Addabellia stepped quickly through the portal to the main room, her full, elaborate skirts held in her hands. She paused, her steps faltering, when she recognized the man.

Ellrohir had done simply as his grandfather had commanded-he'd told the young woman that they'd a visitor and asked if she could join them. Visitors weren't frequent occurrences, and all but strangers were welcome. She'd not asked who or what, she'd simply brushed off her skirts and done as bidden. Much to her detriment.

"You've led me a merry chase," Faramir said flatly, still removing his travel garb. He slapped the glove he pulled off against his palm, then handed both to the waiting elf.

Addabellia's chin came up. "You needn't have bothered," she began.

"I think I did." He strode to her, his face set and angry. "Someday you're going to react without thinking and someone's going to get hurt from it-and I don't mean your foolish, stubborn pride!" he snarled, taking her chin between his fingers. "You couldn't wait one more minute? Heard one more sentence?"

"You made your point-clearly and irrefutably-my Lord." She jerked away, spinning to look out the window.

"You heard only one thing and without further discussion you decided you understood what you'd heard. And you fled."

"I left. I am free to do so."

He nodded, aware of the renewed presence of her elven brethren in the room.

The child running into the room distracted them both.

"Papa!" he called, the dark-haired angel. He looked very much like Adda's young cousin with his shiny curls dancing almost to his shoulders. With such a golden father and such a fair mother it was a wonder that the darker genes of his forebears had been allowed to play dominant. He looked as if he belonged here, with this race of people.

"I missed you!" Faramir called, ducking to pick him up, swirling the child as he hugged him tightly to his own body. "Oh, I missed you," he said again, growling the words against the child's soft neck.

Rahgi giggled, clutching the man, but already looking at the woman who had worshipped him since his very first breath.

"She gave him to me," Adda said softly, stepping to take the boy when he gestured for her. "I had every right-"

Faramir cut her off. "I did not question your right to take him. I hope that he's brought you comfort. I know that he would have been disconsolate without you all these months."

Rahgi didn't bother to listen to the adults. His mind had already wandered elsewhere and he was studying the play of sunlight on the dust motes beaming from the high windows.

Adda pretended not to listen as well. She stepped to the low sideboard and poured water from clear crystal into a wrought metal cup. This she handed the little boy before gesturing with the pitcher toward the man.

"Yes, please. It's been a long journey. Four months I've chased you, Addabellia."

"Your brother made better time when he sought Lord Elrond."

"My brother didn't have to backtrack quite so often I'd guess."

She smiled smugly. She'd hidden her trail well. She'd not wanted company at first and had ridden along rocky mountain tops and through flowing streams before enlisting the aid of the trees of Fanghorn.

"I needed a retreat. I would never have left without saying goodbye."

"No, no, your initial destination was the first of many blows," he agreed, accepting the crystal goblet before reclining in an elaborately carven chair. His son came to sit on his knee, Adda giving him over with no qualms. Faramir indulged in sniffing the boy's hair. Whatever concoction Adda used on the children, the scent always reminded him of home. Of comfort and rest and peace. "I thought you'd have ridden to Galadriel's people. You used to travel there often. I made Lothlorien in two days to find an empty hall and no sign of you. No sign of anyone in quite some time-it was overgrown. I wasted several hours hacking my way in, searching bower and nook and hall for you. Only to return home and find that the reason I'd found no trail was because you'd taken the travelled road."

She shrugged. "I didn't ask you to follow me."

Faramir's eyes flashed and his tone went sharp again. "The hell you didn't! You'd take a lash for me, but you wouldn't think that I'd follow when you ran from me?"

"The point seems moot, sir. You'd made your feelings quite clear. I needed some distance for my own peace. What right had you to expect me to beg permission of you, my lord?"

Rahgi sat up and frowned. Adda shut her eyes, regretting the sharp words that had disturbed the child.

"Go find Wrenham, little one. See if he has any bark that we might use to make boats," she told him. "I need a few minutes of your father's time, then we'll play with you. Yes?"

Raghi's smile bloomed again. He nodded. "Yes, Adda. Yes, Papa." The little boy squeezed the man's hand where it rested on the chair's arm before running out of the room.

"He does everything at a run," Faramir observed.

She nodded.

"Do you worry that he'll hurt himself in these stone halls or fall from a balcony?"

She arched a brow and shook her head. "These halls are of no harder stone than those that he's grown up in. And I daresay the healers are superior."

"I meant no insult. I referred to our homes in general. As opposed to a crofter's hut where the beds are scented of hay and the floor is soft dirt and a play yard is no farther than the nearest vegetable patch."

"A pretty picture," she agreed, turning away from him again. "Fat, happy babies clutching at their mother's skirts before being bathed and put to bed. A family of love, if not monetary wealth."

"You've always had both, Adda," Faramir chided. He knew her legacy. If Aragorn's half-sister had been orphaned early then at least she'd had her father's people to raise her.

She nodded. "I was blessed. Your children know both as well. They don't lack."

"They miss you. More so perhaps than they missed their own mother."

She nodded. "They will adapt. I cannot go back, Faramir."

"I'm going to ask you to reconsider that position."

"Not yet," she told him, turning to leave.

He reached out, catching her wrist. She never wore such elaborate gowns when she travelled to his home. Rarely wore them in her home. It was here, in the halls of her elvish bloodline, that the lush materials and draping designs seemed right on her. The gowns made her appear much more lush and womanly. He approved.

"I have to go back soon," he ground out. "Months I've left my people while I tracked you from land to land. A woman all alone with a small child and a good mount. Would this really seem so damned hard to notice? Any woman but you and tongues would have been loosened. I saw the moments of doubt in their eyes, Addabellia. You asked them not to speak of seeing you, but didn't tell them who would be seeking. They didn't expect me."

"Of course they didn't expect you, Faramir." Her eyes stayed locked on his hand on her arm. "I didn't expect you. I needed time. Distance. And the water and the grass and the wind before I needed my trees. My heart-sister understood that when I went to her. Just as she knew that it would frustrate my brother. It was his minions I expected."

"Have you written to them?" he asked.

She nodded. "Of course. And I've sent missives for Arwen to give the other children."

"My children or hers?"

"Both," she smiled up at him. "You should have gone home. Your worry would have become foundless."

"And my heart?" he ground out.

"You sought my brother's forgiveness and you found it. Would have found his understanding even without punishment," she accused, remembering the gasps and tightness of his body as he'd wrapped it around her lest she feel the sting of the lash. "What purpose did your self-flagellation have if not to rid you of your misery?"

Faramir brought his free hand up to her cheek. "One more sentence, Addabellia. One more before you'd run from that room. Even with the kingsfoot a man takes time to heal. I could hardly chase you down that very moment-especially when there were private words that should have been spoken between us."

Tears burned her eyes. "You could have spoken them! You had time before my brother arrived!" she hissed. She jerked against him, her hand coming up to clutch at his. The tears fell in earnest now. "I didn't want anything from you. I asked for nothing! And you went to him! You were ashamed!"

"I'd taken another man's sister to my bed, Addabellia!" Faramir cried. His hands caught hers again and he drew her up sharply. "A friend, Adda! A friend's child-sister! Without words of love or fidelity or even permission from him to court her I'd bedded her. And, by all the gods, I was half drunk when I did. Yes! Yes, I have guilt! It is right that I do so. You will not twist that!"

"You are the one who told him! You went to him instead of me! Do you know how I felt when you were announced? Then to hear his man call for the whip! Damn you, Faramir!"

"I needed to lance the bad so that I could move on. No-I didn't expect that, didn't ask for it. I sought to confess my sins so that I could begin to make them right."

"He wouldn't suggest-"

"He didn't," the man spat. "He asked me what would have been done under my father-if one of our men had behaved thusly with the daughter of a friend and ally. I told him that my father was fond of lashing. But that not even the ten strikes he commonly pronounced would make up for what I'd done. Not ten times that, not a hundred times that. He sent for the whip I think more out of humor."

"He was angry."

Faramir snorted out a laugh. "His sister was newly come of age when she found herself in love with a married man, a man twice her age. Then, just a few years later, that man confesses that he had robbed her of her innocence in a vile and unthinking way. Hell, yes, Adda. Yes, he was angry. Betrayed."

"By both of us. He's never seen me as more than a willful child."

Faramir still held her arms trapped against his chest. He stared down into her unblinking eyes. Like violets they were, dark and so blue as to appear purple. "No, Adda, by me."

"I grew tired of waiting for you to notice me."

"I'd noticed you. I'd chosen not to act on it. It is unseemly for a man my age to-"

"Unthinkable. Unseemly. Unfaithful. I heard you before, Faramir. Believe me when I say that the months have not softened my hearing or understanding of the words."

"You loved her, too," he said quietly, releasing her when she would turn away.

"I did," Addabellia whispered over her shoulder. "As a friend, as a sister, as a second mother."

"You were so young when she died."
"So were you. So was she. But she saw what was really in me."

He nodded. "She knew you loved me. Knew you loved my children."

Here she scoffed. "I was hardly secret about it then. My affection was marked by everyone."

"I don't want you to think that I-"

"I have no expectations of you, Master Faramir."

"I love you. I loved the child you were. I loved the foster mother you became when my wife laid my son in your arms rather than mine. I loved the warrior princess who fought beside my men. I loved the sweet poet who sang them to sleep. And I fell in love with the laughing young woman. It is hard for me to reconcile the thoughts I have when I see you now to what you once were."

"Fine, Faramir," she snapped. "I won't come to you again."

He jerked her around. "I know it. It is why I've come to you," he told her, pressing his lips down on hers. His kiss was rough, crushing. He opened not her mouth, simply weighed his lips with all that he'd felt-the awakening, the desire, then the regret to be followed so quickly by the pain and the fear and the despair.

"You had the trees move while I was in there, damn it!" he muttered into the air they shared.

Her damp face lifted to his and curse her if she didn't laugh at him. "I did. Treebeard can be devious of mind when given proper motivation. He hates drama."

"While I was in there! One of them could have stepped on me! You purposely sought to confuse whatever riders followed you! Then you rode along that stream and came out on the rocks! I went back to Rohan! Eomer laughed while I searched every barn, every stable for your horse's tack!"

She giggled, then drew a long face. "I'm afraid you'll be a laughingstock, my lord."

"You're going to make up for it."

She shook her head.

"The guilt I felt was not in bedding you. Arwen told your brother what you heard. I offered him no apologies for my behavior, only for the timing of them. I should have been careful with you, small, precious, and innocent. Our first night together should have been one of scented candles and moonlight and sweet wine and rose petals on soft sheets. The last thing I should have done was hold you beneath me when my head was gone with ale. That was my regret, Adda. The cancer in my mind these past months was that I hurt you, when you had come to me in trust and love. That I hadn't told you of my own heart. That I hadn't warned your brother."

"He lay with his wife decades before their vows," she argued.

"You've not even been around for decades and I'd marked you before you even had a chance to entertain other men. Not to mention the fact that my wife had made you a mother long before your time. Your childhood was marked by war. Your girlhood by tragedy and then responsibility. And I misused your adult consciousness before you even had time to bloom into it."

Adda didn't look at him. He saw the shudder of her shoulders and knew she cried, but still she didn't turn to him.

"Oh, God, Adda," he moaned, stepping to her, resting his hands on her upper arms and dropping his face to her hair. "What have I done and what can I do now? Please don't leave me like this. I ache inside. Every fiber of my being hurts with sickness. I want you to come back with me. We'll start over. We'll try it the normal way. I'll announce a betrothal-"

She shook her head. "I cannot go back."

"Why?"

"I won't. I'll stay here and raise my children here. The way is open. The ride through is one that should only take a few weeks, not months. You may see your son often."

Faramir sought to comfort himself. He lowered his arms, dropping them to drape around her waist so that he could feel the warmth of her body. His voice was a husky whisper when he spoke. "The last time I held you like this I sought to protect you. The thought of the leather tearing into your soft flesh brought me more pain than the actual lashes. What pains you now, Addabellia? What do you continue to seek here that you cannot find with me? I'll protect you, sweetling. I'll marry you before we return if you want. But I cannot abandon my people forever, and I cannot live through another broken heart."
She sobbed instead of answering. He turned her, tucking her head against his shoulder while he murmured nonsense words and begged her to forgive him and pleaded with her to help him understand.

He felt the long, slim hands that caught him closer to her. Felt the comfort her body received in him. In knowing that it was him standing before her.

"Adda!" a voice called.

Faramir turned. The woman ducked her face to wipe at her cheeks before lifting her face to the wizened one. The elf-witch came forward, taking her hand to pull her away from Faramir.
"You'll get too overwrought, my sunlight child," the woman chided. "Come, come calm yourself."

"Wait!" Faramir called, taking a step toward her. "I need-"

Telson lifted her brows at him. "You need to find your son and take him home. I will care for Adda and her child."

Faramir frowned, his head coming back as though struck. "What?"

"Tel," Adda murmured.

"My child?" Faramir hissed. His chest rose and fell. "You carry a child-you took my son and ran, knowing-" He paused, acknowledging that Adda was shaking her head. She wouldn't have known yet. "But you didn't come back?"

She shook her head again. "What was I to say? Would you have let the child go, knowing that I'd been an innocent when I'd come to you? Do you think I would trap a man that way? Like a beast with no choice but to submit to the will of those who practice animal husbandry? A shame to my brother's legacy?" She shook her head. "I'll stay here, Faramir."

"The hell you will." He reached for her, shoving at the elder's hands. "Did you not hear what I said?"

"I'm carrying a child, Faramir! How do you plan to explain that? The mysteries of childbirth are not unknown to the realm of Gondor!"

"You're carrying my child! Even if I didn't love you I'd strap you to a damn wagon if I had to in order to take responsibility for that child! You think this baby is a curse? Gods, Adda! This baby is ours. Mine. Just as you will be."

Adda shook her head. "You have no understanding of this. Aragorn will know. More than he, everyone you passed, everyone I passed. How can I go back?"

Faramir took her in again. "If you love me you will do this for me. Wed with me here, now. Then come back to me. And promise me to always come back to me."

"I'll go for the masters," Telson promised, scurrying away.

"Tel, no!" Adda cried. Faramir watched the deep breath she took lift her breasts. Her hands fisted at her sides. "Damn it," she muttered beneath her breath. "They won't listen to a word I say..."

To his utmost surprise she reached for his hand and took off after the older elf.

"What is going on?" he asked as he trotted behind her through the winding passages. He'd never been here before but had heard tales of it. Lothlorien was more familiar to him, but even that not much. More frequently had he visited his wife's childhood home in Rohan, sometimes even taking the eldest child of the house of Gondor with them after his wife's death four years hence. There he'd feel secure and confident. Here he wondered if he'd ever find his way out again if she left him alone.

"My uncles-they're the rash type," she panted.

"Your grandfather is one of the wisest beings of any race to ever walk this earth," Faramir argued. "He'll temper them."

"You think he'll get the chance if Telson goes to Ellrohir and Elladan first? Plus Ellodan's wife-Afir is-"

She stopped abruptly and Faramir bounced into her.

"Afir is what?" the she-elf asked, standing in the crossways. Her arms were crossed over her breasts. Even in the deep sea-colored gown with its long, flowing cuffs edged in silver lace she was formidable.

"Charming, sensible, and rational," Adda warned the other woman.

"That she is. This is the human?" she asked.

Adda closed her eyes.

"He man-handled you, now he chases you through our forefather's halls? He wishes to take the baby?"

Adda had already begun shaking her head. "I dragged him-and since I was the one to go to his be-"

"Move, sister-cousin," Afir ordered.

Addabellia shook her head. Faramir stepped around her.

"Let them eke out their punishment as well." He met the elder's gaze. Her eyes were dark brown-nearly black-and fathomless. She watched his carefully as he held his arms wide, then slowly reached to unbuckle his weapons belt.

"I took her to my bed without leave of her guardian. I was unwise and greedy and selfish when I did so. Then I said something that she misconstrued-something that hurt her."

He tossed the belt to the side where it landed against the wall with much noise.

Afir's brow rose. "You expect me to believe that you'll just stand there while my husband and his brother beat the life out of you for violating our kinswoman?"

Faramir nodded. Both of the women in the chamber saw him swallow deeply.

He turned only his head and looked at Adda. "I want my child recognized. Take Rahgi and yourself and make your way back to Gondor. Call yourself by my name, for I would have you."

"I'm too stubborn to leave you here to this," Adda told him with a half-grin. It melted as the twin brothers clambered into the corridor behind her.

"He's already received his punishment from Aragorn," she began, whirling so that she stood back to back with Faramir. Faramir took her by the shoulders and physically moved her aside.

"Their quarrel is with me, I believe," he murmured in her ear.

"See!" Telson shouted from behind the boys. "See how he touches her! Like any man has a right to touch the daughter of Agratt that way!"

"Forgive her," Adda whispered to Faramir, leaning close so that she could speak into his ear. "My father's mother was precious to her. She's lost almost everyone, but has always found a reason not to go on to the Western lands."

"What punishment did Lord Aragorn mete out for your sins, my lord Faramir?" one of the boys asked. Faramir never had figured out a way to tell them apart at first glance.

"A sentence of one hundred lashes, reduced to twenty."

"You stood for only one-fifth of your penance?" Afir sneered.

Adda rounded on her. "He took twenty. It was more than he should have ever had to receive. More than any man should. Whipping a man is an archaic brutality and-"

"Hush, little one," Afir said softly. She sensed the younger girl getting wound up again. Telson had said that she'd walked in to find Addabellia sobbing uncontrollably. As young and slight as she was, they didn't want to add any further stress to her pregnancy.

"No more," Adda sobbed, turning to Ellrohir and Elladan. Tears broke free again. She put her hands on the man's shoulders and lowered her brow to the back of his neck. "No more."

The elves watched the human's face. They saw his pain and his sorrow. His empathy for the woman behind him. "Wait," he mouthed silently.

Elladan lifted an eyebrow at Ellrohir. Wait. The human was willing to take what they dished out, he was only asking them to wait to do it so that their niece wasn't disturbed. It was hard to hate a considerate asshole. Ellrohir nodded once, slightly, to Elladan.

"Adda, show Lord Faramir where the nursery is so that he might visit his son; I'll have his things sent up to the guest chambers in the second tower."

Faramir had turned, taking Adda into his arms.

"Did it scar you?" she asked through her tears. She'd seen prisoners and slaves who bore the evidence of their master's heavy hands. Twenty lashes sounded not a lot to her kinsmen. She knew what one lash did to human flesh. And Faramir's back had been crisscrossed by the gashes and welts.

"Not badly," he murmured, brushing a hand over her hair. "It's not bad, Addabellia. I promise you. Your brother healed me instantly-you know that. There's nothing left."

She cried a while longer before allowing him to run his hands over her face, then she lifted her lips to his.