Favourite Tolkien quotes➝ Gilraen to Aragorn (Appendix A, LotR)
After a few years Gilraen took leave of Elrond and returned to her own people in Eriador, and lived alone; and she seldom saw her son again, for he spent many years in far countries. But on a time, when Aragorn had returned to the North, he came to her, and she said to him before he went:
"This is our last parting, Estel, my son. I am aged by care, even as one of lesser Men; and now that it draws near I cannot face the darkness of our time that gathers upon Middle-earth. I shall leave it soon."
Aragorn tried to comfort her, saying: “Yet there may be a light beyond the darkness; and if so, I would have you see it and be glad.”
But she answered only with this linnod: Ónen i-Estel Edain, ú-chebin estel anim, and Aragorn went away heavy of heart. Gilraen died before the next spring.