"Got you!"
I screamed as an orc grabbed me by the arm and the man who found me by the scruff of his neck.
"Scream all you want, girl." The thing hissed in my ear. "Nothing can save you now; you or your boyfriend."
Boyfriend?
Die?
...Oh well. If I was going to die, at least it'd be with a handsome bloke.
"Come on." We were tugged sharply away from our hiding place and pulled into the open. "We're going to have fun with you two."
I suddenly had a sort of jumpy feeling in my gut and I began to struggle, earning me a blow to the head from one of my captors. Really, did they expect me to just be warm and welcoming of what they were about to do, whatever it was? I wasn't ready to cark it, not yet.
We were led to a lit up cave in the side of a mountain where I could hear loud snarling coming from, and saw huge hulking shadows on the walls.
"Here we are." One of the orcs said, pushing the man to his knees. "Which one of you will be the first to go in?"
"What?" I asked incredulously. "You expect us to go in there? Why?"
"It's all good fun." Another one said. "We get to kill any prisoner we take."
"And that's…fun?"
"Shut up." The man murmured. "We need to find a way to distract them."
How do we do that?
And then I heard what I'm certain my fellow captive must've been hearing; horses—a lot of them.
"Alright." I muttered. "Um," I said raising my voice. "Look. You don't have to kill us."
"No, you're right. We do it for fun." All the orcs laughed and cheered at this statement.
"That is not going to help us." The man murmured anxiously.
"Well I don't see you doing anything. We just need to stall them." I whispered in his ear. Thank God he was on his knees, otherwise I wouldn't be able to reach his ear and our captors would've heard us. (I'm only 4'8") "Just talk. Keep talking."
"Why?" he asked the orcs. "Why kill us for fun?"
"It's the only fun thing we got!"
Again, every orc laughed as though we were missing something perfectly obvious, which I suppose now we were.
"Well, wouldn't things be much more interesting if you, I don't know…"
"Let us go and hunted us?" I suggested. The man looked at me like I was crazy but the orc who seemed to be in charge scoffed.
"Enough talk." He said pulling the man to his feet. "In you go!" he said giving him a shove.
"What's in there?" the man asked shrinking away from the cave.
"Wargs." The orc chieftain smiled cruelly. "You'll be feeding them tonight; you and your pretty woman."
"Wait—"
Too late, he was shoved into the cave with the wargs. His screams filled the air, mingling with the sound of horses running growing louder by the second—it was a miracle in itself that the orcs hadn't heard them, or even smelled them being orcs, that is.
"In you go." The orc behind me gave me a small push and I stumbled forward a step.
"Um." I said taking another step back. "I'm actually very fond of my life, thank YOU!"
My voice went up several notches as an orc picked me up under my arms and carried my closer to the caves.
"No, really." I tried in vain to talk them out of their insanity. "You don't have to do this, you can just, you know, let me go, track me—"
My words were cut off as the orc who held me stumbled forward with a grunt and then slowly tipped to the ground.
Oh no.
Yeah, I was squished right underneath the dirty, smelly thing, but I didn't move. I lay still to avoid getting killed until I knew it was safe to come out.
When it was quiet, I lifted my head and looked around. I heard voices saying to check for any survivors and to kill the wargs. The wargs that killed the man.
"Over here!" a voice called. Someone knelt in front of me and suddenly there a face in front of mine. "Are you alright?"
Blimey, that's an elf.
"Uh…yeah." He lifted the orc off of me and I stood. "Wish I could say the same for that man. I never even asked his name…" I thought aloud.
"You are alive." The elf said softly. "At least you can say that."
"Mm…" I crossed my arms, hunching over to ward off the cold that had come on so suddenly. "Hey, how come they couldn't hear you coming and I could?"
"We masked the sound." Another elf explained. "'Tis why they could not smell us either."
"Oh."
"Come." The second elf said. One look at him told me he must've been in charge. "You will travel with us."
"Where?"
"To Rivendell."
Good thing I'm a surgeon, I'm good with shock because really, I could've fainted right then and there.