Free Encante by Aiyana Jackson Page A

“There are all manner of devices aboard this vessel, Simeon. Fortunately most of them do not work in this room.”
    “What about the tails? They work.”
    “Yes.” For a moment Axel’s face was suffused with nothing but rage. “Yes, they work all too well.”
    “It seemed to me that Vee was hurt by hers on the day of my arrival,” I ventured. “I have not seen her since. Is she recovered?”
    “From that? Yes.”
    “And the other girl,” I enquired, “Mae?” He straightened at the name, frowning. “I assume she works with Stella? Yet she was not there today. She looked so frail when last I saw her, I feared—”
    “She lives, although I believe at this point she wishes that were not the case.” His frown deepened. “I’m surprised you know about her.”
    “Teddy was treating her not long after I arrived.”
    Axel nodded. “He’ll get himself killed one of these days, but he won’t stop. I can’t say I blame him; if I knew how to take the risk for him, I would do so, but he refuses to teach me. And I believe he feels he owes it to Drusilla.”
    “The risk?”
    That patronising look returned briefly, only to be replaced by something akin to envy, as if he wished he lived in a world where the knowledge in his possession were not so mundane. “Stella’s girls all take . . . precautions, you understand?”
    I thought for a moment. “Pregnancy?”
    “Precisely. They do not wish to end up like Drusilla’s mother. Were any of them to fall pregnant, by law my uncle would be forced to execute them. He opposes the Kabbalah in many things, but that is one line he will not cross. My father took steps to ensure Drusilla remained unseen by them. Even the Harlequin does not know of her existence, but such would not be the case with another child. He no longer has the same resources at his disposal. Stella protects them as best she can.”
    “And these precautions make the girls sick?”
    “Not usually, but Mae is different. You will have noted her legs, or lack thereof?” I nodded. “Teddy has speculated that it is the great difference in her lower torso that makes the drugs he gives the other girls ineffective on Mae. They simply do not work.”
    “By the gods, the girl is pregnant?” I was horrified. I could not imagine the burden of such an event on so young a girl, much less when it would surely be impossible for her to know which of the many sailors she serviced was the child’s father.
    “She was.” Axel shook his head. “Teddy gave her something to shake the child loose. It has always worked before, but something has gone wrong this time. The child died within her, but was not expelled. It caused a severe infection which almost killed her.”
    “Always?” I stared at him, now quite certain there could be nothing more horrific than this backwards system of slavery. “You said it ‘always’ worked before. This has happened to the girl more than once?”
    “A dozen or so times, I’m afraid.” Axel shook his head. “Teddy has been unable to find a way of preventing her from conceiving, yet he cannot allow her to be put to death for something that is not her fault. So he helps her, if you could call it that. He risks death himself by doing so, but such is the nature of the old man.”
    I considered the mild-mannered doctor who had treated me with such kindness, and who had reacted with such genuine horror at the sight of the child, so frail upon her arrival.
    “Drusilla was with Mae the day I saw her in the medical bay. You said Teddy owes it to her—because she is encante?”
    “Because he is responsible for Drusilla’s mother’s death, or at least believes himself to be.” Axel pushed off the gazebo, moving past me as if towards the exit. He paused, turning back towards me, as if expecting me to follow.
    “How so?”
    “My father brought Drusilla’s mother to Teddy once. Drusilla was still very young and feeding at the breast. She was near death due to the way they had been