“What?” I snapped. “What should you have done? Should you have been better at loving someone who didn’t love you back enough to keep you from unnecessary pain? Or been better at trusting someone who didn’t trust you back enough to confide his plans? What could you have done to change what he did to you?” He buried his face in his hands, his shoulders shaking. I got to my feet and paced back and forth. “No fucking wonder you’re all screwed up, what with that monster dragging you around on a string.”
“He wasn’t a monster. I loved him, I loved him like family—”
“Like more than family,” I said. “Like more than anything. Yes, I know. And I loved my master too. I thought she hung the moons. You loved yours, and he betrayed you and let you down. He had obligations to you that he cast aside—obligations as a Chant, yes, but also obligations as a person who has taken responsibility for the care of someone else. What do you call someone who drowns a puppy just because they don’t feel like looking after it anymore?”
“Evil,” he whispered.
“There you have it.”
In hindsight, I probably handled it badly. I should have said “It’s not your fault” and “You’re going to be okay” and “Do you want to talk about it?” and I should have offered him . . . something. Comfort or kindness. I should have told him that I thought he was strong for leaving the rock in the disgusting trough, even though if it had been me, I would have tipped it right over, scooped up the rock, dried it off, and found myself the prettiest waterfall to throw it into out of spite if nothing else. He was strong for walking away and leaving it there where he’d sunk it. That took a great deal of willpower and humility. I should have said so.
But I was angry. I was thinking of his master, not of him.
“You can’t fix what happened,” I said.
“I know! I know I can’t!”
“And it’s not going to get better until you pull yourself together and let go of him.”
“He walked away! He left me there in a drafty ruin of a barn, sleeping in moldering hay, without even saying goodbye! I don’t get the luxury of letting go of him, because he tore himself away from me before I could.”
“Brother-Chant,” I said sharply. “Use what you have. Rebuild yourself. Make up a story about how it should have been, set it in the forge of your heart, and believe it as hard as you can, believe until it burns white-hot, and then pour it over whatever happened before and quench it in oil, temper it so it never breaks again.”
“ ‘It doesn’t matter if it happened that way in real life, as long as the story is good, as long as it’s truer than truth.’ ” He stopped to wipe tears off his face. “That’s what you mean, right?” His voice quavered. “My master used to say that.”
“So maybe he did teach you one thing after all.”
“I’ll still remember what really happened. It’ll still hurt.”
“Yes, it takes longer than you’ve had for wounds like that to heal. But you can at least do this, keep yourself from getting any new wounds.” I crossed my arms. “You already tell yourself so many stories. Make up a new one and give yourself a happy ending. The gods’ mercy is given only rarely. Until that day, you make your own mercy. You save yourself.”
“My master said a Chant shouldn’t make up stories.” I think he had mostly stopped crying by that point. His breath still came in little hitching, shallow gasps.
“Well, someone’s got to, don’t they?” I scowled at him. “You need to get yourself under control. You’re like a caged animal, so frantic to be free that you’ll batter yourself to death against the walls, gasping and crying out and never realizing that you’re doing yourself more harm than anyone else has done to you yet.” I glared down at him. He’d gone still, staring at the ground. “Well?” I said. “Have anything else to say?”
“No, ma’am,” he said softly. He got to his feet slowly, hands clenched at his sides. “I’m sorry for wasting your time.”
“Well, I’ve said everything I have to say too. I’m not here to coddle you, if that’s what you were looking for.”
“I know,” he said, his voice cracking. “I never expected you to be very kind.”
“I’m being kinder than you will ever possibly recognize, you pathetic little fool.”
He turned away sharply and walked off.
“May Shuggwa’s Eye fall favorably upon you, Brother-Chant!” I called after him, not bothering to conceal my mockery and disdain.198
And that’s what you should have written, brother-Chant. That was important.
* * *
198. Flicking back from farther along in this story to check this—oh gods, I even said it.
THIRTY-TWO
Enough. Enough. Enough.
I can’t bear this anymore—I can’t go on being Chant. I’m not Chant, and I’m barely a Chant anymore.
Enough. I can’t go on.
Enough.
THIRTY-THREE
The world! The world is alive! The world is wonderful!199
Something happened that I need to write about now, because I’m awake. I’m awake, for the first time in three years.
Gods, everything! How have I been living like this? How did I go so long without caring about anything? The world is alive; there are colors and smells again. I want to cry with joy, and laugh through my crying, and fling open my arms to the whole world. Here I am! Here I am; what have I missed? All this time I’ve been sleepwalking.200
Last night, when I was writing all that about “enough, enough, enough”—was that me who wrote it? I don’t even recognize myself there. Poor thing, he seems so sad.
It feels like someone else’s hands wrote that, like I was only looking over his shoulder.
But I need to write about what happened. Yes! Now!
Last night, I threw down my pen and I cried on my cot for a long time.201 I can’t remember the last time I cried like that. I can’t remember the last time I cried at all.
Last night, I came back from the talk with Mistress Chant and I cried, and it was awful, but a good kind of awful. Like I’d been holding a marsh in my heart, all stagnant and rotting, but the dikes broke and the king-tide came rushing in and swept everything away with seawater, leaving behind only salt and me, gasping for breath like a beached whale.
I felt raw and empty. I felt.
I was dazed. I remember, faintly, looking around this little room and wondering what I was doing here, what the point of it was. Not in a destructive, angry way, just . . . neutral, curious. And then I heard noises from down in the inn’s yard, and I looked out through my window, and I saw a big party of people arriving—those Pezian merchants, with their fur-trimmed simarres, and their tall boots with the wide, floppy cuffs, and their loose breeches. They had their instruments slung on their backs, ready to make another racket in the common room, and they were so . . . bright.
That’s the thing that caught me first. They were so bright. Brightly colored in their clothes, bright in emotion. They were so happy. They had always been so obviously a family, and a big one too—I only had to watch how they teased and jostled each other, or the familiar touches to each other’s arms and shoulders, how comfortable and easy the men and women looked, grouped all together like that. And the even more obvious, too: There was a resemblance among them, though all I could see of it from my garret window was their build and stature and the color of their hair—dark and glossy among the younger ones, stately iron-gray for the elders.
It had been so long since I felt happy. It had been so long since I had felt, but I was feeling then, and I wondered whether I could have that, what they had.
So I left my room and I went downstairs, into the common room.
I’ve never written much about the inn. There’s two stories, and the attic on top, but the common room is double-height. Much like Stroekshall, it’s got a big central area on the ground level, and the upper part is ringed with a railed gallery. Unlike Stroekshall, there are tables everywhere, and food, and people
aren’t nearly so wild-eyed and harried, and the only people moving quickly are Mevrouw Basisi’s staff.
I stood at the rail of the gallery and watched the Pezians. They got settled in, they bought food and drink, they scattered all throughout the room, and some of them found attractive companions—
And I’ve never written about them, either? What’s wrong with me? Why haven’t I been paying any attention? There’s four companions-for-hire that come by the inn—that’s what they like to be called. Their names are Avit, Orrin, Hildise, and Lijsbet, and I’ve met them when I was doing chores for Mevrouw Basisi. She introduced me once, when I first started here, and bade me be quick and respectful with anything they asked. She doesn’t let most of her patrons keep tabs at the inn, but those four get to. There’s some others who come by from time to time, but I don’t know them very well. They all seem nice.
Maybe I’ll write more about them later.
Chant used to say that I got distracted a lot,202 and that I should learn to keep focused on one thing in a story.
To be quite honest, I don’t think I care about what Chant used to say anymore.203 I’ll tell the story however I like to. And why shouldn’t I? No one’s ever going to see this but me.
Right now, I would like to tell the story about the Pezians, though, and not the companions.
I watched them for a long time, and one of them looked up and saw me—and then I recognized him, I . . . Goodness, I’ve seen him a dozen times before, haven’t I? I’ve written about him before. It was the one who sat in the cellar with me and watched me work.204
But I’ve never described him much either. Damn, I’ve been in the dark. Time was when I would have documented every line on a handsome boy’s lips or his palms, every hair on his chest, every freckle on his nose.
I must make amends by doing it right: He looked up, and I saw him—a young man about my age, with bright brown eyes, kind and warm. Curly brown-black hair. Very fine dark eyes. A seafarer’s tan deepening classical Pezian olive-toned skin. A wide, soft mouth. A sharp chin, clean-shaven this morning, now just shadowed with stubble. Clean, neat clothes in what I suppose are his family’s colors, green and gold, not too fine, but not at all coarsely made.
He held my gaze for a moment or two, then blinked in surprise, I guess, noticing that I’d noticed him, and . . . gave me this sad, wry little smile and nodded politely.
And I decided, quite abruptly, that it was time to have even more feelings, ones that I hadn’t had in ages. Enough of grief. Enough of letting Chant take anything else away from me, like he took my choices and my chance to honor my home properly before I gave it up, like he tore my name away from me before I was ready. Enough of him. Mistress Chant was right.205
I strode over to the stairs, and clattered down to the main level, and I walked right up to him, and he watched me the whole way, getting more and more . . . alarmed?
“Hello,” I said. “What’s your name? I should have asked before.”
“Orfeo,” he said in a vaguely strangled voice. “Orfeo Acampora. I introduced myself a couple weeks ago.”
I have no memory of such a thing. Surely I would remember, wouldn’t I?206
“Orfeo,” I said. “Right. I’m having some trouble with names lately, sorry.”
“It’s all right,” he said, eyes wide. “You seemed distracted at the time; I don’t know that you even heard me.” He was very, very still, like he wasn’t sure which way to step.
“I’m not distracted now. Do you want a drink?”
“Yes? Yes. Yes, thank you. Very much, yes.” He shook himself suddenly and seemed to come out of whatever moment of confusion had set upon him. With a surreptitious glance at his family, he half-led me to the bar with a hand between my shoulder blades and babbled something about wine to the aleman. I leaned on the bar and didn’t take my eyes off him. “Sorry,” he said, clearing his throat. “I’m not usually . . . like this.”
“Like what?”
“Oh, you know,” he said airily. His cheeks were pink. “Flustered.”207
I glanced back over at his family. I suppose there must have been something in my expression I didn’t intend.
“Oh, no, nothing like that,” he said quickly. “No. Not at all. They . . . They’d make fun of me, that’s all—actually they’ve been making fun of me already, and I just—oh look, wine,” he ended desperately, pouring a great deal of wine into a glass and downing it in one go. I continued watching him, ever more curious.
“Are you all right?”
“Fine,” he gasped. “This is kind of new for me, that’s all.”
“What is? Drinking? It’s very simple, I promise.”
“So funny, ha,” he said, and poured himself another glass, then noticed abruptly that mine hadn’t been filled even once yet, and did so with an apologetic wince.
“Drinking with another man, then?” I said, sipping the wine. It was a very good vintage—not Vintish, but good. Avaren, possibly, or Borgalish.
“Nope. I, uh, have plenty of experience with that too.”
“What’s new, then? Being flustered?”
“Yes.”208
“There’s no reason to be.”
“It’s just—can I ask you something?”
“Usually when someone offers to buy you a drink, it means that it’s generally acceptable to ask him about himself, yes.” I added innocently, “That was a good educational point about drinking that you might not know, given your inexperience.”
He huffed at me, but I could see he was holding back a smile. “Why did you—wait. First of all, just so we’re clear, I’m paying for this wine.”
“No, I’ve got it. I asked you, after all.”
“Yes, but I’ve been asking you.”
I blinked. “When?”
The grin slid off his face, replaced by a look of amazement and shock. “I’ve tried three times! Three separate occasions! When you were working behind the bar, and when you were sitting down here by yourself late that night, and when I was helping you and the innkeeper with the things in the cellar!”209
I frowned at him. “Really? You asked right out?”
“Well, no,” he said, exasperated but still faintly smiling around the edges. “If I had, it only would have taken one time of you turning your back on me and sweeping out of the room, and then I would have given up.”
“I don’t sweep out of rooms.”210
“Okay,” he said, topping up our wineglasses. “Anyway, no, I was . . . well, I was hinting. Flirting, or trying to. I’m—” He cut himself off sharply and took another large gulp of wine.
“You’re . . . ?”
“Nothing, never mind.” He gave me a tight smile and set his glass down. “I was about to say something, but it wouldn’t have been right.”
“Say it. You were trying to flirt, and . . . ?”
He took a breath. “I was about to say that I was hinting, but not hinting very hard. It’s . . . complicated. I’m trying to be a better person lately; that’s the short version of a very long story.” He gave me another half-wry, apologetic look from under his curls, and I felt a little butterfly-flutter in my heart. It’s nice to find out you were right about people—I’d recognized he was a flirt, and that he was working on some kind of personal quest relating to how he spoke to people—in the way he went back and forth on flirting with Mevrouw Basisi, in the way he’d so obviously held himself back when we were talking in the cellar. Even numb and empty and taking hardly any notice of the world around me, I’d seen that. Chant instincts, I guess—if it had been anything else, I’m sure I would have noticed other things too, like how pretty he was, and how much he knew it, and how he smiled to say that he thought I knew it too.
“You could tell me, if you wanted.”
He forced a polite laugh. “It’s not that interesting, I promise. And—look, you haven’t even told me your name.”
“Oh.” And then it was my turn to occupy myself with my wine, trying to find a few seconds to scram
ble a flush of terror into something orderly. I swallowed, bit my lip.
He was looking at me curiously, probably as curiously as I’d been looking at him.
“It’s complicated,” I said at last. “You’re trying to be a better person, and I’m trying to be a person at all again. That’s the short version.”
He paused, and his brow furrowed. “Do you want to talk about it?” he asked, very carefully, as if he were reading a poem off a page.211
“Maybe another time,” I said, and his expression relaxed and brightened, and I felt the flutter in my chest again, and then I recognized it. I remembered.
Chant used to grumble about how I fell in love three times a week if I were given the opportunity. I never thought anything of it then. I always ran at the world with my arms and my heart wide open. I remember meeting people and marveling about how wonderful they were, how kind, how interesting. I was always ready to love them.
And there were boys, and some of them thought I was a little wonderful too, and that was usually enough to get me to trip over my own feet for them. I haven’t been in love with anyone for years. I don’t think anybody else would call this feeling love—they’d call it a crush, or infatuation. They’d make it small and harmless and unthreatening, because love is big and scary and takes up space and hurts.
But it’s all love to me. Or it was, in the old days.
And looking at Orfeo then, with him so deliberately and carefully trying to be a better person, I thought, Why? Why did I kill this part of me?
Who am I, if parts of me are dead? What’s my name, indeed?
I think . . . I think you can choose, to some extent, who you are. You can take all the molding and grooming that everybody else has forced on you and you can cast it off, and choose to be . . . real. You can choose. I didn’t know that until now. I didn’t have to be Chant. I was thinking the whole time that I could stop Chanting if I wanted to, but ceasing to be Chant is another matter entirely. And I mean that both ways: I don’t have to be named Chant, and I don’t have to be my former master-Chant.212
A Choir of Lies Page 17