Oh, Papa! And now I know it’s true. You took your gun and shot out the eye of that poor man who had done nothing wrong save come to the wrong place at the wrong time. & because of that our house echoes with the wailing of women & the village is pocked with empty houses and ruin! — & it is because of you! You, Papa! — I will never forgive you, never — I curse you in your grave, because I thought you more excellent in your soul than these brutish others! — & you were never so! My heart is torn with it, my life is broken — I hate Masko — but he is just a fat cruel idiot. I hate you more.
Damek said, Where do you think the money comes from? What do you think pays for these fine clothes and the food you eat? What is the wealth of the royal house? — He said, Did you never think of the Blood Tax? Did you never wonder why the vendetta never touches those of royal blood? — Oh, I never did, & I am sick with misery & horror — I would tear off these clothes and go naked, for they are woven of blood! — & every meal I have eaten stinks of death! — I taste it in my breath. I am vile, vile. I will never eat again.
The wizards must know, and partake in it — even Ezra, even as much as I have hated him, I thought that he made his laws according to his knowledge and what he thinks is right, which is not itself wrong. — And yet they are all empty and evil.
If this is what it means to be a grown woman, I would have stayed in my mother’s curst womb & never been born.
How long since last I wrote here? I no longer know or care what the day is. It is wintering now, and the winds howl like demons. The snows are coming — I can smell them.
I am so lonely — I want to speak to someone, as if I had a friend. I have no friends now, except this book.
I am shamed to the very pit of my being — broken — soiled as I never thought was possible. My soul has been torn and trampled — if I had thought! — I was foolish and stopped putting the chair against my door since it seemed that Masko would not have me killed. — And the night before last — was it then? or another night? — Masko came home late & drunk and forced his way into my room. Even writing this makes my gorge rise — I have vomited up every meal since —
He broke my rib & I have bruises all over me but none of those wounds hurt as much as the memory of what he did to me. I would cut my own head off to stop that memory. But that is not the worst —
Damek has gone. He tried to murder Masko, after he made me tell what happened. I didn’t want to tell, but he made me. I wish he had killed him. I wish he had stabbed him right there in the drawing room — but he is still a boy, he is not as strong as Masko, who is tall as well as fat. Masko grabbed his arm & threw the knife away, and he punched him so hard Damek’s nose was broken and he was knocked out, and then when he was on the ground, Masko kicked him until Kush pulled him off, shouting that he oughtn’t to kill the king’s bastard, however much he deserved to be beaten to death. — And Mrs. Anna & Kush carried Damek into the kitchen and bathed his poor face until he woke up, swearing like the Devil himself. He said that for all the blood, it wasn’t so bad, and that Masko couldn’t punch to hurt a rabbit, but I don’t believe him.
Then he changed his clothes and packed a bag and left. I begged him not to. I fell to my knees & pleaded that he stay — but he said that he couldn’t stay now, that Masko would have him killed, and he couldn’t protect me here — he said he had a better plan & he would have his revenge. He has gone, I don’t know where, and I doubt I will ever see him again. He said he would carry me in his heart, he said if I dared to think of killing myself he would never forgive me. — But what is there for me to live for? — When I told him I would hang myself, he was more angry than I have ever seen him. He told me to have faith, but oh, it is a bitter, tiny thing, and there is nothing to keep it alight. He said he would come back for me. He said he would come back.
I will not shed a tear on account of Masko ever again. He does not deserve such tribute.
Try how he might, he will never hurt me again, nor demean me, nor cause me to sorrow. Even if he abuses my body, he cannot wound my soul.
I will tend the hatred in my heart as if it is the most precious and delicate seedling, as if it were a nutmeg sent from the palace of the king with the brightest blessings of God. It will sprout into a sapling as graceful as an angel, and it will put forth a flower that smells sweeter than ambergris and myrrh and shines like the first sun after winter.
Masko will see it and smile. But when he reaches out his hand to take its beauty, just as he steals everything that is mine, my enmity will strike his heart. He’ll wake to a bitter spring! He’ll find every green thing withered and every hope blackened. The flower will bear the face of my hatred: its petals will rive open like lips and out from its center will writhe a serpent that will coil about him and crush the light in his soul. Its fangs will pierce his heart with anguish, and it will devour every moment of all the days of his life.
Even his death will not serve for an escape, for my revenge will gnaw his spirit wherever it goes for all eternity.
I swear this solemnly, that he has not the honor to warrant being named my enemy.
No, even my hatred is too noble for his kind. No, one day I will pluck his soul from his body as a rat is plucked from its hole and thrown onto the midden, and I will turn away as the gross worms eat out his eyes, forever and ever and ever. Amen.
Much happened in Elbasa in the years I was away, but I heard only the small scraps rumor fed me, since Damek’s letters — the principal mode of my intelligence — ceased after his disappearance. Damek’s leaving was generally explained by his attempt on Masko’s life, and that in turn was presumed to stem from the cruel treatment he had suffered. Until I discovered Lina’s diary, I never knew the real reason for his departure, and I confess that I was never more shocked. I can’t imagine that my mother couldn’t have known, since she would have had to care for Lina’s injuries, but no hint ever passed her lips. Yet it’s easy to understand why Masko’s shameful crime against Lina would have been kept secret by any who cared for her. If it had become known, Lina likely would have been shot: although she was the innocent victim of his wicked lusts, she would have been held to be as much, or perhaps even more, at fault than the criminal himself. Such is the way of justice in the Plateau.
Like most others, including Lina herself, I presumed that Damek must have somehow met his death. I missed him, as I missed all those I loved in that luckless household, and mourned his probable fate. At the same time, I was making my own life and had my own concerns. Most important for me, I met Zef, who was then working as a groom in the king’s stables, and he indicated an interest in me that I was by no means unwilling to return. When a letter unexpectedly arrived from Lina, petitioning the king to send me back to Elbasa to be her maid at the manse, I was torn: my relationship with Zef was still mere acquaintance, although I already preferred him over any man I had met, and had my wishes been consulted, I would have stayed where I was.
The king decided I should go, and so I had no choice but to leave. My joy in returning home was mingled with regret. Our mutual youth meant neither of us had any power to decide for ourselves where to live and work, and so Zef did not declare himself before my departure. I journeyed home with those feelings usually grouped under the phrase “a broken heart.” I can laugh at myself now, since such misunderstandings are long behind us, but it was very painful at the time, as I was sure I should never see him again. In thinking thus, I underestimated Zef’s constancy and determination: after he came of age, he traveled here speedily and declared himself. And so you see us now, after many years of a good marriage, the only grief of which is our childlessness. They have been unremarkable years to anyone but ourselves and make no exciting tale, but I thank God each day for my luck, in finding so early in my life a man who honors the qualities of my mind and heart and who has never disrespected me for my sex. But I digress.
After Damek left, Lina moved out of the Red House and set up her household at the manse. Masko was still officially her guardian, sinc
e she was neither married nor of age, but he gave her permission to move; perhaps he was secretly ashamed of what he had done and was weary of having Lina under his roof, a constant, silent reminder of his crime. Until I arrived, she was assigned a young girl, Fatima’s great-niece, Irli, to be her maid, and lived as a recluse, seldom seen in the village except when she attended church. This was so foreign to the Lina I had known that I was astonished, but my mother insisted that womanhood had changed her and that she had become meek and biddable. I confess that, until I saw her myself, I found this impossible to believe.
The reason for my return also astonished me. Lina was to be married, and I was asked to be the housekeeper for her new household. Her troth had been given to a handsome young man, Tibor Alcahil, whom I knew only by sight but who was said to be of steady character and minor but established wealth. It was hard to imagine a greater contrast to Damek, and I thought she must be changed indeed to make such an alliance.
It was wise of Lina to distance herself from Masko, by becoming the de facto mistress of the manse; although he continued as her official guardian, her move away from the Red House gained her respect in the eyes of the villagers. In the years that he was Lord of Elbasa, Masko had succeeded in making everyone despise him; not the lowest lackey said his name but to spit. He had no shame in flaunting the women he brought up from the South in order to scandalize the northerners. He even took his whores to church, thus putting the priests and wizards in a rare unity of outrage.
The wizards and priests grudgingly tolerate each other because the king, for his own reasons, insists that they must, but it is at best a jealous truce. It is proverbial that on any given topic, one side will automatically disagree with the other. On the question of Masko’s scandalous behavior, Father Cantor and the Wizard Ezra actually made a joint representation to the king that he be divested of his property and exiled from the Plateau. I heard about it while I was still serving in the palace: it attracted much gossip, not only because such a proposition had never before been made, but also because the king refused the submission. It confirmed my belief that the king’s detestation of the Lord Kadar was so bitter that he wanted to see his estate entirely dispersed by Masko’s extravagance and mismanagement and had chosen him deliberately, knowing his character, to ensure this design. Masko of course knew of this representation, and when the king refused it, he became more arrogant than ever. But he was even then sowing the seed of his own downfall.
You might imagine with what feelings I packed my trunk and made my way home. Although it was yet early in the year, it was an unpleasant journey: the heat was excessive, and a storm was building. On the final day of my journey, bruise-colored clouds began to pile in the sky, and the air became ever closer and more sultry, so that the sweat trickled down my back underneath my corset. To make matters worse, I was tormented by midges that swarmed in hosts out of the grasses and which bit any exposed skin. Both the carter and myself were anxious to arrive in Elbasa before the storm broke over our heads. To my inexpressible relief, we reached the Red House just as the first fat raindrops began to fall in the dust.
My mother was glad to see me, although without any demonstration that others might have thought appropriate for close family members who were now reunited after a sundering of seven years. She embraced me briefly and commented that I had grown tall. She was as shy and awkward as I was: when my mother had last seen me, I had still been a girl scarce out of childhood, and now I was a grown woman. I was shocked by how much she had aged: during my absence, she had become old. Her hair was now completely white. Her arms, which had been strong and capable, were grown thin and knotty, and deep, bitter lines ran from her nose to her mouth, writing her unhappiness on her face. We met almost as strangers, and although we both felt moved by our meeting, we were equally unable to express our feelings.
We sat for a time in the kitchen, and she brewed me a tisane as the storm broke over the village and began to hammer the roofs and howl about the trees. It was clearly impossible for me to go up to the manse that night, and gradually, as she answered my questions about what had happened in the village in my absence, the atmosphere between us thawed.
She told me of the major events since I had left, which I have recounted so far as they related to Lina and Damek, but there was much other news as well. She spoke of new marriages, and of births and deaths (there were many more deaths, as the vendetta still burned its slow fatality through Elbasa and Skip). These events, which had once been my first concerns, now seemed to have no relation to my life. This grieved and surprised me; I hadn’t realized until then how much my absence had changed me. I attempted to tell her about my years in the palace, and of Zef, who was foremost in my thoughts, but she showed little beyond polite interest, and I soon dropped the subject. I went to sleep that night with an oppressed heart, wondering whether I would always feel like a stranger in the place I had thought of as my home.
The following morning, the storm had passed, and I made my way on foot to the manse. My trunk was to be sent on later, and after the dust and discomfort of the previous day’s journey, I was glad of the chance to walk in the cool air, which was cleansed and fresh after the night rains, and to look about the village I had not seen for so many years. It was a melancholy journey: because I was used to the grand halls and fine outbuildings of the palace, Elbasa seemed smaller and meaner than I remembered, and I noticed how many houses, like Fatima’s, were deserted and falling into ruin.
Lina was waiting for me at the manse and embraced me with a far warmer emotion than my mother had. “Oh, Anna!” she said at last as she stood back and studied my face, blinking tears from her eyes. “How glad I am you’re home. I was trembling that the king would not permit it. He never would before! And how grown up you are now!”
I was taken aback by her greeting but couldn’t help feeling pleased. “It has been seven years,” I said. “It would be strange indeed if I had not changed. But in most respects, I think I am much the same as I was.”
I didn’t speak my own thoughts, that Lina was changed almost out of recognition. I had been used to thinking of her as strong and robust, the most physically fearless of my childhood friends, and yet here stood before me a slender, pale woman who seemed almost overwhelmingly fragile. I felt that if I touched her, she would bruise, as if she were a lily grown in a glasshouse. It did her beauty no harm; the translucency of her skin made her appear almost luminous. The other strange alteration was that her eyes were no longer the vivid violet I remembered, but rather a dark blue or deep slate gray. It appeared to me that at some stage in the past few years she must have been very ill and was now in a long convalescence.
She studied me a little more and then laughed sadly and looked away. “You were always steadfast,” she said. “In truth, the major changes are in me. I am grown up now and have put away vanity and illusion. I hope you find me a better friend than I have been, Anna.”
This confused me a little; the palace had, after all, strictly taught me to observe my place. “I hope,” I said, a little primly, “that I will be a better servant than you remember.”
“I could have sought a servant anywhere, Anna,” said Lina. “It is as a friend I asked for you. I do not complain of my life — it could be much worse — but I confess it’s been lonely these last few years. And who now knows me as well as you do?”
I mumbled something noncommittal, and I briefly saw a flash of Lina’s old impatience before she turned the subject and said that she would show me the buttery and linen press and other such places that would be in my care.
As she conducted me through the house, we relaxed a little into our old intimacy. As ever when she wanted to charm, Lina was hard to resist, and she was so bound up with my childhood memories that I quickly felt at home. I knew she wasn’t lying about her loneliness: I could smell it in her skin. She was absurdly sensitive; although she didn’t say so, I could see that my initial withdrawal had hurt her. The more we talked, the more I felt pity for her; so
metimes there was almost a feverish edge to her conversation. She was, for example, almost childishly eager to solicit my approval, in a way she would never have cared to before I left, and I particularly noticed that she avoided any mention of Damek. I saw too that she tired quickly, and there were other small signs of damaged health that disturbed me.
My trunk arrived during our tour, so she showed me my chamber and left me to unpack my possessions. It gave me, at last, a little space to myself in which I could think about what I had witnessed that morning. I felt uneasy; I chiefly found myself wondering about Lina’s future husband, and my future master. If he were harsh and stern, in the way of most northern men, I feared that she would not long survive marriage. And I then recognized, with a painful adult perception, what I had always known as a child: that for all her faults, I loved Lina as I would have loved a sister.
It took us a few days to settle into a relationship in which we both felt comfortable, one that at once observed distinction and acknowledged intimacy. It is too easy for a mistress to assume that a servant is at the beck and call of her emotional needs as much as her material requirements, and my sense of dignity demands that such friendship emerge from my own heart rather than the command of another. But these are trivial niceties which might not interest you, perhaps; I have noticed that not many people concern themselves with the self-respect of those who work for them.