[IC Inbox -- Snowblind]

[heavensreader]

Is it worki - oh. Ahem. This is Kesara Freamon. Please leave your message here and I will call back on you as soon as I can.







Wait, is it still - argh, how do I ma-

Comments

[devoutish]

What other mistakes did you make?

[heavensreader]

I thought I could get Duster to - to do what I wanted, and I was wrong. And before, when I lied to Zach and hurt him so... and now with Ecks. People are the same, but the way they look at me is different. It makes such a big difference!

[devoutish]

How do they look at you now, and how do you want them to look at you?

[heavensreader]

Oah, in Serindia no one hardly ever looks at me. Because I'm a girl, and half-caste... no one is easier to trick than people who think they're much too smart to be tricked by the likes of you. But here they don't make this mistake, and I have to keep thinking of new tricks all the time. And maybe I'm...

[She falls silent. The end of that sentence is horrifying to contemplate.]

[devoutish]

Mm?

[It's an encouraging sound. Go on, Kesara.]

[heavensreader]

[Maybe I'm not - maybe I'm not -

She is not gracing that thought with a voice. No. She refuses.]

... it's only that it's tiring. And I have other things to do. Important things.

[devoutish]

What do your teachers tell you about mistakes, at home?

[heavensreader]

That depends on how bad they were. Sometimes Dr. Stein would say we cannot learn without making mistakes. But other times... other times she would say a thing was unworthy of me.

[devoutish]

[The more Alfie hears about Dr. Stein, the more he approves.]

I do not think this was a mistake that was unworthy of you.

[heavensreader]

You're nothing like Dr. Stein at all, Mr. Solomons.

[She says it with a little laugh. But there's something loose about her breathing in it, that says his words have found their mark.]

Maybe - maybe it's one of those mistakes that I need to learn by making. But isn't that a terrible thing to say about a mistake that someone's died for? Duster shouldn't have died to teach me. He wouldn't like to think so.

[devoutish]

He didn't die to teach you, but it would be a waste not to learn from it.

[heavensreader]

He still died. You're supposed to learn before someone dies. That's - that's why they don't let untrained colts out into the Game.

[devoutish]

Kesara, will you tell me more about the Game?

[It's clearly very important to her, but he's never been able to get a concrete explanation of what it is.]

[heavensreader]

[It's a substantial request. Kesara is silent for a moment, over on the other side chewing on her lower lip. She begins very slowly.]

Do you know - in your time, Mr. Solomons, is there still the British Empire? Is India still the jewel in the crown?

[devoutish]

[He settles in to be told a story, for once.]

It is, yeah.

[heavensreader]

India is the jewel in the crown, but in the North there's the Bear - the Russians. They'd like nothing more than to pluck the jewel, and of course we the British must defend what is ours. But Serindia, all that land between our border and theirs, is vast, all terrible deserts and mountains, heathen princedoms, hostile tribes, places where a white man - or a black, if he speaks the wrong language and bows to the wrong god - would be shot like a rabbit in a trap if he makes a false step. And that is if he is lucky to die quickly.

[This, her tone suggests, is tremendously exciting.]

Whoever has the best maps, the hearts of the people there, the markets, that is who will have India. The information, not the soldiers. And that is the Great Game. The war of spies.

[devoutish]

[It's exactly the sort of answer he would have expected. It's so Kesara.]

You're not an untrained colt. Yeah? You must know that. You're a two-year-old filly, young but not untested.

And you have learned from this.

[heavensreader]

[To herself, in her most private heart, Kesara thinks that if she's learned anything from someone's death, she's happy that it was here and not in the Game.

She will never say this out loud.]

What do you say the lesson is, Mr. Solomons? If it isn't that I shouldn't interfere, and we still don't know how to, to manage the people here?

[devoutish]

You shouldn't interfere without understanding the possible consequences. You shouldn't act on something like this without knowing all the angles. And I think you know that, yeah? It's something you think about. You miscalculated this time, but you didn't run in blind.

[heavensreader]

[They are good lessons. Kesara can't fault them that. Their only problem, really, is just as Mr. Solomons says - she knows them already. And still she's gone wrong. Why has she gone so wrong?]

So I'll have to do better next time, right? [She sounds resigned, and tries not to sound sullen. She only half succeeds.] But I will. There's a game here too, a small one, and I need to be able to play it well. As well as you do.

[devoutish]

You're already better at it than I was at your age, so you've got a head start, eh?

[heavensreader]

Only if I live as long as you have.

[Very quiet there for a moment, a reedy whisper.]

[devoutish]

[Oh, Kesara.]

If I can do it, with my dangerous life, then so can you.

[heavensreader]

[Kesara thinks about that. All the things she could say. You're not me, Mr. Solomons. You're a man. You're a sahib. You can read and write. You're not me.

She doesn't say them, though, because he can't help any of them. Some things are just her. That's simply how it is, to be Kesara.]

Thank you, Mr. Solomons. I'll do better, you'll see that I will.