It was a relief to be alone. Iris picked up the broken bits, dropping them one by one in her cupped hand where they clicked together like gambling chits into a little pile. She got the bits and pieces up and threw them away into a bin.

She ran her hand over the glowstones and the soft, white light went up over the room. She took a wooden tray and a sponge of watered down vinegar up to the second floor. The bottle, glasses, plates, all went onto the wooden tray and her sponge scrubbed away at the stains their lovemaking had left behind.

Kneeling at the booth, her arm sawing back and forth to remove the stain, the powerful smell of vinegar filled her nose, but it wasn’t her nose she held shut, it was her eyes. “You knew this was coming.” Iris told herself as she worked and the sick feeling in her gut began to settle from the bitter liquid.

“You’re not going to cry. You’re not going to cry. You’re not going to cry.” Iris told herself over and over again, so often that her cleaning efforts synchronized with her words until finally she finished, stood, and left the room.

Iris took everything back downstairs, cleaned it all, scalding her hands in the water when she held her hand on the hearth stone for too long, and didn’t care. The pain in her hands was a distraction, she scrubbed it all, wiping away every bit of evidence of the pleasant evening she had and putting it all away to be used again later.

Pain began to hit her gut, sharp and stabbing, if any life was to form in her from her hours with Gottfried before, it was prevented now. ‘It’s for the best. It’s for the best. It’s for the best, it’s for the best, it’s for the best, it’s for the best, it’s for the best!’ She shouted in her head on a loop when she finally went down to her bed, removed and stored her clothing, then went to the shower.

She yanked the chain and brought down a brief rain of cold water, it stung. ‘It reminds me of when Johanne used to poke me with icicles in winter…’ She could hear him all over again, that mop of dark hair, bundled up in rich clothing that Iris was starting to forget the feel of, his hand on the base of an icicle he’d found dangling from a tree. His hot breath fogging the winter air, the crunch of snow beneath his feet. “Stab! Stab! Stab! Johanne the Great and Mighty, he stabs at you!”

“Right… I used to run away crying and hide behind our mother… show off the little places on my arm where he got me, then he’d pout…”

The icy water that cascaded over her body and carried away the evidence of her urge to forget, brought that long forgotten memory to the fore, and with it, the memory of Johanne’s corpse, dead in his first battle, on the first day of fighting Gottfried Jabara’s punitive force, stabbed to death.

The pain of the icy water turned to numbness as she stood and leaned against the wall with one hand, her head bowed and looking down as the evidence of her brief union with her ‘cohort’ who somehow seemed to understand her, at least some, vanished in the little rivulets of water that were carried to the grate that would then wash it into a filthy ditch far down the street.

Iris shut her eyes, let the roar of the water slow to a drip on its own.

Each one was like a drum to her mind.

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

It haunted her steps as she left the puddle holding her belly where the stabbing pain was worse, she entered her room, naked, dripping, and in pain, then fell to her bed without any care for anything, until she managed to fall asleep against all odds.

Gottfried walked the streets of the city with a warm glow about him, his feet fell over the stone and sprang off with a contented sort of happiness, his arms swung at his side. “So, you like her, huh?” He looked up at the big orc twins at his left and right.

“Yuh.” Xagen and Xagin grunted out, their hands on the short curved swords they each wore on their hips.

“Why? I thought you two disliked most people.” Gottfried asked.

“Strong.” Xagen said with quiet respect.

“Really? She didn’t seem that way to me… she couldn’t even get loose from you.” Gottfried pointed out.

Xagin chuckled in a deep, gravelly voice and shook his big wide jawed head.

They said nothing more about it, leaving Gottfried quite puzzled.

“Do you… have wives? If you’re determined to stay with me, the least I can do is have your wives brought here.” Gottfried asked, and the orc warriors looked down at him with sharp, deep set yellow eyes.

For a moment it looked like they might be offended, but they said nothing, finally they seem to have collectively decided he wasn’t trying to insult them.

“No. We have not fought our mates yet.” Xagen answered.

“I… don’t understand, what do you mean?” Gottfried asked.

“Orcs marry only one they can’t beat nor be beaten by. We have defeated those who would be our mates, or lost to those who we would have had for ourselves.” Xagen explained like he was talking to a child when he looked down at Gottfried.

“Oh, that must be hard.” Gottfried said with sympathy.

“Worth it. Find one to stand beside, that is the dream of the orc warrior. It makes us few, but makes us strong.” Xagin replied with a wistful look to the east that was blocked by buildings.

“What if I sent you back home to find mates? If you intend to guard my life… the least I can give you is a happy one for yourselves.” Gottfried said and the orc brothers stopped dead.

Gottfried took a step past them before he realized they’d stopped. He turned around and looked up at their expressions, it was hard to tell what an orc was thinking, their hard green skin did not allow much for a blush, their eyes didn’t move much, their mouths couldn’t smile nearly as much as a human was able to. ‘I wonder how they can read each other…’ Gottfried had the thought before Xagen spoke.

“Thank you.” He said, with his brother echoing the same.

“You’re welcome. But it’s my duty to look after my own.” Gottfried replied, “We’ll make arrangements when we go back to the capital in a few weeks.”

The pair grunted and fell in beside him again and made their way all the way to the hotel. The same as before, Gottfried went up the service entrance while the orcs went up the main way and ‘cleared’ his room first before letting him in. “Pick your shifts if you feel the need.” Gottfried replied and went to the round tub near the center of the room with its boiling hot water. He stripped and slipped into it with a satisfying sigh. “Ahhh… yesssss…”

‘I wonder if the royal bathers miss me… probably. Fussy lot.’ He mused, reflecting on their fretting. ‘Mother’s rescues… Mother of Terror my ass… if people only knew her as I did… as we did…’ He closed his eyes and began to sink lower into the hot water.

It bubbled around him, cleansing his flesh of the sweat of his body’s exertions, with only his head above the water, he turned his thoughts back to his recent activities. ‘Admit it, you like her.’ He told himself with at least some contentment as much as regret. ‘And you ruined her life.’ It was the companion thought to the first one and utterly inescapable.

“Cohort, huh… funny enough way to use the word.” He mumbled and crossed his legs down under the hot water. ‘Sooner or later, she’ll try to use you.’ A little voice in his head whispered. ‘She makes her living with lies, why would she tell you the truth about anything?’ He had to ask himself that, but as he replayed it all, none of it felt like lies.

‘Would you know if they were? You’re horrible about this kind of thing, mother is far, far better. But what am I supposed to do, introduce mother to the slave I’m screwing? No, that would not go over well. Not one little bit. But Xagen and Xagin have taken to her after only a handful of encounters.’

That was a very large weight on her side of the scale.

Gottfried’s head was spinning with uncertainty as much as from the heat of the water boiling around him, he put his arms up on the rim and sat up, listening to the steady bubbling noise and the otherwise total silence of the suite, he tried to find answers and found only foolish ideas that even he recognized as boyish.

“Maybe another perspective…” He whispered, and that, he found, felt right.