Tumunzahar makes Menegroth look like a contract project. Which, the Dwarves assure her, it was. The stonework is astonishingly careful and beautiful, silky to the touch up close while from a distance it gives the impression of stretching on forever above, a sky of stone with crystals for stars. Vast natural cave systems are connected by dozens of perfectly smooth, gently sloped broad stone pathways from which the fall, if she fell, would be several miles down. There are handrails. "We use those to move materials carts," someone explains to her, "we're not going to be reckless."
There's an amphitheater, a place where a hundred of the stone walkways twine around to create space for a hundred thousand people to sit in close proximity, and someone is giving a lecture or a demonstration at the base of it, the seats closest to him filled with eager, tiny, bearded Dwarf-children.
And they spiral down, and down, and down, past waterfalls and egg-sized gemstones left half in the rock and halls of crystal. Everything grows gradually more ornate and more perfectly maintained and the clang of hammers fades behind them. "People say," her guide says, "that we only have a council instead of a single King because there were nine winners of the competition to design the throne so we couldn't just select one person to sit it." And they push open the doors to reveal, indeed, nine thrones so elaborate it would be hard to choose between them, and nine squat bearded people sitting them.
There's an amphitheater, a place where a hundred of the stone walkways twine around to create space for a hundred thousand people to sit in close proximity, and someone is giving a lecture or a demonstration at the base of it, the seats closest to him filled with eager, tiny, bearded Dwarf-children.
And they spiral down, and down, and down, past waterfalls and egg-sized gemstones left half in the rock and halls of crystal. Everything grows gradually more ornate and more perfectly maintained and the clang of hammers fades behind them. "People say," her guide says, "that we only have a council instead of a single King because there were nine winners of the competition to design the throne so we couldn't just select one person to sit it." And they push open the doors to reveal, indeed, nine thrones so elaborate it would be hard to choose between them, and nine squat bearded people sitting them.
purposeful_glory
Probably, although he might determine that I'm not moving his requested ex-prisoner, whose location he claims to be able to discern, and derive my answer from that.
"I swear to you, before Melkor, before Eru, before the powers of this earth, that there are thousands of times as many orcs as Elves and Men. That orcs will not suffer for the next six days. That, should you bring me Maitimo Nelyafinwë within that time, orcs will not suffer for the next ten years. That if you accept my job offer, orcs will not suffer for as long as you serve us. I swear this on all of my powers to act within Arda."
"I swear that, if you are on your way with the proof that you're willing to negotiate, the orcs won't start experiencing constant pain in the agreed-upon sense again until you take action indicating breach of our agreement or until ten years have passed."
Wow, he's - that's playing very very seriously. Yikes. Um, doesn't sound to me like they get two weeks no matter what.
"I swear that, if you are on your way with the proof that you're willing to negotiate, the orcs won't start experiencing constant pain in the agreed-upon sense again until you take action indicating breach of our agreement or until ten years have passed."
Wow, he's - that's playing very very seriously. Yikes. Um, doesn't sound to me like they get two weeks no matter what.
purposeful_glory
Yes. I stopped there for a while to see if being uncomfortably warm in general makes me go frosty; didn't help. Why?
purposeful_glory
Ah. Well, he seems to be settling in all right at Tumunzahar, at least as well as can be expected.
purposeful_glory
Then it was lost before I came, wasn't it? I'd be on Midgard, pretending that my soul was a bobcat, and he'd be dangling from a cliff, and the war would be lost?