[Nurumaiel]

Firramer listened patiently, quietly, letting Talômi have his say. He realized it must be a relief to the young man. Finally the Ranger stopped and looked at him, almost defiant, waiting for a scolding. Firramer spoke gently. "I understand," he said. "It is hard to lose someone that dear to you. But you must realize that she won't be gone for a long while. And maybe even longer. Just because she and Eohsecg are quite taken with each other doesn't mean it will last forever, though it may." He stopped, and seemed to consider, then spoke again. "And, Talômi, you're not really losing her."

"What do you mean?" Talômi asked, startled. "If she went off with Eohsecg then of course I'd be losing her."

"I would have thought the same thing if it hadn't been for something that happened to me many years back, before I met Nurumaiel, before I met - " He stopped. "No, you wouldn't know who they were." He hesitated for a moment, then plunged on desperately, like he wanted to get it out as fast as he could.

"Many years ago when I was just a young lad I happened to go to an inn much like this one after a long ride. I was weary and hungry. The first thing I saw was a beautiful golden-haired lass with sparkling blue eyes behind the counter, laughing with delight at the music a wandering bard was playing. I couldn't help it: I fell completely in love with her.

"I approached her and asked for a meal. She gave me the sweetest smile I had ever seen in my life and went right away to get me something. She told me in a kindly voice that though she would be thrown out if she were caught, she wasn't going to make me pay a coin, and then she sat down on the counter to watch me. She appeared curious, and at last she admitted that she had never seen one so young in the service of the King. I told her I was twenty-one years of age, but she insisted that that was young, or at least all of the other Rohirrim she had seen at the inn were very old.

"We talked together for long, and at last I went to the room she got me, again for nothing. I told her that might be a little too much to do, and she laughed lightly and said, of course, she would pay for it.

"I never left the inn. I stayed there where I could be nearer to her, and at last she and I went to my home where we were to be wed." He stopped and looked at Talômi, and the Ranger was surprised to see tears in the man's eyes. "You think it might be a happy ending, but it wasn't.

"The day before we were to be wed, we went out riding together, just her and I, to a cliffside, where we could look over fair Rohan, thinking that soon it would be the two of us, together for all time. But then the unexpected happened, the terrible, the horrible..." He paused, and his hands gripped the table. "Her horse slipped as we were riding along the cliff edge, and fell with her still riding. I galloped down and took up her broken body in my arms. She was still alive, though just barely. She didn't say anything aloud, but she just looked into my eyes for what seemed like hours, then she breathed, 'It would have been beautiful. Remember me.'" He stopped once again, the tears now running freely down his face. "Then she died."

Talômi didn't know what to say. He just sat there as Firramer stood up and lay a hand on his shoulder. "So, you see, lad, you're not losing her. Not really. But I understand." Then he went up the stairs, leaving Talômi alone.