Author's Note: Hello and welcome to chapter two of "The Price of Pity". In this chapter, the first of what will be a series of flashbacks occurs. I would like to thank everyone who took the time to read the first chapter and those who reviewed, MerryKK, Celebne, Nari-chan SND, Awen1923, childofGod-4ever, and ElfLuver13. I do not have a beta and while I have proofread this chapter many times, I am sure I have not caught all my mistakes. Any errors that appear in canon, grammar or spelling are my fault and my fault alone. I hope you all enjoy!
Disclaimer: I claim no ownership of Tolkien's masterpiece.
Chapter Two Confusion and Grief
Faramir awoke with the sun. The dawn spoke of softness, with a mild breeze to caress his flesh and touch his hair. He sat up and found his tunic by the foot of the bed. After he had settled it over his shoulders, Faramir glanced about the chamber. It was empty.
The blankets beside him were rumbled, the sheets askew. Eowyn's ivory robe was missing. He frowned. Perhaps she had gone for a walk. His wife professed a love for the morning and the gardens. Yes, she must have gone for a walk.
Faramir rose and stretched, pain catching in his right shoulder as he did so. Even after several months the wound was not healed and he sensed that it went deeper, burrowing past his bones into his soul. It would mark him for life.
A pitcher sat on a side table. He washed the sleep from his face and relished in the brisk touch of the water. Fresh it was, like a cold kiss pressed upon his cheeks by frigid lips.
It reminded him of Aniror.
Faramir clutched the sides of the table, his fingers curled about the worn wood. Aniror, he did not want to think of her though she haunted his nightmares and still lived on in the face of their son.
It was easier to be numb, he decided and to drive the shattered remnants of memory from his mind. Eowyn helped to soothe his aches, her smile like a balm applied to burning wounds.
Faramir let the water drip from his face before reaching for a cloth to dry his skin. He then proceeded to dress slowly, sitting upon the edge of his bed to slip his boots over his feet.
A tragedy it had been. Or rather, a series of losses. First his brother, then his father and finally his wife. Boromir he had loved, Denethor he had been loyal to and Aniror, well, he could not tell.
For seven years he had known her and for six they had been wed. Could he still find no answer to his feelings?
Faramir stood. Shame made his face flush. Their marriage had not been blissful and at its sweetest moments, indifference reigned. He dared to wonder if she was happy in death, if her end had provided a release from strain. But then he remembered her eyes as she cradled Miresgal in her arms and her smile as she listened to him coo.
The child would not know his rightful mother, not know the Elf who had come from Lorien and lost herself to the walls of the White City.
In a strange way he missed Aniror but did not want Eowyn to see his longing. Why should she suffer for a mistake he had made? No, he wished her to receive him whole and well, free from the smothering grasp of his first wife.
But Aniror's spirit still crept along the corridors and hid in his chamber.
He stared at the chair that sat by the hearth, wooden, with great carvings and a high back. Aniror used to sit there for hours, festering in her anger, wallowing in her delusions.
He could almost see her now….
July 3013 Third Age
Faramir did not go far into the chamber, he never did. Reason kept him in the shadow of the door along with some undefined fear. His heart froze every time he looked upon her.
She was sitting in the large chair by the hearth. Embers glowed against the blackened stones. The servants had not yet come to revive the fire and with the already smothering heat of the morn, there seemed no need to
A book was in her hand, opened to a page that she seldom glanced at. His wife never read the words before her but seemed to lose herself to memory.
Faramir did not want to know her memories.
Morning sun came into the chamber through a thin window. The shutters had been thrown back sometime during the night, most likely by her hand. Often he awoke to find her staring at the stars or so he fancied. Even his dreams deceived him these days.
His wife shifted. The milky hem of her gown dangled over the arm of the chair. He wondered if she sensed his presence.
Faramir cleared his throat. His airway constricted and crushed every breath that tried to escape from his lungs.
Were they all drowning?
"My lady?" It was a strange title for a strange creature. She was no lady and had not been in her previous life. How little he knew of her.
She did not respond and he was accustomed to her silence. He was accustomed to the way she made him feel like a fool.
Faramir did not hesitate now. Pain was best finished with quickly. "I wondered if you would join me this morn."
Not a question exactly, he thought, but perhaps she would open her thin lips now.
Young sparrows fluttered past the window and seemed to laugh at them. Faramir watched the small birds. He envied their wings. Oh, to be gifted with flight.
When his wife did not answer, he took a chance and stepped further into the chamber. Now he could see her hand resting upon her knee, a hint of her hair falling to her waist.
"My lady?"
"Will the piglet be there?"
Faramir winced. She had a strange sobriquet for his brother Boromir and often voiced it. He was only glad that Boromir's hearing seemed directed elsewhere whenever she spoke. Otherwise the two would fall into a battle which would lengthen into a war, just as they had fought so viciously thirty leagues from Lothlorien.
"Yes, so I suspect."
She seemed to weigh his words. "I am occupied."
"Of course." His sarcasm sliced the hot air. The chair wobbled. He had surprised her, a rare thing indeed.
"I said I am occupied," she replied. Her hand tightened over her knee.
"Too occupied to attend breakfast?" Faramir took a step closer. "When do you intend to take food, then?"
"When I wish."
She had ways of irritating him, small, dark ways that caused his judgment to lapse and his heart to pound all the more angrily. She acted as a sovereign, a lofty queen upon a golden throne with no one to answer to.
But his wife was no queen and never would be. An exile, yes, but no queen.
"I wish you to dine with me," he said at last. She only laughed. Faramir curled his fingers into fists.
"For a long month you have dwelled in the house of the Stewards and still you refuse to extend to me any courtesy." He heard the harshness in his voice at once and bit back the venom. She took offense so easily.
His wife did not speak, allotting herself time to think. Swiftness of thought was not a talent she possessed. But she could work her tongue around a lie. Oh, she could lie.
"A long month, my lord?"
"I suspect you have counted the days, my lady." Something in his tone must have jabbed at her for she sat upright this time and stared at him.
"And you have counted the minutes," she said.
Faramir stifled a sigh. "My only wish is to help you."
"Then perhaps you should have stayed in Gondor from the first and not sought me in Lorien," her voice softened and he sensed her regret. But did she truly regret her crimes or did she only wish to avoid punishment? "I would have been most pleased to be left alone, to remain in my homeland with my kin."
Faramir leaned closer to his wife but she recoiled. "And I would have left you there, had you not lowered yourself to the basest of crimes. Do you wish to wander the wilderness for the rest of your years or pass through the Havens?"
She did not answer. Faramir scowled. "Then I should think a life with me is the lesser of any evil."
"Leave me."
And Faramir was quite tempted to. She looked at him with wild eyes and he felt too weary to argue with the once more irate Elf.
"I said leave me!"
Her haughtiness would drive him mad. In one short stride Faramir closed the distance between her and him, pulling the book from her grasp. She did not fight him, but rather looked astonished by his force. Her hands flailed for an instant but she quickly regained her composure.
"Aniror, I wish you to take breakfast with me." Faramir rarely used her name. He had little need to.
Aniror did not speak but she kept her eyes fixed upon his. No longer did he see the fairness of the Elves that shone in Lorien. No longer did he see her wisdom.
Perhaps it had never existed.
"No."
"That is all you will say?"
"Yes."
He straightened and his shadow stretched across her form. With a limp hand, he returned her book to her lap. She looked away from him.
Faramir left and as he pulled open the great chamber door, her old words of warning sounded coldly in his mind.
There shall come a time when you will hate me. You will curse the day when you called me wife and brought me forth from exile into Gondor. And then I will come to hate you.
Faramir leaned upon the doorframe and his mind reel with fresh sorrow. So this had been the price of his pity.
Faramir fled the chamber, leaving his memories and the ghosts alone in that sunlit room. He wanted to see Eowyn, desperately. He wanted to see her fair face and the promise that lit her eyes.
She had saved him from despair, from grief. He owed her more than his life.
Faramir slowed his pace as he walked down the corridor. The household was just waking and the King would soon call for him. Reports would be discussed, trade and the condition of the city. Faramir found he enjoyed such meetings. Normalcy was restored through numbers and letters. Soon he hoped to lose himself in this new rhythm of life. A new life with Eowyn.
Faramir frowned. Where was she?
A high-pitched shriek froze his blood. A door burst open and a tiny child tore into the hall.
"Ada! Ada!" Miresgal cried. Tears threatened to splash down his quickly reddening cheeks. The nursemaid was on his heels, but not swift enough to catch him. At once, Miresgal was pummeling Faramir's knees with his little fists. "Get her out of my room, Ada! Get that lady out!"
And then Eowyn was in the corridor. Her hand scrubbed her cheek. "Faramir, he struck me!"
Author's Note: Thank you so much for reading. Please take the time to review and share your thoughts with me. The next chapter will be up in under a week.