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It doesn't take long after Bard and Thranduil become a couple before Bard starts counting his grey hairs.
He spends long minutes in front of the mirrors in Thranduil's chambers when the elf isn't there, tugging at laugh lines he's had for years, checking that his hairline is holding its ground. He may be young now, but Thranduil will be young forever—that's a difficult gap to bridge, as both of them are well aware. Bard had already resolved to hide the changes of the years from Thranduil for as long as possible. He doesn’t want to upset him.
It's only a short time before Thranduil catches Bard pawing through his own scalp for hairs that are anything but brown, because after all it is Thranduil's mirror and Bard is no master of stealth. But instead of being sad, or ignoring him, or even reassuring Bard that he still has many years of life to live, Thranduil does something Bard would never have expected.
He makes fun of him.
"Going grey already?" Thranduil says in a bored voice. "By the stars. I had counted on you keeping your hair for at least another ten years or so."
At first Bard is shocked, then a little annoyed, but as the comments continue he learns to play along.
When leaning in to kiss him, Thranduil pauses. "Is that another wrinkle?" he murmurs, squinting pointedly at Bard's face. "You used to look so attractive."
"That's rich, coming from the man who had half his face melted off," Bard mutters before he can think the better of it.
To his surprise, Thranduil tosses his head back and laughs. When he looks at Bard again, it's with a quiet hunger in his eyes. "You're lucky I like you, Dragonslayer," he murmurs. This time there's no pause before he crushes their lips together.
On the way to the the meeting at the top of one of Dale's towers, Thranduil catches Bard's arm. "It seems you aren't making your way up those stairs as quickly as you once could. Perhaps I could carry you?" Thranduil suggests with a gleam in his eye.
"Better not," Bard replies. "That will only encourage me to start growing round in my advanced age, and then you won't be so eager to carry me up the steps."
"Do you doubt the extent of elvish strength?" Thranduil asks with raised eyebrows.
Bard chuckled. "Merely the extent of elvish patience."
Thranduil stops him on the steps to run his hands over Bard's chest and stomach, the flesh there already somewhat looser than in the peak of his youth. "Grow as round as you like," Thranduil murmurs. "I'm not going anywhere."
One winter Bard develops a hacking cough for almost a month. "Don't mind me," he mutters to Thranduil after a particularly serious bout. "Just my inevitable demise growing nearer with every passing day."
Thranduil chuckles. "But not today, meleth nin. You're too stubborn to succumb to a simple cough."
"You're right," Bard says, his throat scratchy and raw. "It seems you'll never be rid of me."
If Thranduil's smile turned down at the edges, he was careful that Bard didn't see it.
When his hair is thoroughly grey and his skin creased with years, Bard returns home from a day of easy meetings grumbling about the stiffness in his limbs. "Perhaps it's time you started walking with a cane," Thranduil suggests helpfully. Bard shoots him a dirty look, but still lets Thranduil massage the joints that pain him, press gentle kisses onto the spots appearing on his skin.
Years later Bard does begin walking with a cane, one carved from the sturdiest wood in Mirkwood with Elvish lettering running across it for Bard to run his fingers over. "Better watch out," Bard warns as he hefts it with a menacing grin. "Next time you taunt me about my arthritis, I won't waste so much time on words."
"I believe you'll have to catch me first," Thranduil retorts, and quickly darts out of the way as Bard begins swinging his cane. Bard chases him around the room at a comically slow pace, frequently stopping to dramatically wheeze and complain before starting after him again. The game does not last for long. Bard quickly becomes too tired to continue.
"Your hair is nearly as white as mine now," Thranduil comments, running his smooth hands through Bard's silvery hair.
"I'm prettier than you, too," Bard shoots back, the laugh-lines around his eyes deepening into chasms.
Thranduil makes an doubtful sound in his throat, raising a challenging eyebrow.
Bard waves a gnarled finger at him. "You should show some respect to your elders, young man," he grumbles, but behind the mirth in his eyes there's something else, something painful that Thranduil rails against with everything he has.
One day Thranduil finds him sitting up near the window, a blanket wrapped tightly around his legs which just don't work like they used to. Bain's coronation was the day before, and Thranduil sat beside Bard and narrated what was happening when the man's eyes could not see. "Does he look happy?" Bard had rasped, squinting futilely into nothing. Thranduil had laughed. "Not nearly as happy as you do, to be finally forsaking your responsibilities."
Bard smiled feebly. "Ah, yes. It's nothing but late nights feasting and drinking for me now." Thranduil squeezed his thin hand gently.
Now when Bard turned to him with the window behind him, his eyes were sad. Thranduil stepped up to him immediately. "Now who let you sit here?" Thranduil chided softly. "You'll catch your death in the cold air."
Bard laughed quietly. "I believe that death has already caught me, meleth nin." When Bard laid his hands on Thranduil's, they were cold. His eyes looked to Thranduil's as wide and full of wonder as they were the first night Thranduil kissed him. "Why, you look no different than the day I laid eyes on you," Bard says with a smile.
Thranduil sank to his knees before Bard, cupping the man's hands in his own. He had no quips for him now. Bard nodded his head weakly as if he was listening to something only he could hear. "I hope you will not mourn me," he murmured. "You do not owe me that."
Thranduil forced his lips to smile, his eyebrows to raise. "Mourn you? By no means. Though it would please me if you could attempt to stay living for one more year. Tauriel has bet me a fair amount of coin that you won't last that long."
The laughter in Bard's throat is so quiet it's barely there. Bard raises one shaking hand to the side of Thranduil's face, his withered thumb gently running over the smooth skin there. "Perhaps I will die sooner out of spite, then," Bard says. "One last slight for you to remember me by."
What started as a laugh was cut short in Thranduil's throat, grief strangling it out. He hung his head while he got control of himself, before Bard could see. He felt the other man's fingers stroking his hair, the tremors in them barely perceptible.
"Will you make me a promise?" Bard whispers. When Thranduil meets his gaze, there is no trace of pain or sadness on Bard's face. Thranduil nods wordlessly, not certain he can yet trust his voice.
"Promise me that you will laugh," Bard says. "That you will keep making light of me even when I am not there to hear it. Or so help me, my spirit will hunt you down in the next life and nag you relentlessly."
Thranduil smiled, but the edge was bitter. "In death, Men and Elves take a separate course. It seems likely our paths will part forever."
"No parting is forever," Bard said softly. He coughed. "Besides, I want to introduce you to my wife."
Thranduil chuckled in spite of himself. "Now that would be a conversation."
Bard's eyes glittered beneath drooping lids. "You never agreed to my promise."
Thranduil squeezed his hands. "I would rather not make a promise I may not be able to keep."
Bard rolled his eyes. "It's called lying, Thranduil. At least allow this old man to go to the grave with a little peace."
Thranduil smiled down at the floor. "You know I have never lied to you. I do not wish to start now."
Bard sighed. "You're impossible, you know. I'm not sure how I managed to put up with you all these years." Even as he said it, his voice was growing fainter. He sat quietly for a moment longer. "I find I am growing tired," he mumbled at last. "I don't suppose you would help me..."
Thranduil carried him the short distance to the bed, laying Bard down and settling down next to him. Bard released a sigh that could have been either contentment or exhaustion. "If I stop breathing, just give me a good punch to the arm to revive me," he commented. "I'll do my best to help you win that bet with Tauriel after all."
"At least you are still good for something," Thranduil said with a smile, slipping his hand into Bard's as the other man's breath began to steady into sleep. Thranduil lay awake through the long hours, watching his chest rise and fall, feeling his heart beating through his fingertips.
After the funeral, Thranduil does not remain long in Dale. He pays his respects to Sigrid, Tilda and Bain, all of whom are older now than Bard was when he and Thranduil first met. Beyond that, he cannot stay.
Tauriel finds him not long after he arrives, sitting by the side of one of his realm's many natural pools, watching the surface shimmer in the light from an open shaft above. Tauriel seats herself a few paces away, not looking at him. They sat there in silence a long time, with nothing but the faint sound of moving water between them.
"Are you well?" she asks at last.
Thranduil chuckles humorlessly. "No." He turns to meet Tauriel's gaze, but his eyes are dry and his voice clear. "I hate losing bets."
Tauriel's expression goes from sympathy to shock in the span of a moment, until she sees the small, tired smile on Thranduil's face. "He was a nuisance until the very end," Thranduil mutters affectionately, shifting the set of gems in his hand. The Necklace of Girion shines as bright as green witch-fire in the light, but Thranduil scarcely looks at it.
"I suppose I could call the debt between us null," Tauriel muses.
"Bard wouldn’t like that," Thranduil says with a soft laugh. "He would tell you to squeeze me for every penny I'm worth."
Tauriel's quiet laughter seems to ripple over the water. "Yes, I suppose he would."
With one last glance, Thranduil tucks the necklace into his robes. He would wear them again soon. "I ought to hate him," Thranduil comments. "I do not believe it would be out of my rights. For letting me care for him and then leaving me in this world, hatred seems an appropriate response."
Tauriel's voice is soft. "And do you hate him?"
Thranduil meets her eyes again, but there's no bitterness in his gaze. A faint smile touches his lips. "No. Not remotely."
Tauriel nods, understanding written into her face, her own grief still a weight she bears ever day. Thranduil can see it. He can feel it. "It is good to see you smile, my lord," she says.
Thranduil shrugs one shoulder, a gesture he picked up not so very long ago from one dear to his heart. "I'm merely keeping my promises." And even though the thicket of pain and loss in his chest scarcely lets him breathe, the smile Thranduil finds is real.
For him. Even when he is gone, Thranduil's smiles are still for him.