By the time Éomer called the next morning the household had been up for many hours. I had been scrubbed, filed and perfumed down to what felt like my bones. One of my best dresses (though not too formal, although Alwil insisted for a certain aloofness needed to be observed) had been aired and a new green ribbon sown into the collar to match the one that Alwil arranged in my hair herself. It was the pure green of the house of Erol for apparently we were allowed certain obvious indulgences. She had brushed my hair for an hour or more, until the sheen was as high as it could have been, before she gathered back only two small selections at the temples that she intertwined with the ribbon, leaving the bulk of my hair free. It was strange to feel my hair free and I blushed to look at myself in the mirror.

Widwine and Alwil too had dressed with exquisite care and then we'd gone to sit in the parlor to wait. When Éomer did finally knock they ordered me to go upstairs so the farce of calling me back down could be performed.

"This is ridiculous!" I laughed, as Alwil nearly dragged me up the stairs. "He'll know we've been expecting him, if only from the way I'm dressed if nothing else."

"Trust you to miss the point completely! Now just go! And thank me later!" she said with a final shove.

When Éomer's mouth fell open just ever so slightly as I entered with my new hairstyle I knew exactly what it was she had meant. And what I would be more than happy to give her thanks for. To his credit he managed to master himself an instant later and crossed to kiss my hand. "Westu hal, Lothiriel."

Tea was brought in along with a rather impressive abundance of baked goods, jam, eggs, toast, butter, ham, rashers of bacon, and preserved fruits. Wídwine must have talked to someone before dawn to have arranged such an impressive spread. Mead was also brought despite the early hour. Though we could not be officially engaged until my father gave permission Wídwine seemed to be determined to celebrate the occasion, even if she couldn't yet say so.

Wídwine poured out tea for all of us and then immediately stood up. "Dorn has a cough this morning," she announced firmly. "Alwil, you should take him out into the garden for some fresh air. I will accompany you. Lothíriel, you will stay to entertain our guest."

Dorn, sleeping peacefully by the fire and breathing as softly as he ever did, seemed surprised to be bundled into a little bassinet and taken outside. Particularly as Alwil covered the whole thing with a blanket in the end to ensure that, in fact, no cold air reached him at all while they were out in the garden.

Once the parlor door closed behind them it was impossible to say who moved first but in an instant we were together. My hands tangled in his hair as his arms went around my waist, pulling me against the length of him and plundering my mouth. I gave as good as I got, gripping him as tightly as if we had been parted for years rather than hours. Would I ever grow used to the reality of being held by him? I had imagined it enough that I would have expected not to be so overwhelmed. But the strong arm around my waist, the broad, firm muscles of the chest beneath my hand, the warmth of his lips and the gentle scratch of his beard against my cheek... no mere fantasy could compare to that.

"I thought I might have dreamed it when I woke this morning," I told him when I could breathe again. "I thought I had imagined the whole thing."

"Valar I could tan your hide for leaving that stupid letter in that cursed book. Though not, I should say, if you were wearing your hair like this. You look like a maiden of the Mark, and Bema but it suits you." He brushed a lock of hair back behind my ear. "Like an elven queen out of the daydreams of my youth."

I reached for him again but he kissed me only briefly, pulling back. "We aren't engaged yet, and Widwine can only leave us for a certain amount of time without risking a scandal, whatever her personal feelings may be. They'll be back in a moment and I need to speak to you."

He took a step back deliberately, holding me by the hand but not the waist. I had a sudden lurch of panic. "What is it, Éomer?"

"I'm riding out today. I've asked a few men to accompany me, including Fraca. I'm going to ride to Dol Amroth to ask your father in person for your hand." He smiled. "I tried half a hundred times last night to write a letter explaining all that had transpired but in the end it was useless. I need to see Imrahil face-to-face to explain."

I had wondered where Fraca had been that morning but here was my answer. A long journey on such short notice would require preparation and I did not doubt that Fraca had volunteered to make the arrangements himself, leaving Éomer free to take tea with us. If we had been up for hours, I had no doubt that he had been busy for far longer.

Still, I gaped at him. "You're leaving?"

"Your father deserves an explanation from me, Lothíriel. I do not want him to think... to think that you were coerced into this in any way. I want to answer any questions he has without reservation."

"What would make my father think I was coerced?"

He smiled. "You are ten years younger than me and never traveled outside of Dol Amroth before a year ago. Why should you want to marry a rough warrior such as myself, only to inherit the headache of becoming Queen of the Mark, when political ambition was never your aim? No, your father will have questions, as he loves you. "

I opened my mouth to protest, and then closed it again. I could not imagine explaining to my father that Éomer was a man who moved my spirit and inspired my baser instincts. How to tell the Prince of Dol Amroth, my venerated and respected parent, that I would have had Éomer as my lover if he'd been the basest of our servants and at any cost? Or if I had been born a scullery maid that I would have done all I could to lie beneath him? I could not begin to think it.

"He would never suspect you of any disreputable conduct though," I reminded Éomer. They had after all been friends for a while, allies in desperate times before that. My father knew Éomer for the man he was, the kind who would offer for my hand even though he knew he had not debased me. "I hardly think he will accuse you. You need not ride so far to carry a message."

He shook his head. "I need to tell your father with my own voice, Lothíriel, that I will have you. And hear his blessing in his own words."

"Can I not come with you?" Much though I did not want to face my own father in this matter, I wanted less to be parted from him so soon.

"I intend to ride quite hard and with no proper chaperon for you. I hardly trust myself not to have you under the stars in such circumstances. Even if I were to prove noble enough, the gossips of the court would hardly dare dream you were a virgin after such a ride." He again brushed back a lock of hair behind my ear. "Once you are my wife I will take you wherever you wish. Once I am free to protect you with my last breath there is nothing that I will deny you. But you must be patient."

"And what of Ivriniel?"

"I will ask for your hand from her as well but I think a letter from you would be more compelling than any words I have to offer."

"And what if I do not wish to be parted from you?"

"I will trust you to endure it. As I will endure being parted from you."

"I..." My voice faltered. "I won't sleep well until you return. I know I won't. The thought that I might have so much of what I want seems like nothing more than a dream. I do not trust it... will not trust it, particularly not if you are gone from Edoras."

"I will come back to you with the right to marry you, my love, I swear it."

He took me into his arms again and this time his kisses were tender. I tilted my head back to receive them, like soft, warm rain on my lips.

Wídwine and Alwil returned a quarter hour later with a discreet knock, allowing several minutes to pass they opened the door, time I spent trying to arrange my hair back into some semblance of acceptability. Wídwine however was not to be deterred. She poured us all a generous helping of mead and proposed several toasts that were worded as very thinly veiled wishes for our health, happiness, and many sons. Éomer did not partake much, as he needed to ride afterward but he made as little pretence as Wídwine of the understanding that now existed between us.

It was Fraca, though, who refused most of all to dissemble. He arrived midway through what had turned from tea into a true meal and, as his mother had the night before, bowed to me as though I were already his Queen.

I blushed, waving him off in embarrassment but he would not be deterred. He knelt and took my hand. "The last time I rode to your home, Lady, I was not on such a happy mission. I swore to myself I would not go in vain on that day and I swear to you now, I will not go in vain on this."

I squeezed his fingers in my own in answer, not trusting my voice or emotion to return his speech in kind.

He rose and seated himself at the table. To Éomer he said, "All preparations are complete. We will ride when you are ready."

"Thank you, old friend."

When the tea had finished we went out into the street to see them off. Éomer could not kiss me in such a public place and in front of Wídwine but held my hand for several long minutes after he had kissed it, looking down at my face as if to memorize it.

It was not my habit to meet his gaze but when I looked away, growing shy, he raised my face back to him with his other hand. "Westu hal, Lothíriel." He said finally.

"Westu hal, Éomer."

"I'll be back in not more than a fortnight or I will send word."

We came back in to the house but I could barely sit down. I was alive with a burning energy and joy that would not allow me to sit idle. "Alwil, take Lothíriel for a ride, will you please? She's making me uncomfortable just looking at her fidget."

As ever, Wídwine knew that the best cure for impatience was activity.

The next fortnight was spent in preparation to leave Edoras. If my father were to agree to the engagement, which I had no reason to doubt he would, then I would be expected to return to Dol Amroth for the duration of the engagement. This would be particularly important for me, much though I hated to contemplate such a long separation from him. Whatever Éomer said it would be seen as rather a better match than would have been expected of me. I was certainly Éomer's social equal as Princess of one of the largest and most prosperous houses of Gondor but my peculiarities were well known. Despite the recent changes to my dress and comportment, that it was known I was no longer the hermit I had been, there would be whispers about what could have made him select such an odd wife.

Particularly since I had spent so much time in Edoras the idea that I was already with child would not be too much of a stretch of the imagination. I did not doubt that my father would insist we spend enough time apart that no whispers could be supported on that account.

So I arranged myself to be away from Edoras for a good amount of time. While packing my own trunks was the work of no more than a day, I spent the majority of the time ensuring that I would still have a way to get specimens from Rohan once I was gone.

I had been sending Ivriniel any number of specimens that she requested over the month I had been back in Rohan. She had clearly been putting my new recipes to use, as the quantities she requested could not always be found, as it was winter. With Alwil's blessing I helped Gallen to compose a letter to my aunt as a way of introducing herself and offering her services. At first she was reluctant to write to such a great lady herself, saying she preferred that Alwil be the correspondent. But after much encouragement and having me read the letter several times she consented to ask one of her cousins to take it for her for quite a reduced price from what I had supplied her to send it (the excess having been spent on quite the finest paper she could find).

"Will she not think it is impertinent for me to write to her first?" she asked nervously as we watched her cousin ride away. "My hand is not very good still, the letters are not as elegant as they should be."

"I'm not sure it will occur to my Aunt to ask too many questions about your birth or where you learned to read and write Westron. Usefulness is a thing she values more than any other characteristic a person can have. If you continue to send her what she asks for with good speed then before the next summer arrives she will be fonder of you than any of my brothers or cousins."

"Oh, I shall, my lady! I shall be very prompt!"

I left her with enough money that she could rent a small shop not too far from Alwil. As I was to be married I decided that my dowry was my own to spend and that the people of Rohan would be better served by the development of another healer in their capital than a queen with a few more fine dresses. I wrote the promise of payment under my own name, in anticipation my father would not object.

The shop itself was neat and tidy, all that could be asked for. There was a little bedroom above it to sleep in and a small garden behind it which she could plant in the spring with difficult to find or particularly useful herbs. The shop itself we made into a little laboratory for her with all the plant presses and bottles and instruments I had brought from Gondor. Alwil had become so frustrated over the process of convincing the property's owner to rent to a common woman she had eventually bought the shop straight out so she could offer it to Gallen on terms that would allow her to buy it over the course of several years. My own parting gift to my first ever lady's maid was a little chestnut mare that Fraca helped me pick out and assured me had fleet little legs and a willing spirit.

"Clever of you," Alwil told me as we watched her get to know her new mount, a little shy and overwhelmed, in the snowy paddock of the horse-breeder's shop.

"What is clever of me?"

"To begin to set her up as a replacement for you. You'll need to teach her surgery and midwifery as well you know, don't you?"

"Will I?"

Alwil raised an eyebrow at me. "When you return, you'll be the Queen of Rohan, Éomer's wife. You will have new duties that will not be able to be put aside, not always."

I frowned. "But to save a life..."

"I have no doubt that you would go in your coronation gown to deliver some baby coming out the wrong way, and that Éomer would applaud you for it. But it will hardly be a practical way to live, being called out of receiving foreign dignitaries to go to stitch a stable boy's wound. And what of when you yourself fall pregnant? Do you think that Éomer's people will even continue to ask for you then, knowing they may endanger the heir of their King?"

"I told you that riding is prohibited only very in late in pregnancy."

She shrugged. "I doubt that it will matter much that you think you are fit to ride."

I leaned on the rough wood of the fence and said nothing. Alwil was probably, as ever, right about that. I might consider myself unchanged, but the world would not. Éomer had asked me on the night we had reconciled if I had thought about what it would mean to be Queen, and he had been right to do so. I had meant what I said, that I would endure any hardship to have him, but I found that I hadn't known what those hardships would be. Gossip from the ladies of Minas Tirith, well-meaning but unflattering surprise from my relatives and a level of attention and notice I would, at least initially, find uncomfortable—these had been things for which I had prepared myself. But there would be other things, other restrictions and duties, which I hadn't considered.

Finally I looked up again, meeting Alwil's gaze. "Then I suppose I will train a replacement."

Alwil smiled, snaking an arm around my shoulders to embrace me fondly. "There's my girl."

Etan arrived down from the mountain a few days after Éomer departed but it was clear that he had written to the old man to tell him of the joyous conclusion for he brought a fine bottle of mead with a carefully worded note of congratulations. His wound was healing well enough but I suspected in the next few months the skin might contract painfully as the flesh tightened so I taught Gallen how to rub liniment oil into the scar to keep it supple.

And then one morning as Alwil and I were returning from shopping I spotted a familiar horse at her door. Without a word I broke into a run, dashing up the rest of the street and flying through the gate. A servant threw open the door for me and I dashed into the parlor and flung myself into his arms as he stood to greet me. "Amrothos! What are you doing here?" I demanded as he swept me up and spun me around.

He laughed. "Hello, Lothíriel! It's good to see you too!"

Wídwine laughed. "He arrived just this half hour in fact!"
"I come bearing news for you of course."

"What news do you have for me?" Suddenly I was nervous. Amrothos had surely come as my father's representative. But why had he come, and not Éomer himself to tell me the news? I had been confident before but now a sudden dread leaped up. What if my father had said no? What if he... but Amrothos was smiling.

"Our father's congratulations on your engagement." He kissed my cheek. "Who would have thought that our little Lothi would someday be the Queen of Rohan."

I almost sagged with relief in his arms. "Where is Éomer though? Why did he not return with you?"

He laughed. "Probably at the bottom of some boat trying not to be sick. Our father managed to convince him that since he was in Dol Amroth he might as well accompany him on a fishing trip for a few days up the coast! He looked a little green at the very idea of it but of course he couldn't say no when father had just agreed to give him his only daughter!"

I groaned. "Poor Éomer! I hope he's not regretting that he ever met me."

"Oh he should be here in a few more days so you can ask him yourself. There's to be a feast to celebrate your engagement. Fraca and I have been sent ahead to make preparations for it on his behalf."

"I think it's rather more fair to say that I have been sent to make arrangements. If the two of you do more than sign promises of payment and toast each other into a stupor for doing so, I will be most pleasantly surprised," Éowyn said, coming in from the dinning room.

On her hip she had a babe, a find-looking lad with his father's dark coloring I knew to be named Elboron who looked about three months older than Dorn. She was dressed in the Rohirric style, clearly, like my brother, having just ridden in with the dust of the road still upon her. She was smiling widely... And yet, my heart turned over at the sight of her.

I had been dreading seeing Éomer's sister again. A woman I had wanted so much to impress and please, and who had been privy to the details of the misunderstanding between us since the very beginning. I hardly felt I could have made a good impression. Even if Éomer had explained the mistake she must have grown used to thinking of me unkindly.

I bowed deeply, trembling. "My Lady Éowyn."

She came forward, laughing and drawing me up. "Lothíriel, you must not insist that we stand on ceremony. On another day I will indulge your Gondorian politeness but for now you must allow me to embrace you as my sister, else my heart will burst."

She pulled me into a hug, crushing me to her chest. Unbidden, tears pricked my eyes. "How can you be so kind, after what I made your brother endure?" I murmured into her shoulder.

She broke apart from me, clasping my shoulder. "It seems to me that you suffered as well, at his hands. I encouraged Éomer to write to you after you had left Minas Tirith, told him there must have been some misunderstanding, for the woman I had seen dance with him was surely in love. But he was quite insistent that he would not chase you if you did not wish to be chased." She huffed out a breath. "Still as stubborn and hard-headed as he was when he was sixteen."

I bit my lip. "I only wish he had... that the misunderstanding had not been so prolonged. Truly, you must know it was not my wish to torment him as I have."

She kissed my cheek. "Never mind that. The misunderstanding is over. Now, only happy planning remains."

She was not wrong. Wídwine called for tea to be brought, and, though it was very poor manners to quiz a guest still weary from the journey, none of us could withhold ourselves from talking of plans to come.

She told us that my father had agreed to an engagement of six months in the style of the Mark, rather than the longer Gondorian ones that could last a year or two.

"Barely enough time to put together your troth, beloved," Alwil said, running a fond hand through my hair, which I'd worn loose that day (intending to practice and accustom myself to the strange feel of it free).

I must have looked panicked for she added, "Never mind that though, I'll write letters to all the seamstresses I know in Minas Tirith. By the time you arrive it will all be in motion for you."

"You always take care of me, don't you, Sister," I said, fighting to keep emotion from my voice.

She smiled. "You take care of me and so many others too, in your own way. Now you'll have a whole kingdom to look after, and I shall be happy to share the burden in the small ways that I can."

Éomer had written to his sister before he left to ask my father for my hand, asking her to return to Rohan to help make preparations for the engagement feast, and so she had gone to Minas Tirith to wait for Amrothos and the happy news he brought. She had been, prior to her marriage, the lady of Meduseld and in charge of its management so she was uniquely suited to help me learn to run the great hall myself.

She presented me to the housekeeper of the hall, a woman who I would be working very closely with in years to come. Dernhild was surprisingly young for her position, only in her mid-forties, but a formidable, stocky woman who knew Meduseld down to the last kernel of dried corn in the cellars. I was initially quite intimidated by her. I had never run any household before, much less one as grand as Meduseld and her efficient but blunt style of management an communication was something I initially mistook for disapproval, even annoyance at my lack of experience. But she was so unfailingly kind and patient with me over the course of planning the party eventually I could not help but see her for who she was.

With the help of the staff of Meduseld a rather grand feast was planned in a frenzy. Invitations were sent to all the nobility of Rohan, entertainment was engaged and Meduseld was cleaned and decorated from basement to rooftop. In the depths of winter I was mercifully spared the of arranging parties to gather flowers as decoration but instead the hall was adorned with branches of juniper at my request.

My father had arranged for quite a generous sum to be spent offering free bread and ale to the common people of Edoras, a gift from me as the new Queen to my future people. I insisted on arranging that for myself, not allowing Éowyn or Alwil to help me.

Despite the fact that I missed Éomer as one might miss a limb, those were days I remembered fondly. I was overwhelmed by the new duties my role as queen would impose on me, terrified to assume them, but the good cheer and kindness of the people that surrounded me bore me up like a barrel in a storm.

Besides, it was easy to get lost in the overwhelming number of tasks and new things I had, suddenly, to become accustomed. As soon as the invitations had been written, even before they were sent out, it was common knowledge in Edoras that I was to be the new Queen. My black hair had garnered attention before, but now I could not move without being noticed. Women stared and men whispered behind their hands as I passed. Even those who were familiar to me—my patients, the butcher I had gone to for a year, seamstresses I now considered friends—all treated me with a strange, awestruck shyness.

"They'll remember who you are in a short time," Éowyn told me when I returned from visiting a patient, nearly in tears. The old man, normally one to speak without interruption, unless his lungs were bad to the point of stealing his breath, had said barely a word as his daughter set out what were surely the best cups in the village and poured me tea with a shaking hand.

"Believe me, I thought no one would ever laugh or joke with the slayer of the Witch King of Angmar but eventually they remembered that they already knew Éowyn, and that she liked laughter better than respectful silence."

"Éomer had warned me this would be hard," I told her. "I guess I hadn't really contemplated that he might be right."

She nodded. "A Marshall is all he ever aspired to be, all he ever wanted to be. It is a place of respect but it is not like being King. He had a period of adjustment himself... maybe one that only ended when he met you."

"What do you mean?"

"He smiles again these days, as I haven't seen him since Théodred was killed. My brother was never one to despair but he has felt it. In the darkest hours of the war I do not think he believed any of us would survive it, least of all him. It's hard to come back to hope... once that has been felt," she looked to Elboron, sleeping on the hearth next to Dorn. "I never thought I would see my own son, have a family," she cupped my face, "or a sister.

"Even once he was King, I don't think my brother truly believed he would live to see an heir. After so many years of darkness, he didn't trust the light. Not until... not until he met you."

"I will never understand that," I told her. "Never understand why he would choose me, someone so plain and unworthy."

She laughed. "Neither plain, nor unworthy. But that is a battle," she tapped the space between my eyes, "no one can fight for you, flowered lady of the court."

I laughed, blushing. "Not even the slayer of the Witch King?"

"Not even she."

AN: First of all, I can only apologize for how long this chapter was in coming. Like many of you, I'm sure, my life has been both insane and stressful in the pandemic. I haven't had the time or heart for creative endeavours in a while. But thank you to those of you who asked if I'm alright. I have my health and so does my family, so for that I am grateful. I hope you and your families can say the same. I'm also grateful that all I have left to write of this story is the sweet denouement. I enjoyed writing this chapter, full of love and good things. I hope it brings you joy, and distracts you from how scary and terrible the world seems right now.

Thanks as ever to LBJ, the editor I certainly don't deserve, for all the time and work she puts into this with me.