Page 78 of Wed to the Orc Captive

“You know Grezha. You can trust her.”

His mouth was a bitter sneer. “I thought I could trust a lot of people.”

I could maybe leverage fingers under my hips, take some of the ache away for sleep. But if I accidentally tensed…stupid tears pricked at my eyes. Exhaustion should help me sleep. I needed it to. I didn’t want to cry where he would hear it.

Vrathgar’s voice was heavy. “I went to your mother. I asked for the Vil Srith.” I didn’t know the words, but I knew the shock in the way his friend inhaled. He pushed on. “She said it was for the saving of our people. And fuck that, when I’m saving from our people⁠—"

“Did Grezha say she wasn’t going to live? Will she be able to walk again?”

He fumbled on the answer. “She’s in pain. I can’t…help her,” he hissed. “I did this and I can’t help.”

“You did not do this.”

“I brought her here. I told her she’d be safe. I brought her here and they threw her in that rutting pit. And you want me to go home and sleep while she’s suffering, and they still breathe?”

Khal was trying to soothe. “It was wrong. They were wrong. It won’t happen again⁠—"

“You're damn right it won’t. Because I’m going to slit their bellies open in that circle and leave them bleeding out. Let your mother decide if that deserves to use your wife’s dowry.”

Khal was quiet. I got my fingers positioned, relieved the sharpest focus of the pain. Maybe I would sleep. Maybe this could go away, for a few minutes, an hour. When he spoke again, his voice was gruff. “You have a right to be angry. But bloodshed is not going to help either of you.”

The sound Vrathgar made was disgust. “There is one thing I’m good at, Khal. Don’t tell me not to do it. You know if someone laid a hand on Rowena⁠—"

Why was it comforting to hear him, even when he was angry? Was it because no one had been angry for me before?

I didn’t want Sareet or Larrakh sliced open. I didn’t want anyone dead. I was just tired. So tired.

“Vrathgar,” Khal said, low, “you are my friend. And I am telling you as your friend that your wife in there, she needs you to rest, because she needs you strong. And she needs you sane.” He shook his head, put a hand on Vrathgar’s shoulder. “Put a blanket on the floor and sleep like a dog if you have to. Just close your eyes, please, do you hear me? You cannot help her like this.”

“I’m going to kill them,” he spat.

Khal sounded tired. “You are not killing Larrakh’s stupid friends.”

It was like Vrathgar wanted a fight, needed it, even here, even with him. “Why shouldn’t I?”

“Because it does not help who you want to help.”

His voice shook. “How do you know she wouldn’t sleep easier?”

“Go to bed, Vrathgar. For your wife, go to bed.”

Vrathgar stalked into the room.

I squeezed my eyes shut. For some reason terror gripped me that he’d see I was awake, that he’d be upset that I had listened, but maybe there was just too much terror in my body from the long night and the awful, agonizing day, too much fear left over from the horror of even trying to pull a dress back on over my own head, of not knowing when the next pain would happen. Maybe I was afraid, and it wasn’t about being afraid of him.

Fabric rustled, and a thunk. He must have made a sleeping place on the floor next to mine.

Maybe it was alright to speak. Maybe the distraction or the reassurance would matter more to him than the bother I could be. Maybe it was alright to reach for him, for a moment. “Vrathgar?” I whispered.

His shadow lunged up so fast that I flinched, and the pain took the breath out of my lungs.

“I’m here!” He whispered, hoarse. “I’m here; do you need something?”

My head was like glue. “Some…some water, please.”

He lunged away. Everything was leaping and lunging for him, everything like a battle or a hunt. He was back at my side, a swish of liquid in the darkness. I caught the slight gleam off a cup's rim.

And now I was the problem, freezing.