Time changes all things. This is a fact irrefutable. It is not the browning of the leaves or the hatching of the salamanders that marks the season’s turn, it is that old bastard time, dragging us ever on. It crumbles your towers and mildews your books and makes once virile adventurers fit for little more than circular conversations regarding the weather. All changes. All fades.

All but me.

Ulesorin is here. Ulesorin shall be here evermore, when the stars blink shut and the cosmos herself falls asleep Ulesorin shall be there to blow out the candles and wish her a sweet repose. Yet even for I, all things do not continue unchanged. To whit, I must make a confession to you, dear readers.

The terms of my “community service” have come to their end. Despite the machinations of my draconic ex-wife, my thoroughly incompetent kobold lawyers and a judge that I may or may not have polymorphed into some sort of marsupial as a party trick at a Longest Night celebration once upon a time.

I did turn him back, eventually. When it stopped getting laughs. Admittedly, we had all imbibed rather a lot by that point in the evening so his time among the small and furry may have stretched to an afterparty or two. He was human again within the week with quite a story to tell. It hardly seems fair to carry a grudge after that.

Regardless, the point that I am ambling towards is this; I am no longer legally obliged to reply to your letters. Indeed, I have not been under such a geas for several months now, though admittedly, I was not entirely aware of my newfound freedom until now.

What matters this to you, down among the sod and filth? Only this. Know now, that when I grant you my boundless wisdom it is out of kindness rather than obligation. And that any further requests for lewd representations of my likeness in your “DMs” are liable to end in your sudden transformation into something entirely less savoury than my marsupial acquaintance suffered.

***

We did a team bonding exercise at my new work: 2 truths and a lie. I accidentally revealed that I had suggested that forging The One Ring was a good idea in the first place and the whole team think I’m dubious. What would you recommend?

***

Dear Correspondent,

Apparently, manners have not reached your part of the multiverse as of yet. When you are begging for the assistance of greater powers, one introduces oneself.

As I am lacking your name, I cannot accurately scry upon your exact position within your new adventuring company. However, I feel it is safe to assume that you are in some sort of management position, given your desire to yoke the will of others to your own. As such, you might do well to thrive upon your newfound dubious status. Perhaps swap out your typical accoutrements for something made of spiky black metal. Respond to all questioning with ominous statements of doom. If you cannot win their trust by appearing in the guise of a kindly older gentleman with a walking stick and beard, then you can rule with an iron fist. Lording it over all of them by striking terror into their hearts. If you are not certain how best to achieve this, I would suggest looking to the HR department of wheresoever you have found yourself and mimicking their style of address. Ogres provoke less fear.

If you insist upon back-stepping along the path from a dark domain of your own, then might I suggest that you reframe your original argument as being against the existing hierarchical systems at work within Middle Earth, so that your proposed use of such an atrocious piece of jewellery might instead be interpreted as an attempt to liberate serfs from their unjust conditions. Serfs lap that sort of rhetoric up.

***

Email your problems to thefantasyhive@gmail.com with the subject: Ask the Wizard. Or leave a comment below. Having relationship issues? Need career advice? You name it, our ‘Agony Ant’ can help!*

*Disclaimer: All answers are provided for entertainment purposes only. It may not be in your best interests to follow advice provided by a 1794-year-old man who thinks that his divorce from a dragon only went bad because he employed kobolds as his legal team.