The Pharoah Contract

Nisa bent over Wuhiya. She was at first certain he was dead. No, he was alive, but he looked terribly ill, his skin gray, the muscles sagging in unhealthy relaxation. She touched his face, and then pulled her hand away, a little repelled. His flesh was cool, too cool. On his neck was something that looked like a metal spider; on it lights burned amber. From it slender throbbing tentacles writhed out and sank into his neck. Nisa wondered if she had looked this much like a corpse when Wuhiya had first seen her, and the thought triggered a flush of tenderness. Wuhiya had tended her; now she would tend him.

Nisa pushed the litter across the cell, until it rested beside her bed. She instructed the room to grow an extension of the curtains around the litter, so that he would be with her even when she slept.

When she finished, she felt the helot’s eyes on her, appraising. “Ayam,” she said, “you will treat this man as my honored guest, do you understand?”

The helot bowed deeply. “Yes, noble lady. All is clear.”

Nisa frowned. Was the helot mocking her? No, she must be imagining it. She turned all her attention to Wuhiya.

* * *

Ruiz woke in fairyland, or so it seemed to him. Pastel silks diffused a soft warm light, sweet fragrances filled the air, and hovering over him was the transformed face of Nisa. The black cinnamon hair of the phoenix was cunningly swirled and plaited with strands of glittering gems; her heart-shaped face was painted with great skill; she wore a simple tunic of some sheer fabric that touched her body lightly. When she saw that he was awake, her face lit with a glow that warmed him in places that had been cold for longer than he could remember.

“Wuhiya,” she said, breathless.

Ruiz’s body trembled in the grip of the antisedative, and he felt the small sucking pains of the limpet’s withdrawal. His throat was full of disuse, and at first he couldn’t make any intelligible sounds.

“Where is this?” He heard a frightening weakness in his voice.

“You’re safe, Wuhiya. This is my apartment. Isn’t it pretty?”

Ruiz was confused. His last memories were of the Moc and its ice gun, the tearing sensation in his mind as the death net threatened to trigger, the precarious sense of reprieve as it stabilized. The translation to this perfumed luxury disoriented him in a way that was only half-pleasurable. The limpet finished its withdrawal and fell away from his neck. He wanted to reach up and rub the spot, but his arm would not respond. Then, slowly, life began to burn back into his muscles. The pain twisted his face, and he saw his distress mirrored in Nisa’s pretty features. “It’s all right,” he croaked. “I’ll be better soon.”

She smiled and wiped away the sheen of pain-induced sweat with a cool cloth. The gesture was a curiously practiced one, and Ruiz understood that Nisa had been caring for him.

Sentimental tears trembled on his eyelashes; he cursed his weakness, but it was all he could do not to sob with relief. He wondered again at Nacker’s manipulations, but now he felt no indignation. Whatever Nacker had done, however the minddiver had meddled, the result was not without merit. Ruiz’s heart was raw, true, but what did he expect? Nacker had somehow cut away the calluses of a hard lonely lifetime.

Then another face floated into his misted vision, a striking androgynous face, alight with malicious curiosity. Ruiz’s vision cleared abruptly and he frowned. Here was an unpleasant manifestation indeed. “What’s this?” he asked.

Nisa patted the creature’s broad shoulder. “This is Ayam, the helot that the Lady Corean gave me when I became her special guest.”

Ruiz closed his eyes. Not only was he locked in a cell with one of Dilvermoon’s treacherous race, but the cell was in Corean’s private apartments. He wondered how matters would next worsen. Then he remembered that Corean now knew for certain that Ruiz was no Pharaohan, and not even a pangalac tourist, innocently scooped up with the phoenix troupe.

Ruiz could look forward to a brainpeel. He hoped his shield persona would hold up.

* * *

The following days saw Ruiz’s recovery completed. Nisa was touchingly solicitous, though occasionally her patrician background would surface obnoxiously. Ruiz dealt with these imperious outbursts by ignoring them, and soon Nisa would regain her good humor.

The herman Ayam was a constant source of anxiety for Ruiz. He observed with a surprisingly vivid sense of relief that Nisa had assigned Ayam a bed separate from her own. The herman’s hostility toward Ruiz was apparently not obvious to Nisa. She didn’t seem to be able to grasp the idea that the helot was dangerous.

“But,” she would say, bewildered, “Ayam’s only a slave. What harm could come of that? Ayam is here for our convenience.”