Inception

Arwen Undomiel, her mother’s pretty princess, her father’s little Evenstar, flounced onto her bed and scowled at the door.  It was not fair.  Worse than that, it was NOT FAIR. If one more person, just one more, insisted on comparing her with her brothers, then – well, she didn’t know what she would do, but it wouldn’t be pleasant.

Just for a moment, she contemplated throwing something at the wall, but, almost before the thought was complete, she put it aside.  It would just be silly and the last thing she wanted was a mess in her room.  She frowned, thinking of the number of people who had, just over the course of one day, made infuriating comments to her.  What she really wanted, what she really needed, was to do something that would just show all those people how stupid they were.

And she was just the person to do it.

All it needed to carry it off was some planning, and she wouldn’t be her father’s daughter if she couldn’t organise a ruthless campaign of action.

Over the years, Arwen had heard many tales of the mischief caused by her twin brothers. They had described pranks varying from innocuous to disastrous, from hilarious to horrific, and her ears had taken in every word.  Some had made her laugh, while others made her turn up her nose in disgust, but there was no doubt that she had a huge store of information on how to cause the maximum amount of chaos, while attracting the minimum amount of suspicion.

And now - now she was sick and tired of being perpetually told how good and sweet and innocent and helpful and obedient she was and what a pleasant change it was to be dealing with her after years of being driven demented by Elladan and Elrohir - now she wanted to show everyone that she was more than a perfect, shiny-haired little elleth, she had the knowledge to make them suffer.

The look on her face as she smiled could only have been compared to the predatory gleam in the Balrog’s eyes when it was contemplating barbequing the golden-fair and extremely tasty-looking Lord Glorfindel.  They had no idea what they were about to face.  Let them beware.

***

To carry out a truly efficient operation, she decided, she would need to be well prepared.  Arwen went to her desk and drew out her journal, turning it upside down so that she could work from the back as she made notes.  Right, she thought.  Lists.  She began to make an inventory of all the inhabitants of Imladris who were asking to be taught a lesson by the daughter of Elrond.  Erestor and Glorfindel, of course, went without saying.  The fact that she knew that they loved her brothers as much as they did her did not give them the right to say what they had.  Thereafter the candidates for torment were a little trickier to choose.  Baranion, her tutor, should certainly be on it and so should Mothwen, the housekeeper who had been so infuriatingly insulting.  Her parents, she decided, should not.  After all, she did want to survive to adulthood. Moreover, it was probably a good thing that her grandparents were currently at home in Lothlorien, because she had heard far too frequently from Celeborn how superior a certain little elleth was to her brothers – and even Elladan and Elrohir had been possessed of enough sense of self-preservation never to play tricks on their grandfather.  Who else? Dulin, who loved to play his harp and sing in the Hall of Fire, really deserved to suffer and so did Iavas, whose ability to cook delicious honey cakes did not give her the right to patronise.  Arwen continued to ponder.  The list grew longer.

Finally she sat back and considered the names before her.  Yes, on the whole she would say that she had selected those who most merited her attention. She placed ticks next to the definite victims.  Then she thought again and drew a line through some of the other names.  Now the only question was how to pay them out for all the annoyance she had endured.

If there was one rule she had observed from her brothers’ stories, it was that there was no point in thinking small.  Petty payback would get her caught and in trouble before she knew it – and once she was being watched it would be far more difficult to implement any plan of action.

What she needed to do was make sure that everything happened together – big schemes, little tricks, evil plots – while she sat in the middle like a giant spider and pulled the strings.

Her eyes narrowed and, as she thought, she tapped her pen on her chin in a manner frighteningly reminiscent of her formidable grandmother.