No Dawn for the Wicked
March 2, 3019 – The Dawnless Day; the Rohirrim ride forth from the weapontake at Dunharrow; Faramir is rescued from a Nazgûl by Gandalf; Frodo, Sam, and Gollum witness the departure of the army from Minas Morgul
Nûrzgrat paced nervously, frequently glancing eastward at the darkening sky. The blackness was advancing faster than the sun could rise, blanketing all the land in a shroud. He could hear the whispers in the back of his mind, something he hadn't heard since Saruman's power was stripped, leaving his servants bereft of a guiding hand for the first time.
Come to me. Fight for me. Make them bleed. Glory in their suffering. Feast on the flesh of Men.
"He calls us, do you not hear?" Nûlkol growled.
Frûmâdûrz nodded. "We should go. We should turn around and go." Glaring at the leader with disgust, he snarled, "You can do what you like, old one. I will heed the call."
"Be my fucking guest," Nûrzgrat grimaced. "Go. Die. Take the blood of the Uruk-hai with you, and good riddance."
"What good is our blood if it is wasted?" Nûlkol hissed. He turned a malevolent eye on the women, sitting huddled together by the campfire, watching the agitated orcs fearfully. "Your pets do not share their good fortune."
"Blood such as yours is best spilled on the ground," Morkoth growled, rising to tower threateningly over the wiry Uruk. "It would be a waste to see it passed on to younglings."
"You think your blood is superior?" Frûmâdûrz snapped. "You who talk of Men's ways as though they were our betters? Where did you learn such things? Do you even know what it is to be Uruk-hai, kruf shara-obu?" [whore of Men]
Morkoth spun and punched Frûmâdûrz in the mouth. Enraged, the two Uruk-hai fought viciously. Nûlkol stepped aside while the two were at one another's throats. Smirking, he loped off into the gloomy mid-morning shadows.
Nûrzgrat struggled to separate Morkoth and Frû. "That is enough! Morkoth, get the fuck off him!" The larger Uruk reluctantly climbed off Frû. He still felt Frû's ridicule should be answered, but bowed to his leader's authority.
"If you had more orc blood, you would have fucked that woman on the first day," Frûmâdûrz snarled through swollen lips. "If you were more of an orc, you would have let us have a go at her when you were done. If you were any kind of orc..."
"...I would kill you with my bare hands for insulting me!" Morkoth roared, throwing himself at the taunting Uruk once more. Impatience overshadowing Nûrzgrat's agitation, he again waded into the struggle and attempted to stop it.
"What's wrong with them?" Brianna hissed. Sandy just shook her head, bewildered. They'd all been awake ever since Nûrzgrat got Brianna up to look at the starless sky, only to find that the sun couldn't break through the dense black clouds upon rising. As the shadow continued to stretch westward, more sky was swallowed up, and the sun remained hidden. It felt like noon was not far off, yet it looked like twilight.
The darkening sky seemed to have thrown the Uruk-hai into unexpected turmoil.
Razkaar had been huddled in the lee of a large stone outcropping for the better part of the morning, hugging his knees and rocking while he muttered to himself in confusion. Thakûf was unable to settle in one spot, frequently getting up and moving to another part of the campsite. He kept wiping his hands on his shirt as if he couldn't get the filth off them, even though they appeared relatively clean.
Sitting hunched next to Brianna, Ghrulagûrz trembled. He could hear the Dark Lord's Voice, not as clearly as he had once heard the Voice of his Master, but enough to disturb him. Urges he hadn't felt in many years were awakening, and they frightened him. He had long been trapped in Isengard, and had not seen battle for a very long time, but now he wanted desperately to feel a sword in his hand once again. He wanted to smell fear and taste man-flesh.
He fought it, but his gaze turned to Brianna. His woman. So near. Sweet, warm blood, the memory still fresh. His heart began to pound, his body to shake, hands to clench. It was not battle he craved now.
"Ghru?" she said hesitantly, her voice sounding miles away though she was only inches from him. It seemed to happen in slow motion. Ghrulagûrz's eyes widened, his mouth contorting in a snarl. His clawed hands took hold of her upper arms, pulling her closer. Once again, his mouth closed on her throat, her resistance and protestation a minor disturbance in his fevered mind.
Until he felt a sudden pain in the side of his head, and found himself knocked sideways onto the ground.
Sandy stood over him, ready to launch another attack. Ghrulagûrz shook himself, and all at once, sanity returned, as well as knowledge of what he had just done. He saw Brianna's hysterical weeping, saw the blood running down her neck. This time, his shame and self-loathing was too great to bear. Lurching to his feet, the Uruk staggered away from camp, determined to go as far as he could this time, so far none would find him, and he could do no further harm to Brianna.
There were many times Ghrulagûrz despised what he was, and the urges that often came to him. It was no comfort that his thoughts were often of Brianna, rather than fond remembrances of the use he was put to as globatish. No, he never recalled those times with anything but nausea. He was only beginning to realize that none but Nûlkol meant him harm. The others... they had never abused him before, and seemed uninterested in doing so now.
Ghrulagûrz slowed to a halt. He wanted nothing more than to embrace Brianna the way Morkoth did Sandy. Tenderly, gently. She would look upon him with eyes of fire, as Sandy looked on Morkoth. A sob tore from his throat, and he covered his face with his clawed, bestial hands, and wished he could be rid of all signs, inward and outward, that he was an orc.
He was so consumed by his misery, he didn't hear the stealthy approach of Nûlkol, and wasn't prepared for the blow to the head that sent him sprawling. Stunned, he couldn't resist when the wiry Uruk bound his arms behind his back with a torn cloth.
"Remember the games we used to play?" Nûlkol whispered, shoving a wadded-up rag into the larger Uruk's mouth. "Let me refresh your memory."
"I can't believe he did that to her again!" Sandy stormed, directing an accusing glare at Morkoth. "And you idiots just let it happen. What the hell is wrong with you?"
Brianna was hysterical, sobbing and shaking.
"I do not know!" Morkoth roared, pressing his hands against his temples and wincing. It looked like he was trying to squeeze out whatever was driving him mad.
Nûrzgrat shook his head like a dog troubled by a high-pitched sound. "It is the Dark Lord," he growled. "He must be... moving. Attacking. He calls all of Morgoth's children to him. I did not think... We are Sharkû's, for fuck's sake! Why do we hear him?"
Turning a baleful glare on Frûmâdûrz, the leader snarled, "What would you do if you did find his army, eh? Turn his orcs against him, like you tried in Isengard? Just to see if you could? Stupid fucker."
Frûmâdûrz bristled. "I want to fight. I am not such a woman that I will hide when called."
"I beg your god damned pardon!" Sandy snapped.
"Stop, please!" Brianna cried, hugging herself and rocking in her distress. "Just shut up!"
Nûrzgrat sighed. "We should keep going west. That is where we will be safest." He looked significantly at Morkoth and jerked his chin toward the women.
"We are called," Frûmâdûrz insisted. "If we ignore him, and he wins..."
"He won't," Sandy interrupted. "He doesn't win."
The three Uruk-hai looked at her. "How do you know?" Nûrzgrat asked suspiciously.
Sandy sighed deeply. "Where Brie and I come from, this is... history. Already happened. I've... read the outcome of this war. Sauron is defeated."
Nûrzgrat winced slightly at the mention of the Dark Lord's name, then said, "You did not tell us this before. Why?"
"What would you have done with the information?" she countered. "If you were trying to run toward the war, I might have warned you against wasting your time, but you're trying to get away from it." Glaring at Frûmâdûrz, she said, "Now that some of you have suddenly decided to bury your heads in your asses, it seemed a good time to mention it."
Shaking his head and laughing humorlessly, Nûrzgrat replied, "That we have done. I wish I could say we cannot help ourselves, but that is an insult."
"I do not want to go back to what we were, the things we used to do," Morkoth said firmly. "Call me anything you like, Frûmâdûrz, but following the ways of Men is the only way we will survive now. If you disagree, go chase after the orcs of Mordor and share their fate."
"I seem to remember you stirring up Sharkû's orcs," Nûrzgrat sneered, "causing no end of trouble in the pits. Do you miss being a pain in the ass? Did you know your deeds did not go unnoticed? Did you know the flood saved your neck from an order of death given by Sharkû himself?" Spitting on the ground at the stunned Uruk's feet, Nûrzgrat went on, "I thought you might have potential. You might have some good qualities we could use. Ain't so sure now."
"He... wanted me dead?" Frûmâdûrz whispered incredulously.
"He did not like your games, Frû," Morkoth said flatly. "I do not like them either."
"It doesn't matter now," Nûrzgrat grumbled. "We gotta keep moving. Where the hell is Ghrulagûrz?"
"Lying in a puddle of piss and sick," Nûlkol said calmly from beside the campfire. He was casually poking at the logs with a stick, at his ease. "He was always a weak globatish."
"What the fuck did you do?" Nûrzgrat hissed angrily, bristling. Morkoth and Frûmâdûrz likewise stiffened with revulsion.
"He weeps like a woman," Nûlkol continued in that same conversational tone, as if he were discussing the weather. "Always has." Heaving a great sigh, he went on, "It is fortunate he also feels like one." Then he leered at Brianna.
"You didn't," she whispered, horror building. Even after what Ghru had just done to her, after promising not to... And nobody seemed inclined to punish Nûlkol for his deed. What if he did it again? Or did it to her? Would no one stop him? There aren't any cops here. Sandy's words came back to her, and she began to shake with rage.
"You sick fuck!" Nûrzgrat roared. "We left all that shit behind us!"
"Now will you fucking kill that son of a bitch?" Sandy barked. Nûrzgrat quivered, but made no move to do so. Nûlkol erupted in his hyena-like laughter and rose to his feet.
"He will not kill me, woman," he sneered. "He wants to save us all. All of us. That means when you are finished whelping for Morkoth, you will be mine. Or she will be. I do not care which one of you serves me. In the meantime, I require the occasional... compensation... for waiting."
His laughter was abruptly stopped by a knife protruding from his abdomen. Looking down, Nûlkol stared at the weapon. Somewhere in his mind, he recognized it as belonging to Ghrulagûrz. He looked up and saw Brianna across from him, the second knife poised and ready to launch. His face contorted with fury.
"Ghrulagûrz belongs to me!" she cried, her voice shaking, almost incoherent. "That was for me. This is for him." She threw. Her Uruk's lessons had, perhaps, not been rigorous, but fueled by hate, anger, and the desperate need for some justice to prevail, her aim was true. The second knife pierced Nûlkol through the throat.
It was an ugly, prolonged death that intensified the horror when Brianna came to her senses. Nûlkol lay sprawled on the ground, choking, gasping, convulsing, bleeding a sea of black tar-like blood out his neck with each desperate breath as he clung to life. His hands shook too much to remove the blades.
Tearing her eyes away, Brianna looked around her. The other Uruk-hai were stunned, their gazes flicking between their mortally wounded brother and the intruding human enemy who struck him down. She didn't wait for them to turn on her in a vengeful rage. Brianna spun around and fled the camp.