‘Hello, Lord of the Black Land of Mordor, the Land of Shadow!’ I called in ringing tones. ‘Let the wicked King Sauron come forth and do battle with us, the Host of the West, the Captains of the West, the Bearers of the Last Ring, the Lords of the West!’
Before us was indeed Mordor, where all the evil of all the world came from.1 We were standing before the great big gates that rose up before the land, to stop people from getting into the land of Mordor unless they were allowed in, in which case I suppose the gates would probably be opened up. It was a terrible land, filled with orcs and witchcraft and elves and fog and evil. Likely was it so that it was likely the most horriblest place in the whole entire world for it was so.
Then, as we rode up and down before the gate into Mordor, blowing trumpets and crying challenges, the gates suddenly opened up! And out from the gate came some people to find out what we were up to, including King Sauron’s chief captain, a wicked elf named Fankil.2 And Fankil the Cruel said, ‘Hello,’ cruelly.
‘Hello,’ said I nobly. ‘Tell me, where is King Sauron the Evil?’
And Fankil cruelly answered, ‘He has sent me hereforth, to ask what your errand is and to learn why such gallant and heroic Men have come unto our kingdom.’
And I said, ‘Well, Fankil the Cruel, we have the Last Ring, and now we’re here to kill Sauron and take the rest of the Rings. And thus will be won this, the War of the Ring.’ And thus was it so that evermore henceforthso was the War of the Ring called so, because I named it that in that dread hour of dread.3
Then Fankil, whose cruelty was great, laughed evilly and screeched, ‘Indeed?! Well maybe my King Sauron will take the Last Ring from thee, Lord Tallow! And then he shall win the War of the Ring instead and cover all the world in everlasting darkness and evil!’
And I rejoinded, ‘Ha! Maybe.’ And I saw that some of the Host of the West quailed in their boots, but I did not.
Then Fankil cried in a loud and cruel voice, ‘Well, then, let’s see! Come forth, oh! King Sauron! Slay these weak traitors and also the mighty Lord Tallow, and reclaim the Last Ring unto thyself!’
And a great cry of trumpets and horns and pipes arose from Mordor, so I knew that everyone had heard Fankil and King Sauron would definitely come out to see what was happening. So heroically, I said, ‘Not so fast, Fankil the Cruel!’ And then when he looked up to me to see why I had said ‘‘not so fast, Fankil the Cruel!,’’ Mr Elessar quickly chopped his head off from behind.4 And thus died Fankil the Cruel as he had lived right up until his death.
But now arose a great clamour and noise from Mordor, and suddenly a big army of orcs and elves came marching out, yea, even every single orc and elf in all that nasty dank land. And there too were dragons and black riders and trolls and ghosts and oliphants5 and half-orcs and wizards and witches and demons and giants and wolves and bats and wraiths and all the evil creatures of Mordor came forth. And Sauron came.
Aye, there he was, King Sauron the Black, mightiest wizard and warrior and wickedest king of all time and also of the age. Mighty and tall he was, taller even than I, by a little bit. His eyes glowed with magic fire, for ‘twas in the eyes of Sauron that his magic lived,6 and set upon each of his fingers was a magic ring - each of his fingers, bar one.7 Which finger, you ask? Verily ‘twas the little finger on his right. That alone was bare, awaiting the Last Ring.
And so the biggest battle of our age began, and it did last until the very end of the battle.
There was magic and arrows and magic arrows flying everywhere, and orcs and elves and trolls trying to smash the heroic men on our side and ghosts appearing and eating people and sometimes a giant crushed a hundred men at once with his foot but then the Rohirrim came charging in on their horses and killed lots of the evil enemies but there were still more of them and a dragon tried to eat me but I killed it with my sword and Mr Elessar was fighting by my side and swinging his sword everywhere and he killed a black rider to death and the horns blew wildly and a great spurt of fire hit some of the Rangers and they died and Mithrandir the White turned all the elves into toads and I killed the biggest orc I’d ever seen.
Truly was it the greatest battle possible.
Then King Sauron came stomping over and his magic eyes were shooting magic fire at people and killing them, and he saw me and Mr Elessar and Imrahil and Éomer and Mithrandir and Angbor and he charged over to us, shouting, ‘At last! Now I will claim the Last Ring unto myself and rule the world! Give it to me and you will suffer little, worms!’
And Mr Elessar held up his hand and Sauron saw the Last Ring on his finger, so he started chasing Mr Elessar all about the battlefield, but Mr Elessar was very sneaky on account of being a Ranger and he hid behind a tree! And as King Sauron was about to look behind the tree, Éomer cried, ‘Looking for this?!’ And he held up his hand and lo! there Sauron saw that Éomer bore the Last Ring! So Sauron tried to chop Éomer’s head off with magic, but King Éomer jumped on his horse and rode away!
‘Haha, this way!’ cried Imrahil.
‘Come and get it!’ shouted Angbor the Fearless fearlessly.
‘Hello I think you are, erm, looking for this?’ inquired Mithrandir the White.
‘Nay, they are deceiving you, oh King!’ I deceived. ‘It is I, Lord Tallow, who are the true bearer of the Last Ring!’ And verily was Sauron suddenly very unsure who had the Last Ring.
Then King Sauron attacked me with his magic and also with a big axe! And we fought a great fight, aye, the greatest fight ever fought, probably! And he used magic and also his axe to try and kill me, but I was swift and skilled and stopped him from killing me, and so was it that my battle-skill was the greater! But the power of all the magic rings that King Sauron had meant that he was the most powerful person in the whole world, and he stopped me from killing him and also he tripped me over! Then his magic eyes glowed red as he prepared to kill me, with magic!
‘Noooooo!’ cried King Elessar and King Éomer and Prince Imrahil and Lord Angbor and old Mithrandir the White. And verily did they cry ‘‘noooooo!’’ because they did not wish to see me, their best friend and noblest ally, murdered to death. And then they all attacked King Sauron at once, and tried to fight him! But King Sauron was bigger and better and stronger than all of them put together, and he knocked them all over.
‘Now at last, the truth will be revealed,’ gloated King Sauron evilly. ‘Now I will discover who is the true bearer of the Last Ring, and then I will slay you all!’
Then he looked upon the finger of Mithrandir the White and behold! he did not have the Last Ring, only a copy of it. And so did he also search the fingers of King Éomer and Prince Imrahil and Lord Angbor and they, too, bore false rings to mislead Sauron, as I had counselled. And then did King Sauron examine King Elessar and he, too, did not have the Last Ring.
‘So it is thee, Lord Tallow,’ said King Sauron. ‘Truly should I have guessed that it were thou who boreth the Last Ring, for whom else be better suited than thee to wield such mighty power?’
And I smiled, and I said to King Sauron, ‘Tell me, o King. Do you know of the shell game?’
‘Nay,’ replied King Sauron.
And so I did take the shells and the coin from my pocket, and with great cunning and skilful hand I moved them hither and thither. ‘So where’s the coin?’ I asked.
And Sauron smiled evilly and he sneered, ‘Why, under the shell on the right.’
And I laughed suddenly, and Sauron was afraid. ‘Why, no, it’s not,’ I said, and I lifted up the shell to prove it.
‘Then…perhaps the shell on the left?’ asked Sauron. And I lifted up the left shell, and there was no coin there.
‘Ha, then it is under the middle shell,’ growled Sauron.
‘So it would seem,’ I replied. ‘But that, King Sauron, is the secret of the shell game. For why should I risk your guessing the correct shell on the first, or even the second, guess?’ And I revealed the third shell and it, too, hid not the coin. ‘The secret, Sauron, is that the coin is not under any shell at all.’8
‘I don’t understand,’ wondered Sauron. ‘Where is the coin, then?’
And I reached behind Sauron’s ear, and drew the coin out from behind it.
‘And so,’ I revealed, ‘is it so with the Last Ring also. For when the wicked undead Boromir stole the Last Ring, then did I realise that it was far too dangerous to keep it forever! So I counselled Mr Elessar to give the Last Ring to his hobbit servants, who are very small and sneaky, so that they could take it to Mordor while you, King Sauron, were distracted, and your magic eye bent even upon me and my army instead. And now, any minute now, I think they will reach the mountain of fire and destroy it forever.’
‘WHAT?’ screeched Sauron. ‘What is the meaning of this? What treachery is this?!’
‘Treachery, King Sauron?’ I asked. ‘Nay, tis no treachery.’
Then suddenly, the sun grew faint and unclear, and a great flash as of lightning and thunder and fire rolled across the land. The wind died completely, and a great and terrifying darkness rose all about us so that the very world was shrouded in fear.9 And thus did we know that Nine-Fingered Frodo and Steve, the humble little hobbits, had done as I had instructed them and succeeded in destroying the Last Ring.10
‘Treachery?’ I repeated. ‘No, Sauron. We have defeated you…with the power of friendship!’11
‘Nooooooo!’ screeched Sauron desperately, as all the power of his rings vanished.
And I said, ‘Yes!’ And then I stabbed King Sauron IN THE FACE WITH MY SWORD. And he died.
Thus was the War of the Ring ended and won, all thanks to my brilliance and plans and also thanks to me killing King Sauron, and thus did it all come to pass exactly as it is written here in this, the only full and true account of the War of the Ring, as told by me, Lord Tallow, the War’s greatest hero.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1 Not only a false claim, but a laughably simple and naively foolish claim for good measure.
2 No reliable record of the War makes mention of this name. However, in my travels across the North of Middle-earth, I learnt that this is indeed a name of legend and superstition among certain folk, generally referring to some bogeyman-like figure of fear and rumour that haunts the fringes of folk-lore. It is my guess that Tallow borrowed this familiar name to appeal to his northern audiences. Curiously, no small number of these stories do cast “Fankil” as being elf-like, or are otherwise concerned with elves as dangerous and foesome creatures; thus explaining Nick Tallow’s description of him as being of that people in this passage.
3 It is possible that the wizard Mithrandir was the first to refer to the “War of the Ring” but this cannot be determined with any certainty. What is certain is that the chances of Tallow having coined the name are (needless to say) near-nought.
4 This gross and heinous breach in the right manner of conduct when engaged with a herald in speech clearly reveals Tallow’s own egregious lack of knowledge, decency, or even simple familiarity with the proper courtesies due to any messenger engaged in speech.
5 An attested dialectal name for the mûmakil of the south.
6 Perhaps a misapprehension on Tallow’s part concerning the interpretation of “the Eye of Sauron;” ascribing an overtly literal significance to the title or the symbol.
7 Though it is known that Sauron jealously kept those Rings of Power that he managed to gather unto himself, it is not recorded (and is highly unlikely) that he ever bore any Ring other than the One. Then again, it is also extraordinarily unlikely that Tallow ever beheld the Dark Lord.
8 I have already mentioned this, but it bears reiterating that the resolution of Tallow’s inane and fictitious account hinges upon the correct understanding and execution of a simple swindler’s game. I do not doubt that Tallow was practiced in this “shell game,” for he demonstrates a full knowledge of the principles and practice of the trick; and further, the mere fact of his choosing to base the conclusion of his tale upon this fraud suggests that it was an idea that came easy to his low mind.
Ironically, too, Tallow’s own fantastical explanation is indeed not so far from the truth of the policies of the West in the War. Indeed was it so that Mithrandir and the King Elessar sought to draw the greater part of the Enemy’s strength and attention from the Black Land, turning his own guile and greed and malice against him and granting the Ringbearers some slender chance to fulfil their Quest. I must assume that Tallow came - on some level - to be aware that the Quest was fulfilled through some measure of wilful misleading on the part of the captains of Gondor and Rohan, and that the march of the Host of the West was key to achieving this confusion. Hence, Tallow’s deployment of this literal sleight of hand in describing the deceiving of Sauron in his story.
9 This account of the strange phenomena that accompanied the unmaking of the One Ring and the Downfall of Sauron is broadly corroborated as being accurate by numerous independent sources.
10 Again, Tallow was clearly aware that there was some bond between the King Elessar and the periain, though it is exceedingly unlikely that he knew much (if anything) of the extend or the foundation of that friendship. It also bears mentioning that Tallow’s lack of any description regarding the many hardships and long toil suffered by Frodo and his servant is not necessarily reflective of a lack of knowledge on Tallow’s part. It is eminently plausible that Tallow rather preferred to dwell upon his own “accomplishments” as often and as much as possible, and so saw fit to omit the dreadful trials undergone by the Ringbearers.
To be clear, it is also highly plausible that Tallow did indeed suffer a profound lack of knowledge concerning the Quest of the Ring and the hardships suffered, I do not mean to suggest otherwise! Merely to observe that, in this moment, it is truly impossible to determine which quality of Tallow’s was the greater: his ignorance, or his arrogance.
11 Absolute rot. This would seem to be Tallow’s pathetic effort to impart some semblance of a moral or a point to this tiresome drivel, and it is extraordinary only for its being an inane moral that fully succeeds in managing to truly fit the compass and worth of this entire inane tale.
