Chapter 11 Stone
STONE
Iwake to the buzz of my phone rattling the nightstand, Lacy's breath warm against my neck where she's burrowed in sleep. The screen glows harsh in the predawn dark, showing seventeen missed calls, forty-three notifications, all screaming that the ceasefire is over.
The clip loads, and I recognize it instantly. It’s the fundraiser footage from weeks ago—the one we thought we’d buried with our testimony. But this is different. It’s a new edit, spliced with ominous music and a voiceover questioning the council’s recent decision to postpone the vote.
The caption reads: "The Truth They Ignored at the Hearing: Unchecked Orc Aggression."
My stomach drops like I've swallowed stones. Blair isn't accepting the stalemate; she’s launching a counter-offensive.
It’s already trending locally. Sponsored.
Boosted. Someone paid a lot of money to make sure this appeared on every timeline in the city this morning.
Someone’s looped just the worst three seconds, my tusks prominent, my fist raised in what was actually just an emphatic gesture but now looks like a threat.
"Stone?" Lacy stirs, her hand finding my chest, fingers splayed over my heart that's hammering too fast. "What's wrong? Is it the council?"
"It's Blair's donors fighting back." I show her the screen.
She goes rigid, sitting up so fast the blanket pools at her waist, her face pale in the phone's glow. She watches the new edit, her eyes narrowing. "They spliced in a different reaction shot. That woman wasn't even near you. This is a hit piece."
"Doesn't matter if it's fake." My voice comes out flat, defeated in a way I hate. "It's loud. And it’s undoing everything we said at the hearing."
By breakfast, Tess calls with the damage report. Grant officials requesting a meeting to "reassess risk factors." Three donors pulling support from the bookstore's festival bid. Local news picking up the clip with breathless concern-troll headlines about safety and appropriate boundaries.
"Evan called me," Lacy says quietly, stirring her coffee without drinking, the spoon clinking against ceramic in a rhythm that sets my teeth on edge.
"Offered to do damage control. Said if I issued a statement clarifying we're 'just colleagues in a professional capacity,' he could get his PR firm to bury this. "
The jealousy hits swift and sharp, but beneath it runs something colder. Fear. Because part of me wonders if she should take that out, if I'm poison to everything she's built.
"You could," I manage. "Wouldn't blame you."
She looks up, eyes blazing. "Don't you dare. Don't you dare make that choice for me."
"I'm not. I'm just saying practical is practical. Your bookstore trumps my feelings."
"My bookstore exists because of people like you." She grabs my hand, her grip fierce despite the size difference, her pulse beating quick against my palm. "People who don't fit the comfortable mold. If I cave now, I'm saying they were right to be afraid."
I want to believe her. Want to swallow that conviction whole and let it feed something stronger than the shame eating at my gut.
But the clip keeps spreading.
Darius shows up at noon with news from the enclave. Some of the younger orcs are talking about leaving the program entirely, scared the backlash will get worse. The elders are divided, half wanting to prove we're peaceful, half furious at having to prove anything at all.
"You started this," Darius says, not unkindly. "You and your human girl and your insistence we could just cook and recite poetry and they'd accept us. Maybe you were wrong."
"Maybe." I stand at the window, watching humans pass below, wondering how many have seen the clip, how many flinch when they spot an orc now. "But giving up means they win by default."
"So what's your play?"
The idea forms slowly, bits and pieces clicking together like a recipe I'm assembling from sense memory rather than written instruction. "We show them the truth. Not edited, not spun. Just us."
"How?"
"I'm still figuring that part out."
Lacy closes the bookstore early that afternoon, claims a family emergency when customers ask. Really she's in the back office with Tess, running numbers that don't add up anymore, watching support crumble in real time.
I wander the shelves, touching spines, remembering the first day I crashed through that awning like a disaster with good intentions. The pulp fantasy she loves sits front and center still, the one with the ridiculous orc warrior romance that made her laugh when I picked it up with clumsy reverence.
Books everywhere. Stories about belonging and bridges and love conquering comfortable prejudice.
Words matter. Stories matter.
The idea solidifies.
I find Lacy hunched over spreadsheets, her shoulders tight with stress, Tess rubbing her back in useless comfort. "I need to borrow the store for one night."
She looks up, confused. "What?"
"Trust me. Just one night. I'll handle everything."
"Stone, we can't afford another publicity disaster right now."
"This won't be a disaster." I crouch beside her chair, taking her hands, feeling how cold her fingers have gone with anxiety. "This will be the truth. Our story. Orc and human together, exactly like it is, no edits, no spin. Just real."
Tess frowns. "What are you planning?"
"A reading. A gathering. Food and poetry and people actually talking instead of shouting past each other."
"That's incredibly naive," Tess says.
"Probably." I squeeze Lacy's hands. "But naive got me here. Naive got me you. Might as well lean into it."
She studies my face, searching for something, then nods slowly. "Okay. One night. What do you need?"
"Time. And a printer."
The next seventy-two hours blur into controlled chaos.
I gather every scrap of poetry I've ever scribbled, all the awkward half-formed thoughts about wanting to belong while staying whole, about loving someone across the gaps people insist matter.
Pages torn from ledgers, napkins with verses scratched in haste, the back of a grocery receipt where I once tried to rhyme "tusks" with "dusk" and gave up.
Darius helps me type them up proper, fixing spelling without mocking too hard. "This one's actually good," he admits, reading a piece about Lacy's hands on old books.
"Don't sound so surprised."
"You usually rhyme 'meat' with 'eat.' This has actual emotional depth."
We print fifty copies at the community center, spiral bound with clear covers. "Stone Venn: Poems of In-Between." The title makes me cringe but Lacy insists it's perfect.
Next, the food. I recruit six orcs from the enclave who can cook, who want to show humans what our food actually is instead of the scary exoticism the clips suggest. We plan a spread: roasted root vegetables with fire spices, the sweet berry bread my clan makes for celebrations, tea blended with mountain herbs that smell like home.
"You sure about this?" asks Mara, an older orc woman who lost her placement at a school after parents complained. "Putting ourselves out there again? They'll just twist it."
"Not if we control the story from the start. We invite everyone, human and orc, media too. Let them see us as we are, not cut into bite-sized fear."
She considers, then nods. "I'll bring my storytelling drum. If we're doing this, we do it right."
I rent folding chairs, string lights, borrow sound equipment from the cultural center. Tess helps with social media, framing it careful: "Community Reading Night - All Welcome." No mention of damage control or viral clips. Just an invitation.
Lacy watches me work with this look I can't quite parse, something tender and terrified mixed together. "What if no one comes?" she asks the night before.
"Then it's you and me and fifty chapbooks."
"What if too many come? What if they're angry?"
I pull her close, resting my chin atop her head, breathing in the scent of her shampoo mixed with old paper. "Then we're angry together. Better than being afraid apart."
She holds on tight, her arms barely meeting around my back, her heartbeat quick against my ribs. "I'm scared."
"Me too."
"But you're doing it anyway."
"Only thing I know how to do. Keep trying, even when it's stupid."
She laughs, the sound muffled against my torso. "Your stupid got me through a hearing. Maybe it'll work again."
The night arrives cold and clear, early spring wind rattling the bookstore windows. We arrange chairs in a semicircle, leaving the center open for readers. The food tables line one wall, covered in simple cloth, the berry bread cut into generous slices that fill the space with sweet earthiness.
My chapbooks stack beside the register, their covers gleaming under the string lights Lacy helped me hang. Each one feels like exposing something raw, every bad poem and earnest thought I've ever had about not fitting and wanting to anyway.
Darius shows up first with four more orcs in tow, all dressed careful-casual, trying to look approachable. Then Aunt Rene, carrying her famous pie and a gleam of mischief. Tess arrives with a photographer she trusts, someone who'll capture the real moments instead of hunting for controversy.
Seven o'clock. The posted start time.
A handful of humans drift in, curious locals who know Lacy, who maybe saw the invite and wanted to support her despite the clips. They take chairs cautiously, eyeing the orc food with interest and uncertainty.
Seven fifteen. More arrive. Some I recognize from the hearing, allies who testified or just showed up to witness. Others are strangers, and I can't tell if they've come in good faith or to gawk at the spectacle.
Seven thirty. The room's half full, maybe forty people, mixed species, the murmur of conversation building like water finding its level.
Lacy touches my arm. "Ready?"
My mouth's gone dry. "Absolutely not."
"Good. That means it matters." She kisses my cheek, quick and fierce. "Go show them who you are."