God's War by Kameron Hurley Page B

Plague Sisters kept a diverse colony of insects within their
care, but he should have been able to manipulate them far more effectively than
he had. If the organs and entrails he’d mended on the slabs had been those
belonging to real human beings, he doubted his patients would have entirely
recovered. Some may not have lived. He knew the outcome of his evaluation even
before Yah Tayyib spoke.
    “We have spent some time discussing
your evaluation,” Yah Tayyib said. “My fellow magicians and Plague Sisters
agree that you have some skill in the arts. No doubt Yah Reza would not have
undertaken your tutelage if she did not believe you were gifted.” He carefully
pressed the tips of his fingers together. “Unfortunately, we have not deemed
your talent sufficient to grant you a practicing government license.”
    Rhys exhaled. What had he expected,
that a Chenjan man in his prime would be given leave to walk through a palace
filter and perform surgery on the Queen’s ministers? There would be no easy
road, no well-paying government job. But hearing it out loud felt better than
he thought it would. Something, some expectation, had been cut away. Hope,
maybe.
    “However,” Yah Tayyib said, “we find
it acceptable to grant you a provisional license that allows you to practice so
long as you are employed. Yah Reza has expressed interest in keeping you on at
the magicians’ quarters as a teacher, if you wish it. Otherwise, you’re free to
take up gainful employment with whatever employer you see fit. Do you have any
questions?”
    Rhys looked over at Yah Reza. She
smiled her sen-stained smile. She intended on keeping him prisoner for the rest
of his days, then.
    “Yes,” Rhys said, turning back to
Yah Tayyib. “Is the denial of my government license based on my talent or my
race?”
    The old magician shook his head.
“Rhys, if you were as talented as Yah Reza hoped, we would have no choice but
to grant you a government license. Nasheen could not turn away one with such
skill. But your talents are middling. We have no place among the palace
magicians or within the First Families for a mediocre Chenjan magician. You are
better suited for the private sector.”
    Rhys swallowed his words. What was
there left to say? His father had cursed him the night he refused him. Cursed
and abandoned him. This is my penance, Rhys thought, this time among godless Nasheenians.
    “Thank you,” Rhys said finally.
    Yah Reza led him out.
    When the door closed behind them,
she said, “It is not such a terrible thing, to teach Nasheenian magicians. You
are capable with children and the teaching of standard arts.”
    “I will not be staying long,” Rhys
said. “I’ll find employment elsewhere.”
    “Of course,” Yah Reza said, and he
should have realized then that she knew something he did not.
    The magicians did no end of business
with bel dames and bounty hunters. Both groups often came to the gym looking
for new recruits—petty magicians and women just back from the front. Government
officials frequented the fights as well, recruiting veterans and magicians as
order keepers. Rhys spent week after week at the gym acting the part of a cheap
harlot, trying to sell his services. But no bel dame would have him, and the
order keepers, of course, would not even speak to him. The magicians could
afford to pretend not to notice his accent and his coloring, but the rest of
Nasheen… the rest of Nasheen saw him for what he was—a Chenjan man, an infidel,
an enemy.
    Yah Reza caught up with him one
afternoon in his chambers as he penned a response to an ad for a tissue
mechanic he had found in the morning’s newsroll. If they wouldn’t hire him on
as a magician, he would spend his days digging into the guts of bakkies in
Mushtallah. It was better than a lifetime of servitude to Nasheenian magicians.
Most tissue mechanics were just like him—failed magicians working for bread and
bugs.
    “Why not give this up, baby doll?
Are things in my gym