CHAPTER 6 — Chicken - Lizard . It’s What’s for Dinner .
STEPHANIE
Breakfast at an Orc’s table is something I’d actually recommend.
Because not only was it the most filling meal of eggs, sausage, and a chunk of THE BEST salted, oil-soaked homemade bread ever, that jam Ulda gave me was made of jellied angels and I nearly cried every time I put it in my mouth.
So good. I polished off the whole jar, spreading it liberally on my bread. It was scrumptious.
Immediately after breakfast, Ulda has me stripping the sheets and blanket off of Roarg’s bed and putting fresh ones on.
She warns that I’m expected to make the bed every morning until I get my own room, where I’ll make my own bed first thing, or else.
I need to exercise this little daily discipline, she says, because discipline keeps a household running smoothly.
This is starting to feel a bit like boot camp until I’m bustled off to a relaxing bath, and dressed in clothes that Joktepitha hems for me, telling me while I stand for her that we’ll go to town and order custom fitted dresses so I have some nice new things, and her and Namak?ga and Ulda will take in some of their spare dresses so I have some regular day-wear too.
“Let’s skip the dress fitting in town,” I tell her as I pin the brooches at my shoulders that secure my shoulder straps to the front of my hangerok.
By the way, she gave me underwear and has thus become my favorite.
Although it must be said that here in Ogemaw, there is no such thing as elastic, so I’m basically wearing swimsuit bottoms. My medieval panties are plain white linen, have side ties, and I have serious misgivings that the gusset won’t do its best to ride up my ass crack for how tight the fit is.
Joktepitha looks confused. “Why? Namak?ga is having Roarg put the tongue in the buggy as we chaw tusks together.”
I give her a clueless face. “Say that again in a way I’ll understand, please.”
She shakes her head, but complies. “Our buggy can convert from a single horse to a team of horses. If we’re going into town, all of us, we’ll use a team.
To have a team, you need to install a tongue instead of a single’s poles.
With two of us heavy with his brats, Roarg is handling that change as we chat.
” She gestures to my dress. “You’ll need to go along to the dress shop.
They’re going to require your measurements, or not a thing will fit.
” She eyes me up and down dubiously. “You’re too short for an adult Orc dress and too wide in your hips to wear a child’s. ”
“Thanks,” I say dryly. “That’s the politest way I’ve ever heard anyone remark that I have a big ass.”
Joktepitha forces me to turn around for her, and she scoffs. “Says the woman who can fit in children’s knickers.”
I look down at my body like I can see through my dress, and then my eyes shoot back to Joktepitha. “These are kids’ underwear? No wonder they’re so freaking tight!”
She nods. “It’s all that will fit you.” Then she pats my side. “These hips, though, are a full woman’s. Good birthing hips.”
Not sure if I feel complimented or alarmed at that pronouncement, I flatten my lips and step into the borrowed leather boots Namak?ga supplied me with.
They belong to one of her young cousins, a spare pair brought along then forgotten, she told me when she dropped them off in the bathroom earlier.
They’re cute footwear. I reserve the right to change back to my sneakers if they’re crap to walk in though.
I’d rather look ridiculous in an Orc dress and ASICS than end up hobbling in an Orc dress with pretty boots.
“Anyway,” I say, “back to your question. The answer to that is the same reason I’m not wearing the braid rings.
” I wave at my hair, which is tied back simply with a leather thong.
I refused their offer earlier of doing my hair up with Roarg’s braid ring gift, because, I explained, I could disappear in a blink, returning to my normal life far away from here—and I wouldn’t feel right taking their expensive jewelry with me when I go.
Joktepitha purses her lips in disapproval, just like she did the first time the topic of my braid ring refusal was broached.
I ignore this, and ask with forced cheerfulness, “So what are we going to do today?”
“Well, we were going to go to town, but if you don’t feel enough like Roarg’s woman to be fitted for dresses yet, we need to get lunch prepared.”
I shrug. “Hey, I could go poof! at any minute. I’d hate to have you guys shell out for dresses for me.”
My insistence that I’m going to disappear visibly troubles Joktepitha.
She fusses with a few things, then dusts off her dress.
Crushosh is in the crocheted baby carrier on her back, and he’s quiet and watchful as she turns from me and moves for the door.
“I suppose we’ll see what happens. For now, follow me. We’ll get started on lunch.”
***
To start lunch, we first have to catch chickens, and then we have to butcher chickens.
I’ve never butchered anything in my life.
A thing about Orc chickens:
They have tusks. Like an Orc.
Thus, we have at our feet a flock of snaggletoothed birds pecking at the ground.
They’re outside of their pen, which Joktepitha informs me is normal.
They hop over the paddock fence during the day, then hop over it again by nightfall, instinct driving them to return to their henhouse before they’ll be at their most vulnerable.
The flock is beautiful. They’re scattered around us in an array of colors; silver spotted, shiny reds, bright yellows, and even iridescent birds that aren’t just blue-black in their plumage, but straight down to their combs and wattles.
Together, they make a pretty picture. They look adorable and absolutely harmless, until a hapless lizard has the misfortune of scuttling by—then about thirty fanged birds gang up and stab him to death, peeling him apart and chasing each other for the jiggling, glistening organs.
“Ugh!” I squeak, horrified. “I don’t think my people’s chickens do that!”
Joktepitha looks skeptical. “Are you sure? I’m fairly certain chickens are like this everywhere.” She gives me a bright smile and hands me a wire basket. “If it affects their eggs, who can tell? Let’s get moving. We should have collected the morning clutches already.”
One bird darts between us, cackling madly, entrails clutched in its freaky mouth.
“Mmm, lizard protein coming up,” I mutter faintly and follow her into the paddock, intending to help her with the gathering.
The moment I step inside, rude honking blasts around us. The horrible noise comes care of a gang of geese who are viciously guarding the chicken area from humans. I know because they immediately try to rush me.
Crushosh’s eyes are huge as the obscenely loud birds aim themselves behind his mother to mow me down. Wings flapping, flippered feet barreling for me, saw-toothed bills open to crush whatever they can grab—
“Shoo!” Joktepitha scolds, swinging her arm to toss a scoop of grain in the other direction, gaining the mob’s attention.
With angry hisses, they arch their necks, glare at me, and wobble-scramble for the food.
I lower my hands from my ears. “You just saved your son years of therapy,” I tell Joktepitha.
“Therapy?”
“Yeah. He’d have to visit a professional twice a month to talk about the time he had a front row seat to a woman getting pinched to death.”
She laughs. “The geese’ll get used to you, and then they won’t threaten you.”
I don’t intend to stick around long enough for that to happen, but I have to say: it’s nice she’s so committed to being welcoming.
We enter the henhouse—the cutest cruck-framed henhouse in existence—and I find out that Orc chickens are a little mean. They’re apt to bite as well as peck you if you stick your hand under them to check for eggs.
“Oww!” I hiss for the third time in as many nest checks. “Joktepitha, I hate this job!” I complain, shaking out my smarting fingers.
Joktepitha grabs my wrist and hauls my hand close enough to herself that she can get a look at it. “My, your skin breaks easily. All right. How about a chore that’s gentler on your many soft parts?”
“That’d be great.”
She flashes me another smile—her tusks appearing so much more dangerous than the chickens’ much smaller sets of ivories—reaches down, and, quick as a snake, snatches a bird by its leg as it tries to dart by her, and she hauls it up, flapping madly, between us. “Do you want to do the honors?”
When I look at her, alarmed, she grins wider. She steps outside, stopping on a sandy patch of ground a ways away from the henhouse. “This is lunch,” she announces as I follow her with trepidation. “One of them, anyway. Would you like to dispatch it?”
“Umm, no thanks.”
Without hesitation, she switches her grip so she’s cupping the bird’s body to her hip with her left hand, then she lightly catches the bird’s whole head in her right hand, its toofy-beak resting on her fingers. She stretches its neck gently—
And snaps her thumb down to her knees, her strength so great, she degloves the damn thing—pulling the whole fanged chicken’s head right off.
“AHHH!” I yelp.
Joktepitha’s gaze snaps up to me. “What?” she asks.
The decapitated bird twitches against her dress, its wings lifting and closing like they’re getting mixed signals now that the brain is completely disconnected from its body.
Its legs kick a little in tandem, both out, both in, feet spread, feet closed.
Blood spurts from its neck, and Joktepitha tips the bird down to bleed it out.
She sends me a worried look. “Have you never prepared your own food before?”
“Not like that!”
She gives the bird a considering glance, then nods to me and the rest of the flock. “Pick another one and you show me how your people do it then.”
I shake my head wildly.
She squints at me. “You’re highborn, aren’t you?”
I make a face. “Highborn?”