Locust Girl: A Lovesong Read online

  ‘Don’t get smug now,’ he whispered to me. ‘You’re here only because of that song. You’ll tell us how you know it but not here.’

  I found myself with the two children under the blanket. Quickly Hara-haran began whispering instructions. ‘Get ready. I go first, then Gurimar. You’ll pick up the trick, it works,’ then she jumped on my shoulders, wrapping the remains of her legs around my neck. I nearly fell over.

  She arranged the blanket so we seemed like one body in the line. Only her face and arms were exposed. ‘Move,’ she urged me forward. ‘And don’t dare show yourself.’

  ‘Don’t dare show myself?’ a male voice behind us protested. ‘I’ve as much right to be here in this forsaken place — ’

  ‘Shut up, I’m talking to myself!’ Hara-haran snapped, then in a change of heart, took on a comradely tone. ‘See the chief over there, waving his whip and preening with that blue stone on his neck. As if we don’t know where he got it. I’d love to bash him.’ She never minced her words. ‘Trading our rations for a frippery, that vain animal!’

  ‘Like selling our souls to ourselves,’ the man agreed.

  I now understood the trading last night. ‘I saw,’ I whispered but could not say more. Gurimar’s hand had pressed on my mouth. I could smell the children’s hate. My head hurt with it.

  ‘There was some trading in colours too. Underground, I heard.’ The man kept up the comradely lull.

  ‘Trading in stupid dreams!’ Hara-haran spat out. ‘Colours — hah!’

  ‘We refuse to dream only in brown, we’re human too.’

  ‘We? Why — were you among those dreamers?’

  ‘I mean — I know that kind of trade is a crime but — ’

  ‘What crime?’ Hara-haran’s hand dug hard on my shoulder. ‘What’s more criminal than selling to us what’s rightfully ours?’

  Strangely, she was so light. Or was it because I was strong, made strong by too many journeys?

  After a while, the man whispered. ‘Those stories of colour can keep anyone from despair, you know.’

  ‘What’s colour?’ Hara-haran muttered to herself. I sensed a note of longing.

  ‘Colours are … I wish — ’

  ‘Shut up,’ she snapped, to shut her own longing.

  But he continued. ‘Hard to be a stray with no village.’

  ‘Speak for yourself. I had a village.’

  ‘Last night, my wife lost her last crockery.’

  ‘I’d just love to bash him.’

  Her breath warmed the top of my crown where the scars were fading.

  ‘Lest we forget —

  There is only one story

  There is only one song

  That we take home’

  It had to be played before the rations, and the dutiful crowd echoed, ‘One story. One song.’ But there was no conviction in their response.

  Way ahead the tall man waved his whip about. ‘I did not hear you,’ he called out.

  This time, the crowd chanted in earnest. ‘One story! One song!’

  ‘Good, good. Now listen, before we start, you have to be honest and true. Or you don’t get anything.’

  Agitated murmur down the line, then the fearful shifting.

  ‘We all know that among you are six strays who have betrayed us. Last night, they attempted to walk to the border.’

  The silence was a more cutting chill. Even breaths were halted.

  ‘You must purge them from your kind. They’ve betrayed you from getting your rations promptly tonight, and — you might not even get them.’

  It did not take long before the beautiful youths with shaven heads were pushed out of the line. Still chained together by mouth to ear and mouth to ear, passing on rumours of salvation. Quickly they were taken away by the short man who had slapped one of them.

  Anger and guilt ebbed and flowed through the line. The lights burned brighter and grit rose from their oils.

  ‘The trees,’ Hara-haran sighed towards the disappearing youths.

  ‘Beautiful and green,’ someone in the line sighed with her.

  From my brow, I heard again the whisperers trading in colours and how they halted fearfully in ‘green.’ I heard Daninen’s rumour of trees: ‘Ah, the hunger for trees, for the natural, for things pure.’ Then a faraway voice telling stories about someone dancing with beautiful ladies who danced like trees with the scent of wind behind their ears. My confusion hurt.

  Green was anything we wanted it to be. Like dry cheeks and dry eyes or faces with eyes, or hot barley soup, or barley sprouting on blessed earth. I remembered how Beenabe and I dreamt up the colour together to ease our thirst and hunger. How was I to know that dreams could be stolen and changed, so we wake to a nightmare?

  Inige would later tell about the nightmare. She was one of the six whisperers who were to be smuggled through the border after they were thrown out of the ration line. They were not even meant to be in the line. They were only walking past, away from their village that was warned about a purge, a fire. They were arrested on their walk. They had transgressed; no strays can walk to the border.

  Later Inige would escape to tell her own story about green. She was a green tree. ‘Green’ for nubile. ‘Green tree’ for nubile youth. Green for breasts just beginning to bud and wombs waking up to a cycle. Green for voices just beginning to break. Green was pure and clean. And innocent. Beyond the border, green was anything they wanted it to be.

  Inige was ‘a good, green tree.’ She could fetch a good price. A sack of seeds. Two barrels of water. A jug of oil. It was a shame that her cheek was bruised. Two jugs of oil would have been a better deal.

  On the third day of queuing, we were warned to play our best by the sounds around us. There were censures, feeble pleas.

  ‘Where’s your mother?’

  ‘She left,’ a small voice answered further up.

  ‘Your father — ?’

  ‘Left too — please — ’

  ‘Where to? The border?’

  ‘No, sir, no — they’re — they’re — maybe dead.’

  An intake of breath somewhere, then the shuffling of feet, the restless hands rubbing empty pouches and jugs.

  ‘You know the rule,’ the blue stone man cleared his throat loudly as if he were hurting there. ‘Rations are no child’s play — what’s the rule again?’

  ‘No wasting, no children in the line,’ the hungry mouths were quick to answer then scold the boy who had come alone with his empty pouch and jug. Suddenly I understood ‘the trick’ planned by Gurimar and Hara-haran. I braced my shoulders. When our turn comes, these children will stand tall and grown up on my back.

  ‘Please, sir — just a little bit — ’

  Then, I realised that there were hardly any children in the line. How was I to know that there were hardly any children anywhere in that wretched place and time? Had Cho-choli not spoken about the inner dry?

  ‘Get away, you! You’re holding us up!’ the waiting mouths spat out their despair. Most of the women’s wombs were dry, most of the men’s seeds were dry. How dare this boy remind them, this painfully?

  ‘Just a pinch of seeds, sir, just a sip of water, just to wet my mouth — ’

  ‘Sorry, little one, we must be fair.’ The voice made sure it was thick with kindness and woe. ‘How sad if I gave in to your wish — uhm — the rule’s for all of us — uhm — no one is less or more in anyone’s eyes, we’re all equal — uhm — just as these seeds are equal in size and shape — uhm — so we can have a just rationing.’ Then he fondled the blue stone thoughtfully before he announced with aplomb: ‘Symmetry. Equality. Justice. Yes, yes, we honour them, we dwell in them.’

  Those words. Where have I heard them before? My brow lined them up in my ear. My mouth tested them. So grand and difficult, so dry.

  ‘I’m just doing — uhm — my job. Just me — uhm — care for you and pass on the care and blessings of the Five Kingdoms to you. They have not forgotten you. And just me — uhm — will never forget yo
u. See what I brought? These sacks of very good seeds, these barrels of sweet water, these jars of fragrant oil. Our oil of grace for cooking, for light, for salving wounds and aches — all these for free, just-me-uhm will see to it, so we must be grateful!’

  ‘Just-me-uhm, Just-me-uhm, Just-me-uhm!’ Hara-haran chanted and giggled under her breath.

  Someone tried to hush her. ‘Want to be thrown out of the line too?’

  ‘Just-me-uhm. That’s how we call him, with those noises in his throat.’

  ‘I’m sorry about these — uhm — bad turns of fate. But that child had to go, those whisperers had to go. I must — uhm — we must expel the impurities that are bad for the stomach and worse for the soul. We must uphold purity especially in this ration line, which preserves us all. We stick to the rules and the rules are for all. No bad or wrong seeds in the line. Don’t the Five Kingdoms feed you only good seeds?’

  I was getting more confused. It was very hard to follow Just-me-uhm’s big words, but the way they disturbed the air was enough to chill everyone into silence, except the children.

  Hara-haran was again digging her hand on my back. ‘He always has to sound good and kind — just-me is good, just-me is kind — hah!’

  Just-me-uhm. A beautiful man with lots of hair. Oiled and golden, more so with the light around his neck. He was heads taller than everyone else. He took regular trips through the border. He was well fed, well groomed, well trained by his father. He was a bastard of the Five Kingdoms. His mother was a ‘green tree’ favoured by the Minister of Mouths who kept her, but only until the boy was an uncomplicated joy. Just-me-uhm was always grateful for his mother’s fate. Look at who I am now? So he smuggled green trees across the border. He was doing them a favour. When will they ever understand, these stupid wretches?

  I learned more about him from the rumours down the line. He fancied himself as the Minister’s mouth outside the Kingdoms. When he was barely five years old, he memorised the Kingdoms’ Missions. They were sung daily by his father, then relayed through all the little boxes that were also rationed once. He missed the Missions, they were out of fashion now, and he missed their martial tunes. Nowadays singing them was thought unwise. Just-me-uhm suspected, not without some pain, that his father’s singing embarrassed the other ministers. He had not seen him since he was six. Not wishing to complicate his vocal duties, the Minister of Mouths expelled his bastard son from the Kingdoms. But he continued to look out for his interests and assigned him the task of rationing outside the border.

  I would learn more about him much later — how Just-me-uhm missed the Missions, which he had memorised only in his head. He could not sing; he was tone-deaf. His father never recovered from this tragedy thus sent him and his mother away. That was the true story: a bad turn of fate. But Just-me-uhm remained loyal, always apologetically clearing his throat whenever bad turns happened. He never forgot the Missions and their comforting logic. He sang it in his head. It assured him that he belonged to his father.

  We will protect you

  We will care for you

  We will think for you

  We will act for you

  We will be you

  What is yours will be ours

  Rejoice, rejoice! You are ours

  You are part of Kingdom building

  It was our turn. Finally I saw how truly beautiful he was. His oiled curls glinted. And how smooth his cheeks. How like a boy in the earnest conduct of his duty. I was grateful for the holes in my blanket. I watched his eyes shimmer like his blue stone and even grow soft as Hara-haran played her act to perfection on my shoulders.

  ‘Rejoice, rejoice, my heart says to you, good sir. Your caring made me yours. My last limb is yours, if it pleases you, and so is my head, and so is my heart.’

  Later the children would tell me about how they heard the Kingdoms’ Missions from their father who heard them from his father, who heard them from his father who heard them from a little box once upon a time.

  Evoking the Missions at ration time was the ultimate trick. It never failed. The man’s eyes shimmered even more. ‘Good woman, I accept your joy, your limb, your head, your heart. How well you know the wishes of the Five Kingdoms — open your pouch and receive their blessings.’

  She did and seeds poured into it. And water gurgled into her jug. And oil slid smoothly into another pouch. She came prepared and her tongue was even smoother.

  ‘Rejoice, good sir. You are part of Kingdom building, you are truly a Kingdom builder and I am your servant.’

  Another handful of seeds, another gurgle of water. All saved for later. The children chose to remain hungry to feed a more pressing need.

  In an afterthought, the Kingdom builder added a few more drops of oil. Hara-haran almost kissed his hand, which he quickly hid in his pocket. He made sure he did not touch and was not touched publicly by the strays. Usually the other men did the rationing, and the later duties, which I was to discover soon. But he gave the orders. He believed that he was indeed ‘Just.’ He gave rewards where rewards were due.

  A little later, after we had pushed our way back into the line for a second act on my back, Gurimar had his share of rewards.

  Rewards must be equally shared. Must be reciprocal. It was a big word that I would later hear in the Five Kingdoms. That I would see at work on the sixth day of the rations. The night before was freezing and afflicted with a new smell so foul, we had to plug our noses. The remaining hungry mouths whispered rumours that made the air whine beyond consolation. Distraught mouth to distraught ear and on it went, until the fresh rumour reached my own shocked ears. It was a rumour secretly blessed by the Five Kingdoms. A rumour that unfolded into a true story when the sun rose on the sixth day and the crowd crawled under the blankets to hide their limbs yet unclaimed by the great fires. When the silent men left the ruins to pick out the healthiest in the line.

  Rewards were reciprocal. Rewards were harvested under the blankets. Eyes here, last good leg there, maybe that hand with the ring. And deeper down, more precious parts that could be traded across the border.

  What is yours will be ours.

  The smell of fear rose with the sun. Among the men scavenging for a heart, a liver, a kidney, my brow decided to betray me. The singing was out now for all to hear. No lullaby could have been more plaintive.

  ‘What is mine will be yours

  My child rejoice, rejoice

  So the heart of the father

  Sings to this sleeping thing’

  Running. I never knew that feet could ache so and that the breast could run out of air, even if there was so much of it around. The wind had begun to rise as we rolled down the steep dunes and burrowed our bodies into the sand. We kept so still, until, fearing a sandstorm, the men from the ruins abandoned pursuit. We were saved but not the jugs of water that broke in our haste.

  ‘Why did you have to sing? Why did you not keep still? Why did you betray us?’

  I thought Hara-haran’s breast would burst with her anger. To her, all that mattered was that I sang, not what I sang. She was rubbing her only hand that had caught one of the men’s eyes. It was fondled for texture and weight — but this is a child’s! — until Gurimar hit him and pushed her onto my shoulders. Then we did not stop running.

  ‘She’s hiding songs under that bandage, hiding one of those boxes!’

  ‘We’ll make her pay, we’ll make her tell us why.’

  ‘Us? What will she tell that you don’t already know, Gurimar?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Mother’s song — and yours? You, her favoured one, of course. You who never tell the truth about her, you never answer when I ask, and I ask and ask, every day I ask, but you shut your mouth and turn away.’ She was screaming now. ‘You’ve kept silent since you came home without her, and she never came home, she never came home, and you’ve never told me why.’ Her lone fist pounded the sand, which had begun to whirl into eddies.

  Gurimar’s mouth remained a taut line.


  ‘She took you walking, only you, because you could. And she never came home as she promised. So I’ll find out the truth for myself, I’ll force this ugly girl to tell me,’ and she lunged forward, grabbing my bandage off.

  It whirred. It preened. It fluttered its wings.

  Shock, then screams. ‘The plague, the plague!’ They began to run again, from me.

  So soon, the wind drowned the screaming. It picked up sand and wind became sand. So soon, the children disappeared in the storm but not their revulsion. It trailed the wind, it whirled about. The plague, the plague!

  Beenabe, oh Beenabe, I am not beautiful.

  The whole desert rose. It cut my skin, it opened scars, it cut my eyes. At least there was a reason to cry.

  ‘So soon the loss

  Before the love

  So soon before

  The silence broke’

  When the desert settled, I saw that it had become another place. The wind had rearranged the earth. Maybe Beenabe was right when she said that the old stories never happened. I was alone again and walking. I promised myself to walk like her towards the horizon and maybe learn not to look back.

  Colder now, a cruel cold because I had known warmth, which I must now forget. Perpetual cold is kinder and so is unbroken silence. Keep to one present story then. For what does the memory of its old shape do for this new sand dune?

  It was no dune. It was a large hill now that would take me a day to climb like Beenabe’s hill before she was able to look to the other side.

  From the peak, I saw more dunes, but smaller and endlessly changing shape. The wind was still restless. How I missed the one straight line of the horizon. I began my descent, wishing for certainty again.

  The sun had almost set when I reached the dunes. Their shadows loomed over me. I began to walk faster, but the dunes seemed to multiply, and so did the shadows, walking just as fast. I was sure I could hear them following. I began to run.