chest rise and fall.
Over the past six days, I'd sung all the healing songs I knew, I'd stitched each one with my memories of sunlight, I'd poured any blue sky from my soul into the sounds. Now I was a snail's shell. There was nothing left for me to give.
So I sang him the nonsense song he'd given me in the tower. My voice was a horse's bray, I'm sure, raw with little sleep and so much singing. But I didn't want him to feel alone without any music to keep him company. 'The piglet rolled while squealing, moving by snout and by jaw, happily snuffling for treats without use of hoof or paw.' I sang it wrong. It needs a happy voice, the words jigging and the tune lilting up. All I could manage was a slow whisper, but I think it served.
I kept one hand on his arm and smoothed the hair back from his brow with the other. I sang. His eyes opened, and I should've withdrawn my hands. Really, I should've scuttled under the couch and hidden for shame. But I kept singing. And I kept one hand on his arm and the other on his forehead. And I stroked his hair back.
He watched me while I sang. He looked at my eyes. My heart felt so big, it hurt against my ribs. At last I felt some shame and started to pull away, but he put his hand over mine on his chest to hold me there longer. He knew I was just the mucker girl, the scrubber, and still he wanted to keep me close. I don't think I breathed for a long, long while.
I remembered in the tower before he came to visit, wondering if he'd been formed by Evela, goddess of sunlight. I think it might be true after all, because I began to squint wretchedly and couldn't look at his face.
When he slept again, I left him with the healers. I think I'll curl up in my horsehair blanket until the shivering in my limbs stops.
Day 155
This morning when I entered her khan's chamber, he was sitting up, his face not so pale. The icy fear that had lodged in my belly this last week at last began to melt. He was speaking with one of his chiefs, his face troubled, but when he saw me, he broke out in a grin so wide I have to believe it came right from his soul. Then he held his arms out before him, palms down, inviting me to clasp forearms as though we were of a clan, meeting again after a long absence.
'A warm greeting, Dashti,' he spoke in the formal manner, though the cheerfulness in his smile made me think he wanted to laugh.
'A warm greeting, my lord,' I replied, kneeling beside his bed and grasping his forearms with my palms up.
Then he did what I didn't expect from gentry to commoner --as we gripped arms, he pulled me closer, resting his cheek against mine, and inhaled through his nose, taking in the breath of my soul. I was too terrified to breathe. I hope he didn't notice that I didn't sniff as well, because refusing would mean insult, but I couldn't help but think, Did he keep my shirt from the tower? Does he remember the scent?
When he released me, he said, 'So, just come from milking the sheep, have you?' which made me snort in laughter. It's a common mucker tease after a cheek greeting and means, of course, that I smell like a ewe, which I know I don't because I've been indoors for two weeks and bathed two days ago. His sly half smile made me think he'd actually sought out some other mucker and asked for something right silly to say to me.
So I answered, 'I have, in fact. They send greeting to their brother Tegus.'
Day 156
This morning, Tegus welcomed me again with an arm clasp and cheek touch. I wasn't startled this time, and I breathed in at his neck. How can I describe the scent of his skin? He smells something like cinnamon--brown and dry and sweet and warm. Ancestors, is it wrong for me to know that? To write it? Is it wrong for me to imagine laying my head on his chest and closing my eyes and breathing in his smell?
Yes, it is wrong. I won't think it again.
He told me he likes me close by, says my singing eases the pain. Even though I don't always sing. Mostly we talk. Often we laugh, at least until his arrow wound pierces him and the shaman healers shoo me away. But I always return before long, and they always let me back in. And I sing and we laugh.
I haven't touched him again, as I did when he first woke from the fever sleep. I wonder if he remembers or if he thinks it was a dream.
[Image of a Man Lying On a Bed)
Day 157
I've seen Lady Vachir at last, and she dresses in all the splendor I would imagine for a lady of a realm. Indigo powder colors her eyelids, sandlewood perfume wafts from her skin, and when she moves, the dangling pearls in her hair click against her tortoise-shell combs. One would imagine such finery could make a lady happy. Not so. I find it easier to imagine a snake smiling than our Lady Vachir. Her mouth is stern, her eyes are sad, her hands lie in her lap like frozen things. For the past two days, she's been attending Tegus in his resting chamber. They brought in a second couch for her and her three lady's maids, and they sit with their backs straight, look at us, and whisper. Khan Tegus and I don't laugh much anymore.
When he's awake, I rest my hands on his belly wound and sing to his bones and skin, his muscles and blood.
When he sleeps, I sit in the corner and do scribe work. To tell the truth, the scribbling has become about as much fun as picking lice out of a goat's hair. While I write, I can feel Lady Vachir's gaze prickling me. I don't like it much.
Today when the khan was asleep, Lady Vachir said, 'My back pains me. What is that girl's name, the commoner there?'
Batu the war chief was present, and he answered, 'Dashti, my lady.'
'I want her to use her healing songs on me. Tell her to come to my chamber.'
She and her ladies rose and left, and I supposed she meant me to follow, so I did. Halfway there, she claimed that her own chamber was being cleaned and I should take her to mine. So I led her to my little room and lay her on my horsehair blanket. Her three lady's maids stood around me like so many vultures waiting for something meaty to die. I placed my hands on the lady's back and sang the tune with the lilting high parts that says, 'Tell me
