Chapter 9
Eli
It must’ve been midday when the chest lid was yanked open. Even the dim light hurt my eyes. And I recognized Pilgrim even before he came fully into focus.
“Cough,” he told me.
I didn’t ask why. Just did as I’d been told.
“No, you idiot.” He grabbed me by the upper arm and dragged me to my feet.
Pins and needles played down one leg from my long, cramped confinement in the box, and my sarong threatened to drop off entirely.
“Your guard with missing eye. His name is Kof. Captain of the shaman’s honor guard.
Pay him a visit and weasel your way in.”
“How do you expect me to gain an audience?”
Pilgrim shifted his grip. I steeled myself from flinching, since recoiling from him only made it worse.
I expected pain. A crushing squeeze, or a brutal wrench.
But instead, he dragged a single, callused finger down the sinew of my shoulder.
Suggestively, he said, “I’m sure you’ll think of something. ”
His toadies all laughed.
Shamans are just as revered—and just as feared—as chieftains.
Maybe more, since orcs are even more superstitious than sailors…
and that’s saying a lot. Chances of me slipping into the shaman’s retinue were slim, but I’d have to insinuate myself if I wanted to prove my worth. As long as I was useful, I’d be safe.
And as for this Kof…maybe I could manage to sway him.
I called up a mental image of the orc. There was that brutal scar, of course, where the eye used to be. But aside from that? Broad. Muscled. Wiry dark hair in a short braid, and thick, blunt tusks.
True, orcs were all the same—big and green—but I could definitely tell them apart. The shape of his head, the form of his tusks…there were definitely enough similarities between Kof and Smeg to mistake the one for the other.
Aside from that eye.
No doubt he’d lost it in battle. Or, knowing orcs, it was just as likely he’d been caught looking at something he shouldn’t, and was taught a lesson he’d never forget.
Kof didn’t seem like the type to incur that sort of punishment, though, what with the quiet, steady way of his….
I quashed that line of thinking. I was getting carried away with myself if I ascribed actual personalities to the ugly green beasts. His offer of food and clothing? There was a motive behind it. And if I mistook it for compassion, then I was nothing but a fool.
As I pulled on my boots, Smeg tossed a trinket my way. It was a crude string of beads we’d picked up as the Lost Clan worked their way through orcish villages. “Better make yourself pretty. You’ll have lots of guards to satisfy before you get to the top.”
He was chuckling as he said it. Orcs and their so-called humor.
The day was gray as I made my way to the caves the clan’s shaman called home. I could taste winter on the air, but I didn’t dare double back and beg Pilgrim for a cloak. I could still practically feel his fingertip trailing down my bare shoulder.
According to the murmurs I’d gleaned through the walls of the chest, the shaman of the Red Hand Clan—the blunt anvil of an orc I’d seen at the feast—was rumored to be subject to fits of prophecy.
It was also said he shared his private quarters with a man.
It wasn’t the companion’s gender that the orcs found strange. Only the fact that he was human.
Still, maybe the presence of this human was working in my favor. When I presented myself at the shaman’s den, the honor guard at the mouth of the cave stood aside and let me pass before I could even come up with a plausible excuse to be there.
Orcs say that the Lost Clan becomes part of their own tribe, but I’d always thought that was nothing more than lip service. But if it was this easy for me to gain an audience….
The antechamber was big, strung with totems and symbols. But it filled quickly enough as three big orcs poured into the space. Their armor was light leather, tooled and painted more decoratively than the chieftain’s guards, but they all had the bearing of soldiers.
Clearly, I’d been too quick to pat myself on the back for getting past the gate if they thought I needed this much supervision.
“How much?” one of them asked.
“How much for…what?”
That question rendered him as baffled as I was. He and his cronies conferred for a moment. When they came to a conclusion, he turned back to me said, “Suck me while Tarq fucks you and Rikon watches.”
“And then I shoot my load on you,” one of the other ones added.
My mouth worked stupidly.
“I’ll give you four coppers,” the last one offered. “But only if you’re good and tight.”
I’d been expecting a challenge, an argument, or even an outright refusal. This matter-of-fact negotiation—for sex—had me flummoxed. If Pilgrim had sent ahead word that a whore was coming, he could have at least warned me….
But then another beast filled the doorway.
The entire doorway. And judging by the pendulous breasts straining against her threadbare tunic, this one was female.
No clue what she was, with no tusks and grayish skin instead of green, but she was definitely not orcish.
Her scalp was shorn, her brow was low, her shoulders were broad, and she stood a full head taller than even the biggest orc.
And around her neck was a string of beads—suspiciously like the one Smeg had given me.
When I did finally end Pilgrim, hopefully I’d get the chance to take a shot at Smeg, too. Though I suppose I couldn’t deny that the beads had gotten me through the door.
“You’re lucky I’m through here,” the creature said to me in passing. Her voice was like a storm rumbling low over a too-quiet sea. “If you ever cut in on my trade, I’ll squash you like a louse.”
“I’m not here to work,” I said as I yanked the strand of beads off and bunched it in my fist. The voyeur who wanted to jizz on me looked disappointed, but the others just shrugged and headed back the way they’d come.
The guard who’d let me in was leery of me now.
He frowned and flexed his grip on his spear.
Before he tossed me out, I said, “I need to see Kof.”
The frown deepened. “What for?”
“That’s between your captain and me.”
Good thing you can always count on an orc to defer to his superior.
The guard led me deeper into the caves, and into a smaller, more intimate chamber.
Runes and markings etched into the walls and bones of various animals adorned the space, from a tiny, delicate squirrel skull to a boar’s skull with tusks as big as any orc’s.
There was nowhere to sit, naturally, as orcs think they’re too good for furniture, and the caves smelled of sulfur.
But the air was deliciously warm against my bare skin.
I was pondering the etchings when a string of bones clattered behind me.
I whirled around, expecting an orc—but it was only a man.
Young, slight, with tousled coppery hair and a wry smile.
Normally, you can gauge a man by the quality of his boots, but this one went barefoot.
But though his outfit was simple, the cloth looked fine.
“I’m Archie. Bearer of the Prophecy, consort of the Shaman, and token redhead. And you must be the Eli everyone’s going on about.” He raked a casual gaze over me. “No one told me you were a sailor.”
I blinked. “How did you know?”
“Oh, believe you me…I’ve known plenty of sailors in my time. But you’d be hard-pressed to reach the nearest port from these parts without a good road and a well-stocked caravan. Which begs the question, how did you end up out here beyond the wastelands?”
My story was my own. And it was no one else’s business, fellow human or not. “Blown in by the winds of Fate, just like anyone else.”
The corner of his mouth quirked. “Spoken like a true seaman. Look, sailor boy, let’s be frank—you’re not truly Red Hand Clan, no matter what the orcish traditions say.
The minute the moon comes ’round again, you’ll take off faster than a paying man who’s just tugged up his breeches.
So, if you’re here to scout the caves for your people, don’t expect to find anything worth stealing.
There’s nothing here but a few piles of common herbs and a bunch of bones. ”
“I’m not here to steal,” I said. If I spotted a handy weapon lying around, I wouldn’t hesitate to borrow it. But they’d get it back soon enough once my suicide mission was over. “I want to see Kof.”
“And I suspect he feels likewise.” The words were light, but the tone was far too knowing. “Just keep in mind that orcs might all be green, but that doesn’t make every one of them the same. Once in a while, you do stumble across a good one.”
Archie shifted his attention to the doorway, where a massive shadow flickered against the wall. Smeg, my mind told me, come to collect me before I’d even had a chance to make an inroad here. But, again, my eyes had played tricks on me, and the shadow resolved itself into one-eyed Kof.
“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” Archie singsonged as he slipped from the room.
Good riddance. He was far too canny for my liking. Him leaving made me feel nervous, though, in a way I hadn’t expected.
“What do you want?” Kof asked with orcish bluntness.
The hardness of the beads dug into my palm.
I hadn’t realized I’d been clenching them so tightly.
Here, in the confines of the small cave chamber, Kof looked even bigger than I remembered.
Most orc soldiers are bulky with huge plates of armor, but the shaman’s honor guard wore only strappy leather, to better navigate the narrow tunnels. Kof’s bulk was pure muscle.
The beads nagged at my hand. Before I could dash the thought, I wondered what it would be like to slide a hand under one of those leather straps, to run my fingers over the hills and valleys of his muscled chest.
The captain had been a huge, strapping man. I supposed the big ones had always been my downfall.
“Well?” Kof prompted.
I told myself to stop being an idiot. “You said you could get me something to wear. Can you? Or was that just an excuse to get me here?”
He cocked his head, truly puzzled. “I don’t need excuses. I’m in charge.”
If so…he can help me.
Again, a story unspooled in my mind, unbidden and unwelcome.
A story where I threw myself at Kof’s feet and convinced him to let me stay with him until the Lost Clan no longer darkened their doorstep.
And after that? Anything—anything at all.
Join a caravan. Travel the wasteland. Maybe even take a new name, make my way back to the coast, and hire on a ship.
I’d always wanted to work on a three-masted caravel.
Or even a merchant cog, tacking slow along the edge of the desert sea.
Or maybe I could even stick around for a while…and slide my hand into that strappy leather.
Don’t be stupid. Nothing ever works out like I want it to.
“I need some heavy clothes,” I finally said. “Winter is almost here.”
Kof nodded once. “Sensible. Good. I have a new recruit who’s not much taller than you.” He stuck his head into the passage and called out, “Grok? Bring me a spare shirt and pants—something you’ve nearly outgrown. The tighter the better.”
I’ll give you four coppers…but only if you’re good and tight.
No.
No.
Damn Archie for putting the thought in my head that some of these orcs could be trusted. Because even a human would readily turn on you if it suited his ambitions.
“If you need something else,” Kof was saying, “a traveling peddler stops by every few weeks. He’ll have more to choose from, since there’s a market for that type of thing around here now. You could do with a sturdy pair of boots.”
A small orc joined us, carrying an armload of clothes—and by small, I mean only a hand taller than me. “The tunic won’t lace anymore and I can’t pull up the breeches—”
He’d been so focused on his captain that he only now realized I was there. And when he did, the clothes slid from his grasp into a heap at his feet. He ignored them and jabbed a finger in my direction. “That’s him, Captain!” he said, aghast. “That’s the witch who cursed Ulka!”