Just so you know, chapter 1 is mostly set-up. There's a lot of nudity, but not much sex until the next chapter. Hope you enjoy!
***
Branches caught at Ash's sleeves as she ran through the forest. Breathing fast, her footsteps landed heavily, heedless of any obstructions on the forest floor - until her foot came down wrong on a thick root, sending her pitching forward to the ground. She hit the ground hard, breath driven from her lungs for a moment, and she could feel that one of her outstretched arms had landed right in a thornbush.
She scrambled back to her feet immediately, leaving long, shallow scrapes along her hand as she pulled it from the thorns, and began running again. She dared not look back to see if the bandits were still behind her. Why they were taking such pains to chase her down, she didn't know, but none of the answers could be good.
They had come down on the caravan so fast. Ash was on her way to the capital to take a position under the court physician, away from home for the first time in her life, and joining up with the caravan was supposed to be the safest way to travel. They were weeks out from her village now, and the strangeness of the traveling life had all but worn off. The seasoned travelers had been very kind to her, showing her old tricks for life on the road, and she'd found someone her own age to talk to in the form of the master merchant's daughter. She had been comfortable. Then, just a few minutes ago - although it felt like hours - the bandits had arrived.
The caravan had been circling for the evening when they attacked, shooting crossbows from the treeline. The guards had fallen as if struck by lightning. While the merchants and other travelers in the caravan were still too shocked to react, the bandits, still brandishing crossbows, had descended on them from the roadside and begun herding them into a group. Four bandits had gone straight for the master merchant's wagon, although he kept no money there; it was just where he and his daughter slept. There had been screams, and the bandits had emerged a moment later - just long enough to learn where the money was, Ash thought with a shudder - with blood on their blades. Then they'd joined the others in rounding up the rest of the traveling party.
Ash had been lucky, having stepped outside the circle to get a better look at a plant she'd spotted. It looked like a herb she'd learned the uses of in her studies, but taller and with narrower leaves than the ones that grew at home. She was several feet into the underbrush, trying to determine if it was the same species, when the bandits came. She'd stayed frozen with horror in the brush, watching the chaos - until one of the bandits bent to pick up something shiny. Ash had felt at her neck. Her necklace was gone. That catch that she'd put off fixing had gone again.
The bandit had looked at the necklace, straightened and put it in his pocket, looked at the trees, and made eye contact with Ash. Not knowing what else to do, she'd turned and run. Now she was crashing through the woods, praying to any and every god that the bandits would abandon the chase.
She tripped again.
This time, as she placed a palm on the ground to push herself back up, a boot came down next to it. She rolled away from it by reflex, and from on her back she looked up into the faces of two bandits. One of them drew his sword.
Ash screamed, and then the bandit...
flew
to the side. She scrambled backwards into a sitting position and looked in the direction he had vanished. A few yards away he lay slumped against a tree, groaning, a huge battle-axe embedded in his side. Ash looked the other way, to see where it had come from. There, emerging from the trees, was a hulking man in steel armor.
His helmet obscured his face, and it was painted with a complex design of black lines and curves. He turned from the whimpering bandit, seeming satisfied that he was no longer a threat, and fixed his attention on Ash. The slight turn visibly shifted his weight towards her, and Ash instinctively scrambled back a few more inches.
While Ash had been staring in shock at the new arrival, the other bandit had apparently been doing the same, and he had now recovered enough to charge. Now without his axe, the warrior simply stepped to the side and stuck out his arm - an arm so thick, Ash thought she might not have been able to wrap both hands around the bicep. The bandit ran into it and dropped as though he had hit an iron bar, the warrior barely budging. He crouched down and picked up the prone bandit, one hand at his neck and one at his waist, and tossed him
over
Ash's head and into the woods beyond, where Ash heard him
thud
as he landed.
Ash watched in silent amazement as the warrior walked over to the first bandit's body and pulled his axe free. He took a cloth from a pocket in his trousers and carefully wiped the blade clean of blood, then slung the axe over his back. He walked back to where Ash still lay and held out his gauntleted hand.
Ash took it, and he helped her to her feet. Standing, she could judge his size better, and he was still huge. A full foot taller than her own five foot nine, with a barrel chest and broad shoulders, he was the most imposing figure she had ever seen. Then he took off his helmet. His face was handsome enough, in a square kind of way, although the exact shape of his features was almost disguised by his tattoos, which matched the pattern on his helmet exactly. She noticed all these facts distantly, as if they were a distant echo behind her main thought: this man's skin was green, and he had inch-long tusks jutting up from his lower jaw. Ash thought of every story she had heard in the village inn about the fearsomeness of orcs, and swallowed the impulse to take off running again.
"What's your name?" asked the orc. His voice was surprisingly smooth, though just as deep as she'd expected. Nor did it have the brusque, angry tone she would have associated with a warrior like this. Instead, this imposing orc sounded genuinely concerned for her.
"Ash," she managed to get out.
"Hello, Ash. I'm Toruq. Are there more of these men?"
"No," she said. "Yes. I - There were more at the caravan, but I don't know if any followed me. I think... I think I was the only one to get away."
"Then it would be well to leave here before we find out. Can you walk?" Ash nodded. "Follow me."
Toruq turned and began to push through the forest. Ash remained still for a moment, then darted over to the body of the first bandit. Trying to ignore the wound in his side, she reached into his pocket to find her necklace. It was a cheap thing, only gilded, but she'd saved up money from odd jobs for months to buy it from a traveling salesman. It was the first thing she'd ever bought herself, before she'd even reached her twelfth summer. She'd kept it ever since, and now it was the only thing she had left from home.
She pulled out the necklace, and a crumpled piece of paper came with it. She quickly stuffed both in her pocket, and then, not knowing what else to do, she followed the orc into the forest.
*
After only a short walk - Ash supposed Toruq must not have been too far away, if he had been able to hear her running from the bandits - they reached what must be Toruq's campsite. It was sparse: a small firepit near a few fallen logs. Against one of the logs sat a large pack, next to which was a rumpled brown cloth that looked like a blanket.
Toruq gestured for Ash to sit on the other log, which she did. With the weight off her legs, she realized they had been shaking for some time, from fear and exhaustion both. Toruq took the blanket, spread it flat on the ground, and began removing his gauntlets.
"Where was your caravan going?"
"Tarandenne," Ash answered quietly.
The orc grunted. "I just left there. I would escort you, but I have to be home as soon as I can."
He placed the gauntlets gently down on the cloth, then began to unbuckle the breastplate. "We're closer now to my home than Tarandenne anyway. If you come with me, you could find safe passage from there."
"I - thank you," said Ash.
Toruq said nothing. He laid the breastplate down next to the gauntlets, then pulled off his leather shirt. The wide expanse of his chest and stomach was decorated with the same winding tattoos as his face and hands, and she could see the hair on it - grayer than the dark hair of his head, and becoming thicker in a line down the center of his chest. Although she couldn't see them, Ash knew that under a layer of fat, his muscles were like rock. He had the same build as Colim the blacksmith's apprentice, who won the hay bale toss every harvest festival back home. Ash had no doubt that Toruq could carry a hay bale as easily as she carried a bag of flour.
He laid down the shirt and bent to remove his boots, then began unlacing his trousers. Ash started, and -
Dear gods!
Toruq had removed his trousers, and now stood naked and seemingly unselfconscious before her. His legs were even thicker than his arms, and decorated with more of the same tattoos, as was - gods, she couldn't stop herself looking -
One of the black lines on his chest traced its way down to his groin, disappeared under a mass of black hair, then resurfaced to run all the way along the top of his cock. It was just... hanging there, thick and green, with his balls dangling below. It was longer than any she'd ever seen soft. It was like he had no shame!
It swayed from side to side as he walked back towards the firepit, seemingly not noticing how her eyes followed it the whole way there. He sat on the log opposite hers, his legs spread as if to frame it. Ash felt a bulge beginning to grow in her own trousers. Did he really have no idea what he was doing?
Toruq leaned down to reach into the pack, and pulled out a smaller cloth parcel. He held it up to her. "Food?" he asked. "We won't have time to hunt and build a fire tonight." Ash nodded, feeling like someone else was moving her head for her.
Toruq stood once more and walked around the fire to her, that cock moving closer and closer to her eyeline. He handed her the parcel. As she took it, her hand touched his finger, and she felt its warmth. She couldn't help but notice how small her own hand looked in comparison. He walked back to the pack, pulled out a second parcel, and sat down to unwrap it. This time, he put one foot up on the log, using his beefy thigh to rest one arm as he ate. His cock couldn't have been more on display if he'd been thrusting it in her face, and Ash blushed even deeper at the thought. She was now completely hard, her own cock straining against the fabric of her trousers.
