We're officially well into the second half of this story, and what remains is now edited, corrected and ready to be posted. If you're with me so far, thank you :)

obidawn: Ah, Elrohir. Who knows what he'll make of his brother's choice? (I do :P) But more seriously, don't worry! He'll make an appearance before the end. I was also contemplating writing his own story, so as to explore a bit who could his beloved be, this woman who so unwittingly drove a wedge between the Peredhel twins...

Lucy: Bruiven is lovely indeed, but he's got some serious competition since neither Taniel nor Annahad will abandon the chance to apprentice with Elladan without a very good reason! As for Beylith's relationship to Grima, this is, of course, pure poetic license on my part. Mainly because it makes for an interesting backstory, and an option for another tale, for some other time...

Chapter 36

August 16th, TA 3020

"It's but a month away, now. Do you think he'll ask me to go?"

The excited whisper pierced the hum of the corridor, causing Mehreen to turn and look despite herself. The speaker, a dark-haired girl younger than she – barely a woman, with her dimpled cheeks and dusting of freckles over a snub little nose – ducked her head upon realizing her voice had carried further than intended and, slapping a hand over her mouth, dissolved into a fit of giggles inside the small circle of like-mannered girls crowding by one of the sculpted columns of the gallery.

It seemed to Mehreen that she, too, was on the cusp of something, torn between smiling as if she'd been one of them and the urge to shake her head like a sour, middle-aged matron.

The ribbons of the Hlāfmæsse still adorned some of the tree boughs, and already the Autumn Festival, or Mereth-en-Iavas as the elves called it, was on everyone's lips. Even Mehreen had overheard the name often enough in the last week to memorize it, which was a feat in itself. Now that she was able to raise her head over the surface of her chores, so to speak, she was finding out that such celebrations were an occasion for the menfolk of Bar-Lasbelin to declare themselves to the woman they happened to fancy which, in turn, explained the peak in feminine enthusiasm.

This time, Mehreen did shake her head as she walked down the corridor with her empty basket at her hip; not only because such a blunt, unrefined approach appeared imprudent at best – what would the besotted couple do, if the girl's father disapproved of the match, finding fault with the man's origin or fortune? – but also to banish the sudden and senseless hope of having Elladan do just that. No sane mind would've refused him…not that Mehreen contemplated doing anything of the sort, or that he'd ever approach her with such intentions. Better to nip that illusion in the bud as soon as it'd blossomed, like a dandelion too dangerous to be left untended lest it contaminated every single sensible thought that Lalla Nafiyah had so carefully pruned into existence.

"Do you think there'll be apple pie?" one of the older women mused as she tightened the knots of her apron. "Last year Godwyn made such a succulent one, but it was gone before I'd even got myself a third helping."

"I hope so," the woman's friend concurred, a wistful look in her heavy-lidded eyes. "Though I wish she didn't overdo the cinnamon, this time. I hate cinnamon."

Wondering what kind of implacable grump could possibly harbor such an impossible dislike, Mehreen wound through the crowd unnoticed while remembering the autumns in Jufayrah, and the Shukrun celebration that took place on the ninth day of the ninth month of each year – only slightly earlier than Mereth-en-Iavas. The men and women of the city would ascend to the rooves of their homes; those who lived too far from the sky built platforms in the desert so as to see the stars for the nine nights that would follow. She and Hanaa would share one of the thick carpets that'd be strewn over the palace roof and a woolen coverlet, huddling together as they fell asleep to the sound of Lalla Ishtar's stories and the scent of Ghizlan's honey-roasted lamb, searching the firmament for falling stars. In the morning, one of the women would wake them, and they'd drone out their prayers, yawning and still half-asleep, under the rising sun, before shaking a bundle made of willow, palm, and myrtle to the four winds of the desert as a means to thank the One for having united the once wandering people into a strong and glorious nation.

"Mehreen, wait!"

…Was it her name being called?

Mehreen broke her stride and raised her nose from her feet, which had been purposefully avoiding the gaps between the tiles as a silly little game she and Hanaa used for play in the palace hallways, only to see the women, both young and old, regarding her in the same curious manner she'd watched the girls moments before. Mehreen blushed, heart skipping a beat at the thought of having somehow landed herself into trouble; yet instead of Redhriel it was another red-haired woman who caught up with her, her cheeks crimson with the effort.

"Wait!" she waved a frantic hand, before realizing Mehreen had, in fact, frozen in the middle of the corridor like a gazelle before a hunter. "Oh, thank goodness you've heard me," she then panted, bending to rest her hands on her knees. "Here I was, thinking I'd have to follow you running up until the Great Hall, and Béma knows I hate running. But I'd still run, mind you –" the woman raised a finger to emphasize her resolve – "and this is saying something about how much I need to speak with you."

"Uhm. Well, here I am," Mehreen muttered, relieved to see the onlookers return to their gossip.

The woman nodded, struggling to regain her breath. "My name's Beylith," she declared with a puff that blew auburn wisps out of her face, "but you must've guessed as much from the roster."

A daunting name, if there ever was one. Mehreen repressed a shudder, remembering Lalla Nafiyah's stories about the demon and his horse of bone, though it would've been both unfair and impolite to hold Beylith's ghoulish namesake against her.

"The roster?" she repeated with a frown, feeling like the corridor tiles had somehow turned into a far more treacherous, uncertain ground. As soon as she'd said that, however, a sudden revelation washed over her, relief following in its wake: Beylith must've mistaken her for someone else, and all Mehreen now had to do was to point out the mistake as gently as she could, so that they'd both be on their merry way to their respective chores.

Until Beylith nodded, that was. "Aye. You're to help me out with the herb garden. Lord Elladan's instructions," she added helpfully, wiping the sweat off her brow with the back of a hand.

"Oh."

"Come. I'll show you where it says that."

No doubt mistaking Mehreen's confusion for reluctance, Beylith linked her arm with Mehreen's and fell into step with her, seemingly oblivious of her bewilderment. "Have you some experience in herbology?" As Mehreen shook her head, dragging her basket while being steered off to the One-knew-where and trying not to stumble over her skirts, Beylith continued without as much as pausing for a breath: "Never mind. It's a simple enough task, if you've the right mind for it."

Which was precisely what Mehreen lacked, but before she'd found the time – or the courage – to point out as much, they came to a halt in front of Redhriel's study. Once again, Mehreen's stomach lurched with the thought that despite the plainness of her tasks, she'd unknowingly messed something up; but instead of knocking on the door, Beylith stopped in front of a wooden board that hung upon the adjacent wall, equipped with many hooks from which were suspended long, rectangular tablets covered in a layer of yellow beeswax. Each tablet bore a name upon its frame and, as Mehreen scanned the clear, bold penmanship, she found hers amongst them.

"See?" Beylith nudged her, having relinquished her arm to unhook her own tablet from the board, "it's right there, in Lord Elladan's handwriting."

If, at first, Mehreen had been apprehensive about this new development, seeing her name had woken her curiosity. Now, she was running her trembling fingers along the deeply etched grooves, almost expecting to feel the touch of Elladan's elegant hands captured in the wax. She imagined his dark brows furrowed with concentration as he willed the words into existence, in the very same manner as when he tried to ease the pegs of an old, creaky baluster out of their mortises, swearing in elvish under his breath, and the now-familiar worry lines she sometimes yearned to smooth out, all the while envying the woman who had the right to do so.

Someone like Beylith, perhaps? Once her skin had cooled to its porcelain tone, it only enhanced the delicate structure of her face, her hazel eyes and full, naturally red lips. Many a man would've gone mad with desire only from looking at her…if men had truly been so inclined, that is. Ever since Mehreen had come to Ithilien, her fears of being ravaged by the first man come had dwindled into a vague embarrassment on Lalla Nafiyah's behalf, and the certainty that if they'd both been lied to about this, then what else didn't she know?

If Beylith had noticed her trouble, she showed nothing of it. She'd slipped her tablet back into place, crossing her arms over the front of her apron – which, as Mehreen had noted, was a grubby brown instead of the pristine white of the other healers.

She tapped her foot. "Well?"

"Well, what?" Mehreen stammered, clutching the precious token to her breast.

"Will you help me?" Beylith looked at her expectantly. "Lord Elladan said you enjoyed gardening, and Béma knows I don't."

She shrugged, as though to indicate she didn't care either way, but there was something fragile about the way her voice had faltered, in the end, and the defiant, if slightly wobbling, tilt of her chin. She couldn't be much older than Mehreen; five years, give or take one, and only the hard lines that'd formed around her mouth gave her an older, weary look.

Many an objection sprang to Mehreen's mind, the first one being that of all the people of Bar-Lasbelin, Beylith had picked the worst possible person to rely on. But the tablet was warm in her hands, imbued with Elladan's confidence in her, and Mehreen dared not shake its weight no matter how heavily it'd settled upon her shoulders.

Beyond the obedience she owed him, as a man and the lord of this place, if Elladan believed her to be up to whatever task Beylith expected her to accomplish, then she must at least try.

oOoOoOo

Mehreen had been wrong.

Beylith was twenty-two years old, as she'd readily shared with her on their way out of the Houses, along the thigh-high grasses that grew by the trail, their burs clinging to their skirts. She was the sole daughter of a mother who'd left Rohan before the war to join her family in the distant North. As for Beylith, she'd shown up in Bar-Lasbelin uninvited – a fact she seemed to take considerable pride in – with the firm intention of putting to use what herbology skills she'd learnt from her witch grandmother, and had never looked back since.

Mehreen had startled, stealing a fearful glance of the woman marching ahead, trying to discern some sign of darkness beneath the delicate rosiness of her cheeks. Corruption often lurked under a mask of beauty, Lalla Laila used to say while slanting Mehreen a knowing look, her lips pursed in disapproval, so that as a little girl, Mehreen would squash her nose against a mirror, peering anxiously into her own eyes until her mother pried her off and wiped away her tears.

"Surely," she muttered after a moment's thought – deeming Beylith if not harmless, then worthy enough of trust if Elladan had kept her under his roof – "your father would like to know you safe?"

She hadn't dared even graze the surface of how improper such a behavior would've seemed in Harad, and the gossip that would've spread regarding the looseness of Beylith's morals. Middle-aged matrons would cluck their tongues in the dimness of their salons while licking their fingers clean of almond crumbs and syrup as they leaned towards one another to add some sordid detail to the tale. And no man would ever want to wed her, that much was certain, without a means of knowing she was still…well, pure.

Unless, of course, the reason Beylith didn't care about her reputation was that her plea for help had been less of a formal request, and more of a promise earned amidst the tousled sheets of Elladan's bed. A common practice in the harem, where secrets, favors and even servants were thus traded; yet, Mehreen's chest tightened at the thought he'd willfully let himself be swayed by a similar ruse.

She wound her arms around her, shivering despite the stifling heat.

"My father can rot," Beylith snarled, her hands balled into fists by her side, and thrown a look of such loathing to the earth they trod upon that Mehreen was seized by a terrible doubt about what'd happened to him, "like the traitor that he is, wherever he may be. And if you've something to say on the matter, better say it now and be done with it."

There was something devilish about her, after all. Blotches of red had erupted upon her fair skin, from her neck up to her forehead, ugly and striking in their brightness. The gravel screeched as Beylith dug her heels into the ground and whirled to face Mehreen, who had little choice but to stumble to a halt as well, caught unawares by such unexpected fury and not a little worried about being trapped with a would-be witch in the middle of the woods. She opened her mouth to defend the man's honor, as the obedient daughter and woman she'd been raised to be…

…Before the sting of envy caught up with her. "My father sent me here in exchange for his life," she snapped, "and my mother was banished when I was six, so if you'd feared I'd judge your sad story –" her jaw ached with the effort to control her voice – "then worry no longer."

"Oh."

Beylith appeared to deflate, her shoulders slumping in what Mehreen guessed to be shame, while Mehreen still reeled from her outburst. Whatever had possessed her to say something so cruel? She would've covered her mouth and fled, had her legs not quivered in the wake of her anger.

"I'm sorry," they blurted out at once – Beylith in a small, pleading voice and Mehreen in a hoarse whisper, both shaking and heaving for breath as the forest around them hushed, the birds hiding in their nests – from the heat as much as from the furious voices below.

It'd been days, and still the sullen skies refused to relent, like a lid shut over a simmering cauldron, cooking them all in their sweat. Even in the midst of summer, Jufayrah hadn't been as merciless, its dry heat less unbearable than the damp hotness of Gondor, which reminded Mehreen of a hammam. The pungency of old leaf mulch rose from the undergrowth, together with the warm scent of pine needles. As a distant rumble rolled in from the East, both Beylith and Mehreen raised their faces to the sky, praying each in their own mother tongue for a droplet of rain.

None came. Not yet.

"I shouldn't have…." Mehreen started, hot and cold at once, and hollow where her inexplicable spite had nested moments ago, but Beylith shook her head, her russet locks almost black in the bleak, declining daylight.

"Serves me right for treating you so poorly," she declared with a small, admirative smile. "I didn't think you'd have the guts to beat me at my own game." Beylith tilted her head, studying Mehreen for an instant, before she proffered a round, calloused hand from the depths of her pocket. "Let me try again. I'm Beylith. My father's a bastard, this much you've gathered, and I've done everything I could to repair the harm he's caused…though it's no reason to behave like an ungrateful brat, nor is it a fitting way of thanking Lord Elladan for his counsel. He was the one who's recommended I petition Redhriel for your time, and now I fear I've wasted my chance. Would you still be willing to help me out?" Her full lips trembled ever so slightly. "Please?"

If her endearing, childish pout hadn't sufficed to soften Mehreen's resolve, the news that it'd been Elladan who'd spoken of her to Beylith, rather than the opposite, did the trick. Her pulse fluttered in her throat. He'd remembered! He'd remembered how much she wished to make herself useful, accepted, and how she enjoyed tending to plants more than she'd ever cared for anything else.

Mehreen wanted to sing, and dance, however artlessly, all the way to the herb garden Beylith had spoken about.

"I'm Mehreen," she murmured, grasping her clammy hand with the relief of a drowning man clutching a spar, "and yes, I'll help you…as long as we're in agreement to leave our fathers out of it."

oOoOoOo

Mehreen had seen the herb garden before, though she hadn't realized its nature.

What she'd taken for a clump of earth, barely raised from the ground and supported by a couple of rickety planks overgrown with what'd looked like weeds, was in fact twin rows of square, half-buried casings struggling to hold herbs of various shapes and sizes. It stood close enough to the stream for Mehreen to make out its distant murmur; a watering can stood by the corner of the pit closest to the brook, empty for the time being, its once-shining belly burnished with streaks of viridian blue.

"Here it is," Beylith announced with a brief wrinkle of her nose and a sweep of her arm, "I'll leave you to it. Béma knows I'm good with herbs once they're gathered, but one look from me's usually enough to make them wither and die."

Smiling at the contrition in her voice, Mehreen took a cautious step into the tall grasses, raising a cloud of insects that would've settled into her hair, had she not flailed her hands to chase them away…only to see their leaves and culms so intimately entwined with the boisterous growth that tumbled from the wooden boxes, that it would take a sharper even blade to cut them apart. The very nature of the herbs was intriguing…as much as it was daunting. Mint she recognized, its sweet freshness a relief it itself, the long, slender stems finished by clusters of tiny, purple blooms. But the rest….

Mehreen's smile withered, much as the unfortunate plants Beylith had mentioned. "I don't know any of these," she muttered, turning to see the red-haired woman already halfway down the crooked trail leading back to the Houses.

Saineth, at least, had allowed her to write down what it was she needed to do, but in Beylith's hurry to bring her here, Mehreen hadn't thought – or had the time – to grab anything to scribble on.

"Oh?" Beylith turned around, her pretty lips forming a disenchanted moue. "But Lord Elladan said you had a skill for gardening!"

An ill knot was expanding in Mehreen's belly, forcing its way up her chest.

He must've meant well, but Elladan didn't yet know how untalented she truly was, unable of ever learning anything beyond the most basic of tasks. And how could he?

Amongst the range of sins available to Man, there was nothing more hateful to the One than deceit, Lalla Nafiyah had often told her. The truth was painful; the lies, comfortable. Profitable. Seducing in their convenience. They didn't teach nor cure anything, nor did they develop one's character, mind or soul. Yet, Mehreen hadn't summoned the willpower to reveal to him the extent of her feebleness, postponing day after day the moment when Elladan would open his eyes to grasp her true, wanton nature.

She'd tried to tell him. She really had, but he'd looked at her with such intensity that her treacherous tongue had refused to obey, her mouth dry with longing.

"It's easy," Beylith ended up sighing, remembering perhaps how the sharpness of her tongue had almost cost her. "That's mint, and there's valerian…." She stomped over to the nearest casing and bent to better inspect the jumble. "Oh, and fennel," she jabbed her chin towards a tiny bush of yellow umbels. Just keep those two apart," she advised with a huff, blowing an adventurous bee away, "mind the spreading of yarrow, and you'll be fine."

"Wait!" Mehreen called after her as she made to flounce away once more, voice quaking as an old fear gripped her from inside, turning her guts to mush. "I…I won't remember any of it!"

Already, the names danced a jaunty little jig inside her mind. Which one was yarrow, and which one was valerian? Mehreen whirled around in panic, a cold sweat trickling down her back despite the swelter. Were her ears deceiving her, or had a low cackle pealed from the shrubbery, so remindful of Lalla Laila's contempt?

"What do you mean? Of course, you will!" Beylith laughed, incredulous. "Lord Elladan said you're clever! That you're versed in Haradric, and that you've even been translating books of medicine for him. If anyone can bring this mess under order, it's you!"

The admiration in her voice was like a slap to Mehreen's face – not because it was feigned, but because of its utter sincerity. The girl really thought highly of her, and Mehreen fought the urge to scream it'd taken her years to master the basics of Westron – much longer than Hanaa, or any other girl in the harem, for that matter – to the point where Lalla Ishtar had started to despair. To throw in Beylith's face the whispered insinuations regarding her addled brain – spread by none other than Lalla Laila, who shouldn't have gone to such lengths, so plain was Hanaa's superiority.

"No! I won't!" Mehreen croaked, retreating, until the edge of a box dug into the back of her knees. It was a small mercy that the tears that prickled her eyes dried as soon as they made it into the light, lest Beylith saw her bawling with shame. "You don't understand. I can't do this! I can't!"

Her blood pounded in her ears, so that Beylith's reply was lost on her. Turning on her heels, Mehreen fled; not towards the Houses, but into the woods, deeper and deeper still, until the familiar path left place to a narrow, winding trail. Brambles raked the backs of her hands clutching her skirts, leaving searing lines in their wake, but even that didn't stop her.

She'd been unmasked. Not that she'd ever thought to get away with her little secret, which was all too easy to guess, so it should've come as a relief to finally be seen for what she was: a fraud. A pretty fool, decorative rather than useful. Good for changing linens, and even so, only barely. So why did her chest ache so, beyond the shallow gasps of breath she swallowed in her flight?

And, if it truly was inevitable, why did the prospect of Elladan's silence, deafening in its disappointment, haunt her thoughts so relentlessly?

A.N.: a few pieces of info regarding this chapter:

- The celebration name 'Mereth-en-Iavas' means 'festival of autumn' in Sindarin.

- The 'Shukrun' celebration the Haradric equivalent of 'Thanksgiving'. The description of the celebration partially stems from the Qurban Bayram (also known as Eid al-Adha), which was a celebration during the Ottoman Empire.