She would become a queen, adored by the world and untouched by her past.Īnd then her fragile dream was snatched away. She allowed herself to believe that he would take her away from her unhappiness to a place of glory. Briefly a door opened into her inner darkness and the glorious light that is Aragorn shone into her heart. At least in part she regards herself as a woman from “a thatched barn where brigands drink in the reek, and their brats roll on the floor among their dogs”.
The years of hopeless misery in the halls of Théoden as he became a shrivelled figure dominated by the whispering of Wormtongue have left their mark upon her. She has not said the great “Yes!” of her life to the dark.īut her soul is in danger. Happily this is not the path that Éowyn has taken. Sauron has made his choice and it is fixed for ever.
Why would we want to be unhappy, to choose thoughts of darkness, even to seek out death? Why would we choose to build defences against the light, using all our strength to try to keep it out? There are some, like Sauron, who have chosen the dark, believing that the light is some small, temporary and fragile thing that must ultimately fail against the overwhelming power that is darkness.
