Chapter 21 Othic
OTHIC
The pre-dawn air is cold. It is sharp in my lungs, carrying the metallic smell of frost and the faint, greasy char of last night’s roasted taura. The laughter from the feast is gone. The music is gone. There is only the wind whistling through the new, solid gate I built, a high, mournful sound.
My body is whole. The numiscu poison is a memory, the wound on my shoulder just a puckered, angry scar.
I am strong again. I roll my shoulders, feeling the smooth, healed pull of the muscle.
My hand rests on the hilt of the slaver’s broadsword.
I still hate this blade. It has no weight, no soul.
It is a clumsy piece of human iron, a reminder of what I have lost. But it is all I have.
"Othic."
Aurora’s voice. She is at my side, a small, pale shadow in the gray light. Her pack is on her back, her hair tied back with a leather strip. Her face is pinched, not with fear, but with a cold resolve. She is not the cowering maid I pulled from Privis’s halls. She is a warrior.
The farmhouse door creaks. The rest of the women follow, huddled in the doorway, their breath pluming in the cold. They are wrapped in cured hides, their faces pinched with sleep and fear. They have come to see us off.
Myra, the eldest, steps forward, her arms crossed tight against the cold. Her gaze meets mine, human to orc. There is no fear in her eyes. Only a deep, practical respect.
"It needs a name," she says, her voice rough. She jerks her chin toward the repaired barn, the crude but solid fence line I taught them to build. "A proper name. So we can find our way back. So we can tell others, if any find us."
A name. I am a warrior, not a poet. I look at the barn door I re-hung.
I look at the sharpened stakes I set in the earth.
I look at the women, standing in the open, not cowering, their hands resting on the hilts of the knives I taught them to use.
They are not victims. They are the shield. This place is the fortress.
"It is a Scildborg," I rumble. The Shield-Fortress.
The word hangs in the cold air, heavy and old.
"Scildborg," Myra says, and a slow, grim smile touches her lips. She nods once, a look of deep satisfaction. "Aye. That it is. It will hold."
It is time. There are no more words.
Jessa runs forward, her face crumpling, and shoves a small, crudely carved suru into Aurora’s hand. "For luck," she whispers.
Aurora pulls her into a fierce, tight hug, then moves to Myra, and to each of the others. A farewell of whispered promises and held-back sobs. I stand apart, a stone in their river of grief. They are her family.
Myra finally turns to me. Her eyes are hard. "You taught us to be strong, Othic. Now bring her back."
"Or bring our brothers here," Aurora corrects softly, her hand finding mine. Her small fingers slide into my massive, calloused palm. A perfect, impossible fit.
I look at the women. My clan. "Hold the Scildborg," I command.
Myra nods. "To the last."
I turn my back on the farmstead, the first real home I have known in this cursed land.
I do not look back. I cannot. Aurora’s hand tightens in mine.
She takes a single, shuddering breath, smelling the woodsmoke and safety one last time, and then she walks with me.
We cross the cleared yard, the repaired gate groaning a farewell as I push it open.
The sun is a brilliant, golden lie, a sharp, clean gold that spills over the open fields of Rach.
It feels wrong. This peace feels like a trap.
We walk for hours. The beautiful, open fields, vibrant with the false promise of safety, slowly give way to taller, denser trees.
The sunlight, once so bright, begins to dim, cut off by the thickening canopy. The air grows colder, damper.
The clean, sun-baked earth of the farm is gone, replaced by the true scent of the northern wilds: damp, sulfurous rot. The ground here is not firm dirt; it is a black, sucking mire that tries to steal my boots with every step.
This is the real Rach. The farm was an illusion.
The sound of our passing is too loud. The squelch of my boot in the mud. The snap of a twig. But the woods themselves are silent. Oppressively, unnaturally silent. No birds. No rodan chittering. The familiar tension returns, a cold knot in my gut, the need to scan every shadow.
My hand rests on the hilt of the human sword. It feels clumsy. Wrong. It has no balance. I miss my axe.
I hold up a hand, and Aurora freezes behind me. I squat, my eyes narrowed.
There, in the mud, is a footprint.
My blood runs cold. It is not a worg. It is not an elf. It is massive, far larger than my own boot. It is humanoid, but the toes are splayed, tipped with claws that have dug deep into the mud.
What in the hells...
I scan the trees, my heart hammering a sudden, heavy beat against my ribs. Nothing. Just shadows and the pale, sickly glow of fungus on black bark.
I kick a pile of rotting leaves over the print, covering it.
I will not tell her. Not yet. Her fear is a scent that will draw predators.