There was silence as night began to fall on the beautiful walled city of Minas Tirith. Within its fortified stone tiers the many citizens were beginning to return to their homes. Evening came swiftly, and sleep was hard to come by in times like these.

Except for one.
She sat alone in the courtyard of stone, where the remains of the once-
proud white tree of Gondor still stood, watching the many small firelights going out in the massive expanse below her. She allowed her feet to dangle over the edge and the cool night air caught in her chestnut-brown hair. The sensation was like fingertips across her skin, and it made her smile.

“Isn’t that dangerous?” A voice stirred her from her splendid oblivion, and she met the eyes of the younger son of the Steward, Faramir, Captain and Ranger of Ithilien. For how long he had observed her, she did not know, but she was pleased all the more by his company. It seemed so common that she longed for him.

“Come, sit with me.” She motioned to her side and he gladly sat beside her. The wind played with his shoulder-length hair, and it played about his face. The woman watched his visage with great curiosity, and a smile tugged at her lips once more. His face was so beautiful and compassionate, though it was also sad. “Tell me, son of Gondor, what is on your mind?”

He sighed deeply, an empty, resounding noise that seemed to issue from his very depths. His eyes sparkled, perhaps from unwanted tears, but the woman was unable to discern if he indeed was crying or not. “I long for my brother, but he will not be returning.”

“Proud Boromir has fallen, and now Gondor has his brother to lean upon,” she spoke softly.

“I can’t handle that burden. I can’t.”

She watched him again, his sadness almost overwhelming to behold, and in comfort, she placed her delicate hand upon his cheek. “Perhaps you are not the warrior of the sword like your brother,” she spoke kindly, and momentarily his eyes met hers. They was soft and darkened by his emptiness. Her heart longed to fill that emptiness with love. There was so much that he had to be proud of, and yet his spirit wavered, and very few now appreciated his sacrifice. “But you are a different kind of warrior, I think. You are a warrior of the heart. And that holds so much strength.”

He smiled, perhaps false, perhaps true, but all the same he was thankful for the words. “Thank you, fair maiden.” He tried to stand, but she reached out her hand and held onto him.

“Don’t go,” she pleaded. “Stay the night with me. Perhaps I can ease your pain.”

He did not pull away but pulled her to him, this unknown beauty that seemed to understand so much. The wind seemed to pull both of them into a strange and longing embrace, and they held it, it seemed, for an eternity. “How can I thank you?” he spoke softly, hushed, with bright intensity. His eyes met hers again, and the two visages remained locked on one another.

“Just stay -” was all she could say to him, and so stay he did. They stood together in the light of the stars, and holding each other in the darkness of an empty night. Dawn was just beginning to tint the surface of Middle Earth in shades of violet, red and magenta when Faramir began to stir from an empty yet blissful sleep. He was saddened to find that there was no woman beside him, nor anywhere he could see. His eyes searched the courtyard, but whoever the beautiful stranger had been, she had comforted him and held him and left without a trace.

In lonely contemplation he tread to the edge of the precipice, the glowing city below him just beginning to stir to life, and as he watched the tiny forms come to life miles below him, he felt the sensation of warm hands around his waist. His eyes surveyed the area, but there was no one; only the warm embrace about him and the sensation of breath upon his body.

Its what kept him from leaping.