Although the antique chair started as a soft seat, the crushed velvet soon gave way to the hours of her bedside wait, and Michel's backside ached from her constant vigil. While Chiyo let out moans and snorts, she awakened neither the first day nor the next, although on the second night she thrashed her nightmare, shrieking, "Not my me! Don't take my me!" On the third, Chiyo sleepwalked a yard from her sickbed before stumbling, then sprawling on the chair on top of Michel. Neither this, nor Michel's screeches for the nurse, woke up the wounded girl.
Although Akachi and Aito both offered to take turns, her little brother begged her to play, and her mother suggested that Michel must sooner or later play her role, insinuating that being applauded by the aristocracy for her rank, privilege, and beauty was all she could hope for in life, Michel gave more or less silent rebuffs to these voices--more so to her mother, less so to her friends, and most articulately to her brother, to whom she explained that she owed Chiyo her companionship.
Though Michel was not as able a playmate as the others, Akachi befriended her, then became her eyes in games. Though Chiyo would not wake up blind, and even had new vision planted in her dead eye socket, Michel knew what it was like to live in a different world than her friends. Not that it was an empty world; right now, there were snores, moans, the thump of her heartbeat, the footsteps in the hall of servants or their infrequent visitors, the scent of the yellow roses Akachi brought for them, and the smells and tastes of platters brought by overzealous servants, who called her "Marchioness," or "my lady," and served her before spooning soup into the unconsciously slurping Chiyo.
When they tried to feed Michel, she closed her mouth, clutched the fork firmly and wrested it free, and despite her anxiety, which had grown to a crescendo of internal howling since leaving Earth, took great pains to ensure that all of her meal arrived, one forkful at a time, in her mouth. When a stray shred of asparagus fell on her new plushy gown, she brushed it aside, and assumed, for the sake of her dignity, that the overbearing servants hadn't noticed.
She loved her new gown second only to the daily baths she was encouraged to enjoy, being told that bath water was drawn according to rank, and the warm bath would go wasted if the Marchioness didn't enjoy her privilege. Although she allowed them to escort her the first time, the next day she made her own way there and back, having used a system of mental tabs she devised as placeholders for items in the Mansion of the Shining Prince, so that she could dress herself and walk from bed to the kitchen, the library, or the bathroom without hazard. Not only did she mark the length and turns of the castle corridors, she designated the location of the tub, and the placement of towels, washcloths, and soap.
While the uncharted visual world seemed less mysterious than obscure, monotonous, and monolithic, and she was more or less happy with the tidy mental world she swept clean of the onrushing profusion from her other four unkempt senses, these mental tabs made it easier to go from one activity to another, so that she could take as much pleasure from life as a sighted person. More, she thought, considering how much of her friends' lives was taken by television. What she did find tedious were the interminable stretches of time between activities, for which she carried a book in braille. Although The War of the Worlds in braille was 300 pages, that was the book knocking around in her vestment pocket as they ran for the Greyhound station, and she finished it on the bus, restarted it, and finished it for the second time the first day she waited at Chiyo's bedside.
Although it was an extremely good book, what was worth reading three times in one week? If there was no braille on Alsantia, she now had no defense against the endless stretches of time. She would have to be content to be bored and boring, or she would have to become a good conversationalist. Work on your smile, the Marchioness had told her disapprovingly, before leaving her by the sickbed without sparing a glance for Chiyo.
When she chatted up the next servant with small talk about the weather and her family life, and realized how patronizing she must sound, she forgave herself by telling herself she was practicing her new role of Marchioness.
"What language is this, my lady?" The voice that boomed over Michel's shoulder dragged a trail of warm breath scented with mint tea.
Michel turned in her seat towards the voice. "It's two languages--English and Braille."
"How can a book be in two languages?"
"The other servants didn't hesitate to ask how I was reading it. Yours is a much better question. I like you." Although Michel heard her pomposity as she said it, she decided to continue playing The Marchioness and see how she liked it.
"Thank you, my lady."
"Could you become my regular servant?"
"Begging your pardon, my lady. I'm the nurse."
The Marchioness realized that she had completely forgotten about her friend. Even in a Marchioness this seemed unconscionable, as for the moment they shared the same room. "How is she?"
"As her eyelids are moving, she may be listening, or only dreaming. I expect her to wake tonight or tomorrow."
"Would reading to her help?" asked The Marchioness.
"That's a very good idea, my lady. What's that book about?"
"Oh, not this book. I already read it to her," lied The Marchioness. "And since I don't know Alsantian, I was hoping you could read an Alsantian book as part of her treatment."
"Could you not order a minstrel to come and sing songs or play music?"
When the nurse forgot to add 'my lady,' Michel's thought that the Marchioness would take offense kindled a counterfeit resentment that flushed her face, drew a jet of flustered breath, fluttered the eyelids that she had scarcely paid any attention to until that moment, and in other ways felt very much like the real thing. Unsure how to voice her displeasure in a diplomatic way that would not intimidate or alienate this educated servant, she only simpered, "I can do that?" As The Marchioness missed the CD player in the girls' bedroom in the Mansion of the Shining Prince, her mind whirled with the thought of live music at her beck and call.
"Of course, my lady. Should I carry the order?"
"But I don't like anyone else yet. I like you. What's your name?"
"Helia."
"Any suggestions for a good Alsantian book, Helia?"
"We don't have libraries in Ghulmarque, my lady." As the nurse shuffled around the bed, her shoes scuffled on the flagstones. Michel realized she was dodging the question.
"Surely there are books. With so many rooms in this castle, y mother must have a library."
"No, my lady. Nor are there tutors, as their superior airs offend the master and his grace. While there is a bookshelf in the den, I would fear to bring one of those dusty books near a sickbed. With your permission, I'll make inquiries and borrow something to read with tonight's dose. Might we start with a chapter, my lady?"
"You may." Michel tried to inflect it with her most magnanimous tone. "Could you bring Akachi?"
"If her duties permit, my lady." As the Marquessa did not suffer idle hands, Aito was introduced to the stable upon arrival, whereas Akachi, who was told that as an Alsantian citizen she could pick her duties, chose the kitchen to stay indoors, and closer to Michel.
"Could she not suffer it on my pleasure?" asked Michel, with an imperious air her little brother had used with a servant girl when he asked for pancakes when breakfast was eggs.
"That she could," said Helia, "although she will likely go to bed all the later, and miss dinner as well."
"It's only a chapter," sighed Michel. "Ten minutes, tops."
"As you say, my lady," said the nurse. "As you say." This time her voice was a little nearer Michel's ear, as if the nurse repeated herself while bowing. Why should the nurse bow to a blind girl and an unconscious patient, unless she was very simple or very, very good? Michel hoped for the latter, for she liked nothing better than a skilled reader, who didn't falter over words.
Although Michel would miss Braille, she could get used to being pampered by servants. She could care less about other Earth amenities; although Aito and Akachi complained about the Alsantian toilet, Michel saw little difference in the facilities, given that she only knew them as holes to sit on, and a lever which sucked the smelly waste away, both of which they had in Alsantia.
They also complained about the color of food, especially vegetables, while Michel, who could only imagine how food looked, liked Alsantia's sweeter, crispier vegetables better. If color had a taste on either world, she couldn't taste it. When they complained about their coarse clothes and bedding, Michel tolerated that longer, and did not attempt to deny it, for her garments and sheets were not only feathery, but smelled of lavender and violets. Not that they were malnourished or kept in filth; far from it—while they had smaller wardrobes, their clothes were launderered, and while their food was not gourmet, there were fattening and filling heaps of vegetarian fare. At first the chef thought he was demoted to filling the horse troughs and chicken feed bins, but Michel eventually prevailed upon him to understand her bidding.
If Michel had chose, she could have immersed herself in her mother's world of fashion, gourmet treats, rude opinions, and other matters of taste, but even at Chiyo's bedside, where she could only eat from the fringe of that fancy table, so to speak, she lived in a more carefully cultivated world. While she gave Chiyo what morsels she could from her plate, it was not as if her unconscious friend could savor anything--not even her dreams, to judge from the sour faces, shallow snorts, and clawing hands which fidgeted during those nightmares.
Ten minutes after Helia left, Chiyo plummeted into a nightmare so harsh that it echoed into the real world as panting squeals shot out of the hurt girl, shrieks that collapsed into babbling which continued after she sat straight up in bed, seized The Marchioness's hands, and pleaded with such fervent gibberish that Michel, feeling she must do something, banished The Marchioness from the throne of her personality and felt for Chiyo's brow. This act of sympathy had violent consequences: when the dreaming girl bit her thumb, Michel jerked back, and Chiyo clattered on the headboard.
Clutching the hurt hand, Michel smeared saliva and blood around the peeled skin, then she froze, one hand sticking to the other. The bed creaked, the sheets scuffled, the spoon clinked in Michel's half-eaten bowl of soup, then ravenous slurps stretched longer than humanly possible.
"Chiyo?"
When the other girl came up for air, she panted, "I'm so hungry!"
"You're awake!"
"Not for long. My head hurts, Michel. It hurts so bad my eyes are watering." Chiyo's voice was breaking from the strain of sitting up.
"I'll call the nurse."
"The nurse?" Chiyo sounded frantic. "Whose dungeon is this? Did they get us?"
"Did who get us, Chiyo?"
"Am I drugged? Everything's blurry!" Chiyo tried to stand, stumbled over Michel's chair, and failing to catch herself, fell forward into Michel's lap.
"Chiyo, you're in no danger!" To allow Chiyo room, Michel scooted against the arm of the commodious chair, but the woozy girl slumped next to her in an exhausted heap that was even more sprawling.
"Just tell me where we ended up, Michel. Did the Skiringa sell us to Suvani?"
"No one sold us, Chiyo. We even escaped the dwarves."
"Tell me!"
"Chiyo, we made it! We're safe. And I have big news!"
"Tell me!" Chiyo growled.
"I have a mother!" squealed Michel.
"This is the Marquessa's castle?" The growl bottomed out into a groan. "Tell me you're not serious, Michel!"
"Why would I joke about that, Chiyo? We've all wanted parents." Michel's lip trembled. "Or were you pretending?"
Chiyo sighed. "Of course I miss my parents, Michel. Just because I remembered their faces doesn't mean I missed them less than you."
Michel sniffed. "You could have told me. How could you know this waited for me and not breathe a word of it? I keep secrets."
"Not from Akachi. Speaking of which, where is everyone?"
"Akachi and Aito are here."
"I'm betting the Marquessa put them to work the next morning." When Michel did not answer, Chiyo snorted. "You pulled light duties."
Chiyo winced. "You were unconscious for two days! Someone--not just anyone, but someone from Earth—had to sit with you."
"Why? I wasn't in any danger. I didn't even know you were there. Did you say two days? What happened to me?"
"You don't remember?"
"I remember climbing the mesa, and Oji shifting shape, but not much else." After hearing Michel's recount, Chiyo stepped away from the chair. Her motions were so silent that the blind girl could not discern what she did, until Chiyo uttered a low moan.
"What do you think, Michel?"
"About what?"
"About...never mind."
"Tell me what you want to know, Chiyo."
"I just...I looked in the mirror and saw my dwarven eye. In my shock, I forgot who I was talking to, and was asking you how it looked."
"I think you're lucky."
"Lucky?"
"I can't have them. My mother says I have beautiful pale blue eyes."
"Why would you want fake eyes? Your eyes might not work, but they're you. The dwarf would damage you to give you sight."
"It's easy for you to say, Chiyo. I would give up my beauty and find a way to make seeing agree with the rest of me."
"I could also say 'it's easy for you to say,' Michel. You've never looked into a mirror. You're a pretty girl. If you could see yourself, you wouldn't be so quick to give that up."
"That's just it, Chiyo. I can't see myself, let alone pick out the handsomest suitor my mother will allow. I don't know what handsome is."
"Everything's relative, Michel. Until today, I didn't really know what hungry was. When does the next meal come? I'm so starved."
"I'll get someone. Don't get up!" Michel felt her way to the door with one hand on the wall, but when she stepped into the hallway, Chiyo was there to grasp her hand.
"Your hand is wet, Michel. Is that blood?"
"It's nothing--an accident. You shouldn't be up."
"My full bladder disagrees with you."
They made their way down holding hands until Michel's other hand was grasped. As it was a tiny hand, there could be little doubt who it was.
"Merrick," said Michel to her little brother, "can you get Akachi."
"Are you hungry? Would she make me something to eat as well?"
"I'm sure she would, Merrick, but I need to talk to her now."
"I can do that. What will you do for me?"
"I'm not sure what I could do for you, Merrick. I have a book. Do you like books?"
"The book with the strange letters? It's interesting, but I don't like books."
"I have to pee!" grumbled Chiyo. "Two days later, I wake up full of pee and plugged with a strange eyeball, and you're dickering about a bribe!"
"Use my room." No sooner had Merrick said it, and began pulling them toward it, than Chiyo hastened their six-legged, hand-linked, cadence by near-dragging them into Merrick's room. Although her younger brother was happy to have an older sister and often begged her to play with his wooden horsemen, Michel did not like Merrick's room, which smelled of armpits and old food. Not knowing her way around the heaped toys and clothes piles, she could only linger awkwardly by the door as Chiyo used the facilities.
"Do you like my knights?" When her hand was battered by a wooden toy, she pulled it into both hands, and ran her fingers along the sanded figurine. "What's this he's holding?"
"A sword."
"Very nice." She handed the wooden warrior back to Merrick. "Is there somewhere I can sit?" When Merrick led her to a plush edge which brushed her knees, she felt forward, satisfied herself that it was a cushion, and turned to sit. As the minutes dragged, she wondered if she should say something. While she should be as happy as Merrick to have a sibling, her expectations of happiness did not translate to anything in common, and she hummed the tunes of her favorite TV commercials.
Michel waited uncomfortably for long minutes as Merrick showed her first one and then another toy; though she could only turn them around in her hands, she refrained from reminding him of her blindness, and wouldn't dream of letting him know that she was anything but happy to hold the clammy toys, which had acquired an unpleasant stink--nothing to put her finger on, just the indefinable stink of a boy's toys.
When Chiyo clasped her hand, and helped her up, Chiyo muttered, "it's the little things you miss the most."
"You mean Earth? You're not from there."
"I lived there most of my childhood Michel. Long enough to miss hand soaps. And I don't need to remind you that you're not from Earth either, seeing as how you're fitting in here in Ghulmarque."
When they stepped in the hall, Merrick clasped Michel in a tight hug, then repeated his request that she pass on his command to the kitchen before shutting his door.
They continued toward the clatter of pots, the chopping of knives, the scent of baking bread and the salty, oily aroma of cream of broccoli. "Why would the Marquessa bar her son's window, Michel?"
"Why were you fiddling with the window?"
"I was going to escape, Michel."
Michel took in a shock of air, then stammered, "escape what, Chiyo? My mother? Good luck? Me?"
"Even if you have it good here, this is Ghulmarque. Has anyone told you what lays below your brother's window?"
"Why would they?"
"Let's just say that window satisfies your brother's other hobby."
"Why are you being cryptic, Chiyo?"
"I'm not sure what side you're on."
"Just because I'm happy to have my mother and brother doesn't mean I'm any less on your side. Don't go, Chiyo. Stay here with us."
"Join your happy family and watch the spectacle with a bucket of popcorn? No thanks, Michel."
"What spectacle? What are you talking about?"
"Where's Aito?"
Michel was getting angry—did Chiyo want something to eat, or did she want Aito? Although she had only lived in a castle for two days, she knew a lady should not be used in this way. Feeling the grossness of this swelling entitlement, Michel relented, telling herself Chiyo would soon accept the sumptuous castle as their new living space, and if she must engage in light duties, what of it? Life under the Elderlichs' thumb was more severe than service to the Marquessa. Chiyo would be delighted by her new liberties.
"I might know the way, Chiyo. At the end of this hallway, is there an entranceway to the right?" The sooner Michel took her to Aito, the sooner Chiyo would learn firsthand that the Marquessa held their interests to heart.
"Yes--a stairwell."
"We're going all the way down, then through the door to the bailey."
Having descended the echoing tower stairwell, they crossed the bailey grounds. When she heard the snorts and hoof stamps of the stable, Michel smiled. "I told you I knew the way."
"Clear vision is a good thing." Said less with a note of sarcasm than a whole soundtrack of it, Michel nonetheless did her best not to show that she heard the caustic intention. If her wounded friend was determined to be impolite and mysterious, all the more reason to graceful and pleasant.
"You're up!" Aito's joyous voice was muffled as they collided in a hug, which Michel painfully noted was not extended to make room for three.
"Michel tells me everything is wonderful in Ghulmarque."
Aito seemed guarded. "Though I won't tell you I haven't been distressed by a few details, for the most part the Marquessa allows us peace."
"If you were unhappy, you should have told me, Aito," said Michel.
"Yes, Aito," said Chiyo, "why not tell Michel?"
"She was perfectly happy when we arrived," said Aito. "Why should I bother the Marchioness?"
"You mean much too happy for you to take her into your confidence," said Chiyo, again with the stormy sarcasm that made Michel flinch from its blistering electricity.
"Don't you trust me, Aito?" asked Michel in a very small voice.
"Pity stopped me--why open your eyes to the truth?"
What weren't they telling her, Michel wondered. "Are we not in a castle?"
"Yes..."
"Then why act like this is a dungeon, a prison, or a concentration camp?"
"Michel, haven't you felt anything unusual about Ghulmarque?"
"What do you consider unusual?"
"For instance, you don't think it's a bit quiet?"
Actually, the past two days were bliss to Michel, for whom life in Draden meant jarring beeps, screeches, chatter, clatter, growls, peeps, mews, the snarling hum of neon signs, the constant murmur of the Continental Finance Building, the blare of music, talk radio, and heated argument, and even the moody hush of The Mansion of the Shining Prince, which might have been smaller, but was a rowdy barnyard compared to the dead calm of her mother's castle. "So it's quiet. What's wrong with quiet? I like quiet."
When Chiyo laughed derisively and Aito laughed uneasily, Michel stepped back. She began to feel like she was being bullied by her friends. Were they jealous of her good luck? "What else?"
"Doesn't it seem that—even for a castle in which you're the Marchioness—everyone is inordinately nice to you?" asked Aito.
"As if they're scared to death," added Chiyo, cutting out 'scared' and 'death' with her acid tongue so neatly that it was like they dropped from her word balloon, shattering into pulsing atoms that throbbed back, like the smack of terror against a hearbeat.
"Why would they be scared of me? I couldn't describe them to the guard!"
"Why didn't you tell her, Aito?" accused Chiyo.
"Why do you think?"
"But now she's settled in! It will be worse for her when you do tell her the truth."
"Tell me what?" Michel asked, though it was useless, for they were so heated they were blind to her as well.
"What if we never tell her the truth?"
"You'd leave Michel? What about Akachi?"
"I'm not Akachi's accessory, you know," Michel muttered.
"Why do you think I haven't left?"
"I thought you were waiting for me?"
"Those weren't our orders, Chiyo. We were to report upon arrival in Alsantia. Against orders, I stayed, because you were wounded and comatose, Akachi was moping and threatening to do something foolish—"
"What's wrong with Akachi?" blurted Michel.
"—and Michel doesn't know anything."
"I'm awake now," said Chiyo. "Time to follow orders."
"And leave you here?"
"Why wouldn't I come?"
"Tell me what's going on!" screamed Michel.
"The best thing for you is to keep your mouth closed," said Chiyo, "so you don't mess things up for us."
"Why would I mess anything up? Why are you leaving? Why are you leaving me? As much as I'm happy here, I've only had my mother two days, and known you all my life. What's going on?"
Michel heard Aito's deep breath. "It's your mother, Michel."
"It's not just her, Aito. It's Ghulmarque."
"Michel doesn't care about Ghulmarque, Chiyo."
"What's wrong with my mother? Is she sick? Does she have a disease? Is that why the castle is quiet, because she's communicable?"
"Your mother is fine, Michel." When Chiyo snorted, he added, "she's not sick, anyway."
"Than what's wrong with her?"
"What isn't wrong with the Marquessa?" said Chiyo.
"Shh. You want to know why it's so quiet, Michel? Fine, I'll start there." Aito's voice dropped to a hush. "If you could look above the courtyard, you would see them in a row, with crows on their faces and hands."
"What do you mean? Scarecrows?" Even as she asked, a shudder of realization sank into Michel's quivering heart.
Chiyo brayed a short, barking laugh. "People, Michel! We walked under six people!"
"That can't be right." Michel stammered, fearing the answer her heart knew to be true, "there's no building there."
"When they were caught gossiping about your blindness, The Marquessa--your mother--ordered them hung them for the crime of lying," said Aito.
Though little more than a whisper, this pronouncement lingered like thunder, and Michel's blind eyes seemed to stop, as if kindled to an impossible recognition. Aiyo and Chiyo allowed the quiet to creep in, a noiselessness pregnant with the dangling bodies; unseen, but all the more certain for the bitter disdain that altered the voices of Michel's friends.