“It’s the cutest nose on earth.”
“If you say so...”
They chatted for a while longer, about nothing in particular, simply enjoying each other’s company. Beth dozed off at some point, then jumped awake, ready to run to Kinna’s house to get the baby home.
“Sleep,” Uthar whispered to her as he pulled the blanket up to her chin. “I’ll bring him.”
“What if he’s hungry?”
“I’ll bring him to you.”
“Okay.”
She was asleep before he was out the front door. She felt warm, comfortable, and safe. And the best thing of all was that she knew she could trust Uthar, and sleep for just an hour. If she was lucky.
It was going to get easier. It was going to get better. It was going to be the best.
Chapter Thirty
Had she not been an orc bride, living with an orc horde, and having an orcling as a son, Beth would’ve thought she was the most awful mother in the world. In the past week, she must’ve broken a record of how many times she’d lost Zikel. The boy ran off the second she wasn’t looking. He vanished like he’d never been there at all, and Beth sometimes spent a whole hour looking for him, going from house to house, from orc to orc, asking if anyone had seen him.
He grew up fast. Shockingly fast. He was only a year and a half old, and if in the beginning he liked to play on other orcs’ lawns or in their backyards, or he ran off to Sonya, or played with the chickens and goats in the park, lately he’d gotten into the habit of hiding in the abandoned buildings. He got more and more daring, and when he heard Beth or anyone else coming, he hid in pantries, cupboards, under beds. Beth had once found him hiding in one of the old elevators, and she’d really lost her temper then. She felt bad about it afterwards, but at least she’d instilled a fear of old elevators in him, and she was sure he wasn’t going to go near one again. She’d tried to explain that not all elevators were the same, and they just couldn’t trust these ones because they hadn’t been used or repaired in ages. But little Zikel had looked up at her with confused eyes, and she’d asked herself then if he was ever going to find himself in the position to use a functioning elevator. It wasn’t like he was going to go live amongst humans. And she gave up trying to explain the difference to him.
Today, he’d run off again, and Beth had been looking for him for half an hour. It was a hot day, the sun burning high in the sky, and the large hat she’d put on before she left the house wasn’t helping much. She stopped by the diner to get something to drink, and when Burok and Krib told her they hadn’t seen Zikel, she sighed and went out again into the merciless sun.
She passed by the workshop where the orcs built furniture to sell at the fair, and saw Uthar and Lonar the Beast looking over some sketches. It was as if the captain sensed her presence, and looked up. A smile pulled at the corners of his lips, revealing more of his sharp tusks. He passed the papers to Lonar and walked over to her. He pulled her in his arms, and Beth rested her head on his chest, sighing softly.
“I can’t find him, and I need to feed him,” she said.
“I’m sure he’s around here somewhere. Let’s look for him together.”
He took her hand and kissed it sweetly. Beth looked at him with just a little bit of envy in her heart. Orcs didn’t suffer from the heat. They didn’t suffer from the cold, either. In general, extreme temperatures didn’t affect them. It was a bit embarrassing that she sweated all the time and could barely keep up with him, let alone with their son when he decided to run from her because he wanted to be chased. Without meaning to, Beth had lost a couple of pounds in the past year.
“I’ve already been at the diner. Krib and Burok haven’t seen him.”
“Kinna’s house?”
“He doesn’t go there anymore. Every time she catches him, Kinna tries to make him learn about herbs, and he gets bored.”
Uthar laughed. “She’s trying to see if he has the talent and inclination to become a mage one day.”
“Isn’t it too early for that?”
“Orclings show talent for magic from their first year of life. I’ve watched Zikel... How he plays, what he’s interested in... He’s not a future mage. He’s a future captain.”
“Of course he is,” Beth murmured, smiling to herself. What else would his father, the horde captain, have said about his beloved son?
They stopped by Kinna’s house, anyway. They found her in the backyard, tending to her herb garden while Abby read a book on the terrace. Neither of them had seen Zikel.
“Do you want me to do a quick spell and track him down?” Kinna straightened her back and wiped her dirty hands on her robe.
“No,” Beth said quickly, blushing. She hated it when Kinna jumped to help her with a tracking spell. She was the boy’s mother, thank you very much! She could find him on her own. And she’d only been looking for half an hour. If in another half hour she still couldn’t find him, she would swallow her pride and come to the mage.
“Okay. If you change your mind...”
Uthar smiled as he watched the exchange. He’d witnessed it plenty of times before, and it amused him.
Beth grabbed him by the arm and pulled him after her. There was a new spring in her step.