Page 6 of Ironling
Hakon pulled back to look up at her. “I will carry them with me wherever I go. And this isn’t goodbye.”
Siggy sighed deeply. “Where will you go?”
“Do you remember what the trackers who came last month said? About the human place accepting other folk?”
“The Darrowlands.”
“Yes. Apparently, there are already halflings there.” He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t curious to meet one of his own kind, another who was both human and orc.
Stepping back, Siggy held him by the shoulders, assessing him with those deep-set brown eyes. The family all had such eyes, including Hakon. They were a mark that, even if he wasonly half, that half was theirs.
“Perhaps it’s for the best,” she finally said reluctantly. “There’s talk that Vallek Far-Sight may come north, looking to recruit. Young smith like you would get taken, and I don’t want that life for you. His talk of unity is all well and good, but war is ugly.”
Hakon made a noise of agreement. Vallek Far-Sight was chief of chiefs, the closest thing the orcs had to a king. Ruling over the ancient stronghold of Balmirra, Vallek had taken up the banner of unifying the orc clans into something like a human kingdom. It wasn’t the first time such a feat had been undertaken. The orcs had once held a vast region, far beyond the craggy reaches of the Griegen Mountains they currently dwelt in, but dragon and human conquests, as well dissent amongst the orcs themselves, had eaten away at orcish territory.
There were renewed whispers of threats to the east. Pyrros was again expanding its borders. Having spent centuries at war with the nomadic tribes across the southern plains, as well as the dragons in their desert and rocky islands, the Pyrrossi empire had consolidated its borders and was now looking west, at the mineral-rich Griegen Mountains. There was also talk of Eirean lords encroaching on the disputed borderlands to the north, more human villages sprouting in the forests and foothills.
Vallek wasn’t the first leader to claim that the only safety was to band together and stand united against such outside threats. However, orc clans were unruly, and several had long since splintered away to live in the eastern foothills, far away from others the last time a Balmirra chief tried to fly a single banner. Perhaps the other chiefs wouldn’t mind Vallek trying to subdue the cruel Stone-Skins and vicious Sharp-Tooths, but as for the other clans, the Broad-Backs and their own Green-Fists and the others, Hakon didn’t know how well they would accept having their own power subjugated.
All of it smelled of coming war—and Siggy was right, he wanted no part of it.
Hakon wanted a good life, a small life. A mate, a family, work to be proud of. He’d no interest in politics nor war games. Give him a good woman, a hearty forge, and the chance to make something of himself and he’d be content.
His dreams weren’t big or grand, but they were vivid—and his. His grandmother and Siggy often called him a dreamer, losing himself in his daydreams while working the forge.
Perhaps he was a dreamer. Perhaps he was foolish. All Hakon knew for certain was that he had to take this chance and get away.
Blowing out a loud breath, Siggy reached into her pocket to pull out a bulging sack. She pressed it to Hakon’s chest, the jagged contents poking him even through the hide.
He took one look at the fistful of uncut gems and handed them right back.
“I can’t take this.”
“Oh yes you can,” she retorted, pushing his hands and the sack back toward him. “We’ve got plenty. Use it to start this life of yours.”
Hakon gripped the sack, the gems inside tinkling. Kaldebrak was a rich city built into a jagged eyetooth of a mountain deep within the Griegens. Uncut gems and geodes were almost a nuisance, sprouting like weeds out of the dirt. Behind the chief’s seat in the great hall, a vein of gold thicker than Hakon’s arm swirled in the rockfall.
The Griegens, and Kaldebrak in particular, was everything the Pyrrossi dreamed it was and more. It was why the orcs kept to themselves; such wealth would only bring trouble to their door if anyone knew.
“Thank you, auntie,” Hakon said, throwing his arms around Siggy’s neck.
His aunt huffed at the monicker and hugged him right back, a rib-cracking embrace that squeezed the air from his lungs.
“You’ll come back,” she said, not a question nor request. “When you find this woman of yours, you’ll bring her back to meet us.”
“Of course,” he promised. “No matter where I go or how far, we’re family, Siggy.”
Eyes glittering with tears, Siggy nodded. “Good. Now, move over. Your folding is atrocious.”
2
Five Months Later
Aislinn could only hide away in her study for so long. She knew this, and yet each day, she hoped she might have another half-hour of solitude before someone found her, needing her direction for this or her opinion for that. It was a fruitless hope, of course.
As heiress of the Darrowlands, one of the largest and richest demesnes in the kingdom of Eirea, her time was no longer her own.
That didn’t mean Aislinn had come around to the new reality, though. In fact, as three crisp raps struck her study door in quick succession, a sure sign that it was the formidable chatelain Brenna who’d found her, her first thought was,I need to find a new hideaway.
