Author's Note:

Hello again! Thanks for reading! I apologize to any one who wasted 20 minutes fo their life reading the first draft of this chapter. It was awful. AWFUL! I think this chapter has heart and soul as opposed to the first posting which was basically marching stiffs around a stage. If you see any grammer mistakes, and i think there might be a couple, let me know and i will fix.

Remember if you post a review i will gladly respond.

This chapter is heavy and maybe a little dark. There's a lot of information packed into this chapter also that is crucial to the rest of the story. I tried to be tactful about what happens to Loti in this chapter.

Thanks!

April

Two Years Earlier…

Loti woke hidden amongst the leaves, twigs, and dirt of the forest floor that made her sorrowful bed. Dried leaves tumbled over her face, tickling her cold nose and cheeks. There was no use trying to go back to sleep, she was fully awake now, fearful it was the same thick, black spider that skimmed across her hand two days ago jolting her into consciousness. Making a quick perusal of her person in a panicked fashion, she found no eight legged ticklers this morning. Stretching, she tried to work out the knot in her back from lying on some old knotty root or stone. It was strange how, even after years of sleeping on the ground, she never got used to it. She extended her arms above her head, and lazily gazed skyward between the branches and green foliage of the wooded hills. It was well before dawn, and thick clouds hid any shining gray light from the moon and stars. The tumbling leaves, it seemed, were dusted up by heavy, moist southern winds, announcing the coming of spring thunderstorms that would sweep ferociously over the mountains.

She lay there, prone, listening to the swishing of leaves and twitching of branches in the mature trees above. This far north, isolated, in the pre dawn hours, the breezes almost sounded like waves subtly curling over and breaking smoothly on the sandy beaches near her childhood home. The rich and loamy scented breath of nature felt dense; very different from the light, cleansing, salty zephyrs blown from the oceans in the south.

Even as a little girl, living along the waterfront in Umbar, she had been fascinated by thunderstorms. She and her younger brother, Castamir, would clamor up a gnarly old tree to the roof of their mother's dilapidated townhouse, and wait for them to roll in from the sea. From this highpoint, they could see across the harbor and watch lightning sizzle between the dark clouds burned red around the edges by the setting sun and hear the low mocking rumbles of thunder. There they would wait, until the last seconds before the rain broke, or their mother shouted a furious stream of expletives in a drunken stupor, before coming inside. Looking back, she realized how foolish and reckless this activity had been, as they easily could have been struck by that same lightning she found so entrancing.

Those were good days, simple days, and she was glad to have spent them with Castamir.

Loti sat up, shaking off the leaves, and began digging through her black leather satchel, which also doubled as a poor excuse for a pillow, and found what she was looking for; her hairbrush and her book. She rolled back to the ground with a flounce, resting the leather bound book on her chest under her folded arms, relaxing into the forest floor as if it were a fluffy goose down feather bed.

It was still too dark to read…

Not that she needed light to know what was written on each page.

She closed her eyes, chest heaving with a deep sigh of bucolic idleness.

Loti hadn't known the man who had written the loving poetry in the book- her father. He was like an apparition for most of her childhood, only appearing on the rare occasion her mother spoke of him, in which case, it only increased his mysteriousness and her curiosity. Perhaps she and Castamir had different fathers, but that didn't seem likely, since both siblings had the light brown hair and fair skin that was quite uncommon in the South. She didn't have fleeting glimpses of him in her earliest memory either, so she had been very young when he left, or whatever became of him. She and Castamir were little more than two and a half years apart in age, so she felt it was likely her father disappeared from their lives sometime before then. Her parents must have loved each other dearly to have caused him to write such adoring words, and that oddity made their parting even more vexing.

It was strange to think of anyone loving her mother in such a way. She must have been a different person in those days…

Sitting up again, Loti smoothed a hand down the back of her head, feeling the jumble of knots and tangles, interwoven with crumbled leaves. Reaching inside her black leather coat, she flopped her thick, light brown braid onto her shoulder, loosening it, so it nearly touched the ground. She dragged the brush, with long strokes, through the length of her hair from root to end, knowing it badly needed a proper washing.

Her mother was, quite frankly, a drunken, erratic, irresponsible mess of a whore. From an early age Loti had taken on the responsibilities of the household, cooking, cleaning, washing, shopping, and caring for Castamir while their mother was in the upstairs bedroom entertaining clients. Growing up, men coming and going from the house was as normal an activity to them as eating or sleeping, since mariners had the need for a woman's body after weeks spent at sea in the company of other men. On the unfortunate occasion Loti heard her mother being beaten by an unsatisfied client, she would hide Castamir in the closet under the stairs, and wait vigilantly with a knife or whatever weapon she could find, in case he decided to vent his frustration on the whore's children. Then she would tend to her mother's cuts and bruises, dismayed, knowing it would only happen again.

Maybe, she was too hard on her mother. Perhaps, she wasn't all that bad…

Her mother insisted her children read and write, and Loti learned to play the harp; the one bizarrely extravagant item her mother owned in a household sparsely decorated in basic necessities. Loti fondly recalled being taken to the beach, and playing with a toddling Castamir, building mounds in the white sands and wading knee deep in the crashing sea blue surf.

Satisfied with her hair brushing, Loti dug through the satchel again and produced a handful of leather strings. She parted her mane of hair down the back of her head and fastened two lengthy ponytails with the strings, letting the ends drape over her chest. Each ponytail received a raking with her fingers before being divided in three sections, braided and secured. Shaking her head with a flourish, she flipped the braids behind her and tucked them safely inside the coat. Inside the bag she found a black gauzy cotton scarf and wrapped it around her neck and head. It was traditional for women in the south to cover their heads as a sign of modesty. Women of the northern lands of Gondor and Rohan were under no obligation to wear such things, and she quickly learned, in order to naturally assimilate into their culture, not to wear it openly.

The scarf would serve an entirely different purpose today, though.

Gathering her things, she deftly moved several hundred yards through the woods to the spot she picked out a few days ago. Dumping her things carelessly behind a large boulder on a rocky outcropping that over looked a lush green valley, she sat down against it. Drawing her knees to her chest, she waited for dawn.

Loti had mixed feelings about what would happen today. She had been given a specific two month time frame in which to complete her mission, and now that time was coming to an end. In order to meet her handler in Minas Tirith, it would take nearly a week to walk the Great West Road the fifty leagues, or so, from the Firien Wood in Rohan's eastern Fenmarch. Her procrastination cast serious doubt on the prospect of meeting him on time and with the reassurance the job was completed successfully. That was bad. Even worse was finishing the mission in the rain, wind, mist and fog of the approaching storms.

Killing a man was a dirty affair, and difficult too when he rode with a guard of twenty well trained and armed men; virtually impossible when the target himself was one of the most skilled and fearsome men in Middle earth.

She pressed a cheek to her knees, and shut her eyes.

This was not the life she would have chosen for herself, if she had been given a choice. Left to her own devices, and a normal adolescence, she would have become a healer. Taking care of others, like her mother and brother, fixing their problems, their troubles, their hurts, it gave her life a purpose beyond just mere existence.

But life intervened, forever altering her dreams.

Her mother's thin form burst through the door one oppressive summer day when Loti was thirteen, breathing heavy, a rare look of excitement and sobriety on her face. She dashed up the staircase with the fleetness of a gazelle, leaving her children gaping, and baffled.

Flying back down the stairs, and into the dank common area that served as kitchen, living area, and children's bedroom, she yanked her daughter's hands out of the wooden dishwashing basin.

"Mother! What is wrong?" Loti squealed, distracted from the dishwashing. He mother's irrational antics would hinder her from finishing any chores.

She held a rich, royal blue velvet gown against her daughter, then jerked it away just a quickly.

"Come! You must take a bath!"

She dragged Loti up the stairs, protesting.

"Bath? In the middle of the morning? There's work to do!"

"Today," began her mother, stripping off Loti's linen kirtle and undergown, "You will work no more!"

She spun the naked girl around. Loti's white skin turned red, embarrassed to have her mother's eyes examining the developing curves of her body. Frantically, her mother left the room, returning sometime later with warm water, and forced her in the wooden tub. The older woman shampooed her daughter's hair and washed her body, scrubbing off dirt and years of manual labor. Then Loti sat, wrapped in a linen towel, while her mother combed and pinned her wet hair, and sprayed her liberally with exotic scented perfumes. She had never seen these tiny crystal bottles in the house before and didn't even know her mother owned such expensive fragrances.

After dressing in an undergarment that buoyed her young, small breasts, Loti pulled the weighty gown over her head.

When she finally saw her reflection, she barely knew herself. The dress was too big in the chest and waist and the skirt billowed on the floor. But the square neck and hem of the sleeves were elaborately embroidered in silver and the blue color set her sapphire eyes ablaze and made her unblemished skin appear like porcelain. Her mother fastened a sliver chain belt around her slender hips, scrutinized her appearance, and lightly rouged her daughter's lips and cheeks. Completing the outfit was a pair of oversized, heeled, silver slippers that made walking a challenge.

Loti was dragged back down the stairs and pushed into a chair.

"Mother," Loti insisted, "Will you please tell me what's going on?"

The woman smiled proudly at her daughter, hectically tiding up the house, "Men from the palace are coming! They are looking for new girls at court."

"From the palace! Why on earth are they coming here?" exclaimed Loti.

"They only choose the most beautiful girls in the city. I have told them about you! I told them you were marked by the Valar!"

Breathless, her mother stated definitively, "They will choose you!"

Covering the small mole by her lip with her hand, Loti was taken aback by her mother's confidence.

Marked by the Valar indeed, she scoffed. She was nothing more that a poor, dirty street urchin, not an attractive damsel fit for the court of Umbar.

The woman continued, emphasizing her words, "Girls at court are educated, they have status. You will be able to marry a man of nobility, one who will take care of you. You will have honor! You will have a good life, an easy life!"

"You wish to send me away? What about you and Castamir?" Loti exclaimed, fearing what would befall them if she were not there to carry the responsibilities of the household.

She knelt in front of her daughter and placed a consoling hand on her cheek, soothing her concerns.

When she spoke her voice was reassuring, "We'll be alright. But if they choose you, promise me you will say yes. Promise me. This is the only way out for you."

Loti momentarily considered her options, glancing from the middle aged woman to the little boy playing on the floor.

Was there really that much to think about?

She could stay here on the waterfront and eek out a feeble existence caring for her family with little chance of anything more, or, if they chose her, move to the palace, learn a skill, and wed a man who would provide for her and her family. The former was certainly better in the short term. But the latter could provide for her family, as well as herself, possibly, for the rest of their lives. That was, if her mother could make it three more years, until Loti was of marrying age.

After a short internal struggle she acquiesced to her mothers desires.

"Yes, Mother, I promise."

The men came late in the afternoon to see the girl branded by the divine. They were ushered in the house graciously; her mother offering them what little refreshment they had available. There were five men in total, and all were quite large in height and weight, dark, and finely dressed. She curtsied courteously to each courtier as they looked her over, asked a few requisite questions, and nodded approvingly.

The fifth, a man with giant hands and short, fat fingers, glowered at her sinisterly. His harassing eyes visibly raked her over with what she knew to be a man's unmistakable desire for lust. Loti, unable to hold his gaze, turned her head from his piercing stare, and discomfort swelled in her belly from his blatant mental undressing. As the daughter of a prostitute, she was not unknowledgeable about men, and knew when one was not worthy of trust, and this man certainly was not.

When her mother was distracted, he approached, his towering height bearing down on her small figure. One of his fat fingers traced the line of her collarbone and slid under the neckline of the dress. The finger moved against her skin until it reached the crest of her breasts. Then he pulled the dress open sharply, exposing her tender flesh to his immoral ogling. She struck his hand abruptly, clutched the gown's flaccid velvet fabric closed around her chest, and found the courage to meet his eyes in outrage. For an instant, Loti thought he would strike her with an insolent slap, as his face turned hard and ridged. But, instead, he appeared amused, smiling and chuckling to himself.

To his friends, he said contritely, "She'll do."

After gathering a few minor necessities, Loti knelt and hugged her only friend and brother, hoping he had the strength to be the man of the house. The hug she received from her mother's thin arms was crushing.

Pulling back, Loti noticed she held a book in her caressing hands.

"I want you to have this," she said, her voice was shaky and her eyes were full and glistening, "Your father made it for me. You will find a good man…One who will love you."

Tucking the book safely under her arm, Loti said nothing, too swamped by the suddenness of everything.

She turned Loti by the shoulders and ushered her out the door.

"Go now!"

Then she was led away from the only home she had ever known.

She was led away to new life.,,

A life she knew nothing about, by men she had just met, to a place she had never seen.

In the hazy afternoon sunlight, she turned in a daze for one last look at her family. Castamir stood silent, expressionless, and more stoic than an eleven year old boy should ever look, obviously overwhelmed by the day's life altering event. Her mother was crying, tears of pride and joy streaking her lined cheeks. A sob suppressing hand covered her mouth as she happily waved goodbye to her only daughter.

The City of Corsairs was quite large, with a maze of narrow, dirty streets filled with all types of questionable personages. It was dusk when they arrived at a compound in view of the palace, surrounded by a high stone wall, of a size Loti had never believed possible. The courtyard was quite long and wide and void of any decoration or landscaping she might have expected. Naively, and without question she followed the men into the huge stone building at the far end of the courtyard. Inside, she found it very bleak, dark, and barren, devoid of any motion or natural light. The stone insulated the structure from the searing heat of summer, and she shivered from the contrast in temperature, but also from apprehension. The same disquieting feeling she felt earlier wormed it way back in to her middle and looped around her heart.

None of this was right.

After wandering down circling stairs and along a torch lit hallway, a weathered oak door was opened and she shown into a windowless, unlit room. Her guide lit a candle and exited the room wordlessly. The room was sporadically decorated with an ancient table, two chairs, a night stand and wooden bed with satisfactory bedding.

Loti waited for several hours, sitting cross legged on the bed, reading her new book by the dim flickering light of the candle when she heard the latch on the door. Four men entered the room; one of the men was the rude, fat fingered ogling man, and the other three she had never seen. She was keenly aware that her suppressed apprehension and intuition had been correct when Fat Fingers approached. It was very clear the intruders had lust in their eyes and rape on their minds.

She leapt off the bed and shuffled back to the wall, flattening herself against it, as though she was trying to slither between the cracks in the stone blocks.

"Stay away!" she warned with an outstretched hand, but Fat Fingers came still closer.

Frightened to the point of sickness, Loti made a wild dash for the door, slinking between the bed and Fat Fingers. She was nearly out of reach when his long muscular arm tied around her waist and clutched her to him like a prize. Writhing and screaming, she felt his hot breath and tongue on her earlobe.

"Go ahead, I like it better when you fight," his whisper assured brutally.

His free hand smoothed over her shoulder and down her chest, fondling roughly inside the dress. A rebellious cry escaped her lips as Fat Fingers tossed her on the bed and then fell on top of her, pressing the breath from her lungs. Loti scratched and clawed at his eyes and neck, but her struggling only increased his excitement. Two of the men held her arms, while the remaining man watched with heated intensity as she lay pinned helplessly to the bed. Fat Fingers gnawed at the softness of her neck while forcing her legs apart. He freed himself, and his vile oily hands lifted the skirt to her waist. Loti began to sob in choking anguish at the impending loss of her youth and innocence as her attacker whispered wicked words in her ear.

"You're a tease, and a dirty whore, aren't you? No man will want you now! You're mine!"

At last, he exerted ultimate control over his victim destroying her pure, absolute beauty in one horrifying motion.

She screamed until her voice was raw, praying someone would hear and rescue her from this bodily torment. But none came.

Each man took his turn, systematically deflowering her, painfully plucking each tiny, bright petal and grinding it deliberately and cruelly between his nameless fingers.

The next morning, she waited by the door for them to return. Upon hearing the lock loosen, she hefted one of the chairs and swung with furious force at the man who walked through the door. The stroke found the man in the chest and he collapsed to the floor with Loti and the shattered chair. Unfortunately, Fat Fingers was behind the first man, and he wrenched her to her feet with a thick handful of brown hair, hauled her out into the courtyard, and savagely kicked her until she coughed blood and lost consciousness.

Before passing out, sprawled on hands and knees in the hard dirt, she raised her head.

To her horror and astonishment, as many as twenty other girls returned her petrified stare.

Had they experienced the same perversity she had? By the look of defeat she saw in their eyes, Loti knew they all shared the same violations and fate.

What kind of place was this? Who would do this to them?

Time moved excruciatingly slow in the isolation of her room, and weeks past before she learned her purpose for being taken.

Loti would spend her life working for Umbar and its Lords as a spy.

There would be no promised life at court. That was only a tactic, a brilliantly devised story, to lure the most beautiful girls away from their families.

And Fat Fingers, the disgusting animal that found pleasure in raping screaming girls, would be her trainer.

She fought Fat Fingers' violations for a week until finally giving in and lying quiet and motionless beneath his bulging olive skinned body; physically beaten and mentally broken by his threatening and demoralizing words.

Each morning for eight years she greeted that impervious stone wall. Did anyone know what terrors took place inside those walls? Did anyone on the outside question the high pitched, blood curdling shrieks?

Did anyone care?

She thought not.

Southern men considered women less valuable than a good piece of livestock. The vast majorities of southern girls were poor and uneducated, making them vulnerable and easily coerced into deceitful spies and exacting killers through extreme fear and physical, mental, or sexual intimidation.

The misogynistic tyrannical lord that ruled Umbar did realize women held two advantages over men. They could move about without difficulty, unnoticed and unsuspected, and men found beautiful women irresistible, allowing them access to their home, offices, and beds.

Eventually, Loti was brought fully into the sorority. First she learned how to handle a sword, then a bow and basic hand to hand combat. She was indoctrinated in the psychology and philosophy of killing and death, and to fear neither.

She was trapped, with no hope of escape, in a life not of her own making.

She felt ashamed, and exposed, even as a grown woman, to let men use her in such ways.

Her only consolation in those endlessly dim, deprived years was her father's book and a dream born from his heartfelt, enamoring words; a dream where she would love and be loved in return. A dream of loving a man so powerfully, so deeply it would upset the world. A dream of being loved so completely she could feel it through all space and time.

A true unquestioning love, a flaming passion, between her and a man that she knew would mend her broken soul.

Those events had taken place nearly ten year ago. And now, like time, she felt those dreams slipping away…

Hearing movement below, Loti raised her head from her bent knees. The sun was just beginning to brighten the grim, boiling clouds in the eastern sky, causing them to appear even more dark and ominous. Her attention caught the rustling of tent flaps and the distinct strutting gait of long footsteps. Carried up on the breeze, she heard the faint sound of voices bidding good morning. She recognized one of the voices.

Flattening herself against the rocky ground, Loti crawled to the edge of the outcropping and peered in to the valley.

Below lay the campground of the army of Rohan, or at least, a small portion of the army of Rohan.

Green, sloping, deciduous hillsides gave way to a flat, narrow, grassy valley, well picked over by the grazing horses of the Rohirrum. Three large canvas tents were near her, stretching and snapping in the winds, and well more than a dozen smaller ones extended north, as she lay at the head of the ravine's dead end.

At the farthest point she dared crawl, she could see him…

Eomer…

Even with his back to her, his towering height distinguished him from the other men in the valley, as did his decorative mahogany leather chest plate and pauldrons, intricately inlaid with gold and blackened steel. On the front of his chest plate were two golden rearing horses. Although he did not face her, Loti had first hand knowledge of this fact.

Originally, her plan was to seduce him.

She had finally tracked him down in Aldburg, a town she knew to be his home. In the market place, she thought she might casually bump into him, bat her eyes, touch his arm, pay him a few flirtatious, ego stroking compliments and he would come willingly into her web. But, as she approached him in the crowded streets, she fell prey to distraction and let her eyes fall on a nearby table of hair pins, clips, bows, and combs. Instead of a graceful and planned meeting, Loti's cheek smacked squarely in the center of the King of Rohan's chest with a dull thump, and the momentum of his solid body made her tumble clumsily to the dirty street with a thud.

Eomer stood over her, his rugged blonde handsomeness backlight by the cobalt blue sky and radiant coronal glow of the sun.

He was a breathless, heart pounding sight of flawless manhood.

"Sorry," he apologized in voice as husky and pleasing as his appearance, "My fault. I didn't see you. You alright?"

He extended his thick, calloused hands in assistance.

Loti was speechless, her mouth open loosely, sitting on her bum in the street beneath EomerKing, in a filthy heap. She scrambled to her feet, blushing from embarrassment and discomfort, catching the hem of her threadbare, secondhand dress with her heel and tripping. Leaning down, he grabbed her elbow, almost encircling it with his hand, and single handedly pulled her upright. She tugged feebly at the ragged dress, while Eomer dusted her off, his hand inadvertently grazing her backside.

Jerking her arm from his grasp, she back away, flustered and stunned.

His voice sounded genuinely concerned, "You alright?"

Loti fled, nearly running from the market, red faced and upset. She rounded a corner into an alley and slid against a wall to the ground, her head in her hands. She shook as if she had seen a ghost.

The ghost of Theodred…

If there was ever a man she could have found love with, it would have been Theodred.

Loti watched as Eomer lacksidasically wandered into the depths of the camp to check on men, horses, supplies, or what ever else he did that seemed so habitually routine.

How closely Eomer resembled his older cousin in voice, appearance, and mannerisms made her ill. She couldn't kill him like that, face to face; to listen as he gasped for air, to see the blood ooze between his fingers, to watch his face until he failed to exist…She couldn't take him to bed, share his body, look into those soft blue eyes and then ruthlessly and methodically murder him in the throes of passion.

She may as well have been sent to kill Theodred all over again!

She badly wanted Eomer dead. He was a vicious, merciless, barbarian bastard; a killer of sons and husbands… and of brothers. He deserved no less than to die a slow torturous death in painful agony. But she couldn't do it if he looked at her for even one moment in the same way Theodred had when they lay in bed together.

Yes, this is the better way. It does not matter how it's done, as long as it's done, she surmised.

From a distance she could shoot an arrow through his neck and turn away.

She crawled back to her rock, raising her eyes to the gray sky, wary of what the weather may have in store, and thrust her cold fingers between her knees.

Gradually, she heard more voices, the flapping of canvas as men exited their tents to begin the day's labor, the muffled whickering of horses echoing in the ravine, and the smell of campfire smoke and cooking food drifted to her nose on the breeze, making her empty stomach rumble.

She slithered forth every now and again, taking stock of the situation. After watching him for a few weeks, she knew Eomer was a solitary man, and it was only a matter of time before she would find him isolated.

With nothing left to do but wait, Loti tried to put the emotions of Eomer and Theodred out of her mind and focus on her reason for being here, Castamir. The last time she had seen him was at the army camp of the southern forces in South Gondor. She hadn't seen him in eight years, but recognized the brown hair and fair skin instantly when he approached.

Loti had forgotten how much she missed her little brother when she saw he had grown into a tall, regal looking man. And he was as good natured and amiable as ever. For days they were inseparable, and she listened as he talked about his apprenticeship as a stone mason, his girlfriend, and their ailing mother. She did little talking though, unable to explain her long absence and forbidden to discuss her life.

The morning he marched north, she hugged him tightly, ever the protective sister. Castamir, full of youthful vitality, bravado and cockiness, fully expected to return home victorious.

He never did.

Castamir died with his other countymen on the fields of the Pelennor.

He wasn't even nineteen.

Grief stricken Loti returned to the City, only to bury her mother weeks later.

From behind her rock, Loti angrily pushed back the tears and self pity that always started with a lump in her throat. Crying was not going to bring her brother back. Nor would it replace the vast lonely emptiness in the center of her chest hollowed out by the loss of everyone she loved.

It was all the fault of that smug son of a bitch who camped below!

Why couldn't he have protected his cousin better? Why couldn't he have just stayed in Rohan where he belonged? Why did he have to come that day to the Pelennor?

How was it possible he still lived and so many others died?

Yes, she affirmed, I blame him.