martasfic | Six-sentence Saturday: Bilbo and Glorfindel in Imladris

According to

juno_magic, today's six-setntence Saturday, when we're supposed to share six-sentence snippets from our WIPs. As it turns out, I have two WIPs, both involving Bilbo, and both through some quirk titled "In Living Memory." One's set in Rivendell on the return trip from Erebor, and the other is a tweenage Bilbo learning a bit of family history from the Old Took. I never really did anything with them because the first just was languishing and the second felt too politicized, and because I was getting in to the Sherlock fandom at the time. Still, I do like parts of them and may try to do something with them one of these days.

So, here's a bit of each. First, from Rivendell:

The statue tottered on its base, and before Bilbo could let go, an arm (no doubt quite graceful in other circumstances) hurried past his ear, catching hold of its statue and keeping it from falling. Bilbo fell a half-step back, his shoulder resting against the stranger's thigh, and he heard the statue's base fall back against the stone floor with a resounding clack. Bilbo craned his neck up to take in his rescuer: a rich tunic made from white silk finer than any Bilbo had ever encountered, with a garden's worth of flowers laid out in gold thread along his collar and hem; strong hands marked with sword calluses but beautiful for all that; and a face that struck him as fair and young and fearless and full of joy, all at once.

"My Lord Glorfindel."

"The very same," the elf said. "And my lord Elrond would not thank you for toppling his kin's likeness."

And second, the family history one.

For all Gerontius's stories, Bilbo could still enjoy the adventure of Greenfield as easily as any tween. That, it turned out, had been the pleasant fairytale's undoing. Bilbo had knicked one of his father's golf-clubs so he and his mate could play Greenfields and had been holding it overhead, towering over an imaginary foe, when Gerontius came strolling around the hill. Had his grandfather played games like this? Bilbo remembered the haunted look Gerontius got when he told the stories, and Bilbo doubted it – and doubted, too, whether his grandfather would approve of Bilbo making light of things like that.

Still, Bilbo's friends were waiting, and he did not want to mark himself as different from them. Smiling broadly, he brought the golf-club down in a magnificent arch, hitting the reed knitting-basket across the field with a triumphant whoop.