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Kargorr

T he parog was settling in to their new home rather nicely. He had sent off eight scouts, one in every direction, to map out the closest human settlements. They would go farther if they could, marking on leather with charcoal where they had gone and the landmarks they’d found along the way.

Just as important, though, was his selection for the small delegation he would send to the closest parog to start the process of diplomacy . He didn’t want to go away himself for so long and leave his own people without a leader at such a pivotal moment, so he thought carefully about who he would send in his stead.

Eventually he settled on Orgha, who would represent him well, along with one of his esteemed warriors, a half-orc who could match—and even surpass—a full orc with his skill in battle. If their envoy was challenged, Samrak would be a fair fight for anyone put forward.

A week after the raid, Kargorr gathered together a wagon full of goods, and even some gifts of iron and steel on top, with the promise of more in the future. It would be a long journey back into the snowy tundra for Orgha and Samrak, right into the mouth of another parog ’s territory. He hoped Cedar wouldn’t bear the brunt of Rathka’s strained bond while Orgha was away. It was difficult, Kargorr had heard, to be separated. But Orgha was his best choice for the effort, and Rathka would not be allowed to go with him while she had duties here to attend.

As expected, Orgha took the news well, saying he was honored to be chosen and carefully hiding any displeasure he might have felt at being given such a task. He would be gone a long time, but he only tapped his chest and agreed to do whatever Kargorr asked.

When the sledge was prepared and Orgha mounted his cat, he stopped to lean down and kiss Rathka. He ran his hand over the tooth necklace that hung from her neck before he nudged his cat into a walk. The mammoths were yoked to the sledge, and they set off, back into the north.

There would not be another raid until Orgha returned, in case something went wrong. The weather was cooling, the earth preparing for winter, but Kargorr had begun to look forward to it. The snow would be welcome and familiar to his parog , and then he could spend plenty of time in the furs getting warm again with his concubine.

The last of the leaves on the trees fell, creating a carpet on the ground. Cedar’s kitten was growing stronger every day and had already become rather tame. She even taught it tricks, something a grrosek had never thought to do. She would cut up tiny pieces of meat and then encourage Kiya to follow her, feeding them to him as he did what he was told. He could sit, and jump into the air, and even walk around in a circle.

Cedar poured all her love into the little creature, and Lord Kargorr was surprised by how much she had to give.

“How did you come to be a slave?” he asked her one night as they lay in the furs, covered in each other’s sweat. “I have always wondered.”

Cedar tilted her head up curiously, like she didn’t understand the question. Rarely had he asked her about her life, because before, it hadn’t really mattered to him. But the more times the sun set and rose, the more often Kargorr thought about what had made her who she was, how she had come to be at the farm in the village, running off into the woods.

“My parents sold me,” Cedar finally said. “We were starving. Lissa brought a cow to our village to sell for meat, and all my parents could talk about was how long a cow would last. When they took me to her, I assumed it was to help bring the cow back.”

She paused a long time, but Kargorr didn’t speak to fill the silence. Then she said, “I went with her, and my family kept the cow. I thought it was my responsibility to make sure they could eat, even if it meant I never saw them again.”

This was how Kargorr learned the way humans treated their offspring. Her parents had been hard on her as a child, making her work to earn her keep even as little more than a girl. This was not how the grrosek did things. Orclings were orclings and must be given room to go wild and play, to not have to worry about where their next meal came from. That was how a strong warrior was grown, not by cheating them of care and affection and forcing them into labor.

It surprised Kargorr even more, then, that Cedar had so much of her own tenderness and warmth to dole out to Kiya, lavishing him with it, when she’d had none as a child.

She would make a fine mother.

That thought, after so many weeks of enjoying her body and conforming her to his shape, triggered him to ask the shosek for the leaves. He had nearly forgotten with how deeply he had fallen into the crevasse of Cedar.

The shosek was in her dim, smoky tent, burning some kind of incense, when he arrived. Only a weaver of medicine could get away with ignoring him as she did, dragging the incense through the air in a serpentine shape with her eyes closed even as he sat across from her. When her meditation was completed, she paused for a moment to breathe deeply before acknowledging him.

“Lord Kargorr,” she said with a long exhale. “What brings you to me?”

“The leaves. I want to know if my concubine carries my orcling yet.”

He sensed disapproval in her expression, but she carefully schooled it. Not everyone believed as he did, of course, that sowing half-orcs in a human concubine was the way to grow an empire. But he was kazek , and not her.

“Of course.” She slowly rose, and Kargorr could almost hear her old joints creaking. Her hair was wild and gray all the way through, like a tundra bush. She rummaged through trunks in the back of her tent, then emerged with a handful of dry leaves.

“You know how to use them?” she asked pointedly.

Lord Kargorr’s shosek had been with him since the beginning. She had helped with his very own birth when she was a much younger woman. She knew he’d never had need of the leaves before; he had always been careful with his seed, and it wasn’t until he saw Cedar fleeing that day that he’d ever yearned for orclings of his own.

But he understood how they worked from his own warriors trying to grow their families, so he said, “Yes. Look for them to change color.”

The shosek held the leaves just out of his reach and narrowed her eyes.

“Not just any color. You are looking for bright red. You understand, kazek ?”

Kargorr grunted. Only this old woman could get away with speaking to him this way.

“Yes, I understand,” he said, and she put the leaves in his open palm. But then she grabbed it, hard, before he could go.

“You know, don’t you?” She dug her claws into him. “That an orcling born without the bond, without the use of your sarga , will be weaker in life?”

Every muscle in his body went rigid. These were old traditions, ancient superstitions that did not come anywhere near reality.

“ Shosek ,” he warned.

“Do not talk to me like I’m your concubine, too,” she hissed. “You are opening a door that could help you rise to the power you seek...” The weathered orc leaned forward, her cracked tusks bright in the firelight. “...or it could take all of it away.”

Kargorr snatched the leaves from her and stood, shivering with his anger.

“I did not come to my shosek ’s tent for fortune telling,” he snarled, the very hair on his skin bristling. How dare she threaten him? “I will grow fine, strong orclings, who will inherit all of this when you finally crumble to dust.”

With that, he swept out of her tent, clutching the leaves in his hand.

Cedar

Kiya was getting bigger by the day, and Cedar had spent many hours stitching together a new, larger bed for him with the extra blankets, clothes and furs that had been pillaged in the last raid. Lord Kargorr had suggested a craftsman would do it for her, but she insisted on doing it herself. She’d learned to sew as a girl, and often did it for Lissa, trying to put together old clothes so they looked new again. Cedar enjoyed building the outer layer of the bed and then stuffing it with torn-up bits of skirts and potato sacks, trying to make it as soft and cozy as she could.

Lately she’d been collecting other furs, one given to her as a gift by the family of one of the orclings she played with. They did not look her in the eyes, the same way the rest of the orcs wouldn’t, but they were friendly and kind and seemed to see her as their superior, which sat strangely with her. Cedar had never stood in a station above someone else, and it was pleasant and discomforting at the same time. Not even the other three or four humans scattered about the camp would speak to her, as much as she wanted them to.

How had they ended up here? There were two men and two women, who all seemed to speak in the orcs’ language fluently. One woman had a half-orc child, but when Cedar attempted to speak with her, Rathka shot her a warning look.

Kargorr must not want Cedar mingling with them. Well, that was fine. They all appeared to be concubines, too, and thus were not much use to her.

Cedar paid more attention now to what Rathka said to the other orcs as they walked around the camp, still annoyed at the kiya incident. One afternoon, they came across an old orc man out in front of his tent scraping leather. When Cedar stopped to see what he was doing, he summoned her over to show her. He could speak bits and pieces of the human tongue, saying his daughter had taken a human man of her own.

The old orc had a bounty of cured hides and furs in his tent shop, which he showed off to Cedar happily, proud that someone was taking an interest in his work. Cedar left Kiya with Rathka as she browsed his collection, and she paused on a pelt she’d never seen. It was small and pitch black, with white spots dotting it.

“A good eye,” he said, stroking the pelt. “From a rare deer. I have only ever seen one in my life. A faun.”

That explained the spots. Cedar ran her hand over it again, thinking how sad it was this unusual creature had been killed before it could even grow up.

“Take it,” the old orc said at last, slipping it off its rack. He slung it over her arms. “Perhaps the lord’s yapira will enjoy it.”

Cedar had heard this term before but was unsure what it meant. Still, after she had refused the gift twice, he insisted a third time, and she accepted. The leatherworker looked pleased with himself as she exited carrying the fur, and Rathka only clucked in disapproval as they returned to Kargorr’s tent.

The more furs Cedar acquired, the higher she piled them around the bed, and at night, she kept the faun’s fur under her head.

Kargorr never remarked on them, but when the latest black fur appeared, she thought for a moment she saw him smile.

He always looked at her now as he rocked his cock in and out of her, nursing her flames ever bigger and brighter. He had learned how to make her sob, how to make her beg, how to make her scream. He would hold her down and slide only the throbbing, wet swell of his cockhead inside her, over and over, until she said, “Please, I need it.”

“Very good, little deer,” he would answer, then he would plunge inside her, giving her everything she wanted.

It was curious when he returned one evening with a handful of leaves, and Rathka made herself scarce. He also brought a large clay bowl and then made his request.

“Urinate in it,” he told her in a surprisingly firm tone.

“In there?” Cedar asked, having only gotten used to the wet basket a few weeks ago. “Why?”

“I will use it.” He set the leaves on the table, spreading them out.

“For what?” She didn’t like the direction this was going.

Rather than answering her question, Lord Kargorr said, “Come now. Just some.” He held out the bowl again. “Then I’ll get you that syrup-coated bacon you like.”

He was a wily one. If she could, Cedar would eat that crusted bacon until it killed her.

“All right.” She took the ceramic pot and shooed him away. Instead of leaving, Kargorr sat down at the table and watched her.

She saw the dagger and remembered what he had said about there being no secrets between them. With a sigh, she squatted over the pot and closed her eyes, thinking much too hard.

“You must relax,” Kargorr said in a quiet voice.

Finally, it burst free, and Cedar let out a stream into the pot. When she was finished, she awkwardly shuffled away, humiliated that she’d done that in front of him.

Kargorr kneeled next to the pot and dropped in one leaf, then two, then three. Curious at what he was doing, Cedar crouched beside him and watched.

Before them, the leaves began to change color. They went from pale brown to yellow, to orange, and then bright red.

Bloody red.

Cedar gasped and turned to Kargorr, and saw his eyes were alight, his mouth parted in surprise.

Suddenly, he was upon her, dragging her into his arms, crushing her against his body. His tusks framed the crown of her head as his breathing came heavy, and his claws curled around her waist.

“What is it?” Cedar asked against his chest, finding it rather hard to breathe.

“I’ve succeeded.” He gently released her, keeping his hands on her shoulders. “I’ve planted an orcling in you. It grows even now.”

Her mind went blank as the winter snow.

Cedar knew this time had been coming, but now that it was there in front of her, it barreled into her, plowing her over.

She was with child. With the offspring of an orc .

It would grow up to look like one of those half-orcs, with the fine features and sturdy frames. And Cedar would be bound to Kargorr.

Forever.