Friday 12 October 2007

Runick - Chapter 1

“So… that’s a city to you?”

Rikka stared out at the village below them, shading his eyes from the afternoon sun with one long-fingered hand. From where they stood on the cliff, a sprawl of houses, buildings and roads filled the tiny valley from the sea to the nearest hills, barely a mile all round and with ample amounts of greenery left over among them all. He could make out people, moving in pairs about the place and pausing at street corners to talk, and what looked like a market place at the water’s edge, thronging with trades people. Beside him, Shanarad grinned, one looking down at the picture of urban life happily, the other watching Rikka playfully.

“Not all things are defined by quantity, Rikka,” Narad told him mock-sagaciously. “In some circles utilisation is considered more important.”

Hearing her speak independently surprised Rikka. Usually the bodies spoke in unison; Shanarad must be more distracted by the sight of their home than he’d thought.

“But it’s tiny!” Rikka protested, ignoring the jibe. “Back home our villages are bigger than that! I’ve known houses bigger than that! Oh, sorry…”

He paused as Shanarad shuddered in synch. They had odd customs concerning houses, he remembered; when he’d invited them into his own back in Akona Shan had jumped and looked close to fainting. It had taken a full two hours for them to accept the idea, and when they finally had even Narad had looked ready to run when they’d seen that there were more than two rooms. It had been Rikka’s first experience of culture shock. And, indeed, probably Shanarad’s.

“It’s not a problem,” Narad smiled. The bodies looked at each other, and then turned to Rikka.

“Shall we go down?” Narad asked. Her eyes were gleaming with excitement, making them look almost silver in the sun’s glare, one half-closed against wisps of hair that were caught on her eyelashes. Shan reached out and wiped them away for her. She gave no sign of acknowledgement. “Then you can see the Temple!”

“Although tonight, rather than now,” Shan put in. “We won’t be able to get near it during daylight. We’re hungry,” they added together.

“So am I,” said Rikka with feeling. “Let’s go down and eat, I want my first taste of foreign cuisine.”

Native cuisine, Rikka, native cuisine,” Narad said, shaking her head. “Honestly, and you’re training to be a politician.”

They set off down the cliff, along a path that Rikka was sure had only ever been traversed by one-legged goats prior to that moment. Shanarad bounced on ahead, their excitement at being home obvious. Would he feel the same on seeing Akona again? he wondered. Travel was certainly a taxing and intimidating experience, full of exploration of the unknown and abandoning what was familiar and safe. It probably would be refreshing to return to an understandable and secure society afterwards. Particularly, Rikka thought with a stab of apprehension, after meeting more of Shanarad’s people. Their ways already seemed miles apart from his, and he’d only met one pair. Or was that one person? It was hard to know what was the correct vocabulary.

“Hey, guys?” Rikka called ahead as he slid smoothly down three metres of scree. “Are you a ‘pair’ or a ‘person’, when taken together?”

“We are a person.” They spoke together now, which never failed to freak Rikka out slightly, even though it was their standard conversation mode. “The official word is a 'dyad'. But not everyone else in Hasyol is. Those whose melds were not perfect are simply mind-mates. They’re pairs.”

“So does that make you, like, social elite?”

“Yes.” Shan looked back at him, letting Narad watch the path as they continued to speak together. “We are a single person, a dyad. We can easily interact with others, rather than only ourselves. We are Preferred in our society.”

A tendril of thornyleaf caught at Rikka’s shirt, and he paused to pull it out of the cloth’s folds.

“So, mind-mates share a mind link, rather than sharing a mind, like you guys?” he said as Shanarad stopped to wait for him. “They’re in constant telepathic contact, but are still two people.”

“Well understood.” Shanarad grinned, although Narad looked slightly impatient. “Whereas we are one person with two bodies.”

Rikka tore the last of the thornyleaf away and fell after Shanarad as they continued to leap merrily down the track, apparently with perfect ease. He was jealously impressed by it. Certainly, he was a city boy; wild, unmanaged paths like this were new to him, whereas Shanarad clearly came from a civilisation that practically lived outside and so was entirely capable of clinging to near vertical rocky tracks like monkeys. But, that said, Rikka wasn’t emotionally incapable of going to a dinner party; a skill which Shanarad definitely lacked.

They reached the foot of the cliff finally, and joined a road made of compressed dirt and straw. As roads went it wouldn’t have passed an Akonan inspection with a blind maintenance officer, but after the uncomfortable downhill climb Rikka’s aching ankle joints informed him in no uncertain terms that it was a superb road with a quaint rustic charm, and if he disagreed he was welcome to walk on his hands in the ditch instead.

Presently, they approached the town’s south gate, and Rikka suppressed another thrill of nerves as he saw the lookout climb down from the tower beside it and disappear from sight. Shanarad sped up slightly, Shan’s long legs effortlessly eating up the ground as Narad all but broke into a run.

“What are you most looking forward to?” Rikka asked casually as they neared. The gate was taller than he’d thought, a huge wooden construct with massive doors twice his height and stained with age and rain. Beside him, Shanarad pondered the question, and he could see the side of Shan’s dark, bearded face creased pensively.

“We don’t know,” they said thoughtfully, and Shan looked at Rikka again as Narad watched the road for him. “Speaking to the Priests, obviously, but also small things. Being welcomed back officially, for one. We will be highly honoured.”

“How will they react to me?” Rikka asked. His nerves were growing with every step they took towards the gate.

“They will welcome you, Rikka,” Shanarad smiled at him warmly. “As long as you enter no one’s house. Our culture is based around social interaction. Everyone will wish to interact with you.”

“Positively,” Narad added with a grin. “They will wish to interact positively.”

Rikka grinned back, the knot in his stomach dissolving slightly. That was good. He could take positive interaction. That was fine.

They reached the gate just as it opened, with a protesting squeal of rusted hinge that made Rikka wince. Around fifty Hasyolans stood inside the gateway, making a sort of channel for them to walk down that lead into the ‘city’. They stood in pairs, all garbed in similar fashion to Shanarad, but in different cloths, some dazzlingly ornate, some plain. Now that he looked, Rikka noticed the rich patterning on the fabrics Shanarad wore, although their clothes were dusty from travel along Akonan roads.

Shanarad stepped forward, and said something in their native language. Several dyads answered at the front; all, Rikka noted, dressed in the more intricate clothes. A volley of interchanges bounced back and forth between them all, and then Shanarad walked down the channel of people until they reached the men and women in plain clothes, where they broke off from each other and spoke to them all separately. Rikka watched, fascinated. It was difficult to be sure, since they were speaking a language that was utterly unfamiliar to him, but he got the impression that the words spoken were nothing more than pleasantries, as though the assemblage in front of him had all turned out to welcome home Shanarad in order for them to chat about the weather.

The couple – or dyad, Rikka corrected himself – at the front of the line turned to him, and smiled. He smiled back, nervously, and tried not to stare at the elaborate birth-mark beside her eye; but when he looked at her male body, Rikka realised that the man had exactly the same mark, but reversed; a mirror image. Abruptly he caught himself and focused on their mouths. Now was not the time to mortally offend anyone, especially as they’d never met anyone like him before.

“Brekallan,” they told him, gesturing to themselves, still smiling.

“Rikka,” he answered, and copied the gesture; a flat palm to the chest, fingers slightly splayed. They beamed, and everyone around them murmured, apparently happy. Rikka relaxed slightly. So far, so good. Although the weather was probably coming next, so there was still time for him to violate some important social code and be chased out of town.

Brekallan raised their arms and gestured to the sun with the same flat-handed movement they’d used earlier.

Tar sye harloga immue,” they said.

Crap, what had Shanarad taught him? Well, a lot of plant names, the correct application of a barley poultice, racial tolerance and that something was very wrong with his society, but apart from that… was mada ‘good’? Or was that ‘bad’, and dorra was ‘good’? Mada felt like it ought to mean ‘good’…

He went for broke.

Mada,” Rikka said, nodding and smiling like an idiot as every muscle he had tensed. The people in front of him gasped delightedly as one, and then all started talking at once, and stepped forwards to press their palms against his. He’d been expecting that, at least – it was Shanarad’s standard greeting. Slowly, Rikka relaxed, and they pulled him into the city.

It may have been small, but it was the most beautiful city Rikka had ever seen. Everything was open-air, with vegetation growing between every building and little seats set facing each other at the end of every street. Shanarad rejoined him to point out various areas: the market place was a large, circular clearing ringed with a line of evergone trees that bordered the pier; the school was a paved oval area, open to the elements, that contained stone desks and seats built onto the floor that all faced each other, to enable easy conversation. An entertainment area further on was built in a similar fashion, just an open area with no walls or roof and a stage at one end. There was no governmental building. When Rikka asked why, Shanarad shook their heads.

“We don’t have a government as you do,” they explained. Now that their impatience to be home was sated, the bodies had swapped roles; Narad looked at Rikka while Shan watched where they were going. Rikka suspected that one of the bodies had to be looking at whomever they were talking to at all times. “All important decisions are made by the priests. The Temple is our government, really. But the Elders gather on the beach to discuss things sometimes. Brekallan leads them.”

“So your religion runs your lives?” Rikka asked, nodding. It was an alien idea, but it made perfect sense after their revelations about the Akonan High Ministers.

“Yes,” Shanarad nodded. “In just about every way. There’s the hospital.”

Narad pointed as Shan continued to look at Rikka. He wondered if he’d ever get used to it.

The hospital, surprisingly, had walls and a roof, and seemed to be an actual building. As they watched a dyad approached the open archway that was apparently a door, the female body clutching at the male, her leg bloodied. They went inside without a problem. Evidently, the cultural restrictions on house-sharing didn’t apply to the hospital.

“Where will I be staying, by the way?” Rikka asked. Shanarad grinned.

“Under a bush outside,” they teased. “Unless you build your own house. No; there are guest rooms at one end of the hospital, where people can stay, away from the patients. You can have one of them.”

“You know, if I get some kind of terrible disease in there…”

“Then you will be treated immediately,” Shanarad answered. “You’ll be in a hospital, Rikka. Where better to get ill?”

“True. Although I can think of many better places to not get ill.”

“You complain too much,” Shanarad informed him. “Learn to see the silver lining. It’s better for your health.”

“Yes, it is,” Rikka nodded acquiescently. “Better than sleeping in a hospital, anyway.”

“Wouldn’t it be good,” Shanarad pondered randomly, “if you could get every illness you’ll ever have out of the way in one go? Just, you know, check into a hospital and stay there for a year or two until you’re done, and then live a healthy, germ-free life?”

Rikka blinked. Shanarad said this sort of thing a lot, and he was never quite sure how to answer. As a training Akonan politician there was never room in Rikka’s life for hypothetical situations that couldn’t plausibly be achieved; everything had been treated as a debate, and if it wasn’t worth saying, it should never be said. Shanarad, on the other hand, had obviously been taught all their lives that if there was anything to say it should be said.

“Yes,” Rikka said eventually, and Shanarad giggled. They in turn found his lack of understanding hilarious, obviously.

“Anyway,” Narad said, dropping her voice as low as it could go while Shan tried his hardest to look at the floor with her. Obviously they were trying to appear as though they weren’t saying anything. The Hasyolans ambled by around them, oblivious to their conversation. “We’ll come for you tonight after the tenth gong, when everyone goes Inside. It should be dark enough by then to get to the Temple.”

“Do you have a plan for once we’re inside?” Rikka asked back. Shanarad started to shake their heads, and then stopped.

“No,” Narad murmured. “But if it all goes wrong, we’re just going to run away as fast as we can. We feel this is the best plan we can manage right now.”

Rikka sighed and nodded. He thrived on plans, and rules. The lack of one now made him uncomfortable, even when shrouded in Shanarad’s easy-going deadpan humour; but it didn’t matter now. They couldn’t go back. He steeled himself for the night ahead.

3 comments:

Quoth the Raven said...

So! Not writing, am I Jomas? I should write more, should I? Well, take this! It even has a plot!

Jom said...

Gosh darn, that'll teach me to hint with intent to cause fiction. Look at the bloody mess I've caused now, tuh!

Steffan said...

Great story. Love the mind-share idea, and Rikka's a great way into the story - nearly human, but with a cultural lack of imagination. Lovely!