There was a chill in the room, and Nina shivered. The light from the torches danced on the walls, and the shadows shifted. She closed her eyes and listened.
“One day, the Adviser goes to the Emperor, who has just lost his tayta to an unexplainable sickness, and tells him of the strange dreams he is having about a girl with unimaginable attay. The Emperor, remembering old myths of madness and favor, sends the Adviser to find the girl. He will bind himself to her, and together they will usher in an era of prosperity for their people.
“The Adviser agrees and sets out that very day, traveling far into Icosa where he finally finds the girl in a small ayllu. The Girl, having never left home, is afraid to journey alone with strangers and makes one request—that her Sister be permitted to accompany them.”
The softness of Master Wara’s voice drew Nina into a deep lull. His words played behind her eyelids as if she was dreaming. Or remembering.
“On the journey, the three become fast friends, and when they finally arrive at Amaru Kancha, the young Emperor is filled with jealousy and eager to keep them all close. He creates a circle of elders—the Emperor, the Adviser, the Girl, the Sister, and the Scholar—even though they are all children themselves, and together, they form grand plans for their people and their lands. Ideas to unite under a single banner. Tawantinsuyu, they will call it.
“The Emperor will become more powerful than his tayta, and he will please the gods so that they will gift him a long, fruitful life. But with all this pressure, cracks begin to form. The Girl is not eager to marry the Emperor, and he notices that his Adviser is overtly friendly with her. And the Sister is distant even when she’s near. Absent in a way that makes the Emperor wary of her. Because the two seem close, the Emperor asks the Scholar to speak to the Sister and find out her intentions.
“That’s when the Scholar learns her secret—the Girl is not the only one with unimaginable attay. The Sister can see the threads of life, both past and future, and she knows a blight is coming for their lands.”
A sound pulled Nina back to the present, and she opened her eyes to see Master Wara hesitating, hands hovering over a thread. She said nothing, only watched as he placed the tips of his fingers on a knot and then shook his head.
“The Scholar encourages the Sister to tell the Emperor. She does, and the five discuss how trustworthy the Sister’s foretelling can be when all she knows is that a white man will come to destroy them all. The Adviser thinks it is ridiculous. The Scholar stays quiet. The Girl holds the Sister’s hand with a look of panic in her eyes. Finally, the Emperor says they will take action. They will build an army to fight the kukuchi.
“And so begins the Harvest, where families are required to providethe chani—children, crops, textiles, and whatever else the Emperor asks of them—to belong to Tawantinsuyu. But it is only the Emperor who wants this, and the other four make their disagreement known. Their circle is fractured. The Sister decides she will not be a part of it any longer, and begs the Girl to leave with her, but the Girl has a secret of her own—she is with child, and it is the Adviser’s.
“But the Adviser is willing to forsake all he knows for the Girl. He loves her more than he loves his duty. The night before they are due to leave, the Emperor demands an audience with the Adviser and the Scholar. It is there that the Scholar is forced to reveal to the Adviser that the Girl’s attay can be used toinfluence. That the love the Adviser feels for the Girl is a show of control over his will.
“The Adviser, at first, is in denial, but the Emperor tells him the true story of how the Ikara were formed, and the destruction they wrought on the land. The same destruction that will greet them if they fall into the trap once again. The Emperor pleads with his Adviser to heed his word and join hands, and finally, devastated and heartbroken, the Adviser relents.”
A knock on the door startled Nina, and she jumped in her seat. Master Wara brushed his hand over the table and collected the strands in a white-knuckled fist. “Come in,” he said brightly, as if he hadn’t just hypnotized Nina into envisioning a past life.
Kasik’s face slid into view. “The emperor is insisting that Nina needs rest.”
For some reason, Nina was half expecting Master Wara to laugh and brush him off. Instead, the man stood and gave Nina a shallow bow. “Until next time,” he said pointedly.
Nina had no choice but to leave the room and his unfinished story behind.
There was no rest to be had that night. Despite the exhaustion that blurred her vision and cast a haze over her mind, Nina lay in bed and thought of every worst-case scenario.
Nina would try to kill the emperor and fail. They would go back for Sacha and imprison her for Nina’s crimes. They would strip her family of their land and force them into servitude, and then they would execute Nina for all to see, as an example of what happens when someone dares to defy the emperor.
If Nina was truly doing all this to maintain the peace, then she would simply marry Emperor Maicu. Chaska seemed content enough, with her gowns and gold and freedom to move about. But there was a glint in the emperess’s eyes that spoke of secrets and facades.
Nina knew there was something she wasn’t seeing, and she intended to dig deeper the next morning at tea, but Chaska never came. The same stony-faced attendant who brought their tray every morning delivered it alone and without explanation. Nina drank and ate and spiraled further.
Even Kasik seemed to keep his distance. He was quiet as they walked to the scholar’s wing and Nina had to quicken her steps to keep close. Even then, the space between them was an ocean. Kasik finally acknowledged her right before he opened Master Wara’s door. With his hand still on the latch, he turned to her and said, “The emperor has requested that you dine with him tonight.” He paused, and then added, “In his rooms.”
Nina frowned. “Alone?”
“Yes, alone.” The muscles in Kasik’s jaw twitched. Nina wondered if he felt a certain way about the emperor’s request, or her naive question. Ofcoursethey’d be alone. He was the emperor—he didn’t need to follow rules of propriety with his future wife, but it also meant that Nina might get the opportunity she had been hoping for. A chanceto try and free Emperor Maicu of his achilla. It was exactly what she wanted, and yet the burn of nerves spread through her like a wildfire.
It was all she could focus on as Master Wara droned on about the quipu and how to interpret the knots. There were sequences for each word and number, one string versus two or ten, the length of spaces and the string itself. Her mind was in no position to pay attention, much less understand. Distractedly, she thought about the story he had told her the previous day and whether he would finish it, but when she asked, he gave her a noncommittal answer that left her more uncertain than before.
An unfamiliar guard came to collect her from her lessons. “Where’s Kasik?” Nina asked, looking both ways down the hall.
“I have been tasked with escorting you this evening” was all the walla said. Another nonanswer, another stony silence down another long corridor.
This would be the rest of my life if I stayed, she thought. Nina shuddered.
The benefit of being left mostly alone was the time to consider her course of action. Back in her rooms once again, she spent time on her hair, purposely arranging each strand so that it fell perfectly across her shoulders and forehead. She picked out a dress that was a deep red and thin, the fabric settling over her body with barely a whisper.
The hem and sleeves were embroidered with birds and trees in varying shades of green and gold that reminded her of the Tuta Kulla in the early hours of the morning, when the dew that covered the leaves sparkled like stars fallen to earth. She fingered the gold band around her wrist and remembered what it felt like to be surrounded by so much life and love. It made the loss of it that much keener.
Nina pushed the band up onto her arm and arranged her sleeve over it—something to keep her grounded—and then she waited.
