White Lotus Page 13

  Iadmon kept on doggedly toward the door. He did not look at Doricha, did not react to her words. It was as if the gods had struck him deaf—and had turned his heart to stone. He dragged her down the halls and out into the curved front courtyard of Xanthes’ estate. There stood his litter, waiting to bear him home—offering its comforting curtains to screen him from the eyes of Memphis, to hide his shame.

  Doricha tried once more to appeal to his heart. “Master, haven’t I been a good and loyal slave? Haven’t I learned well, and all to make you proud of me? Please, Master. You promised me once that you wouldn’t waste your money on me if I didn’t waste your time. Think of the cost, if nothing else! Don’t throw away the cost, Master!”

  Iadmon paused. He still did not look at her, only stared into the distance with a grim, fixed expression—but at least he had stopped. With trembling hope, Doricha loosed her hold on his sleeve and waited, looking up at him through the blue shadows of night.

  Sobriety had returned to Iadmon. No doubt it was the shock of his loss that had brought him back to his senses, combined with the great shame of being bested by Xanthes before so many witnesses. Now he understood the full weight of what he’d done—what his weakness had cost him. Doricha could see the truth of that in his strained, tragic expression.

  Silently, Iadmon turned to Doricha and looked down at her for a long moment. In the faint starlight, she could see a rhythmic twitch at the side of his face as he clenched his jaw again and again. Soon, Doricha knew, soon he would find his words, and would speak to her. Soon he would send his men for Aesop, who would outwit Xanthes and set everything right again. Soon the terrible trajectory of fate would be corrected, and Doricha would go on as before toward a hopeful future.

  She reached out and took his arm, gently this time. “Please, Master—”

  Iadmon struck her across the face, so hard and fast that at first she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t understand what had happened to her. All she could do was release his arm and stare blankly into the darkness of Xanthes’ garden. By the time Doricha gasped and lifted her hand to her cheek, pressing her cool palm against her burning face, Iadmon was already halfway across the courtyard. He barked a few words to his litter-bearers, then stooped to enter his litter. But he paused just before hiding himself within the litter’s curtains.

  “I’m sorry, Doricha,” Iadmon said calmly. “But none of this is my fault. You are what you are—a slave—and I am… well, I am also what I am, no more than that. We must both live the fates the gods have made for us.”

  With that, Iadmon slunk inside his litter. The curtain fell, hiding him from Doricha’s view. The bearers lifted the litter swiftly to their shoulders, carried it through the vine-covered gate… and Iadmon was gone.

  Doricha stood alone in the courtyard. She shivered; the night felt far too cold for summer, and the taste in the back of her throat, the churning in her stomach, was far too bitter for life. She had imagined every possible way Iadmon might be rid of her, every disappointment she might bring him, every way she might inadvertently anger him and seal her own fate. But she had never imagined this. The worst of it was, she wouldn’t even have a chance to say her farewells to Aesop.

  10

  The Hetaera’s Knife

  Doricha was left alone in the courtyard, save for Xanthes’ household servants in their dark-blue robes. The servants lingered near the row of empty litters, doing their best to fade into the shadows. Surely they wanted to distance themselves from Doricha’s obvious distress—and the shame her foolish weeping and pleading had brought upon herself and her master.

  Her former master. Reality sunk its claws painfully into her flesh; she shuddered and hugged her body tightly, a useless shield against the agony of knowing what lay before her now. She was Xanthes’ property, gambled away in a drunken game. There was nothing she could do to change that fact. The last threads of her fragile hope snapped inside her; she covered her face with her hands and wept bitterly, loudly, keening out sorrow and fear, shame and horror as she had never done before, not even when she had first become a slave.

  What would happen to her now? The distant memory of Xanthes stroking her in Iadmon’s andron, pawing at her skin, came back with revolting force. She could feel his hands on her even now; she flinched but could not escape the sensation. Dread choked her; she coughed, fighting the nausea that was rising rapidly in her stomach.

  And then Doricha truly felt hands against her skin. It was not her imagination, not a curdling memory of Xanthes’ greed. But the two hands that rested on her shoulders were gentle and sympathetic—not rough or commanding, as Xanthes’ touch would be. Before she even looked up, Doricha knew the touch was feminine. She swallowed and sniffed, quieting her noisy sobs with a great effort, then peered between her fingers to see who had come to offer her comfort.

  To Doricha’s surprise, Archidike stood before her in the darkness. The light of the Dog Star shone on the hetaera’s face, sparkling in the scented oil that saturated her heavy black curls. All the lazy, impudent arrogance Archidike had displayed in the andron was gone now. She looked at Doricha with such obvious fellow-feeling that Doricha began to weep all over again, hiccupping loudly as she struggled to control herself.

  “Hush now,” Archidike said, rubbing Doricha’s back. “Hush, little flower—hush. It does no good to cry. Believe me; I know.”

  Doricha’s cheek still burned where Iadmon had struck her. He never would have done it, never would have done a bit of it, not even the gambling, if it wasn’t for her. He would have kept his wits about him, and I would still be his.

  She jerked away from Archidike’s touch. “You put something in my master’s cup. You made him drunk—worse than drunk! You addled his mind in some way, didn’t you? Drugged his wine, and all so he’d forget himself and make the wager.”

  Archidike sighed, but she didn’t deny the accusation. It would have been foolish to try. No one but she had had access to Iadmon’s cup. No one but Archidike—who had worked all night to ingratiate herself with Iadmon, like a worm burrowing into the heart of an apple.

  “Xanthes knows,” Doricha said coldly. “He knows, doesn’t he, where Iadmon is weak, what he’s prone to doing when he loses his wits? He has always known about Iadmon. Xanthes knows, and you did his bidding.”

  “Yes,” Archidike shot back, losing all her patience now. “And what was I do to? I haven’t bought my freedom yet. I’m still Xanthes’ property, still owned goods, just like you are. If Iadmon had ordered you to do the same to Xanthes, you would have obeyed him in the twinkling of an eye, and put the drug into his wine. Don’t pretend you wouldn’t.” Her expression softened. “You’d have been welcome, too, I’m sure. Xanthes is an eel’s anus. Drugging him would only improve on what the gods have made.”

  Archidike reached into the turquoise-beaded band of her dress. It was snuggled tight beneath her exposed breasts; Doricha was surprised to see the older girl pull out a crumpled linen kerchief.

  “Where’d that come from, then?” Doricha said, letting her icy disdain slip.

  “No one ever knows exactly what I’ve got hidden about my person.” She gave Doricha a sly grin. “Even when I’m naked. You may think you see the whole of Archidike, but you never do. Here, now; let me clean you up. It won’t do to go back inside with your face smeared all to Hades.”

  “I never could go back,” Doricha said miserably. “I can’t belong to Xanthes now—I simply can’t!”

  Archidike took Doricha’s chin in her hand, fixing her with a serious stare. Those blue eyes leaped at her from the darkness, piercing through Doricha’s shroud of misery. “My dear, you haven’t any choice in the matter. You’d best get that straight right now, or life will go hard for you. I’d heard before that Iadmon is too free and permissive with his slaves. Now I see that’s true. Or have you somehow managed to forget that you’re a slave?”

  Doricha shook her head. She lowered her eyes to the ground in shame.

  “Sensible girl,”
Archidike said. She released her grip on Doricha’s chin. “You must never forget who you are—what you are. Soft little duckling like you… haven’t got a chance in this game, unless you think sharp and keep your wits about you. And never step out of your place, do you hear?” She began to dab at Doricha’s face with the kerchief, cleaning away all evidence of her tears. “You can’t afford to forget—what’s your name, again? Doricha, is it?—you can’t afford to forget that you are a slave, bought and paid for. We are both owned goods, you and I… at least, I am for a little while longer. If you’re to survive as a slave, you’ve got to be tough and smart, and aware, duckling, do you see? You’ve got to know where your boundaries lie—the edges of a slave’s territory. You can’t make any mistake about that territory. If you get careless and blunder across the boundary, it won’t matter that you did it in ignorance. There are knives out there in the world, Doricha—”

  Swiftly and suddenly, something sharp stabbed at Doricha’s rib. She gasped and tried to twist away, fearful that Archidike had pulled a knife from somewhere unseen, as easily as she’d produced the handkerchief, and had pressed its point into Doricha’s flesh. She looked down, fearful that she would see a dark stain of blood soaking through the silk of her dress… but it was only Archidike’s finger thrust into her side. The hetaera’s long, lacquered nail bit into her skin.

  Slowly, with a lazy smile, Archidike withdrew her finger and resumed cleaning Doricha’s face. “As long as you know your place, and keep to it, it’s really not so bad, living here. Xanthes does have the very best reputation for making hetaerae. There’s no one better in all Egypt—or in all the world, I suppose—to set you up properly, get you to the top of the heap. And Xanthes is honorable, in his way. He will free you, if you can come up with enough money. I’ve seen it done myself, so I know it’s true.”

  Doricha sniffled. She didn’t want Xanthes, didn’t want his help building her career. She wanted Aesop—her only friend in all the world, the only person she could confide in.

  “Reckon I wouldn’t feel so bad if I had a friend here,” Doricha admitted. She knew it would have been wiser to keep that weakness to herself, but in the face of such unexpected tenderness—from Archidike, of all people—she couldn’t stop the words from coming out.

  “Friend?” Archidike dabbed the last of the mess from Doricha’s face and tucked the soiled kerchief back into her gown. “Make no mistake, Doricha: no one here will be your friend. We’re all competing for the same prizes: the men who buy our affections. The money in their purses. The freedom their coin can buy us, but only if we’re the best, the most beautiful, the most charming—the most popular. No one in Xanthes’ house will be cruel to you, for you’re far more valuable whole and unbroken than ruined and abused. But no one will be your friend, either.” Archidike held up her finger, the very one she had pressed into Doricha’s ribs. The nail shone in the light of the Dog Star. “And always remember, little lotus: hetaerae have the sharpest knives of all.”

  She turned briskly toward the house. “Come along, now. The feast is nearly be over; the men will soon start drifting off to private rooms, or out into the garden with their girls. My patron has run off home with his tail tucked between his legs, so there’s no reason for me or you to go back to the andron. I’ll take you to the women’s quarters instead.”

  Doricha curled her toes in her sandals, rooted to the spot. Archidike may have been kind to her, but she wasn’t her friend. She had just said as much. Doricha had no reason to trust her. “I won’t go with you. You deceived me and my master.”

  The hetaera brushed her heavy black curls from her shoulder. Archidike watched Doricha with a stubborn levelness that sent a prickle of dread up her spine. “Xanthes told me to bring you to the women’s quarters,” Archidike said quietly. “I always do what my master says. Do you doubt it?”

  “No,” Doricha answered meekly.

  “Then don’t make me prove that it’s true. You won’t like it if my hand is forced.”

  She turned away again, sauntering off toward the house, no bothering to glance over her shoulder to see whether Doricha was following. Doricha lifted the hem of her skirt and hurried after. She fell in step behind Archidike, and as they made their way through the gaudy corridors of Xanthes’ house, Doricha recalled Iadmon’s warning on that first day, when she had stood with him beside the Samian Wind at the docks in Tanis.

  If you are not strong enough to face the other hetaerae, to fight for the wealth that could be yours, you may find yourself knocked down to the status of a common porna. Or worse, you may end up in the river, dead at the hands of some rival who is fiercer and cleverer than you.

  The stars peered in through every window Doricha passed, glittering cold and hard as the points of knives.

  Xanthes kept a whole wing of his house dedicated to the hetaerae who worked for him—a dozen or so beautiful and talented young women—and the staff that tended exclusively to their needs. The hetaerae themselves referred to the wing as the Stable, half joking, half grim. It was connected to the main estate by a long corridor, yet it stood well apart from the great rooms where Xanthes dwelt, where he conducted his business and entertained his guests, and where the remainder of his servants and slaves lived. The hall that led to the Stable was quiet, dimly lit by the amber-yellow flames of a few guttering oil lamps. The light flickered in a monotonous rhythm along the painted walls; the murals of women entertaining men—in every conceivable way—seemed to dance lazily as Doricha passed.

  Archidike threw open the door at the end of the hallway, revealing the place Doricha must now call her home. The room was as empty as the hall had been, and nearly as long as the corridor outside. Its mudbrick walls were brightly painted, too—although here, the images were more serene than in the corridor. Plenty of freshly lit lamps illuminated the murals: gardens and lily pools bloomed along the walls, while goddesses both Egyptian and Greek looked down benevolently from the skies.

  Recessed alcoves were set deeply into the walls, spaced evenly down the length of the room. Each alcove had a curtain across its mouth. A few curtains had been left open; Doricha could see that the alcoves were just wide enough to hold a bed and a couple of shallow shelves. Women’s personal effects were scattered on some of those shelves: combs and hair pins, bottles of perfume, the faded twist of a dried bouquet.

  Large and grand as the room itself was, the stuffy, dark alcoves made Doricha’s heart sink. Her room at Iadmon’s house was small and plain, but at least it had been private. These curtained holes brought back hard memories of Tanis, and promised no opportunity for seclusion, for time alone with her own thoughts. Doricha wished for her home—Iadmon’s estate—with a sudden, painful wrench of longing. There was no chance here that fresh breezes would find their way in from the garden. The air of the Stable was heavy and close with the reek of perfume and hair oil. And there was certainly no Aesop here to visit Doricha—to cheer and encourage her.

  “Come along, Duckling,” Archidike said.

  She led Doricha briskly down the length of the Stable, to an alcove near the rearmost wall. Its curtain was pulled back to reveal a space emptied of all personal items. The bed was of the old Egyptian type: a wooden platform raised up on four simple legs, with a slight slope that ran from head to foot. It was topped with a thin mattress of coarse, unbleached Kushite cotton, stuffed with flax stems that crackled faintly when Doricha pressed the mattress with a finger. Linen sheets, reasonably soft-looking, were neatly folded and stacked on the foot of the bed. A silk cushion lay atop the sheets. The two narrow shelves that jutted from the alcove’s wall were entirely bare; they didn’t hold so much as a speck of dust.

  “Your bed,” Archidike said. “This one used to be Semat’s, but she left us a few months ago—bought her way out, the lucky bitch. I hear she’s set herself up in Mendes. Of course, there can’t be a lot of patrons in a town like Mendes—it’s so small and unimportant. But there can’t be many hetaerae there, either, so no doubt Semat has
no competition. It’s hard to keep ahead in Memphis, with so many other girls vying for your men.”

  The Stable door banged open. Doricha peeked out from her alcove to see a few hetaerae wander in. They were talking among themselves, yawning and stretching as they went. A few were already untying the laces of their gowns and pulling the jeweled combs from their hair, long before they’d reached their beds.

  “I always get stuck with the oldest men,” one of them complained as she loosened the neck of her vibrant orange dress. “They leave early—before any of the real fun starts.”

  “Xanthes’ parties are boring, anyway,” another girl said, stifling a yawn. “You aren’t missing a thing.”

  “It’s true,” said a third as she slid golden bracelets from her wrists. “Believe me; I’ve seen enough of his feasts to know. Besides, you should be glad you’re always paired up with the old men. They rarely want to tup you with their tired old cocks, but they still pay just as handsomely.”

  The first—the one in the orange dress—agreed. “Some of the money I’ve had from the white-haired grandfathers, you’d think they’d ridden me all night long. But I never had to do anything more than smile at their jokes and bat my eyes.”

  The girls giggled. One of them tossed something high; it winked and flashed as it rotated in the air. It was a hedj coin, Doricha realized. The hetaera who’d thrown it caught it and flipped it again, grinning up at her pay as it sparkled in the air.

  “Careful,” Archidike called. “Persephone will steal your pay right out of the sky. She has quick fingers.”

  “Not as quick as yours,” said Persephone of the orange dress. She flashed a rude gesture at Archidike—the first two fingers of her hand waggling in a suggestive way—and the group of hetaerae laughed again.

  “Look there,” said the one with the silver coin. She caught the coin, tucked it into the bodice of her dress, and drifted closer. “It’s the dancing girl. Come to be a filly in Xanthes’ stable, have you?”