Chapter Text
“The heart of the king loves everything like a hammer loves the nail”
Epic III, Hadestown
Halbrand had been little more than a boy, sullen and wild-eyed, when his destiny was first foretold.
He stood in the corner of their rundown cabin, staring at the spider that slowly climbed its way up the wooden wall, wondering if his mother would notice if he killed it. She was always so upset with him when he stomped on the spiders and roaches and whatever other tiny creatures that crawled on their dusty floor, tears springing to her eyes, as they often did in those days.
It made him angry – their home was shoddy and miniscule, but it belonged only to them, so why could he not kill the spider if he wished to, instead of gently placing it outside like a guest that overstayed their welcome? Regardless, this time Halbrand would not kill the tiny beast, for the noise would surely draw his mother’s watery gaze in his direction, and he was perfectly comfortable not being its target for once.
He did not know the man that spoke to his mother in hushed tones, with a long grey beard and a hunch in his back that did not hide how immensely tall he was. But the man looked at Halbrand and his eye bored a hole – seeing into him and through him, all he had been and was and would be, if the boy ever grew up to be anything at all.
And so Halbrand quietly waited in his corner, remembering his father’s lessons and stamping out the terror a brave boy like him was not supposed to feel. The man – a seer , he later learned – sat on the only chair that was not wobbly or falling to pieces, and the table in front of him was covered in the finest cloth they had to offer, some white scrap of fabric his mother swore once adorned a queen’s tearoom.
Accordingly, their very special guest was served tea, and Halbrand was almost relieved when the man would raise his cup and steam clouded his sight. His mother listened to the seer’s words with her head low, picking at the tablecloth’s frayed edges and rarely interrupting, until she turned to Halbrand and called for him to join them.
“Come, my child,” her voice trembled as if winter had come much earlier, “and listen to what this good man must tell you.”
The spider stilled, as if it had been called as well, and Halbrand withdrew from it his intent gaze and walked slowly to where his mother sat, standing next to her with his back straight and his chin up. He stared at the man’s beard, as he could not look into his eyes, and briefly wondered if those bits in the brittle gray hair were breadcrumbs.
“You are quite short for a king.”
Now directed at him, the man’s voice seemed to boom in the small cabin, like those actors that Halbrand had seen pass by the village and set up stage in the square, singing loudly over the people bustling around the morning market. But the man hadn’t screamed or even raised his voice – sounded secretive even, a murmur. Halbrand felt dizzy for a quick moment before the man spoke again, the dissonance alleviating by every new word until the initial fright was forgotten.
“But I suppose mortals grow quite fast. A few years, maybe a decade or two, and you shall rule. Unless you try to fight it, of course.” The man’s bushy brows furrowed, looking down at Halbrand with the sort of displeased frown he had not been subject to since his father’s death. “Will you fight against your fate, Halbrand of the Southlands? Many have tried and they all failed.”
Halbrand understood nothing of what was asked. Yet, he answered it with the one truth he had.
“I do not wish to fail.”
“And that is why,” the holy man smiled, “you shall become king.”
Halbrand looked at his mother in confusion, but she remained quiet and hunched over, as his mind wandered to childhood stories of a long-lost kingdom that once ruled these savage lands. A lineage of old, shielded in lofty towers and golden halls until the fires of war burned it all to the ground, and all that was left were the ruined stone walls where children played hide and seek. He had played there once, before his father dragged him home as he screamed and kicked, telling him never to go there again.
“An insult to our ancestors”, his father had muttered, anger simmering down. “How ashamed they must be, seeing their kin brought so low.”
Halbrand did not feel so scared anymore. He stared the seer in the eyes and asked with a rare childish wonder: “King? Am I to be king of the Southlands? Win a war, live in the big castle by the hill and sit upon a throne of gold? I had a dream like that once.”
“Did you? How odd”, the seer chuckled low. “But yes, my child. All shall know your name, and call you Halbrand the Conqueror, for you will unify these lands under a single banner and bring glory back to its people.”
As would any other child fed on goat’s milk and tales of valor, Halbrand grinned from ear to ear. But his mother, to whom he would give an entire wing in their future castle and numerous trunks filled with precious gems, seemed still so unhappy. The old man put his large hand on the top of Halbrand’s head, right where his crown would sit – and it would be a glorious thing, forged by the future king himself, so no one else could ever dare to touch it. Patting down his curls, the man then proclaimed:
“I only fear you will not sit upon that throne of gold for too long.”
Halbrand’s grin, as well as his reveries, froze at once.
“You must understand, my boy, that the designs of Eru are not meant to be fully known by anyone, not even by His servants. I perceive a road and its winding paths, but I cannot say for certain where it leads. What I can do is warn you to the best of my abilities. I see you alone inside your palace walls, as clearly as I see you now. Dried blood under your fingernails that you are unable to scrape off, a head that hangs low and eyes half-closed from sleepless nights. And you’re so very alone .”
The man’s hand on his head was as heavy as iron, but his voice carried the weight of the whole world.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because you cannot fight your destiny, Halbrand, but you can be ready when it bursts thought your door. My vision only extends so far when it comes to the road you must travel, and any man would crumble under such a fate. I shall pray that you become something greater, for I hope your tale reaches the happiest of endings, as unlikely as it may seem.”
The man stood up, hunched so his head would not hit the low ceiling, and had Halbrand been any less paralyzed he would have stumbled to the floor and cowered like the frightened child he was. Those eyes that saw everything and the ever-furrowed brows could not hide the gentle pity on the seer’s face, and he gazed at Halbrand’s mother. After complimenting the “remarkable quality” of the white tablecloth and thanking her for the “excellently boiled” tea, he left as unceremoniously as he came, nothing more than a quick goodbye.
His mother’s sobs echoed in the tiny room, as she let her head fall to the table with a thud, covering it with hands that did nothing to muffle the unbearable sound. Halbrand stared at the door the seer had just crossed, wishing to run through it and scream at the old man’s face until he admitted he was wrong, that Halbrand’s reign would last forever and he would be to the Southlands as Eru is to the heavens.
He did no such thing. He stayed there in that same spot by the chair for what felt like hours, and when his mother’s cries finally quieted down, Halbrand went back to that corner of their home and killed the spider with a smack of his hand. His mother began to cry once more.
Many years later, the King of the Southlands awakes with a memory in his mind and a sob on his lips.
Eight months after his coronation, the halls of King Halbrand’s palace are never quiet. Servants and guards buzz from place to place like worker bees, with trays on their hands or swords on their hips. Renovations are well under way, and what were once high piles of dilapidated stone are now long corridors and salons, covered in tapestries and engravings of battles that will soon enter the realm of legend. Even at night, the construction efforts continue, and the sound of hammers becomes a constant echo – such is the eagerness of a king who will not be able to fall asleep, silent halls or not.
There is but one place left untouched by the crowd, hidden beyond the bushes of blood-red seregon so carefully tended to by the new gardeners. A little pavilion, with white marble columns and a high ceiling, that has somehow endured the test of time. In its center stands an altar, where every morning incense burns to the mighty Valar.
The breeze takes with it the scent of sandalwood, and Halbrand hopes his prayers follow the same trail, up towards the sky.
He brings offerings sometimes, libations of wine or mead, peaches and pomegranates that will soon rot only for him to replace them with more. But he does not sing eulogies to the heavens, praising the beauty of Varda or the power of Manwë, humble and deferential. Instead of worship, Halbrand’s prayers are not much other than shameless begging. He asks Yavanna for his people to never go hungry again, for Tulkas to keep his soldiers’ spears held high, and for Aulë that such spears are strong in the first place. He pours out the drink or puts down the fruit, lights up the incense, bows his head and goes about his day of councils and hearings. A daily task, almost menial, remnants of a creation by a devoted mother.
But there are days when his voice trembles with rage – when he is certain his prayers are being listened to, yet never answered.
“Why grant me this fate,” he asks once, “only to leave me adrift when it is fulfilled?”
The incense smoke quietly dissipates, and the birds greet the rising sun with their song. Halbrand woke up early that morning, eyes stinging from the ashes in his dream. His question goes unanswered – Eru has abandoned him.
The reconquest, Halbrand calls it now. The unification. Never “the war”, even though he knows very well it was one. War implies massacres, battlefields littered with broken swords and broken bodies, villagers fighting over a single loaf of bread. Bloated corpses and bone thin children.
Halbrand knows such things happened, of course. He saw it all, and most of the time he caused it. But how could it have been a simple war, men slaughtering men for land and gold, when it had been predetermined by something much greater? When Eru himself had sent one of His servants to tell Halbrand of his unescapable future? He no longer uses such an ugly word – his speeches, on the few special occasions he speaks to his subjects, are carefully written to avoid it.
And his subjects are glad for it, he thinks. They too want to forget about the bodies and the hunger. They always cheer at the end of his speeches, bowing to the King their legends had promised them.
Halbrand is praying again, on his knees in front of the altar. Ridiculous, that a man to whom all kneel must suffer the same degradation. Even as he does it, he rages against the thought of subjecting himself so fully to the whims of the Valar and their Creator. The moment Halbrand came out of his mother’s womb was the moment his fate was sealed. Covered in someone else’s blood, born in the same manner he would live his life. His own royal blood pumping in his veins, consigning him to a future he could not escape.
A future he never even tried to escape. What would be the point? The seer had said it plainly, and Halbrand never forgot: he could not fight his destiny. He accepted it gladly, did everything it took to attain it. The crown of the Southlands sits atop his head like it belongs there, a perfect fit, placed there by the very might of Eru Ilúvatar.
And now, after all he has done in the name of fate, Halbrand is forsaken. Forgotten and discarded. The seer had warned him: and you’re so very alone .
He is, and he despairs. Days blur into one another as he goes about his obligations: prayers in the early morning, meetings that never end about problems that never end, nights where he either sees visions of blood and fire in his sleep or does not sleep at all. His mind is slipping from him, fraying at the edges like his mother’s old tablecloth. Sometimes he wishes the war – no, not the war, the conquest – had never ended, so he would not have time to dwell on mistakes of the past and uncertainties of the future. But most of the time that idea disgusts him, and he feels dirty to even consider it.
He is unclean, at all times. His is the sort of stain no amount of scrubbing can remove.
And no amount of praying, either.
“Guide me, Eru. Show me the right path, and I will lead us there, as I have before.”
No answer.
“I only wish to be worthy of the kingdom I have gained, and to create a kingdom worthy of Your gift.”
No answer.
“Is it too much to ask? A kingdom of order and beauty, where my people are free of the chaos they have suffered for so long? It is said perfection is found only in Your image, but surely you can spare us some, or else what is the point of all this?”
No answer.
“Sometimes I fear Your servant saw not only the beginning of the road, but its end as well. I fear this is all I am meant to be. A conqueror, crumbling under the weight of the throne he killed for.”
No answer.
When his answer does come, it is in a quiet morning like all others.
Halbrand has a full day ahead of preparations: a festival to celebrate the year’s bountiful harvest is near, and the entire capital hangs wreaths of white flowers on their doors for Yavanna. He cleans up the remains of past prayer, scatters the ashes of incense to the wind and feeds the garden soil with the rotten fruits, only to replace them with a chalice of red wine. He takes a little sip before placing it upon the altar, the taste made sweeter by his little act of heresy.
As he begins the same old lines he has for Yavanna, unashamed pleas and hesitant thanks, he hears a murmuring. A melody, growing closer and louder, sung not by birds but by men and women. Voices in unison, chanting lines he can barely discern:
“O Lórien! The Winter comes, the bare and leafless Day;
The leaves are falling in the stream, the river flows away.”
Halbrand stands up, looking around his pavilion, trying to find the singers – they are not in any way trained, voices weak and tuneless, but there are plenty of them. It must be a part of the upcoming festival he is not aware of, some of the many rituals that change from village to village. Yet he is struck by it. O Lórien , they sing over and over again, and something inside of him sings back.
Quickly, he walks to the edge of the garden – his palace, after all, had been built on top of a hill so he could watch over his people always. On the dirt roads that lead out of the capital, meandering behind the castle hill and still in need of pavement, walks a long procession. They are commoners, dressed in plain clothes, dots of brown and beige slowly moving. Each of them bears a light, lanterns or maybe candles, accompanied by endless lines of carts and horses.
Halbrand is not the only one that stops to watch. From the corner of his eye, he spots another immobile figure in the garden, so short he had almost missed it. He startles, breaking out of the trance the song had put him under, before he realizes: it is only the gardener. A man quite tiny for his age, with blond hair, propping himself on his shovel as he looks down to the parade.
“Mr. Gamgee, is it?” he asks, and the gardener’s shovel falls to the ground as the man turns around in a fright.
“Your Majesty!” The gardener bows, blushing and stammering. “My apologies, I will return to my duties immedia–”
“No need. Tell me, do you know the meaning of this parade?”
Mr. Gamgee – Halbrand supposes, at least, that is his name, but he could be completely wrong – looks at him like it is some sort of trick question.
“The pilgrimage to Lothlórien, you mean? Every year they do that, during harvest season, take offerings to the Oracle and ask for her blessing or something. Last few years haven’t been that good for the offerings, so they’re really going all out this time.” Mr. Gamgee’s blush spreads to his ears when he realizes what he said, but as his king remains silent, he keeps talking.
“I’ve never been there, but I know people who did, and they say she can unweave the tangled threads of fate – or whatever that means. And they also say the Lady of Lothlórien glows like a star, because she was plucked from the sky and put on this earth by the Valar themselves.”
Halbrand scoffs. Foolish stories, told by fools to those even more foolish to believe them.
Three days later, he is mounted on the back of a horse, heading to Lothlórien.