And that was because — Gwyn’s breath expelled from her lungs in a rush — of her father. She was pregnant with — with an orc’s son. Which meant that in two short weeks, she would now be subject to that awful new law. To testifying. To all the horror her father wanted to wreak upon women like her.
Just like the orcs had planned. Just like Joarr had…wanted.
Something kicked in Gwyn’s chest, plummeted down her throat, and her heart was thundering, fierce and frantic against her ribs. Joarrwantedthat. He had. Hadn’t he? Wanted to spark his son upon her, and then…
And gods, the look in his eyes. The way he kept blinking, his hands hot and trembly on her face. “I no ask you to face this,” he breathed. “I take you next to Efterar, and heendthis before it grow. He even keep this from coming again. He has good magic, ach?”
Efterar wouldendthis. With good…magic?! And even as the shock reeled through Gwyn’s skull — surely no orcs hadmagic— it was as though something even darker had punched her in the gut, slammed her straight in the heart.
End this, he’d said. Joarr wanted to… end this? End theirson?
And Gwyn didn’t judge such measures. Had never done so, had always accepted them as one option among many, one way to help ensure women’s safety, to save their lives. But the thought of doing it now, here, herself — with this son, his son,herson — suddenly it made her want to run, to weep, to vomit all over the floor at his feet.
“Youwantthat?” Gwyn somehow croaked, at his glistening, blinking eyes. “Truly, Joarr?”
He stared back at her for a too-long instant, and then barked a sound that might have been a laugh. “Ach, no,” he said, quiet, hoarse. “It is grief to eventhinkof this. But if we no do this, I” — his voice broke — “I see what next comes, ach?”
He…saw. And oh gods, surely he didn’t, he couldn’t — and Gwyn wasn’t believing it, wasn’t even considering it, wasn’t seeing that truth glimmering in his eyes. That… guilt. No. No.NO.
“No,” she gasped at him, as both her hands clutched flat to his chest, her skin sticking hot and clammy to his. “No. You’ve changed your plans before. Haven’t you?I’vechanged your plans, Joarr. And you… went along with it. You ran with what the gods dropped on you. You found a new way. With the Bautul. Withme. Right?”
She could hear him swallow again, could see it bobbing in this throat. Could see his brow slightly furrowing, his head tilting. Considering it.
“So you do it again,” Gwyn hissed at him, hard, fervent. “We do it again. Because I am sure ashellnot sacrificing my son, out of fear of my father. That’s what he wants. That’sexactlywhat he expects this vile new law to accomplish. And I won’t, Joarr. Irefuse.No.”
Joarr’s eyes on hers were unblinking, now, his head still cocked to the side, his body snapped to stillness. As if she’d struck him, shocked him, cracked something deep inside…
And he wasn’t Roy. He wasn’t. It wasn’t the same. And curse her, but Gwyn would say the rest of this. Would say what had been rattling through her thoughts all day, beneath the rest of the mess. She would decide to trust him, one more time. Seek the new way. The — thehope.
“Look, I know I’m probably not” — she gulped for air — “not what you really wanted. Or planned. For your son. And we haven’t known each other nearly long enough, and you wanted to take it slow, and you might not even want a mate, or one like me. But we’ve been” — she sucked back another breath — “figuring it out, haven’t we? It’s been — good.Fun, even. Hasn’t it?”
There was another instant of choked, staring silence, waiting, waiting — because what if she’d horribly misread all this, what if Joarr truly didn’t care, what if this was more lies, more plans, more stupidity…
But then, oh gods, he nodded. Nodded, again, again, and surely that was another laugh, rippling ragged out of his throat.
“Ach,” he whispered, and he bent his head down, his forehead bumping gentle against hers. “No only fun, woman. It is —hope. A cruel taunt from this cruel goddess, ach?”
Hope. As if he’d read it straight from Gwyn’s thoughts, and she heard herself laugh too, choked, high-pitched. “Then why can’t we test it,” she breathed back. “Take this goddess to task. Fight her for it. For our own future. For…him.”
Her trembling hand had somehow slipped down to her waist, to this strange, tenuous truth, this bizarre, impossible hope. Him. Their son. Anorc.
But as Joarr’s clawed hand dropped to spread beside her own, there wasn’t even a hint of what she surely should have felt — no panic, or dread, or fear, or rage. She was finding a new way. Finding hope.
And against her, Joarr was nodding again, again, again. His hair brushing against her cheeks, his lashes fluttering so close, as his slow, heavy exhale burned against her skin.
“Ach, my wise witch,” he whispered. “We try.”
26
For the next few days, it felt like Gwyn was flitting through a dream. A dream in which she’d somehow become not only Orc Mountain’s midwife, but a busy gardener, a respected herbalist, a friend, a lover… and even an expectingmother.
That last one didn’t feel even slightly possible, to the point where Gwyn hadn’t yet told another soul — but she still found herself being struck numb with the truth of it, at the oddest moments. During a consultation with a new Bautul woman. In the middle of another delicious meal in the kitchen. As Joarr pushed her face-first to a corridor wall, grasped a thick handful of her hair, and drove into her from behind with fast, powerful strokes, while any number of random orcs strolled past.
“You just don’t do slow and sweet, do you?” Gwyn asked him after, as she huffed a shaky laugh, her hands skittering against his chest. “Not even now?”
Joarr knew what she was referring to, of course, and she felt the briefest brush of claws over the waist of her dress. “Ach, no,” he said, his voice light. “This is only more cause to make my witch scream and plead for me, ach?”
Gwyn rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help another laugh, her body sagging into his. And into, for a fleeting instant, what must have been a kiss, pressed to the top of her head.
