The next morning I woke early but instead of getting out of bed, I rolled over and pulled the covers up. Last night's fight spun over and over, whirling around in a dark little cave in my head. I was furious at Éomer, but somehow it was a blessed relief. After months of trying to hate him I felt vindicated. I had known all along, I tried to tell myself, what he was really capable of, what he was really under that facade of nobility. How dare he? How dare he speak to me in that tone! And that talk about switching me! Never in my life had anyone spoken to me like that!

"Come on, wake up, little sister," Erchirion said softly when he came into my room some hours later. He rubbed my legs through the covers and pulled back the top of them to reveal my tousled hair. The fight had brought us closer, there was no questioning that, but he was treating me with a strange, tender reverence usually reserved for people who have recovered from an illness that brought them near death.

"The sun is already high," he prompted.

"I know," I said sourly. "That's why I pulled the blankets up."

"Oh, don't be like that," he said gently. "Get up. I want to go show Éomer your maps."

"Fine." I pointed. "They're on that table."

"Lothi, you did all the work. You should come. I'm sure he'll want to thank you himself."
Only if he hit his head on the way out of Firefoot's stall last night – hard enough to make him forget the last few months, I thought. "I'm not feeling well, Erchirion. I think I'm going to stay in bed today." It was going to be tedious to stay in bed with nothing to do but it was certainly better than the alternative.

Erchirion felt my forehead gently and gave me a small, questioning look. "You seem fine. Come on, get dressed and come down and show him the maps, then you can come back and return to your bed."

"I really don't feel like it."

"You really don't want to see his face when you show him?" He said it pointedly, letting me know that he knew Éomer and I had fought.

"No. I don't want to see his face..." I said evenly and just as pointedly. Ever again, I added silently.

He felt my forehead again. "Are you really feeling poorly, Lothíriel?"

"Yes."

"Well, I suppose it can wait," he said finally. "But I won't do it without you. This was your project and you put a lot of work into it. But perhaps it's better this way. We're riding out for the Yule hunt in a half an hour anyway..."

I swung my feet over the side of the bed. "Fine, let's go now."

I could see a good opportunity when it presented itself. Éomer would be expecting me to avoid him for at least a day and if they were leaving in half an hour it would be a brief exchange. But though the fight had been short it had been brutal, I reminded myself with a little swell of dread. Neither of us were one to mince words and it had been an absolute competition for the most ludicrously hurtful thing we could say. A competition I had apparently won, though it gave me less satisfaction than I would have thought.

We made our way to Éomer's private study, Erchirion carrying the pile of maps under his arm. He knocked once and that voice which sent a strange awareness through my limbs answered. "Come!"

He was looking down at some parchments on his desk when we came in and for a second I simply stared at him. Behind him there was a roaring fire, giving heat and light to the room, and he was dressed for the hunt in a dark green tunic and black leggings. On his tunic was embroidered a roaring lion, his personal crest. The heat from the fire washed over me and for the first time since I had left for the village the night before, I felt truly warm. I wanted to stay in his study all day. I had to remind myself to grab onto the tails of my icy anger. They were my only armor against his own harsh feelings.

"Hail, Éomer," Erchirion greeted him.

"Hail," I repeated, somehow unable to force his name out no matter how I tried.

When his eyes flickered over me the flash of emotions in his face was unreadable. There was some anger but mostly there was a vast reserve of something else that I wasn't quite able to place. Scorn perhaps? But no, I knew what scorn looked like and that wasn't it at all.

"Hail," he replied.

"We've come to show you the maps. Lothíriel finished them the week before we left Edoras." Erchirion said eagerly, going over and spreading them out on Éomer's desk.

I was really proud of the maps. They were as detailed as I could make them in the limited time I'd had during the rangeings, and I'd done a very good job of choosing landmarks. Any rider with a lick of sense would never be lost with one of them, I was sure. And then over the landmarks I had carefully copied the names of various villages along with their populations noted beneath. Still, I felt a sharp flicker of nervous embarrassment as Erchirion showed them, for the first time, to probably the only person whose opinion really weighed with me.

Éomer looked down at them for a long moment without saying anything, studying them all carefully in turn. I had meant to let Erchirion do all the talking but I found that I was unable to help myself. "I wrote the dimensions of this part of the river from memory so I'm not sure they're quite right." I gestured to a section of the River Isen. "We rode by it, and I wrote down all my notes as usual but they were ruined in a storm coming back. Also we could see the fold of some kind of valley up here." I pointed at one of the foothills of the White Mountains. "But I didn't insist we ride into it so I just left it blank. When I got back and realized that all the villages at the base get their water from mountain springs except this one I wished we had because looking at the map it's obvious that the source of the spring must be up there and I was thinking it might not be difficult to divert the water in some way so it came to them too. For the moment they're walking almost two leagues to this stream..."

My voice faltered. His expression was unreadable and it took all I had not to blush slightly. "What are the numbers underneath the village names?" he asked.

"Oh, the village names!" I exclaimed. "I'd forgotten about them. I'm sorry if I've made a hash of writing them down but I just tried to listen to what they were saying very hard and then wrote it out letter by letter..."

"The numbers..." Erchirion prompted me.

"Oh yes, populations," I said.

"So..." Erchirion prompted Éomer now. "What do you think?"

Éomer rubbed a hand over his beard and to my surprise he smiled right at me, a dazzling flash of teeth that made a heat quite different from that of the fire wash over me. "I think that if there were lady-knights in Rohan I would have to knight your sister for this."

Erchirion laughed. "You could make her an honorary member of one of your éoreds perhaps?"

"I don't think I would enjoy that very much," I said as coolly as I could through a blush of pure pleasure, "though perhaps one of those enormous great spears would look very fine over a fireplace." I was practically glowing with pride. I wasn't used to being praised for my character. Any genuine compliments I got were usually for my clothes.

Erchirion squeezed my arm affectionately. "I think we can find one for you back in Edoras." "Can more of these maps be made?" Éomer asked. "If you would be willing to teach someone in Edoras how to copy them I would be very grateful...I'd like to give at least one to each of my Marshalls and then another to..."

I had anticipated this question. "I've been reading about techniques for copying maps. And I think the best way if you need them in a hurry would be something they do in the south of Gondor. You just need a very thin sheet of special paper which you can trace the map onto.' I smiled at him. 'I can send for some if you like.' I pushed aside the expense of it, sure my father would pay. 'Then it's a matter of getting a very bright candle that you set behind the thin sheet and you set the paper of your new map in front of that. The shadows of the ink are then simply inked in on the new map. You can even change the size of the map by changing the distances between the thin sheet and your new map."

When we finished talking about the maps Erchirion and Éomer began to discuss the possibilities it opened up. It was almost exactly as I had hoped. They had been having difficulty communicating, having to say things like 'the first village on the left fork and past that village where the raid was last year 'or 'the second valley away from the River Limlight towards the mountains but not the one with twenty villages, the one with only about seven.' Now it was a matter of pointing to where they meant and saying. "There. Let's put the distribution point there."

The map also showed where the places that were really struggling were. "I hadn't realized this branch of the river had been hit so much harder," Éomer said, looking at my little numbers under the names. "We should change the amount of grain we are sending."

These specifics didn't interest me though. I just let the tone of their excitement wash over me as I stared into the fire and thought about all the places I had seen on my rangeings. I was surprised to find that I was almost thinking wistfully of those rides. Now that the maps were made there would be no reason for me to go with Erchirion again and that filled me with an unexpected melancholy.

The rides had been miserable some days. There had been a night when it had rained so hard that my bedroll was almost washed away and had ever after smelled of damp no matter how long or often I left it out in the sun. There had been a day when I had been stung by a bee on my index finger. It had throbbed painfully while I tried to take detailed notes on a particularly complicated river bank as we rode by, Erchirion insisting all the while that we had to ride faster if we wanted to make it to the next inn by nightfall.

But there had been moments of transcendent joy as well. I remembered one day when we had arrived at a village early in the day. The men had had to unload all the grain and distribute it but the terrain had been so easy to map I had finished before the midday meal. Erchirion had suggested that Gænwyn and I could help unload the grain if I wanted. I had laughed and gone to the nearest inn to see if a glass of wine could be bought at any price. To my pleasant surprise there had been a bottle of sweet summer wine still kept in the store as if by a miracle and since the day had seen a fluke of warm weather we had been able to drink it at a table they'd moved out onto the lawn for us, watching the men work as we drank. Afterward, in the glow of the wine, I had magnanimously announced that Erchirion had decided to buy everyone a round of mead at the same inn since they'd worked so hard and had enjoyed unprecedented popularity for days afterward.

And then there were the children of the Mark. I had never been particularly interested in children. All the ones I had known were spoiled little brats of the court who I liked best when they were sulking because at least then they were quiet. But in Rohan everywhere I went the blond children stared and pointed at my dark hair and whispered 'elf' to each other. I had always liked people who liked me first, and I found that the children of the Mark and I got along just fine. At first I liked their reverent solemnity because, again, it kept them silent. But soon I found that they were easy to win over with a few tricks and much more fun once they began to talk.

They were so easy with their affection. Unlike the little Gondorian Lords and Ladies, who were always treated as if they were made of fine china, the Rohirrim children literally begged to be picked up, tossed about and lifted up onto the back of my horse for a little ride around the village (they were all better riders than me but very few had horses of their own). After knowing a child for a single afternoon I would find myself picking them up when we had to ride out and giving them a little shower of kisses before passing them back to their mothers. For the first time I began to think of myself as someone who liked children.

Erchirion and Éomer were still talking at a rapid, excited pace when there was a knock on the door and one of Éomer's riders came in. "Éomer King the riders are ready."

Éomer's eyes flashed to me for a second. He sighed and gave a look as if he didn't really want to stop his conversation with Erchirion. As the lord of the house however he could hardly stay home during the Yule hunt. He nodded slowly. "Fine. We are coming."

After they were gone I walked down to the main hall to find the other ladies were decorating the hall for the feast that night. They had gathered pine branches and were arranging them into wreathes to hang around the hall. It smelled like a forest and Amrothos would have said something very cutting about such simple decorations, but I found that it was somehow a very pleasing smell.

Lady Lithoer spotted me almost as soon as I arrived. "Lothíriel! How glad I am to see you!" she cried, coming forward to clutch my hands. "I feel awful that you walked home alone. I really should have insisted that you walk with us! I knew better, but by the time I really started to worry we were too far to go back for you."

I waved her off, blushing slightly. "I hadn't expected my errand to take so long. It's not at all your fault."

She shook her head. "You are a guest in our country and you do not know how dangerous the snow can be here!" she insisted. "I should never have let you brave the danger unknowingly. Why just a few weeks ago one of the children from the city died walking just the same path as you after dark!"

"Oh?"

She nodded. "A little girl who was walking back from the keep after nightfall. Éomer King was the one who found her and he was furious at the guards for letting her leave so late. He relieved them all of their duty and made them go with him to inform the family."

Suddenly Éomer's rage at what I had done seemed remarkably less like the high-handed meddling it had the night before. And my flippant decision to go back for the horse seemed a lot more foolish. I remembered a moment when I had almost slipped on an icy patch of the road. And what if he hadn't come for me? Would I have made it back at all? I felt the anger drain out of me, replaced by the cold sinking feeling that perhaps I had been entirely in the wrong. The flimsy protection of my own indignation seemed to melt away before me like a snowflake on warm blond eyelashes with furious and terrified eyes looking down at me through them.

"I shall be more careful in the future."

Watching the women make the wreaths, I remembered suddenly that I had never asked Feleas to teach me to weave flower garlands and I wondered what she was doing in Minas Tirith these days. I wondered if I could write her a letter. I could include one with a letter to Amrothos but he would likely not be counted on to pass it along. "Lithoer," I said suddenly. "Could you please teach me to weave those wreaths?"

In the heat of the hall, with the wreaths to make and decorate, I found the ladies much less intimidating than I had the day before. They were very nice about showing me how to construct my wreath and complimented me more than I deserved for my taste. "You have an artist's eye," one of them said when I held the finished product aloft to inspect it.

For a moment I thought she was making fun of me and I was just formulating a very biting response when I looked at her and realized that she was smiling completely guilelessly at me. "Thank you," I said awkwardly, blushing at the retort I had been seconds from lashing at her like a whip.

Old habits, I thought bitterly, are harder to unmake than the ring of power.

After we had decorated the great hall it was almost evening so we retired to our quarters. I took a very long bath using my very favorite rose scented bath salts and washed my hair with my very best perfumed soap, and then carefully dried it by the fire. I felt extremely alone as I sat by the fire, carefully spreading my hair out before the flames. Getting ready for a party, putting on my best clothes and arranging my hair so carefully made me miss Amrothos with a painful melancholy. Perhaps it was just the fight I'd had with Éomer, which, quite apart from any troubling extra emotions I might feel for the man himself, made me feel rejected and out of place in what was literally his country.

The dress I had brought for that evening was a shimmering silver silk. It was made of a single piece of fabric and cut almost ridiculously conservative, with only a small circle of my chest visible at the neck and a high-collar that had been fashionable the generation before. But it made a mockery of this old-fashioned look by being so fitted in the bodice and with the heavy, sweeping recently designed skirt. With it I wore soft silver shoes, gloves and a dark, blood-red ribbon in my hair.

For a moment I stood in front of the mirror and fastened the ribbon in my hair in the fashion of the Rohirrim—clasping two strands for the front together in the back and tying them with the ribbon but leaving the great mass of my dark hair down. I found that I liked the look quite a bit. I did feel it made me look rather like a loose women but quite an appealing one. I laughed at my folly and quickly twirled my hair up into a simple bun, winding the ribbon once around my head and fastening it below the bun.

Not a moment too soon either for there was a knock on the door to my antechamber. "Come in, Erchi."

I came out of my bedroom to greet my brother but it was not Erchirion who was waiting for me in the small room.

Éomer was already dressed for the feast in dark fine breaches, soft, supple boots and a matching black tunic with the silver horse of Rohan as the emblem. Our eyes met and I stopped short, letting my hands fall from where they had been fiddling with the ribbon. I swept him a curtsey. "Hello, my lord."

"Hello, Lothíriel."

"I was expecting Erchi..."

"He went to escort Lady Lithoer," he explained. "I said I would escort you down."

"That is uncommonly gallant of you."

"I was looking for an excuse to talk to you."

I searched for something to say to that, but came up with nothing. He had no trouble with words, though.

"I've wanted to apologize to you since you left the stable last night. Well, perhaps not exactly since you left. It took me a few hours before I calmed down and realized what I had done. I won't apologize for being angry with you for walking home alone. That was a very foolish thing to do, but I will apologize for the very...ungentlemanly things I said."

Another girl might have been displeased with an apology that was also a repetition of the assertion that she had been wrong. But after all, I hadn't been willing to apologize at all and I was mightily ashamed of some of the things I had said. It seemed fair enough to me. The fury that surged through me, the reason I wanted suddenly to slap his face stemmed from entirely different motivations.

How could he stand to be so vulnerable? How could he be so stupid as to present such target to me? It was almost mesmerizing, the open look of uncomplicated remorse on his face. He should know better than to trust someone like me, I thought angrily. A few well-chosen hurtful remarks about his manners, his people or his sister and I could land such a stinging bite it would never fully heal. If I could think fast enough I could probably make sure he would never trust anyone so fully ever again.

It would be a kindness, a voice in my head that sounded remarkably like Amrothos whispered. Show him what people are really like before someone else does first. Show him what you are capable of...what everyone is capable of.

But I knew the price of that particular kindness. I could destroy his trust in people and maybe save him some pain later for if he was stupid enough to give me that sort of power over him he was stupid enough to give it to others who didn't deserve it either. But he would never look at me again. He would hate me until the end of his days, I was sure. And as much as I wanted to pay the price of that, I couldn't do it. Even if he would never look at me quite the way I wanted him to I found I couldn't give up all hope of a friendship.

Amrothos had once told me that there should never be anything in your life or your mind that you couldn't watch burn for a price. Until that moment I had thought that I had managed that reasonably well. But I couldn't watch Éomer burn. No matter how selfish it was, I wanted him for myself in whatever capacity that was possible.

I brushed one hand over my face uncomfortably. "Éomer...if anyone should be apologizing it's me. And not just for last night but for that morning in the stables...I don't know what came over me but I didn't mean what I said...any of it. "I spoke haltingly. It had been so long since I had apologized for anything I had almost forgotten how.

The corner of his mouth twitched up into a smug little smile that should have been infuriating but somehow made him heart-wrenchingly handsome. "I know that, Lothíriel... You aren't the liar you think you are. It shows in the maps you made how much you love the Mark."

I frowned, irked by that. "Still...I shouldn't just say any little thing that comes into my silly head..."

"It's already forgiven," he cut me off.

I usually never had trouble taking things but I found that I was uncomfortable with being forgiven. The cracks I had made at his country were particularly troubling me. He took a step forward as if to take my hand but then seemed to think better of it. "Besides...the way I grabbed your wrist. That was absolutely inexcusable. I will never do that again."

"Or spank me with a switch?" I teased.

To my infinite surprise he actually blushed. I had never thought him capable of that. Before I saw it, I would have found it easier to imagine him in one of my dresses than in a moment of shame. "I didn't mean that even as I said it. Lothíriel...you must know that I would never hurt you."

I thought back to that moment in the stable and realized that I did know it. When he had grabbed my wrist I had felt no fear, only a cold kind of contempt for what I knew was an empty gesture. I had hated that he dared to touch me in a moment when I was so consumed by my rage, but, great warrior that he was, it hadn't even occurred to me to fear physical violence from his anger.

"I know that," I admitted.

"Good," he said, clearly relieved. "Though I am serious when I say I want your promise never to walk that path alone."

"Fine. If you promise never to try to play my father ever again I suppose one concession is a reasonable price."

"It isn't an unreasonable..."

"And everything you do is reasonable?"

Suddenly he laughed. "Let's not fight over the bones of an argument," he said jovially. "We can talk about the path tomorrow. Let's just put it behind us for Yule."

"Fine," I agreed.

"And speaking of Yule," he said, drawing a package from behind his back. "It isn't what you asked for in Edoras but I did get you something."

I laughed. "So you were sure I was going to forgive you?" I asked, cocking an eyebrow.

He shook his head with a laugh and a smile charming enough to make me feel slightly dizzy. "Not at all. I wanted to be ready in case you demanded a higher price for peace between us."

"So now you think my good will can be bought?"

"Are you offended?"

I considered for a moment. "No...I suppose it can be."

The package was simply wrapped in a scrap of green wool and I went to put it in my room to be opened on the morrow at sunrise, but he forestalled me. "I want you to open it now."

"But it's traditional..." I began.

"Just open it. Let's say I want to see what you think of it."

I pulled back the wrapping and inside was a small, velvet box about the size of Éomer's closed fist. It looked quite old. And although some of the velvet had been rubbed bald in places, it was quite rich. Inside was a beautiful bracelet of beaten silver. The band was formed by the shapes of running horses, so finely and beautifully formed that it was almost surprising to see that they weren't actually moving. Without a second thought I took it from the box and turned it over in my hands, noticing the way that there was no beginning or end to the horses. They simply ran forever in their endless circle. It was the most beautiful piece of jewelry I'd ever seen.

But it was obviously very costly and probably an heirloom.

"It was my mothers," he said, as if guessing my thoughts. "Éowyn doesn't ever wear jewelry and I thought of everyone I had ever met you would get the most joy out of wearing it."

"Éomer..." I said softly. "I can't accept this."

I knew he hadn't intended it in that way but in Gondor this was a fine enough piece of jewelry to be an engagement gift. Wearing it in my home country I would be sending a very clear message to anyone who saw it that I was intended for Éomer.

"Come now, Lothíriel. We've just made up from a fight. Surely you owe me at least a few moments of studious politeness," he said. "And it wouldn't be at all polite to refuse my Yule gift."

"But Éomer...," I protested.

He took the bracelet from my fingers and gently captured my hand, trying to slip it on. But I pulled my hand back a little bit, knowing that once it was on I would never want to take it off again. He didn't let go of my hand but he didn't slip the bracelet on either.

"Think of it as a gift for all the work you did on the maps too," he said. "Just until I get you a spear."

My face flamed. "Éomer you can't give gifts like this in Gondor...not without...not without expecting something in return."

"I do expect something. I expect you to wear it."

"Don't pretend like you're that dense," I said, but without the bite I had intended to put in my words.

"This isn't Gondor. The only way to ask for a maiden's hand in Rohan is to give her a horse, not a piece of jewelry."

"I suppose I should have guessed," I said with a sigh and a laugh. "But I still can't..."

"You can't expect to go unrewarded for those maps," he finished firmly. "You have no idea what a great service you've done for the Mark...and for me, by making those."

I hesitated and looked at the bracelet longingly. Seeing his opportunity Éomer slipped the band over my hand and settled it onto my wrist. "There...now that that's resolved we should go down to the feast."

"No wait!" I said. "I have a Yule gift for you, though I'm afraid I didn't wrap it and it's not near as fine as yours." I dashed back into the room and dug through my little satchel until I found the little wooden horse that had caused me so much trouble. I put it behind my back and then went out to the antechamber. "Ready?" I asked.

He nodded, and I presented it to him with a little flourish.

For a second he just looked at it a little nonplussed. But then he took it gently and solemnly. "Why, it's lovely. Thank you very much..." he began.

"It's Firefoot!" I said impatiently. "Don't you think it looks just like him?"

For a second he looked confused then his face broke into a disbelieving grin that he seemed to try to stifle twice before it just broke out of him in great peals of laughter. Indignantly, I tried to snatch the horse back from him but he closed his hands around it protectively. "I hadn't thought this studious politeness business would be so one sided," I said hotly. "In the future should we quarrel I don't think I will be observing this tradition again..."

"No... no... it's a very fine horse," he gasped between laughter. "A true Mearas." But then his laughter took him again and didn't subside for several moments.

I glared at him hotly, though I honestly thought it kept him going for longer than he would have if I hadn't looked so angry. "Well, if it's a nice horse, what exactly is the problem?"

He had to stifle his laughter to answer me. "Well, it's just that she's a very nice horse. This is a mare, Lothíriel."

"No!" I gasped. This time when I tried to snatch the horse back he let me have it. I flipped the horse over and found that indeed he was right. "How did you know that without looking?" I demanded.

He doubled over in laughter again. "Her lines! It's plain as day. A beautiful runner I'm sure, and could outstrip Firefoot over a long distance I'd wager. But she's certainly a lady."

I looked crestfallen. "I didn't mean to..." I began.

"It's a very charming mistake," he assured me, a patronizing smile twitching lips and infuriating me. "I will treasure her always. But I don't think I will be telling Firefoot about this. First you call him 'pretty' and now this. He might feel he needs to run someone down in front of you so that you're properly impressed by him."

"I really hadn't meant..."

"I know."

"You're going to tell everyone about this, aren't you?"

"Only everyone you know."

"How reasonable of you."

Down at the feast the wooden horse was an enormous success. It was passed around the party while Éomer told the story over and over and roared with laughter every time. It was explained to me almost endlessly that the slope of her neck and the shape of her flanks and legs meant that she simply couldn't (couldn't!) be taken for anything else but a mare. Even Erchirion crowed that it was obvious to him what she was. I took the joke with as much good cheer as I could, laughing the first through to the tenth time I was teased about it, and gritting my teeth for the next hundred. If anyone even noticed my new silver bracelet they didn't remark on it.

The hunt had been a success and we ate well on roasted venison and succulent quail and even two small wild boars. We weren't a large party so after dinner there was no dancing. A bard entertained us with some tales, which I found quite diverting, and a few heroic songs. One of the songs was about the battle of Pelennor fields and when it came to the verses about Éomer I found that I shivered, though it was hot in the hall from the enormous Yule fire. Of course I had known the story before that night, about how he had led that hopeless charge against the armies of the Enemy but I'd never heard it told since I knew the man. I didn't like to think about him in a moment when he was so far from hope that all that remained was to take as many of his enemies with him.

After that some of the guests sung or recited poems. Even Éomer sang with some of his riders a ballad about a young man, on the brink of a hopeless battle, who thinks about the maiden he will never confess his love to, as he sharpens his blade. Éomer had a nice deep, confident voice that flowed through my chest like warm brandy.

We were begged for a Gondorian entertainment too. Erchirion obligingly sang a song but I could not be persuaded, though I was heavily urged, even to recite a poem. "No, no, I have no talent for recital. And my singing voice is no voice at all."

Only Erchirion was on my side, having heard me sing before.

As in Gondor, the Rohirrim thought it was good luck to stay up all through the longest night of the year so after the recitals, though it was quite late, we decided to go for a walk in the gardens. After that we went up to the battlements and Éomer sent for hot wine and buns to be brought to us there. The wine was delicious but quite a bit stronger than I was used to so I only had a few sips of mine. Then we walked back to the hall to warm up in front of the fire and to hear a few more stories from the bard.

The bard had just finished a particularly moving story about an elf lord who takes a mortal woman as his queen and the anguish of his love for her, when Éomer stood and stretched. "I feel we are reaching the darkest hour of the night," he said in Rohirric.

There was a buzz of excitement from the Rohirrim and I turned to the lady on my right. "What does the darkest hour mean?" I asked.

"We're going to..." she said a word I didn't know in Rohirric.

"Oh?" I said, not liking to admit that I didn't know what she'd said. "What shall I do to prepare?"

"Get your warmest cloak!" she replied.

I didn't like the sound of that at all but Erchirion and I went to our rooms obediently to fetch our warmest clothes. "What do you think is going on?" I asked Erchirion.

"I asked Éomer. He said we're going down to the fountain to swim."

I laughed at that. The fountain stood in the wide courtyard between the main hall and the stables. Water bubbled up from the underground reserve to the well first where it was collected in the main hall but then spilled over into the fountain before trickling down the face of the mountain in a stream that ran parallel to the path up. It wasn't elaborately carved as a Gondorian fountain would have been but it had a wide, deep basin. In the summer I imagined it would be perfect for swimming but it must have been frozen over for months. Dismissing the idea of bathing in it as ridiculous, I wondered what we really would be doing.

But I had been wrong about it being frozen over. There were enormous chunks of ice floating in it but it was clear that someone had spent a good part of the afternoon shattering the surface of the pool.

The Rohirrim whooped and shouted when they saw it, giddy with a strange, buzzing anticipation. Erchirion and I exchanged a look of dismay and disbelief (dismay on my part, disbelief on his). A servant had accompanied us down from the main hall with a bottle of fortified liquor and some small cups. He poured generous portions and passed them around. To my surprise the ladies accepted cups too and threw the drink back with cheerful determination. Erchirion reached for a cup himself and feeling resigned, and not at all pleased, I stuck out my hand as well.

As I accepted it I realized that all the Rohirrim were looking at me expectantly, waiting to watch how a Gondorian lady would drink what I knew from the smell was a very strong drink. I had never liked liquor but I tossed it back in a single swallow and, though I shuddered mightily at the taste and sensation of it sliding down my throat, managed to drink it all. This was met with a roar of approval and someone slapped me on the back, hard enough to almost knock the cup from my grip, which was loose from the shuddering.

When I looked back up I realized that Éomer was stripping out of his cloak, tunic and shirt. I didn't bother to try not to stare as he pulled the shirt off and his chest, which was broad and muscular enough to break any maiden's heart, was exposed in the moonlight. Next he stripped out of his outer leggings, leaving only his thin under leggings and stepped out of his boots. Then, without another word he ran flat out towards the fountain, smoothly stepping onto its lip and diving into the water with a single, graceful movement. He disappeared through the black surface of the water with barely a ripple and for a long, silent moment it was almost as if he hadn't been there at all. But then his head broke the surface again with a whoop of joy. "Eorlingas!" he shouted in a voice that had never sounded more alive. "Come, join your king!"

With an answering whoop all the Rohirrim began to strip out of their clothes. Even the ladies shed their cloaks and began to pull their dresses over their heads. Like kisses at Beltane, this was a tradition that would have been scandalous any time other than on its proper festival day but was taken as part and parcel of the celebration. But the pass on impropriety wouldn't mitigate the temperature of the water. I looked at Erchirion. "I think he just called the Eorlingas. As children of Gondor it would practically be an insult to King Eless..."

"Fine. You stay right here then," Erchirion said, beginning to strip off his cloak, and not bothering to disguise the fact that he was looking at Lady Lithoer.

I gave a long suffering sigh. "I will be telling King Elessar about this treason."

By the time I had gotten my cloak off most of the Rohirrim were already running for the fountain. I hurried up, pulling off the cloak and wincing as the wind seeped in for the first time. But there was no backing out now. I pulled the rest of my winter vestments off and then, hesitating only a minute longer, my dress. Underneath I had a simple silk shift but I might as well have been naked. The wind came through it like it didn't exist and when it slapped against my skin it was like a little icy bite. I slipped off my shoes last and gasped as the snow closed over my feet, a sensation like putting them into fire. The cobblestones below the snow felt like burning coals.

I didn't quite run out as everyone else had, but more hobbled along, cringing as each foot was put into a new, fresh patch of snow. "Run!" Lithoer called from the water. "The snow is the worst part!"

Everyone else had dived right in, but I hesitated when I stood on the edge of the fountain. The water below me was deep and pitch black. Just for a second I thought about going back to the stables and putting on my clothes again but then I thought about that night in Edoras where I had wanted to be naked under the wind and the stars. Here my wish had come true! Though admittedly not in a way I had ever imagined. With a shriek of fear, I stepped off the ledge.

The sensation of the water closing over my head was like getting kicked in the chest by a horse. The air left my lungs and for a second I forgot to kick for the surface. At every point on my body there was an icy dagger pricking my flesh and my head swum slightly with the overwhelming sensation. But then I remembered that it was either swim or drown. I kicked awkwardly for the surface, limbs numb and strangely disconnected. For a moment I thought I wasn't going to reach the surface in time. I had let all the air out of my lungs involuntarily on impact and I didn't seem to be making any progress by flailing my heavy, clumsy extremities. But then a warm hand in the dark grabbed my arm and dragged me the extra few feet to the surface.

"I... I...th…th…th…thought we agreed no more wr…wr…wr…wrist grabbing." I mumbled through frozen lips, gasping for air.

He laughed. "That was your upper arm, Princess. I never said anything about upper arms. Besides, I've seen more than one person forget how to swim when the cold hits them for the first time. I didn't want to take any chances with... a map maker like you."

"Wh…wh…wh…why in the name of Eorl did we go at the d…d…d…darkest hour of the night? You said that since it was the darkest hour of the n…n…n…night we had to go...why? Even the afternoon would be b…b…b…better than this!"

He grinned. "Otherwise it wouldn't be proper! Now swim princess and get your heart rate up or you'll freeze where you are and sink like a stone."

I tried a tentative dog paddle. It had been years since I had swum and the last time had been in Dol Amroth before I'd gone to Minas Tirith, where the salty water felt like a warm bath. This was somewhat different. My breath was an icy fog before me that came in gasps and every time I moved I regretted stirring the cold water passed my body.

But after a few minutes I found that my body had adjusted slightly and I was no longer quite so miserably cold. I paddled over to Lithoer, who my brother was circling like a fish in the icy stream and laughing uproariously as she tried to splash him. I swam quietly up behind him and tried to push him under the surface of the water as we had done as children in the sea. But he had always been quite a strong swimmer and managed to hold my weight as I pushed myself up onto his shoulders (regretting it instantly the second I left the water where at least I was protected from the chill of the wind). And when I finally gave up, he simply rolled me off his shoulders and dunked me back into the frozen stream. When we stopped tussling I was really out of breath and had started to shiver uncontrollably, though I didn't feel the cold anymore.

"Come on," Lithoer said. "We should get out."

"I want to stay in," I complained. "It doesn't feel so cold anymore."

"That means you need to get out."

We swam to the edge of the ice and pulled ourselves out ungracefully. We were all stiff with cold and the first bite of the wind was almost unbearable. I shrieked a little wild cry as we ran back to where we had left our clothes. Most of the guests had gotten out of the water already and the women had ducked into the stables. Lithoer grabbed her clothes and motioned me to follow her. Inside the stables I found to my shock that the women were stripping off their shifts and pulling their gowns over naked flesh. They were dancing on the hay with their frozen feet while the horses watched them indifferently.

"I c…c…c…c…can't do that!" I whispered through frozen teeth. "It's not pr…pr…pr...Oh, never m…m…m…mind." A little more impropriety was just a drop in a frozen icy lake after what I had just done.

I stripped off my shift and let it drop to the filthy floor, then I pulled on my silky, silver gown, relishing the feeling of it against my naked skin before quickly pulling on my cloak, muffler and everything I had brought with me. I was still cold to the core but the feeling of warmth was beginning to sink in and I was more than exhilarated from the swim. Next, I let down my hair, rung it out quickly, shook it once a little bit and hastily braided it back up.

When I came back out from the stable I saw that some of the men were still in the water, Éomer among them. But they weren't shouting or swimming around anymore, though occasionally they would say something and all laugh. "What are they doing?" I asked Lithoer.

She laughed. "They're teasing Éomer King," she explained. "If he comes in before all his guests it will be a long harvest and a bad harvest."

"He'll die before he comes in then."

But as I spoke the men in the water struck out for the edge and Éomer was only less than a second behind them when he pulled himself out of the water.

We all ran together back to the main hall. Once back inside the fire was stoked to a roaring blaze and we all crowded around to finish off the bottle of liquor. Éomer also sent for cups of hot mulled wine and thick heavy robes, both of which I was grateful for. The Rohirrim congratulated both me and Erchirion copiously, calling us the Ice Prince and Princess of Dol Amroth and clapping us soundly on the back.

"Are all the princesses of Dol Amroth so fearless?" Lithoer asked with a coy little smile.

Erchirion laughed. "I couldn't say. Lothíriel is the only one I've ever met. But she is quite fearless, isn't she?"

"Not at all fearless. Just too scared to stay alone in the courtyard."

"As far as I can tell the thing that you fear the most Lady Lothíriel is a sincere compliment," Éomer said.

"I am proud of you, Sister." Erchirion said softly when the attention had turned away from us.

"Oh?" I was amused. "For jumping in an icy pond nearly naked on Yule with half a dozen men? I should have words with our father about the kind of guardian you are turning out to be."

He laughed. "For everything. I am glad I brought you with me to Rohan...for a number of reasons."

"I'm glad I came," I said, surprising myself with my sincerity.

The rest of the night we simply passed in conversation. There were a few more stories and songs. But mostly we just whiled away the hours until dawn amusing each other with conversation. A lot of it was about things I didn't really quite understand, particularly when they spoke Rohirric, but when I didn't understand, I was content to just listen.

And then, quite unexpectedly, as the sun rose, I found myself thinking about Saeril. She spent a lot of time skirting the perimeter of my mind, spinning her webs in the dark corners I never could bring myself to look at. It had been years however since she had come out to the forefront of my thoughts; so long I'd almost forgotten the strange, half-crushed feeling she evoked in me. Perhaps she came to me then because of the time of the year, but more likely because the previous evening Erchirion had mentioned the summer we had stayed in Minas Tirith and not gone home. He'd wondered what had happened to us during that time. Well, Saeril had happened to us – her outlook on life changing us forever.

But whatever else, the Yule we had spent with her had been magical. There had been a grand party in the Merethrond but we had slipped out early, just the three of us, to follow a young lady of our acquaintance to a distant room where she was meeting her lover. Afterward we'd walked to the edge of the Citadel and stood together in the darkest hour of the night, sharing a bottle of wine and laughing at the world. In the gray dawn she had finished her wine and then flung the glass out over the edge, laughing with the unmitigated joy of the heartless. When we had told the girl's father what she had done, revenge for the mildest slight she'd dared broach against Amrothos, she had been forced to leave the court after bursting into pitiful, sobbing tears at a gathering the next week.

Back then, with Saeril with us, we had felt so important. We had our youth, our health and our beauty and we were learning what seemed like the most important game in the world from the very best player. What could we have had to fear?
But this Yule I was in Rohan, and when the sun began to rise we all went out onto the battlements to watch it and exchange gifts and have some hot biscuits brought from the kitchen. Erchirion gave me a very fine new cloak and some nice charcoal pencils for sketching and said he was very pleased with his own gift. From the other lords and ladies I received an assortment of pleasing trinkets: hair ribbons, sweets and even a small vial of perfume. Though we had technically exchanged gifts I gave Éomer one of the sweets and he gave me a very fine new saddle blanket, which had been his gift to all regardless of gender.

When everyone had thanked everyone else we went back up to our rooms to sleep the rest of the morning away. My last waking thought was of the sobbing girl in Minas Tirith and a warm hand grasping my arm in dark water and pulling me to the surface with an irresistible force.

TBC

As usual my beta LBJ did a truly amazing job of editing this chapter. A huge thanks to her! And a big thanks to those who reviewed! The response to the last chapter was great and I really want to hear what you all think of this one! I love it so much when I see a new review it's crazy!