Page 65 of The Orc Chief's Baker
“But it doesn’t matter anymore, Brovdir. Thepansdon’t matter anymore. Because my mother’s bakery isgone.”
Chapter
Seventeen
TRINIA
She’d said it. She’d gotten the words out. Her tongue burned and her stomach clenched and her heart felt like it was shattering into a million splintered shards in her chest. It was tearing her apart from the inside out.
This was real.
Her bakery wasgone.
Everything had been taken from her.
Brovdir went still, eyes wide. She looked away, unable to meet them as she let out a little hiccuped sob. She tried to hold it back. She really did. She justcouldn’t.
“I’ve losteverything.” She wasn’t sure he could even make out what she was saying. It was so garbled by sobs. “I lost my mother’s bakery. My family legacy. Almost a hundred years of hard work and it’smyfault.”
She covered her face more securely as the cries worked out of her chest. Her shoulders shook and her body trembled, and she couldn’t get her tears tostop.
There was shuffling, movement, steps approaching. She tried to dash the tears away, but more replaced them.
There was a quiet thump, and she looked up to find Brovdir kneeling before her. His shaggy hair hung over his green eyes and his mouth was set firm and his brow was gentle.
There was no pity in his face. No judgment or discomfort. Only... support.
And Trinia lowered her head back into her hands and sobbed harder and longer than she had since her mother died. Since she’d buried the only person she ever loved and who had ever loved her. All her security and safety was stolen away from her when her mother had passed.
Now it was happening all over again.
It wasn’tfair.
Brovdir shifted slightly, and she found herself reaching for his hand. His eyes went wide as she pulled it into her lap and clutched it tight, used him as an anchor. It wasn’t logical. He was a stranger. She shouldn’t evenbehere.
But she needed him.
And he didn’t pull away.
He kneeled before her with his steadfast strength and waited. He rode out the storm of her emotions with her and finally her sobs turned to shuddering breaths and her tears stopped flowing and her mind cleared.
“What happened?” Brovdir asked quietly, obviously sensing she had gotten herself back under control.
She swallowed and took a few deep breaths. “My stupid, drunkard father traded the bakery away to Ronhold.”
There was a moment’s pause before Brovdir asked, “The cobbler?”
“Yes. It sounds strange, doesn’t it?” A few more breaths, then she lifted her head and wiped at her cheeks again. “A man who works withfeetwanting a bakery. But he’s one of the meanest, shrewdest businessmen in Oakwall.”
“Headman Gerald?”
Trinia shook her head. “There’s nothing the headman can do. I saw the contract myself. After mama died, the bakery was my father’s. His to keep or trade away. And he traded it.” Her throat closed again, and she took a deep breath. “No. This ismyfault. I should have known he’d trade it. He was so desperate for mead at the end, and he’d already traded literally everything he had except our rotting home, which no one wanted.Blast it.”
She felt a gentle brush to her fingers. Brovdir stroked her knuckles gently with the pad of his thumb. “Not your fault.”
“It is. The bakery wasmyresponsibility. It was my duty to keep it running. If I’d just donemore, I would have had savings. I could have bought it back from Ronhold. But I didn’t...”
Instead, she’d used all her spare time drawing up floor plans and daydreaming. She was a fool.
