Page 14

Brotan

Humans have always seen me as a monster. Some days, I give them exactly what they expect.

Tonight is no exception.

A boot slams into my ribs, launching me over the tailgate. The pickup screeches around the emergency room's turnaround as I crash into the asphalt. My skin grinds away when my shoulder absorbs the impact, vision strobing—black to red to black again.

Worth it, though. The wad of cash tucked against my thigh says I'm the new underground king of Quinn's fight pit. Five thousand reasons why New York's champion fighter won't be smiling through his wired jaw for months.

"Stay the fuck out of Quinn's!" The voice fades as tires screech against pavement.

Blood money makes the world go round. I learned that lesson watching other orcs die in the camps when we were kids. The human guards pitted us against each other for sport, for profit, for their entertainment. Now I'm the one collecting, and they don't like the tables turned.

Tonight, it took five humans and a Louisville Slugger to my skull to take me down. In the camps, we learned to fight through pain, to use it as fuel. But the beast inside me—that primal, ancient part that lives in my blood—is sluggish tonight, struggling against the darkness edging in.

The Ironborn patch on my cut is soaked with my own blood, but it's still the only thing about me worth a damn. My brothers would be here in minutes if they knew, bringing the kind of retribution that makes headlines. But I'm on my own tonight, my burner phone shattered in the beating.

I plant my palms against the blood-slicked asphalt, arms trembling under my weight as I push myself up. White-hot agony rips through my ribcage, the sound of bone grinding against bone telling me what I already know. Three ribs broken, minimum. They’ve probably punctured something vital inside.

I've survived worse since they dragged us through the Rift as kids. An orc who can't take a beating doesn't live long enough to wear club colors.

I stagger forward, each step a battle against gravity. The bastards didn't dump me at the ER out of mercy—they did it knowing cops get called for orcs who look like they just painted the walls of a fight club. Hospitals mean questions, questions mean jail, and jail means losing my freedom.

Not happening tonight.

"He's trying to leave!" A woman's voice cuts through the night air.

"Don't let him go—he needs to answer for whatever he did!" another screams.

A bitter laugh scrapes up my throat. These civilians think I'm the threat when I can barely stand. Like I'm about to tear through their precious hospital when all I want is to drag my ass back to Ironborn territory.

The crowd thickens ahead of me. An old man plants himself in my path, brandishing his cane like a weapon. His eyes hold that familiar human hatred—the kind I've seen since I was five years old, locked behind camp fences.

"Move," I rasp, my voice shredded from roaring through the fights.

Instead, he jabs the cane toward my face. Pure reflex takes over—the same instinct that's kept me alive through a hundred street fights and bar brawls. I snatch the pathetic weapon and snap it over my knee like kindling. The sound echoes through the suddenly silent crowd.

"Not tonight, old man," I snarl, baring teeth and tusks still stained with my own blood.

They close ranks around me now, a tightening noose of bodies. Soccer moms clutching purses like shields. Men with that false courage that comes from being part of a mob. Security guards with hands hovering over tasers. The circle constricts with each labored breath I take.

"Someone call the police!"

"Don't let him go!"

"Animal!"

The last one hits where they mean it to. That's all I am to them—a beast in boots. All they see is green skin and tusks and an opportunity to be heroes.

White-coated staff gather at the entrance, watching from their safe distance. Their expressions all tell the same story: detached fascination mixed with disgust. Ready to let nature take its course if the mob decides to pounce.

My legs finally betray me, and I drop to one knee. Blood loss is winning over willpower. Dark spots swarm my vision like circling vultures. Dying in a hospital parking lot surrounded by humans—there's some bitter irony in that. Hammer will put my cut in the clubhouse memorial wall, another brother lost to a world that never wanted us in the first place.

Then the automatic doors slide open with a hiss, and everything changes.

She parts the crowd like a blade through flesh—five-foot-nothing of pure authority. Dark hair pulled back in a sleek ponytail, white coat billowing behind her, eyes burning with a fury that seems almost out of place on her delicate features.

"What the hell is going on out here?" Her voice slices through the noise.

She doesn't wait for an answer. Instead, she marches straight to me, showing no fear, no hesitation. Just pure, focused determination.

"Can you hear me?" she asks, crouching to my level, her eyes—hazel, flecked with gold in the harsh emergency room lights—meeting mine directly. She pulls a small light from her coat pocket and shines it in my eyes. "Can you hear me?" she repeats.

I manage a nod, fascinated despite the pain. Humans don't look me in the eye like this. They don't willingly get this close unless they're trying to kill me.

"We need to get you inside and assess your injuries. Where are you hurt worst?" Her hands move with professional precision, checking my pulse, gently probing my abdomen. She sees my leg and lifts the torn fabric on my thigh. "Shit," she whispers. "How are you even alive?"

"I’m not staying here, Doc," I mutter, trying to push myself back up but failing miserably. "Just need to get past these assholes."

The corner of her mouth twitches—almost a smile that hits me harder than any punch tonight. "You're in no condition to go anywhere. You're bleeding from at least three major wounds I can see. No telling what I can't see yet."

"My crew can patch me up," I gesture vaguely toward the street beyond the crowd, the movement sending fresh pain radiating through my body. Pain is good. Pain keeps me from noticing how her fingers feel against my skin.

She nods, then looks over my shoulder. "The same crew who did this to you?" I don't have time to answer before she yells over my shoulder. "Get me a wheelchair. Now."

No one moves. The crowd stares, and the hospital staff remain frozen in the doorway.

"Are you kidding me?" she snaps. "This man is bleeding out in our parking lot. Someone Move!"

Something primal in me responds to her command, to the fire in her eyes. In another life, another world, I'd show her exactly what happens when you wake the beast inside an orc. But that's a fantasy that gets humans killed.

"He's not a man," a strangled voice answers from the crowd.

"Let him die," comes another.

Doc glares at the circle of humans, then over my shoulder again. “Do I have to do everything myself?” The words come out bitter and cold, disgust radiating from each syllable.

"Dr. Johnson." A gray-haired man in a lab coat enters the circle, all pressed whites and polished authority. "You know the policy."

Her back straightens until I swear I hear her spine crack with tension. Heat radiates off her in waves. "Policy? He's a living, breathing being, Dr. Ramsey."

"It's for the safety of our other patients," Dr. Ramsey says, his tone indifferent. "We're not equipped to handle... his kind."

The way he says "his kind" drags claws down my spine, awakening the beast I keep chained in the darkest part of me. But this tiny human doctor seems ready to tear out throats with her bare teeth—and all for someone she doesn't even know.

"We took the same oath, all of us," she says, voice tight as a garrote wire. "Or have you forgotten that part about 'do no harm'?"

Dr. Ramsey's expression hardens to concrete. "I'm not the one who did this to him."

"No. You're just the one willing to watch him die." Her face goes bloodless with rage before her stare locks back onto me. "Stay put," she commands before storming past the gathered staff. They scatter like cockroaches.

A minute later, she returns, shoving a wheelchair through the crowd like a battering ram. The onlookers whisper but part for her—recognizing a predator when they see one, even if it wears a white coat instead of leather.

Something about her refuses to fit into any box I understand. Human women fear me, hate me, or want to use me. They don't risk careers defending me. They don't look at me like I'm worth saving. And they sure as hell don't make my blood run hot when they stand toe-to-toe with men twice their size.

"I'm not going inside," I say flatly, pushing back against whatever the hell this is. "I just need to get clear of this place."

"And I'm not letting you bleed to death in the street," she counters, eyes flashing. "Can you get in, or must I pick you up?"

Nobody talks to me this way. Nobody dares. I fight a grin.

"I got it," I growl, bracing against the wave of agony as I haul myself into the chair. Metal groans under my weight but holds—unlike my resolve, which cracks a little more each time she looks at me.

"You still can't take him inside, Maya. Let security handle this." The other doctor's voice carries the assumed authority.

Maya—so that's her name—ignores him completely, wheeling me around with the determination of someone who's never learned when to quit. She pushes toward the entrance, then veers sharply before hitting the doors.

"Where are you taking him?" Dr. Ramsey calls after her, the edge of panic in his voice sweeter than any victory tonight.

"To be treated," she replies without slowing or glancing back.

As we round the corner, her plan becomes clear. An ambulance sits empty, two EMTs lounging against its open doors, eyes locked on cell phone screens. One look at the storm in Maya's eyes, and they back away from their vehicle like she's pulled a gun instead of just a glare.

"Fine," she says, venom dripping from each syllable. "They don't want you inside, then we'll do this outside."

"I'm fine," I protest, already knowing it's useless. "Just let me–"

"Shut up and let me save your life," she cuts me off, and something dangerous stirs in me—something I've kept buried under years of discipline. Her commanding voice does things to me I'd rather not admit, awakening instincts that have nothing to do with fighting and everything to do with claiming. I imagine her voice like that in a different context, imagine her small frame pressed against mine, imagine the sounds I could drag from her throat if I—

I kill the thought before it fully forms. That's a road that gets people dead. I've seen what happens when the beast breaks free.

Before I can rebuild my walls, she hooks her arm under my shoulder, using leverage and pure stubborn will to haul me up. For someone half my size, she's surprisingly strong—or too determined to accept her own limitations.

"You'll be dead before you make it wherever you're going. Just let me stop the damn bleeding."

She's right, though my pride hates to admit it. I've lost too much blood to make it back on my own. Maya climbs into the ambulance first, then reaches back with both hands. Her fingers wrap around my forearms, steady and certain as she helps guide my broken body up and in.

Her touch burns through my skin, bringing a different kind of pain. The kind that warns of danger ahead.

Inside the ambulance, fluorescent lights reveal the full extent of the damage. Maya moves with surgical precision, gathering supplies and prepping the small space.

"Take off your jacket," she orders without looking up, already threading a curved needle.

I comply, biting back a groan as dried blood pulls free with the leather. My leather cut bears the witness marks of tonight's work—torn in places, soaked through in others. The shirt beneath is a lost cause, more blood than fabric at this point.

She turns back, and I catch the momentary widening of her eyes as she takes in the full canvas of damage. Her gaze moves clinically at first, cataloging wounds. But then something shifts—a subtle change in her breathing, a lingering glance that goes beyond medical assessment.

"You're lucky," she says, cutting away my shredded shirt with practiced snips. The backs of her fingers brush against my skin, and I feel her slight recoil at my heat. Orc body temperature is always a surprise to humans who touch us. "Internal bleeding would've killed you before morning, but these look like they somehow missed anything vital."

Her eyes trace the tattoos mapping my torso, black ink telling stories of Orc camps and underground fight clubs, and my last few years with the Ironborn. Her pupils dilate slightly when she notices the muscle definition that knife wounds and broken ribs can't erase. She's trying not to notice, but her body betrays her—quickened pulse, subtle flush creeping up her neck.

"I've had worse," I rumble, my voice like gravel even to my own ears.

She makes a sound—half laugh, half scoff. "You say that like you’re proud of it."

I'm surprised into a chuckle, which quickly turns into a curse as my ribs protest. "I am."

"Hold still," she murmurs, leaning close to examine the deepest wound—a four-inch gash across my thigh where some bastard got lucky with a switchblade. The wound gapes open, revealing muscle beneath. "This needs stitches. Several in fact."

She douses the area with antiseptic that burns like hellfire, but I don't flinch. I've had worse from brothers just testing my tolerance in drinking games.

"I’m going to numb it first," she says, filling a syringe with clear liquid. This time she warns me before plunging the needle into the meat of my thigh, angling it under the wound edges.

While waiting for the anesthetic to take effect, she cleans the other cuts—one across my ribs, another slicing my bicep, assorted smaller damage to my forearms and face.

"Most of these I can close with butterflies," she says, applying adhesive strips to pull together the edges of a cut above my eye. Her face is inches from mine, close enough that I can count the freckles dotting her nose and smell the coffee on her breath underneath her floral perfume and soap.

She moves back to my leg once the numbing takes hold, threading a curved needle with practiced ease. "Bar fight?" she asks, making the first stitch.

"Something like that."

She shakes her head, not looking up as her hands work, pulling flesh back together with tiny, perfect sutures. "Grown men acting like children. Doesn't matter what species—Y chromosomes and alcohol always lead to the same stupid outcome."

"Says the woman patching up the winner," I reply, watching her hands work. They're small but steady, no hesitation as she pierces my skin.

Her eyes flick to mine, and for a moment I see amusement there. "Is the other guy in worse shape?"

"Guys and, guaranteed."

She shakes her head, but I don't miss the tinge of a grin riding the corner of her mouth. "I bet they are." Her gaze drops to my knuckles, split and swollen from connecting with jaws and ribcages. She runs her thumb across them, a touch too deliberate to be purely professional. "These hands have seen a lot of fights."

The casual intimacy of her touch sends a jolt straight to my core. Something raw responds to the feel of her skin against my battle-worn knuckles—soft against hard, healer against destroyer. My pulse kicks up, and I have to fight the urge to grab her wrist, to see if her pulse would match mine. It's been so long since anyone touched me without fear or purpose that I nearly forget to breathe.

Unfazed by the war she’s set off inside me, she ties off the final suture on my thigh, cuts the thread, then applies a dressing over her handiwork. "Twenty-three stitches. That's going to leave a mark."

The wound addressed, she turns her attention to my ribs, taping them tightly, even when I growl at the pressure. Her fingertips brush against old scars—knife wounds, bullet grazes, the history of a violent life written in raised flesh.

"You should really stay overnight for observation," she says, placing the final piece of tape. "That head injury could be worse than it looks, and these wounds need monitoring."

"Don't worry, Doc," I say, watching her hands work. "Orcs heal faster than humans. By tomorrow, these will be halfway closed."

She looks skeptical but continues her work, applying antiseptic to the smaller cuts and butterfly closures where needed. "At least six weeks before these ribs heal completely. I don't care how fast your biology works."

She reaches for a syringe filled with something else. "This should help with the pain that'll hit once the adrenaline wears off."

Before I can respond, she's jabbing the needle into my thigh, right next to the newly-stitched stab wound.

"Ouch, Doc," I hiss. "Warn an orc next time."

She raises an eyebrow. "Oh, you can take being stabbed and beaten half to death, but a little needle hurts?"

"Those assholes I saw coming. You, I'm still figuring out."

Doc cuts me a look, but I don't miss the amusement dancing in her eyes.

She's about to say something when a shadow falls across the ambulance's open doors. Two security guards stand in the doorway, expressions grim.

"Dr. Johnson," one says, "Chief of Medicine wants to see you. Now."

She doesn't look up from applying a bandage to my forearm. "Tell Dr. Ramsey I need two more minutes, and I'll be done."

"Ma'am—"

She levels a stare that says she'd have no problem putting her next needle somewhere painful. "Two. Minutes."

The guards exchange glances but step back, giving her the time she requested.

"They're going to fire you," I say quietly.

She shrugs, her focus never wavering from her work. "Maybe. Or maybe they'll just write me up again."

"Again?"

A small, tired smile crosses her face. "Let's just say this isn't the first time I've disagreed with hospital policy."

"Rebellious doctor with a thing for lost causes," I murmur, voice dropping to a rumble that has her hands pausing for just a moment. "Dangerous combination."

"Maybe I just don't like being told what I can and can't do," she replies, meeting my gaze with a challenge in her eyes that makes my blood heat. "Or who I can and can't help."

"You and me both, Doc."

She finishes securing the last bandage, then sits back, studying her handiwork. "The pain meds I gave you will help for a few hours. The antibiotics will stave off any infection. The ribs are definitely broken, but there's not much I can do except tell you to rest. The stab wound missed anything vital, but keep it clean. You’ll need to see a doctor if anything changes."

"I'll live," I say. "The patch job will help speed things up."

She nods, then helps me out of the ambulance. The security guards hover nearby, impatient now.

"Dr. Johnson," one of them says, more insistent this time.

"I'm coming," she snaps, then turns back to me. "Take care of yourself. And maybe stay out of bars for a while."

I look at her—really look at her. This human woman who stood up to a mob to protect a bleeding orc. Who put her job on the line to treat me when her colleagues would rather watch me die. Who touched me with hands that healed instead of hurt.

"I owe you, Doc," I say, my voice dropping to the dangerous rumble that typically has humans backing away. Maya doesn't back down. Instead, her pupils dilate slightly, and I catch the quick flutter of her pulse at the base of her throat. The beast inside me growls in satisfaction at her response.

Her eyes meet mine one last time, something unreadable flickering in their depths. "Then do me a favor and don't make someone else patch you up tomorrow night." She gives me a small smile. "I've got enough idiots to treat without adding repeat customers to the list."

With that, she turns away, flanked by security guards, her white coat billowing behind her like a battle flag.

I watch until she disappears through the sliding doors, then slowly turn toward the street. The pain is duller now, thanks to whatever she injected me with. I can make it back to the clubhouse and my brothers in the Ironborn.

But as I limp away from the hospital, my mind keeps returning to her hands against my skin, the challenge in her eyes, the way she stood between me and danger without hesitation. My beast paces restlessly beneath my skin, already hunting, already wanting. Doc Maya with the steady hands and fire in her eyes. A woman who isn't afraid of monsters.

And for the first time since crossing the Rift, I find myself craving something more dangerous than any fight—the chance to be seen as more than just tusks and green skin by someone who isn't afraid to look.