Page 45

“I’m sorry, Melelea,” I say, truly regretting that I am causing her distress. “But I must protect you, and the only way to do that is to make sure the imps cannot follow us.”

Before she can protest again, I make my way back across the bridge. It is still holding on, though I know that I am testing my luck. When I get to the other side, I pull my ax off my back and get to work. I step into the tunnels where we came from and focus first on cutting down the support beams about five lengths into the tunnel. When the old wood comes crashing down, nothing happens. The stone will need more convincing. I take the butt of my axe and slam it up into the ceiling of the tunnel. There’s a faint rumble and I hit it again. The rumble gets louder now and I hear a cracking sound. Stepping back hastily, I barely make it to the chasm’s edge before the tunnel begins to collapse, stone falling and crashing down. I was hoping that the supports at the mouth of the tunnel into the cavern would hold, but I hear them creaking and cracking and I know that my hopes were in vain. The whole tunnel is going to cave in, including the space right where I am standing at the edge of the chasm.

Turning, I start running across the bridge. Behind me, rocks begin tumbling out of the collapsing tunnel, running over the edge into the abyss below me. I’m almost to the other side when I hear a loud crack and the bridge begins to fall. The edge that the bridge was connected to must have broken and now I’m tumbling into the dark, my feet giving way beneath me. A chilling scream echoes through the cavern. I am going to fall to my death.

Instinctively, I reach up to try to find something to grab onto, but there’s nothing. Then, suddenly, another hand grabs mine.

Melelea.

I slam into the side of the chasm, my ribs creaking with the force of the impact. But I’m no longer falling. I look up to see Melelea huffing and straining, her feet bracing on the edge. The trolless has caught my hand and is holding me up with the strength of her arms alone. But though trollesses are stronger than an average female, I am a heavy orc. In a split second, I realize that I could pull her into the chasm with me.

“Let me go!” I say. “Melelea!”

“No!” the trolless replies through gritted teeth. “I will not let you die!”

“You could fall in with me!” I yell, forgetting that we need to be quiet. “Let go!”

“No! I won’t!” Melelea yells back. “So you better start trying to climb up, or we’ll both die here.”

That is unacceptable. I can’t let her fall to her death, but the stubborn trolless won’t let me go. So I do as she says, scrabbling with my free hand to try to find purchase in the stone wall that I am hanging against. I find a tentative handhold and lift with all my strength. Melelea pulls as I do so and my feet search out a foothold. I find a small fissure in the rock that I can push up with and when my foot is secure, I reach up with my free hand and barely grab onto the ledge.

When my fingers find the edge and I begin pulling myself up, Melelea begins stepping backward even as she keeps a firm grip on my arm. I take a deep breath and climb. Through the grace of the gods themselves and Melelea’s stubbornness, I find myself on the ledge, solid ground beneath my feet. But Melelea keeps pulling on my arm, making me crawl forward until there is a safe distance between me and the edge of the chasm.

Only when Melelea seems certain that I won’t fall back into the abyss does she let go of my arm and sags to the ground. The lumen fragment is on the ground next to her where she must have dropped it when she caught me, and it illuminates her form. She’s shaking and I can’t help but worry. Did she hurt herself pulling me up?

“Melelea?” I ask. “Are you well?”

“Am I well?” she hisses out. Her silver eyes shine with concern in the dim light and more than a touch of anger. “Are you well? What were you thinking! I almost lost you! You could have died!”

She is right. The reality of what just happened starts to sink in, now that the adrenaline is fading. I almost died. Not in battle as I have always expected, nor in bed surrounded by family in my old age as I secretly hoped. No, here, in the dark, where not even my bones would ever see the sun again. And the worst realization is that if I did die today, Melelea would have never known how I feel about her. That she is the light of my life, the object of all my hopes and yearning. That no one else even compares to her in my eyes. All my feelings, lost at the bottom of the chasm, forgotten forever.

“I love you, Melelea,” I say carefully, deliberately, so that my words cannot be mistaken for anything else.

“What?” the trolless says, her eyes widening, her anger bleeding out of her as she registers what I am saying.

“I always have,” I confess, the truth of what I am saying heavy in my voice. “Since the first time I saw you. I know that you do not feel the same and that I do not deserve you, but I cannot go to the Nether without you knowing. You deserve to know that I believe you to be perfection itself, the light of every room you enter. Your strength, your beauty, your kindness. There is no one who is your equal.”

Melelea’s eyes are still wide as I talk, her shock apparent. Then she blinks, her expression going unreadable. I have no idea what her reaction to my words is. Even her scent is a mix of so many emotions that I cannot even begin to untangle them.

After a fraught moment, Melelea asks, “Are you injured?”

My heart dips, disappointment that she is not even going to acknowledge my confession coursing through me, but is followed very quickly by acceptance. I knew that Melelea didn’t return my feelings. This is not news to me. She is just too kind to reject me outright, I suppose.

“I am well,” I say, ignoring the aching in my ribs and my heart. “No worse for the wear.”

“Truly?” Melelea asks, scooting forward on the ground until she is close to me. “You are not hurting anywhere?”

“No,” I lie.

“Good,” she says. “Then I can do this.”

Then she darts forward and kisses me, and my mind goes completely and utterly blank.

Melelea? Kissing me?

In my shock, I cannot react. After a moment, the trolless pulls back, looking abashed.

“Oh, um, did you not like that?”

Did I not like that? Did I not like when all my dreams came true?

With a growl, I grab the trolless and pull her close again, onto my lap, crushing my lips to hers. She gives a whimper, a sweet, needy sound, and I haul her closer to me, the warmth of the heat charm she wears enveloping us. Her arms come around my neck and she arches into me, her breasts pushing up against my chest, and I nearly lose my mind.

I kiss her like an orc possessed. I cannot get enough of her, and when her soft body molds into mine, a sense of rightness slides into my chest. Because we are alive and she is whole and beautiful, and if I die tomorrow, it will be with the taste of her lips on mine.

It is all I have ever wanted.