Nosferatu

7

Kristen was almost to the doorway on her way out when his tone softened.

"Look, maybe we can do each other a favor. I was on the lookout for somebody to run me an errand anyway. Get the bus to Simon's Town and fetch something for me, yeah?"

She turned round and looked at him with a wide-eyed smile. There was going to be money in this.

"Take that to my half-brother John. The white one, you've met him," Manoj said with only a little bitterness. Like her, he was of mixed race, but being half-Indian rather than half-Xhosa, he didn't face quite the same

scale of problems as she did. He still got more than enough to be resentful, though.

"Here's the address," he said, scribbling something on the top leaf of a notepad. "Oh, frag it, I forgot you can't read. Look, get a cab at the bus station and show the driver this, got it? No, better still, I'll tell you and you memorize it, yeah?"

"I can do that," she said happily. Being illiterate, she'd had to learn to.

"He might buy this for junk value. The parts might be worth something to him, I don't know. Anyway, he'll give you something to bring back with you, you got it? Fifty rand for you when you get it back here. If you don't come back, girl, you end up in the harbor after I've dealt with you. You scan?"

Drugs, probably, she thought. It wasn't much money for risking five years in Parliament. The city had converted the old Houses of Parliament into a prison twenty years ago, but that irony did nothing to make the idea of spending time there any more pleasant.

When he'd finished reciting the address to her, and she'd proved that she could parrot it perfectly, Manoj mused over the printout for a moment.

"Strange collection of names here. Some big cheese from Vienna, someone from London, England, some weirdo with an elven name from Seattle. All over the place. Huh." He was about to crumple up the piece of paper when, on impulse, Kristen stopped him. It was impossible, obviously, but she had to know.

"The elf. What's his name?"

"Serrin Shamandar. What's it to you?"

Kristen felt like she'd been kicked by a Ramskop buck.

"Jack squat," she managed to lie, picking up the piece of scrunched paper. "I'll get this to your brother. Be back by nightfall."

"You'd better be," he growled.