El and Onine (12 page)

“The blood,” I said.

“A sacrifice.” I thought of my poor Bendo. The only
creature who knew all my secrets. I thought of her alone between the cabbages, the
life force bleeding out of her. “Be strong,” Tal said.

“Will Tiro come for me?”

When Tal didn’t answer, I pulled myself from his
embrace and looked at his face. He seemed distant, and I wanted to caress his
hard cheek, smell his smoky breath. I wanted him to kiss me as he’d done when
we were younglings playing a game of secret find.

“You need to eat,” he said.

I didn’t want to eat. My Bendo was gone and I
couldn’t stomach the milk of another.

“Was it Tiro?” I asked. “Who killed my goat?”

Tal was silent, as he leaned forward to stir the
ashes of the fire with a Venusian stick. I wanted to ask him where he got the
rod but felt compelled to press him about my Bendo. “Did Tiro come and
ki—”

“Eat.” He held out a small container. I hadn’t seen
him prepare it or from where he’d produced the small bowl. “It’s sweet.”

I took the bowl believing it to be milk and grains
but it wasn’t. It was a mixture of serum and herbs. Its smell was distinct and
I recognized it from the wax flowers in the hall of stones. I thought of
Onine—the sweetness of his scent. I brought the cup to my mouth and
realized I was uncovered. I wasn’t wearing a veil, just a frock.

“You don’t need the covering,” Tal said, as though
reading my mind. He stood up and kicked the soot from the heel of his boot.
“Try to sleep again.”

He turned away from me and went back to the other
side of the fire—through the flame. I wasn’t sleepy when I first woke but
after consuming the serum and herbs I felt my eyes grow heavy again. “Tal …” My
tongue was thick.

“Sleep, clay-born goddess.” His voice faded, as my body
sank down into the soil of the cavern’s floor.

“Onine …” I could barely speak, as I slipped away
and was soon gone.

Minosh visited me in the darkness. She came to me
and led me to the Bathing Temple where I saw her as a youngling stirring the
baths. She wasn’t alone. Kypria was with her. The beauty of the golden goddess
radiated in the steam and lit the Temple like I’d never seen it before. The wax
flames rose to meet her, as she held my creator a stick’s length away. Little
Minosh leaned over the rim of the tub just as she’d done with the trough in our
garden.

“See the gold sediment.” Kypria spoke sapient tongue
with elegance and ease. Her voice was familiar but otherworldly too. “Watch the
flakes of gold dance for you, tell you their story.”

Minosh leaned in closer and held her veil to keep it
from touching the liquid in the bath. Her feet were practically off the Temple
floor, as she strained her whole body to see into the pool of gold.

“Be patient,” the goddess said. “It will come.”

I couldn’t see what Minosh saw but I knew when she’d
seen it. Her entire body tensed at the sight in the tubs and she recoiled.

“Do not be afraid,” Kypria said. “Your change is
still to come, and when it does, you will be ready.”

Minosh turned away from the image in the water and
looked up at the goddess and that’s when I no longer recognized my creator. She
looked like Kypria. The veil covered her face, but her eyes and her aura
reflected the sublimity of the goddess. Minosh was beautiful.

“I have chosen well,” the goddess said. “I will
choose you again.”

The vision became muddled and the abyss of sleep
obscured the light Kypria and Minosh had shown me. When I regained
consciousness, I was certain I’d been transported up and out of my body and
back again.

“Did I sleep?” I spoke into the darkness.

Tal was gone and the fire was out. I could smell the
smoke and knew it couldn’t have been doused for long. I’d fallen back onto the
ground and pushed myself up to lean on the wall. My head was heavy and spun as
I sat up. I thought I was going to vomit so I leaned forward onto the cold soil—cold,
cold ground.

By my third attempt, I was able to stand and hobbled
blindly to find an exit, using the wall of the cavern as my guide. I listened
for sounds from the outside, but all was silent. I hoped for light, anything to
lead me to Luna’s blue glow. I was frightened but didn’t look for Tal. I just
wanted out into the fresh air.

“I’m dreaming,” I said to the darkness. “This isn’t
real.”

Then where are you?

I closed my eyes and held my breath for a moment.
Maybe if I lost consciousness again, I’d wake on my bed of silks. Tal wouldn’t
abandon me—not here.

I stumbled over the stony ground, as I made my way
to the smallest point of light coming in from the outside. Even if I’d imagined
the light, I still reached for it like a root to water. I gave up my hope for
Luna and prayed for the eye to be high in the sky. I felt a sudden need to warm
my cold skin. As I got closer to the point of light, it got farther away,
shrinking to a pinprick and then disappearing altogether. Darkness enveloped me
again and I succumbed to it for want of anything else. I fell and landed hard,
splitting in two. The last thing I saw was his face—Onine was in the
darkness with me.

***

I woke to the eye shining down on me. The dark
cavern was gone and I was amidst stalks of wheat. I lay on the ground for a
moment, recalling everything. If it was a dream, it was still vivid and I believed
it was real. If I could find Tal, if I could meet him at the Bathing Temple, I
could ask him. That’s when I realized the eye was up but I wasn’t at the
Temple. I wondered if the master had come for me, if I’d escaped my sentence,
my dreaded assignment. I wondered if moonscapes had passed since I was in my
shanty with Tal, since I’d found Bendo between the cabbages—Bendo! I shot
up and ran through the stalks of wheat toward what I thought was my garden.

“Stop, sapient.”

Tiro’s command stopped me and glued me to the spot.
His sickening presence greeted me before I felt his stick on the small of my
back. He twisted the point, screwing the tip into my flesh. I wanted to shriek,
but wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. When he finally pulled his stick away,
I let out a breath that blew my veil slightly off my face—my veil? I was
dressed in a silk covering again. Perhaps it was all a dream.

“You have disappointed me,” he said. “I expected you
to wait for me on the stones. Instead I find you traipsing through the wheat
field. You cannot escape me so easily, clay-born creature.” He dug his stick into
my shoulder and pushed me forward. “Face me.”

I turned but kept my eyes down.

“No, no, no,” he said. “This is unacceptable,
sapient. You must greet me with something more now. We are to be united. I am
the seed-bearer and you shall be my vessel. I shall know you.” He dragged the
point of his stick along the length of my clavicle. “I shall touch all of you.”

He slapped his stick on my shoulder and motioned for
me to follow him. I wanted to run in the opposite direction but my legs
wouldn’t carry me. I submitted to the fright and kept pace with him, as he led
me out of the field away from my garden and up toward the greenhouses on the
hill.

“You are too slow,” he said, stopping me mid-stride.
“Come.” He pointed to the spot of soil in front of him. “Stand here.” I obeyed
and waited for his next command. I didn’t wonder if he was going to touch me
with his bare Venusian hand. I couldn’t stomach the fear any longer and forced
myself to embrace the end. Just like in the slender tower with the steaming
pipes, I wanted to run at him with my entire body and burn us both up—if
it was my fate, into the fire I’d happily go.

“Master,” I said. “Why wait? We’re alone here.”

“Hush, foolish sapient,” he said. “This is something
to cherish. Now take hold of my stick.”

He held the stick out to me and I grabbed it as
close to his glove as I could, thrusting my body forward. He jerked the stick and
stepped back. He was frightened too.

“Be careful,” he said. “We cannot touch yet.”

We traveled through the field more quickly, joined
together by the rod. With my feet suspended above the ground, he used his
momentum to guide me, as he floated over the soil and rushed up the rock face.
The jade stone twinkled in the eye’s light, as it hung midway over the horizon
behind us. I’d only ever seen the row of greenhouses as lanterns strung along
the edge of the range way off in the distance from my shanty—a patch of
stars fallen from the sky. As I floated up the steep incline to meet them now,
they looked like plates of glass flattened into the rock, impossible for any
being to enter. We didn’t stop at the greenhouses though. Tiro dragged me past
them and up to the top ledge of the rock. When we reached the peak, he snapped
his stick, pulling it back, and my feet touched ground again.

The wind was strongest at the peak and my veil
whipped up and away from my face. Tiro said nothing and I waited for the end to
come. I thought he’d move closer and perhaps whisper in my ear as he’d done in
the slender tower, but he didn’t. It was as if he waited for something or
someone. I held my breath for fear of arousing his anger.

“We will wait,” he said.

He swayed slowly where he stood and looked up to the
sky.

“Master,” I said. “Who are we waiting for?”

He gave me a smirk and then reached out and yanked
off my veil in one quick move, snapping his hand back faster than he’d let it
out. He let the veil go and the wind caught it and took it over the edge. My
hair came loose without it and I could feel my fair strands obeying the wind.

“They say you are Kyprian.” Tiro spoke in Venusian
shrieks. “But I see no resemblance and I will never believe them. You are clay,
nothing more. If Midan wants what is inside of you, Midan may have it.”

Nothing he said made sense despite my ability to
translate his shrieks. I thought perhaps I’d misunderstood the Venusian tongue.

“Let me touch you,” I said. “Let me show you that
you’re right. I’m only clay.”

I didn’t have time to step forward and take his hand
as I’d planned. Tiro crouched down and shrieked in agony. He leaned on the rock
in front of him and placed his hands flat on its surface. His slender back
arched up as though something were pushing it out. His golden skin stretched,
as he continued to shriek, and his cries turned to moans, as his body convulsed.
When he looked at me, his expression made me feel his pain. “Midan is here,” he
said before bursting into a mound of flames, vanishing into a blaze of fire
like the one I’d sat in front of in the dark cavern.

As his pyre burned, ash fell to the ground and piled
in such a way as to look like it was gathering. The wind picked up on the peak
but the ash didn’t scatter. Small sparks rose up from the heap, as the flame
lessened, and when the pile began to rustle, I thought I imagined its movement.

“El.” Tal’s voice came through the haze of smoke and
I could barely see him on the other side of Tiro’s pile of cinders. “They’re
here.”

I can’t explain what happened next and yet
everything seemed in slow motion. Tal reached for me, as the stars fell from
the sky—that’s what they looked like. Seven, ten, twelve, fifteen meteors
dropping to our planet—balls of fire falling from the blue sky onto the
gold terrain in the distance. Each one hit with a boom that shook the ground at
my feet. I think I fell over but I can’t remember. I couldn’t keep from staring
at the balls of fire on the horizon.

I didn’t see Tiro’s ash rise up as another—a scaly
thing with a face like Bendo’s. Tal must have grabbed me because all I remember
is my retreat from the strange goat-like creature. I sailed through the air
looking up at the peak, as I fell farther and farther away. I clung to my
savior, breathing in his redolent skin—his smoky sweet smell. The shadow
of the beast was the last thing I saw before darkness saved me.

When I opened my eyes, I was stung with the light of
the eye. Temporarily blinded, I turned my head to the side and counted several
breaths before I looked up again. I could tell I was inside, raised off the
ground and pinned on my back. I tried to move but couldn’t. My arms and legs
were strapped down and I could only roll my head from side to side. I felt the
heat of a Kyprian beside me and I thought it was Onine.

“Onine?” I attempted to speak but only stilted
shrieks came out. “Where am I?” Sharp and piercing, I recognized my words in
the sounds. I’d lost my ability to speak as a sapient and when the Kyprian
beside me responded, I understood. “Watch, my little Pchi.”

“Minosh?”

“Listen, my little Pchi.” I didn’t recognize the
voice of the Venusian though I should’ve known it was the healer. “Learn, my
little Pchi.”

The light of the eye brightened and I could only
make out shapes. The whiteness blinded me and I couldn’t tell if I’d lost consciousness.
I could feel the Kyprian beside me, especially when she reached out and touched
my mind. The pinch of pain, like a finger flicked on the forehead, made the
contact. Soon vivid images arose, and I saw my planet as it was when Minosh was
a youngling. Rich with verdurous nature, deciduous and dark, the soil was alive
with the smallest of organisms, the seeds of everything. My view was vast and I
imagined the pungent smell of the living dirt—my cold, cold soil. My perspective
shifted and the expanse of the planet shrunk to the small plot of land I
recognized as my garden. Minosh was there with Bendo. She petted the baby
goat’s pelt as I did. Her bleats were small and unfamiliar but the sounds of
pleasure.