Master of None

by N Lee Wood

  “Let’s hope we manage to get close enough to the Assembly to make a run for it before they lynch us,” the sahakharae said, the humor strained.

  “Thanks, Margasir. I can always count on you to look on the bright side.”

  The float inched laboriously forward and stopped, inched forward and stopped. After nearly an hour at an impasse, he heard the hiss of the women’s compartment opening, then Yronae opened his end. “We’ll have to walk from here,” she said dryly.

  He stepped down out of the float and turned. His stomach lurched. Vasant Subah stood in the way of the float, her arms crossed belligerently, legs braced, a full armada of Vanar Security Dhikar arranged in her wake.

  “I didn’t expect anything like this,” he heard Namasi murmur.

  “I did,” Yronae said shortly. She motioned at Nathan curtly, and without looking to see if he followed, began striding toward the security chief with imperial arrogance. Vasant Subah stepped forward to block her, the Dhikar behind her impassive but alert. Forced to a halt, Yronae glared at her opponent. “Get out of my way,” she said. She spoke softly, but the hush of the crowd made every word seem loud and unmistakable.

  The Dhikar chief shrugged eloquently. “It is my right as a citizen to stand in a public place. Would you threaten me with violence if I choose to assert my rights?”

  Namasi Sahmudrah stood beside the Nga’esha pratha h’máy, and all Nathan could see was her back, but it was enough to tell him the young woman was frightened, her spine rigid as she tried to mask her trembling.

  “I have come to hear my brother speak at the Assembly of Families, as is his right. I do not threaten anyone with violence, and your insulting suggestion that I or any member of my Family would stoop to such measures is deeply resented. But should you deny me access to the courts, Qsayati, I don’t care whose protection you think you have, it will not be enough to prevent my taking vengeance on you. Personally.”

  The Qsayati blinked, her only sign of uncertainty. “With all respect, jah’nari pratha, surely you must have more pressing business to attend to? I would humbly recommend that you take your so-called ‘brother’ home and teach him some manners. He may wear the Nga’esha blue, but he is still only an ignorant, barbaric yepoqioh, and no one here is interested in anything he has to say.”

  She snapped her fingers, and the Dhikar behind her fanned out, a slight twitch of their fingers activating their implants, faces impassive. Namasi swayed, as if struggling with herself to keep from retreating, while Yronae remained unyielding. In the tense silence, Nathan’s shoulders sagged in defeat. At least he’d tried, the gesture had been made, he thought. Then someone slipped a hand into his, squeezing it tightly. Daegal dva Pakaran stood beside him, looking as terrified as he felt.

  “I am,” she said in a near whisper. It carried like a trumpet.

  Both Namasi and Yronae turned around to stare, Vasant Subah’s face clouding with bewildered anger. He was gazing down at Daegal in wonder when someone took his other hand. This time his jaw dropped. The Dhikar he knew only as Two-Knock confronted Vasant Subah with dignified defiance.

  “I am,” she said.

  Another woman, a total stranger this time, moved to stand with him. “I am.” Another, this time a distant cousin. And another. And another. “I am,” he heard a male voice say, as Yinanq dva Hadatha Nga’esha and his práhsaedam Jayati joined the small group confronting Qsayati Vasant Subah and her company of Dhikar police. Namasi and Yronae both twisted in amazement as the protective cluster around him grew, and Nathan knew this hadn’t been planned, knew this was a groundswell of spontaneous support. The number of people joining their voices and their hands in his defense was far from the majority of the crowd, but impressive enough that even the usually imperturbable Dhikar police wavered in wariness.

  Yronae grinned humorlessly, then leaned in toward Vasant Subah, her nose nearly touching the other woman’s. “Move,” she hissed.

  He couldn’t help himself from staring, fascinated by Vasant Subah’s entire face quivering with rage. She gestured brusquely at her Dhikar to fall back as his protective escort slowly pressed its way through the crowd with Nathan in its center like diligent workers surrounding a queen bee, until they reached steps leading up to the columned terrace of the Assembly of Families.

  In the confusion, Daegal dva Pakaran lost her hold on Nathan, swallowed by the crowd while Two-Knock deftly but courteously plowed a path through the throng for Yronae, Namasi, and him. He wasn’t sure how he’d gotten there, but before he’d managed to catch his breath, he found himself on the main floor of the Assembly reserved solely for the use of the High Families. Several women waited silently along the semicircular marble wall—his arbitrators for this case.

  Namasi Sahmudrah caught him by the elbow. “They’re all ancillary Family,” she said in a low voice, “but don’t let that fool you. You may not see them, but every pratha h’máy will be listening.” She glanced at the spectators swarming into the Assembly behind them, jostling for room. The men’s balcony above them was already packed with the curious of both sexes. Namasi’s fear had been replaced with brisk excitement. “We’ll take our place and confer, give the public time to settle.”

  And to give him as big an audience as possible, he understood, as he watched journalists scrimmage for a viable broadcast alignment. He followed Yronae as she strode toward the arbitrators and settled onto the emblem of the Nga’esha inlaid into the floor, one leg under her, resting her arm on the other knee. As it was a member of her Family who had brought the litigation, she would have no vote with the arbitrators judging his case. He didn’t have to calculate the proper distance any longer as he stopped behind her right shoulder and started to kneel.

  “No, in front of me,” the pratha h’máy said without even glancing at him. “You and your speaker both.”

  Surprised, he hesitated, then took his place in front with Namasi Sahmudrah beside him. He hadn’t realized before now how accustomed he’d become to Vanar hierarchical arrangements, and the sudden exposure made him feel oddly vulnerable.

  “Are we ready to begin?” the arbitrator from the Daharanan Family asked. What little disorder and whispering there was ceased abruptly.

  “We are ready, jah’narha l’amaée,” Namasi Sahmudrah said. Then looked at him.

  He unfolded his palm-sized reader to open his carefully prepared speech and took a steadying breath. “By tradition, Vaktay Namasi dva Ushahayam Sahmudrah should be presenting this case to you. I could not have hoped for a better advocate, no one has worked more tirelessly and conscientiously than she. According to law, however, I do have the right to speak for myself. My command of Vanar is not perfectly fluent, and I hope you will forgive the many grammatical errors I know I will make. But I have learned Vanar well enough by now to present my own case this one time.”

  The arbitrator glowered at him. “Irregular, but permissible.” She folded her hands primly. “Be warned, however, that any errors you make will not be an excuse for us to tolerate the slightest infraction in the rules of law.”

  He bowed, meticulously polite, and glanced at his notes on the reader, not really seeing them. He set it down, knowing by heart the text he’d painstakingly drafted and rehearsed for weeks.

  “Most of you here from the High Families know me, as I am related to at least half of you through my adoptive mother, the late Pratha Yaenida dva Daharanan ek Qarshatha Nga’esha. I am also aware that all of Vanar has seen enough about me in the media to know who I am. My story is widely known, and I will not waste the Assembly’s time in repeating it. All I will emphasize is that I was trained as a research botanist before I came to Vanar. I love the science of living plants, botany is the only thing I’ve ever wanted to do. While my pratha h’máy has been tolerant, Vanar laws and customs have frustrated my studies. When I first asked l’amae Namasi to speak for me, I only intended to ask for the freedom to pursue my research work in any manner I like. But I knew even then that this would mean asking the cour
t to consider changes in orthodox Vanar laws.”

  “The laws lain down by our Founders seven hundred years ago,” the Daharanan arbitrator retorted, “established a peaceful and just society, and have worked well enough unchanged for generations.”

  Nathan kept his head lowered respectfully. “I most humbly beg to differ with you, jah’nari l’amae. With the help of my learned vaktay, I have researched Vanar legal history. There is precedence, which I ask this Assembly to allow me to present.”

  A muted consultation whispered briefly between the arbitrators, then ceased. “Continue,” the Daharanan arbitrator said shortly.

  He bowed, the silence in the vast hall unnerving. “I am not allowed admission to the best university libraries or laboratories because I am a man. I am forbidden to approach those scholars with whom I might share research, because I am a man. I cannot make field trips to collect specimens or so much as leave the Nga’esha House without permission, because I am a man. I cannot own property or handle my own finances or purchase anything without consent, because I am a man. I’m not even allowed to see my own child without consent, because I am a man. If the pratha h’máy Yronae dva Daharanan Qarshatha Ushahayam ek Nga’esha were not my sister, and were not as lenient with me as she is, I would never have been allowed to continue my personal interests at all.”

  He looked up at the arbitrators regarding him coldly. “And why should I be? I know there are those who say I am not even Vanar-born, why is it fair for me to expect privileges denied other men only because I am different? If I have chosen of my own free will to remain Vanar and Nga’esha, why should I not also accept the ancient traditions limiting the rights of men as established by the Founders?”

  Nathan glanced at Namasi, who nodded and brushed her fingertips across her reader to activate it. He took a quick breath.

  “Because I am different. Not because I wasn’t Vanar-born, but because I have one thing no other man has ever had before: I own the archives of a pratha h’máy. The records and data are only those of the Nga’esha Family and stop with the death of Pratha Yaenida, but I have access to seven hundred years of detailed Vanar history. Including the original records written by the Nga’esha founders, written not in Vanar, because that language had yet to be established, but in Hengeli, my maternal language. Hundreds of official ship logs, thousands of requisitions from early pioneers to administrators back in Vanar’s first capital, journals kept by ordinary people of everyday life, letters to their friends and relatives.

  “I’ve translated many of these from Hengeli into Vanar. The life described in those records is nothing like the traditional history you are teaching your children, including my daughter. These were not wise women rebelling against patriarchal Hengeli rule who came here to construct their ideal society. They were the survivors of a wrecked seed ship who reached Vanar more by miracle than design, people desperate merely to stay alive. Most of the survivors were women, but not all, in contradiction to another of our sacred legends. These men were not subjugated because their women feared violence, but from biological necessity any farmer understands: a limited food supply and the need for every individual to survive in a hostile environment. One man’s sperm could supply all that was necessary to reproduce another generation—”

  “This is rubbish,” one of the arbitrators snapped in irritation. She wore the Hadatha sati, but the trim underneath was burgundy. Nathan instantly adjusted his posture, at once respectful and silent. “Do you really expect us to trust that whatever records you’ve dredged up haven’t been taken out of context and twisted to support some hoax? We have only your word that any translation you’ve made bears any resemblance whatsoever to the original—”

  “And mine,” he heard Pratha Yronae say from behind him. He didn’t dare turn to look at her. The astonishment on the arbitrator’s face was enough. “My little brother’s command of Vanar is, as he’s said, not perfect. I’ve assisted him myself with these translations, and I assure you, they are as faithful as possible to the originals. May I assume my word is good enough for you?”

  The Hadatha woman leaned back silently, yielding to another arbitrator, this one Nathan recognized as a close cousin of the formidable Ushahayam pratha h’máy, as well as distantly related to Yronae. “Of course your word is good enough, jah’nari bahd’hyin. Does it not worry you, however, this sensitive information in the hands of such a subordinate member of your Family?”

  “Yes, it worries me,” Pratha Yronae said serenely, hiding it well. “As pratha h’máy, the honor of the Nga’esha House is my responsibility. I have only recently gained an appreciation of our history, an oversight I should have corrected long before now. I know what is in these records, and it is not pleasant. But while I may not like the truth, I will not conspire with those who would prefer to suppress it.”

  The Ushahayam woman sucked air through her front teeth and exchanged glances with her counterparts. “Then perhaps you would be willing to allow us to examine these translations of yours before we continue any further with this proceeding?” she said to Nathan. He smiled without looking up.

  “We have no objection, jah’nari l’amae,” Namasi Sahmudrah said. “On behalf of my client, I requested and was granted permission by the pratha Yronae Nga’esha to release copies, in both Vanar and the original Hengeli for those who wish to verify the integrity of our translations, into the public domain. I have done so just now. Anyone who wishes may read them. We are willing to wait.”

  The subsequent uproar exploded around him, arbitrators on their feet shouting unheard as the crowd in the gallery above them scrambled for the nearest reader. While Namasi Sahmudrah leapt to her feet to brave the Hadatha arbitrator screaming in her face, Nathan remained frozen in his empty circle of isolation.

  “You had no right to release that information without the express consent of this Assembly!” the arbitrator shouted angrily.

  “You already gave it!” Namasi shouted back just as fiercely. “The court adjudicated the terms of Pratha Yaenida’s will and ruled it was within the prescript of legal statutes. Nathan Crewe Nga’esha is within his rights to release any information he wishes contained in his mother’s legacy to him.”

  The Ushahayam arbitrator and Pratha Yronae likewise stood confrontationally as they argued, only slightly less belligerently, as their status required. Almost unnoticed, Two-Knock had organized a Dhikar defensive buffer, half a dozen casually alert Nga’esha women standing around him, their implants squirming under the skin.

  “Jah’nari Dhikar,” he said, still not knowing her name, “I appreciate your concern, but please do not protect me.”

  Two-Knock looked down at him solemnly. “There are many here who wish you harm, including Dhikar.”

  “I am aware of that.”

  The Dhikar tilted her head curiously. “Are you not afraid?”

  He allowed himself a small laugh and grinned up at her. “Shitless,” he said, using a very un-Vanar expression. Behind her, he noticed one of the media jockeying for an angle, and knew that even through the clamor, his voice was being recorded. This wasn’t part of his memorized script. “But I will defend myself only with words, as any civilized Vanar should do, never with violence. Please, stand away and harm no one.”

  Two-Knock grunted, unconvinced, but raised an eyebrow and shrugged. The Nga’esha Dhikar withdrew, pointedly sitting down and ignoring the small crowd of hostile litigants still standing. Yronae had noticed the exchange, and spoke briefly to the Ushahayam arbitrator, who nodded then pulled the Hadatha woman away from her dispute with Namasi. The pratha h’máy, following her Dhikar’s example, gestured to Namasi as she crossed to retake her place on the floor behind him.

  “Clever boy,” she chided in a low voice as she passed him. “Foolish boy,” he replied without looking at her.

  Her laugh was hushed. “Also true.”

  The arbitrators returned to their seating ledge, consulting one another in subdued murmurs as they waited for the hall to quiet. Agai
n next to him, Namasi inhaled sharply, and Nathan looked up to see the Daharanan pratha h’máy and the dalhitri h’máy from the Arjusana Family shoulder their way into the hall. The Daharanan and Arjusana arbitrators stood, bowed, and relinquished their place to the higher-ranked women. “That’s either a very good sign or a very bad one,” she whispered to Nathan.

  Most of the crowd, both litigants below and spectators above, had again settled, the Assembly Dhikar struggling to hold back those who could find no room in the galleries above packed three and four deep against the walls with no concern for sex or caste. He spotted Daegal dva Pakaran standing beside Margasir, the sahakharae’s arm around her shoulders protectively. Nathan wondered where Amitu was. The shouting at last died down to whispers and the hum of hundreds of readers.

  “May we continue?” Namasi asked, as dignified as she could manage.

  As the most senior woman present, the Daharanan pratha h’máy said, “Are you or your client likely to subject us to any further of these annoying surprises, l’amae vaktay?”

  “None that I’m aware of, jah’nari pratha.”

  The Daharanan pratha h’máy glanced at the reader handed to her, scanning it with a frown. “This Assembly has not had adequate opportunity to properly examine these documents. Does the petitioner realize that no decision can be reached before we can evaluate their relevance?”

  “Under ordinary circumstances, we would be willing to accept a postponement until our translations had been thoroughly verified.” An angry murmur rippled through the hall, the closure of the Worms already starting to bite into the reserves of many, not just those of High Family. “However,” Namasi continued hurriedly, “these are not ordinary circumstances, as I’m sure I don’t need to point out to this Assembly, or to any one of the High Families. Since my client is not requesting an immediate decision, we ask to be allowed to continue presenting our complete case at this time.”