Chapter 10 #3
“I…I don’t know. I had no time to find out.”
“Where did you stab him?” He sounded business-like.
“Here.” I pressed a hand to my right side, high above my breast and close to my arm.
“He’ll live,” Grat dismissed.
“You think so?”
“Sure. I know humans are fragile. But even a puny man can recover from a wound like that with some decent care.”
I didn’t know how to feel about it. On one hand, I was relieved to learn I might not be a murderer after all. On the other hand, only death would stop Reizon from pursuing me.
“Where are you from, Khala?” Grat asked. “Where did these humans come from?”
“From the Avilet Kingdom,” I replied. “It’s way up the ocean shore from here, a few weeks of travel on horseback, I believe. But I don’t know exactly since I left the caravan on their way to the Garland Islands.”
He chewed on his bottom lip, pondering something. “Will you ever want to return to that kingdom? Maybe when things with the stabbing have calmed down?”
“I’m not going back,” I said adamantly.
“But that’s your home.”
“I have no home. My parents died from old age a few years ago. But they had disowned me long before that.”
“Why?” His forehead furrowed.
“There never was much love between us to begin with. Then I disappointed them even more by refusing to marry again after my husband died and especially by not living my life the way it was expected from a widow.”
“Are you a widow?”
“Yes. Just over ten years now.”
“Ten years?” he exclaimed in surprise. “How old are you?”
“I’m turning thirty this year. But I was married young, younger than any girl should marry.”
“Were you forced to do it?”
I nodded.
“Why?” he asked, looking genuinely puzzled.
I shrugged. “Why do people marry?”
“Because they love each other and want to be together,” he replied effortlessly.
“Because they don’t want to live in different houses and spend their nights apart.
Because they want to have and raise children together.
There are many reasons to get married. But if you didn’t even love your husband… Why then?”
He spread his arms wide, looking genuinely puzzled. It was so endearingly sweet of him to believe that marriage only happened out of love and the desire to be together.
“I didn’t love him,” I said. “I never even pretended that I did, but I was married off to him without any consideration for my feelings. My husband was almost four times older than me on the day of our wedding, and we had nothing in common. I’ve never told this to anyone, but…
I found it hard to mourn his death because it brought me the freedom I’d never experienced before.
” I lowered my voice, as if revealing a secret.
“The happiest years of my life I spent as a widow.”
If Grat thought I was a bad person because of it, he didn’t show it. I saw no judgment on his face.
“What is it that you want to do with your life now, Khala?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “When I ran away, I didn’t think about my future or even my life. I just wanted to get as far as possible, and I didn’t care if I lived or died. Now that I met you…” I raised my gaze to him, unsure how to word it and anxious about his reaction.
“What is it?” he urged.
I released a long breath.
“I just want peace, Grat. I want to do what I like and be with the people whose company I enjoy without fear or judgement. I want to live.”
“Do you enjoy my company?” he asked.
I smiled, finding his hand on my thigh under water. “Yes I do. Very much so.”
He exhaled, looking relieved and pleased by my answer.
“Then stay with me,” he offered.
“How?”
“However you want.” He hugged my waist, turning me to face him completely. “If things go as well as they have been lately, I’ll stay here at the cabin for another week or two to get enough meat to win my bet.”
“What bet is it?”
“A stupid bet I made with Agor before coming here. I shouldn’t have even wasted my breath on it.” He waved a dismissive hand. “But now that it’s made, and I’m well on the way to win it, I may as well go for it. In a week or two, I can go back to the keep, and you’ll come with me.”
“You want me to live with you? For good?” I exhaled through a whole hurricane of feelings.
There was excitement and a little apprehension. But mostly, I just felt relieved that I didn’t have to part from him. Grat had become my main source of comfort and peace, so much that it’d crush me to leave him.
He wrapped a protective arm around my shoulders, bringing me closer.
“I’m not leaving you behind, sweetheart. You’re coming with me.” He nuzzled the top of my head. “You’ll fit right in at the keep. We have humans, too, a whole settlement of them at the edge of the woods. And they didn’t come from the kingdom you mentioned.”
That was a good thing. It meant there were fewer chances of anyone recognizing me. But I was so tired of living in constant fear.
“Grat,” I said. “It’s probably best if I stayed here until the army from Avilet Kingdom leaves. No need to risk it.”
“But I can’t leave you here on your own again. Look what happened the last time.”
He gestured at the place where the dead mud toad had lain less than an hour ago.
It was empty now, as Grat and I had chopped off the toad’s legs, the only edible parts of the giant monster, then dragged the rest off and tossed it in the swamp, likely to the utter delight of all the other monsters that lived there.
“The toad is dead now,” I argued.
“There are plenty of other nasty creatures who’d love to have you for dinner. The woods are never safe for you to be on your own.”
“But I survived here for weeks on my own before,” I retorted.
“Barely.” He gave me a pointed look.
He was right, of course, considering the state he’d found me in.
“Alright,” I agreed. “But you do just fine on your own in the woods.”
“That’s different. I come here to hunt.”
“Then teach me how to hunt too. I already know how to set and check the traps. Teach me how to use weapons.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Have you never used any weapons at all?”
Maybe all orcs knew how to defend themselves with their huge swords and maces. But as a child, I was mostly taught poetry, painting, and dance, as well as to look pretty and speak little. I enjoyed finally gaining some useful skills.
“Well, I’ve stabbed a man,” I said. “But the reason I managed to do it at all was mostly due to timing, an element of surprise, and desperation, not due to any real skill with the dagger on my part. I’d love to know how to use a weapon properly. Teach me how to use a sword.”
“You won’t be able to even lift my sword, the tiny thing that you are.” He gently moved a wet strand of my hair behind my ear.
“A knife then?” I wouldn’t give up. “I have made some weapons before, you know? I certainly could learn how to use them, too, now that there’s no one to tell me that I can’t. You’re not saying that I can’t do something, are you, Grat?”
He heaved a long, heavy breath. “No, sweetheart, I’m not saying you can’t do it. I’m just saying you have to be smart when doing it.”
I climbed on my knees in his lap, taking his face in my hands.
“I’ll be smart, darling. Just give me a chance, please.”
He gazed into my eyes with a soft smile playing between his fierce tusks.
“I can’t think properly when you’re sitting naked on my lap like this, my little vixen. Have it your way. Whatever you want. I’ll teach you how to use a sword, shoot a bow and arrow, too, if you want. It’s not in my power to deny you anything.”