So if yall didnāt know, in The Hobbit book, Thranduil had the Dwarves locked up for approximately weeks, and Bilbo was just invisible and wandering in the palace the entire time, vibing miserably.
My headcanon, therefore, is that the Mirkwood Elves now have a local legend about a ghost haunting Thranduilās palace, never seen but generally thought to be harmless. Thranduil scoffs at the idea, but has been seen glancing around at the dark corners of rooms. Legolas fully believes in it and is known to say hello out loud when he enters an empty room, in case the ghost is nearby.
Itās not until Legolas joins the Fellowship that he figures out that the supposed ghost was actually an invisible Bilbo the whole time. He never tells Thranduil, because he thinks itās funny to see his regal father unnerved by the idea of a ghost.
On the other hand: āOh good, it wasnāt really a ghost,ā followed by āIt was the One Ring of Sauron, the most powerfully evil and dangerous artefact in the world, in my home, for weeks.ā
"And Frodo's actual uncle used it to rearrange the banquet spoons that one time that we all still talk about."
world's most harmless nerd, haunting your pantry and judging your cheese choices while wearing world's most cursed artifact
which he uses to mope around like a hikkikomori and sneak cheese slices to inmates at the state prison
this is one of the funniest things i have seen all year, but it is implied at the end of the hobbit that bilbo revealed that he was the palace's ghost when he gave thranduil a necklace in repayment for all the food he stole while hiding.
however, the ring, of course, stayed a complete secret. so while the mirkwood elves know that bilbo was hiding in their palace while the dwarves were imprisoned, they don't know how.
conclusion: the mirkwood elves believe hobbits can turn invisible
