The Woman Who Buried Nations Page 4

  That evening I approached Lord Dober’s encampment, which sat outside the ancient castle he then commanded on the outskirts of our village. There was the thrum of activity, of earthly success about the place, and the very ground shook with stomping feet and stringed instruments.

  “Watcha’ want, you little shrimp?” asked the first guard I encountered.

  “To see Lord Dober,” I said, trying my very best to stand up straight and look worthy of the relationship.

  The guard grunted, and then laughed.

  “And who are you to a great man like he?”

  “I am his sister,” I said. “Tell him that, and he’ll know what it means.”

  “Sister?” the guard said, starting to shift his weight to the balls of his feet. “I didn’t know the great lord had a sister.”

  “Just tell him Loreena is here to see him,” I said in my most bratty and indignant tone.

  So I waited, while they assuredly whispered throughout the castle. After an hour or so passed I had all but given up hope of seeing my friend. But just as I was about to leave, a shadow cast over my face, and when I turned my head it was he.

  “Lord Dober,” I said.

  “Please, you can call me Ryne,” he said. He approached, and let me hug him.

  “I’m so glad you’re safe. Why, you’ve been everywhere.”

  “Everywhere and back again.” He took me by the arm, and I admit that I felt romantic love. That feeling when you can’t quite catch your breath, and everything seems to spin but in a lovely way? For he wasn’t my brother, of course, he was just the last tether of a shared past. I followed him down the hallway, trying my best to look adult, even though I remained outwardly an awkward teenager. I wanted to match the sophistication he then seemed to embody. Eventually we reached a private room, with a hearth and well-lit fire.

  “I should have come to see you,” Lord Dober said. “One should never grow too big for family.” He shook his head. “That was my uncle’s mistake.”

  “With all due respect,” I said, “Adair’s problem was he thought he could cheat death.”

  “That too,” he said, removing the prop axe from his shoulder. “No man can escape the infinite black.” He rested his hands before him, as though in thoughtful prayer. “And I thank the gods for that, because I have sent many men to that place. Somehow I feel less guilty knowing their destruction was always inevitable, even if I shortened the length of their journey some.”

  He sort of nuzzled against me, but in a fraternal way. “Are those ridiculous Mellites still treating you all right?”

  “Fair enough.” I wanted to tell him lies, that I was mistreated and I needed henceforth to remain there by his side. But my honest tongue would not speak what my lying heart commanded.

  We looked into each other’s eyes. “If you need anything, anything, and I do mean ever, you are to come to me. You are, after all, my oldest and dearest friend. Do you understand?”

  “That’s why I came here tonight,” I said quickly. “I have news of the Kimall clan.”

  So I told Lord Dober what I had learned from the herb witch, and of course it was not what the great man wished to hear.

  “Well, we can’t exactly take what that hag says as scripture,” he said. “By her own words, she wasn’t even there to see what happened with her own two eyes.”

  “But she saw with her third eye.”

  “Please sister, don’t debase yourself by going in for those ancient superstitions. I’ve sliced into many a man, and some women, and I’ve never encountered anything like a soul, or a third eye.” Returning the intensity of his stare, I could nonetheless see he suspected the truth of Dramadi’s story. It wasn’t long before he was weeping – weeping and hating me for having borne the news.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said after many minutes. “We long ago buried that shared grief, didn’t we, sister?” He wiped the last of the tears from his glistening eyes.

  “Of course,” I said. “It was unfair of me to burden you such.”

  Drawing me in, he held me close and kissed me on the forehead. “I would rather hear bad news from you, than good news from any other,” he said. And I swooned, of course. How embarrassing, to be so easily seduced by a demon. But I didn’t think him that, not then.

  And so we parted, I thought, as the closest of friends.

  Then Lord Dober was off again, conquering the outer realms: Statlia, Catlia, and the flatlands beyond. And I was back to school and fighting with Daphna over which dress belonged to whom, and perfecting makeup that could cover the encroaching blemishes of time, and loving her more with every passing month all the same. Her face was nearly flawless, because of her care and isolation. Other than a scrape along her wrist from the thorns of a bramble, and a puncture wound on her neck from a stray fishhook, you would never know Daphna was a Mellite. I suppose she envied my freedom, and I her beauty. She was still a (nearly) flawless butterfly; certainly more beautiful than anything my increasingly plain face could compete with. I was ever more reckless, as if to make up for her timidity. Oh, but look at me now…I’ve certainly outlived all such concerns.

  This missing chunk of forehead and hairline came, of course, from the day of the Massacre. Do you see? I tell you with sincerity that I now wear it with pride. I no longer envy my sister’s youthful beauty. How could I envy such a thing? And from someone who passed on so many years ago. It feels both selfish and horrible to admit that I did once feel jealousy of one so simple and pure as my Daphna.

  And like many a sickly child – and I don’t object to that designation on her behalf, for being unable to heal is, after all, a workable definition of sickness – poor Daphna often escaped into the whimsical wilds of books. She read them all: histories, mythologies, scriptures, literature, and many a starlit night we sat together by candle with some tome or other on our little laps, just dreaming, dreaming in a boat carried along in a river of ink. She had taught me to read, a skill I never thought I would possess, not in an infinite lifetime. When Lord Dober promised he would build the world’s finest libraries, well…we both liked that most of all. My sister could speak six languages before she reached adulthood. If anything that’s what I should have envied: the innocence of her education. Daphna wished to learn for no other reason than to work her mind.

  “Tell me more about Lord Dober,” she would say each evening after the last candle was extinguished. “He seems so daring.”

  “He’s become a great and terrible man,” I said. “But I suppose I’ll always think of him as a small and wonderful boy.”

  “Do you think the two of you will be betrothed?”

  “He’s like my brother, Daphna. Gross.”

  “Fine, if you don’t want him then I’ll have a go.”

  And we would both laugh, with the humor of ignorance. “Please, Daphna,” I would say. “You’re far too fragile for a man like Lord Dober.”

  “Yes, but I’m also far too fragile for this world, period. And yet I would like a man all the same. One can’t marry a downy duck, you know?”

  As with most on the cusp of adulthood, I didn’t wish to feel different or other. I would sneak off to the village and play elder ball with the other children. There is such great fun in youthful folly, and although it is often vacuous and always pointless, I think it a great shame that we lose that soft touch with age. Don’t you? I made few close friends with the Tangolorian children, not being allowed in their houses, but they were my most frequent playmates in the outdoors. We enjoyed wicked games like ‘ruler of the hill’ which would have left Mellitian children maimed for life. Of course, my exuberance often left me battered all the same. None of us are fully immune to harm.

  Just look at my hands, madam. Is there a single fingerprint left? Where do they go, these parts of us that we lose? And yet my scars, my bruises, they are as permanent as a brand. Perhaps I have become a purebred Mellite after all? There is alchemy in this world, don’t let them tell you otherwise! Sometimes I even forget what I loo
ked like when I was young, and the more I try to focus on the image, the greater the distance between us grows, as though I’m trying to conjure up the picture of somebody else entirely. Do yourself a favor, my pretty young companion. Do capture a good memory of yourself later today, find some pond or stream and just take a good look. I call it not vanity, but good common sense. Oh to be a man, and to be freed of such concerns. And often free of common sense and decency too, for that matter!

  The Age of (Relative) Maturity

  Time is always hungry, its appetite unique and insatiable. Soon enough Daphna and I were grown, and that is when the real troubles began. By then, Lord Dober had conquered all the known lands, and his attempts to discover new ones proved unsuccessful, aside from a rimy island or two in the Gattis Sea. Despite heroic attempts, he failed to locate the mythical ‘keyhole to the second realm.” So he returned to our little village, the one where he too was raised, and he sulked about for many a week.

  “I might as well have remained a smithy’s apprentice,” he said once during a town festival. “At least then I’d have a life’s work. This job I chose was too easily accomplished. I’m not even thirty and already I have conquered everything there is to conquer.”

  You see, Lord Dober realized too late that he preferred conquering to leading. His wide nostrils craved the seafoam of new lands, the manic shout of battle, the swinging of axe, and the pouring of boiling water and heated sand.

  But of course, people don’t like to see their leaders as downtrodden, and so they pleaded with Lord Dober to undertake new projects. “Perhaps you can sail around the world.” “Wouldn’t it be grand to create a peacetime militia?” And good Warwick’s suggestion, “What about the libraries you’ve long promised?”

  “Of course,” Lord Dober said. “As I pledged, ‘We fight now, so that later we can build schools and libraries.’ I’ve been adrift all this time because I failed to understand a simple fact: that I have finally reached the now in my journey.” He smiled, a resolute smile that even showed a hint of teeth. “Yes, of course – I will build the largest and finest library system the world has ever known. And we will be perceived a nation not only undefeated on the battlefield, but also beyond all others in the breadth of our collective knowledge!”

  Lord Dober threw himself into the library project with the same zeal as he did battle. He spent his days meeting with sour-faced architects and eager builders. But as the grand libraries were erected – for he did not settle for just one – Lord Dober soon realized there were insufficient books to fill them. Attempts to purchase volumes from other nations proved unsuccessful. To complicate matters, many of the continent’s books were destroyed during the wars he had waged. And by then he was running low on public funds with which to purchase old texts or to commission the scribbling of new ones, as the price of war is always monumental. Thus he looked to the Mellites…

  Lord Dober called a meeting of his advisors and the Mellites; he even convened the meeting at our central square. And when he arrived on his white horse, the ever-present prop axe protruding from his right side with evident pride, he looked dashing and youthful, but also broken in a way many of the Mellites could relate to. He too was scarred and mangled beyond repair. He too bore the permanent stamp of time, of loss, of impermanence.

  Our father led each of us, his two blooming daughters to the square, one on each arm. Warwick gave us away that morning as though we were newly betrothed, and the square the site of some tandem wedding. I wore my hair loose so as to cover my scars, and Daphna had her hair pinned back to highlight her flawless skin. Anyone in the crowd would have sworn I was the Mellite and she the Kimall. She wore a long golden gown to cover her bruised knees, the tributaries of discolorations and gaps and contusions. I wore a black silk dress that barely covered me, drawing much ire from father and so delaying our trip to the square that we almost missed Lord Dober’s opening remarks. Thus I paid the price of my rough and tumble existence, and Daphna was the pride of Thanatos.

  Lord Dober dismounted from his horse slowly; it could be he planned a pause to make his entrance seem all the grander. Or perhaps he was already dealing with the stiff joints and bulging discs that would plague him the remainder of his life. His thick hair was still dark and longish, covering his ears and lending his face a slightly feminine appearance. I was charmed, I must admit. He was my oldest friend in the world, and he was beautiful.

  If only things were as they appeared, wouldn’t that lift so many of life’s burdens? He already walked with a slight limp, as though he too were rusted, rusted like his crown and his axe. When he spoke, however, he did so warmly and intelligently, and his eyes seemed to drill into each and every one of us. I later learned his eyes were quite narrowly fixed at Daphna. I had thought all the while he was looking at me.

  “I hope you will all agree,” Lord Dober said, “that I have always maintained a strong relationship with the Mellite people.” He shook his head fondly. “And it cannot be denied that until this moment in time, I have neither interfered with your way of life, nor asked much of you by way of contribution to my empire. As I waged my wars, I never asked your men to enlist in my army, acknowledging your unique situation.” He coughed, and then he smiled a bit nervously, as a child might while answering a question from a new tutor. “But now,” he continued, his chest puffed out and his face a tinge of vermilion, “now I must ask that you play your part in our great destiny. You collectively represent the most learned people in my realm, and we are egregiously low on books with which to fill our new libraries. I ask you not to take up sword, but rather the quill on behalf of your empire. Will you oblige?”

  Of course, when a despot makes such a request, it’s not really a negotiation. What he was really telling us was, ‘you will come serve as scribes for my empire, or you will be dealt with as enemies.’ And yet…Oh, how do I say this without seeming unbelievably naive? It felt nice to be asked, it felt pleasing to be needed. For so long the Mellites were ignored or reviled because of their haggard appearance. How many times have I walked to town and seen strangers and even acquaintances turn their heads away, as though I were a demon coming to eat their children because they simply believed me to be a biological Mellite? Lord Dober was not one of them, but he was from the same village, and despite his humble beginnings, he had united the world’s largest empire. After he left that afternoon, having delivered his speech, there was little debate about how to proceed. And so we Mellites were moved into our own dedicated wing of his castle – leaky and small – but during the first weeks the very novelty of the changes made them seem noble and important. Perhaps you think us fools? It’s so easy to judge history, isn’t it? Yes, as easy as blowing dust off the cover of a book.

  Quills and Ink

  We were assigned seats in long rows of rectangular scriptorium tables. Before us the tools of our new trade: parchment paper made from the dried skin of goats, stretched and scraped and softened, tomes from which to copy, bordering paint, black and red ink, and fine quills made with turkey and goose feathers. In the beginning, we were even granted limited supplies of gold leaf and ground gemstones with which to decorate the pages of our manuscripts. As with everything Lord Dober pursued, it had to be done with maximum effort. Sometimes when I am in a charitable mood, I still think him as just a little boy, permanently on the run through those ancient woods, betrayed by his own uncle and a horde of banchecki nipping at his heels. We are different from most, us survivors.

  It was boring work, of course, but even the most tedious of activities can give pleasure if you can locate some nexus of pride, either within yourself or inherent in the activity itself. Remember, on average one person can only generate a standard sized book or two a year. This was work traditionally done by monks, and the Mellites didn’t exactly have the patience of monks. They knew their lives were sprints, and most of them made haste while they could. And yet, in the beginning they did not complain, or at least not often, and when they did it was with a twinge of pride, pe
rhaps similar to that of a student at university complaining about having too much homework. Yes, everything seems a lark in the first week…

  Later, when my right arm would tire and my eyes would grow dry and blurry, I would harangue Warwick to do something. But father, always the pacifist, would just shake his round little head and cheerfully exult over the importance of sharing knowledge.

  In the beginning, Mellites were free to come and go as we pleased. There was no real leadership, because the Mellites had an informal social order. I was willing to speak up, but felt too much an outsider. Surely they would think me deceitful, wishing to fight back when my skin was tougher than theirs. So instead of acting, for many a day I kept my mouth shut and hand moving.

  Then there was the excitement surrounding Daphna. Almost every morning Lord Dober would visit the scriptorium and make some excuse to speak with her alone. And she, radiant even against the black canvass of that stone room, would giggle, and flirt, and make it known that she was very much a daisy he could stoop down and pluck. He invited her on walks through the countryside, to dances, to windy picnics in the shade of his castle.

  And each time Daphna would return, bronzed and ebullient, and I would warn her that powerful men are combustible, and that she tilted at the sharpened point of a sword, whether she realized it or not. She would accuse me of jealousy, and she would drift further away, as my own hands blistered and festered from overuse. I admit to jealousy, for never once did I receive an invitation from my oldest friend. But what I mourned really was who he used to be, in what then felt like a different lifetime. A paradox of time is this: I felt further away from my childhood then, than I do now.

  We all worked our hardest, save for Daphna, who was exempt from such labor, and I tell you we were little rewarded for the effort. Aside from food and lodging we were not paid for our work, and as the months drifted on Lord Dober grew ever more demanding in his expectations.