At Amon Hen, the Fellowship does not break cleanly. It shatters. Frodo disappears. Boromir returns alone and shaken. Merry and Pippin rush into the woods. Sam vanishes in another direction. Legolas and Gimli begin searching. Then Orcs descend upon the scattered Company. In the middle of that chaos, Aragorn does something that can seem strange … Read more
Boromir’s Last Journey: When There Was No Grave, the Fellowship Gave Him River, Weapons, and Song Boromir dies far from Minas Tirith. There is no tomb waiting for the heir of the Steward. No company of Gondor to carry him home. No time even for Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli to raise a proper cairn. Merry … Read more
Gil-galad stands at the end of an extraordinary line of Elven kings. He is the last High King of the Noldor in Middle-earth, the ruler who joins Elendil in the Last Alliance, and one of the great figures remembered by the Elves thousands of years after Beleriand disappeared beneath the sea. Yet one surprisingly basic … Read more
Saruman is no longer lord of Isengard when Gandalf meets him for the last time on the open road. Orthanc has been taken from his control. His armies are gone. His staff has been broken. Sauron has fallen. The once-formidable head of the White Council is reduced to a ragged wanderer with Gríma Wormtongue trailing … Read more
At Henneth Annûn, Frodo is confronted with one of the strangest moral choices of his journey. Below him, in the dark water beneath the Rangers’ hidden refuge, Gollum is catching fish. He does not know that he has crossed a forbidden boundary. He does not know that Gondorian archers are watching him. And he certainly … Read more
When Bilbo Baggins finally returned to Bag End, he had survived trolls, goblins, giant spiders, imprisonment, a conversation with Smaug, and the Battle of Five Armies. He had become an Elf-friend. Dwarves knew his name. A king beneath the Mountain had called him friend before dying. And in Hobbiton, people were selling his furniture. That … Read more
When Théoden rides out from Edoras after casting off the influence of Gríma Wormtongue, one problem cannot be solved with horses and swords. Rohan's king is going to war. His son Théodred is dead. Éomer must ride with him. Yet thousands of people will remain behind while Saruman's armies threaten the kingdom. Someone has to … Read more
When Meriadoc Brandybuck rides back into the Shire after the War of the Ring, he is not yet the Master of Buckland. His father, Saradoc Brandybuck, still holds that office. Yet Merry returns as something Buckland has probably never seen before: a hobbit who has served a king, ridden with the Rohirrim, fought on the … Read more
When Eärendil finally sailed into the West, he did not come before the Powers merely as a mariner who had somehow crossed the forbidden seas. Behind him stood an extraordinary convergence of the peoples whose histories had shaped the First Age. His father was Tuor, a Man of the House of Hador. His mother was … Read more
When Prince Imrahil rides into Minas Tirith before the great siege, he does not arrive as the man destined to save Gondor. He carries no reforged sword of ancient kingship, no secret claim to the throne, and no prophecy about his future. He simply brings men. From Dol Amroth come hundreds of soldiers and a … Read more