Chapter 6

It’s for the cause—the cause of staying alive.

That’s what I tell myself as I take Simka’s mouth. Her lips are perfectly soft, and she tastes like the dried berries she ate for breakfast. If I want to live, I need to sell it, so I curl both arms around her and pull her in close, bending as far down as I can to reach her while she stands up on her toes. Uncertainly, her hands slide around my neck, but soon she returns my fervor, her lips parting for my tongue.

Surely I don’t need to do that to make this ruse effective. But as I sink into her, the less this becomes about saving my own skin and the more it becomes about tasting her and drinking her in. Her mouth is so pliable under mine, but her lips are also fierce as they learn their way around me.

Shit, she’s good at this.

When I pull away suddenly, Simka opens her eyes, looking dazed. She blinks a few times at me, confused. Then she clears her throat, as if realizing for the first time we have an audience, and steps away from me.

“Oh!” Her sister, Vavi, is simply over the moon. She looks much like Simka, but with a pointier chin and longer hair. She’s also all smiles, where Simka rarely doles them out. “I’m so happy for you. Welcome to the clan, sis. And you!” She grins widely at me, showing both rows of white, blunt teeth. “Thank you, corporal. For taking care of my sister when I couldn’t.”

Simka’s done a plenty good job taking care of herself, but I don’t know what to say that won’t give me away as a liar, so I only nod.

“A man of few words,” she says with a wink. “Troll, I mean.”

Vavi turns to her orc mate and whispers something in his ear, her hand linking with his. Humans and trollkin mating, among this clan of barbarians? I’m mystified by it. The more I search the crowd, the more humans I see among them with their orc companions. There’s something going on here, something I don’t understand yet. Why would there be this bastion of trollkin-human relationships contained in this one camp of brigands?

Perhaps I’ll find out.

“You,” the clan leader says, pointing at me, and then at Simka. His grasp of Freysian is surprisingly good, though thickly accented. “A tent is prepared for you.” Then he turns to his mate, a hand grazing over her belly. There’s no question in my mind that he feels the mating bond, if this is how he’s behaving. “We leave now.”

The two of them scurry away, and an orcess wearing a long leather dress with fur-cuffed edges gestures for us to follow her. Simka takes my hand with a significant look. I accept it, because I don’t have a choice, and hold it loosely in mine as we follow behind her. Her fingers are so small that the entirety of her hand fits into my palm.

Though she’s so slight, I’m comforted by her sturdy touch. Once again, Simka didn’t let me fall.

We’re led to a tent in the center of the camp, and more wild orcs are already there, sweeping it out and carrying in wood. The orcess shows us inside, where a fire is being built in the center of the tent, and a bed full of soft furs lies in the back.

“This is where you and your mate will stay,” she tells me in Trollkin, and like the clan leader, it’s in an odd dialect I’ve never heard before. The fire is lit from a torch, and then the wild orcs leave us, letting the flap fall closed behind them.

Now, we’re alone.

I sit down on the furs and drop my head in my hands. I can finally take a moment to think about where we find ourselves. Simka has sentenced us to a difficult fate with her lie. She sinks into the furs near me, keeping a polite distance between us.

“I can’t believe you did that,” I mutter.

She scowls. “I saved your life! They’d have cut off your head, or whatever it is they do here.”

“Nobody asked you. Death is unpleasant, but I’ve made my peace with it.” I’ve accepted the truth of my own mortality ever since the bandit attack in the desert.

Simka’s mouth falls open. “You’d rather I let them kill you?” She shakes her head in disbelief. “Maybe I should have.”

All I can do is nod. Lucky for me, escape is still possible. The next time the orcs leave for a coordinated attack, I’ll make my getaway. And if they catch me… I’ll accept whatever comes.

“It was a wasted effort,” I tell her.

Simka doesn’t speak as more orcs appear with food. We eat in silence, and I watch from the corner of my eye as Simka devours her roasted venison. She has so much life in her, it’s ridiculous that anyone believed her story. I would never be mated to someone so fresh and energetic.

When she’s finished, Simka finally speaks. “I still can’t believe it.” She wipes off her mouth with one hand. “My sister is married to an orc. Or mated. Whatever.” Her eyes travel up to the hole in the top of the tent, where the smoke from the fire escapes. “It doesn’t make sense, but also makes perfect sense. Why they were stealing young people from the villages. They’re looking for mates.”

This baffles me as well. I thought cross-species mating was limited to my former captain and her orc lieutenant, who served in the Attirex city guard alongside me. I thought it was a strange, once-in-a-lifetime event when they both vacated their posts to be together, but now I’m faced with the idea it’s more widespread than that.

These orcs, far outside of the rest of trollkin civilization, have not only accepted the concept, but embraced it. They seem to be seeking it out.

“Why?” Simka asks again, and I’m not sure if she’s talking to me or herself. “Why would they want humans?”

“Perhaps to preserve their civilization.” I finish my own meal and set the tray aside on the floor where I’m sitting. “Trollkin and humans can reproduce. I’ve seen it. Perhaps their numbers have dwindled so much they were forced to look elsewhere for mates.”

Simka blinks. “My sister is pregnant. And she didn’t have any relationships when she was taken.”

I nod. This supports my theory.

“Damn it.” She leans forward on the bed, dropping her face into her hands. “We can’t leave. And neither can she. Not that she even cares to, which I still don’t understand. Surely she would want to see Dad again. And me.” Her voice trembles. “Vavi would have wanted to tell me she was okay, right?”

I don’t know what to say. Simka’s sister seems happy here, as strange as it is, and I don’t know why she wouldn’t want her sister to be happy. But I haven’t had family since I was young, so perhaps I simply don’t understand.

When I don’t answer, Simka sits back up and puts on a tough face. “Fine. Don’t say anything.”

I shrug. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“Ugh!” She crawls into the bed, pulling the furs over herself, and turns away from me. “Goodnight, Jar’kel. I hope you like sleeping on the floor.”

Getting the hint, I take one of the furs rolled up in the corner of the tent and spread it out in front of the fire. At least it’s warm here, and I’m still alive.

Though lying on the bed next to Simka’s small body… perhaps that would have been warmer. Certainly softer. But this is how it’ll be, until the moment I can make my escape.

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