The Dwarven Lounge

Arlo Proudfoot had an entire evening of free time to spend before he and the other Hobbit delegates returned home the next morning, and he was enjoying it in the lounge he had just found down a side hallway off of the dwarves’ Small Hall, which was on the opposite side of the complex from the Great Hall where he had spent the majority of this trip. Now that the multi-race debates discussing the recent dragon activity had been fully concluded, and he was no longer stressed out trying to decide if he agreed with a particular argument or not, nor sulking about the quality of dwarven cuisine (the dwarven chefs had redeemed themselves in his eyes after how they had cooked that grilled onion lemon salmon – even if the secret to their success there was due to the ingredients they’d been gifted) he was finally able to wander around and actually appreciate what the dwarves had done with this underground place; their skill with interior decorating far exceeded their skill with cooking. This lounge, for example, was a comfortable place, not as cozy or as warm and welcoming as a Hobbit would have designed it, but it was filled with plush couches, multiple pieces of visually interesting resin art, and a tall bookshelf with various genres of books, plus, most impressively, there were several glass jars filled with various snacks on the table.

He had selected a book recounting the legend of a famous dwarven hero titled ‘Arise from Ash’ from the bookshelf, and was currently investigating what snacks each of the glass jars contained (the first one had almonds, the second had dark chocolate chips, and the third had raisins), when Aramyl, one of the elven delegates, entered the lounge with a mildly surprised look on his face. “This is a lovely room,” the elf commented, looking around more closely, “I’m disappointed that I only just discovered it now, at the very end of this trip and our stay here.

“Me too,” Arlo exclaimed, looking up from the bowl of trail mix he had put together for himself, “you know, next time the dwarves host a multi-race get together, they should skip the debate and instead give us a proper tour of this whole place.”

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This story was written in response to these prompts:

Girlie On The Edge‘s Six Sentence Story prompt: lounge

Pensitivity101’s Three Things Challenge: resin, raisin, arise

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If you’d like to read more stories about Arlo, he has previously appeared on my blog in Disrupted Plans and The Perks of Being a Delegate.

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