"Well, this is it."
Morwen squinted up at the sunlight reflecting off the white edifice set deep in a dusty courtyard. "This is Thengel's house?"
Guthere nodded. Then he glanced at her shrewdly from the corner of his eyes. "What do you think of it?"
"Hmm."
Morwen peeked through the bars of the gate into the cobbled space within the walls. A tree with limp leaves rose apologetically out of one side of the space. Old seed pods littered the sparse grass beneath it. The place had an abandoned feel, perhaps owing to the assumption she had made that this house numbered among the abandoned piles throughout the city. If she thought Idhren's garden needed help, Thengel's looked somewhat beyond repair and certainly choked for want of water and fertilizer.
She vowed to tackle the outdoor space first…assuming, well…best not to get ahead of herself.
"I must have passed it a thousand times and never knew who owned it or that anyone did."
Guthere shrugged. "Well, he don't spend much time here and never, eh, entertains."
"Except for his uncle."
Guthere scratched his head. "Though, Prince Thengel's usually sneaking out the back door whenever Oswin comes to town."
Morwen glanced over at Guthere. "That isn't how one treats one's relations."
"Prince Thengel will be surprised to hear that."
They grinned at one another.
They remained outside the gate in silence while pedestrians passed around them. Occasionally, when a breeze blew a certain way, she could smell the hay and a few other aromas from the public stables nearby. That settled it. Thengel couldn't come back here for any length of time. It wasn't wholesome.
"Shall we go and knock on the door?" Morwen asked at last.
Guthere tugged on his collar with his free hand. In the other, he carried a box for Morwen. "Must we necessarily?"
"Don't you want me to speak to the Marshal for you?"
Guthere changed his grip on the box and opened the gate for her. "Well, I did, but now that we're here, I feel less keen. Suppose he says no?"
"Remember we have our advantages," she told him as she went ahead. "The trick is knowing how to apply them. Do you have any advice?"
Guthere glanced at her. "To hear Cenhelm tell it, Marshal Oswin's already settled his mind one way where Prince Thengel is concerned. It's me I'm worried about. Don't let him cow you, that's all."
No, Morwen had had her fill of that sort of treatment to last her a lifetime. She waited while Guthere knocked on the door.
A thin, silver-haired servant answered and let them in. His eyes, which had looked politely vague at first, sharpened with curiosity. The man would recognize the rider but not his companion.
"Eriston, this is Lady Morwen," Guthere said. "She's here for the Marshal."
Morwen only half listened as her gaze wandered down the passage lined with doors and up the stairs. Gildis would approve of the cleanliness and Morwen felt happy to see that even if the courtyard lay abandoned, at least Thengel's servants weren't cheating him out of good housekeeping within. Only, the space wanted something. A stray boot or a slightly crooked picture or a jug of flowers. Something to make it look less like a model.
The servant bowed mechanically. "Lord Oswin is upstairs. Would my lady like to wait in the library for him?"
"Hmm? Oh, yes. Thank you."
"Er, I'll just wait in the kitchen," Guthere mumbled.
Morwen raised an eyebrow. "Wait, give me the box then."
Guthere passed it off before shuffling past her down the passage.
Eriston led her only a short space, stopping at a heavy, wide door. He ushered her through to a long room with windows facing the courtyard. Books lined the walls on two sides of the room. Furniture commanded the center floor and a desk stood next to the fireplace. Piles of maps and loose papers were weighed down by colorful stones. No wonder, Morwen thought, that Thengel preferred her father's library of all the rooms in her home. The only thing missing from Randir's library was a spear and war gear heaped in one corner. Morwen wondered about that.
Alone, Morwen placed the box on a shelf above an empty hearth, then went to stand in front of a painting that had caught her eye. The style she recognized as belonging to Teitherion. She had enough of his pieces in her own home to recognize his craft when she saw it. But she hadn't expected that Thengel would also own artwork by her neighbor. Thengel didn't mask his disgust for Teitherion and his unusual ways, after all.
It soon became clear why he would own this particular painting. "The Wayward Son in Exile," she read from the brass plaque. "Teitherion 2923."
Wayward son. She thought she knew Thengel's feelings on that choice of words. Wayward father, driven son, sounded more exact.
"Ah, you no doubt recognize my nephew's younger self."
Morwen jumped, then turned toward the voice. The doors to the passage stood open just as Eriston had left it, so she had not heard anyone enter. Morwen recognized the man, clearly old, but remarkably hale. Oswin. His hair was tied back in three heavy white braids. On the marshal's russet tunic, the device of the house of Eorl, a horse embroidered in white and gold by a careful hand.
When he saw her she thought he looked a little uncertain, but when he reached for her hand, his grip belied any uncertainty. "Lady Morwen. I'm glad to meet you again."
"Lord Marshal," she said. "Forgive me. I have come uninvited."
Oswin smiled through his great beard. "I am alone here. Company is most welcome. And you've returned Guthere, too." He gestured at the wall, halting her protest. "Do you like the painting? I found it half buried by papers in a locked drawer. Thengel's man hung it up after I badgered him."
"A locked drawer, Marshal?"
"I needed stationary. Do you think it is a good likeness? Judging by the year there, the artist painted this when my nephew arrived in the city."
Morwen turned back to the picture. She recognized a market scene from Minas Tirith. The image Teitherion had rendered of the horse left her feeling a little uneasy for the pedestrians, particularly with the grim young man riding him. The wild, tumbling hair drew her attention, especially. Had Thengel ever had such long hair? Like Wynflaed's? Teitherion had caught the hardened expression, but also the occasional flicker in Thengel's eyes she had grown to recognize. She'd seen it directed at Halmir and at herself.
If painted when he arrived, he would have been about eighteen and fresh from his homeland, Morwen thought. So, this is Thengel of the Rohirrim, not Thengel of Gondor. She felt an odd twinge in her belly, a longing to know more of the man in this painting. Not the grimness, per se, but without the Gondorian influence. Not that he would change in essentials, but the filter would be different.
"He reminds me of Wynflaed here."
Oswin looked surprised, but then he nodded. "They have much in common, which more often than not results in clashes. But where are my manners? Please sit down."
He gestured toward the chair and sofas across from the hearth as Eriston appeared with a tray of cakes and chilled wine. She accepted a glass before the servant promptly stole out of the room.
Oswin chose the chair and she sat on the end of the sofa. Then she said, gesturing toward the embroidered horse on his tunic.
"That is beautiful needlework. I have been admiring it since you came in."
"Thank you," he said, gently running his fingers over the horse. "My wife's handiwork. She's passed now."
"I'm sorry." Morwen reached for a cake to give to him, feeling awkward and forgetting that he was the host and she the guest.
He shook his head, accepting the cake. "No need. She passed a few years ago, peacefully. We were married for more than fifty years."
"So long! Do you have children, Marshal?"
"None but what I borrow from my sister," he replied wryly. "Queen Wynlaf's children occupy most of my time that isn't devoted to the Mark."
"I'm surprised you have time for anything else," Morwen murmured, her expression glazed.
The Marshal laughed. "Yes, you've met two of them, of course. The most volatile of the three." Then he said, "my niece and nephew were very complimentary of the valley around your estate. Imol..Im…"
"Imloth Melui, yes, the valley where I live."
"I have heard that the land is spoken of as a vale of flowers."
Morwen smiled with unmasked affection. "Many, many flowers. Trees and herbs, too. Anything good that grows, really. Have you ever been to Lossarnach, Marshal?" she asked.
"No, never," Oswin answered. "I have longed, now and again, to visit the site at Poros where the Rohirrim constructed a mound for our fallen princes and warriors. But the king's business keeps me occupied in Minas Tirith." Then he looked at her closely. "You've had trouble at home, I think."
Morwen glanced down into her wine. "Did Thengel tell you that?"
"Thengel and Wynflaed and Cenhelm have each given me varying reports on what passed during their stay." His voice grew stern. "It's a bad business."
Morwen felt her hands grow clammy around her glass. She wondered if he blamed her for putting his nephew in danger. Or perhaps Wynflaed had reiterated her position on Morwen's unworthiness to fill the role of queen. Would Oswin warn her off any future possibility of a relationship between his nephew and herself? She hadn't considered that possibility.
"They were a great help to me," she said with only a little tremor in her voice. "I would have lost everything without them…especially Thengel."
The Marshal's keen blue eyes seemed to look through her. "Is that so?"
Morwen swallowed. "Yes."
The Marshal set down his glass and the plate and regarded her for what felt like an age. "Would you say he's made himself indispensable?" he asked shrewdly.
"Well." Morwen stopped and considered. "Perhaps so. At least it seems impossible not to equate him with my home now. He fought for it, for my sake."
The Marshal's gaze fell somewhere over her shoulder as he sat in quiet thought. His lips pursed in and out as he mulled over whatever it was that occupied him. At last his eyes focused on her face again.
"Although I have never seen Lossarnach, I can understand why you would fight to keep it," Oswin said. "My nephew also has a home, Lady Morwen, whether he acknowledges it or not — and it too is worth fighting for."
"You mean Rohan." Morwen's heart guttered a little, wondering if he meant that as a reproach.
"I do," he said gravely. "Do you know the circumstances behind Prince Thengel's exile?"
She nodded, scrambling in her mind for ways to deflect the Marshal away from talk of his nephew's exile. It had been aired often enough in the last months.
"I know the circumstances, but I confess I know very little about the Rohirrim or your country. Would you tell me about them?"
A light began to kindle in Oswin's eyes and she knew she hadn't chosen poorly.
"The people are stiff-necked and slow to change, but great in heart and pride. Some would call the Rohirrim clannish, though we seldom have strangers among us to have an opinion either way. Fierce and swift when we're called to protect our own," he gave her a look and then grinned, "particularly our horses."
Morwen chewed on her lip as a worrisome thought entered her head. "Are the people very much like Wynflaed?" she asked hesitantly.
The Marshal's booming laugh would have shaken the dust from the rafters if they had been sitting in Morwen's hall and she felt herself begin to blush, realizing he had read her thoughts rather clearly.
"My niece is a particularly condensed sample. Does she worry you?"
"I enjoy Wynflaed, and I think we're friends," Morwen confided. "We are, however, very different women. Her methods can be worrisome, yes, though I think she means well."
"Too true." He chuckled for a while longer at Morwen's expense. She sipped her wine, feeling embarrassed, though she liked the Marshal's laugh even if it was boisterous. It felt more comfortable than Turgon's sour asides.
"And the country itself, what is Rohan like?" she asked.
"We call it the Riddermark or the Mark." Oswin's eyes seemed to see past the walls to some far away land. "Weather's changeable. Come for the summer breezes; stay because you're snowed in. That's June, typically."
That had to be an exaggeration, Morwen thought. It couldn't possibly snow that much anywhere, let alone in June.
"When the summer brings it's storms, fire follows soon after. It's like witnessing the fury of the gods. It smells horrible, a real desolation."
Morwen imagined walls of fire spreading across the southern plain of Lossarnach. "That sounds frightening."
Oswin shrugged. "It can be dangerous for folks caught unawares, but the grasslands need the fire as much as they need rain and sunlight. Keeps the trees down and the soil wholesome. And the plain is never without the grass for long. It grows as tall as you in some places."
Morwen wasn't sure she believed that either.
"When the wind moves over the grass, the colors ripple as if the plain a living creature moved in the light. Not just green, but burnt ochre, tawny gold, russets. And in the living grass, flowers of many colors grow. We say the horses run with the plain, not over it."
"I would like to see that one day," Morwen remarked gently. Then she asked, "I suppose there are orchards and farms, too, besides grass and horses."
"The West Vale is crowded with fruit and vegetables and grains."
"Is it true that the Rohirrim do not speak Westron?"
Oswin nodded gravely. "It is, mainly, but I hope that will soon change. We need to interact with the rest of the world and we need a leader who will make us." His head sank down to his breast as he thought. "With the royal family divided, you can imagine the state of the Riddermark. It needs a strong, undivided leader to repair the hurts of a generation. That is my hope for Thengel."
Morwen felt uneasy about Oswin's hopes for his nephew, like a cramp forming in her belly. She especially doubted her ability to be of much use to Thengel to that end, especially if the Rohirrim were as clannish as the Marshal said. She would be an outsider and the thought made her doubt the wisdom of what she had come to do. And yet, should that be allowed to get in the way of Thengel's happiness or her own?
"The Riddermark may have to wait for another generation, Marshal," Morwen reflected with more boldness than wisdom.
He gave her a sharp, thoughtful glance. "That's bleak. I'm beginning to doubt we'll see another generation," Oswin muttered. "Are you implying that Prince Thengel is not the undivided leader we need?"
Morwen set down her wine glass before she spilled something. "Have you not seen Thengel?" she asked, warming to the topic. She hadn't realized how long she had desired to speak to someone about this — ever since they had left Minas Tirith together and she saw Thengel interact with the Marshal's camp. "He squabbles with his nearest relations and sometimes I think even Cenhelm and the rest of his men don't know how to classify him. Do you remember that day he left with me for Lossarnach?"
Oswin's brow darkened. "Yes, he had the gall to wear the Steward's hauberk into my camp."
"Exactly. Marshal, do you realize you can't tell he's Rohirric once he puts that winged helmet on. He can erase his identity as easily as getting a haircut and a shave."
"Hmm." Oswin thought for some time before speaking. "An interesting observation, child. I have had similar inklings. I had hoped with age and maturity…"
Morwen sat on the edge of her seat, leaning toward the Marshal. "But have you also considered that his identity, his life, is divided. How can he bring unity to anything in this state?"
"How do you mean?"
Her hand fluttered as she tried to put her feelings into words. "He isn't whole within himself. He's a hybrid of Rohirric stock and Gondorian values. I believe he would do his best by Rohan - he's proven his good character to me and he has other virtues - but bringing unity to the Mark the way you envision might be beyond his ability as he is now."
The Marshal considered this new idea with a frown. "Twenty years is a long time to spend away from one's home." He wagged his head slowly. "Still, he ought not to have forgotten himself."
Morwen wet her lips while she considered this. "I don't think Thengel forgets, per se. It must be frustrating to worry about a homeland he can't return to while trying to have a life here, always living under the possibility that at any moment he might have to pick up and leave it all behind. He can choose to feel homesick for two places at once or else never to settle anywhere."
Oswin sat in stunned silence. Morwen felt a little stunned herself. She'd held this conviction, half formed, in her heart for such a long time. As the words came, the conviction grew, along with her sense of urgency.
"My whole life I've know a home and what it means to belong. But to be always uncertain," her thoughts drifted and she simply finished by saying, "I pity him, Marshal."
"Pity?" Oswin barked, as that particular phrasing pulled him out of his stupor. "This uncertainty as you call it, it's better than the alternative, I can tell you. The king might have had his head for disturbing the peace of the Golden Hall."
"I realize that," Morwen said delicately. "I know your intervention saved his life. He's made his own mistakes and I dare say his father helped him along." Oswin snorted, which she ignored. "But understand that Thengel is homeless, trying to fit into a foreign land while feeling pressured to meet the demands of duty placed upon him from both Rohan and Gondor. You may not realize what a burden that is to Thengel, never to be present anywhere."
"Is that so?" Oswin harrumphed. "You know about that, do you? This has been a source of consideration for you?"
Morwen brushed Oswin's prickliness aside. She hadn't meant it as a critique of the Marshal's methods or to justify Thengel's past behaviors. "I think he wants to do right, but he has to have something that's his before he can be the leader Rohan needs."
"Oh? And what's that?"
Morwen's hands formed into fists in her lap. "Well, me if he wasn't so stubborn," she blurted without thinking. She clapped a hand over her mouth.
The Marshal's great, booming laughter made her jump a second time. It sounded like Thengel's only deeper she realized as she cringed in embarrassment.
"I didn't mean to say that."
He laughed again, her frankness evidently not disturbing him. "We are a plain-spoken people you'll not easily offend." Then he sobered. "So, you've taken a special interest in my nephew? Good. I'm glad you've come to the point at last. Now I can mention the betrothal without being forward according to the rules of Gondorian missishness."
Morwen's breath caught in her throat. "Pardon?"
A line appeared between his heavy brows. "Are you not engaged to my nephew?" he asked.
It took a feat of strength for Morwen not to gape at the Marshal. "If I am, you know more of the matter than I do," she said. "Prince Thengel has only indicated to me that we are not betrothed."
The Marshal pursed his lips, though somewhat lost in his beard. He rose and paced toward the window with his hands behind his back, thinking. He turned toward her again.
"It has been reported to me that earlier this spring my nephew announced his courtship of one, Morwen of Lossarnach, that he beat out his rival and achieved her hand," he said in such dry terms that he might as well have been reciting from the chronicles. "Is that not so?"
Morwen schooled her features into a look of indifference, though she longed to cringe. "It isn't exactly. I should tell you, Lord Marshal, that what you've heard ends just short of the truth. He did defeat his…rival…but he didn't make good on his claim."
His blue eyes fixed on her face, then seemed to take her all in with one swift sweep of his eyes. He seemed momentarily thrown off course. The lines in his face grew deeper.
"Did the prince give you a horn - an heirloom of the house of Eorl - as a heortgifu?" Lord Oswin indicated the hearth with a bow of his head.
Oswin waited for her answer.
"Yes, he gave it to me," she said slowly. "But it was a peculiar circumstance. He forgot to take it back again — in fact, I've brought it with me so that he can have it back." Morwen gestured toward the mantelpiece where she had kept the box containing the object.
The Marshal gave her an odd look. "You may not understand, being Gondorian, that giving it back in our society would mean that you wished to break the engagement."
Morwen met his gaze. "Marshal, may I ask what difference it would make to you if I returned it or not?"
"What difference to me?" he boomed. "Well, it would be a blasted nuisance if you gave it back now."
Morwen blinked, not expecting such vehemence. "It would?"
"Yes. I don't relish playing Thengel's matchmaker. You have no concept of what an ungrateful wretch he is. Why, at his age Fengel already had two children."
Morwen sagged against the back of the sofa, torn between relief and regret. On the one hand, Oswin wasn't refusing to allow her to marry Thengel and her fears of his disapproval (or Wynflaed's) were unfounded. On the other…she had bad news for the Marshal.
"Then I regret to tell you that the prince and I are not betrothed and never have been."
She received a glower as thanks, which reminded her all the more of Thengel, especially in their last days together.
"But the horn," Oswin began.
"Part of an act, I'm afraid. I don't know where you received your information, but I certainly cannot confirm this rumor. Prince Thengel's reasons for leaving the horn are equally out of my power to explain, except it must have been by mistake."
"My sources were certain," said Marshal Oswin gravely. "Hm. It is an odd business."
"An honest mistake, perhaps," she said dryly, thinking of Idhren.
"Wynflaed is typically more reliable than most."
"Wynflaed!" Morwen gasped. "But she saw the whole thing…she knows…."
Morwen thrust out her hand, as if the gesture would mean anything to the Marshal. He just blinked at it. Why would Wynflaed tell her uncle that she and Thengel were betrothed when she clearly saw Thengel break it off. And when she didn't approve of Morwen anyway?
"This is very puzzling to me," Oswin continued. "My niece told me Thengel acted as your champion and suitor, that he presented you with the horn. And now you tell me that you've refused him."
Morwen expression flared in the heat of sudden temper. "I didn't refuse him, but he wouldn't take my hand when it was given to him."
Oswin's expression drooped into a glower. "He wouldn't, would he?" He slapped his hand on his thigh and muttered, "Typical Fengling ingrate."
Guilt dowsed Morwen's anger. "It wasn't his fault," she said without reflection.
He looked at her closely. "What do you mean? Whose fault could it be?"
"Mine," she admitted with no small mortification. She had been the source of her own doubt. "I thought he tried to trap me and I made my position very clear that I found marrying him undesirable." At least that sounded better than admitting she'd chucked an heirloom at his head. She hoped Wynflaed hadn't told Oswin about that!
Oswin appraised her again. "You thought a prince tried to trap you?" he asked skeptically. "And what, pray, are you?"
The question surprised her. "Well, I'm a…farmer," she said glumly.
Morwen saw the situation through a different angle - Thengel's angle. She blushed. It sounded so stupid when she put it like that. Why would a prince rope a backwoods girl with a dusty pedigree, and nothing but a few acres of fruit trees and herbs to recommend her? If she had had an ambitious bone in her body, she ought to have seduced him! She never seemed to have the correct frame of mind until too late.
But Oswin smiled. "What's wrong with that? Remind me who was your father and who were his people?"
Morwen's eyes lost focus. "Lord Randir of Belfalas, second son of Prince Aglahir, brother of the late reigning Prince Aglahad of Dol Amroth," she recited by rote. Some children memorized nursery rhymes, but her father had chosen to educate her differently. She could give the Marshal the entire genealogy of the Princes of Dol Amroth, if he liked.
Oswin nodded. "And your mother?"
"Lady Hirwen, daughter of Hador, second son of Halgemir, the late Lord of Lossarnach." Morwen frowned. She had never thought about how many second sons she had descended from until this moment. Pedigree had never mattered. She still didn't think it mattered. But then, she wasn't a crown prince…or a matchmaking uncle, for that matter. That reminded her of Oswin's rumored collusion with Steward Turgon and she gave the Marshal a sharp look. "I thought you knew all of this already."
Marshal Oswin had the decency to look mildly sheepish. "I'm a forgetful old man, you see."
Morwen didn't reply.
"So you found Prince Thengel utterly objectionable as a husband and with nothing but pity in your heart, you threw him off at the last. And you've come to rid the last relic of him from your presence. Ah. Well, I wished to confirm a rumor and find there's nothing for me to work on."
Morwen blinked. How in Arda had he come to that conclusion? Or was he willfully twisting her words?
"I didn't say that," she replied, beginning to feel cornered. He wasn't understanding her at all. She'd come for the opposite reason!
The Marshal continued to pace with his hands behind his back. "Then tell me, what are your objections to my hotspur of a nephew?" Oswin said, warming to the topic, "for which of his noble traits would you reject him? His charming temper? His noble stiff neck? His penchant for reading?"
It didn't seem like a fair question. "You can hardly expect me to outline his faults to you," she replied. "And I don't think reading is a fault."
The Marshal smirked. "Whittling down Thengel's character is an old family pastime of ours." He stopped and stared at the box containing the horn. "Thengel Fengeling has many deficiencies. I merely wondered, for the record, which traits a less partial observer might fall upon."
"His deficiencies seemed fairly balanced with his virtues." It sounded like something diplomatic Adrahil would say.
Oswin's wiry eyebrow arched. "Oh, you think so?"
He chewed on this reflection for a time, weighing what he heard and what was said. Although the silence stretched on, she only thought perhaps he would want to return to his chair if he planned to ruminate over his nephew's exact relationship to a young Gondorian woman with tangential connections to lords and princes.
"But you won't have him," he said at last. "Or at least he's persuaded to believe you won't — and vice versa."
Morwen swallowed hard, beginning to feel confused about who had rejected whom. Her tongue felt dry and the right words were hard to find. Oswin's mind moved faster than hers, lighting from thought to meaning before she could puzzled it out herself.
"Wait a moment, please. I've only said we are not betrothed, not that I didn't wish to be or that it could never come to be. You see, Marshal," she said haltingly. It felt odd to admit something like this to a near stranger. "I love him, but…"
"Love him?" Oswin stared at her causing Morwen to blush despite herself. Then he slowly rubbed his hands together. "Now we're getting somewhere," he said.
"Not really," Morwen replied, causing storm clouds to form once more over Oswin's face. "Thengel has no idea. He ran off like an idiot and I need your help — particularly with that noble stiff neck of his, as you put it. I've come all this way to ask a favor of you."
"And what is that?"
"Lady Idhren told me that Thengel intends to meet you before your journey north."
"Yes."
"Would you remind Thengel, from me, that he promised to visit Imloth Melui again."
Oswin's expression cleared a little. "I will, Lady Morwen. But how will that help?"
"It will make all the difference. I can't go to Ithilien and I can't reach him there by letter in order to explain."
His lips twitched as he contained a grin. "Is there nothing else I can do? I could simply tell him…"
"No, you mustn't tell him anything. You know what he'll do."
"Yes," said Oswin darkly. "Even as a boy learning to ride his first pony I had to tell him to go in the opposite direction I intended. It's the contrary Fengling blood."
Morwen believed it. And that's why she wanted only the most minimal message conveyed. If Thengel could see her now, going over his head to treat with his uncle, she suspected he might just chuck something at her for a change. One of his boots, perhaps.
He shrugged. "Well, if that's all you want, it's easily done."
"You must remind him to keep his promise. That's the sticking point. He did promise. Then leave the rest to me."
"And then you think you can handle him?"
"Yes, I think so." If Ferneth's observations could be trusted, then certainly. Morwen tucked her hair behind her ear. "There is one other thing, Marshal."
"Yes?"
"It's Guthere, you see. If you recall my mentioning that he's in love with my cook…"
Oswin looked rebellious. "Lady Morwen, I came to Gondor to get my nephew a wife, not his guard," he said tartly.
Morwen rose and followed him to the other side of the chair. "Yes, and I'm at your service on that score. I'll make sure your nephew gets a wife, but I have conditions."
"Oh yes?"
"Yes. Guthere stays with me."
"What on Middle-earth do you want with Guthere?" Oswin snapped, not taking kindly to someone quibbling over his men. "As I said—"
Morwen stiffened her spine. After all, this was just as much about her happiness as it was for Hareth's and Guthere's. "A princess needs an honor guard, doesn't she?"
Oswin's mouth snapped shut. Morwen could even hear his teeth click together.
Morwen held out her hand. "Consider this an official declaration. If Thengel wants Guthere back and the…what did you call it? The horn, I mean."
"The heortgifu?"
"Yes, the heortgifu, he'd better just come and claim them."
He scowled at her tone, yet Morwen thought she detected a dim glow of amusement behind the Marshal's eyes. Or was it mischief?
"Am I hearing correctly that you intend to hold the horn and my warrior hostage?"
Morwen tried to smother a smirk. "The horse, the rider, and the horn. Yes."
"Is that all?" he asked dryly. "Have you no other conditions?"
Morwen glanced up at the ceiling, thinking. "Well, it's a start."
The Marshal finally shook her hand. "I don't normally negotiate in a hostage situation, but I'll make an exception here."
Morwen felt something like elation as she shook Oswin's hand. After all, she had just negotiated an alliance…or a conspiracy…or something. Probably Morwen had not carried it off with the same polish and skill as the Lady Idhrens of the world, but she had time to improve on the craft. Nor would it be the last round of give and take between the Marshal and herself in the foreseeable future, she reckoned.
Then she bit her lip as reality settled back on her shoulders.
"What's the matter?" Oswin asked.
"Suppose it doesn't work?"
"If we ally ourselves with this common goal we'll have little chance of failure, my girl," Oswin answered. "You'll come again tomorrow of course," he said with a twinkle in his eyes. "We need to strategize how best to direct my nephew."
"I'm sorry, Marshal, I planned to return to Lossarnach tomorrow. I have business from the Steward…"
Oswin waved her objection away. "Turgon's business can wait a day. Béma knows he delayed mine long enough, letting Thengel have the run of the country." He gave her an authoritative look and she began to understand Thengel's position on his uncle. "Delay a little while. You'll stay for supper tonight, of course. I'll lean on you to accept my hospitality. After all, I have a right to know my new niece better."
Niece! Morwen hadn't thought of that. And she supposed Oswin would be the one to represent her to the King and Queen of the Mark — if her plotting succeeded.
And it hadn't. Not yet.
AN: heortgifu = heart gift, betrothal present.