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20. Better the lie that heals or the truth that hurts?
The rhythmic sound pattern of a whetstone being dragged across a deadly blade cut through the quiet evening air, and was only disturbed by the sporadic cracking of a log in the fire and the languorous, almost lazy, noises of hair being brushed. Lothíriel sat at her dressing table, already in her nightgown, combing through her black tresses with about as much interest as a horse might mind the flies at its arse, totally lost in thought. Looking up, she caught sight in the mirror of her lord and husband sitting on the edge of the bed, his prized sword in his lap, working away at sharpening it, as he was wont to do in the evenings, and, halting in her brushing, the queen abandoned all hope of distracting herself from the inevitable thoughts that her agitated mind came circling back to, again and again. It was the night before the feast of Beltane and still she hadn't found the courage to address the little secret she had stumbled upon in a quiet little village not too far from here.
After their return from their little adventure trip almost a week ago, Éowyn had not grown tired of imploring her to not bring up that subject with the king – and who could blame her for that? After all, once those words were spoken and those questions asked, they might echo from the royal chambers throughout the Golden Hall of Meduseld, and from then on who knows were else to? A royal court certainly had no shortage of curious eyes and ears, hungrily lapping up whatever meagre morsel could be provided for their gossip. Of course, Edoras was not comparable to Southern courts in that regard, but even a Northern court would most certainly erupt in scandalous outrage at the revelation that the king had an illegitimate bastard son.
Or so she thought at least. The shieldmaiden, of course, had tried, again and again, to explain to her that their traditions of faith had little to do with dynastic entanglements, that at Beltane it were not any man and woman lying together to make a child, but for a god and goddess to come together to give life to the land. And granted, it felt almost comical to make a fuss over one child when logically, mathematically speaking, dozens upon dozens of Beltane-bastards surely lived and breathed and ate and drunk … and just existed all over the Riddermark. So, yes, perhaps she was blowing this whole thing out of proportion and no one would actually blink twice at the news of a boy born out of wedlock whose father just happened to be a king.
But if this whole business was not a big deal, then why couldn't she stop thinking about? Perhaps it was because this issue had less to do with politics and far more to do with matters of the heart; yes, perhaps, it was not so much the political scandal she feared – if indeed there even would be one – but rather the ramifications of learning that he had known about this and had hidden it from her? Because, she would be lying if she said that she wasn't hurt by this, more than perhaps even she herself knew – to have her trust betrayed so early on in their relationship, after she had just allowed herself to open up to him, to allow him into that locked-up fortress that was her heart. Even the most beautiful of flowers in spring could wither when the late march frost caught up to them – and the bloom of their affection had only started to blossom recently, barely more than a sapling, hardly more than a sprout. And what gardener would waste their efforts on a withering flower?
Yes, perhaps, that was the thing Éowyn had feared would happen: that the queen would be so offended, so affronted, so heartbroken, that she would turn her back on this marriage as a whole? That, in her disillusionment, she would reject her king and with him his kingdom, that she would turn her back on it all, that she would turn back and flee back to her own country? If only she could, the queen thought bitterly then; but no, she was under no illusion, she knew there was no chance for her to return home now, to live the life of a princess again. Her father had made that abundantly clear – she could hope for no safe haven or open arms from him. Of course, that still left her brother Amrothos, and she had no doubt in her mind that he would care little and less for what other people would think of him or her if he took in his shamed, divorced younger sister – but no, he had his own burdens to bear and no matter how much she missed him, she would not trouble him with her own.
All of that, of course, was based on the assumption that this indiscretion of her lord and husband would have her leave, would have her turn her back on everything the two of them had accomplished so far – an assumption, of which she was not certain, not even now. She had not been so naive, of course, to think that a man like him – a king, a warrior – had not been with other women before her. By Ulmo, she knew she should count herself lucky that he had not fooled around with other women during the weeks he had shunned her bed and remained faithful to her so far – in the South, she knew, such courtesy was not often granted between husband and wife.
And yet, it was not so much the knowledge that he had been with other women that pained her so much, but that the evidence of it, the living, breathing proof of it, was being rocked and cradled in a little village not so far from here, and this made it more than just a simple dalliance of a bachelor king – it made it an act of betrayal, a humiliating blow straight to her face. She was his wife, his queen, and yet it was upon a simple lowly peasant girl that he had bestowed his kingly seed, and not upon her, his wife and queen. Of course, she doubted not that the world would choose to see it differently; they would see it as her failings as a woman for not being able to bear a child, a failing in her duties as a wife to her husband for not producing a son, a failing in her duties as a queen to her king for not producing an heir. As per usual, the woman would be to blame.
Oh, she had no doubts whatsoever that her lord father would be the kind of man to blame her for this, she thought with no little sense of macabre amusement; oh, surely he would be furious if he learned of this – a lowly common girl foaling a child, and a son at that, while the rightful queen had nothing to show for it. And a part of her could not deny that she felt an almost wicked amount of malicious glee at the thought of infuriating her dear lord father with that, of humiliating him like that, of ruining all his ambitious plans with her shameful failure – and that at least was some consolation in her precarious situation, that no matter how unpromising her own prospects felt, the thought of making life harder for her father (even if only a little, even at the cost of her own self) made it a lot easier to suffer through it. So there's that – a secret that could destroy her marriage, a scandal that could endanger the diplomatic relations between two countries, a daughter's malicious payback for a father's unwillingness to answer injustice with her very own idea of justice. Did she miss anything?
Only her heart, perhaps, the little voice inside her whispered with a sigh, and at last she relented, her malice, that had spiked at the thought of punishing her father with this, at last dissolved back into this feeling of hopeless fatigue. She knew it would do her no good to put up with endangering her own happiness just so she could make her father's life miserable; that was a cheap, amusing way of life at best, and a pathetic, hollow one at worst. So what did that leave her with, if she actually were to look at it from the perspective of her own happiness? The one man she would have given her heart to had betrayed her; a man she respected, a man she felt for, deeply, had humiliated her in one of the worst ways possible, by denying her the one thing that could have made her life easier and instead had given it to another, and, in her eyes, far less deserving woman. And then he had doubled the betrayal by hiding the evidence from her – but was that really what happened?
That was just the question, wasn't it? Had her king known all along that there was a secret child out there, a child he intentionally chose not to tell her about? Or was it rather that he had not known at all, and had been as oblivious to this secret as she had been? In a way, she couldn't quite decide what was worse. Either he had kept this from her on purpose – because he knew so well what it would mean and didn't want to ruin the image of the honourable man that he had paraded for her or because he thought of her so lowly, thought her so simple that she would not be able to unearth such a monumental secret, that her hurt feelings in this matter were of no consequence to him? Or he had not known about this at all – because he was a man like any other, a man that perceived women as fleeting, pleasurable distractions rather than meaningful pursuits, a man that would lie with a woman for a night and then forget about it as soon as the cock crowed in the dawning of the day; such a man, surely, could father a child and then not know about it. So, what was worse – cunning secrecy or insensitive carelessness?
Only one way to find out, the voice in the back of her head whispered again.
'I've been out riding with Éowyn a lot lately.', she started cautiously, oh so casually; her words chosen with such tactical care, somewhere between mindless ease and light-hearted small-talk. She was quite sure, had she been with her own people, friends of questionable morals and even more questionable companionship, born and bred at the courts of the South, such forceful light-heartedness would not have managed to fool anyone. But here in the North … these people did not know how to lie; as they had no need for it, no stomach for it, they also had no sense for it – where they saw only silly pleasantries, she was already waging war and spying into more secrets he would have ever thought he could have held.
'You're getting the hang of being a Horse-Queen?', he chuckled lightly as he commented, not even looking up, still more focused on sharpening the sword than on her, and there was something in the way he spoke, that sense of boyish smugness that made her shudder as a sense of something much darker tugged at the back of her mind. But no, she thought vehemently, he was nothing like the beasts she had crossed paths with before and it wouldn't be fair to compare him to them.
'You could say that.', she simply said then, because she knew not what else to say – all the other responses she had in that moment were tainted by that twisted feeling in her gut stemming from her twisted experiences with smug men in the past. No matter how hurt she was by what she had come to learn in that hut, she didn't want to see him in that light and yet that feeling in the back of her mind overshadowed everything. And so – because the pressure to vent became too much with every passing moment – she found herself speak again, less subtle this time, 'We've been to the village of Hurstborough. Just a few hour's ride from here – ever been there?'
'Can't say that I've been – but it's in the Westfold, right? So, we'll probably pass through it on our way of the tour.', he answered absent-mindedly while inspecting the sword for any specks of rust or brittle failure, and thus he did not see her face twist at the mention of the first-year tour. That fucking tour, she thought bitterly, that bloody fucking tour. Of course, it shouldn't agitate her like that, the mere mentioning of it, and, normally, it wouldn't, but given all that she had learned over the past two weeks, well, her nerves were a bit on edge regarding everything and anything that concerned her representation as queen and wife. And that was exactly what this tour was: a representation – a representation of her as his wife and queen.
It was an old tradition for any new queen, to make a tour across the Riddermark on horseback, to travel from settlement to settlement, to be seen by the people, because for these people to be seen was to be believed, and if she were not seen, she would not be considered a real queen, or at least not a queen of the people, and sure enough, these people would take offence at that. It was a ridiculous notion, she mused, feeling the mindset of the Southern princess peak through the eyes of the queen now and again, that a regent would have to legitimate oneself like thus, but it was a beloved tradition – a tradition that would have her paraded around like cattle, but still a tradition – and she intended to keep with the traditions of her people as much and as best she could, anything to make herself the queen she needed to be, right? Of course, usually, that traditional tour would have been made within the first month of marriage already, but, unfortunately, other things had kept getting in the way of that, and, given her secret reason for this conversation, it would seem that things would just keep on getting in the way of that …
'Did you two enjoy yourselves out there?'
The question pulled her out of her increasingly desperate thoughts and for a moment she was too stunned to register what she had been asked. Blinking she looked at her husband still hunched over that stupid fucking sword of his, although she found herself glad for once that he was distracted and not really paying attention to her, because otherwise he might have become suspicious, given how far and deep she had gotten lost in the maddening circles of her own thinking again.
'In a way.', she answered slowly then and for the first time since she had decided to do this, to actually have this conversation, she found herself having second thoughts, doubting her very own determination, her need to know the truth. It was a beautiful thing that they had, that thing between them – so would she really want to threaten that by her self-destructive quest for the truth and the reasoning behind it? Perhaps her friend Saelwen had been right when she had warned her not to get too attached, when she had said that she had been burned too often, that she would rather drown out the flame than risk burning one more time, that she would forever be the destroyer of her own happiness. Back then she had merely laughed wryly at her friend's warning words, but only because the idea of happiness with a man – any man, and a warrior and Northerner at that – had seemed a ridiculous notion at best and a frightening one at worst, like a deathly fear one laughed about rather than to acknowledge the very real danger, but now, now she was not so sure. Perhaps her friend Saelwen had been right all along, and that she herself would prove to be the greatest adversary to her own happiness, that she would rather seek to ruin her own chance at happiness from the inside rather than on the off-chance that it might be threatened and destroyed from the outside by somebody else – like the defeated warrior almost that sought to end his own life before the enemy had any chance to capture him. And perhaps, Éowyn had been right, too, to question whether love was really enough – not that she was thinking of love here, it was just …
Perhaps it was not enough to care for each other as long as lies and secrets stood between them?
And what about your own secrets and your own lies?, a voice inside her whispered then, chilling her to the very bone, and looking up she caught sight of herself in the mirror, and as she beheld the reflection of that beautiful woman, she easily saw past the pure and regal and perfect poise and instead saw the shadows of her past and present haunting her eyes. Had she been a different woman, she could have overlooked her king's secrets, and instead of minding them, would have simply carried on in their spring-like bliss. Had she been a different woman, she would have had no need for walls or secrecy, and instead of sabotaging her own happy end, she could have lived happily ever after, blissfully ignorant of the truths and secrets they both carried. But then again, had she been a different woman, she would not have survived and overcome what she had seen and done and lived through, and she would not have been herself. So, all she had now was to see it through to the end, and so she pushed down all those nagging feelings of guilt and despair and shame and jealousy and pushed on no matter what, 'Yes, yes, in fact, we happened to make a new acquaintance up there.'
'Hmm.', he only hummed in response, making that typical non-committal sound he always made when he was not really paying attention to her, as so often more focused on the sword in his lap than the words she was speaking or the trap she was slowly but surely springing. A part of her surely felt sorry for him in that moment; with his golden mane covering half his face, and all of his concentration on the sword he was sharpening again, how he handled it with the utmost dedication and care, it made him seem so innocent and unassuming in that moment, and she felt almost guilty for the way she was about to ambush him – but sure enough, she did not let that deter her in the end.
'Yes, a woman named Ætta – a very kind-hearted woman who offered her hospitality.'
'Hmm.'
'I believe you two have met before.', she continued then, turning around slowly, wanting to catch his reaction with unveiled clarity, and she was using his continued half-hearted attention as the momentum she needed to go in for the kill with little remorse for the possible damage she left in its wake, 'Some two years ago, if I'm not wrong. Or should I rather say: almost to the day two years ago?'
In the hollow silence of her pregnant pause, she waited for the statement to sink in, and indeed, at long last, he understood. The king froze in his movements, whetstone and blade stuck in their last grinding position, and when he looked up and met her gaze, she could see the different emotions play out on his face in a series of shock, confusion, comprehension, shame, and then anger. Cursing under his breath and closing his eyes to try and keep his fury at bay – but failing miserably to do so – Éomer threw blade and whetstone back onto the king-size bed, not minding the damage both bed and blade might suffer from it, not caring, not giving a fuck at this point anymore. She had anticipated his anger – a rather predictable reaction on his part, to be honest – and even if his quick temper flared dangerously high here for a moment, she didn't flinch, not even once, not even a little.
'Éowyn.', he growled then, at long last, pressing out the name of his beloved sister through clenched teeth with the bite of iron poison, and as he jumped up from the bed and started to pace around the chamber, he mouthed a long string of foul curses under his breath, before he turned to address her again, 'She put you up to this?'
Her king zeroed in on her, his eyes, narrowed to slits, perhaps hoping to extract the information from her with something as simple as a direct question, but she gave him nothing. Instead she held his furious stare with a long and hard gaze of her own, and where he was all fire and smoke, she was all chill ice and deep water, calm as the treacherous sea she seemed to have sprung from – he could not contend with her. Like a green boy he had wandered into her trap, lashing out like a wild beast against the snare, thrashing about like a fish caught in the crafty fisher's net – she knew if she only let him rage long enough he would exhaust himself soon enough and then she would have him where she wanted him, and with it, all the answers she needed.
'I swear, if I get my hands on that meddling sister of mine, I will – '
'You will do nothing.', she cut in curtly then, forgetting herself for just one moment, forgetting her own clever plan of letting him vent until he was too drained to put up much of a fight anymore, but even the very idea of her new sister catching the heat for her own undertakings, well, it just didn't sit well with her, 'Éowyn did nothing I didn't tell her to do. I fact, I had to order her – '
'You ordered her?!'
'I am Queen, am I not?'
That shut him up. Initially, he had chuckled, seemingly amused by the idea of her pulling rank with a shieldmaiden, possibly trying to steer the conversation into lighter territory, but she wouldn't catch the bait, and now he clenched his teeth to restrain himself from making any further quips. Quite like a young boy really, one who had thought to joke his way out of a stern talking-to, only to be sobered up by a painful slap on the back of his head. But it wasn't only his jovial attempt at deflection that had been shot down here, it was almost as if his fiery fury had burnt itself out as well, and in the uncertain quiet that his fizzled out anger had left behind, it left room enough for her to fill it with a quiet fury of her own.
'So, why didn't you tell me?', she spoke quietly then, her voice calm and collected, her gaze unyielding and calculating, and she was intent on watching his reaction, eager to catch the lie, eager to catch the truth – she had to look into his eyes to know that, to know which was which, 'Did you think I wouldn't find out? Is that why you left it to Éowyn to explain all this stuff to me?'
'Lothíriel, listen, that ritual – I know I should have been the one to talk to you about this, it's just – perhaps, I thought – fuck, I don't know what I was thinking, alright?', he threw in, stuttering his way through a desperate explanation, and stumbling even more over the words en route to a naive, even if well-meant defence, 'I didn't want to make you uncomfortable, OK? These aren't your traditions – I wasn't sure if I could ask that of you. I had hoped – I don't know, I had hoped to find a way around that, maybe – '
'Oh, I'm sure that would sit well with the council, now, wouldn't it? Or endear myself to your people?', she snorted then, bringing his stuttering, grovelling mess to a screeching halt, and as she smiled a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes, she could not decide whether he was truly as naive as he appeared to be or whether he merely thought to cover more dishonourable intentions – the latter train of thought, she had to admit, stemmed more from her heart than her head really, 'Or perhaps you thought, if a foreigner-Queen wasn't up to the task, a commoner would do just as well?'
At that her king, who had until now paced to and fro, worrying himself away under the grinding pressure of her sarcastic reproof, stopped dead in his tracks and turned around to face her again. She could see it in his face, the realisation hitting him, of what she was implying, that he would still go through with the ritual, just not with her, his wife and queen, at his side – and the insinuation of that seemed to be so shocking and hurtful to him that all he could manage was a choked response.
'No.', he said then, all but pressing the little word out through clenched teeth, exhaled in a breath he had not known he had held, feeling the conversation already slipping into dangerous territory; and with his forehead lined with frowns and his eyes solely focused on her he crouched before her then, one of his large hands placed on her neatly folded hands while the other went to her chin to make her look into his eyes, to make her see and feel the words he meant to speak, 'Listen, Lothíriel, I've been faithful to you, always – and that won't change. But I will not deny that there were other women before you – but, believe me, that is all they are: before you.'
And there it was, the one thing that could even touch a princess from the Southern courts: raw, unflinching, deep-felt sincerity. Oh, she had spent too much time and effort on trying to catch the lies she believed he would be spinning; she had not prepared herself for the truth – and she could see that he was telling the truth. She could see it in the way his green eyes burned with sincere openness, she could see it in the way his whole self vibrated with a sense of conviction she had not encountered before. She could tell that he genuinely believed in his own words, more akin to a vow really, and she could already feel herself slipping.
It would be so easy to get lost in the sincerity of his gaze, to fall for the promise that came from his lips, that burned in his eyes, and she realised that she wanted that – more than anything else, she wanted to believe him, to give into him and the easy way-out he offered her. She could feel her heart take flight – and would it have been so wrong to allow herself to do that, to go the easy way, to pretend that his words were all she needed and that nothing she had found in that village mattered? But of course, she didn't do that, because, of course, it mattered, and even if it had not been wrong to fall for his words, it would have solved nothing, and it would have had her living a lie. But isn't living a lie all you've ever learned?, a voice inside her whispered spitefully then, but she ignored it as she broke her heart's flight along with its wings.
'But that woman – Ætta – wasn't just any other woman, now, was she?', she spoke then, pulling her hands out of the warm, comforting grasp of his paw, out into the cold open, lowering her gaze, far away from any promise his eyes might hold, intent on pushing on, fixed on the thought that knowing the truth was more important than how to live with the truth. Of course, she told herself, he might affirm his faithful loyalty to her with every breath he took and all he liked, but it was he himself that had spoken of other women – women, not woman, mind you – and if she knew of one woman who had had his child, it was just as plausible that there were others too. That thought alone was enough to propel her into action and to push her on – even if she were pushing them over the edge.
'Lothíriel, it's part of a religious ritual, it's got nothing to do with pleasure or – ', he began once more, stuttering away as he rose again, and again he paced across the room, 'Of course, it won't be like that for us, if you and I – because you and me – we – I – ', he stopped again and laughed a humourless laugh at that, clearly flustered, clearly frustrated with himself, clearly aware that he was making a mess of things again rather than explain them to her as he had sought out to do; but he was so busy with himself and his apparent inadequacy that he didn't have the time or good sense to watch her, because if he had paid attention to her, surely he would have seen the way her breathing quickened, or the way her eyes turned to slits, the way her jaws clenched almost painfully – surely, if he had seen the signs, he would have tucked tail and run before –
'It was nothing, Lothíriel, it doesn't matter, it was just – '
'SHE'S HAD YOUR CHILD, ÉOMER!'
In the silence that followed unspoken words and thoughts and feelings hung heavy in the air, thickening the atmosphere between them, widening the chasm that had just erupted between them – and both of them dealt with it in a very different way. The king, thoroughly shell-shocked and thrown, seemed to shrink in on himself as he sank down on the bed, having to sit down as he processed the information that had just exploded in his face. The queen, however, having risen with her revelation, seemed to grow taller by the second, and with her head held high and her back straightened, her clenched jaws and hard eyes, she became calm, but not the calm of a candle saved from the wind, but the calm of a lake frozen over in the heart of winter.
And he could see that, as he looked up, as he slowly regained his bearing, as he slowly wormed his way out of his increasingly maddening thoughts. He could tell that there was a shift in the air about her – where before she had seemed to soften up, ready to give in, she now stood as an unyielding opponent. And still, even though he saw the walls of her inner self tower high and mighty, having her appear remote and untouchable, unaffected by anything he might say, he still spoke up to try and make this right, believing that, at long last, he understood her reasoning for bringing this all up, 'Lothíriel, listen – this doesn't mean what you think it means. This ritual – things are different here – the ritual doesn't mean – you don't understand – '
'Oh, I think I understand enough.', she interjected then, cutting through his attempts at salvaging the situation with the clear chill of appraisal, and he could see that she was watching his every move with eyes intent on catching the slightest slip-up, he could tell that she was looking for ways to point out his failings, ready to zero in on them at the first opportunity, 'I understand that you fathered a child you didn't care for.'
'I didn't know about that, alright?', he spat back, jumping up from the bed, and for the first time since she had started to dominate this conversation did his voice rise up again; he was still clearly on the defensive, but he was not so easily reduced to a position of grovelling as it may have seemed at first. Unsurprisingly though, it was the return of that very spark of defiance that pushed her even further on.
'And that makes it better?!', she hurled back at him, picking up on his vibe, and perhaps – who knew? – she had re-learned more from him than her aptitude for riding, that some of that old fighting spirit had returned after she had thought to have lost it growing up at court, that perhaps some of his own quick temper had bled into her over the months they had been living together, showing a whole new side to her, a side that craved the fight rather than to internalise her doubts and fears, 'Did you even care to inquire? Did you even care to find out what happened afterwards? Or did your manly brain simply expel the memories of the act along with the spilt kingly seed?!'
Taken aback by the sheer viciousness of her words, Éomer staggered back for a moment, stunned by the unfamiliar heights of her anger, and for a second there he actually questioned if this right here was really such a good idea. After all, he had never fought with her before – mostly because she just hadn't seemed the kind of person to care much for fighting – and had no idea if he could bring himself to fight with her. His sister he could fight with, and he had done so often, and even enjoyed it at times, revelling in the cathartic nature of it, but he knew his sister, knew what buttons to push and what lines not to cross – fighting with Éowyn felt safe, healthy even. But with Lothíriel – he didn't know his wife as well as he might have believed, and this here was uncharted territory, so, perhaps, more caution was the safest course of action here?
'Lothíriel, please, if you would just listen – '
'Why? To listen to your feeble excuses? To defend your carelessness?', she countered, stepping forward, her anger almost like a magnet pulling her towards him as her pole, invading his comfort zone, and talking herself into a veritable frenzy, she got more and more personal, closer and closer to crossing a line between them they had not crossed before, 'Are these supposed to be the actions of a king? The words of your House speak: Ride with honour – but where was the honour in that? And to think that the Rohirrim pride themselves in their honesty, their honour – '
'Enough, woman! I will not have my honour questioned by a woman whose cultures excels in nothing but lewdness and adultery!', he bellowed then at last, finally snapping, finally losing his temper, unwilling to listen to her continuous ranting anymore, the unadorned way in which she held up a mirror to his face, scrutinizing his many mistakes and failings, rubbing his nose in it, but even more so that she would dare drag his people into this mess, questioning their honour – it was simply too much, and it would have been too much for anybody, but he wasn't just anybody, and he gave as good as he got, 'Oh, believe me, I'm quite familiar with your people's loose morals. I'm sure your Southern lords and princes have bastards, too – lots of them. So don't you dare pass judgement on me for failings your people commit tenfold!'
'Well, I'm glad there is at least some cultural similarity you freely admit to.', she commented coldly then, or as coldly as she could, because while her voice seemed as hard as steel, it was still shaking with some wild emotion. Anger gnawed away at her; anger at him for acting so carelessly, anger at him for putting them in this situation, anger at herself for putting them in this situation, anger at the words he used to hurt her, anger at the truth she knew hid behind them – but most of all, anger at the way that things had gotten so totally out of control …
Éomer took a deep breath as he closed his eyes, trying to calm down. He had not meant for things to get so out of hand, but somehow she had just known the right buttons to push to hurl him over the edge, and sure enough his quick temper had gotten the better of him again and harsh words had been spoken that now stood like an invisible wall between them. And as he opened his eyes again, he looked upon her and saw the way she stood there, positively tense as a bowstring, eyes cast down and full of unshed tears, cheeks flushed in an anger she desperately clung to as a way of avoiding the pain she felt over all this. No, truly, he had not meant for things to escalate like this, and he knew now what fighting with his wife would feel like; ugly, exhausting, painful – and more importantly, he knew that he never wanted to fight with her like that again.
'I'm sorry, I should not have said that. I didn't – ', he stopped to take a deep breath, trying to find the right words to carry his meaning across, to make it count, to proceed with more caution and sensitivity this time, or at least, as much as he could muster given the way that he was, 'Listen, Lothíriel, I know you must feel hurt, and I admit, I'm not very good at owning up to my mistakes, but, believe me, I would never willingly do anything to cause you pain. And this child – I promise you, this child will never be a threat to us or to our children, this child will never play a role whatsoever in the line of succession, it – '
'But why not?'
'What?!'
Éomer had not meant to snap at her like that, but he had just been too stunned to really rein in his quick temper in that moment, because, Béma help him!, he had no idea what was going on anymore. Looking at his wife and queen, seeing her standing there, shaking, quietly sobbing, he was too confused to counter anything remotely useful, not understanding the world any longer. At the beginning of their downward-spiralling conversation he had been shocked by her knowing the ugly truth of his past better than he knew it himself, apparently, thinking, fearing that she was mad at him for fathering a child he had never told her about, that she was scared it would take precedence over the children they might have together. But now all the shame and sympathy and feelings of guilt were entirely replaced by a tangled feeling of utmost confusion as he tried to figure out and piece together what was going on in the mind of his crying wife before him.
'It's a boy, Éomer.', she finally explained then with the release of a breath she had not known she had held, and with it all the tension from before seemed to be released as well, as her shoulders sank and her face smoothed out all the lines of worry and stress from before – though it was not so much relaxation that prompted the change in her, it was simply exhaustion, the relinquishment of resistance, the final acceptance that things just had to unfold naturally. She had been the one to choose to bring this potentially all-changing piece of information into their lives and now she had to accept the outcome of it, let it run its course, wherever it might take them, 'You have a son.'
And that got to him at last.
He had been shocked before, of course, but learning that you had child out there somewhere was one thing, but learning that this child was a son, well, that was something else altogether. The king, feeling the shock of it sink in, sat down on the bed; and he was hit so hard by the implication of that statement, and the possibilities that came with it, his mind, unbidden, jumping from hopeful conclusion to hopeful conclusion – and it made the anguish he felt at having to deny it all make it all the more painful. And what was even worse was the look on his wife's face; that teary-eyed hope, that desperate thinking that saw chances in all the wrong places – and now, at last, he understood: her tension, her worry, her little angry broken heart, it all made sense now.
In a flash he remembered the awkward conversation they had had all those months ago, about what a bloodied shift might mean for a woman and her king, or all the other talks ever since, every month, each one infused with the same sad, embarrassed confession, and of course, he remembered that day on the ice and to what desperate lengths hope had driven them both. He remembered all of that, and he remembered the words his sister had spoken to him the day he had left for their long march to the Black Gate, that hope could be a dangerous thing too, and in that moment, as he looked at his wife, his eyes softened, softened with all the love and pity, gratitude and anguish he felt for her right then and there. He could see the hope in her eyes, and it was so hard for him not to let it get to him, and he could see the effort, too, that it took for her to feel hopeful at the prospect of this stranger child; and the determination she showed to ignore her own heart breaking at this crazy ray of hope, well, it made his own heart break with all the different colours of love he felt for her in that moment.
'Don't you see, Éomer? Don't you understand the chance – '
'No.'
'But – '
'No.', he countered again then, and this time with more force, his voice almost as hard as steel, but clearly rusting underneath as he beheld her hurt, rejected expression, and that had been one of the reasons why he hadn't wanted for her to continue this conversation, because he had feared he would disappoint her again, and rightfully so. Naturally, his resistance almost melted away under her sad expression then, and he continued with more sensitivity this time, 'It's not that simple, Lothíriel. I can't understand how you can't see that – you of all people? By law bastards cannot inherit, no matter the situation.'
'But you are the king, your word is the law.'
'In the South, perhaps. Here not even a king can simply worm his way around something like this.'
'Trust me, even in the South one wouldn't be able to simply worm their way around this.', she commented sarcastically and for the first time since the beginning of this conversation there was a small smile playing around the corner of his mouth, though he suppressed it again; he knew they weren't at the end of this discussion, and so he sought out to underline his position on this, 'I know you're thinking that this is a solution to our problems, but I'm telling you it's not. It wouldn't work, it simply wouldn't. The implications alone, and not just with my people – think about how this would look, to your father, to the South – '
'I know it's not ideal – '
'Not ideal?! Do you really think I would shame myself like that in front of the whole world? Shame you? Us?', he bit his tongue to stop himself from continuing his rant, seeing the way she had flinched at his rapid-fire words, and taking a deep breath, he sought to continue with more calm and grace, 'Lothíriel, I'm sure you know better than most how this would look: a bastard from a random woman as my heir – even if we could prove that he is – ', he took another deep breath, 'I'm a man of honour, but you said it best: there is no honour in that.', he made a pause to let those words sink in before went on, 'And even if my people were to accept that, what about you? I'm not going to allow my wife to become a target of mockery or doubt, or to take heat for one of my decisions.', he emphasised passionately, and he could see by the way her eyes softened that her heart softened too, 'And what about the rest of the world? What about Gondor, what about your father? Honestly, I would really hate to provoke a feud with my own father-in-law when he demands satisfaction for slighted your honour. And think what this might mean for our trading – '
The king went on to explain to her in painstaking details the ramifications of that possible decision – as if she didn't know already what this might mean for them – but she remained gracefully and suspiciously quiet. She would not deny that his passionate plea against her proposal moved her heart more than anything else she had heard him say or do before, and she also understood that there was truth in what he said, but one thing she doubted very, very much. Somehow she just couldn't see her own father going to war for her. Oh, sure, he would take issue with this, if this secret became known, which it undoubtedly would, and surely he would make a great show of offended propriety, but she knew her father to be far too cunning and calculating than to start a war over something like this and to risk losing his means of manipulation. Anyway, she knew her father well enough to know that he cared little enough for her as it was, and to think that he would declare open war on behalf of her, well, it was a ridiculous idea.
' – and anyway, it's not necessary, we will have lots of children – '
'And how would you know that? How?', she countered then, after his endless explanation had ended in this preposterously naive statement and effectively pulled her out of her own increasingly darkening thoughts, and now she threw her whole self into convincing him of the necessity of her idea once again, 'We have tried, haven't we? Still nothing!'
'Lothíriel, we have time yet, time enough for that, we – '
'How much time do you think we have? Do you think the council is the only one growing impatient?', she countered almost out of breath, ready to talk herself into another frenzy, incapable or unwilling in her riled-up state of mind to understand any position other than her own, 'Sure, things might be different, if you weren't the last of your House, but your are – time is of the essence!'
'Would you stop being so dramatic? I'm not the last of my House, my sister – '
' – is a woman marrying into a foreign Southern House. Yes, I'm sure the council is thrilled at that outcome.', she commented dryly, scoffing at the simple-minded nature of his line of thinking, faintly aware of the unfairness of her harsh reaction, but nonetheless she pushed on to move forward, single-mindedly focused on the idea that her crazy plan was worth the risk and the pain it left in its wake, and there she was again, grasping at straws, just like she had that day on the ice, 'Don't be naive, Éomer, you are the last of your House and line – so what do you think will happen without an heir? If – Ulmo, spare us – something might happen to you? Would you have your country fall into chaos again? Your lands and your people are still recovering – what do you think a civil war would do to the Riddermark?'
'Will you stop it already?!', he threw in, trying to bring a stop to her increasingly pessimistic rant, though he would lie if he protested that the exact same thoughts hadn't crossed his mind now and again too, but no, he wouldn't allow her words to take him down that path of thinking now, he was determined to stay positive, determined not to give in to the false hope she clung to, 'You keep talking about bleak possibilities and futures that might never come to pass – now what about the things that are likely to happen? You and I are both young and we have time yet, and there is nothing in our family history that would suggest anything other than a great number of healthy children. I mean, your own mother – '
'My mother – ', she snapped then with wide-eyed fury, breathing hard and heavily, and he instantly understood that he had crossed a line there by mentioning her mother and for a moment he wondered how high the waves of her wrath could truly rage. The queen, for her part, took a deep breath to calm herself down again, and when she continued her voice was even again and the sea had calmed down once more.
'I'm not my mother and her lot in life need not be my own.', she answered brusquely, intent on directing the course of conversation away from her mother, because, already, she felt her chest constrict painfully at the sad, frightful double-meaning of her statement – because even if she were to be blessed, like her mother had been, with many children, would it then follow that she would be cursed with it as well, as her mother had been, never to witness those children to grow into adulthood?
'I know it's a hard choice we are facing, but bitter choices are the leader's prerogative.', she continued then, this time with a more consoling tone, feeling as though at last she had managed to slowly sway him to her side in this, even if he still looked positively sceptical, with his green eyes reading the sincerity in her face, 'Now, this might bring risks of its own with it, but at least these are risks we can control. If we wait and do nothing, this uncertainty will breed doubt and chaos; but certainty – certainty will give way to stability and growth, and this … this we desperately need.'
'Even if I were to entertain your idea – the council would never just accept a bastard as a legitimate heir – '
'No? A son born of their own king, a boy born and bred of the Riddermark? Do you mean to say the council would reject him – in favour of what?', she countered then with a half-sceptical, half-amused smile, a smile, however, that didn't quite reach her eyes or her heart, and they both knew what she chose not to say but clearly thought, what he could clearly read in her eyes – that the council would not risk the safety and stability of the Mark for the sake of … the barren womb of a foreign mare. And even if Éomer had wanted to say something against the unforgiving way she thought of herself, to protest against the cruel perception she had of the way the council saw her, he could not have done so, because he would be lying if he said that the council had not put pressure on her, on them, ever since they had been married, and so he stayed quite, not yet ready to agree with her, but too exhausted and overwhelmed to disagree any longer, 'I'm starting to believe you don't know your own people half as well as you think.'
'You would really do this? Accept another woman's child to be my heir?', he asked then, quietly, cautiously, his keen green eyes watching her intently, intent on catching even the slightest reaction she might have that would betray her true feelings, but she would give him nothing, nothing but the truth.
'Accept him? I think I can do better than that.', she answered slowly then, a tired smile playing around the corners of her mouth, a smile he couldn't quite place, but the meaning of her words was unmistakable, as she had practically insinuated that she herself would be a mother to this child regardless of his origin, and the idea seemed to strange to him, so unnatural in its selflessness, so untypical for what he had come to believe of Southerners and their Southern ways that it stunned him into a confusion he could not quite shake.
'Why are you doing this?', he asked then, leaning forward, forehead lined in frowns, eyes turned to slits, eyes that tried to figure out a mystery he had thought he had figured out a long time ago, 'I know why you think we should be doing this, why you think it's a good idea for the Mark and its people – you explained that to me quite … quite fully. But why are you doing this? Why would you risk your honour and your position for a gamble that might not even pay off?'
'Because I am Queen. I'm not just your wife, and my responsibility is not just to you, but to your – to our people.', she answered after a while then, and when she did, her voice was trembling, and the conviction with which she said those words, with which she claimed his people as theirs, well, it would have been enough to soften the heart of the hardest warrior, but with her he was no warrior any longer and his heart had long been claimed by her, and he was sure that she could see that truth echo in the way his eyes softened as they looked at her, though she was not ready yet to acknowledge it, and instead she went on, determined, 'That is what makes a leader great – the sacrifices that are made and the willingness to make them.'
Nodding slowly, in the air of a fragile balance where neither one fully agreed or disagreed with each other, the king then rose from the bed and with two big steps walked over to her to stand before her, gently cradling her face in his hands. There was hardly any space left between, because now there was hardly anything left unsaid between them, except one thing, perhaps, and that didn't need to be said out loud right now, as that feeling was between them now, unspoken but undoubtedly felt, and when he was sure that she could read it in his eyes, he spoke, 'I can see now why my sister chose you as my wife.', he said with quiet intensity, eyes burning with that deep emotion none of them had the courage yet to claim out loud, and as the king lowered his head to brush his lips against the lips of his queen, he whispered again, one last time before he sealed it with a long and loving kiss, 'A great king is indeed in need of a great queen.'
FUN FACT #1: Sorry again for the delay. But I just couldn't finish that chapter yesterday ... I just had a real tough week and it felt like I was working two full-time jobs - and writing never feels good when it feels like a job, just kills my muse.
FUN FACT #2: This chapter was hard. Writing dialogue is tough for me. But it worked out fine, I guess?
FUN FACT #3: Saelwen is a character that will be important for the Éowyn-Faramir-story I'm intending to write ... one day - so, I thought, why not at least mention her here already?
FUN FACT #4: Next chapter - Beltane. All turned on already? ^_^