In times like this, when he was suspended practically upside-down from a rope harness ten metres above the ground, pulling arrows from the hide of his Mûmak under the twinkling night sky, that Na'Man, Chieftain of Harmindon, thought about his son, Sufyan.

At this moment, Sufyan would be having his evening meal with his mother, keeping her company in his father's absence. More often he would slip away, to visit the herd and play with the calves, or join in the dancing with his friends, and Na'Man and Sawda would smile turn a blind eye, glad that their only child had the chance to taste from the cup of freedom they never had in their war-torn childhoods; but Sufyan's finest quality had always been his steadfast loyalty. His own pleasures would be put aside for the moment, and he would sit with Sawda and fill his father's absence by regaling her with stories and song.

And how glad Na'Man was that Sufyan was there, in the safety of the Ramyah's House, and not with him now! Sufyan was a child still, a child in the eyes of Haradrim law, and though he trained diligently to one day take up the reins of Uthegental and flew fearlessly like a golden hawk from the back on one Mûmak to another, Na'Man was glad his training was not yet complete.

The previous day's carnage had been a sharp reminder of that.

Mûmakil hide was notoriously tough, but the arrows of Rohan were notoriously sharp. Even as he kept still, Uthegental bellowed lowly, deep within his throat, and Na'Man's heart broke over and over again for the creature as he eased out jagged iron tip after tip. He stowed them in a woven bag draped about his hips instead of throwing them down, where they might hit anyone passing below, ready to be reused the following day.

Na'Man pulled himself up slowly, murmuring soft words of praise to Uthegental as he passed by a gargantuan ear, running a grateful hand over the strong hide. The last time the Mûmak had carried him, younger than Sufyan was now, and his father, and his father's father, into battle, was nigh on thirty years ago; and now that Na'Man led the army of Harmindon alone, Uthegental was a steady presence, a reminder and a blessing in one.

Na'Man looked across the field of battle, leaning his elbows on the wicker howdah, curls fluttering in the slight breeze. The same breeze that brought him the faint screams of the injured and dying, the overpowering scent of blood and salt even as the Sea of Rhûn glimmered dully in the moonlight. The field below was dark, but he knew it was stained red, compounded into the muddy brown by tens of thousands of hooves and feet.

He strained his eyes to see the army of Rhûn camped on the far side of the Sea. His awkward meeting some days ago with the Rhûnic captains had done nothing to further any camaraderie between the two armies, supposedly fighting towards a common goal. From his vantage point, he could not see the armies of the West, of Gondor and Rohan, though he could hear them. The whinny of nervous horses, the clank of metal armour as it was cleaned and pulled off the dying and dead. They slept in tents, those Westerlings, adding those elements of permanence and home even to this awful place.

Were they so afraid of the stars?

The Haradrim and the men of Rhûn had one thing in common, at least - on a military campaign, they slept on the bare ground, taking comfort in the blanket of the night sky and cool night instead of dirty canvas and smelly horses. Na'Man looked down at his men below, mostly still awake, though they lay with their headwraps rolled up as pillows and tried to get some rest, small cooling fires dotting their masses at regular intervals. Their Mûmakil were their guards, swaying watchtowers surrounding their camp.

Na'Man would join them, in a while, but he was waiting.

"Abrakhân!" A low voice floated up, and a quick double whistle alerted Na'Man that he need wait no longer. He climbed down quickly, the movements and feel of the rope in his hands familiar and comforting. Na'Man passed the young man who had sent up the call and clapped him briefly on the shoulder before setting out toward the lone figure standing by one of the fires, illuminated by its dying glow.

Chieftain Bakr of Abrakhân saluted briefly as Na'Man approached, turning his hand towards his face, then outwards. "You sent for me, Na'Man Ji-Eleyen?"

Na'Man saluted in return. "Yes, and Tufayl too. My proposition is for both your counsel."

"I admit, Na'Man, I have guessed what troubles your mind," Bakr admitted, his voice a low rumble. His stormy eyes surveyed the sleeping Haradrim, the Sea of Rhûn, the Harmindon Mûmakil wreathed in shadows, and alighted on Na'Man, seeming to pierce his very soul. He straight and solid, despite his many years, and Na'Man remembered him as he was in the Battle of Pelennor, undaunted by the fallen and roaring his command over the horns of Rohan. "I must confess to your confidence - thirty years ago, my Zamira threw herself into my arms and begged me to consider any alternative option than go to war under the banner of the Great Eye. The Golden Serpent would not be forgiving if we fought on the side of darkness. I, like a fool, ignored her pleas, and sent hundreds of my men to their deaths on strange soils in the supposed pursuit of good purpose. We were young, we both had our dreams of what the future might hold."

Na'Man nodded slowly, not wanting to interrupt.

"When I returned from the West, our first daughter was born. I only realised then what a fool I had been. Since then, Zamira and I, and the people of Abrakhân, have been through some equally terrible times, drought and famine and death. But at least we had each other, never wavered from one another's side, gaining confidence in our rule together. This time my Ramyah did not beg me to leave. She knew without saying that I would go to war of I truly believed it to be the right thing." Bakr shook his head, fingering the hilt of his kilij. "I am an old man, Na'Man, and often speak such nonsense. But the sentiment of my speech remains. I cannot lie to myself anymore than I can lie to my wife. My heart does no longer believe in waging war."

"Especially when it is of no gain to us, and Rhûn sees us no better than blood to be spilled in the place of theirs." Their heads turned - Tufayl had arrived, Chieftain of Pazghar, striding to the fire with a glower on his scarred face.

The youngest of the three, Tufayl had very clear ideas and motivations, but Na'Man jumped on this opening.

"Gentlemen, listen to my proposition..."

•●•●•●•

The next morning dawned bright and clear.

When the chieftains gave their order, it spread through the camp of the Chieftains' council like dye through water. Rumours had been running rampant all night, but mostly the truth rang true - the fight was over, at least for them. The Westerling forces were too strong, and - as Na'Man had thought the previous day, a desperate flash of realisation in the heat of battle - they would make far greater allies than an enemy force. The Haradrim would not fight today.

When the hour of battle came, the drivers brought the Mûmakil quietly round by the mountains. It was the pass that brought then through to the desert, the quickest way home. When the Easterling horns rang out, harsh barks like desert dogs, Na'Man, Bakr, and Tufayl simply observed.

From the nearby plateau, they stood in silence and watched the armies tear each other apart. It was one thing to be in the centre of such an awe-inspiring skirmish; they could not even afford to act on complete instinct with so many lives under their watchful command. That heat, that intensity - the back of Na'Man's neck prickled beneath his headwrap as the thunder of the hooves of the Westerling horses shook made the very ground tremble. A sea of metal, flashing in the sunlight, while the Rhûnic spears bristled like spines on a hedgehog. Even before the two armies clashed, a clear winner was predestined.

"I would have brought Wêrankirin down there," Tufayl murmured, pointing to a clear gap in the Rhûnic defence. "Right through that Rohirric vanguard. We would have crushed them underfoot. And I would have signalled Şevder to bring his Mûmak over -"

"Hold your tongue, Tufayl," Bakr said, mildly enough, though Na'Man could feel the tension radiating through him.

That same adrenaline coursed through him now - though he did not speak aloud, he could not help following the Chieftain of Pâzghar in analysing the battlefield. What would he have done here, what about that opening by Gondor's left flank... he shook his head violently. Would it have been so loud, even as he stood upon Uthengental's proud head and led his army? Those shrieks and clashes of steel that rose from the banks of the Sea of Rhûn were like one big colossal storm. Yesterday, it was like he was in the eye of the storm - and now he stood on its outskirts, watching the true range of its destruction.

The end came sooner than expected.

A break came in the Rhûnic line - a gap, so obvious from their vantage point, that even Bakr winced. It was all too clear how much the Easterlings had relied on their tentative Haradrim allies.

It was not surprising, then, that a narrow column of Gondorian and Rohirric soldiers alike, banners flying and horns blowing, finally forced their way through the Easterling defence. Na'Man fancied he could hear the shouts - For Gondor! For Rohan! - clear and true above the shrieks of the skirmish.

"What now?" Tufayl asked, a slight tone of accusation in his voice as the army of Rhûn began to flee, their lines breaking up unevenly across the field even as the Westerling army rejoiced. Their wordless triumph was heard even by the Haradrim, on their plateau.

"We wait," Na'Man said patiently, despite having gone over this plan - and a thousand others - countless times during their sleepless night. "We wait until nightfall, and go to parlay with the Kings of Gondor and Rohan."

This second part of their plan actually went into motion sooner than expected, when the Golden Serpent was just beginning to brush the horizon, releasing rays of crimson and gold throughout the evening sky.

"Give us courage," Na'Man asked it quietly, even as he wrapped his headgear in place and went to join the others at the edge of the camp.

They set off across the field of battle, stained red with blood, mixed into the ground by heavy horse-hooves.

"Do you remember the story of the three priestesses?" Bakr asked quietly. He had hoisted their banner of truce - a rough piece of cloth cut from sun-shade of his wicker howdah, a vast tent spread out over the sides to shield his men from the sun, made as clean as it possibly could be after the previous day's battle.

"Now is not the time for children's stories," Tufayl snapped, hand gripping his belt in the place where his golden broadsword had hung only a few minutes ago. Na'Man insisted they go unarmed, to further the feeling of truce.

"Yet I will tell it," Bakr said, his deep, rumbling voice like a distant thunder. "Many suns and stars ago, deep in the heart of the desert..."

Na'Man knew the story. He'd told it to Sufyan often enough, when the boy was still small enough to sit on his lap and fall asleep to the sound of his father's voice. Three priestesses - one harsh and hot-headed, one mind and easily swayed, the third a peacekeeper between the two. Every story about the three priestesses ended differently, depending on how the child to whom the story was being told had behaved that day. Now though Bakr wove the tale into something optimistic, and even though Na'Man tried to concentrate on the parlay with the kings, he was glad for that nostalgia to give him a hint of courage.

They stopped a healthy distance from the camp. No obvious commotion was being made, but Na'Man knew better than to presume that King Aragorn and King Éomer were not already aware of their presence.

•●•●•●•