The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien [506]
‘So be it!’ said Théoden.
‘How long will it take to pass by the enemy and come back to the road?’ asked Éomer. ‘We must go at foot-pace, if you guide us; and I doubt not the way is narrow.’
‘Wild Men go quick on feet,’ said Ghân. ‘Way is wide for four horses in Stonewain Valley yonder,’ he waved his hand southwards; ‘but narrow at beginning and at end. Wild Man could walk from here to Dîn between sunrise and noon.’
‘Then we must allow at least seven hours for the leaders,’ said Éomer; ‘but we must reckon rather on some ten hours for all. Things unforeseen may hinder us, and if our host is all strung out, it will be long ere it can be set in order when we issue from the hills. What is the hour now?’
‘Who knows?’ said Théoden. ‘All is night now.’
‘It is all dark, but it is not all night,’ said Ghân. ‘When Sun comes we feel her, even when she is hidden. Already she climbs over East-mountains. It is the opening of day in the sky-fields.’
‘Then we must set out as soon as may be,’ said Éomer. ‘Even so we cannot hope to come to Gondor’s aid today.’
Merry waited to hear no more, but slipped away to get ready for the summons to the march. This was the last stage before the battle. It did not seem likely to him that many of them would survive it. But he thought of Pippin and the flames in Minas Tirith and thrust down his own dread.
All went well that day, and no sight or sound had they of the enemy waiting to waylay them. The Wild Men had put out a screen of wary hunters, so that no orc or roving spy should learn of the movements in the hills. The light was more dim than ever as they drew nearer to the beleaguered city, and the Riders passed in long files like dark shadows of men and horses. Each company was guided by a wild woodman; but old Ghân walked beside the king. The start had been slower than was hoped, for it had taken time for the Riders, walking and leading their horses, to find paths over the thickly wooded ridges behind their camp and down into the hidden Stonewain Valley. It was late in the afternoon when the leaders came to wide grey thickets stretching beyond the eastward side of Amon Dîn, and masking a great gap in the line of hills that from Nardol to Dîn ran east and west. Through the gap the forgotten wain-road long ago had run down, back into the main horse-way from the City through Anòrien; but now for many lives of men trees had had their way with it, and it had vanished, broken and buried under the leaves of uncounted years. But the thickets offered to the Riders their last hope of cover before they went into open battle; for beyond them lay the road and the plains of Anduin, while east and southwards the slopes were bare and rocky, as the writhen hills gathered themselves together and climbed up, bastion upon bastion, into the great mass and shoulders of Mindolluin.
The leading company was halted, and as those behind filed up out of the trough of the Stonewain Valley they spread out and passed to camping-places under the grey trees. The king summoned the captains to council. Éomer sent out scouts to spy upon the road; but old Ghân shook his head.
‘No good to send Horse-men,’ he said. ‘Wild Men have already seen all that can be seen in the bad air. They will come soon and speak to me here.’
The captains came; and then out of the trees crept warily other pùkel-shapes so like old Ghân that Merry could hardly tell them apart. They spoke to Ghân in a strange throaty language.
Presently Ghân turned to the king. ‘Wild Men say many things,’ he said. ‘First, be wary! Still many men in camp beyond Dîn, an hour’s walk yonder,’ he waved his arm west towards the black beacon. ‘But none to see between here and Stone-folk’s new walls. Many busy there. Walls stand up no longer: gorgûn knock them down with earth-thunder and with clubs of black iron. They are unwary and