Day 71
It's past midnight and I've been just sitting here, staring at the fire. I don't want to write, but I may as well, since I can't sleep.
Tonight we scrubbed more pots than I thought existed in all the realms. As I was hauling water in from the well, Koke, one of the serving boys, brought us his apron and asked if we could wash a spill out of it. Qacha grabbed it. She thinks Koke's a sweet boy, and he thinks she's the prettiest thing since the first flower. I think he spilled brown sauce down his front as an excuse to approach her. Osol the cutter came over while we talked with Koke, and he smiled at me once. I smiled back. Why wouldn't I?
"You should see the lady," Koke said. "The clothes she's wearing have so much embroidery, there's not a lick of plain cloth left. Even so, she's not pretty, though she's not like --"
He glanced at me and I think he was sorry he'd said it. I didn't want him to feel sorry he's a good boy mostly, so I asked, "Who is she?"
"Lady Vachir? She's the ruling lady from Beloved of Ris. It's for her Khan Tegus is having the feast, you know. What with Lord Khasar bringing war to his right and his left, Song for Evela needs all the other realms to be allies as close as family, and Beloved of Ris is our nearest neighbor, now that Titor's Garden is ashes. Everyone expected Khan Tegus and Lady Vachir would announce their betrothal tonight, and sure enough --"
I dropped the bucket. I splashed water over me, soaking my deel robe two hands up the hem and breaking the bucket's handle in the process. Qacha tried to fix it for me fast, before Cook noticed. Gal ran for another bucket to fetch more water. My lady and I just stood there.
They asked me what was wrong, if I felt faint, if I should sit down. Qacha sang me the song for sudden illness and stroked my hair. No one noticed my lady, how pale she looked, how her hand trembled. I noticed. I should have gone to her, I should have counseled with her, sung to her, combed her hair. But I couldn't move.
Later
I guess I thought we'd work in the kitchens until Saren came to her senses, until she shook off the terror, breathed free of the tower, and saw fit to be a lady again. I guess I thought he'd wait for her forever, never love another. What should I do? What can I?
Day 74
Lady Vachir is gone now. They'll be wed this winter.
Day 78
News has tumbled down into the kitchens. Lord Khasar overcame Goda's Second Gift. He did not raze it, as those traders had hoped. He killed all gentry and swore all the warriors who'd survived into his own army.
I watched Gal as she listened to news of her homeland, but if her ears heard, her eyes didn't show it. I think she believes her family dead. I think she has less hope than a rock has sugar.
Koke said Khasar will most likely rest his warriors, train his new recruits, and then turn his eye to Song for Evela.
"Engaged to Lady Vachir in the nick of time," said Qacha. "Now the khan's warriors will unite with hers."
"Could Khasar come to Song for Evela?" I asked Koke.
"I'd bet a mare on it. He'll be here before winter, that's my guess."
I think about taking my lady away, but where would we run? Without a gher in winter, we'd die as fast as the honeybees. Cold is its own kind of tower.
Day 79
That boy Osol who winked at me, I saw him today winking at one of the cutter girls. I guess he's just a boy who winks. It doesn't matter, not in the least. And I'm not going to think about him anymore.
Day 80
It's not as though I would've married Osol.
Day 82
Last night I saw Qacha staring at her hands --split fingers, raw skin torn from washing. Scrubber work is hard on the hands.
"My mama was pretty at my age," she said.
Then this morning, Cook saw Qacha rubbing mare's milk butter all over her fingers. There was screaming and cursing, and when it all died down, Gal and I found Qacha sitting on the ground outside the kitchen, weeping and too afraid to enter. I'd never seen her cry before. Her face showed a welt the shape of a wooden spoon.
"Cook says she'll have my hair torn out if I come back in. But my papa can't keep me in the stables and I've nowhere to go. If I leave the city, I'd have to leave Papa, and Koke... how'll I ever see Koke again?"
I could've sung her a song of comfort, but that wouldn't cure the cause of the sobbing. I guessed she'd hoped the butter would keep her hands pretty. Someone once said I had beautiful hands.
"Gal, come with me a minute, will you?" I said. "Qacha, I'm going to go see if we can't get Cook in a good mood before you ask for your post back."
Cook was sweating over a pot, greasy black smoke rushing at her face.
I said, "We're caught up on all the pots and--oh, Cook, you look hot as a fire stone. Would you let Gal stir for you a moment while you sit a step back from the heat?"
"For a moment," Cook said, though she looked suspicious.
I sat her down, brought a stool for her feet, and begged a chance to rub her shoulders. While she rested, I hummed.
What ails Cook? I wondered, humming, touching her shoulders, trying to get a sense of her pain. Soon my hum turned into a song. I started out singing the song for body aches, for tiredness that runs over all of you like water over stones, the one that begins, "Tell me again, how does it go?" I could feel Cook want to get up and I thought I'd lost her, but then I guess she chose to let herself feel better for a time. Her shoulders relaxed beneath my hands.
Taking the tune for body aches, I wove in the words for common pain, "Swan on her nest and the sunlight just so," while touching her shoulders, her back. I guessed her feet were sore, too, but I didn't dare touch them or she might figure out what I was up to. Her face was singed from smoke heat, her hands raw around calluses, and I closed my eyes and thought of the sound of the song going into those areas. She sighed, and I knew she was allowing the song to sink in. But there's usually something deeper than simple pain.
I tried weaving in a new song, the one for heartache that goes, "Tilly tilly, nar a black bird, nilly nilly, there a blue bird." I sang it softly, like you should when the hurt's buried deep and you want to ease it out slowly. It was just a guess, but who in all the realms doesn't have some heartache? Her shoulders tightened, then relaxed. I thought to go deeper.
"Prick, prick, blood on the cloth," I sang, now joining the song for body aches with the one for betrayal. No sooner had I begun than Cook lowered her head and sighed, long and sad as a wind stuck in a chimney. Suddenly, that large woman seemed as small and fragile as any tiny girl.
"Enough, I need to get back to work," said Cook, pushing me off and standing, but now her voice had lost its hard edge.
I rushed back to Qacha and told her now was a good time to apologize. When she asked to be a scrubber again, Cook scolded her right proper, but there wasn't fire behind it. Within an hour, Qacha was scraping pots beside us.
"I've never seen Cook so calm," she said, already laughing again.
Gal asked, "Do you muckers have the changing powers like the desert shamans? Trick things into being what they're not?"
Qacha and I laughed. It was an absurd idea.
"Just the opposite," Qacha said. "The songs nudge things to be what they really are--a healthy body, a heart as calm as a baby's in the womb."
I agreed. "But there's no power in them, they're just songs."
"Well, I don't know about that, Dashti," said Qacha. "I could hear you singing back there, and I've never known someone to combine two songs together. That was clever. And choosing the right songs just for Cook--it's quite a feat to tame a beast like her.''
"Cook did it, I just helped," I said.
My lady sidled up close to me, asking for a hand with a pot she couldn't get clean, and we all set in to work as hard as silence permits. A bit later, I noticed that Gal kept sneaking peeks at me, her face thoughtful.