Chapter 6 #2
"You're not walking anywhere on this." His hands began wrapping her ankle with the same methodical care he'd shown her arms, immobilizing the joint with strips of cloth and something stiffer—bark, maybe. "Not for days. Possibly a week."
"I don't have a week." The panic was rising now, cold and sharp-edged. "They'll find me. They'll—"
"They will not take you."
The words cut through her spiral like a blade.
Ralvar finished wrapping her ankle, secured the bindings with a knot, and finally looked up. His eyes were steady and certain. There was no doubt in them. No hedging, no qualification, no maybe or possibly or we'll see.
Just absolute conviction.
"They will not take you," he said again, slower this time. "I won't allow it."
"You don't even know me."
"I know enough."
"I'm—" She stopped. Swallowed past the lump in her throat. "I'm just some girl who ran into your territory. You have no reason to—"
"You don't have to earn safety,” he said.
His hand was still on her calf, steady and warm, an anchor in the storm of her confusion.
“You don't have to prove you deserve protection.
Those things should be given freely, without conditions.
That they weren't—by your own people, by your own family—" His voice dropped lower, rougher.
"That is a failing of humans. Not of you. "
Delia's eyes burned.
She was not going to cry. She was not. She'd survived the wagon, the cold, the night, the terror of meeting an actual orc in the flesh. She was not going to fall apart now just because someone was being kind.
"I don't understand," she whispered.
"I know." His hand gave her calf a gentle squeeze. "You don't have to understand yet. You just have to trust that when I say they won't take you, I mean it."
She stared at him. At this massive, scarred, impossibly gentle creature who had appeared in her darkest moment and refused to fit any of the shapes she'd been given for him.
"How do I believe that?" she asked. "How do I trust you? I've known you for hours. You're—" She gestured helplessly. "You're an orc. Everything I've ever been told says I should be terrified of you."
"Are you?"
Delia thought about it. Really thought, past the old conditioning, past the stories, past the fear that had been trained into her since childhood.
"Less than I should be," she admitted.
Something flickered across his face. Not quite a smile, but close.
"Then trust that." He released her calf finally, withdrawing his hands to rest on his thighs again. "Trust the parts of you that aren't afraid. They're seeing clearly."
She wanted to argue. Wanted to insist that she couldn't possibly trust a stranger, couldn't possibly believe that anyone would protect her without conditions.
But his hands were open again. Resting on his thighs, palms up, where she could see them.
And her ankle was wrapped. Her scratches were cleaned and bandaged. She was warm, and dry, and fed.
Not one person in that wagon had cared whether she was any of those things.
"The guards," she said slowly. "If they come. What will you do?"
Ralvar's jaw tightened again. That darkness flickered behind his eyes, there and gone.
"Whatever I have to."
"You can't fight all of them."
"How many are there?"
"I don't—" She tried to remember. The wagon, the darkness, the journey. "Two guarding the workers. But there might be more. Outriders or—"
"Two guards." His voice was flat. Unimpressed. "Three or four outriders at most, for a debt caravan of that size."
"You can't fight five or six men alone."
For the first time, something that might have been humor crossed his features.
"Delia." He said her name carefully, like he was still getting used to the shape of it. "Last night, before I found you, I killed six raiders who thought to cross into our territory."
The words hit her like cold water. "You—"
"Six." He held up a hand, ticking them off. "Three archers, two swordsmen, and one who tried to run." His gaze met hers without flinching. "The guard captain and his handful of men are not a concern."
She'd known. Abstractly, she'd known. He was an orc warrior, a captain of the border patrol—of course he'd killed people. Of course he was dangerous. But hearing him say it so casually, so matter-of-factly, like snuffing out human lives was simply part of his evening...
She should have been terrified.
But she remembered the raiders who'd attacked border villages. Remembered the stories of farms burned, women taken, men gutted and left for the crows. She remembered that the human kingdom had its own monsters, and they didn't need tusks.
"You killed them because they were crossing into your territory?"
"I killed them because they'd already raided a trade caravan." His voice was grim now, the dark humor gone. "Found what was left of the merchants an hour before. The raiders were heading back to human lands with stolen goods."
"Oh."
"So yes. I can fight five or six men. The question isn't whether I'm capable." He leaned back slightly, studying her. "The question is whether you want me to."
Delia blinked. "What?"
"I won't force you to stay. Won't force you to accept my protection if you'd rather try your luck elsewhere." His voice was careful, measured. "If you want to find your own way, I won't stop you."
"I can't even walk."
"I know. Which is why I'm asking now, before it becomes urgent." His eyes held hers, steady and serious. "What do you want, Delia?"
There it was again. That question. The one no one had ever asked her.
What do you want?
She wanted to be safe. She wanted to be warm. She wanted to stop running, stop hiding, stop feeling like prey in a world designed to consume her.
She looked at him. At the massive orc warrior who had knelt in the mud and shown her his empty hands. Who had carried her through the forest like she weighed nothing. Who had spent the entire night awake, watching over her, and then dressed her wounds.
"I want to believe you," she whispered. "I want to believe that someone would actually—that I could actually—"
Her voice broke.
She wanted to trust him. That was the terrifying truth, the thing she could barely admit even to herself. Some part of her wanted to believe that this stranger meant what he said. That she could matter to someone.
She wanted to believe the stories were wrong.
"Okay," she said, the word escaping before she could stop it. "Okay. I want—I want to stay with you. At least until I can walk. At least until I know—"
She couldn't finish. Didn't know how.
But something shifted in Ralvar's face. That darkness behind his eyes softened into something that looked almost like relief.
"Okay," he said quietly. "Then you stay with me."