JMJ

Chapter Five

Mawkish Wine

Sharlezeed blinked. "What?"

"What do you mean 'what'?" Quark demanded. "You come here out of the blue and…"

"To not bring embarrassment to you," said Sharlezeed in full seriousness. "You're in the second most important position in all of Ferenginar, and the last thing I want to do is bring embarrassment to you, especially in the position you're trying to make at this time convincing the Alliance that the New Course is more a ploy than anything else and that the answer to our problems are the profits kept with the Hidden Profiters."

"I'm not against everything that came along with the New Course," said Quark in his defense; though he found that he could not speak with full seriousness. "I'm all up for equality as long as it's not forced or fake."

"I know," said Sharlezeed, smiling in spite of herself. "Some things from before were against Hidden Profiters too, anyway, and you would have been caught in two conflicting lies had you spoken like that. Not to mention it would be seen as more than foolish to anyone who has faith in Rule Number 60, all respect would be lost all 'round. Your position is clearly that the movement of the New Course won't help anyone in the end, men or women alike and will make us all only female and male instead of people and at odds forever in an endless fight for latinum. If I thought any differently about you, I wouldn't've come…"

#

"It's not your place to demand from your brother's Golden Boy what he's doing, Sharzee," said Quark.

"Okay," shrugged Sharlezeed as she ducked back behind the curtain.

"I'm quitting so I can really go out among the stars," said Quark softer instead of louder. "The top liquidators are coming next week looking for recruits to bribe away from the Sub Nagus."

There was a moment of silence before Sharlezeed spoke from behind the curtain.

He glanced down at her bare feet shuffling with delight on the other side, and he grinned.

"And you expect me not to report this worker-stealing to my brother?" demanded Sharlezeed. "No one likes a liquidator."

"Except the Grand Nagus pays them directly whether he likes them or not. Rule Number 121, 'Everything's for sale, even friendship'."

"And you think they'll recruit such a nasty little boy like you?"

"Oh, I know they will… I think you said something one time in passing about someone giving marriages to people against the law. Maybe you and I should turn him in. Split the reward money."

"You rogue!" hissed Sharlezeed.

Quark grinned vilely.

"You'd share money with me," Sharzee added. "For shame. 'Females and finances don't mix'."

"Under my supervision and under my name, of course!" sniffed Quark.

"Are you serious?"

Quark crossed his arms as he took one step closer to the curtain.

Quite suddenly Sharlezeed poked her head out again and kissed him like a fish leaping from water before she dove back under the surface.

"I accept," said Sharlezeed. "We'll turn him in immediately. Or…whenever you're ready. You're taking quite the risk."

"'The greater the risk, the better the profit,'" hissed Quark. "Rule Number 62. Besides, I have everything planned out to the tittle."

And the two foolish children in the corridor were unseen and unheard as they continued to profess their… plans to turn in that horrible person that would dream of marrying people against the law, until at last Sharlezeed said, "You'll be late for business…"

Quark gasped and checked the time. Right! Already, the Sub-Nagus could be asking him what he was doing. He sped away as fast as he could, but they were married that very night.

#

Quark sighed.

His mind was wandering despite himself to that other time and place when things were so very different. Not that he had regrets about who he was today, but it was a simpler time— because of age not the age. She had been only eleven years old when he had met her. He had been thirteen. He could still hear Gloobram's voice that evening when he invited him to supper…

#

"Nothing like a local boy," Gloobram told him. "That's what I say. Lagoran is where all the best are raised. The Rules of Acquisition mean something here. Not like at the capital where they talk back, or sea urchins who don't know how to count without using their fingers. Not like down in the Bayou where they're slower than sludge. What do you say, Quark?"

He loved it when Gloobram gave him permission to speak; though, he had been quite occupied by the very interesting dining room. The table was long and narrow instead of circularly round with low chairs and plush backs. An aquatic inspired chandelier poked down from the ceiling instead of a plain round light bulging from a pole sticking down from the ceiling. It cast a warm and atmospheric glow, though Quark also knew that the shadows it cast were meant to hide things.

There was so much décor of long spidery designs so perfectly situated, and mirrors and other reflective surfaces in some spots and not in others. It did not take a genius to see that the room was designed for secrecy. He could not help but feel chills in the best possible way. The strangest thing of all, however was that on either side of the table were two parapet walls, and as Gloobram motioned where Quark was to sit, he found himself facing one of the curtains that were always so prominent in the palace living-spaces.

Everything was attached to the table aside from Gloobram's and Quark's plates, glasses, and finger tongs. There were two revolving trays of food and one bottle holder, which, as Gloobram chuckled, he swung on its line towards one of the curtains.

"Synthale, Sharzee," he said not without a certain amount of affection, which was not lost upon Quark despite how he thought it odd that she would not be sitting with them in silence.

She was not allowed to be seen by any of Gloobram's workers.

His sister's hands came out from behind the curtain as she put a bottle into it. As it was swinging back to Gloobram, Quark smiled and bowed his head with full humility to answer his revered and peculiar boss' question.

"Well," said Quark, "some people say that the drier air makes it so brains don't go idle saturated with humidity like a sponge."

Gloobram laughed.

Quark could not help but see that the sister was peeking over the parapet and smiling with amusement at his candid and gentle response. Feeling encouraged, he smiled broader as he returned to Gloobram.

"Would you like me to pour the drinks, o benevolent nagus?" said Quark with a certain amount of dash.

Gloobram sneered; he certainly knew his sister to be watching but was pretending not to. "Yes, why don't you, boy."

Quark immediately did as bidden. It was the secret to Gloobram's good graces to ask before one took initiative but to never wait to be asked. In fact, he was strange in the fact that insisted upon verbal communication with his workers. Quark assumed it was a way to size them up, and it certainly had given Gloobram the ability to see Quark's value as he had hardly been in the employ as a page for more than a few months and already Gloobram was inviting him special to speak with him about replacing Ootak as Golden Boy.

"Sir!" said Quark handing the glass to Gloobram.

He still sensed the sister nearby, and he wondered again if it was an extra type of protection of her to keep her hidden as she was so young and perhaps inordinately curious even if as gentle as a pixel rain.

"Now, you know why I brought you here, boy?"

"To discuss your will for me, o nagus," said the boy with a bow.

"And I believe the best way to know where a man is best suited is by having a meal with him…"

A man? Oh, how Quark liked the sound of that! But he had to be on his guard. It still was a test to see if Quark would forget his place. Everything about this meal was a test, and he but smiled broadly and bowed in the lowliest, humblest and downright "toadiest" of manners.

"Sir," he barely breathed.

As he took a drink, Gloobram smiled with satisfaction; he felt the sister do the same.

#

"Quark?" asked Sharlezeed.

"Hmm?" Quark blinked. "You're not here to tell me I have a long lost son or something, are you?"

"No, nothing like that. I… I'm here on behalf of my brother."

"You're brother?"

That put a damper on things. He was not sure what he had expected, but the mention of Gloobram despite the fact that he had been partly thinking of him already seemed to bring him back to the present at least to wonder what had become of the young, successful sub-nagus.

"Well, only because my brother said he would go himself to you if I did not."

"Okay, okay, start at the beginning," Quark warned. "Obviously we're gunna be here a while."

He leaned back in his chair thoughtfully.

"I'll try. It's very complicated, but first I want to tell you that I never did marry anyone else."

Quark nodded with care. "They… didn't undo the marriage?"

"If they had they would have contacted you eventually, and you would have had to pay late fees if nothing else."

"Why didn't they?"

"My brother didn't want to expose the family, and… my father asked me if I loved the man I married, and I said, 'yes,' and that I refused to marry anyone else."

One thing that surprised Quark about women from his own planet was their loyalty to the end in these matters. It was an intensity that was stronger than a man for latinum. Deep and almost frightening.

Again Quark sighed, though he was grinning despite himself. "Even after the way I treated you? We were only teens."

A knowing look returned to Sharlezeed. "You're not married to anyone else."

"No…" Quark admitted. "Not that there haven't been other women…"

"But they're obviously not here."

"So your brother wants me to respect the marriage or divorce you or…?"

"In a way, yes."

"But what are things like up there in the Highlands, anyway? I thought the sub-nagus was Poolsha'Bai, and neither as family or authority does he have any control over you."

"He still would have gone himself with authority over himself," she said with stately calm. "I had to do something, and as for Poolsha'Bai… allowing people to be fired for saying that there was still good in the Rules of Acquisition and forcing people to pay exorbitant taxes to pay for the reserve, my brother has very few resources left."

"What about you?"

Sharlezeed shrugged, obviously not wanting to share her own state of affairs.

Quark leaned over the table and put his chin in his hand. "You believe in the Rules of Acquisition?"

"I believe that their original composition was good."

"So you were a Hidden Profiter?" teased Quark. "This whole time. That was why your brother hid you, so that no one knew he clothed you. That was why he didn't press charges against me and why your father accepted the marriage even after we were married behind his back, and how you even knew at the age of sixteen that there was someone who would marry us without a full approved contract."

Sharlezeed smiled. "Half," was all she said.

Quark laughed. "What does that mean?"

"My father was not and my mother was."

"Interesting," said Quark. "And your father was okay with your mother not being a wife of the cultural norm?"

"He allowed it. Yes."

"And your brother?"

"He respected my mother and myself and our needs, but he was all out for physical profit. He needed people he could trust. Somehow he felt that one of those people was you. This is not to say that my whole family was not very displeased that I married you, however."

There was no irony in her tone. Nothing against her family and only good will towards him. Whatever her brother wanted, Sharlezeed meant what she said and only wished to give Quark respect. Or so it seemed now anyway.

Quark closed his eyes. "So basically at this point, he wants money from me, and he thinks he can blackmail me with this relationship between us that no one's going to care about anymore?"

"He thinks you should as a supporter of the Hidden Profiters, help us against Poolsha'Bai trying to squash us."

"But he's not even a Hidden Profiter himself, right?" Quark demanded. "Or does what he really wants is for me to do something about a woman that he's not allowed to touch?"

"He feels that you should be on his side."

"Being a Hidden Profiter isn't about being separate from everyone else," laughed Quark. "If your brother thinks that's what I am, he's in for a big surprise. We're all Ferengi, as far as I'm concerned, besides the fact that me butting into Poolaha'Bai's doings just because he feels I should help someone who's 'half' Hidden Profiter will make people distrust the cultural renewal. If being a Hidden Profiter only means being a cultural minority even if you don't follow the rules, then I'm not a Hidden Profiter."

He paused. "I'm working on that taxation thing, okay? It's hard now that it's been established."

Then back to his topic he went on, "But you can't hide behind the name 'Hidden Profiter' like under a cloak to feel like you're a victim. Besides, it's against everything that being a Hidden Profiter stands for. Sacrifice, right? Pain is profit. No one wants to hear that anymore. They like being told that they deserve this and require that, but Sharzee, I made a career out of being a victim, and that never gave me any credibility to anyone. That's Ferenginar's main problem right now, I think, is that everyone wants to be a victim these days. Well, I'm not a victim. I'm a Ferengi, and I know my place as one and my duty in the Great River." Again he paused looking at Sharlezeed with care. "What are you?"

"Wow."

"What?"

"I can see why you're First Clerk. You still are the Golden Boy," she smiled weakly and turned away guiltily. "I never thought about it that way before, but I know some Hidden Profiters… Maybe that's what they mean."

Quark shrugged, and he smiled back despite himself. "I think I've been First Clerk too long already, really."

"No. Ferenginar needs you."

Quark could not believe he caught himself rocking his head from side to side. He stopped, and even worse, he felt himself yellow up a little. He cleared his throat.

"Well! Tell you what, you explain to me in detail what gree-worm's biting the inside of your brother's mouth, and I'll see what I think. Better yet, tell me what you need, Sharzee."

"What I need? What do you think I need?"

"I don't know. You tell me? Then we'll move onto your brother."

Sharzee shook her head and laughed under her breath. "Well, I suppose I would like to know…"

"Know what?"

"Well…um, do you ever think of me?"

Quark laughed out loud at that.

"Do I ever think of you?" he clicked the roof of his mouth. "I thought you'd been married off to someone else a long time ago and 'put in your place'. I thought you were punished for my sake by a cruel psychotic and unfeeling man. Every time I looked at the Rules of Acquisition there was my blotch. And I… I hated you..."

"I don't believe that," she told him with a smile; even a half-deaf Vulcan would have heard the waver in that last phrase Quark had spoken.

Quark sighed yet again. "That's what you said then too. Let's get out of this tacky place, huh? Even the wine's tasting like mawkish beer."

Sharlezeed made a face. "What now?"

"It's been too many."

"Too many glasses? I'll say."

"Too many women," said Quark staring hard at her. "Too many mistakes. You wouldn't love me anymore if you knew how disloyal I was to you. I never wanted to see a Ferengi female again, but of course, every non-Ferengi woman I liked reminded me of you, and now this…" He shrugged.

Sharlezeed nodded solemnly and slowly stood up. "I'll just tell my brother you said no, and he'll have no reason to embarrass you." She smiled and turned towards the door.

He raised his eyes upwards for a moment and could not help a quick, What's the plan now?

There was still part of him that suspected her of being a ploy of some sort. Something to distract him or get him to do something he shouldn't, but Sharlezeed continued without turning back. Of course, even that could be faked.

Maybe she was infected by a Keeoopii even if she did seem to be the Sharlezeed he knew only older. This could all be a way eventually to get to the Nagus or revenge on Quark specifically for all he knew. Besides, if she was infected, he wanted to know. The very thought sickened him and he would tear the parasite apart himself if he could.

It was at that thought particularly that he admitted he still loved her, but love was really only a fleeting emotion when it came to romance. Had he not felt that he loved just as deeply Natima or Grilka? Now they both were gone and buried as much as if they were dead. Of course, he had a feeling that Natima was truly dead… and Grilka… well, they both had decided that a Ferengi and a Klingon would never work out without the Klingon accidently killing the Ferengi one day... and besides, he had heard rumors that she was with Worf now. Just as well. They suited each other, he guessed.

What was love?

As much as he had begun to embrace that part of him that had always known that love was more important than profit, it was easy to sacrifice for his brother for that filial bond. It was easy to be kind to his mother and not argue with her when she made her rounds suspicious of his motives even now. It was easier to be pals with Julian Bashir, and really easy helping strangers once he gave into it. What was hard was this stupid romance thing, and he could not help but wonder if it would not have been better to send Sharlezeed away with money for herself and her brother, but then the last time he sent a girl away with money and a pat on the back it was Pel… he still had not faced her. He could not not face this.

Despite how he had considered himself quite the romantic in his DS9 days, romance returning now at full swing made him shakier than any dealing with Meegs, Krax or Keeoopii.

Quark rolled his eyes.

"Sharzee," he whined.

She stopped just as the door opened for her.

"Maybe…" he said, but he faltered and shook his head.

"Are you alright, Quark?"

Quark stood up. Slowly he walked over to her. She stepped away from the door and it shut again.

"There was never anyone else?" he asked.

"No."

"And it wasn't just because you were following the code of conduct of the Hidden Profiters?"

"It's only been recently that I found myself back among them. I was all for women's restitution and more not too long ago. I don't suppose you'd love me either as a young political adviser in the Highlands, but not because of any man I'd been around."

"And we've met in the middle again."

"I guess so."

Quark thought a moment. "Let's do this again. After the Aploos' are gone and maybe some other business too."

"You must be very occupied as First Clerk."

"I just…" he smiled sheepishly, and his eyes faltered, "really want to get to know you again. If that's alright with you."

Sharzee smiled. Not wryly but sweetly— lovingly. "It's alright with me. You are my husband, after all."

He waved his hand aside. "No rushing."

"And no mawkish wine," laughed Sharlezeed. "You used to be wittier."

Oh, he could not help it. He hugged her then, close, and she hugged him back tighter than he did. Not that one needed to be in love to hug on Ferenginar where embracing was an unwritten code for any bond of trust even when trust had been supposedly forbidden in Ferengi culture. Just another thing that had made other races not take Ferengi seriously. Quark hardly took himself seriously right now, but he supposed that was not a bad thing. He was actually getting better and better at embracing not taking himself too seriously.

"I used up my wit cutting up parasites," said Quark once they parted enough to look at each other again. Her yellow-brown eyes sparkled, and he spoke far more gently and lovingly than he meant to. He closed his eyes. "So, now that we got that settled, why don't we just… sit down and talk about your brother's proposal and get down to some real business."

"Right."

Just when you think you're safe in this universe, you find out you're always in danger, thought Quark as he reseated himself. But you're never safer any other way…that should be a Rule of Acquisition, and I'll sell it to Rom in the morning.