Jade retched again. After vomiting her breakfast, lunch, and dinner into the shallow bowl of the basin, she thought she had nothing left to throw up, yet her body still convulsed.

In those few moments when she had a brief respite from her misery, Karen’s words resonated in her ears, louder and louder, as if the woman was shouting them by her side.

Yes. Yarina had a severe case of the pregnancy, nine long months of it, but she survived just fine.

It can’t be, Jade kept thinking. I am a Master Assassin and can’t bear children.

The Academy’s precious gift of nanites prolonged the assassins’ lives to shifter length and made them harder to kill, but it also made the men sterile and the women unable to conceive. It was a trade-off Jade had agreed to without even thinking. At sixteen, her lifespan’s expectation was woefully short, and to make it even shorter, her family had dumped her starved body in front of the Academy’s Citadel. When the recruiter read her disciple’s contract for her, she went straight to the line where her signature would go before he finished reciting the fine print. At the time, she didn’t know how to write and scribbled an X instead. Being more dead than alive made her priorities clear.

Vomiting one last time, Jade raised her head and looked at the mirror. A pale face and sunken eyes stared back at her. She swallowed a mouthful of water to rinse the rising bile, but the dreadful sensation didn’t leave.

“I can’t be pregnant,” she whispered, then said louder, “It isn’t possible.”

As if on cue, her body quivered under the strain of yet another bout of nausea followed by dry heaves.

A knock on the door found her collapsed on the floor.

“Jewel?” Lady Lisandra called from the hallway.

For a moment, Jade stared at the door at the other end of the bedroom, trying to find her bearings. Did she forget to pick up a client?

“A moment,” she croaked as she pushed herself up, using the tiled wall as a support. Slowly, she stumbled from the bathroom into her bedroom, then carefully walked to the door.

“You look awful,” Lady Lisandra said as soon as Jade opened the lockless door.

The woman could have entered Jade’s room at any time, but she didn’t, a fact that Jade registered in her foggy mind to ponder later.

“I’ll be ready in a moment.” Jade turned toward the small metal dresser in the corner.

“For what?” Lady Lisandra asked from the door.

“Don’t I need to drive—”

“Your shift ended several hours ago.” To Jade’s frown, Lisandra said, “Gerard told me you didn’t feel well…” She let the end of her sentence trail. “And I wanted to let you know that you can see Rikes, our medicus.”

Jade silently stared at the woman. Her brain was still slow, and she needed to sit. Backing a few steps, she felt the edge of the bed pressing against the back of her legs and let herself down.

Lisandra continued, “You know, in case you decide to terminate—”

“I’m not pregnant,” Jade said. Her head throbbed, and the rest of the room swayed all around her.

“You are sure.” Lisandra moved inside the room and closed the door behind her.

“One hundred percent.” Jade massaged her temple. “I can’t get pregnant.” She motioned toward the only chair in the room.

With a nod, Lisandra sat, adjusting the folds of her voluminous dress. The woman always wore elegant gowns that wouldn’t have looked out of place in one of the many Celestian formal balls. She tilted her head before saying, “I heard that rumor about assassins.”

Jade’s heart sunk. “What are you talking about?”

Lady Lisandra gave her a long stare. “I read people for a living. Your disguise didn’t fool me.” Her long, elegant fingers played with the pendant nested between the swell of her breasts.

“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Jade cursed herself for not being more careful around the woman.

“We all have secrets. I imagined you had a good reason to hide who you are.” Lady Lisandra shrugged. “And don’t worry, your secret is safe with me,” she said, “So, is it just a rumor that assassins are barren?”

“It’s not a rumor,” Jade begrudgingly answered. She didn’t like it, but there was no point in denying the truth any longer. “Our bodies are modified to such an extent that we aren’t compatible with the rest of humanity any longer.” The throbbing in Jade’s temple intensified alongside her nausea. Before long, she ran to the bathroom to cast up her accounts yet one more time.

Gentle hands pressed against her back, reminding Jade that she wasn’t alone. When she raised her eyes to the mirror, she saw Lady Lisandra’s sympathetic gaze.

“It’s a bad bug. Probably the food—” Jade shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe the water. Or more than one thing combined with bad planetary-lag.”

“It could be.” Lady Lisandra canted her head. “Still, I’d like our medicus to take a look at you.”

Still looking at the woman’s reflection, Jade waved her hand in dismissal. “No need to worry. My nanites will take care of whatever parasites I ingested.”

“No worries at all. I take care of my staff.”

“Lady Lisandra, I’m sure that tomorrow I’ll be in perfect shape. I won’t miss an hour of work, I promise.” Even to Jade’s ears, her words sounded forced.

“You’ll still see Rikes first thing in the morning.” With those parting words, Lady Lisandra unfolded and rose to her considerable height before leaving in a whoosh of silk and crinolines.

Jade could recognize a leader when she met one and said under her breath, “Aye, madame.”

Lady Lisandra’s laugh echoed from outside. Maybe Jade hadn’t spoken as low as she thought.

The night didn’t bring any respite to her misery. If anything, Jade felt progressively worse.

A few hours later, she was still awake and heard the softest of knocks followed by a whispered, “Jewel?”

“Come in,” Jade answered, strangely relieved that someone had come by to check on her.

Karen stepped in and asked, “How do you feel?”

Jade didn’t need to answer. She knew she was a sight, pale and sweaty, lying in a tangle of sheets on her bed, with a bucket by the side and towels on the floor.

“Do you need anything from the kitchen or the infirmary?” Karen asked.

“No, thank you. If I could only sleep a few minutes, I’m sure I’d feel better.” Jade couldn’t even raise her hand without shaking, but she plastered a reassuring expression on her wane face.

“Ring if you need anything,” Karen said, cutting her eyes at the small gramophone on the nightstand. A brass, round button jutted from the base of the clockwork communication device.

As Jade looked at the gramophone, an image flashed across her mind like a ghostly memory, but it disappeared immediately.

“I will,” she hurried to say, trying in vain to catch the trail end of that memory.

Karen nodded. “Okay, see you tomorrow.”

As the girl grabbed the door handle, Gerard’s head peeked in.

“I wanted to make sure you were okay,” he said, stepping around Karen, who left with a wave of her dainty hand.

Surprised, Jade watched as Gerard carried into the room a tray he deposited on the mattress.

“Just a light repast,” he said. “Clear broth, red-lavender tea, and a roll of sweet bread, just out of the oven.”

Several emotions battled for supremacy, and Jade felt her eyes moisten. “I don’t think I can keep anything down, but thank you.”

“Just try a sip of the tea. My grandma used to brew red-lavender when my stomach was upset. She harvested the flowers herself and swore by it. I can’t say for sure that it was her concoction, but I always felt better after drinking a full mug of it.” He poured some of the warm beverage into a delicate porcelain cup and handed it to her with the matching saucer.

Jade accepted the offer with a nod and brought the cup to her lips. She had never touched fine porcelain before, and the rim clanged against her teeth, the sensation reverberating through her skull. A few sips of the beverage trickled onto her tongue, surprising her with a sweet aftertaste. “It’s good.” She raised the cup again, drinking a longer gulp.

“Told you.” He broke a chunk from the bread and offered the morsel to her.

As it had happened earlier, déjà vu hit her. Only this time, the strength of the memory shocked her. She saw a hand bringing food to her mouth. She opened her lips, savoring the soft texture of bread. A low, strong masculine voice coaxed her to eat more. Jade shivered, her body reacting to the recollection with a mind of its own, and she moaned.

“I’ll have to ask the cook if he changed recipe. I can’t remember ever seeing anyone having an orgasmic reaction to his bread.” Gerard chuckled. “But just in case, I’ll try feeding bread to one of my clients tomorrow.”

Mortified, Jade grabbed the cup and downed it. Too much liquid sloshing in her stomach caused her nausea to come back with a vengeance, and she dashed to the bathroom, barely making it in time. The one piece of bread she had eaten was expelled like a projectile, followed by the tea.

“I’m so sorry,” Gerard said from the bedroom.

Jade rinsed and wiped her mouth before turning toward him. “Not your fault.”

“Is there anything I can do for you?” He wrung the hem of his shirt between his hands.

“I just need to lie down for a moment.” She dragged herself back to the bed, and he promptly removed the tray.

“Okay, but if you need anything—”

“I’ll ring for help,” Jade finished for him, pointing her chin at the gramophone.

“I’m sorry,” Gerard repeated, backing toward the door.

Jade couldn’t talk but shook her head slightly and whispered, “No worries,” hoping he could hear her.

He did and smiled before gently closing the door.

At the first light of dawn, another soft knock sounded in the room. This time, Lady Lisandra’s voice echoed faintly through the door.

“I’m up. Come in,” Jade said.

The woman slid inside, looking as regal as always despite the early hour, but a brothel manager’s day started before her courtesans’, and it probably lasted longer as well. Dressed in a different gown, Lisandra held a pitcher and a glass. Both wares shone like crystal, and for a moment, Jade was lost in the rainbow reflections of the surface, coloring the walls and the floor as Lady Lisandra moved.

“Any better?” the woman asked, eyeing Jade with a gentle gaze.

“Not yet, but any moment now.” Jade managed a smile. She had been awake since the day before and had kept retching until mere minutes before Lady Lisandra’s visit.

In truth, she couldn’t remember ever feeling this weak from an ailment. During her first year at the Academy, she was beaten within an inch of her life more than once while training. But after the Academy’s medicus injected her with the nanites, she never contracted illnesses that her body couldn’t eradicate in a matter of hours. The last time she had been sick with the flu was when she was still living with her family.

“I’m sure Rikes will know what to do with you. I told him to arrive early, so you can go about your normal schedule if you feel good enough by then.”

Jade automatically said, “I will, don’t worry—”

Lady Lisandra raised her hand. “I don’t run a slave factory here, and I don’t let sick people work when they should be in bed, recovering from whatever is afflicting them.”

Jade listened, astonished. “You’d let me spend a day in bed.”

Lisandra poured a clear liquid from the pitcher into the glass. “What good are you to me if you can’t even stand on your own?” The soft tone of Lady Lisandra’s words gave a different meaning to her statement. “This is water, sugar, and a few drops of a mild relaxant. Nothing chemical.” She walked closer to the bed and reached down to place the glass in Jade’s hand. “You need to hydrate and stop the cramps.”

Jade’s mind was still trying to wrap itself around the concept that the woman would let her sleep the day away, and she was too astonished to refuse and drank a timid sip from the glass. She waited a moment, then sipped again. Her stomach didn’t revolt when the liquid hit its empty walls, and she drank some more.

“Good,” Lisandra said. “Now, try to get some rest if you can. I’ll tell the girls and the boys to stop visiting until the medicus arrives.” She leaned to leave the pitcher on the nightstand. “I’ll see you later.”

After the woman left, Jade finished the glass. She thought she had too many things in her mind to relax, but her thoughts became progressively fuzzier until she finally closed her eyes. As she drifted into the land of nod, her hand pressed against her flat stomach, and for no reason at all, a tear fell to the pillow.