(no subject)
So, why is Janu so obsessed with bringing sexual criminals to justice? Doesn't he need a personal reason? Not a personal reason like that (e.g. being sexually molested, having such happen to one of his siblings, etc.), because frankly what he metes out is not revenge but justice. Admittedly, no one gave him the authority to do so, but he always makes sure that he knows the laws in whichever kingdom he's in and that he follows them scrupulously. I think what bothers him the most is that no one does anything about it. Most local authorities turn a blind eye to sexual predation, and they don't turn a blind eye to sodomy (find non-earth-based term!). It's a double standard, and it makes him furious. In most of civilized Yumeranth, life becomes codified at an early age as chores are meted out and familial roles are cemented intoo the mindsets of children. Then, for most young Yumerantha men in the northern kingdoms, their manner of living becomes further codified by the graduation to military life. Morality doesn't really get worked into the picture; law, rule, and custom define society's boundaries, and Janu is forced to develop morality when he realizes how sharply law, rule, and custom contrast with one another. He is presented with three different sets of "right," and he has to choose one . . . so he has to decide what guidelines exist in his mind to help him make that choice. In the end, he sort of chooses law.
So, why did he choose law? That's a tough one, because what feels right in his head--i.e. bisexuality--doesn't square with law. But he remembers the first time he ever saw a man rape a woman (and that, when the man had finished, he said very casually, "So, do you want her next?"), that woman had looked up at him and silently begged him to kill her and spare her the shame. The only real guideline that he can draw, philosophically and morally, is that consent is the governing factor in all laws regarding rape, and that a woman who does not consent has had something stolen from her, so thus rape is a crime. But if a man consents to be with a man, or a woman consents to be with a woman, nothing has been stolen and thus there is no crime. It's a tough dispute. Rape laws in most of the more chauvanistic kingdoms were instituted to verify paternity and ensure virginity in new brides, and so the idea was that a woman could not consent to give her sex to any man but her husband-to-be. So consensual premarital sex or extramarital sex is also rape, but that doesn't offend Janu's morality. In summary, he doesn't actually choose law, but he holds it in higher esteem than either rule or custom.
All right, now that we've got Janu's philosophy squared away, how does he find out about this kidnapping and prostitution ring? Another tough one. In the kingdom where he finds out about it, prostitution is illegal (for the aforementioned paternity-and-virginity reasons, and also because some prostitutes are migrants and therefore unclean), so he is going about his vigilante duties when he discovers a Deitish woman in a brothel. Deitish women, you may be sure, do not often end up in Yumeranth by choice, and so he hires her out of curiosity and then questions her about the circumstances surrounding her arrival. More than grateful that this scary foreign man doesn't want to cause her trouble, the Deitish woman explains everything from her kidnapping to her transport to her current captivity and sexual slavery. At which point Janu does the Hero with a Sword thing and proceeds to liberate the prostitutes, most of whom have undergone a similar experience to that of the Deitish woman. From their descriptions of their captors and their transporters, as well as their origins as coastal or foreign women, he deduces that the ring must be coast-based. He strikes an agreement with the Deitish woman (name her!) to head to the coast and track the horrid people down in exchange for passage back to Deit for her.
How does he find out who the head of this ring is? . . . um. Sure as heck the police don't know yet, so he needs to get a contact. The Deitish woman would recognize any of the ship's crew of the people who kidnapped and sold her, so she could point out a good contact for him, but then there would be the whole undercover thing and I don't want to play that game. He probably finds out with Anjal, after trying to follow up on a lead at the city records office (and getting in trouble for being a nosy northerner).
What are we calling sodomy, the criminal type? Well, "buggery" springs to mind, but it sounds so British . . . +checks word origins reference+ Actually bugge in Old English (scarecrow, hobgoblin) comes from bögge in German (hobgoblin; probably the origin of "bogle," "boggart," and "bogeyman"). Conversely, bugge in a Norwegian dialect meant "important man"; a decidedly double-sided word. So yes, definitely European, but with an interesting connotation of a demonized figure that I quite like. "Buggery" it is.
What to name the Deitish woman? She's going to be in the first two chapters, after all . . . Let's call her Elara Tammer.
More to come as I think of it.