Page 142 of Halfling
Orek went cold.Krul. The clan.
He’d led them straight here. To his mate. Toyounglings.
Keeley’s screams echoed in his ears, making his stomach roll with sick to think how terrifying Silas must have been, looming over her in the shadows. The beast in him snapped and snarled to think how close the tracker had come to the little girl, how close she’d come to—
“What are you doing here?” Orek demanded, widening his stance.
Silas’s smile was an ugly slash across his face, his eyes dark and malicious. Hatred burned there, glittering as bright as the sun as he pulled a long knife from his belt.
“Told you before,” Silas slurred, stalking further out from the rocks. “You took what was Krul’s. Nobody steals from Krul.” The knife flashed as Silas pointed it in the direction of the Brádaigh home. “And nothing hides from me.”
“Leave now,” Orek growled, angling himself in the way. “Find another clan, one with a fair chief. These humans did nothing to you.”
Silas hissed a laugh. “I’ve come this far, runt. Tracked you all the way here. Took weeks. Left a trail, too. Oh yessss.” He laughed again as horror gripped Orek in a vicious fist. “Found my way here, to all these soft human females, and now all of us can, too.”
Every good orc tracker left a trail for a hunting party to follow, subtle to anyone else but obvious to kin. His heart stuttered—is Krul on his way even now?
Orek pulled his own knife as well as his hatchet.
“You should’ve left that bit where you found her, runt. Hope whatever you got of that cunt was worth it.”
“Keep her out of your fucking mouth—or I’ll cut out the rest of that tongue and feed it to you.”
The amusement fell from the tracker’s face, mouth twisting in a snarl. “I’ve waited for this. I’ll enjoy bringing Krul the female and all her kin. And your head.”
Silas lurched forward, but Orek was faster.
His rage slid over him in a cold wave, like submerging below the ice of a frozen lake. The cold sharpened his senses, focused them on Silas and what he now had to do. It ran so deep, sucked him so far down, it scared even him.
But none of it mattered.
Kill him. Eliminate the threat.
Silas couldn’t leave here alive—and so he wouldn’t. There was no other choice.
They met in a loud clash of metal and flesh, snarls echoing through the trees. Orek caught Silas’s descending knife with his own, the metal screeching, throwing sparks in his face.
He roared at the burn, throwing Silas back. The tracker bellowed and came at him again, again, again, his lean form looming over Orek as their fists and weapons collided. A fist pummeled Orek’s side, just where he’d taken Silas’s knife before, and he grunted at the sharp pain.
The beast inside him howled for blood, reveling in the violence that only orc-kin could mete.
Their fighting was nothing like the human knights’ nor Sorcha’s elegant mounted forms—theirs was all fists and fangs and flashing blades. It was brutal, a flurry of attacks that couldn’t be avoided, only borne. Silas was taller, bigger, and bitter, but Orek was faster. The tracker’s body was all lean, harsh lines, the ranginess of days without proper food. His strikes were brutal, bone-breaking, but it was only hate fueling him.
Orek had something much more important hardening his fists and landing his blows.
He threatens my mate. He deserves to die.
Bring her his heart,howled his beast.
Orek blocked Silas’s next swing with his hatchet, leaving him nothing to escape the vicious slash of tusks across his collar. Blood welled on his chest and neck, the gore stinging in the cold air. Silas bore down with his brute strength and superior height, driving Orek to his knees to keep the blade from his face.
Mouth contorted in an awful sneer, that forked tongue lashing at him, Silas growled, kicking Orek’s leg out from under him.
Orek went down and rolled, hearing the swish of a blade sailing through the air next to his head. He felt the vibrations of it sinking into the earth near him.
Silas lunged, a new knife brandished in his fist.
He rolled again and kicked, his boot meeting flesh and bone. Something gave, the joint crunching, and Silas howled.
