Harem System novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: What the Clerk Said

Veyra woke in the dark with his voice in her ears.

It was low and steady, and it was not talking to her.

He was in the next bed down, sitting beside a woman with a fever.

He was telling her about a lake in a place called Minnesota.

Veyra lay still and listened.

She had listened to that voice through a door for ninety nights.

She knew every pause in it.

She knew the soft grunt he made when he sat down on the floor outside her room.

She had lain awake on the other side of the wood with her hands clamped around the bedpost.

Every night she had waited for the sound of him giving up.

Tonight he had finally given up, and it was worse than she had imagined.

Her whole body ached.

The hunger in her stomach had turned from a pain into a hole.

A crystal lay on the table beside the bed, glowing weakly.

She picked it up and closed her fist around it.

It gave her a small flat ease that lasted a few breaths.

Nine days, the healer had said.

She had heard that, too, through the haze.

She had known the number before the healer said it.

The Ward was silent except for breathing.

She sat up slowly, with her teeth clenched, and swung her feet to the cold floor.

Nils stood across the room with his back to her.

His head was bowed and his hand was loosely holding a stranger's, and he had been up for two nights.

She could see that from here.

She could see the skin under his eyes, and the way his shoulders had started to curl in.

Her throat closed.

She had done that to him, and she had let him believe it was only her pride.

She pulled his coat tighter around herself and walked.

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