Chapter 3 - Maikath

'That's it! You sit and enjoy yourself! Never spare a thought for your poor mother!'

The door to the room was flung open against the wall. It was the Lady Maikath, Thranduil's mother and since Oropher's death the dowager queen. She glared at Riawen, who quickly bobbed a curtsey and fled the room. Maikath then transferred her baleful gaze to Athiel.

'And how are you, madam?'

Athiel nodded her head demurely, too used to the older woman's overbearing attitude to be much bothered.

'I am well, thank you ma'am. The healer says I may get up today.'

Maikath's attention swept to Thranduil.

'I would speak to you, son- outside.'

Thranduil stood and kissed his wife.

'I won't be long, and then we will walk in the gardens.'

Maikath snorted her disgust at such an open display of affection and did not even wait for the door to close before berating her son.

'If you had but wed another of our own kindred rather than that woodland whore you would be holding your first born!'

'Mother, the healer said that it is not unknown for a woman to lose a baby after a shock,' Thranduil said firmly.

'Not Sindarin women.'

'Yes mother, any women.'

'No woman of our line has ever lost a child.' Maikath tilted her chin up as if daring him to contradict her. Unfortunately she underestimated the change in her son's countenance since his return from the south.

'Athiel is of our line now, and she is suffering enough guilt without you adding to it!' Thranduil barked before realising that his tone had been as commanding as a soldier's on a battlefield. He hesitated and took a breath, trying to calm his voice. 'Please try and help her, Mother.'

'Help her?' Maikath accused. 'But who is going to help me with my grief? I am bereft without him- without my beloved Oropher!' Her act would have been impressive, but Thranduil had seen it too many times to be taken in.

'Don't be ridiculous,' he snapped. 'You only married to get the crown and you only stayed because you're too stubborn to go the Havens! There was never any love in this place until I bought Athiel home.'

'I loved you.' Now her voice was quiet.

'You might have done, but did you ever show it?' he snapped with such venom that he even surprised himself, but then the words were flowing thick and fast and he could do nothing to stop them. 'I can never remember being hugged, being kissed, being praised. Nothing I ever did was good enough for you or Oropher. I was never noticed except to be criticised. I was just kept away from you, my mother. If it hadn't been for Fanáon, I would have grown untutored and unloved. And what happened to him?' Thranduil began to pace, realised what he was doing and forcefully stopped himself. His voice turned cold with bitterness. 'I'll tell you what happened to him. Because of my father's obstinacy, because of my father's refusal to follow Gil-galad, Fanáon was ripped apart by a band of Orcs. I watched it happen. They just kept cutting and cutting…and I couldn't get to him!' His eyes were brimming with tears at the memories. 'Then I had to watch all the other others die. I had to watch my father die.' His voice turned hard. 'Do you want to know how he died? How he died screaming?' He looked up to see the impact the revelation had on her. Maikath blanched, her eyes going wide with horror, and shook her head in denial, but Thranduil couldn't stop himself from further venting his fury on the nearest target.

'Do you realise how many died?' he demanded, 'How many talans will be without their husbands, sons, brothers? And now I'm responsible!' He raised his hands, looking for something to do with them that could emphasise his helplessness, found nothing and let them drop again in frustration. 'I've got to guard our borders! I've got to ensure enough food is grown! I've got to keep order! I've got to liaise with those accursed mortals! I've got to do all this and I don't even know how- Oropher never thought to tell me anything about how he organised this place, because as usual he didn't have the time.' He shook his head, finding himself smiling ruefully at the utter absurdity of his situation. 'I can't even find the keys to his desk!'

'He normally left them on the night stand in his bathroom.'

The changed tone of his mother's voice made him look up in shock. He ran a hand through his hair in an unconscious gesture of surprise.

'What?'

'He always left his keys there,' Maikath continued softly. 'He'd drop them there as he walked through. I kept telling him that he'd lose them, that he should put them somewhere safe. But he never listened.' She lowered her eyes and a hint of a smile played across her lips.

Thranduil suddenly realised that his mother was trying to help. He reached across to tilt her chin up with one finger and found that her gaze was now filled with deep regret, and a strange new longing for acceptance, to make up for the time lost.

'I'm sorry,' she said in a whisper. 'I'm sorry…your father, he said it would make you weak to show you love. I- I wanted to do what was right, but I had no one to ask. He said that no son of his would be tied to his mother's skirts.'

'But why do you constantly criticise Athiel?' Thranduil exclaimed, shocked by this abrupt revelation. 'Nothing she ever does is right!'

'I was envious. You have something I never had…you have each other's love.' As if finally admitting it to herself, she raised her hands in surrender. 'I was brought here as part of a treaty between the Sindar of Lindon and your father's people. I never even met your father until our espousement.' Her eyes grew moist in remembered sorrow. 'I'm alone. I've been alone since I left Härlond. Oropher only wanted me to strengthen his blood ties to the Eldar. And to give him a son, of course. But once you were born he never spoke to me again, except to order me.' Her voice grew shrill with emotion. 'He never acknowledged me. I was an inconvenience to him. He kept telling me to go west, but I wouldn't go. I would have gone because I wanted to escape, but not to please him.'

Thranduil stared at her in astonishment. He'd always known his parents were less than lovers, but he'd never realised the extent of his father's apathy until now.

'Will you go now?' he asked blankly.

'There is nothing for me here, nothing to hold me.' Her voice turned bitter. 'I'm even more of an inconvenience.'

'You could stay,' he said suddenly. 'You could help me- help us. There's much to be done.' Hesitantly, unsure how the gesture would be treated, he offered her his hand.

'You would let me stay?' she echoed. 'After the way I treated you both?'

'Naneth!*' This time he caught her hand and gave it a squeeze. 'I'm going to need all the help I can get!'

Now she was smiling- really smiling, and tears of gladness were filling her eyes at this strange and newfound acceptance.

'Than I will stay, ionnîn**. I will help wherever I can.'

Thranduil smiled at her, unwilling to admit how the moment was affecting him as much as it appeared to have done the same to her. But he felt like he needed to say something else.

'Will you have dinner with us tonight?'

'Oh!' The invitation seemed to shock her. 'I- I mean- yes, of course. If you wish it.'

'I do. And so will Athiel.'

'Then yes, aranîn***. And I'll gather all Oropher's papers and keys together. I'll leave them in his- in your office.' She smiled openly and bustled away.

'Aranîn?' Thranduil exclaimed to the empty air. He whirled back towards the door in utter shock as everything came crashing onto his shoulders at once. 'My king? Me? Me, the king?' Shaking his head at the door as if accusing it of being the root of all his problems, he pushed it open and went back inside.

To his queen.