by Patty Jansen
The judge frowned.
"The reason I look like this is that someone just tried to shoot me. One of the employees is wounded."
People started talking.
"Quiet!" The judge rang her bell again. "Is this true?" She was looking over Mikandra's head to the door, where a number of Guild employees stood.
"It is. One of the office staff was hit. We have a gunman loose in the building."
"This is ridiculous!' someone shouted.
Several people rose from their seats and a heated argument broke out in the far right side of the room.
Antho Tussamar had risen from his seat and was working his way out of the row of seats to the path that ran along the far wall.
The judge ran her bell until everyone fell quiet. Antho Tussamar strode out the door.
The judge asked the employee, "Is there a need to suspend the session while the guards deal with this incident?"
"It's safe to continue. This part of the building is secure. He went into the public section."
"What about the injured employee?"
"He is being looked after. The charge glanced off. He will be fine."
"Thank you. Then we shall continue the case."
The man shooed his colleagues out and shut the door behind him.
"Sit down everyone." She rang the bell again.
People sat and Mikandra now spotted Taerzo and Braedon on a bench at the front of the audience, immediately facing the judges' table.
Both watched her with wide eyes.
Rehan stood in the accused box, an area surrounded on three sides by a wooden railing and guarded by a tall Indrahui man in the red and black Trader security uniform.
Rehan's eyes met Mikandra's over the heads of the crowd. His face was serious, but his eyes were wide.
"Let us have a look at your evidence," the judge said.
Mikandra slid her bag off her shoulder, dug inside, and gave the judge the copy of Iztho's letter as well as the Exchange listings which she hoped would make more sense to the judge than they did to her.
The judge read, while a deepening furrow grew on her forehead. The murmur amongst the spectators increased. Mikandra wondered when she would be allowed to sit down. Her ankle throbbed.
The judge turned over the sheet and studied the Exchange listings. She handed the documents to a colleague next to her, a Kedrasi judge, who also read, the expression of unease on his face increasing.
He passed the letter to the judge on his other side and met the chief judge's eyes. A few words were exchanged between them.
She nodded and rang her bell again. "We have seen the documents and decided that the accusation needs serious reconsideration. The case is adjourned."
A murmur of talk went up. Mikandra heard some angry voices, but had no idea who they belonged to. Rehan watched her over the heads of the audience.
The judge rang the bell. "Quiet everyone!"
The talk died down.
The chief judge looked at Mikandra. "This duplicate comes from where exactly?"
"The Barresh Exchange. The original of this letter never reached the family, because the courier who carried it was murdered in the streets of Miran."
Someone said something that sounded like a protest, but she couldn't hear the words. This man was definitely a Mirani Trader.
The judge gestured to the court assistants and one woman in red rose to take the letter from the last of the judges and gave it to Rehan.
His face showed no emotion while he read. Then he looked at Mikandra and while he kept his face blank, his eyes radiated happiness.
The judge rung her bell. "Following this new evidence, the court will adjourn, and the judges will deliberate if the Andrahar Traders have to answer the accusations—Yes?"
An elderly Coldi judge had raised his hand. She spoke briefly to him. Then the Kedrasi judge commented, and the Coldi judge shook his head.
The chief judge spoke to them, and both nodded.
"We've already made a decision. The current case is void. The evidence before us casts serious doubts on the reliability of the documentation brought by the accusers. It includes evidence of tampering with the Exchange logs in Miran. I end the court session. We will deliberate the next step. Any outstanding issues will have to be brought in a new case. You may go."
In the uproar that followed, a Guild employee came from the scribes' table to the stand and handed Rehan a small bag.
With that, the session was closed. People rose from their seats and started streaming out the back of the room. There were reporters yelling questions and soon the buzz went around The Andrahar family has been cleared of all suspicions.
Chapter 31
Mikandra stood in the aisle while people streamed out of the room. Standing still and hoping that no one would step on her foot was the best she could do. Several, much older and mostly male, Traders came out to congratulate her, saying things like good work and extraordinary courage. All of them were non-Mirani. The Mirani Traders eyed her with suspicion from the other side of the room. They didn't congratulate her. She felt dazed.
Eventually, most of the audience left through the back door. Braedon was the first of the brothers to reach her.
Instead of showering her with praise, he squeezed her shoulder in a strong grip. His lips were pressed together. His eyes said more than words could have done. He made her sit down in one of the aisle seats. "Look at you. You're injured."
Mikandra protested. "I'm fine."
"Not while you have blood pouring down you face." He opened his document case, found a face towel, screwed the cap off a small bottle and poured a good amount of the contents over the fabric. The air filled with the scent of Mirani herbs that reminded her so much of home that tears pricked in her eyes.
All of a sudden, she felt exhausted.
Braedon wiped her cheek, turning the towel red. "Did you get hit in the shooting? You look terrible."
"I didn't notice. It doesn't hurt." She didn't even know where and when it had happened, presumably when she had fallen onto the carpet. She must have cut herself on something, maybe something sharp on the outside of her bag.
He worked quickly cleaning up the blood and then wiped some disinfectant on the cut. Mikandra thought of the hospital. One part of her wanted to go back and apologise to Eydrina for using her name and to Liseyo and Mother that she had run away. She would go back and make Mother proud.
Taerzo and Rehan still stood at the front of the room in the company of two Mirani Traders whom she didn't know. Their faces were grim and determined. Rehan glanced at her several times. An employee in red came in and spoke briefly to the men.
"Let me have a look at your foot." Braedon twisted her sideways in the seat so that her feet poked into the aisle. He took off her shoe. Her ankle was swollen and blue.
While Braedon was wrapping a bandage around it, Taerzo and Rehan joined Mikandra and Braedon.
Taerzo said, "The guard said that they've caught Thaeron Tussamar. He got caught in the public bathroom."
"Good." Braedon shook a spray bottle and sprayed liquid on her ankle. It smelled odd and made her skin go cold. He snorted. "Shooting inside the Guild building. I don't know that I've ever heard of that happening. Why?"
"They've been desperate to hide the truth," Rehan said. "That's why Nemedor Satarin came to our house. That's why the Tussamars tried to chat up Mikandra."
Mikandra met Rehan's eyes.
She thought about how rude she thought he'd been when she last met him in person, and how open, almost intimate, his correspondence was. How much she knew about him, and how she—embarrassingly—thought she had fallen for him. Now, facing him and his formal Trader ways, those thoughts seemed ridiculous.
He sat down next to her. He had his hand clamped around the bag he'd been given. His knuckles where white.
"I just wanted to say . . . thank you. You were . . . just awesome. Fucking awesome. This is probably the only time I'll ever say this, so take note. I'm a hard te
acher."
He was going to take over her mentorship? "Does it mean I can stand the heat?"
One corner of his mouth lifted. "You want heat? I'll give you forty, fifty years of slow torture. I'll give you so much heat that you'll beg me to be treated like the other apprentices, the soft ones."
"After Barresh, there is nothing I can't handle," Mikandra said. "Bring it on, brother, bring it on."
"The fuck I will."
"Can you two lay it off?" Braedon said, while putting the med kit back into his document case. "Brother, she's just got us all off the hook, and you're still trying to make this into a bluffing contest."
"Leave him. He enjoys it," Taerzo said.
"She enjoys it," Rehan said, while still meeting her eyes.
Braedon snapped the document case shut. "Come on, let's go and eat something. I'm starving."
Food was good. She hadn't thought about food for a while.
Mikandra let Braedon help her to her feet. The bandage felt snug and already the spray he used had made her ankle numb.
They walked out of the court room.
Taerzo and Rehan went first and then Mikandra with Braedon nearby, but she didn't need to lean on his arm.
"Does that feel better?"
She nodded. "What is that stuff?"
"It's a new treatment based on a plant extract from Indrahui. You have to be careful, though. Even though you may not feel anything, it doesn't mean that the damage has healed. You must rest your foot."
For a while, they walked quietly, listening to Rehan and Taerzo's talk.
Taerzo joked that with Thaeron facing trial and punishment, Rehan could buy his aircraft back.
"Are you kidding, brother? I wouldn't touch anything that piece of shit has touched. I'll get a new one."
Their banter belied the seriousness of the situation they'd still face at home. The brothers wouldn't have missed the glares from Mirani colleagues. Those Traders would think that the brothers had betrayed Miran.
Mikandra turned to Braedon.
"Have you been all right? I mean—with the riots in Miran and all that?"
"I guess, although we've been holed up in the house or the office. It's taken a toll on all of us, including Mother. I can't say it's been very pleasant in our house since you left. We've had many fights. All of us have been sick with worry at different points in time. I'm so glad it's over."
"Is it over? Is the council going to accept being blamed for tampering with the Exchange records or will they take it out on all Traders? Are they going to defend the Tussamar Traders or let them take the blame?"
He shrugged. "Who knows? The council are cowards. I don't think they'll try to spar with the Guild. You've heard about the Ilendars?"
She nodded.
Here in the airy corridors of the building, the oppressive atmosphere in Miran seemed so far away.
"I don't know what the future will hold for Miran," Braedon said. "But whatever happens, the Andrahar Traders can now withstand the blizzards the universe will throw at us. We must take things one step at a time. We cannot solve the bigger problems yet, but we are stronger."
She nodded. Braedon was so cool and composed, so utterly pragmatic. Why had she ever thought that the three brothers were similar?
They had been walking down the corridors following a stream of people who were going in the same direction. Those people now queued up before a set of double doors. Inside, Mikandra could see glimpses of a large, multi-storey hall that she recognised from pictures as the famous Trader bar. A Guild employee stood in a stiff position with his hands behind his back at a small table where people had to sign their names in an old-fashioned book. The Guild employee turned the page when necessary.
Mikandra sensed movement next to her. Aunt Amandra had caught up with them. In the harsh desert light that came in through the window, her face showed more wrinkles than Mikandra had ever noticed.
She spoke softly. "I take back everything I've said about you being too soft to be a Trader. If you have the ability to get out of Barresh better than you went in, you have to be smart. Not even Nemedor Satarin managed that. That was a fine performance. I'm proud of you." She put a hand on Mikandra's shoulder.
"Have you heard any news about my family?" Mikandra asked.
"That stupid oaf of a brother of mine has dug himself in. He's lent his house and yard to the guard and elite army corps supporting Nemedor Satarin. I'm very unhappy and worried about it."
Mikandra's heart jumped. "What about Mother and Liseyo?"
"They weren't at the house last time I was there. I presume they're staying with your mother's sister."
"Are they all right?" She thought of Dalit's story. What if Mother had left the house and left Father? It happened, not very often, but it did. The thought chilled her. How would they get money to live?
"Sorry, I don't know much more than that."
Panic clamped around her heart. She remembered getting that odd note of support from Mother after she had sent the courier to pick up her clothes. "I have to make sure that they're safe."
Aunt Amandra nodded. Her expression was grim and distant.
The line shuffled forward.
After a brief silence, Mikandra said, "I spoke to Ydana in Barresh."
Aunt Amandra whirled and gave her an intense look. "What was he doing there?"
"Selling prefab buildings for the airport construction. He didn't come to see you? He told me that was his plan."
Aunt Amandra shook her head and stared out the window. "Things may be . . . irretrievably broken between us. I haven't seen him for so long. I attended the court because I was hoping that he'd be here. I want to speak with him. We had a really bad fight. I was stupid and said some stupid things." Her face had a painful expression. "Especially now."
Mikandra was curious what she meant, but they arrived at the door and had to sign in the book. Rehan and Taerzo went first.
Inside the room beyond, people sat at tables. A heavenly smell of food drifted from the entrance.
Then it was Mikandra's turn. In the book, Traders had written their names, licence number and place of residence. She wrote Mikandra Bisumar, 1101 and then hesitated. The Mirani council didn't want the Traders anymore. What if she wrote something else, like Barresh? But of course, it wasn't that simple. She added Miran to the line she'd just written.
The Guild employee studied her face.
"He knows every Guild member," Braedon said, while Aunt Amandra wrote in the book. "That's his job."
The man dipped his head at Mikandra. "Lady, welcome to the Guild."
She felt uneasy. In Barresh, she had been friends with Melvi and Ariani, who were ordinary Kedrasi people like him. She didn't want to be treated like she was better than them.
And, as the family was admitted into that inner sanctum of the Guild, the Trader bar, she realised that all her life, she had been treated like she was worth more than other people, even when she thought she wasn't. Even her unpaid job in the hospital had been unquestionably advantaged. At night, she went to a comfortable home while the homeless slept on benches, unheated apartments or in the streets.
Her time in Barresh had profoundly changed her.
The central hall of the bar was three floors high, and furnished in classy wood and stone. The ground floor was covered with tables and chairs, and so were the separate sections of the balconies on the two floors above, which looked out into the central hall. It was already quite busy and the huge space hummed with talk and laughter.
Rehan chose a table in the middle of the hall. Mikandra ended up in a seat between Braedon and her aunt. Rehan sat opposite her. He met her eyes, and she didn't know where to look.
Apart from the brief joking conversation, she had barely spoken to him. After all his intimate correspondence, she had expected . . . she didn't know what, but definitely more than this awkward dance. It was like he felt embarrassed about all the things he had told her.
A waiter in red came, and all ordered m
eals and drinks.
Mikandra let the sounds of talk and laughter wash over her. She was so tired.
Rehan produced the small bag he still clutched in his fist. When he upended it, four medallions fell out. He gave one each to Braedon and Taerzo, put one on top of his reader, set the fourth one in the middle of the table and met Mikandra's eyes. "That one will be yours."
She nodded, and couldn't bear to keep looking at him. There were probably thousands of things she should ask or talk about, but they had all slipped her mind. How was she going to work with him when he kept awkward silences like this?
He pinned the medallion back on his tunic.
Braedon had already put on his, and was checking something on his reader. "Oh, crap."
"What’s up?" Taerzo, who sat on Braedon's other side, looked at the screen.
"The news has just broken in Miran. There are protests all over the streets. Off-duty army troops staged a protest in support of Nemedor Satarin and clashed with the pro-import group. People in the council are feral. Listen to what Nemedor Satarin had to say. Today is a black day for Miran. When our citizens turn on us and use outside influences to 'prove' that we are guilty of fabricated charges, it is time that we reconsider what these citizens mean for us and how we are going to react to this action of treason."
"What a load of fucking nonsense," Rehan said. "Even now he's saying that they've done nothing. Like the Exchange can't possibly be right because they're controlled by evil foreigners. What a fucking dumbwit."
Aunt Amandra glanced at Mikandra in a are-you-all-right-with-the-language? way.
"He's going to want revenge," Taerzo said.
Rehan balled his fist. "Then we fucking give him revenge. We'll show what he's done, to all of gamra. The man's a fucking criminal."
Braedon shook his head. "If we do that, we'll be fighting instead of working."
"Should we just play nice then?"
Braedon shrugged. "I don't like fighting, brother. I sell medicines that fix people up, and I'm not interested in injuring them. If we fight Nemedor Satarin, the ones injured will be us, or we can join the Ilendar Traders here in Kedras."