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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.
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They do, but even the Feanorians don't casually make copies of books.
purposeful_glory
Maybe she should explain the printing press again to this audience.
They like the idea, but lack the means to make much use of it. They don't have forges or tools for metalworking yet. Perhaps next trade with the Dwarves.
That they can give a go. The clumsy first efforts at a printing press begin.
The baby orcs are now big enough to help plant crops, big enough to read books, and hearing complicated stories from all ends about who and what they are.
Yeah. That'd probably be best.
purposeful_glory
Because does she ever have a story for them.
"You're all adopted," she says. "I was adopted too. My birth parents' race are called Jötun and my adoptive parents' race are called Asgardians and the two of them are in a long, long, long war, that started before I was born. And one day my adoptive mother Odin scooped me up and took me home and told everybody I was her daughter, and made me look like an Asgardian, which I still do now except on special occasions; and I had an Asgardian father, too, and an Asgardian sister. And nobody told me I was really a Jötun."
"You're all adopted," she says. "I was adopted too. My birth parents' race are called Jötun and my adoptive parents' race are called Asgardians and the two of them are in a long, long, long war, that started before I was born. And one day my adoptive mother Odin scooped me up and took me home and told everybody I was her daughter, and made me look like an Asgardian, which I still do now except on special occasions; and I had an Asgardian father, too, and an Asgardian sister. And nobody told me I was really a Jötun."
They nod, wide-eyed.
purposeful_glory
"That's not going to happen to you. You get to know what you are from the start. You're orcs; your birth parents were orcs; somewhere some generations back you have Elf ancestors, because that's where orcs came from, sort of how werewolves are made from Men."
More nods.
purposeful_glory
"As far as I know Asgard and Jötunheim are fighting for no reason at all. That could be just because no one told me there's a reason, or it could be just a very stupid war. But you might have picked up that most orcs are fighting most everybody else."
"The Elves say orcs fight them. Everyone else says we just kill orcs if they come and aren't babies."
purposeful_glory
"Elves and orcs have a trait which means that they can promise to do things, and then can't break their promise," Loki says. "It's just the same in both species, but the difference is that Elves almost never swear any promises like that, so they can do what seems right to them, day to day; and all the orcs except you and another orc colony southwest of here live under the Enemy. And he makes them promise, and that still works, and then they're all out of choices about anything he makes them swear, forever. You all need to be very careful not to swear things. This is extremely, extremely important, because if you do it, you can't take it back, no matter how much of a bad idea is or if you fumbled the words and they came out not what you meant or if something changes to make you not want to do the thing anymore."
The Elves have already impressed this upon them. Never ever swear anything until you are much older and know what you're doing and have consulted with them and had lots of time to think it over.
purposeful_glory
"Good.
But the orcs the Enemy has don't get that lecture. They just get told to repeat certain words, and then the Enemy can use them however he wants. He can make them do anything. He can do it from hundreds of miles away, if a Maia's around to deliver the orders with osanwë. Sometimes he tricks Elves into making oaths, too, I've seen that happen once - well, I saw the aftermath."
But the orcs the Enemy has don't get that lecture. They just get told to repeat certain words, and then the Enemy can use them however he wants. He can make them do anything. He can do it from hundreds of miles away, if a Maia's around to deliver the orders with osanwë. Sometimes he tricks Elves into making oaths, too, I've seen that happen once - well, I saw the aftermath."
No oaths. What if we swear never to make any further oaths?
purposeful_glory
"Don't try it. I know why it might seem like a good idea, but don't try it. Ideally the Enemy will never be personally interested in you and you'll never even be very tempted to make an oath. If he ever is, though, any oath you've ever made before he can make you forget, and then he can make you make another oath on top of that which contradicts it, and then your life is ruined forever. He's done it. He did it to my friend Vár."
Now she has a bunch of very scared little kids.
purposeful_glory
She pats one on the shoulder. "It's horrible. The Enemy is very horrible. And the best advice I can give you to deal with that is to not make any oaths even about not making oaths. One day I'm going to figure out how to kill him and then the world will be much safer."
It is, all things considered, a pretty good 'you're adopted' talk. Orcs, when not raised by Morgoth, seem to have temperaments much like those of Men.
purposeful_glory
Good.
She hugs all the little orcs and sends them off to play.
She hugs all the little orcs and sends them off to play.