A Flight of Broken Wings: Aeriel Trilogy #1

Chapter 43

"Ah," said Dawad with a small smile. "It has been a while, young man. I'm fantastic, as always. I trust you're doing well yourself?"

Ruban nodded as Dawad led him down the corridor until they reached the professor's office, a few doors down from the seminar hall. "How is Simani, my child?" asked the old man, settling himself with some difficulty into his large, cushioned chair which made him look even smaller than he really was. At a gesture from Dawad, Ruban took the seat across from him as his host rang the bell for tea. "I saw on the news that she'd been injured in Ghorib. I believe you were there too? I trust she is not in any danger?" he shook his head. "That girl was always too reckless for her own good."

Ruban couldn't help it. He laughed. Dawad's reproving tone brought with it such a strong reminder of their undergraduate days at Bracken that Ruban almost had to remind himself that he wasn't actually in trouble for any of the outrageous hijinks Simani and her friends regularly lured him into during their time at the institute.

"She's fine prof," he assured the old man. "Still recovering, but she'll be fine. Or so the doctors tell us anyway. Actually, that's kind of what I am here for. Ghorib, I mean. You've read about it in the papers, I'm sure. Aeriels were attacking the sif mines in Ghorib. That's why we were sent there to look into it," he leaned back, frowning. "It wasn't a destructive attack, though. They didn't even try to get at any of the workers or anything. It was more like they wanted something...from the mines. That's what I can't figure out. What could Aeriels possibly want in a sif mine? Why were they in Ghorib in the first place?"

"I did read about it in the papers. And about your role in it too. Yours and Simani's, that is. You were very courageous, Ruban," Dawad nodded approvingly, his eyes warm. "Both you and your partner. I feel very proud to have had you as my students."

Ruban coughed uncomfortably, not sure how to respond to his teacher's praise, particularly because it was more than he deserved. Ashwin's role in the incident had been kept out of the papers. The powers that be were apparently still unsure about what to make of the strange foreigner and didn't want to bring him back into the public eye so soon after the mess he had caused with Casia Washi.

In truth, Ruban couldn't even say that he blamed them. He himself wasn't sure he quite knew what he was dealing with when it came to Ashwin yet. The young man had been following him around almost everywhere he went ever since their return from Ghorib, smiling and blabbering and generally making an overall ass of himself. Nothing about him had really changed since that first day Ruban had laid eyes on him on the IAW grounds. Gods, was that only a week ago? It felt like months. But Ruban couldn't bring himself to forget what he had seen of the young Zainian in Ghorib, and he wasn't entirely sure he believed Ashwin's tale about an old grandmother who had taught him some secret technique of ancient Zainian martial arts as a child. There was more to it than he was letting on, but for now Ruban had no choice but to go along with the charade and accept the undeserved compliment with whatever grace he could muster.

Dawad seemed to sense his awkwardness though, and did not press the subject any further. Instead, he launched into a different topic altogether. "I also read in the papers about the rumours regarding this new formula they're apparently developing at SifCo," he began, his aged eyes twinkling with curiosity. "Casia Washi's show was full of it just about a week ago. And then, radio silence. Ever since Emancipation Day, if I remember correctly."

"It's nothing, prof." His lips pressed into a thin line, Ruban tried to avoid Dawad's searching eyes without being too obvious about it. He did not like lying to the other man, but this was not a subject he was authorised to speak about. "Just a lot of baseless speculation."

"Ah, we both know Washi isn't the type to deal in speculation, my child," the old man said, gazing at Ruban with sharp green eyes as if he could look into the younger man's soul. "If nothing else, she has a reputation to maintain. But no matter. You do not have to tell me anything you don't want to. What I was getting at, Ruban, is this. You say the Aeriels seemed to be looking for something in the Ghorib mines. And every news anchor in the country is screaming about Aeriel conspiracies surrounding SifCo, the single biggest research facility in the capital that deals exclusively with sif and its by-products. And as I'm sure you're aware, the Ghorib mines are some of the largest and most productive in the country right now. Besides which, Ghorib is the only major mining town that is reasonably close to Ragah. Most of the others are all in the south. Does it not strike you as too much of a coincidence, then, that Aeriels should suddenly show such interest in all the places that work with sif?" He sat back, letting his words sink in.

Ruban frowned, frustration rising like bile in his throat. "But what can Aeriels possibly want with sif? The only thing it's good for is gutting the bastards." He bit his lip the moment the expletive had left his mouth, looking up guiltily at his old professor.

Dawadsmiled beatifically. "You really haven't changed, have you young man? I triedto teach you this while you were under my tutelage, but I suppose I wasn'tentirely successful. The world is rarely as neatly segmented, as black andwhite as we would like it to be. There is as much variety amongst Aeriels asthere is among men. And they are no more all 'bastards', as you say, thanZainians are all dandies or Kanbarians all greedy capitalists; though I will say that there is some truth toalmost every stereotype," he chuckled. "My point is, there might be much aboutAeriels that you don't yet know, or understand fully. It is a folly to betricked by one's own prejudices. I cannot tell you what it is the Aeriels weredoing in Ghorib, Ruban, especially because I don't seem to have all the piecesof the puzzle yet. But it can't hurt to keep our minds open to the possibilitythat the universe is not quite as unidimensional or monochrome as we sometimesperceive it to be."