CHAPTER 12: QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Deep in the windowless dungeons of Minas Tirith, the towering figure of the interrogator stood patiently before his charge, trying to ignore the dank musty smell emanating from the mildewed floor and walls of the cell, and from the foulness of the prisoner himself. One weak lamp on the wall above the prisoner, one on the far wall, and a small opening with iron bars in the heavy wooden door cast all the miserable illumination that was allowed in the cell, enough for the occupants to make out each other’s silhouettes and, if they were close enough, facial features.

The prisoner was bent over his knees today, his hands shivering from hunger. The wounds in his thigh and torso had been cleaned again and rebound. He had not been fed yet, but he would not die from his wounds at least; Lord Faramir made sure of that.

After lunch, the Steward of Gondor had pressed the interrogator to drag answers out of the prisoner by whatever means before the sun set, for the king had told him in no uncertain terms that he would ride to Ithilien tomorrow, with or without information about a yet unidentified enemy. 

The fool must be starving, the interrogator observed. Almost three days now, but this will be the day. He will be broken today.

He was frankly amazed that the man had held out this long with that much recalcitrance. Besides the occasional scowl and an incoherent raspy growl that went with it, he had not responded in any way. He was either very loyal, very foolish or petrified over the consequences of being branded a traitor should he ever be found out.

Not much chance of being found out, the man of Gondor snorted to himself. You will never be released if Lord Faramir can help it.

The interrogator was doing something different this afternoon. He had brought in a low stool and a low wooden table, which he placed a very safe distance from the prisoner securely chained to the far wall. At a knock on the heavy door, the large man walked over, opened it and received a tray handed to him, mumbling thanks. He took the tray over to the table and lowered himself onto the sturdy stool.

On the table before him now sat a plate of hot, steaming food, a mug of ale and a mug of water. He stretched himself and proceeded to lick his lips audibly and rub his hands together, making a show of inhaling the tasty aroma of meat and potatoes, knowing that, despite the dankness of the cell, it must smell just as tantalizing to the ravenous prisoner, even if he could not see the food.

Noisily, he picked up a fork; the meat had already been cut up into bite-size bits in the kitchen – no knives were allowed down in the dungeons. He stabbed at a piece of meat and slowly inserted it into his mouth, chewing audibly and murmuring sounds of relish.  Out of the corner of his eye, he noted that the prisoner’s gaze was fixed on him, or rather, it was on the table. Even in the dark, the interrogator could see the glint in his eyes and the pathetic desperation on his face. 

After eating one more piece, he took a swig of ale from the mug, gurgling some down noisily and smacking his lips after, with a satisfied “aaaaahhh”. 

The prisoner moved restlessly and whimpered.

The interrogator smiled secretly. He stuck a very small but juicy piece of meat on the end of the fork and got up from the stool. Walking lazily to the prisoner, he held out the fork to the man on the floor. With a raspy growl, grubby fingers shot out to grab the food, but the interrogator pulled it back just out of reach of the fingers.

The growl turned into a yell as the hunger and thirst, exacerbated by the cold and damp of a three-day stay in captivity, turned into desperate need. The interrogator smirked and thrust the fork forward again so that the shaking fingers could pull the small piece of meat off the prongs and pop it instantly into a dehydrated mouth. The prisoner chewed greedily on the pitifully small morsel and reached for more, but found none waiting. He saw the large man going back to the table to pick up the plate of food and a mug. Then the large man placed the food on the floor, and the prisoner stretched out to grab at it, his chains drawn taut. But although the tempting aroma of the food was much closer now, it was painfully out of reach. A howl of frustration was emitted from the figure in chains, and the interrogator sat back on his haunches to look at him.

“It tasted good, did it not? There is more here if you want it. Food and water,” the interrogator asked in an enticing voice. “Tell me where you are from and who sent you, and you will get it.”

The foul man yelled louder, frustrated, but his throat was too parched to yell for long. He collapsed back on the floor, furious and weeping.

“Why do you protect your leader?” the interrogator challenged. “Will he reward you for your silence? Even if he would, you are now in the dungeons of the king – you cannot get back to he who commands you. We can arrange it so that no one ever sets eyes on you again.”

He walked closer to the whimpering figure and asked in a taunting tone: “Who – will – feed – you – then?”    

“I do not protect him!” the prisoner cried hoarsely, suddenly whipping around and catching the interrogator by surprise. “I… I… I fear him.”

The large man controlled his breathing. Carefully now, he told himself.

“You fear him?” he prompted.

“Yeees…” The voice grew hoarser, the parched throat making it difficult to talk. The large man picked up the mug of water from the tray. It was only half-filled with water; he only wanted the throat to be wetted, not the thirst satisfied. He handed it to the prisoner, who grabbed it and drank greedily till the mug was empty. “More,” the thirsty man demanded.

“Talk first. You said you fear him? Why?”

“If you knew him, you would fear him too. He has no – no mercy.”

“I know him not. What is he like?”  The interrogator’s past experience with spies told him that for some reason, if he asked for the identity of their leaders too soon, they would not talk. It was easier for them to talk about the persons first.

“Nasty, vicious. Always angry. He knows what he wants.”

“What does he want?”

“The king’s son, you fool. Could you not tell?”

“We will see who is the fool,” came the reply. He was used to this. “Why does he want the king’s son?”

The prisoner chortled, if a chortle it could be called, coming from a throat that was still dry. “Revenge, why else? That is all he thinks about.”

“Revenge? For what?”

“His son, the king killed his son in the war! That is all I know. Now give me food first.”

The interrogator drew in a breath. So, the motive: revenge. A son for a son. “Tell me more.”

“I do not know much more. Food first!”

“Not so fast. What is his name? Where is he?”

A growl, followed by silence.

“What is his name? Who is he? Where can we find him?”

“If he knows I talked, I will be dead!”

“If you do not talk, you will be dead. From hunger and thirst. He cannot reach you here.”

Silence again.

Time to take a chance. “Very well,” the interrogator said, picking up the plate of food and empty mug from the floor and heading back to the table. “You may not see me for a long – ”

A loud growl was emitted, followed by a name the interrogator had waited to hear: “Sarambaq!” 

Good, he gets desperate. He will answer quickly. The large man turned around to face the prisoner again. “What was that again?”

“His name is Sarambaq, and he will kill me, he will kill me,” the man said miserably, hiding his face in his hands.

“He cannot reach you here. Where is he? Where does he hide?”

“His – his halls. In Adhûn.”  The reply was mumbled.

“Where? Remove your hands so I can hear you.”

“Adhûn!”

“Where is that?”

“By a river. Near the sea.”

“The sea? The sea in the west?”

“No, no. The Sea of Rhûn.”

The interrogator smiled inwardly in satisfaction. Lord Faramir was right: the attackers had come from around the Sea of Rhûn as he had guessed from their use of the ipo poison. The large man knitted his eyebrows as he tried to recall the little he knew of that area: the Sea lay east and slightly north of the White City. But he knew nothing of the people who lived there. Lord Faramir must be told. 

“Are you from there?”

“Yes. He took me into his service. Miserable service, but a man has to eat. And we fear – fear for our families, if we should refuse.”

The interrogator nodded. The evil masters in this world never changed. They always held others hostage to fulfill their greedy demands.

“What is your name?”

Silence.

“Your name?” Louder now.

“Ködil!” It came with a growl.

“Ködil,” the interrogator repeated. “How long has he been there? Has he many troops?”

“Too many questions! I want food.”

“How long?”

“About nine or ten years now, after the Dark Lord fell. I know not how. He only told us the Dark Lord fell. He went there after the king destroyed his home.”

“The Dark Lord? Sauron?”

“Yes.”

The interrogator nodded. He did not know all there was to know about the Quest of the Ring, but everyone in the White City knew that after the Fall of Sauron, King Elessar’s armies had indeed assiduously sought out and disabled many rogue bands of orcs and men. But some escaped without a trace; it was assumed that many had left Gondor. He supposed Sarambaq must have led one such band.

“How far is Adhûn from here?”

“More questions! No, no, food first!”

“How far?”

Ködil hissed in exasperation, but he needed to get his food. “Two to three weeks on foot, a slow walk.” 

The interrogator let out a low whistle. “How did you know the king’s son would be in Ithilien?”

“We watched. Waited and watched. Sarambaq made us.”

“He was not with you that day?”

A snort accompanied the reply. “No, he would not risk his life. He only risks ours.”

A thought occurred to the man of Gondor. “It’s a long way from Adhûn to Ithilien. How do you exchange news?”

“What?”

“How do you communicate with your master? It takes time for you to travel between the two places. Does he send word, ask for news?”

Another snort came. “He has Dárkil.”

“What is a Dárkil?”

“Not a Dárkil, you fool. Just Dárkil. His – his – flying demon.”

This was interesting news, the interrogator thought. Interesting but not welcome. He sat back on his haunches and addressed the prisoner again. “Tell me about Dárkil,” he commanded.

The air outside Sarambaq’s halls in Adhûn reverberated with the screech of the foul creature, as it fed on the stinking meat of carrion. Its master studied in admiration the strong wings and legs of the black beast. The jaws at the end of the longish neck were bloody with its meal, the eyes alive and eager.

A smirk of satisfaction crossed Sarambaq’s face as he recalled when he had first surprised the Dark Lord with his creation – a cross between a giant eagle and one of Sauron’s own flying steeds, the ones the Dark Lord had bred for the use of his Nazgul. Sauron had been impressed that Sarambaq had managed to capture the giant eagle, subduing it to his own will after many months of torture. Kin of Gwaihir the Windlord himself, the eagle had been a prize catch, and when it bred with the Dark Lord’s own steed, the product had been a beast with the ferocity of Mordor and the swiftness and sharp vision of the eagle race.

Dárkil he had named it, and it was one of the reasons Sarambaq had a strong hold on the services of his minions and the residents of the surrounding village. No one dared defy the Master when they knew full well what the jaws and claws of his beast were capable of doing if they refused.

Too unfortunate it is only one of its kind, Sarambaq pondered. He had not been able to produce another. The giant eagle had died in captivity, and now that the Dark Lord’s steeds were vanquished along with him, Sarambaq had little hope of repeating his evil-driven success.

No matter, he thought, I will use this one for as long as I still have it.

He now waited a little impatiently for the creature to finish its meal so that he could start on his journey. He had decided that he had had enough of waiting for news and intended to have Dárkil bear him to the Table. Perhaps some of his useless minions were already there and could tell him what was happening. 

The Table was a huge rock formation surrounded by thick woods, located just a three-day trek away from the fringes of Ithilien on the borders of Gondor, so named because of its flat, plateau-like top upon which Dárkil could land with ease. It also offered a vantage point from which Sarambaq could see anyone approaching, if they were not hidden by the woods. At the foot of the wide rock were caves in which Sarambaq’s troops stored provisions and weapons. These stores, replenished regularly by the few riders allowed to ride Dárkil from Adhûn, enabled the troops to spend long lengths of time watching Gondor without having to return all the way to Adhûn for supplies. As far as they knew, there were no settlements lying in the forests between Ithilien and the Table.

The location of the Table also meant that Dárkil could fly as close as possible to Gondor without being easily spotted by the sharp eyes of the elves who guarded Gondor’s borders. Indeed, the beast would appear nothing more than a stray eagle in the skies to the east when it was seen by elves, and it was totally beyond sight of the guards in the high towers of the White City.

Unknown to Sarambaq, the remnants of the force he had sent to Gondor were indeed already headed there. Having failed to take the king’s son, they had decided to retreat to the Table to recoup and strengthen themselves before trekking back to Adhûn and facing the inevitability of Sarambaq’s wrath. Little did they know that they would be meeting their dreaded master sooner than they expected.

Half an hour later, the beast had finished its meal. Sarambaq mounted this prized steed of his and headed for his destination, unaware that deep in the dungeons of Minas Tirith, one of his minions was talking about this very creature.

So, that is how Sarambaq has kept such a close eye on the royal family in Gondor, the interrogator thought. He wondered with disquiet what elsethe dark Master would have seen and might have planned beyondthe capture of the prince.He wanted to find out more about his plans, but it was clear from the heated protests and agitated reactions from Ködil that he would speak no more till he had been given food. The large man finally stood.

“After you eat, you will talk some more.” This was not a question, it was a demand.

“I do not know much more!”

“Then you will tell me all you know. Everything about Sarambaq.”

The prisoner nodded miserably.

The interrogator walked up to the prisoner now and looked ferociously at the pitiful figure with as much menace as he could conjure in his eyes. The large man’s voice was but a whisper, but the venomous warning in it was unmistakable.

“If you lie to me or hold anything back, you will taste not only my whip, but the ire of the Lord of the White City. And THEN…” the prisoner was almost wetting himself by now. “… and then you will not see me, or food, or water, or light, till the end of your days in this dark, dark hole. Do you understand this?”

The man’s eyes bulged out even further, if that was possible, and nodded several times.

“All right,” the large man said, drawing up to his full height. “Now you can eat.”

A similar line of questioning was taking place in the woods of Ithilien the day after Legolas rode back from Minas Tirith, but the elves were having less success with their own prisoner. Unlike what was happening in Minas Tirith, the thought of starving the detestable man, as furious as they were with him, never crossed their minds. The only times the evles showed no mercy was when they faced Sauron’s orcs or when they fought the giant spiders that invaded Mirkwood, and even then, they always sought to inflict a quick death. At all other times, the gentleness of the elves over-rode any thought of violence or torture. They would have preferred to break the prisoner’s spirit in other ways, but there were no dark cells in their fair woods to aid them.

The cave dungeons of Thranduil Oropherion would be a better place for this, Legolas thought wryly, although his father’s caves were in fact airy and not quite as fearsome as he thought them to be. I will have to manage with what I have.

A grimace marred his fair features briefly as he recalled the last time he had made that decision and the consequences of that action. I tried to keep them safe with what I had, he remembered, but it was not enough. Fleetingly, he hoped Eldarion had awoken and was recovering.

Aragorn’s face flitted across his mind and he felt a pang of sadness again. Thoughts of his friend had dominated his mind on his ride back from Minas Tirith last night. When he thought of all that he had ever shared with the former Ranger, a member of the Fellowship of the Ring, and now the King of Gondor, he could not believe that Aragorn’s words were anything more than a careless utterance born of frustration. Yet he never imagined that those words could hurt so deeply.

He wished he could find out everything behind the attack – who planned it, what their intentions were, why they wanted with Eldarion, and where they were hiding. But he would be content with an answer to the last question if that was all he could obtain, for that was what he had resolved in the healing room: he could not undo what had happened, but he could try to locate the enemy’s base and learn more about him, or them. 

He had thought of doing the questioning himself but quickly abandoned the task to the other elves, for at this moment, he felt he had not the patience or tenacity to slowly and skillfully draw out answers from an obstinate source. Perhaps he would not be aggressive enough, not in the right way. Prowess in battle and leadership skills were quite useless in an interrogation. He could not suppress a grin as he honestly wondered whether the other elves would be able to accomplish any more than he could. He recalled how more than sixty years ago, his father had failed to coerce Gimli’s dwarf ancestors and kin into revealing anything when they had stumbled into the elf realm and been caught.

Elves make terrible interrogators, he conceded. Ah, well, if we draw nothing out of this man from the East, I will have no choice but to send him to Faramir. But they would try their best first.

Legolas shook his head and told himself to focus on the task at hand – a task that he wished were not necessary. He was writing letters to the families of the six elves who had been slain during the attack. They had all been so loyal to him, leaving Greenwood to follow him south to Ithilien. He had known them for hundreds and hundreds of years, and he recalled fondly how all of them had sparred with him in training, climbed trees and hunted spiders with him, and how he and some of them had landed themselves in trouble as elflings. If they had remained in the Greenwood or if they had sailed West with the ships, they would not now be in the Halls of Mandos where dead elves go, he thought with sorrow in his heart. These were the first six elves who had died since they came south, and although none of them would have regretted being slain in battle, he vowed he would do everything he could to make sure they were the last. A promise he may not be able to keep, he knew, but the sharpness of the sorrow he felt at the moment compelled him to make it.

Although each letter contained a similar message of explanation and condolence, Legolas took care to insert a few lines that said something unique about the particular elf he was honoring, along with an item from the elf’s belongings, so that each missive would read like a personal note rather than a cold announcement. After the last one had been written and signed, he sighed and stood to stretch himself. He had considered returning to the Greenwood himself to meet the families; nothing could replace a personal visit. But at present, he really wanted to find out more about the attackers and to track them down if he could. He decided two other elves would leave for Greenwood tomorrow to deliver them on his behalf, and he would go himself at a later time.

Right now, they had to dress and prepare for the ceremony at twilight. Tonight, they would gather at the graves of their fallen kin to sprinkle blossoms and scented water on them, and they would sing songs of lament to honor them beneath Ithil and the stars of Varda. 

In the White City, the king of Gondor looked on the same stars at twilight and thought fondly of the friend who used to sing under them. One more dawn and one more moonrise, and he would ride to that friend.