Chapter Text
You know, I always had this kind of gross pity for Orcs once I hit my late teenage and adult years.
The same type that I felt for Gollum, really. Creatures that were simply born and bred to die as fodder for their Master, who ultimately cared nothing for them in return. They lived dark, harsh lives until they were eventually killed, either by Men, Dwarves, Elves or even their own.
It no longer became fun to watch them get cut down on the screen by our heroes, even though it was the most merciful thing that could be done for them. Sometimes I would wonder if things could be different for them, have they been given any other options besides being slaves to Sauron and Melkor. They were victims of them as well, even though their crimes were too great to be forgiven.
Maybe I’m just rambling my own thoughts on this, but Orcs don’t exactly have the greatest of lives. They are the product of violence and violence is their only way to survive. For hatred to be your very nature, where you even hate yourself, was a notion that was uncomfortable and made me sick. They were forced to fight, to breed, to destroy and do the groundwork for a Master that would get rid of them in the ends anyways. Then after the fact, they were left to take the falls of the greater evil and were hunted to extinction.
It was a sad thought.
That’s not to say that I liked them.
On the contrary, the world would have been better off had they never been created at all, for both the Free People and themselves. Pity did not mean that I was going to justify years of mass murder, destruction, slavery and crimes so awful that I didn’t even want to think about. Pity didn’t mean that I believed that they deserved redemption or second chances. Pity did not mean that I didn’t hate them. Pity only meant that I could sympathize with the unfairness of the situation.
And pity was all I needed to survive.
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If there’s one thing that I learned while I was imprisoned here, it was that Orcs don’t do much in their day to day lives. Orc women in general tend to stay away from civilizations and other Orcs, preferring to live in groups to themselves and away from the constant violence of their male counterparts. They weren’t welcomed in their society unless they were to breed, with them being the smaller and weaker of the two, and weakness was never welcomed.
They liked to stick in one spot, hunting and stripping the resources of the land until they couldn’t anymore, then move onto the next until something killed them. They conserved their energy, since they never knew when they would be attacked, and stuck to the areas they knew, especially when resources were low. Yes, that resulted in them living longer, calmer lives than males, but they were repetitive and boring without much going on in between.
And because they had nothing to do, any form of entertainment was good enough for them. Even if it was just venting out their problems while they skinned a deer.
“It’s unfair and stupid, it is!” Molgorg shrieked, stabbing their only knife into the deer to remove the internal organs. “Cannot believe those burlorz ! Saying I would never find a mate!”
She was the smallest of the group, barely 5 foot as it was, and a figure that never seemed to gain much weight, even though she was mostly muscle at this point. She had been thrown out of her last herd due to her stature, claiming that no one that small would ever breed good warriors. Never mind that she was the strongest of them.
“Right? They wouldn’t know a good makado if she came to them with a sign on her forehead!” Lugut agreed, throwing too much wood into the roaring fire.
She was the oldest of the group, having been the only one to see through battle. She was taller than the average female and the only one that had clothes that still fit. Granted, she had stolen them off a corpse of a woman she had murdered, but she had taken great care of them. She was the only one who had mated and had given birth before, claiming the process of both was so painful that she had felt nothing when both her husband and son were slain years later.
“Can you believe that he said that I would be good for birthing runts for food?! The nerve!” She angrily sliced through the tendons, splattering blood everywhere. “As if he was any better! All his sons turned out ugly and deformed!”
“Aren’t they all ugly and deformed, though? What an ass.” I said, shaking my head.
Granted, it was difficult to fully be part of this bitch fest when I was still chained to a wall, but it was the thought that counted. If I looked passed the kidnapping, imprisonment, the horrendous living conditions of this cave, and having to look at them all day, they weren’t so bad. They reminded me of the girls I used to sit with at lunch during high school, only more violent and with worse table manners.
“You’re the only male I can tolerate, Bardu-snagum. ” Lugut laughed, a vile sound that almost made me wince. “Sometimes I think you’re more female than not!”
Oh, you have no idea, lady.
“HA! I never would have fucking believed it in my younger days!” Kalcmurg, another orc that was lying in a pile of skeletons, snorted. “To think the only burlorz we would keep would be a fucking Elf! I would have shit myself in shock! I’m so glad we didn’t skin ya like we wanted to!”
I’m very glad about that too, Kalcmurg. I quite like having my skin.
Kalcmurg was young, barely out of her spawn stage. So young, in fact, she had only just begun to lose her baby fat (that I didn’t even know Orcs had until now) and replace it with the hard earned muscled and calloused body that adult Orcs worked towards. She hadn’t even reached full height yet and her fangs were only now coming in.
“I still want to know what happened back then. I don’t trust Ashnuf’s theory on poison mushrooms dulling our senses.” Kirzad said.
She was our tallest member, almost 6 feet in height. The daughter of an Orc Warlord but had been kicked out after losing a fight with her older brother over who their father got to keep as an heir. As such, she somehow got it into her head that she was Alpha bitch here, even though she had been the last to join the herd. Honestly, a real try hard at trying to be mean and edgy, like a middle school girl that just got into her emo stage.
She was my least favorite, as she wasn’t afraid to get rough with me and made it clear that she didn’t think of me as anything other than something pretty for them to play with.
Not that she was wrong.
Ashnuf was the only braincell that this herd had, for lack of a better term. She was the weakest physically and small, but the reason they even survived past the first winter. She was the one to lay traps and plan their day, as well as make sure they didn’t overhunt and tear this place to the ground. Even though she was useless at anything physical, I think she was the most important.
Plus, she feeds me more regularly than the others, so she’s my favorite. Or rather, the one that was the least painful to tolerate.
“This again? Ashnuf is never wrong! Never ever!” Kalcmurg said, spreading her arms to exaggerate her point.
“I’m just saying, something was physically stopping me from stabbing his pretty little face! It wasn’t natural!” Kirzad grumbled, plopping down next to the fire.
She was right on the money on that one.
I noticed it within a month or two of my captivity. Even though they could still hurt me, anything of major injury was impossible for them.
Kirzad trying to stab me in the heart only resulted in her slashing lines across my chest and arms.
Ashnuf trying to strangle me for accidentally talking back resulted in a few sharp slaps to the face.
Kalcmurg attempting to break my fingers to see in my screams were as pretty as my singing voice ended up with her simply twisting my arm behind my back.
Even Lugnut’s plan to brand me as their property with a hot iron became nothing more than burning the soles of my feet to keep me from running away.
Something out there was protecting me, and I wasn’t going to pretend I wasn’t grateful. They may still have been painful experiences, but I would choose them over real torture every time. At least none of those ended up in scars that couldn’t be covered up. That would really inconvenience my life right now.
“Ah, what does it matter? We got him now and he tells funny stories and sings! What’s wrong with having a pet?” Kalcmurg barked out laughing, showing off those ugly, yellow teeth that were gross to look at.
I winced as she pet my head, rough enough to hurt.
“Ay! I always wanted to own something and now we gots an Elf!” Molgorg snorted, her hideous face contorting in the closest thing they ever got to joy.
The conversation died down afterwards as they shoved the crudely cut deer meat onto sticks and held them over the fire. I sat back as they did, hugging my knees to my chest as I waited for them to finish so that I could eat whatever was left over. I looked away as they tore into the deer flesh, chewing loudly and swallowing chunks whole, blood running down everywhere.
Gross. They ate worse than my brothers during Christmas Eve dinner.
Thankfully, they saved enough for me to eat decently tonight.
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I had no idea at what point of the series I was in, nor if I was in the books or movies or even the video games.
Orcs in the mountains had no sense of time, nor did they keep track of years or days or hours even. They had no need to when they were constantly in survival mode and just trying to live to see another day. Female Orcs were worse off, which none of my companions even knowing any of the major events that happened outside their territory in these caves. They couldn’t even tell me what Age we were in.
It wasn’t as important to them as surviving and none from their previous tribes had bothered to teach their females anything other than how to birth strong heirs.
As a result, I had no idea how long I was really there.
I know there had been six periods of snow storms and ice since I’ve been here, each dreadful, harsh and colder than anything I’ve ever experienced, but nothing indicated the time or where I even was. I couldn’t tell if a year or just a few months had passed in between those storms, as I am usually kept towards the back of the caves where I couldn’t see the sun and moon.
Telling how many days had passed became pointless when I realized this.
They didn’t even know what this mountain was called, only knowing that no other Orc lived in that small area they claimed (and even that was a mystery since I was confined to the cave and the immediate few yards around it). I wasn’t well versed enough in the geography of Middle Earth to estimate anything. Lost couldn’t even begin to describe how I felt right now.
Asking them proved to be of no help either.
“Why are you concerned about time? You’re not going anywhere until we die, and then you die with us. We’ll kill you beforehand, so you don’t have to worry about that.” Ashnuf said, her tone casual like always. “Unless you’re asking me to kill you now.”
I didn’t bring up the subject again after that.
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I didn’t see my reflection at all in my confinement, even when I was taken out to go bathe.
It was after the snow had melted and the temperature became warm enough to make the ladies begin to sweat that I had been allowed to leave. Granted, it had been while I was bounded and blindfolded and carried by one of them, but I wasn’t going to complain if it meant I could clean the dried blood and dirt off of me. Not that I can complain anyways.
I almost cried when I was set down and cut loose and saw the hot springs on front of me. The water was warm and clean (too clean to reflect anything back at me), blissfully taking away the coldness from the bitter cave that lingered in my body. I stripped, not caring that they were going to see me naked or I them, and sank down into the hot water.
It strung at the open and healing cuts across my skin, especially the throbbing burns across my feet, but I was too relieved to care. It felt too god to let pain spoil.
Kalcmurg jumped in right next to me, splashing me in the face as she did so and laughing hysterically. I flinched away from her, but she paid me no mind as she ran towards the deeper end of the springs to swim. The way she bounce reminded me of my younger siblings, only uglier and with far less grace.
“Kirzad, keep watch!” Lugnut shouted as she too stripped and entered the springs next to me. “This place is popular with travelers and other Orcs. We brought no weapons other than knives, so we must flee if anyone else comes here. If we tell you to run, you run.”
I nodded, sinking down further into the water. After a moment to just bask in the heat, I got to work in removing the dried and sticky blood that was smeared across my chest, arms and face. I winced as I put pressure on the dark bruises and red skin surrounding my wounds.
“Here. I heard you Elves like to use this stuff.” Lugut said, as she threw a clump of cloth at me. “Use as much as you want. We don’t need it like you do.”
I unwrapped the small cloth bundle, and then proceeded to cry as I beheld the glorious bar of white, oily soap. Thankfully, the girls were to busy trying to drown each other to pay attention to my tears.
I scrubbed myself clean, holding back whimpers of shock whenever I saw the water turn red or brown around me. Getting the dried clumps of blood out of my hair has the hardest part, with how tangled and matted it has become after months of not caring for it.
But I was clean and that was all that mattered.
I couldn’t bring myself to care about anything else, not even when I was shoved back into my disgusting clothes and tied once again.
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Part of the reason that they liked me so much was that I didn’t speak unless they wanted me to. Most days, I just let them do their own thing while I stayed out of the way. Less attention was great when you live with a group of Orcs.
It couldn’t always be helped, however.
“ Bardu-snagum.” Lugut purred, inching closer to me while twirling my short hair in between her claws. “You know you’re my favorite of our herd, right?”
“What do you need from me?” I didn’t even look up from the sketchbook I was scribbling in.
It had been a gift from Kalcmurg, one she had taken off of a wagon they had ransacked from a nearby passing merchant road. They had given me anything they didn’t want (which was practically everything), including books, brushes, paints and various trinkets that were considered luxuries for the Dwarves. It was the first time I wasn’t freezing my ass off at night now that I have fur blankets and coats. I wonder if they killed them to get this stuff like they did the horses they brought in.
Something told me to not ask and be grateful.
“Sing for me. Sing me that song of death and pain that I like. I am rather bored and want something to do while I’m guarding you.”
I set the book down, pushing myself up to a sitting position.
“Which one? Be Prepared or In the Dark of the Night ?”
“Both. We have many hours before they return from hunting.” She said, slinking down to sit on the floor and into the makeshift nest of blankets. “Sing me any song about pain and darkness. I’ll tell you when I want you to stop. And if you please me, I’ll let you eat dinner tonight.”
My stomach twisted at that. I swallowed, moving back towards the wall to put some distance between us as a pinch of anxiety hit my chest.
“What? But I-”
CRACK
I hit the floor, the right side of my face going almost numb from the expected, but sharp blow. I cradled my cheek, biting my lip to keep the whimper from leaving, even though I tasted blood. My vision blurred, but I wasn’t sure if it was from the sudden pain or tears. My ears were ringing, and my head was pounding from my skull making contact with the hard ground.
God, that hurt. That was going to bruise later. I could already feel my eye begin to swell again.
“I said sing. Unless it’s a note, I don’t want to hear another word from you. Get up.”
I sang for two hours before she was satisfied.
At least I got fed that night.
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I didn’t cry anymore.
Sure, there were a few tears here and there, mostly when it came to their games that involved twisting me around until I was screaming, but I haven’t truly cried in quite a while. There wasn’t any point to it anymore, since it did nothing but cause them to laugh and torment me more to see how long I would keep going.
After a few years of being confined to these caves, chained to rocks 24/7 and completely devoid of any privacy or autonomy, I had learned to shut my emotions off and go along with anything they wanted. Hunger and cold no longer affected me the same way as before. Switching to a different tone and personality based on what they wanted in that moment was horrifyingly easy. Being completely silent for days and sometimes weeks on end until they wanted me to speak again was almost second nature.
But hey, it kept me alive and relatively well, so it was fine.
I was fine.
I had to be fine.
Otherwise, I wasn’t going to survive much longer.
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Being the therapist friend all my life has never been more helpful than it had been while living here.
I never thought that I would use my two Gen Ed psychology classes to give therapy to Orcs. But I also never thought that I would be chucked into a fictional world in the body of a male Elf and yet here I was. Granted, it was difficult to comfort Molgorg when she had my ankles shackled to a boulder, but I did my best.
“It’s hard, y’know? I didn’t ask to be this small, nor this skinny! I eat more than anyone and yet none of it goes to my height! I know I shouldn’t be concerned with getting a mate, but dammit, I want to breed a good, strong warrior to slaughter a village of Men and prove them wrong! My breeder did it, so why can’t I?!” She screamed, punching a large stone, the sound echoing through the tunnels of the cave.
Damn girl. Impressive. I wish I had that type of strength in these sticks I call arms. Then I might actually be able to open the peanut butter jar without having to cry and beg my father or brothers.
“While I do think the end goal is slightly off, I understand you, girl. There’s nothing wrong with wanting that for yourself and it’s not fair to you to have to put that aside just because some stupid orc doesn’t want to pry his head from out of his ass.”
I sat down, patting the stop on the ground next to me. It was the only spot left that wasn’t littered with rocks and splinters from the boulders and skeletons she punched.
“It’s worse since fucking Kirzad is always there, flaunting around her breeding! Her breeding couldn’t even keep her in her herd! Bah, who would want to mate a disgraced Orc like that?!”
She grumbled, crossing her arms and sitting down next to me. I squeaked as she grabbed my shoulder and yanked me down until my head was in her lap. I didn’t move, only shuddered, as her cold and calloused fingers weaved their way through my hair. She wasn’t gentle, scratching my scalp with her nails while I winced at the streaks of pain.
Bitch! At least warn me first!
“What am I doing wrong, Bardu-snagum? Should I give up? 7 tribes and not a single Orcs wants to mate with me. Maybe they’re right about me being a defective runt.”
Her hand stopped moving as her body slumped, as defeated and depressed as an Orc can be. I reached up to pat her rough hand, shifting so that I was more comfortable.
“Girl, no. Absolutely not. You are not going to give up on yourself on my watch! I don’t think you’re wrong to feel that way!” I said, though I kept my grip on her hand in case she tried to pet me again. “Males are stupid and shallow and don’t deserve you. I mean, you are the strongest of the herd and you just punched a boulder in half. If all those Orcs focus on is your height, then they are the ones losing out in the end. You deserve a child that you can pass your superior strength onto and not risk tainting it with their stupidity. You’ll find an Orc eventually that can see more than your height and he’ll be smarter than them for it. Do you really want one that is just going to insult you like that?”
Molgorg sighed and then shook her head.
“Good. Now if you don’t succeed with those Orc tribes in the mountains, we can always try to go for the rouges. They have to be strong to survive the wild on their own and far less likely to reject you. What do you say?”
“Yes, you’re right! I gotta go out there and take what I want! If they reject me, I’ll kill them!”
“Again! Wrong end goal, but I appreciate the enthusiasm!”
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Contrary to what you might believe, I didn’t just stare at a wall all day until they wanted to play with me. I wasn’t treated like a slave here, instead something similar to a therapy animal or pet. An abused and neglected pet, but a pet nonetheless. I still had little freedoms here and there, including hobbies that I used to enjoy back in my old life curtesy of stolen luxuries.
Painting was one of the things that I enjoyed in my time here.
The paints they had stolen from the wagon had lasted me a long time, as did the brushes and ink. Though I wasn’t allowed to leave or wander unsupervised, it didn’t take long for the walls of the caves to be filled with drawings and paintings of different landscapes that I had missed.
It’s not like I had much else to do. Writing had never been one of my hobbies, so my blank pages were best saved for my drawings and doodles. I couldn’t ready any of the books they had thrown at me, as the scripts made no sense.
Making candles, sewing, knitting and the likes was only fun for a while before I ran out of materials to work with. I barely had enough yarn to make a single sweater. Art was really my only way to go.
They didn’t understand why I did it, but it kept me occupied and obedient, so they hardly cared. My corner of the cave, a small opening that looked more like a cell than a room, was the first to be painted. I put in the most work into it, depicting the bright sun and the desert plains that was once my home in Mexico. The blue skies, red sands, cacti in the distance, and the small but colorful houses of the village surrounded me from then on.
Kalcmurg was the only one to ask what it was, but her interest died as soon as she realized she didn’t know what half of those things were. Lugut was kind enough to ask if I needed any more paints, which I was grateful for, even if I knew it was just to keep me out of their hair. The others didn’t even bother to notice what I had done to my space, only calling for me to come out for dinner.
In the years following that gift, there was no surface that was left untouched by my artwork. The vast trees of the rainforests graced the entrance, followed by the Great Reefs of the ocean, the grand towers of a fantasy city, and various other places I remembered. Even the floors held a picture of a lake surrounded by flowers of as many colors as I could afford.
A colorful prison for me to live in.
Now I know how Rapunzel felt.
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Something did happen after a few years into my captivity.
I had lost count of how much time had passed since I’ve been here, but it had been enough for Molgorg to fly into a rage and beat me to the ground once she realized her childbearing years had passed and for Lugut to no longer leave the cave due to the aches in her joints.
I knew something was up when Ashnuf, now strong and stoic, had come back tense and shaky. I had never seen her that shaken before, not even when she was ambushed by male Orcs trying to get a quick meal out of her and she had to drag herself back after wiping their tribe out (with the leader’s head proudly sitting in her arms).
She wasn’t even supposed to be here. Lugut had sent her out earlier that day, having spotted another band of travelers on the road and had wanted to get to them before any other Orcs did. She claimed it was to get me more paints and books, but I think she really wanted more horses to eat.
Before I could ask what was wrong, she grabbed my arm and yanked me to my feet. I didn’t resist nor bother to flinch, even though her sharp claws were digging into my bruised flesh.
“Follow. Not a word or I rip your tongue out. Sit where I tell you and don’t move.” She said in the same cold tone that had become so common.
What the fuck was going on?
She kicked the boulder off my chains, leaving me free enough to walk. I followed along, stumbling from the force she was dragging me with. She pulled me through the colorful, complex tunnels towards the entrance of the cave.
Wait, we’re going out? Was she going to bathe me? Wasn’t it the middle of winter?!
I tensed, swallowing hard as I began to shake. It wouldn’t be the first time that they dunked me in those hot springs when the weather wasn’t fit for it, but it didn’t make it any less painful the more they did it. Still, they never took me out when it was snowing that bad outside.
I bit my tongue to hold back the spikes of terror that shot up my spine. However, before panic could set in, I was led over to a ledge just above the entrance and pushed to the wall and ordered to sit down. I obeyed, sliding down and barely wincing as she secured my shackles to another stone.
“Stay there. We have more gifts coming in for you, since you’ve been so good to us these last few years.” She smiled wickedly. “Just watch. We’re bringing them in now.”
I felt my stomach drop when I heard screaming from voices I didn’t recognize. She gestured me to look over.
I had to crawl over to the side of the ledge to see them, putting strain on my shackles as I leaned over as far as I could to get a good view. They were on the ground, each beaten and bleeding over the painted flowers on the floor, tied by their hands and ankles with heavy, iron chains. 3 were women and one was a man, though all were beautiful.
I stopped breathing.
Elves.