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The orc again grunted as he shifted backwards, avoiding Gerrard’s strike — but his big head cocked sideways, his eyes oddly intent on Gerrard’s face. “This was not —fair,” his deep voice countered. “This was you — giving up.”
Giving up. Gerrard instantly recoiled, fiercely shaking his head as another miserable barking growl escaped his throat — and when he ran in again, the orc’s parry seemed almost distracted this time. “You gave up, human,” he insisted. “You wished to fall upon your own sword, but have this blame — this guilt — fall uponme. You ken this isfair?”
The words caught and bloomed in Gerrard’s chest, powerful enough that he staggered backwards, gasping for the suddenly thin air. And wait, he’d left an opening, the orc should be rushing in, he should be taking the opportunity, destroying Gerrard where he stood —
But again, the orc — didn’t. And he’d even lowered the sword, his big body pacing sideways, and Gerrard reflexively matched it as his breaths heaved, the sweat now streaking down his hot face. This brute. Thisbeast. This —
“You are too good a warrior to be cut down thus,” the orc’s deep voice continued, and Gerrard distantly noted that his bare grey chest was heaving too, streaked with blood and sweat. “Mayhap the most skilled human I have ever faced in battle.”
Gerrard was still panting for air, for comprehension, as his feet kept pacing opposite the orc, both of them now moving in a slow circle. What the fuck was this. The orc was flattering him, trying to trick him, to catch him and then crush him underfoot, and —
“Rubbish,” Gerrard croaked back, wiping at his sweaty face with a strangely shaky hand. “You’re just trying to —”
What? Curse him, what? He couldn’t seem to think, couldn’t look away from the orc’s hard, glinting eyes. Or from where the orc was now shrugging, rolling his huge sweaty shoulder.
“Why should I speak false in this?” the orc replied, his voice flat. “You have shown yourself strong, swift, skilled with a blade, sure on your feet. You are quick to learn your foe, to find his weakness, and wield this to your gain. And” — he shrugged again — “you showed yourself a good lieutenant to your men. You came for me alone on each charge against us, so they would not need to face me. And you retreated, each time these past days, when you saw your men falling.”
Oh. Something again shifted, swelled, in Gerrard’s heaving chest — and then it escaped, in a sound much like a laugh. “Doesn’t mean anything,” he growled back. “I still failed. My commanding officer raged at me. Stripped my rank, and my pay, too. Even threatened to have meflogged. After fifteen fuckingyears.”
He twitched at the sound of those damning words, escaping his own cursed mouth. This orc was an enemy, a smug mocking swine, and Gerrard shouldn’t be telling him anything, anything —
But then, to his genuine astonishment, the orc curled his lip, and snorted. The sound deep and guttural, and almost… incredulous. Contemptuous.
“Your commander is a fool, if he chastised you for this,” the orc shot back, the disdain glinting in his eyes. “You ken he ought to be glad to have a brave and skilled lieutenant to lead his battles, and spare his men from needless death. But” — the orc’s thick brows furrowed as he mightily frowned — “wise commanders are as rare as gooseberries in winter, ach?”
Gerrard’s still-pacing steps briefly faltered, catching on a loose stone at his feet. The orc was — commiserating with him?Agreeingwith him? And — far more importantly — he was implicitly condemning hisowncommander, too, right?
“Who’s your commander,” Gerrard demanded, without thinking. “Borek? Or Slagvor?”
It had been a guess, based on the look of the orc and his band — there were multiple orc clans, and they usually fought with their own kind — and Gerrard was distantly satisfied to see the orc’s thick brows snap up, the surprise clear on his rugged face. “Ach, Slagvor,” he replied, and then shook his head, his eyes again narrowing. “And how do you know this?”
Now it was Gerrard’s turn to shrug, because any half-decent officer should take the time to learn his enemy — but even so, the triumph seemed to bubble higher, warmer, in his belly. “You look like a Bautul,” he said, with a curt wave toward the orc’s harsh features, and his broad, bulky form. “And fight like one — you, and your band. And Borek and Slagvor are the Bautul’s captains, aren’t they? The ones who keep sending you over here to raid and camp and skulk about, and strike fear in the hearts of Preia’s peasantry? Or whatever the hell this is?”
Gerrard’s hand waved irritably at the forest around them this time, because as much as he loathed Livermore and his fool orders, the orcs’ actions were frequently foolish and enraging, too. It made no strategic sense for an armed orc band to be camping here on a random hill in Preia, sixty leagues away from their impenetrable Orc Mountain. There were no nearby orc settlements to supply with their raids, there were no important human strongholds here to take, no tactical advantages to win. Truly, it felt just as meaningless — just as directionless — as the human lords’ actions against the orcs. Just more moving of pieces on a board, for someone else’s gain.
And surely Gerrard was reading into it now, seeing what his traitorous brain wanted to see, but it almost looked like the orc had winced, his steps stiffer and slower than before, his big shoulders hunching. And if Gerrard was smarter, he’d have taken the opportunity to rush in, to strike with all his strength — but instead, he was watching. Waiting, for the orc’s answer.
“Ach, this is Slagvor’s doing,” the orc finally said, his voice very steady, his eyes held to Gerrard’s face. “He seeks to flaunt our strength and victories against Duke Warmisham here in Preia, and thus to gain the favour of the Captain of Orc Mountain.”
The Captain of Orc Mountain. That particular bastard was named Kaugir of Clan Ash-Kai, Gerrard well knew, and Kaugir was without question the most notorious face of this endless war. And while Gerrard had long ago learned that it wasn’t necessarily the faces one needed to blame — it was the entire grinding apparatus built around them — he still couldn’t deny a shudder, rippling up his back. Even if half the tales about Kaugir were true, he was a raging despot who treated his own orcs like chattel, and made Duke Warmisham look like a sweet-faced summer child.
“How lucky for us all,” Gerrard belatedly hissed, earning a grim nod from the orc in return — and only then did he realize the depth of what this orc had just told him. The orc had identified his own commander. He’d divulged his commander’s goals. He’d hinted — no, he’d admitted — that his captain’s commands were also a farce, designed to gain the favour of a far-off superior who would probably never need to face the fallout, let alone look death in the eyes himself.
This orc was — betraying his own. To Gerrard, to an enemy. And for what? Wait, was he — was the orc going to kill him now? The orc had to kill him now, right?
“And now you’re going back to report to Slagvor?” Gerrard demanded, pushing now, but what did he have to lose, after all this? “Tell him you were victorious? That you sent us all running and squealing back to our outpost, licking our wounds?”
The orc didn’t even bother trying to deny it — why would he, because it was all true — and he shrugged as he gave a halfhearted whirl of Gerrard’s sword in his hand. “And mayhap show off this blade, also,” he said coolly. “Tell the tale of how the fair-faced warrior ran screaming from me, and forgot his weapon on a battlefield.”
Gerrard blinked, stared — and suddenly the rage was seething again, drowning out any bizarre sense of understanding, of affinity. Curse this taunting condescending prick, that was Gerrard’s sword, Gerrard’s property, and howdarethis orc use it to mock him like this.
Gerrard roared as he rushed forward again, his far inferior sword aiming straight for the orc’s abdomen. But the enraging brute easily knocked Gerrard’s blade aside this time, and he even had the gall to laugh, the sound deep and rolling, shuddering in Gerrard’s belly.
It only seemed to flash his rage higher, and he funnelled his focus into fighting, into gaining every possible advantage he could. Striking again and again for the orc’s exposed skin, sneaking past his guard, using his superior speed and dexterity to duck and jab and weave. Avoiding nearly all the orc’s strikes in return, some of them damned close — so close that it took Gerrard far too long to realize that the orc was… holding back. He wasn’t hitting him. On fuckingpurpose.
“Come on!” Gerrard snarled, between his panting breaths, as the rage hitched even higher, tinged with something too close to despair. “Fucking hit me, you great arrogantswine!”
The orc hadn’t liked that, his bushy brows dropping, nostrils flaring — so Gerrard kept at it, lunging forward again, swinging his sword far more wildly than was wise. “Hit me, you ugly beast,” he gasped, the words thick and bitter in his throat. “You coward. Can’t take out a single human who’s fighting with a worthless borrowed sword? You’re that weak? That much of a failure? What’s your clan going to think of that?”
