Page 16 of The Pumpkin Bride

“No. There are side effects on living things, but nothing too terrible.” Fuzzle mewled in her pocket. “Here, I’ll show you it’s nothing to fear.”

She withdrew the mouse-sized cat and set him on the cushion.

“Stop.” The orc flashed his palm. “Is that your—”

She snapped her fingers. Fuzzle blinked back to his full size. Which, if she was being honest, was a few pounds more than he ought to be.

“Cat!” the orc shouted.

She should not laugh, but she couldn’t help it. Her signature bray, the one that Bess fussed about and called most unladylike, snagged his attention from Fuzzle.

“Are you afraid of cats?” she asked.

He’d hidden behind the butcher’s block, his lively brown eyes peering over the edge. “It’s well-known that orcs loathe cats.”

Marigold lifted the mewling tabby into her arms and rewarded him with a scratch below the chin. “Why?”

“I have no idea.” The orc kept his eyes trained on Fuzzle. “They’re sneaky.”

“They’re helpful. Don’t all farms have cats to keep the rodents at bay?” She stepped away from the kitchen and back toward the cozy hearth. “We can put him to work. Do you have any pumpkin puree, perchance? It helps with his tummy upset after resizing.”

“No. And what do you know about farm life?” The mountain of green pursed his mouth as he watched Fuzzle prance through the wreckage. The cat made it five steps before sitting to groom his paw.

“I read a lot.” She sat to adjust her laces. Revolting as it was to wear outdoor shoes in the house after pulling an all-night run in them, there was no sense cutting her feet on pottery shards.

“Reading isn’t the same as doing, Princess.”

“Marigold, please.” She looped and knotted the laces. “And what might I call you?”

The orc stilled. “Nothing. You’re leaving. Tomorrow, after the search dies down.”

Saints, he was intractable. “Be that as it may, when the royal poets write an epic about my hero, he’ll need a name.”

Finally, he muttered, “Jask. Jask Bone-Cracker.”

He spat it out like she’d spat out the bitter chicory.

Orc naming conventions were intriguing. Imagine looking at a newborn creature and naming it something like “bone-cracker.” Although that was his surname, so perhaps they also used professions as surnames, like tradespeople such as Miller or Chandler. Was bone-cracking an orc profession?

Ah, her thoughts were running away again, as Bess would say.

She dusted her hands together. “Well, that’s a colorful name, Jask Bone-Cracker. Do you have a broom?”

“I don’t need help.” He righted the table in the kitchen.

“I can see that, but I’m heartily sorry I brought them to your door.” She surveyed the destruction. “Consider it my penance. Anything that can be mended, we’ll put on the divan; anything that’s wrecked beyond repair goes into the bin.”

“That’ll be half of it, I’d wager.”

“Absolute thugs,” she agreed. “You tackle the kitchen; I’ll take the living room.”

“Do what you want,” he grunted.

As he tidied, something about his movements were familiar. She could not explain, for the life of her, why she was comfortable in his presence. Tusks were not known to reassure humans, but strangely, she was at ease.

Jask, however, was not. Mostly because Fuzzle twined through the orc’s ankles like a child skating eights on a frozen pond.

“Keep the cat away from me, or I’ll turn him into slippers.” He gently shooed a meowing Fuzzle away with his boot.