Chapter 73. Revelations

'Why didn't you tell me?' King Elessar asked quietly.

Faramir's arm tightened around Eowyn, while she remained uncharacteristically withdrawn into herself, hunched together, head down, eyes hidden. He answered for her. 'I suppose you will say that we should have called you the first time the Shadow returned, and then every year afterwards, that we should have interrupted your battle against the Easterlings, for instance.'

Placing both arms about his wife, Faramir kissed her tenderly, murmuring words that Elessar and Eomer could not distinguish. Eowyn slowly relaxed, laid her face on her husband's shoulder, gave a great sigh.

Eomer watched in distress. 'Why did you not tell me?' he demanded. 'She's my sister, after all!'

Eowyn looked up then. 'There was nothing to be done but to ride through the storm,' she said softly.

'The first time it happened,' Faramir said steadily, 'We were alone, together, in Ithilien. We had ridden alone to the woods, to get away for a few days, just the two of us.' His hold on his wife tightened, remembering the fear. 'I could not leave her to ride for help, and I could not get her onto a horse. I thought she was dying... all I could do was hold her, talk to her, sing her songs, make her promises...'

'Promises?' Eowyn said. 'You didn't tell me about the promises.'

Faramir smiled at her, and Eomer took a sharp breath at the love in the Prince's eyes. He no longer doubted that his sister was in the best possible hands. 'I've kept them, every one,' Faramir assured her.

Eowyn straightened, once more in command of herself. She fixed the King with an imperious gaze. 'You ought to have known,' she said. 'You dealt with those Shadow-touched, not just the Knight of the Mark and myself. Surely there were some in Minas Tirith who called on you for aid in the after years.'

Elessar shook his head. 'None,' he said. 'But then, none touched blade to the Witch King and survived, save you and Meriadoc. And Frodo,' he mused, 'though it was the Witch King's blade that went into him. And he could not survive his wounds in Middle-earth, but had to pass over the Sea.'

'That is how I found out,' the King went on. 'Peregrin called on me for aid. Meriadoc was dying under the Shadow when I arrived. It was a near thing.'

Faramir sucked in his breath and turned to Eowyn. 'I thought... the Shadow returned only on the anniversary,' he said. She dropped her eyes.

'It is always there,' she murmured, then raised her eyes to her husband's. 'It is always hovering, always ready to strike.' To the amazement of the men, she smiled. 'But you are always there,' she said, 'and so what does it matter? The Shadow cannot touch me.'

The flap to the pavilion lifted, and Beregond stuck his head in, rain glistening upon his cloak and helm. 'Yes?' Faramir said.

'The River is coming up nicely,' the Captain of the White Company said. 'The rain will make for slow going for the wains on their way back to the South, but we ought to be able to send the next shipment of food in ships.'

'Good thing the wains have already departed,' Eomer said. 'Meriadoc would have tried to fill them with all the gold in the Shire, otherwise.'

Eowyn laughed. 'I told him his gold was no good with the Rohirrim,' she said. 'You owed him such a debt for saving your sister and fighting the Nazgul creature that would have attacked King Theoden, I told him it would be a terrible insult to refuse the food or try to make payment.'

'As if all the food in Rohan could even begin to pay the debt we owe,' Eomer muttered.

'You think the halflings would refuse the food?' Beregond gasped.

Faramir met his Captain's shocked gaze. 'The halflings are a proud and independent people,' he said quietly. 'They do not brook condescension, and they resent being treated as children, for all their comparative lack of stature.'

Elessar was nodding. 'We have had to go very carefully,' he agreed. 'It was difficult, in the first place, for them to ask for help. Samwise...' he shook his head. 'Many of the hobbits would have chosen to starve, but for the little ones that would have been condemned to starve as well.'

'They are a hard people, for all their appearance of softness,' Eomer said.

'Stubborn, rather,' Faramir said, and laughed. 'I can well understand how Merry and Pippin became fast friends with Boromir. They were cut from the same cloth.'