by Adam Roberts
And King Bleary promised his people a golden age. He decreed there would be a social structure that treated all elves fairly, to be called the Elf-fair State; and he decreed a National Elf Service for the treatment of sickness, and free elfucation provision.6 And the people believed King Bleary, and there was much rejoicing throughout the whole of Blearyland.
Now Moregothic watched this latest development from his fastness in the north, which he called Cumabund, which means ‘calling this place a fastness is, frankly, to speak ironically, since its dominant characteristic is on the contrary how slow everything is here; ice-bound wilderness, huge cyclopean blocks of granite, massive architecture but nothing much to do all day except plot evil plots and stare at the snow-covered landscape.’ For it is sometimes the case that a single short word can only be rendered into another language with a hugely lengthy paraphrase. That’s just the way it is with translation, can’t be helped.
And Moregothic gathered together his horde of Orks, and said unto them: ‘Righto, chaps, I’m sure word has reached you of the increasing populations of Elves to the lands south of here. Now, some of you may be asking yourself, “Why did the Dark Lord himself decide to build his fastness Cumabund up here amongst the frozen wastes and black granite peaks, where nothing grows and even the crows perish as they fly through the air?” ’
And with one voice, the five hundred thousand Ork warriors cried, ‘Oo no, my lord, the thought never crossed our minds, honestly.’
‘No, no,’ said Moregothic, indulgently, ‘the rumours have reached my ears, and it’s perfectly understandable. I’m not going to have anybody flayed alive for saying such a thing – I’m not a monster, after all. Well, to be exact, I am a monster, strictly speaking, but, well, you know what I mean. Allow me to explain.’
And the mighty horde of Orks cried, ‘My lord, you’re spoiling us, really you are.’
And Moregothic said, ‘No, couldn’t quite catch that, the legion on my left hand was slightly out of synch with the mass to my right. It came to my ears as a sort of raging confusion of noise. Something about boiling, was it?’
And the mighty horde of Orks cried, more slowly and with distinct pauses in between the words, ‘My lord, you’re spoiling us, really you are.’
And Moregothic said, ‘Ah, yes, got it that time. Well, you’re my Orks and you deserve the best. The truth is, this is a slightly rubbish location for a fastness – but what you need to understand is that when we came here, and the Dragons added words to Emu’s music, thereby creating a much more structured and rational cosmos to live in, it was all much of a muchness. But now that Emu has sent his valpac over here, they’ve smartened things up no end down south. When I was last down there it was all barren rock and hailstones, but now I hear it’s pleasant woodland, parks, rivers full of fish, all manner of interesting wildlife. Anyway, anyhow, anyhew, to cut a long story short, I’ve decided we should invade. There’s plenty of space for all, and as a special bonus we get not only to slay, but also to smash, crush, drive before us, listen to the lamentations of the severely wounded – which is to say, all your favourite hobbies.’
And the Orks did cheer; and raised their hook-ended sabres over their heads and did brandish them in the cold air.
And Sharon did say, ‘Good idea, my lord.’
And so it was that a great Army of Darkness came raging out of the frozen north, and fell upon the elven populations of the more temperate south as a wolf falls upon a flock of sheep, or a hawk upon a flock of doves, although, now I come to think of it, it’s rather confusing to have the same word to describe collective gatherings of sheep and birds. I mean, are there two more different sorts of creatures than, say, sheep and birds? Sorry, I don’t mean to go off on one, it’s just a particular bugbear of mine.7
So, running out of time, barely have time to tell you about the mighty battle between the Elves and the hordes of evil. Ten years of solid fighting. The forces of Darkness had it all their own way at first, but then, just when all seemed lost, you know the drill, a single heroic self-sacrifice turned the tide, I’m not sure of all the details, but that doesn’t matter particularly. Anyway, finally Moregothic was overthrown and chained up, using a really big chain. And I mean really big.
And the mighty Elvish lords who led their different tribes in this great fight were called Tuoni Bleary, and Nodihold, and Manwëewer Lukithatime. And from their respective peoples descended the three great tribes of the Elves; the Bleary, the Nodiholdor and the Man-Wëers.
But although Moregothic was chained with the really big chains, the Elves had not captured Sharon, nor had they extinguished the existence of many of the Orks.8 And they scattered into the wild wildernesses and ‘wa!’ wastes (so called because people often let out a cry of babyish terror on first seeing them), and lived for many generations in those places. And Nodihold did say to King Bleary, ‘Should we not pursue these agents of wickedness even unto the furthest reaches of the Earth and put an end to them, for fear that they will regather, regroup, and come back to attack us another time?’
And King Bleary did say, ‘What? No, clearly there is no need for the public expense of such an expedition. I mean, look: it’s pretty cold up there, and I believe that they’ll all get chills and sneeze themselves to death, or something. Intelligence reports from the Central Inelfigence Agency suggest that no further threat exists to the elven way of life.’
And Nodihold did scratch his massy elven sideburns, like unsightly growths of moss on the sides of his otherwise smooth and golden face, and did say, ‘Are you sure? I mean, it seems like leaving it rather to chance. Couldn’t we just send one squad of soldiers into the wilderness to make certain?’
And King Bleary said, ‘I will institute a far-reaching consultative process, the Big Conelversation, to open up the process of regal governance to the Elvish people.’ Which, as Nodihold knew, was King Bleary’s way of saying ‘no’.
And afterwards Manwëe came up to Nodihold and said, ‘So? Are we going to finish what we started, or what?’
And Nodihold shook his head mournfully, and replied, ‘Manwëe, we’re all crazeee now.’
And Manwëe asked, ‘All what?’
‘Crazy,’ said Nodihold, ‘sorry, I had a sort of hiccough when I said that and it did something strange with the final syllable. But is it not crazy to leave our future to chance in this manner?’
And Manwëe said, ‘Excuse me for a mo, I need to take a comfort break.’
And so the Elves lived in safety for a little space.
4 You, dear reader, must decide whether you intend to pronounce this word in the manner of the forces of Good and Light and Reason and Decency, as Emu does himself, ‘luptenant’; or you can pronounce it in the evil, deformed, Forces-of-Darkness manner of Moregothic, ‘lootenant’. The choice is yours.
5 [Author’s note] Compare the Latin elevate, from levis ‘light’, meaning to illuminate, to raise up to comprehension, to provide meaning; which is to say, ‘word’.
6 For did not King Bleary himself say his priorities were ‘elfucation, elfucation, elfucation’? And did not the publishers of this volume also say ‘we would like to apologise in the abjectest terms imaginable for the barrel-bottom nature of the jokes contained in this particular paragraph of the Sellamillion, which exceeds EU maxima for groans-per-phrase by 300%’?
7 Which reminds me, I meant to include the ‘Bugbear’ amongst the hideous progeny Moregothic created: it being, as you surely know, a gigantic half-insect, half-polar-bear hybrid, with eight albino hairy arms, mandibles instead of a mouth, big muscles, and a special iron exoskeleton that it has to keep oiled with seal-oil from fresh-caught seals. Nasty piece of work, I can tell you.
8 Damn, forgot them again. This should read ‘. . . Orks, and Bugbears.’
Of The Unchaining of Moregothic
The unchaining of Moregothic is told in the Lay of Ladylay.9 Now the Evil Lord had been chained up with these really big chains for ages.
And Moregothic did say t
o the Elves who guarded him, in the dungeons of Cumabund, ‘Look, this chain is really rather uncomfortable.’
And the great Elven lord Ladylay, who was charged with guarding him, did reply, ‘Hmm, well, you should have thought of that before you led a flesh-eating horde of Orks from the howling north to wage war upon Elfkind, shouldn’t you? Eh?’
And Moregothic did reply, ‘Fair point, fair point, only there’s this link digging into the small of my back, very uncomfortable. Could you just slip the chain off for a mo, so I can readjust it? It’d take thirty seconds, and I promise I won’t bother you any more after that.’
And Ladylay did say, ‘I don’t know.’ And he turned to his deputy Crosmybigbrasbed, and said, ‘What do you reckon?’
And Crosmybigbrasbed shrugged.
‘Alright,’ said Ladylay. ‘One minute. Only you have to promise not to try any funny business when the chain is off.’
‘Funny business?’ said Moregothic, as if the very thought was absurd and even offensive to him. ‘Guys! Come on, guys – it’s me!’
‘Say “I promise”.’
‘I promise.’
But Ladylay was not to be fooled so easily, and he said: ‘Say “I promise”, followed by what it is that you promise.’
‘I promise not to try any funny business when the chain is off.’
And they took off the mighty chain, and Moregothic did leg it, and Ladylay did stand holding the chain, looking like a bit of a twit really.
And Moregothic fled to the far north, and there assembled around himself his followers again. And he said to his army of Orks, ‘Well it’s pretty clear the one mistake I made was to put all my eggs in one basket, ork-wise.’
And his Orks said, ‘Eggs?’
‘What I need,’ said Moregothic, ‘is a bigger and a better army, with a fully diverse and ethnically integrated range of evil creatures.’ And so he created new, bigger Orks; and also Giant Ants of Death, War-Ouliphants; and he created monstrous smooth-headed cave monsters, the Baldtrogs; and he created Goblins and hordes of terrible flesh-eating monsters. And then he said, ‘That ought to do it, really.’
And word reached the Elves in the south that a mighty muster was mustering in the frozen north. And they were sore afraid. Indeed, sores were the least of the things they were afraid of. They were more afraid of being torn to blood-scattering pieces of quivering flesh, speared, devoured, and utterly killed.
9 Also known by some authorities as ‘the Lay of Crosmybigbrasbed’.
Of The Coming Of Men into Blearyland
It was during this era that a new race came to Blearyland, travelling from the east over the mountains. These were Men, who are mortal and proud yet had the capacity to become portly and cowed. They arrived in the elvish forest Taur-ea-dorpants, a ragged band of men and women and children. And the Elves did accost them, saying ‘Hey! What are you lot doing in our forest?’
And Riturnov, who was King of these new peoples, did reply ‘Is this Southlands Bec?’
And Fingorbuffet the Nibblesome, a prince of the Elves, did reply, ‘No, no, you’re miles off, mate – miles away, you should have taken the left turn at the waterfall by Ered Loonpants.’
And Riturnov did reply, ‘I knew it, I told Harrison we was on the wrong road. Ah well, ah well, we’re here now, too late to start off again today. You got anything to eat?’
At first the Elves were wary of the newcomers, who ate and drank like gannets, frankly, and who had hair growing out of every part of their bodies save only a small space around their eyes, and a second hairless patch between eyebrows and hair-line, I mean yuck or what. For no Elf has such extensive body hair, excepting only the slight hairiness of Nodihold, and the much more extensive hirsuitery of Wiurdi the Beardy, the elf with a pelt.
Now, when Men first came to Blearyland they were fleeing an unspeakable horror in the east, and when the Elves asked Men from what it was that they fled they replied, ‘Which part of “unspeakable” don’t you understand? – The basic concept resides in a thing not being speakable about, alright?’ After which they went ‘tch’. And the Elves were sore ashamed.
But after many months, and much drink shared, the Elves came to form an alliance with the sons of Man, and with their daughters, though not with their brothers, who were, frankly, a little standoffish.
And so King Bleary agreed a treaty with the Men of Numenorwhat? that they did take up arms together to fight the evil of Moregothic. And they told Men of Numenorwhat? lengthy epic tales of the evil of Moregothic, and of his bitter lieutenant Sharon, of his chaining up, and the unfortunate unchaining incident that happened subsequently, which was just plain unlucky, not anybody’s fault actually, just one of those things.
‘So the upshot, with regard to this wicked Moregothic, is that he’s loose again, is he?’ asked the Men. ‘Just run it past us one more time, how he got free from the giant chain?’
And the Elves did hmm and ha, and did look at their shoes for a bit. Then they did say, ‘But anyway – anyway – the important thing is that together we shall fight the forces of evil! Together we pledge our courage and our blood to defeat this terrible enemy who blights Upper Middle Earth.’
And after much ale, the Men did cry, ‘Yes! Yes! Let us band together in a great alliance, and fight shoulder to shoulder against evil and tyranny!’
And the Elves did say, ‘We will spill our blood gloriously, as brothers!’
And the Men did agree. ‘And we shall be dauntless,’ said the Men. ‘No daunting for us. We shall fight without daunt of any kind.’
‘Hurrah!’ cried Men and Elves together.
And when they had sobered up a bit the following day, Men returned to the elven halls and said, ‘Look, great news about the alliance and all that, really great news, we’re simply chuffed, we really are, it’s just that, well, we were talking to these wood-hewers and they sort of, well to put it frankly, they told us that – well, let me, let me put it this way. You know this evil lord chap, and his evil lieutenant that we have pledged to fight to the last drop of blood in our veins?’
And the Elves did say, ‘Yes? What about them?’
And the Men did enquire, ‘Well, we were just curious, it’s more, you know, curiosity than anything else. But who else is on their side?’
And the Elves did say, ‘An army of half a million terrible Orks, Giant Ants of Death, War-Ouliphants, fifth-column ouliphants who try to infiltrate our cities and blend into the crowd to subvert our defences from within, although to be honest they’re not terribly successful; Baldtrogs; Goblins; Trolls and many terrible flesh-eating monsters.’
And the Men did ask for clarification, saying, ‘How many of those last lot?’
And the Elves did say, ‘Hordes.’
And the Men did say ‘Oh’ in a small voice, and did assume a doleful countenance, which the Elves did assume was a reflection of a certain hangover, which sometimes did afflict the children of Men after the consumption of certain quantities of beer.
But the alliance was binding, and Men and Elves stood shoulder to shoulder.
Of The Coming Of Dwarfs into Blearyland
It was round about this time that Elves and Men first noticed that Dwarfs had come into Blearyland. And when they taxed them with their coming, and asked from whence they came, and for why they had left that place, the Dwarfs did say, ‘Been here ages bach, you just didn’t notice us. Simply ages – longer’n you, I daresay, look you. Under the ground, see. Underneath, out of sight, out of mind, see.’
And the Elves did say, ‘Pull the other one.’
And the Dwarfs did say, ‘No, no, honestly.’
And it being impossible to prove or disprove it, one way or another, Elves and Dwarfs left it there for the time being.
And the dwarf-kingdoms of Blearyland were carved from the very living rock, but also from the dead rock, which was easier to carve actually, since it wasn’t given to moaning and trembling and crying hot lava when you cut into it with a pickaxe. And the great dwarfi
sh cities were named Khzi, Khazhakstn, Khizzikhizzi, Khztofthousands and the dark dwarrow-dwelling of Khz-by-Garinewman.
And the Elves did say, ‘Look, I’m really sorry about this, but you just can’t stay. We’re just not a big enough country to accommodate whole new populations. It’s not as if you’re genuine asylum seekers, you’re more economic migrants.’
And the Dwarfs did say, ‘echo-gnomic migrants’ and did laugh proudly and mightily, as if they had said something funny, and some amongst the Dwarfs did go ‘Hi-ho! hi-ho!’, with the second part spoken in a smaller voice as if it were an echo of the first, and this in turn did provoke the Dwarfs to further hilarity, such that they fell to the floor laughing, although they did not hurt themselves so doing, the floor not being very far for a Dwarf to fall as it happens.
And the Elves more or less gave up at this point, and left the Dwarfs to their own devices.
Of The Coming Of Munchkins into Blearyland
Shortly thereafter a great army of Munchkins did arrive in Blearyland, singing mighty songs and bringing with them buildings and road design of a surprisingly advanced design, bearing in mind that the Munchkins themselves were not only just two foot tall or so but also markedly infantile and pliable. But the Elves said, ‘For goodness’ sake, this is just too much, I mean, I’m as much in favour of ethnic diversity as the next man, but enough’s enough. Go on, you lot, away with you.’ And with kicks, cuffs and general ya!-ing, they did chase the Munchkins to the borders of Blearyland and nudged them over the edge.
And the Elves did say, ‘And stay out,’ and did brush their hands together with alternating up-down strokes.
Of the Great Destruction wrought by Moregothic, and of the Attempts Made by the Elves and Men to wreak Destruction upon Moregothic, and of the wreakage of Destruction upon Moregothic, which was eventually wranged, or possibly wrekted