When they were first wed, she used to wake up with hope each day. She used to feel her heart stutter just a little bit when he was with her. Those early days. Days and nights when she thought that love was real. He was kind to her then, helping her learn the language and the customs of his people. Took her out with him on morning rides among the open fields and the rising sun. She sat with him in the Great Hall during meeting, even as her grasp of the language was elementary at best (she could only learn so much in the short time between her cousin's marriage and her own). And when she had ideas, he listened to her with stars in his eyes. But most importantly, she was there for him. During his frustrations that came with being king rather than a soldier. When he learned that Rohan's pride did not mean refusing offered assistance. She was the only one who understand him because she had been in a similar situation (not that he ever really asked). She gave him strength to become the king he had to be.
Then things started happening. The rosy blanket she cocooned herself in was stripped away. Within their first year, she fell pregnant. The joy of the new life growing inside of her took her higher than the clouds. She fell so quickly when she started bleeding one day. He was there for her that time, being the shoulder to cry on and her anchor. But a year later, before she was ready, she discovered that she was with child once more. A baby girl, her beautiful little flower, lived only for a few hours. And for the next two years, she endured the withering whispers of the court ladies and the wolfish leers of the lords. At first, her husband stood beside her, a shield. But then...he left. To wage war with the King of Gondor against the South, against people Rohan had little quarrel with. He came back different. Indifference, even annoyance, when she expressed the pain in her heart when there was once an understanding. Maybe she was losing him, but he was also losing her. He lost her love.
Did he not understand that they were of the same kind? Did he not see that she was bleeding out from those subtle arrows his own people as she fought for them in the front-lines of the home front while he was away? And when he returned, she was the best thing at the celebration, for did she not prove herself worthy? Still, she was a pathological people-pleaser, forgetting to let herself just be before throwing herself into a cause not truly her own.
While he was gone, she developed a workable plan to build schools and an houses of healing. When she presented the proposal to him before meeting with the council, she had no assurance of his support. And now as the councilmen debated the idea, she looked at him, silently begging him to do something, say something. Prove that he cared about those ideas she once talked about long ago.
He said nothing. Did nothing. And he lost her respect.
She bore him two sons, an heir and a spare. And two daughters, too. But he was often away campaigning in faraway land. She was queen, she was a mother. It was hard to be both, so she started ruling Rohan as if it was one of her children. In her compassion, her love, and her gentleness, there was a firmness. Slowly, with time, the people learned to respect her, love her. The nation prospered under her thoughtful care. She was a mother, and her love was dangerous if crossed.
Another campaign, and he returned. He had been told that his land was blessed. It was because of him, they told him. He thought that he was good king, that the people loved him. While they welcomed him each time with open arms, smiles, and many songs, he did not see the hard glint in his wife's eyes. He did not hear the sorrow underlying the song she sang with his children.
Now, she could only glare at him with storms in her gray eyes every time their eyes met. Sometimes, she would ask him to look into something. He usually didn't, leaving her to make the inquiries. Sometimes, she would express sorrow for a lost child or bygone days, and he would comment that the weather was indeed lovely. Sometimes, he would come to her room at night. Even when they were closest physically, he did not feel beyond the husk she was. Did not notice that her touches were lighter and more scarce. Did not feel her growing sadness, hear her quiet tears, or see the dying light in her eyes.
He forgot how to stop and look. Stop and listen. Stop and feel. He started missing the signs until he missed all of them.
"I believed you and your promises when you first chose me," she mused. She should be sitting next to him as his equal, but here she was, standing before him like a common subject. "Even if you started choosing me now, I cannot believe you." He had lost her faith.
"I don't understand," he said. He sat there on his throne in the empty hall. The fading daylight shone through the high windows, illuminating the crown into a blazing wreath of gold and rubies.
She inhaled slowly, centering herself to the tremulous beat of her heart. She cast a glance around the room, remembering how welcoming it first felt under the candlelight. Then, she gazed steadily at his boots, for it was rude for one to gaze directly at the king. Then, she bowed her head and responded, "I know you don't." She left him without another glance.
Rather than joining him for supper in the Great Hall, she chose to take her meal in her quarters with a dying fire in her grate. She barely touched her food. Instead, she stared into the deepening darkness outside her window. She was glad that she could not see the Great Hall from her rooms. It would have hurt her heart to see the warming light while imagining his hearty laughter and boisterous grin. Still, she preferred the distant starlight over the near glow of the candles - she could not stand another moment faking smiles and affecting a loving union. Was it time? Time to admit what they were now was nothing like the first days? Should she throw away the fragile relationship they had built or keep it?
She was tired, though. How many times had she started over? Her mother's death when she was just a child. One. The darkness that nearly overwhelmed her homeland. Two. A new era, one of peace and victory under the long-awaited king. Three. The marriage that would further solidify the relationship between in Gondor and Rohan (as if her cousin's marriage was not enough). Four. Becoming a queen to a land that was still hurt from the war. Five. Learning a new language and culture. Six. The trials of bearing children - joy of new life, sorrow for potential life, pain of birthing life. Seven. Discovering motherhood without her own mother. Eight. She was a phoenix, always rising from the ashes. Each new life event rendering gashes for her to mend. And now, the ninth. Dismissal by her husband, the father of her children, the king of her heart. That was the final blow to the fragile life she built in Edoras.
He lost her. He lost the love, respect, and faith she once had for him. He lost the one person who understood him. The one person who could make him whole.
She did not need him to be whole, to be herself. Her children, her people, her land. Their love was enough to last her first this lifetime. Maybe one day, he will look around at what Rohan became and see that it was all because of her. Maybe one day, he will mourn for the life he did not live with her, for her. Maybe, maybe. She won't live for maybe's. She lost him, but she found herself. And somehow, that was everything.