particularly beautiful neck, isn't it, slim and alabaster white."
Aragorn turned. The wizard seemed to consider whether to speak his mind.
"Just say what you think, Gandalf!" Sighed Aragorn. Gandalf hesitated a moment longer, then asked calmly: “You love her, don't you?” Aragorn just nodded.
"Well, who could blame you, my friend," Gandalf went on slowly, while his gaze rested on Éowyn, who lay quiet and white in her bed, "She is beautiful, the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in mine Life that has now lasted three hundred generations.At least the most beautiful as far as mortals are concerned. When did one ever see such magnificent eyes! Songs would have to be written about it! "After a moment, the old wizard went on more seriously, grinning a little at his own enthusiasm:" And if you ask me, her kind of beauty touches a man's heart even more deeply than that of immortals. It appears to me like a flower in spring, which bravely and proudly asserts itself against the last harsh breath of winter, with a strong will and full of fire, and yet delicate and vulnerable - not inviolably beautiful, beautiful and adorable, but as distant as the stars.
And yet how high and noble she is among mortals, for the blood of Númenor flows in her as unadulterated as in you. She is a daughter of kings, and there is more bravery, courage, spirit and boldness in her than in many sons of kings. I saw the eyes of every man, whether elf, dwarf or human, shine near her, and, "he looked Aragorn searchingly in the eye," she has chosen you, my friend. ""Everything you say about her is so in my heart. Your eye looks deeply. But I made a promise to another, Gandalf, long ago and with all my soul. And she is ready to give up everything for me, hers Immortality! "Sighing, he buried his face in his hands for a moment:" Truly, nothing is more cruel and shameful for a man's heart and honor than to meet two such women and love both of them. "
"You have resisted for a long time, that much may apply to your honor. I have seen it. But now I advise you to explore your heart. And ask yourself," added Gandalf slowly, "in whose life your love would do more harm than she may be able to outweigh it in the end. "With that, he went out.

As the evening wore on, Eowyn awoke from dark, haunted dreams. Her eyes were veiled with pain and fever that it took Aragorn profoundly. "Éowyn," he spoke to her in a soft, low voice, "what can I do to relieve your pain?Do you want to drink? "
Her beautiful eyes found his gaze. They were sea gray, dark as the sea in a storm. And he saw that in them the proud coolness, once the mask of their despair, had given way to a new, delicious, sad gentleness. Then his heart fell completely into her.
And Eowyn saw a solemn, tender softness come into his gaze, and in spite of her great pain she felt astonished that her bitter winter was now passing and giving way to spring.
"My lord Aragorn," she asked with difficulty, "what are you staying here and not in battle?"
"The battle is over. We have won - for today," he replied gently.
"Then there are certainly brave warriors to be looked after who need your healing skills."
"You are taken care of, Éowyn, and sleep. And my place is with the one whose courage and valor outshines their deeds like the sun outshines the stars." kissed her hand."But what am I talking about your bravery, mistress, while you are in pain!" He continued, and the tender pity in his voice made her heart beat faster. He handed her a mug and his hand gently examined her feverish forehead. She drank and closed her eyes for a moment, exhausted, not daring to ask or say what she felt emerging between them. And her heart trembled as to whether he would go because she was taken care of for the moment or whether he would stay. And Aragorn sat in silence by her bed and was absorbed in the sight of her beautiful, still, pale face.
Then she opened her eyes again and asked him: "Do you want to stay a moment, Aragorn, if your duties allow it, only until I fell asleep? I think my dreams will not be so dark then." Her voice was now that of a young, sad girl, pressed by pain that was painfully borne, and touched him deeply.
"It would be an honor and an even greater pleasure for me, beautiful Lady von Rohan, if you would allow me to do so.Because words cannot describe how glad I am that you have been saved and how good it is for me to see you recovered. ", he replied with a smile, but she saw in his eyes what great fear and worry he had suffered for her.
Then she fell asleep and no longer sank into dark dreams of death and the horror she had suffered as before, and in the morning her pain and fever began to subside.

But Aragorn stayed by her bed until late at night, so that Legolas came to warn him in a friendly manner that he had to sleep.
With the deep understanding of the Elves he saw what was going on in the friend, and after looking at Eowyn for a moment, he said softly, so as not to wake the sleeper: "She is truly beautiful, Aragorn, beautiful and golden and knows how my noble sisters in Lórien. And I feel that she would do your heart good as you do hers, for both of your hearts and souls are of the same kind. "
"Yes, it is, Legolas.I feel like I've always known her. It was like that when I met her for the first time and recognized the despair, but even greater bravery in her. But my heart was already bound and still is. "
Legolas looked at the friend for a moment as if trying to say what he was thinking. "Aragorn," he said then, "is your heart really still in Rivendell as it once was? Hasn't it long since decided in favor of this beautiful shieldmaiden?"
"The realization that I love her is too new to be able to answer this with a clear conscience. But regardless of that, how do I manage to break Arwen's heart?"
"And would you? Mortals can never measure what is going on in the soul of an elf like members of their kind. And so I tell you, my friend, for your consolation, I know it will not break her heart would, even if it would sadly sadden her for a while.The wisdom of countless experienced winters has taught her that everything in life comes and goes, changes, even love.She can accept her fate more calmly than mortals and draw joy and new hope from the future. But how much more desperate her lot would be in the end if she stayed here with you while her people sail west, had to give up their gift and one day lost you to death long before their own end. "

Aragorn moved these words for a long time in his heart.

The next day the great council of war was held to decide how the attack on the Black Gate should proceed. And when it was long past noon, it was finally decided that first of all scouts were to be dispatched in a hurry to report on Sauron's preparations for battle, while Gondor and Rohan were to begin setting up their armies for battle.
And so Aragorn could not go to Eowyn that morning, although he longed to see her. And again and again his thoughts wandered to her, and in his mind's eye he saw her lying on her sick bed in her fragile beauty and wished very much that the deliberations would be over soon so that he could go to her.After the council of war was over, he immediately hurried to her and found her awake and her eyes no longer so veiled by fever and pain, but rather clear and unclouded. And yet she was very tired and exhausted, so that he cautiously stepped up to her bed and asked softly: "Will you, mistress, allow me to stay here for a moment to find out how you are?"
She nodded, smiling, and gestured for him to take a seat next to her bed, but then she looked down as if ashamed and was silent for a moment. Then she looked him in the eye and said softly: "I must have behaved very despondently and pitifully when I was lying here under the influence of these black dreams in the last few days, and how weak you must have found me, sir. Me I am very ashamed of it. ”And again she lowered her eyes.
Aragorn shook his head softly and shouted: "Éowyn, brave Éowyn, please look at me! Don't look down ashamed! Don't you know how strong you are?Truly, I have seldom met anyone so far, whether man or woman, who was as strong-willed and brave as you, and in whom I recognized such inner strength. Someone with whom these gifts would have been less developed than you would have succumbed to this terrible black breath long ago. Because many warriors, great, strong men, to whom the same thing happened to you, have already died under my hands in these houses because they did not have your strength in them. I know these Black Riders and they are horrific! But I have never met them on those terrible winged creatures and I doubt that I would have found the courage to face them. "
She interrupted him with a laugh: "You won't seriously make me believe that, Aragorn!"
But he replied seriously: "But yes! And what luck that I did not have to test myself on them, like you did. Because nobody really knows how great his courage is until he has to prove it."Then he looked at her with a strange smile and spoke even more gently than before: "Why are you so strict with yourself, Éowyn?"
A shadow passed over her face for a fleeting moment as she remembered her loneliness and impotent despair in the bitter times of the King's bewitchment, and she replied softly, "If I am really too strict on myself as you say, so then probably because I would hardly have been able to get through the last bitter years of my life without it. To have to watch impotently as Rohan, my beloved homeland, crumbles, sunk as never before in its glorious history, because his king, whom I love like one Father, the devilish influences of these sorcerers could not resist and they fell for more day by day. To be forced to inactivity because my people would never have recognized a woman as his king's proxy. "
She paused and after a moment continued to speak more calmly: "Now you find me complaining