Page 30 of Mountain Orc Daddy

We walk along the path I found the footprints on. The Morgans believe that the bounty hunter still lurks nearby. The only problem is, I followed a pathway and left it when I heard the noises.

“Do you remember what the shack looked like at least?’ Mara asks.

I nod. “Yes. It’s small and a little rundown. If we see it, I’d recognize it.”

The woods look vastly different between day and night. I don’t know which direction I took off to. Still, I did run a couple more meters into the trees after hearing Blair.

The footprints wore off a bit with my own. When I walk, I tend to drag my feet, leaving thick streaks. I never felt so useless as I do now.

Blair puts a hand over my arm. I look down at her, seeing her give me an encouraging smile. Such a beautiful slight renders me weak to any negative thoughts. I return the kind gesture, forgetting for a moment the presence of her family.

Phineas clears his throat. “I suppose it’ll be faster if we use magic to find it?”

“That’s a fine idea,” Mara replies. She turns to Blair. “Give me your hand, sweetie.”

“Why?” Blair asks, hiding her hand.

“One method of tracking is using DNA. You scratched your legs right? If there’s even a bit of it left in the shack then we can track it by pricking your finger.”

Even Remus appears confused. “I don’t remember learning that.”

Mara laughs. “Of course not. This trick was only for your dad and I. How do you think we knew when you were up to no good?”

“Wait, is that why you guys would sometimes show up to my parties?” Jade asks.

“Obviously.”

Blair stands on her tiptoes and whispers to me. “Parties are a type of celebration.”

I nod in understanding.

“Mom, Dad! Why would you do that? Do you know how embarrassing that was?” Jade whines.

Phineas shrugs. “Better for you to be safe than not. Remus was worse than you. We almost got in a war with the dragon clan because of him.”

Jade, Blair, and I look at Remus with a mix of shock, confusion, and curiosity. The parents still look like the incident bothers them. The person in question shows no signs of remorse.

“What? They started it. How was I supposed to know they have anger issues?” he says.

I’ll have to agree with him on that. Orcs are known to have a short fuse. Dragons are an entire different story.

Jade scoffs. “Because they’redragons? What did they even start? And why didn’t Blair and I know?”

The siblings start to bicker. Blair sighs in defeat. I share her same emotions because this is getting out of hand. We keep getting off track of what’s important.

Going back to how Mara planned to track down the shack, I don’t like it. It feels a bit too ominous to use on Blair.

I say loudly. “Is there another method that doesn’t require blood?”

“Hm, I suppose we can use hair instead of blood.”

“Why wasn’t that the first option?” Blair mutters to herself.

Instead of pricking her finger, Mara pulls a strand of hair. She extends it up in the air, towards the sun. Then, she lights it on fire.

It keeps burning, giving a small flame. Mara lets it go and the strand of hair floats away. The trajectory in how it moves follows a distinct path. We follow behind it.

The hair floats around like a falling feather. We don’t move our eyes away from it. Finally, it takes us to the shack. Exactly how I remember it.

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