Those of My Kind

by Loring, Jennifer

  “If it please you, Your Grace.”

  Anasztaizia rested her chin on her hand. He was handsome enough, with curly dark hair and fair skin, his voice indeed a distraction from her father’s vociferous grieving. Had she not promised as part of her initiation to reject the pleasures of the flesh, she might have persuaded Ispán Gergo to make a match for her.

  The boy chose a minnesong for Anasztaizia, in which he described how she was beautiful like her mother, how the castle district adored her. Her cheeks burst into flame. The castle district barely knew she existed, and she did not know what to make of such attention, as foreign to her as the trader and his silks.

  “Do you find him enjoyable?” said the ispán, leaning back in his chair, his face as dark as the bunting draped above their heads. His melancholy was difficult enough to bear, but he had slipped into something far more sinister, and Anasztaizia entertained an urgent wish to go back to her room.

  “I…I do if it please you, Father.”

  “No, no. Tell me true. Do you find him appealing? Would you marry him if you were matched?”

  Is that all this is? I am being silly.

  Yet his baleful expression did not fade. His glare bored into the minstrel, who carried on with his song in blissful indifference, his concentration focused squarely upon Anasztaizia.

  “He is pleasing in voice and appearance and is of noble birth. I suppose he would make a fine match.”

  “I see.” Ispán Gergo rose from his chair. The boy and the entire hall fell silent at once. “Do you understand, boy, that this feast is for my wife, whom God has claimed for His own, and not for my daughter?”

  “Of course, Your Grace. But she is like the lady in so many ways; I wished only to honor them both—”

  “I am not sufficiently honoring my family?”

  “Yes, Your Grace, of course you are—”

  “Then why do you sing a minnesong to my daughter, when we are here to mourn the death of my wife?” The ispán clenched his hands at his sides. Anasztaizia cast a helpless glance toward Gazsi, who with a sad shake of his head chose to examine his bread plate.

  “Forgive me, Your Grace. I sought only to please you.”

  “Me or my daughter?”

  The minstrel swallowed hard but found no more words to speak. Anasztaizia folded her trembling hands in her lap.

  “And now you defy me by refusing to answer. Rendor!”

  The ispán’s most feared knight rose from the table. He was an imposing man even without his armor, his arms thick as branches, his face scarred, and his lank hair a veil over pitiless blue eyes. He understood what his master desired without words. He reached for his sword.

  “Father, please. Let the minstrel go. He did not mean to offend you, I am sure of it.”

  “And how might you know this? Would you dishonor me as well?”

  “No,” she whispered. Tears clouded her eyes, and for that, she was grateful. She did not want to see anymore.

  “Kill him.”

  Such stillness descended upon the banquet hall that Anasztaizia feared she had gone deaf. Not a single sound, not even as the weeping boy got down on his knees, hands behind his back, and stretched out his neck. The initial chop of sword against flesh and bone destroyed that final moment of peace. It was not merely the minstrel’s end, she thought, but of everything. Something had been irretrievably lost with the death of her mother, her father’s behavior merely the symptom of a greater sickness.

  Blood splashed Rendor’s mourning attire and absorbed into the black fabric. For a man of even Rendor’s strength, several blows struck before the muscles and spine severed. Though Anasztaizia closed her eyes, the minstrel’s primal, unearthly screams horrified her the most. Even in her wildest imaginings, she could not conceive of the pain, how each chop against the neck must have felt. She too would go mad, she thought, but from those screams.

  When the minstrel’s head met the floor with a leaden thump, Anasztaizia opened her eyes. She surveyed the hall, the sickened peasants with hands over mouths, mothers with their children’s faces buried against their bosoms. Gazsi’s face drained of all color. He realized as well as she did what it meant, should the ispán discover their studies. A despot ruled the castle district.

  “Send his remains to his family. Tell them how he insulted me and to pray I do not take further action.”

  Rendor, his face and hands bearing crimson splatters, bowed. He hefted the corpse over his shoulder then grabbed a fistful of the head’s curls and carried both out of the hall.

  The ispán resumed his seat. “Ah, the meat has arrived. Eat! The lambs have grown quite fat this year.”

  Anasztaizia contemplated the thick slab of meat before her, rare and swimming in its own pink juices. She thought of nothing but rings of muscle and severed red veins spewing blood, things meant to stay on the inside. Her stomach hitched. She mustn’t be sick. She mustn’t offend him. She had already caused one death; instigating her own would not bring the boy back.

  “Yes, Father,” she said in her most obedient tone. He handed her a knife with which to cut her meat, his vigilant stare more than a suggestion of his awareness that she wished to plunge it into his neck.

  ~

  The following week, Ispán Gergo assembled all of the castle district’s artists downstairs in the throne room. Through Dorika, he requested Anasztaizia attend the meeting and to appear in one of her mother’s dresses. She did not know why it distressed her so, and yet the demand repulsed her. Her father mourned his lost lady. Might his only daughter, his last link to her, soothe some of his pain? Should she not be grateful he remembered her at last?

  “Go along with it for now,” Dorika said as she arranged Anasztaizia’s long, loose curls around her shoulders then wove a crown of flowers with gold ribbons into her hair. It was too similar to current wedding fashion for Anasztaizia’s taste; she assumed her father meant to have Lady Katinka’s wedding portrait painted. She wished she could wriggle out of her own skin.

  With a straight razor, Dorika scraped away the hairs around Anasztaizia’s forehead to give her as high a hairline as possible. “I’ll see to it the seamstress makes you some new dresses of your own. We can go into town tomorrow if you like.” She tied a linen girdle around Anasztaizia’s waist.

  “Thank you, Dorika.” Anasztaizia lifted her skirts and descended the stairs.

  The men stood in a half-circle inside the throne room. Anasztaizia curtsied, and they bowed in return. Stretched canvas panels rested upon easels arranged for each of them, along with palettes, brushes, and paints.

  “Lady,” said Ispán Gergo. The word rolled like a curse from his lips; he had referred to her only as “You” for as long as she recalled. “These men will be painting our glorious lady, may God rest her soul. You will be sitting for them.”

  She expected with all of his carrying on he’d go a little mad. Truthfully, she’d have preferred his persistence in ignoring her, for she found contentment in her studies with Gazsi, her chats with Dorika, and her entertainments with the jester Árpád, Dorika’s husband and one of the wisest men in the court.

  “But I’m not… I don’t…”

  “Oh, these are talented men, my dear.” Ispán Gergo curled his fingers around her upper arm, and she cringed. “They can change the color of your hair. But everything else about you—why, it’s as if she were standing before me herself!”

  “Are you certain this is what you want? There are paintings of her they could—”

  “Better to paint the subject in the flesh!” The ispán guided her to a chair in the center of the easel array. She did not argue she was not the subject. The artists evaluated her, her skin crawling as they scrutinized each line and curve and color, analyzed how to better force a likeness of her mother from this girl who was not. Then they applied gobs of paints to their palettes, picked up the brushes, and began their work.

  ~

  For hours each day, Anasztaizia sat in one gown or another belonging to her dead
mother as the artists painted canvas upon canvas. Paintings lined the walls of the staircase, surrounded the large framed portrait in the chamber where the lady had died, scrutinized Anasztaizia from the partitions of the room in which she sat. Usurper, they seemed to say, who do you think you are?

  She did not know anymore. In the evenings, during their lessons, Gazsi’s face wore a distressed expression to which he put few words. He had spoken to Dorika and Árpád; they must come to a decision soon. The ambiguity of these words terrified her more than if he had confessed his fears to her. Had Ispán Gergo discovered them? He would be furious at Gazsi’s succumbing to Anasztaizia’s insistence he teach her how to read; Lady Katinka had been perfectly content in her illiterate duties as a wife. The ispán’s orthodoxy gave no quarter to Gazsi’s notions of equality between the sexes, for a woman served one purpose and one alone, just as Saint Paul commanded.

  On occasion, the treasurer made an appearance in the throne room over which Ispán Gergo presided as the artists worked. Anasztaizia, her back and shoulders cramped and her buttocks numb, pretended not to listen to their conversation.

  “You must think about remarrying,” said the treasurer. “Someone must administer her lands, someone other than that incompetent fool of a steward. Frankly, Gergo, I can’t do it by myself for much longer. A man needs rest, and I’ve a family of my own.”

  The treasurer was a childhood friend and largely the reason the castle district hadn’t collapsed under the weight of the lord’s sorrow. On some level, Ispán Gergo regarded him as his peer.

  “And you’ve got to put an end to these paintings, unless you’re going to send them to eligible nobles. We’ll go bankrupt at this rate. Why, they don’t even resemble Anasztaizia!”

  One of the artists barked at her to sit up straight. Anasztaizia arched her back as a dull ache lumbered through it like a wounded bear crashing through the forest. Her father’s gaze fell upon her.

  “See to it the artists are paid for the rest of the week,” he said, not taking his eyes from her. “Raise the taxes on Bodi. They won’t dare complain while the castle district is still in mourning. We will speak further tomorrow morning.”

  “Of course.” The treasurer bowed slightly and was gone.

  “That will be all for today, gentlemen. Anasztaizia, I have moved your room up to the solar. You will have a magnificent view of the forest. The chamberlain has already brought your things. You will wait for me there.”

  “Yes, Father,” she said in a near-whisper. What fresh horror was this, that he desired her so near to him after all these years? Release from the middle of the donjon, yes, but she dreaded the cost.

  Be reasonable, Anasztaizia. You are his daughter, his only child, and he is in mourning. He sees in you the woman he loved, and wishes to be with you in this dark time.

  He sees in you the woman he loved.

  Each part of her—every hair, every flake of skin, every drop of blood—grew as cold as iron in winter, because now she understood.

  Chapter Six

  The metropolis of Lagos, smothered by a grayish-green haze the color of rotted flesh reflected in the Gulf of Guinea’s waters, sprawled out beneath the jet. Western cities had nothing on the malignant riot of skyscrapers, slums, and streets blighting the Nigerian waterfront. Tristan planned to book a room at Isno Hotel, which should have been a five-minute shuttle ride from the airport were it not for the traffic jam the driver told her was typical of Lagos. No wonder the sky resembled death in both smell and hue.

  For now, though, sleep was the overriding concern. The only thing upon which Tristan’s body and mind agreed, even more than food despite the restaurant downstairs. Once inside her room, she shed her clothes for a pair of lounge pants and a T-shirt and crawled into the double bed. The hotel was new, the room so clean and modern she almost fooled herself into imagining she was on vacation. And for a few idyllic hours, as sleep engulfed her, she let herself believe just that.

  She awoke to gunfire on a distant city street. At two a.m., the night belonged to carjackers, armed robbers, and rapists. She considered going out onto the balcony, but she didn’t want to draw attention to herself just yet.

  A large, humanoid shadow materialized on the far end of the room near the balcony. Shapa used to frighten her, before she learned she would never become a dancer or do any of the things normal people did. Before she learned she was something both more and less than human. The shadow understood. It had suffered, too. And in time, the giant specter became something of a friend.

  I’m here, she thought. I’m looking for you. Tell me where you are.

  Seconds passed, then minutes. Tristan stared up at the ceiling until her eyelids grew heavy again. Several minutes ticked by. The air conditioner hummed beneath the window, and sleep lay as thickly upon her as a down-filled comforter.

  Eket, came a child’s voice. Akwa Ibom.

  Tristan imagined the kinds of people she would encounter in Akwa Ibom. And what she would do to them if they stood in her way.

  ~

  An owl cried out from the ash tree shading the front yard, its forlorn hoot a portent that little time remained. If the battered Rom died, they could not prepare him properly for his next journey. They would not touch him afterward. Unclean. They washed him in the bathtub, in water that turned a deep shade of pink. When his head lolled back against the rim of the tub, the clots in his matted hair stained the porcelain, and he made no sound but for a weak moan. Bruises and cuts demolished his handsome face. The blows had knocked out several teeth and swelled one eye completely shut, but there was nothing to be done for it.

  They dressed him in his best clothing, the suit in which he had been married, and lit candles all around him to guide his soul into the afterlife. Members of the tribe asked him if they had grieved him in some way, and if he forgave them. His tongue worked against the top of his mouth but, unable to speak, he gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head each time. They had done him no harm.

  His widow-to-be dutifully turned all mirrors toward the wall. Someone gathered the things he needed in his coffin on his voyage to the next world. Clothing, money, utensils, his clarinet. He expelled one last breath, little more than a pitiful sigh, and died.

  A band played ahead of the coffin on the way to the cemetery. The woman shuffled along behind it, her face drawn, her eyes dark and heavy with tears. She clutched the hands of a little girl and an older woman. The entire neighborhood, mostly Romani, followed her in procession. The women wore all white. The men wore white ties and gloves, and white bands around their hats. Purity, to counter the potential contamination they faced. In all things, there must be balance. As the coffin descended into blackness, the mourners threw coins and earth into the grave, their sobs reaching a crescendo of heartache. His community loved him deeply. He and his apprentice handcrafted the instruments he sold in his shop, and he taught music lessons there. He played at every party, wedding, and funeral.

  She was supposed to weep with them, louder than the rest. But she could not. She felt nothing now that he was gone; she simply stared, stone-faced, as men lowered her entire world closed up in a pine box into the earth. Her husband was only twenty-six years old.

  Her younger sister supervised the cleansing. She had always been a strange girl who saw strange things no one else did, but her spiritual gifts had earned her the title of i drabarni, the one who spoke to spirits. The girl spent most of her time alone in a small hut on the edge of the village, rarely seen even by her own family except in times of sickness or death. She had known the day would come. The spirits perceived all things even if they were powerless to prevent them.

  After the funeral, the family burned the bed sheets and clothing. The rest, his tools and clarinets and anything not combustible, they sold to Gadže—outsiders. Her husband’s parents sold the shop as well, to a Gadže couple whose child had taken lessons from him. They gave the money to their daughter-in-law, and she offered them a respectable sum in return. His apprenti
ce moved away to the city and eventually opened a shop of his own.

  They must not mention her husband’s name ever again, lest they risk marimé, the contamination. They must not let the dead find their way back, for the spirits exploited even the smallest opportunity to live again. They must not even look back as they left the cemetery, or he might believe they called for him to return.

  They did not know about the photo, especially not i drabarni. Or perhaps she did, and did not intervene because destiny had already taken its course. In any event, the woman hid it away in the closet, in the bottom of a shoebox. To demand his erasure from her life was to inflict even more cruelty than his murderers had. She would not forget him.

  Three days later, he made certain of it.

  ~

  Just before six o’clock, Tristan sat down to a breakfast of fried plantains and custard, and a cup of strong black coffee. The U.S. State Department and the UK had advised against all but essential travel into Akwa Ibom, though she could fly into the state on the one daily flight out of Lagos. Her flight was scheduled for seven thirty a.m., with just over an hour in the air.

  Tristan stepped outside the lobby and frowned at the cover of thick, moisture-laden clouds. Yams, sweat, and car exhaust formed a gumbo of aromas. No sign of the airport shuttle yet. She hiked up her bag and walked a few paces then back again, her limbs brimming with restless energy. Two young men approached her as she strolled toward the lobby doors.

  “Where you from?” one demanded. “You a tourist?”

  “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

  They flanked her, grabbed her arms, and dragged her into the alley housing the hotel’s dumpsters. She knew better than to scream or put up any sort of resistance, though they did not brandish any sort of weapon. Fear flared into life within her chest; they could do much worse than stab or shoot her, most of which she’d survive anyway. But she was small, a girl, and good for only one thing in that part of the world.

  “Give us your money, your phone, and any other valuable thing you have.”