by Davis Ashura
He felt sympathy for Bree. She hadn’t missed the interaction. Her giveaway was the mildly derisive smile she wore and the tension Jaresh could see in the carriage of her shoulders. Bree sometimes complained that her beauty was as much a burden as a boon, which was true to a certain extent, especially at moments like this, but it was also utter bat guano when fully considered in all possible contexts. True, her appearance often granted her unwanted attention, but it had also never stopped her from using her attractiveness to its full advantage. She exploited every gift available to her just as their nanna had once pithily advised: don’t be too proud to use what you’ve got to get the job done. Bree didn’t always like the unsolicited interest, but Jaresh knew she wouldn’t have it any other way. Better to be beautiful than ugly.
Jaresh, on the other hand, was as plain as yogurt. Not even vanilla since that was an actual flavor. He was unassuming like a good Sentya should be. Nothing special. Move along, people. Nothing to see here. He had the features typical for his Caste: an aquiline nose perched proudly above his well-tailored goatee; sparkling hazel eyes, accented to his unending embarrassment with long, feminine lashes; and dusky skin, though not so dark as a Kumma’s. The one aspect of his appearance setting him apart as unusual from the rest of his Caste was his build. Like most Sentyas, Jaresh was of average height, but unlike the other members of his Caste, who tended to be slender, he had a thick and well-muscled physique.
He could thank his upbringing for the latter, which was as unique as anyone could ever recall. Jaresh was of the Kumma House Shektan and even carried the surname Shektan but was not himself a Kumma. Nobody could recall a similar situation ever occurring in the past: a Sentya raised in a Kumma House, and by the ruling ‘El, no less.
It was all because his Nanna – Dar’El; not his birth father – fell out of a boat.
When Darjuth Sulle – Nanna’s name before his elevation to ruling ‘El of House Shektan – had returned home after his last Trial, he had taken to spending many an afternoon out on the sea. He had whiled away the hours; resting, healing, or just trying to forget. His final two Trials had been difficult. Painful. He had ended up in Mockery, a city on the far eastern edge of Continent Catalyst near the Mourning Ocean. It was about as far from Ashoka as any place in the world. Darjuth had eventually joined a Trial heading from Mockery to Defiance. The caravan had been large, with a complement of over five hundred warriors, and they had initially made good time. But somewhere north of the Highmark Hills, several Fractures of Chimeras had attacked them. While Suwraith’s beasts had been crushed, the creatures had still managed to cause heavy damage, setting fire to the caravan’s food stores and rupturing their water casks. By the time the caravan had reached Defiance, fully half of the warriors had died, most from dehydration in the unforgiving desert of the Prayer.
After a long respite, Darjuth had then joined another Trial, the short sea voyage from Defiance to Ashoka. It was regarded as the safest and easiest Trial any warrior could make, but it too, had proved ruinous. An unexpected storm had blown down from the Privation Mountains, sweeping the ships of the caravan north where many of the vessels had smashed against the Needle Points, a graveyard of spiky rocks and outcroppings with impassable water and heavy waves. Only one man in four survived by the time the remaining ships had limped their way home to Ashoka. The two journeys, occurring consecutively as they had, were disasters unlike any recorded in decades.
The Trials were harsh, but the sudden death of so many close friends…it took time to come to terms with such loss. The sea was a place where Darjuth could occasionally forget his pain and search out his way in the world once more; where he could reconcile himself to his guilt-ridden survival in the face of the senseless death of so many good friends, men he had loved and who would never again return home. The sea was a place where he had hoped to find some semblance of peace.
On one particularly fine day, Darjuth had gone out by himself on a small, wide-beamed catboat. It should have been easy to handle with its one sail, but during a moment of distraction, the boom had unexpectedly swung around and smashed into his head. He’d been knocked unconscious and thrown from the boat.
Meanwhile, Jaresh’s birth father, Bresh Konias, already in middle years by then, had seen the entire accident. He later described it as a terrible event he could almost presciently guess would happen but had been powerless to prevent. But he had prepared himself for what he knew was about to occur. Before Darjuth had even hit the water or been struck by the swinging boom, Bresh had already aimed his sloop toward where he had guessed the Kumma would fall. An unpredictable riptide and choppy swells had made the ocean dangerous, but Bresh had disregarded the peril. At great personal risk, he had leapt into the sea and managed to save Darjuth. In gratitude, Nanna had offered any boon he could legally promise.
Bresh had been the unwanted third son of a poor Moon Quarter dock worker. He had no claims on those with wealth, and his kinfolk – the Konias’ – couldn’t help him either, being, at best, of only middling-to-minimal wealth. They had been unable to help Bresh with anything beyond the bare necessities for living and the rudimentary schooling in Sentya learning. However, without advanced training, he had nothing to commend him to a potential employer. He had no specific skills or knowledge, which might have allowed him to rise to a higher station in life. His fate had essentially been sealed in childhood: in poverty.
And after his childhood, in poverty he had remained. At an age when many of his contemporaries were readying homes for grandchildren, Bresh had remained single and childless. After all, who would offer their daughter to someone in such dire straits? His livelihood – a for-rent fisherman leasing his sloop at usury rates – had been the only job available to him. Even the Moon Quarter where his father and two brothers worked had been a posting unaffordable to him. His life as a fisherman allowed his survival but little more. Day-to-day drudgery was his existence.
Saving the life of a Kumma, though, everything could change from that, and Bresh had known it. Being unschooled didn’t make him stupid, and he had understood his good fortune and recognized how best to turn it to his advantage. So instead of one boon, Bresh had begged Darjuth for two. The first was simple: money to buy his own fishing boat. After eyeing Bresh’s tattered clothing and old, poorly maintained sloop, it was a request Darjuth had expected, and one he could easily afford. It was Bresh’s second wish that had caught Nanna by surprise.
With halting words, Bresh had begged for a simple provision: any children the Sentya might someday father would be personally sponsored by Darjuth. It was a bold supplication, and Nanna had been curious as to the reason for it. Bresh’s explanation had been rational and straightforward: with his own boat, he would no longer be poor and with the promise of a Kumma sponsorship for his children, overnight, he would become a sought-after prospect for marriage. More importantly, his children would have a chance for a future Bresh couldn’t even dream of experiencing.
Upon hearing his reasoning, Darjuth had agreed to all of it. He had been thoroughly impressed with Bresh’s judgment. A lesser man would have asked for more selfish and fleeting needs. Bresh’s choices reflected a more shrewd intellect. Even then, Nanna had prized competence and intelligence above all else, reasoning from a purely practical level that any children from a man like Bresh should be nurtured so their acumen could flower. They could be of great benefit to House Shektan.
And Nanna couldn’t help but feel empathy for Bresh’s pain. So much longing and desire trapped in a life of drudgery. It was a tragedy.
Soon after, Bresh had married, and several years later, he and his young wife, Shari had their first child: Jaresh. Witness to his birth had been Darjuth himself, holding to his promise to sponsor Bresh’s children. Life must have been an unexpected, endless wonder of possibilities for Jaresh’s birth father. It all ended several years later when a drunk in a downstairs apartment had failed to close the grate to his stove and a stray spark had sent the whole building up in a wall of fl
ames. Jaresh had been three when the apartment fire had claimed the lives of his birth parents. Darjuth and his wife, Satha Sulle, had come for him. He didn’t remember much from back then – except for the fear. He had been certain he would have to go live with his Aunt Veldik, who hated him.
Instead, for reasons he doubted even his father truly understood, something in Jaresh’s soot and tear-stained face must have touched Nanna’s heart. Perhaps it was the voice of Devesh. Perhaps it was a moment of weakness. Or, maybe it had been simple pity. Whatever the reason, Darjuth had followed his feelings, and on the spot, without even consulting his wife, he had decided to adopt Jaresh.
Even now, most Kummas hadn’t quite come to grips with the ridiculous peculiarity of such a decision. What could be the purpose of a Kumma adopting a Sentya? It made no sense.
Jaresh wondered if his nanna sometimes questioned his decision as well.
Adoption into House Shektan had provided Jaresh with a loving home, but it had not solved all of his problems. Far from it. It wasn’t easy being the Sentya son of a Kumma. For his own birth Caste, Jaresh was an oddity. He was one of their own, but he acted and dressed like a warrior. As far as he knew, it was something never before known in Ashoka or any other city. As a result, other Sentyas weren’t sure whether his status counted as a point of pride or as a matter of revulsion. They simply didn’t know how to relate to him. As for Kummas, Jaresh often served as an affront to their ego. He was someone who could never measure up to their lofty warrior standards and yet carried one of their surnames. It was a disgrace for one so incapable to be counted as a member of a Kumma family. It only grew worse upon Nanna’s election as the ruling ‘El of House Shektan and his children’s assumption of the House name. Despite all this, Jaresh was grateful for his place in the world. Dar’El and Satha were the only parents he knew. They loved him.
On most days it was enough.
Jaresh was broken out of his reverie when he bumped into Bree. She had come to an unexpected halt as, wonder of wonders, the crowd had not parted before her. She turned with a frown.
“Be careful,” she admonished. “You almost stepped on my dress.”
“Sorry,” he said. “Just thinking about other things.”
Her eyebrows arched in an unspoken question.
“Did you know that tomorrow is my seventeenth year as your brother?” Jaresh said.
Bree smiled. “Of course I know. Amma plans on throwing you a surprise party,” she said.
“Oh. Had no idea.”
“That’s why it’s called a ‘surprise party’,” Bree explained in an overly patient tone. She tapped her chin in consideration. “We don’t want Amma to be disappointed. So act surprised,” she advised, giving him a condescending pat on the cheek before turning away.
Jaresh smiled at his sister’s patronizing tone. She must be slipping if she thought she could irritate him with such a transparent ploy. For whatever reason, the two of them had always been competitive, even when it came to schemes meant to annoy one another. It was childish, and Jaresh sometimes wondered if they should grow up about it, but the look on Bree’s face when he punctured her inflated sense of importance was absolutely priceless. He imagined she felt the same way, else she wouldn’t also continue with their game.
He hid a grin as an idea came to him. “I’ll make sure to remember,” he said. “And you have to promise not to tell Amma I told you her dinner two nights from now is only a ploy to get you together with your potential future husband.”
“What!” Bree said in shocked disbelief. Onlookers turned at her shout. She grabbed Jaresh’s arm in a painful squeeze. “What do you know?” she demanded in a menacing whisper.
Jaresh carefully pried his arm free. Bree feared marriage like most people feared falling from a great height; it might be survivable but the pain was sure to be awful. Up to a point, Jaresh sympathized with her. Kumma women could only marry a man who had completed at minimum three Trials, which meant their spouses were at least ten years older than them. Bree claimed it must be a horrible fate – like being shackled to an old man.
“Just kidding, little sis,” Jaresh said grinning broadly.
“Not funny,” she said, glowering.
“Was to me,” Jaresh said with a carefree smile. “Now, if you’re done with your tantrum, the crowd’s opening up. We should get going.”
“I wasn’t throwing…”
Jaresh grabbed her hand and yanked her forward, cutting off whatever she was about to say. “Come on before it closes up again,” he said.
They took a large thoroughfare branching off of Martyr Hall and headed deeper into Semaphore Walk. Another turn had them on a small street, close to their destination: the Blue Room. It was an older playhouse, one more willing to take on a challenging project eschewed by most of the larger theaters.
Even here, the streets remained crowded. Well-dressed men and women, perfumed and coiffed, mixed with rougher looking folk; most of whom were Murans coming in from the fields. Restaurants and cafes opened out on the street, and the smell of sizzling meat and spices filled the air. A mild spring breeze filtered through the crowd but did little to cool the warmth raised by the press of so many people.
Jaresh was soon sweating. He looked forward to the cool of the theater.
Tonight they meant to see The Magistrate Divan, an old comedic satire written two hundred years ago. It chronicled a week in the life of a Cherid Magistrate of a fictional city and the foibles of the supposed ruling Caste. Of course, no Caste had been spared by the author, Deside, and his humorous and cutting pen. He had added everyone into the scope of his satire; from the arrogance of Kummas to the lickspittle nature of Sentyas to the earthy know-it-allism of Murans. All were mocked, some more than others. It was supposed to be hilarious, but Jaresh wouldn’t know. He’d never seen it before since the last time The Magistrate had been produced was over a decade earlier. Tonight was opening night of a fresh interpretation of a classic.
At the playhouse they were to meet Mira Terrell, Bree’s friend. The two women had always been close. Both of them were Shektans and had gone to the same schools throughout their lives. Couple this with the fact that she was the only daughter of Sophy Terrell, one of Nanna’s closest advisors in the House Council, and Mira had ended up spending a lot of time around the House Seat. However, despite her frequent presence, Jaresh felt like he hardly knew her. The two of them had never spent much time with one another. On the few instances they had, Jaresh had found himself charmed by her wry, self-effacing humor. He found her…interestingly unique.
He couldn’t say the same for Rukh. His brother thought Mira a bit eccentric.
Rukh. Jaresh sighed. Where was he and how was he doing? He’d left six weeks earlier, but it felt like a lifetime. Jaresh did some rough calculation. Rukh was probably somewhere northwest of the Flats by now. Jaresh sent a silent plea heavenward, praying for his older brother’s safe return.
Jaresh still remembered the first time he saw the young boy who would become his older brother. Rukh. It had been in the parlor of their original home, a large three-story house on a hill north of Scythe Cut with a view over Dryad Park. Jaresh had entered his new home with trepidation, still teary-eyed and covered in soot from the apartment fire wherein his birth parents had died. Rukh had greeted him at the door with open arms and a ready smile that promised a mischievous sense of humor. The two had been close from the very first, driving Amma to distraction with their over-abundance of boyish energy. There had been an episode when they had chased a nonexistent housefly all around the kitchen, pretending to smash it flat. Jaresh could still recall Amma’s cry of horror when Rukh had pretended to promptly gulp down the imaginary insect. And then there was the time he and Rukh had donned matching Tigon masks and walked in on Bree while she’d been brushing her teeth. She had shrieked in fear and tried to flee; tripping on her own feet and promptly fell into the toilet. Her howl of anger when she realized what had happened had been priceless. The switching the two
of them had received was worth it. All these years later, Jaresh still laughed over the memory.
He missed Rukh.
“It’s right over there,” Bree said, breaking him out of his reverie.
Jaresh looked to where she pointed. There, across the street and a few buildings down, stood the Blue Room. The area around the theater was congested as people milled about, waiting for their friends and family. The three sets of double wooden doors leading into the playhouse were thrown open. Attendants, young men and women, stood beside them, collecting tickets, ensuring no one tried to skip in for free. A few hardy souls stood at the box office, hoping to find a seat even at this late date. There might still be a few available, but they would be likely high up in the balcony.
“There she is,” Bree said, pointing out Mira. Now it was her turn to pull Jaresh along.
“I’ve got the tickets,” Mira said to the two of them. “You pay for dinner, and we’ll call it even.”
“But that wouldn’t be fair to you,” Jaresh protested. “You bought two tickets, and we’ll only be buying you one dinner.”
“You haven’t seen her eat,” Bree warned.
Mira wrinkled her nose at Bree before breaking out in laughter. “Nanna says I must have a tapeworm. He even had me tested.”
Jaresh smiled, charmed again by Mira’s self-deprecating humor. “You’re joking, right?” he asked.
“I wish she was,” Bree answered.
“Let’s go find our seats,” Mira suggested with a gentle laugh.
Jaresh led them across the street. He paused on the other side, grimacing when he saw someone he despised heading their way. “Like flies at a banquet, so is Suge Wrestiva’s presence,” Jaresh said. “Don’t look now, but the bilge breather is heading our way.”