Chapter 3

“You’re finally awake?” A delicate voice, one that carried with it a musical rounded lilt, greeted me as my eyes fluttered open only to be greeted with inky darkness.

“Hng.” I responded weakly.

“You’re a master conversationalist Toby,” My subconscious chided me.

“Good. Drink this,” a delicate brown hand the shade of cinnamon bark proffered a small bowl to me.

I took it without a second thought and put the bowl to my lips.

I had already began to drink before the smell of it reached my nose.

I coughed and nearly spit out the broth and did my best to choke it down.

“That’s spicy!” I splurted, surprised.

“Yes it is. It’s got ginger, chilis, white pepper and bone broth in it,” the voice responded.

I turned my head to see where it was coming from.

The shadows were deep, but they weren’t deep enough to hide the woman who was sitting on a small stool besides the bed that I was lying on.

She wasn’t stunning. She wasn’t what most people would call beautiful in New Welling, but she was compelling. Her face was all angles and and her eyes were like dark topaz, hard, but full of empathy at the same time. Her midnight dark hair hung in a long braided tail.

“You’re from Rajastan?” I asked.

“Yes,” she replied. “My family is from Rajastan, but I moved to New Welling years ago for a new life.”

“Oh,” was all that I could think to say.

She smiled. It seemed to brighten the room.

“I’m Ruby, Ruby Shenvi. And you?” She asked.

“Tobias. Toby,” I said without thinking.

“What are you doing you idiot?” I thought. “You’re wanted for murder and your name is plastered across probably every bulletin board in New Welling, and your giving it out like it’s nothing to the first pretty face that crosses your path.”

“Tobias Toby?” Ruby said, a playful smile crossing her lips.

I started to correct her, but thought better of it. “Yeah, close enough for now anyway,” I said after my other words stuttered to a stop.

“Well it’s nice to meet you Tobias Toby,” Ruby said, extending her palm towards mine in what I guessed was a Rajastani greeting.

I put my palm towards hers and, following her example, pressed the bottom of it and the fingertips together. “It’s a pleasure to meet you too.”

“Thank you. Now that you’re awake, how about we find you some clothes?” She asked.

I looked down at my naked chest and let out a squeak.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened and why I’m undressed. I’m so sorry. Please excuse me.”

Ruby let out a delicate laugh that brought to mind the tinkling of wind-chimes. “I know, I’m the one who undressed you and it was quite the undertaking, and I didn’t want to strain myself so much again, so I decided to wait until you woke up to size you up and find a new fit for you.”

I blushed even harder then. This woman, one I barely knew had seen me without clothes on and, now looking at myself, I realized, had washed the blood that had stained my body too?

“Maybe I should have let the sky marshals shoot me.” I thought. “I’m already dying from embarrassment now, better it were a quicker death.”

“Don’t worry. I see bodies in states of undress all the time,” Ruby said, surely reading my mind, or at least the emotions that warred on my face that, according to my father was as easy to read as a children’s book.

I felt even more embarrassed then. Was this a lady of the night that had taken me in?

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Would she want me to pay for her services or force me to lie with her and if I didn’t report me to the marshals?

“It’s nothing like that!” Ruby growled at me, a scowl painting her intriguing face. “I am not a prostitute!”

“I didn’t say that!” I blurted out, even more embarrassed now.

“No, but you were thinking it. Your face is like a book. Anyone who has any learning at all can read it.”

I stuttered and then shut myself up. “I’m sorry,” finally said.

“It’s no problem,” Ruby responded. “And I’m a seamstress by the way. My job is making clothes. So that’s why I see people in states of dress and undress all the time, and I am still a little insulted that a whore would be the first thing that your mind goes to.”

“I’m sorry.” I said again.

“You’re forgiven,” Ruby replied. “And what was it that brought you to my doorstep?” She asked.

“My feet,” I responded without thinking.

Ruby Shenvi rolled her eyes at me and for some reason that brought a smile to my face. “I mean, why were you covered in blood, incoherent, and muttering to yourself in your sleep?”

I panicked. Should I tell her the truth? What would she do if she realized that she was harboring a fugitive? What would she do if she knew that I was wanted for murder?

“Don’t lie to me. I can see it in your face that you’re thinking of lying to me.”

I swallowed.

I was damned anyway, what could it hurt telling her? I was bound to need to run for my life and freedom again sooner or later, so if telling her sooner meant I’d run sooner, so be it.

I needed to talk. I needed to confide in someone. I needed to be heard. To be seen. I needed to grieve.

I started to open my mouth to tell her, but a wave of sobs burst forth, tears started falling from my eyes uncontrollably.

I sobbed for what must have been ten minutes straight before I could find any words. “Someone killed him,” I said. “Someone murdered my father.”

I cried again.

Saying those words aloud cemented the fact that my father truly was dead. I would never get to see him again. Never get to talk to him again. All I had left of him was a long list of things that I would never get to do or say.

“They think I did it,” I bawled. “They think I killed my own father and they don’t care about killing me to stop me from escaping them.”

Ruby sat in silence and hesitantly put her hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze.

“I don’t think you did it,” she said after a long deliberation.

Her sudden show of support for me caught me off guard and the sobs that I was choking on stopped.

“You believe me?” I croaked.

“Yes…I think that I do,” Ruby answered haltingly.

“Why?”

“Where I grew up, life isn’t as…held in regard, as it is here,” she started to explain. “One could say that it is pretty cheap where I’m from, and I don’t see that disregard in you. Life is precious to you isn’t it?”

Her question again caught me off-guard. I had never really thought about it before. Yes, I had been faced with death on multiple occasions, my mother’s affected me the most, but I was far too young then to have developed a philosophy of life.

I did, however, on reflection, think that life was precious. I had to. Otherwise it wouldn’t hurt so much losing the ones you loved. If it didn’t matter, it may hurt, but I’m sure it wouldn’t feel like you had been robbed of a piece of your soul, a piece that you could never ever retrieve.

“Yes it is,” I answered. “It really is.”

“I knew it.”

I was about to ask how she did, but I decided to shut up instead and I looked down at myself again and, for the second time, a bright flush infused my cheeks and I pulled the spare covers that Ruby had provided me with over my naked chest.

“Um…Can I have my clothes back now?” I asked, hoping I didn’t sound too foolish.

“No,” Ruby replied. “They’re going to be burned.”

“What?! Why!?”

“What do you think will happen if the sky marshals come knocking on every door in the warrens looking for you and they find that I have a pile of bloodied clothes, your bloodied clothes to be exact? Of course I’d be neck deep in trouble, and I’ve already put myself at more than enough risk by helping you. Lord knows why I did.”

“Why did you?” I asked suddenly curious.

“Because you looked like you needed it and something in my soul told me to help. You can call it divine providence or hellish foolishness, whichever you wish. I just knew in my heart that I was supposed to help you and I answered that call.”

I didn’t understand, but I appreciated it.

“Now that you’re awake and sufficiently embarrassed, lets find you some clothes to wear so you aren’t parading around my humble little home half naked.”

I wish she hadn’t reminded me of that. I didn’t think my cheeks could get any redder than they had before, but they somehow did.

Ruby laughed at my discomfort.

“You’re cute when you blush,” she said, I was sure I was about to die from embarrassment at her words. “Anyway, can you stand up for me?” She asked.

I did as she said, holding my arms in front of me, trying to protect my decency as best I could.

Ruby scanned me up and down. Her eyes had shifted from the warm inviting ones I had seen seconds ago into ones of appraisal. She was taking stock and mentally measuring me. After about a minute she said, “You’re lucky. I have some extra clothes that a client sent me that will fit you perfectly.”

“But won’t they need them?” I asked.

“No. These are rich folk, and when their child outgrows their clothes, they discard them. When I learned that I asked if I could take them to reuse the material. They didn’t care one bit and lucky for you, there’s some clothes I haven’t yet unseamed that’s just about your size.”

I smiled awkwardly and grabbed the cover that I had been laying under and wrapped it around myself. One problem with living in a floating zeppelin nation was that it meant there was always a draft and you could never truly be warm.

I tried my best not to catch a chill.

Thankfully Ruby was quick and I was fully dressed in warm emerald canvas trousers, a cream shirt, a grey woolen vest and to top it off, Ruby provided me with a beautiful dark cherrywood leather pea-coat.

“Are you sure that I can have this?” I asked, my voice breaking a little. Having seen my father dead in front of me and having been chased, shot at, and branded a murderer made the first sign of human generosity that I had seen since I saw my father’s body seem like God himself had reached down to touch me with His favor.

Who knows, maybe Ruby really was an angel sent from Him. Heaven knows that I needed any grace I could get.