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The Ghost - Chapter 1
The Ghost
by Merenwen Vardamir
Profile • Send Private Msg • Writing
Libraries: Angst, Drama, Original Fiction, Philosophical
Published on Jun 5, 2008 8:29 am / 1 Chapter(s) / 0 Review(s)
Updated on Jun 5, 2008 8:29 am
Sala is a 17 year old girl and lives in a town where she's consdiered the ugliest thing on two legs. But really, she is stunningly beautiful...
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Puppy Love
Chapter 1
Before I start, I'd just like to say a few words about the writing process of this story. I've been writing and re-writing this for four years and have changed it so much that it hardly resembles what it had first started out as. I haven't written anything for it in ages, until today when I had a sudden burst of inspiration and finally knew what direction I wanted to take it in. So I've just finished the first chapter - it's 2.30am and I've been writing bascially non-stop for 6 hours, I'm tired, but I'm happy. Anyway I hope you enjoy, and please give me some honest feedback if you can. Just please note that my muse comes and goes and probably won't be back for a long time - so probably no new chapters anytime soon.
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Sala awoke to the sound of horns.
She did not realise the significance of that, though. She lay with her eyes still closed, trying to recall … trying to remember … but what? She had been dreaming. And she was sure that she had had the dream before. Or was it a memory? A memory of the Time Before? She squeezed her eyes more firmly shut, her brow furrowing in concentration. It was fading. Slipping from her grasp like water.
But wait! A ship. A white ship. Beautiful. The sea. Was it the sea? Sala was not sure she had even seen the sea before.
The horns sounded again. She heard shouts and the sound of running. Next to her, Vuk snarled. But she did not even care. The dream had faded. It was gone. And Sala was overwhelmed with an enormous sense of loss.
“Damn,” she whispered to herself, rolling onto her side to cuddle up to Vuk, calming him down with soft, soothing words. She began to get comfortable again, the warmth from Vuk spreading over her like some sweet drug.
The door to her stall swung open with a bang and Vuk was up in a flash, no longer calm; growling and barking. Sala sat up, finally opening her eyes.
The stable master, Najim stood over her; his dark, bald head gleaming with sweat even though it was only just after sunrise and still freezing cold. Vuk was baring his sharp teeth at the fat man, his hackles standing at attention.
“Whoa boy!” Najim said, putting his hands up as the dog snarled at him.
Vuk lunged. Jumping up, his jaw clamped on Najim’s hand. Najim howled with pain.
“Sala!” he shouted. “Call him off! Call him off!”
Sala jumped up and whistled. Vuk’s ears flattened as he let go of Najim’s hand and walked back to Sala, his head low and his tail between his legs.
“Najim,” Sala said as she absently rested her hand on Vuk’s head, “you know that Vuk will not tolerate anyone but me near his bitch.” She gestured to Inas, Vuk’s mate, who was curled up in the corner of the stall, five squirming puppies at her teats. “She finally whelped last night,” Sala explained. “I lost none,” she added proudly.
She looked back to Najim, whose face was openly disbelieving. Sala – thinking that he was impressed by her successful midwifery – smiled and nodded.
“Are you stupid, girl?” he shouted at her, waving his arms in the air, blood dripping from the bite on his hand. “The Kasir is here!”
“Oh,” Sala said. Then, “Ohh!”
“Get to work!” Najim ordered before rushing from the stall, grumbling.
Sala hurriedly brushed the straw from her hair. She thought about finding some clean clothes to wear, but when she heard the horns singing out again, she knew that there was no time. She had worn the same clothes for the last three days but they would have to do.
She hurried from her stall, leaving Vuk and Inas with their pups. All throughout the stables of the Kasir’s Villa in Tionn, boys and young men rushed about readying for their ruler’s arrival. She was the only girl amongst them but, over time, the boys had grudgingly accepted her as one of their own. It was probably because she didn’t look or act like a girl. That coupled with the fact that she was as unattractive as a girl could get. They had never allowed her to sleep in the hayloft with them, however. So she had always been left to find a place amongst the dogs and horses in their stalls. If truth be told, she preferred the company of the animals rather than the boys. For a start, the animals smelled a whole lot better.
Sala quickly rubbed the sleep from her eyes and picked up a pitchfork to get started on mucking out the animal’s stalls. She knew and loved all of the animals in the stables. And they knew and loved her. She had a way with animals that even Najim could not help but be impressed by.
“Girl, you may be stupid and ugly,” Najim would say, “but you sure know your way around an animal.”
Sala had just finished mucking out her last stall, when she heard the sound of the Kasir’s approaching party. Scores would have ridden with him from his palace in Bomba. Not only his family and soldiers, but also free riders and traders. The city would be overrun for days.
Najim was shouting orders as he bustled over to Sala, his face red and dirty. “What are you doing?” he shouted at her. “Get out of here! The Kasir doesn’t want to have to look at an ugly thing like you.” Sala flinched but he took no notice. He rushed past her, yelling as he went.
Hessa, his wife, followed along in his wake. “Off you go,” she said to Sala, not unkindly. “Go to your friend Aska. Stay for a few hours.” Sala threw down her pitchfork and left the stables, going out the back way so she would not cross paths with the Kasir.
She had only met the Kasir once before in her life. In fact, that meeting was one of the very first things that she could remember of her childhood. He had been a huge muscled man with skin the colour of copper and eyes as dark as the grave. His head had been bald, except for a circle at the top where a black warrior-tail grew, falling well past his hips. She could not remember where she had met him nor how old she had been at the time. All she knew was that she had been young and small. So small that she had had to crane her neck up and up and up to look the Kasir in the face.
He had looked down at her – at her platinum blond hair, blue eyes and pale, pale skin – and laughed.
And so he had named her.
Sala … the Ghost.
The stables of the Kasir’s Tionn estates were situated at the bottom of the hill below the sprawling villa. Sala had never been into the villa, though she knew that before she had come to Tionn, one of the Kasir’s many sons had taken up permanent residence there with his sister-wife, where before it had remained mostly empty until the Kasir had chosen to visit it. Najim said that the estate, and the city itself, had grown then and that everyone was all the better for it.
Sala slowly made her way around the stables towards the estate’s wall, making sure that she kept out of sight of the line of the Kasir’s family and soldiers that were filing into the building. The guardsman at the gate, Esam, smiled at her as she approached.
“Here you are!” he said, giving her a slap on the back. “How are you, boy? I haven’t seen you in a while.”
Sala laughed. “They’ve been keeping me busy up in the stables,” she answered. “All work and no play for this boy!”
Esam chuckled as we waved her through the gate.
Outside the confines of the estate, the streets were dusty and narrow. The sun had risen high enough for it to have become hot. It would get hotter and Sala’s fair skin would burn. So she kept to the shadows of the building whenever she could, already sweating.
The buildings here were two or three storeys high and divided into small apartments. Shops, workshops and homes existed alongside each other, the noises and smells emanating from them combining into a cacophony that was oddly comforting to Sala. Some of the earliest memories she had were of her running through these streets, chasing after the boys as they playfully taunted her. She had been wild then, had lived on the streets, and it had been that way until she had pushed Aska Hyu into the mud on one of those rare occasions when it had actually rained.
Already the streets were filling with the traders from Bomba. They shouted out their wares to passersby.
“Incense! Lovely incense!”
“Ivory! Get your ivory! Ivory!”
“Slaves! Beautiful slaves! Learned slaves! Strong slaves! I’ve got them all!”
Sala quickly walked past them, head down, muttering a “no thank you” whenever she was approached by one of the sellers. She slowly but surely wended her way through the throng of people until she was in a section of the city that was relatively free of people. She breathed a little easier. Whenever people glimpsed her for the first time, she always felt their eyes boring into her, scrutinising her pale ugliness.
She came to Aska Hyu’s home a little while later. It was quite a large home, occupying a whole building on its own, but with only one storey. The outside was fairly drab, “to detract thieves” as Yasir Hyu would say. Sala knocked on the front door and waited, remembering how it was out the front of this very house where she had pushed Aska in the mud after the pretty girl had called her a “filthy boy”. She smiled at the memory. Alima Hyu had come out then to scold them both, but she had taken Sala in and had let her stay with them for the next two years of her life.
The door opened and the Hyu’s servant ushered Sala in with a bow. Sala led her own way into the building’s open-air atrium where she found Aska working over a loom.
“Sala!” Aska exclaimed. She stood and rushed over to give her friend a hug. “It has been so long.”
“Indeed it has,” Sala said, looking down at her friend.
Aska was a year younger than Sala, being sixteen, and she was as unlike to Sala as a cat was to a dog. Where Sala loved riding and swimming and playing with the dogs in the stables, Aska would prefer to sit at her loom or do some gardening or gossip with her friends. And where Sala would only wear the cotton tunics and trousers popular among the men of Tionn, Aska would only wear the sleeveless, ankle-length linen dresses that were popular amongst Tionnian women.
Aska was blessed with the sort of looks that most women would die for. Her smooth skin was the colour of coffee and her almond-shaped eyes were gold-brown with long lashes that curled luxuriously. She had high cheekbones and when she smiled, her teeth shone whitely. Her dark hair was divided into hundreds of tiny braids and pulled away from her face, as was the norm for women in the hot climate of Tionn.
Sala remembered one stiflingly hot summer day, not long before she had started to work in the stables, when she had asked Alima to braid her hair as well, so that it would be kept off her neck. Alima had sat Sala down and attempted to plait her smooth hair but after half an hour, she had thrown her hands up in disgust. “Your hair is too slippery,” she said. “The braids will not take.” Sala had left and taken matters into her own hands.
When she had gone to the inn that night to work behind the bar – as she had in those days – with her blonde hair cropped to little more than a finger’s length, the whole room had gone silent. Sala had self-consciously brushed her hand over her head then, which caused such a raucous round of laughing that Sala had felt tears welling in her eyes.
Then someone had yelled out above the guffawing and hooting, “This girl is clever, no?”
“There can be no doubt!” another had added as Yasir Hyu had emerged from nowhere to affectionately tousle her short hair. She had kept her hair that way for the past three years.
“How have you been?” Aska asked now.
“Well enough,” Sala replied. “Najim and Hessa have given me a few hours free.”
“Excellent!” Aska said enthusiastically. “You can come with me to Rafi’s and Adara’s wedding.”
Sala’s stomach dropped. “Did you say Rafi?” Sala asked, trying to sound casual, but failing.
Aska peered at Sala, her eyes serious. “Yes, Rafi,” she said. “I know you and he have had your differences. But you were once friends so you must be there for the happiest day of his life.”
Differences? Aska didn’t know the half of it.
Sala swallowed hard, pushed down the lump in her throat and nodded. Aska smiled and clapped her hands. “Yaya!” she called. A moment later a female servant came out, bowing. “Please bring me my cosmetic box.”
Sala laughed as the servant left. “You are not supposed to turn up to a wedding looking prettier than the bride,” she said.
“You are not supposed to turn up to a wedding in a dirty tunic and trousers, either,” Aska deftly countered.
Sala and Aska arrived at the tipi that had been erected outside the city on the fringes of the Wadi Savannah just before the bride did. Around the small conical hut, men and women had gathered together. Aska left Sala’s side to mingle with the women who were seated around a fire preparing an assortment of vegetables. The men stood to the side, passing around a long hashish pipe. Sala hesitated for a moment but decided that her presence would cause the least amount of offence among the men.
“Rafi will surely make you proud,” a man was saying to Rafi’s father as Sala approached.
“There is no doubt in my mind,” he answered. “Sala,” he said in greeting as she joined them. “I would not have expected you to be here.”
“I would not miss this for the world,” Sala lied. “It is an honour that I cannot begin to describe.”
The men approved of her words and offered her the hashish pipe. She took a long, deep breath of the sickly sweet smoke, passing it along to the next man just as Adara arrived. The elephant that the bride rode on was draped with colourful throw rugs and bells that tinkled with every heavy, loping step. Its head swung from side to side, ears and trunk waving methodically. Adara looked radiant from her padded seat, with her wavy dark hair loose across her shoulders for once. She wore a simple dress not unlike Aska’s but it was fitted to her body, accentuating her womanly curves. Her head was framed by an elaborate headdress made from the tail feathers of a peacock.
A collective sigh went through the gathering as Adara smiled down on them all, tears of happiness falling from her eyes. Her father, accompanied by the father of Rafi, approached the elephant warily and helped Adara down. She kissed each of them, a soft pressing of her lips against their cheekbones. She said not a word as she left her father’s and future father-in-law’s sides. The women opened the flap of the tipi for her and she entered, alone. There she would wait for her husband-to-be, for as long as it took for him to return from his solitary hunt.
The proceedings went on as they had, with the women chatting over the cooking fire and the men passing around the pipe while discussing what Rafi would bring back with him.
“I brought back a wild boar on my wedding day.”
“Perhaps he will bring back an antelope?”
“A wildebeest, for sure.”
When Rafi finally returned it was the body of a spotted leopard that was slung across his shoulders. He was wearing nothing but a leather loincloth. His copper skin gleamed with sweat, his muscles rippling with each subtle movement. His dark brown hair was loose, shining in the late morning sun, hanging across his chiselled, handsome features. The men let out a cheer as he approached them.
He threw down the cat at the feet of Adara’s father and spoke, his voice beautifully sonorous, “I left here with nothing but a spear and my own courage, in the hope that I would bring back a prize that was worthy of the love of Adara Yesari. I bring you this animal Wazir Yesari and ask for your permission to take your daughter as my wife.”
Wazir responded immediately. “Your request is granted without hesitation,” he said. “You have brought honour upon yourself this day. You are Rafi Bedeon no longer. I hereby dub you Rafi Wakiuessett – leopard heart!”
Rafi knelt to the ground as his father approached him with a razor. And then he had proceeded to shave all of Rafi’s hair – his beautiful, beautiful hair! – except for a circle on the top that would become his warrior tail.
Rafi stood, hair falling from his shoulders, and grasped his father’s hand, pulling him close so that their foreheads touched. He repeated the action with his new father-in-law and proclaimed, “We are kin!”
With the formalities done with, Rafi’s mother rushed from the group of women to give her son a bone-crushing hug. “Your chest,” she said, running her fingers across the scratches that were there. “Let me tend to that.”
“No,” Rafi said, his voice gentle but commanding. “There will only be one who will bathe my wounds and she is waiting for me.” As Rafi approached the tipi his gaze swept over the throng of people around him until his eyes stopped. To rest solely on Sala.
And she looked straight back at him, tears running down her face.
One look. Pleading. Desperate.
Please, she said silently, mouthing the words. Remember.
Two children. One pale – a girl; fourteen. The other dark – a boy; thirteen.
Running. Laughing. Playing. Hiding.
Hiding from the others. They can’t find us. Oh no. They never will. Not down here. They would be safe down here.
Together. Alone. All alone.
A glance. Beautiful.
A soft touch of hands. Passion.
A kiss. Love. Devotion. Forever.
And ever.
And ever.
Rafi’s face betrayed nothing. But silently, he answered her: I’m sorry.
Sala ran through the streets, tears running down her face, sobs escaping from her throat. Why? Why oh why? It wasn’t fair. She didn’t deserve this heartache. What had she ever done wrong?
Sala fell to the ground, grazing her knees, her arms, the side of her face. But she didn’t care. She didn’t even care that people had seen her fall, were still watching her. She wrenched at her tunic, pulling, her fingers digging into her palms, pulling. She let out a bloodcurdling wail and clawed at the ground beneath her, skinning her fingers. She lay on her side, drawing her knees to her chest and wept, cried, howled.
Pain.
So much pain.
“Why Rafi?” she moaned. “I loved you.”
When her tears were spent, Sal brushed herself off, wiped away the wetness on her face, got up and left, leaving a wake of startled people behind her.
She arrived at the stables a little while later, after having jumped the wall of the estate to avoid cheerful Esam at the gate. She kept her head low, lest anyone see her ripped skin and clothes, and her blotchy face, and immediately went to her stall. Vuk was not there, probably off finding food, but Inas gave her a tired wag of her tail from the corner. Sala went to pet her but didn’t even get to kneel down before Najim was shouting at her.
“Sala! There you are!” he rasped, breathing heavy, sweat pouring down his face. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”
“You told me to leave the stables,” Sala said. “Remember?”
“Never mind that,” he said. “Get yourself washed and changed.”
Sala was startled. “Why?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Why?” Najim said, flustered. “Why? I’ll tell you why! The Kasir wants to see you.”
