Author: Cerulean Blue
Rating: G/PG
Title: Bitter Watches
Disclaimer: This is movieverse, so I owe my utmost allegiance to Peter Jackson, king of the Rings. Also, I don't claim any ownership to J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings," or Miranda Otto and Brad Dourif's portrayals of Eowyn and Wormtongue. Furthermore, I in no way am responsible for the utter madness that follows. Where is the horse and rider? Where is the horn that was blowing? Forth Eorlingas!
Summary: A vignette about Eowyn's despair during Saruman's hold over King Theoden.
Bitter Watches ========== "Ah, but you are alone. Who knows what you have spoken to the darkness, alone, in the bitter watches of the night, when all your life seems to shrink, the walls of your bower closing in about you, a hutch to trammel some wild thing in? So fair, yet so cold like a morning of pale Spring still clinging to Winter."--Grima Wormtongue to Eowyn, "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers"
I am alone. Not in the physical sense, nay, I am constantly surrounded by people who wish to cater to my every need but spiritually, emotionally alone. The type of despair that weighs upon your heart until you realize that there is nothing else left in this life for you and yet you cannot bring yourself to end it all out of some sense of duty or obligation to others. This lonliness is punctuated by bouts of futile railing against those that imprison me, those that keep me locked inside this fortress of oppressive safety and protection.
I long to fight. I know that my brother even now rides out with the horsemen in order to protect Edoras from the imminent attack by Saruman and his hordes of savage half-breeds misshapen by fire and incubation far beneath the dark Tower of Orthanc. I know that I am able to wield a sword as well as and even better than the men riding out of Eomer, I remember well the skills learned at my uncle's knee when I was but a child in the hall of Meduseld.
However, despite being a Shieldmaiden of the Rohirrim, one of the legendary fighting women of our country, I am still relegated to a woman's place in this world. My days were spent by the side of a man possessed. My uncle is aware of less and less as the days pass by, his mind poisoned by things unseen. His advisor, the vile Wormtongue, has an ominous presence in the hall these days. Closer and closer he draws to the throne of Theoden king and each day he spends in my presence causes me to hate him even more. His very presence is like a dark cloud hanging over the kingdom of Rohan, the threat of shadow and night on a land still trying to cling to the barest threads of the daylight.
My despair continues to color my days and nights, every task merely out of habit. Even eating and bathing have become methodical, necessary evils in days colored grey by monotony. Wormtongue haunts my steps at every turn, his vile cruelty pouring from every fiber of his twisted and perverted being. A man once great, he is now twisted by the evil wrought upon this land by Saruman in his dark tower.
I feel that all my life is crashing down around my ears, that I am leaving this world not in a glorious battle but in the melancholy acceptance bred by disuse and despair. I do not want to become reticent, I do not want to accept these walls that cage in my spirit. I want to have a role in the playing out of my destiny and I will not allow myself to become useless and unimportant in the grand scheme that is playing out across Middle-Earth. I know what I have spoken into the bitter watches of the night and it is that I have a chance to prove my valor to man, elf, and beast.
Rating: G/PG
Title: Bitter Watches
Disclaimer: This is movieverse, so I owe my utmost allegiance to Peter Jackson, king of the Rings. Also, I don't claim any ownership to J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings," or Miranda Otto and Brad Dourif's portrayals of Eowyn and Wormtongue. Furthermore, I in no way am responsible for the utter madness that follows. Where is the horse and rider? Where is the horn that was blowing? Forth Eorlingas!
Summary: A vignette about Eowyn's despair during Saruman's hold over King Theoden.
Bitter Watches ========== "Ah, but you are alone. Who knows what you have spoken to the darkness, alone, in the bitter watches of the night, when all your life seems to shrink, the walls of your bower closing in about you, a hutch to trammel some wild thing in? So fair, yet so cold like a morning of pale Spring still clinging to Winter."--Grima Wormtongue to Eowyn, "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers"
I am alone. Not in the physical sense, nay, I am constantly surrounded by people who wish to cater to my every need but spiritually, emotionally alone. The type of despair that weighs upon your heart until you realize that there is nothing else left in this life for you and yet you cannot bring yourself to end it all out of some sense of duty or obligation to others. This lonliness is punctuated by bouts of futile railing against those that imprison me, those that keep me locked inside this fortress of oppressive safety and protection.
I long to fight. I know that my brother even now rides out with the horsemen in order to protect Edoras from the imminent attack by Saruman and his hordes of savage half-breeds misshapen by fire and incubation far beneath the dark Tower of Orthanc. I know that I am able to wield a sword as well as and even better than the men riding out of Eomer, I remember well the skills learned at my uncle's knee when I was but a child in the hall of Meduseld.
However, despite being a Shieldmaiden of the Rohirrim, one of the legendary fighting women of our country, I am still relegated to a woman's place in this world. My days were spent by the side of a man possessed. My uncle is aware of less and less as the days pass by, his mind poisoned by things unseen. His advisor, the vile Wormtongue, has an ominous presence in the hall these days. Closer and closer he draws to the throne of Theoden king and each day he spends in my presence causes me to hate him even more. His very presence is like a dark cloud hanging over the kingdom of Rohan, the threat of shadow and night on a land still trying to cling to the barest threads of the daylight.
My despair continues to color my days and nights, every task merely out of habit. Even eating and bathing have become methodical, necessary evils in days colored grey by monotony. Wormtongue haunts my steps at every turn, his vile cruelty pouring from every fiber of his twisted and perverted being. A man once great, he is now twisted by the evil wrought upon this land by Saruman in his dark tower.
I feel that all my life is crashing down around my ears, that I am leaving this world not in a glorious battle but in the melancholy acceptance bred by disuse and despair. I do not want to become reticent, I do not want to accept these walls that cage in my spirit. I want to have a role in the playing out of my destiny and I will not allow myself to become useless and unimportant in the grand scheme that is playing out across Middle-Earth. I know what I have spoken into the bitter watches of the night and it is that I have a chance to prove my valor to man, elf, and beast.