Whatever Can Go Wrong, Will by sallysavestheday

Oh, the day had gone ALL wrong now!

Santur chewed the end of his braid in frustration. All he had wanted was a few quiet hours in his favorite corner of the Hall of Fire – a sweet span of silence after the long afternoon of child-minding that had been so full of stolen apples and spilled seeds and trampled plots and Elrond’s twins tracking the garden manure through the kitchen and the pantry and the fine front parlor.

But the rain had driven everyone else indoors, as well, and from the sounds on the roof it had settled squarely into hail. Which, in and of itself, would not have been unbearable: the percussive beat became mind-numbing, after a while, and it was certainly numbing that Santur was after.

Such a storm was little heard of in Rivendell’s summers, however, and the rustles and murmurs among the other Sindar at the end of the Hall where Santur slumped in his alcove were uneasy. Surely HE had brought it -- that ancient devil -- and who knew what else he might have brought, as well?

Santur truly wanted a drink, and a seat closer to the fire to warm his chilled old bones after the unplanned dunking in the Bruinen, chasing Elladan’s cat.

But there HE was, Maglor Feanorian, blown in out of the rain after centuries of who-knows-what, who-knows-where, grinning and stretching out his long legs and telling his usual kinslayer’s lies to the applause of the wide-eyed crowd. How many knives he kept hidden in those thigh-high boots was anyone’s guess, but no matter how much Santur wished to approach the hearth, it was better to stay carefully clear. One certainly couldn’t protest to Elrond if one got stabbed for interrupting!

And how that horror of a Golodh did go on!! Simpering and giggling; singing rain-songs from the Uttermost West, as though they were not all soggy enough already; batting his long, dark lashes at every fool of a man, woman, or child who dared to sing along.

And then settling in to the storyteller’s honored place – Elrond’s place! – with a sigh and a flourish on the harp that gathered every ear and heart easily into his palm, willing or no.

“A wild night, in truth, friends,” Maglor murmured, and his eyes shone like pale gems in the dim warmth, as the hail hammered on the roof above him. “But I’ve known wilder, and not so long ago. Lean close and I’ll tell you a tale…a song of the far south and east, where the people strayed from their paths, and the angry gods rained frogs…”

And what could scornful, disbelieving Santur do but as he was bid: lean in and listen, and be lost in the music, altogether in spite of himself?!

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