“Vessár,” I said, straightening and clasping my hands behind my back.
“Aldait Han.” He motioned me in.
I tapped my foot on a darker spot on the floor, making a chair unfold. It was tight and uncomfortable, made for someone half my size, but after two cycles of living among Dahlsi, I was used to it. I looked at my commander expectantly. He was short and wiry, with a balding head and grass-blue eyes deeply seated in a web of crow’s feet. They reminded me of two guards flanking the throne that was his enormous nose. The picture would be more dignified, though, if the eyes weren’t always reddened and the nose always runny. Allergies.
Like me, he wore a black single-piece uniform with the logo of Mespana: a sword and a wand crossed over a diamond, along with the number of our cohort stitched on the right arm. The only sign of his office was a silver sash running from left shoulder to right hip.
“What the fuck is this?” he asked, throwing a thin scroll box onto the desk.
I looked at him in confusion.
“A letter for my family, Vessár,” I replied. I had written it during the last mission and threw it into the box on my way here. It was the only thing I’d managed to do after submitting my report.
The mission had been a nightmare. We were in Sorox, a strange, colorless world, and the pervasive grays were getting to me. I almost forgot how my skin looked under normal light. Not to mention trudging through steep, rocky mountains with barely any life, being confined to our six-member group, locked in a tight, uncomfortable tent, and forced to survive on Dahlsian food rations after my own stock ran out. Now, I felt like my uniform was glued to my skin, and no amount of magic would make me clean. I needed to peel it off and take an honest bath: water, soap, and a good scrub. Then put on something comfortable that would let me breathe again and go out, feel the sun on my face. See real colors, eat food that didn’t come from a fucking tube and had a smell, taste, and texture, that satisfied instead of just filling up. I was tired. I needed a break. I’d earned it, by Vhalfr!
But from across the desk, the vessár’s eyes bore into me, and I knew my rest would have to wait.
“Fuck,” he cursed quietly, leaning back in his chair. “Nobody told you yet?”
* * *
The city passed me in a blur. I was drenched in sweat, and my lungs worked like bellows in the hot, damp air. After days spent in chilly Sorox, I found the tropical heat of Sfal unbearable. Yet I ran as if chased by demons, and I didn’t—couldn’t—slow down.
Not until space opened around me and I knew I had reached my destination.
The market.
I had no time for a bath or even a decent meal. Mespana was mobilizing. In half an hour, we were to report in at the train depot, ready for departure to Maurir. But by Vhalfr, I was not going to spend another gods-damned day on food rations!
It was silly, I knew. Food was just sustenance, something to keep the body running. And the state provided all citizens of Dahls, even outworlders like me, with perfectly balanced rations. But I was no Dahlsi; I abhorred that sludge. I was a farmer’s son; I needed real, fresh food: berries eaten from the bush, zeeäth eggs laid in the morning, arpa root thrown on the fire straight from the ground with green tendrils still wriggling, looking for dirt to dig in. Or at least some dry vye to make porridge.
So yes, I was determined to spend the last half-hour of my freedom shopping for groceries.
It was early evening, only one of two triangular suns still open in the golden-pink sky. The market was almost empty; most of the stalls had closed, and the few remaining merchants were packing up. Only food vendors were still aplenty, serving the last dallying patrons, filling the air with the scents of smoke, spices, and deep-fried habava fruit.
I was parched after the run, so I grabbed a bottle of palm sap from a besheq vendor. Their tentacles rippled more than usual, and I couldn’t shake off the impression of being judged. I say “their” because I was never able to determine the sex of most of the nonhumans. Now I wondered how much they could tell about me.
Human. Male.
… Tarvissi?
The vendor left without waiting for me to return the bottle, so I guess that was my answer. I used the spell to turn the flask into sand, and with creeping discomfort, I plunged into the market.
I always had a complicated relationship with that place. I was equal parts intimidated by its size and opulence, awed by the wealth of goods from all around the universe, overwhelmed by crowds, and enraptured by the foods. Now the crowd was almost nonexistent, and the silk cloth hanging over the alley provided respite from the sun, yet whatever semblance of good mood I could muster quickly soured when I noticed merchants stopping what they were doing to stare at me warily. None of them offered me their wares. Usually, it was hard to take a step without having someone throw their stuff at me, yelling encouragements and offers. Especially in the evening when there were more vendors than clients, and they had to fight for every sale.
But now it was different. I—my position—was different.
I pushed such thoughts to the back of my mind. I didn’t have time for them. I stiffened my spine and pressed forward, looking around with my head down, focusing on the wares, not the merchants. Most sold luxury items: ornamental combs of ivory and tortoiseshell, dishes of natural glass shimmering in all colors, golden jewelry, and gloves made for nonhuman hands. A familiar scent reached my nose, and, half-consciously, I followed it to where a
