LOG: BEAKER VILLA, HARTFORD, EARLY SEPTEMBER

  On his next check-in, Basil calls Trimmer first.

  He’d love not to call the guy at all, and just let Mitch pass along his updates. Trimmer’s not exactly a joy to talk to, and the process of calling back home at all is an un-rushable half-hour wrestling match with the apocalyptic spaghetti tangle of landside data networks even if Basil only makes one call. But… every time Basil calls, Mitch looks a little more tired and worried than the last time. He'd never complain, but telling a guy as antisocial as Trimmer over and over again that there's still no update this week can't be making him feel any better. Basil probably could use a longer break from data-crunching than he usually takes anyway.

  Not that calling home is much of a break when it comes to implant load. Having to bounce his calls through a dozen relays is bad enough, but the second or third time he called he picked the wrong node to try to bounce through and ran implants-first into an aggressive bank of firewalls. He still had the lingering migraine when he managed to get through to Mitch the next day.

  Basil’s starting to get why Rich doesn’t like to talk about his scars, the ones he got on his posting where guys had knives and did awful stuff to each other. Getting hurt doesn’t feel cool and tragic and heroic from this side—it sucks. It sucks in a heavy, unavoidable, nonstop kind of way that isn’t going to end until he gets home, and he doesn’t know when he’ll get home. So. There’s no point talking about it.

  The call goes through relatively smoothly this time, at least. Basil sits on hold for a few minutes, idly turning the screen around and around in his hands—Your call is being reviewed by the Michigan Fleet Import/Export Administration Commission! Your call will be monitored! Your call is being reviewed by—before there’s an abrupt little blip and Trimmer picks up, looking like absolute shit.

  “Wright,” he says, and tosses down something that clatters to grab the screen with both hands. There’s a huge, rumbling piece of machinery behind him that Basil can only assume is his penny-boat’s materials reclaimer, churning and clanking, and Trimmer looks sweaty and greasy and kind of wild. He says, “What. What happened?”

  “Nothing happened,” Basil says, a little taken aback. “I thought I’d update you this time, is all. Are you, uh.” Given all the relays Basil has to bounce calls through, not to mention the Fleet bottleneck, there’s almost as much lag on his calls home as there was to Singapore, but Trimmer’s been staring at him for much longer than the lag can account for. With the mismatched blue and green eyes, he looks a lot like the kind of pretty guy who gets a magic destiny and a cursed sword, and then gets driven mad at the end of the story. Or maybe is currently being driven mad.

  Basil tries uncertainly, “Are you… good?”

  “What?” says Trimmer. “I’m—yeah, fuck you too.”

  “I wasn’t—okay then,” Basil says in resignation. “Well, I just wanted to tell you that we’re working as hard as we can, but it’s going to take longer than we thought. There’s a lot of shit to dig through, about lykoi, and… trafficking, and stuff.”

  Trimmer doesn’t flinch at that, just gives a fast, grim jerk of his head that never breaks his terrifying stare from Basil's face and says, “Yeah. Right. Sure. Anything else?”

  “Yeah,” says Basil, and steels himself. “You should talk to somebody. About this.”

  “Yeah?” Trimmer says, like he’d like to take a bite of Basil through the screen. “Yeah?! Who, shrimp? The only guy who’d fucking tolerate me? Oh wait.”

  “I don’t know!” Basil says, defensively. “Your caseworker? Your therapist? Somebody!”

  “I don’t—”

  “Hell, go talk to Angela or something!” Basil says, taking advantage of the lag to push right past the inevitable growling. “They won’t let either of us put an actual call through, she's too tied up with the Washington’s secret libraries or—or something, who the fuck knows, but Lee—Thena says she’s pretty steady, and she’s tough like Rich is.”

  “She’s a club,” Trimmer says, but without nearly as much fire as he did before Basil left the Fleet, just sullenly resigned. “You're too damn cozy with Security, Wright. Just because yours treats you alright—”

  “She's a forensic data analyst missing her brother, she's just as much of a nerd as he is, she's hardly gonna smash your stupid face in for saying hello,” Basil says impatiently, and then catches himself and takes a deep breath. Calm, polite, prosocial. Fire needs fuel and oxygen, a fight can’t start unless both people let it. Damn it. “Do whatever you want, I guess, but going nuts solo isn't gonna help a damn thing. Thena thinks you're funny and Rich thinks you hung the moon, so I would bet that all three Merrills have some kind of inhuman tolerance for your shitty fucking attitude. Sadly for both of us, I do not! I’m going to talk to Mitch now. Okay?”

  Trimmer doesn’t answer. The call ends, and Basil sighs, scrubs at his eyes, and then starts the whole arduous call appeal process over again.

  Mitch looks a lot more pleased to hear from him when he picks up; too pleased, relieved like he thought Basil was never going to call him again or something. Basil makes a guilty mental note to not get so wrapped up working he forgets his bi-weekly call like yesterday.

  “Oh hey, look at you, Professor Landside!” is the first thing Mitch says, as soon as the call picks up. “Nice cosplay.”

  “Oh my god, shut up,” Basil sighs, and tugs at the lapels of his coat, shifting the uncomfortable fabric around. The suits Madame Beaker offhandedly had tailored for him aren’t as ornate and foreign-looking as the outfits Rich brought home from his sexy little patrician friend in New York, but they’re still plenty foreign and uncomfortable compared to Fleet T-shirts and wraps, or even work overshirts and jeans. “You have to dress right around here, or people get so weird about it. I thought they were just being dramatic for movies, but people really do actually care that much about your clothes, it’s insane.”

  Mitch is out on the Reliant’s achingly familiar sundeck, wearing a T-shirt Basil bought him that says “FRIEND SHAPED” in big, peeling block letters and an off-duty officer’s wrap, with the lake and the horizon rocking gently behind him. Basil misses him, misses everyone, misses home so badly for a second it makes him sick. A physical, full-body ache, like a fever that never breaks. He never knew the word homesick wasn’t a metaphor.

  “Hey, it looks nice,” Mitch is saying gently, because Basil’s probably making some stupid face right now. “It was just a surprise. You look really sharp, buddy. Collecting freckles too, huh? Nobody—nobody out there to nag you about sunscreen, I guess.”

  He sounds like he means it to be a joke, but there’s a tight, sad worry in his eyes. He hesitates, then says, “How close do you think you’re getting?”

  It’s been a while since he asked, and Basil wants—so badly—to give him good news. But there’s a stack of books a mile high waiting for him on hold next time he goes to the library, and he can’t lie.

  “Not close enough,” he says, and Mitch’s eyes close for a second, his face tightening. Resignation that hurts more than shock. “It could be… a couple months.”

  “How many months?” Mitch says, tensely.

  “Could be as quick as two. Or three.”

  “And it could also be…?”

  “I don’t know, okay? Four. Six. A year! I don’t know!” Basil hears his voice crack with stress, and drops his face into his hands, trying to keep a hold of himself and not scream or cry or—anything.

  He says as steadily as he can, “We don’t have enough. We know the last person who was with Rich and Liam was a lykoi, maybe a mix. We know the assholes he was in a spectator box with were the kinds of guys who buy and sell people. But the guy who bought the box only deals women to landside sex industry and men to factories and farms, and all the places he deals to refuse to take Hastings. Landside Hastings, I mean, soldier Hastings. They’ve got their whole network, there’s rules about prisoners of war and stuff, if somebody started buying and selling Hastings for farm labor or sex work, the forts they had allies at would come after them. But Rich doesn’t have a fort, and he doesn’t have allies.”

  “He’s got you,” Mitch says, steadfast, and Basil has to swallow hard on the sudden, choking urge to laugh. It’s not a huge web of terrifying supersoldiers strong enough to punch a guy’s head right off his body. But Rich has Basil. Basil and Lee against the kind of guy who does vanish Hastings. Fuck.

  “So—so we don’t know,” Basil says, instead of answering that or bursting into tears. “We don’t know anything. We don’t know if this lykoi guy was a friend, or a client, or a silent partner, or a business rival—maybe he’s got another southern trafficking ring, maybe he’s got a northern one! Maybe he lives in fucking—California. Maybe Rich and Liam are, are already—Y’know. Not… anywhere. Anymore.”

  “No,” Mitch says firmly. “They’re not. They’re fine. You’re going to find them. You’re the smartest guy in the whole Fleet, I know you can figure it out.”

  “…It’s so much bigger out here, Mits,” Basil says, ashamed to admit it, but too scared to keep it in. “God, you don’t know how much bigger everything is out here. How many people there are. I’m doing my best but there’s just… so much to do. Even if—when we find them, I don’t know what we can do about it.”

  Mitch wraps his arms around himself, his eyes very dark and serious. His mouth works for a minute, and then he says: “I want to come out there, Basil. I can take a leave of absence. I’ve already got it all ready to go. I can be out in a couple days.”

  “No,” Basil says immediately.

  “Parsley, c’mon—”

  “Michigan. No. Absolutely not.”

  “But you miss me! And I miss you, and we’re supposed to be a team now, you’re my boyfriend, I need to—”

  “You need to stay home, Mitch! I need you to stay home, I need you to be home!” Basil can’t hold still for another second: he jumps off his narrow cot and starts pacing around, frantic with unhappiness. “There’s nothing you can do here.”

  “Bullshit. I can be with you.”

  “Please,” Basil says. “Don’t. Please don’t.”

  Mitch’s face is a study of pain now. “Do you have any idea how much it sucks to be the guy you leave behind?” he asks. “Do you get how much I don’t want this to be happening to me again?”

  “You’re the guy I’m coming back to,” Basil says. “I swear. I love you, okay? I love you like crazy, I miss you so much it hurts, I just can’t lose you too. I need you to be safe. I need you to be something that all this shit isn’t going to ruin. I need you to be there for me to come back to. Okay?”

  Mitch looks at him for a long, awful minute. “Okay,” he finally says. “I hate this. But okay.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’d better get back to it, then,” Mitch says, and he’s not happy, he’s bitter and quiet in a way Basil’s rarely seen.

  “Mitch—”

  “I love you. I’ll text you tomorrow. And wait for you to call same time on Sunday.”

  “…I love you too,” Basil says. “So much.”

  Mitch nods, and closes the call, and Basil turns and reaches out blindly to snatch up a plate from the bedside table and hurls it against the wall so hard it shatters.

  Then he stands there and catches his breath and sniffles a little, eyes and implants burning, feeling more alone than he’s ever been in his whole life, and then he goes and gets a broom and dust pan.

  –

  Scene 21: A library, disassembled.

  Rich bustles out of the parlor with the precious books under his arm, and Rafael excuses himself to the nearest washroom, ornate and sparkling clean and entirely unused, to splash cold water on his face and regain some small measure of mastery over himself. By the time he’s tamed his rebellious body and ventured forth into the mansion again, the drawing room where he left the workmen has been stripped of its books and the shelves are standing empty. Rafael can only hope and trust that Rich made good on their plan, and the letters were handed off without notice.

  He goes back upstairs to see if Rich returned to the little blue parlor where he left Rafael, only to find the room deserted. Even as he’s wondering where to look next, though, the man himself appears in the doorway, accompanied by workmen with float-crates. Rich has a broad smile on his face, and an entire empty bookshelf balanced on one broad shoulder, and when he sees Rafael he brightens and flashes him a wink.

  “Hey, Sandra said this room needed new shelves, so I thought I’d start in on hauling them up,” he says, and bends down, balancing the bookshelf with magnificent precision, to kiss Rafael warmly. Rafael leans after him, all his thoughts of self-control and cold water briefly and intently forgotten, and then returns to himself enough to flush hotly as a few of the workmen snort and snicker behind him. One of them goes Woo! mockingly.

  “I’ve got more where that came from,” Rich says mildly, straightening back up. “If you guys are feelin’ unloved.” And he puts the bookshelf down with a thump that rattles the floorboards. It’s not a light pasteboard affair: it looks like solid, ornately carved black oak, the sort that should take two men just to drag.

  “I’m good,” one workman says.

  “I got a wife,” another one says.

  “Yeah, I got his wife, too,” the first workman says, and Rich laughs.

  “Well, tell her I said hi,” he says. “I’m gonna go get the other two shelves—if you wanna start on emptying out the plywood crap ones, I can carry ‘em back down afterwards. Okay?”

  “Yeah, man, that’ll be fine,” the man with the wife says. “Thanks.”

  “Sir,” the second one says urgently. “Thanks, sir.”

  “Again, I’m not that kinda Hastings,” Rich says wryly, and taps his collar, a tired, practiced gesture. “Rafael, you doing okay? You want anything to do?”

  “Well, I thought I might carry a few bookshelves, but you seem to be doing alright on your own,” Rafael says faintly.

  Rich grins, putting a big hand on Rafael’s shoulder. “No yeah, don't wanna scuttle your dreams but how 'bout you help unload those shelves?”

  Rafael looks over at the men busying themselves with stacking garbage books into empty float-crates and reluctantly dons the mask of a brave smile. “I’ll be glad to,” he says, and Rich nods at him approvingly before ducking out the door again.

  The workmen are as gentle with him as they are contemptuous, transparently playing nice with the big scary soldier’s dainty pet—but Rafael’s still so far from fit, and has gone terribly stiff from sword practice this morning, and as much as he’d like to simply power through and prove himself, there’s no way he can keep himself from lagging. The workmen indulge him with only three or four books at a time, and slow clear instructions as if he were an imbecile even as they go signing to one another behind his back, and Rafael finds he still stumbles, despite himself. He’s all bones and idleness, anymore, it’s humiliating: he used to have the strength for six full tumbling routines in a day, and enough fire leftover to go for a romp with any admirers who caught his eye. Now he feels as if anything but a pratfall would be beyond him.

  By the time Rich hauls the last heavy shelf in, Rafael is prickling with sweat, arms shaking, lungs burning, and can feel the workmen's annoyance beating against the back of his neck. They probably had a system worked out, some efficient partnership, and now they’re stuck pampering him along… and still the anger chews at him, that they dare to judge what’s become of him in this place.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “There we go, that’s it for this room,” Rich sighs, and cracks his spine out with a sound like a rock slide, the great mountainous mass of his arms and shoulders and back all bunching and rolling. Even the man with the wife is staring. “Fuck, it feels good to get some real work done around here for once. Raf, you wanna nip belowdecks to the galley and get us some lemonade? Bet everyone would like a drink.”

  The other workmen brighten at once, all their resentment forgotten, and Rafael's heart unknots in abject relief. "Yes, of course," he says immediately, although he'd much rather collapse. Rich's smile and guileless charm would be motivation enough—belowdecks, what an endearingly nautical term for an area Rafael’s always considered backstage—but even without the promise of his approval, no one scorns the man with the refreshments.

  Reality doesn't reassert itself until he's halfway down the steps to the second floor, and Rafael's steps slow as the warmth of relief fades and doubt enters his sinking heart.

  Carraway's prisoners are certainly allowed enough food to feed themselves. Rich even enters the kitchen directly and takes enormous portions for himself at his discretion. To feed the hired help, though… Rafael hasn't any idea if this is something Rich has done before, if he has approval for it.

  But he said it so confidently. And the thought of Rafael returning empty-handed to renewed disappointment, to the fall of Rich's glowing smile and the irritated sneer of the workmen…

  He delays as long as he can, torn; makes a detour by Rich's room to wipe down at the sink and change his clinging trousers and sweaty shirt for a gauzy top and drawstring shorts, and then steels himself and begins toward the kitchen.

  Fortune is not his friend. The cook who comes to the counter is a face familiar only from a distance, a young white man in the habit of treating the harem boys as especially distasteful ghosts. He's less than thrilled to have to whip up drinks for a crew of workmen, especially at Rafael's request. Even invoking Rich's name only marginally softens his suspicious irritation, but is at least sufficient to win Rafael a big, sweating pitcher of lemonade and a stack of paper cups.

  Of course, then Rafael has to labor back up the stairs carrying a pitcher whose weight Rich probably wouldn’t even notice and an unwieldy stack of flimsy cups. It seems a much longer distance than on the way down, which was not insignificant in the first place.

  Finally he arrives, and sets down pitcher and cups to start pouring. The men come over and wait in a cluster, thanking him with awkward courtesy as he hands out the lemonade. Rafael manages a credible smile, which gets a bit fixed when Rich pats him on the shoulder, claims the last half of the pitcher for himself, and sends him back down to ‘see to the other guys.’

  “How many hands does it take to install a library?” the cook growls when he sees Rafael back again.

  "More than I thought still lived in this godforsaken world," Rafael says tiredly. "I know it's highly irregular, but Rich—"

  "They don't stock us so Rich can come treat us like an all-you-can-eat buffet!"

  "Of… of course," Rafael starts, and wets his lips, wearing a mask of contrition as his thoughts race. He doesn't want to drag Rich down here, in his moment of triumph, to negotiate with a man who looks at them all with such disgust. Even if he did, word would surely spread that one of the harem boys made demands of a staff member and sicced a Hastings on the man when he wouldn't capitulate.

  He was a fool to attempt this. It's too little and too late, but far better to retreat and tell Rich they haven't permission, as he should have from the start. Rafael draws up an apologetic, self-effacing smile, and gives a self-conscious little duck of his head.

  "I shouldn't have bothered you. I'm sorry to—"

  "Yeah you're sorry! Get lost."

  "Klein!" says a voice, and Rafael and the cook both startle guiltily as Head Chef Byrd, the woman who provides Rich with kitchen implements to fix, appears at the cook's shoulder with a weighty-looking clipboard in the crook of her elbow and a spotless apron over her brown and gold manor uniform. She pauses about her work, takes in the situation with a single glance and frowns. "…What'd I tell you about giving those boys grief? Go help Manuel with prep, go on, get!"

  "But he," starts the cook, and receives a witheringly raised eyebrow that makes him wince like a spanked puppy. He mutters, "Yes chef, sorry," and bustles hurriedly away without more than a brief glare in Rafael's direction.

  "You're down here early," says Chef Byrd, as Rafael begins to creep away, and puts her clipboard down to beckon him back. "No, don't you let him run you off empty-handed. Dinner prep's not done yet, but if you want a snack we can hunt one down for you."

  "Oh—no, ma'am, not on my own account," Rafael says, as meekly as he can. "Rich requested I fetch refreshments for the library installation? If that might be possible? I'm afraid a single pitcher of lemonade proved insufficient, and I've been sent back again to your doorstep."

  "Mm. You know I wouldn't have believed they raised that boy up North if he didn't talk like he does. He fusses about guests like my mama used to, bless his heart. Well, we can make up more lemonade quick if they want it, and there's a couple dozen finger sandwiches that need finishing up from that party that got rescheduled, but I don't know if we got the hands to run them up and down…"

  "Perhaps a refreshment cart?" Rafael suggests. "I can wheel it to the foyer, so no-one is eating or drinking in the parlors—I'm sure the sergeant would love any excuse to drag Rich over the coals for a drop spilled on the good carpets…"

  It's something of a gamble to speak ill of a member of Carraway's inner circle, but it's a gamble on good odds, and rewarded at once. Chef Byrd gives a speaking grimace and shakes her head.

  "Oh, that awful man, he's meaner than a tiger with a toothache. Don't worry about that, sweetpea, I can spare the folks to load up some catering carts." She jots down a note on the corner of an extensive list, sighs, and then looks back to Rafael with a keen, appraising eye. "You can prop up against them and keep an eye on them if you want. Get off your feet a while. You look fit to keel right over."

  "It has been a busy day," Rafael admits, with his most shyly winning smile, and allows himself to lean on the counter. "Keeping up with Rich is something of a challenge. While I see the value in honest work, I must admit I don’t get as good an exchange rate as a Hastings.”

  “Lord, that’s the truth. My hand to God, there's a boy who sleeps standing up. Here, sit tight. I’ll fix you up.” She bustles away, and comes back with a lurid can of energy drink and a big piece of fried chicken in a napkin. “If this doesn’t keep you running on a long shift, you must’ve died this morning.”

  “A thousand angels smile on you, gracious lady,” Rafael says gratefully, and bolts the chicken down, still leaning against the service counter. It’s delicious, and makes him think of the best times in his troupe, where they did well enough for themselves that there would be a real, proper dinner waiting for them all after the last performance of the night and everyone could eat themselves sick and not worry for breakfast. Life as a traveling player involved a lot of squirrel and starch, and nowhere near enough chicken dinners. Pork and beef were rare enough to come by that he has no deeper emotion for them than carnivorous appreciation, but a beautifully fried piece of chicken will always taste of triumph.

  The energy drink is an acrid decoction of citrus and raw lightning, and Rafael sips it sparingly: even if he’s recently gotten his taste for coffee back, he’s probably not used to the level of stimulants that kitchen workers down on the regular. Halfway through the can he feels his heart start to race, and takes himself off to see how the catering is going. Only, as soon as the pretty little silver catering carts are brought out with lemonade and sandwiches and cookies, Rich is there again, snagging three cookies at a time and clapping Rafael on the back, looking sweaty and joyous, the misery of alcohol’s lack briefly forgotten in the delight of the task at hand.

  “God, this is fun,” he says happily. “Hey, they got a whole cratefull'a poetry in up on the next deck, c’mon!” And Rafael finds himself trotting breathlessly in his wake to a second-floor parlor, its small library already nearly reassembled after its comprehensive gutting.

  “Look, they even have these old guy heads,” Rich says, pulling a small marble bust out of the nearest crate. “Like to go with the fancy bookshelves and the brass number plates. Is this one Shakespeare?”

  “I think that’s Lovecraft.”

  “Huh. Nice name. How about this hat guy?”

  “Pratchett.”

  “This guy? Awful mustache.”

  “That’s… good god, I think that’s Hitler. I imagine it was meant to be Poe but I really think some absolute fool swapped Hitler in by mistake.”

  “I don’t know either of those guys,” Rich says carelessly, setting all the busts down. “C’mon, let’s find Shakespeare and swipe him for my room. He can take notes the next time I blow you.”

  Rafael laughs, shocked, and Rich looks up with a wide grin creasing the corners of his green eyes, and for a minute it doesn’t matter that they’re both caged and collared, they’re just happy, digging eagerly through all their new presents, through the dazzling gift of an entire library. Rich is installing an entire library for Rafael.

  He leans up and kisses Rich soundly, because it’s impossible not to.

  “Aw, hey there, sweetheart,” Rich says warmly, and squeezes the back of Rafael’s neck. “Thanks. But save it for when we find Shakespeare, okay?”

  “Okay,” Rafael agrees, still laughing a little. They unpack the busts and set them out in a stern little flock of white men’s heads on the nearest coffee table. Rafael is the one to find Shakespeare, and takes the opportunity to kiss Rich fervently once more.

  Rich is smiling when Rafael leans back again—for a moment, at least. And then he abruptly straightens, the hand on Rafael’s shoulder turning tensely protective.

  Rafael hears what alarmed him a bare second later; the sound of familiar voices approaching. Not raised in anger, exactly, not shouting, but Rich evidently knows the sound of an argument as well as Rafael does, and is just as aware how poorly it bodes to hear Sandgren approaching in a rage.

  “—Without my permission, without increasing perimeter security—”

  “We’ve had the same security protocols since I was hired,” says Mx Sayegh’s voice, raised in its own hard-edged temper. “Do you think I don’t know how to use all those decorative thugs you leave lounging around the barracks just as well as I know how to use my own damn discretionary fund—”

  “Gentlemen,” says a third voice, and Rafael’s breath catches in his chest. Carraway isn’t shouting either, but his tone is tired and irritable. “No call for that.”

  Sandgren growls, stamping closer. “You,” he snaps, just beyond the door. “Where’s the Hastings? The fat one in the collar.”

  Rich has only a moment to tense before someone in the hallway must point the way and the door is elbowed sharply open, banging off of the wall. Sandgren appears in it like the pale shade of some petty devil, sees Rich and immediately brightens with furious intent.

  “Watch it,” Mx Sayegh says, from behind Sandgren’s fuming glare. “Who do you think is going to pay for that to be fixed, William?”

  “I can afford to spackle a few holes,” Carraway says, more sharply than before, and steps inside as well, looming through the doorway with a practiced duck of his head, looking around at the chaos of new bookshelves and unloaded busts of authors. Rafael stands still and straight, but Rich takes two gliding, perfectly balanced steps to brace himself staunchly between him and the new arrivals.

  Carraway says, “There you are, sugar,” in clear displeasure, and the steadfast fortress of Rich’s protectiveness falters for his disappointment as it never would for the man’s rage.

  “Hi, sir,” he says, uncertainly. “Do you like the library? They got these gorgeous new bookshelves in, I didn’t even notice how cheap the pasteboard crap was too until I was hauling it out—”

  “Hmph,” says Mx Sayegh, in evident agreement. Sandgren gives them a look that would love to commit brutal homicide.

  “And, uh,” Rich shifts his considerable weight delicately from foot to foot, uncertain. “You said, when you reassigned Raf, you wanted to see what else I could find, to fix up? So I thought maybe…”

  “I did say that, didn’t I,” says Carraway, with brief, dry amusement. Sandgren makes a noise of derision, but Rich is rushing on, emboldened.

  “So now there’s these, they’re real wood, and Devereaux has this awesome little portable engraver she’s using on all the brass plates—oh! Mx Sayegh, I dunno if it costs more, but she said if the whole compound wants relabeling they brought enough brass for it—”

  “An attempt to wring extra expense from us,” Mx Sayegh says brusquely, and Rich subsides again at once. “That won’t be necessary, Merrill. And don’t encourage them. They’ll take any excuse to bleed us dry.”

  “Yess’n,” says Rich, uncertain once again. “Sorry.”

  “Speaking of which,” says Carraway, “the books are all well and good, doll, but you mind tellin’ me why the hired help’s got the run of my kitchen, too?”

  Rafael’s stomach, which was already shrunken to a cold, hard lump in the yawning cavern of his body, turns sharply within him. With Chef Byrd's permission and Rich's careless enthusiasm, he'd assumed somehow his worry was misplaced—but his instincts had been right, he should have listened. He should have known better, and instead of turning to tell him so Rich just blinks those wide, worried green eyes and shrinks under Carraway's expectant, dangerous smile.

  “Do you not… feed the people who work for you, landside?” he says, sounding small and lost, bewildered. “I mean, they’re, they didn’t bring anything, I was talking to some of them and they said when they board they’re not allowed to bring anything except work tools, and they’re working on your boat, your house—”

  “They’re getting paid a New York ransom!” Sandgren says incredulously. “That’s more than generous enough. And if I catch you asking questions about my security protocols, treasure—”

  “Will,” says Carraway, but he does frown at that, and gives Rich a look that curdles Rafael’s soul, thoughtful and disapproving. “He’s right though, sweetheart. How Will keeps my perimeter’s no business of yours, you hear?”

  “Huh?” says Rich, and then, “Oh!” in clear mortification, the first hint of the fear he should have felt the moment Sandgren accused him. “No, I wasn’t, uh, sorry sir, yessir—”

  To raise his voice now feels near-suicidal. Still, watching Rich stumble and stammer, Rafael breathes, draws up his mask, steps aside of Rich’s guarding bulk, and speaks.

  “Sir, if I may,” he says, a threadbare murmur, and Carraway and his adjuncts turn, looking affronted by his daring. Rafael swallows and hurries on. “I… I don’t believe Rich’s people are much aware of even the simplest of financial matters. If they intend to show charity, to show generosity, their payment is in creature comforts.”

  Beside him, Rich shifts in discomfort as though tempted to nudge Rafael back behind him once more, but either Rafael’s artifice is closer to the truth than he thought, or the man is clever enough not to contradict him. At the very least he must see the way the keen edge of Carraway’s suspicion is at once dulled by a paternal and condescending amusement. If there is one puppet string attached to the heart of every wealthy white man Rafael has ever played to, it’s the eager willingness to cast himself as a civilized being of some higher culture, whose very presence is a benevolent improvement to the masses below him.

  “I know he would never wish to present you as ungenerous, sir,” Rafael says, and it’s with a perfect mask of entreaty to Carraway, but he means the words just as much for the mountainous form he’s pressed against, choosing his phrasing carefully. “I’m afraid he took for granted how generous you have already been, allowing these men to work in exchange for your hard-earned wealth.”

  Rich makes a noise of realization, neatly on cue, and when Rafael glances up at him, carefully threading worried uncertainty into his expression, Rich looks both enlightened and deeply bewildered all over again.

  “I wasn’ try’na mutiny, or anything,” he says, and his accent is as thick as Rafael could have coached it, a bewildered country boy coming too late to realization. “I mean, I wasn’ try’na jack around your orders on pay’n portions, sir, I was—Uh. I guess it doesn’t matter what I was tryin’ to do. It’s clear over the rail now.” He gives a rumbling chuff of a sigh, all contrition. “Sorry.”

  Carraway’s smug amusement mixes further with rueful indulgence. Mx Sayegh is ignoring the conversation and looking over the bookshelves and the busts with interest, apparently taking stock of their value and finding them acceptable. Only Sandgren snorts and rolls his eyes.

  “So the big slut’s from some communist cult that doesn’t know what money is,” he says, and gives Mx Sayegh a pointed sneer. “Sounds like he shouldn’t be allowed to write invoices!”

  “I know you don’t know what the word ‘discretionary’ means,” says Mx Sayegh acidly, distracted from their inventory, “but if you try to tell me how to distribute my funds one more time—”

  “My funds,” Carraway says sharply—and before Sandgren can speak, “which I hand out wherever I want, Will. The job’s well underway now, all three of us have more important things to get to than arguing about it.”

  “Exactly,” says Mx Sayegh. “The work could be done much more quickly if some of William’s better-behaved men came in to do some of the heavy lifting, if he's so damn worried about security. And if you’d like to come look over your new acquisitions, Mr Carraway…?”

  Rafael’s every nerve turns to ice, jolting his body in painful alarm. It’s only through the generosity and courage of the man with the locs that their messages are being carried at all. Desperate as Rafael is, he still sees that the man would be entirely justified in abandoning the ruse if Carraway himself and Sandgren’s troops were present.

  Rafael allows himself no hesitation, just gives a convulsive little giggle as though by accident. Carraway's ear flicks in his direction, and Rafael reaches up to cover his mouth with a mask of self-consciousness, but Carraway doesn't look at him.

  Rich does, wide-eyed and bewildered, and Rafael leans over to him and repeats, "The soldiers," in the strangled whisper of a man choking back further laughter. He darts a covert glance at Carraway and lowers his voice yet further—not too far—to go on behind his hand, "The Hastings all stomping around on the good carpets with stacks of books, can you imagine?"

  "You weren't asked for your opinion, boy," Sayegh says, frowning thunderously, and Rafael winces and shrinks behind Rich again, eyes wide. But he's said all he needs to, thank grace and mercy itself; Sandgren is red-faced with new affront and Carraway is shaking his head, grimacing distastefully.

  "I run a garrison," he says, "not some two-bit moving company. I’m sure these folks can get the work done themselves.”

  “Damn right!” Sandgren says derisively, and Rafael's heart gives a renewed, shimmering double-beat of hope, entirely invisible behind his mask of scolded repentance. “Besides, I’m upping the perimeter patrols while we have all these glorified looters on our property—sneaking around casing the place, smuggling in god-knows-what, probably pocketing the good silver off those damn food carts and getting out scot-free with—"

  "Will," Carraway says, half-laughing. "Not that I don't appreciate the close eye on my business, but you know well and good all these folks got scanned six ways to Sunday at the gate, and are set to get scanned plenty again on the way out. If they plan on sneakin' out of here with anything bigger than a coffee spoon we'll find out about it."

  "The books—"

  "The ones headed for a composter?" inquires Mx Sayegh acidly. "Even if they stole the most expensive volume in this mansion we'd hardly be losing value. It's a miracle we're finding out about their poor quality from Merrill, and not because one of Mr Carraway's guests picked one up and made us a laughingstock!"

  "Mm," says Carraway, looking wholly unconcerned by the idea. "Well, there's no call to go worrying about it now. Will, if you're headed out in the yard to talk to your boys on treeline patrol anyway, how about we take a walk down to the range?"

  Sandgren brightens at once, distracted from his dire muttering. "Well I sure the hell wouldn't mind! Nice day for it, and I could use to stretch my legs—"

  “Sir,” says Mx Sayegh, clearly incensed, but Carraway clearly considers the matter settled. He waves a hand, dismissing the protest, and the quartermaster subsides in simmering fury.

  “As for you, sugar…” Carraway turns to Rich, and there's no aggression in the long, easy stride he takes to close the distance between them, but it can be no accident how he gathers himself up, looming over even Rich's towering height. Rich doesn’t flinch from him, but his shoulders tighten with anxiety, his pale cheeks patchily flushed as Carraway reaches out to condescendingly pat his face—making no effort, this time, to remove or turn aside his claws. “You look nice enough behind a desk, but don’t you forget what you’re here for.”

  Rich’s chest jumps against Rafael’s side, the faintest strain of a growl that hitches and then is choked away again. “Yessir,” he says, with poorly-hidden hurt and affront.

  Carraway sighs and nudges a knuckle under the man’s chin. “Now, don’t look so upset,” he says. “You know you earned a scolding fair and square. Earned more than that, if Will had his way… Don’t let it happen again, and we’ll call it good.”

  The threat is subtle enough, as it often is, but Rich clearly hears it. He nods, neglects to salute as he would for the head cook or the groundskeepers, but says, “Yes, sir,” again with a clear and deliberate enunciation. When Carraway bends his neck, Rich’s huge hands work at his sides before he allows his chin to be tilted up for a kiss.

  Rafael stands motionless, keenly aware of the looming pressure of the man close enough to touch. The sound of the parlor door slamming startles him so badly he jumps, giving a graceless gasp. Mx Sayegh is evidently as done with the argument as Carraway is, although much less satisfied with the outcome.

  “Ten minutes, Will, downstairs,” Carraway says, unbothered by his quartermaster’s ire, and turns with no further fanfare to stride silently off into his mansion, leaving the door carelessly open behind him.

  Smashwords as well as your (but not Amazon yet except for After the Storm), under the series title, Stories From The Michigan Fleet. If you missed book one, After the Storm, you can . And check out our !