One Day in a Small-Town Desert, chapter 15, page 4

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Emperor Bhanar of the House of Narakamíníkı forced open his sticky eyelids. He lay on a buffed concrete floor, close to a metal drain about six inches in diameter. The room was silent except for an electronic buzzing. His shoulder hurt.

“Where am I?” he mumbled as he sat up.

When he turned his head and saw the thick steel bars, he remembered: jail.

Why was he on the floor? Had he fainted? He remembered the guard walking out, leaving Bhanar standing alone in the cell, and then . . . nothing. He must’ve fainted. If he had been tired, he would’ve laid down on the cot.

Bhanar stood, rolling his sore shoulder to stretch it.

“But if I fainted, why didn’t anyone come to see if I was all right?” Would they have let him die?

What the plagues was wrong with the worlds, that he could be imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit, and then possibly die in custody because the police didn’t care enough to check on inmates who collapse? And with Pí‘oro dead and Zhíno still out on the loose! There was no justice in the worlds.

“Plague of Rívorí,” he spat and began to pace in the small cell, tugging up his pants. He could only go three steps in any direction before he had to turn.

“Rívorí, indeed,” he muttered. “There’s a good reason they named this planet after that goddess. Devastation, prisons, death: it has it all--even volcanoes!”

How did someone like Zhíno escape the police? How did the police decide that Bhanar was a suspect? Because they though he was lying. Because Zhíanoso healed his legs. They obviously didn’t believe in miracles.

“But that Enforcer saw my legs!” he snarled at the ceiling. “He saw they were broken.”

Didn’t the police trust their own eyes, anymore? Are they that incompetent here in Sarıma? If this was how his “subjects” acted, maybe he didn’t want to be emperor of this land, after all.

He banged the soft part of his fist against the metal bars. It didn’t move or make a sound.

His father probably would’ve bought his way out of this situation. He’d just wave around a little money or just the promise of some money, and the police would do anything he asked of them. Bhanar was different, though. Even if he had access to money like that--which he didn’t, yet--he couldn’t bring himself to bribing policemen. What the plagues kind of person does that? A criminal, that’s who!

“So the Tara-fucking criminals go free while the honest citizens rot away in some plagued jail cell in the middle of nowhere.”

Bhanar kicked the metal cot. It clanged, but didn’t budge. A sharp pain shot from the top of his foot. The Pétíso-damned cot was bolted down.

Through gritted teeth, he hissed, “Korutuzho-brained Nazhoro’s plague of Rívorí.”

He hopped in a circle and sat down on the cot, grabbing his foot.

Why’d that Voro-fucker Zhíno have to shoot at him, anyway? What the plagues was wrong with that guy?

Bhanar squeezed his throbbing foot with both hands. Thankfully, his leather trainer had kept him from cutting himself on the metal.

Zhíno’s motives hardly mattered. Bhanar was going to get that Zhéporé-spawn, once he got out of jail. He was going to bring Zhíno to justice. That’s what an emperor’s supposed to do, right? Fight for justice and right the wrongs? “Pétíso may damn it, but that’s what this emperor is going to do.”

First, though, he had to get out of jail. He’d have to convince a detective or somebody that he really was innocent. And how to do that? Tell the truth! Ask for a lie-detector test.

It seemed like most of the police around here were heartless bastards, so who knew if he’d get a fair inquiry? That cute girl, Nulıpésha, was all right, though. Surely she could put in a good word for him. If only he ever saw her again.

Bhanar dropped his foot to the floor and rested his head in his hands.

There were no two ways around it. He was plagued.

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