Page 24 of Bound to the Orc Guardian

“Nothing,” Sturrm mutters, his eyes shooting daggers at the unicorn.

“Everything,” Dash counters.

“Coño! I hate not knowing things!”

They both startle and turn to look at me.

Dash recovers first. “Did you just say—”

“Unicorn…” Sturrm growls a warning.

“—female anatomy parts?” The orc’s warning must have worked, because I don’t think those are the words Dash was originally going to say.

“Sorry.” I give a quick shrug. “Spanish is like that. Words have different meanings in different regions, and where I’m from, that’s more like ‘dammit’ than… female anatomy parts.” My lips twitch as I repeat the unicorn’s careful phrasing. “I guess the translation magic is seriously literal.” I guess I need to watch how I swear, which is a real pain in the ass, because I’m used to being around either south-Florida Hispanics, who know what I mean, or non-Spanish speakers, who don’t know enough to get upset.

“Back to the point. Tell me everything.” I start counting things on my fingers. “Where are we? Who are you? And what’s all of this about a cure?”

“Let’s see where we’re going so we can talk as we walk.” Sturrm crouches to spread the dragon parchment upon the ground, then unfolds another, larger map he takes from his pack.

“Don’t you mean ride?” Dash steps closer.

Sturrm stares up at him. “Do I? We only discussed rescuing Selena.”

“You do.” Dash’s hoof stomps against the ground to make his point, kicking up a small divot of grass. “You two are by far the most interesting thing I’ve encountered in years. And now there are dragons. I will carry you on your quest.”

Sturrm’s gaze remains steady and assessing, his eyes narrowing a tiny bit. Then he gives a sharp nod. “All right.”

“So where are we?” I ask, in a rush, everything I’ve been wondering about for the past few days pouring out of me. I tap a finger to the map, unable to read any of the words. “Is this Faerie? Because I think it’s Faerie.”

“It is!” Dash says. “How did you guess?”

“I had an ancestor who told stories about it. Her name was Abigail. Her grandmother had visited Faerie as a small girl, so Abigail spent her youth trying to find the door. She never could, and people thought she was mentally unstable, so her family shipped her off to Peru, which is a different country on the other side of the ocean from England.”

“That seems a little extreme,” Dash says.

“Mierda, yeah.” I say. “But I’m glad, because she’s why I know anything about this place, and she left her daughter, and therefore me, this.” I hold up my crystal necklace.

“How long ago did Abigail live?” Sturrm asks.

“She died about a hundred and fifty years ago.”

“Then she wasn’t mentally unstable,” Sturrm says, his deep voice serious. “The doors to Faerie closed three hundred years ago, isolating all the realms from each other and cutting us off from your world as well.”

“Ay! That’s good to know.” I mull over his words, then snap my fingers. “But if the doors are closed, how did I get here?”

Dash asks, “Did a big ball of light scoop you up?”

“Yes!”

“That was the goddess.” He sounds smug, like he already knew I’d say yes.

Shock zips through me. “Carajo, what? Agoddess?”

“The Moon Goddess,” Sturrm says. “Alarria used to be a lost realm, empty of inhabitants, but once the doors of Faerie closed, the goddess brought various fae here. Most of them, like my orc ancestors, arrived hundreds of years ago.”

“Yeah, the only people the goddess brings now are human women who are moon bou—”

“Unicorn,” Sturrm barks in a warning tone and glares.

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