Page 2 of Summoning the Orc

They were waiting for the names of my mate and offspring. As I entered the cavernous space, my eyes went straight to the untouched stone. It was empty for now. As empty as I was.

I sat on the edge of the bed, burying my face in my hands.

Chapter Two

Becca

I stared up at the building in front of me, awe filling my chest. This couldn’t be right. I couldnotbe living here. It had been a few weeks coming, but I had to give notice at my old job and clear out my old house before moving here.

“If you keep gawking at it, your face is going to get stuck that way,” my best friend told me, chucking my chin to close my mouth from where it’d been hanging open.

“Youlivehere, Pen?” I asked, clutching at her arm.

“I know, right?” she giggled, hugging me to her side. “And now so do you! It’ll be like when we were kids. Sleepovers all the time.”

An annoyed grunt from behind me told me that my best friend’s mate had heard us. Dristan wasn’t the most social male on the best day and I knew thatsleepoversmight be going a little too far. Still, I enjoyed picking at him.

I sent a beaming smile over my shoulder. “Wouldn’t that just be great, Dristan? We could braid your hair and beard!”

His scowl bared his fangs and I held in the nefarious laugh that was building inside me. Riling him up was one of my newfavorite pastimes. Just last week, Pen, Rudgar and I had both texted him that Pen wanted to host a party and insisted that he help us plan it. He’d pouted the entire day.

“And then I’ll spend all night saying thank you for being patient and sweet,” Penelope cooed, sending a kiss his way.

That eased some of the annoyance from his expression, heat filling his gaze instead. I didn’t bother to hide my grin.

Males are so easy.

The pang in my chest—the one that had existed inside me since I was old enough to understand what loneliness was—decided that it was the perfect moment to make itself known. I never got a break from it.

I wasn’t sure why I felt this way. As far as I understood it, no one else did. I’d asked Penelope multiple times since we were young if she ever had that emptiness inside her. She’d nodded, saying she thought she was the only one.

We’d kept that loneliness to ourselves—since it didn’t seem to affect anyone else. I was certain it wasn’t something we could do anything about, though. I’d begun filling that hole inside me with stories of love and romance and she’d focused on her family instead.

Since I was young, I’d devoured books on love and fated mates. I was certain that was the missing thing inside me. I was sure that there was a male out there that would recognize me as his other half—the jagged ends of our souls just waiting to be sewn together.

So far my search had been a bust. It didn’t help that I’d grown up in the smallest town in the history of towns. My options had been miniscule at best.

But now I’d moved into the big city with my best friend and her very own fated mate, Dristan. Grebath would be the place to find my own mate if I had one. There was a huge, eclectic mix of species andmillionsof beings bustling along the streets.

I eyed Dristan’s brother as he moved up behind us, looking at us with concern. I’d hoped that this towering male would spark some interest inside me. Even as a child I was drawn to watching orc actors, but orc males in particular had intrigued me since I saw one for the first time in person, on the street as a teenager.

My heart had pounded with interest as the male had sauntered right past me, ignoring me completely. My obsession had begun then, and it still held strong.

I’d been disappointed when a fated bond hadn’t snapped right into place when I met Rudgar, but I’d just have to keep looking. Rudgar sent a smile my way and I waved.

“I heard we’re going to be neighbors,” I told him, and Penelope squealed with happiness next to me, still gripping my arm.

“Yes! Rud can join us for sleepovers too!” she giggled.

I watched the male’s complexion go pale and a queasy smile spread across his face as he glanced at his brother. Dristan’s expression was smug and he nodded, slapping him across his back.

“Yes, of course. He’d love to,” Dristan answered for him, handing a key card to me. “This is yours. Access to the elevator and your apartment.”

I took it with shaking hands, having never imagined that I would be standing where I was. I was a poor orphan from a tiny town with no one except a best friend to call my own. I’d been working at the underfunded library there, burying myself in books and dreams, and now here I stood, with my entire future laid out in front of me like a gift.

“Thank you,” I told him with a watery smile that seemed to make him uncomfortable. With a grunt and a nod, he turned away from me.

Penelope snorted out a laugh, hugging me close. “What he means to say isyou’re welcome,” she said with a grin.

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