Pump Six and Other Stories(34)

Raphel smiled and sipped his tea. "Already seeking a match?"

"The girl is visiting Bia' Hardez. Her aunt. She's a good Jai girl."

"What point is there? I won't complete Quaran for more than a week."

"Mala is returning to her family at Kettle Rock. If you wanted to see her you would have to go there, and then still pass Quaran in a foreign village. Mala is willing. You will meet outside, with clean sunlight between you."

Raphel stifled a teasing smile. "You turn from the old ways?"

"There is no harm meeting in clean sunlight. She does not fear you. You traveled from Keli. If you are not dead now, you never will be."

"Grandfather would disapprove."

"An untrampled scorpion troubles no one."

"And you were always such a proper Jai lady."

His mother clicked her tongue. "My hook knife is still sharp." She nodded at his finished tea. "Throw your cup away, and make sure it breaks in clean sunlight. No one can use it now."

"A stone cannot be a pillow, the Keli cannot be friends."

—Jai Proverb. Recorded CS 1404, Pasho Eduard.

(Recovered Document, Dry Basin Circuit, XI 333)

Five days into Quaran, Raphel met his potential match on the edge of the village, separated by two meters of sterile light. The black ringlets of Mala's hair shimmered in the bright sun and her eyes were deepened by the black lines of an eye pigment that Keli girls favored. Mala's skirt and blouse were of the old Jai patterns, black and red interwoven diamonds, shot through with gold threads. Her arms were bare of bangles, inviting a man to marry her and swathe her in blue.

Within sight, but out of earshot, Raphel's mother and Bia' Hardez sat on the yellow plain, a pair of blue billowing matrons. Their gold bangles glittered sharply in the sunlight. In the distance, the old city stood silent, black bones against the sky. Raphel remembered exploring the city's tangled ruins where hawks roosted and coyotes trotted arrogantly down streets twice the width of Keli's greatest avenues. He remembered gathering spent shells from the mangled city, hunting for prizes from the vicious protracted wars that had destroyed the place.

Wind gusted. The chaperoning women tucked their blue skirts tighter around them. Mala pulled away her electrostatic scarf. Raphel noticed it was from Keli. The solar pack was distinctly from beyond the mountains, though with a Jai pattern to its weave. He pushed the thought away and studied the smooth lines of the girl's brown skin. She was like a bird, her face thin and graceful. Her cheekbones were sharp, but she was beautiful. At her questioning eyes, he pulled away his own scarf. They studied each other.

Finally she said, "You're much more handsome than in your pictures. Even with all those tattoos."

"You expected worse?"

Mala laughed. She pushed her windblown hair back from her face, showing the knife curve of her throat and jaw. "I thought you might have aged. You're young to be a Pasho. I thought my aunt exaggerated."

Raphel glanced back at the pair of women in married blue, gossiping and watching with speculative eyes for signs of a match. "No. Bia' Hardez is honest about those things. She matched my cousin."

"I've never seen a young Pasho."

"My teachers were dedicated."

"How long were you in Keli?"

"Ten years."

She shook her head. "I wouldn't have lasted a week. All that water. My grandfather told me it rained for months there."

"It's very pretty. When the rain touches the lakes, it makes rings, thousands and thousands of ring ripples all across them. You can stand on the marble bridges there and the rain can be as gentle as feathers."

The girl turned her eyes toward the old city. "I could never have lived in the rain." Her eyes remained fixed on the blackened ruins. "They say the Keli people shake hands. With strangers even. And they eat fish."

Raphel nodded. "It's true. I've seen it."

She wrapped her arms around herself and shuddered. "Disgusting. Bia' Hardez told me that your grandfather would as soon kill you as have you return."

Raphel shrugged. "He is traditional. He doesn't like that I went to Keli."

"Most families would welcome a Pasho back into their family."

"You've heard of my grandfather."

"Oh yes. One of mine died in Keli on his crusade. When they burned the city."

Raphel thought of the chips in Milliner's statue, and wondered if her grandfather had been one of the hook hands who failed to topple it. Or if he had raged through the Pasho libraries, burning and killing and setting the severed heads of delivered Pasho beside the busts of Plato and Einstein. He pushed the thought away. "Do they sing songs for him in Kettle Rock?"

"Of course. He is remembered well."

"That's good."

Mala turned back to him, her dark accented eyes evaluating. "My aunt thinks a Pasho would be a good match for me." She stopped and pushed her hair back. She looked again toward the ruined city in the distance, then back at him. She gave a little shrug.

Finally Raphel said, "But you think differently."

"A husband should be from your native place."

"The basin is still my home."

"But your grandfather disowns you. My family is traditional."