Chapter 21,
Thranduil did not move from her side. He sat still, perched on the edge of the bed with the weight of unspoken thoughts in his posture. His fingers traced gently over the back of Elena's hand, the callused tips betraying how tightly he'd been holding himself together these last few days. His gaze lingered on her face, searching, measuring every flicker of discomfort, every weary breath.
"You've been unconscious for three days," he said at last, his voice low but tense. "Since the collar came off. You were breathing, but you didn't stir… and there were moments I thought—" He stopped, jaw tightening. "You're awake now. You're here. But I need to know what was done to you."
Elena blinked slowly, her lashes casting faint shadows over her cheeks. "It's over, Thranduil," she whispered, facing him. "I survived."
"That's not enough," he said, voice rising just slightly—not angry, but urgent, aching. His eyes searched hers, and this time, the mask of a king was gone. He was only a husband now, sitting beside the woman he had nearly lost. "You carry pain behind your eyes, you haven't spoken. Tell me what happened, Elena. Tell me who I must kill."
A heavy and pulsing silence settled between them. Elena stared up at the ceiling for a long moment, her lips parted but unmoving. Finally, as though her strength came not from within but from the need to ease his torment, she nodded once.
"It was the Goblin King," she said, voice raspy. "We were caught—ambushed—after a storm forced us into the mountains. The goblins dragged us underground. They knew me, Thranduil. By name. Flamebringer. Stormwalker. Warg-thief. They had a collar already waiting."
Thranduil didn't interrupt, though his hand clenched briefly around hers.
"They said Azog had it forged," she continued. "Specifically for me. To weaken me. Drain me until I had no fight left. Until I would be easy to break." Her voice faltered, and she closed her eyes against the bitter flood of memory. "They meant to give me to him."
Thranduil drew in a sharp breath through his nose. His entire body went silent, like ice beneath pressure, but on the verge of splintering. "And you did not resist?"
"They put blades to the dwarves' throats," she said quietly. "Every time I fought, they threatened to kill one. They knew I would choose to surrender if it meant saving others."
For a moment, there was only the sound of her ragged breath and the faint crackle of a torch in the hall beyond. Thranduil's voice came next, but it was little more than a whisper. "They used your kindness against you."
Elena looked at him then, tired but unflinching. "It wouldn't be the first time."
His hand came to rest gently against her cheek, his thumb stroking along the bruised edge of her jaw. "But it will be the last," he said, not as a threat, but a vow. "I swear to you, Elena, he will never touch you. Not Azog, his filth, or any creature that walks in shadow."
She nodded faintly, exhaustion stealing her strength. "The dwarves?" she asked after a pause. "They're safe?"
"For now," he replied. "Watched. Confined. I've spoken to Thorin—he regrets what happened." His voice hardened slightly. "Though regret is a poor salve for pain already inflicted."
Elena sighed slowly, tiredly, sinking slightly deeper into the pillows. "Let it be enough for now. I've had enough blood for a while."
And Thranduil remained beside her, the collar long gone, but the scars it left behind now resting between them in silence.
The silence that followed Elena's confession was not hollow—it was sacred. Thranduil didn't speak, but his grip on her hand never loosened, grounding her even as her strength threatened to ebb again. His expression was unreadable to most, but Elena could see it now, clear moonlight on still water. Not anger. Not outrage. Just sorrow. And love was so fierce that it felt like it would consume him from the inside.
She let out a slow breath, her body sinking deeper into the comfort of the bed. The strain of speaking and remembering had left her trembling in quiet ways, though she tried not to show it. Her eyelids grew heavy again, exhaustion pressing in with the insistence of sleep. Still, she tilted her face toward him, voice thin but sincere. "You stayed with me."
"I always will," he said softly, without hesitation. His fingers brushed back a strand of hair from her face, lingering just long enough to feel her warmth against his skin. "There is nowhere else I would be. No one else who matters more."
A small, weary smile curved her lips, and it reached her eyes for the first time in days. "You're getting sentimental in your old age."
He gave a faint huff-half scoff, half breath of relief. "You're confusing sentiment with survival. If you had left me again…" His voice caught briefly, and he looked away, trying to regain his composure. "Sleep, my fire. You've earned it."
Elena's breath slowed, her fingers gently curling around his one last time before sleep pulled her under. She did not fall like she had before—into darkness and pain—but into something quiet, something healing. Her body softened beneath the blankets, and her expression was finally peaceful. She was still.
And still with him.
Thranduil remained seated at her side, unmoving. One hand still lay over hers, but the other now rested in his lap, clenched tightly as if he could still feel the phantom of that cursed collar. He stared at her for a long time, committing the rise and fall of her chest to memory. Even the way she breathed felt like a victory. Even this… this stillness was precious.
A soft knock at the doorway broke his reverie.
Legolas stepped inside, his movements careful, measured. He didn't speak right away. His eyes moved immediately to Elena, then to Thranduil—searching, needing to see if things had changed. "She's resting?" he asked quietly, keeping his voice low as if afraid to disturb the fragile calm in the room.
Thranduil nodded once, his voice softer than before. "She told me everything." There was weight in those words—shared now, no longer hers to carry alone.
Legolas approached slowly, his hands folded behind his back. The strain on his face was subtle, but his shoulders sagged slightly with relief. "I should have protected her," he said after a moment. "We all should have."
Thranduil's gaze lifted to meet his son's. "No one expected what was done to her," he said, calm but firm. "And yet she endured it-for us. For the dwarves. For all of us." He looked back at his wife's sleeping form. "What we must do now is ensure it never happens again."
Father and son stood in silence together, guardians to a sleeping queen, protectors of something they had nearly lost. And in that still moment, as dawn's first gold bled into the sky outside the arched windows, a quiet understanding passed between them. No more failure. No more delay.
The healer's wing was steeped in stillness, and Aela lingered a moment longer beside the bed, her hand resting lightly over her mother's. Elena's face was serene now—no sign of pain, no tension behind her eyes. Sleep had softened the sharp edges carved there by suffering. Watching her, Aela felt gratitude and guilt intertwine inside her chest, as if love and helplessness had merged into something heavier. She had always known her mother was strong… but had not truly understood the cost of that strength until now.
She slipped away without a sound.
The stone hallways beyond the room felt colder now, the quiet air tinged with a subtle weight. Aela moved like a shadow between the carved columns and ivy-draped arches of her father's halls, descending deeper with each turn. There was purpose in her stride and a hollowness she couldn't quite shake. She needed answers—not for vengeance or justice—but because understanding what her mother had endured was the only way to start forgiving herself for not being there.
The prison ward greeted her with soft green lantern light and the quiet trickle of water echoing through the stonework. Few guards lingered here; they had already learned better than to question the king's daughter. Her eyes scanned the cells, pausing briefly at each one until she found the man she was searching for. When her gaze landed on Thorin Oakenshield, he was already on his feet, his posture straight despite the bruises beneath his eyes and the dull tension in his shoulders.
He stepped closer to the bars as she approached, his expression unreadable at first—cautious, perhaps, but not hostile. Then, as he studied her face in the dim glow, something shifted in his eyes. The weight behind them eased, just a little, and his tone, when he spoke, surprised her with its gentleness.
"You must be Aela," he said quietly. "You look a great deal like your mother."
The words caught her completely off guard.
She blinked and stopped a few steps short of the bars, stunned into silence for a breath. Her arms hung at her sides, hands curling slowly into loose fists. She had prepared herself for anger, for distance—but not warmth. "She… mentioned me?" Her voice was cautious and uncertain.
Thorin nodded without hesitation. "Often," he said. "Especially when we stopped to rest in Rivendell. She would speak of you and Legolas while sitting beneath the trees, usually with a cup of tea and that tired smile she wears when pretending she isn't hurting." His gaze softened. "She said your brother watches from the shadows, but you… You run into the fire. That you carry the heart of a wolf and the courage of the sun."
Aela looked down, her throat tight, her breath caught in her chest. Something hot pricked at the corners of her eyes. She had spent years trying to be strong in her mother's absence—training harder, fighting smarter, keeping herself sharp—but she hadn't known her mother had been speaking about her all along. Speaking of her with pride.
"She said that?" she asked, her voice no more than a breath.
Thorin's voice dropped further, reverent. "She missed you every day. When we walked, fought, healed ourselves, or argued with me over my temper, there was always a moment where she would glance west and wonder what you were doing. She told us stories, little things that you used to sneak bread to the kitchen cats. That your brother once caught you talking to a hawk for so long you missed an entire patrol."
For a long moment, the only sound in the prison corridor was the soft trickle of water echoing deeper within the stone. Aela stood motionless, her arms wrapped loosely across her chest, gaze fixed on the dwarven king behind the iron bars. There was no hostility in her posture, no tension left in her shoulders—only a quiet, solemn weariness that mirrored his own. The fire in her had not gone out, but it flickered now with the softer glow of grief and reflection.
Thorin stepped closer to the bars, the faint clink of his boots on stone barely breaking the stillness. He didn't look like a king in that moment—no crown, no armor, just a man weathered by guilt and silence. His voice came low, carefully measured. "Is she… alright?"
Aela's eyes lifted to meet his, her expression unreadable for a breath before it softened. She gave a slight, slow nod. "She's sleeping," she said quietly. "Resting, finally. The healers say she'll recover, but…" She hesitated, her fingers brushing the edge of her collarbone, as if the memory of the collar lingered in her flesh. "There will be scarring. Around her throat."
Thorin's expression twisted, barely perceptible but tangible. His hand tightened slightly around one of the bars, knuckles whitening as if he could somehow will the memory of her pain away. "I should've seen it," he said after a moment, the words grated out like stone scraping metal. "I should've known something was wrong. She hid it well, but I knew. I knew, and I did nothing."
"She wouldn't have let you," Aela replied, stepping closer now, her voice firmer though still calm. "You could've tried, pressed, even fought her—but it wouldn't have mattered. She was protecting you. All of you." Her gaze sharpened slightly, not unkindly, but with quiet resolve. "That's who she is. She carries burdens others can't."
Thorin nodded slowly, his jaw tight, eyes fixed somewhere distant. "And she paid the price."
Aela let the silence breathe before responding. "She always knew there would be a cost," she murmured. "What matters now is that it wasn't for nothing. She made it back. And if there's guilt in that… let it change something." Her voice dropped, edged with something fiercer. "Let it mean you fight beside her when the time comes. Truly beside her."
Thorin looked up at her again, with less weight behind his eyes and more focus, more clarity. Something had settled in him, like the first piece of stone in a new foundation. "I will," he said, voice rough with something that might've once been pride, now reforged into something quieter. "She stood for me. I'll stand for her. For all of you."
Aela nodded once, the motion slow but meaningful. Her posture relaxed slightly as she stepped back, letting the quiet fall between them again like a closing curtain. "Then I'll hold you to that, King Under the Mountain," she said, her tone low but laced with conviction.
She turned and walked away with the same silent grace she'd entered, the shadows swallowing her figure as she moved back toward the light of the upper halls—toward her mother, and the long road ahead.
Elena stirred slowly, surfacing from the deep, dreamless sleep that had held her for what felt like days. The air around her was warm and still, the scent of crushed herbs and soft linen clinging to her skin. Her limbs ached in that deep, bruised way that followed long healing, not sharp but lingering—an echo of pain that reminded her what she had endured. She blinked against the golden light pouring in through the high windows, warm and dappled like sunlight through autumn leaves. For a moment, she didn't move. She breathed, testing the strength in her lungs, the steadiness in her core.
When she finally sat up, it was with measured care. Her spine cracked gently as she straightened, and her arms trembled faintly. She placed her feet on the cool stone floor, grounding herself, and reached up with tentative fingers to touch the base of her throat. The skin there was tender, raw in places, and beneath the sensitivity was the memory of that cruel, cursed metal. It was gone, but not forgotten. Her fingers hovered over the place it had sat, tracing the pain it left behind, the faint heat of scar tissue blooming just beneath the surface.
Elena rose to her feet with the patience of someone who had spent a lifetime training through pain. Her robe was unfamiliar, elven in design—silken, loose-fitting, dyed forest green. She ran her fingers along the collar, grateful someone had chosen something that did not brush against her healing skin. Her body remembered how to move with each slow step toward the side corridor. Muscle by muscle, the stiffness eased. She passed through the arched doorway that led into the private suite—her suite—set aside long ago for moments like these when her family needed quiet.
The bathing chamber greeted her like an old friend. Steam rolled gently from the sunken marble pool at the center of the room, perfumed with lavender, juniper, and mint notes. Pale vines crawled across the tiled walls, and sunlight spilled through the lattice above, catching on the rising mist in strands of gold. The silence here was complete. No healers to warn her not to strain herself, no guards watching with worried eyes, no footsteps to interrupt her peace. She hesitated only for a heartbeat, surprised that no one had tried to stop her, and then she understood.
They were trusting her to move at her own pace again. To choose for herself.
With trembling fingers, she untied the sash of her robe and slipped it from her shoulders, letting the soft fabric fall into her waiting hands. She folded it neatly, placing it on the carved wooden bench beside the bath. The air was cool against her skin for only a moment before she stepped into the water, the heat enveloping her instantly. She sank into it slowly, carefully, until it lapped at her collarbone. Her eyes fluttered closed as the warmth soaked deep into sore muscles and weary bones.
A long breath escaped her lips—shaky, but steadying.
She leaned her head back against the smooth stone lip of the bath, her damp hair floating around her like a dark halo. Her arms lay across the edges, loose and open, no longer clenched in pain or defense. The scars at her neck still burned faintly, but the collar was gone. She could stretch. She could breathe. And for the first time in days, maybe longer, Elena allowed herself to feel something simple, something powerful.
The water had soaked deep into Elena's limbs, softening every joint, every weary muscle that had forgotten how to relax. Steam curled lazily in the air around her, clinging to the exposed stone and curling the ends of her damp hair as it drifted along the water's surface. Her eyes had drifted closed again, lulled by the heat and the stillness, until a subtle shift in the atmosphere prickled across her skin. She didn't hear the door open but felt it—like a tremor in her bones, a familiarity that stirred her from her quiet daze.
When she opened her eyes, she wasn't met with alarm but with surprise. Thranduil stood at the threshold of the bath chamber, half in shadow, the light from the scented lanterns glinting off the pale gold of his hair. He had already removed his crown and most of his outer garments, his movements fluid and precise. His gaze found hers instantly, steady, unreadable, but not cold. There was a softness beneath the surface, held only for her.
"You nearly gave me a fright," she murmured, her voice husky from disuse and the warmth of the bath. She didn't rise or shift away; she only tilted her head slightly toward him, the corner of her mouth twitching with tired humor.
Thranduil's reply was quiet, almost amused. "You were too deep in thought to hear me." He folded his robes neatly and set them aside, revealing the lean strength beneath his form, scarred and graceful, a tapestry of battles survived and endured. With practiced ease, he stepped down into the water, the surface rippling gently as he joined her. The temperature made him exhale softly, but he said nothing more as he settled at her side.
They sat in silence for a while, the only sounds being the gentle lapping of water and the occasional pop from a scented candle. Their knees brushed beneath the surface; their arms were close enough to share warmth. Elena studied his profile out of the corner of her eye, the noble set of his jaw, the slight crease between his brows that never quite faded. He looked tired, and not just from lack of sleep. He looked like a man who had carried too much for too long.
"I didn't think anyone would let me come here," she said eventually, voice quiet and rough-edged. "I half expected a healer to chase me back to bed with a dozen warnings."
"You've never listened to warnings," Thranduil replied, a faint smile tugging at his lips. He didn't open his eyes, leaned back against the curved stone edge of the bath, letting his head rest. "They know better than to try. Besides…" His voice dropped slightly, turning more solemn. "You needed this."
Elena inhaled slowly, the steam tightening in her chest before it was released. She nodded faintly, eyes drifting down to the rippling water that masked the pale pink of her healing scars. "It still feels like it's there," she admitted, gently lifting one hand to touch her throat. "Even without the collar… the silence, the weight… it clings to me."
Thranduil shifted beside her and reached across the space between them without a word. His fingers found hers underwater, and he gently brought her hand to rest against the bare skin of his chest over the slow and steady thrum of his heartbeat. The rhythm was grounding—calm, certain, real. She let her hand linger there, her palm flush against him, as if drawing strength from the pulse beneath.
"Then let this be louder," he murmured. "Let my heartbeat remind you that you're not alone. Not now. Not ever."
Her eyes closed again, not from weariness but from something softer, a sense of peace she had been too afraid to seek. Her breathing matched his now, slow and deep, the tension in her limbs releasing as her forehead dipped briefly against his shoulder. They sat like that for a long while, not speaking. There was no need. In this moment, the pain did not win. She remembered who she was in this warmth between his heartbeat and her breath.