I choke on the sickly-sweet odor of sweat and leather as the man’s weight presses down uncomfortably. I close my eyes, clench my jaw and pretend I’m somewhere else.
***
This new room is very different than the last. Many colored silk pillows are scattered about the room, some of them spilled over and off a comfortable-looking blue divan, most tossed here and there around the floor. Tapestries woven in purple and gold adorn three walls while a floor to ceiling sheet of polished silver dominates the fourth. I’m drawn to it; it’s my first opportunity to get a sense of who I am, if not who I was. I stand before it and see my red hair and green eyes, the ripped dress hanging off one shoulder. I’m a young girl now, though older than the girl I was in the other room that let sunlight in through the cracks in the wall. Looking at myself, I see a scratch on my cheek, a welt on my shoulder, and other pains reveal themselves as well. The one between my legs dominates.
I look around the room, suddenly scared. Is the man here?
He’s not, but a woman I hadn’t noticed stands near the door. She would be beautiful but for the scar where her nose should be. Her nostrils are black holes in her flat face, giving her a porcine look. My thoughts linger on this until I see the riding crop she taps against her thigh impatiently.
“You have defied the king. He is displeased.”
I should respond but don’t know what to say. Perhaps plead for mercy, but it doesn’t seem like something I’d do, so I don’t. The woman strides toward me. Her dress is of light blue silk inlaid with golden flowers and hugs tight to her narrow hips like a child afraid to be left alone. I step away but the mirrored wall is behind me.
“He’ll be here soon and you’ll be punished.”
She taps the crop hard against her thigh to emphasize her words, cringing slightly at the pain she causes herself. Despite the way her scarred face makes her look and the threat inherent in her words, her tone is filled with tenderness, like she speaks words she doesn’t want to say but must. We stand for a minute, she tapping the crop against her leg, me looking for a way to escape through the solid mirror. I hold my breath; her lips form a hard line beneath her ruined nose but her eyes look perched on the edge of tears.
The door swings open and a man strides into the room. The woman ceases tapping her thigh with the crop.
“Bow before your king,” she demands, tenderness gone from her voice.
I genuflect as commanded but can’t take my eyes off this king. He wears a robe of black velvet so long it drags on the floor behind. There are many colors embroidered on it-silver and gold and green and red-too many to count. But it isn’t the splendid robe which pins my gaze to the man, it’s his face. This is the same man who visited me in the other room, but this time I’m not his daughter and he’s not my father.
And yet he’s the same man.
The woman approaches, mouth pulled down in a theatrical frown making her look more like a pig. She brandishes the crop as she speaks.
“Turn around and receive your punishment.”
I do what she says because I have no other choice. Outside this room are men with swords and spears, men who’d rape me and kill me if I tried to flee. I face the mirror and my breath fogs its surface. Through the mist, I see the man. His arms are crossed in front of his chest, he wears a satisfied look on his face. Beside him stands the black-cloaked figure, but he doesn’t notice. The harbinger exists in my imagination.
The woman pulls up the hem of my dress, hiking it up to my waist to expose my bare buttocks. In the reflection, I see her raise the crop. The king smiles.
“You won’t bite me unless I ask next time, will you?” he says.
The riding crop slaps my naked flesh. The force of the blow pushes me forward to hit my head on the mirror. I cringe and squeeze my eyes tight shut but I won’t cry.
I won’t give him the satisfaction.
***
It’s not a room this time but a chamber carved of stone and lit by a strange luminescence which seems to come from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. It’s beautiful, the way the shifting light shines on the smooth white walls-blue to pink to green-but I don’t have time to appreciate it because there are people in the chamber, things are happening. I take it all in with a quick glance, but my eyes stop on the figure at my feet.
The man.
There’s a weapon in my hand. He seems unconscious.
I’m guarding him, though I don’t know why. I stare at him, hatred brewing inside me. I want to use the sword to punish him for the things he’s done to me but something keeps me from it. Against my will, I turn away from him and toward the others in the chamber. It feels as though I’m the participant in a dream with no control over my actions. I’m observing, no more.
The others in the room are engaged in some sort of ritual. A man with a scarred face and blond ponytail kneels before an old man with a long beard. The third man wears the clothes of a soldier. I should know two of them, but names and happenings are beyond me.
Like the other places, I’ve been here before.
I forget it all when a dagger plunges into my leg. Startled, I drop the sword and sink to the floor, grasping my wound. The man I’d been guarding-the man who raped me and beat me, the man who was my father and my king-steps away and pulls bow and arrow from his back. He releases two arrows. There are cries, then blackness and light. I struggle to my knees and see him looming over the man dressed like a soldier lying on the floor. The old man is gone, the scarred man doesn’t move to help.
“Help him,” I want to scream but still have no control.
The man he threatens is important to me. The dream makes me rise to my feet and lurch across the room. Blood trickles down my leg as the muscle works around the blade planted in it.
The pain is excruciating.
The man raises his sword, ready to strike, and I pounce on him, but he’s strong. He pushes me away and opens a wound in me from hip to shoulder. The soldier lying on the floor stares at me, face twisted by shock and outrage. The man who cut me leers at me before my strength leaves and I slump to the floor.
Something else happens in the chamber, but I don’t know what. My experience is of pain and blood and the realization that he’s killed me. Light fades. I attempt concentrating on the dim figures of the men to ground myself, to keep myself there, and notice the cloaked figure standing behind them, watching. Eventually the darkness wins. I hope to return to the endless field and the boundless blue sky.
But there is nothing.
***
The time it takes for the black to become white seems considerably shorter than last time. The fact it seems anything at all is a vast improvement. The black-cloaked figure already stands before me when my eyes begin to work. I stare for a while, waiting for this person to do or say something, but silence remains. I want to speak but don’t attempt it-my voice has already failed me too many times. The figure floats in the white nothing. After a time, I give in and am surprised to find I have a voice.
“Who are you?”
“One who cares about you, child.” It’s a woman’s voice.
My chest is tight; tears threaten at the memories of the things I’ve just seen, of the things done to me. I feel there’s more, that these visions were but a small part of the wrongs this man did me.
“Why am I here?”
Without moving, she is suddenly beside me, crouching. “I have shown you why you are here. You are dead.”
“You showed me?”
The cowl rocks forward and back. “Yes, child.”
I take a deep, shuddering breath and taste her perfume on my tongue. I want to be mad at her for what she showed me, but I can’t; my rage at the man in the visions is greater.
“Why did you do this to me?”
“Because you have the right to know,” she says. She caresses my cheek with the knuckle of one finger. “You have the right to know who did those things to you. He yet lives while you languish in this purgatory.”