200 - Never so invisible

I should have known what would happen: no pre-dawn appointment, of course. Cherao, I am certain, didn’t even try, deferring to my mother to help her coddle her wounded baby. I woke to dawn, from a strange dream in which a woman with brilliant blue hair was flirting with me, in the Pikeras Fokas, of all places.

So we had all day to wait, and I figured I’d cool my heels in the embassy, where my shoulder wouldn’t feel so irritatingly naked. Sightseeing was the obvious thing to do—it never hurts to learn what you can about a prospective ally—and Cherao assigned one of her staff to take us on a tour, but I didn’t want to go out onto the streets. I had a feeling it would be like being led through Arko by Daisas.

“Well, we’re all going,” Salao, who was the informal leader of the young ones, said. “They’re going to take us up to that spectacular temple to their Goddess, and their Assembly Palace where the headwomen hold council, and the Women’s House—that’s the athletic complex, no men allowed—then the Great Market, where a woman can buy anything and everything she wants… You should at least go up to the Temple, Chevenga. No men allowed, again, but for you I bet we could get a dispensation. So long as you wear a veil—that’s what Pipsimimi, the boy who was serving us last night, said.”

“You mean the one whose arms are thicker than mine?” I said. “You call him a boy?”

“But he said it’s best if a young, attractive man like you wears a veil whenever he’s outdoors,” Theralao said. “So as not to get into, or cause, trouble. Not strictly necessary if you’re with a wife or mother, but most prudent, he was saying.”

“This all sounds so enticing,” I said. “I’m sure you’ll all have a wonderful time. I think I’ll just stay here and nurse my wound and try to convince Cherao that I’m capable of intelligent conversation, if that’s possible.”

“Oh, don’t be a coward, Fourth Chevenga,” my shadow-mother clucked. “If you can’t face—”

I cut her off by leaping to my feet. “Bring on the kevyalin fikken veil then!” I’d never wanted to wear Chirel so badly in my life.

What Piss-whatever meant by a veil wasn’t what I thought at all. I expected something that would conceal my face, probably with some sort of hat, and was stunned when they brought out a garment as voluminous as a gown, made of translucent gold-threaded fabric. It was more like a tent, with me as the pole. Suspecting they might be pulling my leg, I peeked out a window onto the street. There were indeed tents shaped like broad-shouldered people, walking; the others were all either boys under twelve, old men, or women.

I was borrowing it from Piss-kilt, it seemed, and since he was taller than me and I must not ruin the hem, we had to raise it a little and tie off the top bit, which then hung flopped over on my head. I guess it doesn’t matter how silly I look, I thought, if no one can see my face. That also meant I could wear the arm-sling, in my mother’s opinion, so I did. Thus girded, I went out into Thenai.

We did get a dispensation for me in the form of a note from Cherao, and the temple is indeed spectacular, especially if you are mindful of its age, as much as I could see it through this misty fabric. As well as rebuilding it, the Hyerne are working on another huge statue of Theen, which they are making out of marble from a hill near the city from which Thenaians have always taken their marble, though it will also have plenty of gold leaf. We sat in the gallery of their Assembly, the most interesting thing for me, and it was strange to hear none but high voices speaking, but everyone else soon got bored and dragged me out to the Women’s House.

They took shifts for who’d be stuck outside with me, and settled on who got the first turn by a finger-game, since I couldn’t just be hitched to a post like a horse or dog. They exercised there for most of the morning, coming out bathed and flushed and happy, while I waited, wandering the streets with one guard as the day grew hotter, in this uncomfortable, itchy, restraining, half-blinding, sweat-inducing thing, with everyone managing not to see that I, let alone my face, was there at all, without apparent effort. That was perhaps the strangest thing. I’d never been so invisible in my life except when I was sneaking somewhere; never in broad daylight. Even in Arko, suffering the most brutal slavery, I’d been anything but invisible—not invisible enough, in fact. Here, towards the end of the day, I found myself having to fight off an awful, lonely, heart-shrivelling feeling of doubt in my own existence.

That, in part, was what made decide to see what would happen if I took the veil off. “Pips… squeak said it wasn’t strictly necessary, yes?” I argued, when they said perhaps I shouldn’t. “So there obviously isn’t a law and I won’t be arrested.” I whipped it off, and unslung my arm, before they could say more. The free air was sweet on my skin, and the world crisp and sharp and clear to my eyes. The Hyerne who worked for Cherao and was guiding us gave me a distinct look of, “You were warned.”

If you have not lived this, you cannot imagine it. Not every woman we passed, but at least half of them, stripped me naked from head to foot with their eyes, not hiding their judgment or appreciation in the slightest. I want you right here and right now, whether you want me or not, those looks said.

Those were the restrained ones. If I met their eyes, as often as not they’d make a licking motion with their tongues at me, or blow a kiss, or say something in Hyerne which I was glad not to understand. They would even reach through the side-slit near the hip in their long tunics, reach between their legs and then bring out the hand and hold it out to me, or sensuously lick their fingers. More than once someone held out some Hyerne currency, which are gilded shells, to one of my mothers or our guide, pointing at me, and had to be politely rebuffed by the guide, who spoke to them, to my amazement, apologetically. The most blatant were the husky women working on buildings, who kept whistling a certain way at me whose meaning I soon learned.

I was standing by a stall which sold porcelain triangle-pendants—the shape of a woman’s pubic hair is a sacred symbol in Hyerne, symbolizing fertility, and every single one of my guards, as well as my two mothers, wanted to buy one—when I felt a hand slip tenderly between my legs from behind, fingers reaching upward. I was about to do what anyone would do, back-fist its owner in the face, when I thought better—we were on a diplomatic mission—and settled for smacking the arm away, and turning to give the woman a try-anything-else-and-you’re-dead look.

Her expression changed from shock to outrage, and she moved to slap me across the face, the same way you smack down a dog that jumps up. I parried it and went into stance, and felt a pair of hands, then two more pairs, grab each of my arms. “No, no, Chevenga, what are you doing, don’t get into a fight here and now for the love of All-Spirit!” my mothers and my guards all hissed. As if they were all sisters in taming me, the Hyerne who’d slapped me took hold of my chin and let out an unbroken tirade in Hyerne at me, until the guide drew her away, remonstrating, explaining, apologizing, and they had something of an argument. I looked away from them, slowed my breathing, counted. I was shaking with anger.

“Love, you’ve either got to put the tent back on, or walk in the middle of us,” my mother said, in the gentlest tone she could manage. She was right, of course. “Walk in the middle of you,” I gritted between my teeth. I was safe from being touched that way; the best way to deal with the leers and the licks, I found, was not to let my eyes meet anyone’s, or look when someone tried to get me to; in other words, to doubly pretend that neither they were there, nor I. By the time we got back to the embassy, I felt exhausted from doing it.

I wanted to wash every scrap of memory of it all off my skin, but going down to the sea was out, as were the public baths. I felt like a prisoner. I settled for begging Cherao for a basin of water to pour over myself, and she had Pips-whatever fetch it. Sitting alone and wet in the privy, I suddenly found myself shaking again, and wanting to cry, and hating myself on top of that for being contemptuous of him. He’d lived with this every day of his life, never knowing anything else, and I had added to it. I wished I knew his real name, until it occurred to me with horror that what sounded like a pet-name might actually be his real name.

I noticed the way I was sitting, as if I’d been defeated, and realized I now knew why Arkan women were always like this, closed in on themselves, heads bowed, tense and tight as if not wanting to take up more than the tiniest share of the world’s space. If my confidence, which is not exactly slight, was shaken just from one day of it, what must it do to their very souls?

For myself today, and the men of Hyerne, and the women of Arko and all other places where they are held in contempt, I leaned my head back against the wall and let tears of wretchedness, that I could not share even with my mothers, take me. Distantly, it occurred to me that in less than a bead, I had an appointment with the Queen of Hyerne to try to persuade her to join me and my all-but-conquered people in an alliance against Arko. Crawling into the bilge of the cormarenc seemed a more plausible, and preferable, choice.

Pipsimimi came in. It’s not as if there is true privacy for men in Hyerne—or maybe it’s that, as nobody, he didn’t count. He froze for a moment, seeing my tears, then sat down beside me, saying something in Hyerne. Then he looked me in the eyes, reached to gently wipe my tears with the backs of his fingers, and clasped my wrist, in the way that is half the double-wrist-clasp, meaningfully. He said one word in Enchian, though I hadn’t thought he spoke any. “Strength.”

I understood. This was a Hyerne man’s thing; a secret man’s thing. I wondered how much trouble he’d be in if he were caught. I clasped back, we held for a while, and then he stroked my shoulder, and went his way.

“I know what I need, and want, to do before I see Segiddis,” I said, once I was dried off and back in the parlour. “Beat the kyash out of someone, or several someones, sparring. Especially someone female—well, hey, you all are! Who’s game? Shadow-mama, you’re not feeling cowardly, are you? Blood-mama, may I borrow your sword?” Doing that finished bringing me back to myself well enough, or so I hoped.

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