Page 27 of Bound By Blood (Orc Warrior Romances #1)
EIRIAN
T he first wave crashes against our defenses like storm surf against unyielding cliffs.
I crouch behind the stone barrier, hands unwavering through the chaos erupting around me.
Three wounded warriors already sprawl at my feet with arrow wounds, sword gashes, one with a spear point lodged between his ribs.
My fingers work without conscious thought, applying pressure, binding wounds, calculating who needs immediate attention versus who can wait.
"Healer!" A desperate shout from the left flank.
I snatch my satchel and sprint toward the cry, keeping low as arrows hiss overhead. A young warrior, barely past his first battle-marks, clutches his shoulder where crimson seeps between his fingers. Clean entry wound, missed the major vessels. He'll live if I can stop the bleeding.
"Hold still." I carry the authority of someone who's navigated countless medical crises. The totem pulses warm against me as I work, its energy flowing through my hands into his torn flesh.
Strange. The healing happens faster than it should, tissue knitting with unnatural speed. The warrior's eyes widen as strength returns to his injured arm.
"By the ancestors," he breathes. "What did you?—"
"Get back to your position." I push him toward the battle line before he can finish the question. No time to examine the totem's effects now.
The morning sun climbs higher, painting the battlefield in harsh contrasts of light and shadow. Our defensive line holds, but barely. The enemy adapts quickly, using grappling hooks to scale the cliff face where our archers can't target them effectively.
A bone-deep roar shakes the very stones beneath my feet.
I look up to see something that turns my blood to ice as a massive war-beast charges up the pass, its hide scarred from countless battles, tusks gleaming like ivory daggers. The raiders must have been saving it for when our defenses cracked.
The creature stands twice the height of a mounted warrior, its bulk enough to shatter our stone barriers through sheer momentum. Worse, panic spreads through our ranks as it approaches. Even seasoned fighters back away from something that primal and destructive.
"Fall back!" Drokhan's voice cuts through the din. "Reform on the secondary?—"
No. The word crystallizes in my mind with perfect clarity. If we abandon this position, the beast will break through into the main stronghold. Children shelter in the caves beyond. Mothers with newborns. Elders too frail to evacuate.
The totem burns against my skin, power thrumming through its ancient carved surface. I've felt this energy before, during my mother's secret rituals, when she thought I wasn't watching. But this feels different. Amplified.
I step forward, directly into the beast's path.
"Eirian!" Drokhan's warning barely registers as I advance toward certain death.
The creature's eyes lock onto mine, yellow, intelligent, filled with pain that has nothing to do with physical wounds. This isn't mindless rage. Cruelty and suffering have tortured it into fury and driven it beyond rational thought.
Just like the soldiers I tend, I realize. Broken by violence, lashing out because pain is all they know.
My hands find the totem, pulling it free from beneath my robes. Moonlight seems to gather in its carved channels despite the blazing sun overhead. The beast slows, massive head tilting as if recognizing something familiar.
" Thurok nalar vethis, " I whisper, the words flowing from some deep memory of my mother's midnight teachings. Peace to your spirit.
The ancient Orc phrase carries weight beyond its meaning. The totem grows warm, then hot, energy cascading down my arms in visible streams of silver light. The power feels like standing in a river during flood season, overwhelming, dangerous, but flowing toward some greater purpose.
The war-beast stops mid-charge, confusion replacing fury in its massive features.
I take another step forward, close enough now to see the scars covering its hide, the fresh wounds where spurs and whips have driven it to madness. Tears streak down my cheeks as understanding hits. They tortured this creature into a weapon, just like any forged blade.
" Thurok nalar vethis, " I repeat, louder now. The totem's light extends toward the beast like reaching fingers.
Its magnificent head lowers, bringing those yellow eyes level with mine. Intelligence flickers there, awareness fighting through layers of imposed rage. The silver light touches its scarred forehead, and something fundamental shifts.
The beast's breathing slows. Its massive body settles onto the rocky ground with surprising gentleness. Those terrible tusks, which moments ago promised destruction, now frame a face that looks almost peaceful.
Silence spreads across the battlefield like ripples in still water. Enemy and ally alike stare at the impossible sight, a human healer gentling a war-beast through nothing but words and strange light.
"Impossible," someone whispers from the enemy ranks. "The northland magic is real."
Northland magic. The phrase sends chills down my spine. My mother spoke of such things in her secret moments, stories of power that flowed between human and Orc bloodlines in the earliest days. Stories I thought were children's tales.
The beast's massive form blocks the pass completely now, creating an impenetrable barrier the enemy can't breach without dealing with a creature they can no longer control.
But more importantly, the fighting spirit drains from their ranks as they witness something that challenges everything they thought they knew about the world.
"Withdraw!" The enemy commander's voice cracks with uncertainty. "Fall back to secondary positions!"
They retreat down the pass in ragged order, discipline crumbling in the face of inexplicable events. Within minutes, the immediate threat passes, though I suspect they'll regroup and try again with different tactics.
I sink to my knees beside the massive beast. The totem's energy has drained something vital from my core, leaving me shaky and hollow. But alive. We're all alive.
The war-beast, no, not a war-beast anymore, just a creature freed from torment rests its head near my feet with surprising delicacy. Its breathing carries the rhythm of deep sleep rather than the harsh panting of battle-fury.
"How?" Drokhan approaches cautiously, his voice filled with wonder and something that might be fear. "What did you do?"
"I don't know." The truth tastes strange. "The totem responded to pain. To suffering. I think it wants to heal things."
Around us, the clan warriors emerge from defensive positions with expressions I've never seen before as awe mixed with a new respect. Not the grudging acceptance of a useful captive, but something approaching reverence.
An old priestess hobbles forward, her ancient eyes fixed on the totem still glowing softly in my hands. When she speaks, I hear the generations.
"Khaleth mor thuvan," she breathes. "The peace-bringer returns."
Peace-bringer. The title settles over me like a mantle I never asked to wear. But as I look around at the faces surrounding me, Orc warriors who moments ago faced certain death, now safe because of something I barely understand, I realize that asking for it was never the point.
The moment I picked up my first healer's kit, I made the choice. Every patient I've tended, every wound I've bound, every life I've saved has been preparing me for this moment when healing became something larger than medicine.
Drokhan kneels beside me, his calloused hand gentle on my shoulder. "Are you hurt?"
"No." I lean into his solid warmth, drawing strength from his presence. "Just tired. The totem takes something when it gives."
"Then we make sure you don't have to use it again unless absolutely necessary." He has the firm resolve of a leader making a command decision. "But Eirian, what you did today changes everything. Not just for our clan, but for the entire conflict."
I understand what he means. Word of this will spread beyond the battlefield, beyond clan territories, into the halls of power where human nobles decide policy toward Orc territories.
A human healer who can channel ancient magic, who can gentle war-beasts and turn the tide of battle without spilling blood, such a person becomes either a bridge between worlds or a target for those who profit from continued conflict.
"We'll face that when we must," I tell him, putting the totem back under my robes where its gentle warmth reminds me that some powers are for healing, not harm. "Right now, I have wounded to tend."
The afternoon stretches ahead of us, filled with the ordinary miracles of battlefield medicine. But as I work, I can't shake the feeling that everything has changed, that the woman who gentled a war-beast with ancient words is not quite the same person who woke in Drokhan's arms this morning.
Perhaps that's how all transformations happen, not in grand moments of conscious choice, but in the quiet spaces between heartbeats when we discover we're already someone new.