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I’ve got a plan,I tell her.But it’s risky.
Everything we’ve done until now has been risky. She gets a mischievous glint in her eye.I trust you.
My daring Rimi. I grab her hand and suddenly pull her against me, wrapping my arms tight around her tiny body. She lets out a squeak, then relaxes into me. When she tries to hold me in return, her small hands only reach partway around my waist.
What is it?she asks.
Nothing.I kiss the top of her head, then rub my cheek against it, getting some of her hair caught around my tusk. I can’t get enough of her. I want to tell her how I feel—that we have united, that we’re supposed to be together as determined by some power greater than us—but she wants to go home, and she doesn’t need to be looking back.
It’s time to go and attempt my foolhardy plan.
* * *
Rimi
I know that Lo’zar is lying to me. I don’t knowhowI know, but I do. It’s in his voice, his touch, the way his heart is beating hard and fast in his chest while I press my face against it.
Doesn’t he feel this, too? This bone-deep awareness that we were supposed to find each other, that what we share is something special, something one-of-a-kind, and we could be the luckiest beings on earth to have discovered it?
But he’s so eager to help me get home that he’ll risk returning to this city, where he’s a wanted troll. That’s what I want, too—to live in my own world, to return to my parents and tell them I’m all right. I don’t want to worry about hiding in the back of carts, fearing discovery, wondering if I’ll get captured and sold off again.
And I don’t want to be a burden on Lo’zar, either, any longer than necessary. He’s already put himself on the line so many times to protect me, and I can’t keep asking that of him, not when he’s already on the run and trying to save his own hide.
I’m going to tie you up, Lo’zar says, searching the trees for something. He locates a vine and tears it down.You’ll have to pretend to be my prisoner.
It makes sense, of course, but it also means becoming a captive again. I wring my hands, biting back bile.They won’t take me from you, will they?
Don’t worry.He stoops down to kiss the top of my head.I would never let anything happen to you, Rimi.
I put my hands behind my back, and he winds the vine around my wrists. Then we return to the road and join a line of other trolls and orcs waiting to enter the huge city up ahead. They look strangely at us, especially me, the foreign human in their midst. I make a show of pulling away from Lo’zar and trying to make my escape, only for him to roughly yank me back into line. No one seems the wiser.
I take this opportunity to absorb where we are. The trollkin city of Kalishagg is a marvel from afar, with high walls around the outside that would truly make it impossible to invade. It’s built onto a hill, so up above the walls I can make out low, rounded buildings that look to be made of clay, and tents of tough leather. In the center, a great tower rising into the air ends in two massive horns, as if it is the head atop the city’s body.
When we approach the guards, Lo’zar starts spouting off Trollkin, and again I try to make a run for it to really sell that I’m his prisoner. One of the guards slams down a halberd in front of me and I jump backward. The other one approaches from the side, investigating me curiously. They probably don’t see many humans around here.
Lo’zar is still locked in conversation with the other guard, so I ask,Is everything okay?
They’re trying to get me to pay tax on you.
On me?!It sends a shiver up my spine to think I’m merely transported goods to be taxed.But you don’t have any money.
While Lo’zar’s occupied, the other guard creeps even closer, and sloppily runs a big hand down my body, over my breasts and hip and butt. I jerk away, instinctually drawing into Lo’zar’s side. His entire body tenses, and he clenches his fists at his sides—but doesn’t move to help. For a moment, the sting of betrayal sweeps through me. He told me he would protect me. The guard gives one last painful pinch to my rear end, but I restrain the urge to smack him away. I can’t give them reason to take me from him.
I hope this wasn’t all a terrible idea.
That’s when Lo’zar reaches for one of his jeweled rings and takes it off. The guards’ eyes grow wide, and they readily accept it.
Wait,I say.That’s how you’re going to pay?
Lo’zar doesn’t answer as he waits for the guard to hold the ring up to the light, surveying its authenticity. Then he nods and steps aside to let us through, then pockets it.
Surely that was worth much more than me,I tell him.
It was the only way.His expression is intense—furious.And I would have given him anything to keep you at my side.He loosens his grip on the vine binding my wrists together.Now we have to get off the main road so we’re not seen.
We duck into one of the first dark alleyways we find, and before I have a chance to look at our surroundings, Lo’zar lifts me up by the ass and presses me hard against a mortar wall, his lips crashing into mine.
I did not like that,he says, soothing over every inch of my body the guard touched, tenderly caressing it with his familiar hands.I did not like that at all.He takes my mouth thoroughly.I’m so sorry I didn’t stop him.
