Page 1 of The Fall of the Orc

1

Aulis Gerrard was going to die.

He grunted as his shaky hands swung up his broadsword, just in time to clang against the orc’s huge, sweeping axe-blade. The impact strong enough to set him staggering, the pain reverberating up his shaking arms, jarring his teeth, his skull. While the dread kept wrenching louder, deeper, in ominous accord with the thunder of his heartbeat.

He was finally going to die. After thirty years of sweat and luck and sheer damned stubbornness, this would be the end. His body cleaved apart by a cruel orc’s axe, thanks to the fool command of quite possibly the most arrogant, dim-witted commander in the realm.

No retreating this time, General Livermore had ordered the regiment, before they’d set out — again — for the orcs’ camp.You take their base, or don’t come back.

But it was their third attempt that week, after months of similar futility, and the men were hungry, weary, and deeply unwilling. And as the next-highest-ranking officer left standing in this godsforsaken outpost, Gerrard had been tasked with outfitting and mustering the regiment, and leading the charge. Inspiring his exhausted men to do this, to risk their lives for this, one more time.

So once they’d caught sight of the orcs — a solid wall of muscle and steel at the edge of the foggy clearing — Gerrard had drawn his trusty broadsword, and sprinted straight toward them. Again making for the biggest, most brutal orc in the line, a scarred, massive, grey-skinned berserker with a gigantic double-bladed axe, and a harsh, craggy face.

The orc’s grim expression hadn’t changed as he’d swung his axe to meet Gerrard’s sword, or as the clangs and shouts of pitched battle rose around them. But that bulky grey body moved with ruthless, inhuman power, his axe-swings focused and vicious, blocking Gerrard’s blade again and again and again. Forcing Gerrard to work harder and harder, to dodge and weave and strike, seeking in vain for an opening, an advantage, a weakness.

But there was nothing but noise and sweat and frustration, and the relentless steel barrier of the orc’s infuriating, ever-present axe. And though Gerrard was unquestionably faster, lighter on his feet — and he’d gotten in a few good strikes on the orc’s bare arms and chest — the orc still hadn’t once faltered. That massive axe just swinging again and again, coming closer every time, driving Gerrard deeper and deeper toward sheer, staggering exhaustion.

He was going to stumble, and then he was going to die.

The certainty kept rising with every swing, every strike, every shudder of Gerrard’s wavering blade in his numb, weakening hands. And his brief, searching glances through the fog around him didn’t find anyone else faring any better — the orcs were gaining ground, and several of his men had already fallen, curse it,curseit —

He should be retreating. He should be turning, hollering for his men, and running for the safety of the outpost, like any responsible lieutenant would do. There was no point in killing an entire regiment over a stupid skirmish, over a stupid camp with only a few dozen orcs, on a stupid command from a stupid general. It was tactically useless, it did nothing to stop the orcs’ incessant raiding, and it meant nothing —nothing— to the legions of powerful orcs still hunkered down in that damned Orc Mountain, sixty leagues to the southwest. Orc Mountain couldn’t be taken, it was an impenetrable rock fortress, and this war was a cursed fuckingblightof endless fighting and disease and death.

And even if Gerrard survived this battle, this deadly orc — there would be another, and another, and another. There would be more pointless deaths of his men, his friends and colleagues, upon his own conflicted commands. For the gain — the bragging rights — of arrogant, unthinking fools like Livermore.

And for what? Gerrard’s thoughts demanded, as the orc’s axe again clanged against his sword’s edge, shattering more dizzying exhaustion in its wake. For what. For the naive, stupid ideals he’d once held? His thwarted dreams of someday becoming the youngest general in Preia, and making much-needed reforms that might actually help his men, rather than dragging them to their deaths? Or maybe, more likely, for the coin he’d be paid, if he ever made it back north to the city? For the shitty food and conditions, or the too-familiar gnawing hunger? For the quick fumbling fucks with other tired bodies in the darkness, out in the mud and dirt?

Or for the challenge of it, his distant memories pointed out, as he dodged sideways, and managed to duck beneath the next swing of the orc’s huge axe. He’d always revelled in competition, in pushing the limits of his own skill and strength and endurance. In the unparalleled thrill of knowing he’d bested a worthy opponent. An opponent just like… like this.

But in this moment, as the grim-faced orc’s axe again crashed against his wavering blade, Gerrard couldn’t even seem to find a vague, far-off satisfaction in the battle itself, or the ever-decreasing hope of victory. Because even then, if he did somehow rally and regroup, and crushed this orc beneath him — then what? He would slice this powerful grey body apart, drain all its blood into the earth, watch the life fade from those hard, glinting eyes. And the orc’s empty face would join all the others that crowded Gerrard’s dreams at night, woke him up in cold sweats, his heart fighting to escape out his throat. While he was still trapped here in hell, trapped serving the realm’s worst general, staring down the truth of all his own dreams shattered at his feet.

No. There was no point. No fucking point, but stupidity, and greed, and misery. None.

He was going to die, and that was all.

So when the orc raised his axe again, Gerrard didn’t move. Didn’t bother trying to lift his own leaden blade. And instead he just stood there, tall and proud and despairing, as the orc’s axe swung straight for his throat.

2

Gerrard’s death should have been quick. Quick, and clean, and relatively painless, his head sliced from his shoulders in one sharp, decisive stroke.

But instead, it was — pain. Agony, flashing white through Gerrard’s skull, as the orc’s huge axe-blade wrenched up and sideways, and the flat of it crashed against his shoulder.

It sent Gerrard flying, his body slamming into the muck with shocking force, smashing the breath from his lungs, the sword from his hands. While the agony kept wailing, spewing out in stark dizzying streams, in ragged, desperate gasps from his mouth. He was still breathing, why was he still breathing, what the hell had happened, what the —

The orc. The orc had done it. He’d turned his blade, spun it up at the last possible instant, and — and in doing so, he’d kept Gerrard alive. And now he was standing here, looming over Gerrard in the fog with his huge shoulders heaving, his axe still bobbing in his massive clawed hands.

And — wait. Wait. Maybe the bastard wanted to play with Gerrard first. Maybe this was just the start of it, and this orc was going to make Gerrard’s death slow and excruciating, make an example, a mockery, for the rest of them. And Gerrard had witnessed humans — his own damned superiors — doing the exact same thing to orcs, so why was he even surprised, what the fuck had he been thinking, what had he done —

And for perhaps the first time in this hellish day, this entire hellish mission, there was — fear. Fear, creeping cold and terrible up Gerrard’s spine, closing around his throat. He’d always wanted his death to be fast. Painless. And now he had to face more agony, more misery, more humiliation, while all his own doomed men witnessed it. And somehow, watchingthisorc do it would make it even worse. He’d been a brilliant fighter, a worthy opponent, who hadn’t spoken a single word of mockery or shame. And now — now —

Now Gerrard was — trembling. Quivering in the mud at the orc’s feet, like the defeated useless failure he was, while the orc just stood there, and watched. Watched, his huge shoulders heaving, as something shifted, changed, in his grim black eyes.

Something almost like… pity.

Gerrard’s mortification surged up alongside the terror and grief, his body reflexively curling in tight. Bracing, waiting, dreading, until —

The orc dropped his axe, and lunged. His massive deadly bulk lurching for Gerrard’s cowering form, his hand swinging out, its black claws aiming for —

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