The Throne Room, Tana Epak, Ukrainistan
Airat sat on a large bead cushion and stared up at the roof lazily. At eighteen years of age and the second oldest of his brothers (who were six in number including him), he was a young man concerned with enjoyment and present pursuits. He had well-sculpted cheekbones and was tall and strong, even moreso than his twenty three year-old brother Zagip. Airat enjoyed sport and hunting, but outside of that he was rather lazy. His father got very angry at this, although Airat found it to be mostly uncalled for. "I am glad you are not my oldest son", his father had once told him ,"you have no sense of responsibility, and the throne would crumble under you". Of course, being the person he was, Airat had shrugged his father's attack off as simple whining- he was popular in the court, good with a bow and a fast runner, why did he need to be king? He could've easily fought in the army, which his father accepted as a possibility with reluctance.
Airat had spent the last four or so months with two of his brothers- Zagip and Yasher (who was sixteen). The three of them, as the three oldest of Kashin's sons, had been organised to govern the kingdom while he was away. De Jure, the three were acting as temporary regents for the Khan, but in actual fact Airat had done basically nothing apart from gain access to the Khan's rooms. It was Zagip, a natural leader with the heart of a lion, and Yasher, a timid, studious boy, who had been doing most of the work.
There was a knock on the door of the throne room. Airat got up off of his cushion and walked down the carpet that lead to Kashin's seat. He had been instructed not to touch the throne, and while he had deliberately disobeyed this instruction he still found the thing less comfortable than a bead cushion. The hall of the room was filled with unattended tables, a stage that could be wheeled out into the middle for dramatic performances and dances, and bowls of fruits and biscuits. The eighteen year-old opened the door to reveal the angry face of his brother Zagip. "If you don't stop being a waste of space, I am going to cut your nose off!", he yelled, just as he had about a dozen times this week ,"I need you to leave the throne room and actually help us! There are a stack of legal documents to approve, and merchants have been pestering us for three days asking about a damned fur-trapping company! Our father had left us with four pages of advice, and I suggest that unless you want him to be fuming when he gets back you should get off your buttocks and do something!"
Zagip dramatically jumped up and down on the floor in anger, prompting Airat to slam the door in his face. "I don't care, leave me alone!", he shouted at the closed door. Now angry, he marched back to his cushion to the background sound of his brother's muffled swearing. Airat's self-esteem was a bit bloated to say the least, and he didn't really think what he'd done was insolent or prompting of such a speech. Airat snatched a bowl of biscuits from one of the tables and sat back down, crunching at the sweet pastries.
Yasher dipped the seal of the throne's approval in ink once more and boredly stamped another legal document. He was feeling rather depressed- this work in the administration was what he would spend much of his life doing unless he found himself an advisor in Zagip's future court (which he found himself too timid to be capable of). This would leave him dying alone and unremembered in history books, despite having been born into the most powerful family in his realm. An opportunity squandered, and all because of his pathetic nature!
He wasn't even attractive, he thought to himself- he was short and had a sort of pubescent throaty voice despite being already sixteen. He didn't feel smart either, despite what his endearing brothers told him. Why was he even alive? What was he doing that was so great? At least Airat was popular, even if he was a complete idiot and inconsiderate to everyone else around him. But maybe people were just attracted to that- maybe people were supposed to be like that, and the nature of a scholar was an artificial one distanced from man's primal natures and urges.
The sound of angry mumbling and hard footsteps sounded down the hallway. Zagip stepped through the open doorway, his fists clenched with anger. Yasher felt scared. "Is everything okay?", he asked, testing his brother's emotional waters. "Airat is such a fucking idiot!", he screamed ,"why can't he do anything?!". Yasher wanted to disappear into the cushions of the chair he was sitting on, but he would have to ride out his brother's anger. His small frame shrank a little. Zagip noticed this and apologised ,"sorry, brother. I'm not angry at you, I'm just angry at Airat."
The twenty-three year old patted Yasher's back comfortingly and moved over to the desk beside his. Zagip's stack of papers were more or less the same as his- a bunch of local rulers asking for favours and permission to do things, with the odd foreign diplomatic letter. Oh well, Zagip thought, his mood of sadness starting to temporarily subside as it always did, perhaps being scholarly isn't't all that bad. After all, it was something intellectually stimulating to do, and he could serve his realm better than an idiot like Airat ever could outside of the battlefield. Yasher turned and checked is Zagip's mood had brightened. "Hey Zagip", he said. "What is it", asked the young man, holding back the anger in his voice and stroking his goatee ,"what is it you have to ask me?". "Would I ever be capable of being an advisor in your court, or Kashin's court, when I get older?", Yasher asked with a slight stutter. "It depends on what you're an advisor for", said Zagip in a considerably calmer tone ,"I couldn't see you helping with military affairs, but if I were Khan I'd certainly put you in my court above the general administration of merchant caste. You're good with numbers, right? You're good with words, too- you could be a merchant, an envoy, an administrator, whatever you want to be inside your capability." Yasher nodded, put up a fake smile and went back to work. He didn't believe his brother, even if he did have good intentions. He just didn't feel up to a job like that, even if he might be different in the future. But maybe he was just doubting himself- Zagip often complained of that, after all.