“I’m glad he’s escaped,” said Garbazh, “but what are we going to tell them when we get back to Mordor?”

Trazhcan looked at him hesitantly. “We don’t have to go back, you know,” he said. “We can send a big bunch of troops back to Mordor ahead of us. We’ll tell them that we’ll follow later with the prisoner, or something like that. And then we’ll sneak off on our own to Harad or Umbar or somewhere. No one will ever know what happened to us.”

“And no one will care,” added Ashnazg, a hint of bitterness in his voice.

“That’s a brilliant idea, Trazhcan,” exclaimed Szlash, his gold earring bobbing in excitement. (That ring was precious to him, though it had brought him much pain when Marty had yanked it with his foot.)

“It was Rav… I mean, Haldir’s idea, actually,” said Trazhcan. “He said that decent guys like us ought not to work for people like that.”

“But how did he know about them,” asked Szlash, putting out his hand to straighten up one of Trazhcan’s spikes that had flopped down in response to Middle Earth’s gravitational pull.

“I’ve run out of spike mousse,” explained Trazhcan. “I told Haldir what they were like in Mordor. That’s why he said we oughtn’t to go back.”

“Well, Haldir is right,” said Garbazh. “ItÂ’s a good idea not to go back…” He sighed as they all looked at him expectantly. “But I just donÂ’t know…”

“We’ll be right with you,” said Ashnazg. “It’ll work out all right…”

Garbazh shook his head. “ItÂ’s a good idea, but I donÂ’t knowÂ…You know how it is – weÂ’ve got so used to mindlessly following their orders that we just canÂ’t think straight any more…”

“Rubbish,” said Toxzicfumesz in a fatherly manner, “You’re an intelligent young fella. Someone like you shouldn’t be taking orders from that bunch of …” (Toxzicfumesz here punctuated his speech with some colourful expletives) “…in Mordor.” He took an impassioned puff at his pipe. “Go ahead and take the plunge, Garbazh my boy.”

“Yeah,” said Sewazhe, “We’ll be with you all the way…” He fingered his horn, but decided against blowing it. He knew Garbazh’s views on his horn, and Garbazh looked upset enough right now. But why did Garbazh find the thought of escape so upsetting? Sewazhe couldn’t figure that one out.

Garbazh stood up.

“I just need some time to think it over,” he said. The orcs nodded, trying to look as understanding as they could. But they sometimes couldn’t understand Garbazh at all.

Garbazh wandered off to the gates alone. The gates of Radio Mallorn…when he walked out of these gates he would also, metaphorically speaking, be walking out of another set of gates – the Black Gates of Mordor that had held him prisoner all his life. He had always dreamed of breaking away – of making a run for his freedom. But now that he had a chance to do it, he couldn’t – he didn’t know why. Was he nervous, scared or what?

There was certainly a lot to be nervous about, or even scared of. Here he was, with a tiny troop of orcs, smack in the middle of a powerful elven realm. But it wasnÂ’t fear that was holding him back. Garbazh had plenty of courage.

It was all those years and years of serving Mordor, of giving them everything he had. His service to Mordor had knocked out of him his creative spark, and all his sense of initiative. And somewhere along the line, he had begun to lose all hope of getting them back again. What was the point of making a dash for freedom now that he had become a mindless automaton? What would he do with this freedom? How would he use it? He did not know.

The mallorn forest outside was so inviting. Garbazh was tempted to walk out into it, but he resisted the temptation. There were probably innumerable elves hidden in the trees; some of them watching him at that very moment. Looking to his left, Garbazh caught sight of the tree under which he had found the poet Mardir writing.

A few sheets of parchment still lay under it : Mardir had weighed them down neatly with a smooth, round stone. A broad grin spread over GarbazhÂ’s face, as he tried to recall what Mardir had said to him. Something about his face.

Perhaps it was written on those sheets of parchment. Garbazh felt a sudden burning desire to read what the poet had written.

With a sudden, swift movement, Garbazh unsheathed his curved scimitar, rushed to the tree and picked up the sheets of parchment. Back at the gates in a flash, he sheathed his sword again and walked back into Radio Mallorn.

Unlike the other orcs, Garbazh could read elven writing. He had learnt elvish, in order to work as a spy in Mirkwood, and he could both read and write it, although his writing wasn’t very good. As a conscientious orc, anxious to make a success of his assignment in Mirkwood, he had tuned in to Radio Mallorn, to hone his linguistic skills. And he had discovered Marty’s show, “The Poet’s Quill.” It was not an exaggeration to say that Marty had opened up a new world to him; a new way of thinking that suited him better than that of his own culture.

Week after week, Garbazh would write down MartyÂ’s poems in his clumsy elvish hand and read them over and over to himself. Now he had a beautiful copy of a poem by Mardir written in the poetÂ’s own hand.

Sitting down on a comfortable garden bench, he began to read it.

“…we look before and after, and pine for what is not.”*

How trueÂ…Garbazh thought of the years and years that he had wasted in the mindless service of Mordor. There was a voice inside his head, screaming to have those years back again, to do as he wished with them.

“Our sincerest laughter with some pain is fraught”

It was more the other way round, with himself and his lads. They somehow managed to have a few laughs, despite the terrible things that they were asked to do.

“Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.”

Maybe it wasnÂ’t weird to feel depressed about something he ought to be excited about. Maybe it was all right to start something new without feeling terribly optimistic about it. Maybe it was all right to make a dash for freedom, while still feeling nervous and scaredÂ…

He would re-word MardirÂ’s poemÂ…

“The greatest ventures may be entered into by the biggest fraidy cats”

Garbazh grinned. No, that didn’t sound like poetry. But he wasn’t Mardir Soronúmë, writing profound thoughts in beautiful, poetic language. He was Garbazh, son of Cabbazh, mindless orc in the service of Mordor. If he so chose, he could become Garbazh, son of Cabbazh, formerly in the service of Mordor.

“Formerly in the Service of Mordor.” He liked the sound of that. It had a musical ring to it. Like Elwe Singollo in Nan Elmoth, Garbazh suddenly became aware of sweet birdsong in the forest outside. He began to look to the future with wonder and desire. And as the pain in his dark eyes faded into hope, Garbazh began to look a different person altogether, a new orc. One might almost say that he had the light of Aman in his face.

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*Marty’s poem is a quotation from “To a Skylark” by Shelley.