Éowyn rode the remount across the plains, feeling strangely lost. The last day and a half had been fraught. First, Faramir had said farewell to Boromir. Éowyn had made herself scarce: she thought it likely that the two brothers would wish to be alone. Their father had appeared before Boromir's final departure, and Éowyn had watched from a distance, up on the walls. Faramir had been very subdued afterwards. When, later that afternoon, he had finally sought her out, he had managed to say little more than "I have this feeling that he will not be coming back," before burying his face in her shoulder and clinging to her silently for some time. In the evening, Prince Imrahil and his wife had provided them with a quiet family supper, just the four of them, and Princess Merileth had suggested, towards the end of the meal, that she could have an additional guest room made ready for Faramir. There seemed to be an unspoken understanding that he would not want to be at his father's house that night.

Éowyn was not surprised when, half an hour or so after she had retired to bed, Faramir crept into her room. She rather suspected that Imrahil and Merileth were under no illusions as to the likelihood of Faramir remaining in the room prepared for his use, but chose to turn a blind eye to any nocturnal wanderings. In any case, Éowyn thought that, at least technically, the proprieties were observed. Faramir was not in the mood to make love; he simply wanted to be close to her while he slept (or rather, while he didn't).

~o~O~o~

With a sigh of relief, Mablung swung his pack from his shoulders and dropped it on the ground, before sitting down with his back against the bole of a gnarled old pine tree. Éowyn settled against a nearby boulder. She reached up above her head, stretching the kinks out of her back, and gave a big yawn.

"Didn't sleep well last night? I suppose you're used to the captain's nice feather bed..." Mablung teased.

"Feather bed? Lumpy palliasse more like. No, it was Damrod's bloody snoring, kept me awake all night."

"Huh, you're kept awake by his snoring? Least of our problems back at Henneth Annun. The sound of you two shagging, on the other hand..." Mablung winked at her.

Éowyn turned scarlet.

"I mean, is the guy hung like a horse or something? And the length of time you go on for – he must have the stamina of one of the bloody meeries or whatever you call them..."

"Mearas," Éowyn corrected. Then she obviously decided that fronting things out was the best policy because she met Mablung's gaze and said, "And yes, yes he is and he does, if you're really that interested in knowing."

Now it was Mablung's turn to blush. "Actually, you know, I don't think I was."

"Well, you shouldn't have bloody asked then, should you?"

There was a slightly awkward silence for a few moments, which the two of them tried to fill by eating pieces of waybread and gulping from their waterskins. Eventually, Éowyn said rather cautiously, "Am I really that noisy?"

Mablung looked a bit embarrassed. "Not really... Not so's you'd wake someone up if they were asleep. But, yeah, you can tell what the two of you are up to."

"Oh gods! I'm never going to be able to look anyone in the face again."

"I wouldn't worry – living all jammed together, it's not like we haven't heard other blokes knocking one off on the sly when they've got a spare moment, or even the odd time a couple of them slip off to try out the way of the warrior. I think if there's any thoughts on it at all, it's mostly 'how come they're getting some and we're not.' Henneth Annun's a long way to be billeted away from your wife or sweetheart."

"Talking of which, you've always played your cards close to your chest on that one. Have you got a sweetheart?" To Éowyn's delight, Mablung blushed. "You have, haven't you?"

"Back home, in Forlond. But I'm much better behaved than y... the captain is..."

"Oh yeah? Is that a polite way of saying your sweetheart isn't as much of a slapper as me?" Éowyn gave him a grin.

Mablung laughed. "No, it's a way of saying that her mother's a fire breathing dragon who'd use my balls for dumplings in the stew if she thought I'd so much as even considered having a crafty hand shandy while just thinking of her daughter. Even if I was thinking of it in Ithilien while her daughter was in Forlond."

Éowyn burst out laughing, and giggled till she was reduced to brushing tears and snot away with the back of her hand. Mablung joined in. Eventually Éowyn spluttered, "So you just gaze into her eyes while holding her hand..."

"That's about it," admitted Mablung, ruefully. "Mind you, if we ever got the chance... Her ma says we've got to wait to get married till I've got a commission and can get a transfer back nearer to Forlond. Trouble is, I like the Rangers." He looked at Éowyn thoughtfully. "Can I ask you something? Just on the off chance me and Isabet ever get away from her ma's eagle eye. How do you... well... without getting up the duff?"

"Well, to start with it was relatively easy – there's a remedy we use in the Mark. It sounds horrible, but it works – not always, but the odds are not bad, maybe five to one – drinking pregnant mare's piss."

"You're having me on!" Mablung looked slightly green.

"No, it's almost like it fools your body into thinking it's already with child. Makes your tits get a bit tender, but other than that it's all right. Well apart from tasting fucking disgusting. Not fool proof but it makes it a lot less likely. Trouble is once we destroyed the bridge I couldn't get to the farmer I used to get it from. Since then, I've mostly been taking my chances."

"Shit! So you might be with child right now!"

"No, my moon flow came on two days ago."

"Ah, that explains why you almost bit wee Anborn's head off the other day." Mablung winked at her.

"Wasn't that, he was just being a prat."

"Fair enough. But … it's a hell of a risk. I mean, what would you do?"

"Well," said Éowyn, thoughtfully, "If the worst happened, there's a tisane of oil of rue, raspberry leaves and willow bark which sometimes does the trick. But it's far from guaranteed. Then if that doesn't work, some women resort to a long bodkin. But that's bloody dangerous – as like to kill you as to shift the bairn. So I suppose I'd have to go back to the Mark. Éomer would throw a fit. I think I'd probably spin them some yarn about how I'd married the younger son of some noble, and he'd been killed in a skirmish, so here I was newly widowed and with child. They wouldn't believe it, but wouldn't be able to prove it wasn't true. They'd send me off to some far-flung manor to bear my shame in private."

"But surely the captain would do right by you... you only have to look at the man to know he thinks the sun shines out of your... well, he's very keen on you. And you know him – too bloody honourable for his own good, sometimes."

"His father wouldn't allow it." Éowyn's face suddenly looked very bleak. "On the surface, he was icily polite to me when I met him face to face, though the bastard took every chance he could to hint on the sly at what he thought of me and my character. But the next day, I overheard them talking – I shouldn't have done, but the window was open and I couldn't resist it. And then the gloves really came off.

"According to his father, apparently if Faramir 'had to take a courtesan', his father was relieved he'd found one of 'noble, though debased and foreign, birth' and at least it looked as though I was sufficiently prudent to take only one lover at a time and thus 'not expose him to the agues so frequently associated with common harlots.' But I am not of Gondor and apparently his father will not countenance 'the mixing of the high blood of Numenor with that of the lower men of the twilight lands.' Especially not with some slut who 'holds her virtue so cheap that she will lie like a sow in heat with a common captain, even one of such high birth.' After all, once a slut, always a slut: 'A woman who will sleep with one man outside the sacred bond of marriage would sleep with any. If a man was fool enough to marry her, he would have only himself to blame when she cuckolded him, as she inevitably would'. Though of course the old bastard does think his son is a fool... so he holds himself responsible for preventing Faramir from debasing himself in marriage. So, no marriage."

"Fuck! Fucking bastard cunting arsehole..." Mablung drew in his breath in a low whistle. He resorted to a string of soldier's oaths that impressed even Éowyn with their sheer inventiveness. "How did the captain react?"

Éowyn gave a dark laugh. "He lost his temper completely and yelled something very predictable about how he would not stand by to hear me traduced by such infamous slander, then stormed out slamming the door behind him. He still doesn't know that I heard the whole thing."

"There, you see, he would stand by you."

Éowyn shook her head. "You just don't get it, Mablung. There's more important things at stake here. What would he do? Desert his post and follow me to the Mark? He guards the most dangerous part of the border with the land of the shadow – do you think he can abandon that, no matter what he feels for me? No, if I were to get a child, and the tisane didn't work, I'd ride for the Mark and never look back, and the captain would never know." Suddenly she looked him in the eye, as serious as on the eve of battle. "Swear to me you wouldn't tell him."

Mablung nodded. He looked very solemn. "We'd best pray to the Valar that you don't, then."

Éowyn grinned, and said, "Of course that's the other option – 'Pull and pray' – but hell, where's the fun in that?"

~o~O~o~

Faramir returned to Henneth Annun a few days after Éowyn. Their lives fell into a pattern that, had it not had so many terrifying moments, might almost have qualified for the term 'routine'. Periods in the caves, filled with drill and tending to arms and armour, alternated with patrols, in which the odds felt desperate. Now that the retreat was behind enemy lines, even greater pains had to be taken to conceal its presence. Most of the time, there were no fires for fear of the smoke being seen - only a few weather conditions allowed for the risk of lighting a fire. This meant that for the most part meals consisted of hard tack and dried meats, and whatever fruits or vegetables could be eaten raw. Éowyn rapidly got to the point where she felt that the only use she would willingly put either a carrot or even an apple to would be feeding Windfola. She grew to look forward to occasional trips to the river crossing at Cair Andros in hope of a hot square meal.

Late summer passed into autumn, and Éowyn found herself thinking once again that Ithilien provided a rare treat. In her native land further north autumn was pleasant, a drawn-out time of yellow and brown leaves and fruit. But here, further south, it seemed to come and go in a blaze of colour – not dull browns and yellows, but dazzling reds and golds. The season itself seemed to pass more quickly than she was used to, but with an intensity she could not have guessed at. But as soon as the last leaves fell, the first chill of winter began to bite, a chill felt all the more keenly because they could not risk fires for most of the time. For this part of Ithilien was still a fair way north, and their hideout was high in the mountains. November passed in a damp miasma of fogs and rain, rain which took on an icy edge, then early December arrived, and with it the first flurries of snow.

The cold weather seemed to get into Éowyn's bones, and from the grumbling of the rest of the rangers, it seemed everyone else was as miserable as she was. It seemed almost impossible to get warm, even with Faramir wrapping his limbs round her in bed at night. Though their efforts to get warm were not without their humorous side. One evening, Éowyn arrived back after a patrol; Faramir had not yet returned from the river fort. Feeling even colder than usual, and rather miserable, she crawled into bed, pulling the blankets and furs over her, and wishing yet again that they could have a fire. She wasn't quite sure what time of night it was when Faramir finally climbed into the bed beside her. She was vaguely aware of the dim light of an oil lamp, then a slight warmth, then the faint roughness of his beard on her neck as he nuzzled against her skin.

"I have missed you so much." His voice was a whisper, a warm, husky whisper. His lips caressed her gently, his hands found their way round her body, his chest pressing against her back, his thighs cradling the backs of her legs. For a few long moments she lay there, eyes half closed, lost in the sensation of his touch. Then she rolled over to face him... and burst out laughing.

Faramir looked utterly crestfallen, and puzzled, as well as a bit hurt.

"I'm sorry," Éowyn spluttered. "What on earth is that on your head?"

"It's a hat. It's bloody cold in here in case you haven't noticed."

"But... it's made of rabbit fur and it's got ear flaps! I can't possibly shag a man wearing a hat with furry ear flaps..."

She more than made it up to him two days later, when she accompanied him to Minas Tirith. They stopped at an inn on the road just short of the Rammas Echor, an inn with hot stew, beer and a roaring fire, and beds warmed with warming pans. He didn't wear the hat to bed. She didn't wear anything.

~o~O~o~

Yule came and went, then the new year came. The orc attacks came harder and faster for a period, then all became curiously quiet, almost, as Faramir pointed out, as if their attention had been shifted elsewhere. The captain of the guard at Cair Andros reported that sorties upstream showed troops of orcs ranging far afield up the Great River, but to what end, none of them was sure. Faramir was filled with a growing sense of foreboding.

January passed, and February came, and with it, strange dreams. Éowyn would wake in the darkness to find Faramir tossing in her arms, covered with a sheen of sweat despite the cold. But when he came to his senses, he was unable to recall any of the dreams he'd had. He told her that it was almost as if whatever vision he was offered pained him so much that his waking mind refused to frame it fully. All that he could remember was an overwhelming sense of something terrible about to happen.

Thank you to all my reviewers, again. It is so lovely to get such nice feedback. Guests one and two: thoughful as always. You both picked up on the fact that I didn't say what Denethor's vile words were in the last chapter – that was because I already had the scene at the start of this chapter in mind! (And thank you to whichever of you left the lovely review for Howzat! I'm so glad you enjoyed it. I'm so glad you thought it was worth a bit of a wait for this chapter while I wrote it. And of course Faramir would be fascinated by match stats :-D )

As for the vexed issue of Boromir lives, should you like that sort of thing (and who wouldn't?) and assuming that you're prepared for canon divergence, general shennanigans and some major out-of-character-ness, not to mention an Uruk from Milton Keynes, then you might want to read my parody 10th walker fic, Groundhog GDIME. It is very silly from beginning to end, and Faramir is, well, about as different from my usual take on Faramir as you could imagine. And almost everyone gets a happy ending, including one character who shouldn't have been there at all (due to a misunderstanding with a reviewer).