“We didn’t even like him,” mused Gaet to Kathein and Oelita there on the beach. “We made fun of him. We taunted him.”
“You made fun of him? And he was helping you!” said a saddened Oelita.
“Poor little boy,” said Kathein.
Gaet grinned.
At their first Trial of Strength Joesai bullied Hoemei through his failures, saving his life and teaching him the value of an alliance, but Hoemei, instead of joining forces with Joesai, made a blood oath with Gaet and Sanan. Joesai remained on the periphery of the alliance, bullying them, goading them, tormenting them — and protecting them. They reacted with scorn.
It was only later, after the death of Sanan when he saw Joesai crying, that Gaet understood the folly of their petty bickering and made the conscious decision to forge a team from the three of them. He began to mediate the disputes between his brothers. When Hoemei was trapped, he actively sought Joesai’s help and when Joesai was up for soup stock he worked out an aid program with Hoemei. It wasn’t long before they were impressed by their alliance. Gaet negotiated them out of trouble, Hoemei anticipated trouble, and Joesai fought them clear.
“What I’m trying to say,” said Gaet, “is that the ugly fight you’ve witnessed is nothing new. I know how it is going to turn out and so do my brothers. Noe and Teenae are a little frightened because the worst of our brotherly conflicts were over before women came into our lives and so our wives still don’t understand the roots of our fights. You two aren’t used to them at all. My brothers take a fight as far as it will go, and then they turn around and compromise. Probably, I don’t even need to be there anymore. I’m more worried about you two charmers.”
Kathein was watching sand slip through her fingers. “Don’t be. I’m used to heartaches.”
“Don’t say that!” said Oelita, all empathy with Kathein. She was afraid of heartache herself. “We’re in this together!”
“Yes,” said Kathein wisely, “but can we stand it?”
Gaet put on his smoothest manners. “Is it such a tragedy that life doesn’t fit the pictures we have of what life should be? That’s what makes physics exciting — when the reality-trials don’t fit the theory.”
“I’m a romantic,” replied Kathein. “I worship Stgi and Toe. Love is not like physics.”
“Did I ever tell you how we came to marry a madwoman like Noe?” Gaet laughed. “What is the Kaiel picture of a courtship? Doesn’t a single man seek a woman? Doesn’t a woman keep her eye out for that special man? The man and woman love and marry. Then don’t they look around for another man or woman or couple that they can love and, finding such, court them and marry again to increase their kalothi? So it goes.
“But we were three men. There weren’t any women we met who knew what to do with that. Noe married us for all the wrong reasons. She hated responsibility. She started something new every week and finished nothing. Her temple work gave her contact with men without any long-term responsibilities.
“I met her the night she first noticed that she was unhappy. She thought with the three of us she’d have all the advantages of marriage and none of the disadvantages.” Gaet’s amusement warmed his voice. “It was a disaster. She was a spoiled brat. She knew everything about holding a man for the first week and nothing beyond that. She was the terror of her family; very sober people. And we knew nothing about women beyond the basics of getting our wicks dipped.
“She was so impossible that Joesai beat her from time to time and Hoemei and I would sit around in the next room listening to the screams, biting our nails and saying Thank God someone was doing something about her. Then when it was over, we would ostracize Joesai and comfort and cuddle her.
“Money was never a problem. We were very successful with the coins — we had our mansion already — but our Four got worse and worse. And worse. Finally she left us.”
“She never told me that!” said Kathein.
“Of course not.”
“Did you miss her?” Oelita asked with sentimental curiosity.
“Miss her! I was never so happy in my life that she was gone. Hoemei was wiped out. It was sexual withdrawal. He moped around not saying anything. Joesai was our moralist. He always has been. He didn’t even like her but he hunted her down and brought her home against her will. I’ve never found out what happened then. I couldn’t get rid of her afterwards. I was pissing from my nose, I was so mad at Joesai for bringing her home. He remembers being very firm and gentle. But she acted like she thought he was going to kill her if she didn’t behave, that there was no escape from him. I don’t think he ever threatened her, but when you are fresh from the creche you have a certain cavalier attitude toward death that the non-creche never really want to test.”
“I think I know the man,” said Oelita.
Kathein was wistful. “I’m sure Noe returned because after she’d been away she knew she couldn’t live without you all. She was probably happy that Joesai came for her.”
“That’s when I found Teenae. I was up in the mountains and happened to pass through one of the o’Tghalie estates when they had a child auction. My maran prescience, which we all have from Tae, could see the woman she was to become and I was smitten even though she had shaved her head to make herself ugly so that no one would want to buy her.
“Mostly, though, I was thinking how nice it would be to have a child bride around who could be trained properly in the ways of serving a man and wouldn’t be spoiled like Noe. It never struck me that the reason the o’Tghalie were selling her was that she was unmanageable. So I finished my trip in the mountains with this girl-child terror who would follow me because I owned her, but who wouldn’t do the tiniest thing I asked.”
“She loves you now,” said Oelita.
“Of course.” He smiled. “I’m telling you these stories because marriage isn’t an easy thing, and when we look back we never see the thing we saw then. Some marriages that look perfect, don’t work. And some marriages that are the despair of all rational people somehow have the basics that make them work.”
“How did you win her?” asked Kathein.
“I was trying to resell her for half-price to an og’Sieth steel-smith who was interested in her because of the reputation of the o’Tghalie women as superior servants for their men. He asked her about her ambitions and she jinxed the sale by telling him she wanted to be a mathematician. Back on the trail I muttered and told her I’d teach her some mathematics if she’d fix the food. She looked at me skeptically and told me that if I taught her the mathematics first then she would fix our food. So I taught her some algebra that I’d learned painfully and that she learned as fast as I could remember what I knew. She smiled for the first time.”
“Did she fix your meal?”
“The best road meal I ever had! Joesai was the one who really got to her, though. He had her number from the start. He came on with total assurance and would teach her some manipulation that was always flawed. She’d catch him and then he’d grab anyone who’d listen and tell them in amazement how smart she was. When he didn’t know what she wanted to know, he’d hire an o’Tghalie male to teach him and then smuggle what he’d learned home to her. She became our slave. We could get her to do anything provided we were consistent. If we weren’t logical, then she’d fight us tooth and dagger. It would have been a good life, but Noe took pity on her and taught her some of the fine points about bamboozling men.”
“When I met your Five you were very happy,” said Kathein. “I loved your happiness.”