The Sky was Cloudless Blue by Rocky41_7

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The Sky was Cloudless Blue

When Thranduil awoke, the world was fuzzy, and silent. The first thing of which he became aware was the rough press of stone against his cheek, and the aching of the bone beneath his eye. Next, the smell of smoke in his nose, which spurred him to a panicked jolt upright, and that set the world spinning, and it did not stop as he staggered to his feet.

 

His feet, which made no sound upon the stone. There was a ringing in the back of his mind, and he cast about, but there was no one around him. He touched his ears, and heard nothing, but on the left side, there was emptiness and blood, and his tingling hand touched a lump of flesh by his neck, barely hanging on, which he supposed had been his left ear.

There was a sense of urgency, dimly recalled, but it took him too long to put together that the Havens were burning. The Havens—yes, the Havens were burning because the Fëanorians had come.

“Armae!” he cried, and turned about again, for he could hear nothing behind him, nor to either side, and his heart hammered at the prospect of relying on sight alone to find his way through the smoldering settlement. “Adar!”

Yes, the Fëanorians had come—they had chased them down from Doriath, where Thranduil’s mother had been made cold and still, and there had been so little time to put up a defense. How they had learned of Elwing’s survival, he knew not.

“Armae! Adar! Nietta!” It was possible his yelling could attract the Fëanorians, he supposed, but it was just as possible he would stumble into them himself for want of hearing them coming. A single step set the world whirling around beneath him and his stomach pitched like a ship at sea, so that he grit his teeth together. Blood oozed down his neck from the wound on the side of his head. He almost cried out for Naneth, before remembering to save his breath.

There were bodies. The Elves he had fought with before he went down, thrown about like rag dolls into pools of blood and rubble of the town. It was proper to stop and check to see if they lived, but if they did, there was naught Thranduil could do for them, and if he bent or knelt to check them, he was not sure he could rise again. So he left them where they were, stopping only to look at each and think of their name, before he had to carry onwards.

Tiriel’s helmet had been struck off, and there was a wet hole where one of her bright green eyes had been; Mirithien’s throat had been cut so savagely her neck was nearly severed; Gawen had been thrown back into a nearby fishing shack before, it seemed, it had collapsed, and now only his feet could be seen, but Thranduil was certain it was him.

There was blood spattered up his greaves, and it lapped at his feet as he moved past his companions.

Survivalist calculations aside, shouting simply took more energy than he had, and putting one foot before the other too much focus to task himself with other things. He made off in the direction he had been facing when he stood, but progress was agonizingly slow. Smoke seemed to coat the inside of his lungs, and each ragged breath seared his throat.

What had he been doing before he fell…? The Fëanorians had come because…because they had a Silmaril. Because…because Elwing had a Silmaril. Yes, Dior’s daughter, Elwing—Elwing had a Silmaril. Dior was dead and Elwing had a Silmaril. Elwing had a Silmaril, and two children.

“Elwing! Elrond! Elros!” Thranduil could feel his voice rumble in his chest, but he heard it not, and turned about in another circle, as though this paltry effort would keep anyone from riding up behind him and finishing the job begun. “Elrond! Elros!”

It was his duty. Where once he had served Thingol, he now served Dior—no, he now served Elwing, because Dior was dead, and two of his children were dead, and his wife was dead. Thranduil’s mother was dead, and Menegroth wreaked to ruin. It was Elwing, now, whom Thranduil served, but it was a hopeless case, to protect her from the Fëanorians. They knew no leash, no master, and no mercy. Loosed on Middle-earth like a pack of rabid wolves, they would tear through anything in their path, and their minds were impossible to know, except that they were driven one and all by their pitiless and relentless Oath.

Had they killed her already? Was Thranduil now only to turn up the body of another lord he had served and valued, and sit to wonder what was next? But the children—once, Thranduil would have believed even the Fëanorians would not slay a child. Now, if he could only keep Elrond and Elros from the blade, he would consider his service to Elwing as complete as it could ever be.

That he found them he could pin only on sheer dumb luck—that his shuffling pace managed to drag him in the right direction was no credit to any effort of his. The two half-Elflings stood before the Lord of Himring and his dark-haired brother, and there was some debate ongoing, which Thranduil could not discern.

He understood then, that his service to Elwing would complete with his death. He would not save Elrond and Elros, but some effort had to be made. With resignation, he reached for his blades, to find he had only one. Well, that would do for his death, anyway.

You will not be long without us, Naneth, he thought grimly, gripping his blade. It felt like lead in his hand, and there were three small stairs between where he stood and the stretch of road where the children were, which seemed then a barrier utterly insurmountable, to say nothing of the laughable futility of raising his single blade against the children of Fëanor.

Thranduil’s stomach was trying to climb up his throat again, and the ringing had grown until he might have been standing beside an anvil in the forge, and the blood was cold on his neck, seeping down into his armor. The rest of his body lacked most all feeling, which he supposed was not an excellent sign of his overall health, but then, it did not much matter now—or it wouldn’t for long.

He moved a foot towards the stairs, prepared for his pointless and noble death in a pathetic effort to spare Elwing’s children a few minutes more, but he had underestimated the difficulty of carrying his weight up the steps. He slipped on the edge of the first step, and hit the ground, and the blade clattered from his hand down the steps. The distant sound of shouting came to him as though through a thick wall, and Thranduil’s eyes burned as he realized he could not offer the young princes even this, even a doomed display of Doriath’s love for them.

               One hand grabbed weakly at the stone steps, and he tried to raise his head, tried to will his rhaw to obey, to rise, to grip his blade, to throw himself at Maedhros and Maglor so he might be cut to ribbons to show Elrond and Elros Doriath had not let them die easily. He caught sight of the little children, huddled together, fingers dug into each other’s tunics, trembling, waiting for help that would not reach them in time.

               Elrond, Thranduil though as tears spilled over his cheeks. Elros. Elwing. Forgive me; forgive us. We could not save you. The last of Doriath’s ancient blood ran down the streets of the Havens, and Thranduil saw the destruction of his people was in its final moments.

               Darkness swam at the edges of his vision, and closed in over his eyes, which then joined his ears in refusing to guide him, and then the world vanished.

***

               “Thranduil!” Above the Havens, the sky was a nearly cloudless blue, just as it had been the day before. The only mar on it was the blackened smoke that rose from the wreckage of the settlement, parts of which had been thoroughly or partially destroyed in the Fëanorian assault. “Elwing! Elrond, Elros!”

               They were probably dead. Nearly everyone was—she had been right to leave after the last kinslaying, to seek out her family abroad once again but if she had been there—if she had been there—

               The loss of their princess—the all-too-brief queen—and her children stung Niwë to the quick. The other thing she could not even consider, but the dread building in the back of her mind threatened to close up her throat. The arrival of their contingent had come on the heels of the departure of the Fëanorian forces--for what they retreated, she couldn't say, but at present it seemed not unlikely they had simply slain everyone there was to slay. They had not chosen to pursue the wayward Noldor.

               “Thranduil! Elrond, Elros!” Back in one of the structures that remained untouched by flame, her father had set up to heal what survivors there might be, but his hands remained troublingly empty of work thus far. None yet had found the body of Dior’s last child, nor his two grandchildren. “Elrond! Elros!”

               Niwë ached from their frantic ride south, and her eyes stung with the sooty air, and she felt heavy, so heavy with the weight of Middle-earth. Until there were bodies, she could not rest. The right bodies, that was—she had stopped by plenty of others on her trek, and had to check each for signs of life, and closed their eyes where needed. None, so far, had obliged her to get them back to her father for treatment, which was a grief on which she would need to ruminate at a later time.

               Once she had found the last of the bodies she needed to find.

               Oh, but there—there, when she saw him—and she knew, she knew it was him, she knew that white-gold braid, that once-gleaming armor—she stopped, and the tears sprang unbidden from her eyes, and she could thank Elbereth only that her search was ended.

               “Oh, robin,” she whispered, jerking forward once again, passing by the bodies that strew the street leading up to him. She lowered herself down onto the steps and brushed the loose strands of his hair back away from his dirt-smirched, ash-stained face. “Oh, sweet-robin.” The side of his head was soaked in blood, turning his fair hair black-red, and some blow had nearly cleaved off his pretty ear, leaving a gash so deep in his scalp she could catch a flash of white bone. She thought then, of his song at her balcony beneath the lush green canopy of Doriath, and in such pain, she nearly cried aloud. She blinked to wash the tears from her eyes, that she might look upon him for the last time clearly, but when her fingers passed over his pale neck, in a gesture she had made far too many times that day, she felt something she had not expected: a pulse.

               “Thranduil!” she gasped, and her hand moved at once with more purpose, to confirm it was not some phantom of her foolish heart, but true, and his fae had not yet left them. “Adar!” she screamed. “Ada! Ada!”

               The Elf that burst through a half-ruined doorway, sending splinters flying into the street, was not her father, but another—Oropher. Blood was smeared in a broad streak across his face, and she caught a glimpse of missing fingers on his left hand as he whipped his wild gaze around the street, a blade in his right hand, drawn, presumably, by her crying. His sage-green gaze alit on her, and the Elf beside her—the seemingly lifeless body of his only child.

               Time slowed into that tiny fraction of a second when Niwë saw all value on life expire in Oropher’s eyes, watched his knees give way, and his spirit release his body. Oropher’s knees hit the blood-slick stone and Niwë vaulted up to her feet, realizing in her battle-addled mind that Oropher’s assumption was just as hers had been.

               “He lives!” she cried. “Oropher, he lives! He is alive!”

               “Alive?” The words that rasped from his throat in such vivid agony as he raised his eyes from the horror before him to Niwë’s gaze, from an Elf Niwë had always known to be utterly unlike his wife and child in temperament—easy to laugh, easy to smile, quick with warmth, open in word—raked against the grain of her heart and she ached.

               “Yes! We must—please, we must—my father—we must get him to my father.” Oropher’s fae re-anchored to the earth, and he was on his feet again at once, though she knew he must be at least as exhausted as she. Between the two of them, they were able to lift Thranduil off the stairs.

“Have you seen,” she panted to Oropher, “Elrond or Elros?”

               “No,” Oropher replied. “Only the white bird…” He turned his face to the limp body between them. “Hold fast, my star,” he whispered. “We have you now.”

               “And you are not permitted to die under my watch,” Niwë added through gritted teeth. “Not this Age. I know you are too stubborn to let Fëanorians be the end of you.”

               Oropher laughed until he was choked off with tears.

***       

               His children had done more than their share of picking up the pieces of the Havens, and so he could not begrudge Niwë her rest. He could not begrudge her anything, because she was alive. Both his children, and his wife—no, he could do nothing but kiss the stones in gratitude, even in his grief for Eärendil’s family.

               Thank Elbereth, he thought. Thank Elbereth she left Doriath. If she had chosen to stay and move to the Havens with the Doriathrim—but no, there was enough with which to trouble his mind without dwelling on terrible might-have-beens.

               The survivors were precious few, and with every passing hour he could weep anew for the lives of his own family, when so many (so many) had perished, and continued to slip through his fingers, beyond even the reach of his healing powers. Elwing was gone, and so too were her children—to where, none could say. A pair of disoriented Elves had cried that they had seen Elwing dive off the cliffside into the water under Fëanorian pursuit, and rise again as a great white bird, but he could not say if there was truth in it, or if they were all mad with fear and sorrow and rage.

               One way or another, the Silmaril was gone, which meant the burning eyes of the Fëanorians were off them, for the time being (It was almost insulting, how they had stormed and wreaked such horror, and then disappeared again as soon as they understood what they wanted was not there, not bothering even to finish what they had started.)

               He could not sleep yet—there was healing yet to be done—but he could spare himself this, just a moment, to watch his child. Niwë was slumped back against the wall, seated on the floor, her long black braid swung over her shoulder, and collapsed against her side was Oropher’s child. One of her dark hands was buried in his fair hair, and she had arranged them so he lay with his head on her shoulder, his forehead touching her neck. He had not woken since they had found him.

               Oropher had arrived with Niwë, hauling the broken body of his child between them, but once he knew Thranduil was in a healer’s care, he had gathered himself to make a task of taking inventory of the supplies that remained to them, and arranging their departure from the Havens. The seaside was no place for them, he said, nor had it ever been—their place was among the trees—and most felt agreement with that. Tasking himself seemed to be the only way he could keep his head above the grief sucking at him from all sides—but at least his baby lived. For now.

               He pulled himself up to his feet, and approached the pair on the floor, placing a hand on Thranduil’s shoulder for a moment, checking the strength of his fae, which felt faint, but steady.

               “Your sister is gathering supplies,” he said to Niwë.

               “I should help,” she said, shifting. But he touched her knee.

               “No, rest. You have done much already. Besides, you must keep an eye on this one, hm?” Niwë quickly turned her face away, but she seemed to tense nearer to Oropher’s child.

               “So many are lost,” she muttered. “So few, Adar, so few of of the Sindar live…” She looked back to him with tears in her eyes. Oropher’s people were all but destroyed in the wake of the Fëanorians’ second assault. Silvan had lost their lives in the streets as well, but the better part of the Doriathian refugees had been Sindar, and it was their blood that ran rivers down the stones of the Havens.

               “They are very few indeed, now,” he murmured, lowering his head. “You've done well by this one. Certain am I that Oropher will be very grateful for your care,” he said sincerely, and took a long breath as he rose up and moved for the door, feeling a tightness in his legs and an ache at his temples. His wife met him in the street, dull-eyed and weary with sorrow, but still upright and moving.

               “How is she?”

               “She is well enough; nothing too serious. He is the one who troubles me. That was no light blow to the head he took, and he has not yet woken. And…” He rubbed his chin, trying to push from his mind the weight of tragedy, to look to something else, anything else. “I believe Niwë will be heartsick if he should die.”

               “You think?” Her eyes flicked past him towards the building where their long-single and contented daughter sat cradling Oropher’s child with such care as she usually reserved for beasts in her charge.

               “Mhm. But I do not think he will, not yet. If I may be allowed such confidence in my own skills, I would say there is little chance of it now.”

               “Let us hope you judge rightly,” she said.

               “Let us indeed. This world is full of pain, too much and too near. I would be much aggrieved if he would die before we see them wed.”

               “You think she will?”

               “I have little doubt of it, if I know our child,” he asserted. “And I hope most sincerely I judge this rightly too—Elbereth knows we all could use a glimmer of good news in the midst of all this horror.” Thin trails of smoke still curled off the rooftops and collapsed walls, and even the sea breeze had not blown away the smell of blood hanging in the air like a poisonous fog.

               “In that,” she said, “I think you would find no dispute.”

 

Chapter End Notes

Spirit: fëa (Quenya) / fae (Sindarin)
Body: hröa (Quenya) / rhaw (Sindarin)

I have plans for some more Mirkwood family pieces (happier than this I swear) but we'll see.

One of my favorite thoughts about them is that Oropher was this very extroverted, bouncy type of person and his wife and son are both :| constantly...but lo and behold, Legolas takes so much after Oropher that Thranduil does a double-take sometimes, listening to him talk.

Niwe calls Thranduil her "robin" because he sings a lot for her, especially once they start courting officially, (which they do right after this; when he wakes up after all her fretting she announces she's ready to start courting) and she once referred to him half-mockingly as the "twittering robin outside my window."

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