Page 14 of The Bull's Beauty
“Oh, please.” He rolls his eyes. “If I wanted to betray you, I’d have already.”
I don’t dignify that with a response.
Ulric smirks. “Here’s the plan. I go in, scout the place, figure out where they’re keeping her. Then, I get her out.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.” He winks. “Easy.”
I don’t trust him. Not fully. But right now, I don’t have a choice.
“Bring her back unharmed,” I say, voice low. “Or I will break that treaty.”
Ulric’s grin doesn’t waver. “Relax, big guy. I’ll get your girl.” He turns, then pauses. “Oh, and Silas?”
“What?”
“Try not to pace a hole in the ground while I’m gone.”
Chapter Twelve
Beatrice
The Orc camp is too loud. Their language is all bark and snarl, but somehow they all understand each other. The place runs like a village, just a more primitive, muddied, bone-decorated version. Everyone’s hauling, hammering, shouting, cooking. I hate that it reminds me a little of Havenmoor, just much dirtier. And I hate, more than anything, the reluctant, grudging respect it forces from me.
Cassia, on the other hand, seems oddly calm about being a prisoner.
“You seem fine,” I accuse her as I watch her braid a strip of leather into some kind of bracelet.
She shrugs. “What can I say? I’m adaptable.”
I slump against the bars of our cage, glaring at the bustling camp. My thighs are still sore from yesterday’s forced march, my breasts ache from lack of relief, and my pride? Yeah, that’s definitely bruised.
Stupid, stubborn, runaway Beatrice.
A commotion near the edge of the camp catches my attention. There’s some shouting, scuffling and then an unfamiliar, cocky voice cutting through the ruckus.
“—just passing through, friends! No need for the rough handling!”
My eyebrows shoot up in surprise.
That’s definitely not an Orc.
Cassia goes rigid beside me, her fingers freezing mid-braid. Her eyes widen, and for the first time since I met her, she looks genuinely afraid.
“No,” she breathes. “No!”
I follow her gaze.
A man—sort of—is being dragged into camp by two massive Orcs. He’s lean, dressed in tattered leathers, with dark, wild, tangled hair and a pair of wolf ears twitching atop his head. A tail swishes behind him, flicking with lazy amusement despite the fact that he’s currently being manhandled.
Cassia makes a sound like a cornered animal.
I frown at her distress and whisper, “Do you know him?”
“He’s one ofthem,” she hisses back.
One of them. The wolves. The ones she was running from.
