DISCLAIMER: All things LOTR belong to J.R.R. Tolkien. I'm just attempting to wax lyrical with them.
I'll never stop saying this, but thanks to everyone who has reviewed this so far! –Morithil.
X
"...as if it were a scene made up by the mind,
that is not mine, but is a made place,
that is mine, it is so near to the heart,
and eternal pasture folded in all thought
so that there is a hall therein
that is a made place, created by light
wherefrom the shadows that are forms fall"
Robert Duncan, Often I Am Permitted to Return to a Meadow.
Sunlight streams in through an open door.
On the slowly warming stone floor, two children are playing with a large set of miniature horses, each one simply but beautifully carved out of wood. The younger of the two looks up in admiration, all sun-tinged hair and grey-blue eyes, and watches the elder arrange several of the tiny beasts into carefully thought out lines, a faint furrow of concentration as the small hands shift the figures into position. Two armies, equal in the number of riders.
The younger lies comfortably on his stomach, two remaining figures on horseback clutched in each hand. His elder smiles warmly from his crouched position, looking with a youthful but critical eye over the small troops they both dwarf.
Bare feet pad softly on the heated stones. Somewhere beyond the door, a horse's neigh is heard, brash and impassioned from the stables. The siblings' eyes meet over the imaginary battlefield laid between them. Both hold their breath in innocent anticipation, before two hands place the mounted figures in front of the neat rows of horses.
Outside there is the world, a far-ranging blue sky, and a fair wind. But these things have been forsaken in favour of a massive plain, a call to arms and a key decision. The power of imagination swells the room. The younger brother moves, his knees clutched in front of him in emulation of his brother, who kneels decidedly, one arm rested on a raised knee, a strategy forming in his mind.
"Well, are you ready?"
The boy clutching his knees nods, eyes gleaming.
"What is our plan, brother?"
The smaller of the two separates a smaller group from the riders, placing before it one of the mounted riders.
"I shall take these men round, behind the enemy's position, and attack from there"
"A dangerous plan, little brother; are you sure you do not want more men to accompany you on this mission?"
A wide smile, trust implicit in the expression on the boy's face.
"We shall make our move at night, and in the confusion, numbers will not matter so much when we are the ones who are prepared. Besides", his hand moves the remaining rider in front of the larger group, "if we cannot hold the advantage for as long as planned, you will have a much larger force ready to reinforce our position"
The older boy grinned in recognition.
"You have only to call for aid, and I shall bring my men to fight alongside yours. But Faramir", a closed hand brushes under the younger boy's chin affectionately, "perhaps, with surprise, the cover of darkness and your skilful leadership, I shall not have to come to help you"
An endearing blush and a bashful grin from the other.
"But I shall come anyway, if only so that we can share the victory"
The pane of sunlight bathes the two in golden warmth, the image undimmed by the years.
This was the scene that Faramir showed me, the memory that pervaded his dream last night. In the golden interior of our tent, illuminated by the sunlight outside, it became vivid and real, as if I stood in the doorway watching two brothers playing at war. He did not wake troubled and shaking as before. Instead, a slight smile played across his face in the seconds before he sat up abruptly, the dream over, his beautiful eyes opening to find me, head rested in one hand, watching his awakening.
He lowered himself down beside me, pulling the blanket back over his waist. It was with some relief that I heard him speak.
"I dreamt of the past again"
"Of happy times?" I ventured, smiling hopefully. Faramir sighed, not a sound full of remorse and pain, but of gentle wistfulness, a long remembered sadness, his breath warm on my arm.
"Boromir and I were children, playing at commanding armies, fighting enemies, planning strategies for victory"
"Show me", I replied. And we spent the next hour in retrospect, Faramir looking fondly back on that day, one of many spent in similar occupation, while I drank in his words and the play of memory across his handsome face. He showed me the rooms that he and Boromir played in, the trips to the stables, running awed hands over the lowered necks of mighty steeds. He took me to the parapets, gazed over only by standing on tiptoes. He brought me Boromir's tunics, the velvet hastily torn to make bandages for scraped knees, cut elbows, grudgingly mended by mildly disapproving women. I laughed with him at their exploits, whispered in the secret hiding places, stories in the dark. I looked up in reverence at the branches of a white tree, milky against a blue sky, and rejoiced at this gift, Faramir sharing the past with more ease and, dare I hope, eagerness than before.
The rest of the morning we lazed away, loosely held in the other's arms, willing away the chores of dismantling the tent and packing up our things before riding off again. Faramir glanced quizzically at the slumped boots near the foot of our heap of blankets, before a quick smile spread and disappeared on his face. I laughed softly into his chest.
"I do not know why I find them amusing either, Faramir"
His sword-roughened hands caressed my head gently. I snatched one and ran a finger down the now healed gash, the skin new, if a little puckered where the wound had been. Around it the skin of his palm is tough, no doubt from many years gripping his bow before drawing the string taut, his arms stretched. I could almost feel the shape of the wood in his hand.
"Did Boromir - ?" I stroked his palm again to convey my meaning.
His eyes grew a little sad; I almost berated myself for asking. But after intaking a heavy breath, Faramir answered.
"No. He was not given to forms of combat that distanced himself from his foes. He sought the close air of battle, the shared arena of a few steps. His strengths lay in his swordsmanship, where he was unmatched by any in Gondor"
"As you were in archery", I smiled. He laughed under his breath, lowering his head in acknowledgement of the compliment, a mannerism from the childhood he has shown me, still present now. It only makes me love him more. I drew his face to mine and kissed him good morning, ignoring the telltale signs that it was close on midday.
When we finally admitted that it was time to be moving on, it was with an almost unanimous groan. Slowly, a little befuddled with sleep and the exhaustion reminding us of the night before, we set about saddling our horses and packing away our things. In the brightness of the day the locks of Faramir's hair gave off a luminescent glow, crowning him with a cap of dark gold. Verily he is the Prince of Ithilien, tall and noble under the high globe of the sun. I sat down in the grass; my sword laid over my knees, and began wiping its steely blade with the edge of my sleeve. I am not sure of how long I sat thus, absorbed in my task and the play of sun down the long shard of hammered metal, but it must have been some time, for when I looked up our tent had vanished and Faramir stood, leaning against the saddle of his horse, intently watching me.
I felt the flush spread up my neck, and looked away when I saw him chuckle at my discomfort, nodding at my weapon.
"Perhaps you are planning to use the flat side on your husband's head, Eowyn", he suggested, his eyes glinting with amusement.
I feined ignorance of his joke and rose to my feet, studying my handiwork as nonchalantly as possible. I scrutinised the horses' heads adorning the handle.
"Maybe I will use the hilt instead. It may prove more effective", I returned, swallowing a girlish giggle that threatened to bubble up from my stomach. I cannot keep up a teasing pretence for long, and Faramir know this.
He stalks towards me as I avoid his look, staring instead into the blade, watching my distorted image stretch in it. His voice drops, becomes more serious as he stands suggestively close.
"I only know this; that there is no-one else I would rather have knock some sense into me"
I look up to him, and his face is solemn, his mouth sincere. I sheath the sword quickly, not tearing my eyes from his as I return it to its scabbard.
"Can you forgive me, Eowyn?"
His hand lingers, a butterfly's touch on my shoulder.
"What is there to forgive?" I answer before burying my face into the side of his neck. His shoulders loosen in relief, a sigh leaving him as I throw my arms around him, clutching my sword in one hand, the other a spread palm across his back. The muscle underneath ripples slightly as his arm winds around my waist.
"Each day I convince myself that I cannot love you more, and every day you prove me wrong"
He knows I have not the words to respond to this, but I think he feels my response, if only in the tightening of my arms encircling him. Against the skin of his neck I think I feel him smile.
We rode on, making up for lost time and yet not intent on rushing the journey. By afternoon, we had stopped beside a slender brook to refill our flasks and let the horses drink. Hot and tired from the ride, I slipped off my boots and the thin socks from my feet and sunk them gratefully into the cold water, hitching my skirts up to my knees and leaning my head back, a movement that brought me into contact with Faramir's hip. I opened my eyes to find him standing behind me.
"I think I may join you", he said, looking interestedly at the running water. If only the people of Gondor could see their Steward, I thought, as he pulled off his boots with tired relish and plunged his feet ankle-deep into the brook. So calm, so composed, going about his work diligently. The contrast of the ceremonial image and my husband beside me, head bowed between his knees as he splashed water over his tumbling hair provoked a giggle. Faramir raised his head, rivulets running down the strands of his hair and down his brow, and stared, poker-faced. My breath stilled as I watched the water trickle provocatively over his mouth.
"What amuses you, my lady?"
"Nothing", I managed, "other than what the revelations of a mere stream would do to your formal image"
He turned away, and for a flickering second I feared I had offended him. When I touched his arm to rouse him, a spray of droplets showered me full in the face. On recovering from the sudden assault, I found Faramir poised and ready, his hand already half immersed again into the water. I wipe my face with equally wet fingers.
"I do not think my brother will take kindly to his sister being abused so, my lord" I splutter through my shocked laughter.
"I doubt that the King of Rohan would be persuaded to intrude upon his sister and her husband when they have taken such pains to be alone", he counters, removing his hand from the brook and shaking it dry.
"He would listen to his sister. Eomer is stubborn, my lord", I reminisced, staring across the landscape before us, "once his mind is set on something, it is not easily, if at all stirred from following that path. He is like our uncle in that"
I remember how frail he looked, how I suddenly realised that my uncle was an old man, as he lay broken beneath Snowmane. He seemed to age in a single breath, as if in all the years he had ruled Rohan, I had seen him as a man still full of his prime, forgotten the white hairs on his head, blind to the lines around his cheerful but commanding eyes. I stop when, as if in recollection, my arm grows heated. I retreat into childhood before the dark tower of dead flesh before me.
A spiked mace swings.
Only when a damp hand on my cheek draws me towards him do I realise that my eyes have been closed, and that Faramir appears worried by my silence.
"What troubles my brave warrior so?" he mutters gently.
I shake my head.
"That which commits me to remembrance in song"
Faramir dropped his hand to my knee, already understanding of what I speak.
"A dark day for the kingdom of Rohan", he murmurs.
"All the more because none could help him", I swallowed. I had stood, frozen to the earth, to watch in horror as horse and rider collided and tumbled, foul claws reaching towards them.
"There was one"
I look up to meet my husband's gaze. He strokes the side of my face with an index finger.
"A true shieldmaiden of Rohan. A warrior of courage and resolve even when all around her seemed lost"
I blink back tears, the cold, primal fear that swept through me that day, even in recollection, as potent as before. How would you prepare to fight, when you stand dwarfed by what appears to be a tower of what was once a man, a king, like he who lies broken by your feet? Is there any joy in battle when your foe stands dark and unfamiliar as a grave, void of expression and beyond comprehension in his evil?
There is a singular fear, one that harks back to your first experience of it, that can still reduce you to quivering and self-doubt. Such was the fear that gripped me then.
I tell Faramir this. He nods in agreement, his clear eyes misting over as he too, retreats again into the past.
"For so long I wished to fight, to defend Rohan, Edoras. The times I was stopped from setting foot in stirrup, from putting hand to a sword, from riding into glorious battle like the horselords of old. Yet then, I wished for it no more. I wished for the fields to vanish, for Pelennor to become a distant possibility, to reverse time. I did not want it any longer, I-"
I wanted my uncle back. I wanted the closest thing to a father back, wanted him to rise to his feet so that we could take on this foe together, uncle and niece, united in battle.
"If this was the price to pay for a one moment of battle, I would have bartered my sword away and stood watch on the threshold of Edoras, awaiting the riders' return or gathering the people to me to defend the homeland to the last. He was so calm, and I was in chaos"
I smiled bleakly at Faramir.
"For all my hours of practice, the sword cleaved to my hand and would not move. As is now known, my shield proved useless"
He kissed my brow, pressing his lips there, prolonging the touch. My eyelids fluttered.
"All I could think of was to call for help. Help, as if in the noise and carnage of Pelennor any cry would be heard"
"Your deeds rang louder than any cry for help", Faramir rejoined, a hand clasping the crook of my arm, "and yielded more justice than any aid would have brought. You fought with all the more courage because you did so despite your great fear, and because even that could not prevent you from striking hard and true"
I brush his errant locks, sleek and darker from the water, back from his forehead, where they have fallen. My arm cools, and I do not think that it is because of the water splashed on the sleeves of my gown.
"You said that your brother desired the closeness that battle brought", I remember, "I desired that too"
"If you will, I would ask you something, Eowyn"
I blink, curious. I search his face for more of a clue.
"Ask anything, Faramir. I will not refuse you an answer"
He smiles, looks out across the brook where I had gazed. Yellow flowers adorn the weeds in the grass. A bee droned across the view. I cannot remember such contentment before Faramir.
"Tell me of Edoras", he speaks to the lingering bee.
We draw our feet out of the water and plant wet toes onto the green grass. There is much to tell.