by Andrea Ring
Nishta came here to die. That is why she didn’t fight for her life.
Nishta thought the end was inevitable. And preferable.
I am a suicide mission.
How many of the girls knew, or at least suspected? How long did it take anyone to see this dark pattern? I, who was closest to it and best equipped to surmise, did not.
Twenty-two girls…sweet girls, shy girls, strong girls, young girls. And Nilaruna, number twenty-three…
“Did you come here to die?” I ask woodenly.
Nilaruna’s face is still turned away. She slowly shakes her head and turns it in my direction.
“Not exactly,” she says carefully. “I don’t wish to kill myself. But it doesn’t frighten me.” She rubs her eyes hard with the heels of her hands. “But serving as Go-Between was preferable to my other choices.”
“What do you mean, preferable?” I demand.
“I don’t have…the men of Dabani are not beating down my father’s door. There is no trade that will take me. I played the flute when I was younger, and I was good, very good, but after the…I cannot purse my lips properly to make a sound.” Nilaruna lets out a growl of frustration. “People cross to the other side of the road when I approach! Babes in their mothers’ arms cringe from me! My own parents won’t look me in the eye! I have nothing to live for!” She glares in my direction, chest heaving.
“But you were not born this way,” I say.
“You think that matters? It doesn’t. Broken is broken.”
I have known this homely creature for no more than two hours. Yet her pain stirs my own.
“I do not want you to die,” I say.
“You are the only one.”
“I understand of what you speak. I am an outsider as well.”
“Yes,” she says with a laugh. “We have each other, right? The cripple and the old man. We are all that stands between Dabani and evil.”
“You scoff,” I say, “but it is the truth.”
“I feel sorry for Dabani for the first time in a long time.”
“Nilaruna,” I say, and she turns that green eye on me, and I swear it sees into the heart of me. “Please. Do not give in. Your life can change for the better in the blink of an eye.”
She frowns but doesn’t say anything.
“Let me tell you a story.”
***
“Once upon a time, a king owned a mare so lovely, so rare, that he dared not even ride her. A saddle would have marred her silken hide. A bit would have tamed her passionate spirit. And reins — the king wanted no man and nothing to temper her will and independence.
“But independence always comes with a price, and one day the king found the mare coupling with a common plow horse. The king was so enraged that he cut the plow horse’s head off himself, before the coupling had even finished, and quickly locked the mare up in a pen of her own. It soon became apparent that she was with child.
“Penned up as she was, the mare grew frustrated, then angry, then despondent. She refused to eat anything but the apples she herself could reach from the ground near the fence. Her once-beautiful body grew thin, even while her belly swelled fat. The king’s stableman tried to get the king to allow the mare to once again roam the fields around the castle, but the king refused. He couldn’t bear another taint upon his prize.
“Finally, a colt was born. Black as night he was, skinny as a blade of grass and not much more stable in a strong wind. The king wanted to send him to the fields to work, but the mare was fiercely protective. No one could come near him, her beloved colt.
“So they drugged the water in her trough. And when both colt and mare were passed out, the stableman and his assistants took the colt away and sold him to a nearby village. It took the mare one week to die of grief.
“The colt understood little of what had happened to him, except that life took a frightful turn. For two moons he had sheltered in his mother’s love, and then suddenly he had not a friend in the world. He was beaten and made to work. He ate rotten apple cores and mildewing oats. Even the water he was given tasted of piss and mosquito eggs.
“He couldn’t bear it. So he decided to die, just like that. Surely death would be preferable. He stopped eating and drinking, and carried on with his work, content to die in the fields where he at least felt a little bit free.
“On the third day of his fast, he was hooked up to the rusty plow and whipped by the plowman as he plodded through the dirt. He stumbled several times, and his entire body shook. He was weakening, and he doubted he’d live through the day.
“The plowman, now, he was not a bad man, as these things are measured. He beat the colt, yes, but only to get the work done. After all, if the work was not completed on time, he himself would be beaten. He was doing his job. And this was especially tough for him since his wife had passed in childbirth six moons before. The colt knew nothing of this, except that the plowman sometimes brought his babe to the fields when his sister could not care for her. The gurgling baby girl would sit on a blanket at the edge of the orchard, in the plowman’s line of sight, and pass the day in the shade. The colt didn’t particularly like the babe, as the plowman always seemed to whip the horse more on the days the babe was there. Perhaps he wanted to finish quickly.
“So the colt was weak and trembling, waiting for his legs to give out, when suddenly a cry rang out from the stables: ‘Wolf!’
“Both colt and plowman froze, scanning the fields. And then both of their gazes found the babe, and the plowman gasped, the colt chuffed. There was the wolf, stalking silently not twenty paces from the blanket.
“The plowman dropped the plow and ran, but the colt knew he’d never make it in time. The colt shook his head, gathered his strength, and ran.
“He flew across the field, dirt flying in every direction as the plow furrowed the earth. He quickly overtook the plowman, and continued racing, even as he watched the wolf pounce and clamp his jaws around the babe’s neck. He never slowed. While the wolf was distracted, he bulled right into him, sending the babe flying in the air, but he promptly caught her in his own mouth and gently lowered her to the ground. Where she whimpered. It was the most beautiful sound the colt had ever heard.
“The beast was down. Before he could rise, the colt gave him a swift kick to the head and killed him.
“The plowman cradled his daughter and comforted her. She was crying and bloody, but not mortally wounded. She would grow up to be a great healer.
“The plowman named the horse ‘Protector.’ He prayed to the gods for great blessings upon the horse, and from that day on, the horse was revered. His name was whispered. He was the ‘Protector.’ And he lived forever.”
***
“You were a horse?” Nilaruna asks.
“It was a metaphor,” I say. “A poor one, apparently.”
“Oh,” she says. “I thought, maybe, it really happened.”
“Some of it did, some didn’t, but the point was —”
“I understood the point,” she says. “But really, I’d like to know. Did you become Protector under such dire circumstances?”
I shift against the wall. “Something like, yes.”
“Then you are a good man.”
I cringe at her words, but don’t say anything.
“You do know how to protect,” she insists. “It’s instinctual.”
And I sense a change in her as she speaks those words. Perhaps it is her trust in me, taking shape and solidifying. Perhaps it is a renewed determination in her duty. Perhaps it is neither of these.
“Nilaruna, I do know how to protect, and you have reminded me that the individual is as important as the village. Maybe more so. Despite the spell and its bounds, I have been derelict in my duty. And I shall be no longer.”
“Thank you, Maja,” she says, head bent. “You honor me.”
I sigh, knowing what I must say next. “Nilaruna, I must protect, now more than ever. I cannot allow harm to come to you. With that said,” and I pause.
“Yes?
”
“I cannot allow you to leave this cave.”
And before Nilaruna can even gasp, I throw my magic at her and take her in my thrall.
***
I enter her mind.
Don’t think, don’t think, don’t think!
I flick my wrist at her and allow her to speak.
“I am not reading your thoughts,” I say, “and you can speak.”
“Then how do you know I’m trying to keep you out of my head?” she shrieks.
I sigh.
“Release me. I will not run.”
“But I’m keeping you here. Against your will.”
“You should have asked me,” she says. “I would have stayed willingly. I have no wish to die, remember?”
Oh.
I pull the magic back and release her.
We stare at each other, as much as possible in the dark.
“Why did you think I’d run?” she asks.
“None of the Go-Betweens has been comfortable here,” I say. “They do their duty, but they always prefer to go home.”
Nilaruna scowls. “But I just told you I have nothing to go home to. Were you not listening?”
I frown. “But I would be forcing you to stay. You would be my prisoner.”
Nilaruna sits up on her knees again and holds her hands out, palms up. “I am only a prisoner if I am in your thrall. Give me a choice, and my will aligns with yours.”
“Truly?” I say.
She smiles. “Truly.”
I swallow past the lump in my throat. “Will you stay, Nilaruna? Where I can protect you?”
“Will you promise not to use your magic on me again?”
“Yes.”
“Then I will stay.”
We sit in silence. I don’t enter her head. It’s not my promise that keeps me from doing so, as magic is not what allows me to connect with her. It is my own skill, one I was born with. But I have my own thoughts to occupy me, chief among those why twenty-two of my Go-Betweens died before their time. Presumably before their time.
Nilaruna, though, is not as occupied.
“So, if I’m going to stay,” she ventures, shifting on her cushion, “could I, you know, get a tour?”
“A tour?”
“Of the cave. I mean, where will I sleep? What do you have to eat? Where do I, um…”
“Relieve yourself?” I offer.
She nods shyly.
I had not thought this through.
“I will conjure you a bed and whatever you wish to eat. As for the other, stand up.”
She scoots off the cushion and stands.
“Go forty-nine paces to your left until you reach the wall.” She does. “Follow it forward until it ends, but be careful. There is a ledge there, about knee high. You may squat over it.”
Her eyes grow wide. “It’s out in the open?”
“Yes.”
“But…you will see me?” The terror in her voice pierces me.
“I promise not to look.”
“But I wouldn’t know if you did,” she whispers.
“I swear it.”
She nods, but it is unconvincing.
“I will leave you alone now,” I say, and I turn away from her and amble over to the far right corner of the cave. I hum an old lullaby in an attempt to give her privacy.
Before I am finished with the first chorus, she speaks from her cushion. “What song is that?”
I startle and bang my head on a low overhang.
“What?”
“The one you’re humming. What song is that?”
“Dragonblood and Moonsong,” I say, rubbing my head.
“Ah yes, I thought I recognized it. Odd choice for you.”
“Why’s that?”
“Well, it’s sort of a love song, isn’t it? By dragonblood and heart’s first longing, I bid the moonsong hear my calling. Did your mother sing it to you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe your…wife sang it to you?”
“I’ve never had a wife.”
“Never?”
“No.”
Nilaruna falls quiet, and I long to hear her thoughts.
“How old are you?” she asks.
“Three hundred and twenty-two.”
“Wow. But you don’t sound that old. You sound…gruff, hardened…but not old.”
I don’t know what to say to that.
“Do you…look old?”
I stare down the length of my body and try to judge this. “No, I suppose I don’t.”
“How old were you when you became Protector?”
“Young,” I say. “Around your age.”
“And you still look this way?” she asks.
“I have no way to know that,” I say. “But I do not know anyone who looks the same after three hundred cycles.”
Nilaruna smiles. “You’ve no mirror?”
“No.”
“Let me see.”
I stiffen. “Nilaruna.”
“Please, Maja. Please. We’re going to be stuck together for who knows how long. You have seen me, scars and all. It is only fair.”
“Fair,” I whisper. “This is not about fair. No one has seen my true form in hundreds of cycles.”
“I cannot live in darkness, Maja,” she whispers back. “Not forever.”
“It will not be forever,” I say. “Just until we can figure out how to keep you safe.”
“What about morning?” she says. “Daylight will come. I will see you then.”
“Daylight does not penetrate my cave.”
“But…a cooking fire. Surely you cook your food.”
“I conjure my food,” I tell her. “I have no need of fire.”
“Warmth,” she says.
“We are warm,” I say. “Tell me you are not.”
She actually growls in frustration.
“Fine,” she says. “Conjure me a bed. I’m going to sleep.”
“Nilaruna,” I say, and I hate the pleading in my voice.
“Do not Nilaruna me,” she says. “You want me to trust you, and I have. I do. But you will not give me the same courtesy.”
I hold my palms out to her as she did to me earlier. But she cannot see them. “It’s not that. I trust you. But this is something else.”
“What then?” she says.
“I just…cannot.”
“Fine.” She stands up, hands on her skinny hips. “Bed.”
I wave my hand and a feather-stuffed pallet appears in front of her.
“One pace straight forward,” I say.
She flops down face first, trusting me completely. I have never felt like an ass in my long life, but I feel like one now.
“Nili,” I whisper in the dark.
She turns her head to my voice, and her face softens. “It’s okay, Maja. I trust you.” And she closes her eyes and sleeps.
***
I wake, and I know we’ve been sleeping for only a few hours. My head is muzzy and aching from where I bumped it. I rub it carefully, feeling the tender lump, and as I turn over to try to go back to sleep, I see her standing over me.
“Nilaruna?” I ask. “Is everything alright?”
She doesn’t answer. Her knife is once again clenched in her fist.
I slip into her mind.
He wants me dead. He killed them all! Nishta is gone, sweet Nishta, he let her die, he let her die, he let her die!
I know I promised not to enthrall her, but I do not hesitate. My wrist flicks before I can stop it.
“Nilaruna!” I say.
She sways in place, and a whimper escapes her lips.
“Nili! Drop the knife!”
She does.
I draw a drop of my magic back in. “Nili. Talk to me.”
She gasps, but doesn’t speak.
“Can you hear me?”
“Maja?” She slowly opens her eyes, blinking a few times.
“Nili, it’s me, Maja. Can you speak?”
“Yes, I’m…where
am I?”
“My cave,” I say.
“Yes, I know, but…where?”
“My side of the cave. Do you not remember walking here?”
Her brow furrows and her knees buckle, but my magic is holding her in place. “No, I’d never…I mean, I wouldn’t walk blindly through the cave. I cannot see!”
“I know,” I say. “I’m going to set you down.” I gently lower her to the floor.
“You promised you wouldn’t use your magic on me again,” she says.
“I know,” I say. “Nili, you came at me again. With your knife.”
“I what?”
“You came at me with the knife. You were thinking…you wanted to kill me.”
“No!”
“Yes.”
“Maja, no! I wouldn’t.”
I sit up and lean forward. “I think I’m not the only one under a spell.”
Nili shivers and brings her knees up, wrapping her arms around them. “I think I…I feel it. Here.” She touches a hand to her breast. “It’s like a fire, a terrible heat in my chest. I feel it.”
“Put your hand over the exact place,” I say. She does. “Now don’t move. I have to put you in my thrall again to remove it.” She nods shakily and a single tear courses down her cheek from her jade eye. I long to brush it away.
“Here’s the thrall,” I say, pushing my magic into her. I remove her hand from her chest and place it at her side. “I have to touch you. Is that alright? Just think to me, and I will hear.”
Yes. Yes. Go ahead. Hurry, Maja. It’s burning me! Take it out. Please, take it out!
Her terror courses through me, and I have to fight it to concentrate on what I’m about to do.
“Do not be frightened, Nili,” I say, reaching out to touch her breast. “This may be…uncomfortable.”
And even though I want to be gentle and not scare her anymore than she already is, I have to make it quick. For myself. Because if I think twice about causing this woman any more pain, I won’t be able to do it.
I slash her breast open with one swipe and rip the spell out with my gnarled claws.
And even in thrall, Nili faints in my arms.
***
She comes to on her pallet, me a safe distance away. I want to hold her, but not while she’s awake.
“Maja?” she says.
“I’m here,” I say. “I removed the spell. It should give you no more trouble.”
She touches the spot where I removed the spell, fingers working gently.