Page 30 of Courting Mayhem

The glittering blue transporter light engulfed me. Once again it felt like my molecules were being torn apart. I sighed in relief as my molecules abruptly stopped whizzing about. The light faded and we stood on a bobbing walkway. A thick gray-black sludge floated on top of the once pristine water. The stench of waste warred with the suffocating smell of rotten fish.

Anchored to the walkway was a makeshift flatboat crammed with an assortment of vendors hawking their wares. The bustling marketplace sold everything from smoked fish to illegal drugs. The narrow pathway was jammed with shoppers.

Derek swatted at a horde of bloodsuckers determined to drain him dry. “Those are the biggest mosquitoes I’ve ever seen.”

“Welcome to hell,” I said.

A scarecrow of a man waved a long knife at us. “Give me the female or I will gut you.”

I felt Derek’s power flare.

The scarecrow’s eyes bugged and with a shriek of terror, he fled into the marketplace.

I cocked an inquiring eyebrow at the war commander.

“I made him see a hungry Tai-Kok,” Derek replied.

“I would have gone with a rotting corpse, crawling with maggots.”

Papi Sten added, “Or a Katanic shapeshifter in their true form.”

Katanic shapeshifters were damn scary. I shuddered as I remembered the one I had accidently run into. A heaving silky black mass with long ropy tentacles and a gaping maw filled with needle sharp teeth. For a moment, I thought it was going to eat me. Thankfully, he was a friend of Papi Sten.

A half-naked child rowed up in a dugout filled with bottles of brackish water. “Fresh water. For you only one dinar.”

“How much for the boat and water?” Papi Sten asked.

Greed lit up the kid’s eyes. “Fifty dinars.”

“Forty dinars,” Papi Sten countered.

The kid held out his hand. “Done.”

Papi Sten handed him the money and the kid disappeared into the market.

Poppa Jacob strode up, climbed in the dugout, and paddled off.

The Angaga Pleasure Palace was a converted trawler. Six heavily armed males stood guard on the top deck. Nude females beckoned from the windows.

Papi Sten walked up to the guards at the front doors. “Canute is expecting us.”

The older guard nodded. “Follow me.” The doors slid open.

I flinched as the reek of unwashed bodies, stale booze, and puke hit me. Ugh. The filthy plastic tables were packed with intoxicated males hooting and hollering as skinny females wearing nothing, but a smile did energetic table dances.

I sighed. No matter where I went in the galaxy, bars and pleasure houses were all the same. Horny males getting drunk and having lots of sex with desperate females who had no other way to support themselves. The Hus Ping bartenders were identical as were the huge iron cages filled with bottles of booze. To get a drink, a customer slipped a credit chip through the grill.

The guard led us down a narrow corridor to the high-rollers’ room. Eight sports betting machines lined one wall. Small tables surrounded a raised stage. In one corner a small Riu tree sprouted from a funky aquarium. Its tentacle-like roots were wrapped around a desiccated corpse. An unconscious male lay in front of the tank.

Canute’s strong mental voice echoed in my head. “This is what happens to anyone who tries to cheat me.”

To my horror the guard picked up the poor male and dumped him into the aquarium. The Riu tree latched onto the body.

Derek’s hand clamped on my arm when I instinctively moved to help him. “Don’t. He’s already dead and the room is filled with hidden laser canons.”

I pressed my face into Derek’s chest.“Canute is one dead Askole.”

“On that, we agree.”He stroked my back.

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