Page 115 of Her Orc Healer

She shrugged, rolling her neck until it cracked. “Miren likes a calm house. I haven’t been one lately. Thought maybe you’d lend me a bit of yours.”

Then, a beat slower, eyes softer: “I thought maybe I needed help.”

Something in me shifted at that. Not sympathy exactly—recognition. I knew what it felt like to reach the edge of yourself and need someone steady to hold the line.

“You’re not the first,” I said. “You won’t be the last.”

Larka looked relieved in the way only a woman held together by grit and sheer will could look relieved. “Thank the Seven,” she muttered, sagging into the bench like her bones had finally remembered they were tired.

Kazrek looked at me over the baby’s downy head.

I looked back.

“Well,” I said, voice dry, “at least we didn’t make the new sign yet.”

He huffed a sound that might’ve been a laugh. “Better change it to ‘Closed until the family drama sorts itself out.’”

“Don’t you dare,” Larka called from the bench. “I want sticky buns and peace and at least one full night of sleep before anyone sorts anything.”

Kazrek shifted Miren in his arms with a quiet ease that still made something tighten in my chest. Not longing. Just… fullness. A feeling too big for the space it occupied.

“She’s heavier than she looks,” he murmured.

“She’s got orc bones,” Larka said without opening her eyes. “And a temper to match. Wait until she starts teething.”

“Please don’t curse us this early,” I said, but the words were fond, already tugging a blanket from the basket by the stove. I spread it across Larka’s legs, nudging her gently when she tried to protest.

She slumped further into the bench with a satisfied grunt.

“Maeve’ll be thrilled,” I added, glancing toward the front windows. “She’s been campaigning for another baby to practice lullabies on.”

“She can practice on mine,” Larka said. “Just let me nap while she does it.”

The door creaked open again—no knock this time, just the soft slam of familiarity—and Maeve burst in, cheeks pink from the cold, red curls tangled and wild.

“Sticky buns secured!” she declared, holding the greasy paper bag over her head like a trophy. Then she spotted the bundle in Kazrek’s arms. “Is that a baby?”

“It is,” I said.

Her eyes lit up. “Can I hold her?”

“Wash your hands first,” Kazrek said, already lowering himself into the chair by the hearth, shifting Miren into the crook of his elbow.

Maeve bolted toward the back room, shouting something about finding her “magic-free hand towel.”

I leaned against the counter, arms crossed loosely, watching them.

Kazrek and the baby. Larka dozing with one hand still tucked into the crook of her traveling pack. Maeve’s voice singing through the hall in off-key rhymes. The smell of ink and herbs and warm sugar clinging to every surface.

There had been so much fear. So much loss and almost-loss. So many nights I’d braced myself for what might come next.

But right now, there was only this.

Light on the floorboards.

A fire in the hearth.

A home that had become wide enough to hold more than I ever thought I’d have.

---