Page 14 of The Outcast Orc (Claimed by the Red Hand #1)

14

QUINN

I’d love to think I could truly manage to sleep with one eye open—but the orc’s home was not only scrupulously clean, but warm and quiet. Back in the Fortifications, I was used to the sounds of my neighbors carousing. But here, carousing—like sitting cross-legged—must not have been allowed.

Maybe there was no mattress, but Marok had more pelts than a fur trader. The bed I made for myself was more lavish than any mattress I could afford, and before I knew it, I was deeply asleep.

“Quinn?”

Daylight streamed through the high, narrow windows as Bess shook me awake. I was startled, disoriented, duped by the soft furs into thinking I’d fallen asleep in some wealthy man’s bed and not an orc settlement.

I rolled over and gave Bess a reassuring smile. Her eyes were red-rimmed and her cheeks were pale, but at least she’d stopped crying. She whispered, “Do you think the monster would notice if I washed up a little?”

I suspected our captor noticed everything. “Maybe. But he didn’t mind when I did.”

“That’s different. You’re a man. Men can do as they please.”

I thought back to the guards at the gate. That female orc didn’t seem like she’d take any guff. “Marok has treated us fairly so far. Even if you were to step out of line, claim human ignorance and you’ll get away with a stern warning.”

Bess hurried to the basin and splashed herself off, almost surreptitiously, like she was sure she’d be chastised. She was filthy, both from her time in the slaver’s tent and on the road, and a quick wipe would hardly do much to help.

She was quick to come back to our nest of furs and settle in, positioning herself so that I was between her and the orc in the other room.

"At least they treat us better than the slavers,” I said, trying to cheer her up.

"Better than a lot of places I've been," she said with a humorless laugh. "Better than my uncle, after my parents died. He beat me whenever he took to drink. And it’s better than wandering around the Wastelands half-dead, after the household he sold me to did this—” she grabbed a fistful of her shorn hair for emphasis, “and threw me out without a thing to my name.”

Guess she hadn’t sold it for a wig after all. “Why would anyone do something like that?”

“Normally, I tended the children. Taught them their stitching, their letters, their prayers. But the family was hosting a big party, a fancy thing for their wealthier relatives from across town. They brought me out front with the parlor maids to make their staff look bigger. That was when I caught the master’s eye.”

“You don’t need to spell it out,” I said. “I’ve worked for a wealthy household or two myself. But…why your hair?”

“His wife claimed I stole a silver hairbrush. Said it was a fitting punishment.”

And now Bess was there beside me in an orcish village. I somehow doubted the orcs needed her to wipe their children’s snotty noses and tuck them into bed. Especially since they didn’t have beds.

Though they didn’t have any horses that I could see, either. So who’s to say what they wanted with either of us? Back when the goblins attacked us by the fire, Borkul seemed awfully familiar with them. Not just the female goblin, either. So, it seemed orcs weren’t as uptight about their conquests as the men in the Fortifications could be. In terms of both gender…and species.

Which meant we shouldn’t get too comfortable, because the worst might very well be yet to come.

Even if I did get a thrill from slipping my arms around Marok.

I took a look around, hoping to gain some insight into him. His home was unlike anywhere I’d ever been, both crammed full of things, yet somehow austere. There were chests and shelves, baskets and bureaus, all of them brimming with stuff. Lots of it was quite valuable, or at the very least, useful. But not a single damn place to sit, unless you wanted to crouch on the wooden slats of the floor—a floor that was so scrupulously clean that the only grit on it was whatever barkberry dust had fallen when I was treating his wound.

If I touched Marok’s stuff, I suspected, he’d know—so I didn’t handle so much as a candlestick. Only looked. The home had no kitchen, though there was a small hearth with a kettle, and a rack of wine jugs and wooden cups in the corner. In addition to that, there was clothing and armor and a spread of dried herbs and twigs that put my local apothecary to shame. And, of course, the furs. So many pelts.

And that was just his main room.

I might be confident, but I’m not stupid. Did I wonder about Marok’s sleeping chambers? Of course. Most working folks I knew didn’t even have a room all to themselves, let alone a separate bedroom. The nobility or the ultra-wealthy merchants could afford all that space, in their mansions with their parlors and libraries and greenhouses and stables, while the rest of us were lucky to share a room. But while I didn’t dare snoop through Marok’s bedchamber, I did keep watch on the door from the corner of my eye…and I was looking when the sleeping orc suddenly stood up in a single, fluid motion.

Maybe they had mastered the trick of sleeping with one eye open, after all.

He planted himself in the doorway and scanned the room. “I trust no one has shit in the house while I slept,” he said dryly.

Bess went pale.

“He’s kidding,” I told her. If either of us had , he’d probably be able to smell it from the other side of the village.

He told us to put away the furs—then made us fold and re-fold them until we’d arranged them to his satisfaction. He wasn’t threatening, exactly. More like…stern. And clearly accustomed to giving orders.

Which made the way the gate guards had ignored him even more curious.

Once everything was put away, swept, and polished, he marched us out to the latrines, then over to a huge communal building of post and wattle with a big hearth at the center. Inside, orcs squatted here and there, drinking from steaming bowls.

Don’t stare , I reminded myself.

While they seemed pretty curious about us, when they noticed we were with Marok, they immediately went back to their food as if we weren’t even there. Marok walked us over to a stack of clay bowls and gestured for us each to take one. “One dip only. Once you’ve earned your keep, maybe you can have seconds.”

I wasn’t sure what, exactly, was bubbling away in the huge stewpot—but it smelled like heaven. It had been so long since I’d had a hot meal, I didn’t even care what it was. Worst case scenario? Boiled grubs. And I was so ravenous, it made no difference.

We dunked our bowls in the pot and found a clear place to squat…a place that was suddenly even clearer once Marok settled in. Something was going on. This was obviously not the best time to ask about it—though even if we were back in the privacy of his house, I doubted he would enlighten me.

Turned out, if there were grubs in the stew, they tasted suspiciously like venison.

Even though Marok helped himself to three bowls, he finished his food first, since he could swallow it while it was still scaldingly hot. He waited blandly while we finished. As Bess and I were slurping up every last dreg, he suddenly shot to his feet, startling me so badly I nearly tipped onto my ass. I stood just as quickly, though my knees protested and pins and needles played through my feet.

A pair of stout orcs approached. They were decorated with feathers and white paint—the shaman’s men.

Don’t stare.

I turned my gaze to the back of Marok’s elbow and fixed the orcs in my peripheral vision.

“Taruut is ready now,” one of them said. “You will surrender the humans.”

They say that prisoners sometimes form an inexplicable bond with their captors. I’d never taken much stock in that. Until now. Maybe that phenomenon was at play…or maybe I just preferred the devil I knew.

Compared to what we’d suffered at the slaver’s hands, Marok’s treatment of us was downright genteel. But who knew what we could expect from the shaman?

“You’ve left them unchained?” one of the shaman’s men asked.

Marok shrugged. “I hardly saw the point. They have tiny, blunt teeth and no claws whatsoever. No weapons, and nowhere to run. But if you’re afraid of them….”

“Never mind,” snapped the shaman’s man, then gave me a shove to the shoulder that nearly flattened me. “This way—and I’m not in the mood to go chasing you. So don’t get any dumb ideas.”

He didn’t need to tell me twice. Though as I headed off to wherever he was taking me, I did turn and glance over my shoulder to steal one last look at Marok. All I saw, however, was his broad back as he returned to his house without a parting glance.