Bird of Chaos: Book One of the Harpy's Curse

by Susie Mander

  My mother’s dismembered head floats over the banister above us. “I have put up with a lot from you Verne, but this time you go too far. I told you not to leave the palace and yet you spent the entire night at the temple. What am I supposed to think?”

  “I told you, I got trapped by the storm.”

  She ignores me and addresses her war-wit. “Nike, when she comes back from the Seawall you and Adamon are to guard the exit to her room. She is not to leave the palace again.”

  My freedom is shrinking and I want to scream but I remain silent in my defiance. I wait until she has turned away then speak to Nike. “I think she has lost it.”

  When he smiles, Nike’s teeth are big and white.

  Passing through the gardens, the sound of running water and the willow leaves rustling against the riverbank soothe my anxious atrama. Ash from the fires in Minesend fills my nostrils and threatens to make me sneeze. There is a litter waiting and I step lightly up. The big war-wit walks beside me.

  We exit the palace behind the apartments through the rarely-used East Gate which opens onto a narrow dirt road, rutted like a washboard. It leads to only two places: the killing fields, a mass grave for the executed, and the Seawall. I travel with my head lowered, lost in thought.

  We stop at the base of the Seawall which rises up and up, perfectly straight and smooth. Around us the earth undulates, each hill covered in tufts of dry grass, each smooth valley all that remains of the corpses that have been covered over.

  Nike uses a key to open a tiny iron gate in the Seawall and we pass through a long dark tunnel that drips with water. The ground is damp beneath our feet. Algae grows along the edges. We step out into the light and onto a stone platform. It is low tide and the ocean crashes at our feet. At high tide, water will cover the platform and make it half way up the tunnel.

  We stand with our backs to the Seawall admiring the view. The blue ocean reaches out to a blue sky. The horizon is a perfectly straight line between our world and the next.

  “It’s easy to forget how insignificant we are until you see that,” I say and the war-wit nods in agreement. I am thankful for my ability to see the beauty of the world despite the growing darkness inside me. “We may as well get this over and done with.”

  I turn back to the Seawall and look up. Scars, outlines of bricked-up doorways, are made more sinister by the unnatural sounds that emanate from within. Behind the doorways criminals die from starvation and dehydration. The Seawall moans and weeps. At times it bangs and demands to be set free.

  Nike points to an empty niche positioned a foot above the high water mark. “That’ll do,” I say. He holds out his hand to steady me as I step up into the hole. It is a perfect fit. My arms hang freely beside me without quite touching the sides. There is an inch between my head and the ceiling. I turn to face Nike and smile sadly. He makes a gesture that says, “Forgive me.”

  “It is not your fault,” I say then laugh without humour. “Just don’t forget I’m in here.”

  As he goes to shut me in, a thought occurs to me and I jam my foot in the door. “Nike?” I say, opening it to look at the war-wit. A frown pulls at my skin as I remember the dream. “Was Harryet put in here last night?”

  The war-wit nods.

  I gasp. So my dream was true.

  “Is she all right?”

  He points back towards the tunnel.

  “She is already out?”

  He nods.

  “Good,” I say. “Will you tell her I have returned and I am safe?”

  He nods and I settle back into my coffin so he can shut the door. I watch a slice of light diminish and then disappear completely. The dark is an old acquaintance. A familiar sense of panic flickers in my belly—There’s no air! You are going to suffocate! They’ll forget you and you’ll die in here!—and I squash it by closing my eyes and focusing on my breathing. Bricks prickle the skin on my back and arms. I am aware of a very faint stream of air coming through the base of the door. The compartment is too small for me to kneel and drink it but I picture it seeping into my death-chamber and flowing in absolving circles around my head and into my lungs.

  Beneath me the waves crash against the Seawall. I try to distract myself from thoughts of freedom.

  Can there be freedom when our perspective is restricted and our view limited to that which we see down our nose, our hands and our feet? I ask myself to keep myself from going mad with fear. The immense ocean creeps up and up and up. Drayk’s words come to me: Our perspective is all we know. We cannot know another’s truth. We are the victims of our shortsightedness, our desire, our rage.

  I imagine the sea seeping in through the crack at my feet. I have to work hard to breathe normally.

  Our passion blinds us to the hopes and feelings of those around us. We cannot even know the reality of our neighbour or our beloved. We believe they see as we see, feel as we feel, but this is a fallacy. Unless we can see them from within, unless we can be them, we are blind and our blindness holds us back.

  I am almost certain the crashing waves are louder now. If the water gets in I’ll drown.

  I try to see from the perspective of another being. I imagine I am both beside and within the bird Callirhoe flying over Tibuta.

  We are out at sea.

  The dusty-grey-and-white shearwater soars a few feet from the surface using the windshear between the waves to gather energy. Skating down the face of a rolling hill she launches off an upwards draft and climbs into the air. I imagine I am soaring. I feel instantly better.

  Tibuta’s Seawall juts out of the sea like a great column. It encircles the entire island with only one break, a watergate where supply ships can pass beneath the portcullis and travel up Elea Bay. Millennia ago the miners dug deeper and deeper in search of the rare Tibutan Gold Marble. They scraped away at Tibuta’s core like surgeons working on a festering tumour. That they risked waking the Fire did not stop them. They kept on digging even though it meant almost certain destruction. But as the miners dug, the stonemasons built the Seawall to keep the water at bay. It got higher and higher and the ground sank lower and lower until the city sat below water level in a bowl of sand and red dirt.

  The bird soars vertically up, up, and over the Seawall, where slaves gather seawater in large copper drums to douse the fires in Minesend. Below, Tibuta Island stretches out: a rutted landscape of brown where the new mines in the hills surrounding the city are like yawning mouths. The slaves run between the Seawall and the fire with the water drums over their heads like ants. When one collapses with exhaustion the others simply find a new path around him.

  High above Tibuta the sounds of the mines, which stop for no fire, reach the bird: the sound of spades and axes—clunk, clunk clunk—of heaving, and of great weight being dragged over great distances.

  Tentacles of fire coil from the windows at the palace in Minesend. The palace staff—war-wits, holy consorts, chefs and stableboys—spew out the front gate to face the Shark’s Teeth. Others, including my cousin Gelesia and her son Chase, escape out the back into the narrow streets of Minesend.

  The bird flies past the agora in Veraura, a collection of stalls where the truly destitute—cripples and the elderly—have put up tents and mounds of rocks with makeshift walls as symbolic boundaries around their territory. An old woman in rags rummages through a mound of rubbish looking for scraps of corn husks or rotting parsley. A scrawny cat with tattered ears waits at the woman’s feet for a morsel of food tossed her way. Mangy kylons lie in the shade. They are starving the lot of them and could not care less whether the Shark’s Teeth have chosen their home for headquarters.

  The bird flies through the wealthier suburbs of Lete and Bidwell Heights and finally into Elea Bay where two large buildings jut out from the horizon: the palace at the district’s geological centre and the temple, which is arguably Tibuta’s spiritual heart, on the city’s rim to the north.

  When Nike opens the door the night sky glows red. It is low tide again. I gasp with relief
as I step into the glorious fresh air and gulp it up. “Nike, has the castle in Minesend been attacked?” I say and the war-wit nods. A screech from above makes me call in delight, “Callirhoe!” I know that bird circling above us; I know her long white wings tipped in brown-grey, cruciform in flight, her tubular white body and her head capped in brown. And somehow I know that Callirhoe is responsible for my visions. My dreams, the things I see: this is my gift. It is underdeveloped yes, but it is a gift nonetheless and with it I may just learn to overcome my shortsightedness.

  “Nike, speak to Cook. He has been hoarding food in the lower storeroom. Have him send supplies to Minesend. I doubt Gelesia will be in a position to help her people for some time and they are starving.”

  The war-wit nods.

  “And don’t tell my mother.”

  His grin dazzles. He signs, “I wouldn’t dare.”

  At the East Gate, I step out of the litter on shaky legs. The ocean still rages in my ears. My lips are dry and cracked. I have not eaten in close to twelve hours and my belly aches. A shriek like that of an excited child reaches me through the dark: “Verne!” A pair of soldiers standing at the rear of the East Terrace look up, see Harryet bounding across the grass, and go back to their conversation. She races towards me as though she is going to sweep me into the air then pulls up short. “You’re all right.” It is a statement that brings her much relief. Her chest rises and falls as she tries to catch her breath; her big eyes glisten in the dark.

  “I’m sorry she put you in the Seawall,” I say, linking arms with her and heading towards the apartments.

  “Did you find what you were looking for?”

  “I did.”

  “Then it was worth it.” She waves at the guards as we pass. Only her eyes show she is mocking them. I laugh and slap her arm playfully. “What?” she says in feigned innocence.

  Security is all Harryet Nathos ever wanted. She has found it in the bubbling stews in the kitchen, the crisp white sheets on the washing line and the trinkets on my dresser, which she dusts and lines up neatly every morning. But security is an illusion. We seek that which gives us a semblance of it—routine, predictability—to convince ourselves we are masters of our own destiny when in reality the gods fill our sails and blow our ships where they will: to safe shores or against the rocks—whatever suits their purpose. A false sense of security is what lets us flaunt our freedom.

  “You shouldn’t mock them. One day they’ll lock us in the Seawall and they won’t let us out again.”

  She frowns at me, knowing I am right but disappointed that I have to remind her. Only when we reach the veranda does she speak. “So?”

  “She is stealing my gift.”

  Harryet’s eyes go round. “No?”

  “There is no doubt.”

  The light shining through the limestone columns illuminates the blue flowers in Harryet’s wavy blond hair and makes her glow like a celestial being from the Elysian Fields. Her bodice reveals two snowy hills with a plunging valley between them. And yet a frown eclipses her beauty. She has given her life to me, made it her purpose to absorb my pain, and the resulting weariness has accumulated on her face. “What are you going to do?”

  She greets Bolt, who is waiting at the bottom of the stairs. The war-wit turns a bright shade of red. It is impossible to hide it on his white skin but Harryet does not notice. She grips the banister with one smooth plump hand.

  “I don’t know,” I admit and follow her upstairs. She does not respond. She will not verbalise her objection to my mother’s behaviour. Not here in public. She is right to hold her tongue. As we walk along the hallways, we pass Piebald coming the other way. He bows melodramatically: “Highness, I am glad to see you have endured your ordeal.”

  “Piebald, it is so nice to see you. Will you send for food and water? I am famished,” I say and shoot him an expression that dares him to disobey then keep walking. My mind churns my thoughts like butter.

  “Harryet, do you trust the high priestess? It is true she seems like a friend but any chameleon could play at friendship.”

  “She is a holy woman,” she says as if this is proof enough of her trustworthiness.

  I retreat back into my thoughts to consider this. Bolt inspects my rooms for imposters and, finding none, resumes his position in the hall. His gaze follows Harryet as she passes but she is oblivious. Whale-oil lanterns line the hallway, omitting a warm glow that illuminates the frescos on the wall.

  “Why do you ask? What did she say?” Harryet says, following me through the solar, past the fire pit in the centre of the room and into my bedchamber. I toss aside the pile of soft down pillows and furs—there is no need for them in this sticky heat—and sit on the edge of the gently swinging bed to remove my sandals.

  “I have spent so much time thinking about the people of Tibuta and my duty to do right by them. I have never given any thought to what it must be like to be queen. It is such a terrible responsibility. Sometimes I think it would be easier to be a peasant working the fields, far from all this worry of war and succession.”

  Harryet sits on the kline opposite and narrows her eyes at me, wondering at this change in direction. “A peasant is affected by the worry of war and succession. She fears what a change in monarch will mean to her taxes, whether she ought to worry about her enlisted daughters.”

  “And yet she does not have to make the final decision. She is simply subject to a higher power that will determine how she lives.”

  “We are all subject to a higher power,” Harryet says.

  “We are. The merchant is subject to the margin between his profit and loss, the teacher is subject to the whims of her students and their disposition to learn, the miner to the stone’s willingness to break…” I know this is not what she meant.

  “And every woman of Tibuta is subject to the gods’ will. Let me attest to the fact that it is harder for the peasant because she is powerless when it comes to things like war. She must rely on mighty rulers such as your mother to lead accordingly and if they fail, she becomes their victim. All a peasant can do is have faith.”

  “You are right, Harry. And yet sometimes I wonder whether the gods have abandoned me. Gnosis give me wisdom. My atrama is not clean, I fear.”

  “What did the high priestess say?”

  Without offering an answer I move to the alabaster dressing table, sit on the three-legged stool in front of the obsidian mirror and look at my reflection. I am acutely aware of my appearance: lips that I wish were fuller, black hair that I wish was lighter, my pale skin that I wish was darker. I look too much like my mother.

  Harryet stands behind me, picks up a hairbrush made from manatee whiskers and runs it through my hair. “You must trust in your judgement and know that the gods are with you.”

  “And what if I wanted to leave Tibuta?”

  “You mustn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “We need you.”

  “Would you go?” I say. “There are hundreds of people leaving for the mainland. Would you join them?”

  “I belong here with you,” she says, her hands resting on my shoulders.

  I look at her in the mirror. “But what if you didn’t have me to worry about?”

  She shifts uncomfortably, knowing that to answer is like admitting she does not enjoy my company. She takes her time placing the brush between a broken arrow flint and my old bronze dagger with the ivory handle.

  “I know you would never leave me, Harry. But just suppose it came to revolution? Would you leave?” She sits on the edge of the kline, looks up at the ceiling and wraps that long strand of blond hair around her finger.

  “I suppose I would. If it was no longer safe to stay. I would go somewhere where there is plenty of food and trees, where the weather is mild. I would find a daroon and I would have children. I would like six, ideally, three boys and three girls, may Heritia bless me. I want a garden with herbs, all sorts like marjoram and pineapple-scented sage. Something simple, away from the p
alace.” She blushes, realising she has revealed much about her private ambition.

  “It would be nice, wouldn’t it, to have a place of your own, to live a simple life? I think you and the rebels have a lot in common.” She looks aghast and I jump in to add: “I do not mean to suggest you support the Shark’s Teeth. Far from it. Only that I think they riot because they have had enough of hunger. They long for the same things as you do: a small plot of land to call their own, the ability to sustain themselves, their family, acknowledgement, freedom from fear, faith in those who lead them. They want to know that their monarch is in control and can stop the Tempest.”

  “I do not want all those things.”

  “But some of them, surely?”

  “Some,” she says, unwilling to admit she can relate to the Shark’s Teeth. “But I would not take it by force. Liberty is a state of mind achieved through prayer and commitment to something higher than yourself.” She twirls a piece of hair. “Why all this talk of leaving, Verne? Why torment yourself with trying to think like a Shark’s Tooth? They are barbarians, murderers. Won’t you tell me what Maud said?”

  The sound of Bolt’s spear against the floor out in the hallway indicates that my dinner has arrived. Harryet leaves for a moment and returns with a tray. On it is a single bread roll and a cup of water. I roll my eyes, scoff down the bread roll and take long gulps of water. With mouth full I say, “Will you pray with me?” and kneel by the shrine to the First Mother, a nude statue of the goddess with smoke billowing from her mouth and a snake coiled around her thigh. I light an incense stick and place it in a gold urn. I close my eyes and focus my mind on my atrama by looking at the space between my eyes. Harryet hoists her skirt and kneels beside me. I take the wooden club and strike the gong. As the noise reverberates around the room, I whisper to my friend, “What I am about to tell you—it could get a lot of people in trouble so you must not speak of it to anyone, do you understand?”