this bird, my soul

The first time they meet, the Steward of Gondor is so stiff, so painstakingly awkwardly formal, that Zinat comes away thinking him cold and haughty—it is only decorum that keeps her smile demure and pleasant, even as the Steward stumbles through the traditional Haradi greetings like they pain him, immediately turning away to speak to his brother.

(He speaks Haradi worse than the tongueless beggars outside the palace, her handmaid says that night, while brushing out Zinat’s hair. Zinat presses her fingers to her lips, but cannot keep the laughter in—she and her maid laugh until Zinat is breathless, giddy. It is the lightest she has felt since she watched Umbar vanish over the waves.)

So Gondor makes Harad welcome and Zinat makes stilted, labored conversation with a Lord Steward who so clearly thinks her unworthy of it. They are thrust together at feasts and hunting parties, always beneath the watchful eye of Zinat’s lord brother, or King Elessar. No one so much as whispers the word marriage, but it hangs heavy in the air, a leaden yolk with the weight resting between Zinat’s shoulders.

Sometimes, she looks to the Prince of Ithilien and thinks she sees his shoulders hunched under the same weight.

(He is not…displeasing to look upon, her lady-in-waiting remarks once, as they walk through the white, white halls of the White Tower. You must admit that the lord prince has a fair and noble face.

The face of the mountain is fair and noble too, Zinat replies. She finds herself missing the red sandstone of the palace at Umbar, which was not so smooth and cold beneath her hands. It does not mean I wish to build my home on the rocks.)

She hears the whispers too, of course--encourages them, especially from her maids and ladies, who move about the halls of Minas Tirith with less scrutiny, hearing what is said in places Zinat cannot go. She learns from her lady cousin that all the court might love Boromir, but it knows Lord Faramir to be the wiser counsel (if more stubborn, difficult to win over.) From a maid she hears that the lord steward is wracked by screaming nightmares, the legacy of the war and the ring he once helped bear. Some nights he does not sleep at all.

He has no lovers or bastards she can discover, but every soldier and guard in Minas Tirith speaks of him as almost a god.

(She's pleased by what she hears--she had feared lech or a fool, a warmonger or a drunk. Or worse, a husband who was only a figurehead, an empty concession to Harad and a weight around Zinat's ankles. She is not certain if knowing the lord Boromir a good man makes it easier or harder that he still speaks to her like a bothersome servant.)

Her lord brother wishes to know if she gives her consent. Winter is coming, and the Bay of Belfalas becomes treacherous even for Harad's ships. Her brother needs an answer.

One night she cannot sleep, and slips from her rooms. After some aimless wandering she finds herself at one of Minas Tirth’s many balconies—only to discover she is not alone. The lord steward, first Prince of Ithilien is there, lazing on large chunk of stone. (They litter Minas Tirith still, reminders of a war too lately ended.) He is dressed like one of the guards, and singing—she does not know enough of the common speech to make it out, but it is slow and sad.

There is a bottle in his hand, and another, empty, at his feet.

This is about when the lord steward notices her presence, and jerks upright, the song dying on his lips. Lady, he greets her stiffly, before falling silent once more.

Zinat fists her hands so tightly she is afraid she will draw blood.

Do you find me wanting, my lord steward? she asks lowly, all her anger at this forbidding place with its pale, proud men rushing out at once. Have I displeased you in some way I do not know? Have I not been courteous enough, flattering enough—paid you deference, made myself amenable enough to you and your king and your land? Have I not been the very picture of a willing captive?

Princess--

Because if have not, then tell me, tell me how I can please so implacable, so proud a man that he will neglect his duty—or did you think this union did not bind us both equally?

The silence that follows her declaration is deafening.

You have my apologies, princess, the lord steward says finally, sounding sincere despite the slur to his voice. His eyes are very pale in the starlight. My brother—he got all the fair speech and pretty manners. Your lot is to be saddled with a soldier-husband, who loves the sword better than poetry, and—cannot seem to find his way from beneath the shadow of the east. I am sure you sought such in a husband. You have my pity, may it keep you warm at night.

The bitter humor in his voice makes her stop, siphons the poison from her. and Zinat—Zinat lowers herself to sit beside him on the white stone of the white tower. Will you be a cruel husband? she asks quietly, studying his face.

No, the Lord Boromir says, squinting at her as though uncertain whether to be offended.

Will you beat me, or force your way into my bed?

She has certainly offended him now, and he draws himself up. Never!

Will you honor other women above me, raising your children by them above ours? Will you make me an object of gossip and scorn in the marketplace? Will you waste our fortunes on drink, or women, or games of chance, such that I must hide my face, and deny you as my husband?

No, he says, more gently this time. No, I swear to you, my lady, I will not.

Will…she swallows, Will you allow me light, and space—to have women about me whom I choose, to go where it please me, and to do as I will, trusting that I would never bring upon you dishonor?

You shall have that and more, he says, and his voice is most serious of all. Lady, I swear it upon my honor, I would never master you.

Then you are exactly what I seek in a husband, Zinat says. Gently, she takes the Lord Boromir’s hands, feeling the roughness of his palms, the broadness of his knuckles. She can be a soldier’s wife.

I offer my word too, she says after a moment of thought. I swear upon my name, as Zinat Padshah Begum of the House of Verethragna, daughter of the Emperor and sister to Yuvraj Kaveh, that I will bear you strong sons and fair daughters, as befits the House of Hurin. I will never bring you shame or dishonor, nor give you cause to regret our union. I will…I will be a good wife, a soldier's wife.

The Lord Boromir, she discovers, does not appear so grave and proud when he smiles.

That next day, Zinat dresses herself in pearls and gold, and walks into the great hall on the Lord Boromir's arm. Taking a seat beside her brother, she says simply, I consent.

(Her husband’s wedding present to her are rooms with tall, arching windows and clear-swept floors of wood, not stone. They are yours alone, he says, and his smile makes his grey eyes almost warm. I promised you light and space and a place beyond mastery; consider this a beginning.

Zinat does not love the Lord Boromir then, but she feels a great swell of affection that may become it, in time.)

They spend the winter in Emyn Arnen, with the lord Faramir and his pale Rohirric bride. Zinat wears her qabas everywhere, shivering in the damp, heavy cold that is so different from the cool green that follows the rainy season in Umbar. At least the lord Faramir and lady Eowyn are pleasant company, warm in their own ways and curious about her life, about the ways of Harad. She discovers that Eowyn slaughtered the Raja-sahargo on the battlefield, and now she is a healer; Zinat tells her about all the Haradi herbs for healing, promises that she will ask their healers' medical scrolls. Faramir is very much Boromir's brother, and their playful arguments and fireside storytelling and sparring in the courtyard mark the passing of the days.

Her husband takes her riding in the snow, and waits to be invited to her bed at night. Zinat's heart is in Harad, always in Harad, but she is happier than she ever thought she would be.

But spring comes, and the snows melt. King Elessar calls for his counselors, and so they come. The court of Gondor is strange to Zinat—there is no zenana, no place for the women to gather together; the food is heavy and tasteless. She pretends not to understand Sindarin when her new ladies-in-waiting whisper about her dark skin, the perverted, polluted Numenorean line that runs so in her blood; she pretends not to notice the way the other women of the court eye her dress, the bright colors and fine-picked veils that she has refused to surrender for the heavy, dark-dyed broadcloth so popular among them.

She suffers through many, many recitations of Beren and Luthien before she pins her husband down one night and forces him to listen to her recitation of Layla and Majnun. you realize I still don’t speak Haradi? he interrupts with an indulgent smile.

Shhh, she says. We are coming to the good part.

(She recites it for him again and again when nightmares of the war keep him awake, and again one night when his screaming can be heard all the way from her rooms. She rushes to his side with poetry on her tongue and he calls her Layla Layla Layla, burying his face in her shift like she is his last refuge.

This, if you were wondering, is when Zinat finally loves him.)