CHAPTER

39

The Stone-Eye Club

On his first day of classes at Jan Royal University, Kaul Rulinshin stood in the main campus plaza, awash in nervous excitement as he watched students strolling across the grounds between the wide lawns and brick buildings. Ru didn’t think of himself as a particularly academic person, but having grown up in a ruling clan family where nearly everyone was a jade warrior or a businessman, the sheer wealth of possibilities in college made him giddy.

One dense cloud of sadness marred the clear blue sky of his mood. Niko should be here. Niko had always been the smart one, the one who liked reading and was good at school, who would surprise adults with the sorts of things he’d learned and remembered. Now, Ru had no idea where his brother was. He’d received one letter from Niko, saying that he’d finished two weeks of orientation at GSI headquarters in Fort Jonsrock, Espenia. Ru had to look up the place in an encyclopedia to find out where it was. Niko didn’t say where he was going now, nor did he mention the painful conversation they’d had before he’d left. In the letter, he didn’t even say whether he liked the job so far, whether he was happy. There’d been no return address on the envelope, no way for Ru to write back.

Ru shouldered his backpack and went to his first class, Government and Society 120. It was an entry-level undergraduate course, held in a large lecture hall with hard seats and weak lighting. No one recognized him in that class or the other two he attended that day, which was not surprising. His father saw to it that the media kept away from him, and compared to his siblings, he’d always gone unnoticed within the clan.

When he checked out books from the library the next day, however, the librarian who took his student ID card looked at him curiously, then glanced down at his name. “Oh! Kaul Rulinshin? You’re the Pillar’s son, the—” She did not finish the sentence with stone-eye. Flushing with embarrassment, she touched her forehead in abbreviated salute. “My husband and his parents are Lantern Men of No Peak. They own Wan’s Chariot—the chain of autobody shops. All the clan’s top Green Bones take their cars there. My husband’s worked on the Horn’s Lumezza, the Weather Man’s Cabriola, and of course your father’s Duchesse.” She checked his books out with vigor. “We were at the clan New Year’s party, the big one at the General Star Hotel last month. I suppose you must’ve been there? It was huge! I’m sure your father doesn’t remember us, since he spoke to so many people that night, but if you get a chance, will you let him know that the Wans from Wan’s Chariot send their loyal respects?”

“I’ll let him know when I’m home for dinner this Fifthday,” Ru promised.

The librarian beamed. “I’m honored to have met you. Come back often. If you ever want to book one of the private study cubicles or the computer stations, just let me know. I’ll get you the best one. There’s a two-hour limit, but I can override that.”

Ru thanked her. The next time he went to the library to check out books, he told Mrs. Wan that his father said he wouldn’t trust his Duchesse to any other autobody shop, which delighted her so much she gave him a staff code that he could use on any of the photocopy machines in the library without paying for copies. Ru had a few other encounters with clan members or associates on campus. The teaching assistant of his economics class was the younger brother of a high-rank Fist. One of his classmates in Kekonese Literature 300 was the daughter of a No Peak loyalist in the Royal Council. Occasionally, he was recognized on campus by strangers who stopped him to convey their regards to his family.

This sort of attention would’ve irritated Niko. He would’ve started power walking from place to place to avoid being approached by people. Ru didn’t mind. He always smiled and replied in a friendly way. With Niko gone, he had to start thinking of himself as the first son of the family. Even though he couldn’t be a leader in the clan, that didn’t mean he couldn’t make a difference. After all, his mother was a stone-eye, too, but she helped his father to be the Pillar. Ru thought he could’ve been of help to Niko, if only Niko would believe in himself first.

He’ll come back, Ru told himself. He has to. It had been heartbreaking to see his brother not only condemned by their father, but excoriated by the press, held up as evidence of the declining morals of a younger generation that was less green and no longer respected aisho. Those self-appointed pundits didn’t know anything about Niko, and their unflattering characterization certainly didn’t apply to Jaya, or Cam, or the Juen twins. It angered Ru to hear people say ignorant and negative things based on shallow impressions or hearsay. So he felt a responsibility to represent his family and No Peak as well as possible. Besides, he liked to meet people and to learn of all the different ways his clan affected the lives of ordinary Kekonese.

Nevertheless, Ru felt lonely on the large campus of Jan Royal University. His family’s status had always set him apart from his peers at school and added a layer of difficulty when it came to making and keeping friends. Classmates assumed he wouldn’t want to stand in line with them for hours to watch the new Danny Sinjo movie, when his parents could take him to the premiere. They hesitated to invite him to a pool party in Mountain-controlled Summer Park, knowing he would have to come with bodyguards. He was thankful to have had his high school relayball team, and his best friends, Tian and Shin, who treated him no differently than anyone else. But Tian had gone to the Lukang Institute of Technology for college and Shin had joined the Kekonese military. Ru didn’t even have Koko to keep him company, as pets were not allowed in student housing.

Ru perused the student center cafeteria’s bulletin board with notices advertising different campus clubs and decided to take a chance. On a Fourthday afternoon six weeks into his first semester, he made his way into a classroom in the basement of the Social Sciences building to attend a student chapter meeting of the Charitable Society for Jade Nonreactivity. He knew about the CSJN because his mother had spoken at some of their events and been interviewed for a profile in their magazine. Ru’s mouth was dry with nerves when he walked into the room. How would the club members react to the son of a clan Pillar intruding on their meeting? After all, Ru’s family sat at the top of the cultural power structure that revered jade abilities and stigmatized stone-eyes and the entire Abukei race.

A few desks pushed together against the wall held an assortment of bottles of soda and a spread of snacks—the expected bowls of nuts and crackers, date cakes, sesame and fruit candies, the usual junk. There were fourteen people in the room—nine Kekonese stone-eyes and five Abukei students. A young Abukei woman greeted Ru cheerfully and directed him to write his name on a name tag. He did so with trepidation, then grabbed a soda and sat down in one of the empty chairs that had been arranged in a circle in the center of the classroom.

One of the Kekonese students stood up and identified himself as Dano, a third-year political science major and the leader of the student chapter of the CSJN. Even though it was the middle of the afternoon, Dano looked as if he’d just woken up. His spiky hair was sticking up in several directions, he hadn’t shaved, and he was wearing a rumpled T-shirt and jeans that might’ve been fished out from the bottom of a laundry basket. Nevertheless, he was bursting with enthusiasm.

“Our club is about supporting each other,” he declared to the small group. “I’ll bet every one of us in this room has been in a situation where we felt as if we were completely alone. The only unlucky one, someone the gods didn’t care about. Well, that’s not true. You’re not alone. And the more we work together to educate people about nonreactivity and be open about who we are, the less alone we’ll be.”

Dano went on to explain the meeting schedule, club events, the affiliation with the national CSJN and the campus partnership with the Abukei Student Alliance, and volunteer positions that needed to be filled. “I see we have a few new members,” Dano said, “so let’s all introduce ourselves.” He sat back down in his chair.

Ru did not remember any of the other students’ names. When it came time for him to speak, his hands were clammy. He wiped them on his jeans and said, “My name’s Kaul Rulinshin. This is my first year at Jan Royal.” He cleared his throat. “My family is… well, it’s full of Green Bones. I’ve spent my whole life surrounded by clan culture and jade, so… this is all pretty new to me. I’m glad to have found this club, and I’m looking forward to getting to know everyone.”

He couldn’t read any of the expressions around him. If only he had a sense of Perception, he would know whether to get up and leave. Of course, if he had a sense of Perception, he wouldn’t be here at all.

Dano began stamping his feet on the floor in applause. The rest of the club members followed his example, smiling in welcome, and Ru’s shoulders came down in relief.

Dano said, “Welcome to the stone-eye club, keke. By the way, I’m opposed to everything your clan stands for.” He grinned so wide his cheeks stretched, then reached over to clap Ru on the shoulder. “We’re going to be great friends!”

They did become friends. Dano was a natural social connector who seemed to know people from all walks of life and was always going to or coming from a wild party. Spending a considerable number of his waking hours intoxicated or hungover did not appear to dent his energy. Besides being the leader of the campus CSJN chapter, he was involved in the Independence League, a grassroots organization that advocated for the election of non-clan-affiliated political candidates, the Immigrant Rights Watch, which provided legal and economic assistance to refugees, and the Royal Creed, the campus newspaper. At times Ru wondered if Dano even went to class.

They had spirited debates after every stone-eye club meeting. Dano loved to argue almost as much as he loved to drink. After Ru mentioned that he would likely work in the No Peak clan after he graduated, Dano said, “You’ll be devoting your career to upholding the very system that stigmatizes nonreactivity. Don’t you think that’s like a pig building its own roasting pit?”

Ru’s mouth fell open. He had never met anyone who would dare to say something like that to him. “You can’t blame hundreds of years of superstition on my clan. My da has always supported me and never put me down. He named my ma as his Pillarman. Maybe my ma and me being stone-eyes in the clan is one reason prejudice against nonreactivity is going down.”

They left the Social Sciences basement and hurried across campus, late for class but still arguing. “Even if your relatives are nice to you personally,” Dano conceded, “that doesn’t change the fact that the clans exist to protect the interests of Green Bones and keep them in power to the detriment of everyone else.”

“Society isn’t a contest of Green Bones versus non–Green Bones!” Ru retorted. “Every Green Bone has family members and friends who don’t wear jade, and the clans protect all of Kekon. If you studied history”—a shameless dig, because Dano was supposed to be on his way to history class—“you’d know that if it weren’t for Green Bones, our country would be a plundered postcolonial mess like the Uwiwas instead of a prosperous modern economy.”

Dano shrugged, clearly enjoying getting a rise out of his verbal sparring partner. “I admit the One Mountain Society played a big part in overthrowing the Shotarian occupation, but that was almost fifty years ago. Other countries don’t need clans. They’re obsolete, parochial institutions.”

“Must you talk out of your ass?” Ru almost shouted. “Of course, clannism isn’t perfect—no system is. That’s why everyone should work together on improving it, not throwing it out altogether like the foreigners and anarchists want us to. Think about international trade, military reform, even the growth of the entertainment industry—the Green Bone clans led those changes. My own relatives made them happen. You don’t know a damn thing!” They reached the Foreign Studies building where Ru’s next class was located. “So, see you later on Fifthday?”

“Yeah,” said Dano. “Bring cash; I hear there’re going to be strippers.”

Ru wasn’t sure if he actually liked Dano or not. He could be morally pompous, ignorant, and infuriating, but Ru had never had anyone challenge his worldview so regularly. It was invigorating.

He made the mistake of telling Jaya about his new friend. “He sounds like a fat-mouthed little shithead,” his sister declared. “Did he really say those things? I’m surprised the Kobens haven’t picked him up and burned his face yet.” She squinted at her brother with concern.

Jaya always had an insufferable habit of acting like they were the same age, as if her destiny as a Green Bone somehow promoted her up the natural sibling order. When they were in primary school, Jaya had kicked another girl to the ground during recess and dumped all her school books into a muddy puddle for pointing to Ru and tugging her earlobe. “If you do it again, I’ll come to your house and kill your pets,” Jaya had promised, as if she were the older sibling and had to protect Ru from bullies on the playground. The other girl had cried, which had mortified and embarrassed Ru beyond belief. He would’ve ignored the mild taunting, and he certainly didn’t need Jaya to stick up for him.

It was obvious from her expression now that she suspected Ru wasn’t keeping good company. “I wonder if any of these people you’re meeting in college are on Lott-jen’s watch lists. What did you say his name was again?”

“Forget it,” Ru said quickly. “He just likes to say provocative things; he’s not anyone to worry about.” Some of the things Dano said could indeed be interpreted as radical anti-clan sentiment, which might raise suspicion of ties to the Clanless Future Movement. Ru had been twelve years old at the time of the Janloon bombing. He would never forget being pulled out of school and waiting for over a day to find out if his father was still alive. He hated the violent anarchists and understood better than anyone why there was little tolerance for anti-clan attitudes.

Dano, however, was a college student like him, not a CFM terrorist. Ru was starting to think that the threat of clanless extremists unfortunately stifled worthwhile discussions about how the clans could or should change in ways that benefited more Kekonese, including those who could never wear jade or weren’t born into clan families. Dano didn’t have the insider’s view that Ru did. The Mountain and No Peak were vaguely malevolent monolithic entities to him. He couldn’t understand that Ru’s parents and his aunt Shae and his uncle Anden were real people. Good people. People were what made the clan.

Ru disagreed with his friend on many things, but he didn’t want anything bad to happen to him. He resolved to keep his mouth shut around Jaya from now on. His sister was a year-eight at the Academy but sure to take oaths as a Finger when she graduated. If Jaya thought Dano was a threat to society, or at the very least, a bad influence on her brother, who knew what she might do.