not see that the King is trying to hear a messenger amidst this appalling din?" 

The angry voices began to slow, giving way to less certain grumblings and angry words.  Better, but still not good enough, thought Faramir.

“Silence!” came a roar from the King that rumbled around the room. All men stopped and turned towards their sovereign; voices quelled by the undoubted command in his voice.

The King let out a ragged breath.  His pale face coloured with anger.  One hand slowly pressed the parchment he had obviously just read into a crumpled ball.  Aragorn's other hand rested on the shoulder of the weary, bloodstained young messenger. 

The King’s eyes shone bright; but his voice was unmistakeably strained as he said.  “The garrison in Mordor has been attacked by a force of more than three times its number.  This young man rode hard to bring us word.  Captain Anborn identified the invaders as Easterlings.”

Faramir's indignation at the accusations of treachery vanished in the wake of sudden alarm for the Rangers who had once been his own command.  His leg wobbled, throwing off his balance. He sat down heavily back into his chair, cursing the weakness that he could not control. 

“Gentlemen, we are at war!”

The King’s words echoed around the suddenly still Chamber.  The silence lasted for a single heartbeat.  Then the Council fell into chaos once more.

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TBC

Authors' Note:  Ingold appeared in the book ROTK, in the Minas Tirith chapter, supervising repairs of the Rammas Echor (you know, the out-wall surrounding the Pelennor).  For the purposes of our story, we have made him the younger brother and heir of Hirluin the Fair, who died on the Pelennor (The Battle of the Pelennor Fields); since no children of Hirluin are mentioned.