“As far as you like as long as you have food and water.”
“There is a land beyond the southern sea,” she said. “Terasu. There may be some still who live there. Who may have forgiven me by now.”
I looked at her. She was unpredictable. But she had greater freedom than the others in the dairahesi. She left Beauty’s House sometimes and was allowed to move around the Sovereign’s palace. And as I had asked her to search for a boat she was already party to my plan. I wanted to escape. No point in denying it.
“Can we get protection there?”
She gave no reply. Something had happened in her homeland, that much I knew. But I didn’t know what, nor what awaited her there.
I looked up at the patch of blue sky above us. A single cloud drifted slowly past. One which promised calm weather and sun. I turned to Orseola, and bound my fate to hers.
“We can sail there. But you have to help me find the boat. She exists somewhere. You can search through dreams from the coast.”
Orseola removed her hands from her face. Shrugged her shoulders. As if the whole idea were of no interest to her. “But how to get to the coast? How to get out?”
“We can worry about that later. First we need a boat.”
Days passed. The child inside me was growing. The man knew; he told me it was a daughter and that he would allow her to live. His words didn’t matter. He wasn’t the one who would decide over this child’s life—I was.
Orseola came to me a little later. I had just returned from the man’s bed.
“Have you found the boat?” I asked.
“No. But I have seen another dream. Sulani and Estegi are planning their escape.”
She looked at me.
I shook my head.
“No. They are creatures of the land. They know nothing of the sea, of storms, of watery depths and sails.”
“Sulani knows water,” Orseola objected. “Rivers. And she is strong, her soul means to shine and she will let nothing stand in her way.”
“Neither will I.”
“Estegi can move more freely than we. She is only a servant; she is not watched. She can gather supplies.”
“I don’t trust them.”
“You do not trust me either,” said Orseola. “But you need me. And we also need a warrior and a spy.”
I thought about what she had said. I listened inwardly. And I came to the conclusion that she was right. A warrior and a spy would make it easier to escape.
So Orseola brought them to my room one evening. Sulani sat down on a cushion close inside the door. From the first moment she was the one to keep guard and protect us. Estegi brought tea and fruit. She always treated me as equal to the others. I liked her for that. I wondered why she wanted to flee. She was not imprisoned here, not in the same way we were.
I made them swear an oath first. An oath not to reveal our plan of escape to anybody. They swore without protest. Sulani on her river. Orseola on the memory of her mother. Estegi on her secret. I looked at her. Tried to guess what she might be hiding. She was always so calm. She seemed so secure and certain.
I swore on my unborn child.
We spoke in low voices. Orseola explained. Sulani questioned and challenged. She started to outline a plan and made a list of necessary items. I added the things the others seemed not to know about: rope, sails, shelter from rain and sea. Sulani knew a lot about drying and preserving food. Estegi knew even more. We agreed to begin setting aside all the food we were given that could be dried. We couldn’t take it directly from the store, else it would be discovered, but we could take it from our own portions. Estegi knew of an unused, forgotten storeroom where we could keep it all.
When they had left I sat by my window and stared out towards the sea. My room faced west, but if I pressed my face against the grate on clear days I could just about see a shimmer far off in the south. That night the wind set in from the south and I could feel the breath of the sea on my skin.
Soon, I whispered, to the sea and to my child. Soon.
I wondered which of the women would betray us. The thought didn’t worry me. That is the way of people: unreliable, dishonest. Not like animals. Animals are neither good nor wicked, only themselves.
But I had a plan. I was doing something, for myself and for the child. That was all that mattered. To have something to work towards. The fish in my belly swished its tail.
We, the oath-sworn, had gathered in the bathing room on the ground floor to talk undisturbed. Nobody was there, the hot and cold baths were empty and shone in the light of our lamps, but still I was afraid that somebody might hear.
“We must fight our way free,” I whispered. “With weapons.”
Sulani scoffed. “None of you know how to wield weapons. And we have none, besides. It is too dangerous. Too risky.”
“Are you not a warrior?” I asked.
“Was. I was a warrior.” She looked at me darkly. “You three do not know how to wield weapons.” Estegi laid a hand on her arm and spoke to her in soothing tones. As one does to a seal that has become tangled in a fishing net. Estegi’s hand rested on her sinewy arm for a long time. I looked at them.
Then I looked away.
“There are not many guards,” I whispered. “At night there are only two. We lure them in somehow, then strike them unconscious. We don’t need weapons for that.”
“But if we do not succeed they will raise the alert at once,” objected Sulani.
“If they were sleeping I could come up from the servants’ quarters and steal the keys,” said Estegi. “To open the doors and let you all out and lock up behind you, so as no one would even know you were awake.”
“Orseola can give them dreams,” I whispered.
“I cannot make them sleep,” said Orseola.
“No, but you can give them dreams when they sleep. If they fall asleep at their post. Before the night of the escape. Dreams that give them…”
I searched for an idea of something that could help us. “Dreams that are so beautiful that they want to return to them and carry on sleeping. When they are asleep you give them such sweet dreams that they don’t want to wake when we take the keys and leave.”
“It will not work. How can we trust that they will sleep deeply enough? That they will sleep at all? We cannot wait, night after night, in the hope that this will happen.” Sulani leant carefully against the wall and grimaced. The man had hurt her badly, again. Estegi leapt to her feet at once to fetch a cushion and make Sulani comfortable. Then she picked up one of the bottles that stood in the niche that ran around the bathing pools, and poured a little of the sharp-smelling oil into her hands. Then she began to massage Sulani’s feet. Sulani muttered something in protest but let her continue. Then Estegi spoke. Which she seldom did.
“I think we should make them sleep. With a drink. Garai could surely make one for us.”
“No!” I raised my voice. “The more we are, the worse our chances.”
“We could dig a tunnel,” Sulani proposed. “From here, from the baths. At night there is no one here to see what we are doing.”
“That would take years!” I threw up my arms in exasperation. “I need to leave this place before my child is born.”
I left the others, frustrated, and returned to my room. It had been a mistake to invite new people into my plan. We couldn’t even agree on how we would escape.
One day we were all herded out of the palace together. We were given no warning about what was about to happen. After the autumn, when Karenokoi had suffered such defeat, we were given less and less information about what was happening outside Ohaddin. I believe that the wife and Garai knew. But they rarely spoke to us. They went out first, warmly dressed in quilted jackets and piles of shawls. Orano walked by Kabira’s side. Mother and son were both dressed in bright white to signify their grief for the dead sons. Estegi and the other servants were carrying parasols and cushions and baskets of food. The rest of us walked behind, out into the garden. The air was cold and t
he sky was high. It was early winter. My first in the palace. From the animal park in the south-east came the roar of unknown animals and the screech of foreign birds. I wished I could visit the animals there. To afford them a little comfort in their imprisonment. Maybe even set them free.
A stage had been built in the south part of the garden, by the edge of the pond, but it was empty. The guards led us to a platform that was screened off from the outside world by garishly painted screens. We sat down on the cushions the servants were setting out. Next to the wife there was a fire pot and thick animal hides were spread over her legs. Some of the children were whining and being shushed by their mothers. I pulled my hands into my sleeves, away from the cold wind that was sweeping in from the mountains in the north-west.
We waited.
The Sovereign’s women came with their children. The Sovereign’s wife, an old white-haired lady, bent with age, arrived on a palanquin. Her daughters and grandchildren gathered around her, all wrapped up in expensive animal hides. Then a low hubbub could be heard from the other side of the painted screen as the rest of the court took their seats. The stage was still empty. I wondered whether a travelling theatre company or musicians would appear. Nobody seemed to know. The servants were carrying around dishes with food and hot wine with honey. I took a bowl and warmed my cold fingers on it. I hadn’t been cold since falling pregnant, apart from my fingers. Orano and Kabira sat in front of me. I couldn’t hear what they were speaking about, but the wife asked her son something and he shrugged his shoulders. He would soon be a young man. I wondered how long he would be allowed to roam freely in the dairahesi. As the man’s only surviving son, he had taken on a new role. He would surely be married off soon.
Not that this was any of my concern. I would soon be far away from here.
Then quiet fell over the murmuring crowd. Men were led onto the stage. They were naked, and their backs and legs were bloody from whip lashes. I understood at once what was about to happen. I did not want to be there. But guards surrounded our platform—there was no way out.
There were five men in total. One of them barely more than a boy. He couldn’t walk unaided and had to be dragged onto the stage by guards. These guards bore no resemblance to the ones who guarded the dairahesi. They had helmets and swords. They showed no mercy. Five sticks were soon raised on the edge of the stage. The men were bound tightly to them. The boy was barely conscious by this point.
The man appeared on the stage. He was dressed in a long blue quilted cloak and high black boots, with a fur hat against the cold. He was as impeccably dressed and groomed as always, but his movements no longer had the control I was used to seeing. He paced the stage without looking at the men behind him.
He spoke but I didn’t listen to his words. I did not want to hear—or see. Words reached me anyway: Traitors. Everyone is against me. Betrayed us. Blood on their hands. No secrets from me. Confessed.
The wounds the men bore could have made absolutely anybody confess, I thought.
Punishment. Death. A thousands small deaths. A warning to you all.
Orano shuddered. The wife said something, he stood up, she held him back. He looked as if he wanted to rush up onto the stage. His father looked at him and made an angry gesture. Slowly the boy sank down next to his mother.
Five men with white-painted, clean-shaven faces and heads entered the stage. The man disappeared out of sight, probably to join the rest of the court. The white-painted executioners carried blades with an unusual curve. Before I had time to look away, they began. One executioner per prisoner. With the knives they began to carve the meat from their bodies. Slice by slice. A thousand small deaths.
The men were screaming. Not loudly. Quiet, confused groans. One of them spoke. Pleaded his innocence. That he had done nothing, nothing at all.
I did not look. But I could not shut out the screams. Mothers hid their youngest children in their shawls. The older ones looked on, in horror and fascination. The servants brought around plates with sweet things and more honeyed wine. I sat and stared hard down into the bowl in my hands.
We sat there all day. A thousand small deaths takes a long time.
Sometimes I looked at Kabira and Orano. They were quiet at first, but then the wife started speaking more and more urgently to her son. He mostly just shook his head. Between some of the prisoners’ screams I heard a few words.
“Will even this not make you understand?”
“Father would never harm me. Never!” Orano had stood up and was leaning over his mother. His face was very pale and his hands were shaking. He didn’t look at the stage.
“He would consider it betrayal,” said Kabira. She extended her hands towards Orano but he shied away.
“You are wrong! I am his only heir, I have committed no crime.” His voice was shrill. He sounded like he was trying to convince himself.
After a while he sank back down onto the cushions next to his mother.
“I cannot lose you too. You are all I have left.” Kabira turned to face her son. She was crying. I had never seen her express either joy or sorrow before that. Her bony hand grasped for her son’s. He withdrew his and turned away. After a while she lowered her hand. The tears continued to run down her cheeks. Then she pulled a shawl over her head and I could no longer see her face.
It was evening by the time the last of the prisoners’ moans had died out. From the corner of my eye I saw the men being taken down from the stakes. The man came up on stage again. He was standing taller now. His eyes were burning.
“Justice has been done!” he cried. “Those who have betrayed their Sovereign and their realm have received their due punishments! Let us celebrate. Music!”
While the musicians were making their way onto the stage, still slippery with blood, we women and children were taken back to our golden cage.
A shark eats when it is hungry. Sometimes it kills more than it needs, but that is its instinct. It does not torment its prey unnecessarily. Nature is cruel, they say, but never have I seen such cruelty in nature as I saw that day in Ohaddin.
* * *
We were very rarely allowed to go out in the garden after the executions. The man’s twisted suspicions had grown and he had increased the number of guards. I had planned for us to escape by climbing over the wall, but soon I realized that this was impossible. The man wanted to know where we were at all times. He suspected conspiracies and dangers around every corner. The stench of death and decay was closing in around him. His eyes were nearly entirely black now, only a little white around the iris. He still visited me, though my belly had begun to grow. It was as if he relished the unspeakable things he did with me—did to me—even more now that I was pregnant.
One sunny winter’s day I went out to the little pond in the courtyard. I wanted to see some sky, and breathe some fresh air.
Maybe smell the scent of the sea. I missed the garden more than I thought I would.
The window shutters to the wife’s residence stood open above me. I sat on the little bench by the pond and squinted in the sunlight.
“You told him?”
The wife’s voice drifted out through the open shutters. Piercing and panicked.
Orano answered her. “Yes, Mother. And you were wrong. He did not reject me.” The boy’s voice was shrill with indignation.
“He will punish me! He will consider me guilty of high treason! Oh, do you understand nothing?”
“You are wrong, Mother.” Orano tried to calm her down. But his voice was not calm, it was darting up and down like a swallow. “I explained that you so wanted to provide him with another son. That you did not understand the consequences of your actions.”
The wife did not reply.
“He is not angry with you. Not… really.”
“On Lehan’s soul. He is going to take his revenge, but he knows how to bide his time. You are so blinded by Anji that you cannot see your father clearly, Esiko.”
Why did Kabira call her son by a girl’s name?
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“You are wrong, Mother! I am nothing like him. And do not blame Anji!”
“No, the fault is mine for showing him the spring, once upon a time. I told him of her secrets. And now you are becoming as deranged by her power as he is!”
“I am not deranged,” Orano—or Esiko—screeched. “And Father has not rejected me, so see how wrong you are!”
“Can you continue to be his son?” There was a challenge in the wife’s voice.
We both had to wait for an answer.
“Outwardly. For a while. But I will keep to our quarters. He was… upset. I cannot go to Anji without him again.” Orano said this last part hesitantly. Softly.
“That is one good thing in all of this at least.”
“Anji is a part of me! Neither you nor Father can keep us apart!”
A door slammed.
A sob was heard. Just one.
Nothing else could be heard. I waited a moment. Then I came inside.
* * *
Orseola found Naondel on a midwinter’s night when the cold, dry winds were sweeping over Ohaddin from the north. She woke me in the middle of the night. Her eyes were shining.
“I have found her!”
“Where?” I sat up, ready to rush out at once.
“A fisherman in Shukurin has her. He is ready to sell her if the price is right, I believe.”
The boat. We had the boat! I stopped thinking about how we would escape the dairahesi. Now, instead, I was plagued day and night by thoughts of the buying price. I valued everything in the dairahesi with my eyes. Could it be stolen? Would anybody notice? Could it be sold? Kabira had eyes like a sea eagle. A girl had stolen from the dairahesi, and therefore from the man, some years before I came, Orseola told me. She had been executed, naturally, and the wife had been careful with inventory ever since. Naondel’s buying price was all around us, many times over, but there was no way for us to get hold of it. The wife and Garai had a lot of jewellery they had been given by the man, but Sulani and I owned almost nothing.
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