A few days followed the night of the revelation that had caused such a pit of dread for Clara, and the worry she felt had only grown more potent with each day that passed.
Just like the other races before arriving in Greater Hichin, Clara's only knowledge of the orcs came through stories she had heard from the more adventurous residents of her village. Orcs hailed from Veishuk, a country located far from the shores of Hichin, supposedly surrounded by a constant swirling storm that made any journey to its rocky shores a perilous one. The actual land that the orcs lived and thrived on was a thick jungle of sorts, packed with the types of predators that would have made life hellish for those unfamiliar with them, true throwbacks to a bygone era for the wider continent.
It was precisely those conditions that enabled the orcs to become the fearsome beings they were known as, forced to adapt and dominate the predators they lived amongst to maintain their place at the top of the food scale, building some semblance of a functioning society deep within the bogs they were native to. Once they had achieved dominance, it didn't take long for internal quarrels to break out, with competing leaders dragging the species back into the peril they faced when their place in Veishuk wasn't as guaranteed as it became. When the fighting became too vicious, the orcs had no real alternative but to break themselves up into like-minded tribes, led by chieftains with their own agendas and ambitions.
Some tribes gave up the need to compete Veishuk for the most part, setting their sights to the lands they suspected existed far across the the oceans that left their country almost completely isolated. It took a few decades of trial and error to build ships capable of sustaining the heavy blows the foreboding waves dealt them with. Their ships required hulls that could withstand heavy contact with the jagged rocks that rose from the surrounding sea beds, along with a bow reinforced enough to allow the vessels to ram through the undulating waves that threatened to throw them back to the shore.
Once the first few orc-manned vessels successfully navigated their way through the various elements that had kept them trapped on, the orcs soon exerted the strength they had developed over the centuries. The first vessels to encounter them were unsurprisingly ill equipped to deal with the newly discovered species, both in terms of physical strength and the stamina needed to withstand an extended battle with the seemingly unstoppable orcs. Hijacking cargo and forcibly adding ships to their ever expanding fleet turned them from a nuisance in the farthest regions of the charted maps to a genuine force to be reckoned with.
The emergence of the orcs marked the start of the Single Century War, a vicious period of history for all those involved, and by far one of the bloodiest and prolonged conflicts the continent had ever suffered through. Raids and skirmishes became an all too common occurrence, with the orcs always willing to sail head first into battles that would have seemed almost suicidal to any of the other races. But the allure of the pleasures the orcs had never had on Veishuk only made them more willing to take what was once impossibly far out of reach.
The humans took the largest brunt of the insatiable appetite of the orcs, with elvin society keeping themselves firmly detached from the war. Valuable trade shipments were constantly intercepted and stripped clean of their valuables, women were captured and forcibly transported back to Veishuk to be divided up amongst the various tribal leaders, a highly effective method of preventing the same internal conflicts that once threatened them from bubbling back up to the surface.
The conflict came to a head following the capture and enslavement of Queen Lusiara of Marris, an event that had occurred when the Queen and her entourage had set sail for Hichin as part of a diplomatic mission intended to align the landed nations against the orcs. The enslavement of the beautiful Queen was considered a step too far, one that rallied the war torn nations against the orcs in a way the green skinned species had never seen. A final battle in the Hichin Sea saw the amassed armadas of Hichin, Shishem, and Marris dealing a blow to to the orc fleet that finally brought the war to a close, with both sides forced to lick their long earned wounds and enter into a very fragile peace arrangement.
Queen Lusiara was finally returned to her kingdom after almost a year of captivity. For the sake of safeguarding the peace agreement, the full details of what had been done to her had been a secret kept by the Queen herself and her closest associates, keeping her subjects in the dark to prevent any reprisals that would reignite the conflict. Even after the two centuries that followed the war, rumours persisted in relation to what Queen Lusiara had experienced during her enslavement, with some more derogatory stories suggesting that she had given birth to the offspring of War Chieftain Bulvir, the final fleet master of the war time orc armada.
It took time for trade agreements and a bargaining system to be developed between the orcs and the other nations, and it took far longer to dissuade the majority of the orc tribes to desist with the occasional shipment raid. But with Veishuk being rich in minerals and species of animals that were virtually non-existent in the main continent, even the orcs couldn't deny that the exchange of Hechin goods provided them with far more consistency, rather than having to rely on the pillaging of weak targets. Some tribes continued with their conquerous ways, but a semi-centralised government established by the powerful chieftains just about managed to keep such activities either contained or well concealed.
Despite a near full stop being enforced upon the orcs and their penchant for forcibly integrating human women into their tribes, Clara knew that their bottomless desire for beautiful women belonging to the other races could never be dampened, a fact that Madame Kadjia used to her full advantage. Most Hichin brothels outright refused to allow non-humans to cross their thresholds, with a zero tolerance on orcs in particular, stemming from the raucous behaviour that came whenever they were in such close proximity to a line of beautiful women and half a dozen barrels of mead and ale. What should have been cause for caution instead presented itself as a business opportunity for the venturous madame, a gap in the market that The Mare alone could fill, with Kadjia's own first-hand experience with the orcs providing her with some idea of how to enforce a form of crowd control.
Despite Scarlett and Margot's best efforts to reassure her that Madame Kadjia would never force her to do something she truly felt uncomfortable with, Clara was aware of her appeal to the non-human patrons that frequented the brothel. On more than one occasion, Clara had to turn down offers from the goblins who always brought a suspicious amount of coins with them during their visits despite their wretched appearance. Duchess was always more than willing to satisfy the bulk of the attention of the beings most of the other girls remained wary of, with L'indrill and a few others pitching in to assist her. But when it came to the rare nights where the brothel was ram-packed by an overwhelming majority of non-humans, it was at least implied that every girl would try and take her fair share of the workload, regardless of their own prejudices.
As deeply worried as Clara was by the prospect, she still couldn't deny that there was just the slightest sliver of exhilaration that shone through her fear. Just like her encounter with the merchant in the market, it was yet another moment since her arrival in Greater Hichin where her innocence would be chipped away. A nervous smile would reach her lips when she considered just how much her outlook on her own life had changed within such a short period of time. Not too long before joining the brothel, she was still carrying out mundane, repetitive tasks on her family's farm, working from the early hours of the morning to the descent of the sun beyond the verdant hills that encircled her modest village. Her clothes were more akin to rags, having to be mended and repaired whenever the fabric became frayed and ratty.
But since joining The Mare, Clara had become anything but the raggedy farm girl she once was. Though she had been hesitant to wear the sort of clothes that were the standard for Kadjia's brothel girls, Clara had soon come to enjoy the sense of glamour they brought, accentuating parading every inch of the body that had spent so much time being hidden behind baggy sack-cloth dresses. The same could be said about her approach to her customers. She was no longer the hesitant girl who would lay back and let the client get their cheap thrill, Clara had developed her natural talents, utilising them in a manner that made her stand out based on allure and beauty.
