Orc in Ithilien

“Come out where we can see yous,” it barked. “We heard and smelled you coming a mile back so don’t try nothing clever.”

Recognising the voice, Shagrat’s heart sank, as he realised that this Orc-band included at least one of his former acquaintances. It was however too late to turn back.

He stepped out into the circle of firelight, scanning the clearing back and forth and counting bodies. There were seven of ‘em, ten counting the Snaga, and that was just that he could see. Some were familiar, but there were a number of new faces.

“All right then, Dokuz?” Shagrat said to the large lead Uruk who had spoken.

“Well if it ain’t the Uruk what formerly used to be known as Captain Shagrat,” Dokuz replied, and if he was surprised to see him, he didn’t show it. “What you been up to since you parted company from our merry band, eh, Shaggers?”

“You know what he’s been up to,” another of the Uruks reminded his companion. This one’s name, as Shagrat would later find out, was Rukush. “We saw him that one time over Belfalas way, remember? In that town we stopped in going down the coast. Market day, and a hell of a commotion, and then what do we see but it’s your old mate Shagrat, strung up in the square. Head stuck in the stocks, hands out like this, and folk all flinging muck at him. You laughed about it for a week, Dokuz! ‘How far the mighty ‘av fallen!’ you said, and that. And you started that rumour about –“

“Yeah. Oh yeah,” Dokuz interrupted, sniggering evilly. Now here’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you a long time, Shaggers. Hey! You lot!” he shouted, waiting till he had the attention of the whole Orc-gang before continuing. “Oi! Oi, Shagrat! Grown back yet, have they?”

“No,” Shagrat replied, carefully keeping his voice neutral. “No, they haven’t. As well they might not.”

“I want you to know,” continued Dokuz, “sad as I was to see the back of ‘em, and dear as they was to my heart - those little keepsakes I had from you, Shaggers my old mate - in that town I sold the pair I cut off you for a blasted mint.”

Shagrat’s right hand clenched tightly into a fist, and with a quick involuntary movement he rubbed his thumb against the knuckle-stubs of his index and middle fingers; all that was left of them, since the rest had been hacked away.

“Is that right?” he replied quietly. “Is that a bleedin’ fact.” With his left hand he reached surreptitiously for his sword-stick, taking a step towards Dokuz at the same time. Outnumbered or not, he was damned if he was standing for this, and if he was quick enough, there was even a chance he would take that rotten braggart Dokuz with him. “Trading in Orc-flesh now eh, Dokuz? Can’t say I’m surprised. You’d never stick at anything would you, you low, conniving -”

Rising to Shagrat’s challenge, Dokuz stood up slowly, grinning at his opponent all the while. “Remember what happened last time, Shaggers,” he warned. “Thought I’d sorted it so you wouldn’t be able to raise your hand against me in a hurry. Don’t make me beat you in front of this lot again.”

“You’ve got no chance,” Shagrat retorted, wounded pride pricking at him, “You had to wait till I was down last time, well out of it from that poisoned knife-stick I took in the ribs, and –“

“’Oh, I was off my game,’ ‘he gave me the slip’, and let’s never forget the immortal ‘but-I-fort-this-was-the-Halfling-treasure-what-you-was-after’,” Dokuz mimicked, affecting the self-justifying, whining voice of an utter incompetent. “It’s always excuses, excuses, excuses, with you, innit,” he continued, “and if ever there was a sorry excuse for an Orc, you, Shaggers my friend are most definitely it. You’re more Snaga than Uruk – and have been a long time. I’ve always said it.”

“Is that true then, Dokuz?” Rukush interrupted earnestly, absent-mindedly wandering up and standing between Dokuz and Shagrat, seemingly oblivious to the growing tension between them. Evidently he was several beats behind in the conversation, and he repeated the question, tugging on his companion’s jacket to get his attention. “Is it true about Orcs’ finger-bones being good luck for gamblers? I never knew that before, did you?”

“No,” Dokuz sighed wearily, sagging down slightly and taking his seat once again. “We made that up when we were leaving that town. As a wind-up - so I’d get a better price for Shagrat’s. You remember, don’t you, Rukush?”

“Yeah? Oh yeah! Yeah!”

“Thinking ain’t exactly his strong suit,” Dokuz admitted to Shagrat as Rukush ambled off out of earshot again, “but he does what I says and the lads’ll do what he tells ‘em. He’ll make a grand second-in-command one of these days. I’m training him up, you know - same as you did me.”

“You’d better do a better job than I did then,” said Shagrat sourly, “or he’ll end up stabbing you in the back, same as you did me.”

“Give it up Shaggers, it was dog-eat-dog in them days,” Dokuz retorted. “And I never done nothing you wouldn’t of tried yourself.”

At that point a short, rotund and hairy creature bustled up into the circle of firelight. On first glance Shagrat assumed it was one of the lesser Orcs. Though stunted even for a Snaga it was certainly about the right size for a smaller example of that type of Orc, but as it approached he saw it had a healthy, glowing complexion and a well-fed plumpness to it that no Snaga-Orc ever did. Shagrat could scarcely believe what he was seeing but it was – could not be anything other – than, than a bleedin’ Halfling. The Uruk gawped at it.

The Halfling beamed back at him then bowed low to the ground. “Ludlow Pennycress at your service,” it said.

That sounded like abject gobbledegook to Shagrat and he ignored it. The little creature was unabashedly staring at him, and eventually sidled closer until it was standing at his elbow. “Excuse me,” the Hobbit said, “s’cuse me, Mr Uruk, Sir. I was wondering, and the gentleman over there -”

At this another of the Dokuz’s cronies, an Uruk that Shagrat didn’t know from before laughed out derisively. He was short for an Uruk, squat and muscular and almost as broad as he was tall.

“- he said you wouldn’t mind my asking. What is under your eye patch?”

Shagrat turned on him, drawing breath to make a sharp retort, but being met by Ludlow’s bland, innocently staring expression, found himself stopping short. The eye-patch had been one of Goldilock’s earlier innovations - he’d hoped that it would make Shagrat less of an unpalatable sight to the Palace staff. Unfortunately this cosmetic adjustment hadn’t made a blind bit of difference, but the Orc had grown accustomed to wearing it. He sighed out, wearily. “There’s nothing underneath,” Shagrat said. “That’s why people have ‘em.”

“Oh, right,” the Halfling replied.

“It’s the whole point,” Shagrat continued, not really knowing why he was bothering to labour the issue.

“It suits you,” Ludlow said. “Rakish. You know.”

Shagrat eyed him doubtfully, convinced that in some way, he was having the rise taken out of him. He snarled half-heartedly, and turned his back on the irritating little creature.

“What’s the point of that, anyway?” Shagrat snapped in Orcish, jerking his head at the Hobbit.

“Provisions,” the block-shaped Uruk replied, in kind. “Fresh meat. Much easier to carry when it’s on the hoof.”

“It’s a bit small, isn’t it?”

“Quality over quantity,” Dokuz explained. “More of what you’d call a speciality foodstuff. We can afford to pick and be choosy these days. Mean ter say, now that we’ve got a leadership with a bit of nounce behind it. Connoisseurs, and that, innit?.”

Shagrat gave him a blank look.

“Crackling,” one of the smaller Orcs explained, smacking his lips surreptitiously. “You seen the amount of fat on him? Right little porker. Talk about tasty! Little butterball should roast up a treat, eh?”

“What, him, really?”

“Not going soft in your old age are you, Cap’n?” said the Uruk who had spoken earlier, with mock concern.

“Nah, Azof, between you and me, he always was as soft as shite,” Dokuz scoffed. “You ought to of seen what he did with this pretty-boy Tark he got his claws in one time -”

“Tark-sport? Oh yeah?” Azof prompted eagerly.

“No, no, nothing like that. Only went and fell for the blighter, didn’t he? The bleedin’ Mary. So ‘in lurve’ he went and showed the bugger the back door to Cirith Ungol, ‘stead of shagging him blind then slitting his throat like any normal person would’ve.”

“Disgustin’!” Azof hooted.

“Fair dos though. Having said that, time was, my mate Shaggers ‘ud have had that little Shire-rat’s liver and lights out, right alongside the rest of us. Started off a vicious enough old sod all right - never would of made Captain of the Tower without that. But you could see he’s never been quite right, never since – well, since he ‘ad his troubles.”

“Nazgul’s pet, you mean?” said Azof. “Oh yeah – yeah, that one went all the way across Mordor and back didn’it? I was forgetting about that. Give us a story, eh, Shaggers? The way I heard it, you always was as close-mouthed as anything about your holiday in lovely Lugburz. Now, that was quite a fix. Go on now, tell us, how the frigg did you manage to extract yourself out of all that?”

“What did he ‘av to frigg, more like!”

“Nah,” Dokuz said. “He could tell us a much better ‘un. ‘How I nearly won the War.’ Fucked it up for all of us though, didn’t he – and all on account of him bein’ a dirty old bender. Exactly what was he doin,’ our brave Captain Shagrat, all that time alone with that little Ring-Bearing bleeder up top in Cirith Ungol, you gotta ask yourself. Never bothered searchin’ ‘im proper, that’s for sure.”

“Too busy feeling him up, I shouldn’t wonder,” Azof said.

“That goes without saying,” Dokuz agreed. “Don’t it Shaggers, you old bender!”

Shagrat bristled. Over the years, the Uruk ex-Captain had had a lot of time to think about various things. And he had come to, arguably for an Orc, some quite radical conclusions - about leadership styles in general, and in particular, about the wisdom of unquestioningly rendering lifelong services unto the kind of Dark Overlord who had the lack of foresight to tie up all his cruelty and malice – not to say his desire to dominate all the races of the earth - into a single, easily mislay-able (and ultimately, destroyable) portable object of very small size. Shagrat voiced these opinions now, rather forcefully.

“Yeah, I suppose you got a point there Shagrat,” Dokuz agreed at length, nodding approvingly, and he shifted over, making room for Shagrat next to the fire. “I s’pose you could say in them days, we was all a bit too easily led.”

“Not that we had a lot of choice back then, mind you,” another of the Uruks added, at which there was a general rumbling of Orcish agreement.

“Rings of Power, my arse,” muttered Azof. “We’re better of without ‘em.”

Shagrat wasn’t particularly mollified by any of this, but his bad leg was hurting and had begun trembling in a way that suggested that if he didn’t get his weight off it at least for a minute, it would soon give out. To avoid this happening in front of Dokuz’s band he took a seat beside the other Uruks.

Throughout this conversation the Hobbit had been pottering about on the far side of the camp-fire, not really following what was being said, since evidently he did not understand the Black Speech as used by the Orcs when they spoke among themselves. At the mention of the words ‘Cirith Ungol’ however he had begun to look up with interest, and was now staring over at them, gaping at Shagrat boggle-eyed, almost apoplectic with excitement. “You’re that Shagrat? Captain Shagrat of the dark Tower of Cirith Ungol!” he exclaimed, in an awestruck voice. “It’s incredible to meet - but you’re aren’t – you can’t really be him. I mean, we all heard you were – well, that you were ever so, ever so terribly fierce.”

Hearing this, the company of Orcs all began laughing and howling uproariously.

Shagrat stood up abruptly, cut to the quick, knocking his walking-stick flying, in the process. Stumbling as he tried to catch his balance he almost fell, but was steadied by the Hobbit, who rushed up solicitously to help.

“He’s got the measure of you, hasn’t he mate!”

The chance to make a quick and easy exit from Dokuz’s camp was not lost on Shagrat, and thanking his lucky stars for the opportunity, he did not so much as hurry as deliberately flounce away from the other Orcs, provoking more peals of laughter from them as he went. As soon as he judged that he was far enough away, he took to his heels properly. As a social call, the visit had not been much of a success.