Serial, Kherishdar's Exception, Episode 22: Stepping in It

I was aiming the device at the text near the back of one of Lenore’s notebooks when Emma exploded into the room. “Laurence Serapis! I can’t believe him!”

The translation scrawled over the top of the document I was trying to examine, and it was nonsensical. Had he said something to her she found incredible? Something else? Her tone, at least, indicated her outrage. Looking up, I said, “Ah… hello?”

“Did he insult you? He insulted you, didn’t he. That boy! I want to kill him!”

That word I knew. “Really?” I asked, startled.

“Oh,” she stopped short, eyes wide. “No, I… not literally.”

I checked the translation to make sure I hadn’t misinterpreted, but no… I hadn’t. “How did you mean, then?” I asked, chilled. Perhaps the aunera really did have their own Corrections. Did they bleed people in wine? “What is the emotional equivalent of killing someone, as an aunerai?”

Emma slapped her hand to her forehead. “Forget I said it. I don’t actually want to kill him. Or slap him. Or spank him. I just wish I could do something meaningful enough to make him change his behavior.”

“Why don’t you?” I was careful of the words, but I needed to know. “Have him whipped? Or spanked? Or slapped? I assume you can’t do it yourself because you are peers? Who Corrects aunera when they err?”

“I… what? I think I’ve hit a cultural wall.” Wasn’t that an image. “Look, I just mean—” She stopped short and laughed. “Okay, all right, I see why this is a job for professionals. As long as you’re not offended by me being bad at it.”

“Bad at… what?” I asked, fascinated. “Interacting with aliens? How could you possibly be good at it?”

“Andrew was!” She sighed. “But Andrew was special.” She dropped into the chair on the other side of Lenore’s desk, uninvited. Was that typical? Did she consider me her caste-peer, or her familiar, to indulge in that kind of unspoken permission circuit? That’s a word, you know. For us, anyway. Hif jzuvren. “Laurence though.” She leaned forward, scowling thunderously. “Did he annoy you?”

“Why is everyone so convinced he annoyed me?” I wondered. “I’m still here, aren’t I?”

“People can stick it out even when they’ve been hurt.”

The device insisted that collection of words—‘stick it out’—meant persevere, while also translating the individual words. I wondered where the phrase had come from. Stick… as in glue? Stick as in ‘beating something with’? The latter seemed more probable, given Emma’s personality. “I’m not hurt,” I said. “He was belligerent but not violent. It was…” What was it? “Invigorating.”

Emma stared at me, then brayed her enthusiastic laugh again. “You are wild, woman. And I worried you were some kind of wallflower from the whole ‘naked and silent prostitute’ thing.”

The translation of that was offensive. “Fathriked are not ‘wallflowers’. Ours is not a work for the weak.”

Her brown skin went grayish, and again her eyes widened. “I did offend this time. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to. It’s just… you have to understand what it looks like.”

Did I? I suppose I did. I put my cheek in one palm and said, “Very well. Tell me.”

Taken aback, she said, “I guess… you don’t know what it looks like to us, do you. But you have caste-enforced prostitution, which is slavery as far as we’re concerned. Women on our world have overwhelmingly been forced to make their way by selling their bodies.”

This entire speech was far more alien than anything I’d encountered so far. “Selling their bodies… you mean to have sex? But to require coin for it, like a Merchant?”

Emma nodded enthusiastically, a motion like ours but so much more overt it felt emphatic no matter her intention. “Exactly. Men have historically forced women into these roles, rather than giving them any form of real power.”

I squinted. “Were these ‘prostitutes’ bad at their work?”

“…what?”

“You said they had no real power,” I said. “Obviously, they did not know how to use their bodies properly, otherwise they would have had all the power they wanted.”

Emma was staring at me now. I stared back, since apparently this was acceptable behavior.

“All right. Obviously we have very different ideas about sex,” the human murmured. “Maybe that’s good? Is it rude to ask?”

“Your question suggests it would be rude for me to ask you?”

“Yes!” Emma paused, put her hands on her eyes and dragged them down her face, an act that exposed her lower eyelids in a gruesome fashion. The skin inside was pink, unlike the skin on her face. “How did I go from ‘is Laurence bothering you’ to ‘your prostitutes are doing it wrong?’”

“My prostitutes are apparently doing it correctly,” I offered. “It’s yours that were bad at it.”

Emma began snickering, pressed her fingers to her face. “I’m sorry. Maybe we should start over—”

“Why?” I asked. “This conversation is interesting. I’d like to know why you believe fathriked were powerless slaves. This feels relevant.” I flicked my ears back. “Also personal, as I was fathrikedi. And an excellent one.” Who had lost her lord to the blandishments of aliens. And now I was wondering how that was even possible, given that they didn’t bother to elevate sex to an art. Maybe I hadn’t been the best of fathriked after all.

“Oh, now I’ve stepped into it.”