King Of All She Surveys
"You may approach." Éowyn's voice is icy like the winds that batter Meduseld with little mercy and less care, and Gríma shudders to hear it. He obeys her command without question, dropping to his knees before her, eyes respectfully cast downwards. "What news from the Westfold?"
"The last of the Uruk-hai are fleeing. With the fall of Sauron and Saruman, they are left leaderless and without direction. Easily dispatched, my lady." A hard thud momentarily arrests his attention, forcing his eyes up; she has brought one clenched fist down on the arm of her throne. Quickly he looks down again, but the damage is done.
"I am not your lady," she says with some heat, hand tapping out a rapid, ill-tempered rhythm that does not bode well. "I am your queen." He bows his head against the sudden violence in her tone.
"Forgive me, my… my queen." The hesitation is barely noticeable. Any of her dim courtiers and thick lords would be unable to hear it, but she is no such fool. He keeps his eyes trained firmly on the small feet resting at the base of the throne. Once she had wandered her uncle's halls barefoot, a maid dressed all in white and gold, her skirts whispering on the stone.
Much has changed since then. Now she is a warrior queen, still dressed in skirts but with her heavy sword strapped to her hip and her feet in heavy boots capped with steel. A shining breastplate protects the heart he has spent so much of his life longing for.
"It appears you require further instruction in the correct manner to address your liege, Counsellor." The boots move, bringing their owner closer to him with every measured, unhurried step.
"I am ever at my queen's service," he informs her legs, and a small, calloused hand takes his chin firmly and raises it to meet her eyes. They are as cold as the stone pressing painfully into his knees, and just as inexorable. At the touch of her hand he is hard already, his breeches suddenly too tight, his breath catching in his throat.
"My service," she repeats, her grip tightening. "And what might that entail, Gríma son of Gálmód?" He could not look away from her gaze for all the treasure in a dragon's hoard; not for the rule of Rohan nor all of Middle-Earth.
"Whatever my lady deems appropriate," he replies, realising too late his mistake. A sharp slap echoes throughout the empty hall, the burning on his cheek beginning only a moment later. Her free hand has struck him with all the force and accuracy she is known for; even here, in her own country, her exploits are still murmured in frightened tones. Awed tones, to be true, but there is fear there as well. He can understand that. He fears her, too.
"Your queen," she hisses dangerously, releasing him, and for a single wild moment he thinks she is reaching for the sword belted at her hip. "I am your queen."
"My queen?" asks a voice through the closed door leading to the hall. "Is something amiss?" She straightens, her hand leaving his chin, and her sudden, terrifying rage is hidden once more behind the cool calmness of the queen. She steps back, returning to her throne and surveying him with the regal stare she has become so known for.
A guard pokes his head into the chamber. "My queen," he says, giving her every inch the perfect courtesy that Gríma himself denies her. "Emissaries from near the Isen. Their crops are failing."
Éowyn sighs, a soft gusty noise, and fixes Gríma with a glare. "Send them in," she says over his head to the guard, her gaze never once leaving the kneeling man before her throne. "Counsellor. Your further education in how to correctly address your queen will be continued," she murmurs as the supplicants file in. "An hour before midnight, in the usual place. Now be gone."
Gríma waits for her in one of the smaller chambers generally reserved for guests in Rohan's sacred halls. This such room is never to be granted to a guest, no matter how lowly or exalted, no matter if kings must make do with a pallet upon the floor. His queen's own chambers are far from here, as are his own; yet he knows these walls as well as the ones he passes his nights in.
These are not extensive chambers. A small room barely large enough to house a bed and a small desk and chair, but what makes them exceptional are by no means the furniture. Rather, it is the unusual ornamental ties attached to the bedposts, the bizarre array of objects set lovingly on the desk, and most of all the presence of one of the queen's counsellors, patiently waiting in the darkness for his liege to appear.
She arrives some twenty minutes after the appointed time. Gríma, who knows her to observe the height of punctuality, understands that this is part of the game they play. He is her servant. To have her wait upon his presence would be unthinkable.
He had seated himself in the small, rather uncomfortable chair, but the moment he hears the swish of her skirts, he is on his feet, eyes on his boots.
"My queen," he murmurs, and a gentle, throaty chuckle is the only reply, for some moments.
"Very good, Counsellor," she says lightly, closing the door behind her. "I suppose you think that mouthing the appropriate cordialities to me now will save you from your fate."
"My fate?" Gríma questions, dropping to his knees as she offers him one slim, dainty hand to kiss. "I was unaware that my being here was of such a dire nature. My queen led me to expect that this evening would be one of education, not punishment."
"With you, Counsellor, they are one and the same. Rise."
She kisses him with a certain brutality, gripping the front of his tunic in strong fists. For a moment he flounders before bringing his hands up to paw gently at her white arms, her bare shoulders. She comes to him dressed in a thin gown that does not qualify as decent even in the hottest of Edoras nights, merely because she knows how it teases him. She must be freezing now, but she does not shiver. His queen, he thinks fondly.
She breaks away from him to growl, "Did I give you permission to touch me?" Despite her words she is meticulously stripping his clothes from him. Tunic, shirt, and finally breeches. Now it is his turn to shiver before her, stripped to his skin in the faint candlelight.
Gríma is not a handsome man, he knows, not by any means. Thin and a little stoop shouldered, almost shorter than Éowyn herself and with the black hair so despised by the fair Rohirrim. Yet it is him that stands now before the loveliest woman in all the lands. With him, not the strapping, strong men of her guard and councils. He does not know if she takes others to bed; the thought renders him sick and ill with jealousy. If his queen's heart belongs to another, he does not want to know.
And yet, he is here.
Completely nude and more than a little aroused, he kneels before her as she seats herself on the bed. "My boots," she commands, and with reverence he unlaces and removes, setting the shoes neatly to the side. "You may," she says to the unspoken query in his eyes when he looks up at her, and immediately he takes one dainty foot in his hands, bending his head to kiss her instep.
He is well aware this fascination with her feet is strange. But then, is he not fascinated by every part of her? Once these bare feet were all he would see of her save her face and hands, and for long years the sight of those unguarded pieces of her were enough to sustain him. Now, to cradle them in his unworthy hands, to bend his head to her as he bends the knee in front of the rest of the world -
"Enough," she sighs, and with regret he sets her foot gently down. While he has worshipped at her altar she has been busy, undoing the laces of her dress. The fabric slides down her chest to pool at her waist, a goddess bare breasted and wild as the tales of old, her hair streaming down.
"Lie down, Gríma."
Obligingly he settles himself on the bed, and she perches on his lap. He feels colour suffuse his face as his hardness presses against her skirts, but his attention is diverted when he sees her reach for the soft ties on one of the bedposts. "No! My queen, please!"
She likes it when he begs, he knows from experience now, but she likes it even more when he fights. Uselessly he struggles against her, arching and bucking in an attempt to throw her off. But she is a shield maiden of Rohan and she has trained for battle since before she was old enough to hold a sword.
"Do as you're bid!" she snaps, dragging his wrist in the direction of the post, and he struggles all the harder. She overpowers him easily, one knee securing his other arm as she knots and ties the material securely. Yanking hard on the bond is futile but Gríma does it regardless, if only to see the light of triumph fill her eyes.
"It will go easier for you if you do not resist," she threatens, and it's this illusion of control, of force that keeps him coming back to her time and again. Once he had dreamed of Éowyn in his bed, as his wife for all of time. But this is far better than some insubstantial dream. He had not known, not until all of this began, how he craved direction, that he'd spent all of his life taking orders. Gálmód, Théoden, the wretched wizard Saruman, and now her. Only, this sort of control was far more pleasant that all the others that came before.
"But Éowyn -"
"Hush," she snaps, now securing his other wrist. "If you cannot keep a respectful tongue in your head, boy, I will find something to put in your mouth." It is not an idle threat, either.
"Forgive me, my queen. I did not think." A softness fills her face, turning her sometimes severe profile to warmth.
"You often do not think," she informs him, tenderly stroking dark tendrils back from his face before moving on to his ankles. "Such a hasty thing you can be." He can feel part of himself retreating, shrinking in on himself. Here in this bed he is no longer her counsellor, no longer anything approaching her equal. Merely the boy - or man - she chooses to bestow her affections and her demands upon. It arouses him beyond measure, almost as much as it gives him a certain sense of relief. Here, all he has to do is obey. The scheming and plotting of the outside world have no place in her arms.
"Isn't that better?" she asks, and though it is phrased as a question it is not, not truly. "Respond, boy."
"Yes, my queen," Gríma replies dutifully, and Éowyn hums deep in her throat.
"You're so pretty all tied up for my own," she croons, snaking one hand down to loosely fist around him. He gasps, and then whimpers. "Like a gift all for me. Don't you know how beautiful you are like this?"
"So you… keep… telling me," he rasps through a throat gone tight. It shouldn't feel this good when she coos to him as though he is a child or worse, a woman.
"I tell you because you are," she soothes, one hand working his cock even as the other tenderly touches his cheek. She is a creature of contradictions, his queen; silk over steel, and sometimes the other way around. "So precious to me. Your surrender is sweeter than the finest wine, my dear Gríma."
A traitorous, unmanful part of him loves these moments. He drinks in her affection like a dog too long without kindness, trained to expect a kick or blow rather than a pat. And yet his desire for her rages further and out of control, and helplessly he squirms and moans as her fist tightens on him.
"Oh, oh," he whimpers. "More."
"That sounded suspiciously like a command, Gríma," she says with a dangerous calm, and he gasps.
"I mean no offence, my queen," he rumbles, voice gone low with need. "But you torture me so. I need you. I beg of you, finish me." At first her brow is furrowed, but slowly the taut line smoothes until no crumple remains.
"Beg, then," she tells him, removing her hand to his dismay. "Beg me, Gríma, and perhaps you will have what it is you desire."
He chokes out a few barely legible words, and a wicked smirk spreads across her beautiful lips. At moments like this, with bonds trapping his wrists and ankles and his queen astride him, he has never loved her more.
"The finest wordsmith in all of Rohan, perhaps all of Middle-Earth. That is what they say of you. Truly, Counsellor, is that the best you can offer your liege?" He shudders, and tries to find the words.
"Please, my queen," he implores, and a harsh light shines in her eyes. He can feel his face colour with shame at the desperation in his voice. "Ride me. Take me for your own. Only do not leave me here without your touch. I could not bear such a thing."
Éowyn considers him for a long moment, head tilted to the side. "Let it not be said that I am not a merciful king," she says at last, and if she notices her momentary lapse, she does not show it. "You beg so prettily, Counsellor. Part of me is loath to grant you what you ask, if only to see you like this for longer. To hear you plead for clemency, the kind only I can offer you." His hands work into fists, and a smile drifts its way onto her face at the sight of his hopeless resistance. A moan breaks from his throat when her gaze slips downward, to the aching flesh that demands her attention, and the smile becomes a smirk.
"You've been such a good boy for your queen." He nods, pants, unable to muster more of a response. "And so respectful. A good queen rewards her loyal subjects."
He groans, long and loud and unashamed, as she lowers her head to lick a broad swipe from the root of him to the very tip.
He had thought, once, that Éowyn would not deign to do this to him, that the submissive nature of the act would bar it from their play. He had thought that, right up until the first moment of her mouth on him, back in the very beginning of their dalliances together. He had laid in her bed, draped in her furs, a golden chain around his throat rather like a collar. He had had the feeling, then, that he was being treated as the maiden consort to a king, adorned in riches and kept to serve at his monarch's pleasure. Then, his queen had touched her lips to every inch of his body until he was squirming and reaching for her as her lips danced ever downwards to where he desired her most. And from the first swipe of her tongue over his hardness, he had understood how undone she could bring him, with barely a touch.
She is a capricious creature here with him, mercurial in her moods even as she is resolute in the outside world.
Within his bonds his legs are twitching, his hips snapping upwards in a desperate attempt to feel more. With a soft sound of contentment low in her throat, Éowyn climbs up the length of his body like a wildcat advancing on her prey.
"Didn't you like that, Gríma mine?" she asks, and he nods. "None of that, now. Speak."
"Yes," he gasps. "Of course I did, how could I not. Your mouth, dear gods, your mouth -"
"Yes, I think you're quite ready," she says as though answering a question inside her own mind, and she parts her legs to fall either side of him. The slick sweetness of her is brushing over him, he is so hard it hurts, and her smile is sharper than a razor. "Call me it," she whispers, her lips against his, her breasts brushing his chest.
"What?" he pants, too far gone for thought, and she gives him a sharp slap on the flank.
"You know what," she replies harshly, moving a little as if to draw away, and he panics.
"My king," he says, and her eyes flare with triumph. One brief motion on her part and he is in her to the hilt, already arching into her wetness before he even realises what she's done. "Oh yes, gods yes. My king, my sweet king."
"Yes," she hisses in reply, leaning forward to rub her most tender part against him, fingers straying down to give her more sensation. "Again. More."
Gríma whimpers against the punishing pace she's set, already so close, knowing to come without her permission will not end well. "Let me," he begs. "King of mine, my only love. Please."
"Come," she orders him. "Come for your king, counsellor - ah!" Her pace quickens, frantically working herself against him and her own fingers, and as her face goes slack with pleasure he too finds his way into the realms of bliss.
"Was I too unkind to you?" Éowyn asks long minutes later, sprawled over him, his arms and legs still restrained and beginning to throb.
"You were not," he replies, tugging experimentally. "But would you -"
"Of course!" Once the need is gone from her she is his own Éowyn again. Still his queen but also his love, his companion, the centre of his world. She sets him free but returns to her place on his chest, curling into his side as his arms press her tightly against him.
"What would I do without you?" she asks fondly, stroking the mussed and sweat soaked hair back from his forehead. He does not need to tell her how he lives for these times when she binds him and controls him, denies him his release until she has taken what she needs. She already knows, after all.
"Never climax again?" he questions drowsily. "My king," he adds teasingly, and she swats him gently.
"Leave off," she orders lightly, and draws a fur up over his skin. "Will you sleep here with me tonight?"
"Always," he replies, and it's the truth.
He'll stay forever, if she'll let him.