Day 236
My lady says My Lord is gone, killed by Khasar.
'Why would Lord Khasar kill a cat?' I asked.
'I know things,' she said. 'People think I'm not smart, but some things I know.'
She wouldn't tell me what she knows. Sometimes I feel lonely with her sitting right beside me.
And where are the guards? They haven't brought milk since Khasar was here. Maybe they're all right and just ran home to the city to report to my lady's father. I hope they come back soon. Without fresh milk, I've had to mix dried yogurt into my lady's water. It's clumpy and tastes sour, but at least she won't have to drink plain water.
And worse news--The rats are back. Just a few days without a cat and already they return. I hear them scratching and yipping and rustling down there. I set up more traps, but they avoid them. The washing isn't done and we had a cold lunch because I stay hours in the cellar, trying to smack rats with a broom.
I think My Lord the cat must be fine. He'll come back soon.
Day 240
My lady offered to sit a spell down below combating rats so I could warm my hands and make dinner. It seemed a task not fit for gentry, and when I protested, she insisted she'd do it. I supposed if she was willing, then it would be all right.
When the meal was laid out on our little table, I called her up from the cellar. My lady climbed the ladder and made straight for the upper chamber.
'I don't feel well,' she said. 'I'm going to bed early.'
'Let me come sing to you,' I offered. But she refused.
When I returned to the cellar for more rat swatting, I found the culprit of her illness--my lady had eaten half a bag of sugar.
Day 245
Every day, my lady says she will take a turn whacking rats, but really she's down there eating. Rats squeal and skitter around her, and I hear her lips smack, smack, smack.
Day 268
She's devoured our dried fruit, every crumb, and all the sugar's gone but dust. Now she's demanding I soak more meat overnight, cook larger meals and more bread. I tried to argue once, but she raised her hand and commanded me to obey on the sacred nine. So I do. Though I grumble enough to put any piglet to shame.
Six more years, and not a grain of sugar. Six more years and no fruit, fresh or dry.
Later
It appears she also ate the last wheel of cheese. The rats will be heartbroken.
Day 281
Last night or morning or whatever time it was, I sat by the fire taking out the seams in my lady's clothing and stitching them back up broad. Since she's taken to eating, she's rounder than before.
I told her, 'My lady, our food supply's in peril. We have to be careful.'
'It doesn't matter,' she said. 'We won't last seven years anyway.'
That made us both quiet. She stared at the fire for so long, I wondered what thoughts rode the flames in her vision. Then she asked me, 'Dashti, would you have married Lord Khasar?'
'No! I'm a mucker, I couldn't marry a member of the gentry.'
'But imagine if you were me, would you?'
I tried to imagine. Even how he slaps hands and flicks burning chips into our tower, even though his voice makes my stomach spin, would I marry him to escape this coffin? After falling in love with her khan, would the thought of being with any other man make me weep and tangle my hair? Would I have chosen to lock myself up for seven years and even die from darkness? I tried to imagine, but it made me dizzy, and I couldn't keep my eyes on the stitching.
Stop. Just thinking of a commoner marrying gentry is a gross sin of the kind that could get me noosed on the city's south wall and never welcomed into the eternal Realm of the Ancestors. She's wrong to make me think it.
My only reply was, 'You do what you thinks best, my lady. If you'd rather wed Lord Khasar than be in this tower another day, I'll stay with you all the same.'
I didn't want to say that, but I did, and I meant it. I'm her lady's maid, I swore an oath, and I'll serve her till I die.
She smiled, and I saw her cheeks dimple for the first time since we met. What a sad little bird she usually is, how she droops and moans when she could be as brilliant as the sun. Sometimes I forget that she's gentry, that her blood is divine. But when she smiled, I remembered--she is as beautiful as light on water.
She looked back at the fire. 'I know I should have married Lord Khasar. I was born to marry. That's my only purpose.'
'That can't be, my lady.'
'My father told me so when I was small enough to sit on his knee. My older sister, Altan, she'll be the lady of the realm after my father. I have an older brother, Erdene, who will rule if Altan were to die. I'm the third child. I used to dream I'd be chief of animals one day. I like animals. But my father said I'm too dull-witted. And besides,
