Page 48 of Her Orc Protector

Another guard with a red beard and ruddy cheeks elbowed him. "Careful there, Daric. She's claimed."

"That right?" the tall one—Daric—said, tilting his head. "No offense, miss—but you look more like the tea-and-ledgers sort than someone who'd keep up with him.”

My stomach tightened. Not from the words themselves, but from the implication beneath them—unworthy, unsuited, soft in the wrong ways. I saw the flicker in Uldrek's jaw, the breath he didn’t take.

So I stepped forward before he could speak.

"I do like tea,” I said, my voice steadier than I felt. "And ledgers. But don’t mistake quiet for weakness. Uldrek doesn’t."

Daric blinked, then laughed—a short, dismissive sound. "Is that right? Your pet orc teaching you to growl, little mouse?"

"No," I said, meeting his gaze directly. "He's teaching me how to fight. Though I doubt you'd present much of a challenge."

The words left my mouth before I fully thought them through—not aggressive, just matter-of-fact. I hadn't meant them as a challenge, exactly. Just a boundary. A line drawn.

Daric's eyes widened, then narrowed with amusement. "Alright then," he said, his smile sharpening. "One round. Don't worry—I'll be gentle."

I heard the shift in Uldrek before I saw it—the faint catch in his breath, the way his boots adjusted against the packed dirt. But he didn’t step in. Didn’t speak.

He was watching me.

Not with alarm. Not with that bristling protectiveness I’d seen the day Ellie fell ill. This was something quieter. A stillness that felt like trust. Like he was letting me decide how I wanted to carry this.

I glanced over at Ellie—still asleep in her basket under the oak, Hobbie now fanning her with a large leaf. She hadn’t even looked up.

I turned back to Daric.

“Alright,” I said, shrugging off my overshirt and stepping back into the training circle. The dirt was warm beneath my bare feet. The weight of Uldrek’s earlier lessons sat low in my muscles, familiar now.

Daric moved with the lazy confidence of someone who expected to win. I recognized it. Gavriel had moved like that too—never hurrying, always sure I wouldn’t push back.

But I wasn’t pushing back. Not exactly. I was just standing in the space I’d been told I didn’t belong in.

Uldrek hadn’t moved. He stood near the edge of the circle, arms folded, expression unreadable.

I didn’t need to look at him to feel the echo of his voice in my head.

Guard up. Breathe. Don’t chase. Let him reveal himself first.

I took my position, squaring up against Daric as he rolled his shoulders and settled into a fighter's stance. He was taller than me by a head, his reach longer, his build leaner but muscled. From the way he moved—balanced, controlled—I could tell he'd had formal training. This wouldn't be easy.

But I wasn't aiming for easy.

"Ready when you are, little mouse," he said with a smirk.

I didn't respond. Instead, I focused on my breathing, on the ground beneath my feet.

Daric moved first, stepping in with a quick jab that I deflected rather than blocked. His eyebrows rose slightly, but he followed with another strike, testing my defenses. I stayed light on my feet, giving ground deliberately, letting him think he was pushing me back.

"Come on now," he said, his confidence growing with each advance. "I thought you were supposed to be—"

I didn't let him finish. As he stepped in for a more committed strike, I pivoted, using one of the first moves Uldrek had taught me—a simple redirect that used an opponent's momentum against them. Daric's arm swept past me as I turned, and I hooked my foot behind his ankle, pushing at just the right moment.

The move wasn’t flashy or powerful. But it was practiced. Clean. Exactly what it needed to be.

Daric's eyes widened in surprise as his balance faltered. He tried to recover, but I was already following through, using my weight to amplify the off-balance moment. He hit the ground with a solid thud that raised a cloud of dust, the air rushing from his lungs in an audible grunt.

The training yard went silent.