Halfling a fantasy monst.., p.1
Halfling: A Fantasy Monster Romance (Monstrous World Book 1), page 1
Halfling
A Fantasy Monster Romance
S. E. Wendel
Copyright © 2023 by Sarah Wendel.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be used or reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form by any means, including scanning, photocopying, uploading, and distribution of this book via any other electronic means without the permission of the author and is illegal, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, contact the publishers at the address below.
S. E. Wendel
se.wendel.author@gmail.com
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Cover illustration by Bethany Gilbert Art
Interior graphics provided by Adobe Stock
ISBN: 9798988482833
ASIN: B0CC34M69T
To all the oldest daughters who take the world onto their shoulders.
You deserve your own hunky green halfling.
Prologue
An orc camp could be a very dangerous place, especially for a halfling child. Orek had known this all his life, and in his short nine years, he’d gotten good at blending into shadows and creeping out the back of tents. He could move silently between them now, the orc-kin inside none the wiser.
It was with those quiet feet that he was able to catch his human mother unawares.
Normally, Orla had ears keener than a fox, her sense for coming danger almost uncanny.
But Orek wasn’t a danger to his mother. No, he loved her very much. She was the only one in camp who would really talk to him. And the only other not orc-kin.
In a camp full of big, loud kin, Orla had had to get good at sensing danger coming. They were never truly safe, even being the mother of the clan chief’s child.
Orek slipped inside the tent he shared with his mother, a small thing compared to the big rooms of his father’s tent just on the other side of the canvas. As chief, his father Ulrek boasted the biggest tent, though Orek and his mother were rarely allowed inside.
Orla never wanted to go inside, anyway.
Orek didn’t like when she went, either. It always ended with her crying for days, miserable and in pain. On those days, he tried his best to fetch her whatever she needed and stay out of sight, for she couldn’t bear to look at him.
He hated his father for that.
The noise of the camp fell away inside the dark tent. His father and the other hunters were already deep into their cups, but Orek had managed to grab a few scraps of meat and a flatbread before anyone saw him. He held his spoils in the battered tin bowl he and his mother shared, waiting for her to notice him—he didn’t want to scare her.
Curious at what she was doing, knelt there on the far side of the tent, he peered over her shoulder.
Orla hissed, rounding on him to glare, her dark hair and eyes even darker in the shadows. “What are you doing?” she growled in her human language.
“I brought dinner.” He showed her the bowl, though he wasn’t sure how much she could see in the low light.
Orla’s glare softened to a mild frown. “Eat, then.” And she turned back to her task.
Questions bubbled inside him, but he sat dutifully on his nest of blankets and ate his portion. Orla said nothing, and after a while, Orek realized what it was his mother did—she was packing a sack full of things.
In went her few blankets and clothes, as well as the knife she’d found and hidden two years ago. It was summer still, so she ignored her one heavy coat, instead packing what smelled like cured meat.
The strangeness of it had the food in his belly churning and tumbling.
His mother was good at secreting things away, hiding what bits she could find. They had to stay sharp and take what they could to survive in the Stone-Skin clan.
Although Orek’s father was chieftain, Orla wasn’t the chief’s mate. She was a human slave, bought almost ten years ago for Ulrek and kept here ever since as his servant and sometimes bedmate. The years had been long and hard for Orla, her face gaunt and cleaved by lines of hardship. Tiny compared to the orcs, she was often pushed and scolded by the orcesses. And the males…they pinched and groped whenever they thought the chieftain wasn’t looking.
It was nothing compared to what his father meted out.
Being smaller than the other younglings his age, Orek had learned from his mother how to survive in a world of much bigger orcs. You had to be quick. You had to be smart.
“Don’t pick fights you won’t win. Stupidity like that gets you killed,” Orla had told him bluntly once as she’d cleaned the split lip he’d gotten fighting against other younglings.
Orek finished off his meat and bread quickly—eating slow meant having food snatched away. When he offered his mother the rest, she shook her head without looking up from her pack. “Eat it.”
He did but barely tasted it, unease filling his belly more than the food.
“Mama, what…?”
“Shh,” Orla hissed.
She tied off the pack and pulled her arms through the straps. When it was secure on her back, she finally turned to him, her face a web of grim lines.
“Krul is going to challenge your father soon. Maybe even tonight.”
Fear clutched at Orek’s chest. Krul was the biggest, nastiest male in the clan. There had been whispers about him challenging for leadership for a while now; he was younger and more cunning than Orek’s father, who much preferred to sit by the fire and get drunk than go on hunts and lead raids against other clans.
Orek avoided Krul whenever he could—there was something dark and…empty about the male’s eyes.
“I’m not staying to see what happens.” Orla stood and marched for the back of the tent.
Challenges for leadership in orc clans weren’t always to the death, but they often were. If the challenger was victorious, not only were they clan chief, everything that had been their rival’s was now theirs.
Orek shuddered to think of what a male like Krul could do to his small mother.
He hurried to follow her. “Where are we—?”
She stopped so suddenly that Orek ran right into her back.
Orla turned to peer at him sternly. He was a little taller than her now, though the look she gave him made him suddenly feel very small.
“You’re staying here.”
Everything in him went cold. “Mama…”
“I—humans won’t accept you. You look too much like your father.” Her mouth hardened into a line, her gazing cutting away like she couldn’t look at him any longer. “There’s nowhere for you other than this clan. Stay and become a hunter. Be faster and smarter than the rest and you’ll survive.”
“But I want to be with you.” She was the only one he truly cared for in the camp.
“I can’t take you.” Orla adjusted the straps of her pack, still not looking at him. “It’s for the best, Orek. You’ll understand one day.”
Arguments clogged his throat, but nothing came out before Orla slipped from the tent. Tears stung his eyes, and after a moment of wretchedness that made him want to hurl up his dinner, he followed her outside.
He kept back, walking in a daze as he watched her creep along the outskirts of camp. She kept to the deepest shadows, a trick she’d taught him, and soon, she disappeared into a crevice between the tall boulders that ringed camp. Outside was a warren of craggy hills and barren rocks sloping down into a dark, ancient forest.
She didn’t appear again.
Orek stared at the spot where she’d disappeared for a long while, tears tracking down his face into his mouth. His vision blurred with them, and the salt burned his tongue.
He sniffed, pawing at his face, knowing he couldn’t be seen crying.
But the tears kept coming, and he sobbed, “Mama…mama…” again and again, as if that would summon her back, as if he could make her change her mind and take him, too.
The idea of returning to the tent alone, to find it empty, shattered something inside him. His chest cracked down the middle, a rush of anger and despair flooding inside. What would he tell his father? How could she leave him here to take the beating he’d get for not being able to say where she was?
How can she leave me?
“Where’s your mother, runt?”
Orek jumped at the orcish voice, scurrying back as he swiped at his tears. He looked up, and up, into the savage face of Krul. The male was the biggest Orek had ever seen, with shoulders wider than a boulder and legs like tree trunks. His hands were huge and scarred, and many stories were told of how Krul could crush a human’s head in one fist.
Worst were the eyes, crimson red and calculating, set deep in that harshly hewn face.
Orek gulped, fingers going cold.
Shouldn’t have let him sneak up on me. Stupid, stupid.
“In our tent,” he forced himself to say.
Krul’s nostrils flared. “Both of you stay there
“Y-yes, sir.” Heart hammering in his chest, Orek hurried away, disappearing within the maze of tents. He didn’t stop until he ducked under the tent flap and buried himself in his blankets.
Alone, in the darkness, he lay shaking with fear.
He hugged the coat Orla had left to his chest, smelling her familiar scent. Even as the noises outside the tent grew loud and violent as the night wore on, he couldn’t stop himself from crying into his mother’s coat. He didn’t hear the fight happening outside over his tears and didn’t really care, either. Not when it felt like a hole had opened in the earth, sucking him down into a sticky pit of sorrow.
He was given one night for his grief and despair.
When morning came, and he learned what had happened, Orek could only worry about himself.
Orla had been right.
That night, Krul challenged his father for leadership. And won.
1
Twenty Years Later
The drizzling mist clung to Orek’s cloak and shoulders, beginning to steam as he neared the orc camp. He bounced the boar carcass higher on his shoulders, cringing as a warm trickle of congealing blood ran down his neck into his collar, and began up the steep, rocky hillside.
He’d tracked the beast for two days, and it had put up an admirable fight—he’d the gore to the side to prove it. The wound pinched and pulled as he walked, and with every long step uphill, the longing for his tent and a hot cauldron of water tugged harder at his gut. He’d wait long enough by the fire to give over his kill, hope for a quick comment on how big the beast was, and then he was bound for his bed. He almost groaned thinking about it.
Then someone did groan, and he almost tripped.
It was off to the left and had his ear perking up, but he didn’t stop. Merk must be guarding tonight, and the groan could only mean he was asleep or tugging on his cock rather than watching the path.
Orek huffed in irritation. It was only a matter of time before something much worse than him slipped past Merk into the Stone-Skin camp. The clan chief’s fearsome reputation would only keep invaders out so long, especially with Krul growing older in years.
Bright firelight lit the top of the hill, silhouetting the boulders lining the entrance into camp like the maw of some great stone beast. Orek passed through the outer ring and wove through more stone circles, finally catching the path into the camp proper.
The tall steeples of the chief’s tents across camp were burnished a warm amber in the firelight, and a wave of warmth hit Orek as he passed into the first circle of tents. The pop and sizzle of meat over the great fire reached him even though he couldn’t see it through the warren of tents; it made his stomach gurgle in anticipation, and he picked up his pace.
A wave of noise hit him next, the camp emanating a happy rumble as orc-kin gathered for the evening meal. He’d always enjoyed this time of day, watching all the kin gather round over their meal, chatting like birds about their days. Females came with the younglings, and sometimes songs were sung, silly shanties and tragic ballads. Orek was never included, never drawn into the circles of gossip or singing, but he liked to watch as he quietly ate what he could scavenge. But he was always sure to leave early, before the males were too deep into their cups.
The boar he carried grew a little lighter as he strode the path through camp, proud of what he’d contributed to the clan. Much as they reviled him, called him runt and spat at him, they couldn’t say he didn’t contribute.
After his father lost Krul’s challenge, he’d spent the rest of his days in pain and bitterness. The shame of surrendering nipped Ulrek’s heels for his final miserable years, making his mood sour and his fists frequent. But he’d kept Orek near, needing the help of someone spry and quick. Orek had spent his youth serving his father and the group of friends and allies Ulrek still had. The group of wizened, bitter males had mocked him, but they still taught him what they knew of fighting and hunting, even if they sometimes didn’t know it.
Orek learned everything he could, trained every spare second—he had to in a clan where small meant vulnerable.
If his father had done him any one kindness, it was waiting to die until Orek was nearly full grown and able to defend himself against Kaldar and the other youths. Now, Orek was the swiftest runner, the quickest fighter, and the best hunter in the clan. Whether or not anyone acknowledged it.
It was his fourth big kill just this moon. For many nights, the clan had feasted on what he’d provided, and that kept Orek warm at night when the communal fire didn’t.
He’d spent the last twenty years making the best of it, proving himself to them—for what else could he do? What else was out there for a halfling like him?
A growl stirred in his chest, and Orek’s gaze snapped up.
Ahead, a familiar sneer leaned around one of the supply tents, and Orek’s spine straightened, drawing him to full height.
Not that it mattered much, he still only came to Kaldar’s chin.
“Here’s the runt,” Kaldar crowed. “He can guard the tent—even he can manage that.”
As he approached, Orek saw a handful of orcs gathered round the entrance to the supply tent. At the center stood Talon, one of Krul’s top enforcers, with a gleeful smile curling around his tusks. Meaty hands on his hips, Talon watched with greedy eyes as two warriors finished placing large jugs and crates in the tent.
He glanced up at Kaldar’s words, barely considering Orek. “Yes, fine, have the runt stand guard. I have to see to preparations. Everything must be perfect.”
“I’ve got to get this to the fire,” Orek said as neutrally as he could, trying to keep the frown from his face.
Why would they need someone to guard the supply tent deep within the camp?
“I’ll take that.” Kaldar reached over Orek’s head, plucked the boar off his back, and threw it over one of his own shoulders. He grinned wide at Orek. “I’m sure everyone will be pleased with it.”
That growl clawed up his throat, but Orek bit it back. His inner beast, the one revered by all orcs for its aggression and berserker strength, gnashed against his kill being stolen by the handsome, smug full-kin. Orek’s inner beast wasn’t overly loud or forward, so feeling it rumble so violently in his chest almost unnerved him. He assumed, being only half-kin, it wasn’t as strong as others’—that, or it was smarter, knowing it was stupidity to pick fights he couldn’t win.
He was tired and wounded—and Kaldar knew it.
The insufferable male grinned when Orek, after a tense moment of glowering at Kaldar, let the insult pass with a huff.
Chuckling to himself, Kaldar walked off with the kill. Orek clenched his teeth so tightly he thought they might crack as he glared after Kaldar. They both knew the only acknowledgement Orek got came when he brought in food, and now all would assume it was Kaldar who’d killed the boar, Kaldar who’d been gored in the hunt, Kaldar who provided best for the clan. Kaldar, the chief’s nephew, who they already loved and respected. Kaldar, who all the orcesses fawned over. Kaldar, who didn’t need this like Orek did.
A sharp slap to his arm had Orek remembering Talon. He swallowed hard, having forgotten the first rule of survival—never take your eyes off the threat.
Talon’s smile was gone now as he frowned down at Orek, his black eyes narrowed.
He pointed to the tent opening. “Don’t let anyone in. And don’t you dare go inside. Everything’s a gift for Krul and must be untouched, just as he likes.”
Orek frowned in confusion but Talon waved the others away before pointing a big finger right at Orek’s nose.
“You fuck this up, runt, and I’ll skin you alive,” he growled before hurrying off to the fire.
The beast snarled at yet another insult, but Orek did his best to swallow it. The tents around him grew quiet as the clan gathered to eat, and he was left completely alone; no one worried that the runt wouldn’t follow orders.
Orek glared at the tent over his shoulder as he took off his pack. What gifts could be so important that they needed guarding? Nobody was stupid enough to steal from Krul. Sure, many kin skimmed from the supply tent—warriors made off with wine, took extra weapons, and others pinched more spices and herbs or furs than they needed. But a gift for Krul? Never.
