Morwen is 16. She is from the Westemnet in Rohan. She has been going out with her boyfriend for 12 months and they have just had a baby son. They plan to get married soon. Hardly an unusual story in rural Rohan, but Morwen’s family and village have thrown her out and told her never to return.

The reason? Her boyfriend, Ugraf, is an orc.

These days relationships between humans and orcs are increasingly common. In a more progressive realm such as Mordor, they may be seen as a welcome sign of the atrophying of old racial loyalties. But to most of the inhabitants of Middle Earth, they are still profoundly shocking.

Morwen met Ugraf one night when she was looking for a lost goat and he was out with an orkish scavenging party. The boys of Rohan tend to be tall and fair-haired, but she was immediately attracted to Ugraf’s dark good looks, his compact frame and wicked smile. And there was another thing – orcs are sexually adept from a young age.

“He was all sex,” she says. “He knew how to please a girl. The boys back home just shove it in, grunt a few times and roll over. It’s like someone blowing their nose up your fanny. That night Ugraf did things to me I’d never dreamed of. And he kept going for hours.”

Ugraf smiles bashfully.

They kept meeting in secret, though the other orcs eventually guessed. Ugraf says most did not mind, though some of the older ones were a bit shocked.

“They’d always thought of humans as food. But once they’d met Morwen a few times, they could see she was as civilized and intelligent as any orc.”

Was Morwen worried that her lover’s friends might try to eat her?

“A bit, at first. But Ugraf says the younger generation of orcs don’t approve of eating human flesh. One or two of his mates are even vegetarians.”

After a month the orcs returned to their home in Moria. Ugraf promised to write and Morwen promised to learn how to read. Then she realized she was pregnant. How did she feel?

“Totally confused. On the one hand, I really wanted to have a child with Ugraf. On the other, I knew what my family would say.”

Her family were already suspicious. When Morwen started pestering her father for money for reading lessons, they were thoroughly alarmed.

“Dad said only wizards and tax-collectors need to read, what did I want to know for? Mum guessed straightaway I was writing to a fancy-man, as she put it.”

In the end she confided in her elder sister Bronwen. She was horrified and went straight to Morwen’s parents. They in turn informed the village elders, who called a village meeting.

“It was horrible,” Morwen said. “The things they called me. These were all my neighbours, cousins and friends. Nobody spoke up for me. Half of them wanted to burn me, the other half thought hanging was better.”

A compromise was found. Preparations were under way for a hanging, to be followed promptly by a burning, when an officer of the Riddermark intervened.

“He was on his rounds and heard about it. He said it was contrary to the King’s justice and the worst the villagers could do was expel me. Which they did. They were really annoyed.”

Pregnant by an orc, illiterate, penniless, cast out by her family and not knowing where her baby’s father was, Morwen could have given way to despair. Instead she decided to head towards Moria, where Ugraf lived. On the road she lived off wild berries and occasional handjobs for itinerants. Then she saw a group of orcs heading west.

“They said they were going to Isengard. I told them about me and Ugraf and they said I would be welcome there. Saruman the Wise had no problem with mixed race couples or their children – in fact, he was recruiting them for his workforce.”

She and the orcs travelled together. After a week they arrived at Isengard.

“One of the first things I saw was a little group of half-orc children playing together. It was so sweet. I think they were pulling the legs off a cat. I thought, this is my home now.”

Morwen found the contrast between Isengard and Morwen’s village in Rohan profound. Isengard was enthusiastically embracing new technology, while her village had hardly changed since the Second Age.

“There was a hospital and a school and everything. It was like another world.”

She was able to send a message to Ugraf in Moria. A month later he joined her. They have not been separated since. They quickly made friends among the other residents.

“There are so many mixed couples here,” Morwen says. “Our next-door neighbours are gay – one’s an orc, the other’s a cave-troll. The things they get up to – I mean, trolls are huge!”

She is now going to school. Ugraf has a job in the Orthanc cells, questioning detainees.

“It’s a long day,” he says, “and hard work. But I feel I’m giving something back to Isengard.”

The baby was born in Isengard’s modern hospital. They named him Draugluin.

“We’re getting married next month,” Morwen says. “All our new friends will be there, and Ugraf’s family. I’ve invited my family, but of course none of them will come.”

And how do they feel about the future? Ugraf is uncertain.

“Frankly, I’m a bit worried about the international situation. Isengard and Mordor are challenging the old reactionary superpowers, who aren’t going to take it lying down. I think there’s going to be a war sooner or later.”

Morwen is more optimistic.

“If you have a dream, nobody can take that from you, not even kings and elves with their old rings and magic and stuff. They’re the past. We’re the future.”