Page 13 of Humans Don't Have Horns
He just stands there with the stupid apples in his hands. And that makes me cry, and I realize why I’m crying. But I don’t want to think of it. I don’t want to remember. So I wipe my tears and tell him we should go. I don’t take the apples from him. I don’t think I’ll eat an apple again as long as I live.
***
We do not speak during the days. We walk, barely stopping to drink, never stopping to eat or rest. But in the evenings, after the fire is set, we have conversations. Daton is very curious about how I spoke to the direwolves. He has never heard of anyone who could talk to direwolves or even regular wolves. He has also never heard of a Puresoul who can speak Mongan. He seems to believe me now that I have no answers, that it is a puzzle to me as well as to him.
“Perhaps it has something to do with the Nimatek,” he ponders while his fingers run over the beads of his prayer beads.
“What’s Nimatek?” I ask him. Minera had said something about it in the swamps. Said I stank of it.
“You don’t know? But you had to use it so much for such violent withdrawal,” he answers, sounding baffled. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I look at him blankly but uneasiness spreads through my body.
“Nimatek is an odorless and tasteless drug the Aldonians use. It numbs everything – taste, smell, feelings, desires. It damagesmemories, and it is highly addictive. It’s odorless while consumed, but while the body goes through withdrawal, it reeks. They used to give it to enslaved Mongans. They could have given it to you in your food or beverages.”
“My morning tea!” I gasp in shock, as the reality of it all hits me. My guardian had given me tea every day since I was brought to the palace nine years ago. I always preferred coffee but she insisted on a cup of tea in the morning.
“You begged me to kill you when you withdrew,” he said, his eyes are on the beads.
“I thought that was just a dream,” I said, almost to myself. What else wasn’t a dream? Maybe that day, when I clung to my mother as life finally left her body, wasn’t a dream at all. It had taken seven days of torment, and her body finally gave. She looked nothing like the vibrant and regal queen she was just a week before. Her body was covered in blisters, burns, and pus-filled lesions caused by the Aldonian healers’ insistence on using leeches and controlled burns as treatment. I would have said the treatment was worse than the illness, but the illness was brutal. My mother’s and sister’s bodies twitched and seized, and they screamed and sobbed like tormented animals as pain sliced through them over and over. And through it all, my father refused to let any Renyan healer near them, or any Renyan at all. In a way, I was relieved for them both as death finally claimed them. But the deep belief that their pain and eventual, anguished deaths could have been prevented made me feral. There were no thoughts, no real consciousness as I clung to the only two people who ever loved me, to the two people I had let down by my incompetence to help them, to get help to them. I was only thirteen at the time, but I could have done more for them. I should have done more for them.
So when they came to retrieve their bodies, I refused to let go. My mother would have wanted a Renyan burial. She deserved as much. The soldiers were a blur. The blood I drew in my frantic attempt to push them away was also a blur. I’m not even sure whose blood it was. Most likely my own.
I then woke up at the palace, in my new room, and felt and remembered nothing at all.
***
There are figs and olive trees now. The air is sweeter, and its scent reminds me of my mother. I feel light-headed at the thought of finding a home like I had as a child. My mother managed to create a small Renyan heaven on my father’s land. She always spoke of Renya with great love and longing. Once, I was happy, and now that I remember those days again, I realize what darkness I was in. Now that I remember all that was lost to me, I understand why they had me forget it.
Daton appears more at ease near me since we encountered the soldiers. Is it because I was such a damsel in distress? Is it because I retched and cried? He still avoids looking at me when we speak, and he often grips his beads so hard I can see his knuckles whitening.
The night before our arrival at the River of Tears, I ask, “Why did you save me from the wolves?”
“We’ve already been through this,” he answers, his eyes on the beads.
“No. You told me why you wouldn’t have them breed me. But saving me from the wolves. It has nothing to do with Baghiva.”
He doesn’t answer, his face reticent.
“If Minera would have ordered you to kill instead of force me, would you have done it?” I asked
His eyes meet mine. “Yes.” And I realize it’s such a fluke that I’m still alive because he would have killed me, and there is nothing I could have done to stop him.
I can’t stop myself from asking him, “Then why didn’t you just kill me? No one can breed a dead woman.”
He grimaces. “I was trying to make a point, to draw a line. And killing you would be a cowardly way to go at it.”
“But you don’t see a need to draw a line in taking a woman’s life?”Only Sun knows what possesses me to poke him with these questions.
“Why would I?” He frowns at me as if the mere idea of that being a problem is strange to him.
“Because you’re so much stronger.”
“I’m stronger than Puresoul men as well, so I’m not to kill them?”
“But they know how to fight back. They’re armed and trained.”
“It’s not my responsibility. Aldonians treat their women like shit. Mongan women know how to fight. Muscle tone is not what makes a good warrior. You weren’t born helpless. You were raised to be.”
I bite the inside of my cheek, and I don’t know what to say about that; I just know that hearing out loud that he finds me helpless burns me. I hate feeling helpless. More than anything.
