Naondel

by Maria Turtschaninoff

  They had ridden into battle before, but never so far away. Iskan had explained to Esiko, who then explained to me, that a new power had risen in the north-west. Elian had risen against Karenokoi’s authority and begun to encroach upon the vassal states along its border. They had taken over two states, Baklat and Nernai, which, according to Esiko, were crucial for Karenokoi’s economy. They provided the grain for the entire realm. Spices were now the only crop farmed in Renka and the districts surrounding Ohaddin, and they were its source of gold. Gold, but no bread or rice. The prices of food had soared. Now other district governors were looking to the north-west, either in fear of invasion by Elian, or beginning to see a glimmer of opportunity. Iskan was no popular leader. For he was the true leader now, and everybody knew it. The Sovereign Prince was a confused old man. All strength had drained from him since the death of his sons. I do not believe there was yet need for Iskan to feed him Anji’s dark water. He had already lost all will to live and no longer emerged from his chambers. He was very old; nobody blamed him. The succession to the throne was unclear—who was next in line with the Sovereign’s sons dead? One of his illegitimate sons? None of them had dared stand up against Iskan. Everyone knew the consequence of open mutiny: instant death.

  Though Esiko did not speak of it, I learnt from Estegi that the principal cause for the uprising in Elian was the slave trade. Slaves were a further export commodity that Iskan had introduced into the trade of Karenokoi. He was inspired by Harrera, where he had bought Garai so long ago. Selling young women was profitable, and he needed more gold for his perpetual expansion. Iskan wanted to appropriate as many sources of power as possible, in order to destroy them. He was plagued by the fear that somebody else would master prophecy and death as he had, and then use it against him. On the Vizier’s command, young women were kidnapped away from poor villages in Karenokoi and its vassal states, and other nearby realms besides. The girls were then sold to traders in Karenokoi and beyond. It had gone so far that mothers in certain regions where the slave scouts were most rife, such as Elian, disfigured their daughters by shaving their heads, cutting or burning their faces, pulling out their teeth. Anything to try to keep them safe. Those born with a cleft lip or birthmarks were seen as blessed. They were safe.

  Iskan claimed to have had no choice but to send his sons out to head the troops. Naturally he could not go because he was too old. Too important. But he was encountering problems with the population. They despised him from the pit of their starving stomachs. He could not quell them with the threat of death, for they were already staring death in the face. For a long time he had managed to keep them subdued with the cult that he had built up around the Sovereign Prince, as a sort of infallible forefather for them to revere. But they had not seen the Sovereign for several years. Everyone knew who ruled, and an uprising was on the horizon. Iskan did not want to kill more people than he had to: people were labour and therefore necessary for the crucial spice plantations. He had tried to replace some who had died in the last great famine with slaves bought in from Harrera, but to no avail. Now he was trying to inspire co-operation by presenting Elian as their true common enemy: Karenokoi is under attack—we must all unite in the fight against the invaders! Esiko told me that he was working hard to manipulate the people’s outlook on the war. I do not know how successful were his attempts. All I knew was that my sons were a part of his campaign.

  It seemed that Iskan no longer trusted anyone but his sons, and scarcely even them. The previous night, Sonan had told me that he was becoming perversely suspicious even of Korin. He had accused him of withholding resources in Amdurabi.

  “What plans do you have for the gold?” Iskan had asked. “To enlist your own soldiers, perhaps? To march against whose armies? I am warning you. You cannot revolt against me, do you understand? Nobody can, but especially not you!”

  Korin had stood with bowed head and tight fists and assured his father that the gold was to feed the population and nothing more. That he was a good and obedient son, who wanted to obey his father’s wishes in all ways. However, he humbly entreated that he may stay home in Amdurabi and not take part in the campaign against Elian. Hánai, his wife, was pregnant again, and he really ought—

  “Ought to what?” Iskan had mocked him. “Hold her hand while she is bearing down? I am sure I know your real motives. Do not worry. You shall go to battle with honour. I hereby name you commanding officer of the campaign.”

  Korin thanked his father for this great honour, but when Iskan turned away his eyes were filled with hate. Korin was a middle-aged man already, and deeply resented taking orders from his father as if he were a boy, and not a governor in his own right with six children and a seventh on the way. He did not care about his people any more than Iskan did, but he was not as far removed from reality as his father. If Amdurabi’s population revolted against their governor there would be little he could do. If he left his district, the situation would be even more uncertain.

  Sonan and I conversed late that night, with Esiko by her brother’s side, drinking in every word. Despite her closeness to her father I knew we could talk freely in her company. She had never betrayed me or us to her father. She simply stored everything he told her, and everything I told her, in her little head, her face like an expressionless mask. I never knew what she was thinking, and sometimes I wanted to shake her until she let me in, allowed me to see her true self. I could never get truly close to Sonan. The distance Izani had created between us when he was little was too great, even if it had diminished in recent years. Yet Esiko was supposed to have been mine from the beginning.

  Sonan was afraid. He had not said so—no young man would to his mother the evening before leaving for battle. Despite his age, he had never fought in a war before. He was recently married, with a little daughter, and had no desire to leave his hearth and home. Yet he did everything that his father and brothers ordered him to do.

  “I am no warrior, Mother,” he said quietly as Estegi was clearing up after our meal. “Neither am I a leader. Father has appointed me as leader of a mercenary band of mounted archers from Tane. These are tough men, Mother. Seasoned in battle, masters of their art. They despise me and my inexperience. I do not blame them.”

  “You can learn a lot from those archers,” said Esiko. “You are fond of archery, aren’t you? There’s no one who can shoot from horseback like the riders of Tane.”

  Sonan mumbled something nondescript in answer and shortly after stood up to go. I wanted to hold onto him, but could not think of a reason to make him stay. He leant forward and kissed my cheeks.

  “If anything should happen to me… I know that your influence is limited, but try to take care of my wife and daughter. Seeing as I have no sons, I know that my family are of little interest to Father.”

  “Do not say such things, my son,” I said and pulled him fiercely to my breast, holding him more tightly than ever before. I held him as I had wished I could when he was little and at the mercy of Izani’s cruelty. “You shall return to us all, whole and well.”

  “I will ensure they have all they need,” said Esiko calmly to her brother. “You need not ride out with a heavy heart.”

  Sonan gently released himself from my grip. He clapped his youngest sibling on the back. “I know I can rely on you, Orano. And you have Father’s ear. Live well, little brother.”

  “And you, brother.”

  They kissed each other warmly on the cheeks. Esiko and Sonan had always got on well.

  Sonan gave me a final hasty kiss. “I must go. My wife promised to stay awake to see me and I do not want to make her wait. Live well, esteemed Mother.”

  He left, and we were alone. I hid my face in my hands. Though I was distraught that Iskan sent all three of them away together, I hoped that Korin and Enon would keep an eye on their younger brother.

  “Father is sending a supply of Anji’s good water to protect them,” said Esiko to me and yawned. She started extinguishing the oil lamps, one by one. Este
gi had been sent to bed. I looked up and watched Esiko’s figure in the increasing gloom. Her hips were beginning to grow a soft roundness now; it could not be mistaken. Her budding breasts could be hidden under stiff silk jackets, but the hips… And her entire face had started to take on an altogether more feminine form. Soon our secret would not be concealable from anybody. I still did not know how we would protect her.

  “That is good. Then they are safe,” I said, my mind still fully occupied with my raw yearning for Sonan.

  Esiko paused with an extinguished lamp in one hand. She looked at me with eyes that suddenly appeared much older than the girl before me.

  “Anji’s power is bound to this district, to Renka,” she said. “It diminishes the farther away the water travels, and with every other source of power it passes. Father knows this, but sometimes I believe he forgets.”

  I felt a shiver along my spine and stood up abruptly.

  “Have you seen something? Answer, girl!”

  “I have seen many things in Anji’s water. Never have I seen my brothers’ deaths reflected there.”

  “What does that mean?” My voice was trembling.

  “It means that wherever and whenever they should fall, Mother, it shall not be here.”

  I was reminded of her words as my children rode away from me that morning. They did not know that I was stood on the wall and watching their departure, and none of them turned around. They were too soon obscured by the houses beyond the wall, but I lingered as the sun was rising. I could hear additional commanders from Ohaddin joining their small troop. The foot soldiers were waiting outside the city. I heard the city gates being opened to the sound of fanfares and jubilant calls when the soldiers saw their leader riding out. Korin was well liked, or more so than his father at least. I looked towards the Halim mountains in the north-west, and their undulating peaks that marked the army’s destination. They were planning on reaching the pass between the highest mountains as soon as the following day.

  When I turned around to go Esiko grabbed my hand in a most uncharacteristic gesture.

  “You have me, Mother,” she said and squeezed my hand. “I will stay by your side until their return.”

  I withdrew my hand from hers and groped my way to the staircase where the guards of the dairahesi were waiting for us. My feet and hands had to show me the way; my eyes were blinded with tears.

  * * *

  Several weeks later, the messengers started to come. Esiko brought with her reports from Sovereign House, where she sat by Iskan’s side every day and listened in on all of his meetings and negotiations. The first reports told of the arrival of Karenokoi’s troops at Baklat, where they were met with tough opposition. The enemy forces were larger than expected because the local population chose to fight on the side of Elian. Such was Iskan’s unpopularity.

  Iskan tried to recruit more soldiers to send as reinforcements, but, as Esiko recounted, nobody accepted the call to arms. She only came to our quarters in the evenings. She said that so much happened in Sovereign House that she did not want to miss a thing. She looked tired, with dark shadows under her eyes, and she let me fuss over her.

  “He is sending orders and counter-orders several times a day,” she said. “It is soon full moon. He is waiting to see what Anji will tell him then. I have never seen Father this way before. It worries him that the battles are being fought so far away from Renka.”

  “From Anji, you mean. But if the enemy was overpowering his forces could he not simply order them to retreat?”

  “Have you ever seen Father withdraw from anything? Admit defeat? You who never leave these quarters, what do you know of war! Of strategy!”

  I looked at her, astonished. “As a woman, as the Vizier’s wife, I am not permitted to leave Beauty’s House. You know that.” I attempted to change the subject. “You are exhausted, little one. You should not spend so much time in Sovereign House.”

  “I am Father’s right hand,” said Esiko. “He cannot do without me now that my elder brothers are away.”

  A shiver went along my spine. My father’s right hand. That is what Iskan said when first I met him. My arms dropped limply at my sides. I looked at Esiko. She had her father’s weak chin. His marked brows and thin nose. In many ways she was a mirror image of Iskan, which helped to conceal her sex. Yet, unlike her father, she very seldom smiled.

  “I’m going to bed now, Mother. Make sure I am woken at dawn, and tell the servants to bring me breakfast in my bed. I am going directly to Father’s house when I rise.”

  And off she went, leaving me alone with my musings and fears.

  Clarás

  USED TO WORK DOWN AT THE PORT. I RECEIVED several men every night. The poorest of the seamen, the ones who couldn’t afford a beautiful woman, or even a normal one. Only a handsome face fetches a handsome price. Nobody wanted to attend to these men. Not even me. You never knew if they could pay. They were old and reeking, and missing fingers and teeth. When the rich man came, in fine clothes and with good-smelling oils in his hair, and wanted to buy a night with me, nobody could believe it. Least of all me.

  But he didn’t want the choice ones; the beautiful ones. He was drawn to the ugly and disfigured. Like me.

  One night wasn’t enough for him. He wanted to own me.

  The other girls in the pleasure house were jealous. They dressed up in their finery and tried to entice the man into buying them instead. But it was me he bid for. I thought my life would become easier. No more nights receiving man after man. Never again worrying about food or clothes or a roof over my head. I sent the money he bought me for to my parents. Then I followed him, with no more belongings than the clothes on my back.

  He took me to Ohaddin: the capital. I had never been there before. I had never left the sea before. The palace grounds were the size of the whole port town. The houses were tall, the roofs high, the gardens fragrant. Never could I have imagined such a place.

  I strained my neck as I was brought through the entrance of the dairahesi. I couldn’t see the sea.

  The golden doors were locked behind me. I ran over to a window and looked out. I saw roofs and trees and green fields beyond. But couldn’t so much as smell a hint of the sea.

  I was one of the last to come to the dairahesi. But I was the first who decided to escape.

  I came to Ohaddin late one summer, soon after the war in which the man’s three eldest sons were killed. I think that is why he was drawn to me—he wanted someone to degrade. The dairahesi was full of the smells of incense that the wife burned in memory of her sons. I hardly saw her at that time. When I caught glimpses of her she would walk slowly and uncertainly, as if she didn’t know where she was. Always supported by her youngest son, Orano. Her face was like parchment. An old, broken woman.

  The women in the dairahesi ignored me. They didn’t want to see my disfigured face. They were afraid that if they were pregnant and looked at me their children would be deformed like me. The only ones who spoke to me and seemed not to care about my cloven lip were the servant girl Estegi and the dark woman they called Orseola. She was much older than I, but still we became something similar to friends.

  Time in the dairahesi was slow. Like syrup. As a child I worked for my family, for our very survival. With my father and brother in the boat, day in, day out. I set fishing lines and nets, took fish out of the net, cleaned them. Dived for mussels and oysters. Hunted big fish with a harpoon. I was useful, a part of our vital web. In work it didn’t matter what I looked like. But in the dairahesi there was nothing to do. My hands lay idle on my lap. I dried up slowly, and withered.

  It was early autumn when I discovered I was with child. I decided at once that this child would not be born in captivity. It would not be his child: only mine. And it was my duty to give it a life worth living.

  One night I dreamt that I sat at the fore of a fishing boat with the wind in my hair. The air smelt salty. The boat below me was very small, but sleek and strong, with grey-green sails. As soon a
s I woke up I searched for Orseola.

  I found her by the pond in the courtyard, where she was sitting and dunking her dreamsnares in the water. She called it drowning dreams. Who knows what she meant.

  “Was it you who showed me the boat?”

  Orseola shook her head. Her arms were dark with moisture. She didn’t look up, but her hands had stopped working.

  “No. But I saw it. Most beautiful dream I have seen here.” Her voice was quiet and emotionless. Then she looked at me and raised her eyebrows. “The taste of freedom will stay with me all day.”

  That was her way. She changed mood from one moment to the next. Unpredictable as a summer storm.

  “The boat will be mine,” I said. “I’ll name it Naondel.”

  “Where will you sail? Home, little stickleback?”

  “Yes.” I waited until she looked at me again. “Home to the sea. You know that the house where I grew up is no longer my home.”

  Orseola shook her head. “No dowry, little stickleback. What a tragic story. Ach, ach, so sad. Forced to sell your body. The only one of us who came here of her own free will.”

  Bitter words rose in my throat, but I gritted my teeth. “Wherever the sea is, there is my home.”

  She turned away and gathered her pile of dreamsnares. The pearls and bones glimmered wet and cleaned.

  “You can find me a boat,” I said. “Search through the dreams that come to you. Somebody must own a grey fishing boat, small and sturdy, with a slender hull and grey-green sail. I know it. Naondel showed herself to me because she should be mine.”

  “Can you sail far in such a boat?” asked Orseola, still looking away.