"I really don't see how this is going to work."
"You're a clever girl, Tauriel, I'm sure you'll figure something out."
"My Lord...taking inventory when you can see is one thing. Taking inventory blind is another entirely..."
"Oh come now, child, don't be absurd. I'm sure even you can tell a pole-arm from a sword by touch alone."
"From a sword, perhaps. But not necessarily from a stave, or a trident. Or even from an unstrung bow. I would have to take each one and check what the tip is!"
Thranduil's footsteps stop a heartbeat before Tauriel runs into his back, biting her lip as she feels ink slosh out of the little pot she holds and over her hands, praying that none of it has gotten on Thranduil's robe.
"I never said that this would be a quick task, Tauriel," the king murmurs, his voice muffled a little as he looks down, rustling in his clothing for a long second. "Ah."
There is the sound of a key being inserted into a lock and the dull snick of a bolt being slid out of the way before she hears Thranduil push the door open and step into a walk once more.
"I need a full inventory done on the armory, and Gallion is out for the day serving as envoy to Dale. Besides," he says, voice dropping to a mutter. "This should keep you out from underfoot for a good few hours."
"I am perfectly capable of keeping myself out of trouble while you have the throne room re-painted," she huffs, adjusting her grip on the papers and quill as she steps up beside Thranduil.
"Yes, because it went so well the last time I took your word on the matter."
"That was Faelwen's fault, not mine!"
"He said you bumped his ladder."
"I most certainly did not."
"Either way, this needs to be done, and it is much safer for your clothing and your head if you stay far away from where the others will be painting."
"And what will you be doing all day?"
"Probably reading. Strolling the gardens. Relaxing."
"Or you could help me with this, and get it done in a fraction of the time," she suggests, raising the volume of her voice a touch as she hears him walking away.
"I could, but I absolutely loathe taking inventory," Thranduil's voice calls back to her dismissively. "I will return in a few hours to check on you."
"Lazy orc," Tauriel pouts under her breath, turning her attention to the papers she holds.
Thranduil had ordered the papers be scored with a stick, lines pressed horizontally across each page, so she would be able feel in order to keep her writing lined up.
The task was simple, he had told her. Count how many of each type of weapon were in stock, and then write it down in one of the rows marked on the paper. As long as it was still somewhat legible by the time she finished, it would be fine.
Tauriel lets out a long breath, setting her papers and ink down by the door and making her way carefully over to one of the weapons shelves, hands splayed out before her so she will not bump anything.
Thranduil has been giving her more and more busy work as of late, and she is beginning to get frustrated with it.
It wasn't as though he'd had constant assignments for her before she was blind - he'd often had days where he had absolutely nothing for her to do - but it was on those days that she usually went to train with her underlings from the guard, or run patrol with Legolas.
Now, she gets all of the boring, tedious tasks assigned to her. Things that need to be done for the sake of being done and have not been because nobody wishes to do them.
And because the blind elf apparently cannot be left to her own devices.
Tauriel doesn't bother to keep the pout from her face as she traces her fingers across the row of shortsword handles before her, tallying them up in her head.
When she returns to fetch her papers, however, she nearly winds up spilling the little bottle of ink across the floor with an unfortunate grope in the wrong direction.
Tauriel manages to catch the bottle in the nick of time, breathing a curse, and carefully sets it back upright before gathering the papers to her chest.
Maybe it would be best to simply keep it with her.
It takes her a long second to settle the ink bottle steadily in a pouch of her belt, wedging a handkerchief around it to keep it upright, and she takes a moment to straighten out the messy pile of papers before moving to stand before the shelves once more.
Attempt two.
She starts from the top with the swords, her panic at nearly having spilled the ink having driven the final count from her mind.
The quill is far easier to find now that it is at her belt, and once Tauriel tallies up all forty seven of the blades she is quick to find the first little score mark on the paper and write the number down.
All said and done, the first weapon count takes her about five minutes to complete.
Given that she's got more than thirty different weapons stocked in here, and she has all of the armor to follow? This is going to take her ages.
Tauriel lets out a frustrated breath, already annoyed with the task, and reaches to find the next shape resting along the wall.
Unfortunately, it feels like a wooden pole.
She barely manages to bite back a growl as she takes the weapon, sliding her hand up the pole to the top, and then all the way to the bottom to confirm that someone didn't simply set their spear upside down , before counting it as one stave.
She decides on a whim to check the next one as well, plucking it from the wall once the first one is balanced back in place, and she hesitates as she feels a notch in the top.
Wait...is this a bow?
Realizing that she hadn't done more than check that there was not an attached blade before assuming the first pole was a stave, Tauriel gropes around for it once more.
When she runs her hand up to the top, however, she is taken by surprise as her fingers find metal.
It is a lance.
Confused, Tauriel sets both the suspected bow and the lance aside, moving to run her fingers along the wall.
There are dozens of wooden poles, most of them the same size, all stacked in a messy pile against the stone.
And if her last few grabs were anything to judge from, they are entirely mixed.
"Eru's sake," she snaps at the weapons, irate.
She is going to have someone's head for this.
Her underlings know to put their weapons back neatly and properly sorted out...
For a long moment she simply stands in annoyance, digesting the fact that she will have to completely feel over and sort out what is likely hundreds of pole-based weapons. After a moment, however, she comes to the decision that she's going to take care of this particular task a bit later, and instead moves on to the next more easily recognizable object.
She is halfway through counting up the rack of broadswords when the sudden approach of footsteps makes her startle, and Tauriel is quick to place her hand on the blade that she'd last counted, murmuring the number to herself so she will not forget.
A second later the door opens with a worn creak, and the rustle of cloth indicates someone poking their head into the room.
"Ah, there you are, Tauriel! I've been looking all over for you!"
"Meldirion," Tauriel smiles, turning her head a fraction in his direction as her fingers skate along the woven leather handle of the blade.
"Whatever are you doing in here?" the elf asks with a chuckle, and Tauriel can hear his footsteps approaching her.
"Inventory," she replies with a grimace.
"Did you get yourself into trouble again?" her friend asks, a smile in his voice, and Tauriel shakes her head.
"I have been banished in here to keep me out from underfoot," she recites a touch bitterly. "They are painting the throne room and did not wish for any mishaps."
"Well that seems rather unfair...was it not King Thranduil who stepped into a drip and tracked paint throughout the palace the last time?"
"He failed to bring up that particular story," Tauriel scoffs, crossing her arms as she turns to face the other elf and realizing a second too late that she has just lost her place in her count and will have to start over. "He much prefers to make it out as if I am the sole culprit in all of the messes."
"I suspect that the king figures you to be far more likely to be forgiven for such a mistake."
Tauriel hums out a grudging little noise in agreement, making a face as she turns back to her task.
"I don't see why he has to lock me away doing busy work, though," she pouts.
Meldirion allows a soft chuckle.
"Probably because he is not so creative as you were with keeping his underlings busy."
Tauriel gives a little shrug at that, trying to hide her growing smile.
"Either way, this is a tedious assignment, and an especially miserable task for one who is blind."
"Would you like some help, mellon?" Meldirion offers with a laugh.
And Tauriel agrees before he has a chance to change his mind.
She settles herself out of the way in the middle of the small room, arranging her papers in front of her on the ground to write as she hears Meldirion cross to the wall.
"I've done the shortswords already," she tells him. "Everything else needs to be completed still."
"Understood," is the distant reply as she hears the shifting of the stack of pole-arms. "One...two...wait, that's a spear...three..."
The older elf falls into quiet mumbling for a long moment, occasionally broken with a muttered curse at whoever has been simply tossing their weapons in a pile, and Tauriel waits patiently for him to finish.
"Fifty-two staves," Meldirion lists at last.
Tauriel traces her fingers down the page, stopping at the next little score mark that she feels, and carefully dips her quill into the ink before tapping off the excess and beginning to write.
"Fifty...two...staves," she recites as she gets the words down.
On the far side of the room, Meldirion is keeping a mumbled count as he paces along the rows of weapons, tallying them up.
"Thirty five longbows."
Slide. Dip. Tap-tap-tap.
"Thirty...five...long...bows."
"...seven...ten...fifteen...and eighteen slings."
Slide. Dip. Tap-tap-tap.
"Eight...teen...slings."
Meldirion is quiet for a long moment following that, his footsteps tracing from almost the back wall to around by her side as he murmurs to himself.
"Three hundred and eighteen," he announces after a long moment, a smile in his tone. "That's three hundred and eighteen quivers of arrows."
Tauriel traces her finger to the next line, dutifully re-inking her pen, and carefully writes out the total.
"Well, this isn't so bad," Meldirion says, a grin in his voice. "At this rate we should be finished in less than half an hour."
"Whatever shall we do then?" Tauriel asks with a smirk. "Lord Thranduil expects me to be occupied here all afternoon."
"Perhaps we could go to the palace library and get in some reading over a cup of tea? I found a wonderful book the other day that I've been keeping a hold of, specifically to share with you... I won't tell Lord Thranduil if you won't," he bribes, and Tauriel can practically hear the wink in his voice.
She feels a smile creep across her own face at that, trailing her fingers down the page to find the next indented line before shifting her quill to hover above it.
"That sounds like a wonderful plan. What is the book about?"
"Well, I only read the first chapter or two," Meldirion admits. "But it sounds like it's a personal account of an adventure, and one written by a Hobbit of all creatures..."
"The throne room looks lovely, My Lord," Tauriel smiles as she enters the doorway and is hit with the chalky scent of drying pigment. "I adore the color."
"Why thank you, Tauri-"
The King pauses for a moment mid-sentence as he processes her words, and Tauriel bites back her smile as she feels his stare land on her.
"Really?"
She just smiles back at him sweetly.
"I'm sure it looks wonderful," she reassures him.
"Did you finish the inventory as I requested?"
"I did," Tauriel grins, holding out the pages for his inspection.
"You forgot the armory," her King scolds immediately, taking the papers from her grasp.
"They are on the back. You only gave me so many scored pages, so I had to use both sides."
For a long moment Thranduil is silent, not expecting her to have blown through so much work on her own so quickly.
Tauriel, for her part, is doing her best not to look smug.
She and Meldirion had instead spent a wonderful and relaxing afternoon together, with the older elf reading to her aloud as they lounged beneath the shade of the blooming trees in the little herb garden by the healers' halls.
Not that she plans on telling that to Thranduil.
"Is something wrong, My Lord?" she asks, her words dripping with false innocence as she hears her King flipping through the pages in shock.
"It's barely legible," he pouts after a moment, lacking anything better to gripe about.
"Well, you did ask the blind elleth to document everything, so that's rather on your head," she replies with a shrug.
Thranduil has no response for that, and Tauriel doesn't bother to hide her smile as she hears another person approaching.
"Lord Thranduil," Gallion's voice is scolding. "Did you really send poor Tauriel to take inventory all by herself?"
"He did," Tauriel interjects before her King can reply, pitching her words so they sound pitiful. "He locked me all alone in a dark storage closet and forced me to count up and write down weapons totals while blind!"
"Thranduil!"
"I needed her out from underfoot while they painted!" her king objects pathetically, and Tauriel hears his footsteps as he makes his way up to the throne. "I figured I might as well get the inventory taken care of at the same time..."
"My Lord, really...and whatever did you do to the back of your robe?" Gallion asks in exasperation.
Tauriel hears a little scuffle as Thranduil turns around, his clothes shifting as he tugs at them in surprise.
"What th-...? How on earth did all this ink get on my back?"
"You must have spilled it, My Lord," Tauriel says with an innocent shrug as she fights with every fiber of her being not to smile. "After all, I have been safely out from underfoot in the armory all afternoon."
And Thranduil has absolutely no reply for that.
Author's Note: *insert vague mumbled excuses that sum up to "I'm not very good at finishing things"*