Chapter 131: The Pretty Invitation Had an Ugly Condition

Ellis pulled up chairs for her husbands. Thorne sat on Dove’s right, Edrik on her left, and she waited for the answer he still owed her.

The sponsor could request comfortable accommodation for her in A, Ellis explained. Her companions would go through a separate security review. Until it cleared, they might have to stay in C or in temporary housing near the receiving yard.

Dove asked how long they might be separated. Ellis glanced at the papers, and her stomach tightened before he even answered. "It varies."

"Can I leave with them if I don’t like the arrangement?"

"The sponsor would want to discuss any change before transport was arranged," he said.

Dove looked at her husbands. Thorne’s jaw had tightened, and Edrik was watching the clerk without blinking. She’d pictured a room with running water and all three of them eating breakfast at their own table. Ellis had somehow turned that into her waiting alone while somebody decided whether she could keep the people she’d arrived with.

Dove left the forms untouched. "I asked about trading in B. Can your office help with that without introducing me to someone who expects to approve my plans?"

Ellis could explain the freight process, he said, but B’s receiving staff decided who got a permit. Dove asked him to find that form. They would come back to it after finding somewhere to sleep.

They paid with owned food for one night in the bunk annex’s private staff room. Dove and Thorne shared the wide lower bed; Edrik took the neighboring bunk, within reach of her hand. Their unloaded pickup stayed in the guarded vehicle row; the handcart and crates went into the freight cage. She kept its receipt with the listed contents in her bag.

The named road bag went into a separate lost-goods hold, recorded under the possible owner’s name. Dove kept a copy of that receipt too. Someone could look for it here without chasing her along the road.

On Day Sixty-Six, Dove sat while her mind entered the space, with Thorne beside her and Edrik at the outer door. She opened her eyes in the chair, brought out pond water, and washed behind the hanging screen. Afterward, they ate eggs, potatoes, meat, toast, and fruit from their own supply. She went back for more potatoes before either man could offer her his.

Sprout delivered four packs of wide-brimmed sun hats in assorted adult sizes. Three sales would pay. Dove passed over the shaded market canopy offer and tried on the smallest hat, looking at both men over its brim. For once, she might sell the whole batch without explaining why people needed it.

"If either of you calls me adorable, the price of breakfast is going up."

Thorne kissed the part of her forehead the hat didn’t cover. Edrik smiled into his coffee. Apparently marrying him had done nothing to improve his survival instincts around her threats.

Drivers bought all four packs before noon for coffee, canned food, clean socks, and a spare tarp. No leftover fee was due. Dove stored the tarp, completed her stationary task, and earned the exercise reward moving her goods between the room and covered waiting area. Her normal balance reached five hundred eighty-three.

Sprout settled the morning’s Favor at six hundred forty-nine. She was still two hundred fifty-one short of the manual. The canopy looked useful too, but she left both unbought. Once they had somewhere to trade, she wanted to buy things for the life they were staying to live, not just the next road out.

Before returning to Ellis, Dove sat with both men beneath the waiting area’s roof. Other travelers watched her openly, some smiling as though a seat near her was worth more than the next transport. Edrik let his arm rest along her chair, and Thorne took the place on her other side without cutting off her view.

"I could get used to a place with bathrooms," she admitted.

"A shower," Thorne said. "You said you wanted a hot shower." Dove looked at him. She had complained about plenty of things since meeting him, usually while cold and trying to pretend she wasn’t frightened. He remembered that one.

"And a bed we don’t have to pack," she said. Edrik glanced at Thorne, then at her. "A bigger one, this time." Her face warmed. Thorne smiled against his cup, and Dove pointed at them both. "I was having a perfectly normal thought before you got involved."

She stood before they could make it worse, but Thorne caught her fingers as he got up. Dove squeezed his hand. A shower and a bed shouldn’t feel like asking for her whole life back, and yet she kept picturing them there with her. She wanted to find out what an ordinary week together could feel like.

Back inside, Ellis showed them the ordinary merchant route. They could apply together, have their cargo inspected at B, and trade there on a temporary permit if accepted. Living there permanently would come later. Dove drew the form toward her. That sounded worth asking about without somebody choosing a room for her first.

Refusing the sponsor didn’t change this office’s process, Ellis confirmed, writing it beside the application when she asked. He couldn’t promise what B’s receiving staff would decide. Thorne studied the route map while Edrik asked about weapons during inspection, and Dove waited for the answers before reaching for a pen.

Outside the window, a driver dragged his bench into the shade. Snow still clung to the fence, but he had taken off his coat. They needed somewhere worth stopping before the heat made traveling miserable.

She could sell cold drinks in weather like this. Shade, clean clothes, something sweet after work. People would come back for those. Dove pulled out her goods list and put it on the desk.

The next freight convoy allowed private vehicles to follow, but B’s merchant intake required a trading reference. Dove needed their route, fuel access, and someone B would recognize. The Quarry driver had mentioned a receiving contact. She gave Ellis only the description and route she actually knew.

He checked a list, then looked up. "That driver is expected here tomorrow. If it’s the same man, he may be able to introduce you."

Dove pictured the driver leaning over their little table at Quarry, drawing the four districts while her pizza cooled. She remembered his face. She might finally get to ask him about an actual room instead of another month of roads. Beneath the desk, Thorne’s hand found hers, and she squeezed it before she could start hoping too hard.

Ellis slid the sponsor form aside and tapped the merchant application. "The convoy leaves the following morning. You’ll need the reference and a deposit before its cargo list closes."

Dove looked at the deadline, then at the list of goods she’d brought through flooded roads and other people’s hands. She pulled the goods list closer. They had coffee, spare tools, and things she had refused to leave on roadside shelves. Tomorrow those finds needed to buy three places on that convoy, before the driver left without them.