he nodded encouragingly despite the desire twisting through him to steal her away and hide her within his dwelling. To avoid sharing her with his sister or his people, who looked upon her so terribly.
No. He could trust her with his sister.
“I shall return to my dwelling,” he said, turning away with a flick of his tail. “Do not be too long.”
The whisper of feet was all he heard as the females departed, and he held back the urge to follow them. He did not bother to look back as he moved at an easy lope back toward the outer gate, where his home was nestled.
He would have to remember to thank his sister. His home really was a disaster, as the dwelling of one who lived alone, with little time or inclination to do much with the space, would be. His sister had been kind enough to not elaborate while providing him considerable time to get the worst of the built-up dust and tracked in dirt dealt with.
Chapter 25
Charlie eyed her companion as they passed through the streets. For all the city’s apparent technology, the market was so much like an old world bazaar that she was immediately enthralled with, and intimidated by, the thought of getting lost in the narrow, twisting streets where vendors sold their wares and long, colorful drapes of cloth wound everywhere in a kaleidoscope of color. The scent of unfamiliar spices and foods and perfumes overwhelmed her, but it was somehow pleasant after a lifetime of drudgery with little beauty to enjoy.
Despite their rocky start—probably no more than an hour ago—before they had disappeared into the market, she was enjoying her time with Ag’hana. Charlie found a similar camaraderie to what she enjoyed with her friends in the colony. While the Tak’sin female was different from the humans she knew, her easy, direct manner full of humor made her feel right at home.
Not that she still didn’t wonder if Ag’hana would abandon her, or push her into a well or pit at a moment’s notice, but the longer she spent in her company, the more she admired that mischievous bent. Charlie listened to her speak of her city, and what life had been like for Ag’hana and Rhyst growing up there.
Ag’hana laughed as she concluded her latest tale of Rhyst, all of ten solars to her eight, making her return the small trinket she had desired but didn’t have the zelb for. She had stolen it without being caught, but he discovered her and made her return it. Her soft tail, completely lacking the spines that Rhyst’s possessed, flicked in what Charlie had come to recognize as a friendly manner against her thigh.
“Rh’ystmal was always so dour and stiff that our dam was certain even when he was of young age that he would choose to be a’sankh. Not that she didn’t grieve a little, too. Despite solars of trying, she bore us late in life, and we were her only children since our sire joined our ancestors. He died in an accident from a tech malfunction while he was doing maintenance work on one of the buildings in the city. She did not wish for her only son to know the lonely life of an a’sankh, even though it brought honor to our family when he volunteered. But honor is not everything, our mother would say—or would if she were still among us. She died last solar at one hundred and eighty solars.”
Charlie gaped at Ag’hana as the female ducked into a vendor’s stall before following behind her. “Just how old are you?”
Ag’hana paused as she held up a pale blue robe and raised a brow. “Kind of rude, but I like that about you. You are very direct with your thoughts, even more so than the average Tak’sinii, I believe. I appreciate that. Females here are direct with each other in private or in each other’s company, but in public we always defer to what our males expect and what reflects positively on them. I am forty-six solars. I just bore my first youngling two solars ago. He is a bit of a handful at times, and I will admit that I do enjoy the few hours my mate’s family takes him in the evening so I can attend to shopping or anything I need to get done,” she finished with a laugh.
Charlie shook her head as she did the math. “But that would mean that your mother had you when she