Author's Note: If you need help imagining Pelargir, I've a single word for you: Tortuga, but without all the class and elegance.

Not Fire, Not Ice – Not All of the Heat of the Sun

By the time they arrived at Pelargir, even Uglúk was exhausted.

He had set a cruel pace, resting only a few scant hours during the day before pressing southward once more. He, too, had sensed their vulnerability to attack whilst needing to portage their boats past the falls at Rauros and had permitted none to sleep or even rest for the entire three-day hike through the hilly range framing the falls. Eating had been done on the march, and Naurë suspected that some of the Orcs had figured a way to sleep whilst walking.

After sitting so long in the boat, it was almost a relief to be able to walk again, even if it was never quite fast enough for Uglúk. He insisted on leading her about by a rope tied round her wrists, tugging whenever she was too distracted to prepare herself, and causing her to tumble to the ground. Unlike the Orcs, however, whenever she fell the Uruk-hai merely stood and watched her, his flat mud-coloured eyes assessing, searching, and utterly cold. Naurë shivered to think of what he would have done to her if he had not been under orders to keep her unharmed.

Back in the boats, once past the falls, Uglúk kept his Orcs silent with well-placed blows to the head and reduction of rations until the only sound, day or night, was that of oars dipping into the waters of the Anduin, over and over until she felt like screaming just to hear something else. At the deserted city of Osgiliath, the few guards stationed there were easily dispatched by the archers, the twang of their bowshots the only sound in the inky night as their company slipped by in the velvet darkness.

Naurë was mostly left to herself. She washed herself frequently, and even managed to scrub her clothing over the side of the boat as well. Her meals consisted of river-water to drink and whatever fish an Orc might deign to skewer on the point of his weapon as they sailed by. Raw fish was not to her preference but it far surpassed anything else they might offer her, and so she took it eagerly.

They passed the range of Emyn Arnen, its peaks rising gently in comparison to the Ephel Duath jutting cruelly into the sky behind them. Were she in better company on that fine spring day, Naurë would have quite enjoyed herself as she sat back in the boat, feeling the play of wind in her hair and the caress of sunlight on her face. The pallor of old age and illness had given way in recent days to a pleasing warm tint to her skin, and when she brushed out her hair with her fingers, reddish lights were to be found in the wayward strands. Haldir had ever scolded her for her fondness of travel, and she supposed he was correct, if she could find pleasure even as a prisoner.

Naurë wondered what had become of him; truly, she had expected him to have come for her by now. She knew he was following them, and had an arrow from his very bow thudded into the boat by her hand at the moment, it would not have shocked her. But it was nearly a fortnight since that daring day when she'd shoved him and his doughty brother into the Anduin, and there had been no evidence whatsoever of his pursuit. Were she a different woman, and Haldir a different elf, she might have thought he had abandoned her to this strange fate.

But she was as she was, and he was as he was. She would never lose faith in him, and Haldir o Lòrien would never leave her to perish amongst strangers. He had not done so thirty years ago in Rhûn, when he and his soldiers were outnumbered ten to one and it would have been easier to desert the annoying old woman who'd gotten them into that trouble. He would not do so now, not after their friendship was sealed and set.

Naurë turned and stared upriver toward where she knew he was. It was possible that one of the brothers had been injured during their escape; had not Haldir let out a fearsome howl as the Orc-band sailed away with her in their meaty clutches? A sick feeling swelled within her at the thought of Haldir in pain, without her to tend him. But perhaps he still had a bit of the remedy she had given him? Naurë hoped he had the wit to remember it, and use it if there were need.

It was with great relief that the haven-port of Pelargir was spotted in the distance, and anticipation grew with every moment they drew closer. Pelargir had been a mighty city in the Second Age, but now was faded and rather shabby, Naurë thought that night as they disembarked and stood for the first time in a week on dry land. Greasy torches flickered in rusting sconces along the quay, their stench carrying easily on the maritime breeze, and the dock beneath her feet creaked alarmingly. Pelargir had been in the control of the Haradhrim for many years by this point, forgotten and neglected by Stewards who had given it up as irretrievable.

Uglúk jolted her from her ruminations by jerking on the lead he had once more fastened round her wrists. Fatigue was edging onto his countenance, and his patience had thinned to near-nothing. "Baj fushaum jashat ob goi," he barked at the others before dragging Naurë behind him.

The streets teemed with all manner of life. It was odd to hear the Black Speech spoken by human tongues, but it seemed as common as the Westron and Haradhrim languages that tripped easily from the lips of all and sundry. Naurë felt conspicuous in her pallor; this city was overwhelmingly populated by Orcs and swarthy Southrons. She wished for a veil, or that her cloak had a hood; anything to shield her light skin and bright hair from curious, covetous eyes. The inhabitants of Pelargir grew bolder the farther she and Uglúk penetrated into its centre; the Uruk had had to kill no fewer than four admirers pressing for Naurë's purchase by the time they reached their destination: a tavern named "The One-Eyed Narakshi".

"You will sit, and not speak," he hissed in her ear whilst she flinched back from the spray of malodorous spittle. "If you do aught, I make you sorry in ways you cannot conceive."

Naurë wondered idly what those ways could be, as she had ever prided herself on an excellent imagination and she could well conceive some truly horrific methods of torture, and allowed Uglúk to shove her toward a stool in the corner, beside the fireplace. She held out her hands toward the flames, grateful for their warmth as she had learned that even in the south, nights were cold. Why were they here, in this tavern?

The One-Eyed Narakshi was a low-ceilinged, smoky place with tiny, grimy windows that looked to have never once been opened for fresh air, if the smell of unwashed bodies and orcish pong told her anything. Spilled ale (and, she hoped, naught else) make the floor unpleasantly sticky beneath her travel-stained boots, and the guttural grunts of the establishment's non-human clientele filled the air. Occasionally, conversation was punctuated by the sound of a lone woman's voice, its higher pitch clearly carrying over the lower rumblings of the males.

"Why are we here?" Naurë dared to inquire, confident that he would not strike her in public. Alas that her captor was an Uruk-hai, and felt his honour compromised by the fact of his captive speaking; his backhand knocked her from her stool onto the floor and she watched numbly as the drop of blood spilling from her newly-split lip sizzled on the hearth, foaming a little before cooking to a sickly grey glob.

"I thought you were not to harm her," drawled an amused voice, and Naurë froze at the sound of it. Turning her head with excruciating slowness, she first saw a pair of feet firmly planted right before her face. She looked up past long, strong legs in snug braies, elaborately knotted belt and wide chest encased in a rather posh tunic to a face she had once thought she'd never see again.

"Coru," Naurë whispered in awe and relief, and scrambled to her feet, gaze never dropping from his. How could she have forgotten… Coru, son of Ûra, was a pirate of evident renown as far from his birthplace of Bree as Minhiriath, where Lalaith had had to travel for a king to bless the athelas that would save Naurë's life. The very sound of his name struck fear into heart of no lesser a man than Heleg, king of Minhiriath.

Coru, son of Ûra, who was herself daughter of one Naurë of Bree, healer and apprentice to Elrond Half-Elven of Rivendell.

Her own grandson.

Naurë sagged against him in relief. The young man stared a long moment at her, obviously surprised at her recognition of him. Ever a quick one, Coru quickly wrapped his arms around her and used his own body to support hers. "I want her for the night," he told Uglúk. Naurë peeked from under her lashes to find the Uruk staring at them in horror and disbelief.

"No," Uglúk said flatly. "She is not to be harmed." He seemed supremely unconcerned with the fact that not a minute before he'd sent her reeling with his mighty slap.

"I… I want to be with him," Naurë ventured, turning what she hoped was an adoring look up at her grandson's face and caressing his shoulder with her hand. "Twould be no hardship for me."

Uglúk stared a moment more, and then his brown-black face split into a hideous grin. "So much for the elves, eh, shatraug-gru?" he asked, delighted by his own wit. "I can see they were not enough to satisfy you, those Lul-gijak!" He slapped his hand down on the gritty table, laughing with glee. It sounded like a rusty hinge being pried open. "Sit, sit," Uglúk invited the pirate. "We have business. I will be quick, and you can ride your hol kurv into the mattress!"

Slowly, Coru put Naurë from him, and she sat once more on the stool, hands clasped in her lap to disguise their shaking. "So, you have brought the healer," Coru said by way of introduction. His ruddy hair, tied back in a messy queue by a ragged bit of leather, gleamed in the firelight and his eyes were sharp as he leant forward on his elbows to stare at the Uruk-hai. "Will no one miss her? Will no one notice her absence?" He sat back and folded his arms across his chest. "Or will half of Gondor be pelting in our direction, thirsting for blood and vengeance?"

Uglúk snorted in skepticism. "There were only a few elves, and they barely escaped with their lives," he said dismissively. "A fortnight it has been, and never have they come even close to us. No, we lost them by Rauros, and they will not find us here."

Clearly, Coru did not believe his compatriot but said nothing. "And her skills are intact?" he asked then, sliding a glance her way.

Uglúk nodded. "She has created a vast quantity of what we need," he confirmed. "I made her take some, and treated her harshly during our travels from Dol Guldur. She would not have survived had it not been real." Naurë closed her eyes and thanked Eru for the thousandth time that she'd thought to hide a few small vials of the remedy in the binding around her chest. She hadn't realized how important her continued health was to prove to the suspicious Uruk that she was not playing him false. Uglúk continued, "And your ship… it is ready to take us to Umbar on the morrow?"

Coru nodded. "Completely," he said. "When shall we depart?"

Uglúk thought a moment, clearly a difficult task as his mottled brow wrinkled with the effort. "My Orcs have toiled hard," he said at last. "I allow them this night to make merry—" Naurë shuddered to think of what Orcs might consider 'merry'—"and tomorrow day to rest, and then we leave at night." He peered hard at Coru, as if expecting the man to disagree with him. "This suffices?"

Coru nodded. "It does." Then he stood and yanked Naurë to her feet. "I will meet you where the Prauta is docked, at dusk tomorrow." Striding quickly from the room, Naurë jogging to keep up with him, he led her up the narrow, rickety stairs to what was more a closet than a room. Windowless, with naked beams and unplastered walls, it was oppressively small and yet Naurë felt it rivaled the very halls of Imladris in beauty, so relieved was she to be away from her captor.

Coru released her and shut the door, propping the lone chair under its knob to ensure some measure of privacy and security. Then he turned back to her, eyes identical to her own gleaming with speculation in the light of the single candle. "Are you quite sure it is safer here with me, milady?" he purred in what she supposed would have been a very seductive tone had he not been her own flesh and blood. "You look familiar to me, and seem to know me; have I bedded you?"

Naurë burst out laughing. "If I look familiar to you, 'tis because of the face you see in the mirror each day, not because you have bedded me."

"A cousin, then?" he asked, scrutinizing her. "But one farther afield than Bree, methinks, as there is only Lalaith and I that I am aware of…no, I cannot think of who you are, you will have to tell me."

Naurë sighed, knowing this would be difficult. "I will now recount to you a tale, and you must believe me, do you hear?"

His handsome, lean face was impassive, but he leant back against the wall and crossed his arms, tapping the fingers of one hand on the elbow of the other. "I am waiting."

She took a deep breath. "Coru, I am your grandmother. I am Naurë," she began, then rushed to continue when his face twisted into an expression of abject disbelief. "Lalaith… she made a mistake, and gave me too much of that remedy I was working on… it erased the weight that long years of life placed on my body. Elrond was able to halt its effect, but not before I was returned to this state." She glanced down at herself, at her strong young body, at her unwrinkled hands, their skin unspotted and taut, the fingers without gnarled, thickened joints. "I can scarcely believe it myself, and it has been months, now. But it is true."

"Ever has my cousin been impetuous," Coru said slowly, "but I find it hard to believe she would do such a thing."

"She was… distraught… at the time," Naurë allowed. "I was dying, I had said goodbye to her. We were in Imladris, she was surrounded by elves and feared to be alone."

"Let us say that I believe you," he said, skepticism heavily lacing his words. "You are my grandmother Naurë, altered to be young again. How is it that your elves allowed your capture?"

"They were outnumbered," she replied defensively. Coru had always poked fun at her friendships with the Edhel. "Coru!" She slapped him on the arm when he began to laugh. "Ever do you mock me! I am strong enough to put you over my knee once more, child. Do not think to push me." Exhaustion displaced adrenalin in her slight body, and she swayed uncertainly on her feet. "I have had a trying day."

"Ever do you threaten to spank me, but you never do," Coru murmured, and in spite of his familiar words, there was no solid recognition in his eyes. Rather, a worrying sort of interest in the concept of spanking… and he was coming closer to her. Naurë shrank back only to find herself backed up against the bed, entirely the wrong place to be if his hands at her waist were any hint. Paralyzed by shock, she was still enough for him to bend his head toward hers, plainly intending a kiss.

Naurë began to fight him, but she was weak from the inactivity and malnutrition of the last weeks, and he quickly subdued her. "Please," she gasped, trying to slap his hands from under her skirts, "please, do not. I am your grandmother, Coru. Your mother, Ûra, was my daughter. And," she continued as an afterthought as Coru insinuated a knee between her thighs, "I should have made her raise you better. Coru!"

He raised his head from where he'd nestled it against her neck and begun to lavish open-mouthed kisses. "Yes?" he replied, completely unperturbed by her protests.

"What will you do when you learn that I say the truth? How will you live with knowing you raped your own granddam?"

He stared a long moment at her, eyes flicking repeatedly over her features. Naurë was very aware of his body draped over hers, of his stirring arousal digging into the soft flesh of her belly, and prayed Haldir never learnt of this. Coru seemed to come to some decision, for he eventually levered himself from her to lounge on the other side of the bed, head propped on his hand as he continued to gaze at her. But that gaze was not lazy. Naurë had not known that brown eyes could be cold, but cold they were.

"I will grant," he said at last, "that you might be a cousin, for there is no denying that your eyes are very like my own, and your hair—" he reached out and tugged on one of her shoulder-length curls, their warm colour dulled by neglect—"is certainly that of my kin. But I am no fool, and will not allow you to play me for one." His hand shot out and grasped her wrist. "There will be no more talk of my grandmother. What is your name?"

Frightened, she could only whisper, "My name is Naurë."

The manacle of his hand on her wrist tightened. "That is the wrong answer."

Tears started in her eyes, and Naurë cursed herself for her weakness in her inability to prevent their falling. Despair welled up, threatening to choke her, and she thought with longing of Lalaith, of Elrond, and of Haldir. Such hope she had felt at the sight of Coru's face! Such hope, and now such anguish, for it was clear he neither believed her nor cared of her plight.

"Your name," Coru repeated softly, and she felt the fragile bones of her wrist grind together from the force of his grip.

Resolve surged up to battle with the despair. She had not lived ninety-four years, traveled the length and breadth of Arda, befriended the haughtiest elves in the world—not counting her failure with Thranduil—survived attack and capture by Orcs, and returned from the brink of death itself only to succumb now. "My name," she said, eyes flashing, "is Bronwege."

He seemed to accept her answer, for he removed his hand. Immediately, she scooted back as far from him as she could without falling to the floor. "Well, Bronwege," Coru said, amused, "since I am not one to lie with kin, I will not touch you this night." He smirked at her heartfelt sigh of relief. "But we will still share the bed… unless you would like to sleep on the floor?" He motioned to the bare, cold corner as he stood, then stretched languorously as a prelude to shucking his every stitch of clothing. Coru seemed vastly amused by her modest aversion of eyes, and chuckled about it even after he had slid under the covers and blown out the guttering candle.

Naurë sat, knees to chin and arms curled protectively around, for a long time until Coru's sleepy voice commented, "I have given you my word that I will not touch you."

"The word of a pirate!" she snapped, furious and shocked at what had transpired.

" 'Tis the only word you'll be getting this night, so it will have to suffice," he replied, a trifle testily, and rolled over. His bulk knocked her right off the bed and she hit the floor with a thump, tears springing up once more.

Soft snores began to come from above on the bed, and Naurë stood, rubbing her sore backside. She did not dare to undress, but removed her boots and cautiously peeled back the sheets. They were coarse and unclean, but still better than sleeping on the boats between two Orcs, she supposed. She dropped her head onto the pillow and almost moaned at the luxury of it, then pulled the blankets up to her chin. Holding herself stiffly, not allowing her limbs to relax, sleep was a long time coming, and it wasn't until Coru rolled over once more and pulled her tight to him, arm draped round her waist, that she accepted the inevitability of this situation.

Perhaps it was not bad to give up, just a little, Naurë mused, and relaxed against him. She had his word, disreputable though it was, that he would not harm her, and he was her grandson, thought he might refuse to believe it. Exhaustion overcame apprehension, and finally, she fell asleep.

Baj fushaum jashat ob goi = Make camp outside city

Narakshi = a tribal, semi-nomadic people of the Haradwaith

shatraug-gru = witch-woman

Lulgijak = flowers (in the) blood, or extreme wimp = elf

hol kurv = skinny whore

Bronwege = endurance, faith