Chapter 7: Chapter 7 – Matters of Taste

“Oi! Little Miks!”

Catching sight of her as Mika backed away in horror, Threl lifted his hunk of meat-on-a-stick and waved it around. 

“Want some?” 

She shook her head, stopping as her back hit a tree and dropping into the moss with her arms wrapped about her knees. In a world in which she was apparently little more than a snack, Mika reasoned, perhaps her best hope lie in becoming as scrawny and unappealing as possible. That, or get strong enough to defend myself. 

She actually laughed out loud at the thought.

“What’s the joke?” wondered Threl, ambling over and thrusting the meat-stick at her regardless. 

Mika huffed. 

“Just thinking about my chances.”

“Chances of what?” he pressed, bopping her on the lips with the food when she refused it.  “Come on, you really should eat. Or are goblins vegetarian?” 

She scowled and shoved his hand away. 

“I just don’t want to! And my chances of survival, of course.”

Threl frowned, taking an absent bite of amagara steak. 

“You’ve got orcs on your side now, so I’d say they’re pretty good,” he said around the meat as he held it in his cheek.

Scrunching her nose, she glared at him.

“For how long, though? And what about when they’re not?”

Threl twisted his lips almost thoughtfully as he chewed, then swallowed. 

“Why wouldn’t they be?” 

Mika growled in frustration.

“I know the truth,” she said, lowering her voice to a whisper.

“What truth?” asked Threl, loud as ever. 

“About blue. The princes flashed the same color when they saw me as all of you did when you smelled that stuff and ate it!” She jabbed a claw at the meat-hunk. “They want to eat me!”

The elf shrugged. 

“Well, yeah. Kinda, probably. But they would never.”

“What do you mean kinda probably?” Mika hissed. 

“Look, there are a lot of things you need to know about our history and like, orc biology to fully understand what’s going on with all that, but it’s…I don’t know. It’s not that simple. Also, it’s taboo among our, er…orc kind to eat the flesh of any other of the Facets of Ahvar. Has been for hundreds of years now.” 

When Mika said nothing, he sighed.

“His majesty isn’t usually wrong, but I really am not the right one to teach you the ways, you know? I know them and all, but…well, you know what I mean.” 

“I really don’t.” 

“You’ll learn everything soon enough, I promise. The scholas will teach you. And no one will try to eat you, I also promise.” 

She squinted her eyes at him, pushing up her goggles. 

“Or successfully eat me?” 

“Or successfully eat you. Pinky swear!” 

“Wha—”

“Elf tradition,” said Threl, bringing up the littlest of his five fingers—so gross—and hooking it around the littlest of her four before she even registered what it was he meant to do. 

A sound escaped her that was shriek and hiss and gasp all at once as electric pleasure jolted through her body at the point of contact. Snatching her hand from his, she scrambled back through the moss and lichen.

“How dare you?” 

At her exclamation, all the orcs’ attention turned their way. But Mika was beyond caring. 

“Whatcha doin’ to that poor little gob over there, Threl?” called one.

“Oi! Back off!” shouted another as several of them broke from the fire and stomped over. 

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The tips of Threl’s ears turned downward. 

“I…I don’t understand. I just—”

“You don’t understand that you can’t just touch my…my most…” she trailed off, lost for words and rather starting to regret attracting the orcs’ attention as they loomed over her like feral Sentinels.

“What did you touch?” Growled the biggest one, stepping in so close to the elf that Threl was forced to step back to meet his gaze.

“Just…just her pinky finger! I swear!”

“Skin-to-skin,” added Mika. “No glove!”

The biggest orc deflated a bit.

“Er…”

Mika stared around at them. Were they truly so barbaric that that sort of thing was just acceptable to them? Or did they not care, because she wasn’t one of their own?

At least he’s a different species, she reassured herself. At least I don’t have to worry about—

“I think there may be some…er, biological misunderstandings at work here,” hedged Biggest Orc, cutting into her thoughts. “Maybe the hands are a sexual organ for them?”

“You mean more so than normal?” chimed in another orc from further back, making a jerking motion while the others laughed. 

“Or perhaps it’s a religious thing. Either way, Threl, I think it best if you refrain from touching the goblin at all unless absolutely necessary.” 

“Understood, captain,” answered the elf, looking rather like a  kicked mudpuppy. “I’m sorry, Mika.” 

She sniffed and curled her arms about herself once more. 

“Captain?”

Snorting, a particularly scarred orc with a hefty gut and floral tattoo-work stepped forward. “Isn’t that a little premature? What say you, Kroga?”

Biggest Orc snorted back. “Right. Let’s get to it.” 

Then they all started whooping again. Mika grimaced and covered her ears. Throwing one last apologetic glance her way, Threl joined the orcs as they retreated. Kroga and the scarred one took up positions directly between the two great blazes, while the rest closed around them to either side, forming a circle of flame and bodies. Curious and frustrated that she couldn’t see what was happening, Mika sunk her claws into the moss of nearby pine tree, peering up into its needles to check for beasts before climbing up to one of its lowest branches. 

Just as they came into view, the two pulled their weapons from their shoulders as one and handed them off into the waiting hands of the bystanders. So too they removed daggers and swords and axes from their persons, relinquishing them to the crowd. Then they stripped off their armor and their shirts as well, until they stood before one another in nothing but their great leathery orc-pants. Mika’s sharpest tooth, her right canine, dug into her lip…horrified and fascinated in equal measure. 

The pants stayed on. 

As she watched the pair stare each other down, Mika’s eyes watered at the brightness of the flames and she yanked her goggles back down. The orc’s markings glowed back to full color. And while the spectator’s hues fluctuated and varied between green and violet, the pair at the center of it all were crowned in gold. 

Then someone out of her line of sight blew a horn, and the two began, slowly, to circle one another. Predators of equal might, sizing each other up.

Flowers made the first move, barreling forward almost headfirst as he roared a bone-shaking barrage of guttural syllables. At first Mika took it for little more than a brutish battle cry. But as the moss slid out from beneath Kroga’s feet to send him tumbling backwards, she realized her mistake. The Greensinger’s voice rose, and vines shot down from the trees to tangle about the would-be captain’s limbs and throat. 

But Kroga relaxed into their grip, lips dropping open as he unleashed one long, low note. The trees all around them whipped in a building wind. Then he raised the note into an abrupt, keening burst before cutting it off entirely. The winds blew harder still and flowed together into a scythe-like crescent that sheered through the vines in one easy heartbeat. Bracing his feet in the freshly-exposed dirt as more vines shot towards him, Kroga sang another three notes to the sky. Two short and low. One long, high and wavering, the winds rushing upwards with the building of his voice. 

Then, as the vines came down around him, he loosed a fourth and final note. A raw, grating blast of sound that brought the wind down like a hammer upon the head of the Greensinger, smashing his body against the forest floor. The vines loosed, and Kroga dropped to his feet once more. This time Mika knew to cover her ears in advance as—yet again—the orcs howled their approval. Crowding around their captain, they butted foreheads, clapped his back, and even grasped his hand, their markings turning silvery-gray in his presence. Mika’s cheeks flushed hot and she glanced away until they’d stopped. 

Meanwhile she looked to Flowers, who she presumed must be merely unconscious…for rather than adding him to the pyre, his fellows dragged him aside and tucked a blanket over him. Then the real drinking began. Mika seethed in envy, desperately hungry and thirsty but unwilling to do anything about it. And as the funeral pyre burned low, the orcs reached their hands into the ashes, smearing the charred remains of their comrades over their forehead marks.  

Some hours later, there was a rushing of leaves from overhead and the already dim and filtered moonlight vanished from the clearing entirely.

She prayed it was the rescue ship, though in truth she wasn’t entirely convinced she was any safer among the orcs than she was the beasts of the Rooted Sea.

Don’t be stupid, said her Other Voice. Everything may want to devour you, but at least they have reasons not to. 

“That’s the SalRes!” Called Threl a few moments later, bouncing over with Ixos in his arms once more.

“You’re going up first. Come on, get down from there.” 

As the elf led her to the heart of the clearing, a ladder dropped into their midst. And by its look, one crafted of the same uncuttable material that Mika still wore tied about her waist like a rat’s tail. As she climbed, a few others piled on after her. Then it began to roll upward of its own accord. Within moments, she was spilling onto the deck of the rescue ship, more than a little dizzy. The orc who worked the ladder crank cranked on, bringing up another three immediately after her. One was the new captain, Kroga. Another was Threl. And the third, the apprentice medic standing in for Bosarg, immediately traipsed off. Then from off near the stern the princes Uther and Retga came forward—a third, unfamiliar orc with long silvery hair at their side. 

The rain was a bare mist now, and when the wind blew her scent their way all three orcs’ markings flared bright blue. The third orc’s eyes went wide as he looked from Mika to the construct in Threl’s arms.

“I can’t believe it,” he breathed.

“I can’t believe Threl kept her alive,” said Retga glaring at the elf, her lip curled. 

“Don’t even think it,” growled Uthur as the stranger took a step closer to Mika. “She’ll be blooded into our Thral by the next sundown.”

“But she isn’t yet,” rumbled the silver-haired orc. “Is she?” 

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