Article: 294518 of rec.arts.books.tolkien Path: news.uchicago.edu!yellow.newsread.com!bad-news.newsread.com!netaxs.com!newsread.com!netnews.com!xfer02.netnews.com!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!newspeer2.tds.net!172.16.10.2.MISMATCH!kent.svc.tds.net!53ab2750!not-for-mail From: David Salo <<>> Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien,rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: E-text Book VI, Chapter 6: Parts 5 and 6 of 6 Message-ID: <300620021259282284%dsalo@usa.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: 8bit User-Agent: YA-NewsWatcher/3.1.8 Lines: 218 Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 17:56:16 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 208.170.95.117 X-Complaints-To: abuse -aaatt- tds.net (TDS -daht- NET Help Desk 1-888-815-5992) X-Trace: kent.svc.tds.net 1025459776 208.170.95.117 (Sun, 30 Jun 2002 12:56:16 CDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 12:56:16 CDT Organization: TDS.NET Internet Services www.tds.net Xref: news.uchicago.edu alt.fan.tolkien:158813 rec.arts.books.tolkien:294518 _Make Way for Roglings_ (An epickal tragoedy in Syx Partes) *Parte ye Fyfthe* They travelled westward, the Elves riding on their horses, the hobbits on various species of wild deer that Radagast had summoned (Frodo rode an especially majestic elk with an antler-span of ten feet). Radagast himself rode bear-back. They passed by the Gap in Rohan. Radagast had a word with the manager, and within a week they were selling clothing made from hemp , organically-grown cotton, and recycled fibres, while a detachment of well-drilled mandrills provided security. They rode through the Gap into the slums of Dunland. There they found endless chain-link fences, hills of burning tires, vast pavements of cracked asphalt, collapsing brick tenements, and shantytowns roofed in corrugated iron. The Dunlendings who loitered on the street-corners mocked them, calling them _fairies--_; but Radagast had only to gesture, and waves of green _kudzu_ covered the trash-heaps and tenements, and the Dunlendings fled, racked by allergies. Six days after leaving Isengard they journeyed through the liquor-retailing zone of Dunland. At 6, as the lights began to come on, they overtook a lady with a superfluity of legs, dashingly clad in red and black. At her heels slouched a semi-naked man in black leather, leashed to her by a spiked dog-collar and gazing morosely at the ground. 'Well Shelob!ı said Radagast. 'Where are you going?' 'Vhot isz zet beink to you?ı she answered. ŒVosz you lookink for a vogah, or voot you rezser hef a date visz Sztinky?' 'You know the answers,' Radagast said. 'No and no. But in any case your monopoly on wogah is over. The King controls the red-light district in Disgiliath now. But if you had waited in Mordor, you would have seen him, and he might have shown more interest in your offer.' 'Zen all ze more reason to hef left sooner,' said Shelob, 'for I am not desirink him. Indeed, if you are vishink for en enswer to your first qvestion, I vosz lookink for a ravine in ze mountainsz in vhich to be spinnink my veps.' 'Then you are going the wrong way. I know a forest where you might feel right at home, though. Would you like my help?' '_You_ helpink _me_?' said Shelob. 'Surely you isz jestink me. I sink zosz vilt-lants isz not beink so goot for ze nightclups, yes? You haf gecome to be laughink at Shelop in her vonderinks, visz no clup, no staich, no Grisettes...' and she began to weep copious tears. 'There, there,' said Radagast, patting her kindly on the shoulder. 'Who is this wench?' said Paragraph. 'And why haven't we been introduced yet?' said Moribund. 'It's Shelob, the decadent and depraved whoremistress of Disgiliath!' ranted Sam. 'Oh, indeed,' said Morrie. 'Perhaps you should have told us more about your, er, adventures there. What's she do?' 'Vhot dosz Shelop _doink_?' hissed the madam. 'How isz my fame gefallen! Alas, zet I kennot show you vhot I coot be doink in ze daysz of my glory!' And she wept again. Then, suddenly tearless, she clapped her forelegs. 'Sztinky!' she ordered. 'Be showink zeesz fine gentlesz vhot it is ve isz _doink_. I em trop fatigué to indulch myself.' She flicked him the man behind her with a whip she held in her front claw. He shuddered, but did not move or turn his face from the ground. 'Poor Sztinky!' Shelob whispered confidentially to the travellers. 'Hisz tower isz gefallen down, end now he kennot to erect it again. Get up!' she shouted at the slouching man, yanking on his leash. 'Do zet number from _South Tampalas_.' The man staggered up and faced his audience. There were dark circles beneath his reddened eyes, white streaks of dry salt on his face, and a brown encrustation at one corner of his mouth. His codpiece was decorated with the Lidless Eye. He began to sing, more than passably, but without emotion: 'Bloodthirsty Shelob is the lob I love Bloodthirsty Shelob is the lob I love Bloodthirsty Shelob is the lob I love Now ainıt that too damn bad! 'Her kiss is like trinitro- toluene Her kiss is like trinitro- toluene Her kiss is like trinitro- toluene Now ainıt that too damn bad! 'Bloodthirsty Shelobıs suckin' Uruk blood She is always suckinı Uruk blood Bloodthirsty Shelobıs suckinı Uruk blood An' she donıt use Aqua-fresh! Shelob laughed, clapped and blew kisses at the audience. They did not applaud. The sight of Shelob's slave, wretched and degraded beyond imagination, stirred even Morrie with, if not pity, then at least an utter revulsion that afforded no amusement. Shelob's face turned sour. 'Be goink!' she said. 'You hef doomt yourselfs, end you isz knowink it. It vill be comfortink me in my vonderinks to sink zet you hef geburnt down your own house vhen you hef destroyt Sztinky'sz.' Shelob yanked on her slave's leash, and he crouched down on all fours. She turned back the way they had come, and he followed. But as he passed them, he whimpered 'Poor old Stinky! Poor old Stinky! Always beaten, never a wogah. How I hate her! How I wish I could leave her!' 'Then leave her!' said Radagast. But "Stinky" only glanced with one red eye full of terror at Radagast, and then shuffled quickly past behind Shelob. At length the pair came to the hobbits, and Shelob stopped and stared at them; but they looked at her with indifference. 'So you isz gloatink over Shelob too, my ducks?' she said. 'Not even a little kiss for her?' and she turned a heavily rouged cheek toward them. No one stepped forward. Shelob sighed. 'I hef only von vord of advice for you, chickies. Bevare ze Roglinks! Zet isz all. _Au revoir, mes petits amis. Au revoir!_ ' and she and Stinky vanished down the path. _Lovely limbs, eh, sonny boy?_ said the voice in Frodo's mind. Frodo slumped over and had the dry heaves. *Parte ye Syxthe* The next day they rode through suburban Dunland, where no men now dwelt, though it was a green and pleasant neighborhood, due to skyrocketing property taxes. Radagast now rode some way ahead, murmuring to himself, scattered phrases in which the word 'Rogling' could often be heard. 'What's a Rogling, and why did Shelob warn us against them?' Pipsqueak asked Frodo after a while. 'I don't know,' Frodo answered. 'I have trouble thinking these days. Tell me, Pip, did you ever... I don't know... think you heard, well, someone talking, like a voice, only there was no one there?' 'Oh, yes, quite a lot,' Pipsqueak responded brightly. He was having a good day. 'And, um... did this voice ever, well, criticize you or tell you what to do?' 'Oh, all the time.' 'And... did your voice have a name?' 'Sure! It was Aruman, chief of the wizards. He came back from the dead to warn me against Gandalf.' 'Do you still hear him?' 'Nah. He went away after Gandalf died. I guess he was finished with me.' 'Well, Pip... you're not going to believe this... but I'm hearing a voice, too.' 'No!' Pipsqueak was visibly and sincerely flabbergasted with utter amazement. Even on a good day, he had his limits. 'I think it's trying to tell me something... but I don't know what. And I think... I think I know who it is, but I daren't believe it...' 'Who?' asked Pipsqueak excitedly. 'Bilbo. It sounds like Bilbo. But it can't be, can it? Bilbo's not dead.' 'I dunno. Why don't you ask El Rond?' So Frodo rode ahead after El Rond's party, who in typical elvish fashion had ridden along with the hobbits while having absolutely nothing to do with them. It took Frodo quite some time to get El Rond to notice him. Had he still been only three feet tall, he never would have managed it; but he finally succeeded in physically squeezing between El Rond and Al Ladan, with whom El Rond was conversing. 'I hate mortals,' El Rond was saying. 'I can't stand them any longer. It's the _smell_. I feel saturated by it. I can taste their stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been... _infected_ by it. I must get out of here. I must get free. Oh, it's you, Mister _Baggins_.' 'El Rond,' Frodo said, 'do you know what happened to my fa... to Bilbo? He's safe at Rivendell, isn't he?' El Rond made a dismissive shrug. 'And this concerns me how... Mister Baggins?' 'Well, I'm afraid... I think something terrible may have happened to him, Sir.' El Rond sighed and looked angry. 'What happens to Mr. Bilbo Baggins is none of my concern. I am in no way... responsible for his welfare.' 'But... was he safe, was he all right the last you saw him.' El Rond rolled his eyes backward in their sockets. 'Yes,' he said at last. 'He was thinking of you, if you must know.' Frodo breathed a sigh of relief. 'Actually I think he left you a note, though none of us could read it. Do we have it, Al Rokar?' Al Rokar produced an envelope from his saddle-bags and handed it to El Rond, who passed it to Frodo, taking good care to avoid touching his fingers. Frodo fell back and opened the envelope. It was indeed in Bilbo's inimitably illegible script, and it took him several minutes before he could puzzle part of it out; but intercepting Bilbo's letters to his "nieces" and reading them had been one of his favorite childhood amusements. "El Rond you bas...d", it read, "Why didn't you include me in the Company? I'm going whether you like it or not. Frodo can't be trusted with the Ring. He'll spoil Gandalf's plan for sure. So what if they're days ahead. I'll just follow A...n's cute ..s. I'll get that Ring back, sure as my name's Don Gi..anni! BB." Frodo felt ill, but that was nothing new. Then all of a sudden the voice came back into his mind, louder and clearer than ever before. _How dare you read my mail, boy!_ followed by _ It's ours, precious, and we wants it!_ Frodo suddenly found that, without noticing it, he had folded the letter and put in inside his waistcoat-pocket. At last one evening they came over the high moors, suddenly to the brink of the deep valley of Rivendell, and saw emanating from the cleft a red light shining, lighting the whole valley like a dark flame. Radagast caught his breath. At the descent into the valley there had stood for many years a tall birch tree. But though it was only September, it seemed to stand leafless, and yet glowed with a ruddy light. As they drew nearer to the tree, they saw that from the end of every twig there seemed to leap a tiny flickering flame, barely an inch tall; and within each flame moved an almost microscopic black creature. Radagast reached up into the branches, and scooped one off onto his palm. It burned there for a few moments, then crawled to the tip of his outstretched index finger, spread minute diaphanous wings like a mayfly's, and flew back into the tree. 'It is as I feared,' said Radagast. 'The 'Rogs have hatched west of the mountains.' 'I remember who murdered Ariellë,' Frodo mumbled in return.