[Earl of Purple]

I hope this is OK; I haven't written a story in a while, and I've never been good at that whole 'planning' lark .

Wars and Weddings (Part 1)
Mrs. Bloodplunder

Spoiler

It started with a series of raids on the herds of horses belonging to the Great Tree Clan of humans by the Bloodplunder Band of orcs. These raids triggered reprisals by the humans, which caused orc reprisals, which fed the vicious circle further. However, the war weakened both sides, and left both being pushed further east by the borders of an expanding nation of gnomes, and an increased frequency of raids by bandits and slavers. After thirteen years of warfare, the Great Tree Clan-Chief sent a peace party to the Bloodplunder Band, carrying the carcass of an ox as a guest-offering. The orcs accepted, and listened to what the humans had to say. Their shaman had come to the same conclusion, and suggested an alliance sealed by marriage; as the Bloodplunder Chief was unmarried and had no heirs whereas the Great Tree Clan-Chief had several daughters, it was decided to marry the Clan-Chief's eldest daughter to the Bloodplunder Chief. A letter was sent immediately for the Great Tree Clan-Chief's second-oldest daughter, asking her to return from her adventures as soon as she can, explaining also the details of why. She accepted, and invited her party to come as guests.

So, six months later, the wedding took place, attended by humans, orcs, and a group of adventurers. Alondra was very excited for her sister Aldora; Alondra had fought orcs, and admired their strength. She was also jealous, slightly; the chief of the Bloodplunder Orcs was rather handsome, once you got past the tusks and deep orange skin. She had her friends with her, so they wouldn't miss the traditional orcish rites of acceptability. Not that they'd be interested beyond the point of being able to tell their children that they have watched a traditional orcish wedding. Alondra was wrong, as it turned out; Mycha the Mage was contemplating an academic paper on orc traditional practices and Xanthus Xalachar wished to observe traditional orc wrestling techniques, take notes and possibly test his own martial arts against them, to see which was better.

Before the wedding could actually start, the Bloodplunder Band had to determine whether or not Aldora was suitable to marry their chief. The traditional way of determining this is to dig a large pit and have the two orc females ranking highest in the woman's hierarchy fight the prospective bride until either the bride is unconscious/dead, and hence unworthy of the honour, or the last lady standing in which case she's proven her credentials. In this case, the bride has been agreed upon politically, though that merely means they wear leather padding so the traditional clubs are less likely to actually kill than when merely clad in their birthday suits. The pit was dug a few days before, and now Aldora is inside it, standing opposite two large female orcs, each with muscles large enough to impress a body builder and standing two heads taller than Aldora. Aldora has been in battle before, and knows what to do in this situation. The orcs, however, are experienced warriors, and have done this before- they know what the other will do before she does it and react accordingly.