Take care of your sister.
Those were the last words Éomer heard from his mother when she died, and the first he heard from his uncle when he came into that house.
And so he had. He'd dried Éowyn's tears in her grief, fed her bread in her hunger, given her strength in her need. She would not leave his side to do as the women did and so he taught her on the field as well, with sword and shield and bow.
Take care of me, brother, she would say, her hand in his, and he could deny her nothing.
When Éowyn was a woman grown, men's eyes began to follow her. But always she turned her head away, for she had no need, she said, for any other man. And Éomer would smile, but sadly, for he knew some day she would not turn away.
Then one night, when the north wind was bitter with snow, she came to him at night and roused him from his sleep.
I am cold, Éowyn said. I would not be alone. She lay down beside him, her head pillowed on his shoulder and her unbound hair spilling over his chest.
Her body stretched alongside Éomer's and he put his arms around her. She shook and to Éomer she seemed to give off heat, so that he thought her fevered.
I will fetch the leech, he said, but she embraced him and would not let him go.
Take care of me, brother, she said, and put her arms about his neck and kissed his mouth.
This was wrong, Éomer knew, a brother did not lie with his sister. But her mouth was warm and her arms clinging and he loved her more than anything else on the black earth.
The taste of her filled him with hunger. He pulled her close and stroked her face and throat, kissed the hollow of her neck, her shoulder where her gown had pulled aside.
She kissed his face over and over, his cheeks above the beard, his temples, the corners of his mouth. She loosened her gown and took his hand and held it to her breast.
Éomer learned her body, intent upon each curve, as though he were a skald and Éowyn a verse that he was making. He touched her and she cried out softly. He wished that he could see her face.
Take care of me, she said again, and Éomer could wait no longer. He raised her gown, his hands sliding over her strong thighs. He entered her and she cried out again, this time in pain. It grieved him, but she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him as he moved against her.
He spent before too long, and when he rolled aside, Éowyn put her face against his neck and wept. And Éomer wept too, wetting his beard with tears, and they lay sleepless in each other's arms until dawn.
The next night, she came to him again.
FINIS
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