SEVEN
Benedict had no idea why he was so nervous. He could hardly remember the last time he’d felt this way—sweaty palms, shortness of breath, rapid heartbeat. If he’d ever felt this way, it had likely been when he’d been taking his oath to the order. He’d spent weeks studying for it, because Abbot Bartholomew was brutal in his examinations. He didn’t let just anyone join the order, not like some of the other fraternities across the galaxy.
Looking back on it, Benedict didn’t know why he’d been so adamant about joining this particular order. If he’d failed, he was certain he could have joined a different one. Maybe one of the ones that was less rigid in their rules.
And now, as he waited for Oz to arrive at the office, he was wondering why he’d wanted to join one at all. His reasons seemed hazy even to him. His vows—he hardly remembered them. It was like they’d been taken by a different person.
Oz slunk up the stairs at quarter after, yawning and rubbing his eyes. “Morning,” he drawled, stifling another yawn.
“Afternoon,” Benedict corrected, because it was, indeed, after noon.
Oz blinked. “Guess so,” he replied, in a way that indicated he didn’t really care about the minutiae of the clock.
Benedict swallowed, then turned his back and opened the door to the office. A few papers fluttered out of the way, revealing the whirlwind of overturned desk drawers and filing cabinets with their drawers hanging out. Paper was everywhere; hardly an inch of the ancient carpet underneath was visible.
Oz squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again. “Wow,” he said, which Benedict supposed summed it up. Not the word he would have chosen though.
Abbot Bartholomew would have had his head if he’d heard the language Benedict was using as he riffled through the disorganization. Benedict didn’t believe his aunt had been involved in organized crime; her crime had been very, very disorganized, in his expert opinion.
Oz spared him a sideways glance. Benedict half expected him to ask if anything useful had turned up yet, but the Vetruvian merely said, “You got any coffee?”
Benedict almost tumbled over, he was that surprised. “No.” He didn’t drink the stuff himself—addictive at best, sinful at worst—and Farq hadn’t asked for any either.
Oz heaved a sigh and rubbed at his eyes again. “’Kay,” he grumbled, then turned about and started marching down the stairwell.
“Where are you going?” Benedict’s heart slammed into his throat. Oz couldn’t leave him. He needed the Vetruvian’s help.
“To get a coffee,” Oz replied, pausing on the stairs. “I need one before I can even think about that mess.”
“Oh.”
A beat passed, before Oz said, “You coming?”
“Er, yes?” Benedict lurched forward, then hobbled down the stairs after him.
They were silent as they weaved through the crowded streets, Benedict trying not to be awed by the sheer number of people crammed into every square inch of the city. Somehow it didn’t feel crowded—the buildings towered above them, yet there was a sense of airiness, a certain amount of luxury in the width of the sidewalk, the streets.
Like whoever had designed them hadn’t wanted anyone to feel they were being boxed in. It was the strangest thing.
It dissipated when he followed Oz into a tiny shop teeming with customers. Benedict crinkled his nose at the stench of coffee, frying food, and bodies still tinged with last night’s sweat and booze.
He glanced at Oz, but the Vetruvian took no notice. Benedict didn’t know much about Vetruvians; they didn’t come up much in liturgy or even some of the encyclopedias Abbot Bartholomew had them copy out and illuminate.
He shuffled forward to stand beside Oz in the poor impression of a line. “You come here often?” he asked, glancing around until his gaze locked on a menu.
“Not really,” Oz admitted. “Just when the team needs coffee and I draw the short straw.”
“Short straw?”
Oz glanced at him again, brown eyes wide. “You know? The unlucky one?”
Benedict shook his head. Oz shrugged. “Anyway, I don’t really consider it unlucky—being what I am and all.”
Benedict swallowed the sudden lurch of bile in his gut. Slave. Oz was a slave. Of course he didn’t go anywhere of his own volition.
Of course he liked being sent on errands for other people, because it gave him an excuse to leave, to go somewhere else.
His heart broke a little more as they marched to the counter, where a short, bird-like alien was happily taking orders, chirping to customers and other café staff members alike.
“What will you have?” they peeped, and Benedict had to flatten his ears against the pitch of their voice.
Oz looked at him, but he couldn’t make heads or tails of the menu. All they had at the abbey was coffee . And that was for visitors and special occasions.
“I don’t know,” he said. “You probably know what’s good. Order for me?”
Oz considered him for a moment, then turned back to the cashier. “One trattoria and one cremmaccino.”
“Coming right up!” chirped the server, hitting buttons on the register that made a singing noise. Benedict tried not to be too wowed by it; it seemed like commonplace technology here.
Once he’d offered up the requisite credits, Oz shuffled him down the counter, past a display of cakes and pastries, which Benedict eyed longingly. He’d barely eaten breakfast this morning, and dinner was a vague memory from last night. He was pretty sure noon was lunchtime everywhere, even here on Kateria, but Oz didn’t seem bothered as he collected the two cups.
“Did you want to drink this here or go back to the office and get started?”
Benedict knew the right answer was to go back to the office—it was a disaster that was going to take eons to untangle, and Vito had only given him six weeks to figure out what kind of money he needed to come up with.
But he thought about Oz liking being an errand boy again, and guilt overcame him. “Let’s sit here,” he said, glancing around to see if he could find a free seat.
“This way,” Oz said, and Benedict thought he could hear relief in the Vetruvian’s voice. He didn’t want to go back to the office either.
He trailed the shapeshifter through the café, watching with growing fascination as Oz shaped and reshaped himself to move through the crowd with ease. Now he was taller, now he was skinnier, now he was ducking under a table, stretching over a chair …
It made Benedict wonder what his true shape was—or if he even had one. Did he just hold himself in a shape that felt natural, and was that different for every Vetruvian?
He looked like many other aliens at first glance—bipedal, two arms, two legs, although Benedict suspected that was changeable. He had a kind of viscous feeling to him, as though he were liquid forced to hold a particular shape, fuzzy around the edges, like he might start evaporating or something.
Oz led him through a door into a courtyard nestled between several buildings. There were a few tables and chairs, and growing up from the ground were a few spindly trees.
The day was a bit warm—at least Benedict thought it was—with a few clouds overhead, so there was almost no one else outside. They took up one of the tables at the far end of the court. Benedict was almost thankful; he was pretty sure this was the quietest space he’d been in since he’d arrived on the infamous pleasure planet.
They were silent until Oz had taken three sips of his coffee. Benedict merely toyed with his cup, passing it between his paws repeatedly, watching the liquid swirl. He wasn’t sure he wanted to drink it. Would it be a downward spiral from here into hellish sinfulness?
Oz set his cup down. “Do you have any idea where you want to start?” he asked, and Benedict stared into those brown eyes for a moment, trying to process the question.
“How long have you been a slave?” he blurted, then clapped a paw over his mouth, nearly spilling his drink in the process.
Oz blinked at him before sighing. “Not exactly where I was going,” he muttered, then took a long pull of his coffee. “But—all my life. As long as I can remember.”
“Then you were born into it?” Benedict sheepishly lifted his coffee to his lips. Maybe he’d burn his tongue off so he couldn’t blurt out whatever was on his mind. It would be just punishment.
Oz shrugged. “Most Vetruvians are, as far as I know.”
Benedict frowned, ready to protest, but Oz rapped his knuckles on the table. “Anyway. Vito.”
Benedict cleared his throat. “Yes. Vito.”
They stared at each other for a moment.
“I really have no idea,” Benedict said at length. “I remember him, vaguely, from when I was a child, visiting Aunt Belladonna. I remember not liking him, but that’s about it.”
Oz sighed, rubbing his temples with both hands, and Benedict tried not to startle when he realized the Vetruvian had sprouted another arm so he could hold his coffee at the same time. “I don’t know much more,” he admitted. “The last time I remember Vito coming around, I think I was eleven or twelve—so maybe fifteen years ago.”
Benedict nodded slowly. “And you thought my aunt stopped dealing with him.”
“I mean.” Oz almost cracked a smile. “I was pretty sure. She chased him out of The Pub with a butcher knife.”
Benedict tried to picture his aunt doing that. He couldn’t; she’d always seemed like a perfectly refined lady, totally unflappable. He set his coffee down on the table again. “Do you think Vito’s lying then?”
He was having a hard time imagining why anyone would lie about his aunt owing them something, but Abbot Bartholomew always said that sinfulness was ingrained in most of the population; it was most animals’ natural inclination. Telling the truth took more effort than lying, so to speak.
“Maybe,” Oz said. “I mean, I wouldn’t put it past the guy—he’s a nasty piece of work. Maybe he wanted to get back at La Chef, so he’s made up some bullshit about her owing him, hoping you’ll just cough up some money, because you don’t know any better.”
Benedict sighed. He had thought about doing that, even if he couldn’t find evidence of what his aunt owed this other mobster. He only wanted to see if he could find the right amount so he could be sure he settled whatever account his aunt had properly.
“Or …”
He glanced up at Oz, waiting patiently for the Vetruvian to finish his thought. Instead, Oz drained his coffee, and Benedict watched his throat work, then looked hastily away.
Was sinfulness in the air here? Before he’d left the abbey, he’d never had such filth infiltrate his brain. Now, he couldn’t seem to stop.
He peered down at his coffee. Maybe the slippery slope to the fiery pits didn’t start with this innocuous drink.
“Maybe La Chef didn’t break ties with Vito. Maybe she really does owe him something.”
“Maybe,” Benedict murmured, then lifted his cup and took a swig of the drink.
It was delightful— rich and creamy, with a hint of nuts and fruit bursting across his tongue. Not at all like what Abbot Bartholomew served their guests.
He stared at it for a moment, then looked at Oz. “Thank you.”
Oz blinked those big, brown eyes of his. “For what?”
“For ordering this,” Benedict said. “It’s wonderful.”
Oz seemed confused by his gratitude, but he waved a hand and said, “No problem.”
With that, he rose from the table. “You ready to go? You can bring that with you.”
Benedict glanced back at his coffee. “Yes,” he said, “we’d better get back to the office.”
No matter how much he’d have liked to continue sitting at that table with Oz for hours, asking questions about everything under the sun—what kind of person his aunt had been, what had it been like growing up here on Kateria, how had Oz known exactly what drink Benedict would like best?—they had a job to do, and those papers weren’t going to sort themselves.