My second escape attempt is even less effective than my first. I really shouldn’t have tried to run from Steagor. Then I wouldn’t be lying facedown across his horse’s back like a sack of grain, with my ass sticking in the air.
But here I am, slung over Steagor’s powerful thighs, my ribs sore from rubbing against the saddle. I’ll be damned before I complain to him, though, not when he puts his big palm on my back every time I try to switch positions. I endure the discomfort because he’s in even more pain than me—his cock strains in his leather pants, right by my side. He’s punishing me for disobeying him yet can’t seem to stop himself from palming my ass from time to time.
I suppose we were lucky the massive horse hadn’t run away while we were busy rolling around in the leaves. Now, an hour later, it walks with measured steps down a country lane, which our path joined once we got out of the forest. I’ve experienced most of the last leg of the journey upside down, and now I wiggle on Steagor’s lap, trying to sit up.
“Will you let me go?” I grumble. “We can’t ride into the village like this. They’ll come after you with pitchforks and torches.”
Which would serve him right. He’s a brute and a villain for making me ride in such a humiliating fashion. But for some reason, the thought of him getting hurt is unbearable.
“They would not,” he assures me. “This village is in King Gorvor’s territory. A lot of orc folk live here, and they’d know I had a good reason for it.”
“Good reason, pfft,” I mutter.
But he lets up the pressure on my back, so I push myself up—until I’m facing him, staring at his broad chest. I peer up at him, but he’s staring straight ahead, ignoring me. His jaw clenches, though, so I know I’m getting to him.
Steagor brings out a side of me I never knew I possessed. It goes beyond the fact that he showed me things my body is capable of, beyond the pleasure he wrought from me. For the first time in my life, I feel the urge to take over my own fate. To rebel against what others want for me—from me.
So even though I should move to sit sideways on the front of the saddle, like we’d started off at the Hill, I don’t. Instead, I move closer to Steagor. I hook my legs around his waist, ignoring my skirts, which hike up almost scandalously high, and lean my head on his chest. Then I wrap my arms around his middle and hold on.
Steagor’s breath stalls in his chest. His cock twitches where it’s nestled at the juncture of my thighs, and an answering pulse of awareness radiates from my core. Then he sighs, brings one arm around my back to hold me in place, and nudges the horse into motion again.
If the villagers we travel past in the fields think there’s anything strange about us, they don’t say it. Steagor lifts his hand in greeting every so often, and they shout back to say hello. Like Steagor said, there are both orcs and humans around, most too busy to spare us more than a passing glance.
Chickens scatter to avoid the horse’s massive hooves, and a pack of children run after us, shrieking and laughing. After a minute, Steagor relents, dismounting and lowering me from the saddle. Then he helps four children at once to climb on top of the tall animal, and we arrive at the village square in a procession, the three small girls and a boy waving from their perch like they’re royalty.
Steagor seems to know this place, because he leads us straight to an inn, where he pays an older boy a silver piece to rub down the horse and feed it. Then he unties the saddlebags from the back of the saddle and motions with his head for me to enter the inn.
It’s one of the largest buildings in the village, a two-story wooden structure with a stone base, white-washed and well maintained. Its shingled roof is steep, testifying to how severe the winters are in this part of the land, and has glass in all its windows, proving the wealth of its owner. The shutters are painted a bright red, a color that’s repeated on several more houses in the village, giving the place a quaint, inviting look.
The children who hop into Steagor’s arms are sturdy and healthy, their cheeks round. Young orcs and humans soon lose their interest in us and scamper off, in search of another adventure.
First appearances aren’t everything, but this village seems like a good place to live.
We enter the inn, and Steagor leads me to a private dining room off the common taproom and asks me to wait. I use the time to finger-comb my hair and make sure my dress is covering up everything it needs to after that eventful horse ride. I don’t know what he thinks to achieve in this inn, exactly, but I’m sure he’ll tell me sooner or later.
I hope it involves food, because I’m famished.
He seems to know it, too, because a serving maid appears minutes later with a tray filled with well-prepared, hearty food. The roast is juicy and the potatoes crispy, the apple tart is dusted with powdered sugar that has me licking my fingers, and the light ale is just bitter enough to offset the heavy food in the most perfect way.
But I eat alone because Steagor still hasn’t returned, and by the time I demolish the apple tart, I’m more than a little annoyed at him. He put me here and expected me to stay in one place without explaining what’s going on.
Setting down my napkin, I rise from my seat and tiptoe to the door. I crack it open and peer outside, but all I can see from my vantage point is the wood paneling in the hall. Male voices float my way from the common room, though, so I turn that way, wary of showing myself to Steagor.
I peek around the corner and find him sitting with his back to me at a table. In front of the table is a line of human men, ranging from teenagers to middle-aged individuals, all staring at him with a mix of confusion, interest, and concern.
“…have four cows and my own wheat field,” the first man in line is saying to Steagor while destroying the rim of the hat he’s clutching with nervous fingers. “I’ve been saving up to buy a—”
“How old are you?” Steagor barks.
The man flinches, stumbling half a step backward. “Forty-two, sir.”
“Too old. Next!”
Steagor motions for the man to move away, and a young man maybe a couple of years older than me steps forward.
“State your name and occupation,” Steagor demands.
“Jan, son of Tine, but I’m going to stop you before we get too far,” the man says. “You’re here to find a husband for some girl, right?”
Steagor gives him a curt nod.
“Well, I prefer men,” Jan says, grinning. “You really should have said what it was you were looking for before you summoned half the village.”
My orc guardian passes a hand over his face. “All right. Everyone who is not interested in marriage to a woman may leave.”
Jan and two more men scamper out the door, likely fleeing for the hills. The remaining men, including one who can’t be more than seventeen, crowd forward as if excited by their increased chances of success.
I’ve heard enough.
I stomp from behind the corner, and Steagor whips his head around at the sound of my footsteps.
“Good day, gentlemen,” I say. “I think there may have been a misunderstanding.”
My orc guardian has the gall to frown at me. “I thought I asked you to wait in the room.”
Hands on my hips, I try to glare down at him, which is hard, because he’s almost my height despite sitting in a chair.
“You thought you could find me a husband?” I demand. “What were you thinking?”
“I will meet with the potential suitors to determine if they are good enough for you,” he replies.
His expression tells me he’s completely serious. This orc had his fingers inside me twice this morning, and now he’s interviewing men for the position of my husband. Rage boils in my veins at the sheer nerve.
“You think you can pick a husband for me?” I seethe. “Choose a guy and send him my way, and we’ll live happily ever after?”
Steagor must sense the venom in my voice because he leans back in his chair. “No, I wanted to weed out the inappropriate ones.”
“And what makes them inappropriate?” I shoot back. “You dismissed that one for being too old. Maybe I want an older man, have you thought of that?”
“I’ll take her,” shouts a man at the back of the line. He elbows his way past several younger guys staring at us with wide-open eyes and stops in front of the table, chest heaving. “But you might have to double that dowry of hers. She has a mouth on her, doesn’t she?”
He points at a leather satchel sitting on the table.
I ignore the fact that the portly man is talking about me like I’m not present and focus on that satchel. “What is this, Steagor?”
The orc swallows thickly. “Y-your dowry.”
In the few days since I’ve known Steagor, I’ve never heard him stutter. But he does now, and when I swing my gaze back to him, I note his grayish tone and the way sweat beads on his forehead.
Oh, yes. He knows he’s made a mistake.
“You thought you needed to bribe these men to marry me?” I ask, my voice soft.
I’m feeling anything but calm, and some of my emotions must show on my face, because Steagor swallows again, then fumbles with the satchel, pushing it off the table. It lands on the scuffed wooden floorboards with a heavy thunk and a jingle.
“Not a bribe,” Steagor mumbles. “Every woman ought to have her own funds.”
“Oh, so I’d get to keep this after the wedding?” I ask, walking over to the satchel and toeing it with the tip of my boot. “It wouldn’t become my husband’s property, like me?”
The red-faced man who spoke up earlier crosses his arms and puffs up his chest. “Hey, now, what’s that? I thought the money was an incentive. She has a good set of hips on her, that’s true, but she’s not the prettiest. And that hair looks—”
Steagor rises to his feet so fast, he knocks over his chair. It crashes to the floor, and every man waiting in the line flinches. Steagor towers over my would-be suitor, his head nearly brushing the exposed wooden beams in the ceiling.
“Get out,” he snarls at the man.
The villager must be stupider than I initially thought, because he blusters, “You can’t—”
“Get out,” Steagor roars.
The men turn as one and run from the taproom. Even the tavern maids disappear from behind the bar, retreating into the kitchen. Within seconds, the spacious room is completely empty, dust motes swirling through the shafts of sunshine that pierce through the windows.
Steagor stalks to the front door and slams it shut. He remains there, one hand braced on the wood, his shoulders heaving with rapid breaths.
I clench my fists at my sides, waiting him out. I don’t want to be the first to speak. Anger pulses through me in white-hot waves, and if I don’t take control of my emotions, I’ll say something I’ll regret later. But with every inhale that’s supposed to calm me, my throat closes up a little more, and the telltale sting in my nose tells me I’m in danger of bursting into tears.
My guardian wants to get rid of me so much, he was prepared to pay some human man a satchel of coins to get me off his hands.
I have no idea why the truth hurts so much. I knew from the moment I woke up in Steagor’s bed that he wanted me gone, so this shouldn’t have come as a surprise. But today’s events—and yesterday’s display of possessiveness—had me believing that maybe he does want me to stay.
In the end, it was just that I tempted his body enough that he gave in and got some relief for himself. His mind was not engaged, and in fact, he was instantly ashamed of what we did together.
I raise my gaze to the ceiling and blink rapidly to keep the tears away. The words of that pawnshop owner ring through my head again.
If you need money, girly, there are other ways to earn it. Maybe a day will come when you’ll consider it.
At least now I know that I can entice a reluctant male to succumb to my charms. That’s good knowledge to have, I suppose.
A cold sense of calm washes over me. I’d thought I’d find safety with Steagor, my father’s friend, but no one will take care of me. I’m old enough to do it myself, so I should stop relying on others. My father didn’t even make sure that his shop, where I’d worked for years, would pass on to me after his death, and he sent me away to be married off like some inconvenient poor relation. My stepmother certainly never had my best interests at heart.
And my orc guardian? He seems to care to some extent, but his misguided sense of duty now puts me in danger of being sold like a cow to the first presentable human Steagor stumbles upon. He’d dismissed that one guy for being too old and seemed to take affront at what the other man said about me, but at what point will he decide that someone is good enough for me?
If I don’t have a say in his criteria, I’m not really interested in what he has to say about my suitors.
Steagor still doesn’t speak, though he turns toward me and the table again. I ignore him and crouch by the satchel, prying open the strap. I expect it to be filled with silver and copper, given how heavy it is. But what glimmers up at me is pure, yellow gold.
It’s more money than I’ve ever seen in my life.
My stomach lurches painfully.
He is so desperate to get rid of me that he’d pay a fortune.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Steagor says quietly.
He has moved closer to me, and I stiffen, still crouched next to the table.
“I highly doubt that,” I reply.
He leans on the table with both hands, and the wood creaks ominously under his weight. I don’t want to look up at him, but I do, because for some reason, I can’t keep away from him. His sorrowful gaze rips me to shreds, and I press my lips together, willing myself not to cry.
“This isn’t a bribe for your future husband,” he says. “I would have given it to you—and you alone. So you wouldn’t have to be dependent on anyone ever again.”
Gods, how I want to believe him. But things like this are never as good as they seem. Never.
“Then why did you show it off to these men?” I whisper.
He rakes his fingers through his long thick hair. “So they’d take you seriously. And I wanted to weed out the fools like that man so you wouldn’t have to deal with them.”
I stand slowly, keeping the distance between us. “How many did you interview before I interrupted you?”
He scratches the back of his neck and focuses on a point above my head like he’s counting internally. “Eleven? Twelve, maybe.”
“And how many made the cut?” I ask. “How many would you have let talk to me in person?”
His eyes darken, and he rasps, “None.”
My insides clench at the statement, and I try so hard not to let it mean anything. It would be so stupid of me to get my hopes up with regards to this orc who clearly thinks touching me is a mistake. Maybe all twelve of the men were duds. Old men who would have made my life miserable.
Or maybe none of them were up to his standards because he wants you all for himself.
I push the dangerous thought away with all my might. We are literally standing in a room where Steagor was interviewing men for the role of my husband.
Where he was interviewing…
I glance at the fallen chair where he’d been sitting mere minutes ago. I reach down and right it, pulling it up to the table. Then I sit in it and clasp my hands on the table, looking up at the tall orc.
“State your name and occupation,” I demand.
