by Sean Wallace
“But it will do you such good! It will make many aspects of your life far more efficient.”
“But . . .” I didn’t know how to explain it so that she would understand.
“I just wish these things would be considered separately from the relationship Europe has with this part of the world.”
“You mustn’t talk about European devices,” I repeated, as if to a child.
“Houran has talked to some people,” she murmured, obviously unhappy – for many reasons, I suspected.
Panic made my stomach clench painfully. “Europeans and their spies get killed out here, Aynabat. And I don’t think women would be much safer than men, not from some people.”
“He’s careful and cautious. And soon we will move on.”
“Not soon enough.” I knew that traders often lingered, spending time with distant family members and new friends. “I want you to stay here,” I said, in a voice that shook like a rope-end prised free in a storm. “I want to talk to you more, spend time with you. I don’t want you forced to flee here, or worse.” My imagination stupidly, horribly showed me how it could happen. I blinked the images away.
“I’ll talk to Houran. I promise.” She finally sounded worried in the way I wanted her to be, and took my hands. Did I imagine a tremor there? “We only want to see if anyone thinks they could benefit from this technology.”
“No. No one wants it.”
“All right,” she said softly.
Once again, Begench didn’t return from the plains at lunch. “We have a troublesome ewe,” my mother muttered, as she packed up their bread and meat for me to carry out to them. “If it’s the same one, bring it back. We need to slaughter one, anyway.”
“I will.”
Within an hour, I was on my way back, with the ewe tied to my horse, wide-eyed as if it knew what awaited it at our yurt. I was concentrating on riding carefully, so that it wouldn’t try to struggle free, and on trying not to think about my family’s impending decision; I didn’t notice the other rider until he drew near.
“Good afternoon!” Biashim called out.
“Oh, hello!” I slowed Melekush and then we stopped together, alone in the plains but for the bleating ewe. My brothers had gone further in the past week, so that neither the whiteness of their flock nor the darkness of the yurts dotted any horizon. Alone with a man whose family spoke to mine of marriage, I should have felt cautious, but I knew I wouldn’t bring shame on myself. Neither did I think Biashim would attempt to take advantage of me. If he did, well, I carried a knife, and a man’s flesh surely gave way as easily as a sheep’s. Instead, a smile crept onto my face. “How are you? Are you going somewhere?”
“This horse was getting frisky,” he said, patting its dark, muscular neck. “I don’t think he likes standing still for long. I brought him out here to run.” A sly, child-fun look crossed Biashim’s face. “Do you want to race?”
I looked around and saw a suitable rock for securing the ewe.
Would he think me indecent for accepting his offer? Would he be disappointed when my parents turned down his parents’ proposal? I frowned.
The wind teased through my hair and tickled my ears.
“All right.”
I fastened the ewe to the rock and climbed back onto Melekush, and kicked her in the flanks before Biashim could call out the beginning of the race or even mark its finish line.
“Hya!” he shouted. “Hya!” I heard his horse behind me, its hooves pounding the earth.
I wanted to win. I wanted to taunt him, to call out my triumph in the wind, to sing. “Let’s ride onto the hill, sing a laele on the hilltop!” I did. I felt wonderfully, achingly alive. “And, together with new friends, let’s jump and laugh and race!” Perhaps he didn’t hear me. But he overtook me, grinning like a boy, and I kicked Melekush on, faster and faster across the plains, my jewellery as loud as the wind, as loud as my voice.
“Loser!” I shouted as I passed him. “Slow down!” I shouted as he went ahead again.
Eventually, we stopped, and walked the final stretch of hill to the ewe, arguing over who had won.
Beside the rock, Biashim flopped onto the grass and stared up at the sky. I sat a short distance away, unsure what to say or feel after such joy.
“Sometimes I wish,” he said, still breathing heavily, “I was a child again, racing my brothers and sisters, not having to think about adult things like how well business is going and finding a wife and . . .”
I didn’t hear the rest of his words. Wind-stolen – or perhaps wind-twisted? Had I heard true?
“You don’t want to marry?” I asked tentatively.
“Oh! No! I mean, yes, I do.” Wide-eyed and worried. Liar, I thought. I recognized denial reflected back at me – was I really as obvious as that? “I don’t mean to offend you.”
“You haven’t.” I fiddled with the hem of my jacket. “I don’t want to get married, either. Apparently a lot of girls don’t feel ready when the time to marry comes, but I’ve never heard of a man not feeling ready.”
“Neither have I.”
Was I as forlorn as that, too? No wonder Yazjemal and my mother were worried. I frowned, not sure what to say next when the truth still felt so dangerous – like a knife, capable of hurting a poor wielder.
“Why?” I asked.
Biashim shook his head. “It’s foolish, probably.”
I wanted to hug him.
What have I got to lose? I probably won’t marry him, anyway. I took a deep breath and said, “I don’t want to marry because I’m not attracted to men. I like them – as brothers, as family, as childhood friends – but not in the way a wife must love a husband, having sex with him and bearing his children.”
I wanted to look at the ewe or the plains or the few drifting clouds, anything that would not judge me as a poor woman. I didn’t. I looked, and I saw Biashim’s eyes widen, like Aynabat’s, and he said, “Me too.”
I gasped, as if the wind had blown straight into my face, cold and sharp and wonderful right into my lungs.
“I’ve never been able to imagine myself with anybody,” he said. “I know there are stories of men who like men—”
Oh, I thought. Oh. It’s not just women.
“—but I’m not one of them. The thought of sleeping with someone . . . it’s just not something I want.”
“I can’t imagine sleeping with a husband,” I whispered.
“I can’t believe I’ve met someone like me.”
My next words came out all in a rush, canter-fast and searing me, straight from my head into the air without any time to think. “We have to get married. We’ll be perfect – we’ll be happy, we’ll never have to have sex. Oh, oh, I have to go home right now.” I hurled myself to my feet, rushed over to the ewe that bleated at my wide, wild eyes.
“What? Wait!” Before I finished untying the ewe, he grabbed my hands, held them still. “What about children? What about—about the night after our marriage, when our sheets will be checked for blood.”
“Oh, that’s easy.” I grinned and shook my head, setting my earrings a-jangle. “I wear metal all the time, and I’ll be covered in it for a wedding. I’ll cut my inner thigh or somewhere else private. And children, well, your mother will have to give me lots of koeke, and take me to all the holy places, where I’ll crawl under roots and tie rags to trees, and eventually we’ll have to tearfully admit that I’m infertile.” Fear like a knife. “Your family wouldn’t cast me out for it, would they?”
“I don’t think so! My brothers have so many children already.” His crinkled-up, turmoil-creased face was almost cute – like my baby sister, Garhera, when asked to choose what beads she wanted. “I . . . Do you think it will work?”
“I hope so! I want it to, so much. But I have to go home now.”
“No, we should talk about this more. Plan. This is such an amazing opportunity.”
“You don’t understand. I have to go home. There’ll be time for talking later.”
> I pulled myself away – Please, no, please have waited – and led the ewe to my horse, hauled it onto her back, and climbed up – Please, listen to me – and kicked her into a canter with only a briefly thrown glance at Biashim, who was standing by the rock as if thoroughly lost. Please oh please oh please oh please . . .
Melekush dripped sweat and the ewe was not happy, and I saw a displeased look on Gariagdy’s face as I drew near. “Are our parents here?”
“Yes, they’re both inside.”
“Good! Oh, good! I need to talk to them.”
The frown deepened as I left Melekush and the ewe with him, but I didn’t care. List men’s names less often, beloved brother, I thought bitterly. The yurt door jerked but didn’t pull open. “Please, it’s me! I need to talk to you, please can I come in?” Polite, polite. I took deep breaths.
My mother opened the door. “Thank you! Thank you!” I almost fell in.
My father wore a frown to match Gariagdy’s.
“Have you made your choice yet?” I asked, gripped with fear. I stood just inside the yurt, holding on to my jacket like a tree in a storm. “For my husband?”
“We are discussing that.”
“So you haven’t chosen. Oh, please, please choose Biashim.”
His eyebrow quirked. “I was given to understand that you had no preference.”
“I was wrong. I want to marry Biashim, please, please—”
“Why?” my mother asked, standing at my side.
“Because . . . because I’ve spoken to some friends about him, and he sounds like a much better match for me. And when I was riding out to the boys, I realized I love the idea of a life out on the plains. Please.”
“Dursun, you haven’t done something foolish, I deeply hope,” my father said.
“No! No! I would never dishonour my family that way!” I couldn’t stop myself crying, but I held in sobs. I wiped my cheeks, trying to look dispassionate, as if the tears were an accident. “Please, it would mean so much to me if you let me marry Biashim,” I said, and I even managed to keep my voice level. Denial wrote lines on my father’s face and I bit my lip, and heard my mother sigh.
“Dursun,” she said, “we both agree Tagan is a better match for you.”
“No!” I clamped my hands over my mouth – no more honesty, no more truth that neither of them would accept – and sank to my knees, the tears flowing like a rare rain storm, soaking my hems.
My mother wrapped her arms around me and kissed my hair. “If it means so much to you, then we will consider it. No formal decisions have been made.” Though I didn’t see it, tucked under her chin like a far smaller girl, I heard it in her tone: one of her glares that made even my father speak with care.
“You must tell me,” she said very quietly that night, “if you’ve been foolish with Biashim. I won’t tell your father. There are things we must plan, if you have.”
“I haven’t, I promise,” I whispered back. “We met accidentally on the plains and raced and spoke for a while – just speaking, apart, we didn’t even touch hands. I think I love him.” It seemed like the right thing to say. I didn’t know if I wanted love, but I knew other girls did.
“Oh, darling. I do hope you’re right.”
“Can I marry him?”
“Your father asked to sleep on it.” Laughter curved her lips, barely seen in the near dark of the yurt. Moonlight seeped through the open flap above our heads, and by it I saw her reach out to hold my hands. “I hope you’re going to be happy.”
“Me too.”
Relief filled me like the warmth of stew on a winter’s day, like tea after a long ride, like my mother’s approval of a complicated pattern: so good, I felt I would overflow with it.
There was no shouting at Houran and Aynabat’s yurt. I watched, from the crowd that pretended not to be a crowd – all of us standing around as if talking while washing our clothes, yet barely a shirt corner dangled in the stream, barely a woman crouched or averted her eyes from the scene.
Men gathered around the little yurt. Houran stood in front of its shut door, wide-eyed but talking, explaining. The wind hid his words from us. The stances of the men and the changing expression on Houran’s face told us enough.
There was no force. No one entered the yurt, no one tore Aynabat from its safety. No one raised a weapon against Houran.
The wind stilled enough for me to hear, “I want nothing to do with the Russians or the British.” And, a moment later, “I beg for your kindness. My wife is pregnant, our first – I do not want anything to happen to our child.”
I prayed silently. Several other women murmured small prayers – for Aynabat, for the child.
The talking went on. Some men raised their fists, as if to smash Houran or the metal devices he concealed behind his door. Other men touched them on the arms.
My father advanced on Houran and I felt fear rise in me.
They talked – a decision had been made, I realized, as the men soon dispersed like a sandstorm falling away. Houran stood there for a while, just breathing.
I said to my mother, “Are they being permitted to stay?”
“I think so.” Several of the women walked away, too, while others crouched at the stream to begin washing. “That poor woman, pregnant without someone to explain everything. I should offer my advice.”
A murmur of agreement. I smiled up at her.
* * *
Cheper shrieked with joy when I told her about my betrothal to Biashim. “You’re glowing, Dursun! I didn’t know you could do that. Come on, let’s work on our trousseaux together. I am so, so far behind! I was worried about you!”
“I’m sorry I haven’t visited you in a while,” I managed, before her mouth raced ahead: Cheper could out-talk the devil, I remembered my mother once remarking. Every one of her words felt like an embrace, even when our knees or hands didn’t touch.
On another day, I lay on Aynabat’s floor and stared up at the ceiling: the wooden supports radiating out from the centre, holding up the felt. One hand in the air, I mapped invisible patterns over them.
Aynabat and Houran would be staying with our village for another few days, until the caravan moved on – and it was a real child after all. For all Aynabat had lacked a mother-in-law to explain the ways of pregnancy and childbearing, she had known to conceal its growth, keeping it safe from the evil eye. Or she had reflexively kept it secret, like so many other things.
My mother had been with her earlier, explaining things I might never have to know.
I sang of my liking for Biashim, of my happiness at our match.
“I’m so glad you’re singing that,” Aynabat said, and placed an eagle on my forehead. It didn’t move, it didn’t swallow steam like lamb meat and hiss; it sat on me like jewellery, bright and beautiful. “For you.”
“Oh! But why?” I sat up, cradling it in my hands. Such a tiny eagle! With its wings spread, it only just reached across one palm.
“A wedding gift, for you to keep. That’s the tradition where I come from. And I—I hope you won’t be in any trouble for owning a motionless ornament, even though it’s made by a European.”
I would probably have to hide it. “Thank you!”
She gathered me up in a hug, another of many. With each one, I liked being close to her more and more. “I’m so happy for you,” she said.
“I’m so happy, too,” I sighed into her shoulder, and meant it.
The Clockworks of Hanyang
Gord Sellar
Lasher was unsettled, even more than was customary for him, by the lidless gaze of the strange, oriental mechanikaes’ optical apparata. He seemed the only one in the crowd of foreigners upset in this way, however: the Clockworks was a busy place, with machines being banged together, or pulled apart, all about. Commoners in grubby white tunic-and-pyjamas taught by rote a dozen different tasks to the completed mechanikae, whilst all around the thick reek of machine oil hung in the air. One would be forgiven for suspecting that all things mechanik
al had been bustled forth into the Clockworks, so as to show off the state of the art as concerned Hanyang, and all of Chosŏn – as the locals insisted on calling their land.
Marvel at the wonders of the Clockworks of Hanyang!, the invitation had read. Witness mechanikae ordered by Eastern discipline and ancient wisdom! See the fusion of modern mechanikal advances with elemental Corean power! A number of other Western dignitaries had received invitations, as well, though probably not accompanied by the desperate letter into which it had been tucked in the envelope that Lasher and MacMillan had received; many of Europe’s most brightly shimmering stars had declined to attend, understandably, but had sent representatives. The brother of the Home Secretary of the United Kingdom, accompanied by his wife; a Belgian duchesse seemingly of an adventurous sort; a pair of German twins with a fascination for machines built in the shape of women . . . the whole lot of them had shown up, in hazard of their very lives, along with Charles Lasher and his long-time mentor, James MacMillan.
Turning his oft-absent mind from the staring lenses of the optical apparata and back to the ongoing tour, Lasher realized that he had missed some sort of shocking event. Apparently, a mechanika had lurched forward, seemingly on the verge of crying out, and seized the elderly Master Ko, headman of the Clockworks, by the front of his scholar’s robes. The old fellow’s horrified Western guests cringed as a single mass, crying out in a ragged unison, and Lasher, the sole American of the party, was no exception: he had seen Polish-built mechanikae do things to men – and to women, Christ forgive their foolish builders! – that would have provoked screams from anyone save a madman. He wondered, for a moment, whether these intelligent mechanika of Hanyang were invested with the same ersatz memories, and emotions, and longings, and moral codes as their Western-built equivalents.
Yet in truth, Lasher gaped for another reason entirely: it was the fluidity with which the machine moved that stunned him utterly, despite knowing from the expostulations of his traveling partner to expect wonders such as these. The mere sight of this wondrous, oriental-built mechanika and its gliding movements was far more convincing of the Chosŏn tinkerers’ cleverness than the scribblings of all the starving Jesuits that MacMillan had studied, and decanted orally, during their rail trip across Asia. From the moment the letter had arrived, the mysterious letter postmarked from “Hanyang, Empire of Chosŏn”, MacMillan had pored over texts detailing the wonders of Asiatic mechanikae, and the queer – indeed, downright odd – systems of their operation and composition.