She started walking again.
He hesitated and then caught up with her. His legs were longer than hers, so it didn’t take him very long. “I don’t want to marry her, but I can’t do to her whatever happened to my mother, you know?”
She supposed, from his perspective, he felt stuck at thispoint, that he had no other way out, but she was furious and ill and she still wanted to cry, but no tears were forthcoming.
“Aerhril, you are going to marry him,” he said. “It will be the same. We will both be married. What did we think was going to happen anyway?”
She shook her head. “Not this.”
“So, I was supposed to sit around and be all right with you letting him take your virtue and pump his elf sons into you—”
“You were, because you knew that it wouldn’t have been real with him—”
“Wouldn’t it, though? I see the way you are about him. You will never be that way about me.”
“Not now,” she said.
“I am sorry,” he said. “I don’t even understand why I did it. I regretted it immediately. I wished it hadn’t happened. I cannot believe that she is with child just from that. I cannot believe it.”
“Did you enjoy it?” Her voice broke.
“Oh, by the shadows of the leaves, do not ask me such a question.”
“So, you did. You enjoyed it quite a bit. I suppose you’re very enamored with her huge teats and those thick thighs of hers—”
“Just, don’t,” he said.
“I hate you,” she said, matter-of-factly, no emotion.
“Don’t say that,” he gasped.
“Doesn’t matter if I say it or not. It’s still true,” she said.
She went directly back to town.
She marched right down a street she had heard of but had never actually been down. She found the door easily enough, though, because there was an elf officer there in a uniform.
“Is this the place to report orcs who are here illegally?” she said to him.
He looked her over. “It is.”
“Her name is Nathre. She is deceiving the elf who she is employed by Elrion nae Nilriane. She belongs across thepass. She needs to be sent back where she belongs.”
“All right,” said the officer. “I have a form. Write it all down. Someone will look into it.”
She had to sign her name to the form.
They showed the form to Elrion when they came to collect Nathre.
Elrion had papers for Nathre, but they didn’t care, because they never cared, and they took her.
“WHY?” ELRION SAIDas they walked. It was cooler that day, winds blowing the trees in the distance, blowing the petals off the wildflowers. Elrion had said they must walk together. He had come to the Peak and stood outside and demanded her presence, and she had gone with him. Elrion was usually so careful about propriety, even though they were to be married very soon. But he didn’t say anything about a chaperone, just refused to come in and refused anything except for her to come out.
“Why what?” she said.
“Why did you go and report Nathre?”
She sucked in a breath. “I… I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She actually had regretted it after it was done. She had done it impulsively, and she felt guilty. She thought about Dathor’s baby, and she knew she wanted to be able to watch it grow, to hold it. If she could not be mother to Dathor’s children, at least she wanted to know his children. But when she had gone to retract the form, they had told her it was impossible. They had said they must investigate now, that they must look into every report that was made.
