Page 55 of My Orc Has Big Tusks
Laina drew the top layer over us both.
Sofia flew over and snuggled between us.
Laina lay on her side, facing Abagail and the twins. I lay on my back, keeping a handsbreadth of distance between us.
Outside, the rain had slowed.
“In the kingdom,” I said, “there’s a hierarchy over who gets to attend a birth. Since I was the youngest of eight brothers and one sister, I was only allowed to view late-season births.”
“You have eight brothers and a sister? Family dinners must’ve been…loud.”
“My mother says the orc word for chaos is my family’s last name.”
Laina’s shoulders quivered with her laugh.
“My eldest brother, Gravuk, once chased a grumbletoad through three enclosures and directly into a full feast hall before catching it. The feast guests were not pleased. The toad was not pleased. Our mother especially was not pleased.” I paused. “Gravuk was extremely pleased.”
She buried her face in the bedroll. It didn’t muffle much.
“My sister Marra kept broken things. Smooth rocks with crystal insides, creatures, and people if they would hold still.”One of the twins bleated before settling. “She said the things that had been broken and mended were stronger at the seam.”
“My father had a cracked rifle case he kept for years,” Laina said, her voice soft. “He could’ve replaced it, but he said he wouldn’t, that he knew exactly where all the give was. I bet he and Marra would’ve agreed on many things.”
“He sounds like someone I would’ve liked.”
“He would’ve enjoyed meeting you.” She paused. “He brought me on my first birth call when I was sixteen. A mare on the neighboring farm with a foal coming early. It was two in the morning, but the whole barn was lamplit and smelled of fresh-dried hay.”
“Was the birth complicated?”
“No. He came out fine. All legs, like he’d borrowed them from a stallion twice his size and hadn’t read the instructions first.” The smaller twin shifted, and Laina went quiet until it stilled. “He stood there looking down at them.These are mine?But he toddled around on them and was soon running. My dad cried. He didn’t think I saw him, but I did.”
“Did you cry?”
“Obviously.”
Abagail’s breathing had deepened. Both twins were asleep, tucked against her side. The embers in the small stove had almost gone dark.
“Abagail chose us both,” I said. “Snugglethorns don’t choose two birth attendants unless?—”
“Unless what?”
I tried to find the right words. “Where I come from, when a snugglethorn chooses two, it means those two are bonded to her care through the choosing itself. It’s…” What was the right comparison? “She’s decided we belong to each other because we both belong to her.”
Laina stilled against me.
“I don’t have a surface word for it,” I said.
“I don’t think there is one for something that wonderful.” Her voice had gone soft. “But I understand what you mean.”
She laced her fingers through mine under the blanket.
I opened my notebook, and I wrote down my thoughts quickly, before the light went out.
“What are you writing?” Laina asked.
My hand stilled. “Observations. The twins’ positioning. Abagail’s recovery.”
“And?”
