Page 3 of Orc's Forbidden Claim

“Bed?” Dilacs asks.

“Soon,” I say, voice husky with unspent desire and need.

“Heh,” he grunts, and I feel his stare on my back.

My brother is no fool, he knows what is happening, but I do not wish to discuss it with him. I had thought Gwen, his mate, was my dragoste, but I was wrong. My feelings for her were nothing compared to what they are for Saylor. How was I to know, though? I had given up on ever finding a dragoste. My life, before Gwen was thrust into it, was consigned to ending thisworld. Even if Gwen was not my dragoste, I care for her. She brought the one thing I didn’t know I had given up. Hope.

“I said a moment,” I growl, looking over my shoulder.

Dilacs grimaces, his eyes narrowing as he looks past me to Saylor. I growl again and he shakes his head and then drops the door back into place.

“I should go,” Saylor says, looking at the way down.

Her hands are in mine. I tighten my grip on hers and then pull her closer. I wrap my arms around her, inhaling the sweet scent of her hair. It is an exotic scent that I can never quite place, but it is uniquely her. Many are the nights I have laid in bed remembering the way her scent fills my nostrils.

“A moment,” I whisper. “Only a moment more. Please.”

She murmurs something into my chest, but it is too muffled for me to hear. It doesn’t matter because the tight grip of her arms is all the assent I need. I layer kisses on the top of her head then do the hardest thing I have ever had to do, I let her go.

She takes a step back, her hand still in mine. Our arms stretch as she continues to walk backward while our eyes are locked onto one another.

“Wait,” I ask.

She pauses and I pull out the gift I have been working on for her. I extend my hand, letting it dangle from the string. The green gem catches the light from the single torch nearby and explodes with colors as it breaks down the light.

“Beautiful,” she says, a bright smile on her face.

“Wear it,” I say.

She hesitates only for a moment before coming back to me. She turns and lifts her hair, allowing me to fasten it on her neck. She stands fingering the gem between thumb and forefinger before walking forward. She stops after a few steps, then turns away.

“This is wrong,” she whispers.

“How can it be wrong?” I ask my throat so tight the words barely come out. “Your friend, Wrenlee, is with a lizard. Am I so much different? Am I less than a lizard in humans’ eyes?”

Her eyes glisten with unshed moisture. She blinks rapidly, swallows, then shakes her head.

“Not to me,” she says.

Only the tips of our fingers remain in contact, but she pauses there, letting the touch linger.

“Nor you to me,” I say. “And Gwen is with Dilacs. The others back in the city, are with Urr’ki, how can this not be okay?”

“They’re… different,” she says.

“You say that,” I say. “But I do not understand. Are they not humans too?”

“Yes, but not…” she trails off, shaking her head. “I cannot explain it again. I have to go.”

She jerks her hand free and moves quickly down the ramp. Her white dress is fading into the darkness before I can speak.

“Saylor, wait,” I call after her. She stops but doesn’t turn around. A white blur in the darkness, but I see her head is turned to one side. “I… I am sorry.”

“I know,” she says, and I hear the tightness in her voice too.

Her shoulders slump, her head drops, and then she rushes off down the ramp. I stand alone, watching the shadows that dance where she was but moments before. My heart aches as if a hand is squeezing it tight, making it hard for it to beat.

Giving up, at last, I turn and head into my assigned room before Dilacs comes to inquire yet again.