Esteldin’s outer gate sat silently beneath the hazy afternoon sky, as it had for centuries after the fall of Arthedain. The ruins behind the gate were never completely abandoned after the defeat. The Dunedain of the North had clung to the place for shelter, safety, and seclusion, and allowed the area surrounding Esteldin to return to nature. One had to stumble upon the gate through the trees and brambles to find the ruins.
Cutch noticed a change in the ruin’s approach since being here last, when he’d joined his new bride, Her Ladyship Seregrian, in her expedition to Angmar. The old road to the gate was now mostly cleared. Sounds of the ruins residents faintly drifted out. In his youth, as a ward of the rangers here, he was taught to respect how Esteldin was kept hidden. That practice now seemed no longer important.
He was noticed but not challenged as he rode into the first courtyard. A few older, familiar faces turned toward him from their chores. Many were friendly and most of them offered him greetings, but there were still a few who looked away without revealing their obvious reservations. The younger folks were curious and smiled, but questioned others around them. Cutch returned the greetings he was offered and continued through towards the next courtyard. Looking up at the surrounding walls, he noticed fewer archers than before. They paced along their rounds looking outward, but occasionally in. Their posture was relaxed but still vigilant.
Passing through the second courtyard, he noticed the training fields were still active; archers shot practice arrows against targets and arms men sparred. Their trainers nodded Cutch through to the third courtyard; a few of them he did not recognize but it was not lost on him that they seemed to recognize him. He supposed he was, therefore, expected and his appearance had been known and shared. His grey hair and patched right eye would be distinctive enough for an informed stranger to identify him.
The crafting hall’s double doors were propped open to the outside, allowing excess smoke and heat from the labors inside to escape, along with the sounds of workbenches and forges banging, clanging, and hissing. He did not recall such intense activity on his last visit, nor during his yearlong stay as a man-pup. Perhaps Clay was right; they were casting about for crafters. Cutch dismounted and entered, taking care to not get underfoot, and searched for the author of his brief note, Cardegam, now the Esteldin Guild Master.
At the rear of the craft hall, he spotted the fellow, now grey and grizzled, sharpening tools at a workbench. Without introduction, Cutch stepped quietly beside the Guildmaster and lay the note down where both men could see it. Cardegam glanced at it, then turned to face Cutch. “Well, Crane, you arrived sooner that I expected.” He smiled and offered to shake hands.
As a boy, Cutch remembered Cardegam as one of the rangers who was generally friendly and helpful, but seemed to know more than he was willing to say. Cutch assumed he was one of the Dunedain who knew his real parentage and was probably under the Oath to keep it secret. Cutch accepted his hand to shake.
“Perhaps the secret is no longer useful?”, Cutch asked.
“Not since you met your grandmother”, Cardegam answered, nodding towards Cutch’s eyepatch. “Some of the secret was revealed to you then, but not all. Those who kept the Oath out of respect for your parents were not sure how much to tell you then. But now… well the new king has changed all that. As our Chieftain, he understood the nature of the Oath and its purpose to protect you. But his duties as our king are far greater, and that Oath has outlived its worth.” Cutch remembered seeing Aragorn once in his days with the rangers in Annuminas. They did not share many words, but the Chieftain seemed to look kindly upon him.
Cutch listened but did not speak. The silent moment grew uncomfortable and the Guildmaster continued. “His majesty wants to rebuild the old kingdom and rejoin it with Gondor. All the lands of Arnor and its free peoples. To do this, he intends to raise up all the old Houses of the Dunedain, not as conquerors but as protectors and servants of the people. Among those houses was the House of Macarion, your grandfather.” Cardegam paused to leave Cutch silence to fill as he would.
Cutch replied in a voice at first even and quiet. ““I have a House, and I am devoted to it. It has proven to be the home I’ve always needed, far more than any since I left Wildwood, and far more than any the Dunedain offered. When you took me in, you taught me much but never embraced me as family. Some of you looked upon me in distrust, others in pity, but none of you would share with me the truth of my lineage. It was years before you came to me to reveal that and shared only enough to enlist my aid. Even today, as I once again visit Esteldin, many of you look upon me as you did in my youth and may hold my children at the same distance, perhaps my wife as well. And you dare to ask me to reclaim one of your Houses and its responsibilities?”
At first taken aback by Cutch’s response, Cardegam quickly drew himself up.
“Honestly, Crane, do you not see why the Oath was made and kept? It was to protect you from the wrath that had destroyed your parents.”
Cutch’s voice rose, “My grandmother was insane, Guildmaster, and as many despise ME for it as would protect me from HER. ‘Tainted’, you see, by the blood of an Immortal turned to darkness. And what of my Immortal wife? Would not the same bigotry be placed on her, and on our children?”
Cardegam paused, taking a calming breath. “Yes, Crane, there are a few who are concerned about the possibility that you and your children may carry your grandmother’s hatefulness. Even your father shunned the mantle of the Chieftain of the House of Macarion, out of shame, and many thought he did so out of fear that he, too, could be ‘tainted’ as you say. Elessar understands self-doubt based on ancestral failings, but he has learned that one need not be so bound, that one can choose a different path and create one’s own destiny. Your path has crossed with the Dunedain at several times in your life, and always have you proven yourself to be unstained by your grandmother’s treachery, and unworthy of the doubt your father yoked to himself. The king would like you to restore your grandfather’s House and assist the Dunedain of the North in reuniting of the Kingdom. And I doubt many can question your wife. Elessar has also taken an Immortal of high reputation as his mate. I suppose the real question here is this: Are you a Mortal subject of the King, or an Immortal subject to the Bloodqueen?”
Cutch transfixed the Guildmaster with a stern eye. “I am Cutch Crane before I am anything else, and I do not share the shame you attribute to my father, whom I never knew and for whom I cannot speak. I am Steward to Her Ladyship Seregrian of House Bar-en-Acharn, and although I do not presume to speak FOR Her, I am confident in speaking OF Her. She would look forward to the Kingdom of Elessar flourishing and would endeavor to be a good neighbor. No doubt King Elessar would also accept and return the respect of Her House. As she has been helpful in the errantry and even defense of Her neighbors, I suspect she would offer the same to another good neighbor. I would, of course, support Her in that. If, in the future, the Kings subjects prove their neighborly respect and honor to the House I serve, I would not discourage my children from pursuing their Mortal heritage, should they wish. You may tell Elessar this.”
Crane’s return trip to Bree was uneventful, except that he felt a weight lifted from his heart. He had no idea how this new king would react to Cutch’s response to the royal invitation, but it was good to clear the air, to remove the shroud and lay bare Cutch’s thoughts and feelings on the Dunedain of the North.
“We shall see what we shall see”, he thought.
Once he’d returned to Bree and rejoined his son and their dear friends, Cutch sent a message to Her Ladyship about all that had transpired in Esteldin, closing with, “Mell bereth, Ardanion and I await your call on how and where to proceed next.”
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