“Why do you deploy all your foot soldiers to the right flank, in such ragged ranks? Should they not be in the fore of battle?”

He looked up into his brother’s curious face, a sweet grave smile lighting his own. “They are in reserve and in hiding; you must pretend that you may see the trees. I need them to strike quickly only when called forth.”

His brother laid down the sword he had been polishing and peered at the ranks of small wooden soldiers. “Yours is an interesting strategy, though I think it would not work so well save in the woodlands. There is no place to hide one’s soldiers in the midst of a cornfield unless they were of a height strangely unexpected in those of the blood of Númenor.”

He smiled wistfully. “I like the woods. Think you we shall walk through Ithilien again?”

His brother grimaced. “Not in any near future I can foresee. Though my sight is hardly long, you may well trust me on this.”

Eyes that did see both long and clearly suddenly focused on the ensign’s frown. “I am sure father did not mean to blame you so harshly for the last trip we made.”

“It makes no matter, for he had the truth of it. I was wrong to take you and the others there; I had no right to send you into such possible danger. I shall leave Ithilien to the rangers. But do not fret about it more! Tell me instead, Captain-General, about your battle plans.”

Accepting his brother’s deliberate change of mood he complained in jest, “’Tis boring, there are too many orcs to stage a fair battle- why have we so many?”

“Because you have stolen all mine, and my favored tactic has ever been to surround my hero with rings of orcs through which he may battle free and emerge triumphant!” His brother grinned and picked up a battered orc, dancing it along the floor of the sunny playroom. “Grr! Have at you, puny man of Gondor!”

“How you chatter so, brother- have you no respect for battle silence?” Grey eyes laughed as he snatched back the orc and returned it to its position.

“Since I have seen only as much battle as you, bratling, the answer must needs be no.” The older youth blew out his breath in a rude noise to make him laugh, then leaped to his feet. “Look, little brother.” He pulled a small stone jar from the cloak hanging on its peg. “Cook’s stewed apples- they were made last night for a special feast on the morrow, but I did judge our need more worthy, for what is more special than a lazy spring day on leave?”

“Oh, pray you did not! You know well that cook shall rage and then sulk, tonight the roast shall be burned but the potatoes raw- father will be most displeased!”

“Since you and I shall be well filled with sweet apple the burned joint shall matter little,” his brother grinned as he chewed. “Never fear, the sin is mine and I am too old to be thrashed. Even after our ill-judged trip I but received extra duties and a tongue lashing.”

“Father would say you are too old for such pranks.” He shook his head at the offered sweet; he was fond enough of stewed apple but did not wish to leave sticky syrup on his soldiers. How he admired his brother’s courage, however foolhardy, for courage it took to defy their dragon of a father.

“Would you deny me this small treat, age me before my time? Now enough of scolding and tell me of this little one.” His brother picked up a battered soldier, denuded of color and with a missing arm. “Ai, this poor naked fellow needs to visit the Houses, and soon, ere he bleeds away his life as he has his dignity- they may at least offer him a breechclout.”

“No, no,” he shook his head, laughing at his elder’s nonsense. “Listen!” He thought a moment, as he wrought a history in his fertile mind. “He was the brave captain of archers, renowned throughout all the lands of Gondor for his mighty deeds. But sorely was he wounded, so was retained to the service of the king.”

“Gondor has no king.”

“Brother, surely you do not think I am not aware of that?”

“Mayhap you mean Rohan- Rohan, Gondor, they are very easy to confuse.”

“Brother!” His glare was met with an unrepentant snicker. “You must imagine! That the king has returned, and the brave captain has volunteered to sacrifice himself to the orcs so that his liege lord might escape.” So saying he took the poor old soldier and set it neatly in the middle of the battlefield, before the ranks of orcs. He gazed at the arrangement in satisfaction.

“Fool to do so for some unknown king,” the ensign snorted. “And more fool he, to lie naked on the grass before doing battle with orcs. Peace, child! I but tease. Continue with your sad tale.”

“Mark how the orcs seek to overrun my brave- my very brave!- soldier, but he prevails by the grace of the Valar. When at the last he is slain-” he dropped the figure on its back, “the orcs set off in pursuit. But his sacrifice has not been in vain, and his loyal archers rescue their king.” The young boy picked up his three archers, but placed them back down and sat back frowning, his lower lip pushed out in a pout. “I cannot make them from my thoughts- I must have more soldiers!” He gestured at the toys. “Do you not see how small the king’s forces are? How very poorly they defend him against so many orcs. Have you no more?”

“You have already hunted out all from where I had hidden them, bratling.” At his brother’s lazy retort he giggled, and the older youth shrugged, more interested in searching out the last stewed apple from the jar. “Ask our father to commission more. Several full troops of archers, infantry, wagons. And horses!”

“Horses are of little use among trees!”

“Your great love for the woodlands baffles me. Ah, well, ask anyway, they would be most amusing. Father will be agreeable as your birthday will be in two months, time enough for the figures to be carved.”

“That is so!” He clapped his hands. “Always you have an answer for everything I ask or need.”

The young ensign grinned and bowed at the waist. “Ever at your service, my little lord!” He winked. “Ask for your brave archers to be cast in bronze- they shall endure forever and never be broken as your poor hero yonder, save you break them with your own hands.”

------------------------------------

“Next item: special personnel request.”

“How astonishing!” A lieutenant sneered. “Never could I hazard a guess from whence it comes.” Rumbles of agreement issued from the others around the table.

Under his steady stare they subsided. “Proceed.”

“Request from Ithilien. The captain offers his regrets for not attending in person but asks that this matter of replacement personnel and training be considered in all urgency. Sir, there is a footnote addressed to the council but I know not from the tone if it is official…”

“If not the captain would not have included it in his report,” he replied dryly. “Proceed.”

His aide blushed, then cleared his throat. “Sir, from the captain: To the council regarding my continued requests for men and improved training- if in place of tallying boils and gout the council would address my concerns upon the latter, I would gladly desist pressing upon the former. I would ask the esteemed members to consider over their dinner wine that in the interim I write too many letters that I should not be.”

His face remained stern, though he groaned in his heart at his brother’s words, which would win him no friends among the men already so poorly disposed towards him at the planning table. He wondered what had occurred to rouse his gentle brother to such unwonted spite- the passing of yet another of his men, yes, but surely there was more. He held out his hand for the paper. His eyes marked the date three days’ past and the unevenness in the writing that spoke of weariness and barely controlled temper, then flickered back up to the faces of the men around him. Once his attention was upon them each began speaking immediately.

“Captain-General, existing supplies cannot be diverted as requested by the captain! The numbers he quotes are not reasonable.”

“Sir, would you have the city troops suffer want as well? In truth, neither men nor desire exists to augment Ithilien. The captain must needs continue to rely on field training, and indeed any men sent back would best be re-assigned here to the garrison in Osgiliath.”

“The shadow- that is what concerns us, and I do fear it extends over the White City now.”

He touched a hand to his temple, willing away the headache that ever assailed him under the bleating of his staff- administrative underlings who had long since forgotten the true feel of a sword. His field captains were still deployed amongst the troops, free to do battle alongside those loyal men who served them, as he sorely wished to be himself. But Captain-Generals wore fetters of paper and ink more weighty than iron; even those times when he rode out he could sense them holding him to the drafty ruins of his council room.

He brooded upon the sheets of paper arrayed before him, inscribed with unending columns of numbers- hale men in the right columns, dead and wounded on the left- scribbled over with comments and corrections in his own impatient hand. So many soulless numbers to be tallied or discarded, scratched off with a single swipe of the pen- yet each spoke of the fate of a man under his care, each line of ink on the left column a trail of blood. His gaze moved to the tattered map spread on the table before them, resting on the small bronze archer standing upon Ithilien; the others had not comprehended when it had arrived a month back in a dispatch from the captain, but had also not questioned when their grim-faced Captain-General had placed it on the map, in mute attendance on the council.

“Sir, I have done the sums, read the reports many times- the rangers consume much, demand much, but we hear little on what.”

“If the captain would but explain himself-”

“Sadly secretive, the rangers are.”

He could not entirely disagree. He knew well how mightily his brother’s small troop of men strove against the minions of Sauron in the vast Moon-land, but also knew the captain did not tell all to him. Too clever with words, was his younger brother. Although neither would admit to it, he suspected that the captain had orders from the Steward they did not share with him, dealings sharp as glass that for all the love between them left the two circling each other like wary dogs, ever ready to leap in or away. Though as the captain’s superior it angered him to be left ignorant, the Captain-General knew better than to challenge the Steward on this matter. Foolhardy to be caught between such willful combatants, so much alike in their sight and thought that he feared for them at times in their contests- the Steward remorseless in attack, the captain disposed to yield to his lord unless pushed beyond tolerance.

But he must remember- that great love lay between the three; however their duties drove them, whatever terrible choices good or ill each had made or would make, that bond would be ever unbroken and would sustain them.

“The captain is a fine soldier but as he so rarely leaves Ithilien to attend these discussions perhaps he is unaware of the growing needs to support Osgiliath and Minas Tirith themselves.”

“Deploying a number of rangers further west and south would be advisable; the Steward has expressed concern-”

He bent his head over his much-scribbled paper, dark locks falling to cloak his face as he wrote out more lines of numbers, inking some out, circling others, adding the whole. He knew what he would get, but nonetheless ran his pen up the columns and then down once more. Pressing his lips tightly together, he repeated his calculations one final time, slowly and deliberately, then studied the three sets of results. He dropped his pen and sat back in his chair, staring out the window, listening to the slow drumming of the rain echo in the dilapidated building about them. In the distance, a sentry challenged, was answered; hoof beats pounded past- garrison life in the ruined city continued.

His men observed him in silence, well used to waiting for their Captain-General was a man of measured words. At last he bent his attention back, his gaze falling upon each man in turn as he spoke.

“There will be no redeployment of the rangers from Ithilien for they are few enough.” He turned to address his aide. “A reply is to be drafted to the captain denying his requests. Bring it to me to sign. Tonight. I would not leave him with false hope.” The aide nodded, his pen scratching. “What further matters to discuss?”

“Captain-General, the Rammas Echor is scheduled for …”

“Lossarnach requests at least twice the number…”

“Captain-General, if these squads were re-deployed northwards, we could…”

He listened, nodding at times, shaking his head at others, exchanging a quiet word with his aide as needed. His pen never lay still, covering sheets of paper with roughly drafted notes that he tossed to his aide as they filled.

Business concluded, his men filed out, leaving him bathed in the heavy, blessed silence disturbed only faintly by the rain. His aide, last to depart, murmured instructions to himself as he packed his precious scraps of paper into an oiled bag.

“A messenger is to take my reply to the captain in Ithilien tonight.”

The aide looked startled, then bowed and saluted, but he paid no attention, staring instead at the table. Only when the door had closed, leaving him in solitude, did he allow himself to relax his self-control and drop his head into his hands.

He had tried- oh, how he had tried to bend those cold numbers to his will, to find some measure of reassurance he could send his brother, some relief. He, who had hated sums all his life, had spent the past seven nights poring over every available roll and roster, combing through lists, demanding accurate accountings from all his captains. But the numbers would not lie to him and he would not lie to his brother.

He bore no illusions about Ithilien’s and the rangers’ eventual doom; soon the green hills must needs be abandoned in full while the men would be pulled back to Osgiliath. He could only pray that his brother would be one of them when the time came. In the meantime they were bound to their duty, and it wounded him to the very soul to deny his brother, to be helpless to give even the slightest aid. But the Steward spoke of a great threat to the White City itself, and Gondor’s Captain-General was sworn to her service above all.

He picked up the tiny bronze archer, marveling anew at the detail and skill of the Steward’s craftsmen. Few marks marred its surface even after all the years; his brother had ever been gentle with whatever had been entrusted to him.

In his exuberant youth he would have raged and thrown his boot at his hapless aide. Age and the expectations of Steward and City had pressed him into outward decorum, but the prideful spirits still burned deep within.

His knuckles whitened.

Carefully, deliberately, his strong, scarred fingers squeezed about the little archer, then relaxed. He held it up to the light; the figure had bent, but had not broken.

A tall rangy figure cloaked in shadows cast by the light beyond, forever poised ready, body taut with waiting. Waiting for the Captain-General’s response.

For men and supplies that would not come.

For relief that would not be his.

For victory that had never been meant to be.

But they were both true sons of Gondor. He sighed and allowed his tense muscles to relax. He did not believe that his brother had ever expected an affirmative, and knew he would continue to keep faith as he always had. He gently set the steadfast little soldier upon its rightful place and for the first time that night a smile lightened his face. “Hunt well, little brother, and be well,” he whispered, tapping the figure. He rose and donned his cloak, before walking into the rain to consult the watch and to study the sullen fires on the horizon to the east. He too would have to wait.