Page 27 of Her Orc Healer

Maeve shifted beside me. Her face was drawn tight, watching this man with the same wary curiosity she gave to unfamiliar animals—like she was waiting to see if he’d bite.

Iwanted to bite.

I inhaled sharply through my nose, pushing down the sharp spike of frustration curling in my chest. “So that’s it?”

The man blinked at me, as if confused by my persistence. “What more do you expect?”

I expected someone to care. I expected someone to help me. I expected—

“Nothing.”

Maeve wasn’t the only one being dismissed here—I was, too. I could see it in the way his gaze flicked past me, already bored. To him, I was just another overprotective mother, wringing her hands over something trivial. He wasn’t worried. He wasn’t even listening.

He didn't see her.

He didn't see me.

A sick feeling settled in my stomach. But beneath the bitterness, beneath the bone-deep exhaustion of fighting battles that no one else even seemed to realize were battles, something else twisted through me.

Steel.

I had waited this long to seek help because I had known, deep down, how this would go. And now I knew for certain. I was no one’s concern but my own.

Maeve’s soft fingers curled tighter around mine. I squeezed back.

Then, very carefully, I exhaled and straightened. “Come, Maeve.”

Maeve hesitated a fraction too long, as if waiting for me to argue, to fight, to push harder. But I merely turned, keeping my grip firm in hers, and led her from the room.

The first man was waiting outside, but I barely glanced at him as we stepped past, moving through the cold corridors, past the endless shelves of neatly bound books filled with knowledge they had already made clear would not be shared with us.

A mistake. This had been a mistake.

Even as the bitter taste of frustration lingered in my mouth, I swallowed it down, forcing my expression into something unreadable. Maeve was watching me, as perceptive as ever, and the last thing I wanted was for her to see just how much this disappointment had cut me.

We stepped back into the street, the afternoon light too bright after the dim corridors of the guildhall. I lifted my chin, took Maeve’s hand more firmly in mine, and set off toward home with long, determined strides.

Maeve kept up, quiet but watchful, until she finally asked, “Will they help us later?"

I didn’t slow. “No.”

She hesitated, and when she spoke again, her voice was smaller. “…Then who will?”

I swallowed hard. "I will."

That was the end of it.

By the time we returned to the shop, dusk was settling in, painting Everwood in deepening hues of amber and navy. But something felt wrong the moment I approached the door.

I stopped short, my pulse kicking up, and pulled Maeve behind me.

The door was slightly ajar.

I knew I had shut it. Locked it.

A surge of cold panic tightened around my ribs. Maeve must have felt the shift in me because she stilled, pressing into my side without a word. My mind snapped to every possible explanation—none of them good.

Carefully, I reached for the shop door and pushed it open the rest of the way.

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