Page 19 of War Mage

My blood runs cold. “Where did you hear that name?”

“You gave it to me as a false name when I first interrogated you,” he replies.

“Then how do you know it’s a real person?” I shoot back. “It could have just been a random name.”

“Is it?” Urim raises a brow, now being the one challenging me.

I eye my wine goblet again. I could just drink and avoid the question, but I’m already well ahead of him in drinks, with my swallow just now and my sips during dinner earlier, and I don’t want to be the only one in my cups.

“She was my best friend,” I finally tell him, glaring. “And she’s dead now.”

“You forget that I can smell half truths,” the orc remarks calmly. “If you want me to drink, you’ll have to tell the whole story.”

I groan. “Playing this game with an orc was a mistake.”

“You are the one who started it, not I,” Urim replies.

“Fine,” I snap. “Cara was also my casual lover, on occasion. Shocked?”

“Why would that shock me?” The orc sounds genuinely confused. “You told me before that you had casual sexual relationships.”

“Same sex relationships are not common in Adrik,” I tell him. “At least not open and acknowledged.”

“Strange,” Urim says, frowning. “Is it forbidden?”

“Not forbidden,” I respond, “but marriage is seen as a move for more power and property. Power and property can only be solidified with a blood heir. Same gender relationships cannot provide that, so they are usually kept on the side as a lover, but not as the acknowledged, official partner.”

Urim tilts his head, considering. “It is not the same in Orik at all. Orcs cannot have children with each other, no matter the gender. If one wants children they must mate outside our species. But it is not uncommon for an orc to mate another, of either sex, forgoing blood children. They can always adopt a clan orphan and bequeath them their lands and holdings, if that is desired.”

“What about titles and positions?”

“Orik is a meritocracy,” the orc tells me. “Lineage may help put you in a better position to acquire a title or prestige, but you can be challenged and lose it just as easily if you are not strong enough to hold onto that position with the strength of your own arm. Whether you are a blood heir or adopted, it doesn’t matter. What matters is your own skill and merit.”

This fascinates me. “The Tower was much the same,” I comment. “There were mages there who had long magical lineages, with family legacies at the Tower, and were in favorable positions because of that, but if their magic was weaker than another’s they would lose out to them. Magical power was the ultimate determiner and could not be argued with.”

“If that is the case, could you not have been public with your relationship with Cara? You are a powerful mage, you could have made your own rules,” asks Urim.

“Oh, our relationship was no secret,” I say. “But neither of us wanted to commit to the other. We were best friends, but a romantic relationship between us would have been a disaster. We both had needs that we couldn’t fill in the other. Compatible enough for occasional dalliances, when we needed a release to lower stress or clear the mind, but not for anything lasting.”

“What needs?” Urim asks, and though his voice is still even-toned, there is a darker, hungrier edge to his words.

“That’s a new question,” I retort. “And I fully answered yours already, so you must drink.”

Urim acknowledges my words by grabbing his goblet, taking a swallow, though his eyes never leave mine. The air between us is charged again and an anticipatory energy hovers in the bond between us.

I clear my throat. “My turn. What is something about your past that you would not want me to know?”

The stoic orc frowns. “That is not a simple question.”

“Are you going to drink then?” I taunt. The alcohol I have already imbibed buzzes pleasantly through my system and is making me relaxed and loosening my tongue. It makes me want to challenge and needle him until his stoic demeanor breaks again, like it did that night in the cell.

His eyes narrow the tiniest fraction at my taunt, then he says. “I will answer your question, but it is not easy. There is much that I would not want you to know about me. Narrowing it to one thing is not easy.”

“Just say the first thing that comes to mind then. The thing you would most not want me to know.”

“Hmm,” he says, considering. The space of a few breaths passes and I almost think that he will drink instead of answer, but then he finally says, “I am humanborn. That means that my non-orc parent was a human.”

“Which parent was it?” I ask.

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