Chapter
Four
The next morning, when
the sun had fully made it's way into the sky, I woke up with a headache that I
could feel in all the walls of my skull. Perhaps it had been the smell of the
smoke several hours before that sent the dreadful pounding into my temples, but
whatever it was it was driving me mad. The morning after the fire consisted of my brother and I sitting around
and drinking strange herbs he had boiled together to rid oursevles of this
unexpected sickness.
Boromir looked at me
with bleary eyes. "Thank you for the place to sleep."
"You are very welcome,
Boromir, what are brothers for?"
"The floor is mighty
comfortable."
I smiled at him despite
my headache and sipped my brew. "Good, I'm glad."
Boromir stood and rubbed
his eyes wearily, yawning and then draining his mug. He stretched a few times
and then said, "I'm going to find a taylor and buy new clothes…then I will
probably go find a new place to live. Would you like to join me?"
I shook my head. "No…I
have business to take care of in the city today."
"Well then, I suppose
I'll see you at dinner." Boromir nodded at me and left the room, and I finished
off the contents of my own mug. I was a bit tired from the night before, and as
I pulled myself to my feet I nearly fell over and blacked out. Blinking
absurdly, I shot a glance over to my stove where the pot lay idle with a few
herbs next to it – and an empty bottle of ale.
"Oh, Boromir.." I
groaned, momentarily wanting to strangle my brother for possibly giving me the
worst hangover I've had since the celebration of the Dark One's downfall. I
shook my head to try and clear the cobwebs and clouds, grabbed my cape and
stumbled out the door. I had already eaten and had decided to give Eowyn a
morning of her own for once, so I had considerably nothing to do. I decided,
once I had made it to the wide, airy streets of my city, to take a seat on a
wooden bench right outside the blacksmith's shop and watch the people walk by.
While trying to decide
whether a certain cloud formation resembled an ax or the mate of the boot I had
recently lost, a set of small fingers tapped my shoulder and a familiar voice
ended the debate.
"Peregrin Took at your
service, sir." I looked to my left and saw a Hobbit with wild curly hair the
hue of sand and dirt mixed together (being as this was Peregrin Took, I have no
doubt that sand and dirt contributed to the color) holding a hand out and
grinning madly. "Hello, Faramir!"
"Peregrin Took!" I met
the halfling in a rough embrace, and we when we pulled apart we shared that mad
grin. "Pippin, where have you been? I meant to visit you the morning after the
banquet…"
"Eh, word is you've been
with Lady Eowyn the whole time." Pippin winked at me and touseled my hair as if
I were the halfling and he were the man. "Still head over heels in love with
her, Faramir?" I felt my face heat up with a childish embarrassment and tucked
my chin, muttering,
"I, er, well…yes."
"Oh, Faramir, everyone
in Minas Tirith knows you love her!" Pippin laughed and gripped the coarse material
on my shoulder with pale little fingers. "Everyone in Rohan, too, for that
matter. When we stopped there Ingrid the servant woman pulls me aside and askes
me, 'Is the Captain Faramir over the Lady Eowyn yet?' ' No, not yet. Never, I think.' I says in return. Everyone knows,
Faramir!"
"Not everyone!" I
protested in vain, but Pippin only sat next to me on the bench that was too
high for him, swinging his booted feet over the edge.
"Yes, I suppose Eowyn
doesn't know yet." he looked about us as if expecting her to suddenly pop up
and find out the secrete everyone else already knew, and then folded his hands
behind his head. "But she's the only exception. How sad a tale…a beautiful
woman like Eowyn having caught the eye of Gondor's grand captain and she
doesn't even know it!"
I sighed and assumed a
similar position to the Took, and I was falling quickly into another jumble of
thoughts. "I do love her, Pippin. So, so dearly."
"I know how you feel."
Pippin replied a bit dully, and he ran his hands through his hair in thought.
His voice lacked the cheerfulness it held seconds earlier, and I turned to see
if he looked unhappy. He looked distant and very thoughtful. "But at least
Eowyn still considers you a friend."
My eyebrow arched.
"Pippin?"
The hobbit became rigid
with something I rarely saw in one of his kind. "Oh…I had a bit of a fight with
Diamond. She is, or was, a very dear friend of mine and even more, but now she
is in love with a man and she told me she hates me. She told me, Faramir."
At first I stupidly
wondered, "What man? Do you know who?" My little friend now looked very
depressed.
"It was after the
banquet." he choked out after a moment, and I felt something cold arise in my
stomach and travel down my spine in realization. I remained deathly silent as
he continued, "She started crying for some silly reason and…and left. Then she
returned the next morning and told me some blackguard had kissed her and she
was in love with him! She didn't actually call him a blackguard, but…can you
believe that?"
My throat was dry, but I
hestiantly asked, "And…and you do not know who it was?"
"No." Pippin shook his
head, and with every dulled and saddened glance he gave me my heart sank lower
and lower and I lost the nerve to tell him that…that I was the culprit. "All I
was told is that he is a soldier. Of course she fell for a soldier. Soldier's
are dashing, unlike Peregrin Took."
"Nay, Pippin, you are
the bravest among your kind!" I protested, and momentarily forgot my guilt.
Should I have told him? No, not in this moment of anguish. My head began to
sway a little. Boromir and his stupid brews!
"Thank you, Faramir.."
he inhaled softly and then turned to look at me fully. "Where is your brother?
I want to talk with him…it's been far too long since I've seen him anf actually
talked."
Relieved to change the
subject, I inquired, "Did you hear? His apartment burned to the ground last
night." Pippin paled and a wary silence grew between us. Quietly, he asked,
"It burned down? All of
it?" after receiving a nod from me in confirmation, his next question was more
relaxed. "Did they find who was responsible?"
"No." I replied, and
pulled myself to my feet, taking a moment to stretch in the cool morning air.
"But let us go and speak with him…I'm sure he would be glad to see you." I
reached down to steady myself on the bench. I would give him a talking to all
right…about what and what not to put in herbal beverages.
"Aye." Pippin responded
and followed me. We walked in silence until, after a moment, "How is the Lady
Eowyn?"
"Good. Very good." I
replied, and could not help but smile. I thought we might walk to
Selma's…Boromir was bound to be there.
"She's so
spontaneous…not like other women."
"Aye."
"You think you can
predict her but you can't."
I smiled wider and faced
forward, letting Pippin feed me these wonderful thoughts. "Aye."
"Faramir?"
Lost in my thoughts, and
in Boromir's brew I'm sure, I said, "Yes?"
"Do you…do you want to
impress her enough to marry her?"
Like a blow to the ribs
my awareness returned to me…well, not all my awareness. As I look back, I
realize this conversation with the sticky little hobbit should never have even
taken place if my senses had been working that morning. "More than
anything…what are you getting at?"
"I…well…" Pippin looked
up at me and squinted in reaction to the sun above our heads. "I once…read a
book, yes, I read a book where a prince wanted so desperately to woo the woman
he loved that he would ignite things for her. She fell in love with him, of
course – "
I laughed loudly. "You
dream, Pippin. Lady Eowyn would not only never speak to me again, but she would
probably flog me herself."
"No, Faramir, that's
where you're wrong!" he cried, and stopped in the middle of the street to seize
the material around my knees and shaking me. "Don't you see it? The idea of a
man so in love that he is willing to burn down his brother's apartment will
sweep her off her feet in all of it's passion and meaning! She'll see you in a
new light!"
"Yes, the dim light of a
prison cell." I murmmured, but my thoughts were treading in dangerous waters of
ideas. My jaw gaped, and without consent of my mind, and my mouth stammered,
"D-do you think so?" I shook my head, then bent my back to lean down and grip
his little shoulders. "You. Are. Mad."
"No I'm not!" Pippin
challenged, his voice rising with pitch and excitement, and he seized my face
in both little hands, pulling me down further. "It's love!"
The last two words had
been shouted, and a silence fell around us. I slid my eyes to the side, seeing
people staring at the two of us and probably wondering what we were doing. We
must have looked ridiculous the way we quickly pulled apart and uncomfortably
folded our arms about our chests and cleared our throats before turning back to
our walk.
"But it's true,
Faramir…" Pippin continued quietly, looking forward and pointed. And serious.
"You can wait around starry eyed for the next two years and one day go to Rohan
and propose…" he trailed off and shrugged his shoulders. "…and maybe you'll get
to meet her husband. Or," he looked at me this time, into my eyes with a look
that frightened my near drunken state. "Or you can sweep her off her feet right
now and marry her and be happy!"
His words his me like a
turkey leg to the nose on a cold day (ask Boromir if you really want to know
the intimate details of that tale) and I made a noise that almost sounded like
a whimper. Pippin was right. Eowyn was kind and beautiful and the most
wonderful woman I had ever laid eyes on. I knew I was not the only one to know
that; men would give their right eye to marry a woman like my Eowyn. I would
lose her.
As a last fighting
resort, I said feebly, "I will be put into prison for at least five years if I
turn myself in for this fire I did not even start."
"She knows you know that
Faramir! And knowing that and still doing it…Faramir, that is real love!
You're telling her that you're willing to go to prison for her, and you can
take the word of a Took on that." he pocketed his hands and blew a curly lock
of hair from his eyes, then looked back up at me. "Would you take that chance
for Eowyn?"
It was at that moment
that all my doubts and senses shattered and I could no longer lie to myself. Of
course I would! I love Eowyn more than anything and five years in a jail cell
meant nothing in a lifetime of happiness. I sucked my breath in a nodded. "Yes.
I would. A hundred times!"
Pippin seemed strangely
happy as well. "Then you'll do it!"
"This must be Boromir's
brew…I feel crazy for doing this, but yes, I will." I replied, smiling and
feeling shakey. Pippin grasped my hand with both of his and shook it firmly,
and I instantly felt better.
"Good, good! Invite me
to the wedding!"
I only smiled at him and
set my gaze onto the stone of the street. Eowyn would know I loved her, and in
return she would have to love me. I could feel it in my fingers and all the way
in the toes of my boots. A blast of cold air ran past me and my little friend,
and my skin prickled up in goosebumps as I swayed. My head felt light.