LotR fic: "A Thousand Lutes"
Title: A Thousand Lutes
Word Count: 8,000
Rating: T for gangrene and other fun aspects of medicine
Summary: In the aftermath of the War of the Ring, a captured Haradri encounters a healer who is more than he appears. A time stamp to “Ransom” featuring Ayman. Part of my ongoing Dakheel series.
Author’s Note: This is a timestamp to “Ransom,” and will make very little sense if you haven’t read that story first. It is set in T.A. 3019, some weeks after Aragorn’s coronation, but before Hakim and the other Haradric civilians arrive in Minas Tirith. Warnings for medical gore. Don’t try this at home.
This story was posted to the archives some time ago, but I forgot to add it to LJ. *smacks forehead* The lovely and talented Cairistiona was kind enough to beta this for me.
Summer came slowly to Minas Tirith, but when it reached the city, it struck with the force of a maul to the gut. The previous night’s rainstorm had soaked the ruined fields of the Pelennor. The churn of armored feet had long since torn up much of the grass, and many of the farmers who worked those fields had not yet returned to the city. In the absence of plant life, the rainfall simply sat on the saturated ground, turning it into a mire. The mud steamed in the afternoon sun.
A young man of Harad sat with his back to a palisade wall, staring out at the dismal little world that had been carved out for him. The log wall at his back enclosed the whole camp-an area of several acres. The tops of the walls were sharpened to points-a stern warning to any would-be escape artists. Here and there, square guard towers stood straight and tall. Gondorians armed with bows manned those heights, while spearmen watched the many gates. Between the walls stood row upon row of tents, large and small, some made out of familiar hide or felt, others out of the strange heavy canvas favored by the Gondorians. The “streets” between were nothing but mud-ankle deep at the best of times, all but impassable after a rainstorm. But, even as heavily-trodden slop, the earth had a loamy feel to it. This was rich soil-good for farming. The Haradri sighed. He could be a wealthy man if that land were his to put to the till instead. Of course, it was that sort of thinking that had landed him in this mud-spattered prison in the first place.
His captors had taken his coat of bronze plates, his rough helm, his notched sword and broken bow. They had left him his clothes, but the garments were now so weather-beaten that the scarlet in his tunic was a distant memory. Still, he did not accept replacements from the rough peasant clothes the Gondorians offered, nor did any but the most desperate of his fellows. It had become a point of pride for them-refusing the Gondorians’ patronizing attempts at charity. Besides, the Haradrim remembered well the proud sound of drums and the sun glinting off of bronze and scarlet and gold. They were not yet ready to part with even the memory of such splendor.
He caught a glimpse of himself in a dirty puddle and sighed. His hair and beard were growing long and thick around deep, brown eyes. Without a razor, the resemblance was becoming even more apparent; he was his father’s son. People had always told him that as if they expected it to bring him pride. His father, though, was a common herder who had made little of his life. Ayman had long resented the comparison.
But, if he saw the old man now-if he was somehow alive and whole after all this upheaval, then Ayman, son of Hakim, would cast himself at his father’s feet and plead forgiveness before him and all the old gods for ever thinking such uncharitable thoughts.
A damp stump served well enough as a seat. He sat with his knees apart and a battered boot resting between them. Chewing his lip idly, he forced his makeshift needle through the side of the boot and pulled another stitch tight. The cracking leather, which these days welcomed water and mud like long-lost relatives, nonetheless resisted his attempts to repair it. His needle, after all, was fashioned from a splintered chicken bone and threaded only with embroidery thread salvaged from his own tunic.
He was lucky to have the boot, even with its cracks and leaks. The sandals his aunt had fashioned for him had been woefully ineffective in this northern clime, and he’d lost both in the mud before winter’s chill had quite left the ground. The boot in his hands, he’d recovered from a severed leg before tossing the limb into a trench grave. He knew not whether its original owner had been Rhûnic or Haradric or Tarkish. For all he knew, the man might still be alive.
His other boot-the right one-was in better shape. He’d filched it, along with its mate, from a Gondorian guardhouse when his captors ordered him to clean out their hearths. It repelled the rain, but pinched mightily across the top of his foot, so he’d traded its mate for a fine dinner of grilled snake and an extra blanket.
His hands worked steadily, even as he allowed his mind to wander. None of the dozens of men in his line of sight paid him any heed. Across the way, a large group hunched and squatted in a stony patch of land. From their raucous cheers and groans, they were probably betting on the cricket races or any of a dozen other games and sports they’d devised to pass the time. Just a few yards away, a man named Tayyib plucked a discordant rhythm on a battered string instrument. No one could figure out how the instrument, which was favored by shepherds in Near Harad, had survived both the long journey north and the desperate battle several months past. But, then, no one could figure out how Tayyib had survived the battle either. His determined strumming could hardly be called melodious, but no one had the heart to tell him to stop.
Here and there, armored Gondorians patrolled in squads of four or six, breaking up quarrels and dispersing any group of captives that seemed too loud or too angry. Behind a row of tents, two young Haradrim had fashioned a crude ball out of rags and now tossed it back and forth. The game seemed childish and out of place amid a camp for prisoners of war, but then, so were the players; though no Haradri had seen a razor in over two months, the faces of these two were still smooth and soft with youth. Ayman swallowed another sigh. At least he had been allowed to grow to manhood in relative peace before his inevitable conscription.
The tent nearest him belonged to a man named Elam-a fellow conscript from the edge of the desert. He was a good enough fellow-passable singing voice, generous with his winnings from the cricket races. Every morning, he pulled a stick from one of the many small campfires and made a small scorch mark in the side of his canvas tent. His crude calendar told the story of their captivity, with important dates circled with charcoal or marked with blood. It was more than two months, now, since they all had been captured on these very fields, while the Grand Army wavered and shattered around them. Six weeks since riders had reached the city and set all the bells to tolling and the heralds to crying. Already shut away within their log-and-dirt prison, it had taken the Haradrim some time to work out what had brought the northerners to such a frenzy, but when they did, color drained from many a face and trembling hands had reached up to tap shoulders and ward away evil.
Mordor had fallen. Sauron was no more. The Haradrim no longer had the power to ward away evil.
For weeks afterward, he had scarcely slept as he waited for the next hammer strike to fall. He pictured steel-edged columns making their way quickly down the Harad Road. With the Great Eye defeated, the Tarks would fall upon Near Harad and its unprotected homesteads like wolves upon sheep.
Or, so he had always been told.
But, if the Gondorim were indeed forging a new empire out of the ashes of his homeland, they were keeping it to themselves. A great energy came over the Gondorians in the days after what became known as the Last Defeat, but they put it towards nothing more sinister than beautifying their city. By day, bright banners flapped from every window. By night, the sounds of their celebrations stretched out across the Pelennor. And the prisoners of war waited in their pens, apparently forgotten by all but their sullen guards.
A half-dozen Gondorians strode through the camp, looking more alert and watchful than most. Their leader interrupted the game of catch and questioned the two boys sharply. Still, Ayman paid them little mind until he saw one of the boys glance in his direction. A moment later, the youth raised a reluctant finger to point straight at him.
As the guards turned his way, he hastily shoved his foot back in his boot. Attention was never good. But, there was nowhere to run, and, besides, he hadn’t done anything wrong. Lately, at least.
The six halted before him. Their leader cleared his throat. Though he knew what they wanted, Ayman stubbornly kept his seat and shot them his best approximation of a defiant glare. Several of the Gondorians seemed to grind their teeth at that, but their captain’s face remained impassive. “You are Ayman, son of Hakim?”
The man’s Haradric was almost passable. Nevertheless, Ayman answered in the Gondorian’s own tongue. “Who’s asking?”
The man seemed both relieved and a little irritated that Ayman spoke Westron. “That’s none of your concern,” he answered coldly, “Are you, or aren’t you?”
Unpleasant possibilities began to drift through Ayman’s mind. Perhaps one of his fellow soldiers had fingered him as the perpetrator of some crime. Perhaps these guards were here to haul him off to the dungeons rumored to lie beneath the city. Perhaps they had decided to begin executing the prisoners or torturing them for information.
He banished those thoughts with an effort. Running was useless and hiding was little better, so he simply bent his head and adjusted his boot, as if they weren’t even worthy of his attention. “I am Ayman ibn Hakim.”
“What is your father’s name?”
That question startled Ayman into raising his head. He arched an eyebrow. “Hakim,” he said in a tone of false patience. The Gondorian gave him a look that suggested his sass was not appreciated. After a moment, Ayman decided it might be best not to tweak their tails any further. “Hakim ibn Azzam of Near Harad,” he said neutrally. After all, he’d already given this information to the scribes when they’d conducted a census of the prisoners weeks before.
The guards exchanged a look. “Come with us,” one said brusquely, “You’re wanted in the infirmary.”
Ayman moved not one inch. “I’m not ill,” he pointed out, “Nor injured.”
“That is easily mended,” one of the guards muttered, but his captain gave him a warning look.
“The healer’s asked for you.”
“Which healer?”
The other man ran out of patience quite suddenly. Seizing Ayman by the front of his tunic, he hauled him to his feet. “That’ll be enough questions out of you. Infirmary or solitary-the choice is yours.”
Ayman straightened his tunic and glared at the man. “Infirmary,” he said sullenly.
As they set off, Ayman wracked his brain, trying to think what they could possibly want with him in the infirmary. They had seemed strangely interested in his father, though Ayman couldn’t imagine why; Hakim, son of Azzam had lived his whole life without ever travelling more than two days’ journey from the farm where he was born. Perhaps they merely wanted to be certain of his identity-both Ayman and Hakim were common names.
His mind swam with visions of back rooms converted to interrogation chambers, with healers on hand to oversee them. He dismissed those visions as the folly of a paranoid man; if an unusual number of screams had suddenly begun to issue from the rough structure, he would surely have heard of it. More likely, they were investigating some petty crime related to the house of healing. If that fool Thaman had fingered Ayman to cover his own theft of poppy, Ayman would skin him alive.
He had spent some time working with the wounded, back in those early, desperate days when their “infirmary” was merely a collection of tents and their bandages only rags scavenged from corpses. In the weeks since, though, they’d cobbled together the barn-like infirmary and the Gondorians had sent at least one healer most days. There was less work, now, for half-trained medics like Ayman, and he’d gladly given it up.
But, when he crossed the darkened threshold and felt planed floorboards under his feet, the smell of herbs mingled with sick brought it all back. He stood stock still for a moment, nearly staggered under the weight of memories. It was quiet, now, but he could still hear the screams, the pleading, the prayers desperately chanted.
One of the guards gave Ayman a rough shove. It was enough to bring him back to reality and he was strangely grateful. He turned a stumbling step into a steady march. One foot in front of the other-that was all he had to do. The guards led him through a cavernous ward, lined with cots that were now sparsely occupied, and through a large swinging door to a series of back rooms.
The captain paused before a certain door and gave Ayman a hard look. “You mind your manners, or I’ll see that you wish you had.” Ayman did not dignify that with a response. The guard glared at him for one second longer, then reached up to push the door open. The room beyond was fashioned as a small surgery. A Haradric man lay on a raised cot. On a tall stool beside him sat a man clad in a simple linen shirt and a thick, leather apron. He was speaking to the wounded man, his voice professionally low and gentle. The healer looked up at their arrival and Ayman saw that he was a Gondorian of middling years, with clear gray eyes and dark hair touched with silver.
As one, the six guards saluted with bowed heads and hands over their hearts. Their leader said something in a strange, lilting language. The Haradri understood only his own name-“Ayman ibn Hakim ibn Azzam.” The healer inclined his head and responded in the same tongue. Ayman resisted the urge to show his uncertainty by shifting from foot to foot. He wondered for a moment whether he should bow or give some other sign of deference; the guards did not bother to introduce the healer, but they seemed to esteem him highly. In the end, though, he decided it was better to do nothing and be seen as insolent than to seem meek through a fumbling show of submission.
He watched, his face stony, as the healer and the guard exchanged a few more words. The older man’s voice held an undeniable ring of command. The captain seemed less than happy with his orders, but, if Ayman read his tone correctly, he was unwilling to directly contest them. After a moment, all the guards reluctantly bowed again and retreated. Ayman tried to follow, but they closed the door in his face, leaving him alone with the healer and his patient.
As the latch caught, the healer turned his attention to Ayman and offered a smile that softened his features considerably. He directed his words to the wounded man between them. “This is Ayman, son of Hakim. He will be assisting me today.”
The words were spoken mildly in Ayman’s mother tongue. It was rare to hear a foreigner speak the language of Harad so well.
The other Haradri nodded curtly and spitted Ayman with a hard look. “You make sure this foreign barbarian doesn’t kill me, Ayman, son of Hakim.”
Ayman swallowed, but managed a small nod.
The Gondorian did not seem offended. In fact, he smiled a little as he raised the man’s head and lifted a wooden cup to his lips. “We must begin. Drink . . .”
The man drank and his face slowly relaxed. His eyes drifted shut. His breaths came slowly and evenly. The Gondorian gently lowered his head to rest on a stained pillow.
“I’m told you have some skill at healing.”
It took Ayman a moment to realize those words were directed at him.
“Was I told rightly?” the man prompted. Only then did Ayman think of how he must look, staring dumbly at the Gondorian.
He shrugged, his shoulders stiff. “I know a little of leechcraft,” he answered slowly, “Less than many.”
“A little should suffice. I require only a skilled assistant. Could you fill this basin from the kettle on the fire?”
Though he phrased it as a request, Ayman felt himself moving to obey automatically. The water steamed gently. As he filled the basin, he stole glances at the still form on the cot. The Haradri was thin and pale, but freshly bathed. Ayman did not recognize him, though with the wild hair and beard obscuring much of his face, it was hard to be sure. The man’s left arm was stretched out towards the healer. The limb ended abruptly with a mass of red and black tissue just above the wrist. Gangrene stretched its dark fingers up the arm towards the elbow.
The smell did not hit Ayman until he stepped close to place the warm basin on the healer’s table. When it did, he neither flinched nor wavered.
The healer nodded-perhaps in thanks, perhaps in approval-and began to scrub the ruined limb with a wet cloth. “This fellow lost his hand in the battle,” the Gondorian said conversationally, “But the limb continues to die. I fear infection has spread to the joint.” He lifted the man’s forearm a little, showing Ayman how the elbow would scarcely bend. Tentatively, Ayman touched the joint, feeling heat and swelling. In the places where the flesh was not already black and shriveling, the skin was reddened and stretched tight.
Ayman sighed. “You’re going to amputate his arm?”
The healer nodded. “To a point just above his elbow. He should live, if nothing else goes wrong. Take one of those aprons and roll up your sleeves.” Ayman’s hands were steady as he took down one of the heavy aprons that hung on the wall.
While the healer began to wash their patient’s arm with a sharp-smelling soap, Ayman stepped around him to place his hand on the unconscious man’s chest. His ribs still rose and fell in a regular rhythm. Ayman felt a strong heartbeat beneath his fingers. He lowered his ear and listened to the clear sounds of his breathing. He did not stir, even when Ayman pinched his skin. The young Haradri looked up at the Gondorian, his eyes suspicious. “What have you done to him?”
The healer did not react to the accusation in the other man’s voice. “I’ve given him poppy for the pain. He will sleep for a while yet. If we work quickly, we may be able to finish before he wakes. Wash your hands, Ayman.”
Again, he obeyed almost without thinking, thrusting his hands into the basin and scrubbing them with the harsh soap. “So, you know my name,” he said cautiously.
The healer nodded, his face absent. “The wardens of the camps do their best to keep records. They tell me you acquitted yourself well after the battle.” He deliberately missed the point.
Ayman refused to be moved by the compliment. He remembered all too well those first chaotic days and nights, when the wounded far outnumbered their caregivers. Swamped with casualties of their own, the Tarks had provided little assistance. Ayman had performed his first amputation in the mud by the light of a bonfire, with only two men to hold the patient down. It was a memory he could take no pride in, and he certainly would not accept praise from a Gondorian. “In my homeland,” he said coolly, “It is considered polite to introduce oneself.”
The healer nodded without looking at Ayman. But, all he said was “Pass me that knife.”
Ayman obeyed. The healer accepted the small blade and passed it through a candle flame several times. Ayman remembered his father doing the same from time to time-to clean the blade, he claimed-though he’d known no other healer who did so, among the Haradrim or the Gondorim. “Where did you learn healing?” He could not help but ask.
“From my father,” the man responded lightly, “Where did you?”
“From my father.”
The older man smiled softly and brought the knife towards the decaying arm. Without being asked, Ayman steadied the limb. He’d seen far too many wounds over the past weeks to be bothered by either the smell or the feel of diseased flesh under his arm.
When the Gondorian made the first cut, their patient did not so much as twitch.
The healer worked steadily and efficiently, drawing a red line around the circumference of the man’s arm and then pausing to dip his bloodied knife in water.
“You speak the tongue of Harad well,” Ayman said, “For a Tark. Ah, a northerner, that is.”
The Gondorian gave him a look that made Ayman want to crawl into the earth. “I know what it means,” he said, his voice icy. After a moment, though, he looked away and his face softened a bit. “I spent some time traveling your lands,” he said, “Though, that was many years ago.”
Ayman arched an eyebrow. There had been no trade and little travel between Gondor and Harad for generations uncounted. “I would not think a man such as yourself would find such a journey easy,” he said probingly.
The man laughed suddenly, a surprisingly warm sound. “Easy? Certainly not! But, it was quite educational.”
With Ayman’s curiosity thus piqued, the man said no more. He worked in silence-first staunching a bit of bleeding with a rag, then using a blunt probe to fold back a bit of the skin. Swiftly and steadily, he worked his way deeper into the arm.
“I thought I knew all the healers who frequented this camp,” Ayman said after several long moments, “But, I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”
“Other duties have kept me away.” He sounded genuinely regretful, but did not take his eyes off of his work. “Fetch that cautery from the fire.”
Ayman stepped away and returned with a small, hot iron, the handle wrapped liberally in rags. He watched the Gondorian as the older man delicately touched the tip to a bleeding vessel. The instrument seemed almost comically undersized in the man’s large hands. Ayman’s eyes traced a few faint scars that ran across the stranger’s knuckles and up towards his wrists. He suspected that if he touched the man’s palms, he would find calluses there from sword and bow.
“You marched with the Host, didn’t you?” Ayman kept his tone carefully neutral. He remembered how on the third day after the battle-or was it the fourth?-he had stood at the edge of camp, trembling with exhaustion while the great Host of the West marched forth. The sun had glinted menacingly off of thousands of spears and the very earth seemed to tremble under hoof beats and marching feet. The kings of Gondor and Rohan themselves had ridden at the head of the column, looking like creatures out of myth in their gleaming armor, beneath banners, black and green.
The healer gave him a searching look. “I did.”
Ayman tried to keep his face blank. At the time, his fellow soldiers had laughed in bitter triumph. Those who were skilled at numbering armies said that the Tarks departed with no more than eight thousands-perhaps as few as five thousands. That was fewer than the smallest vanguard of Mordor. They’d gloatingly predicted that the arrogant Gondorians would break themselves against the Black Gate and the Haradrim would soon be vindicated.
But, Ayman had not been thinking of Mordor as he watched those shining spears. Instead, he’d pictured that fierce host making its way into Ithilien and turning south, to fall upon Near Harad.
When the Host returned, jubilant with the news that Sauron had fallen and Mordor was utterly overthrown, Ayman had had to work hard to hide his relief. Every day since, he’d kept one anxious eye on the walls of Minas Tirith, waiting for the blare of trumpets that would announce Gondor’s great campaign of retribution against the allies of Mordor. That day hadn’t come. Yet.
The healer glanced at Ayman, his eyes soft with an emotion Ayman could not quite name-not sympathy, but something both less sentimental and more personal. “Did you have kin stationed at the Black Gates?” he asked quietly.
Ayman shook his head. “All my cousins are too young to serve, except for Tawil. And he was in my company.” He looked down and swallowed hard. “I lost him in the battle,” he confessed, “I was supposed to keep him close-I’m the elder-but we were separated when the ships landed. And, no one in camp has seen him.”
“I am sorry.” The Gondorian’s voice was soft and earnest. His hands were steady as he made a deeper cut. Blood welled up, and he quickly staunched it with a rag. “He is your aunt’s son?”
Though the stranger’s tone of gentle understanding had not changed, Ayman’s blood suddenly ran cold. His head came up. “How did you know that?”
The healer glanced up at him, though the bleeding vessel occupied most of his attention. “Merely a lucky guess,” he soothed, “Do not be troubled.”
But, though the Man might be a healer and a warrior and gods-knew what else, he was certainly not a skilled liar. Ayman’s mind spun again with images of cells and torture chambers deep beneath the city where no one would hear. Only, this time, instead of seeing himself hauled into such a place, it was Tawil. Sweet, hapless Tawil, locked in chains, starved and beaten and brutalized.
The healer gave up on stopping the bleeding with pressure and reached for a clamp from among his instruments. But, Ayman got there first and snatched it out of his reach. “If you know something of my cousin,” he began, trying to keep the tremor out of his voice and failing miserably, “Then I would have you tell me.” He forced himself to meet the Gondorian’s steely gaze.
The other man watched him for a moment, his face still. Then, quick as a cobra, his hand flashed out and seized Ayman’s wrist. Before the startled Haradri could do more than blink, the Gondorian had turned his hand over and snatched the clamp from his fingers. Without releasing Ayman, he reached over, one-handed, to trap the bleeding artery between the clamp’s jaws and seal it shut. That done, he turned back to Ayman and fixed him with a fierce glare. “Do not ever seek to manipulate me by putting my patient in danger.” His voice was as hard and sharp as the bones of the earth.
Ayman bowed his head in shame. “I’m sorry, Master.” Some instinct made him add the honorific. “I did not think.” It was true enough. Seized by sudden terror for his cousin, he had momentarily forgotten that the blood and tissue occupying the healer’s attention belonged to a man-to one of his own countrymen, no less.
As he’d predicted, the man’s hands were callused. Ayman felt strength there, but he did not crush the younger man’s wrist to make a point. After a moment, he released him. The Haradri kept his eyes on his feet until the healer pulled him back to reality. “Cut me a length of thread,” he prompted gently, “Ten inches or so.” While Ayman complied, the healer spoke quietly. “I know nothing of your kinsman’s fate. I lost a cousin in that same battle-a man as dear as a brother to me. I would not wish that pain on anyone. I will look for Tawil’s name in the records of prisoners, but of the fallen, few were ever identified.” There was no pity in the man’s voice, for which Ayman was grateful. With quick fingers, he slid the thread under the clamp and tied the vessel shut.
Ayman turned to put the cautery back on the fire; it gave him an excuse not to meet the healer’s eyes. When he returned, the older man’s gaze was fixed once again on the wounded man’s arm. When next the healer spoke, his voice was light and conciliatory. “I have heard that great caravans from your land have requested leave to enter Gondor. It is said that they come to negotiate for peace. Perhaps you will see your younger cousins sooner than you expect.”
The Haradri scowled. “Not likely.”
“Why do you say that?”
Ayman’s scowl darkened, but he shrugged mentally. If the healer needed a lesson in politics . . . well, it wasn’t as though Ayman had anything better to do with his time. “Our peoples have been at war for . . . how many generations, now?”
“Too many,” the stranger said darkly.
“Too many. And with each new conflict, we return to the same dance. One side wins a victory and captures a few soldiers in the bargain. People start to talk of peace. Delegations are sent forth with great fanfare and they argue about nothing for a few weeks. In the end, they all sign some scrap of paper and some gods-forsaken patch of land changes hands for the dozenth time. Then some of the captured go home-the ones with wealthy parents who can pay their ransoms. For the rest . . .” Ayman shrugged bitterly, “The poor have more children. And it’s only a few years before the dance begins again.”
Ayman was a little surprised at the strength of his own diatribe. He must have had too much time on his hands, to think of such things. All the same, when he ran out of words at last, he set his jaw and glared at the healer, as if daring him to contradict a word he’d said. As the other man’s attention was now focused on carefully dissecting out the largest blood vessel, some of Ayman’s vehemence may have been lost on him. Nonetheless, he seemed to take the point.
“Your parents are not wealthy?” The man’s voice resumed its tone of gentle prompting, still saying just this side of pity. He held out his hand, and Ayman dropped a small knife into it without needing to be asked.
The Haradri’s lips twisted. “My father herds goats in the desert south of the Mountains. It isn’t what one would call a lucrative trade.”
“You fear he will not come for you?” The healer didn’t look at Ayman, apparently absorbed in scraping away bits of flesh from around the pulsing artery. Still, Ayman knew this was not idle conversation. The Gondorian was soaking up every word he said, though he couldn’t imagine why the man cared.
“Oh, he’ll come, I’m sure.” The young man resisted the urge to rub his forehead. His face was dirty, after all, and his hands were clean. “He’ll bring whatever little treasures he can scrape together. He’ll prostrate himself before this foreigner you Gondorians have crowned. And when he sees how little a peasant of Harad has to offer, this king of yours will laugh him out of the city.”
The healer shot him a shrewd look out of the corner of his eye. “Few in this city know the mind of the king,” he said neutrally, “Perhaps he’ll surprise you.”
Ayman’s jaw clenched. “People in power are all the same.” He looked away and snorted ruefully. A thought struck him, and it slipped out of his mouth before he could think better of it. “My grandmother might have foreseen this.”
The healer glanced at him sharply, but did not get the chance to respond. Unnoticed by either of them, their patient’s breaths had been growing quicker and shallower. At the next touch of the knife, the man let out a loud moan, half-stifled by his locked jaw. His back arched. Ruined muscles twitched, trying to withdraw an arm that lay open almost to the bone. The Gondorian quickly dropped his instruments, stood, and grabbed the man’s arm, placing one hand above and one below the elbow and pressing down with all his considerable weight. “He’s waking too soon.” The healer’s voice was impossibly calm. But for the slight lines of tension that had appeared in his face, he might have been commenting that the weather would soon turn. “If he tears that vessel, he could bleed to death.”
Ayman hesitated. Were he still treating wounds in the mud, this would be the moment when he reached for the saw, the axe, or whatever edged tool he could get his hands on, in the hope that a red-hot knife would be enough to staunch the ensuing gore. He hoped the Gondorian had a better idea. “What must I do?”
“Take my place; keep his arm still, whatever happens. I will try to make him sleep once more.”
Ayman came up beside the Gondorian, noticing, for the first time, how the other man towered over him. He rested his hands near the healer’s larger ones and leaned down, bringing his weight to bear. Beneath his fingers, he felt the spastic twitch and jerk of muscles. The Gondorian turned away quickly. Ayman heard him moving about behind him-heard the splash of liquid into a cup and the steady grind of a mortar and pestle.
The wounded man suddenly thrashed, his legs kicking, his free arm swinging wildly. Ayman kept his left arm still. Barely. Though the man’s eyes were still closed, he let out a groan that turned into a cry halfway through.
“He’s waking up!” Ayman tried and failed to keep a note of fearful urgency out of his voice.
“His name is Umar.”
“What?”
“Talk to him, Ayman. Try to calm him.
Ayman swallowed hard. “Umar?”
The man groaned again.
“Calm yourself, Umar.”
The high, keening sound that came next was even more disturbing. Umar’s eyelids fluttered.
“We’re trying to help you.”
A foot lashed out, clumsily. Blood was welling up in the craggy gashes in his arm.
“Don’t you remember?”
The man didn’t start thrashing again, but his whole body was shaking. As was Ayman’s.
After what seemed like both an eternity and no time at all, the healer reappeared with a cup in his hand. Deftly, he slipped his free hand under Umar’s head, but the Haradri turned his face away. Wild eyes appeared and disappeared.
“Umar.”
The healer’s voice cut through Umar’s growing cries and Ayman’s building fear. His tone was firm and strong without being sharp, like red rock, smooth from the wind and warm from the sun. The wounded man’s struggles suddenly ceased. His eyes-bleary, but sharper than before-slowly focused on the Gondorian’s face.
“Peace.”
Slowly, the healer lifted the cup. The Haradri’s lips were trembling, but the Gondorian’s hands were steady. Umar took a small sip and then flinched away, perhaps at the taste, but the healer held him, his hand both gentle and implacable.
“It’s alright,” he murmured, “Drink.”
And Umar drank.
Almost before the cup was empty, his eyes drifted shut. The pain and fear in his face slipped away as the muscles under Ayman’s hands went lax. His breathing slowed. After a moment, the healer looked at Ayman and nodded. Ayman cautiously lifted his hands. His fingers had left white marks in the healthy flesh above Umar’s elbow. Even as he watched, they faded to red.
“You must watch him carefully.”
The voice was somehow still calm. Ayman started when he realized it was addressed to him. He looked up at the healer, knowing that his eyes were wide and his hands still trembled, but unable to do more than wrap his hands quickly into fists.
“It is dangerous to give a man so much poppy,” the healer continued as if he didn’t notice, “You must watch and tell me at once if his breathing stops.”
He waited for an answer, so Ayman managed a jerky nod. Moving slowly, as if Ayman were a horse he did not wish to startle, the healer stepped behind him and took his place by Umar’s arm. He staunched a bit of blood and then nodded in approval. “The artery is not torn. It can still be tied off cleanly.”
Ayman managed another nod, not taking his eyes off of the steady rise and fall of Umar’s chest. His own breaths were coming quickly and sharply, to match the pounding of his heart, though he did his best to conceal both. Somehow, seeing the man wake in the middle of the operation was even more frightening than if he’d been awake from the start. Why should that be so? Ayman couldn’t fathom. After all, the . . . episode had lasted mere minutes, and Umar had barely screamed. Perhaps, he’d simply not been ready. Or, perhaps the ordeal had recalled one of those primal fears of childhood-the thought of waking from a nightmare to find it had become reality.
“Tell me about your grandmother.”
Ayman’s head whipped around. He was as startled by the healer’s off-hand tone of voice as by his sudden words. “What?”
“Your grandmother. You mentioned her before all this began . . . ?”
He blinked. Before he could think better of it, he blurted out “Why do you care?”
“Ayman,” the healer’s face was full of understanding. And strength. “You are rattled. It’s nothing to be ashamed of; I am as well, and I saw my first amputation decades before you were born. But, we must be calm, now, if we are to be of any use to this man. So, let us speak of other things. Tell me about your grandmother.”
Ayman closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them once more. He watched Umar’s chest rise and fall, rise and fall. But, as he watched, he let his mind drift back to childhood memories of a comforting place far away from blood and mud. What was it he’d meant to say about her? Oh. Right.
“She believed in the old gods-believed that the Great Eye was a usurper. My grandfather died early, so once her children were married, she joined an order of religious ascetics. It was dangerous-they survived secretly, in defiance of the Dark Lord’s edicts-but she did not want to be a burden on her children. And, she said she needed to make amends.”
The healer carefully closed a clamp around the large artery. “Amends for what?”
Ayman shrugged. It was awkward to discuss religious custom with a foreigner, but the Gondorian sounded curious. And, the laws of the old gods seemed harmless and downright quaint compared to the zealotry that had long surrounded the Great Eye. “She believed that our family was cursed-that the old gods would use this war between our peoples to punish us. Because my grandfather followed Sauron’s law rather than that of the old gods. If she were here, she would say it is because of him that I was conscripted and captured.”
The healer gave him a strange look. “All of Harad was bound by Sauron’s law,” he pointed out, “For . . . what, eighty years, now? And yet she thought your family especially deserving of wrath?”
Ayman shrugged. In his mind, he recalled a dozen childhood visits to the monastery where his grandmother dwelt. She would gather her grandchildren around her and tell them about lands where every season was rainy, about great rivers that flowed into greater seas and cities that shone like the sun in the light of the gods’ favor. And, once, she had pulled little Ayisha onto her knee while Ayman sat at her feet with Tawil and the rest of his cousins and she’d said “Listen, children, and learn what becomes of those who scorn the laws of gratitude and hospitality . . .”
“We have a saying,” Ayman said slowly, “‘To silence a thousand lutes is a public service, but to silence one is an act of evil.’ We don’t see cruelty when it’s directed against armies or races or nations-the truth gets lost in the discord. But, we see it when it’s directed against one person.” Ayman glanced at the Gondorian, but the older man seemed absorbed in carefully stitching and tying off the artery. He was relieved; this conversation had begun to seem strangely like a confession. “My grandmother only knew one Gondorian well. My grandfather rescued him or captured him-they could never quite decide which it was.” Ayman trailed off, not sure how to continue. The tale was a strange one, after all. He’d heard it told a dozen ways by his grandmother, his aunt, his father, yet he’d never known quite what to make of it.
The healer’s brow furrowed. He seemed strangely troubled. “It was this foreigner that convinced your grandmother the family was cursed?”
“I suppose.” Ayman chewed on his tongue for a moment, turning over the healer’s question. “Foreigner,” he’d said-dakheel in the tongue of Harad. It was a common enough word, but it was also the name his father used for that strange character out of family legend. Though, the healer couldn’t have known that. “He was some sort of warrior. A scout, maybe-none of my family knew for sure. But, he was a healer, too. He saved my aunt’s life when she was but a child. My grandmother wanted to reward him with freedom and full inclusion in our family-that’s what the old gods require to pay such a debt. But, my grandfather was afraid of Sauron. He insisted that the foreigner be sold as a slave.”
“As all foreign captives were, if the tales be true.” The Gondorian’s face was inscrutable. Ayman couldn’t decide whether that statement was meant in condemnation of Harad or as some inexplicable support for his father’s father.
“All but the wealthy ones, yes. But, my grandmother never agreed with it. My family profited, but my grandfather’s health began to decline at once. He died long before I was born. The wrath of the gods, my grandmother said.”
The healer cut the artery. Blood welled up, but only from the ruined end of the limb; his knots held. His hands were still for a moment as he stared at the arm. At last, he set his knife aside and picked up a saw that gleamed dully.
“Brace the arm.” The healer’s voice was distant.
Ayman set his jaw-he hated this part-but obeyed. The grating of saw against bone vibrated through his fingers and up his wrists, making his own arms ache. The accompanying sound was so much louder without the din of screams to drown it out. He was relieved when the healer broke the false peace.
“There is more to that story you’ve just told.”
Ayman shrugged. “Isn’t there always?”
A smile ghosted across the Gondorian’s lips. “Fair enough.”
The bone gave. Ayman released it and looked away, trying not to dwell on the sight or the sound. Instead, he returned to watching the rise and fall of Umar’s chest. His breaths were coming a little quicker than before.
“A thousand lutes . . .” the healer said slowly. Ayman stole a quick glance at him. His face held a troubled, philosophical cast, which contrasted strangely with the bloody needle in his hand. His fingers flew as he stitched skin over the bloody stump, but his expression was thoughtful. “That’s what you fear the Haradrim have become, isn’t it? Too many voices. You fear the king will act only to silence the racket.”
The Haradri scowled. “It’s just an old saying. Besides, I was speaking only of the dakheel from my grandmother’s stories.”
“Were you?”
Ayman said nothing.
“What if the king doesn’t hear the clamor?” The healer asked, softly and rhetorically. “What if he hears instead a thousand individual melodies? How, then, can he silence them?” He tied off the last stitch and began to rinse Umar’s shortened arm with clean water.
Ayman placed his hand on Umar’s chest, counting the steady beats of his heart. “You Gondorians idolize your king,” he said with a hint of scorn, “But, he is only a man.”
“Yes,” the other man agreed as he pulled the bloodied sheet from under his patient’s arm and rolled it in his hands, “He is. Umar will wake soon. Will you stay with him until then? I will be just outside. Call out if his breathing stops.”
Ayman shrugged, but lowered himself to sit on the stool the other man had vacated. He was running out of chances to ask the question that had been nagging him. “Why did you ask for me?” he said at last, “Surely, you could have brought your own assistant.”
The healer did not look up from the basin where he was washing his hands. “Umar was distrustful of me. Having one of his own people present helped to allay his fear.”
“There are better healers than me, even in the prison camp.”
“I’d heard you acquitted yourself well. And I wanted to see what kind of man you were.” He looked up at last, with words seemingly on the tip of his tongue, but Ayman cut him off.
“Something is wrong.”
Umar breathed still, but his breaths had become short, shallow, and very quick. The healer was at his side in a moment. He pressed his ear against the unconscious man’s chest. “It’s the poppy,” he said, his voice, like before, carrying only the faintest note of urgency, “It keeps him from breathing as deeply as he should.” He pressed down on the man’s breastbone, compressing his chest, but as soon as he released it, the rapid rhythm began again. Umar’s face held a faint gray tinge.
The healer turned away and strode quickly to the counter where his herbs were laid out. “Do something!” Ayman snapped. He suited his own actions to words by leaning down, sealing his lips over Umar’s, and blowing into his lungs. The air moved easily and Umar’s color improved a little, but each time Ayman paused, his patient’s chest resumed its stuttering, useless movement.
He was so intent on his task that he did not at first notice when the usual sickroom smells were replaced by the scent of spices and sandalwood.
The healer returned, bearing a steaming basin and a few rags. With a hand on Ayman’s shoulder, he gently steered him away and took his place beside Umar’s head. Ayman stared at the basin in his hands. Though he could still hear the pounding of his own heart, a sense of calm seemed to radiate from the Gondorian with each breath that he took.
The healer lifted two dripping rags. He placed one over Umar’s forehead and the other on his chest.
Nothing changed. Umar’s chest rose and fell like that of a frightened mouse. What little color he’d regained drained from his face once more.
As Ayman had, the healer lowered his head and breathed into the man’s lungs. Umar’s chest inflated, but as soon as the Gondorian released him, it fell flat again. The man shook his head. “This herb will help, but he has to breathe it in. Otherwise, it does no good.”
He hesitated, then seemed to reach a decision.
Lifting one large hand, he clamped it over Umar’s mouth and nose. Ayman’s slowing heart rate suddenly reversed direction. “Stop it!” he gasped, “Let him breathe!” He’d seen healers do this before, after all-in dark and desperate hours, when it was known that their patient had no hope of recovery and that death would be long and painful. He tried to shove the Gondorian aside, but he might as well have tried to uproot the cornerstone of Ecthelion’s Tower. “Let him go! You’re killing him!”
The healer held Ayman at bay with one hand, but his eyes were fixed on Umar. His face was intent, as if he were carefully keeping time. For a moment, the unconscious man was still. Then his chest began to strain, fighting the hand that denied it breath. The healer stayed frozen for what felt like a lifetime but was probably only a few heartbeats.
Then he released him.
Breath blew out of Umar in a rush. For half a second, he was still. Then, his chest inflated like a bellows. A second breath followed the first-just as deep and just as slow. As he breathed in clean air and soothing vapors, color returned to his face once more. Ayman felt his own breaths slowing, an inexorable peace descending.
The healer placed one hand over the rag on Umar’s forehead. With the other hand, he felt the pulse in his neck and nodded in satisfaction. “I am sorry for alarming you,” he told Ayman, “Poppy can make the body forget its need for breath. Sometimes it needs but a reminder.”
Ayman didn’t respond. He was staring at the healer and breathing in scents from hundreds of miles away-an aroma that had no business appearing in a Gondorian sickroom. As he breathed, he dwelled on half-remembered childhood tales about an herb that could smell like anything or nothing, about healing that muddied the boundary between medicine and magic.
With Umar looking a thousand times better, the healer turned once again towards the door.
“Who are you?” Ayman called out suddenly.
The man turned. His lips curved in an enigmatic smile. “Stay with this man a while longer, Ayman,” he said, “He is out of danger now.”
And then he was gone.
Fin
Author’s Note: Thanks for reading! Feedback and concrit are welcome.
Word Count: 8,000
Rating: T for gangrene and other fun aspects of medicine
Summary: In the aftermath of the War of the Ring, a captured Haradri encounters a healer who is more than he appears. A time stamp to “Ransom” featuring Ayman. Part of my ongoing Dakheel series.
Author’s Note: This is a timestamp to “Ransom,” and will make very little sense if you haven’t read that story first. It is set in T.A. 3019, some weeks after Aragorn’s coronation, but before Hakim and the other Haradric civilians arrive in Minas Tirith. Warnings for medical gore. Don’t try this at home.
This story was posted to the archives some time ago, but I forgot to add it to LJ. *smacks forehead* The lovely and talented Cairistiona was kind enough to beta this for me.
Summer came slowly to Minas Tirith, but when it reached the city, it struck with the force of a maul to the gut. The previous night’s rainstorm had soaked the ruined fields of the Pelennor. The churn of armored feet had long since torn up much of the grass, and many of the farmers who worked those fields had not yet returned to the city. In the absence of plant life, the rainfall simply sat on the saturated ground, turning it into a mire. The mud steamed in the afternoon sun.
A young man of Harad sat with his back to a palisade wall, staring out at the dismal little world that had been carved out for him. The log wall at his back enclosed the whole camp-an area of several acres. The tops of the walls were sharpened to points-a stern warning to any would-be escape artists. Here and there, square guard towers stood straight and tall. Gondorians armed with bows manned those heights, while spearmen watched the many gates. Between the walls stood row upon row of tents, large and small, some made out of familiar hide or felt, others out of the strange heavy canvas favored by the Gondorians. The “streets” between were nothing but mud-ankle deep at the best of times, all but impassable after a rainstorm. But, even as heavily-trodden slop, the earth had a loamy feel to it. This was rich soil-good for farming. The Haradri sighed. He could be a wealthy man if that land were his to put to the till instead. Of course, it was that sort of thinking that had landed him in this mud-spattered prison in the first place.
His captors had taken his coat of bronze plates, his rough helm, his notched sword and broken bow. They had left him his clothes, but the garments were now so weather-beaten that the scarlet in his tunic was a distant memory. Still, he did not accept replacements from the rough peasant clothes the Gondorians offered, nor did any but the most desperate of his fellows. It had become a point of pride for them-refusing the Gondorians’ patronizing attempts at charity. Besides, the Haradrim remembered well the proud sound of drums and the sun glinting off of bronze and scarlet and gold. They were not yet ready to part with even the memory of such splendor.
He caught a glimpse of himself in a dirty puddle and sighed. His hair and beard were growing long and thick around deep, brown eyes. Without a razor, the resemblance was becoming even more apparent; he was his father’s son. People had always told him that as if they expected it to bring him pride. His father, though, was a common herder who had made little of his life. Ayman had long resented the comparison.
But, if he saw the old man now-if he was somehow alive and whole after all this upheaval, then Ayman, son of Hakim, would cast himself at his father’s feet and plead forgiveness before him and all the old gods for ever thinking such uncharitable thoughts.
A damp stump served well enough as a seat. He sat with his knees apart and a battered boot resting between them. Chewing his lip idly, he forced his makeshift needle through the side of the boot and pulled another stitch tight. The cracking leather, which these days welcomed water and mud like long-lost relatives, nonetheless resisted his attempts to repair it. His needle, after all, was fashioned from a splintered chicken bone and threaded only with embroidery thread salvaged from his own tunic.
He was lucky to have the boot, even with its cracks and leaks. The sandals his aunt had fashioned for him had been woefully ineffective in this northern clime, and he’d lost both in the mud before winter’s chill had quite left the ground. The boot in his hands, he’d recovered from a severed leg before tossing the limb into a trench grave. He knew not whether its original owner had been Rhûnic or Haradric or Tarkish. For all he knew, the man might still be alive.
His other boot-the right one-was in better shape. He’d filched it, along with its mate, from a Gondorian guardhouse when his captors ordered him to clean out their hearths. It repelled the rain, but pinched mightily across the top of his foot, so he’d traded its mate for a fine dinner of grilled snake and an extra blanket.
His hands worked steadily, even as he allowed his mind to wander. None of the dozens of men in his line of sight paid him any heed. Across the way, a large group hunched and squatted in a stony patch of land. From their raucous cheers and groans, they were probably betting on the cricket races or any of a dozen other games and sports they’d devised to pass the time. Just a few yards away, a man named Tayyib plucked a discordant rhythm on a battered string instrument. No one could figure out how the instrument, which was favored by shepherds in Near Harad, had survived both the long journey north and the desperate battle several months past. But, then, no one could figure out how Tayyib had survived the battle either. His determined strumming could hardly be called melodious, but no one had the heart to tell him to stop.
Here and there, armored Gondorians patrolled in squads of four or six, breaking up quarrels and dispersing any group of captives that seemed too loud or too angry. Behind a row of tents, two young Haradrim had fashioned a crude ball out of rags and now tossed it back and forth. The game seemed childish and out of place amid a camp for prisoners of war, but then, so were the players; though no Haradri had seen a razor in over two months, the faces of these two were still smooth and soft with youth. Ayman swallowed another sigh. At least he had been allowed to grow to manhood in relative peace before his inevitable conscription.
The tent nearest him belonged to a man named Elam-a fellow conscript from the edge of the desert. He was a good enough fellow-passable singing voice, generous with his winnings from the cricket races. Every morning, he pulled a stick from one of the many small campfires and made a small scorch mark in the side of his canvas tent. His crude calendar told the story of their captivity, with important dates circled with charcoal or marked with blood. It was more than two months, now, since they all had been captured on these very fields, while the Grand Army wavered and shattered around them. Six weeks since riders had reached the city and set all the bells to tolling and the heralds to crying. Already shut away within their log-and-dirt prison, it had taken the Haradrim some time to work out what had brought the northerners to such a frenzy, but when they did, color drained from many a face and trembling hands had reached up to tap shoulders and ward away evil.
Mordor had fallen. Sauron was no more. The Haradrim no longer had the power to ward away evil.
For weeks afterward, he had scarcely slept as he waited for the next hammer strike to fall. He pictured steel-edged columns making their way quickly down the Harad Road. With the Great Eye defeated, the Tarks would fall upon Near Harad and its unprotected homesteads like wolves upon sheep.
Or, so he had always been told.
But, if the Gondorim were indeed forging a new empire out of the ashes of his homeland, they were keeping it to themselves. A great energy came over the Gondorians in the days after what became known as the Last Defeat, but they put it towards nothing more sinister than beautifying their city. By day, bright banners flapped from every window. By night, the sounds of their celebrations stretched out across the Pelennor. And the prisoners of war waited in their pens, apparently forgotten by all but their sullen guards.
A half-dozen Gondorians strode through the camp, looking more alert and watchful than most. Their leader interrupted the game of catch and questioned the two boys sharply. Still, Ayman paid them little mind until he saw one of the boys glance in his direction. A moment later, the youth raised a reluctant finger to point straight at him.
As the guards turned his way, he hastily shoved his foot back in his boot. Attention was never good. But, there was nowhere to run, and, besides, he hadn’t done anything wrong. Lately, at least.
The six halted before him. Their leader cleared his throat. Though he knew what they wanted, Ayman stubbornly kept his seat and shot them his best approximation of a defiant glare. Several of the Gondorians seemed to grind their teeth at that, but their captain’s face remained impassive. “You are Ayman, son of Hakim?”
The man’s Haradric was almost passable. Nevertheless, Ayman answered in the Gondorian’s own tongue. “Who’s asking?”
The man seemed both relieved and a little irritated that Ayman spoke Westron. “That’s none of your concern,” he answered coldly, “Are you, or aren’t you?”
Unpleasant possibilities began to drift through Ayman’s mind. Perhaps one of his fellow soldiers had fingered him as the perpetrator of some crime. Perhaps these guards were here to haul him off to the dungeons rumored to lie beneath the city. Perhaps they had decided to begin executing the prisoners or torturing them for information.
He banished those thoughts with an effort. Running was useless and hiding was little better, so he simply bent his head and adjusted his boot, as if they weren’t even worthy of his attention. “I am Ayman ibn Hakim.”
“What is your father’s name?”
That question startled Ayman into raising his head. He arched an eyebrow. “Hakim,” he said in a tone of false patience. The Gondorian gave him a look that suggested his sass was not appreciated. After a moment, Ayman decided it might be best not to tweak their tails any further. “Hakim ibn Azzam of Near Harad,” he said neutrally. After all, he’d already given this information to the scribes when they’d conducted a census of the prisoners weeks before.
The guards exchanged a look. “Come with us,” one said brusquely, “You’re wanted in the infirmary.”
Ayman moved not one inch. “I’m not ill,” he pointed out, “Nor injured.”
“That is easily mended,” one of the guards muttered, but his captain gave him a warning look.
“The healer’s asked for you.”
“Which healer?”
The other man ran out of patience quite suddenly. Seizing Ayman by the front of his tunic, he hauled him to his feet. “That’ll be enough questions out of you. Infirmary or solitary-the choice is yours.”
Ayman straightened his tunic and glared at the man. “Infirmary,” he said sullenly.
As they set off, Ayman wracked his brain, trying to think what they could possibly want with him in the infirmary. They had seemed strangely interested in his father, though Ayman couldn’t imagine why; Hakim, son of Azzam had lived his whole life without ever travelling more than two days’ journey from the farm where he was born. Perhaps they merely wanted to be certain of his identity-both Ayman and Hakim were common names.
His mind swam with visions of back rooms converted to interrogation chambers, with healers on hand to oversee them. He dismissed those visions as the folly of a paranoid man; if an unusual number of screams had suddenly begun to issue from the rough structure, he would surely have heard of it. More likely, they were investigating some petty crime related to the house of healing. If that fool Thaman had fingered Ayman to cover his own theft of poppy, Ayman would skin him alive.
He had spent some time working with the wounded, back in those early, desperate days when their “infirmary” was merely a collection of tents and their bandages only rags scavenged from corpses. In the weeks since, though, they’d cobbled together the barn-like infirmary and the Gondorians had sent at least one healer most days. There was less work, now, for half-trained medics like Ayman, and he’d gladly given it up.
But, when he crossed the darkened threshold and felt planed floorboards under his feet, the smell of herbs mingled with sick brought it all back. He stood stock still for a moment, nearly staggered under the weight of memories. It was quiet, now, but he could still hear the screams, the pleading, the prayers desperately chanted.
One of the guards gave Ayman a rough shove. It was enough to bring him back to reality and he was strangely grateful. He turned a stumbling step into a steady march. One foot in front of the other-that was all he had to do. The guards led him through a cavernous ward, lined with cots that were now sparsely occupied, and through a large swinging door to a series of back rooms.
The captain paused before a certain door and gave Ayman a hard look. “You mind your manners, or I’ll see that you wish you had.” Ayman did not dignify that with a response. The guard glared at him for one second longer, then reached up to push the door open. The room beyond was fashioned as a small surgery. A Haradric man lay on a raised cot. On a tall stool beside him sat a man clad in a simple linen shirt and a thick, leather apron. He was speaking to the wounded man, his voice professionally low and gentle. The healer looked up at their arrival and Ayman saw that he was a Gondorian of middling years, with clear gray eyes and dark hair touched with silver.
As one, the six guards saluted with bowed heads and hands over their hearts. Their leader said something in a strange, lilting language. The Haradri understood only his own name-“Ayman ibn Hakim ibn Azzam.” The healer inclined his head and responded in the same tongue. Ayman resisted the urge to show his uncertainty by shifting from foot to foot. He wondered for a moment whether he should bow or give some other sign of deference; the guards did not bother to introduce the healer, but they seemed to esteem him highly. In the end, though, he decided it was better to do nothing and be seen as insolent than to seem meek through a fumbling show of submission.
He watched, his face stony, as the healer and the guard exchanged a few more words. The older man’s voice held an undeniable ring of command. The captain seemed less than happy with his orders, but, if Ayman read his tone correctly, he was unwilling to directly contest them. After a moment, all the guards reluctantly bowed again and retreated. Ayman tried to follow, but they closed the door in his face, leaving him alone with the healer and his patient.
As the latch caught, the healer turned his attention to Ayman and offered a smile that softened his features considerably. He directed his words to the wounded man between them. “This is Ayman, son of Hakim. He will be assisting me today.”
The words were spoken mildly in Ayman’s mother tongue. It was rare to hear a foreigner speak the language of Harad so well.
The other Haradri nodded curtly and spitted Ayman with a hard look. “You make sure this foreign barbarian doesn’t kill me, Ayman, son of Hakim.”
Ayman swallowed, but managed a small nod.
The Gondorian did not seem offended. In fact, he smiled a little as he raised the man’s head and lifted a wooden cup to his lips. “We must begin. Drink . . .”
The man drank and his face slowly relaxed. His eyes drifted shut. His breaths came slowly and evenly. The Gondorian gently lowered his head to rest on a stained pillow.
“I’m told you have some skill at healing.”
It took Ayman a moment to realize those words were directed at him.
“Was I told rightly?” the man prompted. Only then did Ayman think of how he must look, staring dumbly at the Gondorian.
He shrugged, his shoulders stiff. “I know a little of leechcraft,” he answered slowly, “Less than many.”
“A little should suffice. I require only a skilled assistant. Could you fill this basin from the kettle on the fire?”
Though he phrased it as a request, Ayman felt himself moving to obey automatically. The water steamed gently. As he filled the basin, he stole glances at the still form on the cot. The Haradri was thin and pale, but freshly bathed. Ayman did not recognize him, though with the wild hair and beard obscuring much of his face, it was hard to be sure. The man’s left arm was stretched out towards the healer. The limb ended abruptly with a mass of red and black tissue just above the wrist. Gangrene stretched its dark fingers up the arm towards the elbow.
The smell did not hit Ayman until he stepped close to place the warm basin on the healer’s table. When it did, he neither flinched nor wavered.
The healer nodded-perhaps in thanks, perhaps in approval-and began to scrub the ruined limb with a wet cloth. “This fellow lost his hand in the battle,” the Gondorian said conversationally, “But the limb continues to die. I fear infection has spread to the joint.” He lifted the man’s forearm a little, showing Ayman how the elbow would scarcely bend. Tentatively, Ayman touched the joint, feeling heat and swelling. In the places where the flesh was not already black and shriveling, the skin was reddened and stretched tight.
Ayman sighed. “You’re going to amputate his arm?”
The healer nodded. “To a point just above his elbow. He should live, if nothing else goes wrong. Take one of those aprons and roll up your sleeves.” Ayman’s hands were steady as he took down one of the heavy aprons that hung on the wall.
While the healer began to wash their patient’s arm with a sharp-smelling soap, Ayman stepped around him to place his hand on the unconscious man’s chest. His ribs still rose and fell in a regular rhythm. Ayman felt a strong heartbeat beneath his fingers. He lowered his ear and listened to the clear sounds of his breathing. He did not stir, even when Ayman pinched his skin. The young Haradri looked up at the Gondorian, his eyes suspicious. “What have you done to him?”
The healer did not react to the accusation in the other man’s voice. “I’ve given him poppy for the pain. He will sleep for a while yet. If we work quickly, we may be able to finish before he wakes. Wash your hands, Ayman.”
Again, he obeyed almost without thinking, thrusting his hands into the basin and scrubbing them with the harsh soap. “So, you know my name,” he said cautiously.
The healer nodded, his face absent. “The wardens of the camps do their best to keep records. They tell me you acquitted yourself well after the battle.” He deliberately missed the point.
Ayman refused to be moved by the compliment. He remembered all too well those first chaotic days and nights, when the wounded far outnumbered their caregivers. Swamped with casualties of their own, the Tarks had provided little assistance. Ayman had performed his first amputation in the mud by the light of a bonfire, with only two men to hold the patient down. It was a memory he could take no pride in, and he certainly would not accept praise from a Gondorian. “In my homeland,” he said coolly, “It is considered polite to introduce oneself.”
The healer nodded without looking at Ayman. But, all he said was “Pass me that knife.”
Ayman obeyed. The healer accepted the small blade and passed it through a candle flame several times. Ayman remembered his father doing the same from time to time-to clean the blade, he claimed-though he’d known no other healer who did so, among the Haradrim or the Gondorim. “Where did you learn healing?” He could not help but ask.
“From my father,” the man responded lightly, “Where did you?”
“From my father.”
The older man smiled softly and brought the knife towards the decaying arm. Without being asked, Ayman steadied the limb. He’d seen far too many wounds over the past weeks to be bothered by either the smell or the feel of diseased flesh under his arm.
When the Gondorian made the first cut, their patient did not so much as twitch.
The healer worked steadily and efficiently, drawing a red line around the circumference of the man’s arm and then pausing to dip his bloodied knife in water.
“You speak the tongue of Harad well,” Ayman said, “For a Tark. Ah, a northerner, that is.”
The Gondorian gave him a look that made Ayman want to crawl into the earth. “I know what it means,” he said, his voice icy. After a moment, though, he looked away and his face softened a bit. “I spent some time traveling your lands,” he said, “Though, that was many years ago.”
Ayman arched an eyebrow. There had been no trade and little travel between Gondor and Harad for generations uncounted. “I would not think a man such as yourself would find such a journey easy,” he said probingly.
The man laughed suddenly, a surprisingly warm sound. “Easy? Certainly not! But, it was quite educational.”
With Ayman’s curiosity thus piqued, the man said no more. He worked in silence-first staunching a bit of bleeding with a rag, then using a blunt probe to fold back a bit of the skin. Swiftly and steadily, he worked his way deeper into the arm.
“I thought I knew all the healers who frequented this camp,” Ayman said after several long moments, “But, I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”
“Other duties have kept me away.” He sounded genuinely regretful, but did not take his eyes off of his work. “Fetch that cautery from the fire.”
Ayman stepped away and returned with a small, hot iron, the handle wrapped liberally in rags. He watched the Gondorian as the older man delicately touched the tip to a bleeding vessel. The instrument seemed almost comically undersized in the man’s large hands. Ayman’s eyes traced a few faint scars that ran across the stranger’s knuckles and up towards his wrists. He suspected that if he touched the man’s palms, he would find calluses there from sword and bow.
“You marched with the Host, didn’t you?” Ayman kept his tone carefully neutral. He remembered how on the third day after the battle-or was it the fourth?-he had stood at the edge of camp, trembling with exhaustion while the great Host of the West marched forth. The sun had glinted menacingly off of thousands of spears and the very earth seemed to tremble under hoof beats and marching feet. The kings of Gondor and Rohan themselves had ridden at the head of the column, looking like creatures out of myth in their gleaming armor, beneath banners, black and green.
The healer gave him a searching look. “I did.”
Ayman tried to keep his face blank. At the time, his fellow soldiers had laughed in bitter triumph. Those who were skilled at numbering armies said that the Tarks departed with no more than eight thousands-perhaps as few as five thousands. That was fewer than the smallest vanguard of Mordor. They’d gloatingly predicted that the arrogant Gondorians would break themselves against the Black Gate and the Haradrim would soon be vindicated.
But, Ayman had not been thinking of Mordor as he watched those shining spears. Instead, he’d pictured that fierce host making its way into Ithilien and turning south, to fall upon Near Harad.
When the Host returned, jubilant with the news that Sauron had fallen and Mordor was utterly overthrown, Ayman had had to work hard to hide his relief. Every day since, he’d kept one anxious eye on the walls of Minas Tirith, waiting for the blare of trumpets that would announce Gondor’s great campaign of retribution against the allies of Mordor. That day hadn’t come. Yet.
The healer glanced at Ayman, his eyes soft with an emotion Ayman could not quite name-not sympathy, but something both less sentimental and more personal. “Did you have kin stationed at the Black Gates?” he asked quietly.
Ayman shook his head. “All my cousins are too young to serve, except for Tawil. And he was in my company.” He looked down and swallowed hard. “I lost him in the battle,” he confessed, “I was supposed to keep him close-I’m the elder-but we were separated when the ships landed. And, no one in camp has seen him.”
“I am sorry.” The Gondorian’s voice was soft and earnest. His hands were steady as he made a deeper cut. Blood welled up, and he quickly staunched it with a rag. “He is your aunt’s son?”
Though the stranger’s tone of gentle understanding had not changed, Ayman’s blood suddenly ran cold. His head came up. “How did you know that?”
The healer glanced up at him, though the bleeding vessel occupied most of his attention. “Merely a lucky guess,” he soothed, “Do not be troubled.”
But, though the Man might be a healer and a warrior and gods-knew what else, he was certainly not a skilled liar. Ayman’s mind spun again with images of cells and torture chambers deep beneath the city where no one would hear. Only, this time, instead of seeing himself hauled into such a place, it was Tawil. Sweet, hapless Tawil, locked in chains, starved and beaten and brutalized.
The healer gave up on stopping the bleeding with pressure and reached for a clamp from among his instruments. But, Ayman got there first and snatched it out of his reach. “If you know something of my cousin,” he began, trying to keep the tremor out of his voice and failing miserably, “Then I would have you tell me.” He forced himself to meet the Gondorian’s steely gaze.
The other man watched him for a moment, his face still. Then, quick as a cobra, his hand flashed out and seized Ayman’s wrist. Before the startled Haradri could do more than blink, the Gondorian had turned his hand over and snatched the clamp from his fingers. Without releasing Ayman, he reached over, one-handed, to trap the bleeding artery between the clamp’s jaws and seal it shut. That done, he turned back to Ayman and fixed him with a fierce glare. “Do not ever seek to manipulate me by putting my patient in danger.” His voice was as hard and sharp as the bones of the earth.
Ayman bowed his head in shame. “I’m sorry, Master.” Some instinct made him add the honorific. “I did not think.” It was true enough. Seized by sudden terror for his cousin, he had momentarily forgotten that the blood and tissue occupying the healer’s attention belonged to a man-to one of his own countrymen, no less.
As he’d predicted, the man’s hands were callused. Ayman felt strength there, but he did not crush the younger man’s wrist to make a point. After a moment, he released him. The Haradri kept his eyes on his feet until the healer pulled him back to reality. “Cut me a length of thread,” he prompted gently, “Ten inches or so.” While Ayman complied, the healer spoke quietly. “I know nothing of your kinsman’s fate. I lost a cousin in that same battle-a man as dear as a brother to me. I would not wish that pain on anyone. I will look for Tawil’s name in the records of prisoners, but of the fallen, few were ever identified.” There was no pity in the man’s voice, for which Ayman was grateful. With quick fingers, he slid the thread under the clamp and tied the vessel shut.
Ayman turned to put the cautery back on the fire; it gave him an excuse not to meet the healer’s eyes. When he returned, the older man’s gaze was fixed once again on the wounded man’s arm. When next the healer spoke, his voice was light and conciliatory. “I have heard that great caravans from your land have requested leave to enter Gondor. It is said that they come to negotiate for peace. Perhaps you will see your younger cousins sooner than you expect.”
The Haradri scowled. “Not likely.”
“Why do you say that?”
Ayman’s scowl darkened, but he shrugged mentally. If the healer needed a lesson in politics . . . well, it wasn’t as though Ayman had anything better to do with his time. “Our peoples have been at war for . . . how many generations, now?”
“Too many,” the stranger said darkly.
“Too many. And with each new conflict, we return to the same dance. One side wins a victory and captures a few soldiers in the bargain. People start to talk of peace. Delegations are sent forth with great fanfare and they argue about nothing for a few weeks. In the end, they all sign some scrap of paper and some gods-forsaken patch of land changes hands for the dozenth time. Then some of the captured go home-the ones with wealthy parents who can pay their ransoms. For the rest . . .” Ayman shrugged bitterly, “The poor have more children. And it’s only a few years before the dance begins again.”
Ayman was a little surprised at the strength of his own diatribe. He must have had too much time on his hands, to think of such things. All the same, when he ran out of words at last, he set his jaw and glared at the healer, as if daring him to contradict a word he’d said. As the other man’s attention was now focused on carefully dissecting out the largest blood vessel, some of Ayman’s vehemence may have been lost on him. Nonetheless, he seemed to take the point.
“Your parents are not wealthy?” The man’s voice resumed its tone of gentle prompting, still saying just this side of pity. He held out his hand, and Ayman dropped a small knife into it without needing to be asked.
The Haradri’s lips twisted. “My father herds goats in the desert south of the Mountains. It isn’t what one would call a lucrative trade.”
“You fear he will not come for you?” The healer didn’t look at Ayman, apparently absorbed in scraping away bits of flesh from around the pulsing artery. Still, Ayman knew this was not idle conversation. The Gondorian was soaking up every word he said, though he couldn’t imagine why the man cared.
“Oh, he’ll come, I’m sure.” The young man resisted the urge to rub his forehead. His face was dirty, after all, and his hands were clean. “He’ll bring whatever little treasures he can scrape together. He’ll prostrate himself before this foreigner you Gondorians have crowned. And when he sees how little a peasant of Harad has to offer, this king of yours will laugh him out of the city.”
The healer shot him a shrewd look out of the corner of his eye. “Few in this city know the mind of the king,” he said neutrally, “Perhaps he’ll surprise you.”
Ayman’s jaw clenched. “People in power are all the same.” He looked away and snorted ruefully. A thought struck him, and it slipped out of his mouth before he could think better of it. “My grandmother might have foreseen this.”
The healer glanced at him sharply, but did not get the chance to respond. Unnoticed by either of them, their patient’s breaths had been growing quicker and shallower. At the next touch of the knife, the man let out a loud moan, half-stifled by his locked jaw. His back arched. Ruined muscles twitched, trying to withdraw an arm that lay open almost to the bone. The Gondorian quickly dropped his instruments, stood, and grabbed the man’s arm, placing one hand above and one below the elbow and pressing down with all his considerable weight. “He’s waking too soon.” The healer’s voice was impossibly calm. But for the slight lines of tension that had appeared in his face, he might have been commenting that the weather would soon turn. “If he tears that vessel, he could bleed to death.”
Ayman hesitated. Were he still treating wounds in the mud, this would be the moment when he reached for the saw, the axe, or whatever edged tool he could get his hands on, in the hope that a red-hot knife would be enough to staunch the ensuing gore. He hoped the Gondorian had a better idea. “What must I do?”
“Take my place; keep his arm still, whatever happens. I will try to make him sleep once more.”
Ayman came up beside the Gondorian, noticing, for the first time, how the other man towered over him. He rested his hands near the healer’s larger ones and leaned down, bringing his weight to bear. Beneath his fingers, he felt the spastic twitch and jerk of muscles. The Gondorian turned away quickly. Ayman heard him moving about behind him-heard the splash of liquid into a cup and the steady grind of a mortar and pestle.
The wounded man suddenly thrashed, his legs kicking, his free arm swinging wildly. Ayman kept his left arm still. Barely. Though the man’s eyes were still closed, he let out a groan that turned into a cry halfway through.
“He’s waking up!” Ayman tried and failed to keep a note of fearful urgency out of his voice.
“His name is Umar.”
“What?”
“Talk to him, Ayman. Try to calm him.
Ayman swallowed hard. “Umar?”
The man groaned again.
“Calm yourself, Umar.”
The high, keening sound that came next was even more disturbing. Umar’s eyelids fluttered.
“We’re trying to help you.”
A foot lashed out, clumsily. Blood was welling up in the craggy gashes in his arm.
“Don’t you remember?”
The man didn’t start thrashing again, but his whole body was shaking. As was Ayman’s.
After what seemed like both an eternity and no time at all, the healer reappeared with a cup in his hand. Deftly, he slipped his free hand under Umar’s head, but the Haradri turned his face away. Wild eyes appeared and disappeared.
“Umar.”
The healer’s voice cut through Umar’s growing cries and Ayman’s building fear. His tone was firm and strong without being sharp, like red rock, smooth from the wind and warm from the sun. The wounded man’s struggles suddenly ceased. His eyes-bleary, but sharper than before-slowly focused on the Gondorian’s face.
“Peace.”
Slowly, the healer lifted the cup. The Haradri’s lips were trembling, but the Gondorian’s hands were steady. Umar took a small sip and then flinched away, perhaps at the taste, but the healer held him, his hand both gentle and implacable.
“It’s alright,” he murmured, “Drink.”
And Umar drank.
Almost before the cup was empty, his eyes drifted shut. The pain and fear in his face slipped away as the muscles under Ayman’s hands went lax. His breathing slowed. After a moment, the healer looked at Ayman and nodded. Ayman cautiously lifted his hands. His fingers had left white marks in the healthy flesh above Umar’s elbow. Even as he watched, they faded to red.
“You must watch him carefully.”
The voice was somehow still calm. Ayman started when he realized it was addressed to him. He looked up at the healer, knowing that his eyes were wide and his hands still trembled, but unable to do more than wrap his hands quickly into fists.
“It is dangerous to give a man so much poppy,” the healer continued as if he didn’t notice, “You must watch and tell me at once if his breathing stops.”
He waited for an answer, so Ayman managed a jerky nod. Moving slowly, as if Ayman were a horse he did not wish to startle, the healer stepped behind him and took his place by Umar’s arm. He staunched a bit of blood and then nodded in approval. “The artery is not torn. It can still be tied off cleanly.”
Ayman managed another nod, not taking his eyes off of the steady rise and fall of Umar’s chest. His own breaths were coming quickly and sharply, to match the pounding of his heart, though he did his best to conceal both. Somehow, seeing the man wake in the middle of the operation was even more frightening than if he’d been awake from the start. Why should that be so? Ayman couldn’t fathom. After all, the . . . episode had lasted mere minutes, and Umar had barely screamed. Perhaps, he’d simply not been ready. Or, perhaps the ordeal had recalled one of those primal fears of childhood-the thought of waking from a nightmare to find it had become reality.
“Tell me about your grandmother.”
Ayman’s head whipped around. He was as startled by the healer’s off-hand tone of voice as by his sudden words. “What?”
“Your grandmother. You mentioned her before all this began . . . ?”
He blinked. Before he could think better of it, he blurted out “Why do you care?”
“Ayman,” the healer’s face was full of understanding. And strength. “You are rattled. It’s nothing to be ashamed of; I am as well, and I saw my first amputation decades before you were born. But, we must be calm, now, if we are to be of any use to this man. So, let us speak of other things. Tell me about your grandmother.”
Ayman closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them once more. He watched Umar’s chest rise and fall, rise and fall. But, as he watched, he let his mind drift back to childhood memories of a comforting place far away from blood and mud. What was it he’d meant to say about her? Oh. Right.
“She believed in the old gods-believed that the Great Eye was a usurper. My grandfather died early, so once her children were married, she joined an order of religious ascetics. It was dangerous-they survived secretly, in defiance of the Dark Lord’s edicts-but she did not want to be a burden on her children. And, she said she needed to make amends.”
The healer carefully closed a clamp around the large artery. “Amends for what?”
Ayman shrugged. It was awkward to discuss religious custom with a foreigner, but the Gondorian sounded curious. And, the laws of the old gods seemed harmless and downright quaint compared to the zealotry that had long surrounded the Great Eye. “She believed that our family was cursed-that the old gods would use this war between our peoples to punish us. Because my grandfather followed Sauron’s law rather than that of the old gods. If she were here, she would say it is because of him that I was conscripted and captured.”
The healer gave him a strange look. “All of Harad was bound by Sauron’s law,” he pointed out, “For . . . what, eighty years, now? And yet she thought your family especially deserving of wrath?”
Ayman shrugged. In his mind, he recalled a dozen childhood visits to the monastery where his grandmother dwelt. She would gather her grandchildren around her and tell them about lands where every season was rainy, about great rivers that flowed into greater seas and cities that shone like the sun in the light of the gods’ favor. And, once, she had pulled little Ayisha onto her knee while Ayman sat at her feet with Tawil and the rest of his cousins and she’d said “Listen, children, and learn what becomes of those who scorn the laws of gratitude and hospitality . . .”
“We have a saying,” Ayman said slowly, “‘To silence a thousand lutes is a public service, but to silence one is an act of evil.’ We don’t see cruelty when it’s directed against armies or races or nations-the truth gets lost in the discord. But, we see it when it’s directed against one person.” Ayman glanced at the Gondorian, but the older man seemed absorbed in carefully stitching and tying off the artery. He was relieved; this conversation had begun to seem strangely like a confession. “My grandmother only knew one Gondorian well. My grandfather rescued him or captured him-they could never quite decide which it was.” Ayman trailed off, not sure how to continue. The tale was a strange one, after all. He’d heard it told a dozen ways by his grandmother, his aunt, his father, yet he’d never known quite what to make of it.
The healer’s brow furrowed. He seemed strangely troubled. “It was this foreigner that convinced your grandmother the family was cursed?”
“I suppose.” Ayman chewed on his tongue for a moment, turning over the healer’s question. “Foreigner,” he’d said-dakheel in the tongue of Harad. It was a common enough word, but it was also the name his father used for that strange character out of family legend. Though, the healer couldn’t have known that. “He was some sort of warrior. A scout, maybe-none of my family knew for sure. But, he was a healer, too. He saved my aunt’s life when she was but a child. My grandmother wanted to reward him with freedom and full inclusion in our family-that’s what the old gods require to pay such a debt. But, my grandfather was afraid of Sauron. He insisted that the foreigner be sold as a slave.”
“As all foreign captives were, if the tales be true.” The Gondorian’s face was inscrutable. Ayman couldn’t decide whether that statement was meant in condemnation of Harad or as some inexplicable support for his father’s father.
“All but the wealthy ones, yes. But, my grandmother never agreed with it. My family profited, but my grandfather’s health began to decline at once. He died long before I was born. The wrath of the gods, my grandmother said.”
The healer cut the artery. Blood welled up, but only from the ruined end of the limb; his knots held. His hands were still for a moment as he stared at the arm. At last, he set his knife aside and picked up a saw that gleamed dully.
“Brace the arm.” The healer’s voice was distant.
Ayman set his jaw-he hated this part-but obeyed. The grating of saw against bone vibrated through his fingers and up his wrists, making his own arms ache. The accompanying sound was so much louder without the din of screams to drown it out. He was relieved when the healer broke the false peace.
“There is more to that story you’ve just told.”
Ayman shrugged. “Isn’t there always?”
A smile ghosted across the Gondorian’s lips. “Fair enough.”
The bone gave. Ayman released it and looked away, trying not to dwell on the sight or the sound. Instead, he returned to watching the rise and fall of Umar’s chest. His breaths were coming a little quicker than before.
“A thousand lutes . . .” the healer said slowly. Ayman stole a quick glance at him. His face held a troubled, philosophical cast, which contrasted strangely with the bloody needle in his hand. His fingers flew as he stitched skin over the bloody stump, but his expression was thoughtful. “That’s what you fear the Haradrim have become, isn’t it? Too many voices. You fear the king will act only to silence the racket.”
The Haradri scowled. “It’s just an old saying. Besides, I was speaking only of the dakheel from my grandmother’s stories.”
“Were you?”
Ayman said nothing.
“What if the king doesn’t hear the clamor?” The healer asked, softly and rhetorically. “What if he hears instead a thousand individual melodies? How, then, can he silence them?” He tied off the last stitch and began to rinse Umar’s shortened arm with clean water.
Ayman placed his hand on Umar’s chest, counting the steady beats of his heart. “You Gondorians idolize your king,” he said with a hint of scorn, “But, he is only a man.”
“Yes,” the other man agreed as he pulled the bloodied sheet from under his patient’s arm and rolled it in his hands, “He is. Umar will wake soon. Will you stay with him until then? I will be just outside. Call out if his breathing stops.”
Ayman shrugged, but lowered himself to sit on the stool the other man had vacated. He was running out of chances to ask the question that had been nagging him. “Why did you ask for me?” he said at last, “Surely, you could have brought your own assistant.”
The healer did not look up from the basin where he was washing his hands. “Umar was distrustful of me. Having one of his own people present helped to allay his fear.”
“There are better healers than me, even in the prison camp.”
“I’d heard you acquitted yourself well. And I wanted to see what kind of man you were.” He looked up at last, with words seemingly on the tip of his tongue, but Ayman cut him off.
“Something is wrong.”
Umar breathed still, but his breaths had become short, shallow, and very quick. The healer was at his side in a moment. He pressed his ear against the unconscious man’s chest. “It’s the poppy,” he said, his voice, like before, carrying only the faintest note of urgency, “It keeps him from breathing as deeply as he should.” He pressed down on the man’s breastbone, compressing his chest, but as soon as he released it, the rapid rhythm began again. Umar’s face held a faint gray tinge.
The healer turned away and strode quickly to the counter where his herbs were laid out. “Do something!” Ayman snapped. He suited his own actions to words by leaning down, sealing his lips over Umar’s, and blowing into his lungs. The air moved easily and Umar’s color improved a little, but each time Ayman paused, his patient’s chest resumed its stuttering, useless movement.
He was so intent on his task that he did not at first notice when the usual sickroom smells were replaced by the scent of spices and sandalwood.
The healer returned, bearing a steaming basin and a few rags. With a hand on Ayman’s shoulder, he gently steered him away and took his place beside Umar’s head. Ayman stared at the basin in his hands. Though he could still hear the pounding of his own heart, a sense of calm seemed to radiate from the Gondorian with each breath that he took.
The healer lifted two dripping rags. He placed one over Umar’s forehead and the other on his chest.
Nothing changed. Umar’s chest rose and fell like that of a frightened mouse. What little color he’d regained drained from his face once more.
As Ayman had, the healer lowered his head and breathed into the man’s lungs. Umar’s chest inflated, but as soon as the Gondorian released him, it fell flat again. The man shook his head. “This herb will help, but he has to breathe it in. Otherwise, it does no good.”
He hesitated, then seemed to reach a decision.
Lifting one large hand, he clamped it over Umar’s mouth and nose. Ayman’s slowing heart rate suddenly reversed direction. “Stop it!” he gasped, “Let him breathe!” He’d seen healers do this before, after all-in dark and desperate hours, when it was known that their patient had no hope of recovery and that death would be long and painful. He tried to shove the Gondorian aside, but he might as well have tried to uproot the cornerstone of Ecthelion’s Tower. “Let him go! You’re killing him!”
The healer held Ayman at bay with one hand, but his eyes were fixed on Umar. His face was intent, as if he were carefully keeping time. For a moment, the unconscious man was still. Then his chest began to strain, fighting the hand that denied it breath. The healer stayed frozen for what felt like a lifetime but was probably only a few heartbeats.
Then he released him.
Breath blew out of Umar in a rush. For half a second, he was still. Then, his chest inflated like a bellows. A second breath followed the first-just as deep and just as slow. As he breathed in clean air and soothing vapors, color returned to his face once more. Ayman felt his own breaths slowing, an inexorable peace descending.
The healer placed one hand over the rag on Umar’s forehead. With the other hand, he felt the pulse in his neck and nodded in satisfaction. “I am sorry for alarming you,” he told Ayman, “Poppy can make the body forget its need for breath. Sometimes it needs but a reminder.”
Ayman didn’t respond. He was staring at the healer and breathing in scents from hundreds of miles away-an aroma that had no business appearing in a Gondorian sickroom. As he breathed, he dwelled on half-remembered childhood tales about an herb that could smell like anything or nothing, about healing that muddied the boundary between medicine and magic.
With Umar looking a thousand times better, the healer turned once again towards the door.
“Who are you?” Ayman called out suddenly.
The man turned. His lips curved in an enigmatic smile. “Stay with this man a while longer, Ayman,” he said, “He is out of danger now.”
And then he was gone.
Fin
Author’s Note: Thanks for reading! Feedback and concrit are welcome.