Kingdom of Deceit Read online

  To even think of this last question terrified me. I quickly shrugged off my blasphemy, asking Lapis, the Shepherd God of the Black nation, to forgive my insolence.

  I felt as though my prayers had been answered when, just as I began to grow weary of my solitude, I made a friend. A small fawn blundered into my camp. Clearly it was an orphan, for its mother would never have let it come so near. I picked up my razor clam ax, eager to secure the fresh tender meat it would provide. But as it turned and gazed at me with its helpless, trusting eyes, I couldn’t bring myself to kill it. After all, we were both alone in the world.

  I weaned the fawn by feeding her tender grass shoots that I had seen other deer nibble. Before long, she was following me around like a pup and did much to soften the pain and sting of my loneliness. I named her Avala.

  Many dawns passed after I’d taken Avala under my wing, and still no sign of Chtomio. Then, one morning, I heard the unmistakable noise of a horse and cart. Running onto the beach with Avala by my side, I saw him rolling across the sand towards me! It was a joyous sight.

  “Asheva!” he cried out, removing his mask. He climbed down from the cart and we each clasped the other’s arm.

  “I wondered when you’d come back,” I said, my relief clear and obvious.

  He looked at me for a good moment or two, as if to see in what ways I might have changed. “Come,” he said “let’s sit and talk by the sea”

  I showed him my wooden saber and told him of the progress I’d made with my exercises. “I thought that I could start without you in perfecting the art of the sword.”

  “The art of the sword?” repeated Chtomio, clearly unimpressed.

  Taken back by his reaction, I said “it may not mean much to you, but the sons of the Black nation are born with a sword in their hands.”

  “That may be so, but during my life, I have seen many warriors that were strong with swords but feeble with their heads get themselves killed.”

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “Stand up,” he said.

  He unsheathed his broadsword and threw it at my feet. “Pick it up; show me what a son of a Black nation can do.”

  I looked at him, unsure. Did he really expect me to attack him?

  “Come on” he insisted, removing his undergarment. I noticed for the first time that he had the letter ‘A’ tattooed on his left arm in dark, swirling ink.

  “What’s that?” I asked, pointing to his arm.

  “Don’t distract yourself! Attack me!”

  “But you’re unarmed! You don’t even have a shield.”

  He pounded his broad chest with pride. “I have my body, do I not? Now fight!”

  I grabbed the sword and lunged at him. “I don’t want to hurt you, Harlequin.”

  “You will be the one more likely to get hurt young chrome, I assure you.”

  Riled, I thrust the sword straight at him. The blade should have sliced off his arm at the shoulder, only it didn’t. With a deft move I’d never have thought him capable of, he spun sideways. My blade was left to slash empty air as Chtomio, bent low, charged and raised me off the ground with his back before happily throwing me hard down onto the sand. The wind left my body, hard on the heels of my pride.

  “You see? A sword is not your only weapon,” he chuckled, helping me up. “I will show you how to use your body to your advantage.”

  “That is not a very honorable way to do battle,” I said, stung that this old chrome had gotten the better of me.

  “Death does not care if you come to her embrace in an honorable way or not, my friend.”

  We dueled for what seemed like an entire vigil; I with the sword and he with his bare hands. By the time we had finished it was the young wolf that was exhausted and struggling to stay on his feet, not the old fox.

  I sputtered, gasping for breath. “You seem like you could go on forever.”

  “That’s because I use my vigor sparingly,” he said. “I do only what is necessary, while you fling that heavy weapon around like a fool, expending your precious energy to my advantage.”

  And so we continued throughout the day. I enjoyed Chtomio’s company and, once I got over my bruised ego and bones, all that he had to teach me too.

  When nightfall came, we built a fire and I told him of my hunting and fishing. I confessed the blasphemous thoughts I’d had about the gods and the territories. And then I shared my anxiety about my mother in Axyum. It felt good to unburden myself to an older and wiser chrome about these things. As I spoke, Chtomio grew silent, immersed in his own thoughts.

  “What’s wrong?” I finally asked him. “Have I been babbling too much?”

  He smiled. “It is not you my young friend,” he said, staring at the flickering flames. “The territories are growing turbulent. You told me how you want to go back to Axyum. Well, the Blacks’ new Eldest screams for bloody revenge against the Reds.”

  This news shocked me. Our last war with the Reds had taken such a toll my nation was unable to recover. And now there was to be another war? It would be the end of us! “Who have my fellow Blacks chosen as the new Eldest?” I asked.

  “I don’t know his name,” said Chtomio. “You Blacks are good at maintaining the illusion of your Eldest as a mysterious, masked figure who survives beyond death. All I know is the winds of war will blow through the territories once more unless we do something about it.”

  “The Red kingdom is to blame for this,” I said, instinctively defending my kin. “They were too harsh with us during the last war. Your greedy demands for gold brought our nation to its knees.”

  The old chrome frowned: “Gold? What gold? No Black gold ever came into the Red territory. That much I can assure you.”

  “Yes, it did!” I insisted. “The Eldest told us the Reds wanted ten ounces of gold from each family. I was there when he said it.”

  “So even now you take such words as the truth?” Chtomio said. “Did you see the gold leave Axyum with your own eyes?”

  I shook my head.

  “No, of course you didn’t! Let me remind you, Asheva, we Reds control all the salt reserves in the territories. We don’t need the Blacks’ gold. We simply trade our salt for Yellow gold, which is of a purer cast and peacefully obtained. I suspect the gold you speak of has been hidden away by your own Elders and…”

  His eyes widened.

  “And what?” I asked.

  “But of course! How can I have been so stupid not to have seen it? The gold! That’s how they will prepare for another war so soon!”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “The gold you were made to hand over never left Axyum. It will be used by the elders to fund a new war.”

  “Why would we want a new war?”

  “The new Eldest obviously aims to unite the Black nation behind him and consolidate his power. War is a distracting weapon used by all tyrants.”

  Chtomio got to his feet. “I can’t stay,” he said, surprising me. “I must return to Samaris.”

  Samaris, the city of the Reds, lay at the very heart of the Red kingdom, close to the sea. Although it was Chtomio’s home, I didn’t know much about it, for he’d only give the vaguest of answers whenever I asked him about it.

  “Maybe I could go with you this time?” I said.

  “No. You shall stay here. This is the only safe place.”

  “But you said it yourself, I cannot hide or run away from others, forever.”

  Chtomio spun towards me, his eyes wide and urgent, his veins bulging around his neck. “Do not ever come looking for me in Samaris, do you understand? Ever! You would put both your life and mine in peril!”

  Taken aback, I apologized. Chtomio returned to his carriage and made ready to leave. I thought his abrupt departure was because of how angry I’d made him and I was sad to see him leave on such a sour note. I apologized once more for my disrespect, but he only grunted at me before setting his animal to motion. For the second time, I watched the cart disappear away into the far dist
ance along the coastline, leaving me to mull over his strange reaction.

  In the days that followed, I fought off my melancholy by practicing as much as I could with the sword and with some new exercises I adapted from games I learned in Axyum. One of them was called Phersu. It was a game we played during the feasts to honor Lapis. We hung two sacks on a tree branch and swung them hard, each in the opposite direction. Each player stood below the branch without moving his feet. The aim was to avoid the two sacks whenever they swung back at you. If they hit you, you lost. If you moved your feet, you lost.

  I liked to pretend the sacks were two warriors attacking me from opposite directions. If I moved, I’d lose the battle, for I would’ve been focused on running away rather than taking them on and killing them.

  To win, I needed to stand my ground and concentrate on my enemies’ methods of attack. I would work out their battle patterns while I adjusted the balance of my body, bending and twisting in order to avoid the two sacks.

  I stitched two sacks together from part of my robes and filled them with sand. Then I hung them over the thick branch of a pine tree and gave each a good strong push to get them swinging. They hurtled toward me like furies. I tried to swerve out of the way, but moving out of the path of one merely put me in the way of the other. It knocked me to the ground with a strong blow to the stomach.

  I tried again. And again, and again. Each time I got knocked off my feet, not only did my body take a pounding but my anger and frustration grew. All I could think about was the sight of Chtomio’s cart rolling away across the sand without me. My rage continued to build.

  I stubbornly kept going until I finally avoided both sacks by swerving my body to the right and then quickly to the left, without moving my feet. When I finished, I thrust my wooden sword into one of the sacks and let out a howling roar that sent Avala running for cover.

  13. Paths and Trails

  On the morning I carved out my sixtieth cross, the wind had changed direction and the sea was no longer placid and warm. A violent storm broke out that kept Avala and I confined inside my lean-to for most of the time.

  The rain continued on and off for several days until it also decided to rest one night, granting the crashing waves and howling wind the chance to keep me awake all by themselves. The wind shook the dry pine branches of my woods so that they sounded like chattering demons. In my drowsy state, I could almost make out their words.

  I snapped my eyes open. Not almost, I could make out words. The voices of Chromes! I went outside to listen.

  “Quick, tie the animals!” I heard a female chrome say. “What’s takin’ you so long?”

  “I’m tryin’, aren’t I?’ replied a testy male. “You come over here and do it, if you’re so clever. Flippin’ rain. Can’t hardly see what I’m doin’!”

  “Hurry! They’ll be off if you don’t get ‘em tethered!”

  “So why don’t you light a torch or something, ‘stead of carpin’ on at me?”

  It was too dark to see clearly, but curiosity about my mysterious intruders got the better of my caution. I crept in the direction of the voices, with Avala following. I could hear the familiar lowing of oxen. Then, two torches were lit. A house on wheels was parked on the beach! The team of heavy oxen responsible for hauling it around were being tethered to a tree by the male chrome. The female walked beside him carrying the torches.

  “Come on Kairo, easy does it.” said the male, pulling the oxen.

  They were dressed in simple, purple robes with lilac patterns embroidered around the neckline. Their masks were also a pale shade of lilac with white engravings. From the tone of their voice and the skin of their hands I suspected they had probably more than double my solstices.

  “Hey there!” I cried. I had not seen anyone besides Chtomio for such a long time, I was excited to finally be able to talk with someone else besides Avala.

  The Chromes instantly went on their guard. “Who goes there?”

  “Oh my, Jhute, look at his face, look at his face! He’s hideous!” shrieked the female.

  Which is when I remembered I was not wearing a mask.

  “For the love of the gods, young chrome!” cried the male Violet. “Put your mask on, quick! You’ll offend the Gods with that ugly mug.”

  “I’m sorry, I’ll go get it!” I stammered. I ran back to the lean-to and fetched the wooden mask Astor had carved for me during our time together on the Cancerian Road. I put it on and hastened back to the Violets, hoping my ragged clothes would help me pass for a Green. Even though Astor and Chtomio alone knew I was a fugitive Black, I didn’t want any other chrome to find out.

  “I am sorry, I mean no harm. It has been some time since I have seen any other chromes,” I told them. “I am just a simple Green chrome that has decided to pause from wandering.”

  The female said, “You’re a long way from home, young Green.”

  The male stepped protectively in front of her, speaking in an effected and deep voice.

  “Are you alone here?”

  For a moment, I wasn’t sure what to say. I couldn’t very well tell him I was waiting around to do the bidding of a Harlequin!

  “No,” I said. “I have my good friend Avala.”

  “Where is this friend of yours?” the Violet male said, sounding very guarded. “Call ‘em out. Let’s see ‘em.”

  At the mention of her name, Avala scampered over to me. I caressed her gently. “Here she is,” I said. They looked at her, and at me, not sure what to make of us.

  “I have all I need in these woods,” I said. “I vow before the Mother Goddess, I won’t steal anything from you. Except maybe some of your time, if it pleases you. I’ve never met Violet chromes before.”

  I bowed low before the female. “Milady, my name is-” I stopped myself from giving her my real name, hesitating for a moment and hoping they wouldn’t notice. “My name is Fulgor. I’m sorry again for showing my face before. I just thought that-”

  The female Chrome interrupted me, saying matter-of-factly: “Yes, yes. We know. Your ugliness is not your fault, but the will of the Gods. But for the same reason that we Violets must wear our masks to protect our beauty, you must wear yours to spare us your revolting unsightliness.”

  Her words startled me. Up until then I had never thought of myself as ugly, or handsome for that matter. And if I was indeed ugly, I was no more or less hideous any other chrome I’d ever known. I had the same black hair as most other youngsters back in Axyum (with the exception of Andahar, a rare towhead). I’d often been told my narrow green eyes were pleasant; and with my face no longer pale but tanned with the sun, they stood out all the more. Still only in my teen solstice, the short, squat female Violet made me feel rather self-conscious.

  “I am Zimdie” she declared rather grandly. “And this is my husband, Jhute.”

  Even though their robes were half covered in mud, they cast a flowered scent that I fondly remembered from the Harvest Faire.

  “You’re a bit off the beaten tracks,” said Jhute, sounding a little wary and suspicious. “We’ve met many Greens during our travels, but none as young as you.”

  “I’m not like many in my Nation.” I replied.

  “Neither are we,” he said with a small chuckle. I don’t know whether it was because his good humor was contagious or if I was just glad to see someone after so much time spent alone, but I began to laugh with him. Soon the three of us were sharing an amiable chuckle that broke the tension.

  We set a fire and sat down together to exchange formal greetings. Before they could ask me any more questions, I asked them about their house. They told me that Violets traveled the territories in trim, sturdy homes on wheels. Like most of their kin, they were traders and explorers.

  Jhute and Zimdie specialized in making and selling scented tints and dyes. They had traveled to this remote shore hoping to find dust from the wings of the rare Purple Flox Butterfly, but also to see what kind of plants a forest of pine trees had to offer.

&n
bsp; “I can help you with your search!” I said. “I know this area well.”

  “I don’t see why not,” said Jhute turning to Zimdie. “Six eyes see better than four.”

  “Eight eyes,” corrected Zimdie, with a nod at Avala.

  We spent the next day following my deer around to note what she ate. We found wild indigo bushes, mint, and pink posy. I showed them the tender seagrass shoots Avala loved to nibble and both Violets examined them with great excitement. Apparently, they could be pulped for their juice, which provided a nice sea foam green color for dying robes.

  To celebrate our find, Jhute and Zimdie invited me to share their supper and campfire. Starved as I was for companionship, I gratefully accepted.

  When I came back to their rolling house at sunset, I was in for a shock. The two Violets must not have heard my footsteps as I approached. So when I entered their house, I found both of them unmasked. I gasped out loud with the shock at the sight of their abominable, deformed faces. They both had very long chins, ears, and noses and their mouths hung slack and open, revealing gray filed teeth, yet they seemed more shocked than I was.

  “Don’t look!” cried out Zimdie turning the other way. “Our beauty will kill chromes who are not Violet!”

  I turned and ran outside, my heart thumping and my breath caught. I had never seen such grotesque, horrific faces in my entire life! As I waited for them to put their masks back on and call me back in, I could only thank the gods my own mask was there to hide my expression of shock. When I went inside again, I tried to put the image of what I had seen away from my mind. In contrast to what I now knew lay behind their masks, their home was small and pleasant. It was full of dry, hanging plants and glass jars full of colored, scented powders. I inhaled them deeply. It was as if nature itself had left its most perfumed flowers in the Violets’ custody. We sat around a small round table where they had prepared a simple meal of fish grilled in exotic spices.