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the passing of the grey company 1023
‘Thus spoke Malbeth the Seer, in the days of Arvedui, last
king at Fornost,’ said Aragorn:
Over the land there lies a long shadow,
westward reaching wings of darkness.
The Tower trembles; to the tombs of kings
doom approaches. The Dead awaken;
for the hour is come for the oathbreakers:
at the Stone of Erech they shall stand again
and hear there a horn in the hills ringing.
Whose shall the horn be? Who shall call them
from the grey twilight, the forgotten people?
The heir of him to whom the oath they swore.
From the North shall he come, need shall drive him:
he shall pass the Door to the Paths of the Dead.
‘Dark ways, doubtless,’ said Gimli, ‘but no darker than
these staves are to me.’
‘If you would understand them better, then I bid you come
with me,’ said Aragorn; ‘for that way I now shall take. But I
do not go gladly; only need drives me. Therefore, only of
your free will would I have you come, for you will find both
toil and great fear, and maybe worse.’
‘I will go with you even on the Paths of the Dead, and to
whatever end they may lead,’ said Gimli.
‘I also will come,’ said Legolas, ‘for I do not fear the Dead.’
‘I hope that the forgotten people will not have forgotten
how to fight,’ said Gimli; ‘for otherwise I see not why we
should trouble them.’
‘That we shall know if ever we come to Erech,’ said
Aragorn. ‘But the oath that they broke was to fight against
Sauron, and they must fight therefore, if they are to fulfil it.
For at Erech there stands yet a black stone that was brought,
it was said, from Númenor by Isildur; and it was set upon a
hill, and upon it the King of the Mountains swore allegiance
to him in the beginning of the realm of Gondor. But when
Sauron returned and grew in might again, Isildur summoned