Page 13 of Bound to the Orc Hunter

“We will accept your offering of the bouncy castle,” the leader says as her body relaxes back to standing. “What do you wish in return? We have mined many fine gems.”

At her words, the other gnomes hurry to pull walnut-sized chunks of green, blue, and red from their pockets, waving them in chubby fists.

“No gems.” I untie the bag holding the sluagh from my belt. “I require a service instead. You must take this bag several miles in that direction.” I point south, into the unknown, away from orc lands. “Then you must leave it in an underground chamber where nothing can kill the sluagh bird trapped inside.”

They rear back en masse, then finally seem to notice the flock of birds hanging in the air above my head. Fingers jab at the sky, voices calling out, shrill with alarm. “Sluagh!” “By the goddess!” “It’s a soul stealer!”

“It can’t hurt you,” I yell over their protests. “We’ve found a way to subdue the sluagh. I will tell you this information as part of my payment.”

The gnomes huddle around the leader, pressed so closely together all of their moss caps seem to make a new patch of ground floating two-feet high. Furious whispers come from the clump.

“See.” I nudge Aurora with my elbow. “They’re going to hide all proof of Grace’s magicandsolve our sluagh problem.”

“Humph.” Aurora bats my shoulder with her horn. “I suppose your plan’s not completely horrible.”

“Thanks.” I grin at my friend. I’ve known her long enough to know “not completely horrible” is unicorn for “damned good.”

“How are they going to hide the bouncy castle?” Grace asks.

“Gnomes have a special earth magic. They travel through the ground.”

“So they dig tunnels?”

“No. No tunnels.” I shake my head. “They can move through solid dirt and rock.”

“How? That’s impossible!”

“That’s magic.”

“Why do I get the feeling that’s going to be your answer for everything?” She frowns.

“It’s the only answer I need.” I caress a lock of golden hair that’s fallen from the mass bundled on top of her head, coiling its softness around my finger. “Magic brought me you.”

Her wide mouth opens on a little gasp, and a raging need to kiss her wells within me. I bite back a groan.

“We’ll do it!” the head gnome’s voice says. “If you also give us the pillows.”

Perfect. We need them hidden away as well. I didn’t offer them from the start because I assumed the gnomes would ask for something more and held them back to bargain with.

I turn back to my moon bound. “I’m sorry to give away the pillows and soft bed you made for us before we could make good use of it.”

“I didn’t make us a bed!”

“Of course you didn’t.” I smirk down at her and let my tongue tease around a tusk.

Pink flushes her cheeks, and her eyes snap fire as she pushes me away. I love it. I love how strong she is.

Stepping back, I say to the gnomes, “We accept your terms.”

“Finally,” Aurora grumps.

The gnomes tumble across the clearing, snatching up pillows as they go. When each reaches the place they emerged from the ground, they corkscrew back down into it in a blur of motion until the moss settles back into place as perfectly as if it never moved.

Only two gnomes remain, the leader and the man she sent into the bouncy castle first to test it out. She gestures him forward, and for the first time since they arrived, a gnome walks instead of somersaults.

He takes the sluagh bag from me with a solemn nod and disappears into the ground. The flock immediately begins to move, flying south, away from us.

“Your creations will be put to good use, making our burrows more comfortable.” The gnome leader bows to my bride, then sets a hand on the bouncy castle. She spins, and in a blur of motion, the yellow structure is sucked into the small tornado of her form. They disappear into the place she came out of.

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