Harem System novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: The Queue

Nils looked at the bronze disc for a long breath.

Then he took a pear from the basket, because it was a good pear and he was hungry.

"Thank you for the food," he said. "I'll pass on the post."

Ardith's smile did not move.

"You haven't asked what it pays."

"I don't need to. I'm not a man who wants to be kept."

"Everyone wants to be kept, Mr. Halvorsen." She said it kindly. "You simply haven't been offered a house worth the trouble."

"The offer stands," she added, and closed the disc into her palm.

Behind her, Veyra stood very still with both hands locked behind her back.

She was looking at Nils with her whole face open, and he made himself look at the pear.

"Take care of her," he said to Ardith.

"Always."

Ardith touched Veyra's elbow and turned her toward the stairs.

Veyra went, and she looked back once.

Ruenna shut the door and leaned on it.

"You just turned down the stamp."

"I did."

"The Gate won't let you in without it."

"The Gate lets in any party under a leader's seal," Nils said. "A-rank. Guildless. You've got one."

Her mouth fell open.

"You read the Gate rules."

"I read them every night for three months. It was the only thing I could do on the floor outside her door."

Ruenna laughed, short and surprised, and went to find her seal.

The Trial Gate stood at the end of the mercenary road, a black arch three stories high with a slow gray mist moving in the dark inside it.

The queue ran down the steps and around the block.

Nils had stood in it at dawn on ninety mornings.

This time he walked past the front rope at Ruenna's shoulder, and heads turned all down the line.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Harem System from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.