A Different Kind of Despair (9 page)

Shortly after we cleared up our
reasons for being there, my father, Larry, asked if Leo would be
kind enough to show me to the baths while he found a clean set of
clothes.

Marvin and Will went off somewhere. I didn't
have much chance to ask before they simply left to discuss
something. One way or another, I was confident that I was safe in
Nethermountain, so I was sure I could go off and find my companions
if need be.

"So what do you think?" Leo asked
me.

"I think... I've misjudged you. Thank you,
Leo. You've been nothing but helpful. And I know I'm not the
easiest person to deal with."

He blinked at the unexpected confession,
finally breaking into his familiar easy-going smile.

"Hey, that's what family's for, right? Little
cousin." He flipped my hair over my head.

I laughed in spite of
myself, feeling, for lack of a better word,
relieved
. A tension I didn't even
realize had been building suddenly fled my body. I felt tired, and
warm, and I think, to a lesser extent, my hope had been restored in
the process.

"Alright," said Leo, motioning to two arched
entrances. "Left is for men, right is for women. I'll wait around
here until you're done so I can show you where you'll be sleeping.
Sound good?"

"Sounds wonderful," I beamed, taking the right
entrance.

The baths of House Soma were shockingly
lavish, at least on the women's side. I was accustomed to bathing
in rivers or in the rare natural hot springs the tribe would come
across in our travels. It was normal, and perfectly acceptable, to
go without bathing for days at a time.

I stripped off my worn leather and threadbare
linen, taken aback by the stench. I wondered if it smelled
particularly awful after all the wear these past few days, or if it
was the sterility of my surroundings that made the smell much more
evident.

I could no longer see the greens and browns
the men wove into the fabric. It was simply a mottled yellow
throughout. Were I to die wearing the garb I knew no one would be
able to identify me. The markers that made the outfit so special
were gone.

I sighed as I threw the clothes into a pile of
similarly damaged linens; my identity was in my heart, not in my
wardrobe. I wouldn't do anyone any favors looking like a vagabond
and smelling like an unwashed ass.

The actual bath, once I left that foyer,
consisted of a series of tubs lined up against the walls. I
selected one, tentatively lowering myself into the bubbles, before
finally sinking into the warm, rushing water.

I grabbed the bristled brush hanging from the
wall and began to slough off a week of dirt and sweat until my skin
ran raw. I did the same with my hair, loosing all the grease into
the hot liquid, the cleanest I've been in living memory.

I decided to step out once I started to feel
light-headed from the steam. I shook off the excess water, wrung
out my hair, and dried myself off with one of the towels hanging on
the far end of the room.

Leo set my clean clothes near the entrance. I
put on a billowy night gown that brushed against my knees. I'd
never felt more naked in my life.

"You look like a completely different person,"
said Leo as I stepped out.

"I look shameful."

"You look like you aren't going to kill
someone for looking at you the wrong way," he stated bluntly.
"There's nothing wrong with letting yourself be a girl once in a
while."

I squinted at him as we walked.

"What's that supposed to mean? Letting myself
be a girl? I've been a girl all along."

He made a face at the statements. "Look, if we
want to be really, really technical about this, men and women can
be equally great at anything."

"True."

"But, generally speaking here, men are just
wired to look after you. What you think is vulnerable or shameful,"
he paraphrased, "is actually your greatest strength, or at least
that's how I see it. I guess that's what they call feminine
charm."

I saw my foggy outline reflected in the quartz
walls, the nightgown trailing in my footsteps like a curtain of
diaphanous clouds. My hair, when wet, hung almost to the middle of
my back. I looked older, somehow. Different in a way I couldn't
place.

"And here's your room." Leo stepped aside.
"Sleep tight, cousin."

I offered Leo a tiny smile. "You as
well."

The giant plodded off into the distance. I
stepped into the room, closing the door behind me.

The space was lit by a dozen or so
lamps. To my amazement, tapestries depicting the history of the
Four Tribes were hung on the walls. I thought about the traders who
would occasionally intersect our routes; it was only natural that
the necromancers would have so many of our pieces. To them, these
were simply exotic designs. To me, it was home.

I climbed atop the bed, startled by its
softness as I sunk into the mattress. How could anyone bear to
sleep on this kind of surface? I bundled up the blankets with one
hand and set them on solid ground.

The door opened at that moment.

Marvin made a perplexed face at the stripped
bed, following the edge of the blanket to where I sat on the floor.
Like me, he had also come from the baths, if his dripping hair was
any indication.

"Miraj? What are you doing?"

I thought about how foolish I must've looked
in his eyes, wrapped myself in the sheets, and hid in plain
sight.

"The bed was too soft."

He snorted, taking the spot next to me on the
floor.

"I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks
so."

We sat there for the next several minutes,
drowsy, but too awake to sleep. It wasn't an awkward silence; the
kind between acquaintances scrambling for smalltalk, but a quiet
filled with mutual respect -a conversation with no words
required.

"So," I said, nearly an hour after his last
comment. "What brings you here this evening?"

He looked in my direction to see whether I was
looking at him. I was. He quickly darted a glance in the opposite
direction. Was that a blush?

"It might have something to do with the fact
that I'm avoiding my mother, or it might be that I'm a bit worried
about how you're adjusting to all of this."

I released a tiny breath at that round-about
reasoning.

"Careful there, husband. If you keep acting so
sweet I might actually believe I have a chance at snatching your
heart."

"I've been meaning to ask you about that," he
admitted. My ears perked with interest beneath the covers. "Were
you serious?"

I blinked at the unexpected inquiry. But
rather than get angry, (and I was most definitely tempted by the
option) I decided to take this from an objective approach -a
necromancer's approach.

"Do you remember what I said to Larry earlier?
About most children not knowing their fathers?"

"Yes."

"In our society, our identities, our past and
present, is all traced through matrilineal descent. Many women also
don't have access to the magic and knowledge of necromancers, so
whether there are troubles with infertility, or birth, it's
important to leave many descendants. If the mother ever dies, the
siblings still have each other."

I peeked out from the covers, smirking at his
bemused expression.

"Women have many lovers, but they can only
have one husband. I guess you might call it... their first love." I
smiled into my memories of growing up, watching as girls on the
cusp of womanhood carved their totems with a mysterious glint in
their eyes, as though they were in their very own worlds, beautiful
and on a pedestal I couldn't possibly hope to reach. "First loves
are pure and precious, and even the pain is bittersweet. You're my
first love, Marvin."

I closed my eyes then, a part of me wilting at
the words poised to come out of my mouth; another eager to set them
free.

"I was there every morning,
watching you practice walking on your new legs, and I saw you work
every chance I had. Your face was like a mask, so I said outlandish
things and bothered you to see whether I could finally shake it
loose." I paused to giggle at some of my antics. "And when I got
tired of bothering you, I'd just sit there in the yurt. The way
your hands moved when you crushed ingredients of combined them was
so... certain, and beautiful... I felt like I was seeing a magician
before my eyes. If you asked me when exactly it was that I started
loving you, I can't say," I admitted quietly. "Maybe I loved you
all along. All I know is that I do."

Again, silence. The longer it stretched the
deeper my face burned with the realization of everything I had
said. Finally, fearful of the quiet that had grown between, us, I
removed the blanket-shawl from my face.

Marvin's fist was pressed against his mouth.
If possible, he was even redder than I was.

"Does that..." I said carefully, "answer your
question?"

"It does."

He stood up, and I feared that I'd gone too
far with my sincerity. But rather than leave, he just turned out
the lights. One by one, until the room was dark.

"The fire makes you uncomfortable,
right?"

I thought my heart was about to
stop.

"Thank you."

"Miraj, I'm only going to say this once, so
listen carefully."

"Alright."

"You are sixteen -no matter
how you might appear on the outside, you're a child at
least
for two more
years," he stressed. "I'm a bit socially retarded, anti-social as a
result, and a coward who has a knack for getting himself into
terrifying situations. Are you okay, even knowing all of
that?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Okay?"

He made a frustrated sound, more at himself
than at me.

"I'm saying, if you're willing to
accept those faults, I'm willing to see where this goes. This
marriage thing."

"Ma..." I couldn't find the words
for a full minute. "Two years?" I groaned. "That's too far
away!"

"That's the condition. You can take it or
leave it."

"I'll take it! I'll take the condition, and
I'll take you too!"

I heard him snort.

"Glad to see we have an
understanding."

Through the blanket, I felt him
shuffle until he was lying down next to me. I took that as my cue
to do the same. I tried to get closer, but he sliced his arm across
the space between us in an imaginary line.

"Two years," he repeated.

"So I can't even lay a hand on
you?"

"I'm hearing a whole lot of whining from a
woman who supposedly gets to sleep beside the man she
loves."

"Says the legless lizard," I shot
back, referencing the top of the totem I'd carved for him. I
reached out again, but this time Marvin caught my errant hand in
his.

"This," he said, twining his fingers between
mine, "is the only concession I'm going to make."

I smirked as a wicked idea came to
mind.

"So I can hold your hand whenever I
want?"

"Whenever you want."

"You're not allowed to let go
first."

"Fine."

I took our hands and pressed the back of his
to my lips, leaving a warm and gentle kiss on his skin.

"Miraj..." he warned.

Oh Marvin, you're so naive at times like
this.

One by one, I kissed his fingers. First the
knuckles, then the tips, finally propping one in my mouth with the
tip of my tongue.

He swore.

"Two years," I repeated sweetly. "Two whole
years of holding hands. Every. Single. Night."

We remained that way for many minutes until
exhaustion washed over me in a great tide. I fell asleep, eager for
my first night in a safe haven since all this began. I sought to
dream deeply and I did.

…for about four hours.

"
Miraj
.
I
know you can hear me
."

I rubbed my eyes. The blackened
room was filled with fog. I glanced down at Marvin, asleep at my
side, but he was distant somehow. I'd drifted into the realm of
spirits.

"Miraj." I saw a pair of sandaled feet,
grimacing at the demon attached to them. Koronos smirked in his
usual condescending way. "I have a surprise for you."

"I'm not interested."

"Don't be like that. Wouldn't you
like to hear from Lady Galatea?"

The name jerked me awake faster than a pale of
ice water. The devil was doing a fine job of getting under my
skin.

"I already have Marvin's heart," I
said, my voice clipped. She was his past. I'm his
future."

He pressed a finger to his lip, chuckling.
"How precious. Marvin is a good man. Good men know pity. And you,
my sweet, are quite the pitiful character, aren't you?"