Arc 1 Chapter 4

Sundered

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After we've sold all our wine—mother sold the good stuff too—we chase our goat back to the cart's yoke with Taros's help, and we begin the short journey back up our valley.

Mother and I exchange relieved looks, while uncle mutters disappointed under his breath. It seems my fiance wasn't onboard.

That means mother and my plan to get me onto the trading ship is a-go. If we had talked to the navigator in front of uncle we'd give ourselves away, but the ship will likely stay a few more hours for the oarsmen to rest, so we have time to scheme with grandma.

Once home, Taros goes back to his labour in the olive grove, while Uncle goes to tell my father that Sicklemouth wasn't on the boat. 

I split from mother and go into the bedroom I share with my parents and quietly pack my bag. Once full, I leave to find her whispering to grandmother in the kitchen, who's nodding as she listens.

My mother climbs up on top of a stool and takes out from the kitchen's rafters the ceramic jar she keeps our savings in. She adds the 6nail we made today, then counts out about half the jar into a leather pouch, which she then hands to me. Counting the small coins quickly I find 30nail, equal in weight and value to half of a bronze finger. 

My grandmother goes to the large wicker-basket she stores her yarn in, and takes out from the bottom a thin bronze cylinder. Mother and I gasp in shock as Grandmother silently gestures for me to take it.

Southern Archipelago goblins generally only deal with very small quantities of money, so bronze finger ingots are rarely ever seen here. Even my bride-price of 1palm'6finger would likely be paid as 1080 ancient bronze nails, rather than in fingers or palms, although nails do give a better perspective of how absurd my dowry is. Grandmother must have been hiding this tiny ingot for years—probably since grandfather died—and now she offers it to me to save me from my unwanted marriage. This little ingot is worth four months of sales from our winery.

The weight of what I'm about to do finally settles in my heart. Tears began to roll down my cheeks for the third time today. I take the bronze finger and embrace my grandma, who beckons my mother to join. Silently we cry into each other's embrace and whisper our goodbyes. If any of the menfolk realize what we're about to do, they would try to stop our scheme. So we speak quietly to make sure Father and Uncle don't hear us.

I dry my eyes and after Mother double-checks and repacks my bag, I pull it onto my shoulders and tie my money pouch to my belt. Grandmother gives me a final kiss on the forehead and then pushes me out the door.  If she hadn't I'm not sure I would have had the courage to leave.

 

I meet my father were he's mending the cobblestone wall along the path to the shore. 

"Come help me Pimple, I can't let out the goats 'til this is fixed." He grunts.

"Sorry papa. Mama has sent me to sell the sailors more cheese, they're buying at a good price." I lie.

He nods and turns his attention back to the crumbling wall. "Alright, help me when you're back then." 

I pass him, and can't help but look back to see for maybe the last time my father who I love so much, the man who betrayed me, who forced me to flee. 

I feel wistful as I descend the valley for the last time. I've spent my life here. I've left Perrifare maybe thrice in my life, and that was just to go to Pickland and a few other islands nearby. Now I'm leaving. the grass turns to heather as I near the shore. When I round the last turn in the path however, I find I'm not travelling alone. 

Strolling confidently up is the elderly oarsmen who was watching me on the beach.

I suppress my anxiety, I can't go back now, and he's probably just stretching his legs. When he gets near I force confidence and assert, "You've come the wrong way sir. Nothing this way but our farm, and we prefer sailors stay off our land." I hope I sound gutsy enough that he won't challenge me. Or worse.

The orc nods, but doesn't slow down. I've stopped walking and let him approach. Ready to bolt if I need. The sailors that visit Perrifare might not of seen women in weeks, and sometimes they cause trouble. I can get a better look at him as he nears. He's huge. Bigger than Lumberhaver, and Lumberhaver was big for an orc. Maybe 195cm? He's wide too. His skin is the same grey-green of most ogre descendants, over his giant frame he wears nothing but a white sack and the hessian shorts worn by most Graboshen sailors.

He greets me. "Hail young miss, I believe you match the description of my wife-to-be, you aren't by chance the island head's daughter?" He's stopped getting closer, and stands a little down the path.

Fuck.

I look at him dumbfounded, trying to change gears and figure out what to do.

He takes my silence as a que to continue, "I meant to greet you at the shore, but the navigator beat me to you, and then you seemed occupied catching your goat and I had business to discuss with the captain. That went long and soon you were on your way." He smiles. He's not an unattractive man, by either orc or goblin standards. His face is pleasant—despite his age—and he has a calm and confident air about him. More than anything, he has nice tusks. Like really nice tusks. They're white, and almost go up past his eyes. The tips are cracked in a way that makes him seem kinda cool and mature. Those some real manly chompers. They put my father's to shame.

I'm not sure what to make of him, if he was 40 years younger he'd be a stud. Now, he's a handsome but elderly orc. I decide he's definitely too old for me, he's 75 maybe.

While I try to get a measure of him, he's doing the same of me. We're still ten metres apart but I think his attention is mostly on my silver hair. Which I prefer to him ogling my figure at least.

Crap! Why'd he have to be here so soon? If any other galley had come before, I would of escaped!

The bull-orc lets out a half chuckle, "Well? Lost your confidence a bit, haven't you? I promise I'm not as scary as I look." He gives me another annoyingly handsome grin. 

I'm trying to find the courage to tell him to leave. But before I manage, he starts walking up the path again.

"Let's continue with your father present, I've arranged for the captain to wait a while, but time is money in my business, so we'll need a rather rushed wedding I'm afraid. I'd like to leave before dark, which is only a few hours away. I have the Graboshen paperwork if that'll do."

Fuck.

There's no time. If I want to speak without my father present—and before I'm wed—I need to speak now.

 "I, I don't want to marry you sir." I manage to stutter, he's reached me. He smiles again, but it doesn't look entirely kind.

"As I said, let's continue with your father present." He then rather forcefully takes my arm and escorts me up the valley. He isn't hurting me, but his tone and our incredible size difference makes it hard to muster courage and escape. 

I'm starting to think Sicklemouth has much more ogre blood than goblin. 

 

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It isn't twenty minutes later, and I'm sitting on a cushion next to my father in the ceremony room. This room isn't used much but it's where father conducts official business as Island Head. Business like weddings. 

Sitting a few metres either side of us is the rest of my family—I think mother wanted to bite father when she arrived—and opposite us sits Sicklemouth. 

Father looks grim. He's technically the highest authority on the island when inside this room, but everyone knows he's impotent in this proceeding. I'm a little touched by how transparent he's being about not wanting to sign my marriage certificate. 

Normally a wedding in the Southern Archipelago—even an arranged one—would be a celebration between two families, but Sicklemouth has no living family, and his wives are a few weeks by sail'n'oar away, so it's just him on his side of the room. Our arrangements were so rushed I barely even had time to be ordered by uncle to change into my wedding dress. My orcish groom is still in his labourers' shorts.

My father grinds the base of his stubby tusks against his upper jaw in frustration. Sitting on the other side of him Uncle looks so obeisant I think he'd suck orc-dick if Sicklemouth dropped his belt.

 

My father begins with a leaden tone, "I fulfill our Ancestors' Traditions Mystic as Island Head. Today I bear witness to the Lawful and Loreful marriage of my first Daughter of Perrifare, to this Son of Grabosh."

The air trembles. Miasma is a funny substance. It has no mass and no energy, but it still influences the whole world. Everywhere on Mars has a little miasma, it's just concentrated here where it bubbles up from the sea. In some way or another, everyone will feel miasma a few times in their life, even if only faintly. But here, inside a Traditional ceremony room within the Miasmic Cloud of the Crater Sea—even if this specific room is just a stone addition to our ratty house—everyone present can feel it as it reacts to father's words. I wouldn't be surprised if it's tension is felt on the skin of goblins on the other side of the Island. 

The magic of  Law and Lore have been evoked. And the miasma is listening.

My father continues, but his voice has become loud and strange; it comes out hoarse but with a depth I've never heard before, "Daughter of Perrifare, as Father and Island Head, I shall sign my scrawl twice, as I admit you are Unwilling." He takes a razor sharp sea-beast scale, which has been passed between Island Heads since the ancestors wrote our traditions, and uses it to pierce his thumb to the bone, then twice scrawls the Mark of Perrifare onto the certificate. The opalescent quill catches the light as it dances across the page. I feel the miasma on my skin curl around, then through me.

"Son of Grabosh, scrawl your name if you are Willing."

Sicklemouth takes the scale casually, as if unaware of the weight surrounding us, and casually cuts his own thumb to the bone. I suppose he's done this before. He signs his name in the Graboshen script, I didn't know his first name was Gordon.

My father looks remorseful, but his voice vibrates unchanged through the invisible miasma, I feel it as it twists around my intestines, "May the wives serve the Husbands' Substance, May the husbands guard the Wives' Spirit."

My skin crawls, and I don't know if it's by spell or terror.

He continues, "By the Sea's Tradition Mystic, By the World's Witness Miasmic." His raspy voice itches inside me, "As Phobos Wills, I pronounce this Son of Grabosh a Willing and Lawful Husband. As Deimos Requires, I pronounce this Daughter of Perrifare an Unwilling and Loreful Wife." 

The magic boils and my guts shift as father's art climaxes.

"꧁MAY YE NE-ER BE SUNDERED꧂"

 

My father slumps on his cushion, exhausted by his Spell Mystic. He is no longer the Island Head, but Perrifare's headman, a grieving father also. 

The miasma writhes once more, then calms as the magic completes. I feel a cold weight settle immaterial and unwelcome around my bones. 

Fuck.

Gordon inspects and flexes his hand, I'm guessing he felt the spell wrapping deep around him the same as I. He smiles a devil's grin.

"You goblins sure have dramatic weddings, in Grabosh we just have a toast.”