White Lotus

by Libbie Hawker

  With Memphis in sight, after days of learning Iadmon’s temper and habits and his calm, patient ways, Doricha felt sure that her master was the type of man whom she could grow to respect—could even like, if a slave might hold any real affection for the person who owned her. Iadmon seemed honest and forthright enough to please anyone, though Doricha held full judgment in reserve. She was insightful enough to realize that at the age of twelve she couldn’t quite trust herself to be the keenest observer of men’s characters. But she did appreciate Iadmon’s direct conversation, which did not seem to hide anything from her, even when the topics they discussed were not altogether pleasant. She appreciated his careful clarity. Every afternoon on their journey, Iadmon had sat with Doricha on cushions beneath the Samian Wind’s curtained canopy to discuss the weeks and months ahead. He told her everything he could think to tell about the training she would receive, the ways he planned to shaped and mold her until she became the high-class, competitive hetaera he expected her to be. Iadmon never minced a single word, even when his descriptions of the acts she would one day perform made Doricha blush and squirm. “It is best that you be prepared, that you meet your work head-on and undaunted,” he had told her. And Doricha agreed.

  The Samian Wind turned its nose toward a large estate at the city’s northern edge. The property was surrounded by a high, white wall; Doricha could see little of what lay within that enclosure, save for the upper edge of a roof-top, flat and expansive and bristling with potted shade palms, their fronts stirring gently in the afternoon breeze. A long stone quay, darkened by age and the river’s dampness, reached like a welcoming hand toward them.

  “Home,” Aesop said, coming up behind Doricha. He leaned on the boat’s rail beside her, so she stood between Aesop and Iadmon, between her master and her tutor.

  When Iadmon had announced that morning that Aesop was to oversee Doricha in all things—her training, her education, her induction into Memphis society—she had been so delighted she had clapped her hands and hopped in place, the soles of her new sandals tapping on the boat’s deck. She had grown to like Aesop even more than she liked Iadmon. On the journey from Tanis, Aesop had often entertained Doricha with riddles, and whenever she would start to sniffle over her family, or gaze wistfully back over the ship’s stern toward the distant, vanishing Delta, the short, slightly hunched man would distract her with funny tales about talking animals who played clever tricks on one another. Aesop was not only sharp-witted and wise, but kind enough to see Doricha’s pain and offer his stories to relieve her of her wretchedness, even if only for a short while.

  Iadmon’s crew furled the red sail of the Samian Wind. Doricha retreated with Aesop to the boat’s mast, watching with fascination as the men worked together to moor the boat at the dark stone quay. They were like the many legs of a spider or a centipede, moving in a perfectly coordinated dance. The Samian Wind came to rest gently against its pier. The boat’s narrow ramp ran out with a great, ringing clatter.

  Iadmon was, of course, the first to descend the ramp. He left Aesop to look after Doricha; she watched as the master in his vibrant yellow chiton and perfectly draped, gently rippling chlamys strode along the quay toward his home. The white wall of his grand estate featured a towering, double-doored gate, painted the turquoise color Egyptians loved. The gate’s two faces were crossed by great, glittering straps of polished bronze. It swung open at Iadmon’s distant shout. Beyond lay a garden in full bloom—a riot of colors that blazed enticingly in the sun. Doricha watched Iadmon disappear amid that clamor of brightness. He seemed the very key she needed to unlock a luminous new world, one full of endless possibilities.

  But there is still a wall around that world, Doricha thought, squinting at the estate. Rather a high wall, too.

  “Come.” Aesop took Doricha by the hand and led her down the ship’s ramp. His skin was warm and soft, as unmarked by labor as Iadmon’s. But it would have been a grave mistake to assume that Aesop was idle. By now, Doricha knew that the work Aesop did for their master was not physical, but mental—and no less onerous for that. Iadmon’s reliance on Aesop was plain. So was his courteous treatment of the slave. Aesop seemed satisfied quite with his lot in life, as far as Doricha could tell—and how not? His deformity was mild, yet still it was evident. A person like Aesop could hope for little in life. And here he was, the closest confidante of a very rich man—the most valued member of his household.

  Reckon I can rise as high as Aesop someday, Doricha told herself. Only I won’t stay with Iadmon, no matter how kind he treats me. I’ll buy my freedom and go back to Thrace as soon as the gods will let me.

  The plank wavered and bounced beneath their feet; Doricha kept her eyes on the turquoise gate and avoided looking down into the dark green depths of the water below. She could feel a breath of coolness rising up from the surface of the river, brushing the bare skin of her legs with gentle fingers. It was a refreshing sensation—even enticing. But the boat’s ramp was narrow and wobbly, and a fall to the river or the quay would be long. She breathed a tiny sigh of relief when she stood on solid ground again. The pier seemed to sway beneath her, rising and falling almost imperceptibly with the remembered rocking of the Samian Wind. But all reason told her the quay was as bone-solid as any patch of dry land the gods ever made. It was only a trick her head played on her, to feel the ground move the way the river and the boat had moved.

  Aesop’s movement was just as strange as the phantom swaying beneath her feet. His gait shambled, no doubt due to the same mild deformity that hunched his shoulders. Doricha had to slow her natural pace so that she could follow him, but that gave her more time to take in the glories of Iadmon’s garden. As soon as she and Aesop passed beneath the high, flat-topped arch of the gate, a world of sweet delights unfolded to either side. Symmetrical beds lined the footpath, each one carpeted thickly with black Nile silt and crowned with heaps of flowers. The flowers were like the colored clouds of sunset, come down to rest against welcoming earth. The atmosphere within the walls was peaceful and still, laced with the notes of bird song and underscored by the hum of the bees that bobbed from one blossom to the next. Perfumes of lilies and roses hung sweetly in the air, delightful after so many months in Tanis’s stinking back district. Doricha walked along leisurely behind her tutor, breathing in the honey-sweet air so deeply that her head was soon quite dizzy.

  Presently, Doricha and Aesop left the well-ordered peace of the garden behind. They entered the blue shade of a huge portico, its timber roof held up by a row of pillars. The pillars, like the great house they adorned, were made of pale, prim limestone and painted in bands and of bright, angular figures—old Egyptian art that spoke of long tradition and great power. A double door, painted, like the gate, in the bright turquoise-blue of a summer sky, stood open in welcome—but Doricha checked on its threshold.

  “What’s the matter, child?” Aesop turned back, concern plain on his broad face.

  “It’s all so fine and beautiful,” Doricha said. “I feel as if I don’t belong.”

  He chuckled and grinned at her indulgently. “But of course you belong. You are Iadmon’s now—his special investment. You are as much a part of this place as flowers in the garden or the ship standing at the quay.”

  Aesop held out his hand, but Doricha did not take it right away. She paused a moment longer, staring apprehensively at the high roof of the portico, the bold-painted design of hunters pursuing birds and hippopotamus among river swaying reeds. Can I truly belong here? Doricha wondered. She didn’t think she truly could, no matter how long Aesop and her master trained and shaped her. But her tutor was waiting. Doricha did not want to make him feel impatient. She slipped her hand into his, and Aesop led her inside.

  The portico gave way to a spacious hall, its floor made of limestone so pale and smooth-polished that it shone like silver. Niches lined the entryway, and each one housed a small statue of a god or goddess. Doricha gazed at them in open wonder as she passed. Some of the gods were Egyptian—
straight-backed, stern-faced, posed with stiff, proud strides. Many of them had animals’ heads on human bodies, a curious feature of Egyptian deity that Doricha had never quite grown used to, despite the two years her family had spent in that country. Other gods were Greek, and more familiar. She recalled them distantly, summoning up memories of visits to the temples in Thrace. She recognized Bacchus with his wide, wild grin and his crown of cascading grapes. And there was Eirene, mistress of peace. There stood Boreas, the North Wind, whose gusty breath made it possible to navigate the River Nile.

  Best of all—the most bracing and encouraging sight—was Strymon, Lord of Rivers, with his thick, curly, wind-blown beard and his great vessel raised up to his muscular shoulder, pouring out endless currents of water. True Greeks like Iadmon respected Strymon, of course—for in what land is a river not considered sacred? But Strymon meant more to Doricha than Iadmon or Aesop could have guessed. The river god was the father of Thrace, Doricha’s homeland. It gave her a tiny seed of hope to find Strymon here, of all places.

  Aesop noted Doricha’s fascination with the niches. “They are beautiful statues, aren’t they?”

  “Oh, ah, yes,” she replied. “Every one is so pretty. Why, they’re all painted so finely. And look here, this cat goddess has a jeweled collar round her neck!”

  “Iadmon demands the finest things in life, and he gets them,” Aesop said.

  “But does he worship all these gods? There are so many!”

  Aesop smiled wryly. “Let us say that our master hedges his bets. He is prudent and careful. Come; there is much more to see.”

  Beyond the hall of gods lay a room floored with plush carpets and ringed all about with high couches made of ornately carved wood. The couches were strewn with stacks of linen-white pillows; each one had its own small table, too.

  “The andron,” Aesop said, noting the direction of Doricha’s awed stare. “It is the men’s room. The master and his male guests take their meals there, and enjoy their entertainment there, too.”

  “Do Egyptian women eat in so fine a place, too?”

  “The andron is a Greek custom, not Egyptian. Egyptian women and men mingle in ways that most Greeks find quite shocking, I assure you. Did you not have separate dining rooms at your home in Thrace?”

  She blushed, looking down at her toes. They were scrubbed clean now, and seemed very slender and frail in her ornately stitched sandals. “We were poor in Thrace, though not as poor as we were in Egypt. Our home was very small and humble-like.”

  Aesop smiled gently and answered her original question. “No, Doricha; the women’s room—the gynaeceum—is not as fine as the andron. But the women’s room is prized more for its seclusion and peace than for its richness. The gynaeceum is a comfortable room, though—I can assure you of that. Iadmon’s female servants and slaves use it quite happily; it is their retreat from their cares. When his guests bring their wives or daughters, they gather in the gynaeceum, too. You will join them there, now and again. But more often than not, you’ll be here in the andron, learning how to pour wine and serve men.”

  She looked up again, taking in the fine, luxurious room, imagining important men of means reclining on the couches. The thought of being the only female creature in that room, flitting about with a wine jug, made sweat spring up on her back and beneath her arms.

  Aesop noted her discomfiture. He drew her away from the andron, further into the depths of Iadmon’s home. “You needn’t worry about the serving. I will train you carefully, and will be there in the shadows to correct you until you’re so skilled at it, anyone would believe you’d been born to the task.”

  He noted a woman crossing the hall ahead. “Helena, this is Doricha, our new girl. She’s to become a hetaera someday. You’ll see her settled into her chamber, won’t you? I sent word ahead that a chamber should be prepared.”

  Helena smiled and nodded. She was an older woman, well into her fourth decade, with the honey-brown skin and black hair of a native-born Egyptian. Like Aesop and Doricha, Helena was draped in a loose tunic of white linen, belted with a bright-blue sash. The tunic and sash were the marks of Iadmon’s slaves, Doricha realized.

  Helena reached out a motherly hand. Doricha went to her, with one wide-eyed glance back at Aesop.

  “You needn’t worry,” Aesop said as Helena led Doricha away. “I’ll see you in the morning, first thing. But you are no doubt tired, and need your rest now. Go with Helena; she will take good care of you.” With that, Aesop was gone, disappearing down another corridor to tend to some other business of Iadmon’s. Doricha turned and followed sedately behind Helena.

  The halls of the master’s house echoed with the sound of Doricha’s footsteps. Helena was quiet and patient, not threatening in the least—yet still Doricha shivered in her company. She had grown to know Aesop over the days of their voyage from Tanis. Without him, she felt hopelessly alone and exposed in a world that was far too grand for an urchin like her.

  Helena steered Doricha toward a narrow door. She opened it to reveal a chamber that was nearly as small as the door itself. There was just enough space for a small bed. A pitcher of water and a bowl for washing were perched on a narrow wooden stand; a chamber pot rested underneath the stand. A tiny window, hardly more than a slit in the limestone, was recessed into the wall opposite the door. It glowed with afternoon light.

  “Not as fine as the rest of the house,” Helena said in accented Greek, “but all the slaves have the same sort of room. Simple, yes—but comfortable enough for living.”

  Doricha stepped inside and looked about, numb with dismay. She was used to small rooms—that didn’t bother. But she wasn’t used to being alone. Her family’s home in Thrace had been small, just as she’d told Aesop, but Doricha had never been lonely inside it. Her mother or her father had always been near, and later Aella and the boys had come along, filling the house with their squalls and their laughter. Doricha had never had a room entirely to herself. Nor had she ever slept alone. She didn’t know how to sleep without her sister kicking her or the twins rolling over and pulling the blankets off in the middle of the night.

  “It’s time for evening meal,” Helena said. “Normally we all eat together in the gynaeceum, but I’ll bring you a bite here. Just you settle in today; the bed is small, but it’s good and soft. There aren’t luckier slaves in all of Memphis.”

  The door closed softly. Doricha was alone with the silence, alone with the single beam of light that spilled in through the narrow window. Specks of dust swirled slowly in the light, glittering like gold, but no shimmer of beauty could trick Doricha’s eye. Now, at last, she saw her situation for what it truly was. She crossed the few steps to her window and peered outside. The garden was wide, bursting with color; its sweet breath drifted to Doricha on the breeze. The flowers might have cheered her, if not for the fact that beyond them she could see the wall. Towering, solid—immovable limestone—it hemmed in all Iadmon’s possessions with a sweep of its massive, unbreachable arms. Iadmon’s estate… everything he owned. She was his property now, as surely as any pretty rose or slender lily in the garden. There was no way to get beyond that wall without her master’s permission—without her master’s will.

  Reckon it’ll be a long time before I’m good enough at this business to buy my way free, Doricha mused darkly. And maybe I never will be good enough, after all.

  As a poor laborer’s daughter in Thrace, and even as a street rat in Tanis, Doricha had at least been free to come and go as she pleased. But now even that scanty freedom had met its end.

  The blue sash around her waist seemed to constrict like the coils of a hungry snake. Doricha tugged at the sash, trying to loosen it, but it was tied quite firmly. Tears blurred her eyes.

  Suppose I ought to be grateful, she thought grimly. He didn’t put rings in my ears or nose, nor tattoo my skin.

  She had seen ringed and tattooed slaves before. Even a collar would have been harder to bear than a mere sash, for only beasts wore collars. She
blinked, but the tears would not clear from her sight.

  Presently, Helena brought Doricha’s supper, a simple but nourishing meal of flat bread, stewed figs, and a cone of soft white cheese, accompanied by strips of something red-brown, dry, and hard. Doricha picked up one of the hard, red bits and examined it. A piece of hide? What good would that do her? After Helena had gone, Doricha sniffed the dry strip and realized it was the preserved flesh of some pungent, oily fish. She dropped it back onto the tray with a clatter.

  She had no appetite, not even for the sweet figs. She left the tray untouched beside the pitcher of water and the washing bowl, and crawled up on the bed. There she drew her legs up against her chest and pressed her back to the cold stone wall, just as she had done in Tanis when Iadmon had come for her. The stillness of the room was stifling. She rocked herself gently from side to side and tried to hum a Thracian lullaby. But the tune stuck in her throat and only made her eyes burn all the worse.

  Some time later—and hour or two, to judge by the paling of the garden light, the bluish tint of dusk—Helena came back for the tray. The dark-haired woman looked silently at Doricha’s untouched supper for a long moment. Then she turned a look of unbearable pity on Doricha herself. Doricha couldn’t stand the sight of Helena’s eyes, strained at their corners and eloquent with soft-hearted sympathy. She buried her face against her knees and refused to look at the slave woman again, refused to speak.

  “Child,” Helena said softly, “you must eat your food.”

  Doricha made no reply. The river wind moved fitfully in the garden outside, and in its breathy whisper she thought she could hear faint murmurs of the Thracian tongue.