Page 47 of The Orc Warrioress and the Elf Lord

And the smell of everything inside the charred remains of the house, it was putrid.

She staggered outside, falling to her knees, and she put a hand to her chest and she tried to make sense of what she was feeling.

What was she feeling?

Panic?

Sorrow?

Confusion.

“Gathren?”

She looked up. It was dark. The sun had set over twenty minutes ago, and she had pushed her horse on and on, knowing that she was almost home, and she had thought there would be food and drink and her mother smiling at her and embracing her, saying that she knew that Gathren would come home eventually, and some meade or some blackberry wine to drink, and she could barely make out the figure who was approaching her in the darkness.

Then she did make him out, and she thought she must have lost her mind, and she wondered if the burnt house was some sort of hallucination as well, if she were simply seeing things.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

Iahir was gaping at her house. “What happened?”

“Well, I don’t know that, do I?” Her voice was choked. “I think it’s been some time since it happened, though. The burnt fields, there are signs of weeds growing in around the charred stalks of corn.”

“Is this your home?” he breathed.

“What are you doing here?”

“Oh, I followed you, all right? At some point, I began to realize it was pointless, because you were almost home, and I told myself to go back, but then you were almost home, so I thought I would see you safely delivered to your family, and then I would go find an inn for the night and go back to my family in the morning, and then…” He gestured.

“Why would you follow me? Do you really think I needed someone to look after me?”

“Maybe you do.” He was gazing at the house. “Who would burn down your house?”

She pushed past him and went to find her horse. She was going to need to name this horse, she thought. It seemed as if it were her horse, and it should likely have a name. She pulled into the saddle and began to trot off.

“Gathren!” Iahir called after her.

She ignored him. She was dimly aware that he got on his horse and came after her.

She went half a mile down the road to their closest neighbors, but as she did, she could see that the main house here was also burnt to a crisp. What could have happened?

She spotted the newer house, built by her neighbors for their son and his wife, however, and it was intact, and there was a light in the window. She rode straight for it, dismounted, went to the door, and banged on it.

Iahir was arriving. He was dismounting from his horse. Gathren still ignored him.

The door to the house opened.

The neighbor’s son. What had his name been? “M-malreg?” she said.

“Gathren,” he said. “Oh, it’s Maldred.”

“Right,” she said. “So sorry.”

“You came back,” he said.

“I did.”

“Did we win?” he said, lifting one of his massive orcish shoulders. “Did the orc army get the elves to acknowledge us?”