The second time he saw the youngest of Thrain's brood, it was in his own halls. She'd been found hunting in his forests and as she was not known and a dwarf, she was guilty of trespassing in the highest degree. Thranduil hadn't been paying attention when they'd brought her in and had read off a list of her charges. He'd merely planned to sentence her to death like he had the others who'd come before, but when he asked a customary question before her sentencing, her answer surprised him. It had been nearly seven decades since he'd last seen the tiny dwarrowdam, and she'd scuttled across his mind only thrice since that time. He didn't know why he still expected her to be a child, perhaps because that was the only way he'd ever seen her, but the dwarf that stood before him now definitely wasn't a child.
"And what do you have to say for yourself, Dwarf?" He questioned in Quenya, not lifting his eyes from the trade agreement in his lap.
"I'm. A. Woman." There was that same biting tone, spitting back at him in Sindarin. "So the correct term would be dwarrowdam, not dwarf." Thranduil frowned and lifted his eyes from the parchment, looking down at the small, hooded figure on the ground of his throne room.
"Remove its cloak." A silvan elf complied and the cowl was torn away to indeed reveal a woman and the princess of the dwarves. Dark hair was braided in twisted, complicated patterns, sweeping over shoulders, forming knots and cascading over shoulders like a waterfall. Her eyes were bright blue and she would have almost been beautiful -for a dwarf- if it had not been for the red, angry burns covering most of her body. Her skin was a strange amalgamation of creamy, smooth perfection and blackened burns. To make matter's worse, she was heavy with child. His grip on the arms of his throne tightened as she was pulled to her feet.
"You see before you, coward, The desolation the Smaug wrought." He didn't answer her at first, having nothing to say. The king tented his fingers in front of his lips and watch the snarling dwarrowdam far beneath him.
"You were the child playing the harp." He spoke finally, recognizing her through the years and damage.
"Oh, the great king Thranduil recognizes me. How will I stay upright." There was bitterness in her every word, in every gesture. Her hatred for him was palpable. "Of course, I honored you as a child. You were the first one to ever give any sort of credit to my delusion that I might one day be king. I thought of our conversation as my first diplomatic act. " She gave a dry laugh. "I thought you the strongest king I'd ever seen. At least, I did. Then I saw you at the hill."
One of the silvan's tugged reluctantly at the cuffs they'd bound her with. "You must speak respectfully to the king-"
"I see no kings here! Only vow-breakers and those who would turn their back on allies." She was attempting to shame him in front of his court. He would not allow this to stand. He couldn't.
"Take her to a room and get some healers to tend to her wounds." He murmured, waving them away.
" I saw you standing on that hill, astride an elk, hundreds of elven soldiers behind you and I thought that our salvation was nigh." Dis hissed as she was gathered and the Silvan tried to usher her out of the room. "I saw the great king Thranduil and a cry went up from my people because we thought we were saved. But you, you looked down at the slaughter and the burning, at the suffering and the pain of my people, you looked down at the dragon's waste and you turned away from us!"
"I would not brave a dragon and risk the lives of my men for a people who'd disrespected me-"
"You would have braved a thousand dragons and risked the lives of all your people if Nauglamir had been in danger, you snake." The guards were tugging at her now trying to hold back the female dwarf who seemed stronger now than the chains that bound her. "My grandfather paid for his sins with his life and I will ensure, Thranduil son of Oropher, that you do not escape the same fate." He did not meet her glare and instead turned his eyes back to the document in his lap, feigning disinterest.
"Make sure she is healed and fed properly. Her child will be born any day now." He murmured as they pulled her away, her curses echoing around the hall. He felt a peculiar feeling knot up his chest and dry his throat, a feeling he hadn't felt since the second age after the birth of his son and the subsequent death of his wife: Guilt. He shoved it violently away, refusing to accept responsibility for her pain. His fingers brushed over the spot where his own burn markings lay hidden. He'd been able to hide the mars of he serpents with elven magic. Tomorrow he would offer her the same thing.
The next morning when he walked to her chambers, however, she was gone. No broken locks, no bent door frames to suggest how she did it. The child of Thrain had simply vanished as if she'd never been there at all, the promise of his death still on her lips.
