Authors: Wendy Orr
They leave the chamber door open so Aissa can share the music and laughter, though she can't hear enough to understand the stories. The smoke from the Hall hearth fire drifts in, and she has a lamp â a small dish of oil with a floating, burning wick â so she's not in the dark.
Roula brings her honey cake and a drink of goat milk mixed with wine.
It must taste better in the Hall
, thinks Aissa.
Maybe nothing tastes as good when you're sitting outside the party.
Not that I want to be in the Hall with all the Hall folk.
Or in the kitchen with the servants.
Or anywhere but here!
So she sits and spins, because she's finally got her own spindle and has learned to comb wool, and to spin and weave. She doesn't like it as much as she thought she would, but the quiet rhythm is comforting â and she's pleased that she can do it, just the same as everyone else. Gold-Cat likes it too. He bats at the spindle and makes it spin. He claws the wool and tangles it.
âStop it!' Aissa thinks at him.
Gold-Cat cocks his head to one side as if he's trying to hear, and taps the spindle again. Aissa laughs.
The sound of her own laughter still surprises her.
Now the days get longer but the nights are colder; the rain comes hard and there's more and more illness for the wise-women to see to. Roula and Aissa are learning
fast. When the barley is harvested in the spring, Roula will graduate to be a full wise-woman.
Aissa will never do that, but she likes the learning, and loves travelling around the island to wherever they're needed. She doesn't enter homes in the town, where they know her, but the other islanders don't always recognise the cursed child in the clean young server. Or if they do, they're too sick to care.
One bright, almost-spring day she goes with Lyra to see a fisherman with a terrible, hacking cough. Aissa fetches a jug of water from the river and builds up the fire for Lyra to boil mountain herbs into a tea.
âYou're the girl they call No-Name!' the fisherman says, when his coughing has stopped enough to let him speak.
âShe's the wise-women's server,' Lyra snaps.
âYes, yes; I'm grateful. It's just â be careful on the cliffs on your own. Nasta's mother . . . she hasn't been right in the head since her brother died. He was the chief then, you know; she thought that made her quite grand. Then he drowned, and her baby, Nasta, came early with the shock.'
Her brother was the chief! Nasta's uncle . . . the Lady's husband . . . the baby's father. The baby that was me.
Nasta is my cousin.
Wouldn't she hate to know that!
It's hard not to smile.
âWhen I'm well,' says the sick fisher, âpass by here on your way to the beach. It would be an honour to watch out for you.'
Spring comes to the hills
with its new life and flowers.
The swallows fly in,
then the herons and cranes â
nearly the year's full cycle
since the Bull King's ship,
Firefly Night,
the bull dancer lottery
and Aissa's exile.
Now,
gathering greens with the wise-women
Aissa almost forgets
she's not one of them,
and so do they,
watching her grow
with big-sister pride.
Aissa one of the group
when Kelya tells them
that the signs are right
for the barley to be cut
and in the morning,
the oracle will say
the harvest is early
and must start that night
at the rise of the moon.
Kelya always knows
what the oracle means
even before the Lady says it.
Sometimes Aissa wonders â
but no;
the Lady's oracle
comes straight from the goddess â
it can't be Kelya.
Next evening
as the full moon rises,
the chief and the guards,
the men of the hunters,
fishers, farmers and town,
line the path to the barley
with bright flaming torches
lighting the Lady
as she leads Kelya,
Lena, Lyra and Roula,
then Fila and Nasta â
but not Aissa â
to the shimmering, moonlit
field of barley.
Roula carries a wine jug
and a basket of barley cakes;
the Lady pours wine to the ground
for the goddess to drink,
scatters the cakes
for the goddess to eat,
and sings her request
for a full-basket harvest
so they can offer
the same again next year.
With her curved bronze knife
like a sickle new moon
the Lady cuts the first heads
from the barley stalks;
hands the knife to Kelya
then Lena, then Lyra
and Roula too, for the very first time.
But Aissa
is not with them
nor with the women
from the town and the Hall
who reap the barley
in the coming days.
Between two worlds
belonging to neither,
watching in darkness â
careful that no one's polluted
by her standing close â
suddenly
rage burns through her,
darker than the night,
hotter than the torches
the men hold high.
Rage at the Lady,
her mother, not mother
who wanted her dead
and doesn't know she's alive.
Rage at Kelya,
for not dropping the baby
off the cliff as she should have;
rage at herself
for being made wrong;
rage at the goddess
for making her so.
Her rage burns on
against the Lady,
against herself
and the goddess,
but she can't hold it
against Kelya
because even in her fury
she is glad she's alive.
Luki watches the Lady's barley harvest and wishes he were home. His family's barley is a small field and doesn't take long to reap, because the whole family works together, everyone who's old enough to use a sickle without cutting off their fingers. His mother says men are just as good as women, and if the goddess wants the barley brought in on time she shouldn't care who does it.
Luki's only task this year was to hold a torch while the Lady and the wise-women made the first cuts.
Aissa wasn't with them. He still watches for her, the girl who doesn't speak but can sing snakes like the Lady. She's grown taller now she's the wise-women's server and doesn't live under a rock. Sometimes he tries to catch her eye but she still scurries away as if she's afraid of being spat at or stoned. It hurts that she's forgotten how he tried to help.
He never thinks that she might be avoiding him for his own good.
In the middle of the barley harvest, when all the town girls are helping with the reaping and the boys are busy with the girls' other chores as well as their own, the guard Tigo is looking for someone to race the bull dancers. Luki sees Aissa at the back gate, her gathering basket on her arm.
He points imperiously. âThat girl! Call her.'
âGirl at the gate!' Tigo bellows, because he can't figure out what to call her now â but what Luki wants, Luki should get.
Aissa turns. Her face lights up so that for an instant anyone can read it:
I'm going to race the bull dancers!
âTigo!' Nasta wails. âCan't you see â that's No-Name!'
âShe's the wise-women's server,' Tigo mutters.
No one hears him. Nasta is shrieking as if she's walked into a hornet's nest. âWe're the bull dancers! Are you trying to bring us bad luck? Don't you know she's cursed?'
On and on â she's still going when Aissa slips out the gate.
âAre you afraid she would beat us?' Luki asks, which makes Nasta even louder â but Luki's curious, because he's seen Aissa run and he thinks she's faster than him, maybe even faster than Nasta. Of course he wants his fellow bull dancer to be quick and agile to give them both a chance of staying alive. He'd just like to see her lose once.
But soon we'll be gone and Aissa can race with the new bull dancers.
He stops feeling sorry for her. Maybe she's still a servant and some people spit at her, but when he leaves for the Bull King's land, Aissa will stay safely at home. Sometimes he feels his life is dripping away from him, one spring day at a time. But the ship is late this year, and each day that it doesn't come is another day to wonder if it never will.
Then late one morning, after the full moon, the Bull King's ship returns. Last year's dancers aren't on it. They have disappeared like all the dancers before them.
Luki hadn't known how much he'd been hoping he wouldn't have to go. He's not a coward, but he's a realist: if anyone ever survives the bulls, it will be a natural athlete with balance sure as Milli-Cat's, reflexes fast as a snake's tongue, and light-footed as a goat. Someone like Nasta. Not Luki.
Now there's no more hope.
But I can go home for a day
, he thinks. A last night on the farm with his family . . . it's almost worth facing the Bull King for that.
The running rushing panic
like every other year;
Nasta's father leaving his boat
to run with his wife
up to the Hall
to take their precious daughter
home for a day
and the last visit
to their clan's sacred shrine.
Luki, racing out the back gate,
not wasting time
to run around the walls,
stops
to touch hands with Aissa,
a last thank you
for saving him from the snake.
Aissa, too shocked to refuse,
presses her hand to his
for the first time,
because it's too late
for people to mock him
for kindness to her.
She can only hope
it's also too late
for her curse to taint him
since he needs
all the luck he can get â
though she sees the shock
in Tigo's eyes
at her bad-luck touch â
Tigo, sent to guard the bull dancer
across the hills
and bring him back safe
at dawn.
Feeling the dread
all that long, long day
and anxious night,
like all the other ship days
and not like any other
because she is safe with the wise-women,
but this time she cares
what will become of a dancer.
Dawn comes,
the Lady's song so strong
Aissa feels it
tremble through her body
as if she could rise with the sun â
and as the last notes die
and the praise begins
she almost wishes
she could give up her safety
to hide as she used to
and feel it alone.
Then the trembling grows,
the ground quivers,
birds wheel in the sky,
dogs howl and babies wail,
water shoots from the well,
and the great oil jar at the kitchen door
topples and smashes
with a flood of oil.
The earth swells
like a wave from the sea â
and a booming crash
shakes the world.
A silence follows
louder than sound,
broken by screams
and fisherfolk running
up to the gates.
The goddess of fishers
has taken her cliff
and her shrine,
her image and offerings,
back to the sea,
and Nasta's mother
and Nasta
with them.
Aissa knows it's her fault
for worshipping
the fisherfolk's goddess â
till a voice in her head says,
âIt wasn't you she took.'
Her heart stops
then beats as surely
as if it had always known
the way things would be.
While the square erupts â
people crying to the gods,
asking why;
weeping women
clutching their children,
servants skidding in oil
and the braver folk rushing
to the cove to help â
stillness
settles on Aissa.
Blind to the world
she sees
Nasta and her mother
destroying the patterns
Aissa left for the goddess.
Deaf to the screams
she hears,
âYour father was a fisher.
It was your shrine
to honour as you did.'
She feels the wise-women
close around her
in a ring of protection.
âLittle one,' says Kelya,
âYou've been touched by the goddess.'
Aissa wakes from her trance,
feels light pouring through her,
her eyes now
sharp as eagles',
her ears like a wolf's
and she knows
what she must do.
The Bull King's captain
shaken by the omen â
though he doesn't know
the bull dancer's gone â
tells the Lady
the tide and winds are right â
he'll still sail this morning
and all the tribute
must be on board.
âYour spears
and sharp bronze axes
mean that you
can take our children,'
says the Lady.
âBut the gods have spoken â
beware your own king's fate
if he doesn't listen.'
The guard who speaks
the Bull King's tongue
is pale with fear
at the captain's reply:
âMy king serves the Earthshaker,
the god and bull
who spoke this morning â
and he'll take his tribute.'
Now Luki and Tigo
and Luki's family
run in, panting
from the long hike home;
ready for what must be.
They approach the Lady,
and Aissa does too â
wise-women behind her,
like Luki's family
behind him â
the Lady chose Nasta's name
in the lottery
but Nasta is gone
and now the gods
have chosen Aissa.
Through a mist
she hears the Lady,
âThese are our dancers,
sent to serve your king
and save our island.
I must give them
the goddess's blessing
one last time
before they go.'
The sanctuary is dark:
Roula brings flares,
lights the torches
set around the walls
till shadows flicker
on pale faces:
the Lady and the chief,
Luki with his family,
Aissa with hers.
âThis is the girl called No-Name,'
says the Lady to Kelya.
âUntil she became our server,'
says Kelya,
her blind eyes staring
straight at the Lady's.
âHer name is Aissa.'
And the Lady â
who stood up straight
when the earth trembled,
when the cliff crashed,
and the bull dancer was lost â
crumples at the knees
and starts to fall
like any grieving mother
till the chief catches her.
âAissa?' she whispers.
âAissa,' says Kelya.
âTwelve years ago I did a great wrong
but now it seems
that it was right.
And if you want
me to go to the cliff,
I'm too old to care.'
âThe sea's taken enough for one day,'
says the Lady.
âThe oracle will tell us
how we must appease the goddess â
but for this, I thank you.'
âThank the child,' says Kelya.
âIt was she who chose,
or the goddess in her.'
The Lady finally
looks at Aissa,
straight in her eyes,
as if she could search
into her soul.
âThank you,' she says,
with hand on heart,
her voice cracking
so when she sings their blessing
she sounds like Fila,
with a voice to scare toads.
Aissa still wishing
the Lady would touch her
with a mother's love
as Luki's mother is hugging him
and his father holding tight to his hand,
but the Lady
is the ruler again;
her voice clears
to sing a last song
and when she kisses Aissa
on the top of the head,
it is just the same way
that she kisses Luki.
The chief does the same,
but Kelya
hugs Aissa so hard
it seems she'll never
let her go.
âIt's time,' says the Lady.
âBe well,
and return to us next year.'
They leave the darkness,
blinking in
the brightness of day,
to the impatient Bull King's men
and Fila, waiting for her mother,
uncertain what to do
in the chaos of the shaken town.
Then Milli-Cat,
tail up and waving,
leads her family
in a loving coil around Aissa's legs,
and Gold-Cat jumps
straight to her shoulders.
Aissa holds him,
feeling her heart
break to leave him,
turns to Fila
and gives her the cat.
Fila's eyes
open wide with surprise;
she can't put hand on heart
because she's hugging the cat
but she says thank you
not just in her voice
but in her eyes and smile.
And Aissa knows
Gold-Cat will be safe
and even happy.
âNow!' shouts the captain
as the jostling people
race back from the cliff
and grieving cove
to touch the tributes' god-luck hands.
And no one spits
at Aissa.