Page 11 of Agor the Merciless (Orc Mates #10)

“Gods,” Pira whispered, rushing across the stone floor. Setting her basket down, she reached toward the bindings, her fingers hovering over the coarse rope.

“Please untie me,” Zoe said.

Pira’s hands stopped, then fell to her sides. Her shoulders slumped.

“I cannot.”

“What do you mean, you can’t?”

Pira shook her head. “The captain sent me. Ordered me to bring food and water.” She gestured to the basket with a small jerk of her chin. “But his orders were clear. No one touches the rope. Only him.”

“That’s insane! He can’t just…”

“He is the captain. His word is our law.”

“So, you’ll leave me like this?” Zoe’s vision blurred with unshed tears.

Pira lowered herself onto the edge of the fur-covered bed. She arranged her skirts around her knees.

“No. I’ll stay. Help you eat. And drink.” She pulled bread and dried meat from the basket, the aroma of the crust filling the room. “Then I’ll keep you company until he returns.”

Zoe’s throat tightened with frustration. She turned her face away.

“Not hungry,” she muttered.

“You must eat.” Pira broke off a piece of bread. “You must keep your strength. No good will come from starving to spite the captain.”

The female orc held the food to Zoe’s lips.

Her pride fought the hunger, but her stomach cramped, a low growl betraying her.

She gave in, parting her lips to accept small bites.

The bread was warm, the crust giving way to a soft inside.

The dried meat followed, tough and stringy, flavored with smoke and unfamiliar herbs.

Pira followed each bite with sips of cool water from a clay cup.

“There.” Pira nodded after Zoe swallowed the last morsel. “Better.”

She didn’t rise from the bed. Instead, she shifted her weight, tucking one leg under her. The quiet company loosened the rigid set of Zoe’s shoulders.

“Tarn cannot stop talking about you,” Pira said, her tusks gleaming as she smiled. “Says you fixed the engine when his father couldn’t. Said your hands knew the answer before your head asked the question.”

Despite everything, a flicker of pride cut through Zoe’s anger. “Just experience. I’ve been doing it since I was a kid.”

“He calls you Zoe Fire-Hands now.” Pira’s laugh was light and cheerful. “Says your fingers move through metal parts faster than his eyes can follow.”

“Fire-Hands,” Zoe repeated, the corner of her mouth lifting. “I’ve been called worse.”

“Grol was impressed, too. Won’t admit it to anyone but me.” Pira leaned closer, her breath warm. “He grunted three times when telling me about you. Three! That is high praise from him.”

Zoe laughed. The situation was absurd: bound to a wall, being fed by an orc, discussing another orc’s approving grunts.

“Hestra says your eyes miss nothing,” Pira continued. “Says you saw the balance in her arrows when even warriors don’t pay attention.”

“She’s the real artist. Those arrowheads curved just right.”

“And Zana wants to teach you tanning. She never offers to teach.” Pira’s eyes were bright in the low candlelight. “You even scared Roric. He dropped his hammer when you walked to his forge. Thought you were a fire spirit in human skin.”

The horde had seen her, the parts of herself her own family had tried to bury.

Pira reached for Zoe’s bound hands, her callused fingertips sliding underneath the rope to ease the pressure.

“One day among us, and already you belong.”

“Then why did Agor do this? He promised I could do whatever makes me happy. Then he dragged me from the garage like I’d committed a crime.”

Pira sighed. “The captain protects what is his. Sometimes he grips too tight, crushing what he means to hold safe.”

“This isn’t protection. It’s control.”

“No.” Pira shook her head, beads in her braids clicking. “Control is a plan made in the head. The captain burns in his blood. There is a difference.”

Frankly, Zoe didn’t see it, and she didn’t even really understand Pira’s words. Must’ve been the fact that the female orc sometimes found it hard to express herself in English, a language she’d probably had to learn on her own.

“You must understand,” Pira insisted. “Two brides came before you. They were bright with promise, until they shattered against his needs.”

“He mentioned that,” Zoe said. “What happened?”

“The first, Leah, with her red hair, came to us full of smiles. But when the captain wanted to claim her as he claimed you, she cried until dawn, begging to go home. He didn’t even touch her, really. He couldn’t.”

“And the second?”

“Elena. She stood tall, with dark, steady eyes. She made him wait three nights for her to feel ready, then when he could wait no longer, she broke down.”

“Because of the sex?” Zoe asked bluntly. “The spanking?”

Pira nodded. “The captain needs what he needs. It hurts him when women cannot bear his desires.”

“So, I passed his test, and now I’m his prisoner?”

“No, no. You misunderstand. The captain fears.”

“Fears what?”

“Losing you.”

Zoe tried to see the situation from Agor’s perspective.

This wasn’t the casual cruelty of her family, the deliberate diminishing of her worth.

This was terror of abandonment. It didn’t excuse the ropes on her wrists, but it changed the shape of his actions from simple tyranny to something more complex.

“That doesn’t give him the right to tie me up.”

“No,” Pira agreed, rising from the bed. “It does not. But the captain must discover this truth himself.” She gathered her basket. “He will come. Tonight or tomorrow. He will come, and you will speak your heart to his.”

Before leaving, Pira tugged the heavy furs up around Zoe’s body, tucking the edges with care.

“Thank you,” Zoe whispered.

Pira paused by the entrance. “You are one of us now, Zoe Fire-Hands. The horde sees you. The captain will learn to see all of you, too.”

Her footsteps faded down the tunnel until only silence remained.

The last candle guttered, its flame surrendering with a wisp of smoke.

Zoe lay wrapped in darkness and furs, thinking about what Pira had told her.

The women before her had broken, and he had let them go.

His fear of losing her, the one who hadn’t broken, was so strong it drove him to bind her rather than risk her leaving.

Pain from her wrists cut through her thoughts.

She wouldn’t be a treasure to lock away or a doll for a shelf.

She was Zoe Cross. She built engines and she would build her own future.

She wouldn’t break. And she would make him see all of her, not just the parts that pleased him.

The night passed in a haze of pain. Her shoulders ached from hours in one position.

Her throat was raw with thirst. Dawn eventually came, but the room was so far into the back of the cave that light wasn’t what gave it away.

Zoe heard birds calling from outside, the sound echoing down the stone passages into the gallery.

Then she heard boots scraping against rock.

The footfalls slowed, hesitated, then continued down the tunnel.

Agor appeared in the entrance, his bulk filling the space. Dark smudges bruised the skin under his eyes, and his braid was half-undone, strands escaping as if he’d run his hands through his hair all night.

He stood motionless, his gaze fixed on her. He took a step into the gallery and extended his hand toward her.

Zoe’s body went rigid under the furs. Her eyes locked onto his, her lips pressed into a thin line.

“Don’t you dare touch me.”