Broken Hate, Broken Heart - 4. Chapter 4

The large village where the blacksmiths lived.

The small entourage that Gash had sent with him—two warriors who constantly grumbled about the dust and an orcish servant with an ear-grating lisp—he had left behind at their small camp, and with only his bag, in which he kept his notes and writing supplies, as company, he trudged through the morning. The day had started out cool but had quickly heated up, and dust swirled around his feet.

The embers glowed brightly, and the dry heat burned against Thokk’s skin, even though he stood at a respectful distance. The smell of hot metal competed with the other odors here, but didn’t get very far. The blacksmith, who wore no tunic under his thick leather apron, had beads of sweat trickling from his overly hairy armpit, and Thokk briefly wrinkled his nose at the sight, which was itching from the acrid fumes. “Good morning, Master.”

The Master Blacksmith was visibly startled; the hammer froze mid-swing in the air. “My lord.”

“Go ahead and keep working; I don’t want to interrupt,” said Thokk, attempting a smile. Humans smiled a lot, mostly out of politeness, but he was never sure how well his own smile came across or whether people even took it seriously because of his tusks.

The blacksmith sized him up, slowly lowering the hammer. Whatever he was working on was apparently less important than an orc as a potential customer. “Is that knife your… is he satisfied with it?” he asked cautiously after recognizing his counterpart, and Thokk nodded.

“My master is very satisfied, thank you.” He let his gaze wander briefly, but there was no display this time—perhaps it was still too early. “I’d be interested in one myself, if you have a good one.” It was only half the truth—perhaps even less than that—but that was nobody’s business.

The blacksmith cleared his throat and made a head movement that Thokk couldn’t quite interpret. “We do have quite a few knives, but I’m not sure if any of them would meet your standards, my lord.”

“Father, I—oh.” To the side of the smithy, the son had stepped out of the house, and Thokk’s gaze darted toward him. “Please forgive the interruption, my lord." He bowed apologetically.

It was strange to see him again after he had haunted Thokk’s mind for so long, but the sight of the real man was far more intense than Thokk had expected. He wasn’t interested in pricks—not even this one—but a warm, unexpected feeling he couldn’t name spread through his chest. The intense sky-blue of the man’s eyes burned into his own. “No need to apologize,” he said, forcing a smile; his upper lip stuck painfully to his tusks.

The old blacksmith cleared his throat again. “My lord, if you’re not in too much of a hurry, I could prepare a blank for you—something better than what I usually offer.”

Thokk nodded and forced his gaze from the son to the father. “I’m not in a hurry; I’m on a study trip.” He briefly considered broaching the subject directly but put it off until later; patience was a virtue. “I’ll probably stay a day or two.”

“That’s doable.” The blacksmith smiled and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand; a fresh wave of the scent of sweat wafted toward Thokk.

“May I ask your name, Master?”

“Martin, my lord.” Martin the blacksmith bowed. “And my son and apprentice, Henry.”

Henry also bowed and murmured, “my lord”.

“I am Thokk, a shaman’s apprentice,” Thokk introduced himself in turn.

“We are honored, sir, that you are taking an interest in us and our craftsmanship,” Martin said sincerely. “I know that the orcs’ blacksmithing is considered unsurpassed.”

“That’s just a misconception,” Thokk waved it off, “Specialization is everything. Someone who only forges axes is naturally more skilled at it than someone who has to provide their community with a little bit of everything. And that applies to everything.” He was convinced of that, but: “Of course, there’s still such a thing as talent, and you seem to have some.” Or orc blood in your veins.

“I don’t know how you orcs keep your family trees, but I must admit I find our system quite confusing—very convoluted paths with many cross-references,” she said, brushing her long white hair behind her ears before pulling a book from the shelf that looked just like all the others. “This one records the family of the last rose we had among us. There was another one at one point, but that was a very long time ago. I don’t know if I’ll be able to find the right book without a thorough search.”

“Thank you very much,” Thokk said simply as she placed the book on a lectern. “I’ve already gone through quite a few genealogical records.”

Annoyingly, she kept chattering away to herself about past tithe bride elections and the like while she searched the back third of the book for the right entries. The agonizingly slow rustling of the pages turning nearly drove Thokk mad, and he clenched his teeth to swallow any comment.

“Esther, here it is,” Elder Katharina finally said, but made no move to step aside. “Her mother came from the family of—”

“Could I please read it myself? I’m better able to judge which information is relevant to me.” Thokk tried very hard not to growl or grind his teeth, even though this woman was making it difficult for him; his fingers were still gripping the shoulder strap of his bag too tightly. So far, the other elders whose archives he had visited had respectfully stayed in the background because they didn’t want to disturb him.

Thokk nodded slowly as he read the names and couldn’t suppress a triumphant grin; his instinct had been right, and his vague hunch had been confirmed once again. All the roses he had examined in the archives so far had had only sons, apart from the occasional stillborn girl. Among the sons he had traced, male offspring also clearly predominated.
What he had seen and heard further reinforced his thoughts: not only Martin and Henry, but also many others—nearly all the sons, though fewer of the grandsons—resembled orcs in stature. In the next generation, however, the orcish heritage seemed to have been diluted to the point where it was no longer visible. It explained why he sensed this resonance in them—the very resonance he was supposed to be searching for.

But—and this was a point that still confused and worried him, causing his grin to fade—why did this young blacksmith, Henry, of all people, appeal to him so much? A human larva, maggot, caterpillar—but with enough orc blood to emerge from the cocoon as something better?

His fingertip tapped thoughtfully, as if of its own accord, on the pages, while his gaze was turned inward. This resonance… hadn’t he essentially found a suitable tithe bride in him, even if he was male? Shouldn’t this person then be paired with a suitable counterpart? In other words, someone like Henry or Martin with a rose? And wouldn’t orcs like Ekktan, decried as weaklings, also be worth a try? Sometimes you had to consciously take a step back in order to move forward more effectively.

When Elder Katharina cleared her throat, he flinched.

“Yes?” His brusque tone made it unmistakably clear how little he appreciated being torn from his thoughts.

“Will this take long?” she asked.

“It’ll take as long as it takes,” he snapped at her. “Is there a decent table here for writing? I need to add to my notes. And I’d like to see the entry about the other rose you mentioned.”

Perplexed, Martin leaned back. “My… mother?”

“Esther,” Thokk clarified. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Henry working on a piece of metal; judging by the scraping sounds which grated unpleasantly in his ears, he was using a whetstone. Once again, that warm, pressure-like feeling rose in his chest, its gentleness standing in stark contrast to the assault on his ears.

“Esther, yes, my mother.” Martin made a strange movement with his head, somewhere between a nod and a shake. “She’s been dead for a long time.”

“Was she sick?”

“Not physically, no. But maybe mentally.” Martin shrugged.

“Mentally? Can you explain that?” Thokk asked, and again he got a shrug. The grinding noise in the background fell silent; his ears twitched.

“Her family—our family—was always treated with respect because she was the daughter of a tithe bride. But I never saw her accept that respect. I mean,” Martin searched for words, “ungrateful is probably not the right word, but I can’t think of a better one. She was definitely unhappy. As my older brothers all left one after another, it got worse and worse; she didn’t live to see my own wedding. She… just withered away. Like a rose.” Martin’s voice had grown quiet, and Thokk nodded slowly, at a loss for words to directly address this grief. And while he found the metaphor strangely fitting, it was equally unworthy of a woman of such lineage. Strong blood was not meant to wither.

He glanced over at Henry, whose sad expression gave way to a blush of shame when he realized his eavesdropping had been noticed. “Forgive me if the question was painful, but the roses and their families are what I’m currently studying,” Thokk finally said in a lowered voice. Something told him he had to be careful—rather gentle.

“Why do you send your daughters away in the first place?” Henry wanted to know, doubt etched into his furrowed brow.

“To strengthen the bloodline,” was Thokk’s prompt reply, but then he bowed his head and added, “However, I intend to use my research to find out how effective this approach is—or whether there might be better solutions.”

“I don’t understand,” Henry admitted bluntly.

“Our people no longer have any women, which is why we have to rely on yours to avoid dying out,” Thokk lectured, stating the well-known fact. “The hope is that the few human daughters born to us will form a bridge, and that someday we’ll have fertile women again,” he added in simple terms, and Henry nodded.

“Do you think it works, in your opinion? Strengthening the bloodline?”

In a gesture of offering, Thokk turned his palms upward. “Look at yourself and your father—you stand out among humans, don’t you think?”

Henry opened his mouth, glanced at his father, who also looked taken aback, and then fixed Thokk with his sky-blue eyes once more. “Is that my grandmother’s orc blood?”