Ahead of me, back against the wall, a Hrass huddled, the way they did, always appearing frightened to death. Possibly with good reason. Moved by an inexplicable urge, I went to stand behind it.
“You are Hrass,” I said in the creature’s own tongue.
“Soooo,” it replied, noncommittal.
I shifted to the K’Vasti dialect. “Can you understand me?”
“Soooo!” An affirmative.
“I have something to tell the Hrass. Earlier this year, Draug B’lanjo of the K’famir killed the Omniont Ambassador. He sent the body to the Omnionts, saying the Hrass had done the killing. Draug B’lanjo did this because he wants to take over the Hrass shipping routes.”
I turned on my heel and left him. If he talked to the wrong people, they would be looking for a K’vasti. Therefore, I must remember to burn the K’vasti prosthesis as soon as I got home, but not before, for the sharing had to be done every night before midnight, and today had produced nothing usable: no new scandals murmured across my bowed head, no crimes of violence or passion described while I stitched. No corruption uncovered or pretenses betrayed while I listened. So far as Bak-Zandig-g’Shadup was concerned, today might almost have been Eden, and therefore useless to me. Any daytime Eden had to be followed by a nighttime hell, with me doing as Adille had once done: walking the pain path, the horror road, the tortuous routes toward the terrible.
The thing fed on blood, pain, and death. If it knew where these things were, or would be, it would send me there. Sometimes, in the middle of the day, it would squeeze me, tighter and tighter, until I could not breathe, bringing me to the very edge of suffocation, in order to relish my panic.
“Miss Ongamar, are you quite all right?” Lady Ephedra would ask.
“Oh, quite, Lady Ephedra. A spasm of indigestion, I think. Nothing severe.”
“You looked quite ashen there for a moment. Would you like to go home?”
I could not afford to lose a day’s allowance, as Ephedra Mouselline knew very well. The words seemed kind, but the intent was unmistakably minatory, and the thing relished this as well.
In those short times, each day when I was not at the command of it or Lady Ephedra, I sometimes thought of my own life and future. The time would come when my years of bondage were completed. Release from the thing was probably not possible after so long a time, but as my time of release approached, if I could encounter someone human or Gentheran, I could warn them. I had seen humans and Gentherans in the pleasure quarter. They were always closely watched by steel-helmeted security officers. I could not legitimately speak to a human as a bondslave, but I could, perhaps, as a K’Vasti, assuming my disguise would fool the officers.
If such an opportunity ever came, I would not ask for help for myself. I was as guilty as the worst of those I had observed. I knew that purposeful watching was in every respect as evil as the torture itself. Peering into the darkness of pain was the equivalent of inflicting pain. Watching torture was the equivalent of agreeing to torment. Making a spectacle of it was equivalent to doing the torture oneself. Yes. Whether the torture was real or only apparent, the watcher was guilty, for the watcher chose to see it, thereby creating an appetite. My pursuit of agony made me as heinous and depraved as those who committed it. No matter that I did it to save my life, or perhaps only continue what passed for my life, it was evil.
It would be better for me to kill myself than to continue as I was. Of all the choices I might make, that was the only good one, and I was determined to take the thing with me when I did it. I did not have the right to leave life with this duty unperformed, but I would hang on only until I could warn someone.
I Am Gretamara/on Chottem
One evening, as we sat on the porch of the Gardener’s house, watching the Gibbekot playing with Sophia, I wondered aloud what had happened to Benjamin Finesilver, her father.
The Gardener shook her head slowly and sadly. “You know that Mariah expected her father to send a doctor from the city of Bray. D’Lorn had hired a guide, a man named Bogge, who actually knew the way here, but shortly before the doctor was due to leave Bray, Benjamin Finesilver arrived at Stentor d’Lorn’s door. His carriage contained Mariah’s body, wrapped in cerements.
“Benjamin was sobbing, Stentor was blind with fury. Had Benjamin not been so obviously torn by grief, Stentor would likely have killed him on the spot.
“‘Was there no help for her?’ Stentor cried out.
“‘Only the Gardener,’ said Benjamin.
“‘The WHAT?’ demanded Stentor.
“‘The…local wisewoman, midwife kind of person,’ Benjamin said. ‘Everyone told Mariah to go to her, but Mariah wouldn’t go. She said you were sending a doctor from Bray…’
“‘And what had this woman to say?’
“Benjamin looked up, confused. ‘To say? Nothing. Mariah never went to her.’
“‘Wasn’t she summoned when Mariah was giving birth?’
“‘The Gardener can’t be summoned, sir. She is not…not a mere person. One has to go to the Gardener, not the other way round.’” The Gardener fell silent, her eyes following Sophia.
“I am surprised Benjamin knew that much,” I said.
“I doubt that Benjamin did know it until after Mariah was dead. Certainly it was more than Stentor could accept,” said the Gardener. “Benjamin tried to explain that the women of the town had tried their best, but Mariah would not take their advice. Then Stentor asked about the child. Benjamin had no more wit than to say, ‘I did not wish to endanger a newborn upon the road, so I left her in safety
