Hi all, thanks this week for the lovely comments (Narya and Robbie). Hope you enjoy this one :)

Chapter 53 – Too long in fear

Gimli looked up to his work and brushed his hands upon dusty knees. The second gate stood tall and strong once more. Only an hour before it had been blasted stone and rubble.

He shook his head as the wearied men cleared the remainder of the supplies away from the archway. To think that before long this gate too would be again destroyed! But better the enemy should rage against wood and stone than against the people of Gondor, as Aragorn had said. Aragorn had not been the one to restore the gate!

"Gimli!"

A familiar voice reached him out of the smoke and ruins of the third circle, and he squinted into the shifting whiteness. "Who calls?"

"It is I, Merry."

The Hobbit appeared, hale and determined, but moving with nervous swiftness toward him. By his side walked a man Gimli had only seen in the depth of fever at the Houses of Healing. Now that he was upright once more, his rugged appearance and large sword rather overawed the dwarf.

"Gimli, this is..."

"No need for introductions," Gimli interrupted Merry's no doubt detailed explanation. He reached out and grasped Boromir's wrist stoutly. "I have just rebuilt your gate Captain, what do you think of it?"

The man seemed somewhat dazed, but he looked to Gimli's work and seemed impressed. "Very fine, but..."

"I was under the impression," Gimli interjected again, "that you were expected to go storming up to the citadel."

Merry gave Gimli a very disapproving look, and Boromir shook his head.

"Is this not my city?" he asked, his attention distracted from Gimli and Merry as he shifted his gaze to the tower. "Am I not free to go wherever I will? Hobbits and Dwarfs – where are all the men of the guard? I have believed your tale thus far, Merry, for the debt I owe you, but how am I to wait and watch while the upper levels crawl with orcs?"

"The waiting will not endure," Gimli said darkly, feeling pity for this man and no longer speaking jovially. "Sauron's force approaches, it will not be long before these gates will tremble again under hammer and fire.

"Madness," Gimli heard the man mutter.

"I can have you watch as each one of your people is torn to pieces. Not all will bear your betrayal as stoically as these. They will scream for their false King's mercy. Spare them that, for in the end I shall have what I came for." ...

Aragorn bore this last stoically, but was sure he must have paled, for he felt light headed and sickness threatened to overturn his stomach. He did not understand how the Istar's words could wreak such confusion and fear on his ever keen senses.

Saruman seemed reluctant, however, to forcibly search Aragorn for that which he believed to be concealed. Perhaps rumours of the ring's abilities had reached the wizard. Even the ability to become invisible at this precarious moment could undo all if he were to impel Aragorn into such an act.

"Strange things too I have seen since we parted," Saruman said, returning to his soft tones.

Aragorn grew still more uneasy. Perhaps he had given away more than he intended in attempting to influence the seeing stone. He eyed the Istar's staff wearily too, for though it seemed only a carven prop, it appeared to pulse and thrum at the side of his vision.

"A pretty thorn in my side from Meduseld to Gondor."

Faramir's almost imperceptible intake of breath did not escape the wizard's notice, and he turned swiftly. "So much futile endurance and concealment," he touched the young man's face with feigned good humour. Faramir paled immediately at the touch, as though nauseated, "but what man would not lay down his life for such a one... in the hope that she might lie down in her turn..." Faramir turned his head away from the wizard's fingers, and Aragorn thought he saw true rather than feigned distress at the words.

Eomer's ireful sound at the slight to his sister broke their joint silence and drew the wizard's attention. Saruman moved to where the rider was being held pinioned on his knees, with his head barely above the ground. Even as tightly as he was being held, the man's great strength almost threw the orcs off balance as he struggled.

"It is a pity Grima did not live out the road to Minas Tirith. A handsome consort for the lady of Rohan... "

Eomer spat blood onto wizard's white robed feet and immediately shrank back as Saruman's long fingered hand brushed his skin also. He shuddered, head shaking as if to throw off some unpleasant dream, and his struggles lessened.

"And where is the lady now? I would repay her for her trouble."

"You shall not touch her."

"Even the greatest of kings were impotent in the face of the shadow in the East, and the kings of this age are as children playing on sandcastles." Saruman's focus slid to the far side of the hall where Theoden's body was laid out in honour, and his eyes became bright with some further malice.

"Stop this," Aragorn said at last, and the orcs who had been muttering excitedly quietened and focused upon him. He could not take his eyes from the blood that was dripping from Legolas' mouth onto the white stones, and the dread in Eomer's gaze lest the wizard wreak some desecration on the body of his Uncle.

There was a long silence in which Aragorn's own heavy breathing seemed to fill the void. The ringing in his ears had risen to a shriek. They had needed to play this right, to make Saruman believe beyond all doubt that they were at their last throw, but his own conviction was now teetering.

Saruman seemed to read this from his countenance, and narrowed his eyes, boring into Aragorn's mind. For a wild moment Aragorn thought his deception had been discovered.

"So you will not willingly give me this thing?" Saruman asked, and there was no patience or amusement remaining in his words.

This was the very moment Aragorn had been waiting for, but before he could take the chance the wizard's knuckles had clenched white about his staff and Aragorn's head was consumed with heat and pain.

"Then, at this last, know what it is to rule with the ring of power!"

Dropping to one knee in an effort to stay conscious he pressed his palms against the cold floor, but Saruman's voice continued to batter him without reprieve.

"No councillors, only slaves. No comrades in arms..."

Legolas' stifled cry broke into Aragorn's red-tinged world and he clenched his teeth, tearing his eyes open a crack in an attempt to see what was happening to his friend.

"...only minions dispatched to die," Saruman continued relentlessly. "No steward to hold your throne..."

Through half-closed eyes Aragorn saw the wizard draw a narrow blade and instead of turning it upon Aragorn as he had anticipated, drove it into Faramir's side, stopping short after entry so that the young man only stiffened in shock. Aragorn clenched his eyes shut, but the darkness was no comfort.

"Only silence."

The pain in his head eased as though it had never been. Aragorn knelt where he was, frozen. He had delayed too long and missed their chance! All was lost.

"If you have this thing," Saruman voice came to him, "which I am now not so sure you do, you have shown you will never choose to wield it."

He opened his eyes, looked quickly to Legolas and saw the Elf kneeling now too, gasping for breath, neck and fingers red with blood where he had sought to tear away strangling hands. He saw Faramir's face, drained of colour, still lest Saruman drive the knife deeper.

The starkness of the scene without the haze of his own pain, the crudeness of a knife in the hands of a wizard of bountiful power, only further damned his situation. If he really held the ring of power surely now he would not hesitate to act.

The soft sound of a step behind him almost froze his blood, yet the sight of the Steward entering the hall set his heart pounding once more.

Saruman watched Denethor enter, and Aragorn saw the saw surprise reflected in the others' eyes that must have been in his own. He made no sign to direct the orcs to restrain the old man.

Outside his confusion and fear Aragorn's ears caught the sound of horns faintly in the city below. They were no Rohirric horns, yet Saruman didn't seem to hear the sound.

Denethor, whose body seemed to tremble as he brushed passed him, looked Aragorn hard in the face. "All is over... give him the ring."

Aragorn heard Eomer's sharp intake of breath and a slight noise from Faramir as Saruman shifted the knife, but Aragorn could only feel his own heart beat rapidly as he shifted his hand to the inside of his cloak, closing it over the precious object.

"You know I cannot," he said. His eyes met Denethor's, so similar to his own, and knew that for the first time he was acknowledged as an equal.

The Steward's hand was shaking violently as he reached for Aragorn and feigned a search for the ring. "This is not your decision to make," Denethor said, for the benefit of Saruman, and Aragorn thought, his own. His voice was deep with emotion as he spoke. "I have lost one son and will not lose another."

Aragorn relaxed, palms outward feigning defeat, and giving Denethor easy access to draw out the ring and hold it up to the wizard.

"We waited in fear too long," the Steward murmured, "and now all is lost."

Saruman's eyes seemed captured by the golden band, all doubts washed away by the conflict played out between the two rivals. The orcs, too, shifted uncomfortably, muttering amid themselves and shrinking back slightly. The ring was so similar, Aragorn thought, to the One. Hi dipped his own head to hide the eagerness in his own gaze. Only fire would tell the truth of their deception and by then it would be too late.

"Give me back my son," Denethor was saying, but Saruman, having seen his prize surrendered, had no further patience for careful words. Moving faster than sight he lunged forward to snatch the golden chain from Denethor's outstretched hand.

While his heart lurched with horror, Aragorn remembered his part and turned to retrieve Anduril from beside the dais.

Legolas, who had freed himself now the deception was safely achieved, lunged forwards, but too late as Saruman drove the already bloody knife into Dethethor's chest, cruelly holding the old man's hand in his as the blood soaked through his fine clothes and the body slipped to the ground.

Reeling back as Saruman turned, Legolas skirted the wizard in time to catch Faramir as he slipped to his knees in a pool of his own and his father's blood. Aragorn saw the Elf's hands trembling in earnest as he pressed against the young man's side, as Faramir's gaze, almost frightfully calm now, watched Saruman's hand that now held the ring.

Wrenching his eyes from Legolas', Aragorn looked also towards the ring with what he hoped looked like true fear, keeping Anduril hidden.

Also freed, with the orcs scampering backwards to the outer edges of the hall, Eomer had crawled over to where the Steward lay jerking in his last breaths.

All scruples lost, Saruman looked down on them and laughed silently, and made to place the ring on his finger. There was no need for words.

The Istar's cry tore at Aragorn's sanity, as though something was being ripped from his own body. A grey mist had taken hold of the wizard's form as the ring that had once adorned the King of Angmar's hand claimed its new host. Saruman realised his mistake too late, for the will of Sauron was already at work in him, and soon he would become merely a servant of the master he had hoped to supplant.

Aragorn knew he must strike now lest the moment of weakness they had all given their blood to reveal passed. The ring of the King of Angmar was not deadly in itself, and only by Sauron's exerted will and Saruman's betrayal might this opportunity be open to them. Lifting the blade he staggered to his feet and drove it into the Istar's throat. The head was thrown back in a scream so terrible that Aragorn swung again and sliced through the body.

His third strike was with the flat of his blade, tearing the wizards staff from his grasp and flinging it across the floor. But the flaring light from its tip had warned him too late what was to come, and he only had time to turn his face away before the blast tore into the walls.

Merry pressed himself closer to the stone wall, feeling himself shaking as the sounds of battle grew further from their position. Gimli's heavy breath was hot upon the back of his neck as the dwarf peered around him to gain a view of the street.

Upon reaching the second gate they had had little time to ponder what action to take. Sauron's force had battered apart the recently repaired great gate with their great siege engine, and the second gate was soon under contention. A great swathe of Saruman's force had swarmed down from the upper levels to now defend the very city they had overrun.

Orc slaughtered orc, the streets were choked with the dead, and the stones underfoot had become a river of blood.

Merry shrank back between Boromir and Gimli as another wave of Sauron's force passed the alleyway in which they hid. Merry saw Boromir rest his head back against the stone wall as they passed and saw too the horror in his eyes at the plight of the city. For he who had only awoken that day it must have seemed more like the nightmare of a fevered mind than reality.

But, Merry thought, beyond the horror of it all, there was relief too. In the armies' eagerness to penetrate and defend the citadel, the people of Minas Tirith were being passed over. Beyond the initial show of arms Sauron and Saruman's forces had largely been concerned with destroying each other.

"No sign of the winged beasts," Gimli hissed. "That is well for I do not know if I could stand my ground were they to enter the city."

Merry agreed, but knew it to be a selfish thought. Their whole aim in this endeavour had been to draw Sauron's eye furthest as possible from where Frodo might even now be climbing the slopes of the fire mountain. All was darkness in the East.

"We have waited long enough," Boromir said, and his voice was ragged, "any attempt at deception must have been played out by now."

Without thinking Merry grabbed hold of the Captain's wrist as he made to move out into the open. "Where are you going?"

"To the citadel. It is beyond me to wait with patience any longer Merry."

Gimli looked up to the Tower, and to the courtyard and hall where they knew their friends to be. "Aye," he said, "I too have no more mind to wait. Let us carve our way back up to the higher levels!"

They moved off, Merry looking ever over his shoulder for more bands of orcs or worse, silent things that might be following. He could hear the horns of the Rohirrim on the field before the city, and even thought he saw, as he looked over his shoulder, the great lumbering figures of rumoured Mumakil far in the distance.

To avoid great legions of orcs Boromir led them through many winding alleys and several underground shortcuts that shortened their journey, but even so Gimli's axe was heavy with black blood by the time they passed the fifth gate. Merry had struck out at many foes also, and his wrist felt numb from the tightness with which he gripped his short sword.

"This might be the end of our journey," Gimli said grimly as hearing the roar of combat they surveyed the next level. The heart of the battle had taken place here at the sixth gate. The bodies of orcs marked with the white hand and the red eye, and men of Gondor too, filled the space, and the battle raged on over them.

Merry's heart sank, there was no way they could make their way past this blockade.

A great light seemed suddenly to pierce Merry's vision and they looked as one up to the base of the tower, where the light sprang forth from high windows. The orcs paused in their savagery to look too, hesitant and fearful.

The blast that followed both blinded and deafened Merry for several moments, and he found himself upon the ground not having remembered falling. Smoke plumbed above them and gazing up he saw the windows of the hall destroyed and the walls black. He heard his companions' cries of horror.

In their own panic they did not see the other great fire storm rising up into the sky in the East, did not hear sounds of battle ceasing on the Pelenor as orc and man of the west paused alike, and did not think of Frodo and Sam until it was too late.