Page 14 of Bound to the Orc Warrior

“Come, let’s get out of the open.” I hustle my bride under the cover of the trees. They’re no true protection—as evinced by the attack the sluagh waged as Zephyr and I neared the clearing—but the pines will slow the soul stealer down.

“What happened to the saddle and all our things?” I ask Zephyr.

“Ourthings?” she says dryly, eyeing me.

“Mythings.” I scowl with no true heat in it. This is a long-running joke between us. Unicorns are strange that way—they agree to partner with orcs yet seem to begrudge our need to carry supplies.

“They fell off when I turned into a biped. This way.” Zephyr pushes between two pines, leading us to the area where I left her fighting part of the sluagh flock.

“So where are we?” Naomi runs a hand over a close branch, stroking the needles in the direction of their growth. “If we’re not on Earth, that is.”

“This is Alarria, one of the realms of Faerie.” I lift the saddle and attached bags from the ground, tucking it under one arm to free my hands to open the buckle.

“Faerie.” She repeats the word slowly, as if tasting each syllable.

“It used to connect to your world.” I sling the saddle up onto Zephyr’s back and bend to cinch the strap tight. “That’s why you have stories about us.”

“Yes.” The cat sith slinks past her legs, his bushy tail waving high in the air. “Youmusthave stories of my kind.”

“Why are you here?” I scowl at him.

“You’ve been traveling through cat sith lands for several days, orc. And you questionmeas to why I’m here?”

“I did not trespass on a whim.” I bare my tusks at him. “The goddess summoned me.”

“It’s true,” Zephyr says. “I saw her light when she appeared to him.”

The feline’s eyes flick past me, landing on Naomi. “So that makes the human—”

“It does,” I cut across his words, my voice as sharp as a blade. If anyone’s telling her what we are to each other, it’s me. I turn to her and soften my tone. “The Moon Goddess summoned me to come and find you because you’re my moon bound bride.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Naomi

“Bride?” The word bursts from my lips in a startled laugh as disbelief fills me. “Is that a joke? I’m supposed to marry a complete stranger?”

“No.” Wranth frowns down at me.

“Oh, good.” Relief rushes through me, and I let out a big breath. As bizarre as this day’s already been, that would be one big bucket of weird too far.

“You do not need to marry me. The goddess already did that. She bound us the moment she summoned me and gathered you from your world. We’re already married.”

My mouth falls open, but nothing comes out. Here I am, the English major, the one-book-a-day reader, the bookshop owner who lives and breathes words every second of every day.I’ve read hundreds of romance books with arranged marriages exploring all the ways the couples find love. None of it’s helping.

I got nothing.

Another shriek from above makes me flinch. Those weird-ass evil birds are still after us. The wounds on the underside of my forearms throb with remembered pain.

Wranth’s huge hands wrap around my waist, and he lifts me up onto the saddle as if I’m weightless.

Oh! My heart trips and tingles zip through me. I’ve never been picked up and moved around by a guy like this before—it’s freaking amazing.

Then he’s up in the saddle behind me, his massive body wrapping around me, thighs on the outside of mine, arms reaching forward. He touches me everywhere, making every single one of my “only one horse” fantasies come true.

Zephyr leaps forward, still one moment, running the next, with no buildup in between.

With a gasp, I sway back into Wranth, and one of his hands loosens its hold on the unicorn’s mane to splay across my stomach. He steadies me effortlessly, everything he does exuding quiet, solid strength.

---