Page 46 of Dalla's Royal Guards
Musad looked up from where he was making their simple dinner and stared toward the pool area where Dalla had disappeared a half-hour before. He didn’t want to admit that he was worried she was having second thoughts—or worse, full-blown regret—about what had happened earlier.
“Can one of you help me, please?”
Nasser was out of his makeshift seat the second he heard her voice. Musad also rose to his feet, but remained where he was near the fire when Nasser started forward. Nasser squeezed through the narrow opening and frowned when he noticed awooden chest the size of a small cooler. Thick rope handles hung from the side. The rope on one side had broken.
“I don’t remember it being this heavy,” she huffed. “Either I over packed, or you and Musad melted my bones to mush.”
Nasser grinned, bright and sudden, as she echoed his thoughts perfectly. His eyes drank in her faux-admonishing expression, her lips twitching with suppressed amusement, and relief swept through him. He reached down and grabbed the rope pieces. The passage was too narrow to carry the chest in front of him. He would need to either drag it or?—
“I’ve got this end,” she said.
“Itisheavy. What’s in it?” he asked.
“Memories,” she said.
He gave her a nod but didn’t respond. His mind balked at her finding answers that would take her away. He tried to counter it with more reasonable thoughts, but he couldn’t seem to help the fear that had been rising frequently since he’d met her. He hoped he would settle once he and Musad brought her home with them.
Musad was waiting for them when they re-entered the main cavern. “I’ll take that.”
Dalla relinquished her hold on the rope. Nasser and Musad followed her as she walked over to the fire and sat down on a stone seat that he had erected earlier. They placed the chest next to her.
“Dinner is ready,” Musad murmured.
Dalla smiled her appreciation. “I’m famished.”
Musad handed a pouch of the steaming freeze-dried food to Dalla and another one to Nasser. Nasser grinned when his stomach growled.
The aroma of chicken, pasta, and vegetables rose when he opened the pouch and inhaled deeply. He needed to remember to let Christophe and Natalie know that the new meals they were selling were restaurant quality.
“It is amazing how something this good can be made with just boiled water,” Dalla reflected, holding up the pouch and studying the image. “Runa would love this as much as I do. Neither of us enjoyed cooking, and nobody enjoyed eating when we did.”
Musad chuckled. “Fortunately, both Nasser and I are excellent cooks. Our father loved to cook and encouraged us as young boys to help him.”
“He said it relaxed him. He also said it was an important lesson in discipline,” Nasser added.
“If what you cook is as good as this, I’d be happy to let you cook all our meals. Mother and Aesa could take even the most unappetizing root and turn it into a delicious dinner. Father said he had never met two women who were more hopeless when it came to cooking than Runa and me. Still, he was very happy to have us fight beside him.”
“You said the chest held memories,” Nasser prompted with a nod toward the chest. The top was covered in a fine powder of dull gray sand.
A mixture of emotions crossed her face as she studied the chest as well. Nasser paused, his food and hunger momentarilyforgotten. His gaze followed her slender hand as she touched the lid.
“Memories… and perhaps closure,” she said, looking across at him with an expression that tore at his heart.
“Eat first… please,” Musad said, his eyes filled with a dark, unfathomable emotion.
Dalla nodded. “Tell me how you came to be in danger.”
Musad snorted and shook his head. “When haven’t we?”
Nasser scowled at his brother. “Ignore him. We are usually pretty good at staying out of it. This time, though—” He shook his head and looked down at the fire.
“This time?” she gently asked.
Musad stood up and tossed his empty meal pouch in the fire. “This time it was deeply personal.”
Musad explained how their sister and her husband, the rulers of Kashir, had been betrayed for control over the Vasbin, a metal that was virtually indestructible and lightweight when processed correctly, and how the couple had ultimately made it out of Kashir, but were separated from their daughter. Musad and Nasser’s sister, Lissa, had been severely wounded, and the names General Victor Hellman and Prime Minister Hannibal Crosse would go down in history as traitors to Kashir.
“Mario locked down the processing methods of Vasbin and banned all use of the metal except for space applications and the useful inventions stemming from that. He refused to allow any of the material to be refined for weapon development. Both he and Lissa realize the harm that could come from such production,” Musad said.
