A Day in the Life of a Fountain Guard
by Dominic Pollio

With one final swing, the tree was felled. Tän-nor was thankful he didn’t have to walk an hour down to the Workers’ tier to gather firewood for the steward; there was a good tree at the citadel already. He hacked the tree into a few pieces and moved into the palace of kings.
          Almdíer and Diǧǧion strode into the courtyard, a nice breeze wafted through the cold autumn air. The duo of Fountain Guards looked out towards the east, dark smoke emerged from the Land of Shadow. It was around midday, more smoke emerged than usual.
          “So, same breakfast tomorrow as we had this morning, Diǧǧion?” Almdier queried.
          “Maybe, there was this good tomato place down in the Sage’s tier. Apparently, the Steward gets his supply from there and…” Diǧǧion trailed off. He stared at the stump of the White Tree of Gondor. Almdier followed his eyes to the former White Tree of Gondor.
          “Diǧǧion? Where's the White Tree?”
          “We need to find another one,” Diǧǧion blurted out. Both of the men stood in silence, looking at each other rather than at the stump, trying to comprehend if it was really gone.
          “By the grace of Eru, how in Valinor’s halls are we going to find another White Tree?” spat Almdier, “The tree was blessed by the Valar and one-of-a-kind!”
          “Almdier…”
          “No, don't ‘Almdier’ me. This is an omen of ill portents! The forces of Mordor are marshalling their strength, and this… this is that manifest!”
          “Okay, I know this looks bad…. But I have an idea. You need to find white paint, the same kind that's used by the crafters guild to paint the White Tree on the garrison's shields,” Diǧǧion calmly said, looking over to the staircase down into the lower levels. Before Almdier could respond, Diǧǧion continued, “I’ll find a suitable tree. We need to be back here in around two hours;  we can’t allow the next rotation of guards to know about this,” Almdier was once again stopped before asking a question as Diǧǧion raced down the stairs.
          “We’ll be hanged for this…” Almdier muttered, going the opposite direction.
          After an hour and a half, both of the guards reappeared in the middle of the night. Diǧǧion appeared with a small tree in a pot, still bearing green leaves. Almdier appeared with a bucket of paint.
          “They’re out of white paint, they only had light tan,” Almdier sputtered out, out of breath. Diǧǧion breathed, 

          “That’ll be fine, no one will notice it… Help me rip the leaves off this plant.”
          The two men ripped the leaves off the small plant, placing the twig onto the stump. “You have a brush, right?” Diǧǧion asked, and Almdier’s eyes contracted.
          “We’ll just pour the bucket onto the tree,” Almdier stated plainly. Diǧǧion nodded as they hoisted the bucket into the air, pouring it onto the tree. The two men looked at their masterpiece; it looked like the White Tree, at least at night.
          It was early in the morning. Steward Denethor walked with his son Faramir into the courtyard. Faramir looked at the White Tree. It was decidedly more tan today.
          “Father, I believe something is wrong with the tree…”
          “Boromir would’ve never complained about the tree. Come, boy, we have to get my morning tomatoes,” Diǧǧion and Almdier both breathed a sigh of relief as they peeked out of the breakfast hall.
          “Thankfully, we’ll never see another King of Gondor; if we did have one, the tree would bloom again,” Diǧǧion said with certainty.
          “Yeah, can’t imagine that, why would it happen in 3019 of all years?” Almdier stated, agreeing with Diǧǧion’s statement.