Chapter 4 – A Rose by Any Other Name #4
"Hi," I repeated. And then, for good measure, I added, "Greetings," one of the three abayan phrases I'd managed to retain from my hasty research on the shuttle here.
The door pushed open a little more, and one of the children – about waist height, with an unbound black crest and a blue tunic; I thought that must be Sadin – stepped in, wrinkling his nose. "You talk funny," he said in a fluting voice, in crisp Standard.
Behind him, one of the other children trilled with laughter, a short gray crest roughly braided. "And look funny," the last one chortled, lurking in their shadows and still halfway out the door. "What's wrong with your crest? And your eyes? And why are you wet?"
Well, I was used to questions about some of the particularities about being human, even if those questions weren't usually quite so blunt or, well, basic. Had these children ever seen someone from a different species? I could only imagine what they'd make of a nyaan.
"I'm not abaya," I said, still careful to smile in a nonthreatening way. I walked over to the edge of the room, and set my swords down by Araxis's jacket. "I look pretty normal for a human."
The trio of children trickled in, until they were standing a few feet inside of the room. Sadin was tallest by several inches, looking sharp in his blue tunic; he blinked at me with his black eyes, tilting his head to one side.
And then, strangely, he sniffed. Then trilled a little laugh.
The child with the short gray crest – Adrathi, I thought – gave his shoulder a shove. "Don't, Sadin, that's rude."
"I just wanted to know!" cried Sadin, his nose wrinkling.
"Know what?" I asked, flat, although I had a pretty good guess. I wiped a bit more at my damp hair, self-conscious.
For all of the clients I'd had who couldn't get enough of me, there were still plenty of aliens who thought humans were pretty disgusting.
We bled (dramatically), we got sweaty and clammy, we left skin oil wherever we touched.
We shed hair and skin cells. And we were apparently, on average, more strongly scented than most other species.
I'd been told that clients liked how I smelled, and I worked hard to keep it that way. I worked hard to not be disgusting. I'd had enough of that on Seraphim.
"What a grown-up virra smells like," the child chirped happily, grinning at me toothily from across the room. "That's what you'll smell like, Talvi!"
The last child, shortest and standing in the back, hissed. "I will not. I might be sinnenthi! Our Araxis said –"
"Araxis doesn't know everything!"
"Araxis knows more than you and –"
"What is it that I know?" As if beckoned by repeating his name three times, Araxis appeared in the door behind the children.
He had changed out of the crisp charcoal flight suit and into different dark clothes – carefully draped pants that shimmered, just a bit, in the light, and a nearly sheer tunic that left his collarbones exposed to the chilly air.
At once, the bickering children stopped, all three turning to blink up at him. The littlest one, Talvi, ducked their head, while Sadin's crest bristled slightly. "We just wanted to see the virra," said Adrathi, her voice edged with a rumbly whine.
Araxis glanced at me, worry pinching the skin between his eyes. "And did you introduce yourselves and ask his name?"
"Sadin just smelled him," Adrathi said, reaching up to grasp the fabric of Araxis's shirt in her little fist. "And I told him it was rude, Araxis! I said!"
Araxis frowned at Sadin, who tugged hard on his blue tunic, quills still rustling with unease. "That is rude. You know better."
"And Sadin and Talvi said he looks funny," Adrathi continued, apparently eager to unburden her guilty conscience.
Araxis nearly winced at that one, looking at me again. I shrugged, and shot him a smile – just to show I wasn't bothered. "Thick skin."
"Well," he said, returning his attention to the children, "I don't think he looks funny. And do we agree that, while I may not know everything, I certainly know more than the three children of Creche Thiel?"
"Yes, Araxis," they said solemnly, a chorus of three.
"And what should we do now?" He reached and took Sadin's shoulders, turning him in my direction and giving a little nudge.
The child looked back over his shoulder at Araxis, whose mouth was set in a firm line, and then Sadin proceeded to pace across the room to come and stand in front of me.
The other two trailed behind, dragging their feet, each of them flushed silver.
"We are very sorry for being so rude," said Sadin, staring at the floor by my feet. He touched one hand to his chest in an unfamiliar gesture. "Thank you for coming to our ship. We've never met a grown-up virra before and –"
"Introduce yourselves," Araxis said firmly.
The child glanced back at Araxis again, and next to him, Adrathi elbowed his ribs. "My name is Sadin of Creche Thiel," he said, still not looking at me. "And this is Talvi and this is Adrathi." He dared, then, to peek up at me, and almost startled when he met my eyes.
"My name is Sashen," I said. "I'm very grateful to be here. Araxis has been very generous, and the rest of Creche Thiel too. And, uh, thank you for the apology?"
Sadin whirled, then, and stomped back across the room toward Araxis. "Can we go now?"
"Please do. You should be safely tucked in your nest. Our Vivith will be most displeased that you are up at this hour," Araxis said, arms crossed, as he watched the parade of children turn, march back toward the door, and vanish into the ship beyond.
As soon as they were out, he pressed the door shut and fluted out a long breath, shaking his head.
"So," I said. "Virra?"
"Vivith will be horrified by their behaviour," he said, tipping his head against the door for a moment, before straightening and coming to join me. "I am horrified by their behaviour, and I'm not the one raising them. It's your… gender."
My eyebrows shot up. The sweat was cooling rapidly on my skin, and I knew I'd be chilled soon if I stayed still.
"I'm sorry, and they smelled me to determine that?
Even though I'm not abaya?" I untied the sleeves of my jumpsuit and shrugged them on, as Araxis tracked my movements through those pretty lashes of his.
"For abaya, gender isn't cultural; it's innate. Foundational in a way that applies to all species."
If my eyebrows could have gone higher, they would have. "So your genders apply to…everyone. And you can just tell by smelling people. Any person at all, from one end of the known universe to the other."
Araxis coloured, looking away as I ran a hand through my sweat-damp curls.
"It sounds foolish, yes. Some believe abayan genders are rooted in pheromones that translate across species.
Others have suggested – and I think this is much more likely – that there is something in us, as abaya, that is triggered when we meet members of different species and see who they are; we know how to understand them.
If an abaya met a brin xandai, for example, their body would recognize the brin as xandai and create the corresponding sensory impression.
We interpret others through our reactions to them. "
Huh. "So everyone in the whole universe fits in your system, then? Yours is the… right one?" If gender imperialism could be a thing…
Araxis trilled then, amused for a reason I couldn't quite fathom. "Everyone fits, yes, though that is by design: skoshas applies to any who do not fall within any of the other genders. In that way, everyone must fit within the system, as even those who do not are folded into its structure."
My mind was struggling to keep up. I knew there were hundreds of ways of understanding gender, but this was a new one. "Yeah, I can see how that would cover all the bases. And the kids said I'm virra? What's that?"
The amusement fell away. "It was unacceptable for the children to come here and speak with you like that. It is massively inappropriate to tell someone their gender if they're not abaya. Of course someone might ask, but we aren't meant to… force it upon anyone."
That felt like he was dodging my question. I shifted closer, tilting my head to get a good look at his face. I thought I was learning to read it, at least a little. "But they're right – you agree. This is me asking, by the way, so it's not massively inappropriate to answer."
The pink flush was back again. This close, and under these lights, I could see how, when pink crept up to his cheeks, the slight sheen of his skin darkened along the subtle pattern of scales, like a memory of a texture you wouldn't feel.
Or maybe you would. I'd have to touch him to know, and – even with my mind reeling from this conversation – I very much wanted to.
"It is not about agreeing," Araxis said finally, his hands sliding to rest in the small of his back.
His top was nearly sheer, and I could almost make our the pale skin of his chest beneath the bright lights overhead.
"It's… the fact of who you are. You are virra.
" Then, still looking away, he added almost shyly, "I have not met anyone who is quite so virra as you. "
Was I imagining his shoulders angling toward me, just a little?
He looked at me through his thick lashes, and my stomach twisted with pleasure – and anticipation.
I nibbled on the inside of my lower lip, trying desperately to keep my mind on this conversation instead of losing myself to the heated pull that urged me to reach out and touch the flush along his cheeks, to feel his smooth skin under my palm.
I'd asked him back on the shuttle if gender was part of attraction for abaya, and Araxis had said that it was.
He'd come and watched me every night for a week. He'd given me a free ride to the Thenat cluster. He'd been kind and generous, shy and flustered.
Apparently Araxis's type was virra. That explained a few things.