Page 30 of Plucked By the Orc

“Ah! Why, thank you.” Felton smiled like a fool, his lower lip wobbling. The way Duncan himself might look if anyone could peer inside the deepest reaches of his heart.

Besotted by a human woman. As he had promised himself he never would be again.

Duncan reached for a tumbler of brandy. Thankfully, it went without saying that when visiting Mother, such a beverage was available, so he wouldn’t be subject to fiddling with those blasted tea cups. Having no excess of common sense, Albion wrestled with his tea, even holding it with his large pinkie finger askew. The effect was hardly as appealing as when Iris did it.

“You. Strike me. As a gentleman,” Iris continued, helping herself to another cube of sugar and wielding the tongs to plop it in her drink. She was growing more comfortable.

Which likely wasn’t for the best.

“And you seemed raised right proper,” she continued. “Now, some with whom I have acquaintance aren’t so. Not raised righter than any wolf pup with its mum. As my friend Lottie Greenstreet would say.”

Duncan clenched the tumbler tight, willing himself not to bark at Iris to take the dialogue in a different direction. This happened when they were practicing conversation in his library as well. But interrupting at this point would give the game away, so he could do no more than plot their exit.

“A right fine woman. That Lottie. Always ready to ‘elp. Another gal.” The cadence of Iris’s voice remained the same, halting pattern, as though she were out of breath, but she lapsed in some of her elocution. And he doubted anyone in this parlor used the word “gal” either.

Mother lifted an eyebrow but kept silent. Lady Maberly pursed her lips but refrained from comment while the vicar and Felton nodded along to the story.

The brandy wasn’t strong enough. He should have asked Mother’s maid to fetch him a tankard of Orcan mead for this occasion.

“Now, Lottie wasn’t one given. To what you would call. Fine manners.” Iris gently blew on her tea before taking another sip. “In fact. She would cause the greatest fuss. Outside the Royal Theatre at Drury Lane. That is.”

“So you enjoy the performances there, Lady Iris?” Felton said. Duncan fancied he could see the gears whirring and clicking in the young man’s mind as he determined an appropriate way to ask Iris to accompany him to a performance. His family probably kept a subscription box there. His mother would serve as their chaperone.

Iris was most decidedly not ready for such an adventure. No matter what Duncan thought of Felton as a suitor, which admittedly wasn’t much at all, the viscountess would have far too many questions that Iris could not answer. And without Duncan there to save her, he feared what could happen.

Besides, Felton Maberly was not suitable for Iris. It shouldn’t enter the equation, but he couldn’t help but note it. This boy wasn’t good enough for her.

“I have not yet had. The pleasure.” At least Iris had regained her “h,” although she had to pause to catch her breath. “But I know some goings-on out front. And there. I assure you.” Iris glanced around the room, making eye contact with all the guests as Duncan had instructed. Something in her eyes made his heart thump faster as a warning. “Lottie would make all sorts of trouble.”

“Lady Iris, you have barely tasted your sponge cake and have not yet tried your blueberry scone at all.” Duncan slanted his hand toward Felton’s neglected offering, the butter spilling from the scone onto the scalloped edges of its plate. “Mother has procured a delicious elderberry coulis.” It was one of the fewsweets Duncan could tolerate as it was only touched with honey. He may have purchased chocolates for Iris, but no orc had the so-called sweet tooth of the English. “You should try some.”

Iris eyed the scone and the pot of jam beside it, but when she looked up at Duncan, he knew she understood that he only meant to distract her from the tale of Lottie Greenstreet’s misadventures. But if he understood one thing about Iris Gabbert, it was that once a notion took hold in her head, she would not be deterred.

“A fine gentleman once tried to take advantage. Of her amicable nature. You see,” Iris continued. “And while Lottie is a good-‘earted young lady, she has her limits.”

“Take advantage,” Felton said. “Surely, you don’t mean—”

“You know what she means, Felton,” the viscountess snapped.

Duncan had a sudden desire for the floor to open up beneath him so he could fall through it and disappear.

Other than Lady Maberly’s comment, the company at hand still seemed entranced by Iris’s tale. And so she continued.

“If you mistake me. For a woman of the night. Said she. Then I just might. Mistake your face. For a punching bag. And bop it. ‘Til you cannot see.”

A dreadful quiet settled over the room. And Duncan had never before thought the small talk of the English preferable to even the most awkward silence in company.

Leave it to this blasted young rascal Felton to break the moment with a high-pitched laugh that caused Duncan to wince, Albion to startle, and the viscountess to clasp her hands over her ears.

“Jolly good, Lady Iris. I see what you did there. I knew you were too fine a lady for such a story. It was a joke. A poem. How very clever.”

“A rather risqué poem,” Lady Maberly muttered. “Didn’t you think so, vicar?”

“Well, the language was on the edge of what one might call tolerable,” the vicar commented. “But then again, the lady in question preserved her virtue. That’s what’s important.”

“Virtue,” Mother said calmly. She reached for the elderberry coulis. Like Duncan, she found the tendency of the English to saturate drinks with sugar revolting. She dipped a spoonful into her tea and sipped, clearly enjoying the drama playing before her. “The primary concern of most human ladies, I gather.”

“Rightfully so,” the vicar said while Iris looked at him with those wide eyes. She was on Duncan’s side, wasn’t she? Not Albion’s. Or was she merely toying with him? Perhaps Albion had hired her in an effort to recover Wintermist.

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