A/N: A little bit of housekeeping here, tying up a loose end or two, and since EF did the research for me I have gone ahead and written the details into the start of this chapter.

There is a bit of uncomfortable detail in the first half of this chapter, where Sam and Tolly finish their vigil just outside the Bounds, preparing to take the word back to Tookland that the last of the ruffians have been dealt with. If you do not wish to read the details, please skip to the second half, which begins immediately after the three-asterisk (***) break.

Take heart. The celebrations are about to begin. With the conclusion of this chapter we leave death and horror behind.

Chapter 39. Halfway to the dawning

A hanged man does not die at once, or at least his body may linger for a time after his spirit flies free—the heart keeps beating for a time, sometimes half an hour or more even if he broke his neck on the fall, thus the custom in Minas Tirith (and in the cities of the North-kingdom, now that they are once more inhabited) to hang a man at the dawning the day after the hearing, and not cut him down until the sun sets again. In this way he serves as a warning to others, and the authorities are very sure he will not trouble anyone again.

There are certain instances where a condemned man need not wait for the dawn, especially if circumstances allow him to be hanged without a hearing. Ruffians found in the Shire, for example, in violation of the King’s edict, need no trial to be found guilty, since in a manner of speaking they’ve already been “found”.

Thus Berendil did not have to leave his charges hanging through the dawning and on through the day until the sun sought her rest. He would cut the wretches down well before the carrion birds awakened. No need to remind the hobbit witnesses of what they’d nearly set in motion, with the Took’s fumbling request.

He was used to the birds and their unpleasant ways, of course, but then he’d never hanged up a living man before, and left him living, that is. He was glad for the Mayor’s good sense in the matter, and he wondered if the Took would’ve had the stomach for what he’d asked. No matter, now.

He stood and watched, by the light of the flickering torches. The scrawny one, for all he’d dropped first, struggled much longer than his strapping companion. Berendil began to wonder if perhaps this one might actually last until the dawning, but eventually, inevitably the scrawny man stilled. He twitched his last, and the captain stepped forward, removing his gloves to check for a heartbeat on each, finding none.

He went back to the fireside, where the hobbits after three platefuls of food and a bottle or two of beer, he saw, were growing sleepy despite their best efforts. ‘It’s done,’ he said. ‘And your Thain ordered some time ago that men taken in the Shire be cut down and buried without delay, for he thinks that hanging is enough, in itself.’

‘And he has the right of it,’ the Mayor said stoutly, slapping the Tookish archer on the back.

‘But I must be sure they are dead,’ Tolly said, setting his plate aside, his food sitting uneasily. Truth be told, he hadn’t felt like eating at all, and had only taken three servings out of politeness, and because of the Mayor’s urgings. ‘I must be absolutely certain. So the Thain charged me...’

‘Then come,’ Berendil said, holding out his hands to the hobbits, helping them to gain their feet, and walking them to the hanging tree with its dreadful burden.

In the flickering light of the torches, the ruffians more resembled pitiful plucked chickens than fearsome dealers in terror and death, hanging a few handspans above the ground.

‘Shall I cut them down, Captain?’ one of the Watchers said, from the shadows.

‘No,’ Berendil said. ‘Not quite yet.' And turning to the hobbits, he added, 'You see, Master Took, that dead men hang before you. It is likely that they would have died of the cold in a matter of hours, if not... other things, had we not let the rope do its work. There is no warmth in them now, no rush of blood, no heartbeat.’

The Took hesitated, staring; reached out a tentative hand, stopping just short of touching the red-headed ruffian. He’d tended Ferdi’s body, true, and that had held no terror for him, only sorrow and grief. But this was a horror, hanging before him, and it was more than he had in him, to touch the pallid flesh.

Berendil drew his sword. ‘Stand back,’ he said, and Mayor Sam pulled the Tookish archer back a step or two. The captain thrust to the heart, first the one ruffian, and then the other, and pulling his sword free from the second, letting the blade hang by his side, he turned to the hobbits. ‘Now do you believe they are dead?’ he said. He really did not want to behead the bodies, but if that’s what the hobbits needed, to carry away reassurance, then...

‘That pierced the heart, on each,’ the Mayor said, and the archer shook his head impatiently.

‘I know it,’ he growled. ‘I’ve put an arrow through the heart of a ruffian a time or two.’ And he shuddered, and it might not have been merely the cold fingers of the winter wind, plucking at his collar.

‘Are you satisfied, Tolibold?’ Sam pressed.

Berendil found himself holding his breath for a long moment as the Took considered, staring from one body to the other. At last Tolly nodded, a sharp gesture that reminded the captain of Pippin. ‘You may cut them down,’ he said. ‘Bury them deep, if you can, with the weather so bitter.’

Berendil wanted to ask if the Took feared the ruffians would awaken and claw their way out of the grave, but he didn’t. Evidently the hobbits had been badly shaken by this encounter, and the captain cursed the slip in the Watchers’ measures that had allowed these evil ones to penetrate the Bounds of the Shire. They ought to have questioned these men before dispatching them. He’d shown poor judgment in the matter, so taken aback had he been at the Took’s request.

Still, they’d tighten their Watch, all around the Shire, and questions would be asked, discreetly, by unkempt Kingsmen in ragged clothing, in shadowy corners of the inns in the Breeland and near Sarn and in other places where men of questionable motives might gather.

‘They’ll sleep,’ he said, ‘and you may be assured there will be no wakening on this side of the world.’ He’d see to that, distasteful as the thought was. There would be no chance that one of them had merely swooned and would be able to creep away. Berendil owed the Ring-bearer and the Thain that much, and more.

***

Pippin wakened instantly at a touch on his arm, seeing Elessar hovering above him when he opened his eyes. Faramir, too, was awake, staring at the King with wide eyes.

‘Come,’ Elessar said, gesturing to the corner. ‘There is something you must see for yourselves, and then it will be time to waken Merry, have a bite to eat, mount your ponies and begin your journey home again.’

Father and son arose from the bed, walking together to where Elessar’s saddlebags lay, half hidden under his Elven-cloak. Bergil snored, still sitting in the opposite corner. The King knelt, bent to his bags, removed a cloth-wrapped ball that seemed weighty, from his handling of the thing.

Pippin started. ‘Is that...?’ he said, his eye going over the shape, and then he shook his head impatiently and said, ‘but of course it is! Do you think this wise, Strider, knowing how...?’

‘You must not touch it,’ the King said gravely, ‘but only look, as I tell you. It cannot harm you, for it is my servant now, and under my control.’

‘But Farry,’ Pippin protested. ‘He’s so young!’

‘Not too young to have survived worse than might have broken a young lord of Gondor,’ Elessar said gravely.

Farry stared from father to King, only half-understanding.

‘Sit down on the chair there, Pippin, and take Farry into your lap,’ the King directed, and moving as if in a dream, the hobbits obeyed.

The King moved to kneel before them, bringing up his hands until he held the ball at Farry’s eye-level. ‘It’s dark, the vision within,’ he said softly, ‘but no darker than aught you’ve seen or heard, these past two days, lad.’

Farry nodded, his eyes on the King’s hands. Elessar slowly drew the cloth from the Seeing Stone, whispering a word or two that the hobbits did not understand, but evidently the Stone did, for its dull surface flared suddenly bright, casting a light into the watching faces that died into a flickering campfire, and torches around the edges of a clearing.

And then Farry gasped, and he turned to bury his face in his father’s arm, and Pippin tightened his hold on his son as he stared into the Palantir, unable to drag his eyes from the awful scene.

‘Is it...?’ he whispered. ‘Is it... they?’

‘It is,’ Elessar said solemnly.

Pippin stared a long moment, beyond emotion, and then Farry stirred, uncovering his eyes, turning to look once more, gazing in silence for a long moment before saying, ‘They’re dead, then.’

‘Truly dead, Faramir,’ Elessar said.

‘Red cannot...’ Farry said.

‘No,’ the King said. ‘He cannot. He has gone from Middle-earth, to the Halls of Mandos, from there to go to reap what he sowed in life.’

Farry nodded, and in a voice that was much too old for such a little lad, he said, ‘Good.’

And Pippin buried his face in his son’s shoulder, and breathed the living scent of his son, and felt Farry’s breaths filling his small torso, and relaxing again, one breath after another, steady breaths, and Farry’s hands came together to grasp his father’s hands, holding him, and they were warm and strong in their grip.

Elessar covered the Palantir once again, and Faramir nodded, as if in thanks, meeting the eyes of the King, and the King inclined his head, a gesture full of grace, before he turned away to conceal the Stone once more in the pile of baggage.

The last of the child-stealing ruffians were dead, and Farry was alive, and well.