XXXVI.
Ipaused in my tale, uncertain what else there was to tell.
“I think that’s all of it,” I said, “at least until something new and eventful happens here, but I am hoping for plain, boring peace.”
“You have earned peace,” the pale masked Otherlander agreed.
We sat on the marble bench in the garden, in my alcove dedicated to The Kind and Fair.The offering bowl, serving as a bath for birds and other creatures when not in use, sat atop a granite pedestal currently holding the pale pink water of my devotional.
Newly planted rose bushes around the alcove had yet to bloom, save for one.Finding roses proved a challenge, but word got out of a Rivani couple selling rose bush cuttings just north of the capital.Alaina sent a special envoy to procure them on my behalf.Although the Rivani couple relayed that their cuttings only spawned red roses, the Otherlander pricked his fingertip on one of the thorns.That bush immediately overflowed with white.
After his display of magic, the Otherlander draped his bronze robes over the bench as he sat, retrieved a squirrel that caught its claw on the embroidery of the Otherlander’s robe, and then gestured for me to sit beside him.He asked me to recount my full tale now that I was no longer under constraint.We gazed not at each other but outward as we spoke, or rather, as I spoke to him.It made the storytelling easier, not having to face him while I detailed my sordid experiences.
“Tell me,” the Otherlander said, “what is the anniversary day of your birth?”
An odd question, but this was a Kind and Fair Protector of Ilyichia and my unlikely benefactor, so I told him.
“I give you the tsarina’s death as a present then,” he said.“The day after, Ilyichia will be free of her.”
“I do not require such a gift,” I demurred, not wishing to offend him, but also not sorry for secretly coveting it.
“She no longer has my support, and I need to make way for her successor.I will also ensure that you are reinstated.Will your brother pose any obstacle?”
After our second wedding, this time in a chapel dedicated to the Great Holy so that no one could dispute our marriage, Alaina insisted that I write to Alexei despite my misgivings.To my surprise, he answered my correspondence.His letter, filled with warmth and heartfelt apologies, assured me of his genuine relief to learn that I had not perished and reaffirmed his continued affection.He promised me, whenever the political tide turned again, that he would gladly surrender the family estates, funds, and titles to my care once more.Although I never intended to return to Ilyichia, the assurance of uncontested reinstatement eased the guilt of having come to Altania with nothing.
“I think that my brother dislikes the attention it puts on him.”
“Then you are fortunate,” said the Otherlander.
I debated saying anything else, but this Otherlander had come to my aid when no one else would.And as one person in a mask to another, he might understand.
“I am afraid that this and this alone will be my legacy,” I confided.“I fear that I will never be remembered for anything else but my time at the hands of the tsarina.”
“Often that is the way of it,” the Otherlander agreed.
“Tell me if you can, my lord,” I asked humbly, “how is it that one year of a human life can be so dramatic that it obliterates everything that came before?”My question came out like one from a child, but compared to the presumed age of the Otherlander, I probably was to him.“I have lived upon this earth for over four decades, and yet, this will be all that anyone recalls of me, as if I had no life prior.”
“I have lived many ages more than you, and yet a recent incident in my life has consumed and obliterated all else that I have ever been.”After a long pause, he asked, “Do you know why that is so?”
Likely because it was the most delicious gossip to tell.I bit my tongue though and shook my head, unwilling to be my sharp self with this powerful creature.
“Those incidents determine our strength.They allow us to prove who we are beneath the pretense of our given societies.My situation, your hardship.We are still here.We still endure.We have proven ourselves more than what others thought of us.Be proud of your struggle.It is not your year of torment that is the moral of your story, but your triumph over it.It forged you into something better and stronger than you were before.”
The chipmunk sleeping in the Otherlander’s sleeve woke and poked its head out, sniffing the air before deciding that the sleeve offered more warmth and comfort than anything outside of it.Maybe I was just another little creature seeking warmth and comfort to this Otherlander since he offered sympathy no one else around me could provide.
I grieved the loss of my fingers, my glove stuffed where I could not fill it, my boots too where there were no toes.I resented the mask that kept my scars out of sight.Too frequently, I roused from slumber or could not sleep at all for the irrational fear that I would have to return to the tsarina.I dreamed of those I loved turning from me.I dreamed that I was trapped in a costume I could not remove.I dreamed of being blinded and bound again.I dreamed of the cold.I did not know what to do with those wounds.
Speaking with the Otherlander helped, even if I did not feel better or stronger.I just felt tired.So tired.
“Better and stronger.”I turned to face him, mask to mask.“Is that the lie you tell yourself, my lord?”
A soft laugh emanated from behind his beaded silk.“What else would you have me say?”
