Gurukk tries to console her

Gurukk looked down at the girl awkwardly, then about the ruined town. He was not beyond sympathy, though he felt no hatred for those who had destroyed her village. He himself would have done the same, perhaps, and taken the girl besides. He was practical if not necessarily cold. He sighed, half in annoyance, half pity. His axe thudded in the ground causing the girl to rear back with a gasp of fear. She watched, stunned, as the orc kneeled in front of her, leaning on the haft of his weapon.

Gurukk cleared his throat with a rasp. “Human, tears accomplish nothing,” he told her stoutly. “Your village is burned. Your people dead or slaves. Slaves or dead is what they are, by right of conquest, and crying will not change.”

The girl clasped her hands before her mouth. “No…no…” she whimpered, as if unable to accept the same conclusions she had reached when they came from the mouth of an orc.

“Yes.” Gurukk nodded, beginning to feel the rhythm of his admonishments. “Your village is gone. Accept that. What matters are you. You need decide on what happens next. Crying only wastes water. No reason not to regret or mourn. But do it the right way. Do it…” His hand moved in the air as he searched for the word. “Do it…usefully.”

The girl stared at the orc in a sort of horrified wonder as he spoke. “U…Useful.”

“Yes.” Gurukk thumped a fist on top of his axe. “Useful. You need to decide what to do now. If someone attacked my tribe, I would find them, and gut them, make them bleed, take their women! You could seek ****,” he mused, now almost speaking to himself rather than her. She yelped when he suddenly reached forward and grabbed her arm. She tried to pull away but the orc’s grip was like iron as he tested her arm with harsh fingers. “But you are very scrawny,” he said, almost annoyed. He glanced up. “Soft and curvy. Good for woman. Bad for warrior.” He shook his head. “Better forget about it. Go elsewhere, get farm, family, something useful like that. Best put it behind you. Maybe bury bodies. Humans like to do that. Puts spirits to rest.”

He released her and stood. Freed, the girl snatched back her arm and rubbed fitfully where the orc had touched her. “Just…just leave?”

“Mmm. Best.” The orc nodded to himself. “World is hash place. Have to live in it. You never knew that, I guess. Till today. Now you know. That important.” Gurukk lifted his axe over his shoulder again. “You better leave soon, though. Raiders might come back, or beasts. You lived. That’s lucky. Other villages around. Maybe day away. Unless raiders hit those too.” He shrugged. “Good luck.”

The girl scrambled to her feet as the orc began to walk away. “W-wait! You’re just l-leaving me?”

Gurukk stopped and turned his tusked head about. He snorted. “No honour in taking woman like this. Unless,” he added, eyes smoldering, “you want me to…”

Grasping his meaning at once, the brunette yanked her tattered garments over her bared flesh – a futile gesture as they had so many holes and rents he could still see a great deal - and eyed the orc with terror. Gurukk shrugged again. “Then goodbye.”

“No!” The cry escaped her, as well as the step she took towards the hulking orc before she realized what had happened. When she did she hesitated, but pushed forward. “Please! I…Take me with you!”

Gurukk guffawed. “Road is hard and dangerous woman.” He stepped towards her. “What can you do for me? Can you hunt? Can you fight? Why should I take something I only have to look after? There is no benefit to me taking you.”