It would do.
Gingerly blowing the heat off a still smoking spoonful, the king who had never served a woman in his life now fed it to the woman he was sure he loved.
Could she taste his devotion? Propped on a pillow on the bed, her eyes glistened. “Thank you." She tried to bow but he stopped her. Anxiously, he watched as she slowly brought her lips to the spoon almost quaking in his hands.
She finished the bowl surprisingly quickly, then sighed and leaned back against the pillow, closing her eyes. She must have felt better from it, because after a moment, she began her story again.
The girl Caia had finally caught the eyes of her lord. She was rewarded with the position of head chef, overseeing the quality of every dish. The king was impressed by the meat she had used, questioning her about where it had come from; to which she smoothly replied that it had been imported from a farm in her hometown, which produced robust, strengthening meat of exceptional quality. The king was intrigued, and clamoured for more: Could more be shipped in? He was willing to pay. Could it be cooked in other dishes, complementing, for example, soft milk cabbage, sweet lychee, or dried dragon eyes? Could other cooking styles or methods be employed? She should experiment. This was some wondrous meat indeed! Already the headache he had been suffering from was diminished, and he felt revived, elevated with a fresh vitality.
Caia’s heart warmed, and she readily agreed. At the back of her mind she knew she could not keep this up forever, but it was the happiest moment of her life and she clutched at it, willing to give up everything if she could just drink this one intoxicating wine-cup to the lees. Thus all that she had once poured into her song she poured now into her flesh, which she butchered, fried, spiced up and adorned, all for her dream of love. That dream now appeared to her everyday in the shape of a man, her lord—and then, soon after, her husband.
He had grown to depend on her, chattering amicably to her when she served him, telling her this and that about his likes and dislikes. Always she listened intently, quietly nodding. One day, after a particularly tasty dinner in which she had roasted the fatty layers of her belly, he had pulled her into his arms, and kissed her full on the lips. She had cooked the steak flawlessly, he praised, just the way he liked it—sliced precisely into elegant cubes, with a sapid cushion of fat melting on a throne of tender flesh, oozing buttery charm and gilded with a crisp, crackling crust. His eyes told her he loved her; then, as gently as the first, sparkling rays of dawn kindling the mountain crests, he kissed the petals of her eyelids, and slowly made love to her.
She married him in a temple near a mountain peak, where incense laced in smoky tendrils over them, and the soulless eyes of his ever-present ancestors watched and judged. It was there she gave up her name, and completed finally her metamorphosis by filling utterly the name he had bequeathed her.
The moon that night had been high at the apex of its beauty. Full and round, shimmering with the autumn’s enchantment, its face had been radiant as it had gazed down on the lovers at the summit of the mountain. Silently it had hung, swollen silver—poised, like all beautiful things, at the cusp of its waning.
“So,” said the king glumly, “you married him. Why are you here, then? Are you widowed?”
White Peony shook her head. She had been banished, she said, and even now the memory of it brought tears to her eyes.
The king’s heart ached for her. “What did you do?”
Dark eyes gazed at him sadly. “I gave him everything. Still, in the end, it was difficult to give him my heart.”
That received an approving nod. “Tell me his name, and I will bring you justice.”
But White Peony only gave another weak shake of her head. She did not feel like talking any more.
The king slept in a shining orb. When he woke, however, his mind was fazed with panic, still lost in the maze of an unpleasant dream. The morning mist enshrouded him, fogging his eyes; he blinked rapidly to clear them.
The beast, the beast, he had to slay the beast. Dawn broke over the forest, washing the peonies a fervid red, like itching skin. Nocking an arrow into his bow, he took steady aim and shot. Despite the haze, his shot still struck true, the arrow whistling a cocky tune as it zinged triumphant through the air.
Already he had a rough plan formed in his mind, outlining how he would go about slaying the beast. He would not enter its lair, of course—to meet it on its turf while he stumbled blindly in the darkness was pure folly—instead, he would camp right outside its cave, keeping a close watch on the skies as he waited for it to either emerge or return. He was prepared to wait long and patiently for it.
He wanted to ensure that White Peony was well provided for during that time, so he hunted now another animal for her, that she might have enough meat to last her a long time in case he was delayed, or failed to return. He had his eye now on a wild buffalo. When he returned, in the afternoon he would then set off, following her directions to the monster's lair.
White Peony’s face shimmered before him, rosy and sparkling, eyes glowing adulation as she fluttered about him in her chiffon skirts. He swelled, proud as a lion, pulling her to him.
He woke again, sitting up in a cloud of silk to see her face, smooth and peaceful, flowering in the afternoon sun on the pillow beside him. Even in sleep she was perfect, her lashes dark and long, her face a perfect oval tapering downwards like a melon seed. He tenderly kissed the corner of one almost translucent petal of her eyelid, feeling the fine baby fuzz of her face beneath his lips.
Her lotus bud lips curved into a small smile as she sleepily opened her eyes.
“I must go,” he whispered; though his heart felt torn, and he longed also to stay.
Her smile faded. He felt a pang.
“Must you?” Her voice trailed like leaves, despondent. She clutched his sleeve. “Stay a little while—at least until the end of the tale. It ends soon,” she promised.
Her eyes simmered with unspoken words. It was as if, having been left alone and silent for so long, she needed someone to pour her heart out to. Lowering himself back into his seat, the king agreed. Another day, perhaps, would not hurt.
Her words came faster now, like water gushing out after the first few sputters of a rusty tap.
Her new name had taken some getting used to, but she had borne it obligingly. She had become his favourite concubine.
Bit by bit she gave of herself, until her body was full of holes, a recessed shelf whose screws had fallen out. Her evenings and nights were spent with her husband, and her days, when not in the kitchen, were spent carefully sewing her skin back over her wounds, with silk threads so fine they left no visible scar, and even gave her skin a pale luminous sheen; slightly ethereal in moonlight, more obvious in the sun.
Presently her husband began to notice, commenting that she was losing weight, her face hollowing out and her body growing slender, light as wind. She could, in fact, feel the wind whistling through the holes in her body when it blew through her, even though she always stitched them up as best as she could. It whirled confusedly around in them like eddies in rock pools, always making her shiver, chilly against her bones. In the dim night light of his chambers, she would snuggle up against him for warmth. He seemed to like it, taking pleasure in her greater fragility.
She felt she lived for those nights when he would send for her, hold her and call her his sweetling, his pretty pearl blossom, his fair lotus bloom.
One day, however, his summons did not come. No carriage appeared at her door, no shrill eunuch’s voice called. And her handmaiden, Yeni, was nowhere to be found.
The fear that clutched at her heart was petrifying.
She had seen the interested look he had given Yeni, when her pretty handmaid had served them tea, accidentally spilling some on his sleeve. Yeni had hastily apologised, flushing to the roots of her hair, babbling that she had been too intrigued by the chess game they had been playing, though that was no excuse, and had gotten distracted, thinking …
The king
had looked amused. “Thinking! You play chess?”
Yes, her father had taught her a little when she was young, and she had spent her childhood playing with the old men in her village, so she knew a few techniques.
“Who’s winning this game, then?”
At that she had hesitated, throwing a glance at her mistress and falling silent. But when a sullen look had started to cloud her master’s face, she had hurriedly added, You are, my lord. Just move there—and there—
And sure enough, the tables had turned, and the king had won.
Impressed, he had broken out in booming laughter. “A challenge!” he had roared, “A prize for you if you win!”
Yeni’s eyes had lit up, eagerness and nervousness competing with each other across her face. And what if you win, my lord?
“I? I already have all I want, here.” And he had pulled Caia into his lap, and smiled, and Yeni had smiled too, and Caia had rested her head against her husband’s chest, feeling secure again, and feeling as if her heart could burst with happiness.
But now she trembled before her mirror. One shaking hand lifted, hardly recognisable. Was it hers? It had barely enough strength left to rouge her own lips for her visit to her husband. Her eyes were sunken in, her skin loose in places, drooping in unglamorous folds, too much for her meagre flesh. Her hair, once a thick and lustrous black, had now lightened to a dull shade the colour of common ants. It fell in lank locks over her shoulders, so drear that even the jewelled tassels dripping down them, symbols of her concubinage, could do nothing to liven them up. A bony hand cupped her sallow cheeks, tremulous as winter twigs. Yeni’s face swam before her; a rose yet unpicked. How could she compete?
With fumbling fingers she attached a silken veil to her headdress, funereal white and translucent beneath the jewels. It shimmered like moonbeams, covering her face. Even then her eyes peered out dully, grotesquely large.
She had tried to eat more for nourishment, but the holes were too big, and her husband’s appetite prodigious. What could she do, but give until the end?
Four hours later and with still no word from her husband, another steaming golden pot had sat, smoking and fragrant, in a basket. Held by a pair of trembling hands, it had arrived, unannounced, under the dragon signboard; while the grey-haired Head Eunuch had looked with wisdom’s pity at the bent wisp of a woman at the foot of the stairs, requesting entrance to her husband’s bedchambers with his dinner brought as pretext for her visitation.
An evening hush fell over them, faint and bluish, like a bridal veil. Outside across the mountain, birds flocked home with worms for their children and crickets keened between the peach blossom trees.
The king fidgeted. He felt as if a whole day had been wasted, just because he had woken up late. The sun shone its rubescent rays into the room, a florid spotlight on the twirling dust. If they rushed out now, perhaps they could still manage to make it to its lair before nightfall …
White Peony, sensing his restlessness, sprang up. “Teach me how to hunt, my lord! Then, if you wish, I can show you how to cook. Stay! We will transform common swine into the rarest delicacy, rejuvenating body and soul. Will you not stay the night?”
How could he say no? She was gazing at him with such adoring eyes, round and hopeful. Feeling a little nonplussed, the king rubbed his temples. “Come, let us hunt.”
But he did not teach her how to hunt so much as let her watch him hunt. Her breathless expressions of awe at his strength and dexterity invigorated him, making him feel lifted up with hot air, like a lantern floating off the ground. No teacher was more zealous than the king then as he explained in intricate, almost lyric detail to her how things worked; except he did not let her practise anything more than simple bow-holding techniques, always snatching his bow back to shoot another fluttering leaf or moth before her again just to see her inky irises sparkle.
Then, when they had galloped back together from the plains, carrying nothing this time but the limp bodies of moths and leaves and petals that had stuck to their hair, she taught him how to cook. By the time night fell, he had unwittingly whipped up a decadent meal for both of them, with three different dishes of pork. He grinned like an ecstatic child to see her eyes close in bliss at her first taste of his broth.
He wanted to stay this moment, in this glade near the summit where the wild peony grew. Where it was just him and her, with the pale light of stars and the almond moon above, swinging lazily in the fresh silken hammocks of spring. He wanted to stay this moment with silence; but now it was White Peony who wanted to talk.
Her husband had grinned upon seeing her, good-naturedly patting the seat next to him while making another move on the chessboard. “Lotus Blossom! Your maid, I must say, is remarkably bright for a woman.”
“My king, your broth.”
“Ah, yes, just what I need. Split it into two, will you? I owe her a reward.”
The stone table was chilly against his elbows, the cold seeping into his bones. The king shivered, rubbing his temples with his hands again. His headache was back again, the chronic headache that had suddenly worsened since nine years ago, leaving strange, fuzzy blanks in his brain, like time gouged out.
The next night, the concubine known as Lotus Blossom had been waiting by the door as usual when the king’s eunuchs had come for her. Naturally, she had been overjoyed. The king would like his dinner, they had told her. Prepare enough for two.
She was sad when she took out her eyes, one for each of them. The world was dark without them, and she would never be able to see her beloved’s face again. Though frightened of the dark, she had carefully groped about in the kitchen. She would be bold, for him. So she had cooked her eyes till they softened to a creamy white pudding, then topped them with a rich brown sauce, garnished with pink lotus petals.
The king felt nauseated, clutching his stomach and his head. “No more,” he begged, “No more.” But she was relentless.
White Peony’s eyes were hard and frosty now, a glaring obsidian. Her voice cut through him, piercing his soul.
When she had had only her brain and heart left to give, she had refused him for the first time. The king had frowned sternly, calling her mean-spirited, stingy, her selfishness ill-befitting a concubine of her status.
“Is it yours to give or refuse?” he had demanded. “Everything you have is mine!”
Even though she could not see him, his voice painted a vivid enough picture. She thought her heart would break at the way he was looking at her—as if she were something vile, a detestable worm or snake giving insult to the dragon with superficial parody of its form.
Weeping in shame she fled from his judgment, and gave up the last fragment of herself. Not much was left; just enough to make one small pot of thick, gloopy soup, rich and creamy, the colour of honeyed milk. It was her brain, but its flavour a little too pungent and overpowering, so she sprinkled over it some fresh herbs and scented flower petals. The king would never taste her truly, but always—at least of that she could now be sure—filtered through his lens of beauty. For would she not now live on perfectly in his heart, a beautiful memory, his heart forever hers? Was this not the only way that man could love, this transformation into the object of his dreams? Before the mirror Lotus Blossom hovered, uncertain.
But she had shut the door behind her long ago, and now it was too late. She had given all she could—her body, her soul, her virtue—and now only a skeleton jutted out of her clothes, which flapped like tentacles around her frame. She clung on to her white veil draped over her skull and shoulders. Once, her collarbones had been the proud pedestal to her slender neck; now they flamed wide across her ribs in ghastly protrusions, desolate and barren.
The king had frowned again at the portion she had served. “I told you to cook enough for two.”
She had bowed her head, voiceless. Her voice she had given him a long time ago. He had chewed her tongue with relish, had slurped her lips and vocal chords up with gusto from his spoon. How tenderly he had looked
at her then! But now he stared at her, disappointed.
“Has your heart grown so vile that you are ashamed to face the world? Is that why you have taken to wearing that veil? Take it off!”
She knelt mutely before him, her wedding veil trembling like the wavering sea, blowing salt on the wind. No tears now, just air; no flesh, no organs left to cry.
The king stood to his feet in a rage, her handmaiden Yeni by his side. “Take it off!” he thundered. “Look at me!”
When she had remained still frozen in terror he had stridden toward her and swept the veil off her head.
With a resounding crash the king had staggered back, shattering china; a gasp, a scream, and a hoarse cry to the guards: “Take the demon! Banish her! Call the priests — get it out of my sight!”
He apologised again and again, hands over his face. He could not look at her. “What would you have me do? What do you want?”
Black as abysses, the eyes of his love were fastened hungrily on him. Yet when she spoke, her voice was sad. “I just want to live,” she said. Her white hands flittered up like moths, then sank down again, as if she wanted to touch him but thought better of it. She sounded lost and lonely, like a frightened child.
His heart was fraying; inwardly he groaned. Was it a charm, that kept him so in love with her? Beautiful though she was, she was no woman, but demon! White Peony, he cried in his heart, and her sweet, ravishing face loomed up in his mind even though his eyes remained tightly shut; gods, she had infiltrated his very soul—look at her now, that deathly beauty, staring at him with those haunted eyes … And it was Lotus Blossom behind those eyes, Lotus Blossom whose sweet, vulnerable face now surfaced like a pale ghost in his mind, after these long years during which he had kept her so firmly buried. No, gods, he didn’t want to remember—but the memories, once unleashed, couldn’t be stalled. Like a broken dam they flooded his mind, those unutterable, unthinkable images, till hysteria writhed behind his terror-ridden eyes, and love and loathing—for himself or her, he did not know—burst forth in a soul-shuddering cry. And at that cry White Peony almost reached out to him a hand of pity; but Lotus Blossom’s heart had long been eaten, and it was Lotus Blossom now whose gaze was fixed on him, cold and fierce like the pounding of conscience, an eagle’s eye behind the rose-tinted mask of White Peony.
9 Tales From Elsewhere 7 Page 9
