Ria didn’t reply for a while. She felt an approaching warmth and then a twig’s prod between her lips and against her resisting teeth.
“Drink,” she was instructed gently, and understood that the twig was a straw. She took a long, grateful sip and pushed the straw out of her mouth with her tongue. The distance opened up between them, cold and empty, before Diyana picked up where she left off, “Your history is…incredibly tainted. No matter how we try to…” Diyana trailed off and then sighed. “There are a lot of unhappy people— frightened people, who are demanding answers from the authorities right now. And we need answers, Ria. Why?”
Ria continued to remain quiet.
“And then… What you did to your sister. What were you trying to accomplish?”
“What of her?” Ria asked, doing her best not to appear concerned.
Diyana did not buy it. “Alive.”
Ria felt herself breathe a little easier.
“She is in specialist eye care now,” Diyana informed her as if by way of reassurance. “We did what we could but she will never regain her sight.”
“Who are ‘we’?”
“Us, here at the centre.”
“I did it so that you would find me. I did it so that there will be no doubt that I was the one behind Kenanga, behind the disappearing soldiers,” Ria told her.
It seemed that Diyana had not expected the answer to come as easily as it did, because for a time the other woman was quiet.
“And your sister?”
“To spare her.”
“From what, Ria?” Diyana asked, sounding both puzzled and horrified.
“From what is going to come later.”
“And what do you think—”
“You tell me. What do you need a me-tura for?” demanded Ria. “You said before there are a lot of people asking questions on the surface. People seeking answers. Just look at your officer. He did not hurt me without a reason. He hurt me because he was angry. He was angry…like everyone else out there. The world they know is starting to crumble, because scary things—unexplainable things are happening on the streets. Their clean…little streets where not a single lamp has ever burnt out to leave them in darkness at night. And yet now—” Ria paused. “They turned to the government for answers and the government had none. Now that you have me, you can give them what they want and then things will be back to normal.”
Ria could almost sense Diyana shaking her head.
“You know we can still use Barani for that, right?” Diyana asked. “The people know what killed all those victims. They have the Internet, some form of general knowledge. Making them all intelligent, it seems. And with the way things are right now…” Here, Diyana gave a dry chuckle. “The pictures are already on social media and citizen news is already making the rounds. But…they only need to know that the creature has been found and dealt with. You or Barani. It wouldn’t matter to them. The masses are simple, Ria. When their rice bowls are filled and their lives are comfortable and secure again, they easily forget these things in favour of continued comfort. And the fact that you and your sister are so isolated from everyone just makes it easier.”
Ria struggled against her restraints then and tried to pull herself off from the hard board, teeth gnashing, spittle flying from between them to dribble down her chin. She croaked a litany of curses, in both Sce’ ‘dal and Tuyunri, curses she knew Diyana could understand.
The room erupted in a flurry of activity, filled with shouts and metal dragging on resistant floor, and then a shocking wave of pain that did nothing to her but fuel whatever it was that had ignited the sudden violence, and the long-overdue desire to break free and fight. She could feel in every fibre of her person that she would fight. By the Lady she would fight; go into a manic decline just to make all those years of stony restraint, of poise and control, worth it.
Diyana came in close again and spoke urgently to her, “However, we can ensure your sister comes to no harm.”
Above the smell of blood and her own stink, Ria detected the characteristic spicy tang of yun scales before Diyana drew away. The other continued to speak: “We can ensure a comfortable life for your sister. Provided you are cooperative.”
“Lies!”
“Right now, I’m all you have.”
A silent stand-off; Diyana no doubt looking; Ria not knowing where to look. And then: “How?”
“No need for how. There are a lot of things you can help us with.”
Ria was still. She barely felt the pinprick on her left arm. She could feel one of her wrists about to tear free. Her snakes were pushing against the cap. She tasted blood and realised that she had bitten down too hard on her lower lip. Her wrists were slick. With blood or sweat, she couldn’t tell.
“Do we have your understanding on this, Ria?” Diyana asked.
Ria continued struggling.
“Do you understand, Ria?” Diyana asked again.
Seeing no way to escape and feeling herself already starting to drift away into unconsciousness, Ria stopped and replied mechanically, “Yes.”
Diyana must have nodded then. Sadly, because she said, more to herself than to Ria, “Turni’in, bcir(o)h.” Ground above, night below.
The Tuyunri words of prayer that were recited when interring the dead, the only words in their native language that most Tuyuns still knew and still spoke today.
“Et(he),” Ria replied. So it is.
Measured footsteps diminished into a blind distance before darkness came over her with the unmistakable sound of a closing door. The last thing she was conscious of was her own rambling about swings and courtyards, and names—Erlina and Jyadi, Baslit and Unir, Sara and Ani. Chrysaor and Pegasus. A random list that meant so little to her.
When she was conscious again, she found that she was unbound. She was lying in a narrow bed, upon a thin mattress. The pillow that supported her head was hard, and a coarse blanket had been thrown over her. Her head reeled as she sat up. Her hair hung about her face, moving in lethargic and confused loops. It was a while before the effects of the drug they had injected her with wore off, and still a while more before her eyes adjusted to the dimness of the room she was in.
She was in a cell: four bare walls, a sink and a toilet. No mirrors. The only window was a tiny rectangular hole through which a bare bit of light from outside streamed in. Even if she could somehow squeeze through it, the window was barred—there was no escape. The door to the cell was a heavy metal one with a small slit for looking into and looking out.
Ria was barely on her feet when her cell suddenly flooded with light from the fluorescent bulb above. The light blinded her momentarily. In that moment she heard the door open with a loud protesting whine. After blinking hard from the light’s intrusion, she turned to look at the door, expecting to see someone standing in the doorway. There was no one. Only the silence of the darkness beyond.
She waited, thinking this to be a ploy or a trick. When still no one came after a few long minutes of waiting, Ria approached the open doorway. She had only put a foot out before the area outside was illuminated by vast overhead lamps that reminded her of the ones they had back in Nelroote. She was not allowed to feel too nostalgic, for the sight that greeted her was that of a corridor with numerous other cells like hers. A single level of them; every door ominously black and securely closed. Though even that notion of security soon dissolved when, with a collective whine and groan, all the doors swung open.
The cells’ occupants were likely just as puzzled as her to find no one standing at the door because it took some time for the first among them to step out into the communal space outside, disbelieving, bewildered expressions etched onto their faces. There were burly ones and spindly ones. There were those who appeared menacing and those who looked like they could cheat you out of your life savings with a smile. There was a dangerous quality to some of them. And to the others, there was a resignation, as if it was just another day. Ria would say that there was a good mix of the races, howe
ver, the demographics tilted heavily to the non-Humans. And they were all men who appeared to have been imprisoned for a long time, by the way they looked around as if they had never seen an open space before.
She recognised no one from among them and knew they were not from Nelroote.
Ria looked to the wall at the end of the rows of cells and spotted a high-up square of black glass, its surface showing only a reflection of the prison space below it. Installed at regular intervals along the walls above the cell doors were closed-circuit cameras, each dark eye pointed in her general direction.
More prisoners had by then emerged from their cells and all of them were looking at her. There was uncertainty in a lot of their expressions; puzzlement as to what she was doing there. Perhaps a few were eyeing her a little too eagerly—too hungrily—and she knew it was a dangerous place for her, me-tura or not. She cast a final glance up at the window and thought she could make out the forms of people watching her from behind it.
She did not expect the announcement at all when it blared from an invisible sound system: “Attention, wards. The first to kill the medusa will earn a president’s pardon.”
This brought new life to the eyes that now cast themselves upon her, even in those who were resigned to their capital fate. She found herself feeling disgusted by this new sport. She had thought, from the clean streets and the ordered stacks of homes, that this country, this Manticura that others had once fought for, that still more had trusted—that this country would have in it a sense of justice, if not for people like her, then at least for the full-bellied people of their middles and those on top.
Yet, at the same time, she was not surprised. She understood. She was not to die that day. In that moment, it felt as if she was no more than a severed head stuck upon the shield that the nation-state sought to build. For what? Against who? Ria realised she was no longer in any position to ask.
Her hair raised itself in preparation. Then she dropped her gaze to the first man who broke out of the uncertainty, and watched as his countenance greyed over at the sight of her, whilst she moved to the old battle-rhythm of a flightless body.
APPENDIX I
PARTIAL HISTORICAL TIMELINE OF MANTICURA
2nd Lt Diyana Zuranisa, PhD, DI01, S/N 08986
Clearance L.8, Call: Primary Investigator
Project #151: Study on Conflict and Historical Diversity
—Management and Integration
Centre for Research on Multiculturalism
Ministry of Social and Community Development
V03. 17 Her. 5116
PROJECT NOTE #02:
PERIOD OF HUMAN COLONISATION
4498 CE:
First Humans arrived from the lands in the western continents. By then there was already a thriving population of Scereans, Feleenese and Cayanese. The presence of the Tuyuns was generally known, though still considered a myth to the more isolated settlements. In keeping to the nearly impenetrable jungle, the Tuyuns were able to remain obscure, even to the Scereans with whom they made trading pacts.
The Human pioneers numbered a hundred and forty-four—three ship captains each with a crew of twenty, two cartographers, two topographers, three botanists, three anthropologists, and 70 fighting men, builders, and any accompanying spouses. They were all led by a Major-General Kankrow, who had been tasked by the High King of Arlands to seek out new land to occupy and regions within which new trading routes could be secured.
The surrounding jungle was cleared for farming and building, and the wood was used to build houses for the settlers.
4503 CE:
Humans made first contact with the Cayanese Yan (Leader). A trade agreement that resulted in the cultivation of the western half of the Anur Delta region was signed within three months of negotiation. The Cayanese proved not only to be good allies but a good provider of sturdy workers as well. Large groups of Cayanese villagers seeking work and fortune moved to the growing Human settlement, where they worked as menial labourers, often in unsafe environments.
Attempts to strike the same agreement with the Feleenese Nes were not as successful. They met the Human emissaries with hostilities and would sometimes attack the Human-owned farms in West Anur, leading to tensions between the three races.
4504-06 CE:
Human/Cayanese-Feleenese tensions escalated into open conflict, resulting in what the Humans and Cayanese knew as the Anur War. The Feleenese simply called it the “Massacre”. The Feleenese’s primarily melee attacks were no match against muskets, and the result was a loss of more than two thousand soldiers on the Feleenese end compared to three hundred on the Human side. Most of the casualties on the Human side were, in fact, Cayanese.
The war ended with the Feleenese Surrender on the 6th of Mist. Feleenese lands in East Anur were taken over by the Humans, and those directly involved in the conflict were put to work on construction in the Anuri Prison Quarries. For years after, it was illegal for Feleenese to own land, vehicles, or weapons. They were not allowed into Krow City and were only permitted to work under Human employers, and only with recommendations from either a Human or a Cayanese.
4510 CE:
Human emissaries made contact with the Scereans in Su(Ma) Uk’rh, or Lower Marshland. First contact failed when the emissaries fled Su(ma) Uk’rh upon seeing some of the inhabitants rise out of the swamp waters. (See account, “Dragons of the Lower Marshlands” by Sir Grant Shun.) Shun returned with more armed reinforcements; however, the confrontation did not end in armed conflict.
The hostile flora and fauna in Su(Ma) Uk’rh, as well as its harsh environment and location, made the land’s development a very unprofitable one.
Shun and a more adventurous number of his entourage chose to remain in Su(Ma) Uk’rh to study the environment and its people. Their accounts and reports attracted other adventurers from Krow City and countries beyond the shores of Ma(an) TisCera well into the latter years of the 4th Millennium.
Just like their Cayanese and Feleenese neighbours, a few Scereans left the region to seek fortune in the towns that were growing around Krow City. Scereans were the most diverse when it came to appearance, ranging from the dragon-like pure bloods to the ones with embedded Human features. Their appearance and odd natures, e.g. moulting and behaviour differentials during temperature changes, made them the most poorly treated of all the races. Scereans away from Su(Ma) Uk’rh often found themselves without work. They were not allowed into public places such as theatres or post offices, much like the Feleenese during the period of the Treaty.
The Scereans created a space for themselves in Dinya Uk’rh, Lower World, which would later be known simply as Dinya, one of the largest “tin-can” towns in modern Manticura up until its clean-up and development in the early half of 5067.
Manticura was pitched as the jewel of the Layeptic. The promise of space, fortune, and beauty drew large groups of migrants. While most preferred to stay in the Human-dominated city centre, significant numbers, particularly those from the lower parts of the North Continents, chose to establish villages and towns deeper within the country, encroaching upon Tuyun territories.
4511 CE:
Earliest records of Tuyun encounters began to appear. Contact between the Tuyuns and the Humans was often established by the Scereans in Su(Ma) Uk’rh. (See article, “The Other Marshmen” by Shun.)
An expedition led by botanist Mayren Lod made first contact with the Tuyuns of Ne’rut Uk’rh . (See account, “Shadows of the Deep: First Contact with the Jungle People of Lower Nelroote” by Mayren Lod.)
In the wake of the wars of succession following the death of the Jar nahuk’rh, or Blood Aunt, the Tuyuns saw a regression to their older state of paganism and segregated clans. The old catacombs and temples were buried and forgotten, leading to accounts of the Tuyun’s continued primitivism.
Unlike those of their marsh and coastal cousins’, the immune systems of the jungle Tuyuns were not able to fight foreign diseases. An outbreak of the common flu among the exped
ition proved deadly to the jungle Tuyuns. Whole clans were wiped out as a result. The expedition was considered to be one of anthropology’s major disasters, but it led to the creation of an essential first-contact guideline in later anthropological studies.
The term “a Tuyun sneeze” is still invoked to show that a situation will come to a disastrous end, and is a common phrase used to this day.
4728 CE:
Governor Abbett Kros’ proposal for a unified government was met with opposition from the leaders of the other races, who still lived within largely segregated communities.
4809 CE:
Abbett’s son, Gransen, gained political backing from the Cayanese and Scerean leaders to form a union. Ma(an) TisCera was renamed Manticura after the chimerical creature that once lived in parts of the North Continents. Gransen Kros, Herkal Din’l, and Tecra binDrun headed the new Manticurean Union.
binDrun’s position was contested by his cousin, Sunya rinDrun; however, she purportedly withdrew from the race and disappeared from public affairs after his rise to power. Her withdrawal was followed by the resignations of everyone who had been vocal about their suspicions of binDrun’s legitimacy and fairness over the course of his years on the seat.
The Feleenese were invited into the union in 4812 CE, but only joined in 4814 when the old leader was replaced by his young son, Malik Saini, who was fourth in line for the position of leadership. Accusations of nepotism were quickly quelled.
The Tuyuns, the smallest minority in the country, were offered a single seat in the union. Without a proper leader, renowned Tuyun businessman, philantrophist and scholar, Jyani, took up the seat. She was the only woman in the union and the only legitimate advocate for her people’s welfare.
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