The Sylph Hunter (10 page)

Encouraged by the answer but still nervous, Airi moved closer, seeing how Shasha was injured. She’d lost part of her pattern and was leaking energy even as she lay there. She didn’t have the strength to tell if there was still danger outside her hiding place, let alone to get out of it.

Except for the masters they were bound to, the energy of this world was poisonous to them; to try to consume it was to die. The energy within themselves was natural to them though, no matter its source.

Airi eased up to Shasha’s side, afraid the older sylph would interpret her actions as a threat and lash out. Shasha just lay there and Airi stretched out beside her, delicately linking her pattern to the injured sylph so that she could feed her some of her own energy.

It felt strange. Shasha wasn’t from her hive and was an earth sylph. Even back home, air sylphs and earth sylphs didn’t interact much. Their jobs were very different and they didn’t have much need to actively work together. Besides, what Airi was doing now was a very rare thing. Usually, a healer would be sent for a wounded sylph or the queen would order them abandoned if they couldn’t make it back to the hive themselves. For two elementals to share their energy was almost never done, but it wasn’t unheard of.

Airi fed Shasha some of the energy that she’d taken from Devon that morning, now changed within her to something edible for all sylphs. It wasn’t the most nourishing—Airi wasn’t a food sylph and wasn’t designed to produce energy for others to eat—but it was enough for Shasha to regain some small amount of her strength, if not to heal herself. Airi didn’t have enough power in her entire pattern for that.

It was intimate though. Airi felt her pattern blend up against the earth sylph’s, and felt some of Shasha’s pain and desperate fear for her master, even as Shasha experienced Airi’s terror and uncertainty at being in the heart of an alien hive. That need for someone else to be there for them echoed through both sylphs and Airi felt her energy pour into Shasha’s damaged pattern, the flow controlled by the other sylph.

I won’t take too much,
Shasha promised.

I know,
Airi answered, knowing that was the truth.

A moment later, it was done. Shasha rose from beside her unconscious master, a slim creature of marble and gems. Beautiful, she raised her arms and Airi felt the stone around them move, shifting around the earth sylph as easily as the air did around Airi. Gently, the chamber she’d made rose, lifting up through the ground.

What happened?
Airi asked her finally, though she knew the only reason Shasha would have run the way she did was from a predator, and that there was only one predator in existence where calling the battlers wouldn’t make a difference.

Gleaming ruby eyes turned toward her, glistening in the sparse light coming through the airhole Shasha had left to give her master a way to breathe, despite what must have been a very real terror that the thing which drove her into the ground to begin with would be able to find it and use it to reach them.

A Hunter,
Shasha told Airi, to her unsurprised horror.
A Hunter has come through the gate.

CHAPTER SIX

O
n the same morning that Devon and Xehm went to the gate and found Gel and Shasha—and for the first time since she had started working at the restaurant, landing a job that saved her and her father from starvation and probable slavery—Zalia woke after dawn.

For a moment, she just stared up at the cracks in the roof of her hovel in confusion, not understanding what she was seeing. She hadn’t seen the sun shining down on her and her blankets in almost five years. Every morning, she’d already been at work by the time the sun rose.

Suddenly, Zalia realized where she was and rolled out of her blankets, scrambling to her feet in a panic. Unaware of how his own morning would fare, her father was still sleeping in his bed, snoring, and he didn’t wake as Zalia bolted out of the hut, running toward the city. She passed Devon’s hut with only a miserable glance. She’d stayed awake until long into the night, thinking about him. Even the realization that she might lose her job because of it couldn’t cool her warm thoughts toward the man and she hoped that he’d have a better day than she looked to as she ran to the restaurant. She didn’t stop to bathe first. She would only be later and there would be too many people around the stables to risk it now. As she ran, she worked her fingers through her hair, getting the knots out as she tamed it into something that wouldn’t get her fired on the spot. Her clothes she could do nothing about, but at least her apron would mostly hide how worn and old they were.

Ilaja saw her coming up the street, panting as she ran, and the other woman’s eyes widened as Zalia hurried to the edge of the patio. There were already customers in the restaurant, drinking and eating in the cool air of early morning.

“Where have you been?” Ilaja demanded. “You’ll be fired for this!”

Zalia ran up and stopped before her, panting desperately. Ilaja looked at her in disgust. “I’m sorry,” she gasped. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t tell me,” Ilaja sniffed. “The cook’s already sent word to the owner. He’s not going to care why you were whoring around.”

Zalia stared at her in shock. She and Ilaja had never been friends, but she’d never expected this kind of response from the woman. “I wasn’t whoring!”

“I saw you leave with a man,” Ilaja snapped. “This is supposed to be a wholesome place.”

Zalia’s world reeled. “I wasn’t whoring!” was all she could manage to repeat. The customers were starting to look in their direction with what seemed to Zalia to be delight. “What did you say to them?”

“I just told them what I saw,” Ilaja said and turned away, returning to her customers with a smile.

Zalia felt sick. Ilaja hadn’t been joking when she said Orlil would fire her, and from the way she was smiling, Ilaja didn’t care. There wasn’t nearly the business there had been in past years and being the only waitress would mean more tips for her. Trying not to cry, Zalia went to get her apron and work her tables. If he stayed true to past history, the owner wouldn’t be around until midmorning. Perhaps if she made a good enough impression on her customers before then, she wouldn’t lose her job.

It wasn’t easy. Zalia was so stressed, she messed up several orders and even flubbed a pitcher of water, almost dousing a customer who mercilessly berated her for her mistake. Ilaja’s smirks didn’t help either as the woman passed her several times, beaming at her own customers. All of them seemed to take a perverse pleasure in Zalia’s misery. Zalia tried to tell herself she was just imaging things and no one was against her, but her fear was too great. She couldn’t afford to lose this job. There wasn’t much left for a woman of her station in Meridal, save to become the whore Ilaja had already called her.

No one would want her then, she thought desperately. Her father would be so ashamed; only what else could she do?

It was close to midmorning; more customers were taking seats in the restaurant. It looked as if she’d lose her job on one of the busiest days they’d had in months. Zalia put a pitcher on one table and turned to the next to set down their pita and hummus, the same dish she’d served to Devon the previous day. None of this was his fault. He’d done nothing but treat her with respect, and Ilaja had disliked him from the start.

Someone sat down at the table behind her, the chair scraping against the stone. Zalia finished setting out the meal and turned around.

“Hi,” One-Eleven said.

Zalia gaped at him, her heart hammering. He was as unbelievably handsome as before, his carriage utterly different from Devon’s as he sat there grinning. He was wearing simple clothes, but he was so beautiful that everyone looked at him. Even Ilaja was gaping. No one recognized him for what he was, Zalia realized. Then again, how could they? He wasn’t behaving like a battle sylph and there was no reason for one to come and sit at their restaurant. Well, there was, she thought after a moment, wasn’t there?

As if he could read her thoughts, and some of the stories said the battlers could, One-Eleven grinned even wider, lounging in the chair as if it were a throne. He didn’t seem to care at all that everyone was staring at him, or perhaps he felt in some fashion that it was his due. Either way, he was confident and strong, everything she didn’t feel she could be, standing there with her tray clutched to her breast and not knowing if she’d still have a job in the next hour.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered a little frantically. Ilaja was serving another of her tables nearby, glaring jealously at Zalia.

One-Eleven’s grin didn’t even flicker. “I finished the job I was assigned and I wanted to see you. So I came by. You don’t mind, do you?”

What was she supposed to say to that? Zalia didn’t know what to even think. She just knew there was a warmth puddling in her belly at the sight of him and suddenly the memory of Devon was far away. She felt guilt at that, but One-Eleven was just so suddenly and overwhelmingly
there
that she couldn’t think of anything else except him and how he was making her breasts tingle. At that thought, she remembered how he’d found her bathing at the stable and the warmth of him against her back and buttocks as he cupped her breast and prepared to take her virginity.

She’d never keep her job acting this way, she realized frantically, suddenly angry at him for adding this stress on top of the fears she already had. “You can’t be here,” she hissed at him. He blinked. “You’ll ruin everything!”

“How?” he asked, sounding reasonably and, unfortunately, loud. “I just wanted to see you.”

Zalia’s voice had been quiet, only carrying to One-Eleven, but his still came out at a normal volume and Zalia flushed as she realized what it looked like—her snubbing a customer right in the restaurant. Ilaja sniffed and stepped up beside her, shouldering her aside. “Well, if you can’t at least be nice to a valued customer,” she said, “I’ll have to help him.” She turned her smile on One-Eleven. “How can I help you…”

Her voice trailed off. One-Eleven was glaring at her in silence, his body language suddenly tense and angry. The very way he held himself was both a threat and a promise. He looked straight into Ilaja’s eyes without blinking and she squeaked, suddenly backing away.

What did he make her feel? Zalia wondered in amazement and looked back at him. One-Eleven still glared at Ilaja, but when Zalia turned to him, he flickered his eyes at her for a moment and gave her a brief smile that started all the warmth up inside her again.

She sagged. “You have to order something to stay here,” she told him.

“Oh, okay. I can do that.”

A sudden thought occurred to her. “Do you have any money?” she asked.

“No.”

Zalia hugged her tray tighter, trying to think. Maybe she could convince him to meet her later, after her shift ended, if she still had a job. But if she did that, what was to prevent him from trying to seduce her? Did she even have the strength to stop him again? Just the thought of it had her throbbing with needs that didn’t care how ready for it all she might actually be. Part of her wanted him inside her and it didn’t care about anything else.

One-Eleven studied her, tilting his beautiful head to one side to regard her while his smile continued to play around his lips. Oh yes, she thought with something that might have been excitement as much as it was despair. He’d have her if he came on her alone again.

Ilaja tapped her shoulder and she jumped. Zalia hadn’t been aware of the woman leaving or coming back, but she’d regained her composure. “Orlil wants to see you inside,” she said with a smirk.

Zalia’s heart sank. Of course Orlil would show up now; he couldn’t have possibly seen her in a worse light than standing in the middle of the patio, ignoring all her customers while she stared at one man as though she wanted to tear his clothes off.

“What’s wrong?” One-Eleven asked, his smile gone.

“Wait here,” Zalia murmured, waving him down when he started to stand. She was so frightened that all of her ardor was gone. She was so terrified she could even think about Devon again, and wondered a little guiltily if, when he did find the queen, he’d be able to ask her to give Zalia a new job.

She walked across the patio toward the kitchen, her tray still held against her breasts like a shield. Probably sensing what was coming, the other customers laughed as she passed, though a few had the dignity to look sorry for her. No one said anything; there wasn’t anything for anyone to say. There wasn’t even anything Zalia could say to defend her case, not without looking like a harlot, and that would still get her fired anyway.

She walked through the wide doorway and into the kitchen. It was swelteringly hot inside, the heat of the day’s sun combined with the roaring fires of the cookstove. Pots bubbled on the stoves and cooks shouted at each other, somehow producing food out of the chaos. The cool water she served was kept below, deep underground where the heat didn’t reach.

That was where Orlil had his office. Zalia made her way down the steep steps in the dark, one hand on the dry wall as she made her way. Orlil carried his own lamp down with him and didn’t want to waste money lighting the stairs. Anyone else who came down here for the water always risked a broken leg or neck. At the bottom of the stairs was a large cistern that held their water, the liquid dark inside the well. Zalia saw something move in the shadows that might have been a rat and crossed the room toward the office on the other side. The cellar was at least ten degrees colder than the patio outside and she shivered, though that might have been from fear.

Orlil’s office was small, the battered desk covered with the abacus and wax tablets he used to keep track of the restaurant’s sales, as well as those of the other businesses he owned, most of which she didn’t know anything about. Zalia suspected that, even with the chaos in the city, Orlil was still a very wealthy man.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t a kind one. Orlil was bitter, scrawny to the point of looking starved, and his head was shaved to show his free status, not that it mattered anymore. Theoretically, everyone was free now, but Orlil had enough authority over Zalia that he may as well have owned her. He directed what hours she worked, what money she kept from her tips, what she could wear, and how she was to behave whenever she was at the restaurant. Zalia had always suspected that he would have been raping and beating his waitresses if it weren’t for the battlers. Any violence against women resulted in an instant response from them, though they’d always couched it under the rules against disturbing the peace before and taken the transgressor to die in the arena. Now they’d probably just kill the man. That reminded her of One-Eleven upstairs and she bowed deeply to hide her sudden blush.

“You wanted to see me, sir?” she said.

Her head down, she couldn’t see him, but she imagined Orlil frowning and lacing his long fingers together on top of the desk. “I don’t want whores working in my restaurant,” he said flatly.

Zalia’s head came up, her heart hammering though she’d known this was coming. “I’m not a whore!” she protested.

Orlil’s frown deepened, glaring at her through the light of the oil lamp. “Ilaja saw you whoring with a man last night and I saw you with that man when I came this morning. I don’t want women selling themselves here and ruining my reputation.”

Her heart sank further. “I haven’t been selling myself,” she promised. “Please, sir. I haven’t done a thing.”

He looked away. “All women are whores. I don’t want to see you here again.”

Zalia fell to her knees, tears in her eyes. She’d starve. Her father would starve. There weren’t any jobs in Meridal anymore, not with so many people leaving and so much confusion. Her father was too old and frail for this to happen to them. “Please, sir!” she begged. “I can’t lose this job! I’ve never been late before. I’ve never failed you!”

“You failed me this time and I’m not in business to deal with failure.” He regarded her for a moment, his gaze making her feel slimy even through the terror. “Perhaps I can use you at one of my other businesses.”

Zalia clasped her hands together before her breasts. “Sir?” she asked hopefully.

“I have a massage parlor down near the docks,” Orlil told her. “I can use another girl there.”

Zalia’s heart fell. He was firing her for being a whore and offering her a job in a massage parlor instead? “But I’m not a whore,” she repeated in a whisper.

“All women are whores,” he said again. “Take it or find someone else to sell yourself to.”