Page 88 of Wed to the Orc Captive

I clenched the fabric in my fists. “It doesn’t matter, though. Because they all know I failed.” My bare leg grazed his arm. “She's kind,” I forced out, “but…they look at me and know I couldn't earn you.”

A growl snuck into his voice. “You never had to earn me. We chose each other.” He stepped into the water. My foot trailed in, warm. The water reflected back the light, just a little, into the shadows of his face.

I scoffed. “You did not choose me.”

“Nonsense.” He sunk us in, and the water rose, up through the blanket, over my body to my chin.

“Oh,” I gasped, and then remembered where I was, with a sopping wet blanket vaguely floating around me, and I tugged it back.

Vrathgar was looking up and away, what I could see of his throat flushed in the lamplight, from the steam or something else. “Do you want to try standing?” he said. “I could set you down.”

If I was going to be abandoned somewhere, a warm spring was not the worst, even if part of me wanted to hold onto him, to cling like a sopping cat. “Yes. Thank you.”

He released me, slowly, and I found purchase with my toes on the stone floor of the pool. It was warm.

The water was making me light, almost weightless. The heat melted into my skin. Slowly, I felt my breathing deepen and slow, the expectation of pain that haunted me receding. I let myself release the knots I’d been holding to stand upright.

We'd been speaking… “You didn’t,” I repeated. “You didn’t choose me.”

He snorted, a ridiculous sound. “Slander.”

“You didn’t.”

“That's an odd way of remembering.”

“It isn't.” Why did arguing this seem so important? I turned towards him, slowly, balancing in the water. “Me or your life is not a choice.”

He laughed under his breath. It sounded caught, wrong. “If it wasn't a choice that day, what about the day after? And the day after that?” It ached. “You say I didn’t choose you then. Does it matter? When I’ve chosen you every day since.” His face changed. “…you’re crying again.”

I tried to take a step back in the water, had to fling my arms wide to keep my balance. He caught my waist, on instinct, hands on bare skin.

“Sorry.” He let go. “Can you…did I say something asinine again?”

I shook my head. “No, it’s just…” I was crying, like a simpleton. “It just sounded like you wanted me.”

He cursed again, the Orcish hissing on his tongue. “I’ve bungled this.”

“I’m sorry,” I got out. “I’ll stop⁠—"

“No,” he said, and he caught the side of my chin, lifted my face to his. “I’ve bungled this if you’ve ever, for a moment, thought that I didn’t want you.” I couldn’t speak, couldn’t think. He tilted my face up to look into his eyes. “There are so many reasons we won’t work, Nora, but me wanting you was never one of them.”

Tears streamed down my cheeks, and I tried to breathe while something was breaking in my chest. He was looking down at me, so vulnerable in the lamplight, and was this worse? Was this worse than thinking it was only me who’d fallen in love?

“I’ve always wanted you,” he said, “From the first time you challenged me in that cell. From the moment your eyes locked with mine. From hearing you sing courage and fear over that sick lump’s knee. And when you chose me? Who was I to object to that?” His eyes were distant. “The threat of death was an excuse, barbarian, not the reason. I was more than willing to make you mine, even if it meant belonging to a witch.” Something was wrong. The words were sweet, but they sounded like a withdrawal, like an iron gate slid into place. “But the people in your mind that I’m competing against, the people from your town, your father? The people you’re comparing me to? They're not worth the earth to bury them. Do you see it, barbarian?” He was shaking his head. He gritted his teeth. “The only way to do this right is by giving you the chance to realize that you chose wrong.”

“What if I don’t think I chose wrong?” My voice ached. “Will you let me keep you, then?”

“Annora—"

“What if I’m not kind enough to offer you the same thing?” My chest hurt. Everything hurt. “What if I'm not kind enough to want to let you go?” I found the edge of the stone pool with my hand, because I needed something solid, because I felt like I had to hold onto the earth, or I would be torn from it.

“You’ll figure it out. This…it isn’t fair to you.”

Fair. And that was the cosmic joke, that anything about this was fair.

“You think it’s more fair to have you and then lose you?” My breath wavered. I was terrified. I was more afraid than when the bird monsters tried to kill us. The easiest thing I’d done should be speaking aloud, just speaking, but I shook. “You think it’s more fair to take me in your arms and make me fall in love with you and…” The tears were over everything.

He went still. He looked like someone had punched the wind out of him. Like I had. “Is this…is this about sex?”