Orc’s Bride (The Veil Lands #2)

Chapter 1

ONE

ZORAYA

The needle slips through silk—smooth, practiced. My fingers know the way. Three years of mending Mrs. Corven’s wedding disasters have taught me that much.

“This is unacceptable.” Mrs. Corven jabs a fat finger at the gown draped across my worktable. Fifth time in as many minutes. “My daughter’s wedding is in three days, Zoraya. Three.”

I tie off the thread and snip it clean. “Then maybe your daughter shouldn’t have tried squeezing into a gown two sizes too small.”

Mrs. Corven’s face goes purple. The veins in her neck bulge. “How dare you—“

“I dare because I’m the only seamstress in Red Hollow who can fix this mess.

” I hold up the bodice, examining the seam I’ve just reinforced.

The stitches are perfect—tight and even, practically invisible against the cream silk.

“You want your precious Melinda to look like a proper bride instead of a sausage? Then sit down, shut up, and let me work.”

She sits. They always do.

The market square buzzes around my little stall—merchants hawking early autumn vegetables, their voices competing for attention.

Children shriek as they chase each other between carts, weaving through the crowd.

Old men cluster near the baker’s stall, arguing about nothing important.

Probably the weather. Always the weather with them.

I love it.

Not the village itself—Red Hollow is a backwater dump where nothing ever happens and everyone knows everyone else’s business.

The kind of place where you can’t take a shit without three neighbors commenting on it by supper time.

But this stall is mine. This work is mine.

The coins I earn go into the jar under my mattress, and one day, there’ll be enough to leave.

Maybe head south to the coastal cities where they say seamstresses can make real money, where nobody knows my name or cares about my business.

One day.

I’m halfway through restitching the waistline when the first scream cuts through the market noise.

My hands freeze mid-stitch. Mrs. Corven’s head snaps up, her chins wobbling.

Then the thunder starts.

Not real thunder. Hooves. Dozens of them, pounding the dirt road that leads into the square.

The ground shakes beneath my stool, vibrating up through the wooden legs and into my bones.

Merchants scramble to grab their wares, stuffing vegetables back into crates.

Women snatch up children, clutching them close.

The old men’s argument dies mid-sentence, and they scatter.

No. Not today.

The black banners appear over the crowd—death given form. The wolf sigil rendered in silver thread catches the afternoon light, gleaming sharp and predatory.

The Iron Warlord’s collectors.

My stomach plummets.

“Inside.” Mrs. Corven hauls herself up with more speed than I thought she was capable of. Her eyes are wide, showing white all around. “Zoraya, get inside—now—“

“Too late.” The words taste of ash.

The war boars crash into the market square, scattering carts and trampling vegetables into the mud.

Turnips explode under massive hooves. A wheel snaps off someone’s cart with a crack of breaking wood.

Each beast is the size of a plow horse, all bristling dark fur and yellowed tusks long as my forearm, with armored orcs mounted on their backs.

They form a semicircle, blocking every exit from the square with brutal efficiency.

The villagers press back against the shops and stalls. Some of the braver men put themselves in front of their families, though their hands shake. Most just freeze, rooted. Prey instinct overwhelming everything else.

I stay seated. My sewing awl is still in my right hand, the point sharp enough to punch through leather. I’ve used it for that before—patching the hunters’ gear when they come back from the deep woods.

But I don’t put it down.

Can’t make myself let go.

The largest boar steps forward, its hooves striking sparks against the cobblestones.

Its rider swings down with practiced ease, landing with a heavy thud that I sense through the ground.

Captain Hadrun Skarn—I recognize him from the last collection a year ago.

He’s all scar tissue and muscle, with tusks that curve up past his cheekbones and eyes the color of dirty bronze.

His armor is black iron chased with silver, and a great-sword hangs across his back—a promise of violence.

He surveys the square slowly, letting the silence stretch. Letting the fear build.

“People of Red Hollow.” His voice carries across the square, deep and resonant. The kind of voice used to being obeyed. “The Iron Warlord sends his greetings.”

Nobody greets him back.

Nobody even breathes.

Hadrun doesn’t seem bothered. He pulls a scroll from his belt and unrolls it with a sharp snap of parchment. The sound makes several people flinch. “By decree of Clan Lord Vlorn Draegor, Warden of the Ironhold and Lord of the Bone March, the Blood Tithe is due.”

The crowd shifts. Someone whimpers—a child, maybe. The sound cuts off quickly, muffled.

I know what’s coming. We all know.

Every year, the Iron Warlord takes one of us. One soul to serve in his fortress, to keep his protection over Red Hollow and the other villages in his territory. Without that protection, the rival clans would sweep through and burn everything to ash. With it, we’re safe.

Safe, but not free.

My throat tightens. The awl grows slippery in my palm—sweat despite the autumn chill.

“One person.” Hadrun scans the crowd, appraising goods. “Chosen by lot and decree. One year of service in exchange for another year of peace.”

One year. That’s what they say.

But Mara Gildstone was taken five years ago. Never came back. Neither did Thomas Copper before her. Or Jenna Wheelwright the year before that.

One year of service.

Sure.

My mother’s hand finds my shoulder from behind. I didn’t even hear her approach—didn’t hear her leave the bakery stall where she works. Her fingers dig in, shaking hard enough that I sense each individual finger.

“Zoraya Whitfield.”

The name hangs in the air.

My name.

No.

The square goes so quiet, I hear my own heartbeat hammering. The rasp of my breath. Mrs. Corven makes a sound—wounded animal trapped in a woman’s throat.

My mother’s grip tightens until it hurts, until I’m sure her nails will leave crescents in my skin.

I don’t move.

Can’t make my body understand what my brain is screaming.

Hadrun’s eyes find me across the crowd, and satisfaction crosses his scarred face. The corner of his mouth twitches upward. “Zoraya Whitfield, seamstress. Step forward.”

“No.” My mother’s voice breaks on the word, high and desperate. “No, please, take someone else—take me—she’s just a—“

“The lot has been cast, woman. The decree is made.” Hadrun’s voice doesn’t change. Doesn’t soften. He gestures lazily, and two soldiers dismount behind him with heavy thuds. “Step forward, girl, or we drag you.”

The crowd parts.

Every single person steps back, creating a clear path between my stall and the captain. Their feet shuffle against the cobblestones, scraping and quick. Even Mrs. Corven moves away, clutching her daughter’s ruined gown to her chest—a shield against whatever curse might touch her by association.

Cowards. Every last one.

Thomas the butcher won’t meet my eyes. Neither will Sara the baker, who just last week told me I was a daughter to her. The hunters who pay me to mend their gear turn their backs entirely.

My brother shoves through from the left, face flushed red and furious. Tavyn’s only nineteen, still has that gangly look of someone growing into his height. “You can’t just—she’s barely twenty-four! She’s not even—“

The nearest soldier backhands him across the face.

The crack echoes.

Tavyn hits the ground hard, limbs sprawling. Blood streams from his nose, bright red against the pale cobblestones. My mother screams and drops beside him, her hands hovering over his face—afraid to touch him, afraid not to.

And something inside me snaps.

The fear burns away.

All that’s left is rage.

I’m on my feet before thought catches up, the sewing awl clenched in my fist. The stool clatters backward. “You overgrown mutts.” I step over the scattered spools of thread rolling across my table. “You want me? Fine. But touch my family again and I’ll—“

“You’ll what?” Hadrun’s grin shows too many teeth, sharp and white and hungry. “Stitch me to death, little human?”

Laughter ripples through his soldiers. Rough, mean laughter that scrapes across my skin.

Heat floods my face, crawling up my neck and into my cheeks. But I don’t back down. Don’t let myself look away.

I step right up to the captain, close enough to smell the leather and iron and blood on him. Close enough to see the pale scars that cross his throat.

And I spit at his boots.

The laughter dies.

Cuts off clean.

Hadrun looks down at the glob of saliva on his polished leather. Then back at me. His expression doesn’t change, but something shifts in his eyes. Something almost resembling respect.

His grin widens. “Oh, the clan lord is going to love you.”

He nods to his soldiers. “Chain her.”

The first orc grabs my arm—his hand swallows my bicep completely, fingers pressing hard enough to bruise. I drive the awl toward his eye with everything I’ve got.

He jerks back with a curse, and the tool glances off his helmet instead, the point screeching across metal. Then the second one has my other arm, wrenching it behind my back hard enough to make my shoulder scream.

White light explodes across my vision.

The awl hides in my fist. My only means of self-defense.

Cold iron closes around my wrists with a click that echoes through my whole body.

The shackles are heavy. Heavier than they should be, dense and wrong. And they hum. A low vibration in my bones, invasive. Runes are etched into each link, silver against black iron.