Rauthain
When he returned Rauthain found Maethor and Dúlrain studying the signs inside the mouth of the cave, speaking of a woman and of Kaldir. “You saw him today!” he said astonished, reining in Juta who skirted and reared reflecting the Rauthain’s eagerness.
“Yes!” Dúlrain replied in a voice thick with resentment. “And if anyone had thought to tell me my brother’s bitter tale I may have been able to dissuade him from this madness.”
A wish , thought Rauthain. “I too have only recently learned of his survival.” He was struck in this outpouring by Dúlrain’s use of the phase “my brother”. He said it not as one would speak of his fellows, but in an impassioned way telling a stronger bond. He had heard Kaldir himself speak of a brother once in the same manner. So long ago it seemed, when the evenings were long and harsh and the men in his band would warm themselves with tales of lore or of homes left behind. But Rauthain remembered also the day he had arrived on the threshold of Kaldir’s home, finding only a lonely and aging father with no one to bring him comfort after hearing the ill news Rauthain delivered, the last hope of his line had been lost at Raven Falls, and so he had stayed with him for a time, recounting Kaldir’s courage and valor.
“You abandoned him to his fate, you are as guilty as the one we hunt!” broke in Dúlrain’s charges, as he turned his back to face fading light at the cave’s mouth. The bitter words fell on Rauthain more painfully than blows. A resonate pain tore him as Dúlrain gave voice to the accusations so deeply embedded in his own heart. He had truly abandoned Kaldir to his fate, more so then even Dúlrain imagined. And his black guilt had laid the cornerstone of misery. Rauthain’s head trembled slightly in the torchlight.
“Toby is no more than a sniveling coward, under the questioning of the Revennor of Mordor he would have spilled his guts. She knows we are near and the number of our company. Come! Master Rauthain we may yet be able to atone for our crime!” Dúlrain called coldly as he stalked out of the cave. "I will scout ahead."
Rauthain willed himself to look at the ground and examine the prints there. He could not afford to brood on his failings when he could see his recompense so near. He must remain focused. Feelings no longer mattered. The tracks were a muddle of horses and boots at the cave's mouth, with what seemed to be Toby's interspersed. Trying to commit the new shapes and gaits to memory, he felt them slip from his awareness as his thoughts clamored, demanding attention. There was Dúlrain's stride leading to where his horse had been. And there another's, Kaldir's, intermingled with a woman's leading to another cluster of hooves and again a hobbit.
Kaldir is following Naiore with two others, he remarked to himself. He had seen a small group leave the hill and pass through the northern gate from atop his perch on the hillside not an hour earlier. At the time he had thought them a man, woman and child from his vantage point, but he now recognized the dapple stallion and the man as those he had seen at the Forsaken Inn. So we are all on the same mission? he mused. Or is he merely seeking out his mistress, the Ravennor.
Maethor by his side, they made their way quickly to the northern gate, Rauthain looking only occasionally at the tracks left by Dúlrain's horse, for he was lost in his thoughts. Coming upon horse and rider waiting for them, Maethor approached Dúlrain cautiously, wishing to comfort him in his grief. "I'm sorry, friend." He said softy as they drew along side.
Dúlrain nodded silently, a fire still smoldering in his grey eyes.
"We are all sorry," Rauthain added. "This thing should never have happened but for mischance and faulty judgment, though it is more than lamentable to see of the tragic result of a moment’s mistake."
“A moment’s mistake? You speak as though he was a cloak that had been let drop along the roadside, an inconvenience. You had made a choice to turn your back to him, never again hoping in his survival! Everyday you made that choice.”
Never again hoping in his survival, Rauthain’s mind echoed. Was it true? He looked sympathetically at the younger man and placing his hand on his shoulder he said, “You are the one Kaldir called brother.” It was a pronouncement and recognition of the pain they shared. And Rauthain caught his eye as if to say he understood.
[ November 06, 2003: Message edited by: Hilde Bracegirdle ]
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