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The elfling keeps himself pressed to a wall to avoid others around him all running in a panic. Somewhere in the back of his muddied thoughts, he knows it will be bad to be trampled but he hasn’t the mind to justify why. None seem to notice he is even there. Not a single Elf stops to help him as they flee or take up arms against the Dwarves. They run the opposite way he walks. Why? He cannot recall. Unimaginable agony numbs most of his other senses as he wanders in search of…something. What is he looking for? Why does he walk further into the caves?
Father. He is looking for his father. Oropher had been invited to a delegation by King Thingol. He’d left Thranduil some coins and told him to stay out of trouble until he returned.
Father had not yet returned and then the Dwarves had come. No… They’d already been here. They were the reason for the delegation, Thranduil recalls. Then that means his father would have been near them when…
Fresh tears stream down his face as he tries again to call for Oropher but the sound is weak and breathless. It hurts so much. He’s never felt like this before. For the first time in his life, Thranduil feels cold. He feels pain and is so very scared. His grip around his throat stays firm as mother had taught him but blood still rushes hotly around his chilled fingers. The Dwarf’s blade had not gone quite deep enough but neither is it superficial. Perhaps it had been a hesitant strike against one so very young. Perhaps it had been intentional, done to prolong his suffering for a crime that is not his. Either way the Dwarf had just said something in Aulë's secret language, taken his coins, and left him there in the market. Thranduil had just started walking.
Father.
Thranduil feels so very weak and, when walking becomes too much, he leans against the jagged wall of the great caves and sets down slowly. The elfling watches the chaos through a haze. Elves fight, Dwarves kill, and his home is in ruins.
He just wants his father.
The young Elf is struck with the strange urge to close his eyes. He blinks slowly, hand falling from the wound when he can no longer hold up his own arm. He is so very tired and can barely raise his head when he hears his name.
Oropher is unmistakable; a snow-born ellon1 through and through from his pale hair and skin to the colorless whites of his irises. His father’s face is so much paler than usual, eyes wide in fright. Thranduil tries to reach for him, a pitiful twitch of his hand, but it matters not for his father holds him anyways.
Thranduil has only just turned thirty; he is little more than a child in the minds of Elves and even to the eyes of mortals. He doesn’t like to feel so small but does so love for Oropher to hold him, to be cradled in his father’s lap like he is still a youngling. Thranduil does not want to leave him yet. He thought he’d have more time to be held like this. They should have had so many more millenia together.
“L…law gwan...ath an...íron, ad…ada.”2 The words break, choked with pain and the taste of iron. Thranduil's feels so out of his own body that he wonders if he's spoken at all or merely imagined it.
“Ni…ni chwir, gwinig,”3 Oropher comforts weakly with a terrible tremor to his voice. There is nothing that can be done with what little time they have. Thranduil can feel his father trembling as he looks around them. His white eyes settle on something to his right and his face hardens as his voice, "Ni chwir."
Thranduil watches his father’s brow furrow as if in pain. His pale blue eyes widen as he sees the glow pass over his chest towards his neck. Thranduil has never known true pain until now but even he knows that this too will hurt.
“Goheno nin, tithen loth.”4 Before he can second-guess himself, Oropher presses hot charcoal against the bleeding wound at his child’s neck.
He hasn’t the voice or strength to truly scream but Thranduil grips Oropher’s wrist. His heels push hard against the ground and his father holds his head in place when he tries to turn away. A pitched, broken squeal escapes him like the final dying throes of a felled deer and his tears are so heavy they come out silent. Oropher cries with him just as noiselessly but commits to the crude method. They haven’t the time for proper healing.
It is over sooner than it feels to Thranduil but eventually the pain goes numb as does everything else. He cannot move or speak and requires Oropher's help to wrap his little arms loosely around his father's shoulders as he’s picked up from the ground. Then they are moving very fast. So fast it makes him feel unwell like the time he'd stolen a bottle of Oropher's wine to try. He worries he might be sick all over the nice robes his father has worn to meet with King Thingol. Father might be upset. Thranduil would be too—they are such a pretty shade of shimmering silver.
The capital continues to fall around them but everything is a blur of color and sound as his father runs with others who cannot or do not wish to fight. Thranduil thinks of his nice clothes and his toys they are leaving behind. They might get dirty or stolen and he means to ask his father if they can go back for the elk nana5 had made for him but his body doesn’t respond. He’s so sleepy and feels very sick but knows he is safe in his ada’s arms. Thranduil tucks his head beneath Oropher’s chin and shuts his eyes. He falls fast asleep as the light of the sun shines on them as they escape from the caves of Menegroth.