I closed my eyes and the world spun away from me. When I opened them, he was still looking at me intently. "My lord..." I began.

But in several quick strides he closed the gap between us. I stumbled backwards into the side of the plinth but he pushed forward, slamming his hands to either side of me so I was trapped between his body and the stone. I couldn't breathe though my heart was pounding frantically. I must have looked like a deer who has seen the wolf poised almost at its hooves.

"Easy."

Excruciatingly slowly, he closed the gap between our lips.

For such a violent act the kiss that followed was surprisingly gentle, almost tentative. For a moment I was as still as the stone beneath my hands. He pressed his lips to mine lightly, drew back and then returned again, grazing my bottom lip just barely and tilting his head so that I felt his beard, somehow both soft and rough, against my cheek. When I heard his shuddering exhale and felt the warmth of his breath I began to respond, opening my mouth slightly and moving my lips inexpertly against his.

The result was like a damn breaking. He slid a hand along my bare arm and the other went to my hair, tangling in my braid and mussing it. I responded in kind. And suddenly, what had been at first practically chaste, was violent. One arm went back around my waist, crushing him to me. His lips crashed down on mine and into them he poured something of his temper, his pain and his will. them.

But my hands were back in his hair too, pulling his rough embrace tighter. My lips parted for him, willingly, eagerly. Why did I so enjoy being crushed in his arms, not exactly powerless but unable to escape? Why, instead of trying to push him away, did I long only for him never to stop? I would only ask myself later. In the moment, I was beyond thought.

When he pulled back I leaned in, following his lips with mine until he had to grip my hair to keep me in my place. "Oh you little fool," he growled

He kissed me again, brutally and quickly, as if to punish me. I tilted my head forward, searching for more retribution. But quick as a flash he moved back to stand three good paces from me. "Bema, woman, I will have an explanation from you."

That doesn't seem fair or reasonable, the small, still rational part of my mind piped up. He had dragged me out into the night, away from the party and any possible help, kissed me senseless and now he was demanding an explanation while my head was still spinning and my lips still aching? Did he think he was some sort of pirate king from the tales and that I would simply swoon for his pillaging kiss? If he did, he was correct, I thought, leaning against the stone as subtly as I could.

"I suppose you think that cloth flower snatched from my hair gives you the right to kiss me so?"

With another man it might have occurred to me to choose my words and tone a little more carefully. We were after all far enough away from the party that I was unlikely to be heard even if I screamed at the top of my lungs. I was out in the night with a man who had just kissed me as passionately as a man can kiss a woman and who had every reason in the world to be angry with her. At any other time I might have considered my reputation. Though we were unlikely to be observed it wasn't impossible that our absence from the party would be noticed and conclusions drawn from it. But Éomer posed no threat to me—not physically at any rate—and I would have traded in my reputation a thousand times over to have him kiss me again.

"That was a game for children. That kiss was mine by rights."

"By what right?" Anger burned like a torch in the muddled fog that seemed to have replaced my intellect and I grasped it readily, eagerly.

"A man has the right to kiss a woman who is as damn vexing as you are. I have the right to know how you feel about me, Lothíriel and it's no use at all asking you. You can talk in circles as well as anyone but you could never hide yourself as well in your actions. Now I have seen the measure of your feelings for me I want a full account of whatever game you're playing, and I want it now."

"Or what?"

"Or nothing, Lothíriel!" he retorted, glaring down at me. But when I refused to return his gaze he relented slightly. "I am hardly going to threaten you with a sword and we both know how effective other kinds of coercion have worked on you in the past. I can't make you explain yourself to me but you are smart enough to figure out why you should. Even if you often pretend you aren't. "

I closed my eyes and took several deep breaths. They were meant to steady me somewhat but the smell of him still lingering on my clothes only made me dizzy and the aching in my chest throb. Two instincts fought all out war.

The first instinct was older, a little ill used but tricky, cunning and it knew me well. It was my protective reflex towards Amrothos. For more than ten years my brother had been the only person who kept my confidence and gave me his in return. We had been castaways from the world together, voyagers in a dangerous and strange jungle, struggling to survive. And we had survived, and later flourished, because of the bond we had forged. Our mutual devotion and trust had been a comfort and a tool for us. Even now I knew that my brother had only been trying to protect me when he'd given the letters to Éomer. How could I betray his secrets?
The other instinct was newer, but no less strong for its youth, and less well defined. It had to do with Éomer and how I felt about him. But it also incorporated elements of my relationships with Gaoiwyn, Erchirion and even Lithoer and my father. It had to do with telling the truth and doing what I thought was best. It was, I think, a nascent form of self respect.

"I have been in love with you since the day in the cave at the Dimholt. Maybe before."

He let out a low, hissing breath, like a man might when discovering a wound had infected, but he said nothing.

"But my brother has been in love with Lady Harra of Harrow since before I knew what love meant between a man and a woman. We had just come to the court, and Amrothos was a gangly teenager and I was still mostly a girl. We weren't ready for the court and the first months were pretty rough. It didn't matter that we were still children. We were the progeny of a powerful Prince and that meant that we were targets. I don't think father ever knew how miserable we were.

"So when Harra took a fancy to Amrothos, it seemed like a miracle. Overnight all our problems were solved. For me it was glorious but for Amrothos it was...transformative. He had never been powerful or popular and suddenly he was but it went deeper than that. I don't remember my mother but Amrothos and she were quite close. He took her death rather hard and I think that he always felt that... well it's hard to explain. Saeril, as we called her in those days, wasn't exactly a replacement for her but Amrothos got it into his head somehow that she was – what the world had given him when it had taken away his mother. And he was a boy in the throes of his first passion. It just got all tangled up somehow and by the time she got tired of him, he had...I mean we both had become completely different people. People who couldn't admit that Saeril had made them and that they cared that she tossed them aside for her newest conquest.

"And so for years we went along like trained dogs, doing exactly what Saeril had taught us. I don't think we were even really fully conscious of how deeply she still affected us until I left to come to Rohan. We had vowed somehow never to speak of the affair again but it was always there on our minds.

"We kept away from her as well until the night at the party when I defended you and Winweld from her. I think that got her attention again and since I left a few days later, she refocused on Amrothos. When I returned for Beltane it was fairly clear what she could use to hurt me. Or maybe I'm wrong. Maybe she wanted to hurt you and used me to do it. Maybe it was a little of both. Whatever her reasons, the night of the Beltane bonfires she... I don't know if you know that Lady Winweld is married with a child. For a while the father was gone. Winweld's father chased him out of Minas Tirith after he found them together. That night she sent Amrothos to tell me that if I didn't make you hate me in any way I could, she would spread a rumor that the child was yours."

His jaw clenched. "I would never..."

"Don't be naïve," I cut him off. "King Elessar may know the quality of your character but not everyone in the court does. Besides, most of them are gossip-mongering idiots and Lord Winweld is popular. The nobles would have refused to trade with you and Rohan can't afford that. Besides... Winweld would have been destroyed by it."

For the first time, his face softened slightly. "You little fool. Did it never occur to you to tell me that story instead of doing exactly what Harra and your brother demanded?"

"What exactly is it you think you would have done, Éomer?" I demanded. "You are a warrior and Valar-damn you, you see things in black and white. What use are you in a court intrigue? If you had known that I wanted to marry you, you never would have allowed me to do the things I needed to do. You would have insisted on doing the honorable things and going down on my sinking ship like a fool."

"Wouldn't that be my choice?"

I tossed my hair haughtily, as if the act would will the slight dampness in my eyes away or at least distract him from it. "Not while I still drew breath. If I had accepted your suit honor would have bound you to me but it would have bound me to Rohan and to you. As a new queen I would have had to watch my people suffer for a rumor I had allowed to propagate. And as your bride I would have watched you tormented because of my past. I would not have suffered that for anything."

He considered me for a moment. "If that is how you felt, how then have you returned to Rohan?"

He has to know the truth about who you are, Amrothos had said. "I blackmailed Harra. She and my brother used to meet in a brothel in the lower city and they kept all the paraphernalia of their romance there as well—keepsakes, love letters and the like. They were surprisingly sentimental in their own way. I went there one night and asked the madam for the letters so I could..."

"You went to a brothel in the lower city of Minas Tirith at night?"

"I didn't exactly have a choice. Erchirion was gone, Elphir and Father were out of the question, and I couldn't very well ask Amrothos to escort me, now could I? It isn't as if..."

To my surprise he let out a low, whistling breath and raked his fingers through his long hair but his lips quirked into a small smile. "And just when I think I've learned the limits of your depravity. I admit that the thought of you walking alone through the lower city of Minas Tirith at night makes my blood run slightly cold, but it would be unfair to call that anything but brave, considering what your mission was."

My head snapped up and for the first time since he'd returned to Edoras I looked at him clearly and began to see something that I had missed completely before that moment. He was angry with me, furious even, but it was tempered with an indulgent, protective, desirous emotion I hadn't seen since Beltane.

"You believe me then?" My voice was a rasp.

He closed the space between us again and brushed a strand of hair that had come loose from my braid when he had kissed me back behind one ear. He let the hand rest, cupping my neck. "Unequivocally." His mouth twisted up into a little half cocked grin and shook his head. "You know you can thank your brother for my lack of ambivalence too. I like to think that I would have taken you at your word but if there had been any doubt he removed it."

"Erchirion? What did he say?"

"Not Erchirion, Amrothos. Those wretched letters that he gave me convinced me that you were telling the truth when you said you wanted to marry me and had been coerced into saying no."

My brow twisted. "What are you talking about?"

He laughed. "Oh I was furious when I first read them. If I hadn't had a battlefield of victims to take my rage out on I don't know what I would have done. But after about a week it occurred to me that, coming from you, these," he gestured to the parcel on the bench, "are practically love letters. That's when I decided to send Eadric to Aldburg to bring Nightwind for you."

So that's why Eadric hadn't returned with Éomer! As excuses went for breaking a promise, it was far better than I had dared imagine. I gaped at him. "Why?"

"Well once I figured out how you felt about me, I thought there was a fairly good chance that I was going to propose to you...again." He laughed. "You know, I had expected that one of the boons of being King of Rohan would be that I wouldn't have to persuade my lady wife to consent to..."

"No, I mean 'why do you call them love letters?'"

His grin widened into something just shy of wicked. "Well first of all you talk about me without cease. I'm almost a third of what you write about!" I opened my mouth to protest but he continued quickly."And the way you go on listing all my weaknesses... it's just so exactly how you would behave if you were in love with me. Besides the fault you find with me is hardly as stinging as you might have thought when you were writing them. You accuse me in turn of being too loyal, brave generous and humble. Absolutely everything except too handsome. Why I bet your brother knew you were in love with me before you did!"

Contrary to the last I opened my mouth to protest and then closed it again. What could I say? He was correct. A lot of what I had written in those letters had been the frightened thrashings of a girl newly in loved and feeling somehow caught like a fish in a net by it. I hadn't known it was possible for a person to wield the kind of power Éomer had over me—to make me miserable when we fought or he was in danger. And, somehow even more terrifying, to make me gloriously happy just by being around. As much as possible I had hated him for it while still being in love with him.

To my eternal surprise the next words, naked and honest as they were, came spilling out unbidden. "Being in love with you, Éomer is the most scared I've ever been. You have no idea. I love you for it but I worry that your honor will get you killed. It leaves you so vulnerable to attack on and off the battlefield. And besides, I have no idea why you would love me and I think someday you might stop and if you did I don't know what I would do. I really just don't..."

I was babbling. Slowly he took my hands in his larger ones and pulled me gently to him, pressing his lips down over mine. When I didn't resist he let my hands go and put one hand around my waist, pulling my body against his hard chest gently and lacing the other in my hair. I responded in kind, lacing my own fingers through his hair.

It was a gentle, almost chaste kiss, but enough to leave me shaking. When he pulled away finally, sliding his hand down to grip my upper arm. I kept my fingers in his hair, keeping our lips close. I tried to reclaim his lips once but briefly, desperately, knowing that the moment was over. When I pulled back I let out a little mewing sound of despair, keeping my eyes tight shut against whatever came next. I let my hands fall, sliding down his chest to remain pressed against his abdomen.

"Oh my little viper," he murmured, lips pressed to my forehead. "I want you to be my wife."

I pushed back from him. He allowed me to create perhaps a forearm's length of space between us but not more. "Didn't you listen to my story? What do you think I had to do to get out of Harra's web? I manipulated you, lied to you, hurt you. And then I manipulated Winweld and Amrothos. And I blackmailed Harra. I went right back to being exactly the girl I always have been at the first sign of trouble. You don't know who I am, Éomer!"

"That may be true," he said. "But I find I quite like having to guess."

I tried to pull away again but he held me fast. I would have rather walked through fire than say what I said next. I would have rather gone back to Minas Tirith than meet his eyes. But I knew what needed to be done. "It's not just what's in the letters and the things I did to Harra and Amrothos and Winweld. My... my reputation as a gossip and a lady of the court is something I earned a thousand times over. I'm not a lady, not really. I'm not brave or noble or generous or any of the things you think I am. I'm just a silly little girl in pretty clothes and if you can't see that you're an idiot who fell for my act."

He laughed. "Very pretty clothes."

"This isn't funny!"

"It is a little. I always said you could ruin any good moment, I just hadn't realized how seriously you took it."

"I am serious, Éomer! You don't want to marry me!"

His anger was as quick as mine. "I don't want to hear that, Lothíriel!" His lips came crashing down on mine again like a wave beating me down into the sand of some warm beach. Reason washed away spun sugar in a torrent. My lips opened without prompting and his kiss was ravaging. It was a claiming kiss, a marking kiss. It was the passionate equivalent of his earlier proposal and I accepted it. I kissed back with just as much fervor, sliding my hands around his neck and into his loose mane of golden hair. It was softer than I imagined and I closed my fist in it tightly, not caring if I hurt him. I only wanted him to keep kissing me and harder. Neither of us were those who did things carefully or gently, not at least when there was something rougher and sweeter to be had.

His hands slid up my waist, bunching the material of my gown. One hand traced the curve of my breast, a thumb flicking across the peak and making me quake sharply. The other slid from my hair down my back and pulled me against him so my feet barely touched the ground. I could feel the hard length of his chest against mine. Without being fully aware of making the decision to do so, I slid my hands down and began to pull his tunic out from where it was tucked into his britches.

He broke the kiss and caught my hand as it began to slide into his tunic. "Lothíriel..." he said, voice a little lower and rougher than usual. "We need to stop."

"I don't want to."

He smiled at that. "Say you'll marry me then. I'll kiss you every night until you beg me to stop once you are my wife."

"Yes."

"You'll marry me?"

"Yes."

He kissed me again but his hands didn't move to my breasts and there was less raw emotion in it. It was still enough to make me feel giddy and drunk.

"We should return to the party. Your brother will notice that you're gone soon and so will others." He laughed. "If you're to be my wife and Queen, I shouldn't ruin your reputation by absconding with you at a party."

I tried to laugh but only managed a wobbly smile. There was a low, pleasurable ache in my head. I felt over stimulated and weak. Too much had happened too quickly for me to follow it. "I can't just yet. Please just let's sit together for a moment longer."

"All right."

Instead of moving to the stone bench, which was narrow and uncomfortable looking, he took the cloak from his shoulders. The night was warm and besides it was a ridiculous, ornate, overly formal thing. He spread it on the grass at the base of the statue and sat down with his back against the sloping curve of the base and then gestured for me to join him. I knelt, unsure of myself, but he took my hand and guided me to his side, folding me against him quite comfortably. My head fell into the crook of his neck and he looped one arm around my waist loosely. Had I been able to see us I'm sure the pose would have seemed quite scandalous to me but as it was it seemed that nothing in the world could have been more natural.

We sat together for a long moment without speaking.

"In the interest of fairness, it wasn't me who saw through you first. Gænwyn told me your secret months ago but I didn't really understand her until recently. It was just before were leaving to spend Beltane in Minas Tirith. You spent the whole morning ride talking about how excited you were to return to the city and see all your friends. Later when we were waiting for you to finish untacking Wind Chaser, you were still unpracticed, Lithoer remarked that she worried you wouldn't return after Beltane you were so eager to go. Gænwyn just laughed and said, 'I wouldn't worry about that. Whenever Lothíriel talks that much and that prettily about something I think you can be pretty sure that whatever she says, she means exactly the opposite. I don't think she wants to go to Minas Tirith at all!'"

I spluttered. "I don't do that! Let me see those letters again!"

"No, no, I won't have you throwing them into the fire! I intend to keep them as a fond remembrance of our courtship."

"Is that really how you intend to remember..." I began but he cut me off with a quick but somehow languid kiss. It was brief but when it was over I didn't protest when he drew me back down into his embrace.

"Do you remember in the stables at Aldburg when I threatened to switch some sense into you?"

"How could I forget? That was the first time you allowed me to ride Firefoot. I hope it won't be the last."

He ignored me. "If I'd known how well kissing works, I would have tried it on the spot."

I was in such a good mood I barely minded his condescending tone. "Yes, this does seem to have worked rather better for you, doesn't it? You're so clever to have figured it out."

He roared with laughter at that. "Oh, please don't say that! That's not at all the girl I fell in love with!"

"Miss my venom already?"

"Missed it for months now." He put a large hand on my arm, stroking it slowly and soothingly. He drew my hand up and pressed a slow kiss into my palm.

"I wish I were the person you think I am."

"You are. You're a worse actress than you think, my love."

"Say it again."

"What? That you're a worse..."

"No, the end part."

"My love. Lothíriel, my love. I should have kissed you that night I snatched the ribbon from your hair. I wanted to you know."

"Why didn't you?"

I felt him shrug. "You never gave the impression of wanting to be the Queen of Rohan."

"You thought I was indifferent to you?"

I felt his laugh as a small vibration in his chest. "I wouldn't say that. As I said, you are not the actress you think you are... I suppose I thought... but it doesn't matter now..."

"What?"

He stroked my hair and said nothing.

"What?" I repeated, more firmly.

"Well, before I kissed you I wasn't sure that you'd never had a lover before."

My fingers flew to my lips. When I was sixteen I had allowed two men to kiss me out of shear curiosity. Both had been chaste, awkward affairs that had left me wondering why anyone made such a big fuss over love-making. I hadn't experimented since. Had it been so obvious? "Did I do it wrong?"
"Bema, woman how can you ask that?" he said. But he added more seriously, "And even if you were an abominable kisser it would still boil my blood to know that no one will ever make love to you but me."

To stop him from kissing me again, and distracting me I asked, "So? I have never had a lover. What of it?"

"It...It isn't necessarily true that all women who look at men the way you look at me have matrimony on their minds."

"You thought..."

"I thought it was possible," he said firmly. "If I thought anything was possible. I knew you well enough, even then, to know that you didn't have your sights on being the Queen of Rohan, no matter what you felt for me. And I would never have dared to dream that you felt so much.

"But I knew myself too well to think that I could have you by halves. As King of Rohan I've learned that sometimes compromise is best for a nation but as a man I have never truly learned to do it."

"So what I said that morning in the stables about a more casual arrangement..." I trailed off.

"It confirmed all my worst fears. And by then I felt very strongly for you. I should have known better though. What you said and what you did were completely incongruous and I knew you had a past with the court. I should have guessed you were being manipulated. I am sorry that I didn't help you, Lothi."

I shook my head. "It doesn't matter..."

"It does matter," he insisted. "I will never let you stand alone like that ever again. And I will never doubt your sincerity again. But you have to promise never to keep secrets like that from me. You are going to be my wife and that means that you have to let me into your counsel."

"Whatever you want from me, Éomer, it is yours. There is nothing in me that is only half yours," I promised. It was a silly thing to say but in the moment I said it with conviction. And I meant it. It was the truth and I said it with all the frankness that existed in me.

"Not yet. But you will be. Soon if I have anything to do with it. I'll speak with your father tomorrow."

"I don't want to talk about that right now. I don't want to think about what they're going to say about our engagement."

"I think they will say congratulations. You think your father will disapprove of me?"

"I think my father will disapprove of me. He likes you. He wouldn't want you saddled with me. But honestly I'm even more worried about what your sister will say."

Éomer laughed. "I will just have to show them both how very much I wish to be... saddled with you."

I shrugged, not yet ready to joke about it as he was.

"I can be very persuasive, Lothíriel," he said, voice low and persuasive. "Don't worry about your father. I'll take care of it. And Eowyn will grow to love you in her turn"

When I finally realized that my head wouldn't stop spinning for days and we had been gone for more than an hour we rose and Éomer shook out his cloak while I quickly re-braided my hair. "I'll ask your father tomorrow morning," Éomer said as he led us back through the maze and back into the light.

I nodded my agreement. Tonight was for Lithoer and Erchirion and I didn't want the news of our engagement to detract from that.

Back in the hall the light and noise seemed overwhelming. Gænwyn, clearly well in her cups, found us almost immediately. She glanced between us and then her face broke into such a joyous smile it was almost per force irreverent. She grabbed my hand and gave it a short kiss, grinning proudly at Éomer all the while. "Come, come, Lothíriel! You're missing the party! Éomer will have plenty of opportunity to dance with you later."

I let myself be led away into the throng. Gænwyn found me a glass of mead. I felt drunk enough already but I sipped it greedily. Then she pulled me out onto the floor and into a dance for just the maidens. The steps weren't complicated and I felt equal to any task. We whirled merrily about the floor and then collapsed together, laughing hysterically.

When that song was over Éomer and I danced but it was almost agony to be in his arms. The feeling of joy was so newborn there was an aspect of it that felt tender, fragile, like a newly stitched wound.

He had just released me from the first dance and we were coming back from the dance floor when I spied Amrothos in the crowd. I disentangled myself from Éomer's arm. "I will find you again in a moment."

He nodded. He had followed my gaze and knew where I was going. When he saw how studiously I was scrutinizing his face for signs of disapproval or anger he smiled gently. "Tell your brother there will be a hunt the day after tomorrow. I would be honored if he would ride in my party."

"He won't accept. Not unless you ask him in front of our father."

"Then he won't accept. But he is your kin and that means he will always be welcome in my hall."

The muscles of my throat tightened painfully and I couldn't speak for a moment. "Thank you."

He shrugged. "I intend to keep you my little viper. How can I expect to do that if I divide you from your nest?"

"I would build my own nest here."

"I hope you will. And soon. But for now, be sure to say hello to your brother."

I took Amrothos a flagon of mead, though he hadn't half finished the one he already had. "It's a lovely party."

"So it is. Erchirion looked very grand and his wife... I admit there is something quite charming about blond hair. A preference for it seems to run in my blood at any rate."

"I'm going to marry him."

"So I see. There is nothing more obvious than a woman in love, particularly when she's making as little effort to hide it as you are."

"I want us to be friends again."

He jerked his head to one side. "He will allow it?"

"There is a hunt in two days time; he wants you to ride in his party."

Amrothos' laugh could be as mean as a cold winter night but this one was soft and low. "Funny, I never took him for the forgiving type."

"He isn't."

"I hate hunting. And this mead and music are indifferent. I think I shall retire for the night."

I put my hand on his arm to forestall him. "I want us to be friends again," I repeated.

His face twisted in agony. "Lothi..." he said softly. "I never considered our friendship over."

"You'll ride with him?"

"No. But if he saw those letters and still wants to marry you I can see why you would accept. Savage or not, perhaps he is worthy of you. Maybe I'll even ride back to this cursed country to see you in whatever monstrosity of a dress you dream up between now and then."

"I will try not to disappoint."

"You almost never do."

I went back out and found Gænwyn again. The rest of the night passed in a blur. Éomer and I danced twice more and each time we did I felt a little more as if this weren't a dream I would wake from at any moment.

Finally, as the sun began to come up, I walked home with my father. "You looked very beautiful tonight, Daughter. As beautiful as your mother."

"Thank you, Father." I said. But I had barely heard the compliment; I was staring out over the fields of grass, transfixed by their beauty in the golden light of the morning.

Dawn was breaking in Rohan.

TBC?

Ah sweet, steamy conclusion! Thanks as always to everyone who reviewed and, as always, a very special thanks to my beta Lady Bluejay. As usual she brought just the right stuff to this chapter. Let me know what you think please! An epilogue is in the works if you want it but the next month and a half are going to be a busy time in my life so it may take a while to get out! Please bear with me.