by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

— CHAPTER 9 —

  In which it becomes harder to hide things from the Rani and Jaya seeks advice from his Uncle Namun. 

oOo

Hadas was already at the breakfast table, disassembling and eating clusters of grapes, when Jaya entered and took his seat. After a moment of obvious indecision, the Avasan gave a sketchy rendition of the respectful greeting, showing Jaya the carefully tinted Sarojin raicree on his palm.

“It seems Heli has been at work again,” Jaya commented dryly.

“Did I do well?” Heli the Ever-Present carried a carafe of jambu to the table and poured the amber liquid into his glass.

“Thank you. Frighteningly well. You might consider going into business, Heli. I’m sure there would be no end to the parade of people who’d line up to have their cree altered.”

Heli’s expression carried censure. “That would be illegal, Jaya Rai.”

“And this isn’t?”

Her head wagged this way, then that. “This is different. This is to fix an injustice. Since our laws provide no justice, legality is irrelevant.” The dasa turned on her heel and returned to her kitchen.

Jaya pondered that momentarily but, feeling Hadas’s eyes on him, he glanced up to meet the other man’s gaze.

“You will not punish her?” Hadas asked.

“For what?”

“For doctoring this cree?” He held up his hand. “For speaking to you with such disrespect?”

“There was no disrespect. Heli is a firm believer in rita. Rita dictates that you should be free. Therefore, Heli considers it inappropriate for you to carry a dascree and takes it as her duty to adjust reality to suit rita. I am not a believer in rita. Therefore, I consider it inappropriate for anyone to carry dascree. And, since I have no imperatives strong enough for me to argue with Heli’s impeccable sense of duty, I find myself in complete agreement with her solution.”

“Very well-put, politically speaking,” commented Hadas. “You commit to a view without committing to anything.”

Jaya did not answer that no doubt intentional jibe, but instead asked, “Has my grandmother arranged for you to contact your family?”

Hadas merely blinked at the change of subject. “Yes, thank you. They were much grateful for your assistance. They are also distressed by the disappearance of my sister. Like me, they are certain that what happened to me must have also happened to her.”

There was something sharp and watchful about the younger man’s eyes and Jaya wondered (as he had often wondered recently) what was expected of him. “I will make every effort to find your sister, Hadas. Although I’m not sure what or how much I can do.”

Hadas reddened. “You are a mahesa—more than that, you are the Lord Prince of Kasi. What is there that you cannot do?”

“He cannot pry into the workings of a private business without a legitimate reason. If he did, it would almost surely draw unwanted attention and possibly censure.” Ana stood in the doorway of the morning room, half shadowed by a cascade of artful foliage.

“What are either of those things beside slavery?” Hadas asked as she moved to take her seat.

Jaya answered him. “If I am exposed as someone who subverts the law by passing das off as members of a royal family, I will be little good to your sister or any other person who was seized illegally.”

“Then, if you cannot help us, who can?” Hadas asked, temper flashing in his eyes.

The question hung awkwardly in the air as Heli re-entered the room with a large platter of tiny cakes, which she set carefully at the center of the group at the table. Her new assistant was right behind her with a tureen of fruit sauce.

Jaya realized with a start that he didn’t know the girl. He gave her his most disarming smile, asking, “And who is this?”

“This is Dana Kapivastu,” said Ana, watching the child react warily to Jaya’s obviously unexpected warmth. “She’s helping Heli in the kitchen. Dana, this is-“

“Jaya,” he finished for her. “Where did you come from, Dana?”

“The Badan-Devaki dalali, Jaya. Your Jivinta, the Rani Sarojin, purchased me this afternoon.”

“My...Jivinta purchased you?”

“And why not?” asked the voice of that Venerable One from the doorway. “Did you expect me to allow a child her age to be sold into the ranks of some kaladan? Not likely!” She rapped her walking stick sharply on the tiles of the entry. “Now, will someone help me to my chair, please? This old body has not yet awakened fully.”

Hadas jumped to her assistance with nimble ease, settling her reverently into a chair beside his own. She patted his hand fondly, then turned her sharp gaze to Heli. “It looks like a lovely repast you’ve prepared, Heli. May we see the rest of it?”

Heli colored slightly and gave a quick bow of the head before shepherding Dana back to the kitchen.

“Hadas has asked a most important question, Gauri,” Mina Sarojin said, and Jaya knew she did not use the pet name without intent. “Who is able to help him extract his sister from Niraya Hell?”

“Jivinta, I can’t-“ Jaya began.

“I can,” Mina said. “If, as Ana suspects, this traffic in Avasan yevetha is according to some plan, then it is most likely that Belia Gupta was processed at Badan-Devaki just as her brother was. And if that is the case, then she will be easy to trace.”

“And your reason for doing this?” asked Jaya.

“I’m the eccentric old matriarch of a Taj House. I don’t need a reason. I need only that I like Hadas’s looks and wish to have his sister in my household as well. A matched set, if you will. Or perhaps my grandniece’s new das is pining away for his lost kin and I cannot abide his misery or the thought of their separation. It matters very little what reason I give the dalal. He will look up Belia Gupta in his well-kept records and he will direct me to her owner, who will not refuse to cater to the whims of the old Sarojin mata...for a sum of money.”

Hadas looked upon his benefactress with obvious admiration and gratitude. “Rani, I don’t know what to say.”

“Save what you will say for your sister. She will need your words much more than I do.” The old woman looked at him with sharp, searching eye. “She will not be the girl you knew, Hadas. You must understand this and prepare yourself for it.”

Hadas lowered his eyes and colored. “It will not matter.”

“It will matter to her,” Mina told him.

“My, what a serious group,” exclaimed a new voice. “Ah! And who might this be?”

Conversation was swallowed in a silence as profound as the hush before sunrise. All eyes turned to the entry. The Rani Melantha laughed charmingly and floated into the room in a cloud of silk and scent.

“Well, don’t all talk at once. Who is this lovely young man and how does he come to be among us?”

“This is Ana’s cousin, Hadas,” Jaya supplied smoothly and wondered how much the Rani had overheard.

Introductions were made and stories recited. At the end of it all, the Rani shook her head and sighed. “I suppose I really should pay more attention to what goes on in my son’s life. I’m so out-of-touch I don’t even know who he’s invited to live under our roof. Well, since the company is so charming and lively—“ Her bright eyes came to rest on Hadas. “I believe I’ll change my plans and stay in for breakfast. Helidasa!”

Heli, hovering in the kitchen doorway with a bowl of rice, jumped guiltily. “Yes, Rani.”

“Do get on the vicom and send my regrets to Prakash-sama’s residence. Tell him I’ll see him later today.” Her glance flicked to Jaya and she smiled. “Now, I must hear more about our newfound cousin, Hadas.”

Breakfast was an ordeal. If Ana was unlettered in subterfuge, she made up for it in inventiveness. Ignoring Jaya’s tightlipped watchfulness, she regaled the table with tales of snows and storms and deadly flora and fauna in the forests of the Kedar.

When Hadas observed that he was glad such things didn’t figure in the relatively quiet life of a hotelier’s son, he had the Rani’s complete attention. “Your father owns hotels, does he?” she asked sweetly. “In the Sagara?”

“Well, actually he-“

“Uncle owns hotels and inns all over the Territories,” interjected Ana. “He winters in the Sagara and summers in the foothills of the northwestern spur of the Kedar, near our family estates.”

“Really? I don’t suppose family members receive any sort of special consideration...”

Hadas smiled. “Family members stay free of charge at our inns.”

He learns quickly, thought Jaya, and tried not to notice how the Rani stroked the back of his hand. He caught Jivinta’s grimace. She did not seem to be enjoying her breakfast any more than he was.

Jaya’s comfort level took a steep downward turn when Hadas turned to Ana and said, “I had been meaning to ask, cousin, if your trip into Kasi yesterday yielded much fruit?”

Ana colored and glanced obliquely at Jaya. “None, I’m afraid.”

“Did you see our friends?” Hadas persisted.

“No, I didn’t.” The words were accompanied by a look that could have frozen water.

“Did you try the spaceport as I suggested?”

“Yes, Hadas. I saw no one.”

Hadas subsided, but Jaya was already thoroughly alarmed and annoyed. He could see that his mother found the tension between their Avasan “cousins” amusing. He got to his feet so quickly, Ana jumped.

“A word with you, Ana,” he said and headed for the gardens.

He heard a chair being pushed from the table, a murmured apology from Hadas and his mother saying, “My, what could possibly have triggered that? Jealousy, perhaps?”

His grandmother said something in reply, but the closing of the door cut it off.

“You lied to me,” he said.

She spoke from behind him. “I did not lie. I borrowed a horse and went for a ride. I simply-“

He swung around to face her. “You simply lied! You weren’t out clearing your head, you were looking for Parva Rishi.”

“I went into Kasi merely to look, to watch. I saw nothing—no one. I spoke to no one.”

The anger he had promised himself he would try to expunge blossomed in his breast. “You rode through the streets of Kasi alone. After dark.”

“I was only out after dark because I stopped at the Asra to pray. Surely, there is no safer place.”

“It is not the Asra that is the problem; it is the journey. If you decide to take another ride, Kena goes with you.”

“Kena treats me as if I were his virgin daughter. He will not leave my side.”

“Good.”

“Not good. There are those who might talk to a lone Avasan woman who will not talk to a Rani with an attached bodyguard.”

“Hadas then.”

Ana moved to stand at the balustrade beside him, her hands flying in a dismissive gesture. “Hadas is a hot-head.”

Jaya laughed. “And you’re such a fountain of calm wisdom.” The mirth was not strong enough to overcome his anger; the words came out twisted with sarcasm.

She turned to face him, leaning against the balustrade. “I don’t understand you,” she told him. “I have become a thorn in your side. My presence here threatens your political life, disturbs your household, necessitates lies that I know you find distasteful. If I were to go into Kasi and to disappear there, surely your life would be much more serene.”

His juggernaut anger stopped in its tracks. He searched her eyes, looking for some indication that she was trolling for compliments or for a declaration of love. He saw none. Her gaze, as always, was direct, if bemused, and searching.

“Serene, yes,” he acknowledged. “But perhaps not as full. Nor as...challenging. Nor as interesting. You say you don’t understand me—well, the feeling is mutual. Neither do I understand you, but I must admit I’d like to. More than that, I’d like to understand...”  He paused and searched, momentarily, for some appropriate words. He could not, and ended up by making a vague back and forth gesture between them. “This,” he said. “I would like to understand this—whatever it is—that exists between us.”

“Attraction?”

“A weak word.”

Ana lowered her head. “Then, you have me at a disadvantage, Nathu Rai. I have never felt ‘this’ before.”

“Ah. I suppose you think I have?”

“You are a man.”

Now she was toying with him, surely. Jaya’s anger circled, looking for an opening, he elbowed it aside. “Jivinta said something to me the day I brought you here. She said, ‘Don’t confuse sakti with lust. Lust clouds, sakti illuminates.’”

Ana turned her extraordinary pale eyes on him. It was like looking into the sun.

“Are you illuminated, Nathu Rai?” she asked, scorching him.

He held her gaze. “My name is Jaya,” he said, “and I think I’ve just recently begun to know who that is.”

“He knows God who knows his own Self,” she said softly.

He recognized the words as scripture. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t hide behind your Rohin wisdom.”

There was a flash of angry fire in the pale eyes. “Hide?”

“Hide.”

The fire flickered and went out. “Yes,” she admitted and looked away from him. “Yes, I’m hiding.”

“Why?”

“You terrify me.”

He hadn’t expected that. It first shocked, then disappointed, then angered him.

“I will not rape you.”

“You can’t rape me,” she said and turned her left hand palm up and held it out to him. “Not as long as this is in my palm.”

“Stop it. Please.” He closed his eyes, giving his temper another shove. “I’m tired of being angry, and tired of getting slapped across the face with that”—he grasped her wrist and shook it—“every time I talk to you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“So am I. I’m sorry you feel compelled to run from hiding place to hiding place when we’re together—your proper Rohin wisdom, my anger, that dascree.”

“I’ve done that, haven’t I—made you angry so I could hide more easily... Camouflage.”

“It won’t work. I’m beginning to be able to see through you.”

She smiled wryly. “I’ll have to find a new place to hide.”

“You could learn to trust me.”

“I do trust you. You’re a man of honor and candor. I trust that.” She lapsed into silence, turning her head to watch the tall evergreens dance in the rising breeze.

He was also silent, wondering what would happen to her trust if she knew how often in the last couple of nights he had stood at the door connecting their rooms, his hand on the latch, listening to his body’s loud demands that he exercise the rights rita accorded him. He fought her in those moments; he fought himself and he fought the current that washed between them. Then, he wondered why he bothered to fight it at all—why he didn’t just surrender to it as he knew she would surrender to a direct command.

He wondered...and saw the answer in terms of a chain of Karma, a sequence of repercussions, a path littered with distrust and recriminations and bitterness.

The first time he’d stood against that door, he’d remembered a bit of advice from his father. Bhaktasu Sarojin had given it to him in the form of a parable about the Asok tree—the mythic fruit of non-sorrow.

The fruit of the Asok is luscious beyond compare. Its juices give birth to bliss. In the spring, its blossoms are beautiful and fragrant with promise...but a man cannot eat blossoms. Eagerly, he watches the tree—the blossoms fall, the fruit appears, and he waits for its ripening. If he is patient, if he waits until the Asok’s time is complete, his first taste of its fruit will yield the sweetness of bliss. But, if he is impatient, willing the seasons to hurry, and picking the fruit before its time is complete, his first taste will yield nothing but bitterness.

It was good advice—as good as Jivinta’s. He had little doubt where his father had gotten it.

Ana sighed and stirred then, and Jaya realized he was still holding her wrist. She didn’t pull away when he moved his hand to hers and squeezed it, but simply returned the gentle pressure. He left her watching the trees perform their dance.

Patience, he thought.

oOo

The assembly lasted only a half-day and consisted of the presentation of ancillary evidence by the concerned parties. It ranged from the highly technical to the financial to the legal.

Jaya was no engineer. Fortunately, he was not alone in that; the specifications for magnetic stabilizers would go to the appropriate experts, as would the financial and market projections which, while not technical, were shrouded in legalese.

Jaya downloaded copies of the documents nonetheless, then, at loose ends, took Ravi to the Kiritan for the mid-day meal. He was impatient, wishing the experts could be prevailed upon to hurry. His impatience made him a poor companion, and Ravi, to his credit, waited for several minutes before saying anything about his mahesa’s mood.

When he did speak, he said simply, “If it would help to talk, Jaya Rai, I would be pleased to listen.”

Jaya said, ”I want to do what is right and just, but I wonder if what is right and just for Ana and her people is what is right and just for Mehtar.”

“The Avatars—may my life be a sacrifice to Their glory—have said that truth is but one point, which we have multiplied. Surely, this may be applied equally to justice, for justice hinges upon the truth.”

Jaya shook his head. “That sounds like something Ana the Rohina would say.”

“No doubt.”

“You think it’s really that simple?” Jaya glanced idly over the room below the Sarojin box; faces turned away from him and eyes dropped before his gaze.

They were no longer surprised at the appearance of Ravidas at his lord’s table, perhaps, but they still allowed themselves to be scandalized by it. The silent censure bred a peculiar satisfaction in Jaya’s heart and this worried him. Did he subject Ravi to this public display as a token form of rebellion? Did Ravi suppose that he did?

“Ravi, are you uncomfortable here?” he asked abruptly.

The dark eyebrows winged upward. “No, Jaya Rai. I am quite comfortable. You have made it so.”

“Your father would say I dishonored myself by taking a position that others of my caste would ridicule or despise.”

The other man grinned waggishly. “My father would change his tune if he were to ever dine here.”

“Ravi, you’re my friend. Almost my brother. We grew up together. We were raised in the same house.“

“But not in the same caste.”

“I have never understood that boundary. I think that’s why I’ve chosen to deny its existence.”

Ravi nodded. “And that is why I am comfortable here. In your company, that boundary does not exist, truly. You fear I think you insincere. I do not. We have known each other too long for that, haven’t we?”

“I’ve often thought...I could give you your freedom...“

“To what point, Jaya Rai? If I were free, I would still work for you and would mostly likely draw similar wages. No doubt you would have me continue to live in your house, and eat the food prepared by my mother. What could I do as a free man that I cannot do as I am?”

“Marry a free woman?”

A flash of something like surprise crossed Ravi’s face, but was quickly gone. “I am not likely, mahesa, to meet a free woman that I would care to marry.”

“Unless you were a free man.”

Naru arrived to serve them then and, while he did not dare show overt disapproval, he was less than cordial with Ravi. Jaya was, for the first time, embarrassed by something he normally met with wry humor.

The impatience bubbling in his soul expanded and took on nuance. He wanted the AGIM/KNC dispute to be over; he wanted his mother’s relationship with Prakash to end; he wanted the caste structure to crumble.

He wanted. He wanted. Truth. Wisdom. Patience. Enough power to change the world in the blink of an eye.

When he saw a familiar face in the room below, he thought of one way in which his impatience might be assuaged and asked Naru to invite Namun Vedda to the Sarojin box. The older man hesitated only briefly before joining his godson. His smile was genuine and slightly conspiratorial when he saw Ravi there, as well. Namun Vedda, himself a freeman of the merchant caste, had echoed Bhaktasu Sarojin’s views on Mehtar’s convoluted social system since Jaya could recall; it was one among a myriad points of agreement the two men had shared.

It occasionally occurred to Jaya to wonder if Uncle Namun were disappointed in his godson for not being his old friend in any but the most insignificant ways. He looked like his father, had his father’s voice and mannerisms. But in other, more important, intangible ways, he was a watery image of the man—Bhaktasu Sarojin reflected in a troubled pool. He supposed he could claim to hold the same values the older Sarojin had espoused, but he held them more loosely. What had been passions in Bhaktasu Sarojin were, in his son, merely convictions. Jaya wondered if he might raise them to the level of passions sometime before he died. He had loved his father; he loved his father’s memory, but it was difficult to exist as a rippling reflection of another man’s vivid greatness.

Jaya did not speak of either convictions or memories, however. After the obligatory exchange of pleasantries, he turned his mind to demystification. “Uncle, might I assume you understand something of magnetic trim systems?”

Namun seemed amused by the question. “Considering the fact that I help design them, I should hope I know something.”

“Ah. I take it that means you helped design Star Trim?”

Namun nodded. “Why the interest in mag-stabilizers, Jaya? I hadn’t thought that one of your particular avocations.”

“It’s not. But it is one of the points of contention between AGIM and the KNC. The KNC claims the trim systems on the Guild vessels are antiquated and sub-standard—the standard being the Star Trim system. This makes them dangerous, which makes them a poor risk for shipping materiel important to the Consortium associates. That, at any rate, is the claim.”

“I see. Is your next question whether I consider that claim to be justified?”

“Is it?”

Namun leaned back in his chair and studied the fruit arrayed on his plate. “We developed the Star Trim stabilization system because of inherent inefficiencies in the older designs. The AGIM ships are less fuel-efficient than ships with Star Trim—much less—but that doesn’t mean they’re necessarily less stable.”

“Then the KNC claims are false?”

“Let us say, they are highly exaggerated. Yes, a less efficient keel is potentially more prone to magnetic fluctuation, which can be a problem during rotation. But I think the accident records should speak to that; surprisingly few ships experience major problems during lift-off.”

Jaya nodded. “Thank you. The Council is having experts look over the presentations, but I...” He shrugged. “I seem to be impatient.”

 “You weren’t afraid I’d be partial to the KNC? After all, they are easily Vedda Technologies’ best customer.”

“You’re a scientist and a visionary, Namun, not a businessman. If I asked you how much money the Consortium spent at V-Tech last year, I’d be willing to wager you couldn’t tell me.”

Namun laughed. “You have me there. No, I couldn’t tell you. But I could tell you the exact thickness of the magnetic plating necessary to generate a smooth mag-field for a 100,000 ton freighter.”

Jaya raised his hands. “Don’t, please. I have all the information I need about mag-keels. I would like to ask your opinion on another aspect of this, if I might.”

Namun shrugged. “Of course. If you think my opinion is worth anything.”

“What’s your sense of the Consortium claim that a free-market Avasa and a truly independent Miner’s Guild would be disastrous to the KNC and our economy?”

“I honestly don’t know. I have a suspicion they might be right about their own fortunes, if only for the reason that, given the choice, many of those who have been forced to deal with the Consortium in the past will no longer do so. And that, Jaya, speaks less of market imperatives than it does of Karma.” He patted a napkin to his lips, his eyes unfocused.

The look was familiar to Jaya; he had seen it on his father’s face often enough.

After a moment of thought, Namun continued. “There are very few people and organizations outside its immediate family of companies that Kasi-Nawhar has not stepped on or aggrieved in some way. I believe there are those who would sooner pay more for needful services than do business with the KNC. I can’t say I blame them.”

“You do business with the KNC,” Jaya observed.

“They need me—or at least, they need V-Tech. Because they need V-Tech, they have always been generous and above board with me. Better, they leave me alone and do not meddle in or steer my research. Which is not to say they don’t try to take the tiller now and again. But then, I simply remind them of their need. Take the Star Trim system, for example. With a fleet as large as theirs the efficiencies it buys them result in significant savings.”

“Can AGIM hurt them?”

“As I said, they’ve hurt themselves. If they were bigger men, more honest men, in a word—more spiritual men—they would be afraid of neither AGIM’s defection nor it’s power.”

“Afraid?” The words seemed absurd applied to Ranjan Vrksa or Nigudha Bhrasta.

Namun smiled, perhaps a bit wickedly, and said, “Yes, even men in that position of power count fear among their possessions. It is not quite like being a mahesa of the House Sarojin.”

Jaya considered that. “I believe my father proved that even a mahesa of the House Sarojin has reason to own fear. No one can live without fear, excepting perhaps a saint.”

Namun had sobered at the oblique mention of his late friend’s fate, and the smile that now played about his lips was rueful. “Ah, but a saint fears earning his God’s disapproval, does he not?”

In the silence that followed that observation, Jaya imagined he heard Ana’s voice: “You terrify me.” If Ana was not a saint, she was at least a pretender to sainthood—or perhaps a saint-in-training, he thought, more charitably. And, as the attraction between them was inarguably mutual, he represented a potential fall from the high Rohin path. If Namun was right about the fears of saints, Ana had every reason to be afraid.

An emotion not unlike pride fluttered momentarily in Jaya’s breast. He smothered it in incredulity. Had he really, in that self-infatuated instant, seen Anala Nadim’s ethics as a target to be hit or a barrier to be breached?

“You seem troubled, Jaya,” observed his Uncle Namun, quietly. “Are you taking this thing with AGIM that much to heart?”

An upward glance showed that both Namun Vedda and Ravi were regarding him with solemn concern. “I know...some people to whom the freedom of Avasa is somewhat more than an abstract legal issue. Recently I...discovered that the Saroj has some offshoots on our sister world. They are not directly affected by the Guild’s concerns, but...”

“Anything that affects the mining industry on Avasa cannot help but affect all Avasans,” finished Namun. “Excepting, perhaps, a handful whose livelihood derives from purely Mehtaran interests.”

Jaya managed a weak smile. He had not lied to his Uncle Namun since he was a small boy, and all of his childhood and adolescent lies put together paled before the one he had just uttered. “Funny,” he said, “that’s what Ana said just last night.”

“Ana?”

“One of my Avasan cousins—Ana Sadira.” He chanted a litany of falsehoods, then, about Ana’s timber magnate father, and her vacation from a school where she studied forestry.

“She wouldn’t happen to be a tall, rather striking young woman with deep auburn hair, would she?” asked Namun.

“Yes. Have you—?”

“We nearly met the other day, I think. She was Jivinta Mina’s luncheon companion at this very table. I thought perhaps your very stubborn grandmother had taken my advice and hired a young woman to accompany her on her junkets.”

Jaya pushed his jal frazie around on his plate. “Yes, well, Ana is rather fond of junkets herself. Unfortunately, she’s also prone to be stubborn, independent, and risk-taking. She has a particular predilection for junketing about in the Warrows and the Nahar.”

Namun Vedda’s eyes crinkled with silent laughter. “Ah, the Sarojin women! She sounds quite remarkable.”

“She is,” said Ravi, unexpectedly entering the conversation. He glanced at Jaya. “Quite remarkable. It is a shame, Jaya Rai, that you do not get on better with each other.”

Namun laughed. “Do I detect an undercurrent? What’s the matter, Jaya—are you uncomfortable with a woman you can’t intimidate?”

“I’m not uncomfortable with Jivinta Mina.”

“Jivinta Mina is your grandmother, not a potential liaison.”

Jaya suffered a moment of epiphany. He actually stopped to ponder the suggestion, which provoked his godfather into further laughter.

“You are your father’s son, Jaya.”

“What? How so?”

“You have his...habit of introspection and self-analysis. I know few men who would even allow themselves to ponder a question with such humbling implications.” He cocked his head. “I am seized by the conviction that you would have answered, had I not interrupted you.”

“Yes. I would have. And, no, I’m not uncomfortable with Ana, merely...at a loss to know how to deal with her. Until now, the only women of my acquaintance who haven’t been intimidated by me—or by what I represent—are my grandmother, the Deva Radha and Helidasa.”

There was a wonderful irony in that, which Jaya did not explore at that moment, except to note wryly that when he said Helidasa ran his household, the truth of the statement far transcended the domestic realm.

He did not wonder at Hadas’s surprise at him that morning—he knew very few members of his caste who allowed their das to hold beliefs, convictions, or opinions that were uniquely their own, let alone act on them. Helidasa, he had no doubt, viewed herself as being the essence of servitude, and unimpeachably loyal to her House. He had few doubts, as well, that she thought of the Saroj in just those terms—her House—as if she, too, were a Sarojin. In a sense, he supposed, she was. There was also the very real possibility that among her predecessors there were those who had entered into sexual relationships with their Taj masters. It had intrigued him as a youth to speculate that he and Ravi might share a physical as well as emotional and intellectual kinship.

The convoluted loop of thought brought him back around again to Anala Nadim and the irony of their relationship. She was, legally, at once a member and possession of his household. She was, in a reality that transcended law, a free woman who both attracted him immensely and was attracted to him. He had no doubt a sexual liaison would be passionate and satisfying for both of them. If only she were not a dasa. If only she were not Rohin. If only she were not so stubborn. Were she what she pretended to be...

The thought hung. Were she a Rani, he would never contemplate her, his hand on her door latch, while she slept, trusting in an abstract. Honor. He knew what that was. If he had learned nothing else from his father, he had surely learned that.

He knew and despised men who used their hold on their das to force them to the humiliating performance of acts they would never have done willingly or freely. He felt the depth of his loathing and was surprised at it. Before, he might have said, if asked, “I argue no one’s right to own personal das; it is simply not for me.” It seemed his feelings had not only intensified, but crystallized.

No surprise, he supposed. His grandmother had never owned any das of her own; the Saroj household das had come to her through marriage. She had raised her son to view the owning of other human beings as a questionable practice, even as her husband had taught him to assume it as his right. Jaya knew it was something Bhaktasu Sarojin had battled with internally his entire adult life. But Bhaktasu Sarojin had been a man who toiled with things that disturbed him; Jaya tended to ignore them, to abide with them held uneasily at bay, or to tell himself there would be a time to deal with such things later.

In that way, he was like his mother, he supposed. It was easy to blot out uneasy thoughts or stirring conscience in day-to-day minutiae. Now, nothing in Jaya’s life was day-to-day; the minutiae was gone, leaving his conscience naked. He squirmed in the discomfort of nakedness. Perhaps he was his father’s son after all.

“Do I detect,” Uncle Namun was saying, “a note of pleasure in that peculiar observation?”

Jaya shook himself. “I wouldn’t call it pleasure. I suppose it is gratifying to know someone—a woman, specifically—that I can trust to be honest. Brutally honest, at times. Ana does not try to score points with me. On the other hand, some situations would be easier and more pleasant if she were just a little in awe of me.”

“Pleasant?” echoed Namun. “Or pleasurable?” His eyes sparkled—now green, now gray. “From the glance of her I got, I would have to call her a most attractive woman. Perhaps you can work out an arrangement whereby you can be equally in awe of each other. The carriage of passion does not draw smoothly behind a mismatched team.”

“Like my mother and father?” Jaya surprised even himself.

His Uncle Namun’s brows twitched upward. “What makes you say that?”

“They seem so different. Father was a man of depth. A man of...piety and compassion. A man of...faith, I suppose you could say.”

“Yes. And your mother was a woman of faith. She had faith in him and in his causes.”

Jaya made a wry face. He had not intended to, and tried to snatch it back, but Namun had caught it.

“I know. You’re thinking that was only pretence, else she could not have become the woman you now know. I can tell you, having known Melantha Sarojin a bit longer than you have, that it was not pretence. She has changed. I don’t suppose you noted the genesis of those changes, wrapped up as you were in your own grief. That you two drew apart instead of together after Bhaktasu’s death seems a great tragedy to me—more tragic, in its way than his death, itself.”

He paused and searched Jaya’s face as if looking for something that would determine what he should say next. What he said was, “When you judge your mother in the light of your father’s virtue, do try to remember that, in your mother’s estimation, it was his virtue that killed him.”

“You mean because he died a crusader?”

Namun nodded. “Is it any wonder Melantha no longer treasures his causes?”

Jaya felt another epiphany coming on. He shook his head. “No surprise. I suppose that’s why she made light of them to me. Beyond that, she would never discuss my father’s convictions—political or spiritual. I think Jivinta Mina has given me more of my father than mother has. Do you know much about what crusade he was pursuing when he died?”

Namun frowned. “Not as much as I would have expected. He was unusually reserved about it. I don’t think he even shared much of it with Melantha, or so she has indicated to me.”

“That was unusual?”

“Quite. Normally, I would have known more than I would have time to tell, or you have time to hear.” Namun lay his napkin aside preparatory to leaving. “I have a most uninspiring meeting to attend. I would much rather regale you with tales of your father’s various crusades, but my meeting, while dull and possibly sleep-inducing, will be lucrative.” He smiled ruefully. “I am told that the presence of a real scientist in a room full of marketeers sells contracts. A bit of whimsy on the part of the Goddess, no doubt, but there it is.” He rose. “I believe you provided the last meal we had together. My turn, I make it.”

“Uncle-“

“I insist. It was delightful to have my opinion consulted on a matter that did not have to do with a problem of chemistry or engineering. It helped alleviate the fear that I am becoming mono-dimensional.”

“An impossibility, Uncle Namun. You have more dimensions than most ten men.”

Namun laughed. “Flatterer,” he said and gave Jaya the respectful greeting and Ravi a cordial hand clasp, no doubt raising a few eyebrows and noses about the room.