The Last Satyr: The Company is Formed Part 1
A Lesson in Drow

Something did happen to the boy in school that day and it was quite embarrassing.

His aunt watched the boy over dinner. “They say you shot your school teacher with an arrow in archery class today,” she said with an accusing eye.

The boy wondered who had told on him. In showing off for the new girl, Rebecca, he pulled too much draw on a lightweight class bow. His arrow had spiraled off out of control on its own adventure, hitting the archery teacher, who was standing well off to the side, in the buttocks as he ran to get out of its way. Fortunately, the shaft had no arrowhead, yet the wound still required a bandage. Everyone was too shocked to speak, except Draugo. He laughed. Ronthiel though gave him a look of compassion.

Now normally the boy would lie, blame another student, or make up some other fib, but his aunt's information seemed to come from an all too accurate source, likely Sith. He resorted to an altogether new tactic, one he’d never tried before—the truth.

“It was an accident.”

“That’s a laugh!” Sith scoffed.

“It was too an accident!” the boy snapped, his eyes flaring at Sith.

That avenue certainly was not a success. His brows knit together, creating a deep furrow on his forehead, and crossed his arms. The corners of his mouth turned downward, and his lips pressed into a thin line. He cast his eyes downward, rejecting the situation. The obvious shake of his head betrayed not only frustration but also a bitter disappointment. The boy felt like a stranded ship caught in a storm of his own making, tossed between the currents of honesty and the desire to avoid trouble. Honesty, it seemed, wasn’t a passport to smooth sailing here. He'd told the truth and look where it got him.

So the boy made a mental note to himself to bounce another acorn off that dumb elf’s head as he was, no doubt, the source of his aunt’s intelligence report. Yet he said nothing. For now, the more pressing matter was to learn from Sith later whether Rebecca had any romantic interest in him. Priorities, after all.

Besides, it didn’t end all bad at school. Ronthiel promised to make him a heavier bow with stiffer arrows that would fit his draw so it wouldn’t happen again.

As the dinner unfolded, there were unexpected turns in the conversation at the table.

“Well, if it makes a difference, I got my scolding too,” his aunt Athiel informed him. “It seems I’ve done a terrible job in raising you. According to old Graybeard, I should have told you about what happened to your parents.”

The boy perked up at this. There was more to know?

“What’s to tell?” Sith said with a shrug. “We’ve all been up there. There’s nothing to see! There’s not a clue up there to be found about his parents on those cliffs.”

“According to Graybeard, the absence of evidence is, itself, evidence,” she said. “In this case, I’m inclined to agree. We all know what happened to the boy’s parents—drow.”

Now there was a shocked response at the table. Auntie had just used the forbidden “D” word. While it may be that every elf knew about drow, they certainly didn’t talk about them. Raising that dreaded name was rather like raising the name of a close relative guilty of a dozen ax murders. Drow may be elves too, but they were selfish with no truth, honor, or sense of right or wrong—rather like politicians. No elf wanted to own up to the fact that they were even related. Their name was better left unsaid. The boy doubted that Cedar House had ever had that word spoken in it before–even Sith had no comment. Indeed! The silence fairly rang in and of itself.

“I know, ma’am." The boy had figured out he wasn’t to be punished for skewering his archery instructor, and it was his turn to speak. "The old keeper told me.”

“Then he also told you,” she said. “That if the drow ever found out you’re alive, they’d have reason to come back for you?”

“He did,” the boy answered, “but I figure they might just wait for me to die of old age on my own.”

“I doubt they’ll do that,” she stated. “You see, if the drow got rid of the satyrs to end their influence over us, then the last thing they’d want is a satyr living amongst us. You’d be just as threatening to them as a thousand satyrs would be living way up on Gold Creek, maybe even more threatening.”

Now the boy wondered what she was talking about. Was she deliberately trying to scare him into doing something he wouldn't normally do; like being honest? Because it certainly hadn't worked before.

“But I’ll die soon of old age compared to them," he pointed out. "What’s the difference in them waiting a few more years?”

“I don’t mean to scare you, boy,” she said solemnly. “And it breaks my heart to tell you, but there’s plenty of difference. You see, just because you’re the last satyr now doesn’t mean you will always be the last one. If the drow elves want for there to be no more satyrs, they’ll have to come back here and finish the job–and soon.”

If she didn't mean to scare him, it wasn't working. Once again, he pointed out the flaw.

“I don’t understand, Auntie? How can I not be the last satyr if I’m the last one?”

“All satyrs are men. There’s no such thing as women satyrs. Any woman of any race can give birth to a satyr child so long as she has a satyr husband. So, you see, while you may be the last satyr now, you don’t have to always be the very last satyr. You can father one and maybe more. More than likely, with your talents and charm, you’ll father a bunch of them. So, if the drow elves want to get rid of all the satyrs, they have to get rid of you and right quick. You’re not safe here.”

“Sure I am, Auntie! Where would I be safer? I’m surrounded by elves who hate drow!”

“That’s not saying much, dear. Your brother Sith is an elf. Sith, would you defend your brother here against a drow?”

“Against a drow?” said Sith and shook his head. “No–not for anything.”

“That’s about the normal expected response around here,” she told the boy. “I’ve asked your teacher to give a talk on drow in class tomorrow so that everyone can be on the alert for them. You be sure and attend. If you do, I have a gift for you that Graybeard left.”

Oh! That’s right! He’d said that!

“What sort of gift?”

To tell the boy he was to receive a gift, but not to tell him what it was, was sheer torment. Why he’d be awake all night trying to guess what it was and, by and by, he would start to imagine it must be what he wanted most. Which, of course, it never was. So rather than end up disappointed, he set out to try to get his aunt to give some sort of a clue about it. Already, the boy’s mind was exploring this path.

“Go to class tomorrow and replace out,” his aunt said. “It’ll be here when you get back.”

Well! Of course, a gift from a keeper would have to be mighty special indeed. He hoped the list of possibilities included mead. It was enough that the boy made it a definite point to go to school in the morning. Besides! He wanted to see that pretty elf girl again.

ABOUT half-past dawn, the bell of the school began to ring, and presently the students began to gather for the morning lesson. The school children distributed themselves about the classroom with the boy being personally placed next to the aisle by his teacher, in order that he might be as far away from the distraction of the carved open window and the seductive outside summer scenes as possible. The students filled up the aisles: including the Model Boy, Sith, whose job it was today to confirm the boy attended.

The class fully assembled, the teacher gave out the subject of today’s lesson, and read it through with relish. He had his own peculiar style: which was much admired by the elves. He was reading, as he usually did, from an elf’s book, for this was how elves taught history–by reading aloud the book of someone who had actually been there and was alive at the time.

All regarded him as a wonderful reader. To an elf, it isn’t just what is read that’s important. It’s how it’s read. The story provided the subject, but the reader provided the picture with his tone and inflection.

The picture told was the story of the Second War with the Dark Elves. It was not unusual for the teachers to read the history of elf wars and they were generally boring to the boy, for elves have a tendency to name all the elves involved in a battle, out of respect for all the participants. It was not uncommon for the teacher to announce in a certain battle, that there were “eighty-five thousand, one hundred and thirty-three elves on the right flank” and then proceed to name every single one of them, including their fathers out of respect for them too, and, when finally done, to return to the story only to then describe that there were another “seventy-nine thousand two hundred and twenty-seven elves on the left flank” and proceed to name every one of them too and their fathers, as well. It got to the point where the boy usually wished he had been one of those killed in the battle to spare him the torture of having to sit through the name recital now. And when the story of the battle ended, the boy had to endure the final agony of the names of all the elves killed, plus their fathers, out of respect for those who gave their lives. Not just that, but the names of those that killed them, if known, and their father’s name too. At this point, the boy was longing to pound his head into his desk until dead, rather than hear one more name. Yet all his classmates could afterward recite every single name given and with such reverence and perfect memory that their teachers did not even bother to test them on it.

Yet as the teacher began the story now, it came with a surprise to all. For this was not elf history at all.