Page 2 of Alien Orc's Prize
Padreth stopped writing to frown at me. Old Farion moved his mouth in a silent prayer.
“I will no longer tolerate meddling, matchmaking, or being told things I already know. There will be dungeons involved if these rules are not adhered to. Also flogging. Lots of flogging. Not for you,” I added on a hasty growl to Farion, who looked likehe was about to keel over with fear. “We’ll get you sorted out. You are relieved from taxation this season. And there will be no interest.”
Farion let out a wheezy, shuddering breath. Then he lifted his thumbs and pricked their pads on the ends of his tusks, turning his hands and showing me the blood. It was a gesture that demonstrated the very deepest sort of deference and gratitude. I acknowledged this with a grunt before turning to stride away, Padreth close on my heels.
“No taxes? No interest?” he said, sounding slightly amused. “What was that you just said about no longer being such a generous monarch, Prince Gal?”
“Did you not hear the bit about the flogging?” I muttered, an ache building behind my eyes. The sun wasn’t even halfway through its trek across the sky and I already felt like this day had lasted one hundred’s worth. And I still had three more tenants to visit before the evening meal.
“At least you have decent females ready and willing and available to you,” Padreth mused, almost more to himself than to me as we walked, late summer sun pouring its heat over our green hide. “I’ve heard tell of an Alpha on the world of Wulfric who couldn’t even find a mate among his own people. He had to appeal to some new intergalactic bridal program and got himself saddled with a human.”
The word stopped me short.
“A human?” I asked. There was no way I’d heard Padreth correctly. I hadn’t met any of the Wulfric people, but I knew enough about them. Strong, virile, hardy warriors. Not so unlike the orcs of my world, Orhalla. And one of them, one of their Alphas, had been mated to a human?
A tiny, weak, brittle-boned littlehuman?
I could not fathom what sort of catastrophe must have led to a union like that. Though I’d never seen a human, they werewidely regarded to be one of the most pathetic and distasteful races to have ever achieved star travel.
And a Wulfric Alpha had taken one as his wife. His mate.
What must his family have thought?
The question made a vengeful sort of thrill light up my belly.
What wouldmyfamily think?
If I bent to their will to marry, and marry soon, but instead of choosing one of the perfectly primped orc females they kept shoving down my throat, I showed up with a human?
It would be petty. Probably foolish. But apparently, I was a petty fool, at least where my own matrimonial status was concerned. I used all my fairness, all my fortitude, in dealing with the kingdom’s citizens. I would never dream of turning one of their lives into a meaningless joke.
But my own?
And what a joke it would be. To flash my tusks in an indulgent smile and to tell my mother and sisters that no more potential brides were required. Because I had already found one.
They’d be appalled.
They wouldn’t be able to say a word.
I’d finally be free of their incessant nonsense as I turned my focus to what really mattered in this kingdom. Keeping our people alive for the next season. And the season after that. I’d put up my human bride in some nice tower or another, keep her busy with whatever inane task was just interesting enough to occupy her tiny human brain, get her pregnant with my heir as soon as the time allowed for it.
And then I’d get on with my bloody life.
CHAPTER 2
GALBRATH
“Lady Tarley waited for you nigh-on half the day!” my mother exclaimed when Padreth and I finally returned to the palace.
“I have more important things to attend to than impatient orc noblewomen,” I growled at my mother. “If she could not handle waiting half a day for me while I attended to my people then she would not last one season as my queen.”
My mother Ohelia, who still remained queen after the death of my father until I produced an heir, snorted. Her tusks, painted red in mourning, flashed under the lamplight of the palace as the three of us moved towards the great dining hall for the evening meal.
“She made not one complaint, I’ll have you know!” my mother cried. “Truly, there is nothing wrong with her. I defy evenyouto find a fault in her!”
“She sat around waiting for me all that time and didn’t once complain? Then she is too meek.”
“Bah!” My mother’s tusks flashed again. So did her dark brown, nearly black, eyes. That rare, deep colour I’d inherited from her.