It might be interesting in this thread to contrast the assertiveness of Aragorn regarding his royal rights, particularly from the time he declares his identity to Eomer and his men, with the mostly quiet and understated nature of his love for Arwen, as far as we can read in the main text of
LotR.
There is, in my opinion, only one serious indication of what is going on in the text, which is after the Fellowship reach Lothlórien, when they are on the hill of Cerin Amroth:
At the hill's foot Frodo found Aragorn, standing still and silent as a tree, but in his hand was a small golden bloom of elanor, and a light was in his eyes. He was wrapped in some fair memory: and as Frodo looked at him he knew that he beheld things as they once had been in this same place. For the grim years were removed from the face of Aragorn, and he seemed clothed in white, a young lord tall and fair; and he spoke with words in the Elvish tongue to one whom Frodo could not see. Arwen vanimelda, namarië! he said, and then he drew a breath, and returning out of his thought he looked at Frodo and smiled.
'Here is the heart of Elvendom on earth', he said, 'and here my heart dwells ever, unless there be a light beyond the dark roads that we still must tread, you and I. Come with me!' And taking Frodo's hand in his, he left the hill of Cerin Amroth and came there never again as living man.
It's clear that the reader has seen Aragorn as a man in love, and that the beloved is Arwen; so when the reader reads of their marriage after the War is won, and Aragorn crowned, it is not a surprise.
It was only when I read that passage recently that I thought the comparison of Aragorn '
standing still and silent as a tree' was quite appropriate for the context of someone in Lothlórien.
However, the true meaning of Cerin Amroth for Aragorn and Arwen is only seen by the reader in Appendix A, I(v) of
LotR, dealing with
The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen.
In that
Tale, Aragorn, after being told of his true identity when 20, fell in love with Arwen. Nearly 3 decades later, when 49, after many adventures and experiences, he came to Lothlórien, when Arwen was also living there, unknown to him at the time, with her maternal grandparents:
But Aragorn was grown to full stature of body and mind, and Galadriel [Arwen's grandmother] bade him cast away his wayworn rainment, and she clothed him in silver and white, with a cloak of elven-grey and bright gem on his brow. Then more than any kind of Men he seemed, and seemed rather an Elf-lord from the Isles of the West. And thus it was that Arwen first beheld him again after their long parting; and as he came walking toward her under the trees of Caras Galadhon laden with flowers of gold, her choice was made and her doom appointed.
In plain English, she fell in love with Aragorn.
For '
a season' the two of them '
wandered together' in the glades of Lothlórien, till it was time for Aragorn to depart. On Cerin Amroth, they '
plighted their troth and were glad'. That hill was where they became engaged. It was only fair for this to take a season to happen. Choosing mortality to be with the man you love is no easy choice to make...
After Aragorn died, the
Tale tells that Arwen returned to Lothlórien, where she died on Cerin Amroth, and where she is buried.