"Your great clumping hoof was in my face, ninny. I'll pinch if I like!"
Sammie glared down at Daisy from his perch on her shoulders. "You're the one who told me to get up here and see about finding those bottles of wine left over from Yule. Why don't you stand on my shoulders and fumble about for them?"
Daisy put her hands on her brother's ankles to hold him steady as they wobbled a bit.
"Because I'm a girl, of course. Girls have to be... er... dignified, or somesuch. So Goldy tells me, anyhow. Not to mention that you're much lighter than I am, you are far younger after all."
"Not even a year," Sammie shot back, his head buried in the musty recesses of the high cupboard. "And just because I'm not as fat as old Lalia Took was..."
"El's the only one skinnier'n you, and at least she's got the looks to make up for it," Daisy sniped. "At least you freckle properly, or else nobody would believe you were a hobbit at all. They'd say you were a ridiculously short Elf."
"They wouldn't." Sammie's voice held a note of grumpy denial. "Anway, they'd probably think you were a dwarf, if it came to that."
Daisy just snorted. "Whoever heard of a dwarf with blonde hair? They don't go out in the sun enough to catch the rays." She had to make a quick readjustment to her stance as Sammie moved unexpectedly. "And I didn't really mean it, Sam, about you bein' Elflike. It was just teasing."
"Well," Sammie paused, accepting the almost-apology. "I only sort of meant what I said about you being a fat old dwarf. You're not really that fat."
He fell to the ground with an indignant crash, barely having time to catch his breath before he was set upon with tickling.
~