Chapter 2
Oljin
T he High Priest smells of the cold season, of rain on earth, of rotting grass. Why do the priests who worship our star always stink of the dark?
“The signs should be clear to you,” he says, frowning at me and my younger brother, Chanísh. “Your father reported a strong scent, an undeniable urge. A sort of magnetic pull on his heart toward his queen.”
Behind us, my mother, Honhura, Alara of our planet, goddess-given queen of us all, gasps and sobs into the tail of her headscarf as she slumps on the blackrock throne. I want to comfort her, but I know she’ll push me away. Since my father died, she has been inconsolable, unwilling to accept any affection from me and my brother. Unwilling to make any decisions regarding the rule of our planet.
I want nothing more than to shoulder this burden for her, but I cannot take the throne until the goddess shows which son of Grenzar she favors. Most believe it will be me, the oldest. But I have spent enough hours studying in the archives to know that this is not always the case. Sometimes the goddess favors a younger son or even shines on someone not of the royal line. Perhaps neither of us will be Jara.
One thing is certain. It has never taken this long for the goddess to reveal a new queen. Perhaps Alioth wishes my mother to rule, even in all her devastation. Perhaps she believes both Chanísh and I are unfit to lead. Or perhaps the goddess is testing us. Testing our patience. Testing our faith in her.
“It is your duty to seek out your Alara,” the High Priest drones. “Pursue your fated queen to the utmost. Report any symptoms of the bond that you experience directly to the temple. Even if you are not certain, we can assess the female and determine whether she is goddess-blessed.”
Chanísh kneels and presses his forehead to the floor. “May Alioth illuminate my path,” he says reverently. Hope echoes in his tone, although his skin does not betray his feelings. He doesn’t meet my eyes when he rises.
The priest turns to me with a frown as dark as his black cloak. “You do not pray for your queen?”
I shrug. “The goddess knows her own designs. She will favor me or she won’t, but begging for it won’t change her mind.”
The priest glowers. “Alioth rewards the faithful with her smile.”
I can’t help looking at my mother on the throne, broken and shadowed. The goddess did that to her chosen one. I’m not sure I wish that on any female, especially not one I loved.
“Her teeth are sharp,” I recite. It’s one of the oldest sayings in our language, but it’s taken on a new, more painful meaning lately, now that I’ve seen what her blessing has done to my mother.
I turn to Chanísh. “Will you join me to negotiate with Frath?” The nearby planet sent some of their highest-ranked leaders to establish a trade partnership with the new Jara. Unfortunately, we still don’t know who that will be.
“No. I have better things to do, like seek my queen.” He’s rewarded with a bow from the high priest, who is ready to revere him, it seems. But I know the path Chanísh will take from the palace leads straight to a pleasure house. Who knows, maybe he’ll find his queen there. Even I have to admit the pleasure houses are full of more eligible females than the Frathik delegation.
“Until tomorrow, then.” I squeeze my mother’s hand on the way past the throne, but she doesn’t return my gesture, her fingers cold and lifeless in my hand, like her ghost is already gone. I pause, waiting for Chanísh and the priest to leave. Then I kneel before her. “It doesn’t have to be this way.”
“It is this way.” Her voice does not have the rasp of grief. It is hard and cold like the stones under my knees. Like the light of distant stars in the black of night. “You’ll understand when you find your Alara, Oljin.”
“It may be Chanísh,” I remind her.
“It will be if you don’t seek your mate. Don’t hide from your fate in the palace. Alioth’s favor cuts deeper than any knife.” Her eyes shutter, and I know I will hear no more from her lips. I take her point, though. The Frathiks can wait another day if it means Irra finally has a queen.
Outside the throne room, Pravil’s waiting for me. He and I apprenticed to the same warrior when we were greenlings, and I trust him with my life. Good friend that he is, he does not press me for details of the meeting.
Some consider him unsuitable to associate with the future Jara because of his coarse upbringing in the outlands. It’s true he lacks the formal education I received, but he has a special type of intelligence. Maybe he learned it tracking saidal though the tall grasses, watching for every twitch and rustle, or maybe it is something goddess-given, but Pravil has the ability to see hidden motives. He can predict movements others can’t see.
He is loyal, too, but not mindlessly. I had to earn it. And he isn’t afraid to break the rules when it is called for, something I cannot do because of my position. These are useful attributes for a future-Jara’s advisor, even if not for a future-Jara’s friend.
“Let’s go somewhere,” I say. We head down the narrow, winding streets that hug the steep cliff on which our city is built, high above the grasslands that sustained our ancestors.
When we reach the main road, he asks, “Pleasure house or pits?”
“You know my answer.” I’d prefer the archives. The rows of scrolls, the quiet. Knowledge at my fingertips.
Pravil snorts. “I don’t, in fact. Chanísh would choose the pleasure house. I would choose the pits. You never choose. But my guess is you’ve had enough fighting for the day.”
“Observant, as always.” He never misses anything. He knows my weaknesses, another reason why he will advise me when I rule. If I rule. “Not to mention, I doubt I’ll find my queen on the other end of a blade.”
“If only. You might have to fight me for her if you found a warrior queen.” Pravil flashes the points of his teeth at me, his skin’s faint blue hue letting me know he’s only joking.
“Who knows, maybe Alioth will smile on you instead of me. Maybe that’s what’s taking her so long.”
He jostles my shoulder as his reply, like he’s demonstrating his roughness, his unsuitability.
“It happened before,” I remind him. “Jara Vennin was from the outlands.”
“Never heard of him,” Pravil says. Of course he hasn’t. Jara Vennin ruled ten generations ago. I doubt even Chanísh knows the name. Only scholars spend that much time reading the scrolls. Scholars and me.
I’ve always loved our history. Sometimes I wish I was born in another time, without the trappings of the palace and the priesthood casting shadows on me.
“You still haven’t answered.” Pravil’s steps slow as we reach and pass the entrance to the cavern that houses the largest fighting pits on Irra. He wants to go inside and watch the fights, I can tell. And why shouldn’t he? He’s not the one who is tasked with the impossible.
“Go ahead,” I urge him. I hand him my coin pouch. “Place a few bets for me. I must do my duty and sniff every female in Gren’Irra, or the priests will nag me even more tomorrow.”
He takes it, grinning as the coins time together. “When you’re sick of sniffing, come find me to collect your winnings.”
“You’re so certain you will win?”
“I have a talent for picking winners,” he says, his face suddenly serious. “Go find your queen.”
I let my skin briefly flood green to thank him for his faith in me. For his loyalty. I couldn’t ask that of anyone else on Irra, not even my own brother.
Bracing myself for a dull afternoon, I wander the cliffs. Necks bend everywhere I go as people recognize the white, embroidered sveli that marks me as Honhura’s son. A few parents push their daughters out to greet me, and even I can’t help the hope that rises in me each time a new pair of eyes meets mine.
My senses are drawn by some, but is my heart? Many smell of herbs and flowers and other pretty things. Is that the scent my father recognized when he met my mother and knew she was his queen? I wish I could ask him.
I take the names of the best-smelling candidates to give to the priests. My feet are sore from the stones by the time I reach the bottom of the cliffs. Before I jog up the zigzagging streets to rejoin Pravil, I take a few minutes to rest near the spaceport that stretches out a cleared area of the flat grasslands, watching the ships kick up dust as they take off and land.
My father opened up Irra to trade with other species when I was a soft-clawed greenling, but space travel still looks like magic to me, these hunks of metal flying through the air like birds. Irrans do not possess such technology, nor do we wish to spend our time toiling to produce it.
But I can’t deny the appeal of flying, nor the appeal of the coin it produces when we sell our epylium ore to other species who need it. It’s no longer rare to see all kinds of beings mingling in our markets, bringing new flavors to our food and new languages to our ears. Some Irrans frown on mixing with other cultures, but nobody complains about the prosperity it has brought our planet.
Well, the priests complain about the dilution of our traditions, but they don’t decline the generous offerings made at the temple, either. When I am Jara, I will find a way to balance on this blade’s edge, preserving our traditions while welcoming new ideas. I will see our planet thrive.
If I am Jara. It may be Chanísh. His deference to the priests—and reluctance to make any deals with the Frathiks—leads me to believe he’ll follow their guidance and close our planet to outsiders once more. Perhaps this is what the goddess wants and why she hesitates to show me her favor .
As I make the steep return climb, uncertainty weighs my steps, as though Alioth has tied stones to my ankles. How many more times will I make this journey down the cliffs and back up again, searching for my queen?
In my heart, I know the answer. As many times as is required. As long as the goddess glows.
I reach the entrance to the pits and push through the noisy cranac of spectators, looking for Pravil. I catch sight of him near the challengers’ pen, his attention riveted by the fight in progress. I start toward him, but then I catch the first lick of her scent.
Time stops.
Everything stops.
My queen is here.
A second breath burns my nares and sears the roof of my mouth. It’s not a scent, it’s a hunger. An obsession.
Find her.
My eyes rake through the crowd, pausing on every headscarf. Most are the traditional brown or white grasscloth, but some are the new, brighter colors that have come from trade with other planets. Which one is mine? Which one is calling me?
The priests say that my fated queen will feel the pull, too. Before my mother broke to pieces, she said the bond was like a tether, one sash tied around two waists, one mouth feeding two stomachs. No wonder she is torn in half now that it is severed, if this is how tightly it binds.
Where is she? Anger storms my skin, and I can hardly think as the cranac presses close around me, drowning me even as I drown in her scent. I push away the bodies, but they return like waves of grass in the wind. It seems every person stands between me and my queen. Will I have to kill them to keep them off me?
No. I will not mark this day with blood. This is a day of joy. The day the goddess smiled on me, showed me her favor, raised me to rule. My bloodlust is vanquished by gratitude.
May the goddess light my path.
As if Alioth answers my thoughts, a glow at the near end of the arena draws my attention, my view of it blocked by knot of raucous Irrans who are watching a Mizaran traveling circus rather than the fights. As sure as my skin, her scent intensifies as I move toward them, her spice thickening until I’m drowning in it.
But when I reach the front of the group and first lay eyes on her, I don’t even recognize what I’m seeing. Some tiny, broken creature curls in the dust, keening. One of the scaly Mizarans strikes her with a short black whip, and she struggles to her feet as the other jerks the leash that’s fastened around her neck. Wet tracks cut through the dust on her round face.
My queen , I realize with horror that blanches my skin white. She stumbles in a circle around her captor, her movements jerky and weak. She’s made of wicker, she’s so frail, and it’s this fragile, alien being that has drawn me so powerfully.
The Mizaran barks in broken Irran, “See strange, soft one? Cannot walk, only dance.” He cracks the whip at her ankles, and she stumbles, falling to her knees. He growls something in his gravelly language, and she tenses when the leash tightens on her throat. I see her limbs strain to obey the command, but her efforts only land her in the dust again.
The crowd laughs. The leash pulls. The whip falls .
This is wrong. All of it is wrong. Her strangeness, her scent, her pain.
“Stop this,” I roar. The Mizaran holding the leash snaps his head toward me, his forked tongue snaking out. I stalk toward him and grab him by the neck, willing down the urge to crush his windpipe and tear off his smug, reptilian head. I cannot kill him in front of the crowd unless he agrees to my challenge, but that doesn’t mean I have to let this go on. “On Irra we do not delight in the captivity of others. The circus is closed. You’re not welcome here.”
Without looking behind me, I wave the cranac away. They grumble, but, deprived of their show, begin to drift toward the action at the other end of the cavern.
The one with the whip hisses. Membranes flick rapidly over his beady eyes as he takes in my royal sveli and the knives strapped to my thighs. “It dance for you. No trouble.”
He raises his hand to strike her again, but I squeeze his partner’s scaly neck, letting my claws dig in until he drops his whip. “She’s mine,” I growl.
“Good price,” the one I’m holding says, swallowing hard. He holds up the end of the leash, tugging her closer, and she crawls toward him on her forearms. Toward us. “Long travel. Eat many lorva . Fifty coin.”
I can’t bring myself to look at her, because if I do, he’s dead. I’ll be the Red Jara in the scrolls. The one remembered because he claimed his Alara in blood instead of light.
“Done.” I drop him in the dust where he belongs and pick up my queen.