Page 98 of The Orc Warrioress and the Elf Lord

“Well, then,” said Iahir, glaring at him.

His father shrugged. “Have it your way. It only makes it more imperative that you leave.”

Iahir looked around. Yes, he would go, he supposed. He could not hold this place together, anyway. He was not sure that his father could, but at least the man seemed to be paying attention, at least somewhat. “I was thinking about Celedrah.” He named the summer house in the country.

“Oh, no, they’ll seek you there,” said his father. “It’s our holdings. You must not go anywhere they would predict you would go.”

“North, then?” he said.

“North seems wise,” said his father.

“And you will turn your attention to keeping everything together here?” said Iahir. “You swear that you will?”

“I must,” said his father. “It is an adventure, I must say. Perhaps I’d gotten to the point I didn’t know what else to try for your mother, anyway.”

Iahir’s nostrils flared.

“Oh, what is that?”

Iahir shook his head.

“You don’t approve of my having done it at all,” said his father.

Iahir sighed.

“You don’t even have courage to say it aloud?”

“You say you did not know that it would turn out the way it did, that you could only see some bright destination, but when you began to see what was actually happening—”

“They were just obstacles, testing my resolve.”

Iahir sighed.

“I had to try, my boy.”

“So you say.”

“Well, what was I to do? Ignore it? Ignore her?”

“Accept her as she was, I think,” said Iahir. “Perhaps there was some way to make things easier for her—”

“Well, that was what I was trying to accomplish!”

Iahir did not wish to argue about this. It did not matter. In a way, his father had ignored his mother. He did everything for her, but he did not wish to be near her, not the way she was. He wanted her, but he wanted a version of her that did not exist. Until he could create that version, he spent all his time elsewhere.

“You refuse to speak against me, I see.”

“It does not matter what I think, and it never has,” said Iahir. “You have your own inner convictions and those are all that is important to you. Such is the way of being a visionary, I suppose.” There was ice in his tone.

His father’s lips thinned.

Iahir sighed again.

“I cannot find fault with what you say,” said his father. “You are correct that I have been blind and foolish in many ways. That I have refused to see reality, but instead have focused on some pipe dream.” His father patted his pockets. “Speaking of pipes…” He came out with one from his pocket. “Fancy a smoke, then?”

Iahir hesitated.

“We shall talk of something else,” said his father. “Something not so fraught. Tell me how you met this orc woman. I hear she was with you in the capital. Did you do it or did she?”