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Authors: Sofia Samatar
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the window.
“After all, it’s been a wonderful summer,” she said.
Dogs barked; the light of carriage lamps gleamed behind the curtains.
“ Siski, don ’t,” I said.
“No, I have to go,” she said. She bent down and kissed me, smiling. “ I don ’t know what’s the matter with me.” Her breath struggled for a moment in the tightness of her coat and then she was calm, at the door, touching her hair, and gone.
3. Blood
The swordmaiden will bleed.
All bleed who fight with the sword. All confront, with greater or lesser difficulty, the worship of their own flesh. The swordmaiden faces particular obstacles in this matter: she will have seen, in the temples and elsewhere, many images of unscarred women.
The swordmaiden, like all warriors, must transform aversion into pride. She will be aided in this by the knowledge that her path to this achievement, being rougher and less moonlit than the paths of her companions, endows her triumph with a superior glory.
Consider: the unscarred women depicted in the temples are gods.
Consider: very few overcome the worship of the flesh. Bardo of Weis, an exceedingly arrogant brawler, whose skin was so tortured it resembled a carpet, wept in his dreams once a year for the loss of his former body.
There is also the small matter of the swordmaiden’s monthly blood. It is advisable to stanch the flow with rags, and to wash these rags in privacy, if at all possible, as one’s companions may find the subject cause for jest. It is also acceptable to follow the example of Maris, who slew two men in duels prompted by such insults, or of the False Countess, who used to discuss her flow openly in her camp, as she and her men together discoursed on the issue of their bowels.
The question is unlikely to arise except in times of peace; the swordmaiden at war will often find that her flow has stopped. Consider Galaron of Nain, who bled for the first time in her life at the age of thirty, and mistook the pangs and blood for signs that her food had been poisoned.
When my wound had fully healed and I no longer needed the cane, I went into the desert. I dressed in the highland way, in wide trousers and a sheepskin jacket; with my hair loose on my shoulders and the sword worn openly at my side, I was taken everywhere for a young man. Even Fadhian, who met me, as my letter requested, a few miles south of Tevlas, thought I was a boy. He was seated on the fence outside the inn, his horse cropping the weeds nearby, and he nodded to me without expression.
Then I smiled, and his hard face rippled into understanding. He jumped down, I dismounted, and we clasped hands.
“Tavis,” he said.
“Tav.”
He bowed. We rode together in silence until firelight appeared against the dusky sky.
“There’s the camp,” he said. We quickened our pace. Several boys came out to meet us, bearing torches and one broken lantern that gave off an evil smell. They swung the lantern in my face, exclaiming in a dialect I found difficult to understand. I was struck by the rowdy noise they made and the way they did not try to hide the fact that they were talking about me, and also by their jostling closeness, the way they all rode in a knot, which I recognized as a skill but did not like.
Tumbling and clattering, we rode into the camp. Fadhian smiled as girls ran up to greet him and tug his stirrups. He dismounted and embraced everyone and kissed each boy and girl on the top of the head and the women kissed him on the shoulder. Everyone laughed when he kissed Lunsila, who was so tall she had to bend her knees in order for him to kiss the crown of her dark head, and she laughed more than anyone and everyone made jokes that it was clear they had made many times before. The children crowded at Fadhian’s knees and then he was carrying two of them and continued to hold them as he introduced me. I clasped hands with everyone and was overcome by loneliness. Later the boys told me they had feared my angry face. And
“After all, it’s been a wonderful summer,” she said.
Dogs barked; the light of carriage lamps gleamed behind the curtains.
“ Siski, don ’t,” I said.
“No, I have to go,” she said. She bent down and kissed me, smiling. “ I don ’t know what’s the matter with me.” Her breath struggled for a moment in the tightness of her coat and then she was calm, at the door, touching her hair, and gone.
3. Blood
The swordmaiden will bleed.
All bleed who fight with the sword. All confront, with greater or lesser difficulty, the worship of their own flesh. The swordmaiden faces particular obstacles in this matter: she will have seen, in the temples and elsewhere, many images of unscarred women.
The swordmaiden, like all warriors, must transform aversion into pride. She will be aided in this by the knowledge that her path to this achievement, being rougher and less moonlit than the paths of her companions, endows her triumph with a superior glory.
Consider: the unscarred women depicted in the temples are gods.
Consider: very few overcome the worship of the flesh. Bardo of Weis, an exceedingly arrogant brawler, whose skin was so tortured it resembled a carpet, wept in his dreams once a year for the loss of his former body.
There is also the small matter of the swordmaiden’s monthly blood. It is advisable to stanch the flow with rags, and to wash these rags in privacy, if at all possible, as one’s companions may find the subject cause for jest. It is also acceptable to follow the example of Maris, who slew two men in duels prompted by such insults, or of the False Countess, who used to discuss her flow openly in her camp, as she and her men together discoursed on the issue of their bowels.
The question is unlikely to arise except in times of peace; the swordmaiden at war will often find that her flow has stopped. Consider Galaron of Nain, who bled for the first time in her life at the age of thirty, and mistook the pangs and blood for signs that her food had been poisoned.
When my wound had fully healed and I no longer needed the cane, I went into the desert. I dressed in the highland way, in wide trousers and a sheepskin jacket; with my hair loose on my shoulders and the sword worn openly at my side, I was taken everywhere for a young man. Even Fadhian, who met me, as my letter requested, a few miles south of Tevlas, thought I was a boy. He was seated on the fence outside the inn, his horse cropping the weeds nearby, and he nodded to me without expression.
Then I smiled, and his hard face rippled into understanding. He jumped down, I dismounted, and we clasped hands.
“Tavis,” he said.
“Tav.”
He bowed. We rode together in silence until firelight appeared against the dusky sky.
“There’s the camp,” he said. We quickened our pace. Several boys came out to meet us, bearing torches and one broken lantern that gave off an evil smell. They swung the lantern in my face, exclaiming in a dialect I found difficult to understand. I was struck by the rowdy noise they made and the way they did not try to hide the fact that they were talking about me, and also by their jostling closeness, the way they all rode in a knot, which I recognized as a skill but did not like.
Tumbling and clattering, we rode into the camp. Fadhian smiled as girls ran up to greet him and tug his stirrups. He dismounted and embraced everyone and kissed each boy and girl on the top of the head and the women kissed him on the shoulder. Everyone laughed when he kissed Lunsila, who was so tall she had to bend her knees in order for him to kiss the crown of her dark head, and she laughed more than anyone and everyone made jokes that it was clear they had made many times before. The children crowded at Fadhian’s knees and then he was carrying two of them and continued to hold them as he introduced me. I clasped hands with everyone and was overcome by loneliness. Later the boys told me they had feared my angry face. And
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