Encante (8 page)

“A madam, sir,” Stella responded. “I’m the Queen of Whores.” She laughed, but I caught the edge in it. Evidently I hadn’t whispered quietly enough, and she wasn’t nearly as content with her lot as she would have me believe.

“I meant no offence, my lady.”

“I took none, and it’s a fine change to have a man speak to me with such respect. You’re welcome here whenever you please.” She smirked at me. “For either play or refuge.”

“My thanks.” I glanced at Drusilla, wondering why she would want me to meet this woman. I was about to ask, when she answered—I didn’t think I’d ever become accustomed to that.

“This is Simeon Escher, Stella, a . . . guest of my uncle’s.” She smiled in an attempt to cover her stumble, but knew I had heard it. “Stella is a former slave. The encante are not the only beings on this world who are less than free.” She glanced at me. “I see from your face that is also a surprise to you. Idele is very careful to present a pleasant picture of itself to the other worlds, even to its own people. But I wanted you to meet her, so you might know we’re not all bad; we do give them a chance at freedom, they simply have to earn it. Or so my uncle would say.”

Drusilla’s ocean eyes took in the scene around us. “If you ask me, spending so much as an hour in a place such as this should more than ‘earn’ you leave of it, but it takes years, and great service. Even so, I wanted you to know. There is some redemption to our system, even if only the smallest amount. And yes,”—Drusilla jumped back to my earlier thought with such speed I had trouble keeping up—“you will become accustomed. Eventually.”

She grinned, giving me the distinct impression she expected us to remain acquainted for some time to come. I was unsure if I should be grateful or concerned, given her warning about the captain.

“He disapproves of the encante?” Stella sounded genuinely surprised.

“Not of the people, my lady, only the manner in which they’re treated.”

Behind me, the man I’d seen earlier hauled himself from the water, panting and groaning with spent pleasure. He dried himself off, collected his clothes and loped out of the room, pulling his shirt on as he went. Before the door had closed behind him, another man was moving to take his place in the pool, despite the fact one girl had curled herself into a shivering ball in the submerged basket.

Nauseated, I crossed to him and caught his arm.

“They’re taken,” I told him.

“Don’t look taken,” he drawled at me. “Look mighty tasty.” Even as we spoke he unbuttoned his flies. It was a struggle not to lay him out cold there and then. Instead I tightened my grip on his arm, hauled him around and propelled him to the door, expelling him into the corridor. His breeches dropped to his ankles and he tripped over them, tumbling to the deck, lobcock hanging out for all to see. A pair of grubby sailors at the other end of the corridor guffawed as I slammed the door closed on the downed man’s curses. It was the first time I’d shown the other side of myself since coming aboard, and I wasn’t at all sure I should have done so. When I turned back to the ladies, however, I knew I’d done the right thing.

I walked back to them, passing the twins’ pool once more. They stared up at me with wide eyes—huge eyes, perfectly round and somehow hypnotic. One opened her arms to me as if expecting to take me into her bosom, the other turned in the cradle so she faced me. She was in obvious discomfort, but spread her slender legs wide regardless. I felt my cheeks flame and turned away.

“Drusilla, could you explain to them, please . . . I didn’t do it so that I might—I don’t mean to reject them, only . . .” Dru slipped by me and knelt by the pool for a long, seemingly silent moment.

Stella gave me a curious look. “If not to have them for yourself, then why?”

“To give them a respite,” I said. “I am only sorry I cannot offer more.”

“It is more than they generally have in a day. I have five girls here, Mister Escher, one of them the captain sees fit to keep for himself, leaving four. Four girls, and a crew of near a hundred.”

“But they can’t all be happy to . . . Surely there are crew members who have wives? And even those who don’t . . .”

“The captain has a wife.” Stella shook her head. “Doesn’t care for her much, mind. Leaves her ashore. Mister Drew is wed, and still Drusilla there came to be.” Stella nodded at Drusilla, who was still conversing with the twins. “Not all men are as chivalrous as you are, Escher, nor as faithful. The encante have always been known for their sexual appetites and abilities. It proved their salvation in some ways, their downfall in others.”

I considered. “They had value due to their abilities, but it condemned them to a life of slavery.”

“Clever boy.”

I was startled by a gentle tugging on my sleeve. I assumed it was Drusilla, until I turned to see one of the sisters standing beside me. She was short, so much so that I’d have thought her a child had she been human, her twin was equally minute, for they were identical in most aspects. The pair stood on either side of me and wrapped their arms around my waist, locking hands with each other as if seeing if they could reach around the circumference of some great, stoic oak. It was an embrace I found at once uncomfortable and endearing. They seemed far from the sexual creatures I had seen only moments before.

“This is Liza,” Stella told me. The girl with tentacle hair looked up at me, evidently recognising her name, even if she couldn’t speak. “And this is her sister, Beth. Of course, those aren’t really their names. I give them human names when then come to me; even Drusilla can’t translate their real names into speech.” Stella petted Liza’s head. “They’re saying thank you.”

“They’re most welcome. Stella,”—I glanced up at the older woman—“how old are these girls?”

She held my gaze as she answered: “Just shy of twelve.”

Chapter Ten

D
rusilla’s introductions troubled me more than I could possibly have foreseen. It was not only the notion that the encante were kept as sex slaves, but the brutal manner in which they were treated. Girls so young, so helpless, so completely at the mercy of a ship filled with men, the majority of whom appeared not only to condone their treatment, but actually partake of what was on offer.

That night I found myself once again seeking the hydroponics lab, and once again listening to the slow, decidedly melancholy notes of someone’s music drifting to me down the corridors. It seemed I felt more than heard the music, as if it seeped out of the pipes running throughout the ship. It was Axel I sought, and answers. I was not disappointed; I found him once again in the belvedere at the centre of the bay. This time my arrival was no surprise to him.

“It seems you like it in here, Mister Escher,” he said by way of greeting, stepping out onto the walkway and stuffing his hands into the pockets of his rumpled trousers. He appeared generally dishevelled, and I wondered if I’d woken him from a snooze.

“Actually, I was looking for you.” I smiled. “And please, call me Simeon.”

“Looking for me?” The boy’s eyes became guarded. “Whatever for at this time of night?”

“Your sister introduced me to Stella.”

“I see.” He leant with against the gazebo, seemingly nonchalant, but something told me it was feigned; he appeared tense, and despite looking at me directly as we spoke, his eyes kept flickering, just slightly, towards the gazebo behind him. “You’re wondering how my father can possibly condone such things—how he can allow his daughter to be aboard, when her kin are being treated in such a manner.”

“Yes.” There was no point dancing around the issue.

“He has no choice.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Drusilla was brought aboard this vessel as soon as my uncle realised her potential. She has not left it since.”

“But . . . you’re talking years!”

“Indeed.” He attempted a smile, but it faltered. “There are only two ways off the Narwhal, Simeon: upon the metaphorical shoulders of my uncle, as he sings your praises for making him a fortune, or in a coffin. My sister has yet to make him a fortune.”

“And you?”

“I was never expected to do so; I am his heir, I shall take over when he dies. Until then, my sister shall never be free, nor will the encante my uncle believes he owns.”

“You will free them when you take over the ship?”

Axel pushed off the wall and leant so close to my ear I could feel the vibrations of his voice against my neck. “When I take over, Simeon, I shall free all of us. Until then, my friend, watch yourself.” He glanced over his shoulder, into the shadows of the gazebo. “My sister had that made, you know. There is something about the acoustics in this room that prevent my uncle’s listening devices from working. Be it the water or the plants, or the damnable fish themselves, I do not know, but it is the only place a person can be assured of any amount of . . . privacy.”

“Devices?” I frowned. “What sort of devices?”

The boy looked at me in the patronising manner of a parent faced with telling their child that his nose sits between his eyes. “There are all manner of devices aboard this vessel, Simeon. Fortunately most of them do not work in this room.”

“What about the tails? They work.”

“Yes.” For a moment Axel’s face was suffused with nothing but rage. “Yes, they work all too well.”

“It seemed to me that Vee was hurt by hers on the day of my arrival,” I ventured. “I have not seen her since. Is she recovered?”

“From that? Yes.”

“And the other girl,” I enquired, “Mae?” He straightened at the name, frowning. “I assume she works with Stella? Yet she was not there today. She looked so frail when last I saw her, I feared—”

“She lives, although I believe at this point she wishes that were not the case.” His frown deepened. “I’m surprised you know about her.”

“Teddy was treating her not long after I arrived.”

Axel nodded. “He’ll get himself killed one of these days, but he won’t stop. I can’t say I blame him; if I knew how to take the risk for him, I would do so, but he refuses to teach me. And I believe he feels he owes it to Drusilla.”

“The risk?”

That patronising look returned briefly, only to be replaced by something akin to envy, as if he wished he lived in a world where the knowledge in his possession were not so mundane. “Stella’s girls all take . . . precautions, you understand?”

I thought for a moment. “Pregnancy?”

“Precisely. They do not wish to end up like Drusilla’s mother. Were any of them to fall pregnant, by law my uncle would be forced to execute them. He opposes the Kabbalah in many things, but that is one line he will not cross. My father took steps to ensure Drusilla remained unseen by them. Even the Harlequin does not know of her existence, but such would not be the case with another child. He no longer has the same resources at his disposal. Stella protects them as best she can.”

“And these precautions make the girls sick?”

“Not usually, but Mae is different. You will have noted her legs, or lack thereof?” I nodded. “Teddy has speculated that it is the great difference in her lower torso that makes the drugs he gives the other girls ineffective on Mae. They simply do not work.”

“By the gods, the girl is pregnant?” I was horrified. I could not imagine the burden of such an event on so young a girl, much less when it would surely be impossible for her to know which of the many sailors she serviced was the child’s father.

“She was.” Axel shook his head. “Teddy gave her something to shake the child loose. It has always worked before, but something has gone wrong this time. The child died within her, but was not expelled. It caused a severe infection which almost killed her.”

“Always?” I stared at him, now quite certain there could be nothing more horrific than this backwards system of slavery. “You said it ‘always’ worked before. This has happened to the girl more than once?”

“A dozen or so times, I’m afraid.” Axel shook his head. “Teddy has been unable to find a way of preventing her from conceiving, yet he cannot allow her to be put to death for something that is not her fault. So he helps her, if you could call it that. He risks death himself by doing so, but such is the nature of the old man.”

I considered the mild-mannered doctor who had treated me with such kindness, and who had reacted with such genuine horror at the sight of the child, so frail upon her arrival.

“Drusilla was with Mae the day I saw her in the medical bay. You said Teddy owes it to her—because she is encante?”

“Because he is responsible for Drusilla’s mother’s death, or at least believes himself to be.” Axel pushed off the gazebo, moving past me as if towards the exit. He paused, turning back towards me, as if expecting me to follow.

“How so?”

“My father brought Drusilla’s mother to Teddy once. Drusilla was still very young and feeding at the breast. She was near death due to the way they had been forced to live in order to avoid being found, but she had given everything to keep Drusilla well, at the expense of her own health. I was too young to recall, but father has spoken of it often—the selflessness of the woman, the courage it took for her to do as she did. He was at his wits’ end and knew she would die if he did nothing, and so risked her being killed if she was found out.”

“And Teddy gave her up?”