Page 38 of Loved By the Orc
I watch carefully as he moves to the edge of the house and turns the corner. It’s his gait, the way he looks over his shoulder at me like he needs to have that last connection between us that makes up my mind. Of course, it’s fine.
I close the window softly, leaving it open just a bit so it won’t squeak when it touches, but not enough to let the rain in.
Then I tiptoe down the stairs to the back door. My heart thuds against my ribs. Does he to sneak in? Stay with me the whole night? Surely, it’s wet and miserable in the wagon. Or mayhap he has some bad news with the weather. Has he spotted another Southpeak in the area and that’s why he’s tense? Maybe another letter from his father.
Very quietly, I unlock the back door, but the way it’s harshly yanked open against me surprises me.
“Varguk?” I whisper, puzzled that he pulled open the door with such force. He could wake Aunt Rosemary and Uncle Paul and all my quietness sneaking down the stairs will be for naught.
Again, I get a niggling of my senses that something’s off. He’s so familiar, yet… not.
The stranger stares back at me with deeper-set eyes. A face not quite touched with harshness and experience. A leaner face, the lips I’ve kissed hundreds of times not quite as beautiful. Mayhap a bit younger? I realize my mistake at the same time I open my mouth to scream.
This isn’t him.
His hand shoots out and a sweet-smelling cloth covers my mouth. My last thought before the world fades away is wondering if this is what it felt like for Shalia when she was taken from this house.
The damp smell of dirt fills my senses, the cold, hard surface pressed against my cheek. I barely peek from the slit of my eyelashes. There’s no windows, no natural light, just the musty dampness of earth. My groggy mind remembers the sweetness of chloroform. I wonder where they picked it up. It’s not that easy to come by.
I’m fighting not sliding back into unconsciousness, but mayhap I do.
When I open my eyes fully, there are two orcs surrounding me, peering down with similar faces. Completely familiar, each resembling the other, yet they can’t be who I think they are.
Leviton should be dead. And Varguk is staring at me with a hungry expression, wholly different than the desire he normally looks at me with.
But wait… I remember now. It’s not Varguk. He looks like him, but there’s something wrong with the image. And so maybe I’m also imagining a dead Leviton here in the flesh?
“You! You should be dead.” I point at the image of Leviton, which blurs in front of me.
A slight throbbing begins in my temples as I try to think back to what I might be missing. My brain feels cloudy, like I’m stuffed with cotton between the ears.
He chuckles. “Not that easy to kill, m’kirn.”
“Where am I?”
“Halfway to our village.”
“You stole me? My father will have your head,” I spit out, as he begins to loosen my bindings. Blood rushes to my limbs, painful needles flowing to the tips of my fingers.
“Will he?” Leviton asks. “Becausehestill thinks I’m dead. Only you know otherwise.”
“How are you alive?”
“When it comes down to it, wench, you were kidnapped by Southpeaks. Varguk played you. He pretended to be the good brother and kill the bad one, thus earning your trust. Your loyalty.”
“Nay. He would never—”
“We’ve been competing since the day we met,” he snaps. “Until Varguk stumbled across meeting Prince Bakog. He realized the West Mountains were willing to do anything to get their hands on the rogue clan who’d taken one of theirs. We reached an agreement. If you ever see him again? Ask him if he was sent to your town with the intent to mate the bridge between Blackheart and West Mountain. He won’t deny it. Neither will the West Mountain prince.”
“You lie.”
“Nay. I’m not dead at all, am I? We just wanted you to think so. That was the plan between me and Varguk until he tried to betray me,” Leviton answers.
“What sort ofplan?” I echo stupidly.
“A goal of our clan mating the bridge between the Blackheart and West Mountain orcs. Varguk volunteered, of course. Had I known you would be so lovely, though, I’d have taken the job myself.”
“But I saw you die. I watched.” There’s no way he can be telling the truth. No way Varguk was playing a part.
