by Nhys Glover
Father blinked several times in surprise. "I do not think I take your meaning. You do not think you could have taken captive one gently born woman of my harem? You did have a battalion with you, did you not?"
"She has magic, Highness. And fighting skills. We heard tell of them in the town where she was uncovered. She fought a man twice her size, when she was near death from thirst, after spending five days in the back of a wagon."
"Magic?" Father breathed the word in horror, turning his gaze fully on me for the first time. I shuddered.
"Aye, Highness. Air magic. She causes chaos with the flick of her wrist. I have never seen such power before."
"How is this possible?" Father demanded of me. "You showed no sign of magic!"
I shrugged and tried to brazen it out. "I should have been a boy. We both know that. I may have a woman's body, just. But I have a man's soul. I have been sneaking out of the harem most of my life, watching the youths-in-training learn to fight, and practicing on my own. It started when you took my twin from me. I kept doing it because I liked it. As to the magic... well, it was easy enough to hide."
"You are not a man!" he yelled at me, so furious I saw a vein bulging at his temple. "How dare you flout me so openly. I have given you everything. You have been my favourite daughter since you were barely out of clouts. And this is how you repay me?"
"I did not do it to hurt you, Father. I did it to be me. I was never meant for a harem. You know that. You loved me best because I was not like my sisters. I have always been different," I pleaded, just stopping short of wringing my hands in supplication.
"I gave you too much. I spoiled you. Now you think you can get away with anything. But it ends tonight. We will make the sacrifice tonight. And the gods will finally be appeased."
"The gods will be satisfied with a tainted sacrifice?" I asked, shaking in my sandals so hard I could barely remain standing. This was my ultimate betrayal.
"Tainted? How are you tainted?"
I thought he could get no angrier. I was wrong. His face was bright red and his breaths were coming in pants. What if he died? He was an old man and I was pushing him beyond endurance.
But I could not go back. I had spent a great deal of time, in the interminable days of the return journey, coming up with a story that might safely explain away my virginity. I had decided being a victim would be the only way I might be forgiven.
"I was ravished by a man when I was making my escape the second time. I am no longer pure."
"Second time?" It was like the blows kept coming and he was growing desensitised by them. Numbed.
"She escaped in a wagon and, when found, was taken in by Badlunders," the captain provided cautiously. "Airling tamers. She escaped from them on one of their airlings, so they said, and they sent one brother after her. She had been returned to them shortly before we arrived."
"You escaped on an airling?" Father cried, horror the predominant emotion now.
"I have air magic. It stands to reason I would have an affinity with airlings. They are amazing creatures. They talk to me in my mind," I lied. "And I convinced one to let me ride him away. But his loyalty lay with the Airluds, the men who tamed them, so when one came after me the airling went home with him. I had no choice but to go, too."
"And during those days you were on your own with an airling you were taken against your will by a man. You, who can fight so well, it seems?" Father sounded justifiably suspicious.
I shrugged. "I was starving and exhausted. I had landed to sleep and he came upon me while I slept. I killed him, eventually. But not before he took my virtue." I was lying perfectly, in the way I had learned to do from an early age. I almost believed my story to be true.
"This changes things," Father finally said, thoughtfully. "The gods will not accept a tainted offering. Neither will I accept a daughter with magic. It goes against the gods. I must consult the priests on this. Go to the harem and make yourself respectable. Or as respectable as it is possible for you to now be."
"I was taken against my will!" I declared angrily. I could not believe he was blaming me for something that was supposedly out of my control.
"You left the safety of the harem, what else did you expect to happen? That is why you are protected. The world is a dangerous place, especially for women. You got what you deserved."
It felt like he had slapped me across the face. His disgust and hatred threatened to break me. There was no sign of the indulgent, loving man I had known my whole life. This man was a stranger. Someone who would kill his own daughter! Nay, daughters! As many as it took to get him what he desired. We were nothing more than a commodity to be bought, sold and used as he saw fit. No better than whores!
I allowed a servant to guide me away. Not willing to show just how devastated I was, I kept my head up every step of the way. But inside I was crumbling. I had lost the men I loved and now the father I had loved. There was nothing left of me.
My mother waited at the door of the harem, reminding me that there was yet one small part of me left unbroken.
Clearly she had been notified of my return and had come to meet me. She took one look at me, tears in her eyes, and wrapped me in her warm embrace.
"Airsha, Airsha, what have you done? I have been so worried." she said as she cried.
My heart broke anew. What had a done to her? How had my father made her suffer for my crimes?
"Are you well, Mother? You were not punished because of me, were you? They did not think you aided me?"
Mother shook her head. "No, your father knows me too well. He knew I was tricked, just as you tricked everyone else. They turned the harem upside down looking for you, you know, looking for the way you had escaped. They even sent someone down the conveniences to the tunnels down there. It was disgusting."
"So they know how I escaped?"
"They know of several ways you could have escaped. They do not know exactly which route you took. And I do not wish to know. That time was too painful to dwell on. I left you alone for two full days and nights, trying to give you the space you needed. Then I thought you were asleep. I could not believe it when I went to your bed on the third day and found you gone."
"I am so sorry, Mother. I did not mean to be a bad daughter. But I could not let myself be killed. Not for anything."
Mother nodded sadly. "I think I knew that, deep down. You were never one to do what others told you, even when it was me."
"And Airshin? Has he suffered?" I asked, hating the guilt I felt over his possible fate.
"I heard he was sent out with one of the patrols, looking for you. He has not suffered from your actions."
Breathing a sigh of relief, I hugged her again, glad at least to have her unconditional love and warm presence to welcome me. I did not know how long I had before my punishment, but until then I had my mother. It reduced the ache inside me. Though nothing could truly make the grief of losing the Airluds go away. It is one thing to say you are glad to have had the opportunity to love, it is another to then live with the pain of losing the part of your heart you had given over into others' care.
For the next few hours I let servants cleanse me, moisten my skin with ointments, calm my hair with oils and clothe me again in silk that caught on my now-imperfect skin. Though I had not noticed it, the sun and the lifestyle had ravaged my skin. And the half mooncycle I had been missing had taken its toll on my body. I no longer looked like the pampered princess.
I did not care one bit.
When I was presentable, I was allowed to go to the buffet, where I ate my fill of the delights I had missed so much. Yet they did not taste as good as I remembered. I would gladly have traded all the sweet meats and tasty morsels for the chance to eat cold daubler meat with my men.
The rest of the women of the harem were unsure how to deal with me. Did they welcome me back or did they snub me for my unwomanly behaviour? I had flouted everything they believed in. I suppose I did not blame them for their ambivalence.
Curious as to
whether my escape route had been discovered, I took a free moment after my meal to explore the storeroom. I climbed the shelving and tried to pull down the grate. It would not move. I had my answer. Defeated, I returned to my rooms to await my fate.
The first indication was my mother's wails. My skin crawled and my head felt suddenly light. The urge to run overcame me, but I had no idea where to run to. I could fight. But for how long and how many? I was in a fortified prison better known as a harem!
The doors to my private quarters were flung open and two armed guards entered my room. They grabbed my arms and dragged me away. Mother wept and pulled at one guard's arm, trying to free me.
"Mother, do not! Please! You cannot help me!" I implored her.
"But you are to be beaten and put to death for being a hidden abomination. The priests have declared you the reason the gods have turned against us!"
That was an unexpected twist to my predicament. One minute I was to be sacrificed as the beloved daughter, the innocent offering to the gods, the next I was being condemned as the cause of my Father's woes. Either way I died. I assume the only real difference was how much pain I would have to endure before I did.
Part of me wanted to struggle against the hands that gripped me so cruelly. Another part just wanted it to be over. At least I was not to be castrated, it would seem. A small mercy.
They dragged me out of the harem and down a long dark corridor. It was an area of the palace I had never explored before. I tried to take notice of the twists and turns we took, but after a while they just confused me. I was being led into a maze from which I was not expected to escape.
We went down a series of steep stone stairs. Burning torches in sconces attached to the walls allowed only enough light for us to see the stairs we traversed.
The smell as we went lower was what terrified me most. The air was rank with the stench of blood, excrement and mould. My stomach wanted to revolt but I fought down the urge. I had had my first delicious meal in a half a mooncycle. I would be damned if I would lose it now.
I was thrown into a dark hole just deep enough for me to stand up. A metal grate clanged into place over my head. The only light came from the torches on the stairs, and it didn't reach the depths of the hole I was in. If I had been afraid of the dark, or unused to finding my way without light, I would have gone mad with fear at that moment. Instead, I resolutely felt my way around the narrow space, exploring my new home.
It was cut from solid rock. A steady trickle of stinking water made its way down one mossy wall and onto the slimy floor. When I spread my arms in every direction I could feel walls. So, the space was not even large enough for me to lie straight to sleep. Not that I planned to sleep, or expected to live long enough to know sleep again. This was simply the beginning of my torture; punishment for my grievous sins.
Time lost all meaning. I stood as long as my legs would hold me and then crouched in a corner, my back against the driest wall. When my legs cramped up agonisingly, I sat on the slimy floor, feeling the wetness and cold soaking through the thin cover of my gown. I would have been better off left in my boy's clothes. But, of course, I was not supposed to be better off. That was the point. I was being punished as an abomination. A woman with magic. Powerful magic.
What good was my magic now? All it had done for me was to condemn me to death.
No, that was not entirely true. I had saved my men by using my magic. I could never be sorry for that.
I lay my weary, aching head on my arm, hugging my body to keep warm, and prayed to the gods who had rejected me that it would all be over soon.
My time was measured by the flasks of water they dropped down to me with the few crusts of bread I was permitted. It was barely enough to keep me alive. Delirium occupied the time between the arrival of those flasks.
At first I knew the hallucinations for what they were. I knew the images of Darkin, Rama, Calun and Jaron coming to me in my cell, calling me an abomination, could not be real. Yet my beloved father, who had loved me as much, if not more than the Airluds, had turned on me. Why would they not do so too? Mayhap I truly was a monster deserving of my fate.
"I knew there was something wrong," Jaron told me on one such visit. "Four men like us couldn't possibly give our hearts to the same woman. Especially not one so... insignificant."
"I like my women comely and well-endowed. Why would I be interested in you?" Rama declared in disgust.
"I should've let the Gambler have you. You're an abomination," Darkin said in his turn.
And Calun? Sweet Calun simply blocked me from his mind and scowled at me with loathing.
"Not real!" I kept telling myself. "Not real!"
But Father's real declaration, that I got what I deserved, blended with the delusions until they all seemed real. And each one was a torture worse than anything done to my body.
However long it was, eventually they came for me again. By then I had befouled myself and vomited up my bread and water too many times to count. Nothing wanted to stay down. Even sustenance rejected me for the monster I was.
If the guards were disgusted by me, they did not show it. I seemed the only one able to smell my stench.
The sunlight when it came was blinding. I was reminded of another time, so long ago, when the sun had blinded me in just this way. I had spent days under a broiling wagon-cover that time. This time I had been in a dark, foul hole.
Head spinning, nauseous and light-headed, I could do little more than try to keep my stiff legs under me. Luckily, the guards took the bulk of my weight. Luckily? Was there luck in any of this?
Once my eyes had adjusted to the light, I saw that I stood in the small arena used for sparring. Around the edges of the circular space were dozens of troopers, arms crossed over their chests. Had I had time, I would have searched for my brother's face among them. But I did not really want to see it, if it was there. I knew it would show me no mercy, only disgust.
I looked higher, over the wooden barrier that separated the arena from the larger bailey. A series of wooden benches covered in purple satin had been set up on the far side. My father, his generals, the High Priests and other dignitaries, all male, sat on those benches. A slightly billowing canopy had been erected above them to keep the worst of the midday sun from their skins.
I was not so blessed. The arena was blazing with the unrelenting glare of the sun. The dust and sand under foot burned up through my thin sandals. Using my arm to protect my face, I glanced around me. In the centre of the arena a single post awaited me. On training days a whole row of such posts would be in place for trainees to practice their skills on. But today there was only one.
"Tie her!" a booming voice demanded. I knew it was not my Father. I assumed it was one of the masked priests using some method to project his voice.
The guards who had brought me to the arena grabbed me again and dragged me to the post. They looped a thin leather strap around my wrists, binding them together and then lifting them over my head. Finally they hooked the end of the binding around a metal spur several hands higher than I could reach. I was forced to face the pole as my feet were placed and bound, one on either side of it. My head craned to one side to avoid flattening my face against the rough surface.
Even had I the energy to use my magic, I could not have done so, bound as I was. It was the ultimate insult. I was not even being allowed to face my accusers. They were behind me somewhere, able to see my humiliation without me being able to see them.
"We are here to remove the cause of the gods' rejection of us. And to put it right by witnessing the punishment of the abomination that brought this crisis to the kinglunds," intoned the same voice that had given the order to tie me.
I was not sure if I was happy or sad that my mother was not present. I felt very alone. What I would not have done to see a sympathetic face. But I would not want her to see what was about to be done to me. What had already been done to me. No mother deserved that.
The voice went on. "Five suncycle
s ago the gods withdrew their favour. The Godling's sons, who should have been gifted with magic, were denied it. The kinglunds suffered. The Godling sought answers, but to no avail. He sacrificed the daughters of his loins in an attempt to put right what was wrong. But again to no avail.
"None knew of the abomination hiding in the midst of the harem. A woman with air magic! Not just any woman. The favourite daughter herself. No woman has ever been gifted magic by the gods. Only demons could do such a thing. And they would do it for one purpose alone. To destroy the fabric of our society and the peace of the world."
The heat was taking its toll. I could barely hold myself up, and the pressure on my arms made it feel like my shoulders were about to snap. My lungs could barely draw in breath. And still the voice went on.
"A demon possessed abomination deserves a horrific death. Only then will the gods be satisfied. This monster has already spent days in a hole, without light or sustenance. Now she will be whipped until the sand beneath her is soaked with her blood. Only then will her punishment be complete and her death permitted. The Godling himself will cut the throat of the creature and finally put an end to her evil."
So my father would be the one to kill me. I imagined there would be no regret or remorse this time. I was no longer his beloved favourite daughter. I had been turned into a demonic abomination that had infected his harem. Why would anyone regret ending such a monster?
I wanted to laugh. I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream out every foul word I had learned from the men I had shadowed. And from the men I had loved. I wanted to shake the very foundations of the palace with my magic.
But I did none of it.
I felt my gown torn from my back. The rip seemed to echo around me. The silence was as heavy as the air itself. I looked at the row of troopers standing so stoically around the arena. They could have been carved from stone. Sweat or tears blurred my eyes so that I could not see their faces clearly. It did not matter. Nothing mattered.
