Page 9 of Her Orc Healer

I forced myself to take in my surroundings.

The room was dim, lit only by a slant of morning light spilling through the half-drawn curtains. The furniture was sturdy, hand-carved from dark wood. A shelf lined one wall, crowded with earthenware jars and rolled-up linens. A basin of water sat atop a low table, a clean cloth folded neatly beside it.

Not my room. Not my home.

And Maeve—

I swung my legs over the edge of the bed. My feet met thick, furred rugs, the kind that silenced every step. I barely felt them. My pulse roared louder than any sound.

Then, I heard it. A muffled voice. Two voices.

I surged to my feet, still unsteady, and followed the sound to the wooden door set slightly ajar. I pushed it open.

And stilled.

Beyond the door stretched a long, narrow room filled with morning light and the scent of brewing herbs. Shelves lined the walls, stacked with jars of dried plants and labeled bottles. A row of neat cots lined one wall, each draped with clean linens.

A healer's clinic.

And there, at a low table near the window, sat the orc from the market. His broad frame made the wooden chair look almost comically small, but his movements were deliberate as he ground something in a mortar. Beside him, perched on the edge of the table, Maeve leaned forward, watching intently.

"Like this?" she asked, mimicking his grip on an imaginary pestle.

"Mm." His voice was low, a quiet rumble. "Steady pressure. Let the weight do the work."

She furrowed her brows in concentration, her tiny hands mimicking his movements exactly. The sight of it sent a confusing tangle of emotions through me—relief, warmth, something softer. Maeve was safe. She wasn’t scared. If anything, she looked delighted.

The orc watched her with a careful patience I wasn’t used to seeing in people outside of Iris. He nodded slightly in approval, then said something in a low, rolling cadence that didn’t match Common or Elvish.

Maeve perked up immediately. “What’s that mean?”

"Zul'kar gorthul thrak," he repeated, meeting her wide-eyed curiosity with a tilt of his head. “It means, ‘small hands do great work.’”

She gasped like he’d just handed her a secret. “In orcish?”

He nodded.

She looked at her fingers, sticky with crushed herbs. “Say it again.”

He did, slower this time, enunciating each syllable carefully. Maeve echoed him, tongue fumbling over the sounds but determined. He didn’t correct her. Just nodded again, like it didn’t matter that she got it wrong, only that she tried.

Something in my chest tightened.

Maeve—trusting, fearless Maeve—had just met this towering, scarred orc and was already drinking in his words like they were the most important ones she’d ever heard.

I cleared my throat.

Both of them glanced up.

Maeve lit up. “Ro! You’re awake!” She started to scramble off the table, but the orc shifted his arm just slightly, steadying her before she could spill to the floor.

Something unfamiliar flickered through me at the gesture. Protectiveness didn’t come easy to most people, not when it came to other people’s children. But he had done it with such effortless certainty, like stopping Maeve from falling was as instinctive as breathing. It unsettled me.

“You were sleeping,” Maeve informed me, wrapping her arms around my legs and peering up at me with those bright, trusting eyes. “For a long time.”

I ignored the pang in my chest and smoothed a hand over her curls instead. “I’m fine.” A deliberate glance at the orc. “Where are we?”

“My clinic,” the orc answered, voice steady, unreadable. “You collapsed.”