Chapter 7
This damn list almost made for a sleepless night.
Khazaar’s name isn’t on it, but Varsul is listed. He is to be sold at the slave market, and after his name there are a few notations about his health and mental state. “Mild weakness from his injuries, but will be presentable by market day,” I read. His height, weight and the intact state of his reproductive system have also been noted. I wonder why anyone would need a slave who can produce children. Several grisly scenarios come to mind, and I send them back to where they came from. Even if the name has been recorded correctly, and this man is definitely Varsul and not Khazaar, surely he doesn’t deserve the fate of being destined for a genetic lab.
Shazuul’s name was crossed out. But I do find a Mary-Jane Baker. The redhead! She survived! And she isn’t the only one. I find close to 20 women’s names on the list, in addition to the typical Sethari names and others that sound like Qua’Hathri.
I can’t hope for too much, I remind myself. I have no idea how I am supposed to manage to leave the planet with all of the women and Qua’Hathri. It is an impossible feat. In other words, I need to try to negotiate with Zeyliv.
That very Zeyliv honors me with a visit. I have just gotten up, and am getting dressed, when he comes in without knocking. He eyes wander over my body like he’s touching me, and my goose bumps cover my whole body. I act as if his looks leave me completely cold, but in reality, it is quite the opposite. He looks at me like a lion would at his prey. He runs his tongue over his lips, and his eyes burn through me with the intensity of fire. Khazaar looked at me the same way. Maybe that’s what is making me shiver – I don’t know, and don’t want to know.
As quickly as that moment started, it disappears again.
“I hope the list helped you?” Zeyliv’s voice sounds raw. He clears his throat.
“Thank you,” I answer. “I see a few human women on the list who are all supposed to be sold. Is there any way to save them from that fate?” I am just testing the water, nothing more. I know he is going to reject my request for their release. Even so, his reaction shows me that there may be hope for negotiation.
“Do something for me, and then we can talk about it again.” That doesn’t sound too bad, even though I think I have already done enough for this alien man. He is so contradictory that he keeps me guessing. I know for sure that he has a soft side. After all, I saw that yesterday when he wanted to relent when I asked him for mercy. I need to find his weak spot, and soon. Time is running out. Three days until the meat market starts.
“But I am not here for that,” he interrupts my thoughts. “I am going hunting today. You can use this day to relax. Tomorrow …,” he smiles his impenetrable and slightly cruel smile, “you and I will intensify our work. I expect the very best from you.”
My first thought, when he turns on his heel to leave, is thankfulness. Then I remember that I probably have Hathura to thank for this hunting expedition, and know that I will have anything but rest today. I lie back down on my bed and try to sleep.
I can’t, of course. First a woman who wants to clean my room comes in. I don’t have the energy to stop her. There can be no sleep with all the clatter and sound of running water.
Next, Mangali sneaks in my room. there is something furtive about the way she is walking and her demeanor is untrusting. “What were you and Hathura talking about yesterday?” she wants to know, after beating around the bush for a while. “Nothing in particular,” I respond. “She was just reminding me again about all of the terrible things that could happen to me on Betania, if I were to try to push her out of Zeyliv’s bed.”
Her eyes widen, and she turns to hide the smile that comes to her face. I can see it in her eyes, anyway, that subtle satisfaction that her fertile rival is afraid of losing her position. It cannot have been easy to lose Zeyliv’s affection and to be demoted to number two.
“Are you really not interested in sharing his bed? He is very good to his women, and you would definitely not be sold. At least not for the next ten years, if you are a willing participant,” she can’t resist that last little jab.
I try hard to stay calm. This is her fear talking, I remind myself. “I don’t think he is interested in my body,” I answer evasively. But this was exactly the wrong answer to give. Mangali straightens up to her full considerable height, and hisses at me: “Surely you don’t think that he is interested in your intellect, my little one?” She laughs gleefully. “Many women of a different caliber have tried to keep Zeyliv’s interest in them alive with their cleverness, and none of them were as pathetic as you. If you think you can captivate him with your little human magic tricks, you are dead wrong. He will have lost interest in you in a matter of weeks, this I promise you.”
She leaves, and I breathe a sigh of relief.
It was not smart to make her my enemy.
Hathura shows up five minutes later. I lie down on my bed and close my eyes. This time, I am careful. Whereas I trampled around yesterday, today I knock politely and find all doors to be open. She stumbles for a second, but then she takes off.
Determined, she runs to a back part of the house. There, she shows a guard a paper with an impressive seal on it, and is allowed to go down the cellar steps. I restrain myself and just watch. The walls are moist and it’s dark down here, naturally. Stinking torches line the wall and spread their flickering light, creating an oppressive atmosphere, from which Hathura can’t escape. She is afraid and wants to hurry. Who knows how long Zeyliv will be on his camping expedition?
Finally, we go around the last bend.
I can hear them before I see them, the imprisoned women and men. It’s not all that different from up there on the space ship. It’s possible that they have a little more room, but the lack of daylight is taking its toll on them. At least they have access to a toilet and a place to wash up. They don’t have these things because of the goodness of Zeyliv’s heart, but because the goods should be damaged as little as possible before they are sold.
A guard enquires politely about Hathura’s wishes. When she tells him that she needs a new girl and wants to look around, he goes back to sitting on his stool and staring at nothing. I know it can’t be pleasant for the women to be in a cell with the alien men and the Sethari, but it makes the job easier for Hathura and me. Without arousing the guard’s suspicion, we inspect each and every cell. The girls have somehow understood that Hathura’s presence means that one of them will be freed, and they beg for her attention, pleading with her on their knees to take them with her. Hathura acts like none of this matters to her, but I can feel her kind heart wrenching with pity.
We have arrived at the second-to-last cell. Still no sign of Khazaar. When I send out my feelers carefully to search for him, I feel a man I know. At the same time, someone throws himself violently against the prison bars that separate us.
It’s Varsul. He looks scruffy and tired. He has the look of a man without hope, but when he sees me, he lights up. I motion to him to keep his mouth shut, and after moment, he obeys. “Where is Khazaar?” I ask him, but my question answers itself. I can see him.
Even though I am in spirit form, my heart is beating so loudly that I think everyone will hear the dull beating of the drum. When our eyes meet, I experience joy like never before. Without being able to do anything to stop myself, I throw myself in his arms. He doesn’t hesitate at all. Even though we are both in our spirit forms, I can smell the familiar scent of milk and honey, and under it, a hint of neglect. “I thought you were dead,” he whispers, even though nobody can hear us, except Varsul. He has been watching us the whole time. Khazaar holds me tight, as if he were never going to let me go again, and I, too, cling to him as hard as I can.
I will never forget this moment as long as I live. A chaos of emotions is raging inside of me. Relief is there, but right after it, fear hits me with its full force. I have found my love again. But if we can’t figure out how to escape within the next few days, we will be separated from each other again. Fate is laughing in my face, mocking me.
Now, I cannot be indifferent anymore about what is going to happen to me. The spark of hope has now turned into a will survive, so strong that it is practically burning inside of me. Before, it was already difficult to negotiate for every little perk with Zeyliv. Now that so much more is at stake, I will have to be twice, even three times as careful. Or I will end up giving up so much that there will be nothing left of me that can love Khazaar. The fear of becoming one of Zeyliv’s creatures, who has to obey his every word and cannot oppose him, overwhelms me.
We have to separate much too soon. Hathura has walked on, and has been talking with the guard. For a moment, she almost gives me away by looking around for me. She can feel that I am not in her head anymore. She knows that I found what I was looking for.
Freeing myself from Khazaar’s embrace is the hardest thing I have ever done. The pain of separation hits me so hard that I almost can’t tumble back into Hathura’s body. “Can you get out of here?” I ask him while I drag myself back to her. He answers my question by letting his spirit slip through the prison bars. It works. Why didn’t he try it before? He could have found me, and we both would have been spared a few dark days. Then I snap back to reality. I didn’t try to find him, either. I didn’t try to send my spirit on a trip to find out how they were doing. I was sure he was dead.
“Can we see each other tonight?” I want to know. “Can you find me?” I could come down here myself, to meet him down here, but Varsul’s presence deters me. This brings up other questions. If Varsul can see me, then he also has the ability to separate his spirit from his body. Why didn’t he try to get out of here? I am out of time. I will have to wait until tonight to get all of the answers, because Hathura has turned to leave. One last look at my beloved tells me that nothing will keep him from coming to see me tonight.
I slip into Hathura’s head, and we return from the depths of the earth back to daylight. As soon as the door to the cellar has shut behind us, I feel something pulling me back to my body. My cheek is burning as if someone has slapped me. I let Hathura know that she needs to hurry. Something is definitely not right. Someone must have come in my room and discovered my “sleeping” body. She rushes with hurried steps through the house. The minute we go into my room, I slip back into my body.
The first thing I see is Mangali. She is leaning over me, and is giving me one slap across the face after the other, trying to wake me from this strange rigor. My reaction is instinctive. I grab her wrist, hold it tight and press on the sensitive point, right above the pulse. She winces.
It is a strange moment, and it seems to stretch out like a rubber band. I am lying on my bed. Mangali is looking down at me, threatening, and Hathura is standing frozen in the doorway. She can feel the danger of this situation, too.
“What is going on here?” she takes the initiative. I let Mangali go, who gives me a strange look before turning to the other woman. “I wanted to pick Cassie up for a walk,” she declares with a sweet voice. “She didn’t react when I found her so rigid and motionless, so I tried to revive her conscience.” My burning cheeks can attest to that. “If she hadn’t woken up the second you came into her room, I would have had to send a messenger to Zeyliv.” Hathura pales in the face of this undisguised threat, but when she speaks, her voice is calm and controlled.
“Well, then it’s good that she is awake. We wouldn’t want to bother our beloved husband when he’s out having fun, would we?”
They fixate on each other. You could have heard a pin drop in the ominous silence.
“I think the last few days were just too much for me,” I say softly. I brush my hand across my forehead, and try to look exhausted. It’s not that hard right now. “I think I am going to follow Zeyliv’s advice and rest today.”
The mention of the man, around whom all of our lives revolve at the moment, does the trick. Mangali lowers her head.
“Of course,” she concedes. “The two of us will leave you alone. If you need anything, you can find us in the garden.”
I find no rest, even though the house is as quiet as a graveyard.
At first, I try to force myself to sleep, but that doesn’t work. My thoughts are going round and round. Again and again, they return to Khazaar. My proud warrior and I will see each other tonight. That is enough to chase away any fatigue. I am so excited that I run back and forth in the tiny room. That is no small feat, since it only takes a few steps to get from one wall to the other. I consider going out into the garden, but the thought of having to confront Mangali makes me decide against it. I would rather keep wandering back and forth, than have to talk with her and deflect her attempts to find out what’s going on.
In the afternoon, someone brings food to my room. As delicious as the fruit smells, the thought if eating makes my stomach churn. I know I really should take nourishment to keep my strength up, but every bite gets stuck in my throat. Shortly after I get so nauseated that I push the tray away from me, the silence in the house gives way to a loud hustle and bustle. Doors slam, footsteps hurry back and forth. I hear a harsh, male voice drowning out a woman’s sobbing. A loud bang, the sound of a key turning in a lock, and then the ghostly silence returns. This time it is loaded with a feeling of fear. It feels like a summer day back on Earth, when the sun heated up the air ruthlessly. Everyone waits for the storm and the cool-down that comes after it, but fears sever weather all the same.
I venture a look out into the hallway. Two men stand next to a door, obviously guarding it. Their animals are resting next to them, a snake and a lizard that looks like a small dinosaur. When they see me, the animals start to move, and both men point me back into my room.
Later, much later, I hear Zeyliv’s voice.
He says something to the guards, and then I hear them leave their post.
It takes a long time before I hear the next sound. This time, footsteps are coming towards my room. Zeyliv enters. I pull back, involuntarily. He looks like someone had stabbed him in the back. He is moving slowly, as if each step were causing him a great deal of pain. My heart is beating so loudly that my chest might explode at any second.
Without a single word, he grabs me by the arm and pulls me after him. I resist with all my strength, dig my heels in the floor and put my whole weight behind it. It’s no use. His fingers have turned into claws, and are digging into my upper arm. His canine teeth are protruding, and even his eyes have the look of a merciless hunter chasing his prey.
“What do you want?” I croak when we leave the house.
“You’ll see what you have done,” he tells me with a voice that makes my whole body tremble with fear. I have a bad feeling when we reach the small clearing in the middle of the garden. All of the servants have gathered, and even Mangali is standing at the edge of this circle made of alien men and women. None of them look at me.
In the middle, I see a female figure, flanked on either side by the men who were guarding the room earlier today. She is the only one who raises her head and looks at me.
It is Hathura. Her head has been shaved, and her eyes are red from crying.
“No,” I whisper. “You can’t do this!”
I don’t care if I am denouncing Zeyliv in front of his people or not, by daring to question his orders. Somehow, Hathura’s secret has come to light, and now he wants to execute her. I assume that it is distinctly worse to betray a ruler, and to pretend that the child is his, and that this is why Hathura has not been put in the pillory. I suspect that Mangali is involved somehow. She must have been suspicious when she found me unconscious in my room. When Hathura appeared and I woke up simultaneously, she probably couldn’t stand it. She hadn’t had anything better to do than to tell Zeyliv all about it, even if she only understood half of it.
“I can and I will,” Zeyliv growls, and gives both men a sign to let go of her. Hathura sinks to her knees, and stretches her arms out towards Zeyliv. “I do not ask for mercy for me,” she says with a choked voice. “But I beg you to spare my son. He did not know about his mother’s treason.”
Zeyliv grinds his jaw, and his expression hardens. He looks at me. “You will pay for this,” he says to me softly. Then he stands in front of the broken woman, his legs apart. For a second, I think that he is going to pick her up and take her with him. But then he stretches out his hand. The alien man, whose snake is winding around his neck lustfully, hands him a huge sword. Zeyliv bends down to his wife and whispers something in her ear. Her face floods with a mixture of gratefulness and resignation to her fate, something only Zeyliv and I can see, as her back is turned to the rest of those present.
After that, everything happens very quickly. Hathura bends her head. Zeyliv lifts the sword. I will never forget the sound it makes as it cuts through the air.
Hathura dies without having made a sound. Her head rolls a few centimeters across the floor. The fountain of blood shooting from her neck bathes her executioner in a glowing red.
He drops the sword, turns around and grabs me again. In my state of shock, I welcome the pain he causes me. Anything is better than the numbness that has overtaken me.
He pulls me behind him, without any regard. The noise at my back tells me that the servants behind us are taking care of the remains from the execution. When the truth of what has just happened hits me, I can’t suppress the nausea and am violently ill.
“Pull yourself together,” Zeyliv hisses. I wipe my mouth on my sleeve, and taste stomach acid. Ruthlessly, he continues to pull me until we are in my room again. He pushes me onto the bed. For a moment, the possibility of him forcing himself on me hangs in the air between us. He is beside himself with fury, and I am sure that would kill me if I weren’t of use to him. And so my fate is also hanging by a thread.
“Thanks to your interference, I have lost a wife and a son,” he spits out between clenched teeth. I try to say something, but he raises his hand. “We will talk about it tomorrow. Tonight you need to think about what you have done. In light of what you have experienced today, you might even welcome your punishment.”
“My punishment?” I squeak, undignified. “I don’t deserve any punishment,” I say with more conviction, even though my conscience is telling me something else. He can read it on my face and nods, satisfied. “What will my punishment be?” I ask with a small voice.
He smiles, but it is a dark smile that makes me afraid. “You will replace my wife and give me a son.”
Then he is gone.
The panic recedes only slowly. When I can think halfway clearly, his words hit me with their full weight. Starting tomorrow, I will share his bed. Starting tomorrow, he will make use of my body to father a child. Either I need to get out of here right now, and find a way to leave Betania, or I need to hold on long enough until Khazaar and I, and maybe also the women from Earth, can leave this damned planet together. When I attempt a peek out into the hallway, I see one of his Machairos stationed in front of my door. It doesn’t even raise its head, but I know that it will sound the alarm the minute I leave my room.
Another thought races through my head, and leaves a trail of terror in its wake. The soul animals could tell when I was exploring their master’s thoughts. What if the animals will also be able to see Khazaar and me, as our body-less souls streak through the hallways? I need to know if they can perceive me, so I lie down on my bed. With my eyes closed I desperately try to get into a relaxed state, but the day’s events have taken their toll on me. Over and over, the sight of Hathura, dead, comes to mind and chases everything else away. Furious, I grit my teeth and concentrate, until all I want to do is cry in despair.
A hiss in the hallway tears me away from my fruitless attempts. With a leap, I throw myself between Khazaar’s body-less shape and the snapping Machairos. Too late. Its claws have torn a deep wound in his chest. The pain must be horrible, because he writhes and sinks to his knees. Strangely, the animal retreats from me when I bend over my beloved’s deadly pale body. “You need to go back to your quarters,” I whisper, even though nobody can hear us in this state. “Can you make it alone?” He nods, but I can tell that it is impossible. He can barely stand on two legs. I hear a rumble behind me, and I know that time is growing short. If I take him back now, then someone is going to find my body again, staring without seeing, and this time it will be Zeyliv who finds me. I can feel it in my whole body. He will be here any second.
Before I can make a decision, Varsul comes around the corner. So he can make his spirit travel around, too! The traitor has a smile on his lips, which gets wider at the sight of us. Even so, he assesses the situation immediately. “You owe me for this,” he says, and pulls Khazaar up. My deadly pale darling is swaying on his feet, but Varsul is supporting him. “Quickly,” I urge both of them. “Zeyliv will be here any second.” With one last glance, assuring myself that they are out of sight, I race back to my body.
Not a second too soon, because the door opens and Zeyliv bends over me. Our eyes meet. He knows that I am keeping something from him, and I know that he knows. “Tomorrow,” he says almost lovingly, but I know that there is a threat behind what he said.
Tomorrow I will pay for my sins.