Page 14 of Halfling
Sorcha didn’t know what he had in there but hoped it was all worth it.
The heavy weight settled against her back, and she kept a good grip on the straps, which were too long and loose on her.
When she didn’t immediately buckle under the weight, the orc nodded, turned, and knelt.
Gracelessly, she clambered onto his back and hooked her legs around his waist and arms around his neck. She felt like the baby possums she’d seen in the forest near her home, clinging to their mothers from tree to tree.
He rose fluidly, touching her knee to get her settled. Then he gave her arm something of an awkward pat and walked into the water.
She couldn’t help the surprised gasp as icy water splashed her legs and backside, sending another shiver through her. Sorcha was getting tired of all this shivering—from the cold, from the water, from the stress of it all. Morning couldn’t come soon enough. She had to hope everything would look a little better in the light of it.
She clung to the orc’s back as he navigated the river. The cold water cut through her braies, sending gooseflesh over her legs, but it never got past her knees, locked around the orc’s chest. He managed to keep his footing even when rocks slid out from underfoot and the water eddied around them in whorls.
Most of her stayed dry as they crossed, but more importantly, the pack was well out of the water. At its deepest, it came to the middle of the orc’s chest.
Shallow, he says.
With each of his steady steps, she grew a little surer that they’d make it to the other side. The water snatched and tugged at them, and she could see they’d already strayed downriver from where they’d started, but the orc pushed on. His chest heaved under her limbs, and by the time the water began to recede, sloshing off their lower bodies, his mouth hung open to suck in great gulps of air.
They made the shore before the orc stumbled. He grunted, catching himself before they could go down, and pushed on until they stood on dry land.
Still shivering, Sorcha slid off his back in a relieved heap. She nearly fell backwards from the weight of the pack, drawing a manic laugh from her.
They’d made it! They’d crossed the river. Which one? She hadn’t a clue. She didn’t know this river, or the forest surrounding them, or where the nearest humans were—but that didn’t matter right now. The orc had seemed so sure that they had to cross this river and they had; she didn’t know the significance but shefeltit.
She turned a relieved, if a little wild smile on him, wondering if he felt this panicked giddiness, too.
Her smile died when she saw the wobbliness of his knees as he struggled to keep himself upright. He leaned his weight against a tree, his chest still heaving, and he’d put a hand to his side as if he had a stitch there or a…
“Are you all right?”
She made to get up but the pack straps pulled her right back down. Huffing, she extricated herself and hurried to him, helping him turn so his back was to the tree. He slumped to the ground, lips pulled tight in a grimace of pain.
Sorcha looked down at his side. The sleeveless shirt he wore under a loosely laced jerkin was soaked, with water and something darker. Holding her breath, she pried a few of his fingers away to see an angry gash oozing blood.
Had something struck him in the river? This side would have been facing the current, and Sorcha shared his grimace to imagine water constantly running over an open wound.
“How…?”How did you manage to get us across with this?
“Not new,” he said between heavy breaths. “Water reopened the scab.”
She looked back at the wound, realizing it looked like a gore from a tusk. Another orc? She remembered how horrified she’d been when she’d first seen him, blood around his neck.
“You’ve been wounded this whole time?”
He didn’t answer, but the way he wouldn’t look at her was answer enough.
“We need to see to this.”
“I’ll be fine. We keep moving.”
“You can’t walk around with something like this. If someone comes after us, the smell of blood will be easy to follow. And who knows what was in that river water.”
The light of the moon and its reflection on the river was enough to see his sheepish expression. She had three brothers, she knew from the set of his brows that he wanted to argue, but he kept quiet, searching her face without quite meeting her eyes.
Sorcha set her feet, popped a hip, and arched a brow in a way that always got her brothers to do what she wanted, even the ones who were grown and bearded now. Best this orc learn now that when she was determined to have her way, she’d get it.
Finally, he sighed. “There’s salve and a few cloths to wrap it.”
