As with all my short (super short, in this case) pieces, this just sort of popped into my head and wrote itself. You may hate it, you may love it. I certainly had no part in it *points at Eowymuse*, it was all Eowyn, and her love and passion and need for our favorite Ranger.

Disclaimer: If I don't own Harry Potter, Labyrinth, LOST, Inkheart, Final Fantasy VII or Twilight, what are the chances of me owning Lord Of The Rings?

She needs him because he is strong, and she is not. She needs him because he has greatness, power, coursing through his blood, and she does not. She needs him because he--it doesn't matter why she needs him. She does, and that is enough.

But that is a contradiction, anyway. With Aragorn, it is never enough. He whispers to her, in the dark. Their bodies are heaving and naked and warm, even against the cold stone floor of the Golden Hall, or on the frosty furs of her bed, and he is all she can see, but he is all she ever sees, and she wonders how long he will stay with her, thrusting into her and caressing her. It's never long, and it is never enough.

He has this way of looking at her, but she knows he's really searching for the face of his fair Elf, of the one who gave him the jeweled necklace. But then she wonders if that is her own paranoia, if that is what she knows he should be seeing. She cannot help loving him, needing him, lusting for him, but she knows that if he had it his way, she would leave him alone. He is a man, battle-hardened and ready for anything that lay ahead, but he has inherit weakness, because of what he is. Eowyn is that weakness, and she relishes in it, because it is the only thing, the only power, she has over him.

She should surrender it, she knows. It isn't right, and it isn't fair--to Aragorn or his Elf maiden. And it isn't fair to herself, to her heart. Carrying on this way has led to disaster, has led to loving Aragorn and wishing and hoping to be his queen, his wife, something besides, something more, than just his lover.

She can feel him in her soul, inside of her, feel him penetrate deeper into herself with each thrust of his hips, with each hurried kiss and pleading look. She prays for him to stay, silently begs him to, but she can tell that each day, each hour, he is farther away from her. There are wars to be fought, enemies to overcome, men to save, land to resow and rebuild...the list is endless of things that Middle Earth requires, that her people and his people need to survive, but if he would just give of himself, give himself to her, she could go without everything else--the food and the shelter and the horses and anything else that belongs to her, to her uncle, to Rohan.

She just can't give Aragorn up. She's tried it, you know. She's tired living without his moans and the roughness of his beard on her chest, on her stomach, between her legs. She's tried to live without his strength, without his eyes that reflect the sadness and deceit of not only his own actions, but those of his ancestors. But it was no good, because her body, her womanhood and her heart and her soul, they all bled for him. They mourned for him, for his touch and his minstrations, for his embrace and the tenor of his voice and the smell of his pipe and the taste of wine on his lips and tongue.

So she won't give him up, because there is nothing to be gained from it. There is nothing but lonliness and heartache in a world without her king, without her Aragorn, and she will not tread that path until she absolutely has to. And who knows? Perhaps he is right, and his Elf was sailing away, far away from this world and into her own, into the Grey Havens, never to return. And Aragorn wouldn't go after her, not with the survivors of the impending wars depending on him, will he? No, of that she is sure. If there is one thing Aragorn isn't, it is selfish. Although that may seem odd, as he is carrying on an affair with the daughter of the king of Rohan, even when he has given his heart to another, Aragorn knows that Eowyn needs him. She burns for him, burns because of him, and he will not take that away from her, not when he knows it is what is holding her, holding the stitches of her mind and of her sanity, together. Those stitches are already frayed and damaged and worn thin, and about to break, to tear, but Aragorn, slowly, has fixed her, and is still fixing her.

It is a foolish thing to depend on somebody else for your own well being, and though Eowyn knows this better than most, she ignores it, side-steps it. Because relying on Aragorn is one of the easiest things she has ever done. It almost requires no thought, it is automatic. And though the reprecussions will be (or are; she doesn't really know, nor does she really care) of epic porpotions, she simply turns to her lord and unfastens the top of her dress, baring herself for him to see, to take.

Because she can't live without him, or give him up. She knows it means heartbreak, but Aragorn has always been worth the pain.