The danger of Éowyn's paleness is this: when she flushes, it is visible too readily, and impossible to hide. She does not draw away, though, and her fingers curl around Mercutio's, her tone lowering in habituated secrecy, as though this were not the most justified place and time to speak of such things.

"I cannot say what I would have, knowing neither. But when I have dreamed of love, it has rarely been gentle." She bites her lip, trying not to blush more deeply, because this is something she has never spoken of aloud. Who would she have said such things to? What ladies-maid or noble vassal could she confide in, what friend admit to - admit even that she had dreamed of anything so base, much less its details? "I have never wished to be treated as a maiden, delicate and fair, to be tenderly touched on satin sheets. I am a warrior, and I would sooner be loved as one; and in my dreams I have tussled and strained beneath an open sky, and triumphed or been overcome, and treated as gently as warriors treat one another upon the road. And that is all; a score of years have I played gentle maid and treated with soft words and delicacy, and variety is all that I seek, but it will not be found in gentleness."