Nov 30:  Succession (TA 3019, August, Edoras, Rohan)

He laid faithful Guthwine on the table and reached for the other weapon that lay there.  His calloused fingers trembled as they closed around the hilt of the sword, and he felt the regard of those who watched from the halls of his longfathers.  The leather wrapping, the wire, the jewels, the runes that proclaimed the blade’s name; he took hold of the history of his bloodline in his hands. 

Uncle, may I bear your sword with honor. 

Éomer raised up Herugrim before him, and turned to face the people--his people--gathered under Meduseld’s golden roof.

“Westu Eomer hal!”

A/N:  And so NaQuaWriMo comes to an end.  It's been great fun coming up with a drabble each day, despite all sorts of things interfering.  While we didn't get all the way to the Dagor Dagorath, I hope that my little episodes throughout the various eras of Arda were enjoyable and, perhaps, touched your heart in one way or another. 

This drabble is really a speculative imagining of Eomer's coronation. Although he was King of the Mark immediately upon Theoden's death, Tolkien never seems to have assigned an official coronation date for him.  I read a fanfic relatively recently that proposed that Eomer's kingship couldn't be confirmed until Theoden was properly buried in the barrow mounds at Edoras, and so I placed this moment of confirmation taking place after the funeral but before the Hobbits set of for Rivendell and the Shire.  Maybe I'll expand on it (or other drabbles in this collection) in the future.  Or maybe I'll leave them as they are--moments that tell their own story and hopefully inspire other stories in you, the reader.