CHAPTER SIX

“Sprites!” Dash says, sounding delighted.

“Nuisances, the lot of them,” I growl and rummage through my travel bag. I packed light for this trip, leaving most of my supplies back at the dragon clearing to prioritize speed over comfort. Yet that leaves me with little to offer Selena.

Warrior training means I’m used to going without sleep or food. I can do so for several days if needed. Humans aren’t orcs, though. They’re far more fragile. She’ll need food and sleep. I pull out a wrapped piece of hardtack and turn—

Just in time to see a sprite offer her Faerie Fruit !

“No!” The packet tumbles from my fingers as I dart forward. “Don’t eat that!”

But I’m too late. Selena bites into the bespelled blackberry, having no idea what it will do to her. Sprite magic infuses it. Intoxicating to fae, its effects are much stronger on humans. She will either dance until she drops from exhaustion or…

Or she will need to orgasm several times.

My cock stirs, thrilled with the thought of her spread wide across the soft grass and flowers, my fingers digging into her lush hips as I thrust and thrust and…

No.

Selena’s not mine.

She can’t be. She’s too young, too full of life for a bitter old man like me. I lost my chance years ago when I lost Bruna.

Frustration drowns out the old ache as I knock another berry from Selena’s hand.

She looks up at me, beautiful brown eyes wide. They’re lighter in color than an orc’s, warmed with touches of copper and striated with radiating lines of black, so the dark pupil at the center looks like a starburst. Those lush lips press into a hard line, and she snaps something at me, her eyes heating with anger.

Shock ripples through me. “What? How?” She should be lost to the ecstasy of the Faerie Fruit.

Holding my gaze, she takes another berry from a sprite and bites into it with deliberation. The crystal of her necklace flares with light. Her magic! It’s protecting her, healing her of the intoxication !

She raises an eyebrow as she chews, as if daring me to stop her.

I search her face, looking for any sign of befuddlement, but there’s none.

“She’s our elf!” A sprite darts in front of my face and shakes a tiny finger at me, her high voice scolding. “She wants our fruit! She wants fun!”

“She’s human, and Faerie Fruit’s not safe for them,” I snap.

“Human!” The sprite’s wings droop. “She’s not an elf?”

“I told you her ears were wrong,” another calls out. Then more voices chime in. “We want elves! Elves love us!” “What are humans?”

Then the head sprite spins to cast an assessing eye over Selena. “Are you sure she’s not an elf? Because the fruit isn’t doing much to her.”

“She’s a witch,” I say. “Her healing magic protects her.”

“Healing!” The sprite claps her hands and says something in her normal voice. Too high and fast for even orc ears, it comes out as a long whistle, varying in tune.

A group of sprites fly back over to the patch of meadowsweet they originally came from. Several of them gather around one of the white flowers and pick up a sprite. They fly back to us, straining under the weight of their companion.

“Here.” I step forward and hold out my hand, and they settle the new sprite onto my palm.

His small size means he’s a youngling, probably a teen newly out of the nest. He should be racing about with the others, full of mischief, but one of his wings hangs at an odd angle.

“We will give you all the blackberries if you heal him,” their leader says.

“What happened?” I ask.

“A sluagh,” the youth says. “I thought it was a regular bird.”

“Someone went out on his own,” the leader says, her voice worried. “Even after all the times I told you to never leave your flock.”

The youngling raises a defiant chin. “You also said the sluagh never come this close to dragon lands.”

“Alas, that is no longer true.” She flutters beside my hand. “My flock has been safe here for centuries. But the soul stealers make a mockery of that safety now.”

“They’re getting desperate. Orcs and unicorns have allied with dragons and others to fight the sluagh,” I say. The vilest of fae live up to their name, stealing the souls of their victims and trapping them as birds, doomed to an eternity of servitude instead of peace. “We’ve killed many of their kind, so they’re moving to new hunting grounds.”

Her tiny eyes widen. “You have a way to kill them?”

“We do, but it won’t do you much good at your size.”

The leader scowls at me, and a sword appears in her hands. She brandishes the tiny yet sharp blade. “Sprites can fight.”

“Oh, I’m well aware.” Moon Blade Village now has resident flocks of both sprites and pixies, and the diminutive imps are as feral at heart as any Wild Fae .

Before she can say anything more, Selena steps close, her eyes fixed on the sprite in my hand. She brushes one careful finger over the shock of white hair on his head, and magic ripples through the air.

His listing wing straightens, and he jumps to his feet on my palm, raising his wings and giving them an experimental flap. Then with a shout of joy, he leaps into the air to fly in circles around Selena’s head.

She laughs, the sound rich like velvet caressing my ears, and her eyes sparkling with delight.

Goddess damn me for a fool. The sound pierces straight to my heart, the music of her joy making my pulse race. I don’t need Faerie Fruit to be intoxicated. All I need is her, her youth, her joy, her enthusiasm.

My cheeks stretch into what feels like my first true smile in years.