The Last Satyr: The Two Paths Part 2

Their surprise and anticipation were written on their faces. All three wide-eyed dwarf guards waited to hear who their rescuers were so intently, you'd swear you could hear their breath echo off the walls.

“One dwarf,” volunteered Marroh.

“One man and this boy,” added Amien.

“No elves,” finished Graybeard.

“I don’t understand,” peered a puzzled Gimli. “How did the four of you get through?”

Graybeard answered the question before the others could. “I should like to discuss that with the city’s new governor,” he said. “It is the reason we have come.”

The magnificence of the stone city amazed young Joe as they finally passed the inner gate of the last wall. The place far exceeded in magnificence any of that of the drow’s. Yet it was eerily silent. No lights shined from its windows and no dwarfs were going about their work. The place seemed empty.

Gimli Dol led them through the streets, and, finally, there were dwarves to be seen. There were even more when they reached and entered a protected keep with a great hall and many tall pillars.

At the end of the column of pillars stood a high throne, unusual for dwarves to use, and on it sat a frowning, middle-aged dwarf.

“Our temporary governor,” Gimli introduced them, “Arnen Fang. Governor, this company brings you news.”

“What news do you bring?” asked Arnen Fang.

“Good news! An army fights to reach you by way of Thera Pass.”

Governor Fang seemed strangely tall and lean by dwarf standards. Of course, he still would have been short and stout by elf standards—but not by dwarves.

“Thera Pass is closed. Nothing can get past it.”

“We got past it to reach you.”

Fang ignored this reply. “You are Graybeard, keeper of the elves. You expect me to believe you lead elves underground?” He seemed disturbed to see them. “So, what army is this that fights to reach us?” he inquired instead, looking suspiciously at them. “Is it an army of dwarves and men?”

He was looking at Marroh and Amien, expecting more like them.

“There are no dwarves and no men,” said Graybeard, adding, “there are no elves either.”

“Then who are they? Orcs and goblins?” Fang demanded.

“Satyrs and Black Dragons,” answered Graybeard.

“Satyrs and Black Dragons!” exclaimed Arnen Fang. “What nonsense is this?! The satyrs disappeared a dozen years ago. The Black Dragons are drow! What other deceptions would you have me believe?”

“I would have you believe your own scouts’ eyes,” said Graybeard.

“I have sent no scouts out,” replied the other. “We already know what's outside. We are surrounded and shut-in!”

“Then how do you explain my arrival?”

“I need to explain nothing, you old keeper of the elves! You are not my keeper! Of what use are you to me?”

“Myself, I am of very little use,” Graybeard said. “But the satyrs and Black Dragons I bring might be.”

“I see no satyrs or Black Dragons, magician!”

Arnen Fang had just handed the ultimate insult to a keeper by calling him a “magician”.

“You see a dwarf beside me, do you not? Does he call me a liar or a magician?” Graybeard invited.

Marroh’s eyes narrowed at this so-called “king”. He's no magician to me."

The governing “king” saw that and realized he would get no help from that quarter. He changed tactics. He no longer argued they didn’t exist, only that they were of no use.

“The satyrs might as well be gnomes or the Black Dragons orcs for all the good they would do us!”

“They both carry adamantine weapons, and you know the satyrs fought well in the Second War. Both offer you aid but ask your aid in return. They are also the last of their kind and I believe they are worth saving,” replied Graybeard. “You,” he added, “are not.”

“You dare insult me?”

“Why not?” said Graybeard.

The insults were now even.

“I’m aware of the Second War,” said Arnen Fang. “The satyrs who fought that war were on the surface and on horseback. Down here, they would have to be on foot and blind as moles!”

“They are no more blind than you,” countered Graybeard. “And they carry adamantine spears. Do you wish to refuse their aid?”

“Aid?” repeated the dwarf. “What aid? Aid from satyrs? The satyrs simply poke fun at everyone else and they steal, lie, and seduce our women!”

The expression on Arnen Fangs face was in stark contrast to the walls of polished black granite, the floor of bright white marble, and the ceiling wrought with gold foil, sparkling brightly like twinkling stars.

Graybeard ignored the look. “The satyrs aided the elves in the Second War. They are here to aid you in the Third. Is it your desire to send them away?”

“When they bring drow Black Dragons with them?” argued the other. “The Black Dragons are good only in that they reject Lolth. Otherwise, they have an equally empty core!”

Graybeard was not swayed.

“They also carry adamantine weapons as well as armor. Is it your desire to send them away, too?” he demanded.

“There are many things I desire,” answered Arnen Fang. “I should undoubtedly bore you to death with them! But nowhere on my list of desires does it include satyrs and drow.”

“If not for them, you would already be dead,” retorted Graybeard. “Or was that on your list of desires?”

“How so?” demanded the elected dwarf king.

“Vhaeraun called off his man-orc attacks on you for now in order to defend his army’s rear. They now hold Thera Pass against us. If we had not arrived, you would be dead by now.”

“We have already acquitted ourselves well in our defense!” snapped the dwarf.

“And proud of that you can be,” replied Graybeard. “But you have lost well over half your city and people. You had to abandon the fourth wall without it even being taken and still have too few to man the third! How long shall you last when the enemy returns?”

“Of what concern of that is yours, wizard?”

“You must have women and children,” said Graybeard. “Can I not at least be concerned for them if you won’t be?”

“We have them and take care of them. Again, I ask, of what concern of this is yours, wizard?”

“There are two elves amongst the Black Dragons and satyrs. They are my concern.”

“You finally speak the truth, at last, Graybeard; elf keeper, wizard, and magician!” declared a derisive Arnen Fang. “So what would you have us do and by what cheap parlor tricks would you have us do it?”

“I would have you attack the enemy from behind, at the same time that the Black Dragons and the satyrs do from the front and side. Let the enemy understand what it is like to be surrounded and know fear!”

“Thera Pass is easily defended and will not easily be taken.”

“From the front—yes,” Graybeard agreed. “But if you attack it from above and from the sides, it becomes impossible to defend. The satyrs will attack it from above from the stairs of the Plain of Romar. The Black Dragons will attack it from the front wearing the better armor and have the keener blades.”

“While we charge against their rear across the open ground?” countered the dwarf. “They shall make short work of us!”

“They shall have their backs to you. Besides! These are orc men who only see half as far in the dark as drow. You shall get twice as close as you think before they see you. Even a dwarf on short legs can cover that distance rather quickly.”

The dwarf remained unmoved by the battle plan.

“Noble war,” muttered Arnen Fang in disdain. “How glorious it is to keepers and wizards who do not die! Even my dead king thought as you! I evidently lack his eager virtue to desire to die in battle so that songs may be written and sung to me in my honor. The one I replaced, King Glorar the Shining, had three sons; Dolut, Dorili, and Agrim. Dolut, the Noble Sword, was slain on the first wall, defending it, and his songs written to him. Dorili the Red died on the second wall and his valor sung. Agrim, the Lasting Forge, fell on the third wall, the last prince to fall. The king died on the fourth and so great was the people’s wrath that they held the wall, anyway. But now the nobles are all gone. We have no more princes and no king. We have only me. I have no royal blood in me. The people chose me not for nobility but for my common sense, and of which I am to use to find a way out of this. I am to do what the king could not,” he said. “So what should I do? Should I abandon the city? Attack the enemy from the rear? Or stay behind these walls?”

Arnen Fang’s eyes narrowed.

“The king and his sons lie now with their forefathers, and do them proud. The songs are sung to them already. But what about those like me left behind, those without heroic forefathers, those for whom no songs will be written, those last of us who will not be buried in honor but eaten as food for orcs? Where is the heroic nobility in our deaths? Why should we die for you, who are not our keeper?”

The ancient keeper of the Elves grew angry.

“I do not ask you to die! I ask you to fight in order to live! If you are to be these people’s king, then you should act like one and do what is right!” demanded Graybeard.

“Do what is right?” wondered Arnen Fang. “What is right anymore? What is right about dying on a wall? What is right about dying in a charge for satyrs and Black Dragon drow?!”

“If you cannot make a decision, then leave it to others who can!” insisted the keeper. “If it is your desire to die behind these walls, then at least spare your women and children! Let us at least take them with us if you won’t join us in our march to the surface. Do not make your tomb their tomb!”

“If we wanted, we could have sent our women and children to the surface. Once the orc men pulled back, we could have left.”

“Then why haven’t you? And why don’t you do so now?”

“Vanity, I suppose,” answered Arnen Fang. “Dwarves naturally defend and fight for what is their own. It will be a sad day when a dwarf runs. And, of course, when they withdrew, we thought we had won. Now I find out from you they are coming back.”

“Not if you go to them first,” said Graybeard. “Strike them down before they strike you down!”

“You want me to act like a king when I am not a king? Look what it did for Glorar. He lost over half his city and his people and for what—the pride of his forefathers? Dead orcs are nothing to sing about,” said Arnen Fang. “I was not elected to repeat his mistakes but to correct them!”

“If you sit inside these walls, you are repeating his mistakes,” warned Graybeard. “It is what he did!”

“Then you would have me abandon this place and take the women and children with me?”

“That is one counsel,” said Graybeard. “But these are man orcs who can stand the light of day. They will pursue you to the surface. Your own women and children will slow you down. They will catch you and feed on your bones. It is why orcs of pure blood do not attack you. Such orcs could not pursue you to the surface. These can. And it’s exactly what they will do!”

The dwarf was unmoved. His brow deepened at this advice, yet the flat tone of his voice did not change.

“You make it seem like such a simple choice,” he said. “And perhaps to the brave and the noble, and doubtless to King Glorar, it is. Yet with me, you waste your breath. I am not a king.”

“Then, by your own admission, you are unworthy to lead your people.”

“They think differently. They were ready for a change. That is why they elected me.”

“Then they made a mistake,” said the keeper.

“They don’t seem to think so.”

“They thought you would act like a king. They were wrong. A king is willing to die for his people. You’re willing to let yours die for you!”

“I did not seek this job. It sought me!”

Graybeard pounded his staff as he raised his voice to make his point. “Then let it make a worthy choice!”

Arnen Fang leaned forward in a scowl of contempt.

“Their choice was that I make the decisions and not you!”

“I doubt it,” said Graybeard. “They chose you because all the real dwarves had died on the outer walls, and none but you were left! I see I found a poor market to bring my good news. We shall leave here tomorrow. The orcs shall arrive here the day after that. Then your sentries will announce the ‘good’ news you seek. Good luck with them!”

Graybeard turned to Marroh.

“I bid you stay with Arnen Fang that you may exchange news. These people may have some last words or messages for the outside world,” he said, before turning back to Arnen Fang. “Is my company to be allowed to spend the night and will you not feed us as friends or will you toss us out as if we are the enemy?”

Arnen Fang’s expression darkened, a flicker of brooding crossing his face as he weighed his answer.