Quickly with swift speed I started running to Minas Tirith, killing all the orcs in the way with my sword. The High Steward had to be stopped from doing whatever he was doing!
‘What is the High Steward doing?’ I asked the little fat hobbit.
Peregrin answered my question with an answer, ‘Oh, Lord Tallow, it’s terrible! I snuck into the city and was asking about to find out what’s going on, and I found a chap named Beregond, who was in a frightful bother! Apparently Denethor’s gone mad and evil…’
‘Even more mad and evil,’ I corrected him.
‘Indeed! So anyway, Denethor was going to give Minas Tirith to King Sauron, but Prince Imrahil and some old wizard stopped him. Then when Mr Elessar and all of us turned up on our ships, he decided to burn the whole city to the ground instead!1 You have to stop him, Lord Tallow!’
‘Some old wizard, you say,’ I said. ‘I wonder…’
So it was then as such that we did do as we were doing and did run through the gates of Minas Tirith, still killing lots of orcs. And there imagine my surprise, when we saw a horribly old wrinkled man with a big beard, dressed in white, using magic to make all the orcs die. It was Mithrandir the White!
‘Hello, Mithrandir the White!’ I called.
‘Hail, Lord Tallow,’ said Mithrandir the White.
‘Mithrandir, this is Peregrin, he’s a hobbit,’ I said. ‘Peregrin, this is Mithrandir, the good twin of Saruman.’
‘Hello little chap,’ said Mithrandir.
‘Hello Mithrandir!’ said Peregrin.
‘Anyway, we really have to keep on going,’ I said. ‘Denethor’s gone even more mad and evil and he’s going to burn the whole city to the ground unless we stop him.’
‘Oh, I see,’ said Mithrandir oldly. ‘Maybe I should come with you. I was trying to stop him from doing all his wicked things already, you know.’
‘Yes, good idea,’ I said wisely. ‘You might be very helpful, even though you’re so old.’
So we kept on running through Minas Tirith, and wherever we went, men were glad to see us and shouted ‘Hip hip hooray for Lord Tallow,’ for renowned is my name in those lands, because of all my great deeds.
So then it was so that we came to the ancient tombs of the High Stewards, and there we came upon a terrible sight. For there were many of the servants of Denethor, and they were trying to get into the tombs, but another man stood in their way and had already slain many of them, chopping off their heads with his sword. It seemed as if the servants were trying to bring wood and oil and other things in to the tomb, so Denethor could burn the entire city to the ground, bringing death from the home of death!
‘Stay! Stay this madness!’ shouted Mithrandir the White grumpily.2
‘Aye, stop all this at once,’ I commanded, and the servants all did so, for even though they served the evil Denethor, their respect for me was even greater.
Then we heard the wicked voice of Denethor, screaming from within. ‘Haste, haste! Do as I have bidden! Slay me this renegade! Or must I do so myself?’ But the servants continued to do what I had told them to do and not burn the city to the ground. So Denethor came out, holding a sword and laughing evilly.
‘Quick, Mithrandir,’ I shouted. ‘Cast a spell on him!’
So Mithrandir ran up the steps and held out his hand and cast a magic spell, and Denethor dropped his sword because of the spell. So then Denethor started trying to run away, but me and Mithrandir chased after him into the tomb.
‘What is this,’ asked Mithrandir, ‘my lord? The houses of the dead are no places for the living. And why do men fight here in the hollowed tombs when there is war enough before the gates? Or has our enemy come even to Rath Dínen?’
Denethor answered nastily, ‘Since when has the Lord of Gondor been answerable to thee? Or may I not command my own servants?’
‘You may, but others may contest your will, when it is turned to madness and evil,’ said Mithrandir. ‘Where is your son Faramir?’
‘Yes, where is he?’ I asked.
‘He lies within, burning, already burning,’ cackled Denethor. ‘They have set him on fire. But soon all shall be burned. The West has failed. It shall all go up in a great fire, and all shall be ended. Ash! Ash and smoke, blown away on the wind!’
So me and Mithrandir and all the others ran inside, and we saw Faramir, Boromir’s brother and Denethor’s son, but Denethor had gone fully crazy and he wasn’t on fire at all. He’d just been helping out his father because he was so weak willed, and he had fallen asleep for a bit while everyone else was talking. Also he was dying, because an orc had accidentally shot him before.3 But there was a great pile of wood that had been made, to set the city on fire. So Mithrandir started pulling the fire apart, and I said, ‘Come on Faramir, wake up, you idiot.’
But Faramir didn’t wake up, he just said in his sleep, ‘Denethor, Denethor…’ and then he kept on sleeping.
Denethor heard this, and said menacingly, ‘Do not take my son from me! He calls for me.’
‘He calls, but you cannot come to him,’ said Mithrandir. ‘For he must seek healing on the threshold of death, and maybe find it not. Where as your part is to go out to the battle of your City, where maybe death awaits you. This you know in your heart.’
‘He will not wake again,’ replied the High Steward answeringly. ‘Battle is vain. Why should we wish to live longer? Why should we not go to death side by side?’
‘Authority is not given to you, Steward of Gondor, to order the hour of your death,’ growled Mithrandir. ‘Only the heathens, under the domination of dark power, did thus themselves slay in pride and despair, murdering their kings to ease their own death.’
‘Quick, Mithrandir,’ I said. ‘Help me get Faramir out of here.’ So we carried him outside, and Denethor came villainously after us.
‘Come, we are needed,’ said Mithrandir. ‘There is much that you can yet do.’
‘Hahahahahahaha!’ screamed Denethor laughingly, and he ran back into the tomb, and grabbed a magic crystal ball!4 And he held it up and it started to glow with evil sorcerous power, and was obviously proof that he’d been in league with King Sauron the whole time. Then he started to make his evil speech.
‘PRIDE AND DESPAIR! Didst thou think that the eyes of the White Tower were blind? Nay, I have seen more than thou knowest, thou grey old fool. For thy hope is but ignorance. Go, then, and labour in healing! Go forth and fight vanity! For a little space you may triumph on the field, for a day. But against the power that now arises there is no victory, even with the aid of Lord Tallow. To this City only the first finger of its hand has yet been stretched. All the East is moving. The West has failed. It is time for all to depart who would not be slaves.’
‘Such counsels will make our enemy’s victory certain indeed,’ replied Mithrandir.
‘Yes indeed!’ I said. ‘Which is exactly what Denethor wants!’
‘Hahahahaha,’ chuckled Denethor. ‘Hope on then! Do I not know thee, Mithrandir? Thy hope is to rule in my stead, to stand behind every throne, north, south, or west. I have read thy mind and its policies. Do I not know that this halfling was brought hither to spy silently upon me, within this very chamber? And in our speech together I have learned the names and purpose of all the companions of thine friend, Lord Tallow. So, with the left hand thou wouldst usest me for a little while, as a shield against Mordor, and with the right bring up this Ranger from the north to supplant me. But I say to thee, Gandalf, oops I mean Mithrandir, I will not be thy tool! I am High Steward, possessor of the house of Anárion. I will not step down to be the dotard chamberlain of an upstart. Even were his claim proved to me, still he comes but of the line of Isildur. I will not bow to such a one, last of a ragged house long bereft of lordship and dignity.’
‘What then would you have, if your will could have its way?’ asked Mithrandir, in frustration.
‘I would have things as they were in all the days of my life,’ answered Denethor, ‘and in the days of my taller fathers before me. To be the Lord of this city in peace, and leave my chair to a son after me, who would be his own master and no wizard’s pupil. But if doom denies this to me, then I will have naught. Neither life diminished, nor love halved, nor honour abated.’
‘To me,’ countered Mithrandir, ‘It would not seem that a steward who faithfully surrenders his charge is diminished in love or in honour. And at the least you shall not rob your son of his choice, while his death is still in doubt.’
‘Aye,’ said I, ‘Mithrandir speaks truly, High Steward! Come, turn back to being good again, and allow Mr Elessar to become king, and maybe we will generously forgive you for all your evil deeds!’
‘Pah!’ spat Denethor loutishly. ‘Nay, now is come the hour of your death, Lord Tallow, aye and all your so-called friends!’
Then he pulled out a big knife, and ran towards us, but Beregond, the man who’d been fighting all Denethor’s servants before, got in the way and tripped him over.
‘So, thou hadst already stolen half my son’s love,’ shrieked Denethor as he got up again. ‘Now thou stealest the hearts of my knights also, so that they rob me wholly of my son at the last. But in this at least thou shalt not defy my will to rule my own end. Come hither!’ he screamed evilly at his servants, who were all just standing about. ‘Come, if you are not all recreant!’
So two of them ran towards him, and Denethor grabbed a burning torch from one of them and set himself on fire!
‘Noooooo!’ I shouted.
Then Denethor picked up his sword quickly and started trying to kill everyone, but I drew my own sword and started fighting him while he was on fire!5
‘So, for the first time we fight again for the last time this time,’ screamed Denethor. ‘But I’m better than thee, Lord Tallow, even though thou are skilful indeed!’
‘Nay, you arest not!’ I shouted as I duelled him with my sword and he was on fire and running about. Then with a mighty blow, I chopped his nasty old head clean off!
‘Arrrrgh!’ screamed Denethor as his head fell off. ‘How dare thee, Lord Tallow! This isn’t the end of it, thou must knowst! KING SAURON IS COMING! NOT EVEN THEE CAN STOP HIM, LORD TALLOW! ARRRRRRRRGH!’ Then he died, which was a relief to us all. Also his body burnt up but we’d already taken the wood away so Minas Tirith didn’t get burnt to the ground.
‘So passes Denethor, son of Ecthelion,’ said Mithrandir.
‘Good riddance,’ I said.
Mithrandir turned around to the servants and also Beregond, who were all standing about watching. ‘And so pass also the days of Gondor that you have known, for good or evil they are ended. Ill deeds have been done here, but let now all enmity that lies between you be put away, for it was contrived by the enemy and works his will. You have been caught in a net of warring duties that you did not weave. But think, you servants of the Lord, blind in your obedience, that but for the treason of Beregond Faramir, Captain of the White Tower, would now also be burned, and also the rest of the city too. Bear away from this unhappy place your comrades who have fallen. And we will bear Faramir, High Steward of Gondor, to a place where he can sleep in peace, or die if that be his doom.’
So Mithrandir and Beregond picked up Faramir and carried him off, while the tomb of Denethor cracked even in twain and fell apart in flames, because Denethor was still on fire because nobody could be bothered to put him out.
We all kept on talking as we went to the Houses of Healing, to leave Faramir there for a while, and Mithrandir gave a key to Beregond to lock everything up. Then we left Faramir to be cured, and went up onto the walls, and saw a glad sight! For Mr Elessar was using the Last Ring again to kill all the orcs and wicked men with his army of ghosts, and because so many people had already died on the battlefield there were many ghosts, wailing and whooshing around and killing all our enemies.6
Thus was the Battle of Minas Tirith won, and the King returned to his old home, and the wicked High Steward Denethor burnt to death in a fire of his own making, but luckily not the rest of the city of Minas Tirith. All thanks to me, Lord Nicthalion Tallow. But though the battle was won, the war was just beginning, and soon all would be over, unless I stopped it from all being over by ending it. The war, that is.
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1 As is well attested, the last of the Ruling Stewards ended his own life in fire, and intended only Faramir to suffer the same fate. There is no record that the Steward Denethor even ever considered destroying the White City, however.
2 Turgid, unlovely and dull though the entirety of Nick Tallow’s idiotic tale is, the greater part of the following chapter is at least somewhat interesting, owing to its surprising and frequent congruences with the Thain’s Book, especially in regard to the words spoken (though the events depicted also hew far, far closer to historical truth than in near-any other chapter of this wretched tale). Though the prose remains unremarkable at best and actively offensive at worst, the words Tallow attributes to Denethor, to Mithrandir and to others, are from this sentence onward near-identical (with occasional seeming misunderstandings or minor changes) to those recorded by Peregrin Took.
This cannot be a coincidence. Yet equally, it is full impossible for Nick Tallow to have actually been present at Rath Dínen when Denethor met his end, for there were but few witnesses and, aside from Peregrin Took and Mithrandir himself, all were in service to the White Tower. Further, if my conclusions presented in previous chapters are accurate, Tallow came to Minas Tirith with the Black Fleet under the command of the Grey Company, docking at Harlond some time after the passing of the Steward.
This, then, is my answer to the riddle. Tallow cannot have himself beheld Denethor’s death. But it is known that Tallow lingered some little time (though still overlong) in the Houses of Healing from March 15. It is my conclusion that in that time, Tallow must have spoken with several of those who were truly present, and gathered a fair account of Denethor’s end - a fair account marred by Tallow’s clumsy self-insertions and his atrocious narration.
I find it significant that Tallow’s tale is most congruent with the Thain’s Book from the moment that the servants of Denethor enter the tale, and thus my guess would be that Tallow became friendly with one of these servants in the days immediately after the War, and thus gathered (perhaps supplemented by other sources) a good account. This event, then, is also perhaps the genesis of Tallow’s entire ridiculous tale; it must at any rate be the oldest surviving element of it.
3 In truth, he was wounded by a Southron dart.
4 A rustic and uncultured reference to the Steward’s palantír; yet a reference seemingly not invented by Tallow and corroborated by many fanciful songs I heard whilst in the North.
5 I can only assume that Tallow was unwilling to substantially change the truth of Denethor’s choice to die by flame, yet equally did he wish to claim credit for slaying one of the chief “villains” of his piece. Hence, this ridiculous scene, which I find uncorroborated and unsuggested by any other source of greater or lesser merit, in which a burning and dying Denethor is perfectly capable of engaging Tallow in an energetic duel, for some minutes and physically unimpeded by his being on fire.
6 The host of the Oathbreakers were deemed by King Aragorn Elessar to have fulfilled their oath through their rout and capture of the Corsair fleet. Their presence at the Pelennor is, again, unsubstantiated by any good account, and is presumably included by Tallow partly to wrap his chapter up easily, and partly (perhaps) because in not understanding the nature of the Oathbreakers in the first place, it is not unreasonable for Tallow to imagine that the King may have been able to call again upon their service. Though such a clearly sensible argument may, in this case, ascribe a little too much credit to Tallow’s sense of logic.
