Sons of the Steward

My little ending was a ruse, I admit it. Someone cared to email me! *sniffle* Not that I'm some meanie for reviews, but when people just don't you kinda wonder if you're sucking, that's all. : But since I'm damn proud of this plotline I'm posting on despite my insecurities. *raises lighter and sings*

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He was hard at work and as with any duty he performdilidiligently paid attention to the smallest details. Lounging comfortably on a comfortable couch in Haldir’s room and feeling much better, Minuial gazed at the blood-red plant he held up for inspection. Apparently satisfied, he dropped the winter rose into a plain brown herbalist’s mortar, then grabbed a pestle to crush the petals with. Tapping her foot against the cushion beneath her absently, she hummed in thought, smiling when he turned to regard her. “I was not aware you were proficient at plant handling,” she commented with a slight note of teasing to her voice.

Haldir grunted and continued crushing. “I know a thing or two about creating poisons, anyway.”

Minuial knit her brow in mock gravity. “Doubtlessly a skill you acquired a long time ago from Lord Celeborn.”

He smirked at that and shook his head. “As you always tell me. Our world has changed. If we do not adapt with it, we will fade. I do not have to like how far we go, but neither will I let these Men take our world without a fight.”

“Well spoken,” she responded with an exhale as she leaned back and looked up at the ceiling. Holding a pillow against her, she considered her own plans. “If Faramir drugs me again I cannot work on learning the location of the Ring. I think I should try another avenue.”

He looked at her shrewdly. “Another Man, you mean?” He set the bowl down and retreated to a cabinet, removing his bag from it. Minuial watched him curiously as he rummaged through the contents, then produced a small sack. “Lembas. I would not eat any of their food from now on.”

“It might look suspicious if I evade dinner too often,” she suggested, looking in almost instinctively. The waybread lain within a mallorn leaf met her vision and she closed the bag.

Haldir shrugged, taking up his previous labor. “Feign illness. Pretend you do not like the food. If he did drug you, he must know by now you suspect as much. I doubt he will publicly dare you to sample their so-called cuisines unless he is a fool.”

“Or unless he knows no one will care how I am treated.” She frowned at the bag of Lembas, then settled on her side, watching him work. “In any event, I will put on my most innocent expression at dinner tonight and pretend as if for all the world I believe I was drunk. That should please him.” That certainty caused her to roll her eyes cynically.

Though his face declared his irritation with her role in this, the Marchwarden agreed with the necessity. “As long as you are going to continue relations with him, when we make our final move I will give you some of this mixture. Try to use it on him.” He glanced at the window, then back at her.

Following his gaze, Minuial sat up and smiled. “Time for dinner.” She stood and straightened her silver wrap around tunic. “You might consider coming with me or risk their questioning why Lord Celeborn would send such a lazy guardian.” Her eyebrow arched at his glare.

“I think you want to tease me,” he complained, putting the bowl down. Taking up his sword and strapping it to his side, he nodded and grabbed her bag of Lembas, tossing it at her. She took a bite with a small smile. “Unfortunately, you are correct. Come, let us go play with the animals again.”

Laughing, she cocked her head as they headed out. “You really hate Men, don’t you?”

“I hate these Men,” he replied very honestly. “I hate what they have allowed to endure. Instead of destroying that Ring, Denethor could not contain his greed in favor of wisdom’s way. This world is rapidly falling into darkness, when it could have been saved thousands of years ago.”

She shook her head, keeping her comments to herself. In truth she did not want to get into another discussion of this with him. It never ended in anything but bitterness and right now she had to concentrate on an upbeat feeling. For what she had in mind tonight, she would need it. As they entered the room, Minuial gazed around the dining hall, looking first at the head table. There sat Denethor as she had anticipated and Boromir, but Faramir seemed to be missing. Pursing her lips, she swept the remaining tables and still came up with nothing. He was simply not here.

An amused smile crossed her lips. So he would play it this way. All the better. Haldir directed her to sit at the head table and she followed, seating herself across from Boromir. Giving him a glance, she noted his curious stare and awarded him a smirk. He raised his eyebrow, then his glass in a private toast to whatever it was he thought they had exchanged. He seemed to understand the source of her amusement and reflected it.

“So you return to my table,” Denethor interrupted their little exchange. Minuial looked up immediately, putting on a mild expression. The Steward frowned at her. “I hear you had dinner with my son last night.” She nodded without comment. He let it lie. “So shall we continue our discussion?”

Minuial let a smile spread across her lips as she took a goblet of wine a servant poured for her. “By all means, decide as you will.”

The Steward knit his brow at that. “You are indeed a strange Elf. Tell me, how do things fare in your lands? Has the shadow moved upon the Elves?”

“Show me a race of Middle-Earth that the shadow has not touched,” Haldir said dryly before she could say a word. She gave him an annoyed expression that he ignored.

“I’ll not argue that,” Denethor replied, surprising them both. He looked down at his plate, cutting his meat as if he cared to say nothing more. And yet he continued. “The orcs still plague us. My possession of the Ring does not prevent that. Are your people subject to attacks?”

Minuial chose to respond and for once Haldir looked content to remain quiet. “We have been attacked some few timesrtairtainly. The dark ones are always on the move and lately it has been harder to defend our lands.”

The Steward nodded gravely, having expected as much. His next question was as she expected and inwardly she seethed, but outwardly kept her cool. Haldir was another story. “Do you need aid?” One glance proved that the Marchwarden’s expression had darkened. He had opened his mouth to speak some sort of retort, but Minuial shook her head almost imperceptibly and he held his silence.

“I thank you for your kind offer,” she said smoothly with a graceful smile. “We are able to hold our own for now.”

Raising his eyebrow, Denethor nodded once and then lifted his goblet. “Then our talks are over.”

Of course that was not where this would end. She knew it and so did the Steward, but to continue on tonight would be foolhardy. So instead she contented herself to enjoying the hours and waging a campaign of another type. Stirring the food before her but not partaking, she allowed the rest of the night to go on without a fuss. She did not appear to have been daunted by Denethor’s comment, simply smiled at the dialogs offered by the members of the court and let the night play out as it would. Faramir never showed up.

Towards closclose of the night she finally got a hint of what she had been waiting for. She had noticed his curious glances and was polite when Boromir finally chose to speak. “You are a curious person,” he stated, tracing the rim of his glass. His eyes dared her to respond defensively.

Of course she wouldn’t. Minuial smiled at him, looking him over openly. “As are you, Captain Boromir. We’ve had so little time to talk.”

“Is that something you would like to change?” he asked with an upturned brow.

The Elf cocked her head with a challenging look. “Would you?”

Shrugging, Boromir tipped his glass back and then set it down. “I’m not so sure. I do not all together trust you.”

“Neither do I trust you,” she responded, sitting back with her still full drink in her hand. She gave a sidelong glance towards Haldir, who was speaking with Aragorn some distance away. When she looked back she saw Boromir had followed her look.

He smiled smartly. “Do you worry you wiled hed him or worry that his presence will be intrusive?”

“Perhaps I worry he needs me or finds me intrusive.” Minuial grinned at his smirk. Talking with him was going to be different than his brother, she could see. It was interesting.

The auburn-headed mortal cast a look at the Elf. “I would not put it past Aragorn to make your protector find your presence intrusive. He is enamored of your people well enough.”

She laughed at that. “Such a wicked tongue.”

At that he le for forward, his sea-blue eyes glittering in the light of the torches. The orange light darkened them, giving him a warmer appearance. “And you do not have a wicked tongue, Elf?” He darted glances around, finally resting his eyes on his father for a moment before returning them to her. He lowered the tone of his voice. “I am certain it was that tongue of yours that beguiled my brother into bedding you.”

Within her sparked a flare of anger. She narrowed her eyes, meeting his accusation head on. “I assure you, he wanted what happened as much as I did and needed no coercion. Like the average mortal male I found him quite ready just two minutes after speaking with him.”

Boromir glared for a moment, then sat back with a laugh as he drank. Handing his glass off to a servant when it was dry, he said, “You’re probably right.” He looked her over. “Whatever it is you are playing at, Elf, I will find out. I promise you that.”

His trespass visibly forgotten, Minuial leaned back and let her expression ease once more. Raising her goblet as he reclaimed his drink, she replied, “I shall enjoy seeing you try.” He drank and she let the liquid touch her lips, but did not allow it to enter into her mouth. “You are different than your brother. A challenge.”

“Challenge?” he repeated, his expression amused. He set the glass down. “What is it you are trying to get me to do?”

She searched herself for the right response to that, something that would elicit the proper response. A witty remark would do, she decided, and widened her eyes in a mocking manner. “I am trying to get you into bed so you will spill all your state secrets to me as we lay writhing against one another.”

His expression said he was annoyed, but there was just a touch of interest that betrayed him. “It would take a lot more than a frolic to get me to tell you anything useful. You might try something in the way of alcohol, though of course you would have to get me to drink a lot and after a while I would become suspicious enough not to drink anymore. But you are welcome to try it sometime.” His gaze trailing across the way, Boromir pointed and she looked, watching as Haldir exited the room with Aragorn. “If he is leaving so you can lure me on to one of our rooms, you should catch him and tell him there is no need.”

“You assume much,” Minuial replied, returning her eyes to his face. She looked past him towards an open doorway to a terrace. “Instead of heading to bed, let us instead consider speaking as mature, intelligent individuals. I want no more of politics tonight. Let’s go out there where you can tell me about your youth.”

“So you can learn more about me?” he assumed, standing and offering his arm. She took it. “I think I would rather you work on breaking me the hard way.”

Minuial rolled her eyes and gave him a smile. “Very well, I will tell you about my youth so that you feel secure in keeping your secrets.”

They wandered out onto the terrace where she left his arm and went to the rail, looking out across the lands. In the distance she could see Mordor, an oppressive visual that declared the shadow’s presence upon the world blatantly now anthouthout fear that the light would come and banish it. She sighed a genuine sigh. Boromir came up to her right and shared her view. “I have been looking at that since the very beginning of my days,” he stated with a sour expression.

Pursing her lips, she glared at the country across the way with a dark hatred. “You will be looking at it until the day you die if you persist in allowing the Ring to exist.”

He grunted and looked at her. “Is this where I am supposed to agree to speak to my father? I thought you said no politics.”

She shook her head, giving him a pale smile. “No, not if you don’t want to, Boromir. I am not trying to get you to see my point of view. Only musing. I apologize. No more politics.”

“So, tell me what you were like as a little Elf,” he suggested, leaning his back against the railing so he could look into her face.

Minuial smiled at that, remembering. “A little Elf, eh? I was very insistent upon learning the bow at an early age. I was born almost a thousand years after Isildur lost the Ring.”

Boromir frowned at that, but kept his comments to himself. “Did you have any brothers or sisters?”

A well of sorrow opened within her at that question. She sighed softly and looked out again. “I had but one sister.”

“Where is she?”

Minuial sighed softly, fingering the stone rail beneath her fingers. “She is gone.” The tone of her aspirations became lost with that statement.

Inhaling sharply, Boromir turned back towards the view. “My condolences.” He frowned at the darkness ahead of them, but did not abandon her just yet. “So, what do little Elf girls do at such a tender age?”

That brought a smile to her lips. “What do little mortal girls do? We learn to ride, we play with the other children. I am no mortal, but neither am I some sort of otherworldly being either.”

He had the nerve to look dubious about her words. “Fair enough. At what age do you Elves learn to distrust Men?”

Her eyes hardened a bit, but she didn’t hold it against him. “We learn that when we encounter them, generally. You think we’re so arrogant and condescending, but you fail to take several things into account.”

“Oh? What are those things?” he asked with an edge to his deep voice.

She didn’t back down from replying honestly. “What happens during the course of a man’s life, Boromir? He begins as a child and as a child, rushes into life, winning sometimes and losing others. With age he becomes wiser. Do you deny this?” Boromir glared, but shook his head. He knew where she was going with this and did not seem to appreciate her logic. “A child is quick to action, but a man is quick to contemplation. Mortal Men believe that because we are quiet and elusive, that Elves are weak-willed and lacking in strength. You must understand we do not look at the world through one-hundred years of wisdom, but that of eons.”

He nodded slowly, but she could see a reply waiting to be voiced. “Good point. As a man ages, he becomes less apt to act and more likely to think his way through a situation. But do you not also see that life is ordered in this way for a reason? If we all acted without the wisdom of others, we would be in chaos. But if we were all slow to action, our world would stagnate into destruction. There is a balance that must be maintained to prevent our society from flitting from one extreme to the other, for neither extreme would be good.”

For a moment she said nothing, taking his words and thinking on them. He watched her consider, his eyes glinting in the moonlight, reflecting a true interest in understanding. Minuial examined him visually, looking him up and down. “Very wise, Boromir of Gondor. And I thought you were a mindless barbarian.”

Boromir took no offence and laughed at that. “I can be a mindless barbarian, just as I am certain you go against my preconceptions of Elves in order to become a harlot-spy, using your body to get what you want.”

“Perhaps you are right,” she said with a brow raised in challenge and a secret smile tilting her lips. “Or perhaps you are simply being a mindless barbarian.”

Quite suddenly and not completely unwelcome, Boromir moved closer to her, reag upg up. She looked into those stormy eyes as he curled her hair around his finger, then let it flutter out of his grasp as he moved to trace her jaw with his fingertips. “What do you say to my being a little mindless right now?” he breathed, leaning forward. Lifting her chin upwards, he pressed his mouth against hers and beckoned entrance with his tongue. After a second he took the liberty, wrapping his arms around her body and drawing him into his warmth.

Minuial closed her eyes, drinking in the sensations of his warm suck, the darting rub of his tongue against hers. It was pleasant, but she pressed her hands to his shoulders and pushed him back. “Tempting, Captain of Gondor, but I think not.” His expression of bewilderment made her laugh and she made no attempt to hide it. “Perhaps another time.”

“Another time,” he repeated, stepping back. Something in his smile told her that had been some sort of test. This would prove much more challenging than Faramir, for the younger had a will to believe the best in those who drew his attention whereas this one seemed keen on ferreting her plots out—a fact that perhaps added to her allure all the more in this particular situation. She knew the challenge added to his. He gave her a stately bow, then took her hand and kissed it, but his expression was a mockery of his display of courtesy. “Sleep well, Elf.”

Crossing her arms and stepping around him, she stopped only long enough to say, “And you, mortal.” With that she left him standing on the terrace, likely wondering what her next move would be. She found herself eagerly contemplating that as well.

The dining hall was all but clear at this late hour. She gave the room one last, curious glance, then departed feeling she had won an important battle tonight.

Traversing the long, bare hallways, she thought on this, excluding all else until she felt a presence at her back. She turned, half expecting to see Boromir there, or perhaps an annoyed Haldir, but it was neither of those. “My lady,” Lord Aragorn said with a bow of his head. “Might I have a word with you in private?”

Normally she would have thought nothing of his request, but just now there was such a strange, angry glint to those crystal eyes of his that for a moment she considered turning him down. What cause he could have to be so vexed with her personally, she could not imagine, so instead she wondered if perhaps he was troubled by another—Haldir perhaps—and misdirecting the display of his emotion. And so she nodded, following after him to a small sitting room not far down the hall. He allowed her to go in first, shutting the door behind him as he entered. When she met his expression she could tell she was indeed the focus of his emotion.

“You are upset,” she surmised, taking a seat and keeping her expression firm.

Aragorn was not impressed. He remained standing, crossing his arms over his chest as he looked down on her. “I am upset. By what I have seen and heard.”

Minuial cocked her head. “Speak plainly.”

“All right. I did not give you the information I did so you would lay with those that dishonored your kinswoman,” he stated, an edge to his voice that he did not try to conceal. He took a few steps, then stopped again, shaking his head. “What has happened to your kind? Do you joy in what they did to her?”

Her eyes shining, she watched him a moment with judging eyes. “What has happened to you, Estel?” she asked, using the name Elrond had given him with the hope that it would subtly usher in a sense of calm. “What gives you the right to suggest such a thing? I made no promises to you.”

“You did not,” he agreed, pacing to a chair, then sitting. He looked her over with conflicting emotions playing in his eyes. “I am sorry, it…surprises me to see you interact with Boromir in such a manner. And after Faramir…”

“Those are my choices,” she interrupte“You“You have no right to chastise me like I am a child.”

His expression hardened a bit, but he kept his cool. She was not sure what to make of this little interaction, except to surmise that he had looked forward to having two obstacles removed from his path to the throne. “I do not, but Lady Minuial, I will express my concerns, right or wrong. Do you think I am a fool? You were very intoxicated when I found you last night. I can only assume Lord Faramir is up to his old habits again.”

This perked her interest, so she indulged him. “Habits?”

He nodded softly. “I have seen several ladies emerge from his rooms in that condition. I do not know your motives for attending a private dinner with him, but unless you say you willfully consumed that much alcohol and slept with him, then I am fairly certain he saw to it you ended up that way. My lady…I know these men. And I know Boromir will not resort to that. If he wants of you, he will take it by force. He has no gentility.”

Minuial averted her eyes for a moment, letting all of that sink in. When she looked up she could see him waiting for her response. Within her a battle raged between the choice of trusting Aragorn with knowledge of her mission here and simply giving him an excuse, then proceeding. She wanted his counsel on this, but did not dare reveal all just yet. The importance of finding the Ring held her back. “He has no need for coercion or force,” she stated simply.

His eyes flashed, but he held a calm tongue. “Then I can only hope that you have some ulterior motive for sleeping with he who raped your kinswoman. He may have a certain charm you feel drawn to, but rest assured he is using it to get what he wants.”

“I thought he took what he wanted without having to resort to that sort of thing,” she retorted mildly with an upraised brow.

“And that is what I am trying to help you avoid if things do not go as you hope.” He got up from the chair he was sitting in, sinking down next to her on the couch and taking her hands. “Lady Minuial, you play a dangerous game. If he thinks you are a threat, he will dispose of you just like he did her. Rest assured, it was he that did the murdering. Faramir is ill enough, but even he would not go so far. I do not wish this to happen to you.”

Taking her hands back, she rubbed them absently and gave him a straight look. “If he harms me he will die.”

Aragorn inhaled deeply at that, then sighed almost wearily. “He will never tell you the location of the Ring, I fear.” His eyes caught hers a moment. “That is something even I am not privy to.” He stood up, motioning towards the door.

Minuial followed his actions and walked with him, stopping in the threshold. She looked into his face. “Think as you will, but know that I can handle the situation. Do not worry over it.”

His doubtful expression said what she was thinking. She had not appeared very capable last night. But Minuial never made a mistake twice. “Goodnight, my lady. Sleep well and trust no one here, for here is where the Ring rests and no city under such a condition can hold an honest man.”

To that she had no comment. It struck her strangely, but she did not pursue it, wanting to find her precious solitude and rest. Nodding politely, the Elf left without turning and sought out her rooms. His words stayed with her, though, no matter how hard she tried to brush them aside. Boromir seemed polite enough, but there was a hard edge to him she could see beneath the surface. Somehow the thought of his taking their game to a violent level felt disappointing. A part of her did not want to find him guilty of anything worse than misdirection where the Ring was concerned.

Opening her door, she half expected to see Haldir waiting for her, ready to pester her for details, but surprisingly her room was bare. Content with privacy, she retreated to her washroom and prepared for the night. By the time she hit the sheets she had a plan for Boromir.

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