Tesac Rock Replies

[Saynto]

Ok so this is my first attempt at doing a review reply thread! Hopefully it works out~

First off, this is for my slash story Tesac Rock which is about a former indentured criminal turned miner on a remote planet who does something pretty sketchy to assure he gets to have a prisoner-bride.

I LOVE and appreciate all the kind comments, but to keep from spamming and to make sure this is concise, I will just answer direct questions about the story here.

From Anon:

I can only imagine the disaster it is going to be when Oliver at some point finds out that Garth was the one to put him in that situation, because I don't think any thanking is going to happen!

I am wondering though, why the freemen can't be together?couldn't they just both work, and see each other on the weekends, or join lands?

Freemen can be together. And some of them are! However there are some factors which make this rare:

• They can't own the same land together.
• Travel is very cost-prohibitive. Garth blew probably about three month's worth of tesac rock sales by going to Shagalice.
• Most of them come from poverty, and Monarus is the promise of being independent. By living with another miner, they would have to give up working their own land.

The problem with these things is that the two men would have to meet enough times to form a close enough bond that they trust the other to not have a secret motive. (Take Jamal, for instance. He had fallen in love with a cardshark in Shagalice only to be screwed over). Most of these guys are criminals with a criminal survive-at-all-costs mindset, so they're extremely wary of each other.

The reason the brides are so wanted is because they can't negatively impact the miners. They can't own land or use money without permission, plus they're legally tied to their custodians (the miners). Basically, this skips over the arduous and usually failed attempt at finding another freeman a guy can trust. The brides aren't allowed to leave them.

But yes! Freemen are allowed to be together. Only: when there's a successful partnership, the two men also have to deal with a very toxic, bitter resentment and envy against them from the other miners. Luckily everyone is spaced out in the mountains and they rarely run into each other.