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Haleth had refused the offer of lands and protection because they had survived this long on their own two feet, and she wasn’t about to give up their freedom to the elves on the chance that they’d ride to help sooner next time, but it would have been stupid to turn down the elven prince’s offer of more immediate aid for their wounded, and since they were staying for that, it would have been rude to turn the elves away from their fires when the time for eating came.
There wasn’t much left to share at this point - the orcs had destroyed or eaten everything they found - but the principles of hospitality stood.
The elf prince accepted the bowl of stew she offered him with stiff thanks and didn’t object when she sat down beside him with her own bowl. They didn’t have enough spoons to go around, and there’d been far more important things to do than carve more, so he took a small sip straight from the bowl.
He stiffened immediately and lowered the bowl slowly.
She snorted at the expression on his face. What, was it not good enough for his refined elvish taste?
She gulped from hers in grim oneupmanship and immediately regretted it. It took everything she had not to spit it right back out, and she probably would have if she hadn’t had to set an example for all the people sitting around the fire who would also have to eat this because she had almost nothing else to offer.
She swallowed with an effort and tried to gear herself up for another gulp.
“May I ask the recipe?” the elf prince asked quietly with what had better not be amusement at her expense.
“It’s good meat stew,” she shot back instantly before forcing her shoulders out of their tense posture and admitting to herself that just this one thing might not be worth defending. “Or it normally is. It seems to be suffering from a lack of good meat.”
“Kept overlong?”
“No, it’s very fresh,” she said, unable to keep from eying the chunks in her bowl a bit suspiciously. “We had to do something with those wolf-demons the orcs brought with them, and with so much of the food gone, it seemed worth a shot.”
“We’re eating wargs?” the prince demanded, and he suddenly looked a bit green.
“If that’s what you call them, then yes. Meat is meat,” she said with determination, and she forced herself to take another sip. Her mouth twisted. “You know, I bit an orc, mid battle, and I don’t think even that tasted so foul.”
“Spider’s worse,” the prince said with what sounded like first hand knowledge. “Although I haven’t had spider since the first days after we lost Maedhros, so my mind may be playing tricks on me.” His mouth firmed into a hard line after that, as if he hadn’t mean to give away quite so much, so she took pity on him and shares a bit of her own.
“I think this is the first thing I’ve stopped long enough to properly taste since they attacked that first day,” she said. “There wasn’t time to care about things like that event at the first, of course, and then after my father and brother fell, everything tasted like … “
“Ash?” he suggested, some memory bringing pain to his eyes.
She shook her head. “Blood.” It had sprayed across her face. Her mouth had been open in a scream, so some of it had gotten into her mouth.
She could still taste it faintly, even now.
The prince - and alright, he had probably earned being called by his name by now, so Caranthir - pulled something out of his belt and wordlessly offered it to her.
She pulled back the covering to see it was bread of some kind. It looked hard, like traveller’s bread, but anything had to be better than that stew. She broke off a corner of it and popped it in her mouth.
Her eyes widened.
It tasted sweet, and more than that, it tasted good, in every meaning of the word. Wholesome and safe, reminding her of treats baked by her mother in memories so faded they felt more like dreams.
And it was impossibly filling; the soft pangs of hunger that she was so used to as to ignore vanished almost immediately after she swallowed it.
“What is that?” she demanded.
“Lembas,” he said, looking pleased by her reaction. “Officially, it was a birthday gift from my cousin, though I suspect it was intended more as an opportunity for her to show off. I’ve been trying to reconstruct the recipe ever since.” He grimaced as he looked up and saw the faces of everyone else around the fire as they struggled to choke down their own stew. “I’m going to have beg more off of her after this,” he complained, and then before she could say another word, he was on his feet and passing it out, bit by bit.
By the time he came back, there was none left, and she frowned. If he’d kept any for himself, she hadn’t seen it.
The look on his face dared her to say anything, so she didn’t. Instead, she reached into her own belt and pulled out a pouch she’d been keeping for the children. It had been of great help in keeping them quiet while the fight raged, but there were still a few left.
“What’s this?” he asked when she handed it to him.
She didn’t think “treats for the children” would go over well, so she said, “Candies. We make them from maple sap.”
“Tree sap?” he asked incredulously.
“Just try it,” she said impatiently.
This time, she was the one who got to see his eyes go wide.
“Alright, maybe your people aren’t totally hopeless at cooking,” he admitted.
The almost-smile that had spread across her face turned instantly to a glare. She held out a hand for the pouch back.
“My apologies,” he said quickly. “They’re very good.”
She retracted the hand.
“I suppose you need them more than I do,” she said with a sniff. “Goodness knows you need something to keep that tongue of your’s sweet.”
“Oh, in that case - “ he said and flung one into her lap.
She thought about saving it for one of the children, but there weren’t enough left to split them evenly, and it would be a bit rude to turn it down now, so she stuck it into her mouth.
She’d made these with her brother last winter.
It was sticky now and chipped round the corners, but the taste of it was still marvelously sweet.