On the eve of winter, you send two messengers riding out across the land. One rides north, to the black tower on the ford, and another makes east, for the town in the high hill. Both the chieftain of Brun Gledd and the Master of Tharbad are summoned to Tar Nilon, to break words with each other under your protection and with guarantee of safety.
The Middle-Men send back an envoy within the week. They will attend this meeting, they promise, their chieftain and the great elders all together.
The Númenóreans of the tower send no word back, but on the day before the meeting is to take place, a troop of tall men in golden armor emerges from the northern forests. At their head is Hazraban, wearing the robes and regalia of a Warden of the King, his youthful face set firm under a heavy iron crown.
Lacking any suitable facilities in the city itself, a meeting-place is chosen upon a hill outside the city. There the High Men and the Middle-Men meet, their breaths frosting in the first chill. Hazraban's eyes are dark and bright, and his armor shines with a cruel beauty in the morning sun. Braelor, for his part, is far different from when you saw him last: a dozen golden torcs sit about his neck, and the furs he wears are richly oiled. His beard is woven into an intricate pattern, and a sword — of Númenórean make, you notice — hangs from his hip. Behind him are a dozen or so men bent with age, some clutching walking sticks and others outright immobile, carried on litters by their sons.
"The Drugenti-Lûth are come before you," Braelor declares, his voice solid as an oak. He has to arch his neck to look either of you in the face, but there is nothing broken in his eyes, or anything indeed left of the man who but a year ago all but flung himself at your feet and begged for protection. "Why have you called us here? What would the great and puissant High Men of the Sea ask of the men of the twilight?"
Hazraban breaks in before you may reply. "Ask? Nothing. It is ye who should plead forgiveness. How many harvests have you burned, and sons murdered? It is orc-work you do, plain and simple, and if I knew you not for kin and kind, I would think you beasts of the Wizard."
Braelor does not speak, and merely motions with a hand. Behind him, one of the elders sits up on his litter. His old voice is like the creaking of soft bark, and all present must strain to pick out his words against the wind. "Our lives are not as long as your own, my lord, but our memories stretch back far enough to remember when we were not of these lands. The wise-men say that we dwelt once and long ago in the shadow of the Blue Mountains, on the shores of the great sea. But south we have retreated, ever south, over river and hill, and now the shores are lost to us, and even the mountains are a memory."
The elder slumps back, drained from the effort of his speech, and Braelor picks up where he left off. "I ask you, what forgiveness should we ask of the High Men, or of the Tyrant in his far tower?"
Hazraban sneers. "You pass down half-remembered tales in the dirt, and scorn that of which you know less and little. You would have nothing, in the north or the south or the lands between, were it not for we. Have you forgotten so easily the shadow of the Enemy?"
"But the Enemy is gone a thousand years," you break in. "And none of their woes may now be laid upon Zigûrun."
Hazraban looks at you, his face stretched with anger and confusion. "And why? Because of us! Our hand has sheltered them from the dark for thirty lifetimes. My lord Imrazor, I beg you, see their petulance for what it is: the complaints of children, unable or unwilling to understand--"
"Hold," you interrupt him. "The both of you. And listen."
You beckon behind you, and a guard brings a small table and a map, which he unrolls upon the table's surface. Many dark black points dot the map.
"Here. And here. And here again." Each time you speak, you point at one of the black dots. "Here, and here also. Each of these places, orcs bearing the brand of Gundabad have been seen abroad in the wilderness. There is a darkness gathering in the north such as these lands have not seen for many lifetimes of men — Tall or otherwise."
Neither Braelor nor the Warden speak. It seems you have their attention. You forge on.
"This is why I have called you here. A blade hangs over all our heads. The time for strife between our kindreds must be at an end."
Hazraban sours. "You cannot -"
"Silence, son of Algadar, and listen. A power comes over these lands the likes of which you cannot resist alone — which none of us might resist alone, absent allies. If the signs I have seen are correct, only the cooperation of all men between the mountains and the sea might be enough to deter what now rises in the north."
Braelor looks at the map, running a hand over it, then up at you. "What do you propose?"
"An alliance. A great alliance of the men of the north, by which the enemy that marshals in Gundabad may be undone."
"What need have we of alliances with these men?" Hazraban thundered. "If the orcs come, we shall deal with them as we have dealt with them before —"
"You are not your father, Lord Warden. Nor his father before him. Your walls are rubbled, and your numbers dwindled. You have strength enough to terrorize the Middle-Men, but how do you believe your garrison might fare against an army? Have any among your guard ever seen a troll? Or a dragon? Dare you even imagine what fell beasts lie within the Wizard's power?"
Hazraban swallows.
Braelor fills the silence. "What would you have of us, then?"
"All the north," you begin "was manned by forts long ago." You indicate a string of points along the Gwathlo. "These fortifications were made by elves and men alike in days gone by to defy a greater power yet than we now face. Tharbad alone remains. If any proper defense is to be made, this old guard must be restored.
Hazraban's eyes flicker to the map, interested.
"Númenórean forts," he said. "And Númenor's by right."
You nod slowly. "But there is no longer enough of Númenor left to hold them, not in all the north, and not enough grain in all of Tharbad to feed them if you could fill them."
His eyes widen as he grasps your meaning. "You cannot mean…"
"But I do! We of Tar Nilon shall put the work and knowledge of the Shapers to repairing not only the walls of Tharbad, but all the bastion-line in which she once stood. The fort shall be repaired and stand as it was in your father's time, and the Middle-Men shall man her sister-forts along the river. From East to West the river-wall shall stretch, and Gundabad will find the river held as it was held in the days of Tar-Minastir."
"But for all this…" you continue, "there must be peace, and concessions."
Hazraban scowled. "You do not imagine allowing these little men into the halls of our fathers to be concession enough?"
"I do not. You must stay your hand immediately. No more raids. No more retribution. No more thralls or vassals."
"You would have me give up all that we have built?"
"To save all else, yes."
You turn to Braelor. "And from you, I ask something more difficult yet. You and yours must now give freely what has been taken. Your herds and fields must feed the towers and their garrisons, or this defense of which we dream shall starve. In return, you will meet with us as an equal, in council to decide the defense and doings in the North."
Braelor knuckles his beard stubbornly. "It is your dream, Númenorean, and no dream of ours."
"Stubbornness will not avail you when the orcs come. Whatever terrors you begrudge the tower and it's master, worse terrors yet shall sweep out of the north in due time."
"All that aside, what you ask is not so easily done. My father was the Lûth-i-Lûth, king of all the northmen, and could have commanded such a thing with ease — but he fell at the walls of Tharbad long ago. The clans heed the call of Brun Gledd no longer. If they do not swear themselves to the Tower, then they have retreated into the mountains or the hills, and given themselves over to the gods who were before the sun."
Hazraban snarls. "Savagery and blasphemy. There are no gods save The One. Your wood-spirits will not avail you."
Braelor does not blink. "They are not of the wood. Spirits. Gods. Call them what you will. I hold Illuvatar as you do, and yet the fact remains. They were here before the sun, and before you."
Again you steer the topic back to the matter at hand. "Would these clans answer the call to defend against Gundabad?"
Braelor laughs, high and clear. "No. Perhaps my own people might, if I was of mind to beseech them, but the Carag-Lûth and the Draig-Lûth might go to their deaths before they bent to Númenor. Only the Lûth-i-Lûth, the High King, might call them to arms — and I am afraid there are no kings among the Gwaithurim any longer." Braelor casts an isolent look upwards. "The tall sea has taken them, and the long tide."
You knot your brow, intrigued. "And you cannot name yourself High King?"
The chieftain laughed again. "Are things so simple in far Númenor? It is not a thing of naming yourself. The Lûth-i-Lûth is raised by all the clans, as one, amid the barrows of his fathers. He stands high on the naming-stone and the dead who have gone name him true — or strike him low for the trying."
Hazraban has almost stopped listening. "Heathenry. My Lord Shaper, you cannot indulge this…witch-talk. The wildmen shake in fear of ravens and omens in the night."
Braelor's hand twitches on his sword, but he speaks still not to Hazraban, but to you.
"There you have it. If you want the northmen, you must have their king. But the crown of the Kings is lost, and while I have heard tell that the Barrow-Men keep the old places still, none of us who dwell below the Gwathlo have been permitted to venture over the river since my father's time."
Hazraban laughs. "The sheer gall. You are given everything you have ever wanted on a plate — treated as equals — and you demand we make you a king instead. Yours are a miserable people, and you would make a miserable king."
He turns to you.
"Do you see now, Sea-Lord? I tried to warn you. They are a grasping, shameless lot. They see the glory of Númenor and can only pretend at it. Kings. What kings could there be out here, in the wilderness?"
An old woman behind Braelor rises to her full height. Her eyes are stars of scorn. "Higher kings, my lord, and greater, than are thought of across the sea. Better kings than thine, that were conquered or ever your sires were born."
Hazraban scoffs. "It is folly to treat with them. I was inclined once as you are, to a high hand and open arms — but they are a viperous race, these men of Brunn Gledd, and their poison drips deep into the ears of all their kindred. Your plan is bold, and at the hearing of it I was first unsettled, but there is a wisdom in it, my lord. Many of these clans of which they speak are tributaries already to me. I could relinquish them, as you say, and —"
"They will not fight for you," Braelor breaks in. "For him, perhaps, but never for you."
A dry chuckle rings in response. "Is that so? My lord Imrazor, my offer remains open — and I add to it. Repair my walls and I shall relinquish those Middle-Men I have bound in tribute from their duties, should they agree to join this great alliance of yours. We shall restore Tharbad to her glory and fence the North against the Enemy. Leave this little king and his people to their own devices, but I warn thee — do not hope for word or sign of thanks when our blood and our steel shelters them yet again from the Shadow."
Hazraban bows to you and turns to leave, but a sharp call from Braelor stops him.
"Lord of the Tower. I have a sign of thanks for you."
The tall figure pauses, golden armor dancing with light in the sun. He looks down at the smaller.
"Yes?"
Braelor's mouth works a long moment. He says nothing.
Finally, he leans over and spits at Hazraban's feet.
"We are no children, Tyrant."
Braelor turns and walks down the hill. He does not look back.
Hazraban's eyes grow a sickly color. You think he is about to go for his sword, but instead he raises a gleaming fist into the air and calls after the retreating delegation, his voice booming in the winter air. You will remember for long afterwards that tableau: a golden figure, eyes twisted in rage, shouting down a hill at a small one, retreating into the gloom.
"And yet child you are, fool! You live and you breathe and you die and it is the blink of an eye! By the time my son is a man grown, the sons of your sons will be breathing their last! You will wither and fade and go into the earth, and we will live on after you! You are a passing wind, a folly and a suffering, agannâlu lo dubdam*!"
