She found an answer before she found him.
Late winter three years ago, Kili (he was fourteen and fifteen at the time) went into the hospital and stayed two months solid. He'd suffered two near fatal incidents, one right after the other, and was being kept not only for observation but because his condition, it seemed, only seemed to be declining. Apparently, according to an incident report she found deep in his more expansive file (not the one she'd used to study, but one her maternal employer kept handy for her in case) there had been talk of moving him into hospice care when things were looking particularly bleak.
Tauriel did later find her patient in his room; she'd never find out where he'd been before, but that matter was of little importance now. He'd calmed down. There was no need for urgent intervention, he would be fine. And when he looked at her with a kind of timidity she never thought she'd see in him –a heartbreaking sight— she said it out loud. "You're okay." It was as much for herself as it was for him.
He nodded stiffly, shifting uncomfortably on his bed –he gestured for her to sit with him, and she did.
There was a very long silence between them. The silence wasn't broken even when he'd laid his head on her shoulder. She didn't shy away –she let him rest there, find whatever comfort he could in her rather useless presence.
"Don't let them send me away…"
She shook her head firmly, a renewed fondness for him overtaking her. He wasn't a child. He was eighteen years old and had seen more than his fair share of hardship in his young life; from what she could tell now, he'd built up a wall around himself, and it only started to crumble in his most vulnerable moments. He was letting her see him this way. Tauriel couldn't ignore the significance of this –he was trembling against her –she was falling in love.