by Amanda Milo
The passive set of Tiernan’s face belies just how right he thinks this is.
Ekan shakes himself, and answers Beth’s question for the women. “If we get there and you don’t want to stay, we’ll work on something else. But trust me, I think you ought to give this place an honest try.”
Varying degrees of agreement come from them, and Prow comes up behind Tiernan, moving past him and carrying a sack that contains drink packets and foodstuffs for the woefully underfed women. “Take it slow,” Prow advises.
Qolt drops a crate down at their feet with a thud. “He’s right.” He jerks his head to Prow, backing up his statement. “There’s plenty. Don’t hork it down too fast and make yourselves sick.”
The women start to tear into the food, but they do manage to pace themselves.
Watching them, I hate to be the dark-thought advocate, but there are a couple valid concerns we need to address. “Can we talk logistics?” I indicate the females. “Where are we keeping them?” I lower my voice. “I hate to play the naysayer—”
“That’s really Tiernan’s job,” Ekan cuts in.
Qolt adds, “You should leave him to it. Makes him happy.”
Prow snorts. “Looks like he’s concentrating on other things that make him happy.”
Tiernan, who’s been tracing his fingers idly up Beth’s side, is wearing an unperturbed expression. And no wonder; if I were fingering Beth anywhere, nothing would trouble me either.
Beth’s looking a bit more colorful in the face, and boy are we going to have fun exploring what makes her blush. But we’ve got to keep her safe too. I wave my hand to get their attention. “Returning to what I was saying—are we giving our guests full run of our ship? We have a mate about to burst with spawn, and now we have potential rival females onboard.”
Prow sucks back one of the food packets Qolt brought up in the crate. “Oquilion’s got a point. Sounds like the ingredients for strife porridge.”
We eye him until the silence signals to him that he’s got all our attention.
His head swivels to each of us. “What? It’s a cooking term.”
“Heard you use it before, but now that we know you can bake, it opens up a new side to you,” I tell him. I squint. “But it’s been your hobby all this time? How did you hide it from all of us?”
“I didn’t,” Prow says, exasperated. He gestures to Tiernan. “He knew.”
Everyone looks at Tiernan, who, with his arms crossed over Beth, is the picture of relaxed. The ‘veker regards us lazily, like a well fed winterplanet cat.
Prow licks off his thumb and tosses his food packet into a waste receptacle. “Anyway, where are we setting up our new passengers for the duration?”
CHAPTER 35—OQUILION
OQUILION
“Eh,” Prow says—not dismissively, just unworried. “The treasure and weapon’s room were the big concerns, besides you. With them warned to play nice with our narra, and with those rooms locked, there’s not much else they can get into.”
He’s got an arm looped with Beth’s, just as my elbow’s hooked with hers on her other side. Our ship took a pitstop on a trade planet outside of Vfayr, because we have some cargo to drop and there won’t be an opportunity to sell it at our destination. It’s tech, which Vfayrians don’t have much need for—and because our guests are in need of new clothing to replace the rags they’re wearing.
Thankfully, like most planets, there’s an excellent market here. Nestled right in the walls of their city are booths and hawkers and all manner of things for sale. The city walls are a faded yellow stucco, tall as a ghotofreg, and nothing particularly special—or so I always thought.
But the color that reflects off the wall is turning Beth’s complexion into gold, and her smile has brightened to pure sunshine.
At first, the women in our keeping didn’t want to venture out, their current garments in such poor condition they were ashamed to be seen. It was heartugging, and not in the good way. Beth spoke to them to get a feel for sizes and color preferences, and out we set to obtain what they’d need to feel like free beings again. When we returned with our first haul, then they grew excited about leaving the ship and exploring the trade planet—carefully. They had a fear that they’d get snatched and resold—a valid fear, trafficking is a legitimate concern, especially out here in this quadrant of the galaxy. To keep watch, Qolt and Tiernan joined our guard, but eventually the women wanted to split off to see the sights.
Ekan’s handling the tech sale, and usually we’d worry about allowing our luck source to wander off alone—he is too attracted to dangerous situations—but last time he had free run he found Beth. It cuts him quite a bit of leniency, plus with the promise of a mate to return to, we hope it encourages him to return himself in one piece. Although, as he left us, he called out a cheery/cocky, “Have fun, narra. I’m off to fuck things up!”
“Well, at least he’s honest,” I’d said with a laugh.
“Oquilion!” Beth had chided, clearly concerned.
Fuck is one of Beth’s human words. It didn’t translate automatically, and it kept coming up in the movie-stories Beth entertained us with. She’d tried to describe the myriad of definitions for this word, and Ekan in particular took a real liking to it.
However, in this context, it didn’t seem his use of the word portended any good.
Beth wanted to go after him, find out exactly what he meant, but Prow and I convinced her that sometimes, it’s easier to deal with the fallout than to corral the luck source who causes the explosions.
With everyone else away, this means Prow and I have Beth all to ourselves, with no obligations, no course set. We get to wander and enjoy Beth’s reactions to—everything. She’s awed by it all.
Partway through our adventure, when we bump into a gravely serious Tiernan and a hair-trigger-Qolt (who looks liable to shoot anyone who looks wrong at the group of women they’re guarding), Beth gets her arms around her males for hugs. She waves to the women before we part ways again, and she wanders us to another vendor. Beth muses, “The women are pretty brave to trust you guys. My first day with a Na’rith, he sold me like how many times?—and he intended to keep me. You Na’rith are kind of wily.”
“With females, Na’rith tend to deal fairly—almost to a fault. We don’t turn much profit on deals brokered by a crew with a shrewd woman.” I give her a look of mock censure. “But what do you mean, kind of wily?”
Beth holds up her hands in surrender, giggling. “You want credit for being full-out wily—alrighty then!”
Stealing her from Prow, I dance my fingers along her side and force a gruff, “Good. Don’t you forget it.”
“Never,” she vows, rivaling her sun-bright smile from earlier with the brilliance of this new one.
I make a face. “But you still can’t judge us by Ekan.”
Prow steals her back to his side so that she’s shared between us once more. “Compared to him, we’re practically domesticated,” he claims.
Behind him, a man eyes our trio from the awning of a tent. He’s sipping from a large mug of ale, and as we pass, a two-tentacled hand reaches under Beth’s short skirt.
Beth squeaks.
‘Practically domesticated’ Prow cracks his fist into the man’s face and follows him down to the dirt.
“You all right?” I ask Beth.
She rubs her rear, looking chagrined. “Yeah. Just surprised me.” Her eyes drop to the skirmish, and she seems a mite uncomfortable—as always—at the violence. She indicates the pair of wrestling men—both now covered in a bit of ale and a growing spray of blood as the skirt-fingerer is pinned and gets his face reformatted. “Probably don’t need to kill him over it.” She accompanies the statement with an ill-looking wave of her hand.
She doesn’t say we shouldn’t kill him over it; that’s plain to me, clearly plain to Prow who doesn’t slow his fists, and it must be pretty clear to the man cutting up Prow’s knuckles with what’s left of his teeth because he starts bleating
—perhaps apologies, or perhaps he’s begging.
I sound more bored than puzzled when I ask, “What did he say?”
Prow, with a knee on the man’s chest, brings his fist back, holding. “Don’t know. It’s not translating.”
I smile thinly, outwardly ignoring the growing crowd of onlookers we’re collecting as I draw a thin-handled blade from my left thigh pocket. It snicks open loudly, revealing one wicked knife. “Let’s motivate him: cut off parts until he starts apologizing to Beth in a language we all can understand.”
“NOOO! The man screams in Galaxy Standard Tongue—a language most planets have adopted to their translators in an effort to have a universal speech option in common. It’s mostly a growled language, and it sounds cog-damned strange coming out all high-pitched and weepy as tears mix with the blood coming off his face. “I’m sorry—lady, I’m sorry!”
“Would you look at that,” Prow says. “Your knife’s inspiring.”
“I appreciate the compliment,” I tell him. “It’s probably bigger than yours.”
“Tevek off,” he replies easily.
“Boys,” Beth says with a sigh, sounding at once a little shaky and a bit exasperated.
I lick my upper fangs. “Eh. He sounds pretty sincere I guess.”
Prow drops him. “A start anyway.” To the man he says, “You’ll maybe think better of shoving yourself up some female without her permission next time? That was superbly poor manners.”
Beth, who, I notice now, is shivering slightly, surveys the crowd. “Well guys? I’m willing to bet anyone who considered feeling me up in this Special Victims Unit-edition skirt will think twice now. Thanks.”
Stepping over the downed man, Prow goes right to her, throwing an arm around her neck and nuzzling the top of her head before he releases her.
Not bothered by the blood or the spilled drink on him, she gives him a smile, saying, “My hero,” and looks a bit more settled.
I open my arms. “What am I, chopped yanak liver?” I tease.
Beth tethers our elbows again. “You’re my hero for waiting with me and waving your knife around.”
Dragging my cheek over her cheek, I eye the crowd meaningfully, close my knife, and tighten my arm to tuck her close to my side. “Glad to be of service, narra. Your mates protect you fiercely, and everybody best beware of that.”
CHAPTER 36—OQUILION
OQUILION
We sample every bit of food the venue has for sale, buy every trinket a spawn could play with, and by the time we’re halfway through all the market has to offer, Prow and I are loaded down, bookending Beth like we’re her well-trained pack animals.
Initially, she’d protested when we began to purchase all the items she lovingly stroked or sighed over, especially when she didn’t consider the items necessary.
“Do you want them for the spawn?” I’d asked. Without waiting for her answer, I’d handed over my credit stick to each happy vendor. “Then these purchases are necessary.”
And they are. We’ve got clothes, toys, even a crib—Prow’s been grinning like a fool ever since he strapped the hand-carved wooden beauty proudly to his back—we’re as prepared as we can be for our spawn and spawner. Beth also made Prow stop at a tent with cooking and baker’s supplies. Made him cog-damn near blush with her praise for his desserts. Which means we’re now weighed down with ingredients and cookware too.
Judging by her sparkling smile, Beth’s having a grand adventure with us. “Thanks guys. As my handsome pair of escorts, you’ve made sure I’m having a wonderful time and…” Beth’s voice fades off. “What the—?”
I follow where she’s looking. “Oh. A cock painter.”
Prow starts choking fiercely.
Speaking to the popularity of the pastime, this business is set in a permanent structure, with bottles of colorful paints set out with pots of shimmer and bowls of various metal bits for shining up and piercing your club. There’s a queue of men in line, and a couple in chairs, pants down, getting designs applied.
“Where I’m from,” Beth says rather faintly, “We do face painting.”
“That’s interesting,” I offer. I try to move her along. Hells, I try to rush her right past it.
By now, Prow’s chortling. But unfortunately, he manages to spit out, “Ask Oquilion how he liked his cockpaint experience!”
Beth pushes back against the pressure I’m exerting to get her past the painter’s, and she turns on me, her eyes bigger than the plates a person eats dinner on. “You paid someone to paint your willy?”
I pull away from her. “My what?”
Prow nudges Beth, intentionally using her as a bumper to nudge me. “I think she means your club, your cock, your—”
“I know what she means,” I snap over at the sniggering idtrek. “I can infer that much.” I turn to Beth. “Call it a club. Call it a cock. Don’t call it a willy. Willy is the boy on the spaceport’s play station who’s too skinny and too short to play many games.”
Beth slaps her hand over her mouth, but it does nothing to hide the snorting sound she’s making. It doesn’t help that her shoulders are jerking up and down.
“Is this you trying to hide your laughter?” I ask her, trying to drag her past the shop. But Prow’s having none of it.
“Tell her, tell her,” he goads, “Or I will—and I remember quite vividly how you told everyone what colors you thought were pretty on your—”
“I was so drunk,” is what I say to Beth. “Let’s start there.”
“Yeah,” agrees Prow, “Because that makes it better.”
I point at him. “Clog it.” To Beth, I vow, “It’s why I’ve never gotten drunk again. You’re familiar with the machaii crew I fly with?” She tries to nod, sniffling a little in an effort to regain her composure as she raptly listens to my story. “They took advantage of me.”
Prow can’t breath, and I think he’s crying. “Tell her—” he gasps, wiping his eyes with the heels of his hand, his body shuddering hard as he tries to suck in air and balance everything he carries. I hope he chokes—the jackleg deserves it. “Tell her what the paint does!”
Beth’s eyes are still as big as mealplates. “What does it do?”
Glancing down at our feet, I drag my thumbnail over my top lip. “It ah—it plumps.”
Prow sprays spit, he bursts out laughing so hard. I try to shove him, good naturedly, right off his feet.
Beth’s given up all pretense. She’s full-out cackling in a way I didn’t know her human body could vocalize, but I like the sound and sight of it.
I clear my throat. “It irritates the skin, which makes it swell up until the paint wears off—but everything’s natural, or so they claim. Tingles a bit though, ‘specially when you sit down,” I share, sucking in my top lip and chewing on it with my teeth.
Prow doubles over, howling.
Inwardly feeling playful but outwardly scowling, I reach for him—and Beth flinches.
Just like that, the fun’s dried up.
It’s such a small move, but Beth’s immediately embarrassed, losing all traces of her jollification.
“Narra,” I say, glancing at Prow—who’s grimacing, and with his laughter-tears still on his face, he looks ridiculous—“You have nothing to be ashamed of.”
She pretends to be interested in a booth a few hawkers down from us. “I feel stupid every time I jump. I know you guys are just horsing around.”
Horsing… The image of a vaguely Na’rith-looking creature pops into my head thanks to my translator. I wonder what Earth’s horsing has to do with our razzing—and what horsing would be worth on the markets if we collect a few someday.
“I know you won’t hurt me,” Beth continues.
“Hells never,” Prow agrees vehemently.
“But it’s like my body is programmed to panic just a little,” she holds up her thumb and forefinger, squinting one eye, “Every time I hear or see anything that looks threatening.” She sighs, looking defeated.
; And I hate to see Beth looking like this.
I work my jaw side to side, and stretch my neck before giving a lazy roll of my shoulders. I jerk my chin at Prow. “You know what might help?”
Beth finally meets my eyes, but she doesn't say anything.
I grab Prow by the collar of his shirt. “I could hit him again and again until you’re desentized. I won’t mind.”
“He won’t,” affirms Prow.
Beth cracks a smile. It’s lacking dedication, but she’s trying—and after Prow and I trash-talk each other some more as she shoves away from me, Beth’s shoulders relax. Soon, she walks between us easier, almost as free as she was before.
“Tell me you two are getting hungry,” Prow pretends to complain.
We’ve barely had time to digest our last food sampler, but I don’t think it’s so much that he’s hungry: I think he’s keeping Beth diverted from getting tangled up in her mind.
Beth jumps aboard his suggestion like it’s a lifecraft. “I’d love to try more food. What are we having?”
We drag Beth to every food stand left in our vicinity, having her taste a little of this and that—until my attention is captured. “Wait,” I say, tugging her to a stop.
Beth looks to the booth we’re standing beside—and immediately her eyes shoot to mine. “You want women’s underwear?” she razzes, gaze dropping to my groin like she can see through my clothes.
Reaching past her, I snag a lacy pair of panties.
“You’d look really pretty in those, Oquilion,” Prow offers.
Beth schools her expression into a studious one, and nods sagely, being a little chit and agreeing with him. “He’s so right. You would look really pretty in those. I mean look at that cut,” her eyes widen, “super flattering, for sure.”
I slant her an I’ll-rut-the-nonsense-out-of-you grin. “You just watch who these end up flattering later.”
Beth’s smile turns prim. “We’ll see.”
Something floral and something sweet teases my nose, and I must not be the only one who notices the scents because Prow oooohs excitedly. “A perfume stand!” His hand lands on Beth’s arm.