“Oh, I can’t wait for this.”
Ris shook her head as Tate hooted, and Silva continued to smile, closed-mouth, the good humor not quite touching her jewel-green eyes.Here we go again. New location, same old web.
"So do they have you moving back or don't they?" Tate directed the question to Ainsley, pouring each of them two fingers of whiskey and opening the other two bottles of the carbonated spirit with a practiced twist of the wrist
Ainsley shook his head, scowling. "They don't. They seem to think I'm supposed to be happy about needing to commute one week a month." He held up a hand to stave off Ris's objection. "Fortunately, I have a beautiful, generous, kind, funny, talented, sexy girlfriend who lives at the halfway point between my place in the city. So, my commute is easy enough. But it's not the fucking point."
"Iknewwe should have just stayed home tonight. You're in a foul mood. You have been since you got off the train, probably have been since you found out about your schedule. We didn’t need to go anywhere. You could've stayed home and sulked instead of taking your bad mood on the road."
Silva was too well mannered to roll her eyes in Ainsley's direction, but Ris could see the impulse there, just beneath her dignified veneer. Tate merely raised an arched eyebrow, waiting.
"We had plans with Khash and Lurielle tonight," she explained, watching as Silva's eyes widened, her shell pink lip catching in her teeth as Tate snorted, stretching his legs out.
“Thatfucking cunt. Say no more. You deserve a medal for the attempt.”
Ris drove her elbow into Ainsley’s side as he basked in the validation he’d been seeking, stretching his arms out wide as if he could hug it. Silva, unable to hold it in for another moment, rolled her eyes at last.
"I was treated to a dissertation on why orcs who grow up in clans aresomuch more connected to their heritage and their history than the rest of us. With better values."
It was Ris's turn to roll her eyes, shaking her head again at Ainsley's far-from-accurate version of events. "It washardlya dissertation."
"Sucha cunt."
She and Tate spoke almost simultaneously, and then Silvadidlaugh, quickly covering her mouth with both hands, as if the unladylike squeak shocked her.
"It wasn't!" Ris insisted, her shoulders shaking with her own laughter. "And what the fuck iswrongwith you?! Didn't you hear me telepathically trying to tell you to shut the hell up? You started down a dangerous path almost immediately and you did nothing to tap the brakes."
"Nanaya, you heard him! He said in one breath that he was raising his kids in Cambric Creek and then in the next was talking about how important clan values are. I am sure there is probably a folksy saying about hypocrisy and opossums or something, but all I know is that he is the fuckingdefinitionof a hypocrite. So obviously I’m less of an orc because I grew up in the city with no clan to speak of. Don’t pay attention to the fact that both my parents were from clans, that’s apparently inconsequential. My value system is clearly missing.”
"That's not at all what he was saying," she continued to laugh, as Ainsley drained his glass. "Youstarted it by saying modern orcs have moved away from living in clans. How did you think he was going to react?! That would be like me starting a conversation with you and announcing that all men raised by single mothers are incorrigible mama’s boys. Of course you're going to be defensive."
"Except in his case, that's absolutely true." Tate was completely deadpan and Silva choked out another half-swallowed laugh, burying her face against Tate’s shoulder as she shook.
Ainsley threw up his hands again. "I am beingattacked!"
"No, let me tell you what it's really like," Ris cut in once more, the whiskey warming her insides. She drained her own glass, chasing the burn with a long sip of the icy cold carbonated drink, already feeling a bit buzzed. "Orcs and elves are exactlythe same. That’s the problem. Like, withallof us. You're all the fucking same. Elves think they are better than anyone else. Well, guess what? So do orcs.”
Ainsley raised a finger, sucking in a breath to interrupt her, but she cut him off.
"No, you got your chance to talk out of your ass earlier. Now it's my turn. Elves build these insular little communities away from humans, with their own schools and their own clubs. They're all super invested in each other's lives and being judgmental assholes twenty-four hours a day. The whole culture is basically just living up each other's asses. Hounding your kids until they have a baby and then hounding the neighbor's kid until they have a baby and then forming an alliance so that those babies will get married to continue the tradition of hounding kids until everyone's miserable in an endless cycle of generational trauma. And what do orcs do? The same fucking thing. Build their own insular little communities. Their own schools. Their own fuckingtowns. And somehow, everyone wants to pretend thattheirway is better even though it's exactly the same playbook. It’s like looking into a godsdamn mirror."
"But that's my point! Modern orcs have moved away from the notion that we have to grow up in these places, that we have to raise our kids a certain way, that you're locked into this way of life forever. And it's hypocritical for him to claim the clans are so important to retaining culture and values, whatever the fuckthatmeans.”
Tate scowled across the table as Silva wrapped her arm around his. Ris was tired. She envied Silva, being able to wander away from this circular argument and fuck off to bed anytime the fancy might have taken her. Beside her, Ainsley wasn’t done.
“So he can raisehiskids in a mixed species community and it's all going to be hunky-dory because he's going to bring them back to visit his clan, because the clan takes care of their own and willmake sure they're raised up right, but how is that any different than someone like me? Are his kids going to magically be better orcs than their schoolmates just because they go back to visit the clan once a month?"
"Does he think those half Elvish children of his are just going to go strolling up to his nan's house without blinking an eye?” Tate scoffed. “That they'll be welcomed with open arms?"
“Do you think elves are any better?” Ris asked, her turn to arch an eyebrow sardonically.
“Oh, I happen to know for a fact they’re not,” Tate shot back. “You girls aren't the only ones here with the benefit of an Elvish education. I grew up in an enclave. I knowexactlywhat elves are like."
Ainsley ignored Ris, going back to Tate's question. "Yeah, actually. They’ll visit and still get the benefit. That's what he said. The clan takes care of its own. What I want to know is how isthatupbringing any different from any orc who didn't grow up in a clan anywhere else. I really don’t see the point.”
She dropped her head back, groaning. "But itisimportant, Ainsley. All I’m hearing is a lot of projection. Again. Do you even hear yourself? You are the first one to admit half the time that you know more about other species' cultures and histories than you do your own. So I'm sorry, I understand you don't want to hear it, but hedoeshave a point! We all wind up assimilating to the human majority and we lose those bits and pieces of where we came from along the way. I grew up in an Elvish community, I went to an Elvish school. And that was it once I left for university, but now in the past six months or so? I'm wondering. I'm wondering if I'm doing myself a disservice by not joining the club. If future Ris is going to look back when everyone she knows is dead and wish that I had set her up better. So I don't know if I can say that it's not important to have those communities. Idon't think they're all necessarilyrunthe right way, and I don't know what ‘Orcish values’ are, but—"
"Let me tell you what Orcish values are," Tate interrupted.
