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“Pleasure traders?” I repeated, confused.

“That’s what they are,” Malis pointed out, “since they want to sell the pleasure of the Joy Vessels to anyone who pays.”

“But it makes no sense,” I argued. “What pleasure can they feel when they’re caught and sold like cattle? There’ll be no joy to sell. They hurt those humans for no purpose.”

“What do we care?” Malis tucked her little blade into a loop on the net of cords and belts over her chest. “We don’t have the gold to pay for any joy anyway—not to Joy Guardians, not to the pleasure traders.”

“But we don’t charge for Joy,” I winced at the idea. “Anyone is free to come to the temple and connect to our Source.”

“Oh yeah?” Malis scoffed. “No one can even come near your fucking temple without jingling a fat purse of gold.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Trade me your fancy gold skirt for my rags,” she challenged. “See if they’ll let you in your own temple as a commoner.”

“Everyone is welcome to come and pray,” I protested, even as a heavy feeling descended into the pit of my stomach. “Are you telling me you’ve been denied access to the Source at some point?”

The temple was open only six days a week for a few hours a day, since many needed the night to travel there. The space was limited, of course, and the Joy Guardians relied on the offerings brought by the visitors. But I never heard of anyone being denied entry even if they didn’t bring anything.

“At some point?” Malis repeated my words mockingly. “They never let someone like us in. We’ve never been inside the temple, not to mention ever tasted your precious Joy.”

“One has to pay a lot of money before they even allow you to go on a pilgrimage,” Gefred explained.

“But it can’t be true. I never knew…” I sank to the sand, weighted down by this discovery.

Only how could it be true?

Yes, the Joy Guardians lived solely on donations.

We survived on the food brought to the temple by the worshipers.

But we didn’t need much. With hundreds of people passing through six days a week, we had more than enough food for ourselves and often even donated it to various cities, including Kalmena.

We kept no servants and had few possessions.

To my knowledge, we didn’t need any money. But even if we did, the connection with the Source of Joy was every shadow fae’s birthright. No one had the privilege to charge money for it.

Gefred twirled my dagger between his fingers.

“Good weapon.” He clicked his tongue approvingly. “Real iron. But it looks rather plain. With all the money the temple has been raking in, one would think you’d have everything covered in gold and precious stones.”

“The riches of a Joy Guardian are not in what he has but in what he knows,” I replied mechanically, steel reeling from my most recently acquired knowledge about the temple’s operations.

“So, what is it you know that is so valuable?” Malis snapped.

“Right now, I just know that I need to find those who took Ciana. Then I’ll have to bring her back.”

“Good luck with that.” Malis turned around to leave.

But Gefred lingered.

“What if I knew where the pleasure traders were right now?” he asked, kicking the sand. “How much would that piece of knowledge cost, you think?”

“Gefred.” Malis tugged him by his skirt. “Stay out of it.”

“Do you really know where they are?” I asked suspiciously. “If so, take all of this.” I offered him my entire satchel. “I’ll trade everything I own for their location.”

“What good is your bag to me?” He scowled at the satchel. “I don’t have the skills to use any of your gadgets. And even if I did, I can find my way back home to Teekse without your crystal that shows stars in daylight.”

“Exactly,” Malis chimed in. “As long as we stay on this side of that rock…” she pointed at a tall boulder sticking out from the sand to our right, “we know where we are. And if we need to go anywhere farther, we travel at night like all normal people do.”

“But I have nothing else to trade,” I said.

“Oh yes, you do.” Gefred inched closer. “If I tell you where their camp is, I want you to let me into your temple.”

Malis’s eyes flared with interest.

“Us, ” she added quickly. “You’ll have to let both of us in.”

“But I’m not the Master Guardian. I have no control over who comes to the temple.”

“You’re a Joy Guardian, aren't you? You can open the doors, can’t you?”

I could. I had access to the temple and could possibly sneak them in somehow.

Though being a wanted man made things more complicated.

The guards might come by the temple again, looking for me.

And this time, the Master Guardian wouldn’t be there to send them away.

Neither could I count on Oria to defend me from them.

But Ciana was out there, captured and alone.

“Alright,” I agreed. “I’ll find a way to get you in.”

“No.” Gefred smirked. “I need your promise, one that you can’t break.”

I drew in a long breath, buying some time to think. Giving a promise had serious consequences. If I failed to deliver what they wanted from me, I’d lose my mind and then my life in a most gruesome way.

On the other hand, if I didn’t find Ciana soon, she might end up being taken from me forever. She was still so fragile, both in body and spirit. My magic was supporting the life in her. What if she didn’t survive without the support of my tendrils?

Horror gripped my throat at this thought. I coughed, rubbing my chest.

“If I give you such a promise, I’ll need more than just their location,” I said quickly. “I need your help in getting her back.”

“My help?” Gefred flinched.

“Both of you.” I tipped my chin at Malis too. “You said it yourself that I’ll need an army to go after them.”

“Yeah, but we’re no army,” he protested.

“With me, you can be.”

Malis glared at me. “I’m not risking my fucking life for some woman I never met.”

“That’d give you a chance to meet Ciana, if you so wish.

Besides, I won’t make you risk your life by running into a battle or something like that.

I’ll do most of the work required. But I’m just one man and can’t be in several places at the same time.

That’s what I’ll need your help with. Promise me that you’ll help me get her, and I’ll find a way for you to experience joy. ”

“Alright, listen, there is a whole camp of them.” Gefred scratched the back of his head.

“They’ve been hunting for Joy Vessels for days now.

They come and go, but there are still enough of them to kill us all.

I don’t care how skilled you are with your gadgets or how many spells you know.

We’ll need more people to deal with them. ”

“Where do you suggest we’ll get more?” I asked.

“Fuck…” His eyes shifted along the dark horizon. He scratched his head again. “Fine. Come with us. We’ll find you more people back at our place, exchange the formal promises, and seal this deal.”

“And if you back out of the deal, Joy Guardian, I’ll personally rip your throat open before the promise-breaker curse even finds you.” Malis yanked one of the sharpened knitting needles out of her hair bun. “You’ll see why my man calls me ‘stinger.’”

Teekse was just a cluster of awkwardly constructed dwellings that I’d first mistaken for temporary storm shelters.

Nothing about this place was even remotely attractive.

The deep well of water seemed to be the only anchor that kept Teekse dwellers from abandoning the hamlet and moving away with the next storm.

As the night had just begun, Teekse dwellers were slowly emerging from their homes that the day storm had almost buried under the sand.

“Is that how you live? Do you not have any habitable caves here at all?” I couldn’t hold back the questions while surveying this pitiful collection of crumbling huts.

Piles of rocks, rickety panels of twigs, and grass mats were haphazardly assembled in some resemblance of houses and kept together seemingly by nothing but the sand blown over them during the day.

Malis smirked and spat on the ground. “What? Not fancy enough for you, Joy Guardian?”

“It’s not about being fancy. It’s just…” I searched for words carefully, trying not to sound judgmental, but I couldn’t hide being stunned.

The further I walked away from the temple, the more my perspective of the world shifted.

I’d known poverty myself. We never had much when I was a child.

But I’d never seen or heard of destitution like here in Teekse, and judging by the attitude of its dwellers, it wasn’t out of ordinary in the kingdom.

Now, I was trying to get a firmer grip on reality that, as I discovered, I’d been sheltered from most of my life.

“Nah, no caves,” Gefred explained. “If we had any, we would’ve long been kicked out of them anyway.

There are too many thugs scouring the desert for anything of value and searching for a fight.

At least we still have our well.” He pointed at a short pyramidal structure in the middle of the settlement that must be a cover over their well of water. “Are you thirsty?”

My throat was parched. Blood had just stopped trickling from the cut on my neck from Malis’s knife, but the wounds from my severed tendrils still throbbed painfully.

I could use both food and water to help me recover.

Taking another look around, however, I doubted these people had enough of either to spare.

“I’m good. Thank you for your offer,” I declined politely.

Malis glared at me suspiciously.

“Bullshit!” she bristled. “We found you with your mouth stuffed with sand. You must be dying from thirst. Is our water not good for you or what?”

“No. I’m just, um…” Once again she left me speechless.

“What? Too proud to take from us? Hey, Raimus, What do you have for food tonight?” She yelled at the man who’d just climbed out from under a worn leather screen stretched over a wooden frame.

Naked, save for a tattered blanket thrown over his shoulders, the man shook some sand out of his tangled long braid.

“Snake,” he said, dragging out a round tray covered with a metal lid. “Roasted it yesterday, but it’s still good. Not sure if it’ll last until midnight, though. May as well eat it now.”

He opened the lid, revealing several long, charred pieces.

“Thanks.” Malis grabbed three of them, tossing one to me. “Eat, Joy Guardian. Trust me, you need it. You look like you’re in shitty shape.”

Raimus, the man with the tray, gave me a once-over.

“You really are, my boy. What the fuck happened to you here?” He pointed with a piece of roasted snake at the wounds on my arms.

The stubs of my tendrils had long dissolved into shadows and soot, leaving gaping holes smeared with black.

“Nothing.” I bit into the charred meat.

The snake was tough and tasted bitter, but I hadn’t eaten for so long, I could stomach anything now .

Gefred shoved a metal bowl of water in my chest.

“He got beaten up pretty bad during the storm,” he explained to Raimus.

“By the pleasure traders?” Raimus asked, scratching his chest under the blanket he was wearing.

“How do you know?” I nearly choked on the water, drinking it too fast and emptying the bowl all at once.

“They passed just outside here the other night.” Raimus grabbed the last piece of the snake, then put the tray away.

“They said their Joy Vessels are now for everyone to use. I guess one no longer has to live in a palace to get some of that sweet pleasure. As long as you have enough gold to pay.” He sank his sharp canines into the meat.

“I told them they aren’t going to sell it to anyone around here,” he chuckled between bites of his breakfast. “Not for what they’re asking for it.

I’ve never even seen a gold coin in my life.

And if I ever do, I’m sure not going to travel all the way to the lawless City of Ashgate to spend it. ”

“Is that where they took the Joy Vessels they stole? To Ashgate” I asked.

Raimus shrugged. “It’s not like they told me where they were taking them. But where else can they go? In any other city, the guards would execute them all, then take the Joy Vessels right back to the queen.”

My heart sank in despair. No one knew the exact location of Ashgate City. Some said it lay far on the outskirts of the kingdom, where the desert merged with the sky. Others claimed it lay so deep underground, it bordered the afterlife realm.

One thing was certain, Ashgate was a perfect place to take whatever one had stolen because the queen’s laws never reached it. Filled with outlaws, beggars, and disgraced mages, the City of Ashgate had no ruler and followed no rules.

“Hey, you don’t have to pay for joy, Raimus,” Malis announced. “Help this man get his woman back, and he’ll let you into the Temple of the First Priestess for free. You’ll get to taste the Joy all you want. Bring your brother too. ”

Raimus spun to me. “Are you really a Joy Guardian? Can you let us into the temple?”

“Of course he is. See?” Malis poked with her finger at my collar.

Raimus gawked at it in awe. “Well…I bet the camel I don’t have, I never thought I’d speak to one of you during this lifetime. Joy Guardians don’t want us anywhere near their precious temple. No way you’ll let us in.”

Gefred had eaten all the meat from his piece of the snake and now was sucking on every bone of the spine. “He said he’d give us a promise.”

“You will?” Raimus asked me.

I nodded. “In exchange for your promise to help me get the woman I love from the people you call pleasure traders.”

Raimus whistled, shaking his head. “Going after those guys is suicide. Why would I do that?”

“For joy.” Gefred tossed away the snake bones and kicked the sand somberly.

Raimus turned to Malis. “Did you agree to this?”

She hugged herself, biting her lip. “You know what? I’m sick and tired of hearing Grandpa describe for the millionth time how he was allowed into the temple through a favor of some noble lord five hundred years ago and got to taste the Joy.

I don’t know any lords who’d do it for me, but at least once in my life, I want to feel joy too. ”

“Is joy really worth risking your life for?” Raimus wondered.

“According to Grandpa, it’s worth everything, even going to war.”

Gefred gestured my way. “The Joy Guardian here says we won’t have to fight them. It won’t be the same risk as going to war.”

“How is he going to take the woman away from them without a fight?”

“He’s a Joy Guardian. He knows some tricks, right?” Gefred gave me a questioning look .

“Not tricks ,” I corrected. “But I do have a plan.”

“What kind of a plan?”

“Well, first of all, I’ll need your promises and then… Do you have any glass jars? Metal or clay ones would do too.”