The Tower of Cirith Ungol

Frodo came awake suddenly, coughing and gagging. Someone was forcing a horrible, burning liquid down his throat. Opening his eyes, he fought back a moan as the room swam and spun around him. Large blurry shapes hovered over him and he became aware of rough hands on his body, pulling at his clothing. Fighting instinctively against the hands, he wondered where he was and what was happening. His mind was foggy and it was so hard to think. A sharp whip-crack brought his thoughts into suddenly clear focus.

The figures in front of him were also coming into clear focus and his stomach clenched in fear. He was in a large, red-lit room, surrounded by orcs. They were speaking to each other in hideous, garbled speech which he could not understand without more paying attention than he could spare at the moment. Several of the orcs were pawing at his clothing, pulling at the fastenings. Before he could protest, they had pulled off his shirt, revealing the coat of shining dwarf-mail he was wearing underneath. The mithril gleamed evilly in the red light and an answering gleam was in the eyes of the orc who roughly yanked the mail over Frodo’s head. After that it was only a matter of moments before he was naked before them.

He was left alone then, as the foul creatures rooted through his belongings. He had a pounding headache and there was a greasy queasiness in his stomach. He barely noticed this. The Ring was gone. That was the only thought that could penetrate his fear. He didn’t remember any of the orcs taking it from him, but the chain was no longer around his neck. He searched back in his mind, trying to figure out how he came to be in this place. He remembered the tunnel, the stench and fear of that place, and his jubilation at escaping the huge spider web that had almost trapped Sam and him. He had been running towards the pass when there came a sharp pain in the back of his neck. That was all he remembered.

After an indeterminate amount of time two particularly large and brutish orcs appeared "Enough of your grubbing! Back to your stations," one of the new orcs growled. The rest scurried to follow his orders and soon the room was clear of all but the two new arrivals.

"So, a spy," the second orc growled, looking at Frodo with a glint of anticipation in his squinty eyes. He grabbed Frodo by an ankle and lifted him upside down off the floor. "Garn, what a little rat!" He shook Frodo as he spoke, as if trying to dislodge something valuable.

Frodo closed his eyes against the swaying room and the shaking and wrapped his arms about himself. "I told you, Gorbag," the first orc growled, "he’s to be kept intact. Put him down."

He found himself being lowered none-too-gently to the ground. "Garn, I’m just trying to have a little fun with him." A hobnailed boot toed him in the side. "Wake up, little rat." Frodo flinched away from the kick, which earned him a laugh and another boot in the side before he could open his eyes.

"What does Lugburz want with you, anyway?" Gorbag didn’t wait for an answer. "Hoi, Shagrat, I’m telling you, it’s the other one that Lugburz wants. This one’s just a filthy little throw-away."

"Nar, and I’m telling you that all prisoners are to be sent to Lugburz, undamaged." Shagrat growled again. "On pain of death. If you want to tempt that fate for a little sport you’re even stupider than I thought."

Gorbag snarled and turned back to the hobbit. "You’ll like Lugburz, little rat," he leered. "They have all kinds of fun games to play with you."

Frodo barely heard the taunts. He couldn’t think past the aching void that was the missing Ring. They had taken it from him and now all was lost. Boromir had been right to claim it was a fool’s plan to send a hobbit into Mordor.

This time it was Shagrat’s kick which brought Frodo back to his surroundings. "Who sent you here, eh? Speak up!"

"N...no one," Frodo stammered. The Ring may be lost but he would not betray his friends.

"Hoi! So you were just going for a little stroll, eh? Getting a bit of air?" Another kick. "Who sent you, you little maggot?"

"No one!" Frodo shouted as defiantly as he could, which earned him a lash of a whip. Shagrat ran the whip through his teeth, tasting blood, and smirked at the defenseless hobbit cowering before him.

"And where’s your friend? The big one with the elvish sword?" This time it was Gorbag asking the question.

"I don’t...don’t know what you’re talking about." Frodo spoke truly. No one could call Sam big and he definitely didn’t have an elvish sword.

"What are you doing here?" Shagrat again, emphasizing his question with a crack of the whip.

Frodo had no answer to this question, which gained him another boot in the ribs.

"Who sent you, maggot?" And so the questions continued. Frodo did his best to protect his friends, lying or refusing to answer, until his voice was hoarse and he didn’t think he could hold out much longer.

After what seemed weeks but was probably less than an hour, the two brutes grew tired of the game and left him alone. Turning away from him, they began pawing through his pack, scattering the contents about the room. Gorbag picked up the coat of mithril. "Hoi! Look at this. Such a pretty skin for a little rat to wear." He made to tuck it away but Shagrat knocked it out of his hands.

"Everything goes to Lugburz. Everything!" Shagrat gathered up the mithril coat, Frodo’s cloak and broach, and a sheathed knife. Frodo realized for the first time that it wasn’t Sting, but Sam’s sword, that he’d got out of the barrow. He wondered briefly where Sam was, but his thoughts soon strayed back to the horrible knowledge that he had failed in his quest. He had let the enemy get the Ring. He no longer paid any heed to the orcs.

He curled in upon himself, feeling sick and weak, and nearly overwhelmed with fear and despair. After a time his muscles began to protest and he stirred, trying to ease the aches covering most of his body. He looked around, realizing for the first time that he was alone. The orcs had gone. Moving slowly and carefully, he got to his feet and began to move around, trying to find something to distract his mind from the fears crowding out his thoughts.

He could hear orcish voices coming from a hole in the floor. He had just begun to walk in that direction when a brutish head popped up, followed by a large, long-armed body. The orc lashed at Frodo with a whip, missing him by scant inches. "Garn! Stay still, you maggoty little spy. No moving around. If I hear you again, I’m coming all the way up and you won’t like that at all, I promise."

Terrified, Frodo backed away and sank into a crouch. Satisfied, the orc disappeared back down through the hole. Frodo stayed where he was, afraid to move any more. Time passed slowly. After some number of hours had passed, the top of a ladder thunked against the trapdoor and a scrawny orc climbed up into the room. Frodo huddled into himself, trying to think what noise he might have made to summon this creature.

The orc, seeing his fear, smirked at him. "Ho la. Shagrat says I’m to feed you." He tossed a chunk of moldy bread to Frodo. "I don’t see why we should bother wasting good food on dead meat but I’m not the boss ‘round here." Coming closer to the shivering hobbit, he forced more of the burning orc draught on Frodo, who coughed and spluttered but finally was forced to swallow some of the vile stuff.

Laughing, the orc returned to the ladder. "Eat up, my lad. That may be the last thing you ever taste." With an evil grin, the creature climbed down and the ladder was taken away. Frodo stared at the bread in dismay. He was hungry, but not sure he was hungry enough to eat anything given him by orcs. After staring at the bread for several minutes, his stomach overruled his distaste and he began picking the moldy bits off the bread, finding that most of it was still edible, if one had very loose standards of what qualified as edible. Having existed on very short rations for weeks now, he found that his standards were nearly non-existent.

The bread made a very scanty meal, but Frodo felt better for having something in him. Unfortunately, all this did was make him more aware of how dire his situation was. Alone, somewhere in Mordor, the Ring gone, with no hope of salvaging any part of his mission. He had failed. This thought choked him and he could not restrain the tears that were suddenly flooding his eyes. He tried to keep his sobs quiet, not wanting to disturb the orc down below, but some sound must have betrayed him. The brute was hovering over him before he heard anything.

"I told you to keep quiet, you stinking dunghill rat!" The growl was accompanied by a lash of the whip, across his back. Satisfied that this had got the message across, the orc went back down the ladder again.

His head swimming with pain, fear and exhaustion, Frodo closed his eyes and let sleep claim him. He awoke, hours later, to the sounds of harsh shouts and clashing weapons. Something was going on below, but he knew better than to try to find out what. He lay where he was, numb with fear and an exhaustion that had not been touched by his restless, dream-filled sleep. There would be no rescue, he knew, no one to save him. He had failed, had allowed the Enemy to get his Ring back. All of his friends would be hunted down and killed, the Shire would be overrun with foul, loathsome orcs, and there would be an end to light and joy and peace. Because he had failed.

The sounds of fighting down below grew louder, until it seemed as though the whole place echoed with the violence. Frodo gave brief thought to the idea that maybe all the orcs would kill each other and he could escape from this horrible place. He quickly discarded this faint hope. He didn’t know where he was, he had no food or clothing, and there was no one to help him. He wondered, vaguely, where Sam had got to in all this mess. He thought, sadly, that his faithful Sam was probably dead. He had already forgotten Shagrat’s question concerning his large, sword-bearing friend.

He drifted in and out of sleep while the fighting raged on, too weak and tired to stay awake long but haunted by foul dreams of torture and pain which invariably brought him back to wakefulness. After a long while the sounds of fighting faded and eventually stopped altogether. Everything was perfectly still. Suddenly fully awake, he strained his ears, listening for any sound to indicate the outcome of the battle, but could hear nothing and finally his focus drifted away, settling back into a pain filled doze.

He was dreaming of whips and rough, clawed hands when a sound penetrated his awareness. A sound that could not have come from the orcs. Listening, still more than half asleep and thinking it part of his dream, Frodo heard singing. The words were unclear, but they summoned up an image of the Shire on a spring morning, with birds singing and flowers bursting forth in glorious bloom, of the Sun rising high in the sky and overcoming the shadows that lay on the land. Feeling tears come to his eyes at these images of hope, Frodo tried to answer the song, singing out with a weak, cracked voice.

He stopped suddenly when he heard a movement down below. He was awake now and there was no singing. All he could hear was angry snarling. Lying perfectly still and quiet in the hope of escaping another round with the whip, he listened to the sound of heavy boots stomping along the hall, the ladder thumping against the trapdoor and the angry voice coming closer. Knowing what would come next he rolled into a ball, throwing his arms over his head as the whip cracked and came down on his back. The pain stunned him and he fell into blackness.

The first thing he was aware of as he swam back up to consciousness was a well-loved voice calling his name. This was such an unexpected thing that Frodo simply listened for a moment, unable to respond. Opening his eyes in disbelief, he saw a familiar, trusted face bending over him. This couldn’t be real, he thought. It must be a dream. Only, all of his dreams of late had been evil and this was...this was like a glimpse of sun and rainbow after such a storm as could down trees and shatter rocks. Strong arms were wrapped around him, and he felt himself being cradled in a gentle, loving embrace. Sighing, he closed his eyes and relaxed into the arms, feeling safe and warm for the first time in longer than he could remember. His Sam was alive after all.