Chapter 34

The evening had arrived, and Rory had been lured out of her room by Glorfindel and the promise of some good entertainment.

'So what's the occasion?' she asked Glorfindel.

'Nothing, but since the Nine Walkers left, nearly everyone has sitting about and moping, so some of us thought some singing and story telling would cheer everyone up', he replied.

'Good idea', she said as she and the elf entered the Hall of Fire.

Indeed most everybody had turned up. Glorfindel lead Rory to a group that included all of Elrond's children, and the hobbit, Bilbo, and his good friend Gloin the Dwarf, plus two other Dwarves Rory did not know and who were soon introduced as Brin and Eli, sons of one Gloin's cousins.

Story telling was in full swing, with Elrond telling a tale of his wanderings about Middle Earth in the Second Age. He was having difficulty, as good-natured heckling kept on interrupting him. Eventually he got to a part of his story in which a snake was the reason the Lord of Rivendell found himself in a tree, and somebody (probably Gildor) remarked loudly that there was a better tale that included a snake, and Rory.

Elrond agreed, and began to tell of a funny incident during the Last Alliance.

'All the commanders, their heralds, and immediate subordinates were in council. Rory popped in to report to the High Kings that the Orcs that had been sighted earlier that day had vanished again; it was assumed they were spying on our fortifications. As she left she addressed a question to no one in particular, 'Can Elves be killed by the bite of a poisonous snake?'

The answer of course was yes. 'Thought as much,' she answered. Then she looked at Celeborn, who seated to her left, 'Well, in that case, my lord, you'd best not move', she said to him.

Celeborn looked down to where she indicated, and there, right next to him, a big cobra snake was preparing to strike. Everyone but Rory froze. She distracted the snake with one hand, and took hold of it behind the head with the other.

'Now what will you do with it?' asked a little pageboy.

'Crack it like a stock whip, and break it's neck', she answered.

Now the danger was passed, and the snake was longer free to bite people, the lure of watching Rory's proposed method of dispatching it was too great to resist, and we all followed her outside to watch.

The light of a fire allowed everyone to clearly see what was happening, but somehow as Rory explained what she doing to the fascinated pageboys, she made a mistake.

She began by whirling the snake over her head, preparing to crack it, when all of sudden she yelled, 'best get of the way, I've got the bloody thing going the wrong way'.

This meant she hard to stop the whirling, and reverse it, with a reasonable chance of the snake escaping. People went in all directions, tripping over tents, other people, falling into fireplaces. Gil-Galad, and I fell into a hole, and later had to pulled up with ropes, much to our embarrassment'.

Rivendell's people were laughing loudly at the imagined scene of dozens of warriors running away from the snake that was whirling through the air.

'What happened to the snake, Father?' it was the Lady Arwen that asked.

'Rory reversed the snake, and broke it's neck with one crack. She then revolted everyone by cooking and eating it'.

'Told you Elrond, snake's good tucker when cooked fresh. Don't know what you missed out on, it's better than rabbit!'

Disgusted noises echoed around the room, and a couple of the more sensitive elves were nearly sick.

'Enough snake stories', said Arwen who was looking slightly green from the thought of someone eating snake, 'perhaps Rory would care to tell us a tale?'

'Ok, this the story of the horse that changed it's name. Once there was a tall rangy chestnut mare with a mean nature, she bit, she kicked and by heck she could buck! Threw everyone on the station, but once she'd been worked in for the day by tossing a couple of people, she was a very good stock horse, with a terrific talent for holding a mob of cattle together. We called her The Bitch, but one day, when the mustering season was nearly over, an incident occurred which meant her name was changed forever.

A goanna is a big lizard; they can reach 6 feet in length. Big claws and jaws strong to bite fingers off. When startled, they have a habit of climbing up the nearest thing that is taller than them, trees, livestock, buildings, people, anything. This day, as she walked through some thick, long grass, The Bitch trod on a goanna's tail. The goanna immediately ran up the mare's legs, and wrapped itself around her rider. The horse exploded, bucking like you could not believe, we were sure the only way the rider stayed on was because the goanna's back claws were stuck in the horse, and it's front ones in the rider! They disappeared in cloud of dust.

It was several hours before we tracked down the horse and it's passengers. Both the mare and her rider were covered in deep scratches and bites, but the goanna lay dead on the ground.

From that day on, the mare was known as Goanna. But she was no good for work anymore, if anything even looked vaguely like a goanna, she would bolt for miles.'

' A dangerous place, your homeland', said the Dwarf Brin to her.

'Yeah, its full of deadly snakes and spiders too'.

'Giant spiders like the ones in Mirkwood?' asked Bilbo

'No, just full of poison'.

The conversation died away as the musicians began to play. 'Dance with me Rory?' asked Jessryn, who had appeared out of nowhere.

In a much better mood than earlier in the day, partly because of having had a couple of glasses of wine, Rory agreed, and spent an enjoyable evening dancing with Jessryn and other Elves, and even Bilbo.

It was early morning when Glorfindel returned the favour from the previous morning, and helped her to her room.