Karli, or, A Princess With Dragons

By L. V. MacLean

He's working his way through school at the Premier Escort Agency.

Jared Ramirez was born in the slums of a mining planet but he found his way to the planet Haivran, the intellectual center of the Four Species Alliance, where the major universities, institutes, research facilities serving all Alliance citizens are located. Agencies are legal, licensed and regulated, and an attractive young man with a flair for pleasing a female clientèle is in great demand. And Jared has an advantage; he can read minds, and sometimes influence the minds of the people around him. It's only a little talent, and he never talks about it, but it can be useful.

He's been at the Agency for years now, and he's handled all sorts of clients, but Karli is special. She's past the legal age of consent on Haivran, but she is still very young, a school girl, in fact, innocent and naïve. Jared isn't quite comfortable with this. And he begins to realize that not all of the people around her have her best interests at heart; some of them, in fact, look like predators, and he needs to act decisively to protect this child, who already has a bit of his heart.

This is a novella, one of several prequels to The Misborn, to be released in the near future. The story is suggestive rather than explicit.

• Language: English
• Publisher: L. V. MacLean
• Release date: Feb 6, 2012
• ISBN: 9781465960108

L. V. MacLean

I come from a long line of story tellers and journalists, and I worked as a local journalist for years. That was fun, but my first love is fiction. Home is the eastern half of Montana, wheat fields and range land and small towns. I have a husband, two grown children, a lively grandson, and a superior cat. What more could anyone want? Just a laptop with a word processing program!

Book preview

Karli

A Princess With Dragons

by L. V. MacLean

Copyright 2011 L. V. MacLean

Smashwords Edition

Cover Art by Taylor Steele

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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There were many

encouraging voices

saying I should publish Karli

But the most insistent

(and persistent!) voice

came from Matt

So this book is for him.

Karli

or

Princess with Dragons

Chapter I

How it usually worked with a new Premier Escort Agency client, in Jared's experience, was that she was waiting for him in a hotel room, a restaurant, or a bar.

There were exceptions, but very few at the first meeting. If she lived here in Bridgeton, if she liked him and felt comfortable with him, if she became a regular client, she often invited him to her home for later meetings unless she lived with three roommates and a vicious watchdog, or an irritable father with a laser rifle, or a husband, a situation Jared approached with care; he had run into a few husbands during his early years with the Agency.

But whether she was at home or in a hotel or at a more public place, she was the first to arrive and she was waiting; he was the one locating the address or the room number, running a hand over his hair, straightening his sleeves, and knocking or ringing the door chime, conscious of her peeking at the scope screen at him before she opened the door, wondering how she would look in person and how the evening would unfold.

He found it odd to be the first one in the hotel room, awaiting the arrival of the client. It was all odd, as a matter of fact, and the oddest thing of all, Jared thought, was that he himself had agreed to take part in it. So he was here, waiting, according to the father's choice and arrangement; the man apparently had no problem with sending his young daughter to the bed of a perfect stranger – investigated and bonded, to be sure, but still a stranger – but he didn't care to have her waiting by herself in a hotel room playing vids and drinking soda, slightly hampered by the fact that she had no credit account of her own, nor access to her father's, and in fact the expenditures for the evening were entirely in the hands and at the discretion of the stranger with the bed. It struck Jared as bizarre. He would have balked if Joan hadn't talked to him.

He had never worked for another Agency, or any agency employer on the planet Haivran but Joan. He had been recruited to Premier Escort by his childhood friend Cindy; he had been young, nineteen, when he arrived on this Four Species Alliance planet of hospitals, research facilities, universities. He didn't know for sure how Cindy had found her way to Haivran, a long way from their home planet, and she had been younger when she went to work at Premier Escort. She had, however, been past fifteen, the legal age of consent here, and therefore employable.

He could have read her story in her mind; his Ears were untrained and he didn't take them very seriously, but Cindy's mind was open, requiring no special effort to read. He didn't like to invade her privacy, however, just to satisfy his curiosity.

He had known Cindy since he was seven. She lived with her mother, Darla, who supported the two of them and a sizable drug habit the same way Ava did, as an independent, connected with no Agency and limited by no licensing requirements or inspections and only semi-legal. They lived in the same flimsy tenement as Jared and his mother. Ava and Darla, something like friends, something like rivals, sometimes went out together to troll for paying customers around the spaceport, where off-duty crew members sought entertainment. And there was, on this domed mining planet, an ever-changing population of laborers. In those days, Ava's addictions, compared with Darla's, barely existed. She had closed this gap later.

Now Cindy and Jared, far from their planet of origin, worked at the same Agency, licensed and legal, unlike their mothers and with much different aims. It was a means of financing an expensive education for Jared. Cindy, not at all interested in formal schooling, had other ambitions; she had almost from the first taken their boss for a role model.

Joan had worked her way up to owning and managing her own Agency, one of the best on the planet, where there was a strong demand for the personal services Agencies provided. She was active in community organizations and planet-wide Agency associations, and she ran a well-regulated business, meticulous about the licensing requirements, and maintaining the highest standards. They catered to the high end customers, those willing to pay for quality.

Jared liked and respected Joan, and he was willing to listen to her as she tried to explain why she wanted him to take on a client he would normally refuse.

I knew her mother very well; we were close friends. I remember when Karli was born, Joan said. When she left, she begged me to keep an eye on Karli; she knew how Rodney is. He means well enough, but he's absorbed in his work and, well, his own life. He never did have time for Karli.

"Where did her mother go?'

Joan pointed to the ceiling; space, somewhere into space. It was to be a one-year assignment, she said. She hated to be away that long, but the salary was so good; she thought – but she didn't come back. An accident to the ship.

I'm sorry.

Yes, it was a shame. Karli was not quite two. More than thirteen years ago. And here she is, past fifteen, age of consent, and Rodney has no more idea – I suppose it's something that he even remembered that she's growing up. He used to have a live-in housekeeper, but she left to get married when Karli was about twelve, and he never replaced her, just someone to run in for a couple hours a day to keep the house decent. He has a home office as well as one downtown, and he has an office staff there. They make sure she's home right after school, that sort of thing. I get the feeling the staff is pretty much in charge of her, actually. They have security on her phone, and she isn't allowed a credit account of her own. They run background checks on friends, and they don't let her go out with them unless someone is with them to supervise. I guess they feel this will keep her out of trouble.

He, or his staff, kept his daughter on a tight rein, it seemed. Sounds like his staff pays more attention to her than he does, said Jared.

By far, said Joan. By far. But someone may have pointed out that she's fifteen now, and it occurred to him that it was his duty to be sure she is instructed in all the appropriate areas. He said to me on the phone that he thought it was better to send her to a professional who will teach her properly than to take a chance on some teenager doing a bad job of it.

Oh, hell, said Jared. You can't be serious.

He was, said Joan. And I made up my mind then and there; I owe it to Arabelle. And that's why I called you in, Jared. You're good with the sensitive cases, the girls who need special handling.

Which this girl probably did, Jared thought, but – She's fifteen, he said to Joan. She's barely legal.

She's past the age of consent, said Joan, and I don't know her very well; Rodney isn't someone you drop in on, or have a casual conversation with. But as far as I know, she's a nice, normal little girl. I'm not dumping a problem client on you. Her father has authorized an expense account for you; well, I won't tell you how much, you wouldn't believe it, but you can fill the hotel room with dozens of imported roses, take her out to dinner absolutely anywhere, order imported champagne and seafood on golden plates, if that's your fancy.

She's fifteen, said Jared. She may be at the age of consent, but she isn't at the legal drinking age.

You can order the champagne in the hotel from room service, said Joan. They'll assume you're drinking it yourself.

Oh, sure, said Jared. They'd never see through that.

The point is, said Joan, ignoring his sarcasm, he's authorized anything you want. Any expense. Even extravagance. Karli doesn't have an account, as I think I said, so it's all up to you; you control it.

So he trusted a stranger, but not his daughter. If she needs instruction in the appropriate areas, said Jared, how about in handling her own finances?

Maybe he'll hire an accountant for that, said Joan, or get one of his staff members. They looked at each other; she liked Rodney's child-rearing methods about as much as he did, Jared saw. Anyway you have a free hand for time and expenses, and she's perfectly legal, and – it would be a great personal favor, Jared, if you'd do this. I know you don't like dealing with very young girls, but I can't think of anyone who would do a better job with her.

Jared could think of several. Well, he said, and she smiled and waved his objections away.

I keep thinking of Arabelle, she said. And I think that with you, her daughter will be in the best possible hands. I know I can rely on you. You'll take good care of her.

Well, he would, although he did not much care for very young girls and he was always uncomfortable at the prospect of initiating such a girl. It was different with adult women. Trudy, for instance, a long-time regular and friend, extremely sensitive about her weight, had lacked experience at the beginning, convinced no man could desire her. He hadn't minded being her first lover. She had more experience of the world in general; she was more tolerant, had fewer illusions. A girl of fifteen was still full of fantasies and fairy tales; he did not want to disappoint her, but he wasn't sure he could live up to such visions.

And this girl had apparently been very sheltered – or else very creative in finding ways around her father's control. He would have to wait to see her and find out which.

And waiting was what he was doing. The schedule, arranged around the end of her school day and the demands of homework, another bizarre aspect of the evening, called for a member of her father's staff to drop her off at six-thirty at the hotel the staff had selected. She knew the number of the hotel room, Jared had been told at the Agency by the cool female voice on the phone confirming the arrangements. She had been furnished with a small holo of him, so she would know how he looked. He, too, had a holo, a sweet-faced child with dark blond hair and slanted, up-tilted dark eyes and a nice smile. Jared wondered if she had been allowed time to dress, comb her hair; he knew most females and especially teenaged females would like to do this before a date, even one with a professional.

Perhaps, having been dropped off at the hotel, she had ducked into some convenient rest room to do this, because it was now six forty-five. He had left the door a couple centimeters open; he did not want to leave her standing in the hall. So he had heard people passing, adults, and he had heard a good deal of activity by the lift, just down the hall, many arrivals and departures on the eleventh floor, the door opening and closing, but his client had not yet made an appearance.

Trying to find an unalarming pose, he had settled in the armchair by the window with his reader, enjoying the early autumn colors mingled with green in the trees and the bushes and the hedge around the parking lot, but the autumn daylight was starting to fade and now it was nearly seven. Rodney would probably not appreciate Jared's mislaying his daughter. His staff, at least, might complain. And Jared was finding it hard to concentrate on the reader. He put it down and walked to the door. He didn't want to open it all the way, suggesting impatience, implying any sort of demand, so he looked at the scope screen instead. There was a man in an overcoat opening a door down the hall, and the lift was in operation; someone was heading for the eleventh floor, but they were coming down from above. No one seemed to be coming up. She might have taken another lift, or hers might be shunted to the side as this one, down-coming, stopped on Eleven and the door slid open.

And there she was, standing just inside the lift, a pretty young girl in a light jacket and a short dress, with dark blond hair, and large dark eyes that turned at once to his door; she looked for a moment as if she were going to step out of the lift and then she stepped back instead, and the door closed and the lift continued its descent, answering a call on Ninth.

She was having second thoughts, riding up and down on the lift while she made up her mind. In fact, she might well be having third and fourth and fifth thoughts, he reflected, and who could blame her? He wasn't sure any part