Lothíriel slumped down into the soft armchair by the hearth and started brushing out her damp hair. Even though darkness was still at least an hour away, she wasn't planning on leaving her chambers anymore, and so she had taken a long thorough bath much earlier in the day than what she was normally accustomed to. She had been in desperate need to clean off the nervous sweat that had covered her palms, armpits and thighs over the course of the day, and she was in equal need to clear her mind after the turbulent funeral of King Théoden. The warm lavender scented bath that had been prepared for her fulfilled both of those demands, and Lothíriel found herself unusually calm and relaxed, enjoying the solitude of her quiet room. She was finally able to let go of all the confusing thoughts that were disturbing her peace of mind, even if only for a brief moment, and so she simply sat in her armchair, observing the flickering embers in the fireplace absent-mindedly, her hand running the brush through her hair over and over in repeat motion. It was so hot she didn't bother to add any more tinder to the dying fire; instead, she had lit a few candles on the mantle to create an even cozier atmosphere.

A soft knock on her door interrupted her distracted mind. Lothíriel groaned and slowly stood up. It must be Amrothos. She had expected her brother to show up at some point to console her after that disaster of a wake, but she was in no mood to talk to anyone. She dragged her feet to the door and quickly opened it.

"Amrothos, I'm not-"

Her words got stuck in her throat at the sight of her unexpected visitor. Amrothos was nowhere to be seen; instead, King Éomer stood out in the hallway between the two guards that had become a staple outside her chambers.

"Your grace," she gave him a small uncertain curtsy.

"Princess Lothíriel," he greeted her quietly. "May I speak with you for a moment?"

"I, uh… I am already dressed for bed." Her quiet comfort may have been disturbed for good, but she sure as hell wasn't going to get dressed again and deal with her messy wet hair.

He seemed unbothered by any of that and said matter-of-factly: "We can talk inside. I will only take a few moments of your time, I promise."

She regarded him for a short moment before she reluctantly acquiesced, stepping aside to let him enter. The guards outside were staring at the ground, pretending not to see anything. Her past self may have been bothered by what they may think of her, but after everything that had happened to her in the past few days, she had no capacity to give any more shits. And so, she slowly closed the door shut behind them and turned to address the King first:

"You should not be here."

"I didn't know where else I could talk to you in private."

He let his eyes wander farther down from her face as he spoke, and suddenly Lothíriel became aware of the thin silk nightdress she was wearing. The low-cut sleeveless gown left little to the imagination; she felt as though she may as well have been standing there butt naked. She fought the urge to wrap her arms around herself in an attempt to look more decent, but she came to the conclusion that there was really no point to it; after all, he has seen it all, and more.

Still, it was unbecoming for an unmarried princess to allow any man that was not her closest family inside her chambers unchaperoned, much less a man that was betrothed to marry someone else. If the guards outside her door couldn't keep their mouths shut about what they had witnessed, it could become a scandal the magnitude of which Lothíriel couldn't even bring herself to imagine.

"You know we should not be talking in private. Not anymore," she felt the need to remind him. "Every rule of propriety I have ever learned would dictate that I kick you out of my chambers immediately, your grace."

"Then why don't you?"

Lothíriel decided to leave his question unanswered and deflected it with one of her own. "Why did you come here, your grace?"

The King shifted uncomfortably and sighed. "I came here to apologize. For everything."

"Apologize?" Lothíriel was caught off-guard by his words. She was not expecting an apology; in fact, she hadn't really expected him to talk to her at all and thought it would be best if he just let the situation fizzle out by itself once she returned back to Dol Amroth for good in a few days' time, possibly never to return to Rohan again.

No, you're thinking too much like a Gondorian. Ignoring things and letting them fade away on their own was not in the Rohirric nature, she had understood that by now. She only wished he had kept it to the bare minimum and just said his formal goodbyes in the stables moments before they left, or something along those lines. She still remembered the pitiful way he looked at her while the bard was singing her sad ballad, as if he thought the song had been about Lothíriel of Dol Amroth, an ugly lying mountain troll in her own right. Lothíriel despised the fact that he sat there, contently holding his future queen's hand, all the while feeling sorry for her.

"I should have given you a chance to explain," he said. "I let myself be consumed by my anger."

"You had every right to be angry, your grace," Lothíriel admitted, unable to return his gaze. She had been scrambling to collect the scattered pieces of her self-confidence ever since her talk with Amrothos that morning, before the funeral; she had felt like she was loosing her footing for a while now, the conviction that she had always been in the right slowly eroded by every reproach that told her she had been selfish and indifferent to her duties. Amrothos' words were the last blow that shattered her belief in herself like a fragile glass flung against the wall. Her thoughts had been playing a tug-of-war in her mind all day, oscillating between a Lothíriel that stood by her actions, and another one that doubted herself more and more. "I should be the one to apologize, not you."

"Remember back when we were traveling to the Mark together, when you had to stitch the wound on my forehead?" he asked out of the blue, a soft grin playing on his lips at the distant memory.

Lothíriel nodded uncertainly.

"And how you thanked me after I had apologized to you?"

"I do remember, unfortunately," Lothíriel admitted quietly, rolling her eyes slightly when she recalled just how embarrassed she had felt about it.

"I would have expected an apology from you then," he said with a soft smile. "I do not expect it now."

"Don't you think it's more warranted now?"

"No," he shook his head. His grin had faded away and was replaced by a soft melancholy look that made Lothíriel's heart ache with the desire to jump in his arms and wrap her arms tightly around his neck. "Has your father always treated you like that?"

"Not quite like today," Lothíriel had to admit after a moment of rumination. She had let her pent-up frustration take hold of her at the wake, and allowed it to steer her words, deliberately poking the proverbial bear that was the Prince of Dol Amroth until he could no longer contain his anger, defeating even his strong instinct to always keep up appearances in the eyes of the public. Words could not express how sick she had grown of the never-ending farce; her father's controlling behavior, the eyes of everyone at the table pinned on her as if she was a lion trapped in a cage at the town fair, and Lady Erthil's slender fingers wound around the King's hand; it had all just been too much for her.

"My father has always been very stern. Very…" she paused to find the right words; "...unforgiving of a daughter that wanted to live life outside of what he had envisioned for our family."

"I don't want him to treat you like that. Ever again," the King said with a strange seriousness in his eyes.

Lothíriel furrowed her eyebrows at the intense remark. "I appreciate the sentiment, I really do, but I'm afraid that is outside of your control now, your grace."

"I hate it when you call me 'your grace'," he interjected with an ever-so-slightly annoyed crease on his forehead.

"Would you prefer 'your Majesty' instead?" Lothíriel couldn't resist the easy jape. A wave of nostalgia rushed over her when she remembered the sarcastic way she used to mock him whenever he had infuriated her.

He seemed to be thinking of the same thing; a soft smile appeared on his lips as he shook his head and said: "No. I prefer Éomer."

Why are you torturing me like this? Lothíriel couldn't help but wonder as she watched that irresistible smile on his face. She wished more than anything to say his name out loud again, but it felt inappropriate somehow, even within the confines of her own room. "That is an honor reserved only for your future queen, I'm afraid."

"It is. And she can have it, if only she so wishes," the King took a few steps towards her, and for a split second, she was sure he was going to kiss her. Instead, he stopped a few inches away from her and grabbed her hand, so softly their fingers were barely touching.

Lothíriel felt her heartbeat resonate all the way in her throat, as if her excited heart refused to be contained to the limits of her chest. He can't mean what I think he means, she tried to mentally convince herself. The familiar tenderness in his features as he was looking at her, one which she was sure she would never get to see again, made her feel warm and weak.

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're implying, your grace," she slipped her fingers out of his grasp and took a step back. That wasn't exactly true, but she had suddenly become very aware of the impropriety of it all; he was still betrothed to another, so what were his words really worth at that point? Lothíriel had found a strange comfort in retreating inside the shell of practiced formality she had been so familiar with most of her life.

"I thought we were past this nonsense already," he rolled his eyes at her empty deflection. "Didn't you say you were embracing your more honest side?"

"I did, yet my attempts weren't received very favorably, as I am sure you have noticed," she said with a sour smile. "Besides, I have been plenty honest with you, believe it or not. And yet you have given me nothing in return. You expect me to bare my heart again, and for what purpose?"

He regarded her in silence for a while, his deep dark eyes never straying from hers.

"You're right," he nodded at last. "Then I will say it plainly. I want you to be my queen, Lothíriel. But I need to know it is something you want, too."

There was no misinterpreting his words now. The look in his eyes mirrored their genuineness exactly; she was sure beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was being serious. Still, she wasn't ready to tear down the walls she had built around herself, or at least the few bricks that remained at that point. Lothíriel had felt far too exposed already, far too vulnerable when faced with the men around her, to succumb to his sweet words so easily.

"You should not be saying that," she said with a voice that surprised even herself with its sternness. She took a few more steps away from him to create a distance she suddenly felt she needed, and stopped by the hearth whose embers had died down to almost nothing by then. "It doesn't matter what I want. What of your betrothal? You can't just throw it out of the window as if it never existed."

"And why not? I should have done it a long time ago," he protested, following her steps across the room like a shadow.

"Because your actions have consequences, remember? You told me that."

"And you're worried about consequences all of a sudden?" he crossed his arms on his chest and regarded her with skepticism.

"Until recently, I was not aware how much the people of Dol Amroth have suffered because of my actions," she said quietly, her confidence trembling and threatening to crumble into bits yet again. The admission left a sour aftertaste in her mouth. "I thought I was deciding only my own fate when I walked away, but it turns out I was wrong."

"No, you had it right, Lothíriel," he objected, instinctively grabbing her by the arms, as if he wanted to accentuate the weight of his words. Lothíriel tried to focus on what he was saying, but his calloused palms felt so warm on her bare skin she thought she might swoon. "I have only seen a shadow of what you must have lived in Dol Amroth. I see now that to stay would have been too great of a sacrifice for a young woman like you."

"And yet, many make such a sacrifice willingly, without running away," she shrugged dejectedly.

"If you hadn't run away, we might never have met. Maybe it is the way fate had intended all along."

"Fate?" she was unable to suffocate a cynical snort that had escaped her mouth. She would never have taken him for a spiritual person. "I have disgraced my family, betrayed my people, and lied to everyone that had put their trust in me. What could fate possibly have intended to justify all that?"

The King eyed her in disbelief for a moment. "Béma, Lothíriel!" he raised his voice in frustration. "What happened to the woman who had stood up for herself even when faced with a foolishly furious King of the Riddermark she had only just met? You've spent less than three days in the presence of your father, and already you sound just like him."

The King's reproach took Lothíriel by surprise. She had been wallowing in self-doubt ever since she was confronted with Imrahil; his criticisms had been eating away at her determination to oppose him until she was left with almost nothing. She didn't even realize she was repeating her father's words like a trained parrot until the King had pointed it out to her.

"How do you know you haven't saved more lives in the Houses of Healing than you've supposedly ruined by running away? That you haven't helped many more people by sharing your knowledge with our healers?" the King continued, his voice steadfast and unwavering. "Those are all things of great value, Lothíriel. You shouldn't let your father undermine your self-worth like that."

Lothíriel stared at the King wide-eyed; his words had suddenly woken her up from the strange trance she had fallen into as soon as she had become the Princess of Dol Amroth again, somehow regressing back to her inexperienced sixteen-year-old self. Nothing he said was really that shocking, and deep down, she used to believe all those things about herself. The fact that he saw her exactly as she craved to be seen, that he was able to look beyond the pretense and betrayal and still wanted and appreciated her, turned the remnants of the crumbling wall around her heart into dust.

The King didn't wait for her reaction and put his hand in the pocket of his tunic, pulling out a rolled-up piece of parchment.

"What is that?" Lothíriel asked warily.

"This is my betrothal contract," he said as he handed it to her. "Take it."

Lothíriel eyed him uncertainly, unsure what his intentions were. She obliged him reluctantly and looked down on the parchment in her hand, grazing her thumb over the imprint of the galloping stallion of Rohan that was sealed in its center in red wax.

"You may do with it as you please, Lothíriel," he almost whispered, his voice uncommonly shaky. "I want the choice to be yours."

As he stood there expectantly, so close she could touch him if she wanted, Lothíriel was overcome by an urgent yearning to feel his nearness, now amplified by the knowledge that it wasn't just wishful thinking; that it would no longer be a fleeting moment of passion that was ultimately not meant to be. She could be his, and he could be hers, not for now, but forever. The skeptical side of her nature made her doubt whether this wasn't too good to be true; marrying a King she had fallen in love with and staying far away from the home she had despised seemed like the stuff of fairy tales, not real life. But the sincerity reflected in the depth of the King's - of Éomer's - gaze was unmistakable.

For a long while, the soft murmur of the rain drops against her window was the only sound filling the deafening silence between them.

"I can give you the life you've always wanted, Lothíriel," Éomer broke the quiet of the room. "If you choose me… if you choose the Riddermark, I swear you will never be put in a gilded cage again. Our way of life befits you so much better than the stuck-up south. I know you can be happy here," he was almost pleading with her, his eyebrows contracted in worry and anxiousness.

He thinks I may reject him, Lothíriel realized with an ache in her heart when she saw his nervous demeanor. He must have misinterpreted her prolonged silence as a sign that she wasn't so readily going to say yes. In reality, her mind had been made up a long time ago. She lifted the hand that was holding the parchment towards the candles that were flickering merrily on the fireplace mantel next to her. They both watched as the flames jumped from the candle wick to the paper effortlessly and started biting away piece by piece with incredible velocity. Lothíriel threw the remnants of the document onto the dying embers in the hearth before the flames could burn her fingers; soon, it had turned to nothing more than a few fragments of black dust that had settled over the ashes.

Lothíriel turned her eyes to Éomer, whose features were beaming relief as clearly as if it had been written on his face with a brush. She only had time to give him the faintest of smiles before he pulled her to him and placed a soft lingering kiss on her lips. Lothíriel could barely contain herself; the familiar touch rekindled a spark of memories of the last time he had held her this close. She returned his kisses with utter desperation, clutching onto him as if she was still afraid that if she let him go, he would disappear like a phantom from her dreams and she would return back to a grimmer reality.

No, this is real, Lothíriel, she had to remind herself again and again as she savored the sweet taste of his tongue intertwining with hers, his labored breath warming up her face. She hated the thin layer of her nightgown that barred his hands from caressing her naked skin, and when he pressed her tightly between himself and the wall, she was willing to rip it off of her body and surrender to his whims without a second thought. Éomer seemed equally inclined, and she felt his hand slide down the side of her thigh and begin to pull the silky material higher and higher. Lothíriel let out a soft moan when he buried his fingers into the soft bare flesh of her butt.

The sound seemed to have snapped Éomer from his trance; he stopped moving and finally parted his lips from hers. He didn't step back to give her more space, though; instead, he put his forehead against the wooden wall behind her and slowly slid his palm away from her bottom, letting her nightgown fall back down over her legs.

She could feel his warm breath on her ear as he groaned and whispered: "I wish I could stay with you, Lothíriel."

At long last, he took a step back and looked her up and down with eyes flaming with desire, as if he was evaluating whether he really had to go, but in the end, his honor had prevailed; after all, burning his betrothal contract was only a symbolic gesture, Lothíriel knew.

"I think it's time for you to kick me out of your chambers, for propriety's sake," he smirked at her. "The guards outside your door must be getting nervous."

Lothíriel chuckled, the corners of her mouth curving into an involuntary smile; a genuine happy smile, which had become so unfamiliar to her in recent months. "It will be quite something when the rumor spreads that you have broken your betrothal after you had visited the Princess of Dol Amroth's chambers at night."

"Let them all know. I don't care," he placed one final soft kiss on her lips. "I will deal with this first thing tomorrow. I promise."

He made for the door and had already put his hand on the door handle when Lothíriel called out after him: "Goodnight, Éomer."

The warm smile he had given her in return made her think that maybe he was right; maybe this was really fate, and she had ended up exactly where she was supposed to be all along.