Marta's Mathoms - BMEM 2011 by Marta

Go East, Young Man

Oropher looked around the room, taking in the sight. It looked so forelorn! They would leave the bed behind, and the table and other odd pieces, for he knew that wherever they went there would be no shortage of wood and they could fashion other pieces once they arrived. But the blanket full of goose feathers was already packed away, and all the odds and ends that had made this room a home.

His son had lived here, once upon a time. This windowsill had borne jars full of frog-spawn, rocks and pinecones and other interesting specimens found on walks through the forest. Oropher also knew for a fact (though he didn't quite dare tell his wife) that the packed-away blanket had hid a box where spiders lived, and that Thranduil's dearest hope had been to catch a snake for a pet.

Such remnants of childhood would not be carried east with them, for Thranduil was long since grown. But still, in his mind's eye, Oropher saw this room as it had been: blankets bunched into a pile at the bed's foot, the books assigned by his tutor stacked precariously on the table's edge, the previous day's clothes strewn here and there.

Was he ready to leave rooms like this behind, truly? The irony was not lost on him. Fëanor's kin had abandoned their homes in the furthest West for a dream of adventure and conquest. He had bristled at Fingon's words, back in Doriath: his home was to them the furthest frontier! And now he was packing up his family's lives into crates and heading east himself. He told himself that he was neither kinslayer nor conqueror, and that he would not set himself up as king by the sword.

Was that enough? Why should he move yet again? A glint in the floorboard caught his eye, and he kneeled to examine it more closely. There, carved by a yet-unsteady hand, he saw his son's initials: TuO. Thranduil of Oropher, yes, but Thranduil of the trees as well. He knew, then, that it was not dominion but freedom he sought. Freedom from foreign domination, from the lure of hands grown cold through too much contact with harsh stone.

Lothlórien had been such a land, once upon a time, but no more. He had journeyed east in his own youth, seeking a land untouched by those who had known the Furthest West. It was unnatural, to preserve and control and remake the world in their own image. Their hands had grown cold through too much handling of stone, and when they looked at the stars they saw only lights that might yet be harnessed. That drive twisted their soul, and the trees felt it; those Noldor turned the whole world on end by their very being.

His cousins had understood. They had all spoken in quiet whispers of a land beyond the mountains, a land shielded by the very stone those Noldor thought to turn to their advantage. So they had ridden west and found a virgin wood yet unsullied. They had made a home for themselves, a life, and Oropher had made a son. He smiled at that thought.  'Twas a more natural craftsmanship than any practiced west of the sea.

But then Celeborn had joined them, he and his stone-cleaving wife. She wore stone on her very hand now, a white stone that made the very streams quake in her presence. Must he go to the ends of the earth to find a land free of them?

If need be. He loved Celeborn like a brother, and he would not make war to drive him back to Beleriand, not while all the wilds of Wilderland were still open to him. He would leave come morning, and he would not look back. Thranduil deserved a land where he might raise his own son to hear the trees' songs. They would find a green wood yet untouched by Noldor hands, and there they would start again.

Chapter End Notes

In The Hobbit, Thranduil seems reluctant to go to war lightly. While he has no qualms about defending his people, he also won't start a war over gold. I like to think he came by this honestly. Perhaps dear old dad wouldn't rush into battle if he had another choice?

Several Tolkien sites list the etymology of "Oropher" as "great beach tree." While no source is given, the consensus makes me think this is a reasonable interpretation. Thranduil uin-Oropher could therefore be taken to mean "Thranduil of the great trees" or something along those lines.