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Rohan Secret Santa 2025
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Published:
2025-12-26
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4,274
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1/1
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Ungentle

Summary:

The last days of Lindmaeg, mother of Éomund, give us a glimpse into what has become of the shieldmaidens of Rohan over time and how her granddaughter, Éowyn, became connected to that tradition.

Notes:

Perhaps slightly darker of theme for a Secret Santa event, but I think/hope fitting for the wonderful prompts I got from my giftee, Arveldis/emyn-arnens, which focused on both the history of the shieldmaiden tradition and women in Éowyn’s life who influenced her and her path.

Content warning for references to serious illness, as Lindmaeg has breast cancer.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

Lindmaeg’s last days were fast approaching. 

She knew it even before the healer had spoken the words. A few more months at best. It was a truth she’d been waiting to hear ever since finding that hard, swollen lump in the curve of her breast. Ever since the sight of food began to turn her stomach and what she could choke down often came right back up. Ever since the pain that had started in her chest appeared suddenly in her abdomen as well, and then her hip and then her head.

In truth, she wasn’t sad to know that time ran short. Her ailing days had grown tiresome and unpleasant, a constant string of new limitations on a body that had always preferred to be active and useful. Sitting around all day in imposed rest was mortifying to her productive spirit, though the frustration these limits dredged up in her heart only made her all the more tired. Perhaps, she came to believe, that was the point of long, slow illness: to gradually drain away all energy and patience and contentment until the prospect of death no longer seemed frightening but a welcome relief instead. It was a relief she’d take willingly, gratefully even, just as soon as she saw to her final affairs. 

Fortunately, wrapping up the remains of her life wasn’t proving as difficult as she feared. Impending death seemed to sharpen her focus, and many of the things she thought would matter to her suddenly didn’t. What would become of her home. What would be said at her funeral. Who would watch over her lifeless body until Béma’s wife came to collect her soul. Possessions, reputation, and self were all just things, and she wouldn’t hesitate to leave them behind. Only the people mattered, and there were precious few of those still left. 

Her circle had never been big, careful as she was about who she allowed to share in her trust and affections, but it was smaller now than ever. She’d already buried both parents, all her siblings, her closest friends, and her husband. Hardest of all had been her treasured Éomund, fiery and bold to the very end. It wasn’t the natural order of things to outlive a child, but it did make it easier to know that she would be going toward her son now rather than away from him. In fact, all of the losses that had burdened her life seemed to bring an unexpected weightlessness to her imminent death, freeing her of large portions of regret and longing. She wouldn’t be one to fight and claw to hold onto life no matter how diminished and undignified it became, not when there were better things waiting for her.

Those who remained would make do in her absence well enough, she was sure. She would miss her grandchildren fiercely, but they had a bountiful home, wealth and security, and an uncle and cousin who treated them with care. A whole royal household saw to their upbringing, and there was little they might require that couldn’t be found for them without need of Lindmaeg’s help. Indeed, in all of her planning there was but one thing she knew would have to come from her while she still had the chance to give it. Something special for little Éowyn that could only be bestowed by her father’s mother.

At just nine years old, it was early yet to speak to Éowyn of destiny or to assert a calling or true purpose to her life. But there was a tradition among the women of her family, one that Éowyn couldn’t yet see was meant for her even as it was already clear to Lindmaeg. Shieldmaidens were born, not made. It was in the blood, the mind, the gut. Éowyn was to be a shieldmaiden, Lindmaeg was sure of it. And before she passed on beyond the circles of this world, she would be sure that Éowyn knew it, too. 

**********

In the Mark of Éowyn’s childhood a young girl might play at being a shieldmaiden in the confines of her imagination, conjuring up visions based on old poems and songs or the images she’d seen in paint, carved wood, and woven tapestry. But the shieldmaidens themselves had already begun to take on the mythical quality that attaches to history that is older than one’s own lifetime. To a girl of Éowyn’s age, they weren’t people so much as stories. They were of this world, but not in it.

Not since Lindmaeg’s prime had a woman ridden openly in the uniform of an éored, and any who wished now to clothe themselves in a shieldmaiden’s trappings would find that such things were no longer readily available. Armor and armaments abounded, but they weren’t made for those who needed a sword grip for smaller hands or a mailcoat that fit over curving hips. Those were specialties, and the once thriving industry that supplied them had slowly withered over the years like a muscle that had gone too long without use.  

The glory of the shieldmaidens had not been taken from them all in one go, for that surely would have met harsher resistance, but it had been taken all the same. Our allies in Mundburg are simply not comfortable with women in arms alongside them in the field, the early Rohirrim had been told, and suddenly the days when the shieldmaidens rode with the éoherë in joint campaigns with Gondor came to an end. Years later, those who sought to project an image of Rohan to the wider world would turn their eyes to the éoreds who fought only in defense of home and kin, protecting the borders of the Mark itself. If we allow the givers of life to participate in this business of death and war, then we will be seen as no less crass than the Easterlings, the people were told, and overnight the éoreds were purged of all wives and mothers.

In time, even this proved insufficient in what became a royal quest for respectability. A civilized society does not put any of its women in harm’s way for work that a man can ably do, proclaimed Thengel King, and the unmarried women were duly summoned to trade their spears for cooking knives or sheep shears or even the idleness of empty hands. And so the cancer of conformity had continued its spread, every bit as voracious as the blight that now crept inexorably through Lindmaeg’s own body and just as lethal to a tradition that had survived the long ages of history only to die a gradual, quiet death in the name of progress.

She could remember well the day when Thengel had stood before the assembled people of Aldburg to announce the new law that snatched away her right to serve. His queen stood at his side, every inch of her exuding prim elegance, and it was impossible not to see Morwen in Thengel’s evocation of a new Rohirrim woman, one that was firmly modeled on the Gondorian values with which he had become so enamored during his many years in the White City. Subtle, soft, and nurturing, he declared. A jewel to be admired for its grace and clever sophistication. These were not the traits of the women who had birthed the Mark into being, who had raised it to greatness and strength through their grim devotion, bloody courage and sweat-soaked labor. Thengel’s dismissal stung Lindmaeg and the others like her. All those women’s effort and lives given to secure a future for the kingdom only to now see a very different kind of woman held up as that future’s ideal? The sting quickly gave way to disbelief and then to anger. If he wants to live in Gondor so badly, furious women had whispered among themselves, I’d gladly boot his ass back there myself. 

But even as the king’s will was enforced, the anger morphed again into defiance. Culture can’t be changed by decree, and not every Rohirrim would relinquish the traditions of old, no matter what the law now said. There remained both women who would take up the sword to do the work of their mothers from behind a disguise and men who would loyally turn their heads and close their mouths to keep the secret. Persistence and discretion could still get a young woman a set of spaulders for her narrow shoulders or a breastplate made to conceal actual breasts, if she only knew where and how to ask. But rarity bred cost, and so a healthy amount of coin was also required unless the young woman in question had a well placed relative who could pass down the armor and weapons that had served her in her own time. A mother, an aunt, a cousin… or a grandmother.

**********

The ladder into the hay loft was brittle and rickety, shifting and sagging under Lindmaeg’s already shaky feet. She had to pause twice on the way up, hanging precariously in the air long enough to regain her breath, which grew ragged now at even the mildest exertion. Éofara would scold you for this, she thought, and she could almost see her husband standing below, holding the ladder steady while shaking his head in bemused disapproval. For Béma’s sake, woman, the phantom Éofara laughed. Nearly eighty years old and you still haven’t learned to ask for a little help when you need it. But there was no one left now to ask, and so she struggled on alone.

The loft was musty and dim, lit only by a few half-hearted shafts of sun that filtered through the dust-laden air. The stables had been unused ever since the last of the horses died without replacement, their expense deemed too steep for a sickly widow who had already given up riding when it became clear she could no longer do it with her old flair. All that remained in the loft now were some mice and a forlorn pile of old hay. Its outer layers were yellow gold and rustled softly as she thrust in a hand, but below the surface the hay quickly proved rotten, the stalks gone slick and black and sour-smelling. A glance up confirmed the cause, a leaky roof whose drip, drip, drip had soaked into the center of the pile and spoiled it slowly from the inside out. 

It was a careless error, one that any conscientious Rohirrim would have quickly noted and fixed long before it could get to this state. Water in my own hay loft, she chided herself. You’re better than that. Or, at least, she had been, back when such everyday work had been her only concern. But the damage was done now, not just to the hay, which was no loss, but to the sword, mail and armor nestled within it. Their metal, once bright as the surface of the Entwash glittering in the sun, lay stained and corroded, the sharp edges dulled and the smooth edges nicked and jagged. The sight of it added a new pain to her chest, an ache of old memories no less beloved for their distance. Late nights on the windswept marches, the warm ringing of horns, songs of battle echoing down a line of charging horses. It was all so long ago, a brief period of her life, but the proudest one nonetheless. And now reduced to so much scrap by years of benign neglect.

How many times had she told herself that this could happen? How often had she thought of hauling all this back down the thin little ladder and storing it safely away inside a cupboard or closet in the house? But space in her home had always been tight, and over the years there had seemed little reason to keep armor easily on hand once her own time as a rider had ended. Béma had only blessed her with a tall, strapping son, one whose courage and spirit were a match for her own but who would never have to hide himself in the guise of another person or struggle to find tools of his trade that were made just to suit him. By the time it became clear that a much wanted sister for Éomund was not to be, Lindmaeg had already made an unhappy peace with the idea that she would be the last shieldmaiden in a line that stretched back longer than the Mark itself, longer than the Éothéod before that, longer than any of the songs and poems could record. Her sword and armor had seen their final charge.

But then had come Éowyn.

**********

Lindmaeg had never really expected that her impulsive, hotheaded Éomund would ever settle down enough to take a wife and start a family of his own, but one day he suddenly announced that he had met his match in the unlikeliest of places: the house of Thengel. Théodwyn’s parentage had not been a point in her favor, as far as Lindmaeg was concerned, but she couldn’t help liking her son’s wife nonetheless. Théodwyn was lively and brash, unconcerned with niceties and decorum. She was the very sort of woman who might have taken up the covert role of shieldmaiden herself if she had not loved her family too much to fully flout her father’s royal will and, later, her brother’s. But her same vibrant nature appeared early in the mind and manner of the daughter she eventually bore, much to Lindmaeg’s great satisfaction.

Even as a tot, Éowyn had torn through the streets of Aldburg, high hearted and fearless. She was as curious as she was restless, always pushing to see, to do, to learn, to lead. Whenever she could, she rode at the front of Éomund’s saddle, straining forward to take the reins even at three years old and whooping with delight when he urged their mount into a reckless gallop across the plains outside the city. Lindmaeg had watched it all, this little body of kindling who caught the spark of both her fiery parents, and thought of the possibilities. She thought of her old armor and the chance that it could yet be pulled from the loft and given new life one day by this scrawny, spirited child who conquered whole kingdoms in her playtime.

Anything seemed possible until that frigid winter’s day when tragedy blew in with the wind and left a once happy home stricken with grief. Éomund’s family unraveled, abruptly and irreparably, over three nightmarish weeks in which the unthinkable happened and then happened all over again. Deprived nearly at once of both her precious son and his wife, Lindmaeg had barely found the strength to contemplate what life would look like now for her grandchildren when a third unthinkable turn arrived in the form of Théoden, who came with condolences and kinds words but also to execute the plan he had already devised on his own. Éomer and Éowyn were to join his household in Edoras. 

Lindmaeg regretted every day after that she hadn’t fought harder that morning to keep them, to see them raised among their father’s people as the pride of Aldburg. But the king had a claim to them as both subjects and kin, and so off they went to new roles and new futures, no longer just the children of her Éomund but of the crown itself. 

She visited when she could, proud but saddened to bear witness to all the little milestones of their lives that her son would never see. Birthdays and Yules, lost teeth and outgrown boots, firsts of many kinds and lasts of others. The children adapted as well as she could hope, but their lives were far different than what she’d always imagined, especially for little Éowyn, and she despaired of the day she would arrive to find that years in Meduseld had trained all the cherished unruliness out of her granddaughter, replacing it instead with useless etiquette and social graces. She could see it in her mind’s eye, the strong-willed, ungentle little girl who rode with abandon turned into a stoic, docile young woman whose part in matters of honor and glory was limited to offering the stirrup cup to her uncle or cousin or brother. She could see it, and she hated it.

It brought only relief, then, to see in time how stubbornly the old Éowyn refused to be pushed entirely aside by the strictures of her new life. She did her prescribed lessons and played her royal part, Lindmaeg could see on her rare trips to Edoras, but it was not from interest or joy. Like a horse that resists the halter, Éowyn’s acquiescence to duty was grudging, and her own will could still be glimpsed in the way that her eyes always wandered away from the quill or embroidery or harp she’d been handed. Her gaze invariably went to the window instead, following her brother to the sparring yard for sword training or her cousin to the garrison where the éoreds of the city ran drills when they weren’t needed for fighting. Her restless spirit, the one that yearned for adventure, esteem and renown, was still there, buried away to escape all but the most attentive notice. The spark still burned, and Lindmaeg had already resolved to herself to fan it into a flame when the healer’s words gave new urgency to the task. 

**********

Getting out of the hay loft proved harder than getting in, and she was utterly exhausted by the time her feet were on the ground once again. Tired out by only a short climb up and down, she thought bitterly. It’s enough to be dying, but must I also become a weakling first?

The walk to the merchant’s quarter was a long one, but she managed to find a neighbor headed that way who would let her ride there in the back of his pony cart. She counted out her coins as they bumped and jostled up the road, knowing it would not pay for the replacement of all that had gone to ruin. Equipment of high quality was dearer than ever, and she would have to content herself with only a single piece for now. Perhaps she’d live long enough to find the money for more, and perhaps not. But she would at least make a start. 

The armorer, an old friend of Éofara’s, smiled broadly when she came through the workshop door. Everyone smiled at her these days, well intentioned looks meant to lift her spirits but which felt instead like being a child patted on the head by a grown up who wanted to console a grief without having to speak about it directly. 

By winter, I’ll be rotting in a barrow, she thought of saying, just to dispense with the awkward sidestepping and coded words for once. I have a task that needs doing, she said instead. 

She handed over her money and described what she wanted, watching closely over the armorer’s shoulder as he sketched out a horse motif as a focal point, surrounded by knotted scrollwork in various patterns and designs. It was beautiful, but not only that. Beauty could already be found in the ceremonial armor of Meduseld, the thin, flimsy replicas worn by queens and princesses and useless for anything but the performance of rite and ritual. That was not what she was paying for now. This piece would have both beauty and strength. Fine lines and thick iron. Graceful curves and practical padding. It would be worthy as a piece of art and a tool of war.

Fit for any shieldmaiden, the armorer said with a satisfied flourish as he finished the last detail of the sketch. Not just any shieldmaiden, she replied. 

**********

It took a month of waiting before his labor was finished and two further weeks before she could contrive a way to Edoras so that she could deliver the gift herself. They were painful days, filled with aches and nausea and bodily indignities large and small, but the promise of that delivery made them all bearable. She waited, traveled, and suffered without complaint, for never would she allow it to be said that she had yielded to something as trifling as physical discomfort.  

She arrived at Meduseld late in the night, a frail, slow moving figure carrying nothing but a rounded bundle wrapped up in an old woolen shawl. Théoden’s grown son bid her welcome, helped her in, urged her to rest, but she had no time anymore for delay. Even the next sunrise no longer felt guaranteed, and she had not come this close to lose her chance forever over a few hours of fitful sleep. She had him show her instead to Éowyn’s door, where he lit a few candles when her tremored hands fumbled the task. His eyes rested long on the bundle she’d brought, a peek of engraved iron shining through a gap in its woolen wrapping once it was bathed in pale yellow light. She caught his stare, meeting it with a look of prideful defiance, but he only smiled in response, a soft, knowing smile that Lindmaeg remembered from his mother’s own kind face. Mustn’t spoil the surprise, he said, tugging on a fold of the fabric until all was hidden again, and then let her in with a wink. 

Éowyn’s room was large and tidy. It looked nothing like the little bedchamber she’d occupied in Aldburg, one that overflowed with maps and muddy boots, makeshift hunting horns crafted of beech bark and resin, and glass jars of fireflies that swirled and blinked in the dark. Instead, this room had silver-handled combs and neatly hung dresses. Leather-bound books lined one wall, and on a desk sat papers with rows of Gondorian script traced out over and over again for practice. Only a line of tiny dragons idly doodled in the corner of the topmost page gave testament to what the mind that had learned that script would rather be thinking about. Lindmaeg ran a finger along the dragon-filled corner with a smile before going to sit at the edge of the bed to rouse her granddaughter.

Éowyn had known enough tragedy to be wary of a relative waking her suddenly in the night, and all the more so when the relative doing the waking had the distinct look of death about her. But she calmed quickly with an embrace, a reassurance, and the promise of a very special gift. She reached eagerly for the shawl-wrapped bundle, but the gift wasn’t just in goods. It was also in words, and she would hear those first.

I think I know your heart, Éowyn, Lindmaeg whispered, and I perceive it to be much like my own. If that’s the case, then I want you to know that it’s alright to want the things you want. It’s in your very blood, which is not just that of Eorl and Helm and Folcwine but also Cynewyn and Hild and Idis. Even humble Lindmaeg. No law can keep you from taking your place in that line. There are those who will help you if you can find them. There are those who will teach you all that you must know, get you the things you’ll need to succeed, support you in the hard times. Those who you can trust to keep this secret. I wish that person could be me, but instead I offer you what I can. May it serve you well when you are ready to wear it.

The woolen wrap fell away from the helmet she held in her hands. It gleamed in the warm glow of the candles, a silvered horse charging over the cap to a filigreed brow band and nose guard as delicately wrought as any fine jewelry and as strong as any wall of stone. 

For me? Éowyn’s words had the same awed amazement as her widened eyes. In secret?

There is greatness in you, answered Lindmaeg. Don’t let them take it. Guard it, protect it, let it grow and spread until it’s in every part of yourself. It is yours to give to the world, and even if the world can’t yet appreciate it, know that I will. Wherever I am, I will see it, my little Dernhelm.

She watched the words slowly sink in and take hold, finding purchase in the girl’s heart and mind, places that were deep enough that they could never be fully dislodged. Lindmaeg thought again of Théodred and his knowing smile, and she wondered if he would be the one to pick up this thread, to be the trusted teacher who would see Éowyn’s journey through to completion. Anything seemed possible now as her granddaughter grinned up at her from beneath her gift, already sitting taller just from pride of ownership. 

Pain lanced through Lindmaeg’s chest with each breath in, but she hardly felt it anymore amidst her overwhelming relief. She had done what most needed doing and could go to her rest now content that her message had been heard. The spark that flared in those little wide eyes would be her one true legacy, the part of her that would remain in the world long past when her own body surrendered to the inevitable. The part of her that would live on to hear the horns of the éoherë ring out again over rolling grasslands and echo through snowy mountain passes. The part that would rise to ride and fight, to taste glory and honor, to serve the only land she had ever called home. The part that would be a shieldmaiden once more. 

Notes:

I think this is all canon-compliant based on what we know of Rohirrim history, Thengel, Éomund, Théodwyn, Éowyn and others, though obviously it’s firmly in HC territory. I have THOUGHTS about Gondorian cultural imperialism and the effect it had on Rohan (intentional and not) that are glanced on here (*hopefully* in a comprehensible way) but I may expand on them via Tumblr post this weekend because it turns out I had more to say on the matter than I anticipated!