For Jane
Dedicated to Caisson
"Glory to Quay in his waxing, for in him is the source of all bounty, and in him is the greatest fullness."
Yala Sard placed a resinous lump of incense upon the burning coal in the censer. The smoke wafted up in front of the large crystalline orb of milky white, the embodiment of the one to whom she addressed her words. She paused for a moment, closed her eyes, and inhaled. The pungent smell of the incense mixed with the faintly sweet scent emanating from the figure seated next to her, also kneeling on his knees, his eyes also closed. The floral aroma was rarely dispensed from his weequay physiology, reserved only for moments such as this, when rapt in the ecstatic embrace of mystical oneness with his creator.
Emerging from the flood of hypnagogic imagery that met her behind her closed eyelids, Yala looked back at the altar to Quay and at the chalice that sat nearby the spherical idol, its polished silver reflecting the glow of the coal, and the circle of carved moonstone, embedded prominently and surrounded by glyphs of an archaic weequay dialect, reflecting the spirit of the lunar deity presiding over the ceremony.
She lifted the cup, and said, "Glory to Quay in his waning, for in him is freedom from all bonds, and in him the ultimate surrender". She put the cup to her lips, and drank deeply of the Ko'nu wine. Wine was a loose translation – the drink was the fermented milk of the fearsome, canyon-dwelling bandigo beasts. To track a female bandigo protecting her cubs and subdue her long enough gather enough milk to make Ko'nu was quite a feat, and so the drink was reserved for religious rituals of the greatest importance. The scarcity of the beverage also made it expensive to procure, particularly on worlds away from Sriluur. Pious weequays living off-world flocked to the few weequay-owned specialty import stores that carried it, and even there the drink usually sold out quickly in the days leading up to the high holy days on the Month of Plenty.
Yala withdrew the chalice from her lips, savoring the acrid, lactic taste of the precious libation. She passed it to her Weequay companion. Without opening his eyes, he allowed the chalice to pass from her hands to his own, raised it, and took a long, slow sip of the sour, frothy milk. He finished, and as he placed the goblet back on the altar, a rare smile crept subtly over his face, a slight upturn of the corners of his lipless mouth that flowed into the labyrinthine network of wrinkles that covered his entire leathery, brown skin. Yala noticed, and for but a moment her devotion to Quay was interrupted by reverie as she reflected upon the beauty of the Weequay's face. Slowly, he opened his eyes.
The Weequay glanced over at Yala, and as his eyes caught hers, her love for him flowed back into her love for her god until the two were indistinguishable. Raising her palms upward, she prayed, "Glory to Quay, and may we follow him forever and ever. Glory to Quay, on the holiest of days. There is no force greater than Quay. Hail Quay!"
"Hail Quay", repeated the Weequay.
Again the two closed their eyes, and they sat before the altar, experiencing the inner secrets known only to those who possess true piety in the veneration of their god. The room was nearly silent, the stillness only adulterated by the sizzle of the incense on the coal, the countless rain drops that beat steadily on the windowpane, and the rhythm of the two initiates' breath, but they were unaware of these distractions, lost totally in their oneness with Quay. Only with the cessation of the smoke rising from the censer and the final sizzle of the coal as it met its end did the two open their eyes and rise to their feet.
Yala rubbed her eyes, and again became aware of the storm outside. She turned towards the window to watch the downpour, but then turned back around face her companion, and asked, "How did I do?"
This time, the Weequay did not smile; his face retained the unchanging graveness characteristic of his people. To some it might resemble a scowl, but from the subtle, earthen scent, imperceptible to most, that had replaced the sweet smell from before, Yala recognized his mood to be affectionate. "You have done well, Weequay", he said.
To most observers, she did not look like a weequay. She appeared, by most accounts, an average human female. On the shorter side, perhaps, standing at scarcely more than a meter and a half. And young, certainly, perhaps 19 years old at the most. And true, to many eyes she was exceedingly beautiful. Her skin was fair, her hair dark, bundled in a loose bun that permitted a tendril or two to dangle as it may. Her high cheekbones, her aquiline nose, the unadorned softness of her lips, may have caused pause to some that beheld them, for while elegant, her countenance was accompanied by an intensity, the source of which was hard to identify. No one feature betrayed this acute quality, but it was unmistakably the mark of one who possesses the force of will and pursues it to its very end. Perhaps in this resolve, at once stoic and passionate, that clung to her like a weequay's pheromonal aura and carried no less of a message, she did possess the resemblance of that race. Still, most that looked upon her assumed her to be human. It was only her eyes – which like emeralds glimmered with a vibrant green, a green that flickered like a flame and yet stood definitely still like durasteel; a green that a painter would long for, but would never dare to use without diluting it – that betrayed her nonhuman origin. But they were no weequay eyes.
Yala glanced again at the window, and at the heavy raindrops landing in the glow of a streetlamp, still illuminated as the first light of dawn filtered through the heavy cover of clouds to grace the city below. She turned to her companion and said, "It's coming down hard. Check the weather".
The Weequay walked away from the altar and over to the other end of the living room, to a table littered with various communications devices. He passed over to the holoreceiver for planetary broadcasts, and flipped it on. The pale blue light of the hologram projector sputtered on, and soon the room was filled with its ghostly glow. The Weequay flipped the switch several times, landing on the right signal. A Twi'lek in a turtleneck started to say, "...haven't had a storm like this for as long as I've been reporting the weather. It's going to be a big one, folks. This rain that we're seeing now is just a shadow of what will come midday, and the real storm hits this evening…"
Yala continued to gaze down at the street. Her eyes strained in the dawn gloom to apprehend the heavy drops of rain as they terminated in the puddle on the Nal Hutta street-corner, but as the sunlight increased, her vision began to focus. Her gaze unbroken, she said, "The storm is auspicious".
Continuing to flip through various communication devices, the Weequay said, "It is auspicious, indeed, Weequay". He paused, and then continued, "It is written: What star illuminates the way of the Weequay lost in the sandstorm? It is no starlight, but the moonbeams of Quay".
As he spoke he clicked the dial of receiver for private communications. He flipped through them, and lingering for a moment on one, said, "We've been offered a bounty, easy and well-paying". At this Yala broke her glance from the torrent outside and looked over to him, and raised an eyebrow. He went on, "Quisa the Hutt's private jeweler, a zeuol, has been kidnapped. The job looks sloppy. Quisa is offering 15,000 credits for his return".
Yala laughed and said, "15 thousand for a jeweler! Quisa really is a strange Hutt. That is some easy money". Her voice betrayed a tone of enthusiasm, which landed in her own ears and made her recoil. A graveness fell over her, and she said, "Quay tempts us on this, the most holy of days".
"Very good, Weequay", replied her companion, and he emanated an aura of approval. He added, with some affection, "Your piety pleases Quay on this Month of Plenty". At this, she smiled softly.
Yala rose from where she was seated by the window. She gave a final glance at the street below, now becoming clear to her eyes as the day began in earnest, the first few early-rising denizens of the city beginning to trickle out onto the street to brave the storm. Wordlessly, she went left the room, went down a short hallway to the bathroom, and splashed cold water on her face in the sink. Her skin prickled as it readjusted to the humid heat that clung to the air. Her eyes caught themselves in the mirror's reflection, and dwelt there for a moment, before she turned away, finished up in the bathroom, and returned to the hallway. She opened the door to her own quarters, and there she removed the silvery, shimmering robe that clung to her body, a garment reserved for ceremony and unsuited to the day's activity. She replaced it with a short-sleeved, buttonless shirt and light trousers, both plucked from a pile, neutral in color and selected with little thought beyond the stifling heat.
As she began to leave, she stopped, and remembering the storm outside, she grabbed a purple rain poncho, still wet from the previous day's precipitation that the humidity had preserved, from where it had been unceremoniously discarded. Then she returned to the living area, where the lingering incense smoke from the dawn's rite still clung to the air. Her companion was no longer present, and so after another glance at the rain, now beating harder upon the window where she had stood before, she moved over to the small kitchen adjacent to the main living space. The dull grey countertops were bare, save for a single book placed intentionally the night before. She set the rain poncho aside on the counter, and approached the book. Dusting off the worn jacket of deep brown Sriluurian leather, she looked at the Sriluurian script of the title, which read: Food to Please Quay: A Cookbook for the Month of Plenty. Opening it, she carefully turned the fragile paper pages and quickly scanned them with her eyes as she moved through the precious volume's archive of traditional Sriluur cuisine: After-Dinner Pudding, Amber Salad, Anthive Soup, Aq'tur Liver Pate… she flipped forward to B, and landed on the entry marked Bantha Roast, subtitled for the feast on the holiest of nights, in the traditional style. Banthas were not native to Sriluur, but had been introduced in antiquity, and the recipe suited a weequay living off-world, where meat from indigenous Sriluur fauna was more difficult to acquire.
Yala opened the refrigeration unit, and glanced at its sparse contents. Save for the large cut of bantha meat reserved for the intended roast, and a jug of earthen brown that bore the a small marking indicating its role as a vessel for Ko'nu, little else dwelt here. Yala placed a hand on the jug, lifted it slightly, and with a flick of her wrist swished around its contents in appraisal of their volume. As she returned it to its place and shut the door of the refrigeration unit, she looked up to see her Weequay companion entering the room. He, too, had removed his ritual garb, and now wore a simple shirt and trousers, each a slightly different shade of light brown that seemed to flow into the deep brown of his skin, as if he were cloaked in the drab dust and dirt of his home planet.
"We're really low on Ko'nu", said Yala. "There's hardly enough left for a single cup. Should we get more?"
The Weequay paused for a moment in reflection, and then spoke. "We have not yet consulted Quay on this day. Is it not written: Ask your questions of Quay often and frequently, and heed well his words?
Yala nodded, and silently they again moved into the living space and over to the altar. They kneeled, and Yala watched as her companion removed a leather pouch from the shrine. He unwrapped it, and as the strip of leather rolled open it revealed several yellowed bones – weequay vertebrae.
Despite the importance of divination in the religion of Quay, few weequay still used genuine weequay vertebrae in discerning the edicts of their god. On Sriluur, it was now common to use various other types of bones in the casting of lots, and off-world, many Weequay had adopted the practice, often amusing to the profane eyes of nonbelievers and other species, of consulting a common, commercially available device, marketed to non-weequay as a children's toy, that contained pre-recorded messages that were randomly generated when a question was asked. The white plastic sphere was seen to represent the orb of Sriluur's moon, and was thus an alternative to the traditional methods that was not only more practical but also suitable for the sacredness of the activity. To eschew this modern convention in favor of the old ways was truly a mark of exceptional piety, not to mention an indicator of intimate familiarity with intricacies and obscurities of Quay's religion that even the devout had largely forgotten.
The Weequay cradled the bones in his palm, closed his eyes, breathed in, and then slowly exhaled. Yala watched with rapt attention. He spoke, "Great Quay, should we drink more Ko'nu on this, the holiest day of the Month of Plenty?" With a deft motion he let fly the vertebrae, as he did so, time seemed to slow down, and he could feel the movement of the force of Quay between his hand, the bones as they moved through the air, the surface upon which they would land, and the hot and humid air in which they seemed for an eternity to be suspended. He felt the force of Quay, flowing between these elements and binding them together, and Yala felt it, too. A moment later, the bones landed on the altar.
Yala, not yet able to discern the meaning, asked immediately, "What does it say?"
The Weequay looked down at the lots with instant recognition of their meaning, clear as though it had been spoken aloud. Nonetheless, he paused and stared at them for a long while, as Yala awaited his answer. Finally, he declared, "The will of Quay is clear. We must drink much more Ko'nu wine". He turned his palms upward towards the altar, again feeling the presence of Quay through the room, and said, "Hail Quay".
"Hail Quay", repeated Yala.
Her companion scooped up the divination tools in a single motion, and returned them to their container, tying it with care. Yala waited for him to finish, and then said, "It will be hard to find Ko'nu on this day".
He replied, chastising her, "Challenge is the path that a Weequay walks. Let us have faith in Quay". He detected a look of embarrassment in her eyes, and allowed his pheromonal scent to become gentler in tone. He added, "The Weequay who calls himself Ano Tal owes us a favor".
Yala looked once more at the window, and now the day had begun. Her eyes welcomed the light of morning, dim though it was underneath a sky so overcast. The rain was picking up. She said, "Still, we should make no delay in visiting him". Her companion nodded slightly in agreement.
Yala moved back over the counter, and retrieved the rain poncho, and pulled it over her head. It clung to her body from the neck down to her ankles, and covered her arms with long sleeves. Her drab clothes underneath remained visible yet brightened through the lens of the translucent purple plastic. She turned to her companion, already sporting a plain brown raincoat and putting on rain boots. Yala's vibrant raingear was incongruent with the dull tones of the rest of their collective wardrobes – indeed in the context of the muted tones of the stormy Nal Hutta morning, it seemed almost comical. The whimsy of it was dampened, perhaps, as she affixed two sling holsters over the poncho, their straps crisscrossing over her chest, with the holsters themselves dangling on either side of her waist as they rested on the violet poncho. In each holster she placed a model 434 DeathHammer blaster.
She put on galoshes, and stood and faced the Weequay, who was now similarly ready. Along his back was strapped a long, two-sided force pike, terminating at each end in a single point. Dressed and armed, without speaking, they left the apartment.
