That time when Thorin was eating supper, while Wren was suspended from the ceiling.
A/N: Hahahahaha, my lovely RagdollPrincess, you seem to be enjoying the ninja Wren idea just as much as I do! Note the tight black outfit I gave her in previous chapters! So cue mission impossible-esque Wren :)
A/N#2: Dearreader, you are fantastic! You are right, there are five more chapters written already, and guess what, there is a scene of a heart-to-heart in the goblin caves, exactly the way you described it. It's written around the "Thorin is having a weak moment" prompt. I hope you'll like it.
Please, my darlings, leave the prompts in the requested format :D The less you give me in the prompt, the madder the result will be :P
Curse the Elves, curse their Lord, curse the wizard, curse their ponce manners and their boring food, curse the eerie music, curse everything and anything in the cursed Rivendell! And especially curse his empty stomach!
Thorin stretched on his excessively long and wide bed, and surely he was given it to mock his height, and stared at the ceiling. He was so irked by Elrond, Gandalf and Bilbo and their cursed decorous dinner conversation that he ended up hungry. He wistfully thought of ham and eggs. Why exactly this dish he wasn't sure, but he did indeed love ham. And cheese. He scolded himself, daydreaming of food, and especially cheese, would aggravate his sullen mood even more, but he couldn't stop.
He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. They just needed a bit of rest, he now had learnt what the map said, of course the cursed Elven Lord just happened to know how to read it under the moonlight, and in the Durin's name what's with an unnecessarily spacious cave just for that purpose? And if it was specifically built for deciphering ancient Dwarven runes, why for Mahal's sake the table was so tall?!
There was a knock at his door, and he opened his eyes. He counted three heartbeats before he decided he wasn't running a fever and the redhead swinging from his ceiling on a rope tied around her waist wasn't indeed a result of hunger induced delirium.
"My King, it is Bofur, we brought you supper," he heard the familiar voice from behind the door. The situation was so ridiculous that he just stayed motionless. "Bombur made sausages, and there is vegetable stew."
His eyes met hers, and she smiled widely. His hands flew up in a questioning gesture, and she pointed at the door with a delicate index finger. He decided that he couldn't do much in this situation anyway, and he jumped off the bed and opened the door.
Bofur and Balin were standing in the corridor, a plate of food in each of their hands, smiling from ear to ear. They were very pleased with themselves, he quickly threw a glance up and to his left. She had successfully moved from the arch she was previously suspended from to the top of a decorative column and was stretched, like a cat between two rows of fences, on top of it, trying to reach the next arch. He wasn't fond of Elven architecture, it was too intricate and filigrain to his taste, but he couldn't complain at the moment. She was pretty much in a split, her appetising small body taut and tense, her perky bum sticking out in the very best of ways.
He grabbed the plate and pressed his hand to Bofur's chest who was clearly planning to enter the room.
"Thank you for the supper," he was going to quickly close the door, when Balin shoved the second plate towards him.
"Don't forget the stew, Thorin."
The moment of tense silence stretched. Were he to take the plate, he wouldn't have a hand to close the door and prevent them from entering. Bofur was obviously still intending to come in, there was bread and cheese on the other plate he was holding, it was obviously for Thorin. Balin was still smiling happily, pleased to feed his friend. Thorin screw his eyes and saw her sitting on some ledge, sniggering silently in her hand. He cursed internally and wondered whether there would ever be an encounter between them when he wouldn't look like a massive idiot.
He pressed his shoulder into the door, keeping it in place, grabbed the plate with bread and cheese from Bofur and put it on top of the bowl with stew in Balin's hand to the astonishment of the latter. Then he grabbed the second plate from Balin's hands and put it on his own head. Both Dwarves stared at him as if he had gone mad, and he wondered if he had. Then he grabbed the bowl with the plate on it from Balin's passive hand, smiled quickly, muttered, "Thank you," and closed the door with his foot. Their faces were beyond description but he assumed he wouldn't be bothered anymore.
The giggling from above made him sigh, and he put the food on the table and looked up. She was stretched on a bar under the ceiling, like a cat, on her stomach, her little feet in soft leather slippers dangling in the air. He lifted a plate and slightly shook it as if trying to coax a wild animal to approach him.
"Come have some food," he sing-songed, and she burst in silver laughter. "I bet you are hungry."
"Immensely, but I am not coming down. There are sheets and chairs in this room," she giggled, and he shrugged feigning nonchalance. He sat at the table and tucked in. The food was exceptionally good.
He knew she was still in the room, there was that strange excited tingling at his nape he always felt around her, and he spoke without turning around.
"I thought you disliked Elves."
"Them yes, their gems not so much," her voice was merry, and he saw a fishing line with a hook on its end to go down in front of his nose. He smirked and watched a sausage being deftly picked up from his plate. One swift jerk, and he lifted his head to see her still on her stomach and eating it with zest. He remembered her healthy appetite when he had been feeding her cheese and bread in the swamps. As skinny as she was, she was in no way sickly or frail. The line went down again.
"Bread, please," her tone was endlessly decorous, and he hung a slice on the hook. He thought for a second and added some cheese on it. "No, thank you, I'm not fond of cheese. Ate it for your sake at the swamps." He shook his head, chuckling, took the slice off the hook and popped it in his mouth.
"They will catch you," he spoke intentionally lightly.
"Not today. They are still bedraggled by your visit, and currently they have even more important matters to attend," the second sausage left his plate, "An old wizard and an Elven Queen arrived to Rivendell a few hours ago." He stopped eating and turned in his chair to look at her. She was sitting on the bar now, her legs dangling off it.
"A wizard and an Elf?"
"Lord Saruman, the Head of the Istari Order, and Lady Galadriel. They are having a council right now, in the Western Tower, Lord Elrond and Gandalf are there as well."
"What are they discussing?" He felt he lost all appetite and pushed the bowl away from himself. They were surely conspiring how to thwart his quest.
"I don't know, I just saw them heading there. I was on my way to the Eastern Tower, to the treasury, but then I had to make a detour. Wine, please," he watched her suddenly drop off the bar, holding to it with bent legs, and she was hanging in front of his eyes, upside down, a few curls having escaped the braid going around her head. She was grinning and stretching her hand towards his glass. He absentmindedly picked it up, and slightly rising he pushed it into her hand.
"We need to leave," he muttered. She pulled herself up, without spilling a single drop, gracefully twisted her body and climbed on the bar again. She took a sip and nodded.
"I'd go through the Northern Gates, they are unguarded at the moment." He looked up at her. She was smiling and saluted him with a glass. There was no time to lose. He rushed to his clothes and started pulling on his brigandine. She was watching him with shiny eyes sipping the wine.
He asked for directions, and she explained in details. Meanwhile, he was all dressed, and lastly he clasped Orcrist to his back.
"I love the sword, it suits you well. You are even more appetizing these days, darling," she purred, and he cocked a brow. She giggled and blew his an air kiss. "As lovely as it was, sweetpea, we both have matters to attend. But it was nice, we should have dinner together again." He stopped his hand already on the door and looked at her attentively, his eyes roamed the small body in the provocative black outfit, graceful lines of her face, small hands and feet.
"Gaubdûkhimâ gagin yâkùlib Mahal." May we meet again with the grace of Mahal. The goodbye was formal, as if not fitting to be bestowed to a small girl of Men, and a thief for that matter, but he felt a stir of something genuine in his heart. He shook the mawkishness off and turned away.
"Mukhuh Mahal bakhuz murukhzu, baheluh." May Mahal's hammer shield you, my darling friend. Her voice was tender and wavered at the end. He jerked his head up but she was already gone.