Interlude – The Room Where It Happens

“I have to ask, Lady Talla,” one of the Degala tribe elders—a woman named Feena—begins, “but what is the story behind that bizarre creature of yours? It seems odd that you’d make an enemy of a rising power like the Shaa family over it.”

Talla hides her grimace behind a long drag from a cup of imported wine. An illegal vintage smuggled through the embargo, she notes, which was not offered in any of the more official meetings she’s had with the tribal leaders of Degala. For all that the old tribes keep to ancient traditions, their elders aren’t so different from any other matriarchs at their core.

Any notion that the elders were poised to suffer as much as the rest of their tribe is dispelled with one glance around the luxuriously decorated captain’s quarters of Feena’s ship. An expensive, if eclectic, collection of tapestries, furniture, and other imports courtesy of Degala’s many merchant ships.

Or perhaps not. The tribe’s fleet wasn’t always dominated by traders, after all. Nor was the tribe itself always so unified. The old woman may well have been a corsair once, while the tribe was in its heyday and she was in her prime.

Much to Talla’s chagrin, fleeing Stebaari with a political fugitive was not enough to escape her duties as a noblewoman. Especially when her mother keeps sending them chasing after her. As House Goa’s representative, Talla’s been charged with handling negotiations with the tribe on her mother’s behalf, forcing her unwillingly into the role of ambassador.

“If you’re talking about Maev, then she is not ‘mine’ in any sense of the word,” Talla explains more patiently than she feels. “She is a person, stranded far from home, and under my protection. Not to mention a friend.”

“I meant no insult, of course,” the elder lies as easily as she breathes. “I’m simply curious about its—er, her origins.”

It takes great effort for Talla to resist rolling her eyes as the naked attempt to probe for information. Similar though they may be in some ways, it’s clear that the tribal elders are more accustomed to politicking with each other rather than among the notoriously backbiting noblewomen of the cities.

“Far away, as I said,” she equivocates. “It’s not my story to tell.”

The elder sighs and sets her own cup to give Talla a condescending look. “Young Lady, that may be enough to settle matters for the young clans in their sparkling cities, but I’ve sailed every sea under the Goddess’ light and never seen her like. She’s no troglodyte, and she’s not from any land I’ve ever seen.”

Didn’t stop her from calling Maev one during the last talks, Talla bitterly recalls. The almost mythological cave dwellers are pale, furless, and blind. Said to be either native to some convergence point, or perhaps spawned by demons. They are popular villains in children’s bedtime stories and trashy fiction, but few people have ever met one. Of everyone Talla’s met, only Fargo can give firsthand accounts of the creatures, and those mostly involve tales of being driven off at spearpoint.

Which just makes it doubly unfortunate that “pale, furless, and wielding a spear” just so happens to also describe Maev. Blood and acid, she’s even got bad eyesight. Still, there’s no question in her mind that throwing the word at Maev is a calculated insult, rather than a genuine misunderstanding.

She hardens her own gaze as she matches that of the elder. “Then let my silence speak for me. If you wish to know, then perhaps you can ask her yourself. Maev can be quite personable, if you approach her correctly.”

And get the right personality. Her multiple identities is a known factor already, since it’s difficult to hide and they’ve taken to waving it off as the product of a skill—which is not as convincing an excuse as they seem to think it is—but many of the elders find it confusing and offputting. None of the other tribeswomen have expressed an issue, though, so Talla assumes that the problem lies with them.

Admittedly, Magdalena’s company can be a bit like a hoof-trimming—painful and tedious, but satisfying if one puts in the effort—but there’s nothing but prejudice stopping the elders from engaging with Allie or Vi directly, and Evelyn’s manners are old fashioned even to the more venerable among them. Indeed, like Jira and Remi, the wiser ones have already found the time to spare Maev a visit.

“I mean no disrespect, my lady, but I’d sooner share a drink with that genderless snake.”

Talla takes a polite sip of her drink, then sets the glass down with just enough force to make a satisfying click against the table between them. Enough to express vexation without crossing into being outright impolite—she may be a ranger, but she hasn’t forgotten her etiquette lessons.

“So you keep saying, but perhaps if you mean no disrespect, Elder Feena, you should be less eager to give it,” she replies, keeping her voice cool and level. “Msshi is a friend, and their gender is not missing so much as it is private. I would expect an individual as worldly as yourself to know that.”

Unless, as Talla increasingly suspects, her time on the seas was mostly spent marauding and raiding. Not the most apt way to make friends, that.

For the first time in their meeting, Feena grows visibly agitated, scoffing and taking up a small pipe of whisper tea.

“Young Lady, I recognize and respect your status,” she grunts, lighting the pipe with the end of an oil lamp. Blood and acid, that must taste as horrible as it smells. “But you are still a young lady. Spend more than a few fancy hiking trips outside that gilded city of yours and you’ll learn that those savage things can scarcely even be called people.”

“The serpentfolk of Stebaari are upstanding members of the community,” Talla argues. “Most of them follow the law more closely than Fa’aun do.”

“That’s what they like you to think,” Feena says, taking a drag from her pipe. “But who do you think runs all the shit we smuggle through that embargo into the cities, eh? Nah, they dress themselves up for you city folk, but it’s all just...” she exhales a pungent, hazy plume, “smoke. When’s the last time you saw one of their brutes?”

Talla crosses her arms and frowns. “Snake Ogres are born less frequently in urban environments. That’s a known phenomenon, likely due to a reduced demand for heavy physical labor.”

“Uh huh, that’s what they like to tell you. I say they just cull them. It’s what I’d do if I wanted to pretend to be civilized. It’s why they keep their hatcheries closed off. One of the little monsters comes out with not enough arms and,” Feena makes a sharp twisting motion with her hands. “Quick and clean. Then the rest of the snakes keep their claws behind their backs long enough that you softies forget that they’re even there.”

It would be simple enough to point out that serpentfolk living in the cities developed the habit of hiding their claws to prevent Fa’aun from attacking them, but Talla has met Feena’s like before. It is, tragically, a fairly common position among the nobility. A belief like that doesn’t move for arguments or rationality. The fear and hatred is too deeply ingrained—the woman’s hands too deeply stained in the blood of her enemies for her to think of them as anything but monsters.

“I think there’s little more for either of us to gain from this conversation,” Talla sighs.

The elder chuckles and puffs out another plume of acrid smoke with a shrug. “To business, then. I’ve got a proposal for you—one I think your matriarch will find quite appealing.”

Talla doesn’t like the sound of that, but forces herself to set her own preferences aside. She has broad leeway to negotiate on her mother’s behalf, but it’s her responsibility to do so in good faith.

“I’m not sure what’s left to negotiate,” she admits. “Given that the tribe intends to award Shaa exclusive rights to Degala ships.”

Feena grimaces and waves the hand carrying her pipe, drawing trails of smoke in the air. “The chieftain and her coddled little heiress intend that. The tribe is not ruled by a matriarch or empress. We are captains of our own ships, and what we do with them is our decision alone.”

“But you do have a chieftain,” Talla points out, narrowing her eyes.

“Jira’s always steered us right, as her mother did before her, and as her daughter might have before the war took her,” Feena says. “But losing Brianna broke her. She took the empress’ terms, had us settle here, then left her granddaughter in charge while the mainland tamed us like they think they’re doing to their pet snakes.”

Talla politely ignores the implied “you” behind each “they,” and instead listens carefully to the underlying message Feena is presenting. Some of the elders are unsatisfied with Jira’s rule by proxy, and with their current status as a protectorate of the empire.

“What is it that you propose, then?” she asks carefully.

“I know your mother doesn’t want our ships—just for Shaa not to have them,” the elder explains. “Of course, as you say, the decisions have been made, and they may as well already be in the young matriarch’s hands. What I can promise you is that those ships will never land at their destination.”

Feena speaks the words so casually that it sets Talla’s fur on end, and she has to take another drink to calm her nerves.

“You’re talking about sabotage.”

“A harsh word,” the elder replies, grinning. “The ocean is a dangerous place, my lady. Tragic accidents are common, at sea. A poorly timed storm, a wrong turn while the Great Wheel hides behind the clouds, there’s a lot that can go wrong.”

Maybe Talla was too swift to judge the elder’s politicking ability. That’s the sort of equivocation she’d expect out of any number of her cannier cousins.

“And the men you provide to Shaa as sailors?”

Feena shrugs. “Are just men. Nothing that can’t be replaced, and the tribe’s too fat and swollen to return to our proper place on the sea—Jira’s brat is right about that, at least.”

Talla lets herself go completely cold, brutally shoving aside the anger and indignation in her heart. There will be time to ruminate later, but now she needs information. How deep does this go? Has Aunt Arelii been given the same offer? Perhaps most critically—

“What do you want in exchange for this?” Talla asks.

Feena takes a long drag from her pipe, then exhales before responding.

“Simple,” she says. “When little Remi comes begging at the Empress’ hooves for protection from Shaa, I want the Goa family to shut her down. Gaa too, if you can manage it, but you’re here and she’s not.”

Talla purses her lips. “Why?”

“Because Remi’s little tirade about our clan dying is already happening,” she hisses. “We don’t belong here. We belong on the sea, taking what we need and selling the rest. Degala’s name was once feared—now we’re being fattened up like poultry and harvested for our talents. Serve Jira’s brat a proper defeat and I’ll have enough reason to oust her, to take our tribe back to what we’re supposed to be.”

It takes Talla long enough to process it all that the elder takes her silence as hesitation and goes on.

“I’m not asking you to do it for free, of course. The tribe will remember its friends. Protection for Goa and their allies from raids and piracy, and perhaps occasionally we could be convinced to prefer particular targets among their enemies.”

A privateer fleet, giving Goa presumptive control over seaside trading routes right on the heels of Shaa’s ships being destroyed, costing them control over the river. Feena’s right, it is an appealing offer. To her mother. There’s no doubt in her mind that Tamara Goa Baanu would take the deal. Not on the spot, of course—there’s always room for more negotiation—but those negotiations would be made with the intention of accepting.

“I’ll need some time to think about it,” Talla says.

They make a bit more meaningless smalltalk, but she pays it little attention. Before long she makes her excuses and leaves, letting all the feelings she’d been suppressing during the meeting go once she’s away from the elder’s company.

“Blood and acid,” Talla whispers to herself. “I think I’m going to be sick.”