by Camilla Monk
I fell to my knees in the damp grass. Surely Tia couldn’t smell me in here, so far away from the forest trail, my stink overpowered by the heady perfume of the flowers. I could stay a little… sleep, maybe. I placed a hand on my empty stomach, feeling it growl in response. There was nothing to be done about hunger until I found something to eat.
I removed my sandals and placed them neatly on a flat stone next to the soldier’s sword and satchel. I debated whether to remove my dress and decided that Picumnus, who was known for his propensity to harass beautiful nymphs, would probably pass on my bony body and the dirt-matted braids coiled around my head. I unfastened my leather belt and shrugged off my dress before hanging it to dry on the tree’s lowest branch, along with my threadbare breastband. Goose bumps peppered my skin almost instantly, but I knew it’d be even worse if I kept my wet dress on.
It was when the cool air hit my thighs and my belly that I remembered I wasn’t wearing a loincloth. My hand reached hesitantly between my legs, grazing the curls there. There was no blood left; the lake’s water had washed it all away. Only the pain remained. At last, alone, I let sadness overwhelm me and did nothing to stop the hot tears rolling down my cheeks. It was often like that, I told myself. Arun looked at me, too, when I washed my arms and my face after a day of chores. If it hadn’t been Servilius, it would have probably been him; what difference did it make when girls were made for that sort of thing anyway? It didn’t matter.
But the tears wouldn’t stop, and neither would the sobs shaking my frame. I was seeing him again, his sweaty bearded jowl against my neck as he pushed me against the table. I’d let him touch me at first, slide his hand up my dress eagerly. He wanted to kiss me but something deep inside me had rebelled at the idea that the first man I’d ever kiss would be Servilius, so I’d turned my head away while he tried to shove aside my loincloth with blunt, clumsy fingers. I kept telling myself he just wanted to touch, like all men did.
But his trousers had come off.
I thought of his white belly, of the sudden, searing pain. My skin crawled, and my stomach heaved with the need to throw up at the memory. He’d said that was how girls became women. Made me one such woman. I had tried to squeeze my eyes shut so I wouldn’t see his face, but with each agonizing stab in my womb, each happy grunt against my neck, a burning anger had welled inside me, that I had never suspected was there. Under my palm, I’d found the stone pestle my mother used to grind herbs and nuts. It was like being struck by lightning, feeling it rip down my arm all the way to my hand. I’d never imagined I had that in me, enough rage to strike a man.
It had felt good, the flash of red arcing in the air, his broken teeth flying out, clattering across the floor. He’d fallen onto his ass in his own blood and tried to grab the pitcher to throw it at me, but he had missed and sent it crashing on the table instead. And I’d run, without thinking, under the rain, past gray hills that faded in the clouds, down the road we took to go the lake, and into the woods. Now, the soldier’s treasure, my fast legs, and my anger were all I had left in the world. So, I let myself fall back into the bed of cool, high grass, and closed my eyes.
•♦•
It tickled. My lips, then my nose, and it wouldn’t stop. My hand jerked to scratch the itch away and met something soft and squishy. I sat up and tossed the caterpillar aside before it had a chance to worm its way up my nostrils—perils of life in the great outdoors. I blinked the sleep from my eyes, blinded by the morning sunlight trickling through the sigillaria’s thick foliage.
I felt dizzy, slow. I licked my parched lips over and over, as the events of the day before slowly returned to me. A jolt of sudden panic whipped me awake for good. I looked around, fearing I’d find Lar, Arun, and Mamarcius ready to catch me. But it was just the birds singing in the trees and me, the water coming from the cave in the pool shimmering invitingly while the crusamantes slept, their sated petals rolled into tight buds.
I dragged myself to the pool and drank, throwing caution to the wind. I knew the lake’s water could make you sick if you were unlucky—according to Arun the reason was that fish shat in there—but I was desperate. I could do a little longer without food, but not without water. Once I had quenched my thirst, I got to my feet and walked back to the tree. My dress was dry, and the soldier’s treasure still sat on its rock, now warm to the touch from baking in the sun. His boots stank, but maybe I could wear them after I washed them; they looked sturdier than my sandals.
After I’d dressed, I took the satchel and emptied its contents into the grass, marveling at my good fortune. The stench of his spare woolen trousers and socks was barely tolerable, but I trusted that enough washing would make them good as new. He had a knife, and his waterskin was still full—although I wouldn’t trust any liquid that had been sitting in there since his death. There was also a metal bowl and a spoon, and strange dice I had never seen around here—I counted twelve sides.
My heart drummed a little faster when a small leather purse revealed the glint of five—five! —silver sigli. He was rich! I studied the noble profile struck into the metal with an appreciative frown. I had never seen any of those in my parents’ hands. Like my mother would sometimes say, we didn’t see the emperor’s face much around the lake. There was nothing to be done with all that money here in the woods, but once I reached a town… I’d eat sweet meat there every day.
A low growl rose from my stomach in response to the thought, and I gulped down the sudden rush of saliva under my tongue. I set on finishing my examination of the soldier’s belongings to take my mind away from the hunger clawing at my stomach. He carried a few parchment papers whose oily ink had resisted the water fairly well. I traced the columns of signs on the thin layer of ibex skin, torn between a sense of mild awe and frustration. Was it maybe a letter, or something important and official? I gave a bitter snort. What did it matter to me, who couldn’t even read my own name? At least I could burn them to light a fire, since he had a nice steel striker.
Tucked in a cracked leather scabbard, I found a dagger, whose sharp incurved blade I caressed reverently, before laying it next to the rest of his belongings. I gazed down at my treasure, pondering my next move. Going back was out of question: I risked running into Lar and Arun—or even Servilius once his mouth was healed. My jaw clenched in renewed anger at the prospect. I’d rather his gums bleed for the rest of his life.
I could follow the lakeshore east, but what if the soldier really came from Nyos and the Lorian legions were killing everyone there? Better hide in the woods for now. I could use his equipment to collar all sorts of animals, and I liked my secret clearing; I felt safe here. I nodded to myself; I could stay here a few days, just long enough to figure a good plan.
I’ve made my way through the charred ruins of enough villages burned to the ground since to understand that there is, in each of us—even in the bravest traveler—a sedentary instinct, a need for a home, which won’t be denied. It’s the feeling that rivets the farmer in his field even as clouds swell and darken on the horizon. The weakness that gets them killed.
3
Tia’s barking didn’t resound in the woods that day, nor the day after. I figured that tending to Servilius’s now toothless mouth and taking over his work while he recovered kept my family busy enough that they wouldn’t waste their time scouring the lakeshore to look for me. When my hunger grew too strong, I swam back into the cave and ventured a few feet away from the entrance to pick up some musca nuts and mushrooms.
I mustn’t do that again; the shore isn’t safe, I reminded myself as I chewed on this meager meal on the morning of the third day in my hideout. Sunlight filtered down the sigillaria’s leaves, mottling my shoulders with warm spots. Around me, the crusamantes had fallen asleep and curled their petals over struggling flies. I cast them an envious glance. I’d have given anything for a little meat too.
I looked around at the clearing, wiping my hands on my dress. If only rhagamuses ventured down there, I migh
t collar one. They didn’t taste very good and there was very little flesh to suck from their tiny bones, but it would at least be something. They could neither swim across the cave though, nor jump down the steep rocks encasing the clearing. They were up there, in the woods. Free.
My hands bunched the coarse fabric on my lap; the modest ankle-length covering my legs suddenly felt too heavy, unbearably cumbersome. There had been a time, before I first bled, when I wore nothing but a short tunic and ran, did cartwheels, and played with my doll. I’d even climbed onto our farm’s roof once, at the age of ten. My father had climbed up to fetch me, and I thought he might scold me, but instead it had made him laugh, the two of us sitting on the thatched roof like a pair of birds.
He had good legs, too, until he cracked one open trying to catch a runaway horse. There was no doctor, and the stinky paste my mother made of piss and ferula seeds couldn’t save him. She even cut some of her hair to dedicate the locks to Meditrina, but the wound festered; the leg turned bad—a deep shade of purple that meant he’d lose it. We prayed to the goddess, but the fever killed him before anyone could decide to cut the limb. My mother gave him the final kiss, so his soul could travel through her breath, and he was buried the day after.
We had no wine or grain to spare for a dead man, and much less a coin for the Obol to pay for his journey to the underworld, but Servilius came to our home and gave my mother two bronze assari for the Obol and some herbed wine in a nice engraved glass bottle so she could fulfill her duties to my father’s departed soul. Lar and Arun helped us burn the body too.
My mother was grateful, and Servilius came to our house a lot after that, until we packed what little we had and went to live with him. It was, in fact, a marriage, but I never thought of calling it that, and I don’t remember any particular ceremony. Maybe they joined hands in front of a neighbor; widows were a second-rate commodity that didn’t really warrant a floral wreath or a delicate yellow veil. Not long after that, I’d woken up one morning and found my thighs sticky with dark blood. My mother sewed a dress that day, and I knew my childhood was over.
How long had it been since? Three, maybe four years? Was there any of that freedom left in me, a tiny part Servilius could never touch?
Only one way to know.
I went to retrieve the knife from my satchel. I grabbed my dress and pressed the blade mid-thigh, nicking the fabric. Yet my hand hesitated to tear ahead and get rid of that length of dirty wool that separated a girl from a woman—or rather a woman from a whore. I closed my eyes, thought of my father laughing atop the roof, and ripped my dress all around until it was a tunic again.
I considered the remnants of the garment and decided they’d make good shin bands, and a better, tighter breastband than my old one. I tore the wool into large ribbons and fastened them around my torso, and around my legs to protect them from scrapes and cuts. The soldier’s spare trousers and boots weren’t quite clean even after I’d rinsed them the day before, but they’d be a considerable improvement from my old straw sandals.
I tucked the knife in my belt and went to examine the steep wall. Trailing hesitant fingers across the mossy rock, I craned my neck to glimpse the top. There were a few good holds, but they looked slippery. My stomach coiled in protest as I grabbed a protruding edge I deemed safe enough. Even for a lean girl, I was definitely heavier than my ten-year-old self. Untrained muscles in my shoulders tightened and ached from the effort to haul my weight atop the first hold. I found a ledge I could comfortably stand on and soon found my rhythm until was halfway up the wall, my heart drumming with fearful elation as the sigillaria’s top leaves tickled my back. I glanced down at my satchel resting under the trunk. My hands, my arms, my thighs all throbbed with a sort of diffuse, almost pleasant pain. I felt light-headed, as if I’d drunk from a cup with too much wine and too little water to cut it.
I grew bold, straining to reach precarious holds, careless of the emerald patches of moss painting the stone. Until my fingers slipped. My heart rose up my throat in a panicked rush as I clawed at the rock in vain. I saw myself falling and breaking my legs like my father, but I didn’t let go. I clutched the closest hold even harder, until my fingertips bled, and even then, I didn’t let go.
I found myself stuck five feet from the top, gasping for air as pain flared under my nails. I stood spread-eagle against the wall with nothing but even riskier holds to get me all the way up. I pressed my forehead against a cool patch of moss, exhaling my fear, digging deep into myself to find the spark of courage I needed to beat this. All I found was anger, thundering rage against the silent rock, my weak and aching body. Against Servilius.
Maybe I needed anger more than courage, after all. I tapped into that bitter stream as I climbed on a ledge too narrow to welcome more than the balls of my feet, slipped again, nearly fell, and kept going, until I looked up and saw a fringe of grass atop the wall. I was too exhausted to be happy—I could barely breathe as it was—yet, the final effort seemed the easiest. I forgot the agony in my shoulders and my bruised hands. I pushed my legs one last time, and the squishy expanse of fragrant grass was everywhere.
I rolled to my back with a groan of relief. The sky was looking down at me; the sun rained on my skin through the canopy. I wanted nothing, and there was no pain, just the steady beat of my heart, calming down after the storm. Time stretched blissfully until my rest was cut short by a sudden rustling in the undergrowth. I sprang up and crouched in the grass. Listening. My sanctuary was at least a quarter league away from the trail crossing the woods, but maybe someone had wandered away from the path. Or maybe a blue wolf? No; they only came out at nightfall—and I’d need to be careful about them too. They tended to avoid men for fear of being turned into a fashionable winter cloak, but I knew better than most how dangerous a frightened beast could be.
Something crashed through the thicket and tore past me with a familiar squeak. I let my head drop and hung low between my shoulders, drawing a frustrated breath. A rhagamuse, and I’d missed it! I rose and kicked the grass, as if it might distract me from the hunger clawing at my gut. I wouldn’t let the next one escape.
•♦•
I had perhaps been too confident in my budding hunting skills. Hours must have gone by; the sun was halfway through its course in the sky, and all I’d eaten were some brown mushrooms. There was a small clearing on the slope that rolled down to the lake’s rocky neck: I placed a makeshift twine collar there, right next to a patch of bloodberries, and sat watch there, lying flat in the tall grass, munching on my last mushroom. I swore under my breath and kept waiting, baking under the noon sun like an idiot until, less than twenty feet away, the grass blades stirred suspiciously. I went rigid.
A pair of ears emerged from all that green, much longer than those of a rhagamuse, and coated with silvery brown fur. A hare! Salivating in anticipation, I flattened my palms on the bed of humus and bent my legs a fraction, seeking leverage against a tree stub. The hare gobbled the berries one by one, carefully avoiding the collar, going so far as to nudge it away with its nose when it got in the way of his feast. I was starting to think I should just have kept the fruits for myself and given up, instead of watching that nutsack eat them and taunt me like that.
After the hare ate the last berry, I saw the moment it’d just run away. Since I had nothing left to lose—not even my berries—I pounced. Never had I been so acutely aware of the explosion inside me, the instant every piece of the complex machinery of bones, muscles, and sinew came together and propelled me forward, always a little higher, a little farther than before. The hare saw it, too, and sprang so high I thought for a moment it’d disappear in the clouds. I went after it, and ran, one breath after another, my toes only touching the ground long enough to send me flying forward, my arms bent at my sides like rigid blades swinging in tune with my legs to go faster. Faster.
The trees, the sun, and the grass became a shimmering blur spinning around a single goal: the brownish dot dashing away from m
e. I saw and felt the distance grow between us and, deep down, I knew it’d take a miracle by Picumnus for me to catch up with a damn hare, but I didn’t care. I was ten again, leaping over rocks and trunks, drunk on the fire flowing through my veins, the speed. I gave myself up to the burn in my muscles, the maddening beat in my chest.
Was it the hare who slowed down, hindered by the terrain, or me who grew wings? I don’t remember—but I’ll never forget that brilliant moment when, for the first time, I knew my prey was too slow, just within reach. It was the single instant before it all ended that felt the best, the raw power when the hare tried to dash into a hole, and I threw myself to the ground to catch it.
I didn’t even feel the rough landing that followed, the rocks and pine needles biting into my skin. All I knew was the warm fur under my fingertips and the frantic pulse of its heart, so similar to mine. The hare squirmed and strained desperately in my hold, but I didn’t let go. My fingers clamped around its neck. We looked each other in the eye, two shiny marbles reflecting each other. Predator and prey. Something welled in my chest, guilt maybe. I squeezed anyway, clumsily, until it stopped struggling and went limp in my grip.
After it was done, I was submerged once again by the same sense of peace I had felt after my climb. I strolled back to my sanctuary without a care, basking in the waning warmth of the dead hare in my satchel. Yet, above my head, the sky was turning a dark blue already and the air was damp with the promise of a storm.
4
We rarely ate meat back at home, but when we did get a little game for dinner, I was often the one to skin it. I did a quick job of the hare and skewered it with a branch before I went to wash my bloody hands in the pool. I studied the eerie palor of my fingers in the water, the pinkish swirls of blood. The hare wasn’t the first creature I’d killed, but this time it felt different; I wasn’t sure why. Maybe because I’d never hunted before.
