Morwen sat alone in the library. On the desk before her, papers lay spread out on top of one another like autumn leaves in a field. Some were letters and lists sent from the Warden of the Houses of Healing, others were sketches of green houses and garden beds. She would carry these to Ferneth for one last round of approvals soon.
She leaned deeply into her father's chair and rubbed her eyes. They felt dry as old onion skins from long reading. Before her life had taken a sudden administrative turn, she would have been in the orchard now with the sun toasting the back of her neck or in the yard with Beldir combing over the crates of fruit being shipped to Arnach. In truth, they didn't need her presence as much as she wanted them to need it. Everyone had come back to work as soon as Halmir's men vacated the property. With the promise of new income and fewer trees, they were keeping up under Beldir's direction. But who else would do the paperwork?
Morwen glanced around the room. At first she had not minded the emptiness of the library. It provided a break from the constant attention she gave to the members of her household, providing solitude to think over the strange turns her life had taken in the last year since Randir's death, particularly since the spring. Not long ago, Gildis and Hareth were squirreling away her mourning clothes behind her back in preparation for Lossemeren. She had believed, incorrectly, that she had survived the greatest change of her life in losing her father. The trees and the wind had had other ideas about that. And so had Halmir.
Relief soon turned to restlessness and solitude had taught Morwen nothing about herself which she didn't already know. Not for the first time that afternoon, her eyes alighted on the shelf above the little hearth where Gildis has moved the Horn of Eorl, which had been left behind in Thengel's haste and then returned once again after her trip to Minas Tirith. Morwen flexed her fingers, then clenched them where they lay on the armrest. This was the hand that Thengel had given back, had given her freedom of choice. Now that she had chosen, time would tell if her accomplice would succeed in his mission in Anorien.
A knock at the door disturbed her circular revery. Guthere stepped inside. Nanneth had thrown away the last dressing weeks ago and his hair had begun to grow in, save for the stubborn tonsure-like patch surrounding the injured scalp. He looked odd, but she had grown used to him.
He shuffled over to the desk when she beckoned him. He had a cloth in his hands which he must have used to wipe away the garden dirt before he came inside. His fingers worked over the shabby fabric and she recognized a case of nerves.
"Is something the matter, Guthere?"
"Well, Lady Morwen," he answered. "I think you'd better step outside."
Morwen reached the yard just as a tall, green-clad figure shut the pasture gate, his back to her. She felt the thump of recognition in her chest. Thengel turned at her approach and seemed glued to the gate once he noticed her. He remained there like a vagabond unsure of his welcome or perhaps willing her to come to him.
She went, passing blindly between boys and girls carrying bushel baskets of fruit from the orchard to be stored away until the carts came ahead of market day.
Cenhelm remained in the sun-filled pasture with their horses, Morwen saw as she drew nearer. He dipped his head in greeting when he caught her looking at him. And then she reached Thengel's side. At first she felt at a loss for how to begin. He watched her but didn't seem inclined to speak, which didn't help until she realized that he might actually be subject to shyness. After what they had experienced together, the thought nearly made her laugh.
"Welcome back to Imloth Melui, Prince Thengel." She dipped into a low curtsey. "This is a surprise."
Thengel's lips tremored almost imperceptibly as he tried to contain either nerves or amusement. "Is it, Lady Morwen?" he said, matching her formal tone.
Morwen ignored the question. "You must be thirsty after traveling on the dusty road all day. Allow me to send my man for a glass of something for you. Guthere," she called.
Guthere appeared from the side of the house. He looked ready to swallow his tongue for his role in the conspiracy against the prince. Shuffling forward, he kept his head bowed.
"Ask Hareth to have some of the cherry juice for Prince Thengel and Cenhelm."
"Yes, my lady." Guthere blushed to his roots, gave his former charge an alarmed look, bowed, and disappeared around the house toward the kitchen door.
Morwen turned back to Thengel with a benign smile as if she hadn't just flaunted his old guard in front of him. His own expression proved harder to interpret, understandably, given the difficulty of trying to glare and conceal laughter at the same time. Morwen's head went a little giddy with the pleasure of seeing him off kilter for once, after the merry-go-round he had put her through in May.
"Are you well, Prince Thengel? You look like you need to sneeze," she teased as she felt inside her sleeve for a clean linen.
"I'm fine," Thengel muttered. Then he added, "You know he's a warrior not a footman."
"Yes, I agree," Morwen replied playfully. "Which is why I've sent him to guard you against thirst. You see it's a very real danger, especially in summer. Dehydration can lead to all manner of complaints. Lightheadedness or a loss of appetite, for example."
"Or headaches."
"I believe that is a symptom of being struck by a tree," Morwen replied.
Despite his efforts to appear grim, Thengel looked down and grinned at his boots in defeat. "As you say."
Morwen watched him with growing satisfaction. "Now, my lord, are you passing through to Arnach again?"
"I doubt I would be welcome."
She smiled and shook her head. "By Ferneth you would be very welcome. I hope Hundor won't get under your feet too much in Ithilien once he's released — and assuming hard labor doesn't kill him."
Morwen had been teasing, but he looked at her gravely. "My work in Ithilien is done for some time now. It has also been brought to my attention that my other duties are somewhat lacking," he told her.
"It has been an improving season for you," she noted.
"If you like," he replied with a mock bow. "As for Hundor, he will have Ecthelion's feet to worry about soon enough. The Lord of Gondor's armies wears studded boots."
"So does his wife, I think. Will you come into the house?" Morwen stepped along side of him.
Thengel glanced suspiciously at the front doors as if suspecting some hidden trap within. Did he suspect that if he entered her house, he'd share a similar fate to Guthere's? Wise man.
"Not just yet." Noticing the faces of Morwen's workers all staring, he said, "Perhaps you might show me this new structure here."
Morwen followed his line of sight toward the house to the makeshift lean-to Beldir had constructed from the first set of the Warden's plans. While it hadn't taken long to build, the structure looked far from permanent. Being summer, Beldir left all sides but the one abutting the house open. By autumn it would be replaced with something sturdier and fully enclosed.
"The nursery, you mean," she said. "Come with me."
They passed Hareth coming from the direction of the kitchen garden with two glasses in her hand. She appeared red-faced and her hair frizzling an extra inch in any given direction. Probably the result of nerves, Morwen thought, despite the near guarantee she had given the couple that the danger of separation had passed. She decided to ignore the implied doubt in her capabilities.
Thengel accepted his drink in silent bemusement as Hareth nearly ran in search of Cenhelm, to whom the other glass was destined. The cook didn't stay long enough for Thengel to either thank her or pronounce doom.
Morwen touched his sleeve to remind him of their destination. She led him inside the shelter. Soil-filled boxes covered a row of makeshift tables made of boards and hobbyhorses. Here and there a seedling had broken through the dirt to the free air. Morwen bent over these and whispered encouragements and tested the moisture of the soil with her fingers while Thengel sipped his drink, bemused.
"What are you growing here?"
Thengel stood closer than she realized and her arm brushed his when she stood up. "The next generation of Hyarnustar golds." She smiled up at him. "These seedlings here were found by Beldir between the stumps of the fallen trees. We usually weed these out. We'll plant them again when they've grown enough to avoid trampling. What you can't see are the seeds given to me by the Warden."
"How did the Warden have your apple seeds?"
"From my father, actually. He donated them to the seed library back when the Warden and Headmaster first conceived it. Thank goodness. We won't be as behind as I feared."
"When did you learn of this?"
"In Minas Tirith. Lord Turgon arranged it with the Warden to partner with Bar-en-Ferin for their botanical gardens. I'd forgotten about my father's contribution, but as we combed over their seed collection, there they were. The Warden let me have some of them."
Thengel gave her a sidelong glance. "Is that what Turgon summoned you for?"
When Morwen nodded, his shoulders relaxed as if she had relieved some anxiety on that point. She wondered about it, but let the subject lie.
"Since then Ferneth and I have been writing back and forth. The Houses of Healing will sublease the land — which offsets the cost for me, a good thing because I am not sure I could afford it for much longer without the full orchard. And this will still be a working farm. Permanent green houses will have to be built. Until then, the Warden and the Headmaster of the Archives wants to send student horticulturists to study the valley," she said with deep satisfaction. "Beldir and Nanneth have both agreed to apprentice the candidates, so they can learn about domestic and wild plants. In exchange, I am going to send Ioneth to Minas Tirith to learn at the Houses of Healing. We need to think of the future of Imloth Melui's families, with Nanneth getting on in years and none of her children showing any interest in taking up her mantle."
He was smiling at her and she stopped. "What is it?" she asked.
"You've warmed to being the lady of the valley, not just Bar-en-Ferin."
Morwen smiled back, glad that he seemed to be warming to her again. "Yes, I have. It turns out I enjoy directing people."
Thengel stifled a snort as he leaned against a sawhorse. He finished his drink and set the glass down. "So, you're satisfied with the outcome here?"
"Satisfied? Maybe." She crossed her arms and looked away into the woods. "It's still a shock, sometimes, when I'm working up on the hill. But I don't feel so badly about the trees now that we have this project. New trees will grow in time. My family will still have a legacy and now all of Gondor will benefit from our work here, not just one man."
"When will all of this take place?"
"Slowly. Funds have to be raised still." She turned a bright smile on him. "I don't suppose that a contribution could be made from the coffers of Ecthelion's favored lieutenant? Or perhaps an official donation from the Crown Prince of Rohan? We'd put your name on a plaque…um, somewhere."
"I think something can be arranged."
An inevitable lull fell in the conversation. Morwen picked up a trowel that had fallen off the makeshift table and hung it back on a nail in the wall, then stepped back to see if all the others tools had made it back to their homes. All the while his eyes catalogued her every move. She could feel it like the sun on her skin.
Morwen took a deep breath, then faced him. "You didn't really travel here to discuss paperwork and seedlings, did you?"
"You know very well I have not."
Morwen's belly flipped. "You're in time to see the roses in the valley. I could use a long walk."
"Are you well enough?" he asked, unsubtly eyeing her side.
"Well enough to climb ladders and fall off of them," she quipped. When he looked alarmed she added, "we had a wet early June. I slipped on a rung and landed gracefully on my backside. It only bruised my ego. Nanneth says the wound is completely sound." She pressed her hand to her side, thoughtful. "I don't even remember what it felt like."
"Not at all?"
"Not clearly. But then, I'd rather forget. And so should you."
…
Morwen threaded her arm through his and led him out of the lean-to. Rather than guiding Thengel through the orchard to her special door in the wall, she skirted along outside the walls along a thin deer path through the wood eaves.
"Not through the orchard?" he asked.
Morwen shook her head.
"You don't want to be reminded of what happened," he said stiffly. "I don't blame you."
Morwen blinked in surprise as he misunderstood her maneuvering. "Thengel, I live here. As if I could forget it. I only wanted to be alone with you and half the valley's at work in there."
He swallowed. "Oh."
They lapsed into silence as they walked beyond the orchards under the protective arms of ancient beeches were the land rolled into the ridge. The orchard walls and the sounds of people at work fell farther behind until they lost sight and sound of them all together. A lark warbled at them and a breeze gently strummed the treetops. The deer track crossed the path leading to Anorien's well and Morwen steered him onto it. They had not gone far when Thengel stopped dead.
"What is it?"
Roses of many colors grew in walls of pink and white along the path. Delicate five-petaled cups gazed worshipfully at the sun, and at the center, pure gold. More than the eye could count. Thengel breathed in the heady fragrance and let his eyes wander. With no small amount of pride, Morwen watched the changing emotions on his face as the valley outdid itself to impress him. She saw surprise, admiration, longing, peace. Regret?
"What I had taken for mere thickets…." He exhaled as if at a loss for words. "I expected a few bushes here and there, but this…."
"Imloth Melui is famous for its roses for a reason, Thengel. I'm pleased you came back to see them."
He swallowed and let go of her arm. "No wonder you love this place so much."
"I do." She said this rather mournfully. Then, as she already felt a little sad, and what could it possibly hurt to get it out of the way, she said, "You didn't come for so long I though you had forgotten your promise."
Thengel shook his head, as if to clear a fog from his mind. "I did not forget."
"Then why put off the visit?"
"I doubted if the promise was wisely made."
"But why?"
"Can't you guess, Morwen?" He waved a hand at the roses. "Because of all this. And, given the circumstances, people will have ideas about us."
"People are allowed to have ideas and we are allowed be unmoved by them," she answered with an imperious shake of her head.
He watched her curiously, as if trying to understand her meaning. Morwen walked on, irritation quickening her pace. She hadn't brought him here to increase his regrets, but to entice him by what she had to offer. Stubborn Fengling ingrate, or whatever Oswin had called him.
"Besides, I don't see how this particular idea should offend," she hazarded when he caught up with her. "It didn't offend me when your uncle asked me to confirm the rumor."
Thengel paused and stopped her too with his hand on her arm. "Oswin asked you to confirm this rumor?"
"Yes, he did," she told him boldly. "I went to see him, as you know." She didn't bother to try to sound concerned. "He thought we were promised to one another. Apparently everyone in Minas Tirith is under the same impression still."
Thengel stared blindly down the trail. "But I never told him so."
"You left the Horn of Eorl on my mantelpiece. That I still had it in my possession he seemed to think significant. That, and your friend Idhren has a talent for speaking things into existence."
Thengel seemed to want to say something in reply, but could not think of the right words. Then he asked, not quite looking at her, "So. The idea, the rumor didn't offend you?"
Morwen turned away to lean over and smell a rose. "Why should it? You are a pleasant person."
"Pleasant?" he parroted, as if he hadn't expected her to word it that way at all. "You once described me as a two-faced orc."
Morwen turned back to him, her eyebrows drifted toward her hairline as he repeated that line back to her. "Well, at the time I thought you were behaving like one," she said in her own defense. "But Marshal Oswin's description is more apt. You are a hotspur."
Thengel scowled. "And that's the sort of person you don't mind having it rumored about that you're betrothed to marry?" He sounded as if he doubted her judgement, even if it was in his favor.
"No fear," Morwen quipped. "But maybe you are afraid of me?"
"No fear," he parroted.
"What then? My lack of position in comparison to yours? Wealth? The language barrier, perhaps?"
Thengel crossed his arms. "No, it's the bit about you're barely old enough to marry someone my age," he replied tersely.
It was her turn to scowl. "I am not a child," she said as she sailed past him, happy to be walking again.
"No, but I have not been a child since long before you became a child," he called.
Morwen did not immediately reply while he caught up with her again. When they were shoulder to shoulder, she spoke at last.
"Do you recall in the book of Númenórean history that you borrowed from my father's library that Tar-Aldarion was seventy-one years older than Erendis, his wife? What's seventeen years to that?"
Thengel looked askance.
"Yes, I read it while you were away," she answered the unspoken question. "You left it sitting out and I had some free time while my wound healed."
"They had a troubled end," Thengel pointed out. "Not exactly the model for a happy marriage."
"They were self-centered." She shrugged. "They never shared the same story. But here we are and you've already fallen into mine."
They walked in silence, each with their own thoughts. Or doubts. Then the corners of Morwen's lips curled upward just a little.
"You did return to Imloth Melui," she observed with satisfaction, "despite your doubts."
Thengel looked at her, helpless. "I promised."
"And you always keep your word," she chanted. "You're a fine old fellow, Thengel. Very polite."
Morwen laughed softly at the crestfallen expression on his face. "You're the one who keeps harping on the age difference. Not me."
"Old fellow. Polite. Huh," he scoffed. "What a saucebox you're turning out to be."
"Nonsense. I'm very pleasant myself."
"Most of the time," he grumbled. "My men have started to call you Steelsheen."
"Steelsheen! One day you will have to explain that to me."
"Easy. She is the kind of high-handed young woman who goes around a man's back and tells his uncle that she's permanently reassigning his body guard to her own person and who refuses to return his personal affects."
Morwen bit the inside of her cheek as she watched him. "You don't say? Am I such a one?"
"Morwen Steelsheen," he said sternly, "You know better than anyone what you've been up to since I left. Isn't that why you paraded him in front of me earlier?"
Her eyes flashed with humor and pique. "Well, you weren't using him. Poor Guthere was dumped on my doorstep like an abandoned child. It's only natural for us to adopt him. Besides," she sniffed, "it's not as if I'm taking him out of the family."
"No?" he growled.
"No, Thengel. There is one point," she said, solemn where she had been playful before, "which we have not discussed." He looked at her, wondering. "Are people's ideas about us true — no matter what we might persuade ourselves to think?"
Now he really looked at her. "What do you say?"
"I think you need me," she said frankly. "I think you need a place like Bar-en-Ferin. A home. To really settle in somewhere and belong."
Thengel's gaze roamed fitfully up into the trees, before returning to her face. "I can't belong anywhere on this side of the mountains, Morwen. So why would a young woman like you look at a man like me when you know how my story will end?"
"Because you are generous and kind. At least, that's how it began. And when my cousin treated me like a commodity rather than a person, you upheld my dignity and returned my choices." She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "There were moments when you were not so kind and I think I understand why. But I hope you've learned better than to try to keep me at arms length now. Just who do you mean to protect anyway?"
He opened his mouth but closed it again just as quickly as she exposed his methods.
"Morwen, you've seen so little of the world or the people in it. There are other men for you to know."
Now Morwen crossed her arms and had just enough presence of mind not to tap her foot impatiently. She hadn't reckoned talking someone into marriage could provoke one so.
"You should have thought of that before you came back," she said wryly. "We're past possibilities now. Aren't we?"
The world was a wide place. Morwen had managed to ignore that for the first twenty years of her life. It was odd how one fallen tree could undo all her unknowing. Odder still how it didn't seem to matter.
"You aren't going to give Guthere back?" he asked.
"No. Nor the horn."
Thengel exhaled. "I see. And you really twisted Oswin's arm?"
"He didn't put up a fight."
Thengel shook his head as if trying to reconcile his thoughts with this emerging side of Morwen.
Together they walked on in silence. Something grew between them as they walked together in the quiet afternoon. It made her feel like crying, though she didn't know why. It both filled her with hope and it hurt her. Looking at the wild roses, she though that something irrevocable had happened, an unstoppable chain of events that shook her certain future to the foundation. Only it had happened so long ago that there never was a chance of stopping it now, like a road that had run on ahead of them and wouldn't let them off. Would she trade Bar-en-Ferin after Thengel won it for her - in exchange for an uncouth, northern country where the grasslands came to life?
Perhaps her roots were as shallow as the beech's, because she could countenance the question and feel that the answer she would have given only a few months ago didn't sit right on her lips. Thengel's coming in April had become the first breath of cool northerly wind through the trees, the first frost on the flowers. The sound of hoof beats on the loam would never sound the same to her again. And yet, she would rise to meet it. She loved Bar-en-Ferin, but it wasn't enough.
"I need you to keep borrowing my trouble, Thengel," she said at last. "But it can't be one-sided. I can offer you a home and a family. You don't have to be a wanderer anymore."
"But Morwen—"
She held up her hand. "You said you can't belong anywhere on this side of the mountains. Nonsense. If I've learned anything this past year it's that it doesn't matter where you belong, it's the people you belong to who make a home. When King Fengel's time comes you need to be able to take a piece of that home with you. That is — if you think you could finally tell me the truth."
Thengel stood quietly. She walked a space down the trail before stopping too. She turned and they regarded one another with the distance between them, perhaps taking the measure of the other and weighing costs. Another kind of duel.
And then Morwen understood his stubbornness. He was a strong one, she thought, but here he seemed to lack the courage to claim anything for himself. Or was it too much generosity? He wouldn't ask for a sacrifice. But then, she thought, that wasn't how sacrifices were made.
"No fear," she told him.
He smiled sadly. "It would undo everything we did so you could stay here."
"Yes, it will," she admitted, "but not yet. The valley wouldn't be the greater loss to me."
He studied her eyes, curious. "Are you certain of that?"
"You gave back my hand." She held her upturned fist out between them. "Now it's mine to give wherever I choose."
Morwen unfolded her fingers. Thengel considered it as if it were a flower he wanted within a locked case that belonged to someone else.
"Maybe that's not what you want." She began to withdraw her hand.
Then his own darted forward and snatched it roughly to himself, his whole hand enveloping her own. Her heart hiccuped as the momentum drew her closer to his chest.
She laughed softly, partially in surprise and in triumph. "That's what I thought."
"I love you, Morwen."
Her smile faltered as tenderness overwhelmed her. Finally, the plain truth. "You have shown me that over and over again," she said. "And I love you, though I haven't had as many opportunities to prove it."
"You were behind for so long," he said, "I didn't think you ever could love me back."
"I didn't know." She looked down, for the first time betraying the sadness she felt. "Until you released me." She shook herself and smiled. "So, will you stay in my orchard?"
"Till they call me back," he finally said.
She came to him fully then and he folded her in his arms. His fingers tilted her chin so she had to look at him. His face was grave.
"When Rohan calls, will I go alone? Do you want to be a queen?"
She looked at him in desperation. He had touched upon the one doubt bruising her plans. What did she know about being a queen, much less a queen of Rohan? And yet he seemed the least concerned about this than about taking her away from Imloth Melui.
"You are a champion, Steelsheen. It will be like rescuing Gundor from Beldir, but you've had practice."
"Gundor is learning to hold his own under Guthere's care. We'll learn together," she said truthfully. "You won't go alone."
He had borrowed her trouble, now it was her turn to borrow his. As he kissed her in the half-light, they both prayed the sacrifice was a long way off.