”Is everything all right?” asked Brunil. She was standing at the kitchen door, watching the old man eat. Brunil was worried for him. The old man looked so frail and weak, yet he ate so little. Maegon had told her very little about their new guest. Brunil only knew that he had been lost in the east, found wandering in the savage wilderness of Ithilien, and now he was sick and his stomach needed to be treated delicately. She had not yet heard about the miracle that took place earlier in the morning in the atrium.
Romenstar looked at her as if she was a ghost. Then it seemed like he suddenly remembered something. His eyes turned down and his lips moved. He nodded at the woman and tried to smile as well.
”Yes, thank you. This is very good, Lady…?”
”Brunil”, she said. ”Please, just Brunil. Let me know if there’s anything you need. You are sick, right?”
”Yes. Sick. Been sick for a long time now. And so much has changed.”
”You came here from some place in the east, right?”
”Yes. From Rhûn.”
”Rhûn.” It did not mean anything to Brunil. ’Rhûn’ was simply a Sindarin word for ’east’, and while it was mostly used in connection of places and people much farther in the east, in this case Brunil interpreted it as a confirmation to what Maegon had told her – that the old man had been found wandering somewhere in Ithilien. ”I have a friend who’s son was there, you know? Served with the Rangers for a time. He was never the same when he came back. A terrible shame, that, and such a handsome boy he was. Now the poor lad spooks at his own shadow, lives with his mother and sleeps with a rag doll, or so I’ve been told. Such a shame.”
”I’m so sorry”, Romenstar said, as if Brunil had told him of someone who had just passed away.
”I told Cuguwi yesterday, that’s my friend’s name, I told her that…”
Brunil was interrupted by Martun as he entered the kitchen. Brunil glanced at him suspiciously. Martun was a handsome young man but there was something crooked about him. Was it his eyes? Were his eyes crooked? No, it was something else about him that was not quite right, his color or the way he looked at you when he talked to you. But there was definitely something crooked about that young man!
”Romenstar?” Martun asked. ”Are you quite finished?”
”Yes, I am finished”, Romenstar said, looking like a man about to face an unpleasant chore. ”Thank you again, Brunil. It was very good.”
”No meat”, Brunil said. ”You shouldn’t eat meat until your stomach is better. Meat is for the healthy.”
”Good”, Romenstar said, smiling at Brunil. ”Ready when you are”, he said to Martun.
They went into one of the libraries and sat at a table, facing each other.
”Last night you were too tired to talk”, Martun began. ”How are you feeling this morning?”
”Better. I have more strength in the morning.”
”Very good. I wanted to ask you about…”
”What then?”
”This morning. About what happened this morning.”
”What about it?” Romenstar asked with a faintly mischievous glimmer in his blue eyes.
”Well, we can get to it later.” Martun fell silent, staring at his hands. He did not want to upset the old man. He had to tread carefully.
”Romenstar”, he said after a while.
Romenstar did not react to that. He waited because he knew he was being interrogated. He could see through all Martun’s tricks, like he had seen through the tricks of the Rangers. And the tricks of the others before them, during his hundreds and hundreds of years in the East. He had seen so much.
”The Rangers of Ithilien kept you in their custody for weeks”, Martun pressed on. ”Obviously they wanted to learn great many things about you.”
Romenstar’s body began to bend and shrivel as he sat there opposite to Martun. ”Yes”, he said, and his hands began to shiver and tremble. ”I told them everything.”
Martun looked up sharply.
”Everything? What means everything?”
”Nothing. They wanted to know more than what I could tell them. I don’t know what they wanted, but they did not seem pleased with my answers.”
”Then why did they let you go?”
Romenstar stared at him. Through him. They both felt the oppressive silence of the library wrapping around them like a cloak. ”I don’t know.”
Martun pressed his fingers against the table. ”Last night I told you I was an emissary of Isengard – of Saruman. You said nothing to that. But you do know who Saruman is?” Martun could not keep a faintly pompous tone away from his voice.
”I know who he is”, Romenstar admitted. ”At least I thought I did. A long time ago. I’m not so sure anymore. So much has changed.”
Martun stared at him. ”What are you?” he asked.
”A man, just like you. And maybe the lesser man of us two.”
”What happened? Where have you been? Where is…” Martun hesitated. ”Where is Morinehtar?”
Romenstar smiled at that. It was a slow, wistful smile, the smile of a child when the pain has ended. ”Everything happened as it happened”, he said after a long pause. ”There is so much to know, so many who want to know it all.”
Martun stared at him. After meeting him last night Martun had thought he would be easy to crack. The old man was so weak and frail and seemingly addled. His movements were fumbling, as if he could collapse at any time. Had the Rangers done something to him? Or had he been like that all along? Had the Rangers broken him on the first day or the second? What had they been able to learn from him that Saruman should also know about? Saruman had given Martun’s secret instructions at the last moment. Saruman had told him of the urgency concerning everything about Romenstar. When he had seen Romenstar for the first time he had been sure he was too late. He had been sure that Romenstar had been broken, that he had already told everything to the Rangers. Now he understood that the man was not at all as weak or addled as he pretended to be.
”You must tell me everything”, Martun said. ”You are a member of the Istari, and Saruman is the First of the Istari. Saruman the White. You owe him your allegiance.”
”I am the Fifth and the least of the Istari”, Romenstar agreed, ”and as such I would owe my allegiance to the First of the Order. We were sent here to aid the Free Peoples against Sauron, you know?”
”Why would the Rangers of Ithilien want to keep you in their custody?”
”We were sent here on the Middle-Earth to help the Free Peoples against the rise of Sauron. That is our purpose”, Romenstar repeated, ignoring Martun’s question. He stood up slowly and his body seemd to bend by the weight of his thin flesh as he leaned on his staff. He walked across the ugly patterned carpet to a bookshelf and stared at the backs of the books.
”We are dealing with the real world here”, Martun’s crude words broke the silence in the room. ”You are a sick old man who has – for reasons known only to you – decided to return to the West. At this moment I am not speaking for myself, I am speaking on behalf of Saruman the White. By the authority bestowed upon me by the First of the Istari I command you to obey me. I command you to be silent of all these things to all other authorities. I have already spoken to Maegon about this. I command you to tell me everything you have told to the Rangers and everything you have kept from them, everything that you know and everything that has happened to you.”
Romenstar’s tremors were getting worse, he was unable to control his body now. He was bending again, his back was burning with pain and his legs were getting numb.
”Romenstar!” Martun’s voice was sharp, alarmed. ”Are you all right?”
Romenstar looked up and around the room wildly. ”Yes, I’m all right.”
”I don’t want to cause you pain…”
Romenstar smiled. ”You don’t cause me pain. Nothing pains me anymore. I have only memories of pain.”
”I would like to return to Isengard as soon as…”
”I asked Maegon for a journal last night”, Romenstar interrupted. Weariness had crept into his pale face. ”A diary. I realize there will be no peace for me…” He looked at Martun. ”In a while, but you must be patient. Everything will be in the diary and then you can leave me alone with my pain. Everything you want will be in that book.”
”Is that why you returned?”
”What? To report to Saruman?” A smile of immense pity spread upon Romenstar’s face. ”Oh no. The matters of the Istari don’t concern me anymore. Nor the Free Peoples.”
”Then why did you return?”
”Because…” Romenstar smiled, but the smile was not directed at Martun. He was smiling at his own private thoughts. ”Because otherwise there will be no peace for me. I don’t want anything but the pain to stop. I’m in constant pain now, all the time.”
”I could ask for Maegon. Maybe…”
Romenstar laughed. ”It’s not that kind of pain. My pain is new each moment, like I was cursed with it. Cursed to carry it until my duty is done.”
”Romenstar!” But Martun didn’t now what to say now. What could he command now? Don’t be so crazy? Don’t feel pain?
Saruman had told him everything, or so he had thought: ”Romenstar might have a secret. Or nothing at all.”
What was it that worried Saruman so? What had he kept from Martun?
