I don’t know you well enough yet to trust you, and you can’t know me that well either. Perhaps you can tell from my handwriting which days have been good and which beyond terrible. See how scrawny and shaky, borderline unreadable, my handwriting is now? There’s no need to remark on that. It’s been such an awful two days that, to begin with, I don’t even want to write about them. But I suspect that writing might make me feel better, and at this point I’m willing to resort to absolutely anything.
By the way, Scribs. This dialog with you, it doesn’t flow naturally yet. It’s not fair of me to continually compare you to Notes. I must give you a chance to prove your worth. Very well then. Here goes.
Argh. Why is this so difficult? Scribs, a little help here would be much appreciated!
Yesterday, after the silent servant departed with the lunch dishes, I immersed myself in the exciting world of the scriptures, as has become my habit. Yes, Scribs, contrary to what you might think, I do read the scriptures before I write sideways over them. It’s not exactly my fault that I had to abandon Notes that night the guards escorted us to the train with me wearing nothing but my nightgown (and since thinking of that still makes me want to die of shame, from now on we shall simply pretend that it never happened). It’s curious that there are no notebooks or letter paper on this train, but that the guards forgot to unclip this fountain pen from your side. Then again, there are many things I don’t understand when it comes to this journey’s peculiar arrangements. For example, we have only one hairbrush and comb between the five of us—and since Merile so kindly decided to steal the brush for her rats, the rest of us have to do with one comb. One. Comb.
My head started to ache after an hour or so, and I simply couldn’t continue reading. I closed my eyes and tried to dream of K, of how he’d gallop to our rescue, and then sweep me up in his arms. Well, I dreamed of more than that, but those thoughts are so intimate that I don’t feel comfortable sharing them with you. Not yet in any case.
It was then that I heard the strange conversation between Merile and Alina. No, I wasn’t eavesdropping. As such. There’s just no privacy to be had when you’re forced to share one carriage with your sisters every single day. We’re lucky, though, to have our own cabins for the nights. I can’t imagine having to share a room with any one of them. Don’t get me wrong, Scribs, I love my sisters above anything else. But there’s a limit to how long I can listen to Celestia’s rational reasoning, Elise pining after that captain who’s clearly forgotten everything about her, or worse, talking of how the revolution isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And Merile, dear Papa help me, she either throws hissy fits or prattles on about her rats that pee on the carpets and poo on the floor (well, perhaps the latter hasn’t yet happened, but it’s only a matter of time, if you ask me). But even so, the worst is Alina, because sometimes her mind wanders down paths that lead to unsettling places.
So what did she say today? I’ll tell you, Scribs. Have just a little more patience.
Merile and Alina were feeding the rats dried hare legs once more. The rats gnawed at the leather and bones, silent enough. Merile cooed over the rats as if they were the most perfect creatures ever to live. But Alina wouldn’t say a word, no matter how Merile coached her.
“What is it?” Merile finally asked.
Every one of us is concerned about Alina. More often than not, she leaves her meals untouched. Since we don’t know what she’ll taste, we’ll have to spike everything with her medicine: the porridge, the eye of butter, the cloudberry jam, the blackcurrant juice, and her tea. This is something our captors didn’t foresee, and we’re now running out of the supply. Based on the discussions Celestia has had with Captain Janlav, Alina’s medicine isn’t something that’s easily acquired here in the middle of nowhere.
Alina buried her head against the brown rat’s back. I really had to hearken my senses to make out her words. But this is what she said: “I fear something has happened to Mama.”
I think Merile has an inkling of what really came to pass, though Celestia and Elise won’t talk of it for fear of upsetting Alina. Try as we may to keep secrets from each other, there’s no way to hide the truth when we breathe the same air day after day. And lately, that air has been getting very stale indeed. Up till yesterday evening, we hadn’t been let out even once.
“Mama.” Merile sniffed, but her hold on the bone loosened so much that the black rat managed to snatch it for itself. I don’t know if she does it on purpose, but things have been slipping from her fingers more and more often lately. “Mama is the Crescent Empress. No harm can fall on her under the Moon.”
No matter how annoying Merile sometimes acts, I do admire her bravery. She knows her duty without having to be told. We must hold up the façade before Alina, for to her, ignorance is bliss. For a long time, I wanted to be older, but now I would like to be younger. Much younger. Too young to understand that Gagargi Prataslav’s schemes have torn Mama’s empire asunder.
Instead of being soothed by Merile’s words, Alina sank deeper into the sofa, taking the brown rat with her. Though her eyes are deep set, with perpetual dark circles around them, her gaze was strong and unwavering. Un-ignorable. One by one, Celestia, Elise, I, and Merile lowered our needles and teacups and whatnots and turned to face our little sister.
“A shadow of a swan visited me last night,” she said in a gossamer-thin, trembling voice. She clutched the brown rat against her chest. “Mama is dead.”
Celestia paled. She breathed rapidly through her mouth the denial every single one of us wanted to voice. “No…”
Elise clasped a hand over her mouth. “Surely…”
“A swan?” I asked, trying to make sense of what I’d heard. If Alina had been visited by our family’s charge, the most sacred bird… The scriptures say many things about swans, some truly terrifying when you stop to think about them.
“A shadow,” Merile repeated. This meant more to her. There was something Alina hadn’t shared with the rest of us, and I couldn’t figure it out then.
“It couldn’t keep her safe…” Alina burst into tears then. The brown rat on her lap turned around, whip-fast, to lick her face. That did little to soothe her. She only wailed louder. “Mama is dead!”
The wail battered against the lacquered wood panels, echoed through the length of the carriage. At once, Celestia was on her feet, and Elise too. I scooted after them, always clumsier and slower. Mama had decided to remain behind in the Summer City. She’d sent us away with the guards to keep us safe. But that wasn’t the whole story. We aren’t free to come and go as we please—we’re prisoners here.
“Now, now…” Celestia kneeled before the sofa, cupping Alina’s tear-stained cheeks with her slender hands. Her voice, when she spoke, was so ethereal and kind that I wanted to believe her too. “It was just a bad dream.”
Alina paused her bawling only to draw a shuddering breath. “No. Not a dream. I sheltered that shadow in my hem.”
The rat that had lain on Merile’s lap jumped down and rushed to lick Alina’s hands. Merile dashed after it to Alina’s left side. Elise settled on the other side. Uncertain of what to do or how to help, I hovered behind Celestia.
“Hush, now,” Celestia tried. There was one thing she’d said from the very beginning, one rule we had to adhere to, no matter how challenging it felt at times. We should never draw attention to ourselves. We had to wear the simple dresses we were told to wear. We had to eat the meager meals without a single complaint voiced. We had to establish a routine so that the guards would forget that we existed and when the time came for us to break the routine, it would take them longer to notice that. “Hush now, my little Alina.”