FIC: Kitchen Wisdom, PG, Tolkien, Oropher, Thranduil, Legolas and Bellothia(OFC)
Kitchen Wisdom
Author: alexcat
Type: Gen.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I do own this original character but I do not own Middle Earth or Tolkien’s characters, nor do I profit from using them.
Warnings: None
Characters: Oropher, Thranduil, Legolas, Oropher’s wife, Thranduil’s wife, Legolas, Original female character, Bellothia
Archive: Ao3, OEAM, Alex’s Story Book
Author’s Note: Jenny wanted a story about Oropher and Cook, so I decided to give her a month’s worth of them.
Spoilers: For the stories of Oropher and Thranduil, yes.
Summary: Every day, I will tell a little of the story of Bellothia, cook for the house of Oropher.
~~~
Part One
Bellothia stood with Oropher at the practice field, watching Thranduil train with the other young elves of Doriath. Oropher, Gwaelas, and Thranduil had come to Doriath only a few months before. She had befriended them because it turned out that Oropher was a distant kinsman of both her and King Thingol. She also was quite lonely since her mother had left the city and disappeared in the forest after her father had died in a hunting accident.
She had volunteered to help Gwaelas in their new home. She knew quite a bit about cooking since her own mother had been one of the best cooks in all Doriath, cooking often for the king and his family as well as their own friends and neighbors. Bell had been happy to help and she’d learned much as her mother’s assistant.
It had been only a few weeks until she’d moved into the family home as well, her room a nice big one off the kitchen. They didn’t consider her a servant and she certainly never felt like one as she began to take care of her new family, a family that she loved already.
“So, how do you think he is doing?” Oropher asked her.
“He is strong and very skilled for one so young. He can hold his own against the older elves, ones who have reached adulthood already.”
“He will need his skills and wits. One day we will leave here and have a kingdom of our own, a kingdom that he will rule when I weary of it. Will you come with us when we go?”
Bell nodded, knowing she would never leave this family, not as long they wanted her with them. She had found her home with them, though Doriath was the only other home she’d known.
***
Part Two
Oropher returned to Doriath to find it a tomb. The dead were everywhere. There were Noldor all around as well the citizens of Doriath. By Eru, where was Gwaelas? He began to run from room to room, hunting frantically, hoping he wouldn’t find her. He turned over body after body, but she was nowhere to be found.
He found a few people who had somehow hidden huddled in the kitchen. He took control and organized a hunt for survivors, hoping against hope to find Thranduil and Gwaelas. They found no one else alive.
Oropher wanted to hunt his wife and son, but common decency would not allow him to leave all these people lying dead. He and the others began to dig graves. The dead were too many to dig a grave for each so they buried them in mass graves, wrapped in sheets and draperies and lined in rows. The king and queen, he buried in a grave together. The Noldor, he buried in the forest and did not mark their graves with stones as he had his neighbors and friends. The task took all day and into the next.
In the dead of night, he left Doriath forever.
***
Part Three
Bell watched for Oropher in the groups of refugees that came in from Doriath and other cities in the way of the sons of Feanor and their mad oath. Gwaelas was helping Cirdan’s healers take care of the wounded and her son was aiding in finding lodging and food for the influx of homeless into the Mouths of Sirion and the haven that Cirdan offered to one and all.
She hoped he found them soon. Gwaelas was putting on a brave front, but Bell knew that she was frightened that something had happened to her husband. Thranduil had grown into a fine elf, but he still needed his father as well.
And she needed him. Oropher was the best thing that ever happened to her. He gave her a family to be part of when her mother left.
There he was! He looked tired and sad, but then he saw her face.
“Bell!” He shouted as he ran to her. “Are they here too?”
“Yes. We all made it. And so did you!”
Oropher lifted her into the air and swung her around. “I am so relieved that my family is safe!”
Bell knew he meant she was family too.
***
Part Four
They had traveled several weeks and had arrived in a beautiful green woods. They made camp, Oropher, his family and a few dozen other elves who’d begun to follow them as they’d trekked away from the Mouths of Sirion to find their own lands. Most of the followers were Silvan elves or ‘wood elves’ as the elitist Noldor called them. Cirdan had simply called them elves as did Oropher.
Oropher and Thranduil began exploring the surrounding area as well as hunting game for their cookfires. The wood was vast and filled with all sorts of animals and plants.
“Father, come! Look at the caves! They look a little like out home in Doriath.” Thranduil had found a huge network of caves in a craggy hilled area.
Oropher could see how they could expand and build in the caves to make them a very fine dwelling. He would live there with his household. Several of the Silvan elves who’d come with them had asked if he would like to be their chieftan, as they referred to him. He had simply smiled and nodded.
With a forest this size, they would have plenty of everything they needed and room to grow as well. That evening as they all ate food cooked in huge iron pots over the campfire, he told his friends of their new land, told them of his dreams for a beautiful home isolated from the troubles of the Noldor.
“We shall call it Greenwood the Great, our new home.”
***
Part Five
Adandil was one of the huntsmen who kept the kitchen supplied with meat, so Bell saw him often. He was taller even than Oropher and had hair the color of Thranduil’s. He had come to them with Silvan elves who’d joined them after they’d settled here.
He had been hanging around the kitchen a lot the last few weeks. He always smiled at her but said little. She decided that she’d have to do the talking.
“How did you come to join us?”
“I grew up near these woods and since the Noldor came, we have retreated farther back into the deep woods, far from civilization. My mother and sisters were not happy being so isolated, so when your people came through, I thought it would be a good wayfor them to have a better life.”
“Do they like it here?”
“My sister is already betrothed to one of the king’s guard. My mother has begun to work with the healer, helping her with herbals. So yes, they do.”
“And you?”
“I do. I like having companions to spend time with.”
“Do you have a particular companion?”
He blushed.
She changed the subject and offered him an apple turnover she’d just taken from the oven. “I bake them for Thranduil. He comes by every afternoon for one.”
“Are you - is he - ?”
“No. He is my dearest friend but not that kind of friend.”
She smiled as Adandil’s shoulders visibly relaxed.
“Would you like to be?” she asked as she handed him a cup of fresh milk.
“Yes,” he stammered. “Will you - may I court you?”
“You may.”
Bell was pleased to have Adandil as a suitor and after only a few weeks, they married in the garden that Bell and Gwaelas had planted the week after they’d moved in.
***
Part Six
The Dark Lord was stirring. Everyone knew it; everyone feared it.
Rumors had come from the outside that Sauron was gathering his forces in Mordor. Thranduil was anxious to fight in this war though he had little regard for Gil-galad and Elrond, not to mention the man, Elendil.
“Son, we have no business fighting their war. They are Noldor. Let them fight,” Oropher stated at dinner when his son mentioned joining forces with the other elves to fight against their common enemy, indeed the enemy of all that was good in Middle Earth.
“But we must fight to protect our people,” Thranduil pleaded.
“And we will. If he comes here, we will.”
Gil-galad sent an emissary, a dark crow of an elf, one who seemed more suited to dusty library shelves than diplomacy. But when this elf left, he’d somehow convinced Oropher that the elves of the Green Wood needed to join the rest of the free people in this war, this attempt to unseat the evil minion of Morgoth.
And so it was that they began to train and make weapons. Every elf who would come was pressed into service for king and country.
Into war they all marched.
***
Part Seven
Thranduil went to the kitchen to find something to eat and Bell wasn’t there. Oropher was sitting at the table peeling an apple instead.
“Where is she, Father?”
“She is at the training field with her husband.” Oropher stabbed a slice of the apple and popped it into his mouth with a grin.
“Why is she there?”
“Because she is going to war and needs the training.”
“She’s our cook and our friend!”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to allow this?”
Oropher laughed. “You think I can stop her? Go down there and if you think I should, come back and tell me. Then you can tell her she can’t go with us.”
Thranduil turned on his heel and ran toward to the field. Bell was dressed as any elven warrior, with her knives at her sides and her bow in her hand. He started to run up to her and Adandil, but stopped short when she pulled back her bow and let an arrow fly toward the target, hitting it dead center then following immediately with a second one that split the first.
He didn’t approach her, stepping back to watch as she worked with a target that was placed on a rope and randomly pulled this way and that as she tried to hit it. She did, hitting with every arrow in her quiver.
Thranduil was deadly with his knives but even he wasn’t that good an archer. Adandil was as good as she was too. His father was right. Any able bodied warrior was needed and Bell surely fit that category.
He found his father sitting at the table, eating a chicken leg. Oropher offered him a piece and motioned for him to sit down.
“Believe me now?”
Thranduil said nothing, munching his chicken in silence.
***
Part Eight
Thranduil married on the day before his father’s army set out to join the march to Barad-dûr. His new wife was a lovely Silvan elf, the daughter of one of the chieftans who had asked Oropher to bring them under his rule when he moved into the Green Wood.
Lúthwen was her name.
She was the kindest, gentlest woman he’d ever met. He’d fallen in love with her the moment he saw her, but she had taken a while to convince. Five years. She had put him off for five years. It was not a wait that he minded at all if she could be his in the end.
Now he was going to war in one day.
The elves of the Green Wood danced and celebrated the wedding until the wee hours. Many knew it would be a long time before they saw their loved ones again.
Thranduil and Lúthwen slipped away sometime after midnight and did not come out of their apartments until the sun rose high in the sky.
Lúthwen cried when she watched him leave, wishing she had told him to hurry home to his new child, who would be born while he was at war.
***
Part Nine
Bell hated everything about Barad-dûr. It was dusty. Dry. Dark. Boring.
They waited.
The kings had meetings and yelled loudly at one another.
Oropher came back from the meetings and yelled loudly at Thranduil.
Bell cooked and practiced her archery.
Thranduil came to their tent one night, several months into the siege. “I would like you to go home,” he said without preamble.
Bell jumped to her feet, ready to argue that she was every bit the warrior he was.
“I got a missive today. Lúthwen is with child and is due in the spring. I want you to go home to see my child and help my mother deliver him. I don’t want Lúthwen to feel alone.”
Bell agreed. She and Adandil would leave immediately and she’d return once the child was born. She packed up and was gone by sunrise.
Lúthwen was already large with child when they got back to the Green Wood. She threw her arms around Bell. “I am so glad you’ve come. I miss you almost as much as I miss Trhanduil.” She grinned. “Almost.”
“I wouldn’t have gone had I known. I’m not sure what good I’ll be here, but I make a lovely cup of tea.”
So Bell took care of Lúthwen, making her herbal teas to ease her sickness and to make her cheeks rosier. She did not care for the pale color of her friend, nor the dark smudges under her eyes. She made soups for her and helped sew clothes for the coming child. And said nothing to alarm anyone about Lúthwen’s condition.
Her husband returned to the Dark land to wait with everyone else.
Both for the coming child and for the inevitable war.
Legolas Greenleaf was born on a fine winter morning, the same day that his young mother departed for the house of the dead. He lay in his mother’s arms until she was too weak to hold him any longer.
Her last words were: “His name is Legolas. Please take care of them both.” And she was gone.
Bell cried as though her heart would break and when she was finished, she picked up the tiny elf boy and promised to love him as she did his father and grandfather.
***
Part Ten
Oropher sat in Bell’s tent. He was eating a bowl of her rabbit stew. He wondered where she got the carrots, potatoes and onions. No matter. The stew was good.
“How is he?” Bell asked him. “He won’t talk to me. He asked me to take care of them. I failed him.”
“Failed him? My dear Bell, you know as well as I do that we do not always control everything; we don’t control anything, for that matter. He is angry and grieving. He will survive. His son needs him and Thranduil will not shirk his duty, by his son or by his people.”
“You don’t think he hates me?”
“My dear Bell, who will help him raise that child, if not you?”
“You and his mother?”
“We are grandparents. We will spoil the child. You’ll have to stand in for his mother when he needs you. Tell me, is my grandson handsome?”
Bell smiled. “He is. He is fair haired like his father and as comely as his mother. He is a fine child.”
“I will be glad to be done with this war, to go home and meet him. Tell me, do you have any honey stashed away?”
***
Part Eleven
Oropher had known for a long time that he would not leave this hellish plain alive. He had felt it in his heart when he’d agreed to come here with the Noldor king. The Noldor king would not leave here either. It would take their all to defeat Sauron.
He did not mind. His son would be a fine king and he already had a son to follow him. He did regret that he would never see the child. Bell would take care of them both. It’s a pity his son had not married the cook. She was as fine a woman as his wife was.
He pulled his long sword out of its ornate scabbard and looked at it. It was polished to a mirror finish and razor sharp. He sharpened it again, oiled the blade and put it away. His armor was polished and his horse was clean and fed, ready.
He left his tent after all were abed and slipped into Gil-galad’s.
“What on earth are you doing here?” Gil-galad was sitting at his desk, looking at some maps.
“I have an idea on how to end this. Let me tell you about it…”
And he did.
***
Part Twelve
Bell was terrified. She didn’t want to go into battle but they needed her. She was a good archer and she could aid the healers as well. Neither she nor Adandil had slept all night. She had worked on her arrows while he sharpened his blades. Neither had said much as they worked.
When the dawn came, they dressed in their armor and went to field where the rest of Oropher’s troops were assembling. The mood was somber. The cavalry mounted their horses and the archers followed on foot.
It was to be a day no one would ever forget.
***
Part Thirteen
No one but Oropher and Gil-galad knew that the army of the Green Wood would attack early on purpose. They were the diversion that allowed the other armies to go for Sauron himself.
The plan worked brilliantly but all would still have been lost had Isildur not cut the One Ring from the hand of the Sauron. Gil-galad fell. Elendil fell. Elves, men and dwarves fell.
None of that mattered to Thranduil.
His father died as well. A single wound to his heart felled him. Thranduil fell to his knees in the dirt and cried out in anguish. He had lost his wife and his father. He gathered what was left of their army, retrieved his father’s body and left the plain for the Green wood.
Bell was among the survivors but her husband was not. He had died beside his king. She found his horse and put him across its back, leading the horse as she followed her king from the field. The elves of the Green Wood carried as many of their dead home as they could find.
It was solemn procession that left that day, not to be seen in Middle Earth for many years to come.
***
Part Fourteen
The Green Wood was a somber place since the battle. Thranduil’s mother had made her way to the Havens and sailed to the West. He was left to raise his son alone and to run his father’s kingdom alone.
He holed himself up in the royal apartments and didn’t talk to anyone for weeks. Even little Legolas was not allowed in to see his father.
After the third week, Bell decided that enough was enough. She knocked on his door and he didn’t answer.
“I am not leaving. In fact, I am coming in.” She tried the door and, as she thought, it was locked. No matter. She had a set of keys to all the doors in the entire royal complex. She unlocked the door and went into Thranduil’s home.
He sat in his father’s chair, reading a scroll. He looked up when she came in. “Go away. I am not seeing visitors.”
“No. I am not a visitor. You have people who need your leadership and a son who needs his father. I am here to see that they all get what they need from you.”
“Can’t you see that I am not ready for this?”
“It doesn’t matter, my friend. This is ready for you. I’ll have you a bath drawn and will polish your father’s mithril crown. You can speak to the people this evening.”
“Are you not listening to me?” He was angry.
“Are you not listening to me? You have no choice. Period. So get dressed and be the king your father taught you to be.”
He glared at her for a long moment then nodded. “You are right. Our people need me, need leadership. It is up to me to provide it.”
“It is indeed, sire.” Bell bowed to him, her new king.
***
Part Fifteen
Bell was kneading a huge mound of dough for the morning bread when Thranduil came into the kitchen. It was still dark out and would be for several more hours.
He grabbed an apple out of the bowl on the table and sat down.
“Being a king is easier than being a father.”
Bell hid her grin. What had Legolas done now?
“He told me that I smell like old people!”
Bell laughed out loud. “You’re younger than me and he tells me I smell like a party!”
Thranduil stuck his tongue out at her. “That’s only because you always smell like baking. Any day Legolas gets pie is a party to him.”
“Maybe we should all take a lesson from him then.”
“How come you’re so wise?”
“Because I am older than you are.”
Bell divided the dough into five loaves and covered them with a towel to rise. There would be hot bread to eat with butter and honey when everyone came to the dining room for breakfast.
She opened one of the ovens and lifted out a large baked ham, which she set up on the carving table to cool a few minutes before she sliced it.
“I have some bread already done. Would you like a bit of ham on hot bread?”
Thranduil sighed with happiness. “I thought you’d never ask.”
***
Part Sixteen
“I am never going to be a good archer, Bell!” Legolas had just begun his training with the other young elves of his age.
“Yes, you will. You must keep practicing.”
“You bake bread. How hard can that be? You don’t know anything about being an archer.” Legolas was just learning to read and he thought he must know almost everything by now.
Bell grinned and leaned down so they were face to face. “Actually, I was one of the best archers in your grandfather’s army. If you don’t believe me, ask your father.”
He clearly thought she was delusional but that didn’t stop him from pocketing a couple of her biscuits on his way out the door.
An hour later, he was back, looking a bit sheepish. “Bell, Papa says you are the best archer in all the land and that if I want to learn to be a good one, then I must be nice to you so you’ll give me lessons.”
Bell smiled at him. “You certainly must be nice to me.” She kissed the tip of his nose. “But that is not a problem. You are the sweetest elf in all of the Green Wood. Grab a few more of those biscuits and follow me to the training field. We’ll have you hitting the bull’s eye in no time at all.”
***
Part Seventeen
Legolas had been hanging around the kitchen a lot the last few days, looking all moony-eyed and sighing a lot. That could only mean one thing. He was in love.
The stone cutter’s daughter, Merien, was a cute little thing with her mop of dark hair and her huge blue eyes. Legolas had been following her around for weeks. He was bothering her so much that her father came to to Bell.
“He’s a sweet lad but he’s proposed marriage to her and her only ten years old. I think she’d like to stay single for a few more years.”
Bell smiled. “If she can be patient for a few weeks, I think her problems will be over.”
“Is Legolas going away?”
“Oh, no.. His father is giving him his first horse. He sent all the way to Rivendell for a pony from Lord Elrond’s horse master.”
Mirien’s father smiled. “Not even the prettiest little girl in the world can compete with a boy’s first horse.”
“You’re safe for a few more years then, until they hit puberty,” Bell said.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. No use in us borrowing trouble, is there?”
Bell agreed thoroughly.
***
Part Eighteen
Legolas was out hunting deer in the forest outside his hidden home when he heard something nearby. Whoever they were, they were noisy and they weren’t speaking Sindarin. It was a similar language but very harsh and guttural. He hid down behind a large row of wild roses that grew all over the forest.
They came into view. There was a band of twenty-five or so of them.
Orcs!
How had he not smelled them before they came into sight? He certainly smelled their awful stench now. It was all he could do not to gag. He put his hand over his mouth to keep himself from making a sound.
The orcs were speaking the Dark Speech but Legolas could hear words similar to those he spoke. He heard them speak of a goblin king, of dragons, of the master.
Could it be that the evil one was stirring again?
He remembered his father’s stories of the Last Alliance of Men and Elves against Sauron and the battle that killed his grandfather and Bell’s husband.
He stayed still until every last orc had passed then he hurriedly made his way home. It would seem that evil had awakened once again.
***
Part Nineteen
Bell watched with amusement as the handsome dwarf king refused to answer any of Trhanduil’s questions. This was a stubborn one, as stubborn as the elf king himself. While Thranduil had no love for any outsiders, Bell found the dwarvish folk to be an interesting lot, with their beards and their bravado. She admired them for their loyalty to their king even when Thranduil sent them all to the ‘dungeon’ without any food.
She slipped into the kitchen and filled a basket with fruit, bread and cheese. She carried it in one hand and a skin of water in the other and headed for the dungeon. Thranduil could be as mean as he pleased but no one was going without food as long as she ran the kitchen!
When she stepped into the dungeon’s main hall, she was certain that she heard someone breathing beside her but no one was there. The guards weren’t even at their posts. Thranduil would be furious if he knew, but she wasn’t telling him.
“Hello?” she called out. “I have some food and water for you all.”
The dwarves called out to her then, asking her to free them.
She smiled. “I cannot do that but you’ll not go hungry. The king is not an evil man. He will release you all.”
She visited each cell and handed a portion of each food through to each one. Thorin, the king, refused the food, but he did drink a bit of water. He was very much like Thranduil, she thought to herself as she tidied up the basket and headed out of the dungeon.
She stopped to talk to the youngest dwarves and set her basket down. When she looked back at it, the towel was opened and an apple was missing. Maybe they had some huge mice down here because she certainly hadn’t seen anyone else.
The next day, all of the dwarves were mysteriously gone. The next she heard of them was when they holed up in the Lonely Mountain, trying to steal Thorin’s kingdom back from Smaug, the dragon who lived there.
***
Part Twenty
“What do you mean gone?” Thranduil yelled at the guard, who looked a little worse for wear.
“They are gone, sir. Nothing but some apple cores left in their cells.”
“Apple cores? Bell?!” He yelled.
Bell had been lurking outside the door of his throne room anyway so she popped in the door. “Yes, sire?”
“Did you let my captive dwarves go?”
“No. I fed them but I didn’t let them go. I hated to think of them all hungry down there. ”
She popped back out. He looked like he might throw something at her. She wasn’t afraid but she usually let him calm down when he was in this state before she talked to him. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen him this way.
He asked the guard how they’d gotten out and it turned out they’d rode some barrels from Laketown out onto the river. Bell laughed to herself at their cleverness. But how did they get out of their cells? They’d been locked in when she was there.
Could there have been someone there she didn’t see? She felt a chill at the thought, but then dismissed it. Where would anyone be able to hide?
***
Part Twenty-one
It wasn’t long before they found out exactly where the dwarves had gone. They’d gone to the Lonely Mountain and stirred up the dragon, Smaug, who’d gone on a rampage and destroyed Laketown before being killed by Bard the Bowman.
Thranduil, in a rage over what the dwarves had done, came storming into the kitchen. Bell was kneading bread.
“Get your bow, woman. We’re going to the Lonely Mountain. I will have my part of that damnable dragon’s loot and we must give aid to those who fled the town when the dragon laid waste to it.”
“Aren’t you being a little hasty?” She had not stopped her kneading nor changed the expression on her face.
“Indeed I am not! If I find them, I will skewer every last one of them alive!”
“They must be dead if they were in the mountain with old Smaug.”
“I hope not because I want to kill them!” Thranduil was in fine form.
“Calm down. Eat your dinner then pack up some supplies and set out at dawn. I’ll get the other women to help me pack extra food and medical supplies for the people of Laketown. I will ride with the healer.
Thranduil stopped and looked at her. “As usual, you are right. We will wait until morning. But I am still going to kill that dwarf!”
***
Part Twenty-two
The battle, when it came, was not with those infernal dwarves but with an army of orcs. The price was high but the dragon was dead and the orcs pushed back.
For now.
They had all known that there would be another war to fight against Sauron and that war was coming. Thranduil had watched darkness creep over the Green Wood. Giant spiders who talked had infested the forest and ate unknowing travelers. The squirrels were black and menacing and nothing green grew in much of the forest.
He kept his city safe, but just barely.
For now, he’d wait.
***
Part Twenty-three
Thranduil was sitting in the kitchen as he often did, eating while he watched Bell bake. He poured honey onto a plate and dipped his bread into it. As he took a bite, he said, “Do you think it’s time we found Legolas a wife?”
“More importantly, does he think it’s time we found him a wife?” Bell asked as she put the last loaves in the oven and sat down with her tea to wait for them to bake.
“Well, I haven’t asked him,” Thranduil said as he poured himself a cup of tea.
“Why exactly does he need a wife?”
“Everyone needs a wife.”
“I don’t have one and you never took another,” Bell said as she added a little honey to her tea and sipped it slowly.
“I have never wanted another.”
“Maybe you should let him find his own wife. You found yours.”
“Remember some of the prospective wives my father had me meet?”
Bell burst out laughing. “Do you remember that one elf from somewhere near Gondor? She was some sort of princess?”
“The one who asked my father if I was a little off in the head?”
“Well, we did put a bag of bugs in her bed,” Bell reminded him. “I was afraid she might kill us when she found out who did it.”
Thranduil was laughing as hard as Bell was. “She’s lucky! It could have been spiders!”
“We did put spiders in the tent of the one that Gildor brought to meet you.”
Thranduil stopped for a moment and started laughing again. “Legolas’ mother and her sisters put a snake in my saddlebag when I first met her.”
“You never told me that! It’s no wonder I liked her so much!”
Thranduil grew almost serious. “Do you think it would be all right to hint to Legolas that he might be thinking about a bride? “
“As long as you warn him to keep a lookout for spiders and snakes as well. How about some more honey and bread?”
Thranduil nodded as she cut them both a slice of fresh bread.
***
Part Twenty-four
Bell had always loved the old man though old man was certainly not all there was to him. What else she did not know. He called himself wizard but he seemed almost from another world to her. This time he had a human with him.
“Mithrandir! Come in! The king will be with you soon. Would you like something to eat?” Bell never stood much on ceremony and certainly not with Mithrandir.
“I can never get enough of your food, my dear girl! This is Strider of the Rangers. He and I are looking for - well, we’re searching for someone and we found ourselves close so I thought I might come by and visit, perhaps speak with Thranduil before we go on.”
The man was as tall as an elf and long past his youth. He had years on him but was no old man yet. Bell sensed that this man was not a typical man, even of the Rangers.
She poured them both tea and made them a plate of pastries, butter and jam. Strider ate as if he’d not seen food in a long time. She wondered what exactly he and Mithrandir were doing. Thranduil would tell her later, she was sure.
As if by cue, the king appeared in the kitchen. “Mithrandir! To what do we owe the pleasure?”
“My friend and I were close by and we thought we might warn you to be on the lookout for the creature Gollum.”
“We have seen no such creature here.”
“No, probably not but if you begin to get reports of a fish thief, then send for me or Strider.”
“That I can do. I have heard rumors of a creature that lived in the Misty Mountains, a vile little creature who lived in the deeps.”
“That would be our Gollum.”
“Why do you seek him?”
“I think he may know secrets we’d rather the Dark Lord not find out.”
Thranduil looked at Mithrandir. “He stirs, does he not?”
“He does,” the old man acknowledged. “We mean to keep Gollum from him.”
“Then we shall keep a watchful eye. Good luck to you and Strider. We will give aid if needed. Simply call.”
Bell packed them a basket of food and a bottle of wine and saw them to the door. She hugged the old man at the door. “Please be safe, my friends!”
And they were gone.
***
Part Twenty-five
It was a few years later, when Thranduil and a company were hunting in the forest, that the man Strider found them again. He carried a big cloth bag with a wiggling, screaming creature inside it. All anyone could understand it saying were the words Baggins and precious.
Thranduil did remember a Halfling named Baggins at the battle of the Lonely Mountain. Perhaps that was what the thing was talking about.
“Can you hold him for me? I must find Mithrandir,” Strider asked.
Thranduil agreed and in the exchange, the horrid little thing escaped, jumping about until they chased it up a tree. The king set guards about, figuring that it had to come down sometime but in the night, something happened to the guards and all were found with bumps on their heads and no memory of what happened when daylight came.
There was also no sign of Gollum.
***
Part Twenty-six
“Father, we should go to the council in Imladris. We did manage to lose Gollum and Mithrandir and Lord Elrond need to know that.”
Thranduil was not agreeing to anything right now. He had no intentions of being blamed for the escape of that nasty little thing.
“I am not going there. I am not leaving this wood, not for Mithrandir, not for anyone.”
“Then I shall go. I’ll take Goweston with me,” Legolas told his father.
“I am not sure you’ll be welcomed back,” Thranduil threatened.
“Father, you do not mean that, I know. You are angry and I understand that as well. But I am going to this council. It is important. We know that evil is stirring and if no one acts, it will overcome us all.”
Thranduil said nothing, preferring to sulk and thinking that his son would come around to his way of thinking in a day or two.
Legolas said nothing either. Not to his father anyway.
“Bell, Goweston and I are going to a council in Imladris. Father says we should stay away and I disagree. I thought you should know where I am.”
He hugged her and was gone with the dawn.
***
Part Twenty-seven
Thranduil was livid when he found out that Legolas had really gone to Imladris to meet with Mithrandir and Elrond. He knew nothing good would come of this. They’d blame him for Gollum’s escape. He had paced and ranted and raved for hours when Bell had heard enough.
“What would have him do, then, Sire?” she asked with no trace of formality.
“He should obey me?”
“Like you did Oropher? Legolas has always been an obedient child. That he was willing to go without your permission should tell you how important this is to him.”
“I cannot protect him there!” Thranduil shouted.
“No, you cannot but he is an adult. He is a capable warrior and a sensible elf. Trust him to do what is right.”
Thranduil was not happy in the least but he did calm down a bit.
Several weeks later, Goweston came back home without Legolas.
“What do mean, journey?” Thranduil asked as he backed Goweston across the room.
“He is going on a journey with Mithrandir, Strider and some others to return to the One Ring to Mount Doom.” Goweston said very, very quickly.
“What others?” Thranduil had him against the closed door.
“Four hobbits, a man from Gondor and a dwarf.”
“A dwarf? What in the name of Eru is he doing that for?”
“We - they - all decided that the Ring must be destroyed and this is the only way anyone knows to do it.”
“Why did my son go instead of you?”
“He volunteered.”
“You go back and tell him to come home this instant!”
“They left already, sire.”
Thranduil was so angry that he released Goweston from his service and banned anyone from speaking the name Legolas in his presence.
Bell had never seen him so distraught or angry over anything. She made his favorite dishes, she honeyed him, she yelled at him and nothing seemed to make him back into his old self.
She hoped nothing bad happened to Legolas on his journey because she was going to kill him herself when he returned home. With her bare hands, if need be.
***
Part Twenty-eight
Thranduil had always been short of temper at times but now he was insufferable. He yelled at the house servants, he yelled at the stable boys, he yelled at his council. He simply yelled sometimes at no one. But even he did not have the nerve to yell at Bell.
Bell was worried about him. Thranduil had lost everything he ever loved except for his precious son. She knew that he feared Legolas would never come back. She sometimes had the same fear. She loved him as if he were her own child.
Late one night, she heard Thranduil in the kitchen. Her rooms were near the kitchen so she could hear the even the quietest visitor. He was not very quiet. He ran into a chair and Bell smiled to herself at the line of curses that spewed from his mouth.
She’d better check on him.
“What manner of lunatic is making a mess in my kitchen?” she said as she lit several of the candles about the room and stoked the fire in the stove to heat water for tea.
“I wanted pie. Do you have any?”
She suspected he was in his cups. She did have pie, though. She always had pie and she never turned anyone away who wanted food.
“I have a lovely blackberry pie. I’ll cut you a piece.”
He sat back and began to eat as soon as she set it in front of him. “Mmmm. This is good.”
He seemed to sober up a bit as he ate and drank a little of the strong tea she’d brewed. He also seemed to lose a little of his anger.
“He is an adult, you know,” she told him.
“He is my son.”
“He loves you and is doing what he feels is right.”
“Look where right got my father.”
“Had your father not done what he did, the war might have been lost.”
“Then what am I to do?” He looked so lost when he asked her the question.
“Take care of this land, these people. Trust that Legolas will make things right in that world.”
He looked thoughtful then smiled, a sad smile but still a smile. “When did you get so wise, my friend?”
She patted his shoulder. “Get yourself to bed when you finish your pie.” She blew out all but one candle and went back to her own bed.
***
Part Twenty-nine
Thranduil ended up fighting along with Celeborn against the forces of the Dark Lord as they joined forces to defend Lothlorien and Mirkwood.. As he led his troops, he wondered where Legolas was and how he faired.
Word came from Gondor then from Mordor. The Ring was destroyed and the war was over. Thranduil and Celeborn cleaned up a bit in their own lands and decided to rename that land Eryn Lasgalen.
Peace had come at last. The Ring was gone and Sauron vanquished.
Thranduil expected his son to return home. He did not and there were rumors that he journeyed the Fanghorn Forest with a dwarf. A dwarf? What evil spell had been cast upon Legolas to make him abandon his home and keep company with a dwarf?
Thranduil was invited to the royal wedding. The Ranger would marry Elrond’s daughter and they would reign in Gondor. He decided to go and bring his wayward son back home where he belonged.
Oddly enough, Bell seemed to be keeping her own council about the whole thing. He had expected her to t\ell him what he should be doing but she said little.
He noticed that she packed for Gondor too.
***
Part Thirty
Thranduil had not been the same since Legolas had declined to come home. Bell worried about him but there was little she could do. He was the King and she was a simple servant.
She did send word to Legolas in Ithilien that his father needed him to come home, even if just for a visit. She’d heard nothing back until one day, she went to the kitchen to start dinner and there he stood in the doorway. He was no child anymore. He was confident in his bearing as he lifted her off the ground and kissed both cheeks.
“Child! You are so much like your grandfather! I thought I’d never see you again!” She kissed his cheeks in return.
“I have come to visit Father. I have been gone far too long. I’ve missed you both.”
It was only then that she noticed his companion, a dwarf, the dwarf, she suspected.
“This is Gimli, son of Gloin. His father was one of the company that Father put in his dungeons years ago.”
She smiled. “I am glad to meet you, Gimli, son of Gloin. We have heard many stories of the elf and dwarf of the Fellowship.”
Gimli blushed, which Bell found totally endearing. He kissed her hand in the formal way of men.
“Bel-It is you!” Thranduil stopped dead in his tracks and stared at his son.
“It is I, Father, and this is Gimli, my friend.”
Thranduil started open mouthed until Bell elbowed him.
“I am glad you are home, both of you.” He grabbed Legolas and hugged him for all he was worth. “My son! Welcome home, my son!”
***
Part Thirty-One
Legolas had built the small vessel that he and Gimli sailed west in. It was sturdy and dependable, like Gimli. Sometime in the years after the War of the Ring, Legolas had realized that he would never marry. He would, instead, spend his life with Gimli, who came with him because he said he wanted to see Lady Galadriel one more time. Legolas knew there was more to it than that and knowing was enough. Gimli didn’t need to say a word.
*
Thranduil and Bell had sailed some years before. When he’d told her he was sailing, she’d said, “I helped bring you into the world and wherever you go, I am going with you. I promised your mother that I’d take care of you.”
And so they lived in a little house by the shore. Every morning, they walked on the beach and talked of their lives. Every day, Thranduil looked to the sea, watching for his son.
He saw the small sailboat as soon as it was visible on the horizon. It had been years since any ship had come into port so many other elves saw it as well.
Thranduil and Bell made their way to the dock to wait and see who was coming so many years after almost all had sailed. They knew long before it docked that it was Legolas, his golden hair and his bearded companion giving him away.
Thranduil was waiting to catch the line to tie them off. He tied it quickly and was the first person to greet Legolas and Gimli.
“I have waited long for this day. I began to fear you’d never come.”
“Gimli said he wished to see Galadriel once again so I knew it was time to sail,” his son said to him as they embraced.
“Bell is sure to have some fresh baked pie for you. Let’s go home.”
They did, all walking arm in arm down the beach.
~end~
Author: alexcat
Type: Gen.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I do own this original character but I do not own Middle Earth or Tolkien’s characters, nor do I profit from using them.
Warnings: None
Characters: Oropher, Thranduil, Legolas, Oropher’s wife, Thranduil’s wife, Legolas, Original female character, Bellothia
Archive: Ao3, OEAM, Alex’s Story Book
Author’s Note: Jenny wanted a story about Oropher and Cook, so I decided to give her a month’s worth of them.
Spoilers: For the stories of Oropher and Thranduil, yes.
Summary: Every day, I will tell a little of the story of Bellothia, cook for the house of Oropher.
~~~
Part One
Bellothia stood with Oropher at the practice field, watching Thranduil train with the other young elves of Doriath. Oropher, Gwaelas, and Thranduil had come to Doriath only a few months before. She had befriended them because it turned out that Oropher was a distant kinsman of both her and King Thingol. She also was quite lonely since her mother had left the city and disappeared in the forest after her father had died in a hunting accident.
She had volunteered to help Gwaelas in their new home. She knew quite a bit about cooking since her own mother had been one of the best cooks in all Doriath, cooking often for the king and his family as well as their own friends and neighbors. Bell had been happy to help and she’d learned much as her mother’s assistant.
It had been only a few weeks until she’d moved into the family home as well, her room a nice big one off the kitchen. They didn’t consider her a servant and she certainly never felt like one as she began to take care of her new family, a family that she loved already.
“So, how do you think he is doing?” Oropher asked her.
“He is strong and very skilled for one so young. He can hold his own against the older elves, ones who have reached adulthood already.”
“He will need his skills and wits. One day we will leave here and have a kingdom of our own, a kingdom that he will rule when I weary of it. Will you come with us when we go?”
Bell nodded, knowing she would never leave this family, not as long they wanted her with them. She had found her home with them, though Doriath was the only other home she’d known.
***
Part Two
Oropher returned to Doriath to find it a tomb. The dead were everywhere. There were Noldor all around as well the citizens of Doriath. By Eru, where was Gwaelas? He began to run from room to room, hunting frantically, hoping he wouldn’t find her. He turned over body after body, but she was nowhere to be found.
He found a few people who had somehow hidden huddled in the kitchen. He took control and organized a hunt for survivors, hoping against hope to find Thranduil and Gwaelas. They found no one else alive.
Oropher wanted to hunt his wife and son, but common decency would not allow him to leave all these people lying dead. He and the others began to dig graves. The dead were too many to dig a grave for each so they buried them in mass graves, wrapped in sheets and draperies and lined in rows. The king and queen, he buried in a grave together. The Noldor, he buried in the forest and did not mark their graves with stones as he had his neighbors and friends. The task took all day and into the next.
In the dead of night, he left Doriath forever.
***
Part Three
Bell watched for Oropher in the groups of refugees that came in from Doriath and other cities in the way of the sons of Feanor and their mad oath. Gwaelas was helping Cirdan’s healers take care of the wounded and her son was aiding in finding lodging and food for the influx of homeless into the Mouths of Sirion and the haven that Cirdan offered to one and all.
She hoped he found them soon. Gwaelas was putting on a brave front, but Bell knew that she was frightened that something had happened to her husband. Thranduil had grown into a fine elf, but he still needed his father as well.
And she needed him. Oropher was the best thing that ever happened to her. He gave her a family to be part of when her mother left.
There he was! He looked tired and sad, but then he saw her face.
“Bell!” He shouted as he ran to her. “Are they here too?”
“Yes. We all made it. And so did you!”
Oropher lifted her into the air and swung her around. “I am so relieved that my family is safe!”
Bell knew he meant she was family too.
***
Part Four
They had traveled several weeks and had arrived in a beautiful green woods. They made camp, Oropher, his family and a few dozen other elves who’d begun to follow them as they’d trekked away from the Mouths of Sirion to find their own lands. Most of the followers were Silvan elves or ‘wood elves’ as the elitist Noldor called them. Cirdan had simply called them elves as did Oropher.
Oropher and Thranduil began exploring the surrounding area as well as hunting game for their cookfires. The wood was vast and filled with all sorts of animals and plants.
“Father, come! Look at the caves! They look a little like out home in Doriath.” Thranduil had found a huge network of caves in a craggy hilled area.
Oropher could see how they could expand and build in the caves to make them a very fine dwelling. He would live there with his household. Several of the Silvan elves who’d come with them had asked if he would like to be their chieftan, as they referred to him. He had simply smiled and nodded.
With a forest this size, they would have plenty of everything they needed and room to grow as well. That evening as they all ate food cooked in huge iron pots over the campfire, he told his friends of their new land, told them of his dreams for a beautiful home isolated from the troubles of the Noldor.
“We shall call it Greenwood the Great, our new home.”
***
Part Five
Adandil was one of the huntsmen who kept the kitchen supplied with meat, so Bell saw him often. He was taller even than Oropher and had hair the color of Thranduil’s. He had come to them with Silvan elves who’d joined them after they’d settled here.
He had been hanging around the kitchen a lot the last few weeks. He always smiled at her but said little. She decided that she’d have to do the talking.
“How did you come to join us?”
“I grew up near these woods and since the Noldor came, we have retreated farther back into the deep woods, far from civilization. My mother and sisters were not happy being so isolated, so when your people came through, I thought it would be a good wayfor them to have a better life.”
“Do they like it here?”
“My sister is already betrothed to one of the king’s guard. My mother has begun to work with the healer, helping her with herbals. So yes, they do.”
“And you?”
“I do. I like having companions to spend time with.”
“Do you have a particular companion?”
He blushed.
She changed the subject and offered him an apple turnover she’d just taken from the oven. “I bake them for Thranduil. He comes by every afternoon for one.”
“Are you - is he - ?”
“No. He is my dearest friend but not that kind of friend.”
She smiled as Adandil’s shoulders visibly relaxed.
“Would you like to be?” she asked as she handed him a cup of fresh milk.
“Yes,” he stammered. “Will you - may I court you?”
“You may.”
Bell was pleased to have Adandil as a suitor and after only a few weeks, they married in the garden that Bell and Gwaelas had planted the week after they’d moved in.
***
Part Six
The Dark Lord was stirring. Everyone knew it; everyone feared it.
Rumors had come from the outside that Sauron was gathering his forces in Mordor. Thranduil was anxious to fight in this war though he had little regard for Gil-galad and Elrond, not to mention the man, Elendil.
“Son, we have no business fighting their war. They are Noldor. Let them fight,” Oropher stated at dinner when his son mentioned joining forces with the other elves to fight against their common enemy, indeed the enemy of all that was good in Middle Earth.
“But we must fight to protect our people,” Thranduil pleaded.
“And we will. If he comes here, we will.”
Gil-galad sent an emissary, a dark crow of an elf, one who seemed more suited to dusty library shelves than diplomacy. But when this elf left, he’d somehow convinced Oropher that the elves of the Green Wood needed to join the rest of the free people in this war, this attempt to unseat the evil minion of Morgoth.
And so it was that they began to train and make weapons. Every elf who would come was pressed into service for king and country.
Into war they all marched.
***
Part Seven
Thranduil went to the kitchen to find something to eat and Bell wasn’t there. Oropher was sitting at the table peeling an apple instead.
“Where is she, Father?”
“She is at the training field with her husband.” Oropher stabbed a slice of the apple and popped it into his mouth with a grin.
“Why is she there?”
“Because she is going to war and needs the training.”
“She’s our cook and our friend!”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to allow this?”
Oropher laughed. “You think I can stop her? Go down there and if you think I should, come back and tell me. Then you can tell her she can’t go with us.”
Thranduil turned on his heel and ran toward to the field. Bell was dressed as any elven warrior, with her knives at her sides and her bow in her hand. He started to run up to her and Adandil, but stopped short when she pulled back her bow and let an arrow fly toward the target, hitting it dead center then following immediately with a second one that split the first.
He didn’t approach her, stepping back to watch as she worked with a target that was placed on a rope and randomly pulled this way and that as she tried to hit it. She did, hitting with every arrow in her quiver.
Thranduil was deadly with his knives but even he wasn’t that good an archer. Adandil was as good as she was too. His father was right. Any able bodied warrior was needed and Bell surely fit that category.
He found his father sitting at the table, eating a chicken leg. Oropher offered him a piece and motioned for him to sit down.
“Believe me now?”
Thranduil said nothing, munching his chicken in silence.
***
Part Eight
Thranduil married on the day before his father’s army set out to join the march to Barad-dûr. His new wife was a lovely Silvan elf, the daughter of one of the chieftans who had asked Oropher to bring them under his rule when he moved into the Green Wood.
Lúthwen was her name.
She was the kindest, gentlest woman he’d ever met. He’d fallen in love with her the moment he saw her, but she had taken a while to convince. Five years. She had put him off for five years. It was not a wait that he minded at all if she could be his in the end.
Now he was going to war in one day.
The elves of the Green Wood danced and celebrated the wedding until the wee hours. Many knew it would be a long time before they saw their loved ones again.
Thranduil and Lúthwen slipped away sometime after midnight and did not come out of their apartments until the sun rose high in the sky.
Lúthwen cried when she watched him leave, wishing she had told him to hurry home to his new child, who would be born while he was at war.
***
Part Nine
Bell hated everything about Barad-dûr. It was dusty. Dry. Dark. Boring.
They waited.
The kings had meetings and yelled loudly at one another.
Oropher came back from the meetings and yelled loudly at Thranduil.
Bell cooked and practiced her archery.
Thranduil came to their tent one night, several months into the siege. “I would like you to go home,” he said without preamble.
Bell jumped to her feet, ready to argue that she was every bit the warrior he was.
“I got a missive today. Lúthwen is with child and is due in the spring. I want you to go home to see my child and help my mother deliver him. I don’t want Lúthwen to feel alone.”
Bell agreed. She and Adandil would leave immediately and she’d return once the child was born. She packed up and was gone by sunrise.
Lúthwen was already large with child when they got back to the Green Wood. She threw her arms around Bell. “I am so glad you’ve come. I miss you almost as much as I miss Trhanduil.” She grinned. “Almost.”
“I wouldn’t have gone had I known. I’m not sure what good I’ll be here, but I make a lovely cup of tea.”
So Bell took care of Lúthwen, making her herbal teas to ease her sickness and to make her cheeks rosier. She did not care for the pale color of her friend, nor the dark smudges under her eyes. She made soups for her and helped sew clothes for the coming child. And said nothing to alarm anyone about Lúthwen’s condition.
Her husband returned to the Dark land to wait with everyone else.
Both for the coming child and for the inevitable war.
Legolas Greenleaf was born on a fine winter morning, the same day that his young mother departed for the house of the dead. He lay in his mother’s arms until she was too weak to hold him any longer.
Her last words were: “His name is Legolas. Please take care of them both.” And she was gone.
Bell cried as though her heart would break and when she was finished, she picked up the tiny elf boy and promised to love him as she did his father and grandfather.
***
Part Ten
Oropher sat in Bell’s tent. He was eating a bowl of her rabbit stew. He wondered where she got the carrots, potatoes and onions. No matter. The stew was good.
“How is he?” Bell asked him. “He won’t talk to me. He asked me to take care of them. I failed him.”
“Failed him? My dear Bell, you know as well as I do that we do not always control everything; we don’t control anything, for that matter. He is angry and grieving. He will survive. His son needs him and Thranduil will not shirk his duty, by his son or by his people.”
“You don’t think he hates me?”
“My dear Bell, who will help him raise that child, if not you?”
“You and his mother?”
“We are grandparents. We will spoil the child. You’ll have to stand in for his mother when he needs you. Tell me, is my grandson handsome?”
Bell smiled. “He is. He is fair haired like his father and as comely as his mother. He is a fine child.”
“I will be glad to be done with this war, to go home and meet him. Tell me, do you have any honey stashed away?”
***
Part Eleven
Oropher had known for a long time that he would not leave this hellish plain alive. He had felt it in his heart when he’d agreed to come here with the Noldor king. The Noldor king would not leave here either. It would take their all to defeat Sauron.
He did not mind. His son would be a fine king and he already had a son to follow him. He did regret that he would never see the child. Bell would take care of them both. It’s a pity his son had not married the cook. She was as fine a woman as his wife was.
He pulled his long sword out of its ornate scabbard and looked at it. It was polished to a mirror finish and razor sharp. He sharpened it again, oiled the blade and put it away. His armor was polished and his horse was clean and fed, ready.
He left his tent after all were abed and slipped into Gil-galad’s.
“What on earth are you doing here?” Gil-galad was sitting at his desk, looking at some maps.
“I have an idea on how to end this. Let me tell you about it…”
And he did.
***
Part Twelve
Bell was terrified. She didn’t want to go into battle but they needed her. She was a good archer and she could aid the healers as well. Neither she nor Adandil had slept all night. She had worked on her arrows while he sharpened his blades. Neither had said much as they worked.
When the dawn came, they dressed in their armor and went to field where the rest of Oropher’s troops were assembling. The mood was somber. The cavalry mounted their horses and the archers followed on foot.
It was to be a day no one would ever forget.
***
Part Thirteen
No one but Oropher and Gil-galad knew that the army of the Green Wood would attack early on purpose. They were the diversion that allowed the other armies to go for Sauron himself.
The plan worked brilliantly but all would still have been lost had Isildur not cut the One Ring from the hand of the Sauron. Gil-galad fell. Elendil fell. Elves, men and dwarves fell.
None of that mattered to Thranduil.
His father died as well. A single wound to his heart felled him. Thranduil fell to his knees in the dirt and cried out in anguish. He had lost his wife and his father. He gathered what was left of their army, retrieved his father’s body and left the plain for the Green wood.
Bell was among the survivors but her husband was not. He had died beside his king. She found his horse and put him across its back, leading the horse as she followed her king from the field. The elves of the Green Wood carried as many of their dead home as they could find.
It was solemn procession that left that day, not to be seen in Middle Earth for many years to come.
***
Part Fourteen
The Green Wood was a somber place since the battle. Thranduil’s mother had made her way to the Havens and sailed to the West. He was left to raise his son alone and to run his father’s kingdom alone.
He holed himself up in the royal apartments and didn’t talk to anyone for weeks. Even little Legolas was not allowed in to see his father.
After the third week, Bell decided that enough was enough. She knocked on his door and he didn’t answer.
“I am not leaving. In fact, I am coming in.” She tried the door and, as she thought, it was locked. No matter. She had a set of keys to all the doors in the entire royal complex. She unlocked the door and went into Thranduil’s home.
He sat in his father’s chair, reading a scroll. He looked up when she came in. “Go away. I am not seeing visitors.”
“No. I am not a visitor. You have people who need your leadership and a son who needs his father. I am here to see that they all get what they need from you.”
“Can’t you see that I am not ready for this?”
“It doesn’t matter, my friend. This is ready for you. I’ll have you a bath drawn and will polish your father’s mithril crown. You can speak to the people this evening.”
“Are you not listening to me?” He was angry.
“Are you not listening to me? You have no choice. Period. So get dressed and be the king your father taught you to be.”
He glared at her for a long moment then nodded. “You are right. Our people need me, need leadership. It is up to me to provide it.”
“It is indeed, sire.” Bell bowed to him, her new king.
***
Part Fifteen
Bell was kneading a huge mound of dough for the morning bread when Thranduil came into the kitchen. It was still dark out and would be for several more hours.
He grabbed an apple out of the bowl on the table and sat down.
“Being a king is easier than being a father.”
Bell hid her grin. What had Legolas done now?
“He told me that I smell like old people!”
Bell laughed out loud. “You’re younger than me and he tells me I smell like a party!”
Thranduil stuck his tongue out at her. “That’s only because you always smell like baking. Any day Legolas gets pie is a party to him.”
“Maybe we should all take a lesson from him then.”
“How come you’re so wise?”
“Because I am older than you are.”
Bell divided the dough into five loaves and covered them with a towel to rise. There would be hot bread to eat with butter and honey when everyone came to the dining room for breakfast.
She opened one of the ovens and lifted out a large baked ham, which she set up on the carving table to cool a few minutes before she sliced it.
“I have some bread already done. Would you like a bit of ham on hot bread?”
Thranduil sighed with happiness. “I thought you’d never ask.”
***
Part Sixteen
“I am never going to be a good archer, Bell!” Legolas had just begun his training with the other young elves of his age.
“Yes, you will. You must keep practicing.”
“You bake bread. How hard can that be? You don’t know anything about being an archer.” Legolas was just learning to read and he thought he must know almost everything by now.
Bell grinned and leaned down so they were face to face. “Actually, I was one of the best archers in your grandfather’s army. If you don’t believe me, ask your father.”
He clearly thought she was delusional but that didn’t stop him from pocketing a couple of her biscuits on his way out the door.
An hour later, he was back, looking a bit sheepish. “Bell, Papa says you are the best archer in all the land and that if I want to learn to be a good one, then I must be nice to you so you’ll give me lessons.”
Bell smiled at him. “You certainly must be nice to me.” She kissed the tip of his nose. “But that is not a problem. You are the sweetest elf in all of the Green Wood. Grab a few more of those biscuits and follow me to the training field. We’ll have you hitting the bull’s eye in no time at all.”
***
Part Seventeen
Legolas had been hanging around the kitchen a lot the last few days, looking all moony-eyed and sighing a lot. That could only mean one thing. He was in love.
The stone cutter’s daughter, Merien, was a cute little thing with her mop of dark hair and her huge blue eyes. Legolas had been following her around for weeks. He was bothering her so much that her father came to to Bell.
“He’s a sweet lad but he’s proposed marriage to her and her only ten years old. I think she’d like to stay single for a few more years.”
Bell smiled. “If she can be patient for a few weeks, I think her problems will be over.”
“Is Legolas going away?”
“Oh, no.. His father is giving him his first horse. He sent all the way to Rivendell for a pony from Lord Elrond’s horse master.”
Mirien’s father smiled. “Not even the prettiest little girl in the world can compete with a boy’s first horse.”
“You’re safe for a few more years then, until they hit puberty,” Bell said.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. No use in us borrowing trouble, is there?”
Bell agreed thoroughly.
***
Part Eighteen
Legolas was out hunting deer in the forest outside his hidden home when he heard something nearby. Whoever they were, they were noisy and they weren’t speaking Sindarin. It was a similar language but very harsh and guttural. He hid down behind a large row of wild roses that grew all over the forest.
They came into view. There was a band of twenty-five or so of them.
Orcs!
How had he not smelled them before they came into sight? He certainly smelled their awful stench now. It was all he could do not to gag. He put his hand over his mouth to keep himself from making a sound.
The orcs were speaking the Dark Speech but Legolas could hear words similar to those he spoke. He heard them speak of a goblin king, of dragons, of the master.
Could it be that the evil one was stirring again?
He remembered his father’s stories of the Last Alliance of Men and Elves against Sauron and the battle that killed his grandfather and Bell’s husband.
He stayed still until every last orc had passed then he hurriedly made his way home. It would seem that evil had awakened once again.
***
Part Nineteen
Bell watched with amusement as the handsome dwarf king refused to answer any of Trhanduil’s questions. This was a stubborn one, as stubborn as the elf king himself. While Thranduil had no love for any outsiders, Bell found the dwarvish folk to be an interesting lot, with their beards and their bravado. She admired them for their loyalty to their king even when Thranduil sent them all to the ‘dungeon’ without any food.
She slipped into the kitchen and filled a basket with fruit, bread and cheese. She carried it in one hand and a skin of water in the other and headed for the dungeon. Thranduil could be as mean as he pleased but no one was going without food as long as she ran the kitchen!
When she stepped into the dungeon’s main hall, she was certain that she heard someone breathing beside her but no one was there. The guards weren’t even at their posts. Thranduil would be furious if he knew, but she wasn’t telling him.
“Hello?” she called out. “I have some food and water for you all.”
The dwarves called out to her then, asking her to free them.
She smiled. “I cannot do that but you’ll not go hungry. The king is not an evil man. He will release you all.”
She visited each cell and handed a portion of each food through to each one. Thorin, the king, refused the food, but he did drink a bit of water. He was very much like Thranduil, she thought to herself as she tidied up the basket and headed out of the dungeon.
She stopped to talk to the youngest dwarves and set her basket down. When she looked back at it, the towel was opened and an apple was missing. Maybe they had some huge mice down here because she certainly hadn’t seen anyone else.
The next day, all of the dwarves were mysteriously gone. The next she heard of them was when they holed up in the Lonely Mountain, trying to steal Thorin’s kingdom back from Smaug, the dragon who lived there.
***
Part Twenty
“What do you mean gone?” Thranduil yelled at the guard, who looked a little worse for wear.
“They are gone, sir. Nothing but some apple cores left in their cells.”
“Apple cores? Bell?!” He yelled.
Bell had been lurking outside the door of his throne room anyway so she popped in the door. “Yes, sire?”
“Did you let my captive dwarves go?”
“No. I fed them but I didn’t let them go. I hated to think of them all hungry down there. ”
She popped back out. He looked like he might throw something at her. She wasn’t afraid but she usually let him calm down when he was in this state before she talked to him. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen him this way.
He asked the guard how they’d gotten out and it turned out they’d rode some barrels from Laketown out onto the river. Bell laughed to herself at their cleverness. But how did they get out of their cells? They’d been locked in when she was there.
Could there have been someone there she didn’t see? She felt a chill at the thought, but then dismissed it. Where would anyone be able to hide?
***
Part Twenty-one
It wasn’t long before they found out exactly where the dwarves had gone. They’d gone to the Lonely Mountain and stirred up the dragon, Smaug, who’d gone on a rampage and destroyed Laketown before being killed by Bard the Bowman.
Thranduil, in a rage over what the dwarves had done, came storming into the kitchen. Bell was kneading bread.
“Get your bow, woman. We’re going to the Lonely Mountain. I will have my part of that damnable dragon’s loot and we must give aid to those who fled the town when the dragon laid waste to it.”
“Aren’t you being a little hasty?” She had not stopped her kneading nor changed the expression on her face.
“Indeed I am not! If I find them, I will skewer every last one of them alive!”
“They must be dead if they were in the mountain with old Smaug.”
“I hope not because I want to kill them!” Thranduil was in fine form.
“Calm down. Eat your dinner then pack up some supplies and set out at dawn. I’ll get the other women to help me pack extra food and medical supplies for the people of Laketown. I will ride with the healer.
Thranduil stopped and looked at her. “As usual, you are right. We will wait until morning. But I am still going to kill that dwarf!”
***
Part Twenty-two
The battle, when it came, was not with those infernal dwarves but with an army of orcs. The price was high but the dragon was dead and the orcs pushed back.
For now.
They had all known that there would be another war to fight against Sauron and that war was coming. Thranduil had watched darkness creep over the Green Wood. Giant spiders who talked had infested the forest and ate unknowing travelers. The squirrels were black and menacing and nothing green grew in much of the forest.
He kept his city safe, but just barely.
For now, he’d wait.
***
Part Twenty-three
Thranduil was sitting in the kitchen as he often did, eating while he watched Bell bake. He poured honey onto a plate and dipped his bread into it. As he took a bite, he said, “Do you think it’s time we found Legolas a wife?”
“More importantly, does he think it’s time we found him a wife?” Bell asked as she put the last loaves in the oven and sat down with her tea to wait for them to bake.
“Well, I haven’t asked him,” Thranduil said as he poured himself a cup of tea.
“Why exactly does he need a wife?”
“Everyone needs a wife.”
“I don’t have one and you never took another,” Bell said as she added a little honey to her tea and sipped it slowly.
“I have never wanted another.”
“Maybe you should let him find his own wife. You found yours.”
“Remember some of the prospective wives my father had me meet?”
Bell burst out laughing. “Do you remember that one elf from somewhere near Gondor? She was some sort of princess?”
“The one who asked my father if I was a little off in the head?”
“Well, we did put a bag of bugs in her bed,” Bell reminded him. “I was afraid she might kill us when she found out who did it.”
Thranduil was laughing as hard as Bell was. “She’s lucky! It could have been spiders!”
“We did put spiders in the tent of the one that Gildor brought to meet you.”
Thranduil stopped for a moment and started laughing again. “Legolas’ mother and her sisters put a snake in my saddlebag when I first met her.”
“You never told me that! It’s no wonder I liked her so much!”
Thranduil grew almost serious. “Do you think it would be all right to hint to Legolas that he might be thinking about a bride? “
“As long as you warn him to keep a lookout for spiders and snakes as well. How about some more honey and bread?”
Thranduil nodded as she cut them both a slice of fresh bread.
***
Part Twenty-four
Bell had always loved the old man though old man was certainly not all there was to him. What else she did not know. He called himself wizard but he seemed almost from another world to her. This time he had a human with him.
“Mithrandir! Come in! The king will be with you soon. Would you like something to eat?” Bell never stood much on ceremony and certainly not with Mithrandir.
“I can never get enough of your food, my dear girl! This is Strider of the Rangers. He and I are looking for - well, we’re searching for someone and we found ourselves close so I thought I might come by and visit, perhaps speak with Thranduil before we go on.”
The man was as tall as an elf and long past his youth. He had years on him but was no old man yet. Bell sensed that this man was not a typical man, even of the Rangers.
She poured them both tea and made them a plate of pastries, butter and jam. Strider ate as if he’d not seen food in a long time. She wondered what exactly he and Mithrandir were doing. Thranduil would tell her later, she was sure.
As if by cue, the king appeared in the kitchen. “Mithrandir! To what do we owe the pleasure?”
“My friend and I were close by and we thought we might warn you to be on the lookout for the creature Gollum.”
“We have seen no such creature here.”
“No, probably not but if you begin to get reports of a fish thief, then send for me or Strider.”
“That I can do. I have heard rumors of a creature that lived in the Misty Mountains, a vile little creature who lived in the deeps.”
“That would be our Gollum.”
“Why do you seek him?”
“I think he may know secrets we’d rather the Dark Lord not find out.”
Thranduil looked at Mithrandir. “He stirs, does he not?”
“He does,” the old man acknowledged. “We mean to keep Gollum from him.”
“Then we shall keep a watchful eye. Good luck to you and Strider. We will give aid if needed. Simply call.”
Bell packed them a basket of food and a bottle of wine and saw them to the door. She hugged the old man at the door. “Please be safe, my friends!”
And they were gone.
***
Part Twenty-five
It was a few years later, when Thranduil and a company were hunting in the forest, that the man Strider found them again. He carried a big cloth bag with a wiggling, screaming creature inside it. All anyone could understand it saying were the words Baggins and precious.
Thranduil did remember a Halfling named Baggins at the battle of the Lonely Mountain. Perhaps that was what the thing was talking about.
“Can you hold him for me? I must find Mithrandir,” Strider asked.
Thranduil agreed and in the exchange, the horrid little thing escaped, jumping about until they chased it up a tree. The king set guards about, figuring that it had to come down sometime but in the night, something happened to the guards and all were found with bumps on their heads and no memory of what happened when daylight came.
There was also no sign of Gollum.
***
Part Twenty-six
“Father, we should go to the council in Imladris. We did manage to lose Gollum and Mithrandir and Lord Elrond need to know that.”
Thranduil was not agreeing to anything right now. He had no intentions of being blamed for the escape of that nasty little thing.
“I am not going there. I am not leaving this wood, not for Mithrandir, not for anyone.”
“Then I shall go. I’ll take Goweston with me,” Legolas told his father.
“I am not sure you’ll be welcomed back,” Thranduil threatened.
“Father, you do not mean that, I know. You are angry and I understand that as well. But I am going to this council. It is important. We know that evil is stirring and if no one acts, it will overcome us all.”
Thranduil said nothing, preferring to sulk and thinking that his son would come around to his way of thinking in a day or two.
Legolas said nothing either. Not to his father anyway.
“Bell, Goweston and I are going to a council in Imladris. Father says we should stay away and I disagree. I thought you should know where I am.”
He hugged her and was gone with the dawn.
***
Part Twenty-seven
Thranduil was livid when he found out that Legolas had really gone to Imladris to meet with Mithrandir and Elrond. He knew nothing good would come of this. They’d blame him for Gollum’s escape. He had paced and ranted and raved for hours when Bell had heard enough.
“What would have him do, then, Sire?” she asked with no trace of formality.
“He should obey me?”
“Like you did Oropher? Legolas has always been an obedient child. That he was willing to go without your permission should tell you how important this is to him.”
“I cannot protect him there!” Thranduil shouted.
“No, you cannot but he is an adult. He is a capable warrior and a sensible elf. Trust him to do what is right.”
Thranduil was not happy in the least but he did calm down a bit.
Several weeks later, Goweston came back home without Legolas.
“What do mean, journey?” Thranduil asked as he backed Goweston across the room.
“He is going on a journey with Mithrandir, Strider and some others to return to the One Ring to Mount Doom.” Goweston said very, very quickly.
“What others?” Thranduil had him against the closed door.
“Four hobbits, a man from Gondor and a dwarf.”
“A dwarf? What in the name of Eru is he doing that for?”
“We - they - all decided that the Ring must be destroyed and this is the only way anyone knows to do it.”
“Why did my son go instead of you?”
“He volunteered.”
“You go back and tell him to come home this instant!”
“They left already, sire.”
Thranduil was so angry that he released Goweston from his service and banned anyone from speaking the name Legolas in his presence.
Bell had never seen him so distraught or angry over anything. She made his favorite dishes, she honeyed him, she yelled at him and nothing seemed to make him back into his old self.
She hoped nothing bad happened to Legolas on his journey because she was going to kill him herself when he returned home. With her bare hands, if need be.
***
Part Twenty-eight
Thranduil had always been short of temper at times but now he was insufferable. He yelled at the house servants, he yelled at the stable boys, he yelled at his council. He simply yelled sometimes at no one. But even he did not have the nerve to yell at Bell.
Bell was worried about him. Thranduil had lost everything he ever loved except for his precious son. She knew that he feared Legolas would never come back. She sometimes had the same fear. She loved him as if he were her own child.
Late one night, she heard Thranduil in the kitchen. Her rooms were near the kitchen so she could hear the even the quietest visitor. He was not very quiet. He ran into a chair and Bell smiled to herself at the line of curses that spewed from his mouth.
She’d better check on him.
“What manner of lunatic is making a mess in my kitchen?” she said as she lit several of the candles about the room and stoked the fire in the stove to heat water for tea.
“I wanted pie. Do you have any?”
She suspected he was in his cups. She did have pie, though. She always had pie and she never turned anyone away who wanted food.
“I have a lovely blackberry pie. I’ll cut you a piece.”
He sat back and began to eat as soon as she set it in front of him. “Mmmm. This is good.”
He seemed to sober up a bit as he ate and drank a little of the strong tea she’d brewed. He also seemed to lose a little of his anger.
“He is an adult, you know,” she told him.
“He is my son.”
“He loves you and is doing what he feels is right.”
“Look where right got my father.”
“Had your father not done what he did, the war might have been lost.”
“Then what am I to do?” He looked so lost when he asked her the question.
“Take care of this land, these people. Trust that Legolas will make things right in that world.”
He looked thoughtful then smiled, a sad smile but still a smile. “When did you get so wise, my friend?”
She patted his shoulder. “Get yourself to bed when you finish your pie.” She blew out all but one candle and went back to her own bed.
***
Part Twenty-nine
Thranduil ended up fighting along with Celeborn against the forces of the Dark Lord as they joined forces to defend Lothlorien and Mirkwood.. As he led his troops, he wondered where Legolas was and how he faired.
Word came from Gondor then from Mordor. The Ring was destroyed and the war was over. Thranduil and Celeborn cleaned up a bit in their own lands and decided to rename that land Eryn Lasgalen.
Peace had come at last. The Ring was gone and Sauron vanquished.
Thranduil expected his son to return home. He did not and there were rumors that he journeyed the Fanghorn Forest with a dwarf. A dwarf? What evil spell had been cast upon Legolas to make him abandon his home and keep company with a dwarf?
Thranduil was invited to the royal wedding. The Ranger would marry Elrond’s daughter and they would reign in Gondor. He decided to go and bring his wayward son back home where he belonged.
Oddly enough, Bell seemed to be keeping her own council about the whole thing. He had expected her to t\ell him what he should be doing but she said little.
He noticed that she packed for Gondor too.
***
Part Thirty
Thranduil had not been the same since Legolas had declined to come home. Bell worried about him but there was little she could do. He was the King and she was a simple servant.
She did send word to Legolas in Ithilien that his father needed him to come home, even if just for a visit. She’d heard nothing back until one day, she went to the kitchen to start dinner and there he stood in the doorway. He was no child anymore. He was confident in his bearing as he lifted her off the ground and kissed both cheeks.
“Child! You are so much like your grandfather! I thought I’d never see you again!” She kissed his cheeks in return.
“I have come to visit Father. I have been gone far too long. I’ve missed you both.”
It was only then that she noticed his companion, a dwarf, the dwarf, she suspected.
“This is Gimli, son of Gloin. His father was one of the company that Father put in his dungeons years ago.”
She smiled. “I am glad to meet you, Gimli, son of Gloin. We have heard many stories of the elf and dwarf of the Fellowship.”
Gimli blushed, which Bell found totally endearing. He kissed her hand in the formal way of men.
“Bel-It is you!” Thranduil stopped dead in his tracks and stared at his son.
“It is I, Father, and this is Gimli, my friend.”
Thranduil started open mouthed until Bell elbowed him.
“I am glad you are home, both of you.” He grabbed Legolas and hugged him for all he was worth. “My son! Welcome home, my son!”
***
Part Thirty-One
Legolas had built the small vessel that he and Gimli sailed west in. It was sturdy and dependable, like Gimli. Sometime in the years after the War of the Ring, Legolas had realized that he would never marry. He would, instead, spend his life with Gimli, who came with him because he said he wanted to see Lady Galadriel one more time. Legolas knew there was more to it than that and knowing was enough. Gimli didn’t need to say a word.
*
Thranduil and Bell had sailed some years before. When he’d told her he was sailing, she’d said, “I helped bring you into the world and wherever you go, I am going with you. I promised your mother that I’d take care of you.”
And so they lived in a little house by the shore. Every morning, they walked on the beach and talked of their lives. Every day, Thranduil looked to the sea, watching for his son.
He saw the small sailboat as soon as it was visible on the horizon. It had been years since any ship had come into port so many other elves saw it as well.
Thranduil and Bell made their way to the dock to wait and see who was coming so many years after almost all had sailed. They knew long before it docked that it was Legolas, his golden hair and his bearded companion giving him away.
Thranduil was waiting to catch the line to tie them off. He tied it quickly and was the first person to greet Legolas and Gimli.
“I have waited long for this day. I began to fear you’d never come.”
“Gimli said he wished to see Galadriel once again so I knew it was time to sail,” his son said to him as they embraced.
“Bell is sure to have some fresh baked pie for you. Let’s go home.”
They did, all walking arm in arm down the beach.
~end~