"By which you mean you've already made up your mind, and Stars above or hells below, you're going to do what you decided to do. It's a very orcish trait. Mutt was just the same." How many times had he told me that he had heard my words with his soul, and his soul would hold them, and then do the exact thing I'd asked him not to do? I'd lost count even during his lifetime, and lost any desire to remember a handful of petty disagreements after his death.
I sighed a little bit, withdrawing my hand. Casimir knew the disdain of humans, their fear, their loathing. He did not understand that the elves were ten times worse. He would find no succor in safe places, no welcome at warm hearths, whatever noble deeds he had done, because he'd been born with an orc's face. If I was any judge, he deserved so much better than that, and he deserved it more than I did. Anything I did in Raiaera, I did for selfish reasons. He was going out of a genuine desire to defend the defenseless, to heal the hurting. These motivations were as alien to me as chrysanthemum and dandelion salad would be to him; selfless nobility didn't seem to benefit the noble.
A moment passed in silence, and my ears caught something. A hitch in his breathing beyond just the pain of a broken rib. A quickness in his pulse that didn't seem to come from simply sitting and talking. Of course; we'd fought side by side until every single enemy laid dead at our feet, then we'd shared a drink. I don't know what his human blood and training were telling him, but as far as his orcish side went, that was courtship.
Well, why not, if that's what happens? He hasn't got a lady, and Mutt is long gone.
"Timbrethinil. You'll want to start there. You'll encounter the edges of Xem'Zund's corruption and learn more about what lies deeper in the nation. It was once our greatest forest, full of silver birches. These days..." I shook my head. "But I believe you'll do fine there. You must be an excellent woodsman if you were able to track me down. I'm not accustomed to being found."
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