KINSLAYER
Once again we return to the palace and the machinations of Sanjay Rash, who has no idea Dalla is in Iziz. - LS
...
Sanjay Rash crunches into the muja fruit, careful the juice doesn't dribble down his chin. If he was in private or with only guards around he wouldn't care a twig, but when Kason Blackwell stops his singing to glare at him, he's glad the boy hasn't caught him in the unflattering position.
He picks up another fruit and holds it out to Kason. "Would you like one?"
Kason holds the glare for a few more seconds and then goes back to his singing in the old language. Sanjay leans back against the throne and listens. The song's low and soft, like a threat, and even though he doesn't understand the words he's sure it's some Blackwell victory song. If he ever decides to have his new wife sing to him, he'd put credits on the same song coming from her lips. But with the lyrics nothing more than gibberish in his ears, he can focus on the boy's high, sweet voice. Just like Shara sang to him on their wedding night, though he knew the words of her song spoke only of love.
If he knew the title he'd make Kason sing it for him. But the boy would never sing to bring Sanjay joy. He's only managed to listen this long through reverse psychology.
The victory song ends and Kason makes no move to start it again.
"When was the last time you ate?" Sanjay asks, extending the muja fruit again. It's an honest question; he doesn't remember if Dendup and Kason got breakfast this morning, and they certainly didn't have lunch.
"I don't want your fruit," Kason snaps. "I don't even like fruit."
Sanjay suppresses a sigh, which only gives Kason more fuel for his disobedience.
"Don't your teeth rot from all the sugars?" he taunts. "Bet they do. Bet you have cavities everywhere."
He tries to simply blow off the comment, but it's not working. He hates the fact a child can get under his skin so easily, but then again Kason Blackwell isn't most children. He could - should - be Sanjay's and Shara's child, gazing bright-eyed at his father the king. Instead all Sanjay gets are stony glares and sharp remarks.
Kason does his best to hide a wicked grin but doesn't entirely succeed. Sanjay's expression sours.
"Bring him here," he orders.
Two militiamen leave their posts at the door and grab Kason by the arms, hauling him to the foot of the throne.
"Sit." Sanjay gestures to the black chair to the immediate left of the throne. It's a new addition, made for the queen he plans to seat in it.
Kason scowls at him when the militiamen plunk him in it.
Sanjay places the muja fruit on his lap. "Eat. You need it."
Kason pulls back as if he's trying to give him a grenade. "I'm not hungry."
"You haven't eaten." Despite the boy's claims it's clear he's hungry. "Eat the fruit or I'll have it fed to you."
The threat of force-feeding clinches it. Kason picks up the fruit with his fingertips and takes the smallest bite he can.
"It's not poison, Kason," Sanjay scoffs. "I wouldn't put poison in my own fruit bowl!"
"Don't call me that," he mumbles and chomps into the fruit. He definitely hasn't eaten today.
"Call you what? Your name?" Sanjay asks incredulously. "What else am I supposed to call you?"
"Nothing."
He rests his head in his hand from exasperation. "Son…"
"I'm not your son!"
Sanjay jerks at the outburst. "You will watch the way you speak to me!" Dear Nadd, is he going to be getting this the rest of his life from Dalla?
Kason slumps in the chair and ignores the muja fruit, though he still eyes it hungrily. It only took those two bites to whet his appetite.
"Finish it," Sanjay orders and gestures to the fruit. Kason doesn't look happy about it, but he's still hungry enough to eat. Once the boy's polished off a few more bites he continues. "I'm only trying to take care of you. As a noble hostage, you're to be provided for while in my household."
"Quit pretending to be nice," Kason mumbles. "You're not. You're just a creep who wants to make my whole family miserable."
"I'll be good to your cousin," Sanjay says for what seems like the millionth time. "Once she adjusts to the change I'm sure she'll be very happy here. I'll make sure she has everything she needs and I'll do my duty by her. I would never, never hurt her." It's the truth. Why would he hurt someone who's to give him the most precious thing in the galaxy? As long as Dalla does her duty, there would be no reason to hurt her. And he can't think of any reason she wouldn't. Melaana certainly didn't have any trouble.
Kason tries to scramble out of the chair before Sanjay can think of his sister anymore. "You're sending people to steal her! Just like you stole my mom away from her family."
"I loved your mother!" Sanjay raps out. "Did you ever imagine for a moment that it might be your pirate father who stole her away from me? Of course not. It's the winner who gets to write the history of the battle no matter what means they used to obtain the victory."
"That's all my mom was to you? A victory?"
Of course not. Shara is so much more. "It's a metaphor. That means -"
"I know what a metaphor is. You're not my teacher either," he sticks his lip out like a child, which Sanjay supposes he is. "My mom and dad are my teachers."
That restores some of his good mood. "Shara's a fine teacher. She's very smart, managed her family's fruit business all by herself." He was so impressed when he saw her handle the fruit sale at Rash Estate, all those years ago. "What are you learning now?"
Kason scowls and chomps the muja fruit. "You're trying to be my friend. It's not gonna work. I'm not your friend and I never will be."
"If I'm not supposed to treat you like a guest and I'm not supposed to treat you as a friend, then what would you like me to treat you as? A servant?" Sanjay throws up his hands. There are only two bites or so left of the muja, and he'll take that as a victory. "Fine. If that's what you want, you can serve me."
"Want me to bring you another tooth-rotting fruit?" He looks hungry enough to eat the whole bowl. "Maybe a dentist to go along with it."
"No." Sanjay gets comfortable on the throne once more. "There's a song I want to hear," and then he says the first line in his absolute best Onderonian, which isn't very good.
Kason jerks back.
"No!" he shouts and then lets loose a barrage of Onderonian Sanjay assumes would be better suited for the deck before switching back to Basic. "No way would I sing that to you. You're not my dad! Get it through your head! My dad is Jamos Blackwell and you can't even hold a spark to him. He's the best dad and you're nothing but a lying -."
Sanjay lunges forward and grabs the front of the boy's shirt. Kason stops his diatribe midsentence, frozen in fear. Sanjay pulls him close.
"You will never speak to me like that again," he threatens.
Kason gulps, for once speechless.
Sanjay releases him and he snaps back like a stretched rubber band, hitting the back of the chair with a smack. One of the guards grabs it to stop it from tipping over.
"Take him back to his chambers. Ensure he has fruit available to him at all times. He's to eat some of it before he gets another meal, but it must be available," he instructs one of the guards quietly so Kason won't hear. "I don't want him to go hungry again."
The guard bows his head and grabs Kason's bicep to yank him along. The half-eaten muja fruit falls to the floor and rolls in front of Sanjay's feet.
He stares at it while the guards drag Kason out, even watches as a service droid scoops it up. Sanjay never thought he'd think this, but he's suddenly lost his appetite for fruit. He tosses his own muja into a flaming brazier and it hisses as the fire engulfs it.
With a sigh he rises from the throne and adjusts the crown on his brow.
"Take me to the communications room," he orders. "I have a wedding to plan."
…
The Royal palace only has one frequency on which to contact the Blackwells. When Sanjay asked if Kason had a comlink they could search for Marlon's and Dalla's personal frequencies, General Tandin told him the comlink had fallen into the water during the abduction and Kason hadn't memorized any of the frequencies saved on it. He accepted that; if anyone can get a comm number out of the boy it's Tandin. How the man doesn't have children of his own boggles Sanjay's mind. His way with young ones was one of the top reasons Sanjay selected him to procure Dalla; there was no one he trusted more to bring her to Iziz promptly, alive, and unhurt.
If only Tandin hadn't limped into the harbor bruised and swollen, with a consolation prize in his cargo hold. The two Sanjay sent after him, while capable, are a bit of a gamble. If - when - they arrive he might have to take Dalla to a medical droid to be checked over, but it won't be anything a bacta patch can't fix. The harder part will be getting her cooperation and Kason's - and for that, he'll enlist Tandin's help for sure.
As he plugs the frequency into the holotable, Sanjay crosses his fingers until the little chime signals his transmission's been accepted. He laces his hands behind his back while the hologram forms.
It's Marlon Blackwell. And on his right is Shara.
Her opening words are "Sanjay Iago Rash, you let my baby go!"
"S-Shara?" He stammers, amazed it's her and terrified at the fury exuding from her. He hasn't seen Shara for seventeen years, since that awful week where she swept south to erase their marriage and ran back north to wed that pirate Jamos Blackwell. Sanjay couldn't believe someone lovely as Shara would want to be with someone so unrefined, so unkempt as Jamos. The man didn't even know how to shave!
But Sanjay has a beard now too, better than anything Jamos could come up with. He hopes she notices.
"Where's Kason?" Shara demands, sweeping the hologram for any trace of her eldest. "Bring him here. I demand to see him!"
Sanjay almost complies before he remembers he's the king. He gives orders, not bows to them. "Kason is in the dungeon and there he'll stay. Transfer me to Dalla."
"Not a chance," Marlon snaps.
"Not in a thousand years, Sanjay. Not after what you did to me. Leave her alone and let my Kason go!"
"Shara, I've learned. I'm going to do things right this time -."
"By kidnapping my son?" Shara rages.
"I have a bride gift," Sanjay continues, ignoring the part about Kason. "I have a cloak and an officiant and a family witness. I have a place prepared for her in the throne room! It's a queen's chair, made so she'll still be comfortable in it as she grows."
"Only you or your mother would fail to grasp how utterly wrong that is."
He ducks out of the transmission for a second and returned with his betrothal necklace looped in his hands. "Look," he says, holding out the strand. It's truly beautiful, rubies arranged to look like writhing snakes with seven snake head pendants. "Here's the proof. Won't she look pretty in this?"
Marlon quivers with either rage or terror, his lips pressed in the thinnest line. Sanjay's starting to think it's rage.
Shara takes a deep breath. "Sanjay Rash, may the salt gods have mercy on you if that's the same necklace you tried to give me."
Maybe that wasn't the greatest move. "It's one of a kind. Perfect for a queen."
Shara gives him a disapproving look. "Sanjay, 'cheap' was never something that came to mind when I thought of you…"
That necklace certainly isn't cheap, either. "I only want to give my wife something beautiful."
Marlon's composure snaps. "My Dalla is not your wife!"
"She is my fiancée, and I wish to speak with her," He has the rebels to deal with and Count Dooku breathing down his neck, the last thing he needs is to be afraid his wife is going to smother him in his sleep. If he can talk to Dalla, find out why she's so upset, then he might be able to find some solutions. But more importantly after Tandin returned empty-handed, after the rebels destroyed the city's power generator, after Count Dooku sent a tactical droid to succeed where he's failed, after what happened with Kason today, Sanjay needs to win something.
"What have you done to my baby?" Shara changes the subject. "If you hurt him Sanjay, I swear -!"
"I fail to see how this has anything to do with my talking to Dalla."
"It does because if you hurt him, I'm going to reach through this holoprojector and kill you, you impotent bastard!"
Sanjay blinks and takes a step back.
"I," he growls with barely managed anger. "Am not impotent."
Shara looks like she wants to say a whole lot more but Marlon steps in front of her. Of all of them, he must remember Sanjay has Shara's son.
"Put me through to my fiancée," he orders.
"Even if I would allow it, it's not possible." Marlon speaks up. "Dalla's sick and she just fell asleep. She caught something while looking for her friend on the water."
Sick? If it's bad as Marlon's making it out to be that might hamper his plans. "I'm very sorry to hear that. Give her my best for a speedy recovery. Did she at least find her friend?"
Dark clouds cover Marlon's face.
"You know the answer to that," he spits and then adds a final barb: "Kinslayer."
Kinslayer. He fills with rage. Why would be kill his own kin? He doesn't even have any to kill!
Sanjay grabs the holotable, his knuckles white. "Are you deliberately trying to provoke me, Lord Blackwell?
Marlon and Shara share a look. A look that says he doesn't know.
"What is it?"
"I'm sure you'll get the report soon." Marlon says icily. "I'm surprised you haven't gotten it already."
"What happened?"
"You're the king. You can find out." Marlon signs off without another word and before Shara can say anything else about her son.
Sanjay leans on the holotable even after they're gone, his mind reeling. How could he be a kinslayer if he has none to kill? There's not a single other person with the name Rash. Not a single person of his father's line…
Still, if Marlon wants to levy charges of kinslaying, Sanjay needs to have solid proof of his innocence. With an exasperated sigh he contacts his only men in the north: the two agents he sent to procure Dalla.
The agents answer their comm in short order. "Sire."
"I'm calling for a status update," he says. "How close are you to Lady Blackwell?"
"She hasn't been out, Sire. Her ship is still in the harbor and she's been inside the Hold for days."
"She's sick," he murmurs. Looks like Marlon didn't simply spit out an excuse. "When you find her, if you believe she's too ill to make the journey, abort the mission. Remember she is to arrive here alive and unharmed. I'd be most displeased to find her on death's door because of your poor judgement."
"By your command, Sire," the second says, bowing his head.
"One more thing." He looks at one, then the other. "I received a disturbing accusation today and nothing of the sort has been noted in your reports. Please enlighten me why Marlon Blackwell would accuse me of kinslaying, while according to your reports you have only been conducting surveillance?"
The first agent's eyes drop to his boots. The second has a little more courage. "My lord, we did note a false positive in our report approximately one week ago."
"You did. Explain."
"This false positive...we were already at sea by the time we realized it wasn't Lady Blackwell. The girl had seen our faces. She knew why we were here, and if she had told someone the operation would be over."
"We were ordered to leave no unnecessary loose ends," the first pipes up.
"What was her name?" Sanjay demands. "Who was this girl you killed because you couldn't be bothered to pay attention?"
The second agent looks to the first. "You heard better than I did."
"Miranda."
Sanjay searches his memory banks for any relatives named Miranda, but it's in vain. He doesn't know any of his mother's relatives. "Show me a holo."
Both agents fumble for this request. "Sire, we don't have much of a holo. Just from the onboard holocam of the -."
"That wasn't a request!"
The agents reluctantly comply and their images disappear, replaced by a grainy holo. In the corner, he can see a young girl curled up on the deck.
The second agent walks past her and in the blink of an eye, she's in motion. She sweeps his legs from under him and bolts out of the holocam's field, the agent on her heels and shouting for his partner, but Sanjay can hear a multitude of shouted curses from the off-camera agent and the girl, the sounds of a fight, and a final hard blow followed by a girl's whimper of pain.
"The king says we're not to harm her, idiot!" one agent screams to the other.
"There won't even be a mark." The second agent returns into the field, hauling the girl behind him. "King Rash will take one look at her and you know what he'll say? 'Thank you for bringing my wife.'"
"His wife?" The girl cries. Her voice is high-pitched like the child she is, and she wrenches from the agent's grip. The first catches her before she can go anywhere but the motion reveals her face to the cam, fright apparent in her big eyes.
Sanjay's blood runs cold.
Those are his own mother's eyes; he'd know them anywhere. He's seen them on her, he's seen them on Melaana, he sees them every time he looks in the mirror. Mother always said they were her children's best feature, the feature that marked them for greatness. "No one else has eyes like these," she would say over their shoulders while Sanjay met her eyes in the mirror and Melaana's gaze wandered to whatever was going on out the window. "They're the mark of our great house."
Except, he remembers. Someone did have eyes like these. The winner of Miss North Sea on the year of their family vacation, the woman Mother told him not to speak to…
"Easy, Lady Blackwell," the agent holding the girl orders. "It isn't so awful being a queen."
"Lady Blackwell?" The girl stomps on his foot and he almost lets her go. "I'm not Dalla! My name is Miranda and I'm not even old enough to get married. Let me go!"
The agents look at each other in panic. Then one unholsters his blaster.
The girl freezes in shock, then starts thrashing and screaming while they haul her to the rail. Screaming for them not to do this, for someone to help her, for her mother and father, for the salt gods.
Sanjay averts his eyes.
The grainy holo disappears and the agents replace it. They get an eyeful of Sanjay's face and suddenly look very, very sheepish.
"That girl was my kin," he growls. He doesn't know how she was related, but she was. There's no doubt about it.
"O-our deepest apologies, sire," the first agent stammers. "We didn't know. We were only trying to preserve the mission."
If Sanjay speaks to them any longer he's going to blow his top, and he can't afford to lose it in front of his men.
"Return to Iziz," he orders. "Lord Blackwell knows you're in the Hold; we'll have to send someone else." He can't believe he ever trusted such imbeciles with retrieving Dalla. "I'll deal with you when you arrive."
It's clear the agents aren't looking forward to it. "Yes, my lord," they say and sign off.
When they disappear Sanjay leaves the comm room and goes back to his chambers. There he settles himself into one of his favorite chairs, his datapad on his lap, and searches the HoloNet for a family tree.
And there she is: Miranda Harkon, youngest daughter of Adria Kretash-Harkon, niece of Sanda Kretash-Rash. Cousin of Sanjay Rash. And she was born on … Melaana's birthday.
He puts the pad away, defeated and sick to his stomach. Why didn't anyone tell him? Why didn't his mother tell him they were related to the Blackwells' closest bannermen - to Dalla's best friend? If he had known he could have used the connection somehow, gotten on Marlon's good side through them. None of this ugliness had to happen.
Now he's much too far down this path to go back. He has a prisoner who hates him, a fiancée who'd sooner stab him than smile at him, and a murdered cousin.
Sanjay's mind goes back to his wedding night. Shara running her fingers through his hair between jokes of making an honest woman out of her, singing the song in the old language while the firelight from the dalgos caretaker's cottage danced around the room. He can't recall a moment in his life he was happier or more relaxed, not worrying about his mother or his obligations or anything but the firelight.
He'll hear it again. After his wedding he'll bring Dalla up to this chamber and have her sing it for him. It won't be a cottage in the jungle, and he'll need to encourage her to sing, but he'll hear it.
Until then, Sanjay sighs and searches the HoloNet for Shara's song.
…
Thank you to Starwarshobbitfics for your review! For more information on kinslaying, check out the updated legal reference in the forum.