Back To You (Thranduil Fanfic)

Part Nine

                                       *+*

Lúthien could feel the creature's body as it walked along beneath her. She kept her eyes closed, all she could hear were it's hooves as they hit the forest floor. It was freezing out, snow had begun trickling down from the sky. And despite it being completely cold outside, she felt warm. There was a heavy weight on her shoulders.

When she opened her eyes, everything was a blur. As Lúthien started coming to, she felt off. Her fingers were numb and it took a moment to realize where she was exactly.

She was sitting behind her King, they both sat on his great elk's back. She was wrapped in the King's cloak. The last thing Lúthien could remember was chasing after a hare in the snow. And then suddenly there was a painful throbbing on her head. When she lifted her hand to touch her head, Thranduil spoke.

"You fell. The guards said they last saw you chasing after something last night, they didn't know where you were going. It was nightfall when you left the castle, and it was pitch black when they came back to tell me you were missing."

Lúthien had seen the hare in the garden and went running after it, not even acknowledging it was past dusk. It was all she remembered before the fall.

"They said they called after you, but you never responded. I know now it was because you tumbled down the hill and knocked yourself unconscious. You were covered in snow when I found you."

Lúthien never said a word, instead she fell back into a deep sleep. And when she woke up, the maids had told her she had been asleep for three days battling fever. Apparently the King refused to leave her side, until that morning when the maids shooed him away. They didn't want to say, but it was because he needed to bathe.

Even though her fever had broken, The King had ordered the maids to make sure she rested well enough. And even though Lúthien was bored out of her mind, Thranduil managed to sneak away from his Kingly duties to spend time with her.

He realized that he needed to be more vigilant during the the winter, especially now that Lúthien had begun to branch out. In her earlier years of being with him, she would normally stay by his side.

                                     *+*

"What do you mean she's getting worse?" Thranduil whispered

"We're doing everything we can my Lord, but something is attacking her body from within."

Lúthien couldn't keep focus as she slipped in and out of consciousness. But then she recognized her King's voice, and she realized that she'd be alright.

The truth was, she wasn't alright. All the healers could figure out was, she had an infection which was killing her from the inside. The kingsfoil that Thranduil had treated her with only did so much. Nobody could understand why her body wasn't responding to any of the treatment. They couldn't ask her what caused her injury in the first place.

Thranduil hadn't felt more afraid than he did the moment the healers told him there was nothing they could besides make her feel comfortable.

Rumor had spread quickly throughout his court. Everyone knew he had gone to find her, nobody he had sent could find a single trace of her. But it wasn't until she had fallen ill that the atmosphere in the palace had changed. The entire household was on edge due to the King's energy, he basically went mad searching for a cure. He had his men ride far all over Middle Earth so that Lúthien might live. Thranduil knew that she had been exposed to various types of poisons and venoms due to her recklessness and curiosity, he was certain that whatever she had been infected with was something he'd never heard of before. He wanted to believe Lúthien could win this battle, she was indeed strong. But how long could that little flame of hers last before burning out completely?