Notes:
I apologize for the delay in updating. I gave myself a concussion and it slowed down the writing process. I do hope you enjoy! Comments and questions are always welcome!
Ella spent the night awake, prowling the length of her quarters like a cat in heat. Amrothos had offered to spend the night on the divan, should Ella need to talk or simply want someone around. He had been true to his word for hours, to his credit, and managed several hours of stilted conversation but he had grown ill at ease with her constant pacing and she had taken pity and asked him to leave. He had kissed her forehead before allowing her to be alone with her thoughts.
It had been Amrothos that she had feared. Not that he would lash out in anger, but that he would quietly burn with it. Perhaps he did, but she did not know her brother to be false and he had pulled her to him and crushed her half to death. She had heard his breathing turn wet with tears, and she had pretended not to see them, and he had kept them down. Oh my darling, she wanted to say. I wish you had never known the fear of my dying, but she did not say it, because he would understand and he would hate her pity. When children grow up together, they learn the tender parts of each other, but as they grow older they become almost shy of the way another might know them. There was a part of them, Ella thought, that wished to be known by a lover, someone who would see deep inside them, but for anyone else to do so felt wrong, who could you trust to protect the parts of you that were vulnerable? She paused... why not family? She loved her father and her brothers more than she could imagine loving anyone else but she did not want them to see her the imperfect parts of her. She realized she did not mind Éowyn and Éomer seeing those little fragmented bits of her. They understood, or at least she imagined they did... but she had also imagined that Faramir did, and he still was distant from her.
Now that she was safe in Ithilien and with her family informed of her whereabouts, Ella found that she had time to examine all the bits of herself she would have rather ignored. There was a part of her that refused to be happy. It refused to be happy when she had run Dol Amroth and which had banged against the bars of her living in Minas Tirith during the war, and the stifling nature of life as things returned to normal. She knew so many people who were content, who understood their lot in life and simply existed in the moment. People who just were. She wanted desperately to be one of those people. It was exhausting to look for more around every corner. She was running out of corners and out of energy, and she did not think trying to find more was something her family could handle again.
Her pacing brought her to the balcony of her chambers. She liked it out here though the air still held a chill and it was not nearly wide enough to encompass the pacing of the last few hours. She put one leg over the balustrade and when she found it sturdy enough, she brought her other leg over so she sat on the edge, gazing down at the steep drop before her. She had never feared heights, never feared water, never feared the world outside her window nearly as much as she imaged she should. Her life might have been easier had she been a bit more frightened and a bit more amenable to a quiet, gentle future. She drew in a deep breath and savoured the night air turning from crisp to warm in her mouth. Her grip was tight on the banister but she grew braver the longer she sat there. She wondered which would come first: discomfort enough to force her to move, or sleep. She decided that if she felt her eyelids go, she would come down immediately but she did not feel even an inkling of sleep. Her body was tired but her mind was not.
"I think little bird is only a pet name, princess, I do not expect that trying to fly will work in your favour."
Ella felt herself start to grin even before she turned to find Éomer outside his rooms, his balcony a good two feet from hers but close enough that if she leaned over the edge and reached out her arm she could touch the stone of his banister. "How smart you are, King Éomer. Here I thought my wings were suspiciously feather-less."
He looked better after having bathed, which Ella noted with a slight blush and a sharp kick of guilt. She supposed she too must look better. Her hair was combed through now and her skin was speckled with freckles only, the filth of the road had come off easier than it had been gained. Her clothes were borrowed and simple and the sleeves and hem were too long. She had been tripping over herself constantly until she had tied the skirt up with a knot. She did not feel embarrassed that he should see her looking so plain, certainly he had seen her looking far, far worse. It was almost nice that she felt no need to pin up her hair nor powder her face, she was certain now that it made no difference to him and there was a slightly bubbliness to that feeling that she could not explain.
For her part, she preferred this version of him. His long hair was still wet but pulled back in a knot and his beard was trimmed close. His clothing, too, was simple and he looked like he had slept at some point. His eyes seemed dark as they looked at her, intent on her words and her face and her body. It was a pointedness... an awareness and recognition that she did not often feel. It was as though she was momentarily the centre of his world.
"Would you like to fly over here?"
"Someone will see me in the halls." She shrugged lightly and watched him make a half step towards her. It made him nervous to see her up here. He was worried for her. For his sake, she climbed carefully down and was rewarded by his shoulders relaxing just slightly when her feet were back on solid ground. Éomer walked towards her, and she towards him, and she pretended that she felt nothing and draped her arms over the banister and pretended she did not want him to reach his arms over to her.
"I could jump the gap."
Ella shook her head but her grin was less careful now, "You shouldn't. You could fall." She was almost certain she could make the jump, and if she could do it, then certainly Éomer could. Though to call it a jump was misleading. She would have to climb over the balcony and put one leg across to the opposite balcony, then bring her hand to his railing and when she had a good grip, she would bring her other leg over. She told him as much, and he agreed, and before she could offer, he had already reached across to her and though he didn't need her help, she went to assist him. If he had asked she would have said she worried for him, but the truth was she wanted a reason to touch him. The truth was that he felt solid and real and she liked that about him. She did not move her hands once he was over and he put them to his chest and put his hands on top of hers. They stayed like that for more than a moment, more than a second, much longer than they should have.
"Are you feeling better?" As if her tears had been an illness and she had simply needed a poultice and some tea to return to health, she rolled her eyes at him and went to take a step away but he kept her hands in his.
"I shan't have any children. It is too bloody a sport for me."
"Is it?" Éomer finally released her hands but he brushed the scar across her nose. Propriety should have kept him on his balcony and Ella on hers but it was too late for that so she allowed it. It reminded her of dancing with him on the tower. Dancing with him reminded her of the wedding. The wedding reminded her of how easily he had given her up. She took another step away from him and this time he seemed to understand it as more than coyness. "El-?"
"I should be mourning. And I should not be mourning with you. My reputation suffered for you!"
"That was not my intention!" His eyes were still laughing, and Ella realized that for Éomer, this was a good week. The war was ended, he had heroically rescued Ella, and his sister was alive and the mother to a healthy baby boy. He was living a good life, and he wanted to celebrate that with her.
"It is never your intention to hurt anyone." She had learned from him, however. She had been more careful with her heart, but she had not stopped caring for him. It seemed that she had forgotten to get all of her heart back, for a part of it was still his. She did not remember giving it to him. She had liked him and wanted him to like her, but she had thought her heart protected and safe. She had not realized that she had given him a seed of it, and like a seed, it had grown and grown until it belonged to him. She wanted to tell him so. She wanted to warn him that little tendrils of her heart were his and she didn't know if there would be a way to remove them, but the words didn't make sense when she tried to open her mouth, so she said: "It makes me like you more" instead.
"I've wanted to hurt people, Ella. Just not you."
She shrugged, "Yes. In battle."
"And outside of it. I am not a patient man... and I do not brook disrespect."
She knew of Grima, who had wanted Éowyn and who had almost had her. She knew the man had almost destroyed Éomer's Uncle, the Great King Theoden. That was different, that was revenge, and she could understand that, but she did not think that was all Éomer meant. If she tilted her head just so she could see that the planes of his face could be hard and sharp. In the dark his face was shadowed in a way that could mean danger. Ella herself was tall enough, but Éomer towered over men and women alike. In truth, if she took a step back, she could see how he could be fearsome. If she closed her eyes and tried to think back to meeting him for the first time, still stinking and covered in blood and dirt, she knew she had been shy of him and careful. Or what had seemed to her to be careful. There had been a man's life in a balance, so certainly not as careful as she should have been. Indeed, she was alone with a man who would strike fear into any opponent and she could see why. She was not stupid, he was fearsome and she had never truly found herself on the wrong end of his displeasure, but she was not scared of him. She knew him. She was certain of it.
"I am not afraid of you."
He laughed and the hard edges disappeared. She wanted to warn him to be quiet but she didn't really care to lose the warmth of his voice. "I am afraid of you, Princess Lothiriel."
"Yes. You ought to be. I am terrifying. Look, I wear a ring. If I tripped, I might bruise you with it."
He took her hand to look at said ring, it was larger than most ladies wore, and had the Swan seal of Dol Amroth but he did not remember having seen it on her hand before. It fit snugly on her index finger so it must have been a woman's ring but it carried the weight of something official. "It certainly would leave a mark."
"Isn't it something?" She tried hard to look proud, "it grants me the power of The Master of the Treasury. I used it as Regent, but now it is an official position. I shan't ever have to leave home again." It was hard to tell if she was joking or not, but certainly her tone seemed off. "It'll be me and Amrothos, at home forever."
"You can still marry."
"I can, can't I? Do you think my husband will give me such power?"
Éomer found himself frowning now. He knew, as much as he knew anything, that if he married a girl like Ella who understood politics as innately as one understood hunger and thirst, that he would give her equal power to his own. If he were to choose someone to be Queen, that person would have to be smart and capable and willing to take on the burden of ruling. He knew, also, that not all men felt the same. He knew in Gondor that the women did not fight, they ruled behind the scenes, if they held power at all. He knew that once he had thought battle and power to be the providence of men, and his sister had proved him wrong. It seemed a waste to gain a wife who was so very useful and put her to work only darning socks and pushing out a brood.
Ella, however, was not the sort of wife one put to work, even if he had the mind for it. She was the sort of wife who arrived at Edoras- or at the hold of her husband, not Edoras specifically, but any hold at all... She would arrive and clean out the cobwebs. She would see where the darkness was kept and carve out windows, by hand if she had to, to brighten them. She was the sort who would strip the sheets from the beds and sew new ones from her own wedding dress if there was nothing else because that was what she had once believed marriage to be, and she would be damned if it was not what she would make it. She was the sort who would search for her husband's favourite recipes and make them, terrible or wonderful, it did not matter, she would make them to familiarize herself with all that her new home was and she would learn to love it.
"Ella, do you cook?"
She started to laugh, since the question came from the ether and she had never been asked it before, "Are you hiring me for a cook? Is Meduseld living off gruel and unleavened bread? I know how to cut apples and roast fowl. Will that do?"
"It would do, though I might hire a cook's maid to help you when we hold feasts."
"That cook's maid would have more experience than me. I should assist her, and she should be the cook."
"If you won't be helpful in the kitchen, perhaps you can serve the food, then."
"I would be helpful in the kitchens! I'm very helpful, I never said I wouldn't help. Besides, I would spill the food all over everyone if you asked me to serve. I'd pour the wine on some pour soul's head."
Whatever frustration Ella had felt towards her ring was gone now. Éomer's hands were covering it from view, and they were still on hers and neither of them seemed inclined to step apart. He was laughing, but not at her. He was laughing with her, like he thought she was the wittiest person he had ever met, which she was sure was untrue, but she like it anyway.
"Not wonderful in the kitchen, not able to serve without upsetting foreign ambassadors-"
"Wonderful seems an awfully high standard to set for working as an assistant in the kitchen-"
"I'm not done- You don't know how to sing, do you?"
"Not well enough to be a bard-"
"So that won't do, then."
"Probably not."
"You'll sit by me then."
She wrinkled her nose at him and released one of her hands to shove him softly. "I don't think you need to keep an eye on me."
"No? If you don't need me to protect you, then you'll simply be sitting beside me." He took her hand back and pulled her closer to him and she let him easily. "So you'll be there as my Queen. What do you think of that?"
She wasn't sure whether to hit him again, or if she should start laughing to show that she understood the joke. This was obviously a joke, and he thought it was very funny. "I'll be in the Queen's position, yes, but that does not make me your Queen. I could put feathers in my hair and it would not make me a swan."
His face grew serious, as if he had suddenly realized what he had said, and then realized what she said, and he was piecing it together and coming to a conclusion that was more than a joke. "Then I should ask you to be there as my queen... Unless you would rather be a swan."