Strange Creature

"You'd better be against the wall, cause I'm in no mood for foolishness," the woman called through the thick oak door. The guard frowned.

"It's chained to the wall, Lily," he said in confusion. "Can't go nowhere else."

Rolling her eyes at the guard's utter lack of humor, she pushed the door open. The old hinges creaked appropriately, like any good dungeon door would. It gave the place just the right atmosphere, when coupled with the moans of the sufferers and the drip, drip, drip of moisture on the dank stone floors. The guard followed her into the cell.

After a round with the 'interrogator,' the prisoners' cells always had a stink to them, mostly of loosed bowels and emptied stomachs. This one wasn't too bad; evidently a newcomer, early in the questioning process. He had nowhere to go but down from here.

They hadn't told her what she'd find, only that he needed cleaning up, that he had wounds that needed tending. It always floored her that they would bother healing a prisoner they had no intention of keeping alive for very long, but she guessed they wanted to prolong their sport. She was by no means hardened to the prisoners' pain; on the contrary, it was all she could do to keep from setting them all free at times. They weren't criminals, and they weren't orcs; they were men taken in battle. Overcrowding tended to happen these days, as Dunland got out of hand with its raiding. Skirmishes along the southern borders usually resulted in a fresh supply of fleshy grist for the mill. So the effort to 'take things easy' was lessened by degrees. Her sympathies tended to rise in proportion to their cruelty.

"Light a torch, will you? There's a dear," she said absently to the guard. Flickering golden light suddenly flared in the small room, forcing a hiss from the prisoner, and a little shriek from Lily.

The bucket in her grasp clattered to the floor as she stared at the thing in horror. It was sort of an orc, only much taller, broader in the shoulders, and leaner in the hips. Not an ounce of waste on this one; it was all muscle. Filthy hair hung over its face in strings, but failed completely in hiding its bestial features, from low forehead shadowing yellow glittering eyes, to flattened nose with flaring nostrils, to curled sneering lips exposing jagged, sharp, yellow teeth.

"What...the hell...is that?" she managed to say as she clutched her heart.

"Don't rightly know, miss," the guard said mildly, holding the torch a little higher. The beastly creature turned its head away, unaccustomed to the light. But its eyes were still slitted open, watching her.

"I am not touching that," she said slowly and succinctly, pointing at it. Even chained to the wall, it radiated menace that was nearly palpable.

"Not sure you got much choice, miss," the guard replied. "Captain says this one's gotta be kept alive, leastways till the Lord of the Mark shows up. So you gotta see to that." He gestured at the long, deep sword cut across the beast's ribcage.

Blinking, she looked where he indicated. She hadn't seen the wound; had this been a man, the sight of so much blood would have alerted her immediately. But this one...the blood wasn't the red she was used to. Against its dark skin, the black blood covering its side had gone nearly unnoticed. So this was an orc, after all, though a breed she'd never seen before.

As her senses began to return, she became aware of the low growl that came from it, almost as constant as its breathing. Perhaps it was just breathing. Its arms were up, spread out to the sides, and chained in thick manacles that were unlikely to let it move more than an inch or so from the wall. Its ankles were likewise secured. A short cloth kilt spared her from seeing more of the orc-like beast than she had to.

Swallowing hard, she turned to the guard and said with as much dignity as she could muster, "Exactly how much of it am I supposed to clean up for his lordship's inspection?"

"Couldn't say," the guard said with a shrug. "I wouldn't do more than throw a bucket of water over it, myself. They say it killed three men before they could take it down. Roared like a beast, I heard. It don't seem to me like something that cares much for washing."

"Look, I don't presume to tell you your business," Lily said doubtfully, "but what kind of information is the captain expecting to get from it? Does it even speak?"

Again, the guard shrugged. "I reckon if it can, Pappy'll loosen its tongue up nice in a day or two. If it knows what's good for it, that is."

Lily shuddered and closed her eyes, trying not to imagine what Pappy, their chief interrogator, would do to make it talk.

"Well, best get on with it, Lily," the guard said. "The thing ain't gonna tend itself, not trussed up like that." He snorted with amusement at his own joke.

"Here, then," she said, picking up the bucket and slapping it into the guard's stomach. "Fill it up again. Had I been given fair warning, it wouldn't be necessary, now would it?" Chagrined, the guard departed for the well.

Taking a deep breath, Lily turned toward the strange orc, forcing herself to look at its face. "You're an ugly son of a bitch, aren't you?" she muttered. Its lip curled again, and she could swear it snarled at her. "Give it a rest, orc, if that's what you are. We both have our jobs to do; you get tortured, I bind your wounds, you get tortured some more, I tend you again, and it goes on and on until you sing like a little bird. You'd better start practicing your scales, because Pappy's been at this for decades. You don't stand a chance."

"I do not feel pain," the orc suddenly said, its voice growling like a slavering beast. Lily was so taken aback she nearly fell over.

"You...speak?" she breathed, her own voice seemingly afraid to come out of her mouth.

"No," it snapped, baring its teeth in what might be a grin, but was far toothier than any she would place such a benign name to.

"Well, I hope for your sake you're right," she said shakily. "Although if you are, that doesn't necessarily mean it'll go easier for you." Again, she shuddered involuntarily.

Once the guard returned with the full bucket, she wet her cloth and willed herself to approach the orc. Close up, it radiated an unnatural heat that made her uncomfortable in the close cell. Keeping the cloth firmly in her grip, she wiped the sticky, drying blood from its side. Once or twice, her fingers brushed its skin, though it felt more like tough pig hide than the softer skin of a man.

The cut across the ribs required over a hundred stitches for her to close, and all the while the orc just stood there, unflinching, as the needle dove in and out of its flesh. Oddly enough, it was when her fingertips lightly brushed its skin that a twitch would occur, rather like a horse flank when a fly lands on it. She wondered if the orc was ticklish. Nearly laughing out loud at the absurdity of the thought, she wrapped its midsection to keep the wound clean and stepped back to admire her handiwork.

"Your mum would be proud," the guard commented. "Of the work you done, not what you done it on," he clarified.

"Hmph. You have that right." Wiping her hands clean of the foul-smelling blood, she looked up at its face again. Shaking her head, she said, "Ugly as homemade sin, my grandmother used to say. Never knew what she meant by it till now."

With that, she turned and left the cell, the guard sparing the orc a single backward glance before closing the door behind himself and the torch. The orc was plunged once more into near total darkness. Only a tiny square of light coming through a high barred opening in the door illuminated its surroundings.