“So what exactly is going on with you and Torren then?"

“We're having a lot of sex, master. Why do you ask?" she fluttered her eyelashes innocently whilst doing a single hand flip over an unconscious orc woman snoozing on the table.

“I meant that your old rules seem to be getting a little bendy, but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't hurt him. So what's the deal?"

“There isn't any deal, master. I just introduced him to Fiona and

Lydia. We played a game together. Torren enjoyed it very much. My friends showed him just how much fun they could have without getting too intimate, and afterward when we were together he was exceptionally... vigorous." She let out a dreamy sigh at the memory.

“Having played a game with you guys before, I can only imagine."

Looking at her knowingly, he stepped out of the great hall and into the night. Most of the camp had gone dark as the revellers had dissipated.

Many orcs had retired to bed, but there were still enough torches to light their path.

“I do love Torren, master." She looked ahead of them and smiled to herself. "It was a surprise to discover, but I feel like I love him more with each day. At first he didn't quite understand that. Every time I took my clothes off for him it seemed like he was shocked that

I'd do such a thing. Now? I think he's coming to know how I feel, and to trust in it. So he is more comfortable, and on firmer ground. That makes the rules between us bendier. He's not afraid that I might sit in your lap and never return to him. It was even he who suggested that I kiss you tonight, for the performance. We talked of it, and he knows of my role as a courtesan, so it no longer troubles him as it once might have. Although he does expect that I make it up to him and offer him threefold whatever I might offer you. I'm quite looking forward to returning home tonight." The wicked smile returned to her lips as she continued to Look ahead in anticipation of returning to her Lover.

"Sounds like he's getting a hell of a deal there then," Gregory acknowledged, immediately suppressing the familiar little stab of jealousy that prodded his chest. A man couldn't have everything he wanted, after all. It would just be greedy.

They continued their walk together in silence. Talina picked up the pace a little and walked ahead of them, leaving him to enjoy the stray kisses Algra and Borika placed upon his face and bare upper body. As they were approaching the corner that would lead them into Bolut's encampment, he looked ahead and saw Talina's pale figure seeming to glow in the firelight from his camp. She stood still and statuesque, looking toward the campfire, which was still hidden from his view behind the circle of tents. He smiled at the sight of her nude form looking so beautiful in the flickering light.

It wasn't those nude delights that he focused on, however. He noticed her face wasn't quite right. She was happy. She was playful. Why had her features gone so oddly blank? It wasn't until those features shifted to contort into an agonized scream that he knew something was clearly very wrong.

Both orcs in his arms immediately sprang forward, and he was hot on their heels upon hearing the cry of the experienced courtesan. The noise made him dread to look upon his home for fear of what he might see.

So it came as a strange relief when he rounded the corner and his first thought was: Oh, I guess Bolut's back.

The huge trade caravan of the orc merchant had indeed returned, and stood before the central campfire. Its return had made it the most central feature of the camp, with the enormous structure designed to safely hold a horde of goods. It didn't take long for Gregory to realise that something was wrong, for the caravan was too still. In all his time looking at it, there had been human slaves or orcs moving around or interacting with it somehow. He was reminded of a time when he'd walked through his old high school late one night after attending an after-school class. The people he'd been used to seeing the halls packed with had all gone, and the feel of their absence was downright spooky.

An orc walked from behind the caravan, limping a few paces before tilting its head back and releasing a silent screech of victory. It was no ordinary orc. Its body seemed to have been grievously misshapen, for the Limp it carried was not borne out of injury but rather a seemingly twisted spine. Its hair was black, oily and shaped into a rudimentary

Mohawk style that flopped over at the tips. A hideous mask covered the upper part of its face, showing only two inky-black eyes peering out from within. The lower portion of its face was pallid, and streaked with thick, black markings. Both its tusks had been broken, and the resulting stumps looked to be in the process of rotting away. The armour it wore was a patchwork of misshapen panels of black iron that seemed to have been uniformly coated in the same black substance it wore on its face. He thought that the thing would have appeared almost eerily coated in darkness were it not for the thick red smears around its hands and across its chest.

Then he saw the bodies at its feet, and his heart shattered.

Lydia lay on the ground just outside her tent, her eyes unblinkingly looking up at the night sky. She'd adorned herself in a blanket, but it had fallen away to show the open wound in her abdomen that still trickled with blood into the Large pool that still continually expanded around her.