Monday, December 18, 2017

Tother Hand, Chapter 8, part 3


She made her way deeper into the middle of the oasis, unsure what exactly she should look for. She felt a tingling in her spine and the hairs on her neck stood up. The words were spoken in Avestan, but they slowly transformed as she processed the practiced language in her head.

The words were: Healer. Welcome back.

And: Turn around.

She placed her hand on her father’s blade and turned. An unusually happy old man sat on a rug next to a yurt. He nodded and laughed and laughed silently. He waved: Come here.

He nodded again, grinning ear to ear, and patted the space on the rug next to him.

She walked over hesitantly. She asked in her native tongue: What do you want, grandfather?

The old man smiled and smiled, and laughed. He had perhaps only one tooth in his whole head. His face was impossibly old and wrinkled, but the hills and valleys in his face were completely smooth and shiny. One eye seemed completely covered by eyelids and the colour was off, almost whited out with a milky mist.

He spoke Avestan again and it took a while to make the marks in her head: Don’t be formal.

And: Sit. Sit.

She kneeled down opposite him. This was both a sign of respect and a solid fighting stance. The old man continued to laugh silently and smile crazily. His one good eye moved around eagerly.

A squirrel chirruped and the wind whistled through a canyon. This meant: I know who you are, child. I know what you seek.

A camel belched in response. She replied: Tell me everything.

The ancient man smiled. He smiled more, and his lips spread so wide you could see the gaps at the back of his jaw where his molars used to be. He nodded and nodded and waved her inside the yurt.

She looked over her shoulder and nodded inside. She pointed. It meant: In there?

The old man smiled and laughed and laughed silently. He nodded the whole while.

9001 stood and turned, then lifted the blankets covering the yurt entrance. Her eyes took a long time to adjust to the darkness inside. But she heard a familiar voice and arch lilt in the accent.

The voice said: Hello sister. We meet again. Come in and sit down.

9001 pushed herself forward into the space between the light and dark. Her eyelids were mostly closed, but her senses were tuned and she could sense the layout of the yurt and the objects in it. She moved swiftly in the proper rhythm, leading with the left to pull out her father’s rondel and follow the corners of the imaginary metre-sized squares in front of her. She closed the gap to her opponent quickly and could see everything brightly by the third step.

A cicada hummed and a rook tapped at some tree bark insistently. This meant: Do not fight. We must talk.

Undeterred, 9001 could feel and sense the forearm of her opponent in outside-cross position, that is, her left was crossed with her opponent’s right. She pulled the blade back across the elbow to cut the tendons where the bicep ended, and pushed forward with the right hand to strike at the ribs behind the opponent’s elbow. She must have missed with the blade, but that was a feint anyway, she did connect with something that crackled and squished, though, as she smashed her right hand through the target.

She felt a sharp pain in her left side and collapsed in pain. Her left foot was simultaneously kicked out from under her and she floated to the ground in the frozen time between the light and dark. Her eyes were completely open by now and the light in the yurt was bright. She stared straight up at the ceiling of the yurt. She marvelled at how perfectly in sync she was despite being bested, and wondered at her mastery of the magic spell.

She blacked out before she hit the ground, however, and fell out of the spell as she rolled over in pain. She raised her blade in the left hand defensively, trying to get her legs under her. A foot pushed down on her left shoulder and she collapsed. Her father’s blade went skittering across the floor. Her own blade was still hanging on her right side and she wanted desperately to move her right hand to it.

The foot pressed her upper arm and shoulder, and was dangerously close to her neck. She grasped the ankle with her right hand and tried to twist it off. A masked face leaned close to hers and laughed gaily. She recognised the mask and the eyes from the night when she had fought the woman in Kabul.

The woman said, laughing: O sister! You are very determined! If you will not talk, at least listen. Please listen to what I say. If you are wilful, you’ll just get hurt more.

Another voice said: Stop it.

It was her father’s voice, she realised. Only she would have heard it. She relented and the foot came off her almost immediately.

The woman offered her left hand to help 9001 up. She took it with her right, which seemed more natural and easy. Sure enough, the hands interlocked and the strength of both arms lifted her easily. She felt sharp searing pain in her left ribs and grabbed herself with her left arm to support her ribs and side.

They regarded each other for a while, eye to eye. The woman seemed the mirror image of herself in every way.

9001 asked: Who are you?

The woman asked: Who are you?

9001 said bravely: I am 9001, daughter of 2711.

The woman said: Who was your mother?

9001 held her mouth shut in fear and shame.

The woman said: I will tell you, since you know but won’t answer. Our mother was 2387.

9001 stared in shock. Had the woman actually used the first person plural?

The woman laughed and unhooked her silk veil from one side so that 9001 felt the shock of looking at herself in a shiny reflection. Except that this was no facsimile of a shiny reflection, it was a real person who looked exactly like the way she envisioned herself from her reflection.

The woman said: 9001, I am your sister, 8999.

9001’s mind rebelled. She said numbly: My sister’s name is 9003.

8999 laughed happily. She said: O sister! 9003 has too many threes. We are both indivisible, you and I. The rhythms you have tried to use were mine and yours. But I am the left-handed twin and you are the right. No wonder you are always slightly unbalanced.

And she laughed again. As 8999 laughed, she seemed to catch her right side as if she were hurt there.

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