Only animals move as silently as the orcs do. I didn’t hear them approach, though in all fairness, I was focused on trying to hurt my father the only way I could. With the threat of a half-orc grandchild.
A threat I don’t plan on carrying out.
This male, this orc with two scars on his cheek and large muscles that bulge under the leather straps across his chest, stands there with his hand locked on my father’s wrist. He doesn’t need any of the five knives strapped to his harness or the large sword resting against his back. The power this male exudes tells me he can easily crush my father.
I don’t know if that pleases or scares me. Both, I suppose.
“You will damage my female,” the orc says.
“She’s my daughter.”
“Now she belongs to me.” The orc’s voice fills the area with a dark, menacing tone, like the beast himself.
There is nothing soft, gentle, or even forgiving about this beast. Not his appearance, not his voice, and not the way he’s squeezing my father’s wrist. He’s the epitome of power and ferocity.
And he’s the one who bought me.
I stare at the massive brute and swallow hard, trying to block thoughts of how he’ll treat me, how he'll force me to be his, to give him kids. Without thinking, I hiss at him.
His eyes lock on mine, the ridges on his forehead scrunch together and his lower lip pulls back, baring his tusks.
Oh, god, I’ve already pissed him off.
I want to screamI’m no one’s property!but sheer terror keeps me from speaking.
“Rucha vek, Atox,” the orc beside him, another beastly male wearing as many knives as him, says while glaring at my father.
I have no clue what they’re saying, but the orc won’t release my father, who’s turning pale. When my father cries out in pain, every hair on my arms and neck rises. But the orc… his lip curls back further. He’s enjoying hurting my father.
I can’t watch this. I just can’t.
Without thinking, I reach out and rest my hand on the orc’s, gently, not trying to force him to let go. He has a vise-like grip on my father.
I don’t know why I want to keep this orc from hurting him. He got what he wanted by selling me off. A seat on council, the highest level of government in our colony. Which means he can protect my sisters from a similar fate.
Maybe that’s what this is about. He’s sacrificing me to protect them.
I won’t risk my sisters.
“Please don’t,” I say to the orc as calmly as I can. I’m trying to hide my fear while praying my actions don’t make me look weak.
Leathery skin stills beneath my fingers. The orc stares at me, his dark green eyes swirling with flecks as black as onyx. “He touched you. You aremine. I have a right to take payment for damages.”
I don’t know what to say. My mind is blank, my entire world turned upside down.
Myownerbarks something at the orc beside him. I watch in fascination and horror at how those tusks move outside their lips as they speak.
My stomach churns. It’s a good thing I didn’t eat breakfast this morning. I haven’t eaten much since I’ve been told my fate two days ago.
“I’m not damaged.” Somehow, I push out those words in a steady voice. Talking back to this orc when I don’t know much about him doesn’t seem wise. Talking back to my father, well, I know his limits. Though he’s never hit me before today.
Orsoldme.
The orc growls at my father before releasing him with a shove that sends him crashing into the thin wood door of our house. He could have done a lot worse, like hurl him into the adobe wall hard enough to break my father’s back.
From where he’s slumped in the dirt, cradling his broken wrist, my father yells at me. “You’ll never see Camila, Renata, and Marta again. Nunca, chica. Comprendes? It’s bad enough you’ll be whoring yourself out to those monsters. I won’t have you contaminating anyone else.”
Fuck me, I should have let the orc crush him.
