Read Online Unraveled Visions (A Shaman Mystery) by Nina Milton - Free Book Online Page A

Mirela, I look after you.’ Then she say, ‘don’ worry, Mirela, I be back soon.’ But no back. I am stuck! Alone.” She put down her tea, mostly because she’d begun to weep, quite silently, the tears oozing and trickling. She wiped her wet eyes with a scrap of greying paper that might originally have been wrapped around a plastic knife and fork.
    “How long have you been here?”
    “Two month. It not like was promised.”
    “What were you promised?”
    “Good wage. Happy. But, no wage, no happy.” She pushed the tissue up the sleeve of her matted woollen cardigan.
    “You don’t think your sister went home, do you?”
    “No. Not home for Kizzy. She like it here. She say it better—Bulgarian gypsy not spat on here.”
    “Even so,” I said, thinking that gypsies were unwelcome everywhere. “Your family must miss you both.”
    She gave a wet sniff. “Itso miss me.”
    “Itso?”
    “My boy.”
    “Your boyfriend?” I said, a bit cautious. “How old is Itso, Mirela?”
    “He one year on me. Seventeen. We want join hands and marry. But Itso … no bride price for Tatta. So I go to bride market.”
    “What’s a bride market?” I said. “Is it like a show where you can choose your wedding dress, the cake, all that?”
    “No!” Mirela laughed, once. “Girl on show, not cake. Gypsy girl love it … talk, talk, all time before, buy makeup; can’t wait. Wear best clothe. Dance. Nice day out, see many men. Hopeful men,” she added, with a touch of humour. “Make thousands levs if wealthy man. For family of girl.”
    “Did you have to go to the bride market?”
    “Yes. At Horse Easter in Zagora. Kizzy been before, but no good offer. Wait for best offer.”
    “Would your family have forced Kizzy into a marriage?” I asked, recalling her sharp, confident movements when she read my palm. I didn’t think she’d agree to anything she didn’t want to do.
    “Kizzy did meet man at Bride Fair. Stanislaus. He not Roma. Bulgarian-British. He say, ‘come England, work. Wage good. Four euro hour’.”
    “Sounds like this Stanislaus deserves a whipping.”
    “You have this punishment?”
    I laughed. “We do have a minimum wage, and four euros is well below it. You should tell someone official about all this.”
    “Yes. We saw man. We tell story. But him ask so many questions. Too many. He like stray dog; lick your hand then bite your hand.” Mirela crawled even farther into the corner of the sofa. For a second, I sensed the energy field around her body. It was shrunken, dank, and sliced thin, like canned mushrooms. I could understand why someone official, even if they wanted to help, would seem overwhelming; frightening.
    “What did this person say they would do for you?”
    “Nothing. Useless. Kizzy say if we go back to him, we lose job. Get thrown out work, get thrown out country.”
    “Are you here without visas?” I asked, not wanting to use the phrase illegal immigrant.
    “We are EU in Bulgaria now,” she said, shifting a little. “But gypsy hard to get passport.”
    “No wonder your wages are so low. They’re getting away with murder.”
    “Kizzy say we move on. Go find better thing to do. More money. She say find save and go back head high. She say, ‘Mirela, take little risk.’ I don’t like. She say, ‘Mirela, you so uncool.’ ”
    “Uncool?”
    “Like I will never dip my toe.”
    “In case the water’s too cold?”
    “In case the water poison.”
    I was piecing her story together as best I could. “So, Kizzy asked you to leave with her, but you wouldn’t, so … so she went without you.”
    “Many days go by. No Kizzy. No phone call, no nothing. She in trouble. I know it. Know!”
    “You think she’s in some sort of danger?”
    “In my blood, yes, but this strangely. Kizzy like … e balwal … she go where she want, no asking.”
    “ Balwal ?”
    “The wind, yes.”
    The skin of her face was drawn tight and looked sallow under my dim lighting. I didn’t think Kizzy