Free Heroes Adrift by Moira J. Moore Page B

luck.
    With no hope at all, we walked the curving stone streets of the village. After making a few inquiries we learned that there were, indeed, no other boarding houses. And that people expected us to pay for things. We went to merchant after merchant, and all of them, with varying degrees of patience and amusement, pointed out that they didn’t care who or what we were, everyone paid.
    We were in so much trouble.
    I couldn’t believe it. How could this happen? How could we end up in a place where our skills were worthless? Why did no one warn us?
    Maybe that was why the Empress had sent us, of all people, on this ridiculous mission of hers. Cheap labor. She wouldn’t have to pay us, or pay our way. Only that had blown up in our faces. Mine and Karish’s. Her Imperial Majesty was safe and comfortable and well fed in her palace in Erstwhile. Probably had a new pretty boy to decorate her court. Probably had forgotten all about us. Damn damn damn, what were we going to do?
    We found a place to sit on the ground away from any of the performances sprinkled throughout the village. We didn’t want an audience while we panicked.
    And I was panicking. I had that roiling in my stomach, that sour taste in my mouth. My breath was coming short and sharp. Hell.
    â€œWe don’t have nearly enough, Lee,” Karish was telling me, flipping the coins over in his palm. “These coins are different from the ones back home, but I’m not sure we’ve got enough even for one night at that bunker.”
    Nightmare. A total nightmare.
    â€œI’ve got a few earrings on me,” he said. “I wish I’d kept my ring.” When I’d first met Karish, he’d worn a family ring. He’d removed it after abjuring his family’s title, in order to continue working as a Source.
    I wished he’d kept it, too. I wished I’d cultivated the habit of wearing jewelry myself. I had nothing of value. Except, apparently, my shirts, and I had only a couple more of them on me.
    What were we going to do?
    That stupid, ignorant, careless bitch. How dare she do this to us? When we got back, if we got back, I was going to throw a tantrum worthy of Her Imperial Majesty Empress Constia herself.
    All right. Breathe.
    â€œDamn, it’s hot,” Karish muttered, pulling his collar from his skin.
    There was nothing for it. We’d just have to find work of some kind. Lie to get a job and learn the skills after, if necessary. I didn’t like that idea, and it might jerk back to smack us in the face, but I didn’t know what else to do. We needed a place to sleep and food to eat. And really, it couldn’t be impossible to find work. Thousands of people found work without having any real skills. Surely, we could as well.

Chapter Five
    It so happened that we did have enough currency to spend a single night at Vikor’s bunker, provided we shared one room. We even had a couple of coins left over, but we were too afraid to spend them. I was starving. Karish wasn’t hungry, due to his difficult voyage, but he should have eaten something. We didn’t have the money for a meal.
    We had spent a terrifying and futile evening looking for work. It was obvious to everyone that we didn’t have the first clue how to go about it. When asked what I could do, I listed my pitiful collection of non–Triple S related skills. People were shaking their heads before the words were half out of my mouth. Later, when asked what I could do, I asked what they needed doing. No one liked that response.
    Everyone was very kind, of course. All very sympathetic and pleasant as they told me they had no use for me. Some of them referred me to their neighbors, naming names, and I wondered if the so named went back to the namees and visited upon them some physical retribution. But in the end, as the sun slid out of the sky, I met up with Karish and had any faint hopes destroyed when he said he’d had no more