“What will I do?” she asked quietly, turning to her brother and touching her hands to her forehead in salute to the Pillar. “My job. As Weather Man of No Peak.”
CHAPTER
49
The Prince’s Stand
the twenty-second year, twelfth month
For Ru’s birthday, his friend Dano invited him to a party in the Dog’s Head district. “It’s at this place called the Little Persimmon, and it’s going to be a great crowd,” he told Ru as they walked to class. “You should come. These guys I know really want to meet you.”
“Really?” Ru wasn’t accustomed to getting any attention on his own, but he guessed that with Niko and Jaya gone from Janloon, he was the only one of the younger Kauls to take notice of now.
“Sure!” Dano insisted. “Anyway, keke, you could stand to cut loose a bit.”
Ru supposed his friend was right. Midterm exams were around the corner, and Ru had been studying until late into the night for weeks to catch up. His third-year classes were more difficult and there had been a lot of stress in his life over the past year. The terrifying abduction of his mother and his aunt had caused him to miss classes right at the beginning of the school year. That summer, Typhoon Kitt, the worst typhoon in thirty years to hit the East Amaric region, had pelted Janloon for three days, causing enormous damage. Jan Royal campus had been closed for a week, and even after it reopened, Ru had spent all his time outside of classes helping with the No Peak clan’s clean-up and relief efforts. The latest problem was that his dog Koko was going deaf and blind in old age, and had several teeth removed last month after difficulties eating. Ru tried to go home every weekend to see him.
On top of everything else, Ru was torn about what to do when he graduated next year. He’d decided to major in public policy. Time spent living on campus away from the clan and getting to know the other students in the Charitable Society for Jade Nonreactivity had cemented a realization that he’d been born as the luckiest stone-eye in the country. Sometimes he felt like a walking paradox, possessing all the privileges of being a son in a ruling Green Bone family despite his deficiency, and suffering few of the indignities that other nonreactive people experienced, especially the Abukei. It seemed only right that he consider how he could use his position to help others.
Ru thought he might like to work for a nonprofit organization, with a goal of getting involved in political advocacy, but he wasn’t sure his father would approve. When he was in a good mood, the Pillar was receptive to Ru’s ideas, but at other times he would respond impatiently. “You’re too idealistic, son. No Peak is a Green Bone clan, not a charity house.” After the disastrous loss of the office in Shotar, the most pressing need was on the business side of the clan. The best way for Ru to contribute to the family would be to work for his aunt Shae after graduation. The Weather Man had already suggested she would be pleased to have him on Ship Street, and Ru’s mother had reminded him sternly, “You have to put your family first, before you think to help strangers.”
Ru decided to take Dano’s suggestion and blow off some steam. The Little Persimmon being in Mountain territory gave him a moment’s pause, but he was twenty-one years old now and not about to inform his parents of every minor risk he took by crossing clan district boundaries like an ordinary adult. When he arrived at the address Dano had given to him, he went up to the second floor and found the lounge to be a dive, with dim lighting, red benches around a small dance floor, scratched wooden tables, and a black bar with mini-lights strung behind a mirrored backsplash.
Dano excitedly brought him over to meet a lean, sharp-faced man working behind the bar. “Tadino here didn’t believe me when I said I knew you.” Dano tapped the bar top. “Pay up on that bet, keke!”
The man named Tadino leaned closer. “Are you really Kaul Rulinshin?” He had an accent—Shotarian?—and to Ru’s surprise, a circular burn scar on his left cheek.
Ru dug out his driver’s license and showed it to the man, who laughed and said, “I’ll be damned. All right, Dano, I’ll pay you in free drinks.” He poured them each a generous shot of hoji and touched his forehead to Ru in salute. When he grinned, his puckered scar stretched and pulled at the corner of his eye. “I’ve always wanted to meet one of the Kauls in person. You could even say I’m a bit of a clanmag addict.”
The comment made Ru dislike the man. The cheap, trashy magazines that printed clan gossip and photos of Green Bones had been unkind to Niko. Although, to be fair, they were unflattering to everyone, even Ayt Ato. Clanmag photographers had had their camera equipment smashed, vehicles set on fire, and even bones broken by irate Green Bones, but apparently the money was good enough for them to continue their activities. Tadino didn’t notice Ru’s grimace. He prodded another man sitting at the bar, a pale, sullen fellow with a crooked face who was presumably a regular at the Little Persimmon, as he was alone and studying his half-empty drink. “Hey, you hear that?” Tadino said. “This is the Pillar’s son, show some respect.”