A birthday party

Common Room(#32029RM)

This large and rectangular room serves the purpose of Common Room for the Prancing Pony. Large windows along the western end of the room peek out over the Great East Road which runs outside the Inn. There are long tables with bench seats for the patrons in the centre of the room. Nestled into the wall is a large fireplace with several bundles of wood piled next to it. Overhead, lamps hang down from roof beams, but their light is dim and half-veiled in smoke. The corners of the room are wrapped in shadow.

Obvious exits:

Out

================================== Bree Time ==================================

Real time: Tue Jun 08 14:43:39 2010

Bree time: Late Night <04> on Mersday of Winter - February 17,1450

Moon Phase: First Quarter Moon

Breelands Weather

The late night winter air is cold and dry around you. Snow piles on the ground around your feet. The moon is above the horizon and in its first quarter phase.

===============================================================================

[Nob(#16122)] The tables are pushed back against the wall, and there are bright ribbons strung from every available hook - the windows, the sconces, nails in the walls... All is quiet.

Until the door bursts open and several hobbits race in. They run to the far wall, all but crashing into it as they come to a stop, and turn to look at each other. \"I WON!\" shouts one, breathless and laughing.

\"Fine, fine, that means you get to help bring in the food.\"

But all three of them turn and race back towards the door - presumably to invade the kitchen. \"It\'s MY birthday,\" calls the third, who is at the rear - a little more portly than the others. \"I GET TO BRING IN THE FOOD!\"

Bluella \'s ears perk up at the mention of food, and kitchens. Finally, a chance to complete her errand!

Hard on the heels of the trio is young Brandebras Bywater, well wrapped up and well-mufflered but without a woolly hat. There is a dusting of snow on his chestnut-brown curls, and his rosy cheeks are pink with cold and excitement. Rumour has spread round town that it\'s Someone\'s Birthday - never mind if he was invited or not, the lure of free food and free mathoms is great.

\"Many Ha-\" he begins, then looks round the room, suddenly turning a deeper shade of pink. \"Am I .. uh, too early?\" There\'s a first time for everything.

Bluella notices Brandebras\' hasty entrance, keeping her attention on the voices of the trio behind the kitchen door.

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

A woman follows almost immediately behind Brandebras, looking a bit worse for the wear. Her hair is more grey than brown, and her clothes more holes than fabric. She has a gaunt, emaciated look about her, and by the way she scans the tables, it\'s quite possible that she\'s here only for the prospect of free food.

\"FINE! You can bring out the food, but my ma helped make the cake, so I get to bring it out!\" One of the hobbits tells the birthday girl, and all three hobbits disappear into the kitchen.

Brandebras watches the distracted hobbits disappear through the kitchen door, his face growing redder by the moment. Then, perhaps feeling Bluella\'s eyes rest on him, he turns an enquiring gaze in her direction and sighs with relief. \"Ohh. I\'m not quite the first then.\" Beaming at his discovery, he doesn\'t move further into the room - which of course means he\'s blocking the path of the newcomer.

Bluella looks around. The room is not as empty anymore, and she sees that her chances of getting into the kitchen might be slim. She takes a dusty kerchief off, and shakes out her short dark ringlets while she searches for a place to sit, or at least stand out of the way.

Within the kitchen comes much giggling and murmuring, and then the former ceases as though the giggler\'s mouth had suddenly been plugged. By a cream bun, perhaps?

[Aleswyn(#21413)] The woman who followed Brandebras into the room stands behind the hobbit, waiting quietly and ... well, quietly anyway. Her eyes keep glancing about the tables, even though she\'s just seen the hobbits run off for the food. The little girl who follows /her/ is far less patient and not in the least bit quiet.

\"Excuse me!\" Elaine says loudly, and in a mostly-polite manner. \"Excuse me, m\'am,\" she says again when Dirianna doesn\'t move out of the way. \"There\'s supposed to be a party in here and ...\" she stops talking after pushing her way past the old woman to see that a hobbit blocks her way. \"Excuse us, little sir!\" she tells Brandebras.

Brandebras blinks as Bluella turns away, as though he\'d been expecting a response. \"What is it?\" he asks the empty air. \"I didn\'t forget to wash my face, did I? He reaches up an exploratory hand, finding no more than melted snow.

It takes a moment for Elaine\'s piping voice to penetrate. \"Sorry, I didn\'t mean to-\" he begins, automatically shuffling toward the nearest table (and Bluella again), then notices who\'s actually speaking to him. \"What do you mean, \'little\'? You\'re not much bigger than I am,\" he protests indignantly.

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

Dirianna, the old woman, remains standing in the doorway, blocking anyone else who may be trying to enter the common room.

Though she\'s already pushed her way into the room, Elaine stops a moment to turn back around to Brandebras. Flashing him the cutest gap-toothed smile she can manage, she replies with simple logic. \"Yes, but I\'m /going/ to be a lot bigger than you when I grow up and you\'re always going to be as short as you are now. But it\'s okay,\" she says, with the air of an adult placating a child. \"There\'s nothing wrong with being little.\" Turning around again, she walks further into the room and scans the crowd.

Bluella gasps initially at Elaine\'s cheeky response, but then smiles despite herself.

But /I\'m/ much older,\" Brandebras retorts, drawing himself up to his full inches and even standing on tiptoe for effect. At the sound of Bluella\'s gasp he looks toward her. \"That\'s true, isn\'t it?\" he adds, clearly hoping she\'ll add her support.

Someone /is/ waiting at the door, apparently, for a shout comes from outside, \"Get a move on, will you? Half the town\'s out there, freezing their noses off!\"

It\'s at this point that the kitchen door swings open and a plump hobbit-lass emerges. There are scarlet ribbons in her curly hair (which alas has come half-out of the knot it had been up in) and white-and-scarlet trimmings on the dress that\'s hanging askew on her portly frame. In her arms is a plate piled high with savoury pies, still steaming. She grins at the room in general. \"Hello everyone! Welcome to /my/ birthday.\" Then she turns and sticks her tongue out at the hobbit just behind her.

Bluella finally turns her ful attention to Bandebras. \"Of course, good sir hobbit! Age is indeed more important than height!\"

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

At Bluella\'s gasp, Elaine turns her attention towards the other hobbit, and then back again to Brandebras at his comment. \"So?\" retorts Elaine, proving that she really is only seven. \"So what if you\'re sooo much older, it only means you\'ll get dead faster.\" She goes so far as to stick out her tongue at the first hobbit, then darts across the room towards Bluella to touch the other hobbit\'s hair. \"Your hair is very pretty,\" she tells her kindly.

At the shouts from behind her, Dirianna turns with a start. Her eyes widen when she sees the stack of people behind her, she mutters a hasty apology, and then slides around the corner and into the room. Flattening herself against the wall, she allows everyone else to enter.

The hobbit just behind Blackberry reaches out a hand as if to grab Blackberry\'s tongue. \"Don\'t stick that out at me!\" he says or else I\'ll trip you, and then everyone would talk about how you give terrible birthday parties.

Bluella looks at Elaine\'s own hair, crooked plaits and all. \"Thank you!\", she says to the little girl. The room is filling up quickly, both with hobbits and other folk, and she wonders whether this was a good day to come in here after all.

\"That\'s not very nice!\" protests Brandebras to Elaine. \"And it\'s not even true. Pa says that - uh, I suppose it\'s not a subject for dinner.\" Belatedly he catches himself, letting Bluella deal with the little girl instead.

Blackberry, setting down her pies on the nearest available table, pauses a moment then sticks her tongue out again. \"Bet you can\'t. I\'d catch you like a frog catching flies. \'Sides, you\'ve /got/ to dance with me. Ma says so. If you\'re not nice I\'ll stamp on your foot.

From the busy kitchen comes a tutting sound. \"Blackberry, darling, just for once can\'t you ...\" Whatever the rest of the protest might have been is lost as the door swings shut.

Bluella decides that her errand is best left for another time, and quietly slips out the door, into the cold. She ties her kerchief around her head again, and walks off into the night.

Brandebras notices that Bluella\'s slipping away, and his brows scrunch together in a puzzled frown. \"I think you must have scared her,\" he tells Elaine. Almost he starts off after the lass - and then the smell of meat pies wafts his way, and the mystery of the departing hobbit is dismissed. Happily he trots toward the food.

[Aleswyn(#21413)] But little girls don\'t always have to be nice when they\'re making logical comments. At least, that\'s what Elaine seems to think, because she doesn\'t deign to offer another response to Brandebras. She flops down in the chair Bluella has just vacated. That is, she was /going/ to leave it alone, until Brandebras tossed out another retort. \"I thought you were sooo much older than me,\" she says to him with a lofty, bratty air. \"MY pa tells me that I should act older than my little sister and set her a good example, and I bet YOUR pa would say the same to you.\"

The hobbit behind Blackberry opens his mouth to retort, but closes it again just as quickly at hearing that he\'s got to dance with her. \"But but but ...\" he says, whining. \"I don\'t WANNA dance with you!\"

Halfway to the pies, Brandebras stops suddenly. \"I\'m the youngest. Torebras always says I\'m- always said-\" The words falter and suddenly he turns away from both child and hostess and bites his lip, letting out a suspicious-sounding sniff.

Blackberry\'s grin widens at the hobbit-lad\'s whine. \"I know. But Ma said. Oh, this is going to be so much fun! Now ...\" She reaches out to take a pie from her tray, holding it well out of reach of her companion (for now), then in the twinkling of an eye her bright gaze turns on the foremost guests, \"I get to give the mathoms out. Who\'s first?\" She scans the nearest guests: hobbits, a child, the odd young Big Person ... what? Her gaze pauses on Diriana, and she looks somewhat startled.

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

Hopping up from her chair, Elaine leaps over to Brandebras and reaches out as if to touch his shoulder. \"I\'m sorry. I didn\'t mean to make you sad,\" she says quietly, with genuine-sounding concern in her voice.

The hobbit lad sneaks around behind Blackberry when she turns her back on him and though she *tries* to hold the pie well out of his reach, he snakes out a hand underneath the pie tin. With a mischievous glint in his eyes, he appears to be ready to shove it towards the birthday girl\'s face when she looks away.

Brandebras, staring down at his furry toes, jumps as Elaine\'s hand reaches out. \"It\'s nothing,\" he insists, sniffing again, then tries to change the subject. \"Hey, did she say something about mathoms?\"

Blackberry\'s brow\'s furrow slightly as she assesses Diriana, then she shrugs. \"I\'m sure I can think of /something/ for her,\" she murmurs to herself - and thus preoccupied, she of course isn\'t looking at her companion at all.

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

You don\'t have to be a hobbit to know the word mathom, at least not if you live in Bree. At the word, Elaine\'s hand drops from Brandebras\' shoulder and her eyes widen. \"Mathoms?\" she asks, in an excited small-child way, and turns towards the birthday lass.

The hobbit lad, seeing the perfect opportunity, quickly pushes up the hand holding the pie and lets it fly towards Blackberry\'s face, then darts behind the nearest Big Folk he can find.

Dirianna remains flattened against the wall, right next to the doorway. She\'s watching Blackberry look at her and starts to lift a hand of warning when she sees the pie about to fly, but alas is too slow in responding.

The pie hits its target with a very satisfying splat. Then, for a moment, there is silence. Party-goers, Big and Little, stare, open-mouthed. Someone, probably a hobbit-child, starts to giggle.

And as for Blackberry herself? At first she can do nothing but splutter out crumbs, but then her brown eyes open and she stares round the room. \"All right, where\'s that tater-head Bargo hiding? I know it was him ... or was it Dargo?\" She tries to sound stern, but then a blob of gravy drips of her nose and she sticks out her tongue to lick it. \"Mmm, this stuff tastes good.\" A grin on her face again, she reaches out for another pie. Who needs mathoms when there\'s the prospect of a food fight?

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

It was, in fact, Bargo because Dargo is standing right beside Blackberry. \"Waste not want not,\" he says, taking the pie tin from her and dipping his finger in to what remains of the pie, then licks the gravy. \"Mmm, it /is/ good,\" he says. When he hears the grin in Blackberry\'s voice, Bargo steps out from behind the Big Folk and goes back to Blackberry\'s side. \"You were looking far too serious Blackie,\" he says, grinning widely.

\"Hey, that was /mine/,\" Blackberry protests to Dargo, though without real heat. At Bargo\'s words she grins even wider, ignoring the fact that her face and once-pretty dress are streaked brown. \"Don\'t worry, I\'m not at all serious right now.\" Quick as a flash her arm lifts up as she attempts to plant pie no. 2 in Bargo\'s face.

It\'s unfortunate that this is the moment when a portly-looking hobbit matron bustles through the door with an enormous cake in her arms. \"Blackberry!\" Her prim voice rings out like a bell clearly she is shocked to the core. \"Stop this at once! Why, we\'ll be the laughing stock of all Bree. Oh, to think of it, a daughter of mine behaving like a common alespot ...\" Her words trail off in a wail.

Brandebras watched wide-eyed with the rest after a moment, though, he has pulled out a quill and ink-bottle and a rather crumpled piece of parchment, and now he\'s scribbling furiously from the dubious safety of one of the tables, chewing on his quill betweentimes. Likely he\'s writing a garbled account of The Great Pie War.

[Aleswyn(#21413)]

But, as it would happen, the pie was already on a downward spiral towards Bargo\'s face and just because Blackberry\'s mother willed it so, does not stop gravity once it is set in motion.

*SPLAT* is followed by more titters, which is immediately followed by, \"Mmmm. It *is* really good. You done us right proud with these here pies, Ma! Anyone got a spoon?\"

Shouts, cheers and suggestions come from a few of the younger hobbits at Bargo\'s question. The rest are shuffling their feet uneasily as they watch Blackberry and her mother. \"But Ma,\" Blackberry turns a gravy-stained face back toward the hobbit matron, \"/he/ started it!\" Behind her back, her fingers make a rather .. ahem, improper, gesture in Bargo\'s direction. \"And you know what they say about birthday parties? It\'s /supposed/ to snow food and rain drink.\"

The rest of her words are muffled as her mother (after very carefully setting down the cake, what a mercy that the shock did not cause her to drop it!) reaches for the nearest napkin and starts wiping at her daughter\'s face, keeping up a low-voiced tirade all the while. \"You children are simply incurable. Why, I declare you don\'t deserve a coming-of-age-party ...\"

[Aleswyn(#21413)] For once, Dargo is quiet - he\'s done nothing wrong, and doesn\'t see any need of attracting the wrong kind of attention (will wonders never cease!). With spoon in hand, Bargo digs into the pie. He\'s stuffed his mouth full when Blackberry makes her accusation, and rather than trying to deny it - since the evidence is very clearly in front of them - he offers a shrug and a grin. Around the mouthful of pie, he offers, \"But if I was gonna have to dance with her, I wanted her to look better than she normally does!\"

\"Mmmph ... fffph ...\" Blackberry splutters in vain as all vestiges of pie are wiped from her plump and pretty face. Alas, the stains on her dress aren\'t so easily dealt with. Her mother steps back to survey the damage, then grasps at her arm. \"Ruined! Simply ruined! Oh, what a mercy I packed a spare dress. Come along, I\'m sure Mister Nob can find a room. And as for you ...\" She turns her most withering look on Bargo, for once at a loss for words.