The transport stayed fairly close to the ground because most of the buildings were stone and not more than three or four stories tall. The wind made the ride a little bumpier than I’d like, but I arrived in one piece.
Jade’s was a small hotel on the corner of one of the main streets and a narrow alley. A bright sign decorated by a carved jade dragon indicated the hotel had vacancies.
I exited the transport and hurried to the door. A bell tinkled overhead when I pulled it open. I stepped into a small but clean lobby. The main desk was off to the left and a couple of chairs on the right clustered around a lit fireplace.
A petite woman with long, straight black hair bustled out of the back room. She smiled at me. “You must be Ms. White,” she said. “I am Jade, the owner. Gunther will be pleased that you arrived safely.”
So this recommendation was a kickback and not a trap. Probably.
I stomped a few times to knock off the worst of the rain before I dripped all over the dry floor. When I was reasonably dry, I lowered my hood. “Does Gunther work at the spaceport? About this tall?” I asked, holding my hand twenty centimeters over my head.
Her smile grew wider. “Yes, that’s my Gunther. He looks fierce but he’s a big teddy bear.”
I’d have to take her word for it. Gunther looked as if he could pull arms off people without breaking a sweat. “He said you have rooms available?”
“Yes. One hundred credits a night, with a two-night deposit. Breakfast is included.” She showed no sign of recognizing me as Lady von Hasenberg.
“I’d like to prepay for a week,” I said.
She didn’t even blink. “Checkout on the seventh day?” she confirmed.
Because solar days and nights lasted months, most Brava residents were used to thinking in Universal Standard Time. So a day was just twenty-four hours, regardless of whether it was dark or light.
“Yes, please.” I hopefully wouldn’t be here that long, but Peter Guskov moved at his own pace. If he thought I was trying to rush him, he’d let me cool my heels for a few days just because he could.
Jade held out a chip reader. “Scan here, please.”
“I’d prefer to pay with hard credits.”
That got me a raised eyebrow, but she didn’t protest. She entered the amount on the reader then handed it to me. I inserted a credit chip with a moderate amount of credits. The reader shouldn’t report the total available credits back to the vendor, but some vendors were shadier than others.
Jade took the machine back after I removed my credit chip. She handed me an old-fashioned keycard. The fact that she had them handy told me I wasn’t the first person to stay here who was reluctant to scan my identity chip. “Your room is on the fourth floor. The lift is out of order; are the stairs going to be a problem? Do you need help with your luggage?” She peeked around the desk, looking for my bags.
“No, thank you, the stairs are fine. I can manage my backpack.”
“Breakfast is from six to nine in the dining room.” She gestured to a door behind me. “And the stairs are farther down that hall on the right.”
I thanked her and headed for the stairs.
Chapter 9
As a young woman, my self-defense tutor had kept me in excellent physical condition, something that I’d taken a bit for granted. After Gregory modified my nanos, I hadn’t felt well enough to keep exercising. I’d recently started going to the gym again, but I was nowhere near my normal fitness level, and I felt the four flights of stairs.
I let myself into the room I’d be calling home for the next few days, assuming I could hack it. My head was already lightly throbbing. Tonight would be the first night I voluntarily slept in an unshielded room in four years—since Gregory had first modified my nanos.
I’d nearly died before he’d conceded and deigned to shield my bedroom. I didn’t remember much of those early days but apparently I’d gone into seizures any time I was exposed to the minimal amount of signals around our House.
For the first six months after the injection, I’d been too sick to continue working remotely for House von Hasenberg, which had caused Father to start asking questions. I think that, more than anything else, is what changed Gregory’s mind.