Rise of the Warrior of Everfen

Chapter 11: You Deserve Peace

Each morning, Erinne rose first and made her way to the nearest place where she could watch the sun rise. It had somehow become her ritual, a freedom she could now enjoy. There was a moment of peace as the sun came up, where all the nocturnal creatures went to sleep but the day animals had yet to wake. It was quiet in that moment, the sort of quiet someone like her craved only because they'd never had it.

She had found an incline with an open meadow below it and found some boulders to sit on to watch the sun, but she had not been there long when a dire wolf came walking into her peripheral, it's master just behind it. She could tell by the dark coat that it was Cold Hammer's wolf.

She didn't turn to look, but she held her hand out beside her and the dire wolf bumped her hand so she could scratch his ears. She didn't ask Cold Hammer to speak and he didn't, instead he watched the sun come up with her, saying nothing. She didn't understand it, but she didn't want to interrupt the moment of peace, the beauty as the sun rose, the calmness of the wolf.

It wasn't until the sun was above the trees that he finally spoke as deer walked into the meadow far below the hill they were on. "I am confused by you, Human." She turned her head slightly to acknowledge she heard him but didn't reply. "You have a hatred in your heart for orcs, but you have a kindness in your heart you extend to all creatures."

"What do you mean?" She kept her voice soft and low so as not to disturb the tranquility in the air.

"I saw it in your eyes the day we met you, the hatred. It was there in the way you looked at your captors, it is there when you argue and challenge me, yet I see you also begin to accept us. You make jokes with Ghorg and laugh with Murchkik. You are tiny and frail but you risk certain death by standing your ground against a dire wolf. Now you are friends with the whole pack."

"When they are not threatened, they are docile creatures."

He snorted, "Hardly."

She finally looked at him and smiled, motioning towards Bukoo who now had his head resting in her lap as she rubbed his ears. Cold Hammer followed her gaze down to his wolf and, to her surprise, he smiled. It was brief, but it was real. No smirking with a devilish secret or sarcasm, it was pure joy. She liked that smile.

"You are contrasting parts, fierce and gentle, hate and kindness." He met her gaze, serious again, all joy gone.

"Only when I have to be. I never wanted to be in the fight rings at Everfen, but I couldn't not fight back. I had to." She considered her words further before adding, "I seethe inside, Cold Hammer. The hatred isn't gone."

"So do I." He murmured, voice low.

His words hit her in her soul. It would be so easy to hold onto anger and rage. There was so much wrong with her life, but there was so much more out here to see and behold. "The farther I get from Nukbrik, the less angry I feel, but I don't know if I can ever let go of my hatred."

"But you let it go a little more each day you're with us. You trust Lohke, you protected him last night. That's not a woman of hate."

"And yet you hold onto yours?"

"I do." He ground his teeth together a moment, still staring out at the field.

"Lohke doesn't hold onto it, why do you?"

"Lohke's imprisonment wasn't the only time you humans did me wrong." He turned to glare at her and she felt her brows pull together.

"I never hurt you, Cold Hammer." He looked taken aback by her statement and then she added, "And you didn't hurt me. That's what I'm coming to terms with here. That's how I'm absolving myself of my hate, but you still blame all humans for what a few did to you and yours."

He looked like he wanted to kill her, clenching and unclenching his jaw for a long moment before he sighed and faced the meadow again, setting his hand on Bukoo and stroking his fur lightly. "You sound like Lohke." He growled and lifted his chin higher. "He always told me to let it go. Especially where he was concerned. He said that it wasn't my burden, but it's always been mine." He turned to face her again, "Yesterday, I expected you to say you fought those humans because you owed Lohke a debt for saving your life. Instead you said 'you were helping me, they were not.'"

"I did say that." She swallowed, not sure why he brought it up.

"I saw the look on your face when you killed that human. You were cut to the core, shocked by your own actions, but when Lohke's life was on the line, you killed more without hesitation. Because he was helping you. That's the most morally sound thing I've ever heard in my life from a woman that has no reason to be that moral. You care about him?"

She could only tell the truth that lived inside her heart, "I've begun to consider him a friend. I haven't had one in so long, I'm not sure that's the right word, the right description of the situation, but I trust him, I think. I also think he's right, we can bring peace. Even if he's not right, I want to try."

He scoffed, "I take it back, you don't sound like Lohke, you are Lohke." His eyes cut to her but they weren't full of the harshness that she often saw lingering there. She didn't answer him. She wasn't sure what he wanted here. He seemed to be trying to puzzle her out, but everything he saw before him was everything she was. "For your sake, and for his, I hope you're both right."

She frowned, "What do you mean?"

She could sense the heaviness in his soul when he spoke again, "Humans tortured him, for weeks. You weren't there, you didn't see him and what they'd done to him. He has not been quite the same since." He looked at her. "You both deserve the peace of having no threat of war."

"That's the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me."

"Second to Lohke telling you that you were free I'd imagine."

She surprised herself by laughing and thought she almost saw him smirk. Still, she sobered, pondering his words before she said, "In all my years as a slave, I never expected—didn't even consider—that humans were being as cruel to orcs as orcs were being to me. What happened to Lohke...humans did that. My people. People I've craved for so long to save me from the hell I lived in. I never once thought an orc would be the one to set me free."

"Lohke often says all races are capable of the same cruelty and the same decency. Dwarf, elf, human...orc." He ruffled Bukoo's ears a bit and his hand grazed hers. He paused for a moment, his hand still on hers and she was surprised he didn't yank away from her like she had a disease. Slowly, he pulled his hand away and continued petting the wolf. "By all accounts, he should hate humans most of all. Instead it is I who hate them for him, watching as he befriends one of them. I don't understand how he hasn't crushed your skull yet just because you're human. If it had been my choice, I would have put you out of your misery the day we met." He took a deep breath and let it go. "By all accounts, you should be the same way. You should hate orcs, just like he should hate humans. You and he are a lot alike, perhaps that is why I cannot find it in myself to continue hating you."

She blinked and looked up, she would've been less shocked if he'd actually tried to crush her skull. "Wait, what?"

"You mean nothing to me, Human, but you do have my respect, and my assurance that I will not let anyone hurt you. As Lohke says, you are safe with us, but it is not just for him, it is because of you, too." He glanced down at Bukoo and smirked, "Perhaps Sheobulf is a good name for you."

Sheobulf. She-wolf. It was the name Lohke had blessed her with since he wasn't fond of calling her just Human. "How so?" She questioned him.

"You are as a dire wolf. Calm, docile, until threatened. But always defiant and strong."

"Is that a compliment?"

"Orcs do not compliment. We only give credit where credit is due." He murmured and then walked back towards camp.