Free Sasha by Joel Shepherd

yourself?”
    “Serrin women, exactly,” said Kessligh around another bite. “Petrodor has a very conservative branch of Verenthane belief where women are concerned. My mother died when I was young and from then on the Nasi-Keth were my family. I saw many serrin women, but the human women I knew were very fixed in their notion of what a real woman was. Even when I rode to Lenayin for the war, I didn't see Lenay women as much different. It's only when I met you that I truly realised that a human woman might be born with the aptitude to be my uma.”
    Sasha smiled. “Well at least I know what kind of behaviour impresses the great Kessligh Cronenverdt—brattish, noisy and overactive. I could revert, if you like?”
    “Revert?” Kessligh asked in mock surprise. Sasha kicked him lightly on his boot and scowled. “My point,” Kessligh continued, “is that people never know what they shall be, and how they shall respond, until the moment of testing arrives. I can assure you that very few of my Nasi-Keth elders and peers suspected that I could rise to such heights from my beginnings. As a student I was quiet, uncooperative and solitary. I loved serrin teachings because they seemed to me to offer the best solution I'd yet seen to all humanity's obvious ills.
    “But I was always frustrated that neither my uman nor my other tutors seemed to grasp the implications of those teachings fully. And so I enjoyed the company of the serrin more than humans. Serrin never judge. Through them I learned to see the world as it is, and myself as I am, rather than what I might want or expect them both to be. Which is how I recognised your talents, while other men would not. I realised I was wrong about human women. Many men cannot admit this about themselves.
    “Always be aware that you may be wrong, Sasha—about anything and everything. I rose to Commander of Armies during the Great War simply because I learned from my mistakes, and the mistakes of others, and when something did not work, I stopped doing it and did something else. Many commanders did not, due to pride or stubbornness, and killed not only themselves, but many good men as well. The unquestioned belief in one's own supremacy and righteousness is the surest road to ruin yet devised by man. Avoid it at all costs.”
    Sasha listened sombrely, chewing the last of her lunch as the river bubbled about their rock. Kessligh did not lecture often, yet she was not surprised that he chose to do so now. A Hadryn–Taneryn conflict was surely the most serious calamity she had yet ridden into. An uman's role was to teach, and to prepare his uma for trials to come.
    “Why have the Nasi-Keth not spread more through Lenayin?” Sasha asked suddenly. “I mean…you led Lenayin to victory over Chieftain Markield, you risked your life and became a Lenay legend—all because you volunteered to come from Petrodor. The popularity of the Nasi-Keth and the serrin was surely never so high in Lenayin as then. And yet there are so few other Nasi-Keth here.”
    Kessligh nodded slowly, as if faintly surprised at the question. “Your father tried,” he said. “He believes in providence, in signs from the gods. When Markield was beaten, your father saw that the gods favoured the Nasi-Keth, and thus surely they favoured the teachings of Saalshen. That was a time when the king was least persuaded by the northern fanatics, since the north had failed to defeat the invasion without help as they'd insisted they would, and had protested my ascension to commander at every turn. Trade with Saalshen improved dramatically, and many senior serrin were invited to visit the capital. And, of course, he declared that Krystoff would be my uma, binding the kingdom and the Nasi-Keth inextricably together.
    “But the response of the Verenthanes was not good, especially in the north. And precious few Nasi-Keth from Petrodor have felt inspired to follow me to the highlands.” He shrugged. “Perhaps it would have been