Worth Her Weight in Gold: A Tor.com Original by Sarah Gailey

Author:Sarah Gailey [Gailey, Sarah]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates
Published: 2018-04-18T04:00:00+00:00

Ruby’s Romance

Ruby loved Dr. Bantou with a passion, and Dr. Bantou loved her right back.

Houndstooth and the doctor had a slightly different relationship.

“Mite-bitten huckster,” Houndstooth muttered under his breath.

“What has this cruel, neglectful man been doing to you?” Dr. Bantou crooned into Ruby’s open mouth. He tucked a large, glistening bunch of grapes into Ruby’s cheek as he gripped each of her molars in turn, looking for a loose tooth to yell at Houndstooth about.

Houndstooth drew himself up with a lofty indignance that would have made his mother deeply proud. “I have been doing precisely what you told me to do the last time you extorted me for a fortune,” he sniffed. “Anything that’s wrong with her is your fault, I shouldn’t doubt.”

Dr. Bantou showed absolutely no sign of having heard a word Houndstooth said. He squeezed a melon slice over Ruby’s gullet, then ran his juice-soaked hands over her gums and tongue. “And I’ll wager he hasn’t been feeding you enough, either,” Dr. Bantou said conspiratorially. Ruby made a pleased noise in the back of her vast throat, and Dr. Bantou chuckled, dropping a pomelo onto her tongue. He withdrew himself from within biting distance and patted Ruby’s nose. She immediately dropped her teeth shut with a snap, sending various fruit juices spattering across Dr. Bantou’s long leather apron.

“Well,” Dr. Bantou said, turning around and wiping his hands across his front. “She’s in acceptable condition, other than the cracked tusks.”

“I know that,” Houndstooth snapped. “I take damned excellent care of her.”

Dr. Bantou raised an eyebrow. “So excellent that you didn’t notice those tusks for … what, a week?”

Houndstooth didn’t mean to lose eye contact with the dentist, but he did. Just for a second. It was enough.

“Mmm, that’s what I thought,” Bantou drawled.

“I was on a job,” Houndstooth snapped. “I was helping a friend to whom I owed a favor and my honor—something I’m sure you’d know nothing about.”

“Well, whatever you were doing, you left her someplace too small and too boring,” Bantou said. “She’s been biting at boulders. Did you put her in a quarry somewhere? By herself, I gather?” Houndstooth clenched his jaw. Dr. Bantou’s face remained placid. When he spoke, his voice carried the authority of a man who has had the upper hand all along. “They’re bad, Houndstooth. I’ll need to pull them out.”

Houndstooth felt all of the blood drain from his face. “No,” he breathed. “No, you can’t. There must be some other way. Ruby’s tusks, they’re—they’re her pride and joy, Bantou.” He knew he sounded like a lunatic, but it was true. When Ruby basked with her mouth wide, the sun glinting off her beautiful white tusks, every other hippo that saw her would dip its nose below the surface of the water. Her tusks were beautiful, strong, fearsome. “What are our other options?”

Bantou clicked his tongue. “You won’t like it,” he said. “Better to just pull them out.”

“What’s the other option?” Houndstooth asked. His heart was racing. He kept looking at Ruby, who was merrily crunching on a watermelon.

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