The Last Satyr: The Two Paths Part 2

At last! Daylight!

As Graybeard watched, everyone was finally out of the ground and on the surface again. The last of the Black Dragons, satyrs, and dwarf women and their children had all emerged from the Three Candles under a bright blue sky, green grass, cotton ball clouds, and the forgotten feeling of a fresh breeze. The experience of freedom was overwhelming to all except the drow Black Dragons, of whom all were now blinded by the sun and had to be guided by the satyrs, who took the job of escorting them quite seriously, as they were all beautiful women.

But reaching the surface had not ended their problems. Rather, it had intensified them. The dwarf women and children slowed them down, and the blinded Black Dragons were now even slower still, and, until dark, useless in battle. They no longer had just one roadway to the surface to defend against Lolth’s attacking army, but three. The man-orcs were already fighting their way up by all three cave entrances. If they could break out of even one, it was the same as breaking out of all three.

So far, Graybeard and Sar had organized a defense of all three cave entrances to try to delay the man-orcs from getting out long enough for the helpless dwarf women and children to put some much-needed distance between themselves and the Three Candles. They decided now to defend the three caves in shifts: the satyrs by day and the Black Dragons by night. Graybeard believed that if they could hold the caves for three days while the Black Dragons adamantine armor held, the dwarf women and children would reach safety at the dwarf city of Minas Morgul. Yet, after that, the situation would be very grave. Their weapons and armor of Adamatite would fail under the sunlight, and they could no longer keep the enemy bottled up, who would then break out and kill them all. As dusk fell, Graybeard called a meeting with Shinayne and Sar.

“Our time grows short,” he told them. “The Black Dragons have used up all their darts and are fighting with swords and daggers. The sun is already destroying their adamantine weapons and armor. The satyrs have only light armor, and their spears deteriorate as well. Once our adamantine weapons fail, we shall have to flee or be killed and possibly both. For they shall catch us on the surface in the open, without armor or weapons, and attack during daylight when the sun blinds our Black Dragons or at night when satyrs cannot see. If that happens, our defeat and ruin are absolutely certain.”

“The keeper is right,” said Shinayne. “Our weapons and armor already begin to fail. Not blinded by daylight, these man-orcs can then attack on the surface.”

“So all we can do is buy time for the dwarf women and children to get away?” surmised Sar. “And at the expense of our own doom?”

“I never accept defeat,” said Graybeard. “There is still one option available to us.”

“What is that?” asked Sar.

“We seal the caves,” replied Graybeard. “We collapse the entrances.”

“I agree,” said Shinayne with a nod. “It is our only chance of survival.”

Yet Sar showed reluctance.

“While I agree, the plan will work,” he said. “Have you considered the consequences for your company still down there? I know at least the boy is still alive. I can feel him. And what of the Elf boy and the drider? Can you feel them?”

“I feel them both and they are together,” answered Graybeard. “But there is no hope for them. The drider hunts Lolth. It is a desire she can conceal from Ronthiel but not from me. It is to their doom that they go.”

“There are also the two humans, the ones you call Joe and Amien,” Sar reminded him. “If we seal the caves, we not only seal the man-orcs underground but them, too.”

“We lost Amien and young Joe defending our rear to a dire bat. The Black Dragons reported it,” said Graybeard. “There is no reason to believe them to be still alive, and, if they are, they are captured, so there is no hope for them even if they live. With Leradien carrying Ronthiel to his doom, that leaves only the satyr boy’s fate to decide our course.”

“The boy broke me out of prison,” Sar reminded him reluctantly.

“And he bought us several days with Lolth’s army,” added Graybeard. “I have delayed sealing the caves this long in the hopes he would somehow appear alive and well! But can we allow the boy's accomplishments to taint us and lead us all to our doom? I think not. If he were here now, would he not vote to seal the caves? We decide now before dawn!”

“But I feel the boy is still alive,” said Sar with certainty.

“And I feel that both Ronthiel and Leradien are still alive as well,” said Graybeard. “And I fear for Ronthiel’s mind should he find himself sealed in. But that does not mean they have not been captured, placed in chains, and are not being personally tortured by Lolth at this very moment. Even if they were free, how would they possibly fight their way up through so many man-orcs below to reach us? They would all die before they got here.”

“Graybeard is right,” said Shinayne. “They can’t make it. We must seal the caves.”

“The drider tunneled her way into my prison,” offered Sar with hope. “Leave her a means to tunnel her way out of the Three Candles.”

“No!” stated Graybeard in disagreement. “Lolth’s army has spider steeders. If we leave a way for Leradien to dig her way out, then we leave a way for their steeders to dig a way out. The caves shall be sealed so that not even Leradien can reach the surface. And we do it now! We have wasted too much time already!”

“Time?” repeated Sar. “How interesting it is to hear another keeper use that word. For time is meaningless to us, who do not die. You began your company with seven. A lucky number for you, but, evidently, not for a single one of them,” he noted. “For, as I see it, not one of them will survive our decision. Let me guess? You rationalize your decisions based on the fact that the lives of men, satyrs, and dwarves are so miserably short that they might as well serve some useful purpose for you before they die? In that case, may I offer you a contrary opinion based upon my experience with the satyrs? And that is, the shorter one’s life is, the more precious to them it becomes. You have taken away the one most precious thing to the boy.”

Graybeard faced him gravely.

“I shall gladly change my mind if you have a better plan,” he said.

“Unfortunately, I do not,” admitted Sar, his eyes dropping in despair. “Though I may regret it later, I agree. I shall order the immediate collapse of the caves by my satyrs. Nothing will get out.”

There was a reluctant silence then, like a choking fog that engulfed their unwelcome decision.

“Thank you,” said Shinayne to him. “I know it must be difficult for you.”

“Don’t thank me,” replied Sar, leaving. “Thank him,” he said of Graybeard and then asked. “May I make one suggestion?”

“Which is?” asked Graybeard.

“That we leave something in the cavern for them, something only they can find.”

“What do you suggest?”

“Something to comfort them,” answered Sar. “Something to show we did not forget them.”

Within the hour, the process of sealing the caves began. By the end of the next day, the task was completed. The danger, though, was not over. By the following day, the already blinded Black Dragons would find their weapons and armor crumbling to dust in a land where everything alive was now against them.