Beyond Binary

by Brit Mandelo

  ∞

  I went back to the cellars because I didn’t know where else to go. I did not belong anywhere now. I sat curled for hours next to one of the beer vats, numb and quiet, until I heard the chattering voices of cooking staff come to fetch a barrel for supper: I did not want to meet anyone, so I unkinked myself and went farther down the hallway until I found a small heavy door slightly ajar, old but with freshly oiled hinges that made no sound as I slid through.

  I came into a vast, dim place, heavy with green and the smell of water. Not a garden: an enormous twilight conservatory in the guts of the oldest part of the palace. Even through my despair I could see the marvel of the place, feel its mystery. There were trees standing forty feet tall in porcelain tubs as big as our room upstairs. Light seeped through narrow windows above the treetops. There were wooden frames thick with ivy that bloomed in lightly perfumed purple and orange and blue. Everything felt old and unused, sliding toward ruin, with the particular heavy beauty of a rotting temple. The humid air, the taste of jasmine on my tongue, the stone walls that I could sense although I could not see them under so much green—everything collided inside me and mixed with my own madness to make me feel wild, curious, adrenalized as if I’d eaten too many of the dried granzi leaves that Brax liked to indulge in sometimes when we were off duty. The narrow path that twisted off between the potted trees was laid in the unmistakable patterns of desert tile. I followed the colors toward the sound of rain, and the sound turned into a fountain, a flat-bottomed circle lined with more bright tiles. Strings of water fell into it from a dozen ducts in the ceiling high overhead, onto the pool and the upraised face of the woman in it.

  She was dancing. From the look of her, she’d been at it awhile: her hair was flung in sodden ropes against her dark skin, and the tips of her fingers were wrinkled, paler than the rest of her when she reached them up to grasp at the droplets in the air. She breathed in the hard, shallow gasps of someone who has taken her body almost as far as it can go. Her eyes were rolled up, showing white, and her mouth hung half-open. She whirled and kicked to a rhythm that pounded through her so strongly I could feel it as a backbeat to the juddering of my heart. Faster, faster she turned, and the water turned with her and flung itself back into the pool. I knew what I was seeing. It was more than a dance, it was a transportation, a transmigration, as if she could take the whole world into herself if she only reached a little higher, if she only turned once more. I knew how it must feel within her, burning, building, until her body shuddered one final time and she shouted, her head still back and her arms clawed up as if she would seize the ceiling and pull it down over her. Her eyes opened, bright blue against the brown. She saw me as she fell.

  Bless her, I thought, at least I’m not that alone.

  Her shout still echoed around the chamber, or at least I could still hear it in my head; but she was silent, lying on her side in the water, blue eyes watching me. I eased myself down onto one of the tiled benches bordering the walkway, to show her that I was not a threat or an idle gawper. There was a shawl bundled at the other end of the bench, and I was careful not to touch it. After a minute she rolled onto her back in the shallow pool and turned her blue gaze up to the high windows. Neither of us spoke. I was relaxed and completely attentive to everything she did: a breath drawn, a finger moved, a lick at a drop of water caught on her lip. When she finally pulled herself up to her knees, I was there with the shawl and an arm to help her raise herself the rest of the way. She draped the shawl around her shoulders but did not try to cover herself; she seemed unaware of being naked and wet with a stranger. I stood back when she stepped out of the pool.

  She looked me up and down. She was medium tall, older by a few years, whip thin with oversized calf muscles and strong biceps. An old scar ran along one rib. The skin on her hands was rough. I pictured her in one of the kitchens, or perhaps tending the smokehouse where the sides of beef and boar had to be raised onto their high hooks.

  “I hope you closed the door behind you,” she said absently, in a dry and crackly voice.

  “The door? Oh…yes, it’s closed. No one will come in.”

  “You did.”

  “Yes. But no one else will come.”

  “They might.”

  “I won’t let them.”

  She looked me up and down. “You’re a guard,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “So you’d kill anyone who tried to get in.”

  “I’d meet them at the door and send them on their way. If they tried to come in further, I’d stop them.”

  She drew a wrinkled finger across her throat.

  “Not necessarily,” I replied. “I might not have to kill them.”

  “Oh,” she said. “I would. I wouldn’t know how to stop them any other way. I don’t know much about the middle ground.”

  She had begun to shake very slightly. “You’re cold,” I said, and pulled off my overshirt to offer her. She peered at it carefully before she put it on, dropping the shawl without a glance onto the wet floor.

  “Most people don’t talk to me,” she said.

  “I’ll talk with you whenever you like,” I said, thinking that I knew very well how people would treat her, particularly if she wandered up to the kitchens with one of the meat cleavers in her hand and tried to have this kind of conversation. Standing with her in the dim damp of the room felt like being in one of those in-between moments of an epic poem, where everyone takes a stanza or two to gather their breath before the next impossible task.

  She appeared to be thinking, and I was in no hurry. Then she straightened the shirt around her and said, “Walk me back.”

  “Of course,” I answered. I plucked her shawl out of the muck and fell in behind her with my hand on my sword, the way I’d been taught. She was so odd and formal, like a little chick covered in bristles: she wanted looking after. When we left the room, she watched to make sure that I closed the door firmly, then nodded as if satisfied and led me back up through the cellars. I was surprised when she bypassed the carvery and the scullery, and nervous when she took the stairs away from the kitchen, up toward the residential levels of the palace: I wasn’t sure what to do if someone challenged us, and I did not want trouble with Andavista on top of the mess I’d already made with my quad. But she held her head high and kept going, and then we made a turn and almost ran into Saree talking something out with one of his seconds. Oh icy hell, I thought, and was absolutely astonished when Saree gave me an unreadable look and then bent his head. “Prince,” he said, and she sailed by him like a great ship past a dinghy, trailing me behind. As I passed him, Saree pointed his finger at himself emphatically, and I nodded, and then followed the prince. We came to the great wooden doors of the royal suite, and the four guards there stiffened. They opened the doors clumsily, trying to see everything without appearing to look at us, and I knew the stories would start a minute after the watch changed when the four of them could get down to the commissary.

  The hallway was a riot of rich colored tapestries, plants, paintings, a table stacked high with dusty books: and silent as a tomb. I wondered if the king was behind one of the many doors we passed. A servant came out of a room at the far end and hurried toward us with a muffled exclamation. The prince waved her off, and I handed her the shawl as she stepped back to let us pass. Then the prince stopped in front of one of the doors and turned to me. Her eyes were hard, like blue stained glass. I saluted and bowed.

  “You saw me,” she said, and her voice was like her eyes.

  I imagined what it would be like to practice with my quad from now on, their knowing what it meant to me every time we touched, their distaste or their tolerance, my most private self on public display because I had not kept my secret. I understood how she might feel; and she deserved the truth.

  “You were beautiful,” I said. “You were like a storm.”

  She looked at me for a moment, then she took in a breath and blew it out again with the noise that children make when they
pretend to be the wind. Her breath smelled like salt and oranges. The door shut between us.

  “What happened?” Saree growled when I found him.

  “The prince asked me to escort her back to her rooms,” I said evenly.

  “Where did you find her? Her servants have been looking for her for hours.”

  “In the hallway near the armory.” It was the farthest place from the cellars that I could think of.

  “Oh, really?” he rumbled. “She just happened to appear in the armory hallway soaking wet, and there you were?”

  “Yessir,” I answered. “Honestly, sir, I didn’t even know who she was until we met you. I just didn’t think that she should be—I mean—”

  He relaxed. “I know what you mean, no need to say any more. But we’d like to know where she disappears to.” I stayed quiet, and he lost interest in me. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?” he said, and I saluted and got out of his sight as quickly as I could. My head was too stuffed full of tangled thoughts to make any sense of anything, and I didn’t want to deal with Ro and Lucky and Brax until I felt clear. I took myself off into Lemon City for a long walk and did, in the end, get my wish: I got lost.

  It was late when I came back to our rooms. The quad was there, and so was Andavista. They all wore the most peculiar expressions: Lucky was trying to send me seventeen different messages with eyes and body language, but all I got was the general impression that a lot had been going on while I’d been away. Then I looked beyond her, and saw the carrybags we’d brought with us all the way from the crossroads, packed now and waiting to be closed up.

  “No, you idiot,” Brax said. “Your things are in there too, we’re being transferred. Don’t look at me like that; everyone knows what you’re thinking, we can always tell.”

  “Ummm,” I said helplessly, and Ro grinned. Andavista stood up from where he’d been sitting, in our only chair. “Very touching. Sort it out later. You, I’ve just about run out of patience waiting for you, but I’ve got direct orders to fetch you all personally. I suppose I can be thankful you didn’t decide to stay out all night. Particularly since this lot wouldn’t say where you could be found.” He squinted at me. “Well, at least you’re not stupid enough to turn up drunk. Now, all of you, get your things and follow me.”

  He stomped out of the room and we scrambled to shoulder our gear and follow him. I shooed Lucky out of the way and picked up our biggest pack. “Get away from that, you can’t carry it with your leg.” She grimaced impatiently. “What’s going on?” I whispered.

  “You tell me,” she whispered back. “All we got is some wild story at dinner about you and the prince, and then Andavista saying he’s giving us a new home and everyone who’s not on watch finding an excuse to wander by our rooms and goggle at us.”

  “Shut up and move,” Andavista snarled without turning, so we did, Ro and I carrying everything between us while Brax braced Lucky with her good arm. Of course I knew where we must be going, but I could scarcely credit it: I’d only been nice, and certainly more free in my manner than what was due to her. But I was right: we went through the by-now-familiar wooden doors and into a room just beyond, where sleepy-eyed servants were busily beating the dust out of a rug and several coverlets, with a new fire in the hearth and a pitcher of mulled wine on a mostly-clean table. And my overshirt, carefully folded on the mantel.

  Andavista said, “You’ve been assigned as the prince’s personal guard. You’re with her wherever she goes, all of you, which means more time on duty than before. She breakfasts at midmorning, you two—” looking at me and Ro, “—report to her then. If she forgets to let you out for meals, let me know. I expect a full report every day from one of you, personally to either me or Saree, no exceptions. You’ll go back to teaching when you’re all off the sick list, at least until you’ve got others good enough to take over. Where you find the time is your problem. And don’t get above yourselves, I’ll be watching. And don’t let so much as a mouse near her,” he added, in a different tone. Then he glared around the room and left. The servants scuttled out behind him.

  My three pounced on me with questions before the door was closed. “Wait, wait,” I said, trying to gather my wits while Ro poured us a cup of wine. Between hot swallows, I told them about meeting the prince, curiously content even though we all knew why I’d been downcellar in the first place, the unfinished business between us.

  “Unbelievable,” Lucky said. “How do you do it, Mars?”

  Brax said, “I wouldn’t go planting any gardens here, Luck. She’s thrown out more guards than we have ancestors. She could change her mind anytime.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “She’s never taken a personal guard before that I know of, just the shift watches outside the door. Can you imagine some of our mates in the barracks standing outside the conservatory doors while she…. She’d have been a laughingstock years ago.”

  “So why now?” Ro said.

  “I understand her.” They looked at me. “Maybe I’m mad, too, I don’t know, but seeing her dance—you know what I think? I think she wants someone to share with. I told her she was beautiful, and she was. Maybe no one else ever has. But whatever you think of her, you mustn’t—you mustn’t hurt her.”

  “Oh, Mars,” Lucky said sadly. “Of course we won’t.”

  “I know, I’m sorry. It’s just—”

  “We know what it is,” Ro said. “And we decided we didn’t want to talk about it until you and Lucky and Brax are better. And that’s the end of it,” he said as I opened my mouth to speak. “Now, who gets the bed nearest the fire?”

  ∞

  We and the prince began getting used to each other. She spent a lot of time watching us; it was a bit unnerving at first. She tested us in little ways. She led us on some incredible expeditions into the belly of the palace. She seemed more and more trusting of us; but she did not dance. She seemed to be waiting for something.

  And so was I. Every arc of motion that returned to Brax’s arm was one step closer to all my worst fears. By unspoken agreement, we did not practice, and the others stopped making love in front of me. There was a particular kind of tension between us that I could not define, but that made me miserable when I let myself think about what it all might mean, and what I had to lose. I wondered if the prince felt it and thought it was directed at her: it made me try even harder to be easy and gentle with her, who’d had so much less than I.

  Ro and I came back to our rooms one night to find Lucky and Brax already toasting each other with a mug of beer from a barrel swiped on our last trip to the cellars. “Back on duty tomorrow,” Lucky grinned around a mouthful of foam. “Hoo hoo!” She poured, and we all drank. I felt numb.

  “Oh, sweet Mars,” Ro said, “don’t look like that. Don’t you know we see right through you?” Then he took my cup away and opened his arms and folded me into himself, and Lucky and Brax were behind me, gathering me in, stripping off my clothes and theirs. “I don’t know if I can—” I began to say, and Brax murmured, “Shut up, Mars.” Then Ro shifted his weight and sent me backwards into Brax’s waiting arms, and she pinned me down for a lightning second while she brushed her breast against my mouth, and then rolled us so that I was on top and Ro’s arms came around me in a lock, and I hesitated and he whispered Go on and I turned the way we’d taught ourselves and felt his thigh slide across my back and heard his breath hitch, and mine hitched too. And then it was Lucky with her leg across mine, strength to strength, my heart beating faster and faster, everything a blue-heat fire from my groin to the tips of my fingers. They traded me back and forth like that for some endless time, and each moment that they controlled me they would take some pleasure for themselves, a tongue in my mouth or a wristlock that placed my hand on some part of them that would make them moan; and I moaned too, and then answered their technique with one of my own and changed the dance. Then Brax reached for Ro, and Lucky and I continued while beyond us they brought each other to shouts; and then Lucky was gone to Br
ax and it was Ro with me, whispering Best me if you can, and then Brax with her strong arms; until finally the world stopped shuddering and we lay in a heap together in front of the fire. And later some of us cried, and were comforted.

  ∞

  We are the prince’s guard. When she sits in a tower window and sings endless songs to the seabirds, we are at the door. When she roams the hallways at night peering through keyholes, we are the shadows that fly at her shoulder. She dances for us now, and we protect her from prying eyes; and when she is ecstatic and spent, when she is lucid and can find some measure of peace, we take her back to her rooms and talk of the world, of the rainbow-painted roofs of Hunemoth and the way that cheese is made in Shortline. She is safer now; she has us to see her as she is, and love her.

  And there is still time for ourselves, to teach, to learn, to gossip with other guards and steal currant buns from our favorite cook. Sometimes the prince sends us off to Lemon City for a day, to collect fallen feathers from the road or strings of desert beads from the market; to bring back descriptions of her beggars and smiths and shopkeepers; to gather travelers’ stories from the inns. Sometimes we carry home a flagon of spicy Marhai wine, and when she sleeps, we drink and trade wild stories until the moon is down. Sometimes we sleep cuddled like puppies in our blankets. Sometimes we fight.

  ∞

  Fisherman

  Nalo Hopkinson

  “You work as what; a fisherman?”

  I nearly jump clean out my skin at the sound of she voice, tough like sugar cane when you done chew the fibres dry. “Fisherm…?” I stutter.

  She sweet like cane too? Shame make me fling the thought ’way from me. Lord Jesus, is what make me come here any atall? I turn away from the window, from the pure wonder of watching through one big piece of clear glass at the hibiscus bush outside. Only Boysie house in the village have a glass window, and it have a crack running crossways through it. The rest of we have wooden jalousie shutters. I look back at she proud, round face with the plucked brows and the lipstick red on she plump lips. The words fall out from my mouth: “I…I stink of fish, don’t it?”