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She had no idea, why she was still there. Well, that was technically not true. She knew why, she had just a hard time to still justify it to herself. It didn’t exactly make any sense in the traditional meaning of the word. „The time of the elves is over“, she had said and he had lowered his head in silent agreement. Well, of course, that wasn’t exactly any news to him. It didn‘t seem to faze him though. „Will you not join us?“ she had asked. „What for?“ he had returned and that had caused her to frown at him. It was obvious, wasn‘t it? It was one thing to nurture superficial animosities but a totally different when it came down to what really mattered in the eye of the end of all things. He wasn‘t stupid. In fact, she had come to appreciate, he was anything but. But sometimes he could be really daft. „To endure the upcoming times. To be with your people.“ „My people are here“, he had told her and it had been totally ridiculous. „The Silvan elves will fade.“ „Did you know, that nothing sticks to these leaves? Their structure makes it impossible.“ He had held up a large green leaf and she had just stared back and forth between his hand and his face, seriously lost for words.
That had been two weeks ago. She still hadn’t left. She had tried to talk to others, to influence him to change his mind. She had argued with some of his advisors and finally, the Silvan elf who was a captain of the guard whom he considered a daughter. „He doesn‘t like it, but he is one of us.“ Tauriel had laughed at that as if it had been the joke of the century. “No offense my lady, but he isn‘t.“ It clearly was an offense, one she wouldn‘t have cared about a month ago. For whatever reason it got to her now. „You were never on good terms. Why do you even care?“ Tauriel had asked. „Do you not care?“ That had given her a pause and she had avoided her eyes then. „I do. A lot actually.“ „Then tell him, there is a life waiting for him. He doesn‘t have to watch all of this world die around him. Will you have him watch you die?“ Tauriel had sadly shook her head. „I wouldn’t, if I had the choice.“ „But you do.“ “No I don’t. And you don‘t understand.“ Obviously she didn‘t. „What about his son?“ „He does understand.“
„I kind of admire you“, Galadriel admitted one day while they walked his woods. It was a beautiful day and she still hadn’t left. Thranduil raised an eyebrow at her „Don’t mock me, I know there is no love left between our realms.“ She laughed quietly. I admit, I never understood the things you did here.“ „Obviously.“ „You know, I can see the future.“ „Yes.“ „You do as well.“ „Only vague possibilities.“ „Still.“ They walked for some time in silence. The roots at the ground arranged themselves around their feet. Butterflies tried their best to be as colourful as possible and flowers blossomed as if there was no tomorrow. And maybe there wasn’t, you never knew. Well, at least most people didn’t. Thranduil looked at the roof of green leaves above them. „Even if I wanted to, I could never leave“, he said. Galadriel took in the rustling leaves, all the small animals and buzzing insects, the breeze of the wind and how alive everything felt. „Is all of this you?“ He weighed his head. „Yes and no.“ She squeezed her eyes at the bushes behind them. „What about the elk?“ Thranduil waved his hand dismissively. „Oh, don‘t mind him. He just doesn‘t trust you.“ Somehow, right here and then, this seemed a totally normal thing to say. „Do you trust me, though?“ He didn’t answer, just smiled down at her again. „I see“, she mumbled. And to his defense, with their history, why would he?
She still didn’t leave after that. She stopped trying to convince his people to talk him into sailing to the undying lands though. It had helped nothing and gifted her only with pitiful looks. She kept joining him during his walks and sometimes, he invited her to dine with him.
„If you don’t change, it will not end well.“ „It?“ She glanced at him over her wineglass. She wasn‘t used to drinking wine. It made her head a little dizzy. “You.“ He just smiled at her as if he didn’t have any care in the world. „You are not afraid.“ she stated the obvious. „No.“ Galadriel contemplated that. Was she afraid? She wasn‘t sure. There was seldom uncertainty in her musings and it was completely useless to worry about certain events. But was he certain? Or just blissfully oblivious? „You are an interesting person“, she said instead. He put his glass down and leant in over the table, leaning onto his elbows. „Really? I think you are an interesting person. You know everything that will happen for all of eternity. How do you manage to get up to do anything at all? Does it ever make a difference?“ „You know foresight doesn‘t work like this.“ „That is a pathetic answer to a question you knew I would be asking.“ She laughed at this and Thranduil leant back to lounge in his chair seemingly satisfied of having made a point. „You must think, I have all the answers in the world.“ „That‘s hardly my fault. It is your carefully crafted reputation, after all.“ „Well, you also have one of those.“ He raised a challenging eyebrow at her. The ice king, they called him. She was quite sure by now, that there was absolutely nothing made of ice in him, apart from maybe the colour of his eyes. Eyes that stared her down right now but could as well drift away to take in every detail of a fly on the edge of the table the very next moment. He wasn‘t anything like his reputation. But she had also no idea at all what else he was. „I‘ve never met anyone like you“, she finally said and Thranduil weighed his head. „Must be awful, if you want me to change so much.“ He filled up their glasses. It should be, shouldn‘t it? Only it wasn‘t.
„There is always a reason,“ she said a few days later. „Hmm?“ „To get up.“ „You‘ve thought about that for almost a week?“ She felt the urge to slap his arm, but refrained. „Time passes and asks of us to do the things, which are necessary. It‘s not an option, it is duty.“ He snorted. „Duty, really? Why?“ „What do you mean, why?“ Thranduil turned his head, looked down at her and somehow managed to make her feel young under his scrutiny, young and utterly naive. „Have you ever just lived in the moment?“ „There is no moment without context to the whole meaning of the world.“ „Oh, of course not. But have you lived in it?“ Galadriel was unsure what he was speaking of. „For all of us, a hundred years is a blink of an eye. But have you lived in the blink of an eye for a hundred years?“ She still didn‘t understand and Thranduil sighed eventually. „Isn‘t it ironic, that time passes faster, the more you have of it?“ He laughed quietly and they didn’t speak for quite a while after that until they came to a waterfall. The sun reflected in what seemed to be a million of water drops. He reached out with his hand and got seemingly lost for a while in the rainbow the sun cast through them into the sky above them. „I am just trying not to waste it“, she eventually said. It sounded weak, even in her own ears. How could you waste something that was infinite? „The light fractures in the water molecules, did you know that?“ when he held up his hand she could almost feel how the colours changed depending on the angle of the light. „I suppose, I did,“ she said. He smiled at her then in a way, that made her doubt she knew anything at all. There used to be a difference between the sun and the elf in front of her, but the rainbow didn’t care and for a moment, all she was, was colours around his fingertips. She gasped and the moment was gone. The warmth of it, however, still lingered. „How did you do that?“, she whispered. The trees around them blossomed in response, or mabye she just hadn‘t noticed before. „I?“ He laughed. „I didn‘t do anything.“
Galadriel stayed on her own for some days after this. She didn’t feel well, she told the elf who was assigned to her quarters. That wasn’t exactly a lie, but the truth was a lot more complicated. She had started to dream excessively of the elvenking. Horrible dreams of the future and the past. And some dreams, that should be disturbing as well, but to her shame, weren‘t as much as decency would have demanded. Whatever people called him, to her he had been mostly a traitor with very unpleasant manners and this journey a diplomatic duty. She hadn‘t been prepared to get to know him on a personal level. By the Valar, she hadn‘t been prepared to like him. But there was something deeply captivating about him. He radiated life in a way, that was impossible to ignore for someone as starved of it as her. She had always suspected that there was something in the mind, that wasn’t immortal. Something that passed away during the time their bodies lived on. That there would be hardly anything left but an empty shell, eventually. She couldn’t remember the time, when she had felt like she had under the rainbow, water drops on her face. It had been way too long ago. He had wiped the drops away, gently, as if she was the most precious creation of all creations. Creations he was ruling over, because they had chosen it to be that way. Nature, the wood, his people bowed to him, bended to his every wish without him asking for it. He had never held a ring of power. He had never needed one. She had all but fled that clearing and she couldn’t stop thinking about this ever since. It was like that, was it? He hadn’t been born to rule, he had been chosen by his subjects. And in return, he had chosen them, unconditionally. She had taken off her own ring that night, for the first time ever. A night of horrifying freedom and painful realisations. That night had also cemented her decision to leave her task unfulfilled. There had been dragons in her dreams. Dragons and a dead wood and an elf who would remain a king in this world, for as long as there was any life left in it. The part where he had stretched out his hand for her to take it, got buried deep down in the darkest part of herself. So deep, it should by all means have woken a Balrog. She shuddered at the thought of it and put her ring back on. She had duties.
„I didn’t think I would ever say that, but I will miss you“, the elvenking said, pulling at a branch laden with snow, when she told him about her decision. Galadriel had noticed, that he wore seasonal crowns here in his realm. Not from precious gems and metals, but from small branches, berries and flowers. Today it seemed to be from pure ice though. Still the ice king, after all. She chuckled silently. Thranduil let go off the branch with mirth in his eyes and a cascade of snowflakes fell down on them. Galadriel watched the way they glistened in the sun, temporarily distracted. „Your kin?“ He laughed, almost childlike, and it brought her back from her musings about snowflakes. „No, you.“ „Why do ice crystals not fracture the light like water drops?“ She asked. He stopped and tilted his head at her with a curious look before something else caught his attention and he grabbed her arm and pulled her down to a small heap of mud. She was about to question his sanity – not for the first time honestly - when a tiny furred nose sniffed out of it. „They come out in the morning“, he whispered. „They are blind, but they’re able to dig even through frozen ground. There are tunnels everywhere under this hill. Isn’t that amazing?“ He was watching the entry of the little burrow intently, while all she could do was watch him. In this very moment, she swore, he was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. There was a feral innocence about him, which was an absolutely laughable thing to say about a being that had lived through millennia and some of the darkest times of this world. The humans told stories about fairies in the woods who would lead people astray. They would happily die from exposure to the elements and exhaustion just for looking at them. She could see where these stories came from. „I will miss you too“, she heard herself say and couldn‘t decide who was surprised about it the most. If not about the fact itself, not anymore at least, then about her own brazenness. She would be damned, but she was physically unable not to lift her fingers to the side of his face. He froze for a second before slowly covering her hand with his own to pull it gently away. „Galadriel.. there is no future, where this could be true.“ Of course not. There was no one who knew better than her. She felt the bleak emptiness of her prophetic dreams creeping back into her mind. It simultaneously made her want to scream her lungs out and give into it, but her voice stayed toneless. „I know. There is no future.“ And he smiled at that, still holding her hand. His damned angelic, careless smile which would haunt her dreams for the rest of eternity. „Not for me. But for you, there is.“ The journey here, all of their conversations, everything had been totally pointless and if she was honest with herself, she had known after the first few days. He had made his choice a long time ago. And if she stayed any longer, she would beg him to make her understand.
Nothing had ever tempted or frightened her more.