He hadn't seen her for sixty years.
She'd been banished at the time of the Dragon. A troublemaker; that's what she was. Asking to join the Spider-watch. Trailing around after his son like a little, sad shadow. Disobeying orders. Daring to feel love and tenderness for a Dwarf. Love! Even after all they'd suffered at the time, all they were suffering now, the Elvenking couldn't say he'd ever felt love for a Dwarf. Pity, perhaps. That was about as far as his emotions could stretch. As for tenderness... Something painful gnawed deep within Thranduil's breast. Memories of his son, clear as waking sight, drifted before his eyes. Legolas. His boy. He'd set out for Rivendell in summer and never come back. And now it seemed that the whole world would be devoured in flame and shadow. Where in Middle-earth was he? Was he even alive?
#
They had come to bring him news, that first day. The day she returned. Scouts from the perimeters of the Realm, quivers at their backs and despair in their eyes.
"Sire," they said. "Mirkwood burns."
It was the news he had been dreading these months. The Host of Mordor had come. Neither the power of Vilya nor of Nenya had been able to prevent it. The Woodland Realm was ended. There was no way they could win back against such reckless hatred. The Men of Dale and the Dwarves of Erebor had their own battles to fight. And Thranduil had forsworn all other alliances.
In the last age, alliance led to death, he thought. Now lack of alliance will do the same thing. His arms ached to hold his son one last time. To tell him all the things he'd been unable to say. Namarië, Legolas, he thought. May your end be better than mine.
"What are your orders, Sire?" The scouts asked.
Thranduil simply sighed.
That was when the forest rangers had arrived. A slender figure was being frogmarched between two of them, eyes glittering, hair like autumn leaves.
"We caught her entering by the secret way," they said.
The she-Elf lifted her chin, looked Thranduil defiantly in the eye. It was her. Tauriel.
"I've come to help you," she said. "To win the War."
Within seconds, Thranduil's lethargy had left him. He raised himself from the throne, gripping the antlers that formed its arms until his fingers strained against his silver rings.
"You?" His voice rang in the throne room like a clarion. "I threw you out years ago." A hundred questions battled for supremacy in his head. "Where have you been all this time?"
A look that could have been sadness passed over her features.
"Oh, the southern woodlands. Erebor. Dale. Never far." Her voice softened. "I could never travel far from here."
Had she been mourning the Dwarf all this time? A fatherly sensation plucked at Thranduil's heart. He dismissed it. This was the Elf-maiden who had tried to make a playmate of his son.
"Legolas is not here," he said coldly. "I don't know where he is."
Was that disappointment he saw in her eyes? She quickly masked it.
"I haven't come back for Legolas," she said. "As I told you, I've come to help you win the War."
"The War is lost," said Thranduil. "Go back to the southern woodlands. The Spiders will be more merciful."
Again, that defiant look. Troublemaker. Rule-breaker. Always wanting to fight on, however unworthy the cause.
"Oft hope is born when all is forlorn," she said. He gripped the throne tighter. That was one of his son's sayings. "Should not the great woodland realms unite against this common enemy? Send to Lothlórien. Celeborn will come."
Thranduil snorted.
"Celeborn will not come! With his High-Elven Lady and her Ring of Power! They could not prevent this Host from attacking. Why would they bring us aid? The Golden Wood already burns, I'll wager. They are no more use to us than a dead Dwarf!"
He watched as her nostrils flared and fire flashed in her eyes. Now she would storm out and leave him to his misery. But she did not.
"Neither are you. Sire." She leaned on the word. "If you sit on your throne drinking wine while orcs ravage Mirkwood with fire. Lead out the Elven Host. Do battle under the trees. And I will make haste to Lothlórien and beg Celeborn for his support."
"Ha!" Thranduil gave a bitter laugh. "You would risk yourself in this foolish way? Do you wish to join your Dwarf in the Halls of Mandos?"
"No, I wish to join you in a celebration of victory when Mordor is defeated." She held his eye. That proud look. Could it be that he had actually missed it, over these last sixty years? "Would you have it said that the Elvenking of Mirkwood dared not wage battle when a mere silvan Elf would?" She cocked an eyebrow. "And a maid at that?"
Thranduil strode down the stairs of the dais.
"Bring me my armour!"
#
He had been a fool, he told himself. A fool to trust her and a fool to rise to her bait. The battle beneath the trees had been raging five days now. There was no sign of Celeborn. No sign of the Lórien archers. Just orcs, bigger than any Thranduil had seen. They swarmed through the forest, burning brands in hand, setting fire to the Elves' beloved trees. In his head, Thranduil could hear their screams of pain. Beech and elm dying in torment, and nothing he could do to stop it. The Elves were swift and soft-footed while the iron-shod orcs were easy to pick off, but they were too few in number. More orcs arrived every day. Why had he let himself be persuaded to fight on, Thranduil thought? He could have stayed in his halls with his memories of Legolas. Gathered his silvan folk around him. Protected them just a while longer.
She had wanted to protect things, he recalled. Deer. Rabbits. He remembered her as an Elven child. Huge eyes shining in that defiant face. Trying to bend a bow twice her size. Legolas standing behind her, patient hands manoeuvring her into the correct position. How would his son have been with a sister, Thranduil thought? Like that? He had seemed to understand the strange little Elf-maid. Spoken up for her when she wanted to join the Spider-watch.
"She just wants to defend our realm, Father," Legolas had said. "Don't you?"
Thranduil slashed at an orc's head, watched it fly off into the foliage. How dare the Troublemaker come here and speak to him with his son's voice? His heart ached for Legolas. Ached with an almost physical pain. And all Elbereth sent him was a crazy Elf-maid who had lured him towards his own death.
He was so angry, he almost didn't hear the scouts' voices.
"Sire! Sire! Lothlórien is come! The Galadhrim are on the march!"
#
He had clasped hands with Celeborn in the midst of the forest. New Year's Day, and the Host of Mordor were no more. Even in the days of his father, Thranduil could not remember when wine had flowed so freely in Mirkwood. No, not Mirkwood any longer. Eryn Lasgalen. He and Celeborn had renamed it together; a new name to mark the passing of the Shadow. The Wood of Greenleaves. It was not lost on the Elvenking that his forest now bore a name very much like that of his son. Legolas. If only he were here right now! Then this would be a true celebration, not the hollow thing it felt. When had fatherhood become such an all-consuming passion, Thranduil thought? When he had held his newborn son in his arms? When the boy's mother had passed, and Thranduil knew he must now do this alone?
It hurts because it is real, he had once told Tauriel. She had learned the hard way. Sixty years of sorrow. It was barely an eyeblink, compared to the Elvenking's long years of suffering. But she was young, so young to be living when the time of the Elves was ending. Legolas had been that young once.
"More wine, Sire?" Galion was at his shoulder. Thranduil took the goblet and sipped automatically. "By the way, Sire, Tauriel returned with the Galadhrim. She keeps asking for an audience with you, but..." Galion looked embarrassed. "To be honest, the rangers aren't sure whether she's still banished or not. She is a war hero, so..."
There was a hopeful look on Galion's face. Thranduil gave a deep sigh. Not tonight. He could not consider this tonight. He waved Galion away.
"I'll deal with it later."
#
It had been a week before he granted her an audience. She had stood at the foot of his throne. Small. Defiant. A little spark of flame beneath the thousand lamps.
"What do you want?" He asked.
"To stay," she answered simply.
She had done well, the rangers said. Run swift and silent. Argued Thranduil's case with Celeborn. Then run all the way back, only to fight ferociously alongside the Galadhrim. They had given her one of their own grey bows, much more powerful than the weapons of the Woodland Realm. She held it in her right hand now. A status symbol. A badge of honour."
"And what, pray, would you do here? There are no more Spiders to slay. The Shadow has passed."
"I would do anything my lord wished of me. Truly," she said, when Thranduil raised a questioning eyebrow. "I have no reason to defy you any longer, Sire. As you said, the Shadow has passed."
Thranduil felt suddenly weary.
"I'll consider it," he said. "Come back tomorrow."
She turned to leave, then paused on the stair.
"Sire? The Galadhrim said that Legolas has been in Lothlórien. With two Men, four Hobbits and a Dwarf. They stayed some time."
Thranduil held out his hand, hardly daring to move in case the new world just created before him suddenly shattered.
"Indeed?" His voice did not sound his own. "Perhaps, Tauriel, you would care to sit with me for a while? I'll send for some wine."
#
She came back every day. Her knowledge of Legolas' time in Lothlórien was only second-hand, but he made her tell what she knew again and again, questioning every detail. How had he looked? Was he injured? Where had he gone next? It seemed the Galadhrim had gifted him with one of their bows too, and with a cloak of grey. Did that bode good or ill? Did she think his son had survived this War? He could never hear enough.
"And he was with a Dwarf?" He asked over and over again.
Tauriel suppressed a smile.
"The son of Glóin, no less. The Galadhrim seemed to think the two of them were firm friends. They found it most odd."
"No doubt they did."
A new worry nagged at Thranduil's breast. Ironic as it was, that did sound like Legolas. So open-hearted and free with his friendship. Just like his dear mother before him. The sudden pang of loss for his wife was like a blade. Thranduil sighed. He had seen at first hand how close brothers-in-arms became, long ago. What if these new friends meant more to Legolas now than his Woodland kin? What if he never returned?
It was as if Tauriel had read his thoughts.
"Legolas will come back to you, Sire. He always loved you." She blushed. "It was real."
#
He came.
Thranduil was in his private chambers when he heard the news, but he ran to the entrance of his Halls in a manner he had previously thought beneath his dignity. Tears spilled from his eyes as he pressed his son's golden head to his cheek. He breathed deeply of a scent he had thought resigned to memory.
"Legolas! Ah, Legolas! You are home! Home at last!"
Then he saw his son's eyes.
A light was pulsing from them that had not been there before. A pure light, unlike anything under the stars of Middle-earth. The light of Valinor. Thranduil swallowed the lump in his throat.
"Legolas?"
His son's eyes filled with tears to match his own.
"I'm sorry."
Thranduil laid a hand on Legolas' cheek. So pale, so flawless. How long did they have until the Sea took his boy away, far beyond his reach?
"How long have you had it?" He made himself ask.
"Since the springtime." Legolas leaned his head against Thranduil's shoulder. How many times had he done that as a child? How many times more before the final parting? "The cry of the gulls, Father! I can never forget it."
"My boy, my poor boy." Thranduil stroked his son's hair. "When will you sail?"
"Not while Aragorn yet lives." Legolas gave a weak smile. "I'd like to go to my rooms now."
While Aragorn lives. With those words, Legolas had driven home the final nail. He would return to his friends. Then he would sail for the Undying Lands. The Elvenking would be left childless.
#
She had been to visit him. Of course she had. But she didn't understand. How could she? She was a Wood-elf; what would she know of Valinor? He doubted she'd ever seen the sea. Misgivings plucked at his heart. Had she lingered in the Woodland Realm hoping to see his son? Hoping for a return to their former friendship? He must speak with her. Help her to understand.
"Legolas is...ill?" She had screwed up her face, baffled. "But that's a Mortal thing."
"Not ill." How could he explain this to her? "The sea-longing is... Legolas will not be able to remain in Middle-earth for many centuries longer. He must sail West. He may take only one with him." He dreaded her response to his next words. "He chooses the Dwarf."
She became very still.
"He will take a Dwarf to the Undying Lands? One of Kili's kind?"
"Yes."
"Gimli will not have to die?"
"If the Valar grant it, no."
She fell on him and flung her arms round his neck. The surprise was so great, he found himself patting her back before he knew what he was doing.
"Oh, I'm so happy for them! And for poor Kili. Ever remembered by his kindred, beyond the ending of the world!"
He gently disentangled her arms from around his shoulders, more gently than he would have imagined possible.
"But, Tauriel. You are not jealous? You do not wish to follow him?"
"Because I followed him everywhere as a child?" She gave a wry smile. "You know, I used to think that was love, but it was more like hero-worship. I wanted to be Legolas as much as I wanted him." She blushed. "You taught me what real love is. It's when you would lay down your life for another. That is the love Legolas has known with his companions. That is why he must return to them, and stay with them, whatever the cost."
Whatever the cost. That ache again in his chest.
"And where must you go, Tauriel?" he said.
She looked at him and smiled.
"I must stay with you, Sire. The one who taught me how to love."
#
Legolas was gone. They had spent every day together while his son had been in the Woodland Realm, but the day of parting had to come in the end. Thranduil knew the moment would remain with him to the End of Days. The tears. The songs. The parting words. The strong embrace of his only son, as they held on for the last time. He doubted Legolas would come this way again.
And now the Halls were silent. Thranduil poured himself a glass of wine and stared into its ruby depths. What now for the Elvenking of The Forest of Greenleaves? Now that his own Greenleaf was gone.
"May I come in?"
Tauriel was at the door, peeping round in defiance of all orders that the Elvenking was not to be disturbed. Glittering eyes. Hair the colour of autumn leaves. Did he really used to call her Troublemaker? It was starting to get so he couldn't imagine his days without her.
"Very well." He sighed.
She came in and sat at his feet, leaning her head against his chair, just as an Elven Prince used to do many centuries ago.
"Here." She passed him a wreath of ivy and elderflower she had been weaving. He turned it over in his hands. A gift of love.
"Thank you, Tauriel," he heard himself say. "Why don't you sing me a song? Something about the turning of the seasons."
She snuggled more closely towards him.
"Yes, Father."
###