Ejem was so happy that when she saw a familiar face, she smiled and waved before she remembered that the bearer of the face had disowned their friendship some months ago. Chidinma gave a hesitant wave in return before she approached Ejem, smiling.
“You’re covered! You’re claimed! Turn around; let me see. Your wife-cloth is so fine. I’m upset you didn’t invite me to the claiming ceremony.”
The words were friendly but the tone was strained, their last exchange still echoing in the air.
“There wasn’t a ceremony. There was nothing to invite you to.”
Chidinma’s smile faded. “You don’t have to lie. I know I was awful to you; I’m sorry.”
“No, really, there wasn’t.” Ejem leaned closer, yearning to confide, to restore their former intimacy. “It’s self-cloth. I covered myself.”
It took Chidinma a moment to absorb this. Then she bristled, pulling back any lingering affection. Her smile went waxy and polite.
“You must be very happy with your husband.”
“Chidinma, I don’t have a husband. I’m covering myself.”
Chidinma’s look turned so vicious that Ejem stepped back, bumping into a man who excused himself.
“Are you, now? A self-cloth, is it? Someone from a good family like yours? I don’t believe it.” Unlike Ejem, Chidinma didn’t lower her voice, earning startled glances from passersby. Ejem shushed her.
“Oh, are you ashamed now? Did something you’re not entirely proud of?”
When Ejem turned to leave, Chidinma snatched her by the cloth. Now she whispered, “You think you’re covered, but you’re still naked. No amount of expensive ‘self-cloth’—how ridiculous!—will change that.”
It was a spiteful and malicious thing to say, meant to hurt, and it did. Ejem tried to pull her cloth from her old friend’s fist, but Chidinma didn’t let go. She continued, her voice cracking with tears.
“You don’t get to be covered without giving something up; you don’t get to do that. It’s not fair. After everything I did for you, it’s not fair.”
Chidinma cried openly now, and Ejem used the opportunity of her weakened grip to twist away, near tears herself.
It had been easy, Ejem thought, in the opulence of Odinaka’s house, to forget that they were breaking laws. Easy too to clink glasses night after night. What had some woman given up so that Ejem could have this cloth? Was she a weaver by choice or indentured, deemed past her prime and burdened to earn the care of the state? The fabric felt itchy now, as though woven from rough wire.
Ejem hurried back the way she had come, to the safety of Odinaka’s building. On the verge of panic, she fumbled with the keys to her apartment and let herself in. Once inside, she leaned against the door and slid to the floor, head to knees, catching her breath. She felt . . . something, which made her look around, and that’s when she saw the osu woman standing in the corner. Her skin was light, almost blending into the dusky beige of the wall, her scar a gristly, keloided mass on the side of her head. She appeared to be Ejem’s age or older. She held a bottle of cleaning solution and a rag. She was naked.
It was clear by the hunch of her shoulders and the wary look in her eye that it was not a nakedness she enjoyed. How long had it been since Ejem had carried that very look on her own face? How long since she’d felt shame so deep she’d nearly drowned in it?
The day she’d lost her father-cloth, she’d pleaded with her father, fought him as he’d attempted to rip the fabric away. Her mother had cried to her to bear it with some dignity, but Ejem had gone mindless. When her father had finally taken all of the cloth, uncurling her fingers to snatch even the frayed strip she’d held on to, Ejem had curled into herself, making a cover of her appendages. Each day since had been a management of this panic, swallowing it deep in her belly where it wouldn’t erupt.
The osu woman nodded to Ejem, then slipped through a panel in the wall and disappeared. The panel slid back into place soundlessly, and when Ejem went to the wall she could feel no seam. She clawed at it, bending and breaking her nails, trying to force a way in. Finding no entry from her side, she pounded and called out, seeking a welcome.
Martin Cahill
GODMEAT
The godmeat stank of hibiscus and saltwater. Its noxious divinity threaded through the kitchen, the air itself feeling suddenly buoyant in its wake. If Hark closed his eyes, he could almost imagine himself on the beach where Spear had killed the Sea Mother: pale green water lapping at his feet, miles of white sand stretching into the distance, while pink blossoms bobbed in the surf. He could almost see Spear standing on top of the godthing, her weapon shimmering with the blue blood of the dying Beast.
Hark took in the cut of godmeat before him, shining a bloody pink against his dark skin, clean and ready for a dry rub of spices. Seven dishes he’d had the honor of crafting, and it still quickened his heart to handle the raw flesh of one of the Great Beasts; no other chef in all the Wild World could say they’d done it, and none could do it so well as Hark.
All he’d had to do for this opportunity was condemn the Wild World itself to die. But what was the annihilation of a world against the pursuit of culinary perfection? The question echoed in the back of Hark’s mind, and like every time before, he ignored it.
Sprinkling a mélange of ochre, emerald, and golden spices onto his palm, Hark rubbed his hands together and sank them into the cut. On contact, desperate emotion shivered up his wrists; visions of waterfalls, lily pads, coastal storms, and ice floes rode on the dying whalesong of the godthing still inside the meat. Ever the professional, he paused; after the first few meals, he learned that the visions, no matter how strong, eventually subsided. When they did, he continued on with his work. The Hollowed would only wait so long for their next course.
Footsteps behind him dragged the shadowed taste of cloves, mint, and ash into the room. Hark rankled. “Put that out, Spear. Please. I’ve lived almost seventy years in perfect health. I am not going to die from your secondhand smoke.”
She grunted, challenging as ever, but Hark wouldn’t back down. She could smoke those wherever in the Wild World she pleased, but the kitchen was his kingdom and he’d be damned to let Kai’nese tobacco into it. After a moment he heard her crush the butt in the sink and felt her eyes on the back of his neck. “There’s a carafe of peach and raspberry tea in the icebox if you’re looking for something to fiddle with. This is going to take some time.”
She pulled out the carafe and poured a glass. “Hollowed don’t like to wait.” She slurped tea with the delicacy of a street urchin in finishing school; Hark bit the inside of his cheek. Four years they’d been working together, and there were still some days he wanted to throw her into the ocean.
“They’ll have to,” he replied, tasting sand and seaweed in the back of his throat. He patted the thoroughly spiced cut of godmeat with admiration. “She was one of the oldest, and she’ll take a long while to cook. To eat the Sea Mother raw would destroy them, their gullets breaking with storms, their blood boiling with salt.” He turned to smile at her, his sun-sharp grin unwavering in the face of her sternness. “They’ll let me take my time, or they’ll simply drown in the air.”