Page 19 of Own to Obey

Shaya nodded, strangely she didn't actually feel afraid, just startled. “Why was she angry? What did she want?”

Treska gestured for her to sit down on the bed. “She was…” Treska paused as she tried to figure out the words. Shaya had been trying to teach her more of the Common Tongue so that they could communicate easier, but she wouldn’t be able to help guess the words for this. Shaya had no idea what the woman had come in for.

“She was searching,” Treska said finally.

“For me?”

Treska nodded.

Shaya pursed her lips, shocked. “Why would she be searching for me?”

“She searches for the answer for the shinno's change.”

“His change in what?” she asked, her heart sinking a little as she guessed Treska was going to say next.

“The shinno has changed for her and she is searching for the answer.”

The shinno's change. Shaya exhaled in frustration. Did that mean that she was involved with the shinno?

Treska watched her face carefully, and then spoke again. “She and the shinno are…”

Shaya suddenly found it difficult to breathe in the moment that hung in the air as Treska tried to find the next word to explain herself.

“She and the shinno are one sometimes.”

Shaya nodded, releasing a breath she didn't even realize she was holding. Sometimes. That meant that they were not together all the time, which likely meant that she was not someone permanent for him. She suddenly caught her thoughts and stopped herself. She shouldn't be relieved. If the shinno was intimate with her when he had someone else, that did not make her look good, although she wasn't sure what the general behavior was like with these kinds of things in their particular culture. It didn't seem like the shinno had a wife based on the amount of time she had seen him before she became injured, but who knew? He could have had a wife that he went to see after their time with the ocean. Maybe he was going to see this woman?

Before her direction of thought could run away with her again, Treska spoke.

“They are one sometimes,” she said again. “More than some others. But since this journey, he has changed. She was searching for the answer.”

“She thinks I'm the answer?” she asked, somewhat sharply. It was one thing for her to guess what was happening between Shaya and the shinno, but if she was convinced that something was indeed happening, she could make things difficult for her.

Shaya had heard plenty of stories from Kyus regarding bitter women who became cruel when they didn't get what they wanted, women who felt they deserved more than they were due and then try to destroy something they felt made them look less desirable. If she became the target of this woman, her life on the ship could become hell. It was better she did not know anything about the shinno's attention to her or his actions with her.

Unfortunately, Treska nodded. “She does not know you. She knows everyone else. She knows you are the answer.”

Shaya exhaled. “And now she knows my cabin as well,” she pointed out.

Treska nodded, although a frown was on her face. “The shinno will not be happy.”

Shaya's brows rose. “He won't?”

Treska shook her head, but she was distracted. “No one should know.”

Hmm. So he was keeping her location a secret. Strangely, that comforted her a little. She would prefer nobody on the ship know where she was, but now this woman did.

“Are you going to tell him?” she asked.

“I have to tell him everything,” Treska said, lowering her eyes. “He said everything from now on, or I get the black.”

Shaya pressed her lips together tight, annoyed that he had still threatened her, but at least she knew that Treska would be telling him everything, and it wouldn't necessarily be her fault. “I think it's best that you do, in this instance anyway,” she said. “I do not want this woman knowing where I am if she is angry about me. I can’t even try to reason with her.”

Treska nodded. “Yes, it is smarter.”

Shaya thought for a long moment. “There are some things the shinno says I don’t understand…” she began.

Treska sat up straight. “I will help. Tell me.”

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