Thranduil had a headache. It was a condition that was reportedly rare among his people, but the medical texts must have been written by pathological liars who had never raised children. The dwarves had been enough of a hassle, but Legolas had to choose that particular day to make an announcement of intentions that had ended in a hissing, half-whispered shouting match, which is how all their conversations seemed to end of late. He only had a few minutes of respite before he noticed the presence of his captain and ward.
"I know you're there. Why do you linger in the shadows?"
He knew perfectly well why she was lingering. She had an innate sense of when he was annoyed—and he very much was—but she would have left if there was nothing to discuss. Let all the leaves of firith fall at the same time, then.
"I was coming to report to you."
It must be the patrol report. Stars above, save him from having to discuss the dwarves again.
"I thought I ordered that nest to be destroyed not two moons past." Spiders were only slightly more pleasant to discuss than dwarves, but there was no way to turn this particular patrol report into anything pleasant, so he might as well pick his battle.
"We cleared the forest as ordered, my lord, but more spiders keep coming up from the south."
Of course they were. It wasn't as if Tauriel had ever shirked work. She relished it, in fact, with a zeal that was sometimes disturbing.
"They are spawning in the ruins of Dol Guldur. If we could but kill them at their source—"
Thranduil's eyes narrowed, and Tauriel wisely fell silent. He had heard her views on this before, and he was not in the mood for another prolonged argument.
"That fortress ruins lies beyond our borders. Keep our lands clear of those foul creatures, that is your task."
It was obvious to anyone who remembered the Great War that the spiders that managed to enter the Woodland Realm were only small scouting parties, but small scouting parties could be dispatched easily, and the borders could be maintained. The ruins of Dol Guldur, on the other hand, would be crawling with hundreds, if not thousands, of spiders, and that would be in addition to the orcs he was sure had not moved from that crumbling fortress in the last twelve yén. It would be madness to attack.
"And if we drive them off, what then? Will they not spread to other lands?"
Why was she so determined to argue? It was exasperating, even more so because he knew very well that she'd learned that from watching him.
"Other lands are not my concern. The fortunes of the world will rise and fall, but here in this kingdom, we will endure."
Tauriel did not remember the last time that Thranduil had—with great reluctance—permitted an attempt to kill the spiders closer to their source, but Thranduil did, all too well. He remembered searching through the rubble of the outpost, hoping to find some hint that anyone, anything had survived the destruction. He remembered finding the only survivor, a tiny red-haired girl barely past toddling, who had hidden obediently in a cupboard while the woman who was clearly her mother was run through with a spear outside the front door. He had been able to cover her eyes then, keep her ignorant of just how brutally competent the foul things of the world could be, keep her safe from the flashes of memory that danced in front of his eyes even now. The red-haired woman. The severed head of his son's mother. All his sins and failures—moral, regnal, and parental.
Parental.
Legolas.
Something had to be done about Legolas and Tauriel, and it had to be done today before the boy started an avalanche of misfortune.
"Legolas said you fought well today. He's grown very fond of you." Thranduil's words halted Tauriel where she stood, and her face fell as it sunk in exactly what was meant by "fond."
Tauriel looked down, deliberately avoiding his gaze. "I assure you, my lord, Legolas thinks of me as nothing more than the captain of the guard." It was a lie, but he could not blame her for it. Very likely, it was how she wished things were. It was how he wished things were, and it would have been good to hear had it been true, but that lie was wearing far too thin to continue to be pressed into service.
"Perhaps he did once. Now, I'm not so sure." Understatement of the age, and that truth was only magnifying his headache. Wine, he needed wine. It might not resolve the pain, but it would at least dull it, and the glass bottle on the other side of the room was practically singing enticements to get him to imbibe. As he approached his old friend of a beverage, Tauriel's voice crackled.
"I do not think you would allow your son to pledge himself to a lowly silvan elf."
Where on earth that excuse had come from in Tauriel's brain, Thranduil did not know, but this was not a time for examining gift horses. "No, you're right." He poured the sweet red drink into a goblet, his hands less steady than usual for all the stressors of the day. "Still, he cares about you. Do not give him hope where there is none."
Once Tauriel's retreating footsteps were out of range, Thranduil drank the wine in a single swallow before pouring himself another. Dignity be damned, now was the time for forgetting.