Chapter 6 #3
Thodin ducked his head, looking rapidly away. "The only violence done was by the guards. That is what I've heard anyway."
By the time we stepped into the lobby of the glossy guard station – way more buffed and polished than any building had the right to be down in Radiant Ward, which immediately told me everything I needed to know about the ward guards (as if I needed the confirmation) – I had largely decided on a course of action.
I stepped up to the counter, plastering on one of my prettiest smiles.
"Hi," I purred as the marn guard behind the counter jerked up, torn away from what looked to be a live feed of some hovercar death race on a desert planet halfway across the galaxy.
"I'm here to pay some detention fines. Do you have a Celravi here? "
The mar's eyestalks flared wide as they took me in.
My stare dropped to the name tag on their chest – his chest; Guard Officer Lurjo's pronouns were helpfully noted by a little symbol next to his name and rank – and I let my smile grow a little sharper.
"Oh, do you watch a lot of broadcast? Maybe you recognize me. "
He flushed an embarrassed, flustered orange beneath his gleaming gray skin, all along his refractory patches. Well, he definitely recognized me.
"Uh, let me check the records," he said, minimizing the window just as some hovercar went careening off the side of a canyon.
One eyestalk stayed pointed in my direction, the other skimming the files he pulled up.
"And – uh – I mean, ha. Sashen Solar, here in our station.
No one's ever going to believe this. Oh – yes, we've got an abayan agitator here by that name.
Is –" Both eyestalks tilted in my direction.
"Wait, you said you wanted to pay some fines?
Aren't you part of a creche now? Officer Ju'dai bet a lot of money on that, and I didn't believe her.
No way, I said. He's going to get sliced and diced out there!
But you didn't, and now – here you are. Which is good.
It would have been pretty sad if you got – uh. " He trailed off awkwardly.
I kept my smile firmly in place. "Horribly murdered?
" I supplied. He flushed even more orange, so I forged onward, Inmadra hovering just behind my shoulder while Thodin stood awkwardly in the corner of the little waiting room where I suspected that no one from Radiant Ward ever actually spent any time waiting.
"Anyway, yes. I'm going to pay Celravi's fine. How much?"
"Uh, for agitation and disorderly conduct?
" He tapped away on the input and then quoted a number that was what I would have made in two weeks at the den, if I hadn't had any expenses.
It would be a lot for anyone who worked salvage or who did whatever other jobs crecheless abaya did.
It would have been a lot for me when I was a dancer, because I was lucky if I was able to save a couple credits each week.
Now, though…
"Great," I purred. "And how many other abaya are being held on the same charges?"
I felt a cool touch against the back of my hand as Lurjo started tapping away at the interface. "Sashen." Inmadra's tone was firm, commanding, like an arkathi. "You cannot."
I shot her a sideways look. "I can."
She shook her head. "This will be understood to be a statement on behalf of your creche. It is – No matter how progressive your Araxis is, this would be politically fraught. The Concord creches would –"
Oh, would it upset the Concord? I tugged my hand away.
"They're my credits," I said, sharper than I intended.
"And whether or not Araxis would agree is beside the point – although he will.
But I think it's wrong to lock people up because they can't pay a stupid fine.
I think it's wrong for there to be fines or – or debt claims in the first place.
So if I can make it right, then I will."
Behind the polymer partition, one eye still pinned in fascination on the odd human and abaya pair in front of him, Lurjo made a wet gurgling sound, which was more or less a sigh from a marn. "There are thirty-eight others detained for failure to pay fines for the same charges."
Which is how I ended up freeing a bunch of abaya from a shitty detention centre in Radiant Ward.
Celravi looked delighted to see us when she was brought out, if a little confused.
"Oh," she said, "I was having the most interesting conversation with a historian who lives on Perthalia.
Did you know, Inmadra, that they have recently unearthed a tomb made entirely of jade?
They wonder if it might be the resting place for Arkedrin and Aevi.
" We sat outside on a little bench as the rest of the abaya drifted out.
A few came over to offer their thanks to Araxis, which I waved away; one elderly abaya walked over, took my face in their hands, and pressed a kiss to my forehead with shimmering eyes before rejoining the little cluster of six they'd been part of.
Next to me, Inmadra fluted out a sigh. "You seek to burn the blight, but risk the orchard," she said in abayan.
"He does not," said Celravi, who sat on my other side. She patted my shoulder affectionately, beaming. "He gathers rushes so that he might light the way home and bed down safely."
And, look, I'd be lying if I said either of those sayings made any sense to me, but Celravi's tone and her affectionate touch still left my chest fizzing with pleasure.
We eventually returned to my apartment, Elethenn sounding incredibly disheartened when he admitted he hadn't been able to determine much.
"It wasn't a wholesale theft," he said, his head angled downwards as we stood around his dumpling cart, catching up.
"There were too many valuable items left.
" I scoffed and he spared me a little smile.
"With a value that would make them worth taking to pawn, in any case.
Whoever came seemed to want… information, perhaps?
I checked as well for any surveillance tech – there was none, but now you can be assured of your privacy. "
I frowned. "Do you really think that whoever broke in wanted... intel?" It was true, the display was gone. At least if someone had taken it with the hope of getting information, they'd be disappointed.
"The gaanith did say there were inquiries made about you," Inmadra said.
"Yeah," I sighed, suddenly exhausted. The question, then, was whether this was because of the creche or because of me and my fleeting broadcast fame.
The fact that an abaya had broken in suggested the former, but I was pretty popular with abayan viewers, so who could really say?
That thought made me crack a smile, and I looked at Inmadra, keen to move on, and said, "I am very popular.
I will be great popular when I speak abayan.
" I fucked up the words so that she could correct me as we headed up to my apartment.
I figured I'd go through my lessons while I tidied up and was surprised to see that everything had been put to rights already, and Elethenn had laid out the teapot, ready for boiling water.
On the counter in the warming compartment rested an array of dumplings, gleaming like little gems.
I didn't know what I'd done to deserve to be surrounded by this much kindness, but I was grateful.
Maybe it was like Rodil said: there was something in me, something about me, that made abaya think I had some sort of value.
I resolved then that I'd do whatever I could to repay their kindness, to prove myself worthy of their generosity of spirit.
The more I could show kindness back, the less likely they were to realize that the only thing special about me was what they placed there.
That I was a mirror, reflecting what they wanted to see.
Even when I wanted to be just Sashen, I was someone else.
And maybe that was for the best. I wasn't sure about what was lurking behind that reflective surface, not after years and years of shoving things down there to rot, unseen and untended.
Then, I just made tea and set out the dumplings and was happy, in my own way, to have three kind abaya in the apartment with me and another outside keeping an eye on things.
And I tried not to wonder too hard who had been looking into me, and what their purpose was and whether they might turn, next, to something worse than asking questions and pawing through my things.
I didn't imagine violence would follow in my wake, or that it would grow, every day, stronger inside of me as well.