Ounce for ounce, the salt’s purity rivaled the silver’s worth. After all, silver meant currency and jewelry, baubles for the nobility, but salt meant life.
Askaran females suffered a severe mineral deficiency, the same one that kept the Evanti enslaved in what once had been their homeland. In rare veins of salt, a hormone-like supplement called progesaline was found. Demon females consumed marked amounts of progesaline during pregnancy, or they became anemic. Miscarriage and death, of both infant and mother, were common in slave castes due to the inability to pay for the vital supplement. Already Harper planned outreach programs for part of his mine’s supply, but he’d hoped for more time to prepare. Today’s attack proved the purer the product, the more drastic measures raiders and nobles employed in its procurement.
“It’ll only get worse. Once that shipment hits the black market, nobles will start asking questions.” His chest sank in a sigh Harper didn’t hear. “We need her help.”
Her. Emma. Her name caressed his mind, as welcome to him as razors sinking through his chest.
Recovery wasn’t an option. A shipment taken was a shipment lost. He raked a hand through his hair, tugging on the roots as if manually extracting answers. Four years left until their stipend ran dry and this colony either stood alone or blew away. “I know.” As consul, Emma’s lips brushed Nesvia’s ears. Forget the silver, and even the salt. More of both could be mined. The lives lost could never be recompensed.
His palms shed their dusty coating in a wash of nervous sweat. Dillon was right. Hell existed, and this was it. Why else would his red-lipped, personal demoness be their only hope?
His lips twisted in a mirthless smile. She’d called him her friend. He supposed he would find out soon enough. “Pack a bag.” He accepted the inevitable. “We’re heading for Feriana.”
“You’re fair game out there.” Dillon scowled. “I don’t like it.”
“I don’t have a choice.” If he had pushed harder, sooner, he might have saved lives. “I can’t hide while my people die.” The spot between his shoulders itched as if a fresh target had been drawn between the blades. The murder of Emma’s father was a feather of regret on his conscience, and he only allowed that ounce of remorse because time constraints meant Archer had an easy death, when Harper would have collected a pound of flesh for both Emma and Maddie. Still, nobles weren’t quick to see things his way. In their world, blood mattered, and the closest Harper had ever come to blue blood was when Archer’s had bathed his hands.
Harper glanced toward the east, torn between whether the tightness in his throat was in anticipation of seeing Emma again, or if it was the imagined rope burn of the hangman’s noose.
Chapter Six
I popped a rancid green pill, shuddering as it slid down my throat. The herbal remedy left me tasting grass and dirt. I’d give this kingdom for a bottle of aspirin. Rubbing the space between my eyebrows, I considered crawling back into bed, but couldn’t afford such a luxury.
Isabeau, my resident healer, stood at my elbow, forehead creased. “I don’t like this.”
I didn’t either. Drums pounded in my temples to a wanton beat. Around me, the room spun in clockwise circles. Drunken ambition sloshed through me. Yet I hadn’t had a sip of wine.
“You’re certain you ate and drank nothing?” Her sharp tone made me wince.
“It wasn’t a social call.” I squinted up at her. “It was business.”
Her doubting glance made my jaw tense. Her lips pursed as if in thought, the direction of which I guessed. “Sometimes the loss of one addiction leads us to find a suitable replacement.”
“That’s what’s got you so worked up?” I shoved from my desk and paced, wishing I could have kept bits of my past a secret. “Look, I had a problem, I’ll give you that. But there’s no caffeine in Askara.” My saliva pooled at the thought. “I detoxed. I’m good.” I wiped a hand across my mouth, furious when it came away damp. “I wouldn’t go that route a second time.”
Isabeau didn’t pull punches, and I liked her for it. She knew about my caffeine addiction because withdrawal had almost killed me, would have if not for her. The punch of coffee heating my gut had helped me survive on Earth. It got my sister cared for, kept my façade from crumbling, it was all good. Until I got sloppy and Maddie realized what a mess I’d made of me.
And Harper…I blamed his loss for craving oblivion, but his return had sparked the same frenzy. He had looked at me, and my past dissolved. I had become his Emma, this virginal waif who once thought he hung both Askaran moons. She wasn’t me. I wasn’t her. His adoration was woefully misplaced. I had nothing pure to offer. He deserved her. He deserved better than me.
“If you’re telling me the truth, then I believe you.” Isabeau cut through the chaos of my thoughts. Did she notice the irony in her statement? I doubted it. She wanted to believe the best of me.
Her miracle touch with healing herbs spared her life as a sthudai, a pleasure slave, when her fragile build meant life as a sthudal, a menial laborer, would have halved her life expectancy. I credited her lack of designation for her naiveté. Slaves of either caste were never so…optimistic.
Still, I’d found a rare treasure in Isabeau, and paid her out of my salary to work for me. While Nesvia wrote off my employment expenses, she expected me to relocate slaves, not keep them.
I gave her a steely glare. “Now that we’ve established the fact I’m not hyped up on something, what’s on the agenda for today?” A final glower cast in my direction and she switched from practitioner to secretary with an efficient shrug. Behind her back, I exhaled with relief.
She walked to a small desk, the duplicate of mine, and pulled out a scroll covered with handwritten notations. “Helen and Joshua Lowndes, the mated pair in service to—”
“Employed by,” I corrected her absently.
“Oh, you’re right, of course.” She started a second time. “The mated pair employed by the Demara family filed a complaint about their wages being garnished.” She frowned. “They’re being charged some type of fee for the uniforms issued to them, as well as the cleaning of those outfits, although the pair launders the material themselves, along with the family’s clothing.”
Snapping a clay marker between my fingers, I rolled my eyes. I’d had second thoughts about placing that pair, any pair, with the Demaras, but the Lowndes were eager for placement and the consulate had been at full capacity. I should have asked for their patience while finding a better match. I saw that now. Hindsight’s always twenty-twenty.
“Sounds like a breach of contract.”
Helen’s narrow face drifted to me on a crystalline recollection. Her former master had gouged out her right eye in a fit of rage over a spilled drink. How many identical stories had I heard? Too many to count, but Helen was special. She was a female Evanti, and that made her a rarity.
Evanti were this area’s only native demons. The first Askarans had arrived by ship, far south of here, by the Gray Sea. They’d sought a substitute for a supplement no longer mineable in their homeland. What they found were the Evanti and rich progesaline deposits. Was it any wonder they claimed the lands in the name of Askara and left their depleted kingdom behind?
Fear of a progesaline shortage had fueled Askaran greed. They refused salt rations for pregnant slaves and, as a result, females became the first mass casualties of the Askaran incursion. As females died, males were bred to heartier demons, and some of the majesty of their race was lost. Few bloodlines were pure now, and females of breeding age—like Helen—were jealously guarded.
The only purebred I could name was Maddie’s father, Zehiel, and my father had killed him after Eliya’s pregnancy was confirmed. Harper and Clayton were the closest to purebreds I’d ever knowingly met, but glamour concealed a multitude of sins. It was, however, still an illusion.
Considering Helen’s history, and the duty she was expected to do for her race, I felt the least she deserved was for her male to look upon her during their private time
s without feeling self-conscious. So I’d fought with Clayton over having a prosthetic made for her.
One of the conditions of my return to this realm had been swearing not to recreate Earth’s technological advances here. When I bent the truth, suggesting sand in her eye socket gave her incurable migraines, he relented under the condition she would use whatever could be made here without aid from Earth.
“I want them out of there.” It was a small miracle the pair had reached out in the first place. If I failed them now, I wouldn’t be given a second chance to regain their trust. “Write a letter demanding the repayment of all monies drafted from their pay.” I checked my memory. “They’ve been employed there for almost seven months. It’s probably happened all along.”
“That’s a large sum.” She stole a marker from my desk and frowned at the bite marks. “I suppose the release clause applies?”
“It does.” I smiled. “I’ll consider Demara’s debt paid if he signs release papers.”
“You’re rather crafty when you want to be.” She made a few marks. “I’ll prepare this for tomorrow’s post.” She nibbled the end of her pen. “I’ll also have the Lowndes’ room prepared.”
“Thanks.” The marker halves fell from my fingers. I dipped to pick them up and kept going, landing in a sprawl across the floor. Fresh nausea swamped my senses until I pressed my forehead to the clay tiles spinning geometric designs in every direction and dry heaved.
Hard knocks rattled my bedroom door, unsurprising since I’d moved the office in here to free up more space for boarders. “See who it is and what they want.” I moaned, coughing.
Isabeau’s footsteps recessed. “I’m sorry, but Lady Gray is unwell today. Is there perhaps some way I could assist you?” She gasped and more footsteps scuffled. A pair of leather boots stopped inches from the end of my nose. I gave in, lay on the floor and rolled over so something stronger than my neck could support my head. Isabeau fussed and chattered in the background.
I didn’t hear a word she said. Hope, dread, joy, fear, clamored through my blood and plugged my head until no sound entered or exited. I lay there, staring up, lips parted, foul breath watering my eyes from the pill I’d swallowed earlier, and wished I’d had the sense to stay in bed.
Nausea tugged at my gut, but lucky for me, my heart stopped up my throat. The toes of Harper’s boots dusted sand in my hair. His knees hit the tile, one to either side of my head, as he forced my eyelids wide. His thumb hooked inside my mouth, and my stomach rebelled at what came next.
Before his pointer found my tonsils, I bit down hard. He snarled inches from my nose. “What have you done?” He cradled my jaw, his grip hard, vise-like. “What did you take?”
“Nuffing.” I choked on his fingers. My cheeks burned as I peeled his hands from my face, shoving him with enough force he slid feet behind me as I righted myself. I shot him a dark glance from over my shoulder. “I haven’t taken anything. I haven’t done anything. I’m sick.”
“She’s telling the truth.” Isabeau spoke over Dillon’s snort of disbelief. Of all the males Harper could have brought from Earth to help him found the Feriana colony, he would pick that one. “She’s been ill all morning.”
Isabeau rushed to my side, placing herself between the males and me. I grabbed her hand. “It’s okay. They’re friends.” An understatement if I’d ever made one. “That’s Dillon Preston.”
“Oh.” Her grip loosened once she recognized the name, and she turned toward the surly demon warming floor tiles behind me. “Then you must be Lord Delaney.” Her airy curtsey put my best efforts to shame. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Emma has told me wonderful things.”
His blue-gray gaze snapped to mine. “She has?” He sounded doubtful.
“Yes, she even keeps a pic—” Isabeau cried out as I crunched her fingers until her knuckles popped. “Oww.”
She cradled her hand to her chest, and I winced. “Sorry, Isabeau, I didn’t mean…”
Great first impressions we all made. Some days should come with a do-over button built in. I’m careful of Isabeau, of everyone, really. Being halfling, I have to keep my strength in check. Otherwise, people get hurt. I swallowed, holding on to my anger so I could excuse myself for hurting her, for scaring Harper when I knew it was my fault for setting such a rank precedent.
“So this is what a consul’s office looks like.” Dillon wrinkled his nose at my dirty laundry, his slow perusal stopping when he got to me. “It’s nice to see our tax dollars at work.”
Glaring, I used my chair to stand, then sat before I toppled onto the floor. “As much as I love having unannounced visitors, I have work to do.” I forced my gaze to Harper, who sat on the floor, his knee bent and forearm propped across it, as if I’d offered him the best seat in the house. Pity I couldn’t get rid of Dillon without Harper leaving too. “I should get to it.”
“We need your help.” Harper’s voice grated. “Otherwise we wouldn’t have come.”
Silly, fragile hope bubbled and burst in my heart. For a moment, I had hoped…
Wait…he’d risked traveling for my help? I glanced between them. He and Dillon both wore glamour. Dillon, of course, was never without it, but Harper itched beneath the illusion.
Some slaves had been conditioned to maintain it, Dillon for instance, since he’d spent several decades on Earth where every trace of his heritage must be well hidden. Harper never had that luxury. The breath-stealing beauty that earned him sthudai status meant his ebony perfection was displayed, never covered, not when the use of glamour would have devalued him.
Why the charade? Unless secrecy demanded he doctor his appearance as an Askaran.
I stared where his long legs stretched in my direction. Shivering as gooseflesh raced over my arms, I reminded myself of Nesvia’s request. I’d gone to sleep with the promise of three months to work up courage to face the male lounging at my feet, cool and confident. Now what?
I wasn’t prepared to be in the same room with him. My hands slipped off the armrests when I adjusted myself with sweat-slicked palms. Breathe, Emma. “What can I do for you?” I picked up a new marker and tapped its dyed clay tip on parchment. “It’s not a worker, is it?” All his new colonists had checked in with me, happy with their lot, content to live in tent city, as many called the colony.
A tic worked in his jaw. “Our caravan was ambushed by Askaran raiders this morning. We lost two males, a third was critically injured.” His fingers tapped a rhythm on his ankle my toes twitched to match. “So, consul, what are you going to do about it?”
My foot froze in place. Throat already raw, I asked, “What were their names?”
“Anders and John.” He blinked in what I thought was surprise. “They were—”
“Twins.” I finished his sentence, already sick as their shy smiles filled my memory. “They were part of my first dozen cases.” Loss blurred my vision. They’d lived down the hall for months instead of weeks, both full of shy wit. “They wanted to be placed together, but no one who could afford two wanted them. It was either working the colony’s mines or splitting up.” Second-guesses choked me. If I’d pushed harder for their separation, they might still be alive.
I’d fumbled Helen and Joshua’s placement, now I’d cost Anders and John their lives. What had I been thinking by coming here and accepting this position? My sole area of expertise was in running a diner. No one died if their fries were served cold or their drinks were flat. I had no right to make these decisions, but if I didn’t, who would? No one.
Slaves—ex or not—we mattered only to ourselves.
“Emma.” Harper climbed to his knees, as if he meant to stand.
I lost sight of him for a few seconds. Blinking, I brought the room into focus and gulped air heavy with his cardamom scent. His rough hands cupped my face, forcing my gaze up to his.
His breath fanned my neck, and my chest flushed. “What will you do?”
“I’ll contact Nesvia, and we can—”
“Not goo
d enough.” His warmth slid away from me. I scrambled to get it back. “This has happened twice in less than three months.” The air crackled with his anger. “You can do better.”
“I can’t demand an audience. She’ll be in Rihos.” My excuse sounded weak, even to me.
“And?” His illusion fizzled for an instant, and his black eyes peered out at me.
“I can’t.” I shook my head, dislodging his eerie calmness. My hands curled into claws, stabbing into the wood of my desk. He was lucky I didn’t clutch his collar and shake him senseless, or shake sense into him. I wanted to scream. I wanted him to scream. I wanted a reaction from him when faced with the place where we spent our childhood, where he’d been imprisoned, where we were headed again unless he woke up and realized it was a very bad idea.
Earth, Askara, all the same. Every little thing is fine as long as we don’t talk about it.
Five years lost. A year later, and he still acted like it was nothing.
“How many more will die before summer court ends?” He paced. “They planted explosives, blew up an older section of the mine.” He stopped, raking fingers through his hair. “When we left, everyone was accounted for except those in the lowest quadrant. Just because I can only report two bodies doesn’t meant there aren’t more, or that there won’t soon be.”
“You never said…” More bodies, more lives lost, no alternatives. “I’ll contact Nesvia—”
“That’s not—” He spun toward me, and I cut him off.
“She’s Askara’s queen. I can’t just grab her by the ear and drag her to the colony.”
His lips thinned.
“I’ll send my courier. Once Nesvia approves our request for an audience, we’ll leave.” I turned to Isabeau, who inspected Dillon with due interest. “Find Aaron and send him on the fastest horse in the stable.” She knew I’d caught her staring. Blushing, she nodded and rushed from the room. I turned back to Harper. “This is the way it must be done.”
Evermine: Daughters of Askara, Book 2 Page 5