“If you’d like to try a few herbal options to settle your stomach, just let me know,” Gwyn said, once they’d covered her full list. “And ideally, I’d like to see you again in —”
She caught herself just in time, her face again furiously heating, her eyes glancing reflexively toward Joarr. Joarr, who’d pulled down one of the scimitars lining the room’s walls — there was quite a considerable quantity of them — and had been sitting on a bench, sharpening the blade with a nearby stone.
“Ach, soon,” he said now, as he smoothly rose to his feet, and hung the scimitar back up behind him. “We make sure all is good.”
With that, he strode toward Gwyn, lightly punching the other orc — Simon — in the arm as he passed. But Simon abruptly reached a hand to catch Joarr, pulling him back, and clasping his huge arm around his shoulders.
“We thank you,” Simon told him, his voice low. “You watch your way in this, ach?”
As he’d spoken, his big hand had grasped to tug at that tooth, still hanging around Joarr’s neck. And then Simon added another stream of words in the black-tongue, all of them entirely unintelligible to Gwyn, but for the distinctive wordBautul.
“Ach, ach,” Joarr said, with the cool, purposefully distant smile Gwyn now recognized all too well. “I ken, I ken.”
His strides toward the door were quick, his hand on Gwyn’s back firm and efficient. And Gwyn somehow even managed a series of bright-sounding pleasantries over her shoulder, to which Maria broadly smiled, and Simon only looked… troubled?
But at least Joarr had said that was the last appointment for the day, right? And as they strode through the corridor again, perhaps back toward the garden, Gwyn felt herself deflating, her shoulders dropping. Her thoughts fixating, foolishly, on good women, beautiful women, and how Roy had always preferred those, too.
And with that, even more lowering, somehow, was how all these orcs today had treated their women — all with obvious, open affection, and concern for their wellbeing. And while Joarr might cook for Gwyn, or show her fun in his garden, or even take his calculated pleasure with her, it still surely wasn’t that. Not a good woman. Not a beautiful one. And most certainly not his mate, or a real Bautul, no matter what the rest of these orcs seemed to think.
“So look, that whole… ritual, on the altar, last night,” Gwyn heard herself say, her voice hollow. “You didn’tmeanfor it to go that far, did you? You didn’t actuallywanteveryone here to start thinking I’m a real Bautul, right?”
And beside her, suddenly, there was just… silence. Not even the sounds of Joarr’s footfalls, or his breaths. She might have thought he’d vanished, but for the still-present touch of his hand on her back, now light enough to be almost imperceptible.
And of course, Gwyn knew what that meant. It meant that no, surely, Joarr hadn’t meant that, or wanted that. He’d wanted to gain his own place among his clan, and that was all. Because of course it was all about him, everything was all about him, he was a selfish and completely manipulativeasshole—
But the louder Gwyn tried to silently scream that truth, the more empty it felt. Because today, ithadn’tbeen about him. He’d carted her all over his mountain, falsely advertising her as his true Bautul mate — surely to his own future detriment — so that she could help care for these women. So she could try to help save them from her father’s horrible new law. And he’d waited patiently through hours of consultations, he hadn’t once complained, he’d fed and supported her, and offered reassurances to his kin.
And gods, even before that — Gwyn’s hands rubbed at her sticky face — he’d given her that tour of his garden. He’d offered her a prime location for her plants. He’d fully intended to keep giving her that day of fun he’d promised, even at the expense of what he’d obviously felt should be their true priority.
They’d finally reached the end of the corridor, the way to the garden. And Gwyn mentally grasped for that, clinging to the forthcoming vision of sun and green as he shoved the stone open —
But instead, the sky beyond was a deep grey, already somehow darkening into night. And not only that, but it was pouring rain, pattering in through the stone opening, pelting large drops of water against Gwyn’s skirts.
“Wish to stay in?” Joarr asked, so cool, so casual, as if Gwyn wasn’t already drowning in cold wet darkness, in rising clawing misery. As if she could bear another instant in this close cramped mountain, knowing all these bitter truths, knowing her own failures. Knowing this orc — this infuriating, devious, lying orc — didn’t actually want her, and knowing she wasn’t supposed to give a damn, and still feeling like she was about to weep.
“No,” she said, or perhaps sobbed, as she slipped out past him, to stand under the raging sky. Into the beautiful, chaotic garden that didn’t really want her, either, didn’t belong to her, and never would. Just like him.
Stupid, stupid,stupid.
“No,” Gwyn said again, to the streaming-wet darkness. “I think — I think maybe you should take me home.”
19
The silence seemed to pound after Gwyn’s words, pummelling into her like the driving rain. Like anger, or like… rage.
“You wishwhat?!” Joarr’s voice demanded, and suddenly he was standing before Gwyn in the rain, looming tall and menacing over her. “I take youwhere?!”
Gwyn twitched and swallowed, wiped away the water streaking down her cheeks. “Home?” she said, the word nearly drowned by the rain. “To Varrahan? Where Ilive?!”
Joarr’s growl rumbled through the air, his form bobbing back and forth on his feet. “Now?” he hissed at her. “Afterthis day?!”
“Yes!” Gwyn’s voice snapped, or maybe wailed. “And don’t tell me Orc Mountain’s Chief Scout can’t find his way in the rain, because I surely won’t believe you,again!”
Another growl hissed from Joarr’s mouth, and he jerked even closer, his already-wet hair dripping onto Gwyn’s face. “I never speak false to you this day,” he barked. “Noonce.”
“Yes, I know,” Gwyn said, her voice badly wavering. “Which is why I finally understand exactly how things are between us. I might make you feel obligated, or aroused, or maybe even amused — but I’m also a lord’s daughter, and my father’s causing a hell of a lot of trouble for you, and I’m well aware I need to do a hell of a lot more to help clean it up. And obviously you don’t ever intend to trust me — I mean, you told me that yourself — and you’d never want someone like me to actuallyjoinyour new clan, or be your — your —”
Good gods, what was she evensaying, and she squeezed her eyes shut against the rain, against whatever rubbish this orc might spout next. Because he would surely saysomething, cajole her, throw a measly pinecone or two, and Gwyn needed to stamp that down where it belonged, and face the empty, echoing truth in its wake.
