Chapter Eighteen
Audrey walked onto the sports field wearing her hunter gear.
The leather pants allowed for easy movement, and the fitted black tank top left her arms free. Her combat boots were laced tight, and she wore a vest with reinforced panels over her torso. Two of her daggers hung at her waist in leather sheaths.
She felt strong and ready. She just wanted to show Brumis that she’d been wrong about her. She knew she might be making a mistake, but she didn’t really care. So many things had changed.
Audrey could tell the orcs liked her and accepted her, but she wanted to prove herself to Brumis the Bold, too. The female warrior saw her as a soft human, and it had started to grate on her.
There were about a dozen orcs on the field, scattered around the training equipment and weapons racks.
They stopped what they were doing when they saw Audrey, their conversations dying.
They stared at her, taking in the daggers strapped to her waist. Their eyes widened slightly, and a few of them exchanged glances.
Brumis smiled. She looked pleased, like she had been hoping for something like this. Seeing the knives, she dropped her sword and pulled two daggers from her belt, twirling them in her hands.
“I’ll give you a fair fight,” she said.
“Don’t worry about me,” Audrey said, facing her. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Is that so, little human?”
Brumis attacked. She lunged forward with surprising speed for someone her size.
Audrey sidestepped, bringing her dagger up to block the incoming strike. Metal clanged against metal.
Brumis swung with her other dagger in a vicious arc aimed at Audrey’s side, but Audrey ducked low and rolled away, coming up in a crouch several feet from where she’d been standing. Her heart pounded in her chest, adrenaline flooding her system.
“You move well for a human,” Brumis taunted.
“You talk too much.”
Audrey sprang forward, slashing with both daggers in a coordinated attack that forced Brumis to react. The female orc blocked one blade and deflected the other with a twist of her wrist.
They circled each other slowly, eyes locked, each looking for an opening.
Brumis feinted left, then struck right. Audrey anticipated it and parried, her blade catching Brumis’s just in time.
She countered with a quick jab aimed at the orc’s exposed ribs.
Brumis twisted away, avoiding the worst of it.
They started fighting properly, and Audrey soon realized that Brumis the Bold was not pulling her punches.
Every strike was meant to connect, and every move was aggressive and designed to hurt.
Audrey had to keep up, or she’d go down hard.
She matched Brumis move for move, but it was exhausting.
Brumis was stronger and heavier, and she used that to her advantage by pressing forward relentlessly.
More orcs began to gather around the field, drawn by the sounds of combat and the growing commotion.
They formed a loose circle around the fighters, watching in curiosity and amusement.
Someone shouted encouragement to Brumis, another called out support for Audrey.
The crowd started cheering and shouting, picking sides and getting invested in the outcome.
The noise rose around them, but Audrey barely heard it over the sound of her own breathing.
They started seriously hurting each other as the fight intensified.
Audrey kicked Brumis hard in the stomach with all the force she could muster.
Brumis grunted and stumbled back a few steps but recovered quickly.
She slashed with her dagger in a wide arc, and the blade nicked Audrey’s arm.
Pain flared, and blood welled up and started dripping down her arm.
Audrey looked at the wound with concern, her breath catching.
“Don’t worry,” the female orc said. “The daggers aren’t laced with magic. Besides, I’m not even putting on a real fight. We’re just playing.”
Well, that wasn’t true. Brumis was totally kicking her ass. But she couldn’t back down now, not with everyone watching, and not when she’d started this whole thing.
Audrey knew it was nearly impossible for a human to take down an orc in battle, even if the orc was female. But she tried anyway, because she’d come this far and stopping now would be worse than losing.
The fight continued. The crowd grew larger.
Audrey managed to cut Brumis when she saw an opening and took it. Her dagger sliced across the female orc’s thigh. But Brumis cut her back almost immediately, her blade slashing across Audrey’s ribs. Audrey hissed in pain, her body jerking away.
She was bleeding from various places. A cut on her cheek stung, and another on her leg made her limp slightly.
But she kept going, because stopping meant admitting defeat.
She wouldn’t stop, wouldn’t give up, even though her breathing had become heavier and her reactions were getting slower.
Her muscles burned with exhaustion and sweat dripped into her eyes.
Varka the Keen stepped between them with her hands held up.
“Stop! This is enough.” She turned to Hokran the Distant: “Take the captain’s mate to his hut.”
“It’s not over!” Audrey shouted, trying to shove past Varka. “We can keep going!”
But Hokran was already there, scooping her off the ground before she could get around Varka. He carried her with no effort at all and started walking toward the woods, his long strides covering the ground fast.
Audrey punched his chest, but he didn’t react.
“Let me go. I didn’t give you permission.”
She might as well have been hitting a wall. The adrenaline was fading, and the pain was catching up with her. Her vision blurred at the edges, her arms grew heavy, and she finally stopped fighting and went limp against the raider’s shoulder.
The hut was clean when they arrived, no evidence of the potion incident anywhere. Morgath turned from his worktable and froze when he saw her.
“What happened?”
Hokran laid Audrey down on a table.
“She sparred with Brumis,” he said. “Brumis is hurt too, but not as badly.”
“Damn right! I got her good,” Audrey said, though the words came out slurred and the ceiling was spinning above her.
Morgath sent Hokran away with a sharp wave of his hand.
“Tell Brumis I will have a word with her later.”
The coldness in his voice made Audrey glad she wasn’t Brumis.
He gathered cloths, water, and bottles of potions, then started cleaning her wounds. He worked carefully, wiping away the blood to see how deep the cuts went before applying salves and bandaging them.
“Why did you do this?” he asked through his teeth.
“Because she’s a bitch,” Audrey said. “And I’m not useless. I wanted to show her that.”
“You are not useless. You are my mate, and you don’t need to prove yourself to anyone. I’m going to punish her for this.”
“No. Don’t.”
“I am the captain. I discipline my horde as I see fit.”
“Not this time.” Audrey held his gaze. “If you punish her for fighting me, you prove her point. She’ll think I ran to you for protection. Please.”
He clenched his jaw and looked away. It cost him something, but he said, “Fine. I will only talk to her. Nothing more.”
He held a cup of water to her lips, and Audrey drank slowly, the coolness clearing her head a little. Color crept back into her face and her vision steadied, though her whole body throbbed.
When she looked less like she was about to pass out, Morgath’s expression shifted. The tension around his mouth loosened, and something warm replaced it. He grinned at her.
“So. How good did you get her?”
Audrey laughed and immediately winced when her ribs screamed in protest.
“Good enough that no one in this horde better think I’m some damsel who can’t take care of herself.”
He leaned down and kissed her.
“I never thought you were,” he said. “Not from the moment I met you.”
Audrey cupped his face with her hands.
“Can I ask you something?”
“All right.”
“The skull. You wore it every second up until yesterday, and now you’re not wearing it at all. What changed?”
Morgath sat on the edge of the table beside her, his weight making the wood creak.
“The Kharadan was a beast from my home world,” he said. “Near mythical. Enormous. Full of arcane energy. Legend said its power could only be claimed by a warrior who defeated it in a pure test of strength. No weapons, no magic. Just your body against the beast.”
“And you did that?”
“I was young and stupid, and wanted to prove I was more. Kind of like you today.” He smiled. “I killed the Kharadan with my bare hands. The skull became my magical focus. It amplifies everything I do, lets me channel power I couldn’t reach otherwise.”
“So why did you stop wearing it around me?”
He was quiet for a moment.
“The skull makes me feel safe. And around you, my heart didn’t feel safe. So, I hid behind it.”
Audrey hadn’t expected that. She’d asked a simple question about a helmet and gotten an answer that made her chest ache in a way she didn’t want to examine.
He continued before she could figure out what to say.
“I wear it when I hunt or patrol, when I’m away from town. But there haven’t been real battles in years. Peace has lasted long enough that I don’t need it the way I used to.”
“I like seeing your face,” she said. “Don’t wear it when you’re with me.”
He took her hand and pressed his lips to her palm.
“As you wish, my mate.”
Mate. Audrey swallowed hard and stared at the ceiling. This was bad.