Archive of Our Own ^beta

He picked his way through the ruins on Ravenhill, eyes sweeping over dozens of orc carcasses, searching.  Searching for the one who mattered most.  Seeing the bloodied bodies of his fallen soldiers had shaken Thranduil terribly, had lanced fresh pain deep into his being.  Had even pushed him back to the edge of that horrible, earth-shaking day so many centuries ago.

But he could not, would not pretend that the steadiness of his body, born of both the inherent grace in him and the experience of battle, did not conceal a deep trembling dread.

Even as his eyes frantically roved over the bloodied ground, his last moments with his son played grotesquely through his head.  Had he even spoken a word to Legolas, after he stood against his father to protect Tauriel?  No.  What had been his last words to Legolas before this wretched day?  When was the last he’d said anything worthwhile to him?

Which would she have you value more? Mithrandir had challenged.  Of course, he’d known the answer immediately, the weight of the truth adding to his sudden shame.  And oh, he’d never stopped valuing, never once stopped loving his son, her son.  It had always been there inside him.  Only… over time, as he’d pushed the old griefs down,  numbed himself to them, determined to see their people survive, and steeled himself against the growing darkness… perhaps he’d unknowingly steeled himself against other things as well.

‘You think it is love?  Are you ready to die for it?’ he’d sneered at Tauriel, his blade at her throat.  And she couldn’t have known, so young as she still is, so very vulnerable to all the bitterness of this world.  There was a time when dying for his love would have been all too easy.  It would have been effortless.  The greater challenge, then, had been to live for it.  And by the Valar, he had done it, painstakingly, but he had.  For as deep as his love had been, as agonizing his grief, it had not only been her to have a hold on his heart.

He pushed on, climbing the stairs, feeling he was headed toward a great precipice.  And even in his dread, he still could not brace himself.  As he emerged on the next level and turned the corner, it was there, ready to cut him down.

Flaxen hair, splayed on the dirty ground, soaking up red blood.

“Legolas!”  His voice broke on the name.

He dashed to the still form lying prone among the rubble, all kingly grace cast thoughtlessly aside.  He crashed to his knees, begging silently to be mistaken — but all of his most desperate wishes in this life, it seemed, were met with cold and cruel refusal.

For it was him - his precious son, pale as white ash, pierced by some vile Orc blade and left to perish alone.  Silent.  Following the footsteps of his beloved mother, Thranduil’s starlit queen.

Even as he sobbed out his son’s name, even as he choked on senseless pleas, even as he searched desperately for a pulse or a breath with shaking hands, it was all for naught.  

There was nothing.  His little Green Leaf had been struck down, and Thranduil with him, as surely as if the jagged blade had pierced his own flesh.

Even as his mind struggled to grasp it, the heavy waters of despair flooded down upon him.  He could not even be here to comfort Legolas in his passing.  Had he been afraid, as he fought for breath?  Had he tried futilely to staunch the bleeding?  Had he forgotten his ire, and called out to his Ada for help?  Had he met it with the same noble courage he’d shown every day over the centuries?

“Ion-nin,” he whispered, feeling tears burn down his cheeks even as the core of him felt pierced with razor-sharp ice.  Leaning down, he gently lifted his son’s head and shoulders, pulling the limp form to him and holding him with all the tenderness still left in him.  Pressed a trembling, tear-soaked kiss to his forehead. 

On the edges of his vision, past the reality Thranduil was trapped in, he thought he saw flashes of red and green, dashing and turning with vicious yells — Tauriel, distraught, avenging her felled prince and friend with the feral rage of their ancestors.  

He couldn’t summon the will to continue his ire at her, but nor could he move himself to help her.  He felt as if he were weighed down with the heaviest of stone.  Even if she triumphed, there would be no victory for her in it.  No victory for any of them.

His lips parted not of his own volition, baring his teeth, but the anguished, agonized cries that escaped him were completely silent, for all the breath had been driven out of him by the same iron fist crushing his heart.  His eyes were pressed shut to block out the sight he could not withstand.  He couldn’t stop himself from rocking Legolas back and forth, as he had millennia ago when his golden prince had been such a tiny babe in his arms.  He didn’t want to stop.  

“Legolas.  Ada is sorry.  So sorry, my little leaf.  Please, come back.  Please, for Ada,” he begged, his voice hoarse.  

Only hopeless silence answered him.

The silence of his mother, his father.  His wife and queen.  Now, finally, his son.  All the songs of his people in his heart, strangled off.  Their voices cut down.  His own voice silenced in yearning to follow them.

It could have been minutes or hours, it could have been years that he sat upon the hill, grasping his son.  He could not have cared, either way.  All he managed to notice was the chill gradually passing over him, a sweeping numbness in his arms and legs, creeping toward his center.  Water seeping out through the cracks of a broken reservoir.  A candle flame inside him, once great and bright and strong, now slowly being starved of air.  Dimming.  

His eyes opened briefly, staring unseeing at the bloody, broken ground.  Felt only the weight of his son in his arms, his hair against Thranduil’s cheek where he pressed close.

In the long, stretched moment of a single heartbeat, he realized.  And he accepted.

It was a short moment of relief, now.  The last breath.

*************

Far down below them, in the smoking bones of Dale, Galion felt a harsh chilling wind at his back, and turned.  He perceived a piercing dread come over him, as away from their home in the once-great woods, a great cry rose on the air.  All the birds shrieking as one, the mammals enduring under the tyranny of the spiders all giving shrill yowls of pain.  As he looked, in the distance even the leaves of the tree tops seemed to turn gray, more drab and bled of life.

Beset with a new, sudden terror, he dashed to follow the path of his king.

The short journey did not tax him, but upon reaching to top of the hill, his breath left him all the same.  For he looked upon them, leaning brokenly against a stone wall, and he knew.

He did not have to check, to press his fingers to the sides of both of their throats to know.  But he did it all the same.  It was his duty.  

He did not have to puzzle as to what had transpired; it was laid out plainly before him.  Even in his oncoming grief in the overwhelming pain of the whole day, he could not be surprised at the end result.  And even as he wondered what would become of their people, of Mirkwood, he could not begrudge his king this.  After everything and everyone that had been torn away from Thranduil, if Galion had stood in his place, he knew he too would succumb under this last blow.  After a lifetime of fighting, would not have fought against the last breath.