She offered the other half to him, expecting him to take it. But he took her wrist in his hand, putting the back of her hand against his tongue. “Tastes like a halfling.”
Bianca stared, wide eyed, frozen. The devilish smile faded from his face. He dropped her wrist and stepped back.
“I’m not actually going to eat you,” he rolled his eyes.
Somehow that wasn’t actually what she was concerned about, at the moment.
Wasn’t there supposed to be some kind of instinct to flee or throw a punch? All Bianca was feeling was a wave of warmth and flutters low in her stomach.
What a strange orc. She’d really only heard about how they were viscous in battles and not to fight one if she could avoid it. And she’d never really questioned that, because it made some sense not to go toe-to-toe with someone literally twice her size.
“Thank you for bringing me here. I don’t think I would have found this place at all on my own,” Bianca started to say, before she shook her head. She had already spent too much time chatting about pointless things with him, when she should have been more concerned with getting back to her troupe. “Can you help me find my friends? They have a camp somewhere in the woods, probably closer to where you found me.”
He nodded slowly. “It’ll be easier to get back there in the daylight. I’ll take you to them in the morning.”
That was something, and it felt good to have that settled. Even if he did make her heart beat wildly in all sorts of places it shouldn’t, she did feel safer with him than she would have on her own.
Bianca returned to piling up different mushrooms in her basket, more than half full now with everything from morels to boletes and king trumpets. Every time she turned to toss a couple more in, she felt him watching her. The silence stretched between them, and Bianca had never been great at silence. Even during her troupe’s plays, she often found herself whispering and giggling backstage. “Hey. Um. Tell me more about the whole betrothal ritual thing.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Why?”
“Because you mentioned it earlier, and I don’t know what else to ask about?”
She watched him cross his arms and lean against a tree. At first she didn’t think he would answer her, but then he sighed and shrugged.
“I don’t know how halflings do it. It’s a… courtship by combat thing. Drawing first blood. If it starts the Blood Fever, you’ve found your mate. But that rarely actually happens.”
Bianca couldn’t conceal her surprise. Not exactly how she pictured betrothal normally. But at the same time, there was something nice about the idea of having a mate. Knowing where you were meant to be, a real answer instead of hoping this path was the right one.
He shrugged and continued on. “At this point it’s mostly custom. But someone who may want to join their lineage to yours might start picking fights.”
“They really want in on the whole Son of Bloodthirsty, Kin to Bonecrusher line?”
“Some find it valuable.”
“Yeah, but, people randomly fighting you? That sounds exhausting. I’m sorry you’re going through that,” she said, sitting back on her heels. She watched his posture soften, the tension leaving his crossed arms.
Bianca sighed and hefted her much heavier basket to the next patch of morels. “Being wanted for the wrong reasons sucks. It’s almost like not being wanted at all, because they don’t really see you.”
She stopped picking mushrooms for a moment. She had that same problem with a few members of her acting troupe, usually the leads of their productions. They probably didn’t even realize she was gone.
“The actors who invited me to travel with them said that I had talent for the stage– but I haven’t been on it once in a whole year. I’m just another pair of hands around the camp, now.”
She glanced at Tanis again. Even if he was a bit rude for her taste in company, she wanted him to know she was grateful. “I know you were probably just trying to make sure I didn’t scare off that huldira you were tracking, but I’m glad you didn’t just let it… trample me, eat me, or whatever.”
She wasn’t sure how to word her question without actually asking if orcs ate halflings.Why did you save me, why are you putting up with me, why aren’t you like the orcs I’ve been warned about?
“I’d never seen a Halfling before,” Tanis offered, as if he gleaned her question from her face. “Only heard stories.”
She dared a coy glance back at him as she advanced into the grove. “Oh. Do I live up to them?”
“No. You’re not nearly as...ugly as we’re told.”
“What! That’s rude. We’re not that different from orcs, just proportioned a little differently,” she stammered on. Well, no halfling she had ever met had tusks, or been green.
“Youareshort,” Tanis allowed with an eye roll.
“Maybe you’re just oversized. Everyone insists on calling us ‘Halflings’, but maybe you should just call yourselves ‘Doublings’, and us by our proper name.”
