The Trials of Caste by Joel Babbitt

that the Deep Guard would be impressed enough with his performance to grant
him his wish of continuing with the Climbers after his year-group’s quest was
done.
    As he sat talking with his father, Arbelk heard
the third gong ring out.  Remembering a meeting that Gorgon had planned, Arbelk
excused himself and made his way quickly toward the upper portions of the Kale
Gen’s home caverns.
     

     
    Trallik was still confused by Trelkar’s generosity
in blindly taking his side against Durik and Keryak.  He didn’t know why
Trelkar had done it, but he could only imagine it had something to do with the
Trials.  Perhaps Khee-lar Shadow Hand and his chief elite warrior saw greatness
in him?  Perhaps they were expecting him to take the competition and be awarded
the rank of elite warrior?  Trallik’s imagination was working overtime on the
options and possibilities for his future.
    The more he thought about his future, however, the
less happy he was with his current circumstances.  Like normal, he sat
simmering in his home surrounded by his numerous younger siblings.  It wasn’t
much of a home, of that he was sure, and he would be glad to leave it.  After
all, it was only a tent with a sand floor in the deeper regions of his gen’s
home caverns.  Why did his family live here?  Trallik had often asked himself
that very question, and had long ago figured out who to blame.
    When he was a young whelp, not much taller than
his father’s knee, he had listened with amazement as his father had recited to
him, his older brother and younger siblings the glorious stories of their
heritage.  Stories of great warriors and powerful leaders filled his whelping
years.  The fact that these were his ancestors had only made these stories more
wonderful. 
    He’d had his mother, who always understood him and
seemed to care as much about him, the second son, as she did about all the rest
of her whelps.  When his mother had died birthing his youngest sister, however,
his father had too quickly taken on that ugly, nagging female who was not more
than a handful of years older than Trallik as his new mate.  Trallik had
resented that, and in the two years since had grown further and further away
from his father.  He had never opened his heart to his father’s new mate.  With
the arrival of her first whelp, she returned the favor and ignored Trallik as
well.
    Trallik’s interest had changed to focus on the
power his ancestors had held.  His respect for his father and for his humble
upbringing had waned.  Being his father’s second son, and always in his older
brother’s shadow, had helped to twist his ambitions.  Eventually Trallik’s
rejection of his family made him bitter.  If his father’s ancestors were so
powerful, why had his father ended up as a servant caste?  His father wasn’t
even a warrior, much less a leader of warriors.  No, he was a fungus farmer,
one who smeared sheep dung on the walls of the lower caverns to grow the thick
shelf-like fungus that the poor of their gen ate.  He could only imagine that
his much more powerful ancestors must have never tasted the wretched stuff.
    When Trallik had entered his year of training, he
had been utterly determined to do whatever it would take to match, and perhaps exceed,
the power and positions his ancestors had held.  Now as he sat listening to his
father’s recital of the story of Mintraub, Trallik’s great grandfather who had
gone on a quest with the last Lord Kale, and like Lord Kale, had never been
heard from again, Trallik shook his head and stood up.  He had no time or
patience for his father’s ramblings anymore.  He had taken the necessary steps
to ensure his own destiny, and had no use for this house anymore.
     “Trallik!” his father said, “We’re not finished
here.  Get back here!”
    Trallik looked around at his younger siblings.  He
could see that most of the younger ones looked up at their father with the same
look of wonder that he had