#grimowyn

Théodred died as he had lived - in a woman’s bed. He died without legitimate issue, a fact Éowyn almost mourned more than her cousin’s death. Three years ago, King Théoden died, wasted away by a disease that ate him from the inside out. Three years before that Éowyn’s elder brother, Éomer, had fallen, along with the rest of his fellow riders, in a vicious warg attack as they patrolled the Misty Mountains. Seven years before that she lost both her parents – one to battle, the other to grief. At nigh twenty Éowyn, daughter of Éomund, niece of Théoden, was utterly without family. Her chest ached with the emptiness of orphanhood, loneliness drew the tears to her eyes and flavored them with salt and bitterness. What made her body shake and throat burn with blood and acidic bile, however, was not being utterly alone in the world. It was the larger issue, as large as Rohan itself. She was the last member of her family. She was the last legitimate member of the House of Eorl. She was now Queen.

Théodred had been retrieved from one bed and place in another, cleaned, groomed, and dressed in the softest white tunic and breeches, silver and gold thread forming intricate knots and patterns at the neck, wrist, and hem. On the morrow he would be interred but for now he was laid in a side chamber for visitation. He is peaceful in his eternal sleep Éowyn thought, trying to stem the tide of tears, though her thoughts did not stray far from the morbid. For whatever reason that fact amused her. Her amusement amused her further until she giggled. The first was soft but a second came swiftly, a throaty arpeggio in contrast to her more wrenching sobs. The twitters dissolved into silent tremors – emotions too confused to sound. Éowyn – Queen – standing over the last of her kin giggling with tear stained cheeks and an emptiness that made her sway.

“My Lady?” His sonorous voice was full of concern, yet its worried tone lost none of its richness. Éowyn turned at the words and, damnit - shieldmaidens did not swoon - she felt the world shift under her unprepared feet. He, and his rich voice were to her in a moment, a gentle hand on her arm to steady her, to ground her. “Forgive me, my Lady, I did not intend to startle you so.”

Éowyn did not have to raise her eyes far to meet the piercing, crystal blue gaze of Gríma, son of Gálmód, Lord Counsellor. His deep-set eyes were focused on her intently, like he could read her very soul. Not that it was difficult at the moment, her soul was shattered, raw and bleeding along the broken edges. A tear rolled off her cheek and landed on her collarbone, breaking the spell the Counsellor’s eyes cast. Gently he removed his hand to retrieve his handkerchief. He pressed the cloth into her hand, it felt clean although it was rumpled and covered in faded ink stains. She dropped her gaze to the cloth, were his hand lingered on hers.

“I am needed?” Her voice was brittle. She made no move to dry her eyes, nor he to draw back his hand.

“No. I came to see if you needed...something.” He meant to say someonebut clearly thought “something” to be a more appropriate choice. What Éowyn needed was her family alive and with her again. What she needed was not to be sole heir to the throne. What she needed was not to be alone. She knew that Gríma knew this though he would not say it. She knew it like she knew that in spite the pain and trials of the world the sun would rise again. People feared Gríma, hated him as well. Théodred himself couldn’t stand the man but couldn’t be buggered to do the business of statecraft and so could not remove him from the small council. Had Éomer lived Éowyn knew he would have hated Gríma more than Théodred. Éowyn knew all the reasons to hate Gríma, son of Gálmód, from his mixed blood to his suspected mixed loyalties, his sorcery to his spiteful, often cruel temper. He was not to be trusted, Éowyn was well aware and yet also very willing to overlook it. His flaws were lessoned – not expunged – but blunted in her mind by one grace. One saving grace. Gríma sawher. He saw her, Éowyn, not daughter of the noble Éomund or the White Lady of Rohan, not Princess, not Queen but Éowyn. And what he saw he did not seek to change but rather sought to understand and what he could not he took in stride.

“I need my family.” She said, finally raised her hand and his handkerchief to dry her eyes, and more importantly buy her time to phrase her request.

“Would that I could, my Lady, I would reunite them at your side.” He offered, hand twitching slightly. Few people touched her, even fewer she suspected touched the man known at court as “Wormtongue”. Did he miss contact as much as she, she wondered suddenly.

“You are a truly loyal man, but I am aware you have limits.” Her face was dry, but she loathed to give up the now damp cloth in her hand. “I am not ready to leave.” Her eyes turned back to her cousin, the King while still above ground, silent but regal still. To leave would mean to enter a new reality, one she felt utterly unprepared for. “I am not ready to leave but cannot bare to be alone.” She returned her gaze to his and could see her own pain reflected in his eyes. If anyone knew what ‘alone’ was, it was this bastard son of Rohan. “Would you sit a while with an orphan?” She meant the question to lighten the mood. It did not. Gingerly she reached for his hand. A closer study of his face – his eyes, the set of his muscles where eyebrows should grow – told her he was still deciding how best to comfort her, feeling how much of her tone was safe sarcasm designed to shield other feelings. She laced her sword calloused fingers through his writing calloused ones and led him to the seat she had occupied and its long cold companion.

She sat, hand in his, forcing him to sit as well. Gently she squeezed his pale fingers.

“Perhaps soon I will be ready to face-” she paused, unsure of how to correctly articulate what had her so very – Valar she couldn’t even pick an emotion – trepidatious about the world and her new place in it.