Skillful Death

by Ike Hamill

  “I have no mother or sisters to come help me with my birth,” Tara said.

  “But we’ve hired you the best attendants in the village. They’re here to help you through this process,” Dom said. Their house employed two midwives, but Dom refused to let anyone call them that. They had to refer to the women as “attendants.”

  “It’s not the same,” Tara said.

  “What about your aunt? Have you sent word to her?” Dom wanted to reach out to the aunt, but Tara had begged him to let her handle the communications.

  “She knows how far along I am, but she doesn’t come to me. She’s ashamed of me.”

  “That can’t be true,” Dom said.

  “I’m going to be all alone with this child.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  “You work constantly. You are Torma more than you are Dom.” Tara spread the cloth across her face, hiding her eyes.

  “Darling, I love you more now than ever. You’re beautiful carrying our child. You can’t fault me for wanting to provide as much as I can for my beautiful wife and our precious child, can you? You know how far we’ve come in the past year. We went from nothing to all this. We are richer than your aunt’s husband, and our fortune grows every day. Our hearts will be wealthier by tenfold when our child comes.” He placed his hand on her belly.

  “You think I’m crazy,” Tara said.

  “Not at all.”

  “Dom, I’m not sure it ever grew back.”

  “Pardon?”

  “My soul. I don’t think my soul ever grew back. Do you think you could purchase it back for me? Do you have enough money for that?”

  Dom sat down and tried to think. One of the traits which made him so successful was his ability to guess what something was worth. This calculation she presented was tricky. He didn’t know his buyer and he’d never heard of a transaction of this type. Surely any monetary offer would be more worthwhile than the possession of a soul. What profit could one expect from a soul?

  “If it will make you happy, then I will buy back your soul,” Dom said.

  Dom didn’t sleep that night. He lay awake, looking at the bulging form of his wife and thinking about the nature of happiness. He considered himself to be very happy. His business thrived and his gravid wife glowed. How much of that happiness would be placed at risk if he sought to purchase back her soul? Would her body remain married to him, or would her soul be inclined in a different direction? Would the soul cost so much that he would lose his working capital and doom his business to flounder? Would fulfilling this demand lead to more, where she forced him to spend more time being Dom and less time as Torma?

  In the morning, he wrote a careful letter to Tara’s former betrothed, and sought a particular pair of men to deliver it. He chose one of his designers—a man who could glance at a part once and then return to his bench to draw a perfect replica of the item. The second man was tall, strong, and known to strike fear into those who crossed him.

  Dom sat them down in his front room and explained their mission. The men would take the letter along with a sum of money and ask to see the box. They would negotiate. Then, if necessary, intimidate. If all else failed, the pair would replicate the box. Dom sent the men off that day.

  While the men were gone, Tara gave birth to their perfect baby girl, Diki.

  Dom set aside his previous understanding of the word happiness, and lived each day to look into the wide, curious eyes of his precious baby girl. Her black hair, rich skin, and delicate features, were the reflection of her mother’s beauty. To Dom, her every wail was music. When he was not allowed to hold her, he haunted her room, watching her tiny fingers clutch at her blankets or her mother’s hair.

  Tara performed her motherly duties, but asked Dom several times each day if the men had yet returned with her soul. She felt she couldn’t fully bond with her daughter until she had her soul back.

  One day, the attendants pushed Dom from Diki’s room and he found himself on the balcony. Tara stood there and looked down at the performance circle below.

  “I don’t understand why they forbid me to stay with my own daughter,” Dom said.

  “She needs her sleep, not a panting bear hovering over her all the time,” Tara said. She looked at Dom with weary eyes, heavy with insomnia.

  Dom sat on a bench and looked at his haggard wife. She had not eaten much since she gave birth and slept even less. Her skin hung on her bones like a cheap, ill-fitting robe.

  “Haven’t you heard from those men yet?” she asked.

  “No. You must give them time. It’s a long way to travel.”

  “I traveled the same route when I was just a young girl. And it didn’t take me so many weeks to do it.”

  “You are still a young girl,” Dom said. “And you didn’t have to go both directions. And it’s easier to travel down from the mountains in the summer. I’m sure the snow is creeping into the passes by now. Plus, you had a guide.”

  “Why didn’t you send them with a guide?”

  “I don’t know. It didn’t occur to me, I guess.”

  “Dom, do you see the rock down there? The rock where you performed the sacred ceremony to cleave my soul from my body?”

  “Of course.” It occurred to him for the first time that perhaps he could end her obsession if he revealed that he had invented the ceremony.

  “That’s the last time I was a complete person. You used the knife and sent my soul back to my betrothed. I didn’t realize it until I had a child growing within me how empty I was. I think that Diki’s presence within me made me believe that I could feel whole. Now that she’s gone, I know that I cannot.”

  “She is not gone. She is right there in her room,” Dom said. He half rose to verify that his assertion was true.

  “Gone from me,” Tara said. She turned to him and he saw pure despair in her eyes. “I have nothing in me now.”

  “Listen, Tara,” Dom began. He decided to tell her the whole story about the cleaving ceremony. She would hate him for a while, but then she could move on. He changed his mind just before the words left his mouth. “We will get your soul back, don’t worry. And we can have more children as well. We can keep you constantly full of life.”

  Tara ran from the balcony.

  38 MESSENGER'S RETURN

  DOM’S MEN RETURNED TO his door while Diki was down for a nap. They returned at knifepoint. Dom rushed to his foyer at the news. He found his men on their knees on his polished tile floor. Behind them, holding a long knife to each of their backs, a giant man stood. He was wrapped from head to toe in tattered scarves. Only his piercing green eyes shone out from his headdress.

  “Who are you?” Dom asked.

  “I might ask you the same,” the man said.

  “My name is Torma,” Dom said, using his business name to command respect. “And this is my house. Why do you hold my men at knifepoint?”

  “Because they’re either liars, or thieves, or both. I do not suffer either.”

  “Who are you?” Dom demanded.

  “They tell me you’ve stolen my wife.”

  “I have done no such thing,” Dom said.

  Tara, having received the news, pulled herself through the doorway, and propped herself against a wall. She looked as frail as a ghost haunting the body of a dead woman.

  “So, it’s true after all,” the man said, looking at Tara. “You have died here.”

  “Yes,” Tara said. “I’m afraid I have.”

  Her eyes tried to make sense of the giant man holding his knives to the backs of the kneeling men. The men on the floor didn’t say anything, they just clasped their hands to their chest and awaited their fate. The miles they’d trudged through the mountains showed on their faces and their cloaks.

  “My betrothed has died. After I kill you, Torma, I will join her,” the man said.

  “Wait!” exclaimed Tara. “Come here.”

  The tall man lowered his knives and crossed the room to Tara.

  “Come closer,” s
he said, motioning.

  Dom watched the tall man lean down closer, bringing his stunning green eyes to within Tara’s reach. She lifted her arms and he allowed her to unwrap the scarves from his head.

  “Your eyes are so green,” she said as she unwound the scarves.

  “When I heard the news of your death, I climbed through the snow to the monastery, to live a life of silence. The snow blinded me and burned my eyes to green. I couldn’t stay up there. My eyes just kept getting worse. With all the light reflecting from the snow, I couldn’t see to do my chores. The monks finally sent me home a month ago.”

  Tara pulled the last scarf away from his face and she slumped to the floor.

  “Lha-mo,” she said.

  “Yes, ghost of my betrothed. I thought your spirit eyes already recognized me.”

  “You are Lha-mo? The boy to whom her soul was promised?” Dom asked, coming closer despite the man’s knives.

  “You are unlike any man I have ever seen,” Tara said. “You’ve grown so tall and strong, and your eyes are so green. You are unlike any man I have ever seen.”

  “But we sent her soul back to you. You don’t have any claim to Tara’s body,” Dom said.

  “How did you die, my love?” Lha-mo asked. “They told me you had an accident, and showed me the blood on your promise box. How did you die?”

  “I asked Dom, and he killed me,” Tara said.

  “A bear?”

  “No,” she said. “Dom.” Tara pointed to Dom (Torma).

  Lha-mo raised his knives.

  39 STAR-CROSSED LOVERS

  DOM BACKED AWAY AS the tall man with the knives advanced. Deeper in the house, he heard people shouting, trying to find weapons and formulate a plan. Dom backed through the front room and stepped back onto the balcony, until his hands pressed against the railing.

  “She told me that her soul was betrothed to you, and she must have it cleaved from her body,” Dom said.

  Lha-mo moved his long knives to different positions, as if deciding which way to divide Dom.

  “At her request, we separated her soul from her body and sent it back in the promise box. Jetsan sent it. When the messenger returned, Tara and I were married. We have a daughter.”

  Lha-mo didn’t advance, but neither did he acknowledge that he heard Dom’s explanation.

  Tara arrived behind Lha-mo and grasped his scarves, holding herself up.

  “Do you have my soul with you?” she asked. “My body cannot survive without it.”

  “You told me that you are already dead,” Lha-mo said. “And look at you. You’re nothing but a phantom.”

  “I am nearly dead,” Tara said. “That’s why we sent after my soul.”

  Lha-mo lowered his knives and turned to Tara. “Please, tell me what happened. I received your box with news of your death. Then two men appeared and said you needed your soul back. You look dead, but this bear, Torma, says you have a child with him. What has happened here?”

  Tara explained. “I thought I wasn’t supposed to marry you because the blind woman from the cave said I that my husband would be a man, tall and strong, unlike any I’d ever seen. I thought that was Dom, so we cleaved my soul, sent it to you, and I married him. But I cannot live without my soul. And now that I’ve seen you, I realize my mistake. When I left, you were never so tall, and strong, and handsome. What have I done? Have I ruined everything?”

  “No, my precious love,” Lha-mo said. “I’ve come for you. Your marriage to this man is not valid because they lied to me and said you were dead. I never relinquished our promise.”

  Lha-mo dropped his knives and pulled Tara into an embrace.

  “Your soul is with me, and you can be whole again,” Lha-mo said.

  Several of Dom’s workers burst through the door to the balcony. One held a hammer, one a sharp rod of metal, and the others held stout sticks. They brandished their weapons and formed a semicircle around Lha-mo and Tara.

  “This is ridiculous,” Dom said. “Our marriage was presided by all the town officials, and conducted in the presence of Tara’s guardians and the law. She married me legally and willingly, and we have a family. Tara, this nonsense about your soul needs to stop this instant. I should have told you before, but I didn’t perform any cleaving ceremony on your soul. I don’t have the slightest idea how to do such a thing. I just invented all the stuff on the rock, and the blood was from my hand. I still have the scar.” He held his hand up to her wide eyes. Her arms began to drop from Lha-mo’s sides.

  “What you’re experiencing is a perfectly normal depression that all young mothers suffer. Haven’t all the attendants told you so? This man before you has no hold on you. You have no life with him. You and I have a family. We have a beautiful daughter.”

  Lha-mo began to reach down to the floor for his knives, but Dom’s (Torma’s) employees raised their weapons towards him and he stopped.

  “Come with me, Tara,” Lha-mo said. “We’re supposed to be together. My father has bequeathed me part of his estate as soon as you and I are married.”

  “Dom’s right,” Tara said. “I have a family with him.” She shrank down to the stone floor of the balcony.

  “You cannot reject me,” Lha-mo said. “I will cast myself from this ledge and end my life.”

  “Don’t do anything crazy,” Dom said.

  Tara propped her head with her hand and didn’t bother to look up at Lha-mo.

  “It’s not high enough for you to end your life,” Tara said. “At worst, you’ll break your ankle.”

  Lha-mo ignored them, turned his face to the sky, and shouted, “My destiny has been destroyed!” He swept his eyes over the semicircle of men and then threw himself over the balcony. Lha-mo screamed as he fell, but his scream ended immediately when he hit the rocks of the performance circle. Replacing his scream was a low moan.

  “Please help me,” Lha-mo called up from below.

  Dom motioned for his men to go help Lha-mo. He stayed on the balcony and knelt next to Tara. “Come, darling, let’s get you inside.” He reached out to Tara.

  She took his hand in both of hers and turned his palm upwards. She traced a finger over the scar on his palm.

  “You really invented the whole ceremony?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Dom said.

  “Why would you do that? Don’t you understand that my soul has a commitment? Don’t you believe that my soul has an obligation to fulfill?”

  “No,” Dom said. “And I don’t believe your aunt believes those things either. She sent news to Lha-mo that you died. She knew that he would never accept your soul in a box as payment for your promise.”

  “But why would you lie to me?”

  “Because you believed your soul needed to be cleaved. I was honoring your belief.”

  “That’s not honor. You were humoring me, like you would a child with a strange obsession. Is that what I am to you? I’m a child who doesn’t know better?”

  Dom sighed and looked at his hands. Below, in the circle, Lha-mo cried out as men helped move him towards the house.

  “No. Never. But what am I to do? I love you and I wanted to help you fulfill an obligation that you should have never been burdened with. How could I let the woman I love return back to a relationship dictated by her deceased parents? You clearly wanted to stay here with me. As much as it wasn’t my privilege to remove your obligation, it was not theirs to commit.”

  “Our marriage—is it even legitimate?”

  “Of course,” Dom said.

  “Don’t be so blithe. Where I’m from, a young woman may not engage in her own contract while she is already bound by another. If Lha-mo thought I was dead, then he certainly never gave his permission for our union.”

  “And where we live now, the guardians of a girl can break such contracts and agree to new unions. Your aunt possessed the authority to shift your promise to me.”

  “Then who is right?” Tara asked.

  “Ask your heart,” Dom said. “My heart belongs
to you and our daughter. Can you not reciprocate that love?”

  “I don’t know,” Tara said. “My soul knows.”

  40 LIVING WITH REJECTION

  THE FOUR ACTORS IN Dom’s play lived in adjacent rooms. Dom kept the marital room, which adjoined to his daughter Diki’s nursery. Across the hall, Tara took up residence in a room next to Lha-mo, who was recuperating from a broken tibia. Dom wondered which would recover first: his wife’s heart, or his rival’s leg. Regardless, he planned to send Lha-mo back into the mountains as soon as possible. He would send two men carrying him on a litter if required.

  Tara continued to care for Diki, but she did so without talking to Dom. Diki grew fast, pulling in the world from all sides. Dom was sure that the little baby would grow so fast and beautiful that she would absorb everything, including him. Dom watched Tara feeding their daughter and he wondered if his wife would ever forgive him. He always thought the lie was something they shared. Like co-conspirators, they had plotted and then executed a plan to release Tara from her mountain obligations so they could marry, or so Dom had thought.

  Lha-mo, on the other hand, was more than willing to talk to Dom.

  “I know I must be a terrible burden on your house, but I do hope that you’ll allow me to maintain my dignity by letting me heal enough to walk out of here on my own two feet,” Lha-mo said, almost daily. Dom didn’t like having his rival under his roof, but his obligation in this respect was indisputable. And although he dreamed of sending Lha-mo away on a stretcher, carried by indifferent, rough-gaited fools, he merely provided the best care available and hoped Lha-mo would feel up to traveling soon.

  Diki cried all night when she got her first tooth. Tara, who had been gaining weight and looking better each day, looked gaunt again. Soon, Diki stopped feeding from Tara, and Dom had to bring in a wet nurse and yak milk to satisfy his girl’s hunger. Dom caught Lha-mo walking in the halls, but the man’s atrophied leg still didn’t look up to the task of carrying him up into the mountains. It seemed that everyone was in flux.