Review Responses:
Ciel- Undomiel: Are you actually allowed to go on fanfiction .net at school? I wish we could do that at our school! Anyway, thanks for your review!
Malara: Hmmm, depends how you define 'a few' chapters. Another 3 or 4, maybe? Possibly 5. I'm not quite sure yet. If enough people say to, I might do a sequel once I've finished my other three stories.
LalaithoftheBruinen: Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it.
Dark Borg Drone: Uh, yeah. Is that a compliment or an insult for the story? Thanks for reviewing!
Rhys: Hey, no need to praise me on it getting better! It's thanks to you and a few others who've helped me with this!
Irish Anor: Yes, I saw I was on your faves list and I thought "Hmm, this person hasn't reviewed!" It's okay though, at least you did it eventually!
Hope you enjoy! I think I need to work on the last half of the chapter, so any suggestions are appreciated. I made it the best I could but I still don't think it's good enough! So please, share any ideas for improvement!
Aragorn stood up and strode out of the door. He found Arwen stood outside, staring over the wall westward.
"Meleth?" He asked gently, approaching her. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine, Estel." She turned towards him. "You should return now. They obviously detest my being there, and I should not create disharmony in the kingdom by behaving in a way that they do not find acceptable."
"No," Aragorn said kindly yet firmly. "You have many years more wisdom than either myself or them. Your opinion is valued much more than theirs will ever be." He paused briefly, then said jokingly: "I can't stand being with them alone, anyway, with them acting like children in the school room."
Arwen's lips curled up, though it was barely noticeable, before her face became serious again. "Please go back, Estel."
"Only if you come."
"I'm not going. It would only earn me a reputation of being too full of myself and acting in a way that a lady should not. Now, please, go. There are more important things to do than trying to persuade me to return."
"Nothing is more important than you," Aragorn whispered, his voice soft and loving.
Arwen smiled and leaned into him for a brief kiss.
"Now go," she murmured when they broke apart.
Meanwhile, the advisors were talking about their queen.
"She is incredibly wilful. A woman in the high council chamber?! Such a breach of tradition has never been even considered, until now," Hendras said angrily.
"The King Elessar does not treat her like his wife at all, he treats her almost as though she holds a station higher than his!" Seyban added.
"That's because he loves her," Faramir broke in.
"Of course he does, she's incredibly beautiful."
"No. He loves and respects her: she is the most important thing in King Elessar's life. And if you cannot hold your tongues out of respect for the lady, do it for yourselves. You will be very low in his favour if you continue to insult and degrade the Queen."
"Oh, never mind that," Aragorn said from the doorway. "You have already lost my favour, both as advisors and as ordinary subjects. I will have you no more in this council. Lords Hendras, Seyban, and Thein,"(the name of the Lord who had spoken against Arwen's advice for the peace agreement) "are all dismissed. Perhaps in a year I shall consider accepting you again."
"But my lord…"
"No protests, or you shall never sit on this council again. Understood?"
The three men nodded dumbly.
"Good. Now leave."
They did so.
That night, Arentiel was staying in her aunt's wooden, thatched house on the Pellenor fields. During the night she awoke to her aunt shaking her.
The scent of charred wood fully awoke Arentiel from her dreamy state, coupled with her aunt's frantic tone. Her aunt tried to rush her from the house, but Arentiel was adamant that her best dresses, hung in the wardrobe, be taken with her. Her aunt ran as a beam from the roof fell, trapping Arentiel.
Her aunt screamed as she ran outside, crying: "She's trapped, Arentiel's trapped!"
Her uncle threw a rope up to the window, and Arentiel was soon safe on the ground outside, but too late to save her from burns.
"Fetch my best stallion!" Her uncle roared, as his niece fainted in his arms.
Her uncle sat Arentiel on the front of the saddle and leapt up behind her. Digging his heels into the horse's sides he set off at the fastest gallop the tired animal could muster, ever urging him onward. He galloped through the circles of Minas Tirith, pulling his mount to a halt as he dismounted by the door of the houses of healing.
There, Arentiel's dress was removed, and she awoke as she was slipped into a tub of cold water to cool down the burns.
She let out a cry of pain.
"Shhh, lady," Murmured one of the healers. "You'll be fine."
Burns treated, Arentiel lay in a soft bed, awaiting the dawn when, she hoped, her friends would come to visit her.
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