by Cooke, Chele
17 Question of Delicacy
Georgianna’s conversation with Jacob and Lacie remained in her head for two days. In some ways, getting Nyah out seemed more possible than it had before, as the story that cinystalq collars were placed on every drysta at the moment of purchase had been proved a myth. However, knowing that a drysta would be more heavily controlled while they became accustomed to their new situation made the idea of breaking her out any time soon look virtually impossible.
Still, even though it had been days since her argument with Taye, Georgianna had yet to approach him about helping out. She knew that the longer she left it, the more likely it was that Taye would do something reckless, but Georgianna also didn’t want to go to him with a half-baked idea that would wash away at the lightest touch. She needed something positive, something they could work with, like who it was who had bought Nyah in the first place.
She had meant to go to the compound the next day, feigning that she had her days mixed up, but as things usually went, she’d been caught up with other responsibilities, one of which included looking after Braedon while her father went down to the Oprust district and Halden worked. Her nephew had been more than happy to spend the morning with her, especially as it meant going to various sections of the camps to make small trades. Georgianna had been a little worried about taking her nephew with her, but Braedon had been fascinated with the different places and people. He was thrilled when his aunt, someone who was usually seen as someone to entertain him, had been asked to stitch up a rather ugly-looking wound on an equally ugly-looking man, something Georgianna was grateful Braedon had not commented on.
Having left the family home early that morning to get back into the centre of the city before sun up, Georgianna made her way through the tunnels towards the east of the city, taking the familiar lines until she could come up out of the entrance a few hundred metres from the entrance to the compound.
Getting through the gates was a rather regular affair, though with Edtroka not standing guard, it had been up to Georgianna to ask whether he was on duty.
“Dreta,” the guard had grumbled at her, handing back her bag, now checked for contraband, for Georgianna to take inside.
Georgianna gave a small, polite nod and instead of taking the first door into the compound, walked down a bricked path that led along the side of the high walls.
Between the wall and the fenced cage surrounding the compound, the thin path felt more like a tunnel than anything else. Georgianna could only guess at the reason they’d made it so narrow, but as she saw the crowd of people gathered in the yard at the end, she wondered whether it was to prevent a quick getaway should anything happen. Only so many people could get through the fenced corridor at a time, not to mention that at the other end they would face guards with heavy copaq weapons. Her father had once told her that, should you wish to fight off a large number with only a few men, leaving them no entrance or retreat but a small corridor meant only so many could attack at any one time. Looking at the swarm of Adveni and the number of Veniche lined up to be sold, she decided that was a useful thing to keep in mind here.
It took a while to locate Edtroka. She’d first made her way respectfully through the crowd to the other end of the yard, letting Adveni bump and push her around and apologising to them each time they did. When she could not see Edtroka standing guard near the dreta waiting to be sold, she instead stood near the high wall of the compound, looking out through the sea of people. She finally spotted Edtroka. He was talking to a man with a pompous, self-important expression on his face. Edtroka was nodding politely, but even through the stiff, polite smile, Georgianna could see that he was not enjoying the conversation.
Georgianna slipped through the crowd, once again apologising to anyone who barged into her, until she reached Edtroka’s side. She held her distance a few yards away, giving the two men the space to continue their conversation. It only took a minute or two before Edtroka held the side of his fist to the middle of his chest in the Adveni mark of respect, and the other man turned to walk swiftly away.
“Guard Edtroka?” Georgianna asked cautiously, stepping forward.
Edtroka turned, the forced smile on his lips fading for a moment, to be replaced by a look of amusement. Georgianna looked at him, surprised that his expression would not be one of annoyance, especially seeing as he’d seemed almost incapable of fully hiding his contempt from someone who was clearly his superior. Edtroka stepped forward and nodded to her.
“Med,” he answered, his head cocked to the side. “Don’t see you here often. You do know I’m not allowed to sell to you, right?”
Georgianna gazed back at him in surprise. The only time she’d seen Edtroka for long enough to hold an actual conversation, he’d been stiff and surly. Today he seemed practically happy to see her.
Not entirely sure how to respond, she faltered, glancing up towards the area where Veniche were waiting to be sold as dreta. There was such a stark contrast among them, young and old, male and female, defiant to downright terrified. She couldn’t look at Edtroka, his gaze was too piercing for her liking, as if he could see what she was thinking, what she was planning.
“I was hoping you’d be able to give me some information,” she said. “On a sale.”
His gaze flickered over to the soon-to-be dreta and the Adveni guarding them. Georgianna suspected that he was about to tell her that he wasn’t allowed, that giving over information like that was considered dangerous. However, when he looked back at her, he nodded for her to go on, holding one hand out and curling his fingers over his palm to ask for the details.
Georgianna was stunned. She’d expected to be drilled with questions about why she wanted such information, but instead she was being treated like an equal to this man. At least, for the moment. With no idea how long the pleasure would last, she quickly adjusted the strap across her shoulder and glanced around them to see if anyone was listening.
“Her name is Nyah Wolfe, she was Kahle,” she continued. “Twenty-three, blonde.”
Edtroka nodded, his lips curved into a momentary frown before he shrugged.
“Gone eight days,” he answered. “Maybe nine, this heat makes it hard to remember.”
She nodded enthusiastically.
“That’s right. She was in the block for an assault.”
Edtroka let out a laugh, a gruff sound that didn’t suit his face. Georgianna looked at him properly. His eyes, the mottled brown of yapoque leaves after they had been dried for smoking, held more warmth than she’d noticed before, and his features were almost delicate. High, curved cheekbones on a slim face above a pointed jaw and a straight nose led the gaze directly down to the bow of his lips. She blinked and glanced down, forgetting about his face as she realised he had about five methods of killing her strapped to his uniform that didn’t include his bare hands. Her gaze settled on his slim fingers, capable of killing a person with ease.
“She wa…”
“E’troke!”
The voice came out of the crowd and despite the difference in the pronunciation of his name, Edtroka turned his head towards the sound. As Georgianna fell back a step, not wanting to get caught in the middle of a conversation between two Adveni, she wondered whether the difference in pronunciation was because she’d been saying it wrong. Yes, Edtroka had introduced himself as such, but Georgianna knew that there were certain pronunciations Veuric tongues never got right when it came to Adtvenis words. Maybe Edtroka’s name was one of them, so he’d just given up trying.
“Tzanlomne,” Edtroka greeted the newcomer with another fixed, polite smile.
The man was short compared to most Adveni, almost a head shorter than Edtroka, but with dark features to rival the taller man and a wider stance, he seemed to demand as much respect as the guard. Georgianna averted her gaze, but unfortunately not fast enough.
“That one, how much?”
Edtroka looked over his shoulder at Georgianna and shook his head.
“She’s a medic
, not drysta.”
The man, Tzanlomne, snorted in derision and rolled his eyes. Edtroka’s word meant little as he reached out, grasping Georgianna’s chin in a grip so tight that she thought his fingers might crush straight through her jaw. She jerked backward away from him, but his grip was too tight, holding her still with one hand while he waved the other dismissively.
“I don’t care what she was, E’troke,” he answered. “I care what you will sell her for. She’d make a nice addition.”
Tzanlomne barely looked at Edtroka. He turned her head this way and that, his gaze travelling over every inch of her face. He reached out and tugged the ribbon from her hair, watching as it fell in a tumble of messy blonde waves over her shoulders.
“I won’t, and she wouldn’t,” Edtroka snarled through gritted teeth.
She struggled against him. Grasping his wrist, she tried to pull his grasp away from her face. Tzanlomne’s grin of approval slid into a sneer. He grasped her hair in a tight fist, yanking her head back.
Georgianna yelped and her ribbon sailed silently to the ground.
“Now, E’troke, I have my ways, you might as well be part of the…”
Edtroka cut him off by snapping something in such rapid Adtvenis that even if Georgianna had known more than a few names and swearwords, she still wouldn’t have understood. It was no more than a few sentences, but the snarl on Edtroka’s lips, or perhaps the words that hissed forth, were enough to make Tzanlomne narrow his eyes and turn his attention away from his new potential toy.
She could barely see Edtroka from the way she was held, but she felt the extra fingers in her hair as Edtroka pried Tzanlomne’s hand from her. Tzanlomne released her and Georgianna hurried back a few steps. She rubbed her fingers over her skin, glancing to Edtroka to find his face twisted into a murderous mask. Tzanlomne took a step back, and when Edtroka’s expression didn’t soften, he turned, stalking away through the crowd.
Georgianna watched with cautious curiosity as Edtroka glared after Tzanlomne. She didn’t dare ask him what had been said in Adtvenis though she was dying to know what had transpired between the two Adveni men. Once Tzanlomne had disappeared into the crowd, Edtroka turned back to her, the frown still present on his pursed lips.
“Everything alright?”
Edtroka gave a dismissive wave of his hand.
“Vtensu varsonnir!” Edtroka answered without any more explanation.
It was an insult, one Georgianna had learned a few years before. Vtensu could be used in a number of ways, but as an expletive, it was very similar to the insult ‘bastard’. Varsonnir, however, was specific. You had to listen carefully, as a Veniche anyway, to hear the difference from Volsonnar, the name for the Adveni leader much like the Elder of a tribe. Varsonnir, on the other hand, was reserved for someone who thought they were more important than they were.
From Edtroka’s insult, Tzanlomne was a self-important bastard, and Georgianna found herself grinning.
“Well, thank you,” she muttered.
“For?” Edtroka asked, looking at her in surprise.
“For not selling me.”
He laughed again, the same gruff burst that in Georgianna’s opinion didn’t suit him.
Glancing over his shoulder in the direction Tzanlomne had disappeared, Edtroka reached out and took hold of her elbow.
Georgianna tugged her elbow back away from him. She didn’t feel as safe as she had before. The man had cared little whether she was legally for sale, and if other Adveni were the same, what would it take for Edtroka to turn a blind eye and accept the payment? She was in the compound already, it wouldn’t be difficult for him to create some charge that stripped her of her legal registration as a free Veniche.
Edtroka’s grasp, while not as tight or restricting as Tzanlomne’s, was just as unbreakable. He kept hold of her arm and began leading her through the crowd towards the compound doors.
“Even if you were up for sale, he would not have you,” Edtroka told her with a wicked grin. “I would be in front of him in the queue.”
“Is… Is that a compliment?”
“Perhaps.”
Georgianna couldn’t help but notice the glances she received as she was half-tugged towards the walls of the prison. Maybe it was because she wasn’t out here often, or because she was being held onto by a guard of the compound, but she received more than a couple of curious looks before they slipped through the door and into the cool relief of the compound corridor.
The shadows that flung themselves through the corridor stunned her into blindness once the door swung closed with a bang. She blinked rapidly as she was tugged along. Edtroka seemingly had no problem with the sudden shade, or knew the corridors too well to need sight to navigate them. Surging forward, he turned them down a slimmer corridor that ended in an open door. With her sight slowly returning, she glanced over her shoulder, any exit now out of sight.
Fear surged through her as she wondered whether Edtroka’s protection of her in the yard had more to do with his own desires. Had she asked about a drysta’s whereabouts to an Adveni who’d been looking for a reason to keep her in the compound? Was that where he was taking her now?
As they proceeded through the open door, Edtroka made no effort to close it behind them. Instead he released Georgianna’s elbow and marched across the small room, collecting up a jacket. Georgianna stood just inside the doorway watching him, her hands clenched before her. She wondered whether he was retrieving the device that opened the block door, or perhaps a pair of binding cuffs before he took her back to the yard. He dug into one of the pockets of the jacket, and pulled out a tsentyl, swiping his thumb casually across it.
She didn’t feel any more reassured, wondering if he was registering her capture. Glancing over her shoulder through the open door, Georgianna wondered how far she could run before the guard would catch her.
She’d never reach the gates, and even if she did, Edtroka could easily send a message to make sure the other guards knew not to let her pass.
“The girl, she related?” he asked, barely glancing up from the device as it opened onto his palm.
“Who?” Georgianna asked in surprise, looking at him again.
Edtroka glanced up, raising an eyebrow.
“You wanted information on a sale, right?”
She blinked, staring at him for a moment before she realised what he was talking about. The run in with Tzanlomne had driven Nyah from her mind. Now the memory was back, she nodded.
“Nyah.”
Edtroka nodded, but didn’t look up as he moved his thumb over the tsentyl again.
“Not by blood,” Georgianna answered. “I grew up with her and a friend, though. I just…”
Lifting his head, Edtroka fixed Georgianna with a hard glare, one that immediately told her that she was not to argue with him.
“You just want to make sure she is safe.”
Georgianna paused, taking a slow deep breath before she nodded.
“That’s right.”
“Maarqyn,” he answered. “She was bought by Maarqyn Guinnyr.”
“Maarqyn,” Georgianna repeated. “Who is he?”
Edtroka shook his head as he slid the tsentyl closed and stuffed it back into the pocket of his jacket. Slinging the item over the back of a chair, Edtroka perched himself on the edge of the table, watching her like a hawk hunting for prey.
“No one you should be pressing for information, Med,” he said. “My advice: find out your friend is okay from a distance and then leave be. Your pretty neck will be the better for it.”
Georgianna’s eyes widened as she looked back at Edtroka. She didn’t want to think that Maarqyn was really that dangerous, or that he would hurt Nyah. She knew better than most that only a small number of dreta got through unscathed. Even if they weren’t physical wounds like Jacob’s, they were always there.
“Thank… Thank you for telling me.”
A shudder moved down her spine when Edtroka’s gaze didn’t falter from her
face. She took a step back and his lips flickered into a momentary grin.
“No need to thank me.”
She didn’t like the sound of that. Taking another small step back, she was again wondering how far she could run when Edtroka shrugged, almost chuckling.
“Dreta owners are public record. I could have sent you into the city to find out from them, but they ask more questions and… well… not a problem.”
Georgianna froze. Had she really just worked herself up over nothing? Every look, every motion, she’d thought meant something else. She almost didn’t know what to do now. She’d worked this whole thing up in her head as such a problem when, as it turned out, it was almost as if it were a common occurrence.
Edtroka pushed himself quickly up from the edge of the table. Georgianna didn’t think anything of it until a hand clapped onto her shoulder, making her jump. She turned her head, looking up at one of the other guards.
“What you doing here?” he asked. “E’troke?”
“I’m guessing she’s looking to be let onto the block,” he suggested. “Got turned around, right, Med?”
Looking between the two guards in surprise, Georgianna hesitated for a moment.
“Yes, Volsonne,” she answered, glancing at Edtroka with a cautious smile.
“I’m going that way anyway,” Edtroka said, patting the guard on the front of his shoulder as he passed through the doorway into the corridor. “I’ll take her.”
The guard shrugged and removed his hand from Georgianna’s shoulder.
“Thought you’d have known better, Medic,” he warned.
Georgianna nodded.
“Yeah, me too,” Georgianna replied.
She followed Edtroka down the corridor, wondering why, if it was all public record, Edtroka had lied to the other guard. However, the guard was right about one thing. When it came to the compound and asking about things that went on within it, she really should have known better.
18 Into the Northern Quarters
“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Georgianna asked, looking over her shoulder for what felt like the hundredth time.