The workshop is a lonely drystone shed built within a copse of gum trees at the end of a gravel road, just a stone’s throw away from the kraal’s northern wall. Practically as far from the gates as is possible to go inside the kraal, and since there’s not much else in its vicinity, few people are ever tempted to visit.
Salo likes it that way.
The interior smells of metal and grease. Arrays of tool kits and disassembled rotary machines overrun the tabletops. They find Aaku Malusi dozing with his feet up on one of the worktables, looking mere seconds away from falling off his chair. He jerks as the door creaks on its hinges behind Nimara, which makes her freeze in place. But somehow he keeps defying gravity and starts snoring again a moment later.
“How does he do that?” Nimara asks, still frozen by the threshold.
“Practice.” Salo shakes his head with pity. “I better get him out of here.” He quietly approaches the sleeping man, grimacing as the stench of musuku wine surrounds him like a cloud. He’s relieved to see the man wearing a loincloth beneath the gray fleece blanket swathing his torso. “Thank Ama for small mercies. At least he’s not naked today.”
While Nimara tries not to laugh, Salo gently shakes him awake. “You must go to your hut, Aaku. You’ll be more comfortable there.”
Aaku Malusi squints as his eyes flutter open. “Musalodi?” His voice is harsh and croaky. “What time is it?”
“It’s past noon, Aaku.”
He scratches the bristles on his gaunt cheeks and frowns like there’s a bad taste in his mouth. “Past noon, is it? And I had so much work to do.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Salo says. “I’ll take care of business here. You go get some rest.”
Aaku Malusi blinks around the workshop like he’s trying to remember how he got here. “Are you sure? I . . . don’t want to burden you with too much work.”
If he’s even half as confused as he looks, he’ll sooner break something than fix it.
“I’ll be fine,” Salo assures him. “I promise.”
A smile briefly animates his haggard face. “You’re a good boy, Salo. Thank you.”
“Think nothing of it, Aaku.”
It takes him a while, but he finally gathers enough wits together to get up on his feet. A current of anxiety runs down Salo’s back as he watches him leave.
Take a good look at him, says a cruel voice inside his head. This is what happens to men who forget their place and chase after things best left to women. Men who’ve lost the respect of their clan. Is that the future you want? Because that’s what will happen to you if you keep walking down this path.
“I see your education in letters has made you very sharp,” his uncle Aba Deitari once said to him. “But I fear you are becoming too much like a woman.” They had just finished playing several rounds of matje, all of which Salo had won effortlessly while the older man had struggled to keep up.
“You are crafty and subtle,” Aba D continued. “Your mind is like a maze; I can never tell what you’re thinking. And you care far too much about books and the mysterious ticking of machines. This is not wholesome behavior for a man.”
“I don’t see what’s so wrong with books and machines,” Salo said, trying not to shrink into himself.
“And that’s why I worry,” his uncle told him. “A man’s strength is not in letters written on a page but in his knowledge of the soil and the rivers and the lakes. It’s in his herd of cattle and the sweat of laboring in the suns; it’s in the arm that wields his spear. Leave books to women; they are creatures of the mind. You are a man and must be a creature of the flesh.”
Books for girls and spears for boys: a creed all Yerezi clans live by, with little room to wiggle. But Salo’s aago danced to the beat of her own drums, and if her grandson wanted an education, then he would get it.
And no one, not even her son, the chief, could sway her once her mind was set.
It was her tutelage in languages, scripts, and numbers that gave Salo the skills he needed to read the magical and academic tomes his mother had left behind. By the time Aago passed on two comets ago, he’d learned enough to start making a difference around the kraal, and because they desperately needed a mechanic who wasn’t an unreliable drunk, no one made too much noise when he took over much of Aaku Malusi’s duties.
The old man, meanwhile, sank deeper into a pit of loneliness and alcoholism.
“Such a shame,” Nimara remarks as they both watch him shamble down the gravel road with the aid of a staff. “He looks like he was handsome once.”
Salo turns away and walks to a wall-mounted chart listing all his unfinished projects. He was last working on repairing the desynchronized patterns of a mind stone for one of the chief’s water pumps—a project due in two days. Given how he’ll be stuck at the mill the whole day tomorrow, he doubts he’ll be able to meet that deadline.
Just what I need. More blame for someone to lay at my feet. “You said you wanted help?”
“I did.” Nimara’s shoulders are tense as she drifts past him on her way to the largest worktable in the room, leaving a whiff of her citrusy perfume hanging in the air. While Salo watches, she reaches for the spiderlike choker wrapped around her neck; it unclasps itself, and she places it on the table. That choker is actually her talisman, and he knows what she’s about to ask even before she opens her mouth with an imploring look.
“I’ve hit a wall with my Axiom, and I desperately need a pair of fresh eyes to look it over.”
I knew it. Salo immediately shakes his head. “No. Absolutely not.”
She tries to work him with an endearing pout. “Please?”
“No, Nimara,” he says. “What I do for the clan is one thing. People might turn their noses up at me and Aaku Malusi, but they know they need us. We’re useful. But what you’re asking? It’s not just crossing the line; it’s outright sacrilege. I’m not even supposed to know about Axioms, let alone help you with yours.”
Nimara stares at him like she thinks he’s an idiot. “Everyone knows about Axioms, Salo. You’re being paranoid.”
“And you are missing the point. I’m not supposed to know enough about them to help you.”
“There’s no ban on knowing things,” Nimara argues. “And all I’m asking for is advice, nothing more. That’s not sacrilege.”
“It is. It really is. But for the sake of argument, let’s say it’s not. We still both come out looking bad.”
“Only if we tell anyone about it,” Nimara says, “which I won’t. Not that I’d be ashamed of it, by the way, because unlike you, I don’t think there’s anything shameful in asking for help from a more informed source, no matter who that source is.”
The migraine Salo felt earlier gathers force near his right temple. He pinches his eyes shut beneath his spectacles to soothe the pain, but it makes no difference. He moves to sit across from Nimara, settling down onto a high stool. “Why not consult the librarians at the Queen’s Kraal? Helping young Asazi with their Axioms is literally one of their main responsibilities.”
“Why bother?” Nimara says. “There’s an expert sitting right in front of me.”