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The foe came swarming down the hill like black beetles. Their arms bore spikes meant to pass for swords, and their faces were unseen under their helmets. Their armor was a dull, haphazard patchwork of metal and hide, and they only knew, as like as not, that they were to seize a halfling.
“Get behind me!” Boromir shouted, and before the words were out of his mouth, both hobbits were behind him. Merry stepped towards Pippin, and Pippin towards Merry, and both drew their arms.
The prince of Gondor cut down one Uruk-hai after another as they swept toward them, his blade slashing wherever the heavy armor gapped. Soon, the hobbits were giving as good as he was. Off-balance, he heaved his blade at one Uruk-hai and missed, and both hobbits jumped onto the monster’s back, stabbing him with their short elvish knives and crying out.
Then they threw stones at the others, their little arms strong and true as slingshots.
But it was never going to be an even score. The foe simply kept coming. Perhaps it was just retribution for a man who sought power beyond his ken.
His sword steamed with blood and he did not even notice the Uruk with the bow at first. He was among the others, but nowhere near the front, and Boromir was busy trading blows with another who would not fall, despite a nasty gash across his throat.
Then Boromir felt like he was whacked with a wooden rod – the kind they used when they traded blows in the sparring ring back home. It hit him in the shoulder. At first, it was painless, and he did not think much of it as he drove his blade through the chest of the maimed Uruk-hai. Then he crossed swords with the next one, but his arm would not move as it should. It was slow, and if it were a wheel, it was like having sticks in the spokes. But it was nothing. He gritted his teeth and threw all his strength into his blows, never mind that he was scraping reserves he could not spare.
Two more Uruk-hai fell under his sword before the second arrow came. This one did the same to his other shoulder, making it a penance to bear up his shield. He let it fall as he summoned death to another Uruk with black blood in his teeth. Then came the third arrow: another thwack without much pain, but much harder as it sank into his breast.
Wide and heavy these arrows were, made for piercing hide and armor at short distance.
Isildur, why had he not gotten the bowman when he had the chance?
But he never had a chance. The Uruk was brutally tactful and never got close, letting his comrades swarm past him. He might have hit one of his own, but likely did not care.
Now, the Uruk-hai had thinned out, but as Boromir hacked, his arms could not keep up. Like swimming through mud it was: each limb weighed more than a boulder, the leafy earth threatening to pull him down. He swayed where he stood, and the Uruk-hai no longer saw him as an obstacle. They swept past him, not bothering to fight. It was only a matter of time.
A few more of Merry and Pippin’s stones met their marks, but in the end there were not enough stones to throw; the forest floor was earthen and covered with leaves and needles. And he was no longer a bulwark. Two Uruk-hai seized the hobbits where they stood. The last thing Boromir saw of them was Pippin writhing in his captor’s arms, while Merry slung over a shoulder, pounding the Uruk’s back with his fist.
Boromir fell to his knees.
Somehow, with the hobbits there, it had felt like there was something left to fight for. That after what he had done to Frodo, he could atone for his sins. Now that was gone. His breath was shallow in his chest – it must have been that way all that time, but he never noticed. His limbs were heavier still – each like ten boulders, in need of strong horses to pull them. His vision rippled, its edges closing in. Everything was either very dark or very bright. He felt pain, but it was not part of him.
The bowman stood before him, a white, hungry smile on his grime-caked face. He raised his bow and pulled a final time.
But no arrow flew, because someone bowled him over from behind.
At first, Boromir could not see who it was, but he was not short and he did not bear an axe, nor was he blonde, so it must have been Aragorn. Long, leather-clad limbs flew with a speed beyond his comprehension. By now, he could barely move a finger and the pain was growing, kindling, flaring. Instead of something far away, it was very much a part of him. Each breath felt like his insides were being torn apart. Finally, he slumped to one side, his head by the roots of a tree and the pine needles soft beneath him.
He did not know how long he lay. He looked at the sky, stamped with a brocade of long, slender branches. The sun was very bright; the edges of his vision nearly black.
What does one think about when one is about to die?
He had been wounded before, but never this badly. For all his dance with death – a lifetime of it – he never thought it would be him. He mourned all the men he had seen fall, but also thought himself luckier, stronger.
Well, he had his reckoning now.
He did not see much of the fight because it hurt to move even his neck. He only heard the occasional scuffle, the clanging of steel, and the grunts of both when they lost their weapons.
He hoped Aragorn might gain the upper hand, but then again…
He did not have faith in much anymore. He only hoped death might come quickly. That way, his shame might be cleansed and he would not have to remember.
Finally, the scuffle ended. All was silent at first, save for the twanging of birds. Then Aragorn came rushing to him.
Aragorn had always been an enigma. Endlessly capable, deep-thinking and quick-acting, he nonetheless grasped for power less than other men. He only bore its mantle when none other would. It was difficult to understand, and what Boromir could not understand made him wary of what might lie beneath.
Aragorn seized his arm.
“They took – they took the little ones,” Boromir gasped. Each word cost him a wave of pain.
“Stay still,” Aragorn whispered.
But Boromir would not.
“Frodo… where is Frodo?” he persisted, lifting his neck as much as he could.
“I let Frodo go.”
Boromir closed his eyes, releasing a breath.
“Then you did what I could not. I tried to take the Ring from him.”
He opened his eyes and Aragorn looked at him, his gaze gray and bright like the Bay of Belfalas. He had never seen a face.
“The Ring is beyond our reach now.” His voice a rustle, as if he knew what Boromir needed, and sought to spare him the shame of saying it.
But Boromir said it nonetheless.
“Forgive me.” He set his teeth on edge. “I did not see. I have failed you all.”
“No, Boromir, you fought bravely. You have kept your honor.”
As he spoke, his eyes traveled to Boromir’s front, a spasm contorting his brow. With one hand, he moved to undo Boromir’s gambeson, but the arrows pinned the fabric in place. He reached for his hunting knife.
“No, no, it is over, leave it,” Boromir gasped.
He tried to bring his hand up, to bodily obstruct him, but Aragorn shook his head.
“I do not know what strength is in my blood,” he said, his voice rising, “but I will not let our people fail, nor you perish before your time. Legolas!”
His last word was nearly a cry, and though Boromir heard no steps, Aragorn must have done with his keen tracker’s ears.
The elf appeared before them, squatting down. Boromir’s hearing rippled in and out.
Aragorn and Legolas exchanged words he could not parse, and Legolas’ handsome face remained dogged as a cliff. Then Gimli arrived, and his coming Boromir felt: the pounding of hard boots on the needled floor.
“Gimli, do you have the oil?” Legolas asked.
“Aye, that I do, Master Elf.”
More scuffling, and then, to Boromir’s chagrin, Aragorn succeeded in ripping aside the gambeson. By now, the pain was just at the edge of bearing, and with it came a keen resentment. They were losing precious time, with the Uruk-hai putting distance behind them. Frodo needed aid – perhaps no longer to bear the Ring, but from afar, in bleeding Sauron as best they could. And the White City…
Yet here they were, capable fighters all, squatting around a dead man.
Boromir might have shouted, but his body was like a house where the lights were going out room by room. His arms and legs did not seem to exist, except in thought. The world rocked above him, the earth below him, and beside him, Legolas rubbed something vigorously over his hands.
Then he felt those hands upon him – on his ribs, pressing. Not too hard, but hard enough to bring a fresh crest of pain.
Boromir’s vision went blinding-white, and he had no breath to groan. All he managed was to set his teeth on edge.
“Legolas, what do your elf ears hear?” Aragorn asked.
The elf did not speak at first. Then the pain ebbed, and Boromir saw that he was indeed… listening.
There was nothing else it could have been. With his eyes and lips closed, he leaned with one ear toward Boromir. His face had the serenity that elves were known for – solemnity and detachment that Boromir once though deceitful.
He thought nothing like that now. Both Aragorn and Gimli watched the elf like people hanging off a cliff.
“Blood. Much blood,” Legolas said at last. “Drowning the lung, all around it. At least a goblet. The arrow… three fingers’ breadth inside. I cannot – wait –”
He turned his head, aiming his ear at another angle. Then he moved his hands, setting off another shock of pain.
“No large airways broken,” he said. “Heart is well. Only the lung collapsed. The blood is coming between the ribs and the lung. A smaller vessel… I can tell you where exactly…” (1)
“Is the arrow pressing against it – is it slowing the flow?” That was Aragorn, his voice tight.
Another moment passed. Legolas moved his hands, bringing more pain.
“No. I doubt it,” he said. “Though moving the arrow may well tell us otherwise.”
“I know.” Aragorn’s voice was grim. “Well, let us hazard it then. Boromir” – he fixed his eyes upon him, gray and kind, though part of Boromir struggled to trust that kindness. “We shall try to save you yet – for greater deeds, Son of Gondor. To take three arrows and meet such a turn, that is a rare fortune. Do not despair!”
Boromir might have laughed.
And yet, Aragorn was forging ahead, his lips and brow set in tight lines.
“Gimli,” he commanded, “get at his head. You will breathe for him if he ceases altogether. Legolas, keep your hands on him. Your will tell me what happens with the blood, and guide me if I go astray. Gimli – the liquor, and your pipe, please.”
With a scuffle, Gimli extracted the items and got into position.
Aragorn unscrewed the cap, and cold flowed over Boromir’s wounds, followed by heat. Then Aragorn poured the liquor onto something he could not see.
“Alright, Boromir,” Aragorn said. “I shall open a window for the blood to drain. Then we remove the arrow. On three. You will feel more pain between the ribs. I am sorry. One, two –”
On three, Aragorn stabbed him in the chest, gouging something upward at a sharp angle.
If before Boromir could just bear the pain, it was beyond comprehension now.
If he had had the strength, he would have bellowed. But instead, a swarm of bees blotted out his vision, and then he knew no more. (2)
Over the next stretch of time – no knowing how long exactly – Boromir was neither alive nor dead. He floated at the edge of consciousness like a rudderless boat, now tossed about by wind and wave, now plunging over a waterfall.
Now and again, he heard voices, but could never tell what they said. He only knew that Legolas’ voice sounded like a smooth tablecloth, Gimli’s like gravel underfoot, and Aragorn’s ever like the waves, the way they echoed from the bay when they visited Belfalas.
Time and again, there was more pain, and all he could do was wish for oblivion. One time, there was a pulling in his chest, as if something deeply rooted was being hauled out, and was hell-bent on taking his innards with it. Another time, his shoulder felt like it was being frayed apart, fiber by fiber and vessel by vessel.
Every time he came to, his vision grew darker, his consciousness smaller. Sometimes he could not hear; other times he could not see. Only the pain in his chest ebbed by fits and starts, allowing him deeper inbreaths.
And yet, by nightfall, the place would be swarming with orcs. Whatever life smoldered within him, he would only be a burden if they tried to escape. He would have left himself behind – a choice he made countless times with others, and rued as he was meant to.
Maybe he would die and they would have a day’s delay and that would be the end. Nothing really changed anything after all.
He slipped into oblivion again, dreaming of white towers. They rose thin and needle-like against the sky, and it hurt to look at them. Around them, fields stretched in every direction, lovely as a tapestry and dotted with towns.
Then he dreamed of his mother’s homeland, Dol Amroth. When they spent the summers there, they walked along the shore with waves leaving the sand mirror-like before them. Out west, the sea lay blue and endless, and the sun lay scattered over its surface like shards.
When he came to, Boromir lay on the forest floor, the brocade of boughs still above him. They lay over an indeterminate blue sky, touched with red as if the sun was half-awake.
But even that felt too bright, so he closed his eyes again, groaning.
There was a smell of cool, wet earth, dry pine and tinny blood.
He moved, and the pain came all at once. It was like someone took a hammer to every bit of him, though it was sharpest at his shoulders. When he breathed, there was pain, but not as sharp as before.
“Well-well, awake?” Gimli’s cheerful voice floated above him. Boromir opened his eyes and groaned again.
The dwarf took his hand, careful not to turn his wounded shoulder.
“It will be morning soon,” he said softly. “Lucky for us all, it was a quiet night, save for your moaning. No hide or hair of any foe. How goes it with you? Do you think you can speak?”
Boromir tried, and after a few false starts he managed words.
“Why… didn’t... didn’t you… Merry and… Merry and Pip –”
The dwarf lowered his voice, squeezing his hand.
“Why did we not leave to rescue Merry and Pippin?” he said. “Why did we not leave you behind to die amongst Saruman’s Uruk-hai? Well, why do you think, m’lad? The hobbits we can yet track if we move soon, but who will save the White City?”
In his painful haze, Boromir could not understand.
“Well... Aragorn,” he said, measuring his breaths to be less painful. “He is Isildur’s… heir… I am but the Steward’s…”
Gimli joggled his eyebrows.
“Ach, well,” he said. “And it was Aragorn’s will that we should save you, and it was his notion to drain the blood out of your chest using my pipe. How’s that for a riddle, eh? You can press the question to the man himself, but they say: look not for flaws in a gifted gem. That would be my advice, if you choose to mind it.”
He chortled and turned around.
A wave of pain twisted Boromir’s insides, and again it felt better to close his eyes.
“Aragorn!” bellowed the dwarf, entirely too loud. “He is awake! He lives! He speaks words, even! Come see!”
Some distance away, there was a shuffling – long limbs moving about and something flung aside.
Hasty footsteps crunched toward him, but Boromir took his time opening his eyes.
Whatever Aragorn would look like in that moment – his eyes misted over with sleep or emotion, or his face twisted up with pain – he did not need to see him to know one thing.
Maybe it took coming this close to death and being pulled back, and maybe it took the words of another to accept what he saw all along.
They were two of a piece, and he owed him his fealty. For the White City he had been saved, and perhaps for other deeds, and he would learn to trust him – the man who had hope enough for both of them.
(1) A general note for what Legolas is doing. In essence, through the Magic of Elves ™, he is functioning as a living ultrasound. He generates vibrations or sounds that the others cannot hear, perhaps through humming. Then he listens for their echoes as they bounce off structures inside the body. He cannot generate a picture except in his own mind, so in that way he falls short of a real ultrasound. However, he can describe what he sees. Mr. Nisilë came up with a portmanteau for this capacity: elftrasound. Back
(2) In general, safely extracting an arrow to the chest in field conditions is nearly impossible. So I am twisting biology and invoking an extraordinary amount of luck. Medical imaging (in the form of Legolas) is necessary to place the arrow’s location and determine if major organs or vessels are damaged. Here, they are not. Then, a chest tube (in the form of Gimli’s pipe) needs to be placed to drain excess blood. Finally, the arrow needs to be plucked out and bleeding quickly controlled – a tall order even in an operating room. The liquor is used as a poor-man’s disinfectant, and Gimli is poised to perform artificial breathing if Boromir cannot breathe on his own. Back