This one is hobbit-level short, but I promise it'll be the last sad one for a while. Probably. It happens immediately after the last one.
Thranduil knocked on the door to Eithryn's room. "May I come in?"
No answer.
He went in anyway and sat down next to the Eithryn-shaped lump in the blankets. "They are going to bury her. I—I did not think you would want to go, but Felrion said I should tell you." He waited. "Eithryn, are you all right?" When she still did not respond, he pulled the covers off her and lifted her into a sitting position.
A tear ran down her cheek.
"Oh, Eithryn. Why did you let yourself get attached to her? You knew she was dying."
That finally got her attention. "So? Would you have let her die alone? She had no one else, Thranduil. Her parents abandoned her."
"Abandoned?" Abandoning was something one did not do even to one's friends. Were humans that evil?
"She said they told her to go away," Sky said softly. "If I knew where to find them..."
"They would die," Thranduil agreed. "But we do not."
Eithryn stared unseeingly at the wall. "She was so young, Thranduil."
"She would not have lived a hundred years anyway," he reminded her.
Apparently, that had been the wrong thing to say. "So that makes her life worth so much less, does it?" she snapped.
Thranduil could not decide how to respond, so he stayed silent.
"I know you think mortals' deaths are meaningless because they didn't have a lot to lose," she said, her voice shaking, "but for them, it is a lot. They only get a few years in this world, Thranduil, but that only makes that time more precious to them. If you take that from them, it's just as bad as taking thousands of years off the life of an elf, and we'll get another chance at life. They won't."
Thranduil had never thought about it that way before.
"And yes," Sky told him, "I will be going."
. . . . . .
The hole was dug, and Felrion picked up the sheet-wrapped body.
"Felrion?" Sky pulled out of Thranduil's arms and held out hers. The healer nodded and gave her the bundle.
Sky walked slowly to the hole, cradling Mira's body in her arms, seeming to forget anyone else was there. She gently lowered the small form into the earth, and her hand lingered on it for another second. "Goodbye, little fish," she murmured. Then she turned and walked past the others and into the forest.
. . . . . .
Three Months Later
Thranduil found his wife-to-be at the edge of the stream, just looking into the water. He had seen her doing things like that more often since the human girl's death than in all the time before.
"You still miss her," he observed, sitting next to her.
She nodded absently.
"You only knew her for one night."
"That's enough time for a child to make a friend. Why should I take any longer?"
He laughed softly. "You are amazing." He waited a moment, then added, "Have I mentioned that I love you?"
She smiled—a sight that was finally becoming more common again. "A few times, yes."
He put his arm around her. "I ask you again: when will you marry me?"
"Tomorrow?"
Thranduil smirked. "I like your enthusiasm, love, but my father would kill me. I believe the soonest he would agree to is a year from now."
"A year it is, then," Eithryn agreed, and she kissed him. No sooner did their lips touch, however, than she broke away to say, "I want children. At least five."
"Perhaps we should wait a few years, hmm?" Thranduil did not have the slightest idea what to do with children. He would need to ask his father, or maybe Coryn. No, on second thought, not Coryn.
Eithryn sighed. "If we must." They kissed again.
So, as you may have guessed, the next one is (probably) going to be their wedding, and I have NO idea what an elven wedding's supposed to be like, so if you have any ideas...
Oh, and while I'm thinking about it, I realize some of you may be wondering (or are at least vaguely curious) about why I decided to make Thranduil's wife Silvan. Well, my biggest reasons are that 1) Silvan elves are cool and 2) It worked better for the purposes of my story. HOWEVER, there is some evidence, mainly from looking at Legolas, that suggests she was not Sindar. Here are the ones I can think of right now:
1. Legolas is shorter than his father. Silvan elves tend to be considerably smaller than Sindar.
2. Legolas's choice of weapons. Legolas uses a bow (which he is very good with) and knives- -definitely Silvan weapons.
3. Legolas's fighting style. To be specific, the way he jumps/climbs on all his enemies- -let's see, spiders, dwarves, a bat, a troll, Bolg, another troll, and a mumakil. Am I forgetting anything? Anyway, he did grow up in a forest, but still.