Jte closed her eyes for a moment. Crying had made them sting. She took a deep breath and then ignited her gaze once again to look into the distance where Gregory had been led away.


    “I just…” she paused, steadied herself. “A lot’s happened. Coming here, Freddie getting loose, and now this. Then finding Greg and feeling so much for him so soon. It’s a giant mess and we’re both lost in it together. I can just about deal with that. I just don’t want to be lost in it alone.” Speaking more to herself than to Emmet, she finally turned to face the old man. “Where did they take him? If I can’t talk him out of it then I can at least be there if he needs me.”


    “You cannot be with him now.”


    “The hell I can’t.” Jte’s blue eyes red with anger.


    “The orcs do not allow humans near the training grounds. They don’t want us seeing the fighting and getting ideas. You would be turned away immediately, and I would definitely not suggest pressing the matter with the guards.” Emmet did not seem pleased about the situation either.


    “I’m not going to just stand here while he goes through that!” Jte made no effort to keep her tone civil.


    “Algra will be there. It is her right. She will make sure he is safe. Come now.” He lifted his arm to gesture back toward Gregory’s tent. “I promise you that when he returns you shall be the first to know.”


    Jte considered making a run for it before her more rational senses reigned back the urge. Sitting at home and waiting for the man in her life to return was most certainly not her style. What did Emmet expect her to do? Make the bed and have Gregory’s pipe and slippers ready for when he got back?


    If he got back.


    She pushed that thought down as quickly as it had arisen and glowered at the old man before whirling on her heel and marching back into the tent. Emmet watched her take her leave, wrapped up in her nket and then began the walk towards where he knew he would find Talina.


    The slender, raven-haired woman was pacing back and forth inside her tent. Lydia and Fiona were both outside, discussing the events of the evening with the other residents of Bolut’s camp. Talina looked up and saw Emmet pass through the canopy and calmly settle his hands together on the front of his robes.


    “Begone, old man. I am not entertaining now.” Talina barely gave him a backward nce as she continued her pacing.


    “My dear girl, have you ever known me to seek you out for such a thing?” Emmet’s voice was smooth, if slightly withered with age.


    “The girl is in no mood to speak with you either way, old man.” Talina halted her pacing to narrow her eyes dangerously upon Emmet.


    “Well, I’m truly sorry about that but I fear we need to talk. Our young friend is in trouble and I know that look in your eye. It was the same one you gave the soldier from the diplomat’s guard before he went missing.” Emmet turned to the side and began looking through the supply of scented oils mounted on a small table beside Lydia’s section of the tent.Content rights by N?velDr//ama.Org.


    “I know nothing of what you say.” Talina had, however, gone rather stiff.


    “I don’t believe that. No one else saw. No one else would believe you were capable of killing a man and disposing of the body so smoothly. But I saw the way you were smiling in the days thereafter. I know that look, Talina.” He turned away from the collection of coloured vials to look directly at her. “Your secret is safe with me. I know who he was and what he did. I know why you did it. Yet that brings us to why I’m here now. You are forbidden from making anyone disappear in the wake of Gregory’s training.”


    “They will kill him!”


    “They will not kill him. They will hurt him. Orcs don’t care much about human soldiers vanishing into the night, but they will care a great deal more if it starts happening to their own kin. Especially if it happens to their pups during their provings. They’ll be out for blood and Gregory will be their first suspect after all this mess.”


    Talina warped her beautiful features into a frustrated snarl before she began pacing again. She hated being shackled, even if it was only by logic. Someone had hurt her master and she wanted their heads on a spike.


    “That doesn’t mean you can’t do anything,” Emmet continued. “We do not yet know who released the madmanst night. His escape was certainly not his own doing. So, we must find out who it was. I fear I am too old for such an investigation, but you? I think you are more used to such things, aren’t you, Talina?” Emmet left the question hanging there for a moment. It pressed down on her shoulders like a lingering threat.


    “You see much, old man. Too much.” She levelled an icy stare right back at him and Emmet would have recoiled had he not prepared himself for it. Then, after a moment of silence between them, Talina finally looked away and let out a long, steady breath from between her lips. “But you are not wrong about where our true problems lie. I will do as you ask and find the one who released the rabid child.”


    “Thank you,” Emmet turned to leave but stopped just before reaching the opening of the canopy. “Oh, and I would ask that you tend to Gregory’s red haired friend. She needs someone to keep her upied until he returns.”


    “I will go to her.”


    With that, Emmet offered Talina a small and rather grateful nod before shuffling out of the tent leaving her to look back at her things. She thought of the knives, carefully slid into the lower lining of her sleeping furs, never to be used again.


    She hoped.


    – – – – –


    Gregory followed between the two massive orcs who had been sent to collect him and felt not entirely like a man walking towards a guillotine. Part of his brain was panicking, screaming for him to run away and hide. Those thoughts were bing more and more persuasive as they walked out into the proving grounds. Even young male orcs all outsized him by at least ten inches and what the orcs referred to as unproven pups had bodies hardened by years of brawling with each other. Gregory watched them practice, the main weapons either being two heavy wooden clubs or a singrrge one. They did not fight in much armour save for a protective metal brace crossed over their bare chests.


    Females were interspersed amongst the males, fighting therger beasts with more speed and swiftness rather than brute strength but with no less ferocity. Gregory saw some of the impacts the weapons made. Merely walking across the proving fields, he heard the sounds of bones cracking on two separate asions along with the agonised roars that soon followed.


    Throughout it all, Gregory remembered the face of Valise and what would likely happen to her if he should flee. Then there was also the considerable worry of what would happen to himself, since he doubted the orcs looked fondly upon cowards. The greater fear won out and he remained with his guardians until they brought him before a rough and tattered old pale-green tent.


    “I- I should go in here?” Gregory looked between the two hulking figures mped up in their thick, ckened armour.


    The orc he had looked to red out a thundering bark before pushing his spear forwards toward the tent and baring his tusks beneath his helmet.


    “Alright! Alright!” Gregory hopped to attention and walked in through the withered cloth of the tent and found himself face to face with another of the green behemoths.


    The orc he saw was evidently an elder and it seemed that age had taken away none of the creature’s considerable bulk. Not overweight like Bolut, but rather stocky and stout of build. Many old scars lined the bare arms and chest that were bulked up with years of muscle grown and burnished in battle. The top of the head was mostly bald with a single knot of long white hair at the rear of the skull. A thick white braided beard outlined the mouth that only had the single tusk at the corner, the other having been broken off long ago to leave the orc’s mouth in a permanent snarl.