Eat, Drink, and Be Merry by AdmirableMonster  

Mooncake

for the prompts

beer - fiddle - silver - doze

mooncake

The shy silver Moon had appeared from behind the clouds, adding a ghostly white light to the cozy, firelit kitchen.  Nimruzimir sat awkwardly on a high stool, watching Sakalkhôr work.  His round, cheerful face was not so different from the Moon itself, though no one would ever call Mordor’s first historian shy.

Sakalkhôr took a quick sip of the beer Eshara’s people had perfected and rubbed his nose, leaving a smear of flour across the bridge.  Then he pulled out a generous heaping of chilled bean paste, rolled it into a ball, and surrounded it with the pastry he’d prepared.  Finally, he inserted it into the mold and pressed down, then pulled it out and inspected it.

“Is the m-mold all right?” Nimruzimir asked.  The question felt entirely too momentous, as if they were in one of those cheap, tawdry dramas in Armenelos, the ones that cost only a coin or two, and the fiddles would start shrieking a tense tuneless noise any moment.

“You’ve done a great job,” Sakalkhôr said, turning that sweet grin on him.  “Come help me put the mooncakes together.”

Armenelos might be dozing beneath the waves now, but Sakalkhôr’s smile was still strong and precious.