In which Tauriel's subconscious wish for vengeance becomes conscious, and Thranduil comes up with a somewhat unorthodox method for her to punish him. (And no, that is not as dirty as it sounds. Yet.)
Tauriel was uncertain if she greeted Lady Galadriel's visit with anticipation or dread.
She had heard tales of the Lady of the Golden Wood – from sources less biased than Thranduil – and was quite certain they could trust her. It was the thought of meeting someone so very powerful that daunted her – someone who might judge Tauriel for staying as harshly as everyone else did.
But then, Tauriel thought, stringing her bow in the sunshine, if she could truly see into people's minds, she alone would be able to understand – possibly better even than Thranduil and Tauriel herself. That was the hope, anyway.
They likely had around two months to wait for the Lady's arrival, assuming Legolas didn't have too difficult a time convincing her. He probably wouldn't, although Eru knew what nonsense he would fill her head with, with the best of intentions. Whatever came of this was likely to be vastly irritating at first.
As with most evenings, Tauriel and the King were seen wandering about the halls, arm in arm, heads bent together, seemingly perfectly content. Even after all these weeks it had never ceased to be bizarre, but it was no longer shocking.
"How is that relationship not carnal?" Lady Ríniel asked, sounding almost as if she complained. "It would almost better if it was. At least it would be something simple and comprehensible."
Silwen almost agreed. Almost. Watching the pair of them, how incredibly tactile they were with one another – would have actually made sense if they were going to bed in anything but the most literal sense, but it was obvious to anyone with eyes that they were not. The King's caresses were near constant – Tauriel's hand, her face, her hair – but there was worship in them, not lust. The obsession and possessiveness were by now no surprise at all, and markedly less unsettling than they had once been.
And Tauriel…what of Tauriel? Unsurprisingly, there was no reverence in her touch, but there was a very great deal of affection. She often touched his face, smiling up at him, for some reason most frequently skimming his left cheek – Oh.
Oh.
Silwen had to admit, she was stunned. Few still in Middle-Earth knew of Thranduil's scars, but he must have shown them to Tauriel. That…dear Eru. He would not have shown her that if he was not wholly convinced that he loved her.
Lady Galadriel was going to have her work cut out for her. But, for the first time, Silwen wondered if the King did in truth actually love Tauriel, in some strange way. Always had Silwen – and everyone else – thought him delusional, his supposed feelings the result of his madness and nothing more, but to have betrayed such vulnerability…no mere madness or strange infatuation would have induced him to do that.
Silwen did not know if this was worse or better than she had thought. Possibly worse, because Tauriel, though obviously very fond of him, had no answering love in her green eyes – and, after all the King had put her through, probably never would.
How long would the King be content with that? How long could he bear the thought that the elleth he loved so desperately held only fondness and affection for him in return?
Hopefully Lady Galadriel could sort that one out. Otherwise, sooner or later, they were going to have a very large problem.
But for now, the pair seemed content with their odd paradox of chaste need. Silwen prayed it would last until Lady Galadriel arrived.
Galadriel was already well aware of the Woodland Realm's tribulations. And for once, she was not entirely sure what to do.
Love was not an affliction that could be cured, and in a twisted way, Thranduil did indeed love Tauriel. His feelings were unhealthy, but they were genuine. Tauriel…Tauriel was another matter entirely. Her feelings and her need for her were equally genuine, but they were not the same. She did not love him, and she did not want him as he could so easily want her, were he to allow it of himself. He never would allow it, but that restraint would cost him.
It had been a very, very long time since Galadriel had seen one as broken as Thranduil, and never one so torn between love and need and obsession with another person. It was as though he were her uncle Fëanor, and Tauriel a living Silmaril. Her uncle and her cousins had created much death and misery in their attempts to recover the lost jewels – it was extremely fortunate no one had actually tried to remove Tauriel from Thranduil by force, for in his madness they might well have faced a fourth Kinslaying.
Galadriel knew what Legolas would ask of her, and it was not what she would – or could – do. What he would see as damage had already been done; all she could do was override their obsession, or try to, and leave the good of what they felt for one another behind. It would not be perfect, but sometimes things that were broken could not help but leave cracks when they were repaired.
Thranduil knew Tauriel was not yet ready to hear him tell her he loved her again, but when he felt the urge to say it, he would wait until they had gone to bed and trace the words up her spine with his fingers – in Quenya, so that he need not fear she would work it out. Using the language and alphabet of the Noldor was hardly ideal, but so long as she mourned, and so long as she had not forgiven him, he knew she did not want to think about it.
And though she did not know what he wrote, she did enjoy his touch – indeed, she practically purred like a cat. He had been so starved of any kind of touch since she and Legolas were children, because he was the King, and one did not touch the King. None but the Queen, who would never touch him again.
When she was like that, sprawled out contentedly alongside him, that dark thing in his mind wanted to break free. It wanted to keep her like this forever, all to himself, unwilling to share her with the outside world. It whispered that he could make her love him, if only he could isolate her long enough. He had named that shadow Eöl, and bound it away in chains at the back of his mind, where it could do nothing save whisper. No, he did not have Tauriel's love, but he had her fondness and her affection, her companionship and laughter and the light that was slowly returning to her eyes once more.
That light exposed the shadow for the twisted thing it was, but Galadriel was likely the only one who would be able to actually banish it.
"You are very quiet tonight," Tauriel said, twining a lock of his flaxen hair around her fingers. "What are you thinking?"
"I long for Galadriel's visit," he said, "and yet I dread it. If she cannot fix this, there are none left in Middle-Earth who can."
"She will," Tauriel said, her breath fanning warm over his chest. "I will not believe otherwise."
"Then your faith must be enough for both of us, for now. I fear my own mind, Tauriel."
"You are not the only one," she sighed, her fingers trailing along his collarbone. "The dreams I have had…I do not know how my mind produces them, but I wish they would stop."
"Do you have nightmares about your captivity?" he asked, though he already knew the answer. Her thrashing had woken him more than once.
"Sometimes," she said, drawing a vague pattern over his shoulder. "Of late…of late they have been of things I might do to you. Things with the chain."
Thranduil shut his eyes. The chain, that thrice-damned chain – somehow, it was the worst for both of them. "I would deserve it," he said.
"No," she said. "No, you would not, but I cannot say more on it. You would think me evil."
He shifted so he could look her in the eye, facing her on the pillow. "I would think you evil?" he asked, incredulous.
"Thranduil, you fear what you could do to me physically," she said, tucking his hair behind his ear. "What I could do…I will not say. They are evil thoughts, and why I need Lady Galadriel. I do not want you to ever know them, for I do not want to know them myself."
"I would never think you evil, Tauriel," he said, tracing the line of her jaw with one long finger, "but if you feel you cannot tell me, I will ask no more."
She shut her eyes. "Thank you, Thranduil."
As if Thranduil's words had summoned the shadows within her mind, Tauriel's dreams were troubled.
Normally she did not dream of inflicting actual physical harm upon him. Nearly always, the evil of her sleeping thoughts was the same as those which plagued her waking hours: she created myriad ways to use his feelings for her to destroy him. His love, however warped and twisted, was pure – she knew that now, and it would be so easy to crush him with it. Thranduil was so much more fragile than he knew, and a tiny, cruel thread within her mind wanted to smash him and all that he was.
This night, though – this night was one of the deviations. And all the worse for it.
In this dream it was night, moonlight pouring in through the open garden door. She'd chained Thranduil down onto the bed itself, his arms stretched taut, the manacles digging into his wrists as they had never done to her ankle. Smears of blood, so bright in the moonlight, traced down his forearms.
When she looked down at him, she saw stark terror in his pale eyes, his silvery hair spread out over the pillow like a silken corona. He was so beautiful like this, offering her his fear.
Tauriel traced her left hand down the smooth expanse of his chest, nails digging in hard enough that blood welled up in their wake. Thranduil's hiss of pain made her smile, dark and delighted.
"Tauriel," he said, his voice unsteady. "Tauriel, I am sorry – I am sorry for everything."
She leaned down until she could whisper in his ear, inhaling the heady scent of him while she did. "Not half as sorry as you will be."
And then came the letter-opener.
The real thing had been destroyed, but this one was as wickedly sharp as the implement she'd opened her arms with. She didn't cut Thranduil nearly so deeply, though, when she began drawing patterns across his chest with it. He had not let her die, want it though she had; she had no reason to let him.
"Tauriel," he tried again, swallowing hard, but no word followed her name.
"What, Thranduil?" she snarled, the tip of the blade pressing deeper into his skin."You are sorry? Yes, you've said. You imprison me for months and chain me like an animal – what us is your sorry to me now?"
Wisely, he said nothing.
"I should leave you like this," she said. "I ought to let you starve, but even I am not so cruel. When I am finished with you, I will grant you what you twice denied me."
"What?" he asked, and there was a sheen of tears in his eyes.
She leaned over him again, her hair brushing his face. "I'm going to kill you, Thranduil," she said flatly, "and I'm going to make it hurt."
The sight of his terror, the slight hitch of breath in his chest, filled her with dark, alien satisfaction. Her grip tightened on the letter-opener –
Mercifully, it was then that she woke, before she could actually dream of carving out Thranduil's heart. Her own face was wet with tears, hot and bitter, salty where they touched her lips.
Why, why must she dream such things? Why must she think them? She knew at least part of the answer, though she did not want to admit it.
Thranduil had never actually pain for his actions. He had made her life hell for six months, and even when he no longer actually locked her away, he spent another fortnight dictating her every move. Oh, he had paid a steep emotional price, but not nearly so steep as hers.
And that was why she wanted to find the chain. That shadow in her mind wanted him to suffer as she had suffered, to be so desperate that death seemed the only release.
The trouble, she thought, even as she tried to fight back her tears, was that that desire was not unwarranted. The fact that Thranduil knew he had wronged her, that he felt genuine guilt and sorrow for what he had done, did not change the fact that he had essentially got away with it.
Tauriel tried to rise without waking him, which of course didn't work. Even now, he was unnaturally attuned to her.
"Tauriel, what is it?" he asked, his voice thick with sleep.
She wanted to lie, to say she merely needed the toilet, but he would know – and she had promised not to lie to him. "Nightmare," she said, not quite able to keep her voice steady.
He released her at once, and sat up the light the bedside lamp. The concern on his face was nearly heartbreaking. "Was it about me?" he asked.
Tauriel looked away. "Yes," she said, "but not in the way you think." The shadows in the corners all too perfectly mirrored the shadows in her mind.
Thranduil touched her chin, guiding her gaze back to him. "What was it?"
"You would think me evil," she said again.
"I could never think you evil," he said, brushing his thumb down her cheekbone. "Tell me, Tauriel. Tell me what it was."
She shut her eyes, unable to meet his. "It dreamt I chained you to the bed," she said, "and carved into your chest with the letter-opener. You were terrified and in pain and I liked it." It was all she could do not to sob. What was wrong with her?
Silence followed that, but after a moment, Thranduil gathered her close, his chin rested on top of her head. 'I know why you dreamt that," he said, his voice laden with guilt and sorrow, "and I think I know what you must do, so that you do not dream it again."
"What?" she asked, sniffling, pressing her face against the hot skin of his shoulder.
He stroked her hair. "You must do it in reality."
Tauriel froze, but when she tried to lean back to look at him, he wouldn't let her. "What?" she asked, icy horror flooding her veins.
"The suffering I have felt since your release is all of my own design," he said gravely. "You have never made me pay."
"But Thranduil, even at your worst, you never did to me what I dream of doing to you," she protested. "You confined me, and terrified me, but you never hurt me."
"No," he said, "but I drove you to hurt yourself."
Now he finally let her sit back, and she saw the sheen of tears, of crushing guilt in his eyes. "Thranduil, I can't," she said. "When I am awake, I cannot bear the sight of your pain. To deliberately cause you more…I am not that cruel. I could never be that cruel."
"Then here is what we must do," he said, his thumb tracing the track of a tear she had not known had fallen. "Things will be quiet until the harvest. I will tell the Council I am taking leave, unless some dire emergency appears, and you will imprison me until your shadow has had its revenge."
Tauriel was appalled to find that her shadow, as he called it, liked the idea. But there was far more to consider than sating it. "Thranduil, I will not risk your sanity," she said. "Or mine, for that matter. We are both so fragile."
"Galadriel will come," he said, "and you will never be free of your nightmares if you do not give vent to them."
Tauriel heaved a sigh. "I will not confine you as you did me," she said. "It is not what I dream of anyway. Nor will I physically harm you – I do not truly wish to. But what I will do, for it is the only way you will truly understand, is chain you each night. Even if it is only for a few hours each evening, you will still have some idea of what I endured."
Thranduil froze, but in this she did not feel guilty. Out of everything else, all she had gone through, the chain was and remained the worst of it, and probably always would. And perhaps, if he felt it himself, her shadow's desire for vengeance would be sated. "Why would you not leave it on overnight?" he asked at last.
"Because you did not. I do not wish to torture you, Thranduil. I only wish that you understand, even a little, what I felt."
He shut his eyes, resting his forehead against his. Do whatever you must, Tauriel," he said. "Whatever it takes. You are right – I have no real understanding of what you endured in my madness. Tomorrow I will retrieve the chain, and you can do with it, and me, as you see fit."
Is it just me, or could this actually be kind of cathartic? Thranduil, for all he knows that what he did was totally, utterly wrong, still really doesn't get it. He can't, having never endured anything like it himself. While this might only be a taste of what Tauriel endured, it's more than he's had so far.
