Of Elves and Clean Pigs
"Ahhh!"
"Eleberth, Elrohir! It's just a pig," cried Estel, "It's penned up, it won't hurt you."
"But it's ROLLING in the MUD!" Elladan answered for his brother. Elrohir was currently opening and closing his mouth like a fish.
"Estel!" the affronted younger twin cried, "what are you doing?!"
"I am petting the pig, it likes it."
"But it's dirty!" the future king of Gondor sighed. He'd of course had known about elvish cleanliness, but he hadn't thought it would extend to PIGS. He rolled his eyes and limped outside. The door swung shut behind him.
After a moment of counting slowly to ten, he was ready to go back inside. He pulled on the door. It didn't move; he tried harder. It still didn't open. Aragorn gulped. The twins were going to kill him!
"Ellie? Ro?" he called, "I can't get the door open."
The door started to bang and rattle. After about a half and hour it began to cease. The twins couldn't get it open either. "Estel!" two voices called," we're gonna to kill you!" the targeted sighed again. There were no windows in the barn, so the twins couldn't crawl out, they were several hours away from Imladris, they had brought no horses and Estel had sprained his ankle. That was why they had been in the barn.
"Stay calm. I'm gonna go back to Imladris for help. I should be back in a day or two. There's water in the barrel away from the pigs."
"Go to the house!" Elladan cried.
The future king of men looked at the smouldering ruin of a house over the hill. "I think it burnt down."
Concern filled Elladan's voice, "You can't walk home on that ankle!"
"Well, I can't stay here either, we don't have enough food!"
"Ellie calm down, Estel make a crutch, and we'll slip some food for you out from under the door."
Aragorn set to carving a crutch and filled his pockets with food the twins slipped under the door, "Namarie," he called out and started limping away.
Two and a half days later, a party of elves rode up. A figure slipped from the back of Glorfindel's horse, "That's it!" he cried, limping toward the barn. "Do something Glor!" The elves set to the door, using horses to pull it off the wall. Inside of the very clean barn were four pigs that looked as though they had been scrubbed seven or eight times, and two dirty sleeping elves who were lying close together in a pile of (clean) hay.
"Elladan, Elrohir," said Glorfindel softly, shaking first one then the other by their tunic. "We're here. We've come to take you home."
Elrohir rolled closer to his brother, muttering, "Don't let the pigs get dirty."
Elladan, however, sat bolt upright, "GLOR! You've come to save us! We got the pigs clean but all the water was gone, and Ro said that we had to save it to drink, and we haven't bathed in TWO days!"
In due time, the elvish twins were returned to Imladris, with their clean pigs and were allowed to bathe. They did try to kill Estel with a series of pranks and all was back to normal in Imladris, until Aragorn went Throngiling. The two days with no baths were honoured in a ceremony of sacrifice, for it was the longest time an elf went without bathing since the Last Alliance.