Disclaimer: Everything belonges to J.R.R. Tolkien. (except the plot, but you knew that)
-----------
'Mother! Mother!', a children's voice calls, 'Mother, were are you?'.
Théodwyn recognises Éomer, he's now 11 years old, and seemed to have too much energy. Luckily his becoming 11 also meant he now had swordfight lessons, so he could at least lose some of it.
'I'm here', she says. 'In the sitting room'.
A few seconds later, he storms in. 'Mother, you must come to the stables, Rytha is having her foal'. And then he's gone again. She sighs, for a second she'd hoped her husband had come home. He'd been gone for too long now, and she was worried.
She stands up, and as she walks to the stables, she looks out over the plains of Rohan. All she sees were grass and a blue sky, the same as she has been seeing for days now.
In the stables, she sees that the foal already had been born. Éomer looks a bit disappointed, while he was getting his mother, the foal had been born, and now he'd missed everything. But Éowyn, who was there as well, looks exited. Her brother could always do the fun things like sword fighting and now she'd seen something her brother hadn't. When you were 6, the small victories counted most. Théodwyn smiles. 'My husband is far away now, and I don't know if he will ever come back, but at least I still have my children. And they still have there mother', she thinks.
'Mother?' Éowyn starts 'It's a mare, what will her name be? May we give her a name, Éomer and I?' she asks.
'That's all right', her mother answers, 'You two may name her.'
She smiles when her two children start arguing about a name. Éomer may be older and stronger but when it comes to stubbornness, Éowyn always wins. Something she gets from her father. She becomes sad again when she thinks of him, she has never been so certain that there was something wrong. It frightens her that this is affecting her so much.
Éomer's voice takes her out of her thoughts again. With a formal voice he announces: 'This little foal, will now be named Rytholfa'. Everyone in the stables starts to applaud for the name. And then she smiles again, because of the proud and happy look on the faces of her children. She loves them so much.
That evening when Éomer and Éowyn are already sleeping, Théodwyn is still awake and sits by the fire in the great hall. The book she was reading is lying forgotten in her lap, her eyes are set on the fire and her mind is far away. She is thinking of Éomund, again. Every hour since that morning her fear had grown stronger and now she was almost visibly shaking. It was like dark clouds were gathering in her head, the thunder just minutes away. She tries to relax herself by thinking of all the other times her husband had rode out and had safely come back. But as she is doing it, she just knows this time is different. And after a while, when she just can't bare it any longer, she stands op and goes outside. She doesn't even notice her book falling on the floor.
Outside she looks out over the plains, in vain hoping she'll be able to see anything in the dark and takes a deep breath. Then she looks to the sky, just hoping her husband would be doing the same thinking of her. The stars have always been a comfort to her. But her thoughts are soon interrupted by a young guard who comes up the stairs to the great hall. And the moment she sees his worried face, the fear comes back like a big dark wave.
'My lady,' he says 'Your husband and his riders have been attacked by a group of orcs' he hesitates a little 'They all fell in the battle, one of our other patrols found them today'.
And at that moment darkness closes around her soul and her world comes crashing down.
-----------
A/N: This was my very first fanfiction and the very first non-Dutch story I ever wrote. It was originally posted in 2005. I reread it for the first time in years this afternoon, and found I still liked the story, but the English was downright horrible. The only good thing about that: apparently, I'm still learning ;). I revised it today, but if there still are things wrong, (I don't really doubt that actually) please tell me, as this is still unbetaed and I know how annoying errors in spelling and grammar can be.