A/N:  This was written for the May Teitho Challenge “Capture,” where it placed first.  It is unbetaed.  Warnings for violence, depiction of battle, dark themes.  Complete in two parts.

The Tolkien estate owns Aragorn, Denethor, and Ecthelion.  All other characters are OCs.

Aragorn twisted as the ground rushed up at him.  But, not enough.  Pain exploded across his face from the sharp rocks.  He rolled quickly to the side, dodging a spear thrust and scrambling to his feet.  If he didn’t deal with the spearman, and quickly, he’d have more than a split lip to worry about.

“Thorongil!”

One of his men was in trouble.  Over the din of battle, it was impossible to tell which.  Aragorn’s cowled opponent advanced, his spear pointed at the ground in an effective guard position.  Aragorn feigned a stumble, watched for the coming spear thrust . . . and then he was inside his attacker’s guard, driving his sword deep into the Easterling’s belly.  The other man gave a grunt that was more of a gurgle.  Without pausing to think, Aragorn wrenched his sword free and decapitated the man.

Momentarily free of attackers, Aragorn scanned the impromptu battlefield.  The raiders—Men of Rhûn if he read their gear and garb correctly—had chosen their ambush site well.  Aragorn’s patrol was spread out along the rocky slopes, and their armor was a disadvantage, as it made them more prone to turn an ankle on the uneven ground.  Still, his men were rallying well.  It was clear the Easterlings had underestimated them, as the ambusher’s numbers barely exceeded the eight in Aragorn’s patrol.  With the spearman’s demise, they were evenly matched.

There.  A man named Meneldir was fending off two Easterlings who tried, again and again, to flank him, their short swords flashing.  As he watched, Meneldir lost his footing and crashed to the ground, his head making a sickening crunch as it connected with a rocky outcrop.  Aragorn ran in his direction, his sword raised.  He’d hoped to cut down one of the Easterlings before either realized he was there, but the clatter of disrupted stones gave him away.  Both turned and the taller of the two caught Aragorn’s downward cut near the hilt of his own sword.  Aragorn was gratified to see the man stumble a little under the force of the blow, but he had no chance to capitalize on his opponent’s loss of balance.  The other swordsman was advancing on his flank.

Blocking a clumsy sweep from his first opponent, Aragorn suddenly turned and kicked out, catching the second in the belly.  The would-be attacker flew away—almost literally; the Men of Rhûn tended to be shorter than the Dúnedain, and this one was particularly slight.  A distant fraction of Aragorn’s mind noticed that Meneldir was sitting up, looking dazed but very much alive.  There was no time to consider him further.  Aragorn parried his attacker’s next strike and killed the man with one swift thrust to the torso.  Vaguely, he noticed his men also winning their battles.  The Easterlings’ numbers were dwindling rapidly, though for some strange reason, they did not turn and run.

Aragorn turned and set himself between Meneldir and the second swordsman.  He saw the raider take a deep breath . . . saw him gather himself . . . the Easterling sprang at Aragorn with a war cry, but Aragorn was ready for him.  He knocked the short sword from the man’s hands with a single stinging blow.  His opponent stumbled and dove for his dropped sword.  Aragorn swept his blade down for one last strike . . .

But, the Easterling’s dark cowl had come loose when he fell, and as Aragorn’s sword descended, he turned to look up at him with eyes that were fierce, but hopeless.

Aragorn saw the rage in his face.

And the youth in his face.

At the last moment, he twisted his wrist, turning a sweep that would have decapitated the Easterling into merely a hard strike.  The flat of his blade caught his opponent just above his ear.  The raider fell back, but scrambled to his feet almost as fast and pulled a dagger from his belt.  Aragorn moved to follow, but lost his footing once more on the uneven ground.  His enemy advanced, knife raised.

A bow twanged.  The Easterling cried out, his pained voice the only sound in the suddenly-still air.  Focused on his foes, Aragorn had not even noticed that they were the last ones still fighting.

The young Man of Rhûn sank slowly to his knees, an arrow sticking out of his side.  From thirty paces away, another of Aragorn’s men—a grizzled veteran named Sarn—lowered his short bow just as slowly.

Aragorn stood, panting from the exertion.  His sword dropped until the tip was only inches from the ground.  He studied his last living attacker.  On his knees, half-curled in on himself from pain, the Easterling seemed even smaller than he had before.  Sweat dripped from a face that still held some of childhood’s softness and rolled down a chin still too young to grow a beard.

Fifteen, Aragorn thought, Certainly no older.

The boy—to call him a Man of Rhûn was certainly an exaggeration—locked eyes with Aragorn, his face defiant despite the obvious pain.

Nevertheless, he was trembling, his olive skin blanched pale.

Aragorn stood still, as did most of his men.  With a quick glance, he took them in; all but Meneldir were on their feet, and he saw no grievous wounds.  Only Sarn moved, though, crossing the battlefield with an unconcerned, loping stride to approach the boy.  The older man’s sharp gray eyes took in the young raider’s defiance and lingered for a moment on the arrow protruding from his side.

Sarn drew his dagger.

Slowly, the boy released his grip on his own knife.  Keeping his dark eyes fixed on Sarn, he deliberately tilted his chin back, baring his throat.

It was an obvious invitation.

His face inscrutable, Sarn approached and kicked the Easterling’s dagger away.  He knelt behind the boy and took hold of his hair firmly, but not roughly.  The only sound was the youth’s ragged breaths as Sarn brought the tip of his dagger to his neck, preparing to give the wounded boy a nearly painless death.

Aragorn remembered himself quite suddenly.  “Wait!”

Sarn froze for half a heartbeat.  Then, quick as a flash, he turned the tip of his dagger aside and instead pressed the flat of the blade against the boy’s throat.  Aragorn approached, sheathing his sword and drawing his own belt knife.  As he drew near, the boy went rigid.  Violent tremors traveled up his body.  Sarn was forced to loosen his grip to avoid cutting the young Easterling’s throat accidentally.

Crouching beside Sarn, Aragorn used his knife to cut open the boy’s dark tunic where it clung, blood-sticky, to his side.  The arrow had pierced his back just a few inches from his spine, but at an angle.  It had glanced off a rib and emerged from his side.  Aragorn probed the wound lightly.  Yes, he could feel the shaft of the arrow buried in the meat of the boy’s back, just under his skin.  The arrow itself had no iron head—only a tapered, fire-blackened tip.  Sarn used that bow mostly to hunt deer.  Only the vagaries of battle had turned it into a weapon against Men.

Aragorn met Sarn’s questioning gaze.  Realizing what he intended, the Man of Gondor sighed, but nodded.  Tossing his knife aside, he replaced it with a forearm held like a bar across the boy’s neck.  With his other arm, he braced his shoulders.

Gripping the arrow just below the fletching, Aragorn gave it a hard, twisting jerk.  The boy screamed—a cry that echoed off of the surrounding cliff faces—and thrashed in Sarn’s arms, but the arrow was out before his struggles could do any more harm.  Once it was done, the young Easterling twisted as much as Sarn would let him and fixed Aragorn with a look of utter betrayal.  Aragorn did not react.  He knew how this must seem to the boy.  To him, Aragorn was the cruel enemy captain who denied him Sarn’s mercy stroke and kept him alive only for further torment.  “Easy, lad,” he murmured, though he was not yet sure whether the boy spoke Westron.

Aragorn tried to examine the boy’s side as gently as he could, but there was no painless way to explore an arrow wound.  It bled sluggishly, but the blood flow slowed as Aragorn held a rag to it.  He probed the surrounding skin lightly, feeling almost constant tremors under his fingers.

After a moment, he breathed again and nodded to Sarn.  “This wound is not mortal, I think.  The arrow has not pierced the belly.”

Aragorn’s subordinate did not seem to share his relief.  His face darkened, but his arm shifted to grip the boy by the shoulders instead of across his neck.  “I await your orders, Captain Thorongil,” Sarn said shortly.

Aragorn frowned.  He’d known Sarn for only a few short weeks—long enough to know plenty of his reticent nature, but little of his heart.  Still, this terse, almost angry response was . . . troubling.  He knew that some career soldiers could become overly-vengeful, but he’d not expected that sort of anger directed at one so obviously young and inexperienced.  Especially since, as he could now plainly see, none of their soldiers had taken wounds more serious than Meneldir’s knock to the head.

“Search him for weapons and bind his hands,” Aragorn ordered at last, “We’ll take him as far as the garrison at Osgiliath.”

Sarn’s scowl grew, but Aragorn scarcely noticed it because the boy’s eyes had flown wide.  “No!”  He gasped.  A moment later, he was twisting and flailing in Sarn’s grip like a cornered cat.  Well, Aragorn reflected, At least that answers the question of whether he speaks the Common Tongue.  His struggles were fierce but brief; Sarn was nearly as tall as Aragorn and somewhat broader in the shoulder.  He easily subdued the boy, even before two more men could approach to search and bind him. 

Aragorn stepped away, trusting his men to handle one small prisoner of war.  He went to check on Meneldir, who was standing, if rather shakily.  “How do you feel, my friend?”  He asked the young soldier.

The man managed a smile that was only a little weak.  “Much better than I did five minutes past, Captain.”

Aragorn lifted a fresh rag to the gash on Meneldir’s forehead.  It was bleeding profusely, but that was to be expected with that sort of wound.  “Did you lose consciousness?”

“Perhaps for a moment.  I thank you for the rescue.”

“Think nothing of it.”  Aragorn tilted the man’s chin to inspect his pupils more closely.

“Still,” Meneldir said a bit ruefully, “It is somewhat of an embarrassment to so nearly be undone by one so young.”

“Again I say:  think nothing of it.”  Aragorn probed his skull gently, feeling for cracks and finding none, “I’ve found that steel does not much care how young the arm that wields it may be.”

Meneldir grunted, but he was watching Sarn and the boy with a troubled expression.  “Thorongil,” he said suddenly, “We don’t have to do this.  We can execute the boy right now and everyone will put it down to a battlefield mercy killing.”

Aragorn blinked in surprise.  Meneldir was not an unknown quantity like Sarn; the younger man had been under his command for almost the entire year he’d spent in Gondor.  There were few men less prone to cruelty than he.  “Mercy strokes are for the dying,” he said, letting a trace of sternness enter his voice.  “This boy will recover.”

Meneldir quickly looked at his feet and nodded.

Aragorn felt a sneaking suspicion that Meneldir—and perhaps Sarn as well—knew more than he did.

He shook the feeling off, telling himself they were merely rattled by the sudden ambush.

Turning back to watch their captive, Aragorn found Sarn giving the boy a drink of water, having already bound his hands and bandaged his side.  Aragorn caught his gaze and nodded his approval, though he’d never known Sarn to care what Aragorn thought of him.  Sure enough, the man did not react.  His hands, though, were strangely gentle as he pulled the boy to his feet and steadied him.  Without a word, Aragorn signaled for his men to move out.  Having been once ambushed, he was not willing to tarry here even long enough to question their captive; it could wait until they reached safer lands.

Far above, a carrion bird cried.  Aragorn felt his gaze drawn, irresistibly, to the nine bodies that lay scattered like drift wood among the stones.  His mouth tightened.  Loath though he was to leave even an enemy to rot, there was nothing they could do here.  Even if they’d not had to worry for their own safety, the soil was too rocky to dig graves and there was no firewood for a pyre.

He paused to straighten the limbs of the body nearest him.  This one, like all the others, wore a mask of dark cloth, concealing all but his sightless eyes.  For a moment, Aragorn’s fingers hovered over the fabric, torn between drawing away and pulling the cloth aside.  He wondered, bleakly, whether their young prisoner was the only child Rhûn had sent against them.

He pulled his hand away, afraid of what he might find behind that innocuous-looking cowl.

Without a word, he turned and led eight men and one boy away down the barren slopes, seeking friendlier ground.

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They made camp that night in a small ravine.  Tucked away with stone on two sides and a rocky outcropping over their heads, Aragorn decided to risk a fire.  His men—at least the five who were not on watch—spread their bedrolls around the small blaze gratefully.  They traveled light for this patrol, carrying only a single tent for emergency use as a shelter for the wounded.

Or, in a pinch, as a prison for the captured.

Aragorn paused before the tent.  They had pitched it at the rear of an alcove, positioned a guard in front, and bound the boy within by tying his hands to one of the tent stakes with a length of rope.  Then, at Aragorn’s orders, they had let him be for a time.  The boy had been utterly unresponsive to questioning, even to questions as innocuous as “what is your name?” or “would you like some water?”  Still, he had not fought them and had accepted some food, both of which Aragorn chose to interpret as encouraging signs.

But now that he was alone, soft, pathetic noises were emanating from the tent.  The other men likely could not hear them, stifled as they were, but Aragorn’s ears were sharper than most.

He sighed.

You must be cruel to be kind.  That was among the first lessons any healer learned and one Aragorn had been taught at his foster father’s knee.  The harder a dislocated joint is wrenched, the greater the chance it will slip back into place.  The agony of having a wound stitched can save a man from the agony of seeing it turn gangrenous.  It was a simple concept, in theory, but far harder to see through in practice.

“You’re acting the fool.”  A quiet voice put a halt to any further musing.  Aragorn turned.  Sarn, who was on watch, had turned to spit Aragorn with a hard look, though he pitched his voice too low for the others to hear.

“Eyes front, Sarn,” Aragorn said sternly.  He did not get particularly riled by insubordination—so long as it occurred in private—but no soldier under his command would put his comrades at risk by neglecting his watch.  As Sarn turned his steely gaze back to the shadowed ravine, Aragorn approached to stand beside him.  “Say what you’ve come to say.”  He pitched his own voice low, but allowed an edge to enter it.  “You’re angry that I spared the boy.”

Sarn snorted.  “Of course not.”  The flicker of the campfire threw his face into shadow.  “I am angry that you didn’t.”

Aragorn blinked.  “What are you talking about?”

“That child deserved a quick, battlefield death dealt before he’d had a chance to agonize over it.”

“’That child’ deserves not to die at all by our hand if we can avoid it.  Young as he is, you must that see he is redeemable.”

Sarn gave Aragorn a startled glance.  Aragorn thought he saw his eyes widen before he remembered himself and turned them back to the wilds.  “You don’t know, do you?”

“Know what?”  Sarn was silent, though his jaw worked.  Aragorn frowned.  “Out with it,” he ordered somewhat testily, “I would know why you and Meneldir are acting as if I mean to cook and eat this boy when all I’ve done is treat his wounds.”

“He will be executed.”  Sarn’s face was hard, but his voice was bleak.

Aragorn swallowed.  “What?”

“Rhûn does not negotiate for the return of prisoners.  When our men are captured by them, we get them back in a dozen pieces.”

“So, Ecthelion simply responds in kind?”  Aragorn did not bother trying to keep the disapproval out of his voice.

“What would you have him do?  The Men of Rhûn are fanatics.  They care nothing for their own lives and they strike at us any way they can.  To imprison them would simply put the other prisoners at risk, and to release them is to invite them to strike at us again.”

“This is a frightened child.  The Steward will have to see reason.”

“The Steward will protect the people of Gondor first.”

Aragorn had nothing to say to that.  He wanted to refute Sarn’s words, but the man spoke with such matter-of-fact certainty.  He had known Ecthelion far longer than Aragorn had—had served in his household even.  He had experience on his side and simple logic as well.  Aragorn had only his threadbare convictions.

“We will speak on this later,” he said at last, “Keep your eyes to the wilds.”  He turned away and walked back toward the camp with leaden steps.  At least now he knew.

He paused again beside the tent without meeting the eyes of the man assigned to guard it.  Yes, he could still make out the quiet sounds of despair from within.

You must be cruel to be kind.  But, it was so hard, sometimes, to know which cruelties would lead to a greater kindness and which simply to more suffering.  Would his act of mercy come to mean nothing in the end?  Had he spared this boy only to prolong his fear and pain?

With a quiet sigh, Aragorn turned and picked his way back to the fire.  His own watch would be starting ere long.  He should at least try to sleep.

You must be cruel to be kind.  He didn’t know what the future would hold for the wounded boy of Rhûn. 

All he knew was that at that moment, the kindest thing he could do was to pretend he did not hear the muffled sounds of his weeping.

TBC

A/N:  I will post the conclusion tomorrow.  Reviews are wonderful.  All reviews are wonderful.  Concrit reviews are the best.