Heartfelt Sounds (7 page)
Then—my fever would produce ghosts. Figments of heated hallucinations. I'd…
see
things. People—places.
One night, I saw Althea.
All gray hair tied tight into a topknot, the bulb of hair decorated with a large crescent painted gold.
I blinked—my mind silent.
“You're here.” I whispered. “
Finally.”
And my hands reached for her. Slowly, as if they were climbing the very air.
“Did you know that I loved you?”
I freeze.
“I loved you very much, Naia, sweetheart. Please—look into my face.”
I see withered eyes—old and haggard.
“You're not painted.”
“I am somewhere cold, Naia. Very cold and very damp. I fear I may not last the night.”
I want to choke her—to wrap my fingers around her thin neck. I want to watch the life roll from her eyes.
“You took my home.” I hiss—, “
You took my HOME!”
But she hushes me—quietly. With a long finger to her lips.
“You'll wake the house.”
she tells me, her eyes smiling. Crinkling.
“You'll wake your sisters.”
And I crack her hard across the face—crying—laughing—thrashing because I can't help it. I curl my arms into myself and sob as she rubs her face.
As she looks down at me—her face glowing.
“You will live on and on, touching many lives with your voice. But—tonight—I die at the hands of the invader. And I've come for forgiveness. For
your
forgiveness, Naia. Will you let this old soul have that?”
My fingers twitch as they curl beneath my chin. My stomach rolls as my mouth becomes a hard line. I feel empty. Hollow. Lost, alone, and dead. “I want to go with you.”
“It is not your time.”
“I feel like it is. I feel like I might…”
“You will survive this. You will endure more. Naia, will you grant me your forgiveness?”
No.
I pause.
“You took
everything
from me.”
She nods. Sighs.
“I understand.”
the crescent upon her head glints.
Hands touch my shoulders—slowly, moving inch by inch—minute by minute. I watch them grab me. I feel them move me—shake me. But it's as if I'm not in my body—I can't feel it. I've gone numb as Althea stands before me. Her arms do not touch me—the arms come from my left.
Shanti.
I swallow bile. “Go in peace, spirit.”
“Very well.”
“Naia—
Naia,
it's only a hallucination! You're okay—I'm here, Shanti's here!”
I grab hold of her arms—my eyes lock with her own. She gasps, her hands freezing—moving from my shoulders. Hovering. “Are you…”
“Thank you, Shanti.”
“You're—,” she swallows, purple eyes puzzled. “—you're welcome.”
…
The morning comes with rolling golden light that pours through the hallway outside my room, light filtering through the cream colored paper of my door.
And a silhouette dances before the paper as it cranes its neck forward, dips one toe to the floor outside and stops. Looks to the right and left. It pulls itself from the room opposite—slowly, quietly—and it turns to softly slide a paper door shut behind it. When the panel
snaps
the figure jumps—squeaks with a high-pitched peep—and moves itself up the hallway. Stops halfway. Doubles back to place a hand upon my door.
I snap my eyes shut when the door is slowly peeled back.
“Naia,”
a voice murmurs, the tone watery—unsure.
“I'll see you soon.”
When my door shuts, I snap open my eyes just as the window in the hallway
screeches.
Before it's forced open with a
crack
and the figure's gone.
Taken by the harrowing melodies of a morning wind.
…
I feel as though a couple of months have passed before I am finally able to sit up on my mat without feeling the world spin. I gaze over at Shanti's mat to find it empty. I come onto all fours. I pull myself to our shared window and push up the flaxen blinds. Slowly, I peer out over the lip of the window and into the snow caked alleyway below.
Soldiers.
Behind me, the door is flung open with a
whoosh
of cold air.
“Change into this—” Shanti's voice. Cloth hits me and I spin around. “—
quickly—”
I pull a long tunic from the ground, along with breeches and leather boots. “Why?” I ask her, holding the garments. They smell like salt. “Why are there soldiers down there? What's going on?”
Strength ebbs through me. The fever heat gone. I feel new.
“Bad things.” Shanti snaps as she moves about the room. She rolls up her mat and throws her pillows to the wall. “Hurry up—I'm not sure what's going to happen next, but I've got an idea about how to handle it.”
“But you don't
know—”
She rounds on me. Violet eyes flash. “Put the clothes
on.”
she snaps. “If you value Kokoros and I, you'll do as I say.”
I shrug off my shift, throwing on the thin tunic. I pull on the breeches and boots, one foot after the other. I've barely got my right foot completely into the boot before Shanti's at my back.
Cold steel kisses the nape of my neck.
I turn on my heel and shove her.
“I need to cut your hair!”
“No.”
I tell her.
I can't. I can't let her.
With my zither gone—and the Orthella nowhere in sight—my hair is all I have to remind me of where I come from. Of my status as a songstress.
This is it.
“No.” I repeat, clenching my fists at my sides. “I won't let you.”
Purple eyes narrow into slits. “You'll do as I tell you.”
I shake my head.
“Do you care about us? Kokoros and I?”
“I'm not—I'm not letting you cut my hair.”
“Do you want to be
raped,
Naia? By those men down there? Do you know where they come from?”
I wince at the word. She spews it like poison. I shake my head. “What's going
on?”
“The invader has sent men to inventory the people and homes of Felicity. They will be back and they will take
everything—
people, things—
women!
Have you lived through war, Naia? Have you lived beneath the fist of a dictator?”
I shake my head.
“You'll be safer as a boy.”
But I can't part with it—a songstress is never to cut her hair.
Never.
“They will be back, Naia.” her voice is low. A warning. “And when they realize that Kokoros has lied to them—that you and Chima aren't boys—they'll take both of you from us. They'll kill Kokoros and I for lying. They'll
rape you.”
I swallow.
This is it—this is all I have. My hair—the hair of a songstress.
But I…I never earned the title. I performed for the house mother, but she never bestowed me with the title.
The title of Songstress.
Truly…
Truly, I wasn't a songstress.
Then what am I?
What
am I?
A lump forms in my throat and I swallow. I feel myself grow cold. I bring my eyes to the floor.
“Cut it.”
Shanti cuts my hair short. Shorter than it's ever been.
Long black locks tumble down my shoulders. They slide through the gaps between my fingers like water darkened by a starless sky. They fall to the floor. Lifeless.
A weight has been lifted from me—a soft, beautiful, weight and I feel my chest
tighten.
With tender hands, Shanti carefully ties my hair high into a tail. From this height, my hair barely reaches my neck. When—just moments ago—even if I tied it up, the hair would brush my ankles. When I danced, it would flow around me as my partner. As my silken cocoon.
And now it litters me like snipped threads. Dead. Gone, when Shanti brushes it away.
The piles of fallen hair stifles me—chokes me as if it's clogging up the air and I have to leave. I venture outside of our room. The sound of tears from the opposite end of the hallway calls me and I find Chima collapsed upon the floor. Her knees hugged into her chest.
Her bob is missing.
“A-Akane—” she sniffles, her eyes open. They stare at the wall. At nothing. She can't look at me. “s-she—she cut it all.”
When I sit down beside her, Chima brushes me with a glance. A hard stare. A face that asks me to leave—to go away.
But I can't. “I'm sorry.” is all I can tell her. “But look—you're still beau—,”
She stands before I can finish—teeth clenched. She stands and turns on her heel.
Leaves.
…
The soldiers don't come back for a day. For several.
But the streets are alive with them. Creatures made of steel and leather walk the white streets freely, brandishing swords. Brandishing death. They flock to Akane's shop like geese led by a trail of bread—begging for her services as a gerant. Demanding it.
Chima still can't look me in the eye when she passes me in the parlor—an air of cold about her—but Akane's still friendly. Still strong.
“They bring souls,” she tells me one evening as the sun slowly shifts towards the golden light of the horizon, “that aren't in
no way
related to them. The souls of their
enemies.
Of the men who
died
protecting Felicity from
them.
They expect me to bind a soul to their blade
against
the soul's will. All because they want to go back and tell their buddies—
I've got a soul in my sword! Look!”
Akane leans back in her chair, the thing suspended on two legs as she brings her eyes from the bay window to me. “And when the soul shows them things they don't want to see—they want to blame
me.
As if it's
my
doing.”
“Whose men are they?” I ask her, taking a seat across from her as she knocks back a cup of gray liquid that makes her shiver. “Where did they come from? Why did you cut all of Chima's hair?”
The last question startles her. Akane freezes—slides cold eyes towards me. “What?”
Her tone makes my stomach drop. But I repeat my question. “Why did you—”
Akane slams her chair's legs upon the floor. “I heard you.”
“Then—”
“Notice she has a new attitude now, huh?” and Akane chuckles, the sound dark and joyless. “It's not because of her
hair,
Naia. She's a whore—you forget? She didn't come from some cushy silkhouse—she came from the worst of things—a
whorehouse.
You think she hasn't had worse things done to her? You think having a bald
head
matters to her?”
Akane slides her empty cup across the table. It takes a dive off the edge, rushing towards the floor before it shatters into a million little pieces. Akane's smile is crooked—dark. The grin doesn't meet her eyes as her lids lower slightly. “See anything different, girl? Think we're missing someone?”
I've been sick for weeks—maybe a couple of months or so. The seasons have changed—snow has fallen and Felicity has become occupied by foreign soldiers. All of the girls tended to me before the cold rolled in. But when the snow fell and I started to feel a bit better, only Akane and Shanti waited on me. Checked up on me from time to time.
A soft silhouette moves behind cream colored paper. My door slides open—a voice calls my name. Tells me, “I'll see you soon.”
And then I saw the soldiers.
“Nyx and Chima aren't sisters, girl. Not anymore.” Akane comes closer, her breath hot. Spices tinging her scent. Sake sharpening her breath. “Sisters don't leave sisters behind. They share everything—love, hate,
fear.
But Nyx couldn't do that. She's
gone,
girl. And
you
led Chima to believe that Nyx and her had a sisterly bond—”
I'd say it's sister looking after sister.
My words—my eyes widen at the accusation.
“You led her to
hope—”
I'm telling you to
believe
there's hope. Can you do that for me, Chima?
My command—a light promise between girls made after a night of nightmares.
“And now Nyx has run off. Disappeared in a night. Poof!” Akane throws up her hands. Lowers them. Stares at me blankly—glares at me harshly. “Now, the city's occupied by foreigners—you want me to tell you how long Chima
hoped
Nyx would return? You want me to tell you about her tears when I told her the truth?” Akane breathes, her tone grim, “Tell me, Naia, do you still hope? Do you still believe in sisterly bonds? After all that has happened—are you still okay with lying to yourself?” her words slur from her mouth and she cocks her head of red hair. Even her hair has been cut.
I bite my lip—hard. A metal taste enters my mouth and I realize I've dug my fingernails into the wood of the table. But I don't relax—I can't.
“I haven't
lied
to her!”
“Things are going to get
worse.”
she tilts her head again. Smiles crookedly—all teeth. “You think your disguise will save you? You think I can? Shanti? You think—
you think Chima will ever forgive you?”
I shoot to standing—the legs of my chair screeching loudly against the tiles of the floor. “I won't sit here and be
insulted
by you, Akane!”
“Maybe you'll stand. Maybe I'll sit. Maybe I'll watch this last sunset with you.” she swallows. “
Our
last sunset.”
I sit. Pull the chair closer to the table. I look at her.
“I'm boarding this window up tomorrow.” she tells me. “So better enjoy this while you can. Before I destroy it.”
…
When Akane boards the bay window up, Shanti begins to sleep on the floor of the parlor.
“Are you our watchdog?” I ask her one night, jokingly.
But Shanti takes the question seriously. “I am better than that. I am your guardian.” Violet eyes are murky. Bags hang low under her eyes as if she hasn't slept in days. “When the reckoning comes, you'll thank the Fates I slept here.”
Her words frighten me—they send a shiver up my spine.
The reckoning?
I had no idea what she meant.
When I bring it up to Akane, she simply shrugs it off.
“You know how
old
she is, right?” Akane smirks. Rolls her eyes as she piles beige sacks of rice in the far corner of her room. “Shanti's been through some things. Seeing all those soldiers outside day after day probably brings back memories—bad ones. But if you're alone in your room—why not come sleep with me?”