Page 13 of The False Shaman (Claimed by the Red Hand #2)

DROKO

One by one, my teams of explorers returned to report all the passageways in which they didn’t find the crypt. And one by one, I chalked their routes onto the floor. As the day wore on, the map tripled in size.

And still…no crypt.

Kof stood beside me, glaring down at the map. His shoulders drooped. But he made no move to stop searching. “We must have missed something. I’ll go back and check again.”

A good general knows when to march his troops, and when to rest.

“Go back to your barracks,” I told him. “We’ll take up the search in the morning. It’s been a long day.”

“Indeed it has,” said a goblin voice, once the guard captain was out of earshot. “But you may want to savor it. There may not be many more ahead of you.”

“Are you telling me you still haven’t found it?”

“Your predecessor lived to a ripe old age…which means the crypts haven’t seen any use in our lifetimes. Maybe even our fathers’ lifetimes. If there ever was a trail for me to pick up, the years erased it long ago. But I didn’t come entirely empty-handed.”

He unhitched a pouch from his belt and presented me with a cloth sack.

“It’s not a crypt. But it may buy you some time.”

There was a round bulge in the sack about the size of a spring melon, but it was lighter than it looked. I opened it and peered inside, and was greeted by the bony curve of a skull. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

Crespash sighed and rolled his oversized eyes. “You need ivories? Take this poor sod’s—he won’t be needing them.”

I turned the skull in its swaddling of burlap and inspected the teeth. Only a few were missing.

“Good,” I said brusquely.

It was probably the highest praise I’d ever given the goblin…and he noticed. “You’re not in the clear just yet. You’ve still got a chieftain breathing down your neck and a crypt to find. And only one more day in which to do it.”

“We’ll find it. I have a whole team of guards searching.”

“Maybe so. But who’s to say they’re actually looking? Trust no one, and you won’t be disappointed.” Crespash sidled toward one of the tunnels, readying himself to slip off into the warren of passageways. “No one.”

This was the way goblins thought. Always scrambling for power, always willing to step on whoever it took to get it. He didn’t understand that orcs knew the strength of the clan was more important than personal glory. Yes, the one who found the crypt would hope to be acknowledged. But there was no doubt in my mind that they were all looking.

I thrust a hand into the sack and pried at an incisor, but soon realized I’d need to get a good look at what I was doing, or else risk ruining the teeth. But not here.

I headed to the only spot I knew I’d be undisturbed: the meditation chamber. I rolled the stone into place, relieved to finally be safe from prying eyes. My guards might be loyal—but if they found out I was no shaman, the natural order of things would be shattered.

As I lit the brazier from a torch I carried, the room danced with firelight, and the old tapestry fluttered. Back when Gorgul had first offered me the room, it had felt too close, too quiet. But now that I was more familiar with the space, I felt a calmness steal over me. Probably just relief at being able to pull some teeth without anyone seeing. But it was a welcome change.

I squatted beside the ludicrous cushion and pulled out my eating knife. I kept the blade keen and the point sharp, and soon I’d managed to pry out a good handful of ivory.

The teeth were definitely better than pebbles, but I wasn’t sure they’d pass muster if anyone looked at them too hard. They seemed awfully large. What I needed was a child’s skull.

Or a human’s.

A tap on the round stone door snapped me to attention. “It’s suppertime, Droko the Sage,” called Archie. “Don’t make me set down this tray to open the door—evidently, you might end up with spider babies in your food. Though maybe orcs are into that sort of thing….”

I swept the teeth into my belt pouch and tucked the skull behind the hem of the tapestry, then rolled the heavy stone door aside.

The human stood there in the doorway in his linens, with a platter in his hands and a challenge in his eyes. But it wasn’t the way he looked that struck me. It was the way he smelled—like human sweat.

Sharp. Pungent.

Good.

The last time I’d been this close to him—that morning, when he’d slipped me the cure for the chieftain’s ailment—he’d smelled of human, certainly. But also of sulfur and herbs. Now, though, the scent of him filled my nostrils, alluring and rich—laced with something else I couldn’t quite place.

I parted my lips and let the scent settle on my palate. It played across the back of my tongue like a mystery.

“I knew you’d be hungry,” he said, and shouldered his way into the room.

He plunked the tray on the meditation cushion. Sacrilege, no doubt. But no worse than me using it to pry out a dead man’s teeth.

“Are we still playing the little game where you pretend I’m going to poison you?” he asked breezily. “Not that I mind, of course. I think I’m getting the hang of orcish cuisine.”

He plucked the dome off the food, and the smell of the meal blotted out everything else. Not the venison. And not the cave carrots.

But the spice.

Rubyseed was as rare as the gemstone it was named for—so rare it was reserved only for special occasions. Like birthdays. And victory feasts.

And weddings.

There’s a cask of rubyseed as big as your footlocker waiting for your wedding day. Farya will never forget how lucky she is to be part of the Two Swords Clan.

My father had been so proud. Not to celebrate my wedding—the wedding that never happened. But to make a show of dominance after his crushing defeat by Ul-Rott.

Archie took a spoonful and smacked his lips. “Maybe it’s an acquired…taste.”

He trailed off when I covered the ground between us in two strides, stopping short just shy of pressing myself against him. The scent of human mingled with the smell of Rubyseed. It was intoxicating.

He looked up, his eyes wide.

“What?” he asked cautiously.

I didn’t answer–I couldn’t. I just stood there, lost in the scent.

Then his eyes narrowed and he fell back a step. “Having fun?”

“What do you mean?” I demanded.

“This little game you’re playing—tease the lowly human.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Truly, I can’t imagine why I care,” he said with false breeziness. “And no doubt it’s amusing, you puffing up all big and virile whenever we’re close. Gazing at me like you’re undressing me with your eyes. Lavishing looks upon me brimming with promise…knowing full well you’ve no intention of making good on them.”

The urge to grab him and drag him up against me—to bury my nose in the crook of his slender neck—was overwhelming. “You have no idea what I intend.”

“Is that so? What about your vow of celibacy?”

“I took no vow.” The words came out low and rough. I risked everything by telling him that—and I knew that trusting him might be my undoing. But I couldn’t help myself.

The sardonic smile froze on his face, coloring with something part hope, part fear. “Truly?” he said, so softly it was barely a breath. “No wonder you seem so hesitant about all this shaman business. You’re no acolyte.” He smiled knowingly as I sucked in a gasp. If the human knew me for a soldier, it was only a matter of time before the honor guard caught on.

Archie smiled wider. “You’re a novice, at best.”

Relief flooded me as I closed the small gap between us and dipped down to bathe in his scent….

And then stopped myself, knowing that if the other orcs smelled him on me, Archie’s head would end up on a stake—right beside mine.

As I backed off, Archie’s eyes went cold. “Hah—you almost had me going there. I actually thought you wanted me—”

I grabbed him by the arm before he could turn away and gave him a rough shake. “What I want makes no difference. If I lay with you, the others will know.”

“They certainly wouldn’t hear about it from me!”

“It makes no difference. My scent mingled with yours would damn us faster than any accusation possibly could.”

A sly understanding dawned in Archie's eyes. “Well, if the pesky little matter of life and death is all that’s holding you back….” He smiled a secret smile. “I pride myself in being very creative.”

My heart beat so loud I was sure he could hear it. “What are you saying?”

He glanced down at my hand clenched around his upper arm. “I can get big results from a surprisingly small point of contact. A long time ago, I figured out that the power of seduction isn’t about a tight ass or a practiced stroke. It’s about the mind.”

My hand dropped to my side…but I stood my ground. Even when Archie’s eyes raked me up and down, and his scent shifted, growing even headier. This thing we played at could get us both killed. But desire surged within me so sudden and fierce that the risk paled in the light of my need.

As a soldier, I’d been prepared for many things. I drilled to take on an opponent with a sword or a spear. I practiced anticipating an enemy’s move. I even learned to fend off an attack from all sides. But this burning ache consuming me from the inside out was something I’d never experienced before. And I hadn’t the first idea how to fight it.

Only that the urge must be slaked.

“You’re wearing wa-a-ay too many clothes,” Archie purred. “Take off those leathers.”

I unhitched my cloak and fumbled at my armor’s lacings with fingers that somehow managed to be both over-sensitized and numb. It was madness to let a slave give me orders—yet I was powerless against his command. It should have been ridiculous, him in his children’s linens.

It was anything but.

I lifted my chest piece over my head, and Archie’s eyes roamed my body. “So chiseled I can see…. Every. Last. Muscle.”

Surely, now, he’d know me for the soldier I was. No acolyte would be so fit.

But that wasn’t the conclusion Archie had drawn. “I’ll bet you feel amazing. Skim your fingertips down your chest. Slowly. That’s me—learning you with my fingers and tongue. Exploring every hill and valley. Every rock-hard inch.”

The touch of my own hand was hardly anything to get excited about. But with Archie watching, sensation lit my body as I trailed my fingers down my chest. He reached down and adjusted himself and the scent of human arousal flooded my senses.

“I promise you this, shaman…someday, that touch truly will be mine. Once you’ve made your mark in this clan—once no one would ever think to question you—we’ll figure out exactly how to cover our tracks. Between the geyser and the herbs, there’s gotta be a way.” His gaze dropped to the lacings on my breeches. “And when we find it….”

He folded to his knees, and my entire world narrowed to the dart of his small pink tongue on his lower lip…and the thrumming of my pulse in my painfully-stiff cock.

“When we finally find it…I’ll do things to you that you’ve never even imagined.”

No doubt. He already was.

“Show me,” he said, urgent and low. “Show me the hulking beast that’s straining to bust out.”

I thought it would be a relief to free my aching cock, but when I pulled it out, the sight of it bobbing there inches from Archie’s upturned face only made its need grow sharper. “Touch it,” he whispered. “With my hand. It’s so big and meaty I can’t even close my fist around it. But I don’t let that stop me.”

My breath caught as familiar calluses rasped against my shaft. Surely, it felt nothing like Archie’s nimble, smooth human hand. But I was too far gone now to care.

“Damn. That head’s like a fist. And the veins…never in my life have I seen such girth. And it makes my mouth water.”

“Tell me,” I grunted, pumping my shaft. My balls drew up and arousal clenched my body. I wanted to take him and use him, and make him cry out and spurt his hot human seed.

“So big. And I’ll bet you taste divine….”

Archie’s eyelids closed as he swayed forward, cheeks flushed, utterly fuckable. His hot breath played across the gleaming tautness of my cockhead, and from that alone—a mere whisper of sensation—I found myself spiraling toward the point of no return.

Nothing else mattered—not the clan or the crypt or the fact that a sharpened stake was surely waiting for my head. Just the sweet, wet promise of Archie’s ripe lips.

The surge ignited somewhere deep in my guts. It flared fast, overtaking all my senses, with the power of a thrown spear. Wetness. The merest trace of a soft, human tongue skimmed my slit—Archie’s tongue—and I became the spear. Hurtling toward my target. Relentless. Unstoppable.

Even as I lost control, I scrambled to regain it—but I was too far gone. My thighs trembled as my legs locked, and pleasure roared through me that was just this side of pain. I’d denied myself far too long for a reward that would never come. This would have been my wedding night. And instead of spending myself with my mate, the one I would mark with my scent was this fragile human slave….

Who rolled to one side just as my seed pumped into the empty air where his sweet mouth had been a moment before.

His breathing was rough—almost as rough as mine—as we looked at the evidence of this thing we’d just done, painted across the meditation room floor in pearly strands. We’d barely touched each other, it was true. But a real shaman would never have let things go so far.

And that realization made fear take hold. “They’ll know,” I said. “The guards will know.”

“What?” Archie scoffed. “How?”

“They’ll scent it.”

“And here I thought Gargle was exaggerating this whole sense-of-smell thing just to get a rise out of me. But worry not, my shaman. I’ve got this.” He pushed to his feet and grabbed the meal he’d prepared—the stew heavy with rare rubyseed—and dumped the entire bowl on the floor, obliterating my spend.