Ragamuffin Read Free Page A

me?” She didn’t like this. She glanced around, looking for eyes staring back. This screamed wrong to her.
    “The package you delivered has been discovered,” Steven said, meaning that the Gahe had found the breeder she’d killed. “The recipients are not happy, and they’re looking for the postmaster. They’d like to make an example of you.” Too many people around, Nashara thought, to really deal with Steven.
    “They thinking to look up here yet to express their gratitude?” Nashara stepped back from him and jostled an old man in a ragged suit who swore at her.
    “I’m told they’ll finish their sweep of house’s garden”—that would be Pitt’s Cross—“within the hour.”
    “Steven, or whatever the hell your name is, why is this your problem again? You paid me, I did it. I’m leaving. You’re making yourself traceable. You’re holding me up.”
    Steven swallowed. Nervous, Nashara thought, but about what? “We’re impressed with what you did. They want to help you more. Do you want to see full freedom, do you think humans should be able to exercise all the same rights as the Gahe? Or any other damn alien?”
    “All bullshit aside”—Nashara folded her arms—“what are you trying to offer here? I have a berth to go to. I need to leave.”
    Steven took a deep breath. “You don’t actually have a berth.”
    Nashara stared at him. His neck would break a lot easier that some Gahe’s. “What do you mean by that?”
    “Do you really think that . . . that package delivery was worth the price of a ticket to another world?”
    Nashara shook her head. This wasn’t about the assassination. They’d underestimated her again. “You didn’t think I would make it back out of there.” It wasn’t a question. Just a statement.
    “No one down there has the ability to deliver packages. But we’re working on it, and we’d hoped that what you did would encourage others to try. And if that happened, we would assist them. We’ve been secretly building a network of couriers, and not just here, Nashara,” Steven brimmed with excitement, “all throughout the worlds. We’ve been preparing for
decades
. We have ships, secret couriers, and lots and lots of packages we want delivered soon.”
    They’d expected a martyr. The League needed someone to strike against the Gahe and die, and then they would help Pitt’s Cross rise against the Gahe. But she had no desire to join. She had a mission of her own.
    Nashara unfolded her arms and tapped his chest. “I’m going to kill you. It’s going to be very slow, very painful, and you’re not going to care about packages,” or any other simple code words.
    “We’re willing to help,” Steven belted out quickly. “Truly. We really need someone with your talent.”
    “That was a onetime thing, Steven. I was a desperate girl in a bad situation.” The toy she’d purchased from the stall couldn’t even be purchased with Pitt’s Cross coin, let alone a trip into orbit. She’d had to do something.
    There. She spotted a simple table knife on a stall table.
    She was so close to getting away from it all. So close. “For a onetime thing, you were very good at it.” Steven sensed her weariness. “We’d like to hire you.”
    The eagle-eyed vendor didn’t spot the snatch, and now Nashara had a weapon. “I have a pressing mission of my own that doesn’t fit in with being a League ‘package deliverer.’ I’m sorry. I need to get to it, Steven, and you’re telling me I’m not going. That’s a problem. And of all people you should understand that when I say I am not for sale, I really mean it.”
    She whipped around him. He jumped, but before he could do anythingmore, she’d draped one hand around his shoulder and pressed the knife against the small of his back with the other. Bystanders didn’t notice the move, and by keeping herself pressed close to Steven, no one would notice the knife. They just looked overly chummy.
    The kid behind the stall