Glorfindel the cannibalistic taxidermist beamed down at the red-hooded and cloaked elf, who was a great deal shorter and younger than him, and arguably just as pretty as he, if not more so.
He had had the great fortune of coming across the youth whilst out hunting new creatures for his collection. Now, he fancied he had found his centrepiece or his next meal.
"My, my, my, now what are you doing all on your lonesome in the woods of Mirkwood?" he asked, his hands behind his back.
"I live here," the elf replied. He turned and pointed with a long pale hand down the leafy path along which he had come. There was a glimpse of green and brown beneath his red cloak, "in yonder Elf-King's halls."
"Oh? And where are you headed?"
"To Imladris," the elf replied, with a pretty smile. He readjusted his grip on the covered basket that was hanging from his right arm.
"That is a long way," Glorfindel commented, glancing at the basket. "Would you not like an escort? I am well acquainted with the road and its perils."
"Oh, I am in no need of one, though you are welcome to accompany me. I am armed and able to use my weapons." The elf nodded back at the quiver that bulged beneath his cloak at the back.
"What of food?"
"Oh, I intend to catch it. I do know how."
"What is in your basket?"
The elf hesitated. Then, with a smile he reached down and pulled back the leaf patterned cover to reveal the small furry bodies that lay within it on the cushion and pressed tightly against each other.
"Puppies. Oh, how beautiful. You are taking them to Imladris?"
"Indeed." The elf covered the basket and began to walk. Glorfindel walked along beside him.
"Why are you delivering puppies to Imladris?"
"Oh, my family deliver puppies to Imladris every year, but the previous deliverer – my eldest brother – disappeared there under mysterious circumstances last year. We still have not discovered his body. You would not have heard of its whereabouts, I suppose?"
"What is his name?"
"Oh, he is the Crown Prince of Mirkwood."
Glorfindel shook his head, although he did have a distinct recollection of luring a certain green and brown clad elf that purported to be a Prince of Mirkwood to his oven exactly a year earlier. Oh, how tasty that elf had been! He licked his lips.
"You are his… brother?" he asked then, looking sidelong at the elf. Oh, but if this elf was the sibling of that delicious dish, then he would have to try him.
"Indeed. I am another Prince of Mirkwood."
"How many princes of Mirkwood are there?"
"Three."
"Hm…" Glorfindel glanced back down the path. "Your… youngest brother is not looking to accompany you, then? To be safe?"
"Oh, no. He is more interested in shooting puppies than delivering them." The elf raised his right hand and waggled the long tapered index and middle fingers at him. "He has twitchy fingers, I fear."
Glorfindel looked at the fingers and licked his lips. "I see. How unfortunate…" …that he is not with us, he added in his thoughts.
Presently, they left the realm and came to the main road of Mirkwood: the Old Forest Road. Here, as night fell, the Prince shot them each a spider, which they did not attempt to cook, and then each a rabbit, which they did. They sat down beside the cheerful fire and after a merry time and chat together, it was time to eat.
"Oh, you keep your seasoning bottles in your sleeves. How useful!" the Prince exclaimed on seeing Glorfindel shaking flavoursome spices over his sizzling rabbit from the sleeves of his tunic. "May I have some seasoning too?"
Glorfindel looked at him and blinked. Then he smiled broadly. It was so rare, but oh so wonderful when food cooperated with him. "By all means," he said, and he shook his sleeves at the Prince, who sneezed when pepper flew up his nostrils.
"I did mean… ahhh-tishooo! I did mean for you to season my… ahhh-tishooo! …to season my rabbit!"
"Oh! I do apologise," Glorfindel said, and he reached into his backpack."
"Oh my… ahhh-tishooo! What a long piece of rope that is!"
"All the better to truss you up with, my dear," Glorfindel commented as he leaned over and began to do so to the unfortunate Prince.
"This is not… ahhh-tishooo! seasoning my rabbit."
"Indeed, it is not," Glorfindel said, ripping away the cloak and quiver and bow. The elf gasped.
"Ahhh-tishooo! What strong hands you have!"
"All the better to put you on this fire, my dear." And so saying, Glorfindel bundled the elf onto the low blue flames and hot coals of the fire, which burst into new crackling life around him.
"Ahhh-tishooo! What a tricky elf you are!"
"All the better to catch my supper, my dear!" Glorfindel waited for a response, but after another sneeze and few screams the Prince spoke no more. So Glorfindel sat back down beside the fire and nibbled the rest of his cooked rabbit while he waited for the body to cook to medium rare.
As soon as it was cooked and was cool to touch, he rolled it out of the fire and into the cloak. Then he drew up the corners of the cloak about it and made a twisty handle at the end.
With a chuckle he slung the sack over his shoulder, picked up the basket of yelping puppies, and continued on his merry way back to Imladris.
Out of the forest he skipped, sucking on an eyeball. Across the plains he ran, chewing on an ear. Over the mountains he hopped, sucking on the marrow. And down into Imladris he would have trotted, rolling the prince in the cloak before him and gnawing a nice lean bit of leg had not he spotted Elrond and Erestor standing on guard at the borders and waiting for him.
Out of sight of them and on the lower slopes of the Misty Mountains, he stopped, yanked the calf from his mouth, and sighed heavily. What was he to do? If they caught him with what was left of the second Prince of Mirkwood he was sure to be in the most tedious sort of trouble. Why, they would probably accuse him of offing the first Prince as well. He could see them now, addressing him with narrow eyes and folded arms and pursed lips.
"Glorfindel," they would said, "unhand the Prince of Mirkwood."
"What Prince?" he would reply.
"The one whose leg is sticking out of that sack."
"Oh, that belongs to… um… someone else."
Such tedious trouble, for then he would have to identify the body as belonging to someone else and then justify offing this someone else and as neither Elrond nor Erestor thought killing anyone except for Sauron and orcs was a good thing and the body definitely did not belong to Sauron or an orc… He sighed heavily again. What a spot of bother he was in!
He considered camping on the borders until he had finished chomping on the body, but then, his eyes falling on the covered basket, a sudden smile lit up his face.
He reached for his work knife and his needle and thread.
Not long afterwards, he ambled up to the borders of Imladris, a sack hanging from his arm. "Ah, how do you do, my friends?"
"Open the sack, Glorfindel." Elrond jerked his chin at the bloodstained red cloak. "What have you caught this time?"
"Oh, I went ahunting and caught a little litter." Glorfindel, still beaming, set down the sack and opened it. "Look how lovely and plump they look!"
"They look like Mirkwood puppies," Erestor said.
Elrond made a vague noise of agreement in his throat and contributed, "They look swollen. And dead." He looked back up at Glorfindel, his eyes narrow. "Did you meet the Second Prince of Mirkwood?"
"There is a Second Prince of Mirkwood?"
"How did you find the puppies?"
"Oh, on the mountain," Glorfindel said. "They were just lying on the ground, already dead. I am going to stuff them and add them to my collection."
At the mention of collection, both Elrond's and Erestor's faces twitched.
There was a pause.
"You have a blood moustache," Erestor observed then.
"Cut my lip."
"Why is the sack covered with blood?"
"Bled a lot."
"Hmm," Erestor said.
"Hmm," Elrond said.
The pair of them gazed long and hard at him, arms folded, eyes narrow, lips pursed.
Then finally, first Elrond and then Erestor stepped aside. "Go on, then," Elrond said.
"Thank you, my lord." Glorfindel inclined his head and made to move, when…
"Oh, and Glorfindel," Elrond said then. "That sack…"
"Yes?"
"It looks awfully like the cloak belonging to the Second Prince of Mirkwood."
"Must be mistaken, my lord. 'Tis just a sack."
"Hmm," Erestor and Elrond said then in unison. But they did not move to stop him and so Glorfindel, with a little jump and heel kick on the air, danced down into the valley of Imladris and off to his oven.