Next morning she dragged herself from bed in a dull fog. She wished she could believe the night before had been nothing but a nightmare, but she knew better. She went through the motions of her work automatically, without thought.
When meal break was called, she hung back, reluctant. She would rather just avoid the slave's mess hall altogether, but hunger gnawed at her belly. She fell in at the very end of the line, trying not to look, but her eyes sought the head of the line almost of their own accord.
There he was, accepting his bowl from the server. He didn't look around as he approached the tables.
From a table crowded with men and women, a call went up. "Hey Kern! Come sit with us." He nodded and went to join them, seating himself between two women who had hastily scooted aside to make room. At first he was quiet, but soon his voice joined the babble of chatter and laughter.
Shmi stumbled forward, nudged by the people behind her in line, eyes blurred with tears. It truly was over. She took her bowl to the furthest corner of the hall and ate in solitude, forcing down food gone dry and tasteless in her mouth. After she finished she deposited her bowl with the dirty dishes, habitually keeping her cup with its last few drops of water.
She took one step toward the kitchen door, and then looked down at the cup in her hand. She bit her lip and clenched her free hand into a fist. Slowly, deliberately, she brought the cup to her lips and drained it dry. Her hand shaking, she threw the cup down among the dirty dishes, turned, and walked with heavy steps back to her workplace.
The days that followed were bleaker than Shmi had ever imagined possible. Angry fantasies of confronting him, slapping him, spitting in his drink, tearing up their patch of flowers and throwing them in his face, alternated with darker visions of slipping into his alcove to cut his throat and then her own, finding some poison to put in his bowl or hers, making a doomed break for freedom so the guards would blast her into oblivion. But in the end she did nothing, for she could not truly will any harm to him, and though in her despair her life often seemed worthless, Kern had sensed truly that her will to live, like that of the desert flower, was strong, and she could not easily surrender it.
So, in spite of herself, she adjusted. On the rare occasion when she could not avoid him, she looked past him without seeing, and he did the same to her. Her heart ached with emptiness, and she felt like only half herself, but work was always there, and sleep, and there was little enough time apart from those two occupations to worry about filling.
She still brought Irneeto nightly tidbits, for his was the only friendly face left to her. He accepted them graciously, and chatted with her about inconsequential things, and was kind to her, which she appreciated deeply.
One evening a tart, briny smell permeated the corridors of the compound. When Shmi came to bring Irneeto her offering, she was surprised to find him pacing restlessly, pausing occasionally to breathe deeply, then blowing out his breath, shaking his head, and returning to his agitated prowl.
He took her food with a nod of thanks, but she could tell he was still distracted. He gazed down the corridor longingly, and then turned to her.
"Do you smell that?" He seemed reluctant to speak, but she felt he needed to talk to someone.
"Yes. I was wondering about it. Do you know what it is?"
"Oh, yes." His voice was sharp with bitter amusement. "That's the smell of pickled praanto eggs. They come from Mordant, my homeworld. Every spring the praanto migrate to the tops of the highest mountains to spawn. The eggs are harvested, and preserved in sea salt and plinda-berry wine, with herbs that only grow on a certain island." His voice had softened, and his eyes were far away. "They have a mild hallucinogenic effect. I grew up eating praanto eggs every three-moon-night and dark-night. They say once you taste praanto dreams you never loose the craving."
He shook his head and grinned wryly at her. "They are sacred to the moon-goddesses, so they're never exported, which I knew very well when I left Mordant. But Jabba has a private supply smuggled out. He takes it as a challenge, you know, to obtain that which is unobtainable. He likes to serve them to his most honored guests. And every time he does, I have to smell them, and be reminded of what I cannot have."
Shmi caught her breath at the naked longing in his voice. "Don't you have them when you visit your home?"
His grin grew very strained. "No, furling. My leaving Mordant was… not entirely voluntary. Circumstances would have to change a great deal for me to be able to go back. I doubt that will ever happen."
"Can't you ask Jabba…"
He snorted, a mirthless, cynical sound. "I tried to buy some, the first time I found out he had them. I would have paid all my savings. When he refused, I offered to work a year at half pay. Ten years." His eyes dropped, and his voice lowered. "I offered to sell myself to him as a slave, in exchange for a single case. He just laughed."
Shmi stared at him. He made a self-conscious shrugging gesture that involved all three arms. "No matter. But if I seem a bit distracted tonight, now you know why."
Shmi nodded. There was nothing she could say. But before she left, she reached out tentatively and patted one furry blue arm. He smiled and shooed her off to her quarters.
Months passed. Shmi settled into an attitude of calm. Not depressed, but not happy either, focusing only on the present moment, working, sleeping, thinking as little as possible. She supposed she might spend the rest of her life this way, but dismissed the thought as soon as it occurred. She would not think of the future or the past.
Until one day her peace was shattered. She was dishing out spoonfuls of vegetables to the servants and employees who shuffled past, when the large Gamorrean guard, Ketrell, and his group of friends approached. She had never quite lost the habit of paying particular attention to them, so her ears picked up their agitated conversation even before its significance registered.
"… no, Ploddle's so stupid he wouldn't know a six-card orbit from a hole in his head."
Coarse laughter greeted that remark.
"Curse Borq anyway for getting himself blasted and leaving us one short of a seven." A chorus of enthusiastic voices denounced the unfortunate Borq's ancestry and personal habits, and described his desired fate in vivid language. Shmi ducked her head and blushed.
"And there's no one else in the whole compound knows sabaac well enough to be worth taking their money…"
Without thinking, Shmi spoke. "Kern plays sabaac."
The huge tusked aliens stared at her.
"Kern Bluesand." His name was strange in her mouth. She shrank from their gaze, wishing could sink into the ground and vanish, but their eyes fixed on her compelled her to continue. "The head mechanic in the garage. He's good at sabaac."
Ketrell spit contemptuously to the side. "That human scum?"
She put all her effort into a shrug she hoped looked casual, but feared looked as terrified as she felt. "Just thought you'd like to know. Though if you'd rather play with six…"
Ketrell accepted her scoop of vegetable on his plate and turned away. "A slave's got nothing to wager."
One of his cronies hurried after him, almost slopping the vegetables Shmi aimed at his plate as he passed. "But Ketrell, six is no good, you know that. We could float him a loan to start out…"
"Shut up." But Shmi could see that neither he nor the other four Gamorreans who followed would be quiet for long. As they followed Ketrell to their table their voices were already raised, badgering him to include Kern in their game.
Shmi turned back to her work, tears blurring her eyes. Why had she bothered? Kern had given up trying to escape, hadn't he? He shouldn't care anymore about finding a way to avoid the perimeter guards. But what was done, was done. She just hoped they never mentioned to Kern who had suggested they ask him.
They must not have, for on the rare occasions she saw him nothing in his manner toward her had changed.