She learned Aelakesh with Tristan and Simon, practicing the new sounds and letter-forms until they were embedded into her brain. She learned more about John’s library — not only continuing to translate the midwifery book, but also taking breaks to further update his catalogue, clean and organize his shelves, and repair several of his most tattered bindings. And she even learned more about orcs, asking Tristan and Simon as many innocuous-seeming questions as she dared, ignoring Simon’s snarky non-answers, and finding herself deeply appreciating Tristan’s thorough, thoughtful replies.
And while some of what she learned was unsurprising — orcs would eat almost anything, they needed less sleep than humans, they had a similar lifespan — other revelations were truly intriguing. Orcs took vows very seriously. They often sought to mate for life, whether to another orc, or a human. Their sense of smell was very highly developed, to the point where they could even smell certainemotions. And each clan had its own unique culture and role within the mountain, though much of their collective history and skills had been lost in the constant wars.
More than once, Rosa felt a compulsive longing to seek John’s opinion — but John stayed away for most of the day this time. A fact that began to drag slightly at Rosa’s lingering warmth — at least, until he finally did return, and immediately strode straight across the room toward her. Fully ignoring Tristan and Simon, in favour of bending his head into her neck, and inhaling slow and deep.
“Ach, little pet,” he breathed. “Have you done good work for me today?”
His body felt oddly taut, and Rosa slid her arms around him, fingers spreading wide, instinctively rubbing the tension away. “I think so,” she murmured back. “Would you like to see?”
It led to her shyly showing off all that she’d done that day, rather like a hopeful pupil seeking to please an exacting schoolmaster — but John did seem pleased, and again, perhaps even surprised. And when he abruptly bent down, and gave Rosa one of those thorough, delicious kisses, she actually staggered with relief and pleasure, and had to clutch at him to stay upright.
“Can I come with you now?” she asked him, damnably hopeful. “Surely I deserve some kind of reward for all my hard work, John-Ka?”
He answered with a surprisingly tolerant half-smile, a gentle scrape of his claws against her neck. “Ach, you do, pet. What should please you?”
“I’d like to see more of your mountain,” Rosa replied promptly. “And visit the laboratory again. And, maybe you can tell me whatyoudid today.”
John’s eyes had instantly shuttered, but he flicked his claw at her cheek, and accordingly guided her toward the door. “I did much work,” he said vaguely. “And many meetings. Now, do you ken you might find the laboratory from here, without my leading you?”
The challenge had the desired effect, of course, tearing Rosa’s attention away from his continued non-disclosures, and toward the splendid opportunity to explore Orc Mountain, with her indulgent lord close by her side. It took some time to find the laboratory, but it was entirely worth it — especially when John even did a little experiment with her, comparing two separate disinfecting solutions Marcus had been working on, and discussing their observations together.
Next John tasked her with finding the shrine, which took significantly more effort, and next, his bedroom. Which proved surprisingly impossible, and led to Rosa darting wildly from room to room with the lamp while John followed, clearly trying not to laugh. “You’re enjoying your pet’ssuffering, youreprobate,” Rosa gasped over her shoulder, though she was laughing, too. “Just tell me where it is, you —”
But then the pleasure stilled all at once, shuddering into silence, because Rosa had darted to another door whichshouldhave been John’s bedroom. But it wasn’t, it was something else entirely — and Rosa stood frozen in place, her eyes gaping, unblinking, while the sights in the room seemed to flash into her vision, one after the other, imprinting with staggering force.
It was a room of —debauchery. Of perhaps a dozen orcs, all in varying stages of undress, all taking their pleasure with one another. Or, rather, some were taking pleasure — like that one, sprawled on a bench with his trousers pulled down, while another orc knelt between his legs, his head bobbing over his groin. Or the naked orc on his hands and knees, head bowed, while another orc knelt behind him, his hips snapping loudly against the first orc’s bare arse.
But. Close behind them, there was another naked orc, standingshackled,face-first, to the stone wall. There were huge, vicious-looking metal cuffs around his wrists and ankles, and behind him was another orc — in fact,Gary, the helpful orc from the Ka-eshforge— delivering hard slaps to his bared arse with a clawed hand. Another orc was similarly shackled across the room, but behind him another orc was driving his hips against his arse, while two more orcs hungrily watched, their trousers visibly tented. Almost as though —waiting their turns.
And most shocking — or compelling — of all was the naked orc on his knees before the small crackling fire, his streaming eyes held on the light. His hands were bound behind him, and there appeared to be some kind of gag in his mouth, and something else protruding out of his bare arse. And around his neck was a thick metal ring, which — the comprehension slammed into Rosa’s screeching thoughts — looked very like the piece Gary had shown her in the Ka-esh forge. The one he’d called akraga, the one she’d thought was a lovely, innocuousnecklace. And attached to the kneeling orc’skragawas a heavy chain, and holding that chain was —Aaron, from thelaboratory. Standing calmly and fully clothed behind the kneeling orc, with a slim woodenswitchin his hand.
And as Rosa stared, her heart threatening to leap out of her chest, Aaron slapped the switch against the orc’s bared arse, making him jerk and moan, struggling against his restraints — and then a sustained spray of white shot from his groin, spattering wide into the fire before him.
Goodgods. Rosa had spent half a lifetime learning the hidden depths of men’s desires — but even so, there was only pure disbelief, reverberating sharp and powerful through the entirety of her being. Orcs did such things?Enjoyedsuch things? And surely — surely Johnknew?!
She somehow shot a frantic, accusing glance over her shoulder toward John — and found him looking just as frozen as she felt. His eyes and his body caught, trapped, and — Rosa’s wide eyes darted downwards, to his visibly tented groin —betrayed. Johnwantedthese things. He —likedthese things?!
The memories were roiling now, punching into Rosa’s churning, shouting gut. “Y-you,” she stammered, as she lurched a few staggering steps away, deeper into the corridor. “Youlikethis. Don’t you? Gods, John, you — yesterday youtiedme to abed. You — you’ve threatened top-punishme. You want me toobeyyou.”
And suddenly the game was gone, this cheerful, innocent charade they’d been playing of a lord and his pet. And it had been a charade, of course it had, Rosa was aspy, she had eighteen days left to find an atrocity worth starting awarover, and wait,wait—
“You know I should never do aught that might truly harm you, woman,” John’s harsh voice cut in, flat, cold. “Humans cannot heal or bear pain as orcs do. And most humans have not been raised to blend pain and fear and power and pleasure, as we have.”
As we have. Ashehad? Rosa’s horror was surging again, and she gaped at his face, at the bitterness glinting in his eyes. “All of you?” she managed. “All the orcs in thismountain?!”
And yes, yes, maybethiswas the war-worthy scandal, the atrocity she needed to shout from the rooftops. The orcs force each other, they beat each other, they tie each other to walls and thentake turns—
“Not all orcs seek this, or find pleasure in this,” John countered, his voice noticeably strained. “It mayhap runs deeper among the Ka-esh than the other clans, but even among us, many do not welcome this. Ach, Tristan will weep if I even —”
Rosa’s heart plummeted with shattering strength, her legs badly wobbling, and John’s hands shot out to steady her, even as his face visibly grimaced, his eyes squeezing shut. Clearly not meaning to have shared such a gods-damned crucial fact, and between Rosa’s swarming shock and rage, there was a powerful, gut-wrenchinghurt.
“Sothat’swhy you’re not mated to Tristan, then,” she said, brittle. “Because he doesn’t share your —proclivities. Because you would be otherwise, wouldn’t you?”
John’s eyes fluttered open again, his brows furrowing, but the bastard didn’t deny it — so Rosa kept ploughing on, every word a biting, miserable truth. “You don’t have to pretend, John. I mean, of course you like him, how couldn’t you, he’s really very lovely, and —”
She couldn’t seem to finish, her voice caught in her closed-off throat — at least, until another realization, even worse than the first, seemed to slap her in the face. “And — and when you said,” she choked out, “that you wanted a tall, hale, hearty woman —thisis why, isn’t it? So she can handle all these things you want to do to her?!”
John’s hands were still gripping at Rosa’s arms, tight enough to be almost painful, and he barked a growl, deep in his throat. “Heed this, woman,” he hissed. “I care for Tristan, mayhap more than any other orc yet alive. But I shall never seek to take him as a mate, and I have not touched him in many moons. Not only because we do not seek the same pleasures, but” — he grimaced again — “also because he and Salvi have not yet settled matters between them.”
