“Tearshan.”
Hearing my name spoken properly for the first time in ages came as a shock. My body tensed. I feared it wouldn’t listen to me, but somehow I managed to turn around, trying to locate the speaker. It wasn’t hard: he was standing one step ahead of everyone else, slightly to my left.
“Peridion,” I countered, almost barking the name out.
I knew him, as much as I regretted it. We grew up together—sort of. Despite the fact that my parents let him live, he was never really part of our community. He remained outside, skulking at the edges of the colony, barely talking to anyone, thinking himself far above us solely because of his ancestry.
Because Karlan Peridion was a noble; the son of the lord who was in charge of my family before my father slit his throat to free himself from aristocratic oppression.
I was so fucked.
“Aldeaith Tearshan,” he drawled languidly. His voice was naturally high-pitched, and he always tried to make it sound lower, but the result was grotesque at best. Everything about him was grotesque: strangely disproportionate body with long, frail limbs and a barrel-like chest, wide face with small, sharp features, adorned with thick, brown curls on top, but unable to grow a half-decent beard. Almost as if someone had taken random elements and connected them without an ounce of care about how they fit together.
“Look at him, thinking himself a real Dahlsi,” he said, turning away from me. He had a knife he was waving around carelessly, and I waited for him to drop it.
Pain exploded in the back of my shin, and I fell to my knees. Someone twisted my hands behind my back. My thoughts scattered in panic, until I spotted something that grabbed my attention and allowed me to focus for long enough to collect myself. My wand. Some bastard was already handing it to Peridion, having apparently snatched it from my belt. That wand had been with me from the beginning, covered in scratches and slightly chipped at the end from the close call in Sorox. The sight of it made some half-forgotten thought scratch at the back of my mind, but I pushed it away; I had more pressing problems. Peridion didn’t even seem interested in my weapons, putting them aside and studying me with pure, unadulterated hatred.
His lips twitched in a cruel smile when he addressed the crowd again, “Maybe we should cut his legs at the knees; he’d be just like them imps.”
They laughed.
I wanted to say something, but my jaw was frozen and my mind blank. And no, it wasn’t because of the looming death. My brain had already detected a much bigger threat.
He might talk to me.
Myar Mal, I thought. He didn’t send me here to die. I focused on the knife Karlan was wielding and tried to pretend it was just him and me. There was no crowd surrounding us, surrounding me, witnessing my ineptitude in all of its ingloriousness.
“I come as a representative of Dahls,” I stammered. It sounded weak. Pathetic.
Karlan’s face contorted in anger, and he jumped forward and slapped me. For a moment, my universe shrunk until nothing but the pain remained.
“I see your manners have slipped in Dahls,” his sneer broke through. “But in Tarviss those like you don’t speak unless asked.”
I was certainly glad I was not born in Tarviss.
My mind cleared, but I did my best to limit the amount of sensations I let through. I focused on the slap. I could have avoided Karlan’s hand; I could have grabbed it and broken it. I was much stronger than him, after all. But that wouldn’t be wise when I was in his domain, surrounded by people, who, judging by the reaction, were his subjects. So I let it slip. I dropped my head, like the meek, obedient peon I was supposed to be, and hoped he didn’t notice that my hatred for him was as strong as his for me.
“But, since you’re so eager, tell me if your masters have agreed to our terms,” he said.
I had no masters, only higher-ups, but it wasn’t time for discussing semantics. I just repeated what I was instructed to say: “As part of Meon Cluster, Maurir belongs to Dahls, and is and will always be, subjected to Dahlsian rule.” I barely finished the first sentence before the crowd started booing. I waited for them to calm down before picking up, “if the people living here decide to live according to Tarvissian laws, they’re free to do so. If they want to obey the Tarvissian Council, they can. If they want to pay taxes to Tarviss, they can. But only after paying their due to Dahls.”
“See, that’s the problem,” said Peridion, waving his knife in circles. “Dahlsian rule means the people’s rule, and if we let the people decide, sooner or later the decision will fall to those like you. And we can’t have that.”
I ignored him and continued with my message. “If you surrender now, none of you will get hurt. You will be deported and barred from reentering, but the Directory will consider allowing other people of Tarvissian descent to enter the colonies in the future.”
Was it a laughable sentence? Yes, it was. Did it make my blood boil when I heard it? You bet it did. Those assholes were murderers and insurgents. They deserved to die.
But there were too many of them. Dahls had never faced such a big group and was not eager to try now, especially when there was a risk of angering its bigger neighbor. So, the Directory was willing to let them out, to restore the peace and pretend the whole thing never happened.
I understood that. I hated it, but I understood.
“Are you listening to me, or are you just repeating what they told you?” Peridion’s eyes narrowed. “I shouldn’t expect much; you were always dumb, even for a peon. Let me say it simply:
