face. “Breathe, sadora.”
She hitched in a breath and then another, her face still the colour of muldeva sand, and her slender body quivering.
I propped her up against the wall and squeezed her hand. “Stay here.”
I slid off the bed, grabbed a bottle of gallberry juice and returned to her. “Drink, sadora.”
She drank a few swallows of juice and I breathed a sigh of relief when some of her colour returned to her face. “Tell me what is wrong.”
“Are you positive that ukana means too young?” she said in a timid voice that sounded nothing like her normal speaking voice.
“Yes,” I said.
Her bottom lip was trembling, and her eyes were watering like she was about to cry. That sent what almost felt like panic rushing through me. I had never seen Ellis even close to crying, not even when she found out she had cancer. What in Krono’s name was happening?
“Sadora, please,” I said when she remained silent. “Tell me why you are upset.”
She took another deep breath and drank some more juice before pulling the quilt up around her body. I sat next to her on the bed, leaning back against the wall and resting my hand on her thigh. Not having to look directly at me, seemed to help her hesitancy because she said, “I have – had – a sister. Her name was Esther and she was a few years younger than me. She was sweet and lovely and… good. She wasn’t like me, you know? Even as a kid, I was difficult and a pain in the ass and I caused my parents a lot of grief. But Esther, she was special. Everyone loved her. She was so kind to everyone. It didn’t matter what your social class was, Esther treated you the same.”
I squeezed her thigh when she lapsed into silence. “What happened to her?”
“When she was twelve, she got bone cancer.” She laughed bitterly. “We all seem to get cancer at some point, don’t we?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Inara says it’s worse with the lowers. The doctors and the government keep saying the cancer isn’t because of the atmosphere but Inara says the numbers prove that it is. Anyway, my family were actually middle class but only a step above lower, you know?”
“Yes,” I said.
“My mom had a hysterectomy after Esther was born so she couldn’t even try the breeding program for the Draax to get some juice. But even if she hadn’t had one, the Draax won’t accept married women into the breeding program.”
She glanced up at me as if waiting for my confirmation. I nodded. “That’s right.”
“Because you always hope to convince the woman to stay and be your mate and have more babies, right?”
“Yes.”
She took another large swallow of juice. “Anyway, they sold a bunch of stuff to try and raise enough money to buy some juice on the black market.”
She glanced at me again, but I kept my face neutral. The black market for juice was becoming a large problem, but neither the Draax nor the humans had figured out a way to stop it from happening. But I couldn’t blame Ellis’s parents for trying whatever they could to save their child.
“They were not able to get enough?” I said.
“No. They even tried taking out a second mortgage on the house, but the bank denied them. Esther was receiving chemo, but it was obvious that it wasn’t working. The doctors told us she had maybe another month.”
“I am sorry, sadora.” I took her hand and squeezed it.
Her fingers were cold and clammy, and she clung to my hand in a tight grip. “One night, after Esther was in bed, my parents came to my room and told me they had found another way to get the juice. I was ecstatic.”
She was near tears again and the little colour the juice had given her already leached away. “My dad had found a guy, I don’t know how, and he never said, who was willing to help trade with the Draax for the juice we needed. He was like a broker. Do you know what that word means?”
“Yes,” I said. “he receives money or juice in exchange for arranging the deal.”
“Right,” she said. “My mom said that I could save Esther. She said that I would be working with the Draax for a couple of nights and I just needed to be brave and strong. I said I would do whatever they wanted me to do.”
The laugh that spilled out of her throat was jagged