Nomvula

53. And Its Weight

When the stars signalled three hours before dawn, Anathi dropped down from the ceiling and woke the Queen. She peeled her eyes open briefly, closed them again, and hugged her blankets tighter. 

"Is it time already?"

Anathi couldn't answer with the Queen's eyes closed, so she opened a cabinet and started sifting through the robes.

"I want to say I had the most wonderful dream," the Queen said, groggy still, "but I can't remember what I dreamed about."

Most of the her robes were practical. There was strong wool in muted colours for the winters and light but sturdy cotton for the summers, with the occasional silk gown for far-foreign guests. Anathi pushed them aside and found a white frock folded on the back shelf., with a belt of woven goldgrass coiled on top of it. It was unremarkable in design, but the fabric would have delighted the girl Anathi had once been.

"There's a lesson in that, I suppose." The bedframe groaned as the Queen sat up and threw her legs over the side. "Dreams are dreams, but what good memories we want, we make."

Anathi scooped up the frock. The fabric flowed down her forearm like quicksilver. The King's first bridal gift had been a bolt of Essari silk so fine it had cost him two heifers and three talents of copper, and he had hired a master seamstress from Mezo to sow a dress of deceptive simplicity for his new wife. Anathi tossed it onto the edge of the bed. It slid off and landed on the damp floorboards.

"I'm going to make this a good morning, Anathi." The Queen stared at the frock the same way she stared at her daughter's grave. "The best I can manage. But first, a mask. Come."

And she did. Anathi stood at the side of the bed, barely taller than her Queen, even though she was the only one on her feet. She extended her hands of clay and hands of flesh took them. Hands without callouses, because in the Sunlands no warrior or ironsmith or farmer was barbaric enough to leave their blisters untreated. Instead, the Queen's palms had an honest toughness about them, and her fingers a strength that was bone deep.

She rubbed her thumb against the Queen's wrist. A smear of clay blackened the skin, robbing it of light and contour. The contrast made the red undertones in her hands blossom. Anathi rubbed her palms over the Queen's knuckles, blotting out their vibrancy until her hands were silhouettes, then her forearms, her shoulders. She was still naked, so when she stood, Anathi set about painting her from the top of her neck to her heels. When she was done, she disappeared back into the ceiling to check on the rest of the manse.

The Queen's Mother and the old woman who had come back with the Prince slept soundly.

Four women huddled around the budding fires of the outdoor kitchens, lamenting guests who needed to be cooked for in the death hours of autumn mornings. The stars winked above them. Cicadas in the frosted grass made noise enough to drown out the pops of burning logs.

Three younger girls kneaded dough in the inner kitchens, glad to be surrounded by the smoky warmth of clay ovens as they stole sips of the Queen's cooking wine. A young soldier sat in the corner of the kitchen, nibbling salt meat as he waxed the bladestring of his knife. He pretended not to notice one of the girls making eyes at him. The girl pretended not to see him knick his thumb on the iron when her friends giggled.

And deep in the bowels of the hill, the General drifted in and out of the shallow sleep that came with breathing air that was two-days stale and drinking sun-soured water.

By the time Anathi dropped down into the bedroom again, the Queen had applied three calamine dots under her left eye, and one against the back of each knuckle. The silk frock was a wraith of white against her clay-lathered skin. She sat on the edge of the bed, braiding a sixth of her hair in a thick row. Anathi knelt on the bed and silently got to work on the other side. She let her fingers take over while some of her spirit drifted.

By the time the braids were finished, the Queen's mother had risen, the outer kitchen fires were blazing, and the girl had asked the young soldier for his name.

The Queen fetched her own jewellery: anklets of unpainted ostrich-shell beads, a bronze pendant hung on cowhide string, and a length of fine gold wire that Anathi threaded through the left-most braid. The Queen left through the door and Anathi through the ceiling, both in silence. As she let her spirit crawl across the manse's ceilings, Anathi sensed the awkward weight in both of them, that it would cost perhaps more than either had to relive a dawn as peaceful as this one again.