Page 108 of Orc's Possession
It has taken me weeks of lying in bed, healing, to figure out why she walked away. I once told her I’d never hurt her. I always thought protecting a mate meant keeping her from physical harm, but she’s shown me there is another type of pain, that of being ripped from those you love. Like how I took her from her sisters and her people.
If you care about me, even a little, then let me go. That’s what true love is, sacrificing for the happiness of another.
Her words haunt me as I remember my mother taking my father’s sword in her belly, to save me. She sacrificed for me, as I’ve sworn to do for my mate.
Paloma’s chosen her people over me because she needs them.Not me. She will not thrive without them. I don’t care if Verig, Ossa, or any of my people understand. I won’t cause my mate more pain by taking her again, by keeping her from or destroying those she… loves.
“Instruct our warriors not to kill the human males. The females will be difficult until they adapt to our ways. Killing their kin will only make that task harder, if not impossible.”
There is only one female for me. I won’t take another for myself, but my warriors deserve what I promised them.
“Yes, Grak. It will be done.”
Verig rides his gorja to the rear to convey my orders. A new energy surges in the ranks, making me sit straighter on my mount. I may have failed as a mate, but I won’t fail as a grak.
PALOMA
Throwingthe plate of food at my father and Councilman Roberts who stand outside the bars of my cell does nothing more than make a mess of the eight-by-eight-foot area that’s been my home since returning to my former colony. The tray lands with a satisfying clank that gives me a fleeting moment of joy. The only joy to be had in this dismal cell previously used for drunks.
A wave of dizziness overwhelms me from overexerting myself, so I sit down on the cot, clutching the scalpel I stole from the doctor. I haven’t let go of my only weapon since my first day in this cell, when the doctor showed up with a surgical bag declaringhe was ready to relieve me of my beastly burden. He thought he was funny. I didn’t, and I made that quite clear when I grabbed his knife and left him with a six-inch gash down his left arm. Poor aim on my part; I’d been aiming for his throat.
The man now refuses to come near me. Good!
“What am I to do with you?” my father says. “You are as stubborn and willful as ever. You insist on keeping that abomination growing inside you, and you still refuse to give me information I need about the orcs. Strengths and weaknesses. Location of their settlement. Placement of patrols. Anything, Paloma. This is your chance to be part of New Earth again. Prove you belong here.”
“But I don’t belong here. And I won’t keep repeating myself. You won’t get any information from me. I won’t betray my people.”
“Weare your people,” Councilman Roberts says.
I glare at him and calmly say, “Release me.”
My father scowls, displeased of how my behavior is embarrassing him in front of the senior councilman. “We left her with the orc too long. They brainwashed her,” my father says.
“Hardly. I’m as sane and aware of everything happening here, Father.”
His eyes narrow. He can’t explain my sporadic behavior. Throwing my tray one minute and talking calmly the next. I’m making myself as unpredictable as the wind, intentionally.
“You’re as difficult as ever, Paloma. That’s why you’re in this mess.”
“Then release me. You’ll never see me again.”
“We don’t abandon our people,” Councilman Roberts speaks up, the ass. “Your father said you’d bring back intel about the orcs. Why won’t you even give us the most basic of information? I promise we won’t send you away again.”
Send me away… as if they’d sent me off to camp for the summer.
“This,” I point from Councilman Roberts to me, “Is not apartnership. I don’t work for you. I don’t want to talk to you or him,” I say, pointing to my father. “Nothing you can say will ever regain my trust.”
“If we had told you why we gave you to the orcs, you would have messed up. It was for your own protection,” the councilman says.
If he’s thinking of attacking the orcs, then he’s more of a fool than I already thought. Either way, I won’t betray my people. Orc or human. Giving Council logistical information about the orcs puts everyone at risk.
“Don’t try to convince me that I was only there to glean intel for you. You didn’t care what happened to me. Whatever you and Council intended aside, it boils down to one fact. Youusedme. And for that, I will never forget, forgive, or trust anything involving any of you. Ever!”
Earl Conners, my guard in this one-cell building, returns with another plate of food which he slides through the slot beneath the bars in my eight-by-eight-foot cell. “Here, Paloma. Nothing but fruit and water.”
Earl doesn’t get it. I don’t trust the food they constantly push at me. It’s drugged, I’m sure of it. My hand slides over my belly where my baby bump is finally visible.
“Eat,” my father orders, pushing the tray further into the cell.
