Disclaimer: Don't own 'em. Don't own Alasse, either, for that matter. She's out of my control.

Author's Note: This is a chapter that I wrote when we were still working on "Only Time Will Tell", and I liked it when I reread it. So I decided to put it up separately. It's not based on canon, but on the movie (I'm so ashamed…). So it's set in Helm's Deep, after that fight with the Wargs in The Two Towers, where Aragorn goes over the cliff and everyone takes him for dead. Just a bit of OOC Éomer-OFC fluff in nice archaic speech. Please read and review.

Interesting thought: the letter that we call "y" was used in Old English as a separate letter for the sound "th", so the word we write in Modern English as "thou" would have been written in Old English as "you". Likewise, "thee" would have been written as "ye". I'm not sure how we got from "thy" to "your". Hm. Linguistic problem! I find this kind of thing cool. Sorry if I bore you.

One Shadow

"I am sorry, lady," he said softly, coming up to stand beside her. She whirled around to look at him, her eyes blazing.

"How canst thou be, son of Éomund? How long didst thou know him? Two or three days, at the most. I knew him for years—he helped to raise me, taught me to fight with a sword. Aragorn was my far-off kinsman, and he was like a brother to me: he chided me when I did wrong, and praised me when I did right. How canst thou claim such, who knew him for so little time?"

And he said: "I cannot, lady, but he was a valiant man, and he died with honour in battle. Better to die thus, than to die a doddering old fool, like Saruman would have had my king to be!"

And Alasse turned away and said bitterly, "Would then that I died with him, that I might not have my heart broken twice, ere I had seen twenty winters!" She turned toward him again, her face at once grave and stern. "Therefore I say unto thee, Éomer son of Éomund, that thou mayest love me, as I see in thy face that thou dost, and thou mayest wed me, or any other man may, but I can never give my love to a man again. For lo! it is too dangerous; to give my heart to a man is for it to die when he does, or when he leaves me for another. I shall be like unto a flower, just come to bloom, but encased in a shield of unmelting ice, so that all may marvel at its beauty, and—"

"And yet pity thee, lady," said Éomer. "Thou readest my face and heart aright; I do love thee, but I pity thee, that thou shouldst have ten winters less than I, and yet have seen so many of thy loved ones dead, or gone. This indeed in the work of Sauron, that a maiden so lovely and young cannot while away her hours dancing and singing across the plains of Rohan, but instead must learn from a young age to wield a sword and bow, to avenge her parents and fight evil."

"I want no man's pity," said she. "We have lost Hope, and so I lose hope. We cannot dream of fighting Saruman without Aragorn. I feel so useless, knowing that I was there on the battlefield, and that I could have saved him, had I paid only little more attention!"

"Do not despair, lady," said Éomer.

"I cannot help myself. Too many dark things have chanced in these dreadful days. How can one be glad in such times?" A dark tear trickled down Alasse's cheek, but she turned not away from him, caring not that this high lord should see her show a sign of weakness. And Éomer did see indeed, and he loved her all the more, that this lady so strong and proud and unattainable, should show him not only the shieldmaiden, but also the side of her which loved and heeded the cares of others.

"Lady…" he said. She did not answer, but continued to gaze out over the Deeping Wall at the Shadow in the East. And of a sudden, the Sun struck her from behind, so that her tresses seemed to blaze in flame, and he marveled at her beauty.

"Lady," he said again. "Lady Glaswyn."

"What didst call me?"

"Glaswyn. 'Tis thy name in the tongue of my people."

"'Joyful maiden'…'daughter of joy'…" Alasse said, as though the words tasted harsh upon her tongue. "Why dost thou mock me, lord? I have only now finished saying that I find no joy in life, and thou dost call me 'joyful'?"

"I do not mock thee," said Éomer, grieved that she should think him scornful of her. "I only called thee in my own tongue, in my love for thee. Heed me, lady! I am no seer, nor a wizard, but only a man, a soldier unskilled in perceiving the thoughts of a woman. Yet I know that despair will do more harm than good, and that in losing hope, one may lose everything thereby. I am a captain of war, lady, and I have seen men driven mad by grief and despair, and their only peace was brought by death in battle."

And Alasse said proudly, "Then I would rather die, and drown the ache in my heart with the pain of a sword therein, and thus have peace."

"But lady," said he, "thou speakest as one who knows not the meaning of true pain. Canst thou say truly that when thou seest death on the battlefield, that thou wilt not fight bravely to stay it?"

Then she turned back to him, and he shuddered to see the wrath in her fair face as she answered him. "Thou thinkest that I know not pain, that I have not seen death, stared him in the face? See!" And she drew up the hanging sleeve which obscured her right forearm, and he saw a great wound there, a long scar from wrist to elbow. It was not yet healed, and there were places where her blood was crusted still on her pale flesh. "And there is another place, where I took an orc dagger. I saw death then, Éomer. And he is a shadow who stands in the corner, waiting, waiting…" She put her hand to her side as she spoke, as though the memory of it pained her even now.

"Lady," said he, "I did not say that thou knowest not true pain. I said only that thou dost speak as one who doth not. That thou hast taken this hurt and another and didst survive, I count a great blessing, and as a mark of thy stern will and desire for life. And now thou dost speak to me as though I knew not death." He grew stern again, and spoke as a captain might to a soldier, and not a man to his beloved. "Think thou that I have never seen death? My father was slain by these foul orcs when I had but eleven winters, and my mother was claimed by illness too soon after. And now my cousin Théodred, dearer to me than brother, is dead also. I have only my sister and my king to comfort me now, lady, and thou—if thou wouldst have me." His voice broke, and he leaned on the parapet, holding his head in his hand. Then he raised his head again, and he looked at Alasse. "For thou art not useless, lady, nor homely. Though little I know of women, I think thee fairer than anything I have ever seen, save only my sister."

"Truly thou thinkest this of me, Éomer? I know there are many who would say that by taking names to myself, I am seeking flattery, but this is untrue."

"Untrue and unjust, my lady," said he, stepping swiftly to her side, and looking into her grey eyes. "And the same folk would say that I am falling into the trap of a harlot enchantress who would seduce me and have me to her bed ere I could protest, but that also would be untrue. Thou dost enchant me, but 'tis not thy fault, only my blind love for thee. Wilt thou forgive me, Glaswyn?"

"What is there to forgive?" she asked, looking at him in surprise.

"When first we met, I spoke ill of that which is fair beyond the reach of my thought, and being in doubt as to the true nature of thy quest, I spoke contemptuously toward thee. Wilt thou forgive me?"

"Be at peace, lord," she said softly, and placed her hand upon his breast. "I bore no ill will toward thee then, nor do I now."

And Éomer looked at her in wonderment, seeing that she also bore love for him, and he bent, holding her face gently in his two hands, and kissed her sweet mouth. He tasted on her lips her salty tears as she wept for her broken heart, and the Ranger she had loved like a brother, and still she kissed him fiercely while he wrapped his arms about her, that he might the better return her kiss.

At last she pulled away, her breast heaving beneath her light kirtle, and they stood for a while, his arm about her waist, looking over the parapet toward the East. Then Éomer stirred and spoke.

"Know you," he said, "that save only my mother and my sister, thou art the only woman I have ever spoken to?"

Alasse laughed bitterly. "I hope thou shalt not make thy judgment on my kind based on what thou hast seen of me!"

"Nay," he said, smiling, "for if all women are like thee, then I would count them all blessed, and more blessed those men who would wed them!" He bent and kissed her lightly. "Truly, daughter of Gailwyn, thou art a woman like to my own heart!"

"How so, lord?" she asked.

"I said unto my sister, lo! She doth seem more like thee than any other I have yet seen, and even she is a shieldmaiden, like unto thyself. Truly, Éowyn, wert thou not my sister, I would love thee also, and wish to wed thee instead!"

"What said she to that, my lord?"

Éomer laughed long and merrily. "She told me that I clearly had had more mead than was good for me, and so should wash my head in the Snowbourne until I had hold of my senses!" He chuckled again, and a moment later Alasse joined in, and the clear sound of their mingled laughter rang out over the Deep as had not been heard for a long while in that place.

When she stopped laughing, Alasse looked at Éomer, and he saw then what no man, save only Glorfindel, had ever seen: she smiled, and her face shone as though lit from within.

"I feel so strange, lord," she said wonderingly. "My heart raceth, as though I were just come from a battle, and yet all I have done is laugh. What is this that stirreth my heart so?"

"'Tis gladness which hath melted thy heart of ice, lady," said Éomer. "I know, for I feel it also. I am glad, for lo! my kinsman Théodred is dead, but I am quick, and I stand here upon the wall of the Deep, alone with the woman I love. Dost thou love me, Alasse?"

And Alasse looked into his eyes, and they were bright with the light of love, and with the light of the Sun as it set in the West, and she could not speak. But she nodded, and with a glad cry Éomer took her in his arms again, and claimed her mouth with his own, and their two bodies showed one shadow upon the stone floor of the Deeping Wall.