"I came here to collect an Ephemeral Card, not take on a job for you," Asher grumbled.
One month prior, the southern city of Elidu . . .
He trudged over endless dunes while the sun beat at his shoulders and head through his makeshift cloak. The desert heat felt good, though the sand rubbing his feet raw through his open-heeled shoes was getting old.
The fish-thing thrashed in agitation.
"Take it easy!" Asher paused to remove his hood, shaking out his sweaty hair in the dry, hot air. Then he looked down at the fish. "This is the one I'm supposed to rescue?" he asked.
The fish flapped its fins, its reddened, swollen eyes rolling.
Asher sighed, squinting against a headache that had started behind one temple. "I can't believe I have to deal with this."
He held out his left arm so that he and the fish could look each other in the face like men. The damn thing swallowed a little more of his arm, just an inch or two, until its snub nose nearly reached his shoulder.
"All right!" Asher yelled, trying, once again, to shake it loose. "I'll help you. Just let go!"
In reply, it chewed manically on his biceps, teeth snagging in denim.
With a sigh, Asher knelt to study the unconscious figure lying in the sand. She was an alien, judging by the pale skin that shimmered like abalone shell under Ephemeros's fierce white sun and the sea-colored hair, blue eyebrows furrowed over thick blue eyelashes. Just a kid. She had obviously collapsed amid the windswept dunes.
"She isn't hurt, you know," he said in a softer voice. The gnashing jaws stilled, so he put the edge of his free hand against the girl's forehead. "She's just dirty. And she might have a fever. I know a guy who can help her, so I'll take her to the city."
Apparently reassured, the fish burped. It regurgitated Asher's arm and fell with a plop in the sand. It coughed a couple of times, and then a length of leather strap rolled out from between its teeth, which it hooked to two rings that pierced its tailfin and its jaw. With much wriggling around, it managed to wrap the strap crosswise over the girl's shoulder and settled, with a happier look, in the small of her back like a very weird duffel bag.
Asher watched the whole procedure impassively. While his hand had been inside the thing, he had felt many objects of countless textures and shapes, but nothing like the slimy guts of a fish. It looked up at him with a pitiful, bloodshot, doll-like eye, pleading for his help.
There was nothing for it. Asher scooped up the girl, slinging her with some difficulty onto his back. Holding her like an awkward backpack, he turned and began the long trek back to the city.
She woke once near sunset, for he could feel her lift her head and her gasp on the rim of his ear, as he topped a final rise and Elidu came into sight. Then she passed out again, whimpering.
The crags drew together, funneling Asher toward a natural bridge of rock, which protected the city's entrance. A cooler blast of air issued from beneath the bridge, setting the tall, lush, blue-violet trees rustling. There, in the modest and efficient adobe buildings of the southern city, they would find shelter, food, and water. Plus, the Ephemeral Card he had come to trade for in the first place. He made his way through the wide streets, which were shaded by the high bluffs and bustling with activity. Adventurers, mercenaries, journeymen, and mancers of the Elementis Achaici plied their trade among close-packed shops and stalls, though aliens like Asher and the girl on his back were few. Well-dressed civilians on the shop for dinner gave him a wide berth as he turned the corner toward Mareh, a Card trading post owned by his friend, Evidd.
Evidd opened the back door to his knock, took one startled look at Asher and the unconscious girl, and yanked them inside. The door slammed shut behind them.
..::~*~::..
"Three Cards."
"Forget it. You've got to give me at least five Cards."
Night had fallen, and the street lamps had been lit. But on this night, Mareh Trading Post was not open for general business.
"Some things never change, Ev," Asher said, snarling through his grin. "Except for your prices. They just keep going up and up and up! Five is a big hike over last year."
Evidd mimicked his less-than-friendly grin. "Sorry, Ash. I've got to eat, too. Inflation's pretty bad this year."
Asher glared at Evidd, but Evidd didn't back down. Something had changed him since the last time Asher had rolled through town, made more of a man out of him. The bandanna Evidd used to keep his long, crinkled hair out of his face was the same, though, as were the wire-rimmed spectacles he pulled out of his pocket, snapped open, and placed on his nose.
Smiling, Evidd picked up a receipt book and a glass pen from next to his clockwork cash register. He dipped the pen in a tiny pot of green ink and held it ready. "So, then, five?"
"Four, or I set fire to the shop," Asher retorted, holding up a smoking Zini Card. When his friend grudgingly agreed, he set his canvas seabag on the floor so he could search for the wallet in which he kept his less-used Ephemeral Cards. "Throw in one of those new bottles of gingko pills, will you? The big one."
"You got it," Evidd said, perking up immediately. He made a tick on his notepad with a happy flourish. "If you give me three more Cards, you can purchase Zinika and get the pills for half off regular sale price."
"Nah." Asher selected four Ephemeral Cards from the wallet's folds: two common water-type Undi, a single common metal-type Tinni, and the mid-grade metal-type Keloa. All good Ephemeral Cards, but useless to a fire-type Card Master like himself. "You know, I wouldn't be buying into your racket if I didn't need a high-powered Card to take care of the mess in East Hasalmawet. It'll be tough, but Zind should be enough. I nailed some punks near Basanose with just two Zini."
"Ah," Evidd said, pulling down a Red Book of Fire from the shelf behind the register. He flipped through the pages, his back to Asher. "So that's where you were."
"You know it?" Asher asked. He accepted the Zind Card from his friend, and then passed over the coins for the gingko pills.
"Sure," Evidd said, smiling in an unbearably sappy way. "My wife Nimua and I got married there."
Marriage. A wife. That explained a lot. Asher wasn't interested in settling down. Especially not with a human. Still, a wedding in Basanose . . . Had to have been recent, too . . .
"You sure surprised me, showing up with that girl the way you did. I can't imagine why the Vigilante Corps didn't stop you," Evidd said, breaking into Asher's thoughts. "I thought I'd have to help you bury the body!"
"I didn't see any of the Corps, but I saw the posters." Asher scratched his ear piercings. "You're having some trouble with Nightmares lately. They're all over town. Five dead at last count, was that it?"
"Yes. It's a shame, but Elidu is much too big for the Nightmares to turn us into a reap-site."
"Seems to me the Corps isn't doing its job."
"You may be right." Evidd finished filing the new Ephemeral Cards in the proper books, the Silver Book of Metal and the Blue Book of Water, and then turned, his face serious. "I have to tell you, Ash, I never expected to see you doing a good deed. That girl you brought in, I guess she felt a lot better after resting. Nimua's up with her now. She was asking for you."
Asher refrained from rolling his eyes with extreme difficulty. He couldn't just bail and leave this burden on Evidd, he supposed. Better go see what she wanted first. Then he could be on his way.
He followed Evidd through the door that opened onto a narrow, rickety staircase, which gave them access to the living quarters above the store. Evidd shut the door, sliding the U-bolt home. Obviously, the threat of Nightmares bothered him more than he had let on. Then he led Asher to the small guest room that Asher himself had occupied once or twice. Quite differently from before, Asher could smell the faint perfume of flowers, see them in a little powder-blue vase on the nightstand.
Two women looked up at his entrance, one a blonde-haired human, from a chair, the other the blue-haired alien, tucked into the single-person bed, nude to at least her waist. Two sets of eyes widened at his appearance.
He didn't notice. The surprisingly mature swell of the alien's pearl-white breasts sort of pushed everything else to the background. The rosy perkiness of her nipples wasn't such a bad repayment for a good deed, he supposed. But then she ducked under the edge of an embroidered quilt, which Asher guessed belonged to the new lady of the house. She pulled the quilt all the way up, over her nose. Seaweed-purple eyes studied him warily.
"Where are your manners?" the human named Nimua gently chided her patient. She had the lighter, peaches-and-cream complexion of the natives from the northern cities. "Don't you remember the man who saved you?"
Shell-pink flooded the girl's face. She sat up, mouth open to speak, but Asher stopped her.
"I wasn't trying to save you," he said. He jerked a thumb at the fish, lying on a side table. "That thing took my arm hostage."
The girl's seaweed-colored eyes slid toward the fish. It stiffened guiltily. A look of affection passed across her face.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly. Her accent wasn't unbearable, though pronounced. She hugged her knees. "Sang-eo was just trying to protect me. My memory has been hazy ever since I got thrown from the ship."
"Ship?" Asher frowned, curious in spite of himself. "Are you a sailor?"
The girl shook her head. "I am haenyeo. Namsaeng-i is our home on the darkling Seas of Hangsang Bam. It's the star-time of sea giant harvest, but a storm threw me overboard. Hangsang Bam is friend and mother to all haenyeo, but that night, she was angry and frightened. Did the storm wreck your ship, too?"
Nimua, who didn't appear to have comprehended much of this speech, clapped her hands together in delight. "Haenyeo? I've heard that word before. I read it in a book I loved as a child." She looked up at her husband, her face happy. "It translates as mermaid."
The alien girl cocked her head. "Mer-maid?"
"Come on, you're spare," Asher said to Nimua. "Don't mermaids have tails like fish?" At least, that's what he thought he remembered about mermaids. She'd loved ridiculous books like that, too. Humans. They were all the same, no matter what world they came from.
"Dummy!" Nimua winked and grinned. "Mermaid magic allows them to transform into a human body when they walk on land! The little mermaid traded her voice to the sea witch for legs so she could be with the one she loved, you see."
Asher tried to share a glance with Evidd, but the Card trader was smiling indulgently at his peach-cheeked wife. That time, Asher did roll his eyes.
"I'm sorry, I don't really understand," the girl said. She buried her face in her knees briefly. When she lifted it again, it shone with an urgency Asher remembered all too well. "Um, so can you tell me where I am? And how do I get to Anasika Port?"
"Anasika?" Nimua put a finger to her chin and lifted eyes as blue as the northern skies to the featureless ceiling.
Evidd shrugged. "Never heard of the place."
"I don't know how I got here," the girl said, her eyes filling with tears. "I only know that I must return to Namsaeng-i. I can reach home from Anasika."
After an uncomfortable moment, in which the girl's gaze had jumped with increasing desperation from face to face, Nimua filled a dainty, posy-painted mug from a pot on the nightstand. An inviting curl of steam rose into the cool nighttime air, and Asher couldn't help but sniff appreciatively. The noodle soup broth inside must have come from the popular restaurant next door.
"Here, Miss Keon. Drink this," Nimua said.
"It's Keon-hee, please," the girl said, sounding as though she was apologizing for requesting they use her name correctly.
Nimua brushed a lock of blue hair away from the girl's eyes. "Okay, then, but drink. It will help calm your nerves."
Her solicitousness jabbed into Asher like a mushussu's barbed tail. No one had carried him in from the desert. No one had fed him, or protected him. And if it weren't for him, this kid would be dead.
"Listen," he harshly said before she could take the offered mug. He crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe. "There is no place called Anasika. There is no such thing as a Namsa-whatever. We're not on a ship. There isn't an ocean for hundreds of mails. You're not in your world anymore. You're an alien here."
Nimua's previously kind face darkened.
"That's quite enough!" she announced. She stood, shaking out her skirt and straightening her apron, and then she set the mug a little harder than necessary on the nightstand. "Could you step outside, please?"
Asher ignored her. Natives never truly cared for aliens, no matter the show they made of their generosity at first. He looked past her as though she wasn't there, causing her to huff and put her fists on her hips.
The alien girl met his gaze, tears pouring over her cheeks.
"If I were you, I'd get used to this place," he said brutally. "You're never gonna get back home. And a word of advice? Don't travel alone or a Nightmare will get you."
With that, he marched out of the room and down the stairs. Evidd did not follow him.
This suited Asher just fine. In the quiet, book-filled shop, which crackled and whispered with the latent energy of sleeping Ephemeral Cards, he tightened the laces of his shoes, packed away his Card wallet, slung his saber from his belt, and swung his heavy seabag over his shoulder. Time to move on, now that he had the Zind Card. His new contract was waiting for him on the Black Tortoise road, a native named Elyk. Elyk wanted an escort home to East Hasalmawet since the last anyone had heard, it had become a reap-site, and he wanted to search for evidence of his fiancée's death.
Asher, having left the Mareh Trading Post "Closed for Business" sign swinging, made it as far as the back alley before the girl came charging out right behind him. In her haste, she had left the fish-thing behind. The sign swung harder, scraping the door.
Her people must have lived in tropical seas, for she wore very little in shades of white and teal, just a cropped, short-sleeved shirt that barely contained her breasts, a pair of shorts belted high around her slender waist, and sandals tied with striped ribbons up to her knees. He seriously doubted she even knew what underclothes were.
"Wait, please! Mr. Asher?"
He stared at her incredulously. What kind of name was that for a guy like him?
She'd stopped crying, thank the fires of Mt. Yrianthe. A small breeze lifted a single, thin braid in her pixie-short hair, bringing the sounds of dining and talking natives from the restaurant next door. It was a busy night, judging by the noise.
"Thank you," she said, steepling her fingers. She spoke to them rather than to him. "You rescued me from the desert, and bought me food—"
"I've got news for you," he interrupted. "I didn't buy you dirt. I didn't get a reward for saving you, either."
The shy smile of gratitude froze on her face as the meaning of his words sank in.
"Hope you work it off," he called as he began walking away.
"I don't understand!" she cried. "Wait, please, I—"
"Where do you think you're going, girl?" a gruff voice demanded. Asher glanced over his shoulder in time to see the proprietor of the restaurant grab the girl's arm. He spun her around and marched her toward the open kitchen door, through which Asher could see a mountain of dirty pots, pans, and other dishes, and two haggard scullions scrubbing for all they were worth. "You owe me for that meal. Get to work, or we'll get to work on you!"
Completely free of guilt, Asher walked to the front street and merged with the late-evening crowds. He let out a sigh of relief.
Finally rid of her.
This little detour had cost him a whole day. Who could have known that the fish-thing had been lying in wait behind that stack of crates, prepared to latch onto the first arm that got too close? A lumbering ox of a mercenary had shouldered him aside; he'd taken half a step back; a broken bottle had shanked his heel; he'd flinched as though he'd never been stabbed before; and what was that about, anyway? – and that was how he'd gotten into the thing's range. But now he was rid of it, and could get back to work. He walked along, ears alert for trouble, his long stride keeping him out of the crush of shoppers and revelers.
Against his chest, the dragon claw twitched.
Asher looked down. The broken claw, stained brown in the cracks, slowly rose from the front of his ratty white shirt, trailing the thong that kept it tied around his neck. It lifted into the air like a question, seeking.
Then it pointed, as straight and true as the needle of a compass.
A grin spread over Asher's face. "Right," he said in a low voice to the claw. "Nothing wrong with a little side trip."
He took off running.
A/N: Hello, darlings. Finished this a day early, so I thought I'd put it up and focus on the next ThunderCats submission. Please drop a review on your way out!
Reviewer Thanks! St4r Hunter, again! It makes me so happy to see your comments. X3
Cheers!
Anne