Page 3 of How the Orc Stole Christmas
I shook my head. “One of the younger orcs would be a better mate.”
“Mate?” She shrieked next to me. “I never said anything about a mate. What are you trying to do? Pimp me out to your people?”
She tried to scramble out of the sleigh but got tangled in the fur that I gave her for warmth, falling back on the seat next to me with a muttered curse. Kharag gave me a look of reproof, but before either of us could say anything, his door opened again and his very pregnant mate waddled out.
“What’s going on, Kharag? Oh, hi Klas. Who is this?”
Jules stuck her head out of the fur. “I’m Jules and I want to go home.”
Olivia glared at me and elbowed her mate. “Help her down. What did you do, Klas?”
Kharag stepped forward and easily lifted Jules down. I resisted the urge to growl at him and snatch her back to my side. That possessive urge was so unfamiliar to me, and I tamped it down. She wasn’t for me. She was young and sweet, better for one of the younger orcs, not a grumpy asshole like me.
“I found her on the road. I rescued her. Look how she’s dressed. She would have died if I hadn’t found her.” I was insulted that Olivia thought I had harmed Jules.
Olivia wrapped an arm around the other woman. “Come inside. I’m sure you have questions, and these males are terrible at explaining anything.”
Jules stopped and turned back to me. For a moment, I thought she would ask to stay with me and my heart leaped. “Thank you, Santa.”
“Santa?” Olivia asked, a hint of laughter in her voice.
“Sinteklas. A name for Santa. Sort of,” Jules replied.
Jules cocked her head for a moment. “I guess his name does sound like that. But trust me, there is nothing jolly about Klas. He’s more like Krampus.”
“So I gathered,” Jules said. Then she looked at me. “Thank you for helping me.”
And she followed Olivia into the warm hut. I looked at Kharag, thoroughly confused. “Who is Krampus?”
He laughed and took the reins of the horses. “You, my grumpy friend. I’ll help you stable the horses.”
CHAPTER THREE
JULES
Ilet Olivia lead me away from Sinteklas or Klas, as they called him, and into the warm hut, feeling oddly bereft at leaving the one safe haven in this strange new world. He may have been grumpy and blunt to the point of being rude, but he cared about me, checking me for injuries and keeping me warm when I would have frozen in the snow. Honestly, most people back home would have driven right by me. He didn’t seem to care if I walked away, and that hurt my feelings, though it really shouldn’t, though the whole mating thing needed a conversation and I wasn’t having it with an insensitive male.
Olivia was frighteningly efficient, having me seated and digging into a warm bowl of stew in short order. I had forgotten that I hadn’t had time for dinner, so food was welcome. She sat across from me, studying me with kind eyes, though her belly kind of pushed her back from the table a bit.
“You’re not going to drop that kid while I’m sitting here, are you? I mean, I could totally deliver the baby, since I assume having an orc or minotaur kid is the same as any other.” I eyed her terrifyingly large belly as if an alien was about to burst out ofher, not even able to believe that I was speaking about orcs and minotaurs as if they were everyday creatures.
Yet somehow they were. When we drove through the small village, I saw things I never thought I would see outside of movies. More green-skinned creatures. Orcs, as Klas called them. Varying degrees of green, some leaning toward grey and others a dark green. Most had scars and long black hair, braided, with beads and ribbons in them. They wore vests and leather pants like Klas, despite the cold.
Then there were minotaurs, towering creatures with bull-like faces and legs, with hooves for feet, and amazingly muscular for their bodies. They too only wore leather vests and pants, with a light pelt of fur it appeared on their body, which may have kept them warm.
I didn’t see any humans until I came here and saw Olivia. That seemed strange, and I wondered about this world, but I didn’t know where to begin with my questions. But the first was if I was going to have to deliver a monster baby on my first night. I was going to need some serious incentive for that one.
Olivia laughed, her sound echoing in the room. “I don’t think so, though I can’t wait for this one to be born. Clearly Klas told you I’m mated to both an orc and a minotaur, so we don’t know who the baby will take after, which also means we don’t know how long I’ll be pregnant.”
I stared at her, utterly appalled. “What do you mean, you don’t know? Nine months doesn’t apply here?”
“Not exactly. Our genes are not dominant unless we mate with a human. So, if we mate with an orc, our baby takes on their characteristics. Which means, our pregnancy is usually around that time period. For orcs, it’s around seven to eight months. Close to humans. Minotaurs, on the other hand, are eleven months. Yeah, a long time. Leave it to me to overachieve.”
“Why would you mate both of them? Or either of them?” I couldn’t understand and as soon as the question was out, I knew it was rude. Before I could apologize, Olivia was waving me off.
“Human females are prized here as mates. Many females died from a plague and the few that remain cannot have children. We can have children with most of the races. As a result, we basically have our pick of mates. It’s a big competition, with prospective males paying lots of money for the chance to be selected. I was in an auction when I first came here. They bid for the opportunity to have me select them. While an auction sounds barbaric, I got the final choice. At the time, I didn’t know any of the males well, and my options weren’t the best. But I knew Kharag represented safety. Now I know there was a mate bond at work.”
I sat back in my chair. This sounded like something out of one of my romance novels. “Mate bond?”
