Chapter 17
Graz
G usak wants to go— personally. Kal'zan and Agna, the two who found me in the Stoneteeth, are accompanying us.
Even as we prepare for the journey, I still don’t believe it. I’ve never seen the boss leave the clan base before, except on short business trips. Typically he sends someone else to do his dirty work for him, building connections and meeting with partners.
First, though, I build a holding container for the magic I’ve tucked in the back of my shop under Gusak’s orders. He doesn’t want it infecting anyone else with my “magic sickness.” It takes me quite a while longer to design something robust enough, and he’s tapping his toe impatiently the whole time.
Of course, we don’t bring any with us. Gusak can’t risk getting the sickness himself.
This final marker will be challenging to reach, as it lies fairly deep in human territory. Perhaps we aren’t at war right now, but they will not respond kindly to trollkin in their midst. We’ll have to tread carefully and stay hidden.
I think Gusak’s generosity has an expiration date, and the moment we open the ruin for him, he might just finally off me for my disobedience. At least he heeded my warning about trying to travel to other locations with the help of magic, and decided he doesn’t want to scramble his own brains.
We’ll go by train, then get off as close to human territory as we can before taking horses the rest of the way. Gusak has mapped out a trajectory that should avoid any major towns and keeps us off the beaten path.
Though I may not be tied up on this journey, it’s clear that I’m his prisoner.
I’m immensely tired of traveling, but I resign myself to it as we board the train. Gusak has a private car with enough beds for all of us, but I still lie awake at night for hours. My soul aches, as if it’s been dislodged from my body. It’s a misery I’ve never felt before, and Vienne’s orgasmic face as I slid my cock into her, her sweet face as she sleeps at my side, will not leave my mind’s eye.
I wonder where she is now. I both hope that I see her at our destination, and that she stays far, far away.
No matter what she’s done, I can’t let Gusak get his hands on her.
* * *
Vienne
Raiden holds casually onto the rope as we ride along, our saddlebags stocked full of supplies. I’m still bound, and the threads dig deeper into my wrists with every day that passes.
We’ve been on the road for what feels like weeks now. We’re going a relatively unpopular direction into more rugged terrain, so we have to ride on horseback the whole way. Raiden refers to my map often, but never asks for my input. He knows I’ll lie to him.
The first thing he did was take my gun. All right, sensible. But the moron never second-guessed my full water pouch, and he also hasn’t figured out that I don’t use it for drinking. It sits in my traveling pack, untouched—if only I could get to it. Even at night, though, Raiden keeps a hold on me, tying my rope around his own wrist so he’ll know the moment I move.
Not even my mother knows where I am. If he kills me, no one will ever find out who did it. And I have a suspicion that killing me could very well be on the menu after he gets what he wants.
I can’t believe I ever slept with this asshole.
Soon, though, things take a turn for the worse. Raiden ties me to a tree while he sets up camp for the night, and pours out some booze over the tinder to help light it. Just the scent of the alcohol going up in flames evokes a visceral, disgusted response from my stomach. Without any warning, I bend over and puke. Then I sag against the tree when I’m done, panting.
Raiden returns, leaning down to look me in the eyes. “Hm, something upset your tummy?” he says in a mocking tone.
I’ve always known he was a piece of shit, but I didn’t realize the depths to which he’d be willing to sink. He’s still wearing his uniform, so no one we pass on the road has questioned why I’m tied up. He simply looks like a lawman taking me off to jail where I belong. And the farther we go, the less often we’ve encountered other people—and the lower my chance of ever getting away.
“I’m fine,” I grind out.
Raiden shrugs. “I’m going to see if I can pinch a rabbit,” he says in a bored tone, slinging his rifle over his shoulder as he wanders out into the woods, leaving me there.
I sink down to the ground, hands above my head because the rope won’t move. It’s pathetic, really, that I’m here, that I haven’t found a way out yet. Raiden’s certainly not any smarter than I am.
I throw up once more for good measure before he finally comes back. I don’t know what’s wrong, but it’s probably the bad food and the stress has finally caught up to me.
The fire is burning bright and the sun is almost set when Raiden brings his rabbit into camp and skins it before setting it over the flames. Then his hand jerks, abruptly knocking the spit off the rack and sending the raw rabbit tumbling to the forest floor.
“What the fuck?” he mutters, getting up to grab it. He tries to wipe off the dirt. “Fuck!”
That was odd. I watch him closer as he grumbles, pouring water over the carcass and wiping it again, then returning it to the rack.
This time, it’s while he’s assembling the tent that he shakes again. His arm moves unnaturally, as if the entire thing is twitching involuntarily, and the tent topples over.
Raiden snarls and grabs his own hand, pressing it to his side as if it’s a disobedient animal. He mutters something under his breath, clasping the rebellious arm tight.
“What’s wrong?” I call out. I just want the chance to mock him after how he’s treated me. “Freaking out a little?”
Raiden stiffens. “None of your damned business.”
He finishes putting up the tent without further interruption, then begrudgingly gives me some rabbit to eat with my bare hands. I’ve never been so degraded, but I keep my chin up anyway, shooting him a glare whenever I get the chance.
If he would just let his guard down, maybe I could get to his knife and cut myself loose. Or maybe I could choke him out with the rope while he’s asleep. He’s been very careful so far, but after whatever strange thing happened to him tonight... he might falter.
I’ll have to keep a close eye on him.
* * *
Graz
It’s not an easy mission for four trollkin to trek across a swath of human territory unseen. I’m starting to wonder if the magic has somehow gotten its claws in him and Gusak has lost his mind.
Kal'zan and Agna kill anyone who comes across us as we make our way through deep forest. Agna keeps us on track with a compass, and somehow, Kal'zan is able to use the stars at night to track our progress. At night, Gusak asks me questions about what I’ve seen, what experiments I’ve done, what I’ve learned about magic. I tell him most of what I know, which still isn’t much. But tonight...
“How did you get the rat out of town?” he asks me, rather casually, chewing the bone of a deer we killed a few nights ago and have been lugging around in a cart. “You must have been real clever to sneak a human onto a boat.”
I sigh. I expected this, sooner or later, after what I confessed. I’m finally going to have to explain this and reveal my part in all of it. At least I know he won’t shoot me before we reach our destination.
“Magic is temporary,” I begin. “You make a wish, you impress your desire upon it, and it manifests—for a limited time.”
Gusak frowns. “Yeah, so you’ve told me. Not all that useful.”
I hold up a hand. “But it is possible to freeze it in time, to stop it from reaching its half-life and dissipating. I’ve found two ways of doing it.”
Gusak sits forward on the log where he’s perched. “What are the two ways?” Agna is sharpening her knife, but Kal'zan is also listening from the spot where he’s acting as watchdog.
“Well, the first way that Lo’zar discovered was to eat it. That makes whatever you wished for permanent. Then, the magic becomes a part of you.”
Gusak’s lips screw up with disgust. “He ate it?”
“I know. No sense of decency or self-preservation.” I pull out my pendant and tap it. “The other way is to build a housing for it that’s secured. That way, when you tell it what you want, it holds that command as long as you seal it away before its half-life expires.”
I swallow. Here’s the ugly part, where I have to tell him exactly how I undermined him.
“I gave Lo’zar an amulet like mine,” I continue. “Wear it, and it makes you look... different. It made Rimi, the human, appear like a trolless, so she could get on the boat safely.”
Gusak listens with an unreadable expression, but doesn’t interrupt.
“It works for him, too,” I say, because I can’t help myself. I’m proud of the gadget I created for my best friend. “He can appear like a human whenever he needs.”
“Impressive.” The big orc sits back on his log, tossing his bone away. “And you found all this out yourself through trial and error.”
I nod.
“Explains why you got as sick as you did if you were experimenting with it so closely.” He rubs his chin. “Trollkin taking human mates. What a bizarre phenomenon. At least now I understand why one of my best men betrayed me.” He sighs. “I probably would have done the same.”
Is Gusak really admitting this to me? I don’t speak, because I don’t trust myself.
“Are you still in contact with Lo’zar?” Gusak asks after a time.
I grimace. I do get Lo’zar and Rimi’s letters occasionally, though with how he travels, it’s hard to respond.
“...Yes.” I cringe as I say it. Gusak’s too keen to try to bald-faced lie. “He is still working outside the law. And he has a few whelps of his own.”
Two, if I remember right. Twins, just born.
Gusak gawks openly at me. “What? Whelps? With a human ?”
All I can do is nod.
“What a fucking mystery the world is.” He rubs his forehead like this has all made him very tired. “I hope you haven’t sown a whelp in your human.”
He sighs and gets up, heading to his tent. I stare at his back as he disappears inside, my mind spinning.
I couldn’t have. I couldn’t possibly have left my mate behind with a whelp in her belly, all by herself back in that forest.
Could I?