Free Assassin's Hunger by Jessa Slade

don’t,” Torash said. “Corso has told us before that the Asphodel ’s freedom comes at a price. I’d like to know the value of this coin. Let us change into proper clothes, and at least braid our hair.”
    But Shaxi shook her head. “The attack, when it comes, won’t be fair. Maybe you’ll be in your night robes, or with a full belly, or already hurt.” She glanced at Alolis. “Or sleepy. You need to be ready, whatever happens.”
    Though she kept her attention on the girls while she donned the safety gear and explained how they should come at her vulnerable points, she was perfectly aware of the hard set of Eril’s jaw. She hadn’t anticipated the depth of his displeasure. He’d seemed at ease with endorsing her to Benedetta after seeing her fight. Or did he think pretty, young girls shouldn’t sully themselves with violence?
    As if the universe would give them a pass.
    She went through one round with the surprisingly fierce Torash, who attacked with knees and hand chops and piercing screams. When she looked up again while Alolis stepped in front of her, Eril was gone.
    Off to tattle to the captain? Fine, she’d set him straight too. And Benedetta as well, if the older sister complained. Who walked around a sheership barefoot anyway?
    She lunged at Alolis with her hands in threatening claws. The girl shrieked, much less convincingly than her sister, and batted at Shaxi half-heartedly. Shaxi gritted her teeth in a cruel grin she knew the girl could see through the the thin, transparent molding of her protective faceplate and clamped her hands around the girl’s neck.
    Alolis’s eyes widened and then slitted as she brought her fists up inside the circle of Shaxi’s arms, ready to break her hold.
    Then the screen on the club room wall lit up in a white flare and the Asphodel rocked at the fiery blast.

Chapter 6
    Eril abandoned his battle station without a second thought and raced for the club room. He was almost bowled off his feet by Shaxi, the girls in tow behind her.
    She spared him a quick glance. “Get to your post!”
    Of course she had everyone’s duties memorized already. He ignored her and followed them to the twins’ suite which was their assigned location when the ship was under threat of any sort.
    Alolis stared around wildly. “What’s happening?”
    Shaxi never slowed but she raised her voice over the squall of the ship’s alarm. “Plasma charge. Not of significant force to pierce the hull.”
    No, it wouldn’t be, Eril thought grimly. Not when they’d want the twins alive.
    “It felt significant,” Torash said. She slapped her hand over the lock plate on the suite, and the door slid open. Her sister slipped through before the door was fully open, but Torash lingered a moment.
    Her gaze jumped between him and Shaxi, pupils blown wide in fear or excitement or both. “What can I do to help?”
    He should break her neck now and then Alolis’s, quick and painless. Which was kinder than what their attackers would have in mind. According to the underwriters, reverse engineering the powers of the qva’avaq would demand brutally invasive testing, probably for years, before the remaining crystal was extracted from their bodies, with fatal results.
    Chance or choice, Shaxi had said.
    The poor girls had never had either. He flexed his hands, which felt strangely stiff.
    “Stay out of the way,” Shaxi said.
    For a second, he thought she was talking to him, and his heartbeat raced. How had she—?
    But she was looking at Torash. “One bout doesn’t make you a fighter. Maybe next time. If you keep practicing.”
    To his shock, she smiled. He doubted Hermitaj had ever given its conscripts reason to smile, but she did it as brightly as the double suns above Khamaseen’s endless dust. As if the light had been there the whole time, waiting to shine. It transformed the harsh angles of her face. Not pretty, by no stretch of the most imaginative simulation. But strangely captivating, nonetheless,