A/N: I celebrate by completely unplanned, unintentional, unofficial year-long hiatus from fanfiction writing, with a new chapter that will complete my fic. Sorry to anyone, if any, who's mad at me for not updating until now. Sorry also to the rest of the people who are facepalming at the reappearance of this particular fic. But without further ado, I bring you my latest chapter.
Disclaimer: The day that snow falls in Kenya, I will own this lovely series and all the characters I so joyfully play about with. Unfortunately enough. Kenya Does Not Snow.
Haldir
The pot bubbled mirthfully on the fire. Haldir glowered not-so-cheerily on a chair before it.
And the pile of cookbooks towered threateningly over them both.
Footsteps sounded some distance outside the room, and Haldir looked around sharply, ready to make a quick getaway if he suspected anyone coming. It was unbecoming, to say the least, of a celebrated Elven fighter to be seen sitting around cooking (and failing in the attempt), and getting all frustrated over this most mundane of tasks. Thankfully enough, the footsteps soon faded away as whoever it was made his way somewhere else.
Haldir sighed to himself and set about trying to do something about the unpleasant smell wafting from the supposed stew. More like dinner leftovers after a week. He cast an eye over the sinister mound of books and winced. It had seemed so easy to just follow a recipe. Anyone could do it so long as you could read it. Actually experimenting with this particular fine art, however, had proven him sadly, drastically and tragically wrong. Haldir kicked himself inwardly for ever trying cooking in the first place.
Kicking himself, however, would be like running through a meadow of daisies as compared to the sound he heard next. The same sound that made Erestor shiver in his shoes, and Lord Elrond age a hundred years with worry within two seconds flat.
Twins were laughing.
More specifically, Lord Elrond's twins were laughing. And what made Haldir really tremble was that the seemingly wholesome, innocent sound was coming from right over his shoulder.
"Look what we've got here! Haldir's trying to cook!" Elrohir was always one for pointing out the obvious.
"And failing miserably, at that. Honestly, Haldir, you could industrialize a city of orcs with the books you've got here." Elladan was only just a notch more analytical than his brother.
Haldir, unfortunately, was far too petrified to hear anything.
-
Estel trudged heavily back to his room, eager for a rest after the morning's training. He stopped momentarily to console, albeit unsuccessfully, a spluttering and desperate Erestor, who seemed convinced that Haldir had been kidnapped by Estel's adopted brothers. While he knew that Erestor had never quite fully recovered from his brothers' most recent attack on him, Estel thought it just a bit silly, not to mention unjustified, to automatically assume that anyone who couldn't be found in a minute's searching had been abducted by them. He shook his head and laughed to himself at Erestor's silliness, but continued on his way.
-
Haldir looked piteously at the soup pot he'd been using, as if imploring it for aid. The pot wasn't bubbling quite so happily any longer, presumably because of the numerous atrocities the twins had flung into it. The brew now contained several purgatory herbs, a few foul-smelling medicinal leaves and many others that he dared not even think about. The smell had worsened fivefold as compared to before, but the twins didn't seem to mind.
"A small dash of pepper, everyone loves a bit of spice," Elrohir threw in a packet of pepper as large and as thick as a man's palm.
" I think this is one of the exotic spices one of the servants brought back from her trip somewhere" Elladan poked a strip of a toxic-looking red plant into the pot.
Haldir blanched. He hoped the twins were too engrossed in trying to smoke all of Rivendell out of their homes, to notice if he tried to escape.
They weren't.
-
"Now now, Haldir, we've made this oh-so-enticing soup and we can't finish it all ourselves." The evil-smelling murky green concoction was enough to turn any man's stomach. The twins seemed unaffected. But then again, thought Haldir, they weren't men.
The potion bubbled ferociously in the ladle. Haldir, beneath his terror, wondered to himself how anything as destructive as the Twins of Rivendell could possibly have actually created any life, as they seemed to have done with this... lively... green stew.
His mind was soon turned to more pressing matters, however, as the large spoon hovered ever closer to his face, followed closely by the sadistic grin Elrohir had taken so many years to perfect.
-
It was to Haldir's immense gratitude that a guard burst through the doorway at this moment, rescuing him from the odious green thing that spilled onto the floor, sizzling contentedly.
Two more guards seemingly assimilated out of thin air, in the other doorway leading into the room. There they caught hold of two fleeing elves and hauled them away, in the direction of the Lord's study.
-
Slightly later in the afternoon, a couple of tired sons were seated at a table, faced with two large bowls of steaming green broth.
"He didn't have to yell quite so loud. I bet that woke half of Middle- Earth."
"Well, volume is the only thing he can vary now. I mean, responsibility and sensibility and all that. What haven't we heard before?"
A loud rap on the table soon shut them up, and they resigned themselves to scowling at the broth, and at the shaken but very satisfied Haldir seated opposite them.
He'd never felt more grateful to the Lord. Or to Erestor, whom he'd heard had gotten every off-duty guard to conduct a search for him. Haldir made a mental note to thank the counsellor personally after he'd finished the task at hand.
-
On his way to the afternoon meal, Estel noted a faint smell floating through the corridor. Slowing down to see where it came from, he craned his head this way and that, but couldn't find a clue as to what it might be. He wrinkled his nose with some distaste, but hurried on to the dining hall. He was hungry, and forgot the smell soon enough, as he remembered that he hadn't seen his brothers heading for lunch.
Oh well. They probably had some reason of their own, if they chose not to turn up. It wasn't his fault if they got hungry later. And perhaps if he remembered, he'd ask them, or Erestor, if they knew anything about the unusual whiff he'd noticed on his way to lunch.
END.
A/N: I took a while to finish this, I was distracted by several other things, mainly the chocolate I have lying on the desk. But I finally finished it! Review if you like it, though I'm afraid I've lost my touch from the year of non-practice. Review also if you're kind enough to point out areas of improvement, just avoid flaming. Thanks to all who've followed this fic long enough to see this!