Hinge of Despair

Éowyn hated Harrowdale - she always had. Grima Wormtongue had come from Harrowdale, and sometimes she wondered if that was what had twisted him so.  The shadow of the Dead seemed to lie about the land, and she did not doubt that it could ravage the heart.  Had she not seen it?

Yet when Aragorn had come to Dunharrow, she had ceased to feel that shadow.  For moments she had been happy, glad to see him and his men, glad to house them and care for them, glad to help him in some small way.  What a child she had been – her happiness had not lasted.

The men had gone to parley with Saruman, an endeavour that seemed to her pointless.  Yet her opinion mattered little, and so she had led the women and children to Dunharrow.  They followed her without question – she had won their loyalty in the caves of Helm’s Deep.  When they had arrived she had seen the folk settled, and then she had waited.  For two days she had paced the ground at Dunharrow, desperate to hear word of her kin.

On the evening of the second day Aragorn had arrived, with a whole host of men at his back, and Legolas and Gimli at his right hand.  She had been glad… No, she had been joyful to see him.  Dunharrow was buried deep in the White Mountains, and she had felt cut off from the wind and the sky, surrounded by the unfamiliar peaks.  When she had seen him, somehow she had been reassured that she was not forgotten by the world outside; some knew that Éowyn lived still, though she was hidden in deep shadow.

Éowyn had seen the eyes of the women following them, and yet she had only been able to look at Aragorn.  Ragged though he was, when he looked at her, she could feel something within her answering a call - her blood thrilled when he was near He could ask her to follow him to the very ends of Middle-Earth and she would follow.  This knowledge left her breathless, and almost a little afraid. She felt close to him, and yet she did not know him. Stranger he might be, but he was not strange; he was a thing higher and nobler than any she had yet known.

And yet, when that great host had ridden into Harrowdale, she had not deluded herself.  In her vague fancies Aragorn would have ridden so far and so fast merely from a desire to see her face and hear her voice.  But it was not so, she had known it could not be so.  And yet, and she stifled a sob at the thought, it had never struck her that he would come to Dunharrow for so dreadful an aim as the Paths of the Dead.  All who walked those paths were lost to the darkness; and so it would be with him.  Another good man dead.

She pleaded with him not to travel the evil paths, or if he must, to let her ride in his following.  She could not bear to think of him riding away in the morning, knowing what fate lay ahead of him.  He refused, and for a moment she saw herself through his eyes – a lovesick child, thirsting for battle – and almost despised herself; but she rejected that judgement. She wasn’t like that. 

Later she stood by the window, and looked out at the sky.  The moon was riding high above the clouds – she had always loved the moon. Boromir of Gondor had told her of Ithilien, the moonland, and she had dreamt of living in that fair country.  That dream had passed away in the long dark of Théoden’s enchantment; now that very country that she had once pinned her dreams upon was under threat, and she could not even help in its deliverance. She must wait, and prepare food and beds for the few who survived the carnage.  No one dreamed that her heart strained to be gone from this place, that it beat in her breast like a terrified bird at the thought of the days and weeks she must wait to hear if any had survived.  Éomer might lie dead on the field of battle while she argued with the seneschal about cheese.

A footstep behind her alerted her to someone’s presence.  It was Aragorn.  She turned away, not wanting to see his face, not wanting to be reminded of what she knew she could not have.  He came close behind her, and spoke, “My lady, I would not have you think that I doubt your abilities or your strength.  I truly believe that your place is here, not wasted on the battlefield. You are a symbol for all of Rohan to follow

She turned to him and said quietly, “I can’t be a symbol.  Would you have me stand by and watch while you all die?  Must I feel nothing?  Must I do nothing, when I have the strength and the skill?  When I trained for battle since I was a girl?”   She stepped away from him to look at the moon once more “I have lost much to this war.  I have given everything.  Would you have me stay quiet and still while what little there is left is lost to me also?  I can not do it.” 

He said nothing.  Always before he had understood her instantly, without any further explanation on her part, and yet now he would not meet her eyes.  She wanted to make him see, and so she said in truth, “It’s killing me.”  Yet still he would not look at her and she realised that he did understand. 

But he would do nothing.  He said haltingly, “Your duty binds you, my lady.”  And then of all things, she saw pity in his eyes as he turned away.

She felt the desperation swell within her, tensing her muscles, closing her throat.  She could not stand under such weight – she could not bear it.  She could not see or hear anything – she was bound within her own head.  Never had she felt so confined, so tight within her own body.  Everything inside her ached, and all she wanted was to be oblivious.  She wanted to be free of the dreadful space that bound her to the earth and to herself; if she could be free of it then she might find happiness.

Her throat felt tight, as though a strong pair of hands were slowly crushing it.  She was straining to breathe, one hand bracing her chest while the other scraped against the pillar beside her.  She could not get a grip, she could not hold on to anything.  She could hear her nails scraping against wood and the dreadful rasp of her breath but nothing else.  She was alone, unutterably alone.  Yet she could not escape the aching dark within her – there was no sweet swoon to rescue her.  There was nothing to rescue her.

At that thought something in her shattered, and she turned and strained her arms against one of the pillars, pushing against it as hard as she could, until her muscles collapsed and her breath came in gasps.  She stared at her palms for several minutes; callused and strong, they were not the hands of a Gondorian or Elvish noblewoman. 

She heard the footsteps of two men cross the hall behind her and awoke from her reverie.  She squared her shoulders, lifting her head high and walked stiffly to her chambers.  Something dreadful wanted to claw its way out of her mouth but she clenched her teeth against it.  No good could come of giving it life.

She sat on her soft bed, laid her head on the pillows; but there was to be no rest for her that night, though she ached for it.

Aragorn had asked her to arm the halfling who was esquire to the King.  She had laughed to herself at the irony – she was fitting a halfling for battle, while she must wait quietly in the house. It had taken much searching but she had found armour and a light shield.  She had shown them to the hobbit, and had seen the light shine in his eyes.  He did not wish to be left behind either

Yet she had not found armour only for him: in her room there lay now a chain-mail shirt and helmet. One last duty remained before she could call herself ready for battle, and so she sat and cleaned her sword.  The cloth slit smoothly up the blade, beautiful silver-blue steel that made the weapon a thing of beauty.  She smiled to see it.  It would do very well.

She would no longer be a face without a heart – she would ride behind her Uncle and defend him.  Perhaps her life might earn some value before it came to its end.  Her people did not need her in Dunharrow.  Their headwomen controlled everything; she was just the lady of the hall, filling her belly with food that could be eaten by others, taking service that could be put to better use.  She would go and do something that might be of use to them.