“It’s complicated. Basically, if s-s-someone gets hurt, insurance p-pays for their medical bills s-so they don’t sue us.”
“Sue us?”
“Try to get money from us because they got injured.”
Becken stared at me. “They can do that? Even if they chose to climb on a sorhox?”
“App-apparently.”
“Surface dwellers are strange.”
Tressa, who had been lying quietly beside my chair, got up and padded over to Becken. She rested her chin on his thigh and looked up at him with adoring eyes.
Becken scratched behind her ears. Tressa’s tail thumped on the floor, and she shot a look toward the table of women as if to say, he’s taken, ladies.
Jessi emerged from the kitchen carrying two loaded plates of food, weaving between tables with the grace of someone who’d been doing this for months. She set our food down in front of us with a smile.
“How’s the pottery business, Hail?” she asked.
“Good. Really g-g-good, actually. I h-had help today with a b-b-big class.”
“Oh?” Jessi’s eyebrows rose. “From whom?”
“A woman named Allie. She’s new…in town.”
“The pretty brunette who raved about my dartling muffins?” Jessi grinned. “I like her. She’s sweet.”
“She is,” I said, then realized how that sounded. “I mean, she was helpful with the po-po-pottery class. She’s good with people.”
Jessi’s grin widened, but before she could say anything else, Greel appeared beside our table.
“More ale?” he asked, though his eyes were fixed on me rather than our nearly full tankards.
“Still drinking,” I said. Sipping, actually. I didn’t want a headache tomorrow morning. “I wanted to ask you about Allie.”
Greel’s expression didn’t change, but I caught the tightening around his eyes that meant he was paying attention. “What about her?”
“She…helped me with the pottery class today. I was wondering…” I trailed off, feeling foolish.
“Wondering what?”
“Aunt Inla said s-s-she’s looking for work, that she likes Allie. I wanted your op…op…opinion.” Though I didn’t really need it. I’d pretty much made up my mind to offer her a job already.
What I wanted to ask was if Greel felt there was something special about her like I did, but that would be strange. He and Jessi were mates. He wouldn’t give anyone else more than a cursory glance.
Greel studied me for a long moment. “Are you thinking of hiring her?”
“The pottery business is growing, and I…I…I could use someone who…understands people better than I do.”
“She’s solid,” Greel said. “Seems like the kind who’d work hard if you gave her the chance.” Coming from Greel, a male of almost-no words, that was a stunning recommendation.
“You should hire her,” Becken said around a mouthful of food. “If she can handle tourists, she’s worth her weight in fymsom.”
Up here, they called fymsom gold. Up here, they treasured it more than almost anything else. Where I came from, it lay on the ground like any other rock. We’d figured out its value quickly and while we used it to fund the building of Lonesome Creek, we let the humans believe we’d mined it in the mountains.
I looked between my brother and cousin, both of whom seemed to think offering Allie a job was the obvious choice.
“I’m go-going to do it,” I announced.
