by J. Naomi Ay
“No, no, no!” the crowd cried. “That is unfair. The boy is too small for you, Torym.”
“He has a brave heart,” the Chief chuckled. “Go back to your horse, Dov. Torym, pick another closer to your size.”
“Kari-fa!” Dov swore. “I want to fight. I can win.”
“Him, then.” Torym pointed now at Amyr.
“No!” This time it was my voice that shouted in protest. “Not my cousin. His eyesight is very poor.”
Torym looked at me, his eyebrows raised briefly in surprise. Then, a smile of recognition spread across his lips.
“All the more reason for me to replace him. What sort of army do we command with a blind man in its midst?”
Amyr nodded at the Chief, before jumping down from his horse, landing unsteadily upon his feet, a hand outstretched. My cousin tripped as he started to rise, prompting both Torym and the crowd to laugh, for little did any know of my cousin’s strength.
“No!” I begged again. “Amyr, please don't. You'll be hurt.”
My cousin ignored my appeals, slowly approaching Torym, while the crowd grew anxious and excited to watch this show.
Amyr was nearly as tall as his opponent and from his appearance, looked formidable enough, but I was certain that no one understood his lack of vision.
“Please Torym. He doesn’t see,” I cried, but now my voice was drowned by the cheering of the village people.
Torym's fists were balled up as Dov's had been before. For a moment, Amyr stood uncertainly, as if he wasn’t sure what to do. He cocked his head to the side, listening to sounds of Torym’s breath and his steps as they approached.
“Come on, fight!” Torym challenged, jabbing him once and then twice in the chest with his fist. Amyr blinked, but did not react in any other way.
“Strike him, you fool,” a man yelled.
“Torym, knock him down. We do not need warriors who refuse to defend themselves.”
I watched as Torym hit Amyr in the jaw and my cousin fell back upon his heels, his cheek red, his eyes blazing.
After that, I covered my eyes and refused to watch anymore. Instead, I prayed that Amyr wouldn't be hurt. Amyr was no more a warrior than Dov could tend a sheep. Both boys would have been better off working in Uncle’s shop.
It was then that I heard a scream and the heavy sound of a body falling. The crowd gasped loudly and someone called Torym's name. Through my fingers I dared to peek, expecting to find my beloved cousin laid low. Already, my feet were moving through the crowd.
“Amyr,” I called, tears threatening at my eyes.
“Someone get the doctor,” a voice yelled.
“It's too late,” another cried.
“Oh Amyr!” I wept. “Let me through! He's my cousin, as close to my heart as a brother.”
To my horror, and further surprise, it was not Amyr who was now dead.
It was Torym who was splayed upon the road. Blood was seeping from his eyes and mouth, his skull concaved as if it had been bashed by a fierce hammer. A long gash cut across it where a knife had been drawn.
“One slash,” the voices whispered around me as I dropped to my knees before Torym. “The lad killed him with a single stab of his knife.”
I did not think my heart could manage another beat, nor another breath would ever fill my lungs. I collapsed alongside Torym, who I had imagined would someday lay beside me in a grave.
The villagers thought me mad, for they had never seen the two of us pass a word, let alone walk hand in hand about the streets. But, Amyr knew my heart. He knew what he promised me years before and he knew what he had taken from me in just this moment.
“Why did you do that?” I wailed and keened as my cousin walked away. “I hate you.” I spat upon his shadow and cursed his name.
At first, Amyr didn't respond, nor offer any explanation, until he had mounted his horse and resumed his place among the warrior boys. He gazed at me with his odd eyes, which burned red like the fires of the world below.
“He was not for you,” Amyr said. “I have saved you from a lifetime of disappointment.”
Now, he smiled slightly, a condescending upturn of his lip, as if I should be grateful, something I never would.
Forever after, I would hate my cousin. Every morning, I would curse his name and never again, would I welcome him to my home.
Another girl, the farmer’s daughter joined me in a vigil by Torym's body, until the old men came to collect him and take him to his grave. Together, the girl and I walked behind them to the burial ground. Together, we recited the prayers for Torym’s soul.
That night, I lay alone upon my cot, watching the moons rise above the forest trees, listening to Uncle's snoring from across the room. Hate for Amyr, like a tiny cancer, began to grow in the pit of my stomach, filling a void that had once been my hopes and dreams.
Life for me would never be in a boat upon the sea, next to the man and children who I loved. Instead, Amyr had condemned me to remain forever a maiden, tending to this shop. Forever, I was destined to care for the sad, old man across the room.
Chapter 18
Ailana
For a short time, I thought I was in love with the King, not overly so, just a little bit. When I spied him from a distance, or when someone said that he was passing down this hall, or when the guards made us clear away, my heart skipped.
Sometimes, I imagined that when he was on the balcony waving at the crowds, his eyes found me amongst them, and he smiled. From my spot far down below, I imagined he could see me smiling back and mouthing words about his button, which I held tightly in my hand.
“Come collect it,” I would say and imagine what we might do on that occasion, for it would entail far more than just my mending.
He was old though, especially to me, who was barely twenty years. He was double my age, or even more so, well into his forties. He was widowed and had lost a child, thus the owner of a shattered heart. Yet, in my innocence and naiveté, I thought myself solely capable of reassembling it.
Certainly, I forgave him for his cruelty to my friend, Lioter. After all, Lioter should never have conspired against a king.
A king was all powerful and entitled to do as his royal heart wished. To that end, if he wished for me to join him in his grand four poster bed, I would have gladly run across the courtyard and climbed the many stairs to his magnificent suite.
Although I had never seen it, I imagined he would have a hearth in his bedroom, which would warm the air to just the right degree. On summer nights, the French doors to his balcony would remain open to let in the fresh ocean breeze. While lying there, I would wear no bed clothes so the air could caress my naked body, and the King would like this. He would smile and his sad eyes would light with desire and appreciation.
Although, he would give me my own suite, the King would prefer if each night I dwelled by his side. While I lay nestled safely within his arms, satisfied in the knowledge that he needed my love, I would gaze out at the white crests of ocean foam beneath the golden moons.
It was just a matter of time. Each day, I fingered his button, assured that this was so. He was only waiting until his heart was ready to love again. It was still too soon since the Queen and his child had passed. When this business with Korelesk had settled down and his reign was no longer challenged, surely, he would announce that his heart now belonged to a Karut seamstress from Farku.
The autumn arrived again and with it, the news of my grandmother’s death.
“You must return and help me with the shop,” Embo wrote. “I cannot manage it, my husband, and two children all by myself. You must come pay your respect to Grandmother, and say your prayers over her departed soul.”
I tore up the letter and pretended it had never come, knowing full and well that my prayers would reach Grandmother’s soul from wherever they were uttered.
On the darkest day of the darkest month, when the rain fell incessantly in gray sheets, and the color of the sky matched exactly that of the ocean, a page
arrived with a note bidding me attend the King and bring the button that was missing from his favorite cloak.
The Head Seamstress made a tsking noise and muttered something about servant girls acting above their station. I ignored her and cleaned up my table as if I meant never to return. Then, I followed the page across the courtyard to the Big House.
The boy did not take me to the King’s office, but rather continued up three flights of the marble staircase to the very suite which I had imagined in my dreams. A guardsman stood at the door, his eyes mocking, a smirk upon his lips, as he held the heavy oak open and waved me through.
The suite was not as I expected, for I had envisioned it filled with light and warmth. Instead, it was as dark and dreary as the shore outside and as cold as the ocean. From what little I could see, the furniture was old and in disrepair, the floors unswept, and the windows splattered with sea salt and grime.
“He’s in the bedroom. Attend him there,” the pageboy called, as the door shut behind me, muffling the laughter that he and the smirking guardsman surely shared.
Briefly, I thought to clean, as if this mess was entirely my fault. I could hear my late-grandmother’s voice admonishing the dirt.
“What man would want to live in a house that was fit for only animals? If you wish to ensnare him, make his home a place that he would desire to be.”
To that end, I removed a wayward sock and a shoe from the cushions of the couch. The sock had holes in both heels and toes, and the shoe’s sole was worn beyond repair. It saddened me that our king should live little better than the beggars upon the street when once our nation, our planet was the envy of the galaxy.
“’Tis a pity indeed,” he spoke from behind me, from the door to the bedchamber, and with his words came the stench of alcohol-filled breath. “But, it is not your place to tidy the furniture when I have maids to do this task.”
“What maids?” I exclaimed, waving a hand about the room. “It appears that they have been overly long in attending you.”
“Have they? Ach, I believe you are correct. I did tell them only come when they are summoned, and I have quite forgotten when I last requested their assistance.” He laughed a little at this, clinging to the doorframe where he stood. “No, my wife, my queen would never abide this room in such a state.”
I set the sock and shoe down upon the floor, turning to face the King and await my orders. Did he mean for me to repair his cloak, or was I brought here for another reason?
“Neither would my mother,” the King continued, strolling across the apartment to a small kitchen area, whereupon he opened the refrigerator. “Or anyone else who has lived in this suite. Did you know, this is the very apartment built by the Great Emperor for his wife? They were the first to share a suite together, followed by my illustrious parents. All of their ghosts live in these walls. This entire palace is filled with ghosts, all of them gazing down at me. All of them reminding me how I have failed in the stewardship of their realm.”
The refrigerator door closed, and he emerged again with a bottle of clear liquid in his hand.
“It is a curse to have the blood of glorious ancestors flowing through one’s veins. One is expected to be just as great, as if their knowledge has passed to one’s brain through their DNA.”
“You are a fine king,” I said, knowing not how else to respond. “You are doing your best. The circumstances now are extremely trying. You are not responsible for the Disease, nor the famine and poverty that has ensued.”
“I do not need you to tell me this,” he snapped, bringing the bottle to his lips. “Do you think I do not know how our planet has been rampaged? How my people suffer when there is nothing I can do. Korelesk challenges my every step, yet provides no remedies of his own. And, then there are those who wish to depose all kings and elect a president. I fear I shall be removed in due course for unlike my predecessors, I have overseen the decline of our once great society, rather than the ascent. But, I do not bring you here to garner your pity, or to weep upon your delicate shoulder. Rather, I have summoned you only to repair my cloak, to return the button, so I may go out. The rains have come and soon will be followed by the snow, and I am trapped inside this miserable place like a caged animal.”
He paced across the room, waving his hand at the filthy window panes which were rattling from the onslaught of the rain.
“There, there, fix my button.”
He pointed at the cloak draped across a corner stand, and so I took it, and sat upon his sofa with my needle and thread. In the meantime, he indulged in his bottle, wiping the spills with the back of his hand, all the while muttering under his breath, cursing the ghosts.
“My wife was better suited for this job, than I. She had a much more level head. Damn the Disease which took her life! Damn Satan for thrusting this plague upon us! Why did he take all whom I loved, and leave me here alone?”
I said nothing, but did my work, letting him rave and rant with abandon. Just as I snipped the thread and rose to present him with his cape, he drained the dregs from the bottom of his bottle.
“Thank you, Miss Ailana of Farku.” Instead of taking the cloak, he put his hands upon my shoulders and held me fast. “Ailana of the motherland, whose eyes bespeak the wisdom of our elders, and golden hair mirrors the light of the two moons. Do you know what I want of you now, Mistress?”
I didn’t answer, for I suspected, but was too afraid to voice the thought. My heart was pounding so loudly, I feared he could hear it. I had dreamed of this, but now, I wished for nothing of the sort. His breath, strong with the drink, nearly made me retch.
“Come,” he ordered, and tossing the cloak upon the floor, he pulled me into the bedchamber, his steps unsteady.
The bedroom was as bad, if not worse, than the rest of the suite, for clothes were strewn about the room, and giant plumes of dust rose as we walked through them. The bed itself was not the elegant and inviting four-poster of my dreams, but rather, a tussled mess of well-worn sheets and wrinkled blankets. They reeked sourly from lack of washing, after hosting sweaty bodies, and they were dusted with cigarette ash.
“No,” I said, although my voice was barely that of a whisper.
“Do you know what I do not have?” he cried, overly loudly, clearly drunk and without care. “I have no heir. I leave this land nothing, but an empty throne.”
An heir. I thought on this. An heir, a king who could be my son. I could do this. I could provide him with that which he was missing.
Closing my eyes, I ignored his filthy bed, his foul breath and temperament, and I did what I had been brought there to do.
It was neither pleasant, nor unpleasant, merely a task for me to perform. Fortunately, it went quickly and satisfied him well enough, after which, I gladly took my leave. He had no objection as he was quite content, snoring drunkenly, spread out upon the bed.
Two days later, it was announced that King Mikal was deathly ill. The Disease which had taken his wife and daughter before him, was in his blood, and he was suffering a spell. He had retreated to his suite and was attended by physicians who would do their best.
Weeks later, I feared I had contacted the Disease, too, for I did not know how it spread, and neither did I know the symptoms of a quickening in a womb.
For days, although I worked at my sewing desk, my head felt as if it was in a spin. I became clumsy with my stitches and extraordinarily slow in all my work. When it was clear I could no longer manage even the simplest of tasks, the Head Seamstress dismissed me.
With nowhere else to go, I returned to the place of my birth, the tiny corner of Farku, the ghetto filled with those descended from the motherland.
“It is good that you have returned,” Embo declared by way of greeting. “You can manage the shop while I tend to my children.”
“But, I am ill,” I insisted. “I cannot work.”
Embo eyed me critically and tapped a foot against the floor.
“You are no more ill than any other woman has been. Who wa
s he, a poor student, or a cavalier professor who didn’t know your name?”
“Neither,” I mumbled, and stumbled to my old room.
Two weeks later, Embo produced Pellen from the village pawnshop. He brought me a bouquet of roses in many colors, and blushed shyly in my presence. His hands trembled when he touched mine and sweat formed upon his brow.
“He is a good man,” Embo proclaimed. “He will take care of you and love you with all his heart.”
“I don’t love him,” I muttered, staring out the window of Embo’s kitchen, imagining the King dressed in his heavy cloak, wandering the countryside under this same rain.
“It doesn’t matter who you love. You are in need of a man and home. You could do worse than Pellen. He will treat you like a queen even though you don’t deserve it. He doesn’t know of your condition, so I suggest you complete your courtship at a rapid pace, before it becomes clear that what you carry is not his.”
Pellen’s looks were nothing, and his conversation was just as plain, but he was kind and brought me flowers at every visit. I grew ill, I thought with the Disease, and would often retch immediately after he left.
“Marry him and move to your own flat!” Embo ordered. “Your malaise is making me ill.”
I assumed my days were limited, and grew indifferent to how they would be spent. Within a week, I was married to Pellen, and six months later, instead of dying, I produced a tiny and sickly infant boy.
The Disease didn’t take me after all, although it eventually claimed the King, on the same night as the fire’s embers flamed bright, and my son nearly died during one of his odd spells.
Chapter 19
Sandy
When I was fifteen, my dad walked away from a non-illustrious career in the SpaceForce. He’d been turned down for several promotions, probably because he wasn’t all that great of an officer. He was argumentative and opinionated, filled with ideas that weren’t politically correct and happy to argue about them long after everyone else had moved on. In addition, Dad had a chip on his shoulder the size of a battlecruiser because my mom was more successful, having been a captain already for many years.
