Chapter Three
Most successful inns had a staff. Some jobs required a dedicated person: usually there was a chef, a bookkeeper, sometimes a kennel master if the inn catered to guests with animal companions. Typically the innkeeper’s family handled many of these tasks. In my parents’ inn, I’d worked as a gardener. It was my responsibility to keep the vast flower gardens, service the ponds, and maintain the fruit trees. I loved the gardens. They were full of small secret places that were just mine. My memory served the delicate scent of apricots in bloom, their dark crooked branches bearing small white flowers; rows of strawberries; the two yellow cherry trees I used to climb… All of it was gone now, disappeared without a proverbial trace, together with the inn and my parents within it. One day the inn that used to be my home simply vanished. Nobody knew how or why.
A familiar pang pierced me, worry mixed with anxiety and a dash of mourning. I missed my parents so much. So much. It had been years, and still sometimes I woke up, and in those drowsy, half-asleep moments, I thought I heard Mom’s voice calling me down for breakfast.
I was in a different inn now, my own inn. Up until this moment, Gertrude Hunt hadn’t needed a staff. I cooked for Caldenia, myself, and whatever rare guest happened to stop by. Cooking for two people and cooking for a party of at least forty, counting the Arbitrator’s staff, with at least four different species in attendance, was completely different. Not only that, but with otrokars and vampires in the same building, all my attention would be occupied with keeping them from killing each other. And they would expect a banquet. Of course they would. We didn’t even have a definite date for the end of the summit. I might end up feeding them for weeks.
I couldn’t do it. It wasn’t feasible. I had to hire a cook, but a cook good enough to prepare a banquet for four different species would cost a fortune because he wouldn’t be a cook, he would be a chef. I had set funds aside for the food, but somehow in all my preparations it never occurred to me that someone would have to be cooking it. I hadn’t budgeted for a chef. Where could I even find a chef with less than twenty-four hours to go? It took weeks to find and hire one.
I could imagine the ad now. Hi, my name is Dina. I run a small inn on Earth, two and a half stars, and I need you to drop everything and prepare meals for a party of otrokars, vampires, and spoiled Merchants. I have a shoestring budget and your pay would be a pittance.
I groaned. Beast barked at me, puzzled.
I looked at the tiny Shih Tzu. “What am I going to do?”
My dog furiously wagged her tail.
I blew air out. Panicking never solved anything. I had to go about fixing the problem in a logical fashion. First hurdle, money. Where could I get some money to hire a chef?
The only money I had, besides the food fund, was the inn’s six-month budget. Guests came and went, and an innkeeper’s income was usually somewhat erratic. My parents had taught me to always budget six months ahead and to never touch that money. If I dipped into that budget, I wouldn’t be able to cover utilities in the upcoming months, and nobody would visit an inn without running water or electricity. We had backup generators, but they were an emergency measure. If I used that money, I’d be breaking one of my parents’ most fundamental rules.
Was there any way around it? Any way at all?
No.
No, there wasn’t. I couldn’t take out a business loan because my business didn’t generate enough income to qualify me for one and because business loans and lines of credit took several days to process. Personal loans were out of the question too. Asking other innkeepers for financial assistance wasn’t an option. It wasn’t done. Besides, without a solid track record, and the inn only rated at two and a half stars, I was a bad business risk. All things considered, I wouldn’t lend myself money.
There was simply no other money to be had. I had to feed the guests. Vampires required meat with fresh herbs, otrokars had to have spices and citrus with everything, and Nuan Cee’s clan had a taste for poultry, and they were particular about how it was prepared. I had to hire someone, whatever it cost.
Realizing that was like dipping my head into a bucket of ice water. If there was no other way, then there was nothing I could do about it. I had to use that money and pray it would be enough to entice someone to work through the summit.
“One problem solved,” I told Beast.
Now hurdle number two. The chef.
My parents knew many innkeepers, but were friends with only a few. Our kind were a solitary lot. Innkeepers operated in secrecy. Deals were done on a handshake, meetings usually took place face-to-face, and each inn was its own little island of strange in a sea of normal. When my parents’ inn had vanished, even our former friends distanced themselves. What had happened was odd and unexpected; nobody had ever heard of an entire inn simply blinking out of existence. Odd and unexpected was dangerous, and for people who dealt with the universe’s weirdness on a daily basis, most innkeepers were surprisingly risk averse.
I was on my own, but I did know one man who could help. His name was Brian Rodriguez. An innkeeper like me, he ran Casa Feliz in Dallas, one of the largest, busiest inns in the Southwest. Like others, he had been a friend of my parents. A few months ago, when I went to ask him for advice out of pure desperation, he helped me. Since then we’d corresponded a few times and he had given me his cell phone number, a huge sign of trust in our world. Begging him for money was out of the question, but asking for a loan of staff wasn’t unheard of.
I dialed the number on my cell. He answered on the second ring. “Dina, how are you?”
“I’m fine,” I lied. “How are you?”
“Surviving. What can I do for you?”
“I’m so sorry to ask this, but I need a cook on short notice.” I really didn’t want to say what I had to say next. The words stuck in my mouth, but I forced them out. “Could you lend me one?”
He didn’t miss a beat. “What grade?”
“The highest I can get.”
Mr. Rodriguez paused. “Are you hosting the Nexus summit?”
“Yes.” News traveled fast.
“They asked me and I declined. The risk to my other guests would be too great.”
I was well aware of the risks, but I had no choice.
“Unfortunately…”
My heart sank.
“…all of my kitchen staff is really busy. We’re shorthanded at the moment.”
I fought hard to keep despair out of my voice. “Thank you anyway.”
“So happens I know someone who might help,” he said. “If you’re desperate enough.”
What? My hopes soared. “I’m very desperate.”
“He was ranked as a Red Cleaver a few years ago.”
My hopes plunged to the ground, hit hard, and exploded. “I can’t afford a Red Cleaver chef.”
Mr. Rodriguez probably couldn’t afford a Red Cleaver. That was the second-highest ranking. I couldn’t even afford a Gray Cleaver, which was the lowest rung. A Cleaver ranking meant certification by the Galactic Gastronomy Board, a diploma from the best cooking school in the galaxy, and a long apprenticeship in one of the most prestigious restaurants. Cleaver chefs were worth their weight in gold, literally.
“He was stripped of his certification.”
I’d never heard of someone losing their Cleaver. “Why?”
Mr. Rodriguez hesitated. “He might have poisoned someone.”
I put my hand over my face. This was just getting better and better. A poisoner chef. What could possibly go wrong?
“Dina, are you there?” Mr. Rodriguez asked.
“Yes. I’m just wrestling with it.”
“I warned you that you would have to be desperate. I don’t believe he was ever convicted of the crime, but somehow he was involved in the death of a diplomat. You would have to talk to him to get the whole story.”
With my back against the wall, I didn’t have options. The least I could do was talk to him. “Where can I find him?”
“He lives in a small hole-in-the-wall hovel on Baha-char. Just past the Gorivian gun merchant.”
“I know where that is. Thank you.”
“Oh, and Dina, he is a Quillonian. They can be touchy.”
That was the understatement of the year. Quillonians were notoriously difficult.
“I hope it works out.”
He hung up. I slumped against the wall. Tired or not, I needed to go and see this touchy, dishonored Quillonian chef who might or might not have poisoned someone, because the Arbitrator was due to arrive the following evening.
I had quite possibly bitten off more than I could chew. No, thinking like that would only get me into trouble. It was the fatigue talking. I would host this summit, and it would be successful. Gertrude Hunt needed the guests.
I got my boots out of the closet, put them on, and buckled a belt with a knife on it around my waist under my robe. Baha-char was the place where you went to find things. Sometimes things found you instead and tried to take your money. On the inn grounds, I ruled supreme. Outside them, my powers dropped off sharply. I could still take care of myself, but it never hurt to expect the worst and be prepared.
Beast barked once, excited. I took my broom, pulled the hood of my robe over my head, and headed down the hallway. The inn creaked in alarm.
“I’ll be back soon,” I murmured. “Don’t worry.”
The door at the end of the hallway swung open. Bright light spilled through the rectangular opening, and dry, overbearing heat washed over me. I blinked as my eyes adjusted to the light, and Beast and I stepped into the heat and sunshine of Baha-char.
#
I strode through the heat-baked streets of the Galactic Bazaar, the hem of my robe sweeping the large yellow tiles of its roads. Around me the marketplace of the galaxy breathed and glittered, its heart beating fast, pulsing with life. Tall buildings of pale, sand-colored stone lined the streets, decorated with bright banners streaming from the balconies. Plants, some green, some blue, others red and magenta, spread their branches on the textured terraces, offering cascades of flowers to the sun in the light purple sky. Above me narrow stone arches of bridges spanned the space between the buildings. Merchant booths offering a bounty of goods from across the universe lined the throughway. Open doors marked by bright signs invited customers. Barkers hawked their wares, waving holographic projections of their merchandise at the crowd flowing past them.
Around me the bright, multicolored crocodile of shoppers crawled through the streets. Beings from dozens of planets and dimensions, clothed in leather, fabric, metal or plastic, tall and short, huge and small, each with their own odd scent, searched for their particular goods. A constant hum hung in the air, a cacophony of hundreds of voices mixing together into the kind of noise that could only be heard on Baha-char.