Page 59 of Her Orc Protector

As we reached the edge of Tinderpost’s yard, I saw Hobbie standing at the gate. She didn’t say anything when she saw us. Just stepped forward, both hands cupped around a bundled scrap of cloth. Her face was unreadable, but her silence carried a kind of gravity—like a pot left to simmer too long on the stove, never boiling over but too still to ignore.

Uldrek slowed beside me. I took a step toward her.

“What is it?” I asked.

Hobbie didn’t answer right away. She just held the bundle out, her small hands steady as stone.

I accepted it carefully, unfolding the bite of homespun. Inside lay one of her protective charms—twine wrapped around bundled herbs, fastened with a loop of copper thread. It was one of the small ones she’d made soon after Ellie’s fever passed, hung over the cradle with a charmed whisper and a muttered dismissal of ceremony.

Now, it was blackened at the corners, the metal thread warped, and the sweet scent of sage and fennel replaced by an acrid, bitter edge.

Hobbie’s voice was low, matter-of-fact. “Didn’t burn from inside.”

I looked up. Her mouth was pressed into a line that wasn't quite tight, but firm.

“Something reached,” she continued. “From afar, maybe. But deliberate. Not stray. Not chance.”

Uldrek moved behind me. His hand settled against my shoulder, the pressure firm but gentle.

“Was Ellie—?” I started, throat dry.

“Asleep,” Hobbie cut in. “Didn’t stir. That charm broke before it crossed the cradle’s ward line. Magic held.”

I swallowed hard and smoothed a frayed edge of the wrapping with my thumb. “And you’re sure it wasn’t—”

“Nothing local,” she said, flat. “Not the kind of reach folk here know. And not cast close.”

I heard Uldrek breathe in behind me, slow and low, like preparing for something he hoped wouldn’t come.

“Which means?” he asked.

“Means someone is looking,” Hobbie replied. “And they’re getting closer.”

The evening hush seemed to press in tighter, muting the rustle of tree branches, the creak of porch planks. Distant laughter drifted from the house, soft and unaware.

For a long moment, none of us moved.

The charm in my hands felt heavier than its weight ought to allow. My fingers tightened around it instinctively, shielding it from the wind, though I knew it had already lost its power.

Uldrek didn’t speak, but his hand remained on my shoulder, not urging, just there—anchoring me to the ground I stood on and to the shape of the now.

Hobbie turned, her shawl snapping slightly in the breeze. “I’ll reweave the ward,” she said. “Better anchored. I’ll use hawthorn and silverthorn this time,” she added grimly. “Let’s see them reach through that without shedding skin.”

She didn’t wait for a reply, only tucked her hands beneath her arms and slipped past us, disappearing toward the back of the house with all the grace and grimness of a war priest twice her size.

I stood there, the charm still in my hand, the dusk deepening around us.

Uldrek’s voice came at last, low enough that it barely touched the wind. “You think it was him.”

“I don’t know,” I whispered.

But I did.

Only one man had reason to reach now.

“I need to be stronger,” I said, the words raw in my throat—not a vow, not a fear, just fact.

After a beat, Uldrek reached down and very carefully took the ruined charm from my hands, tucking it into his coat. Then, softly, “We’ll sharpen you. Blade to flint.”