writing_shadows

"And so I travelled from the land where the sand met the sky, I travelled into the Blue and then into the Green, which you call 'the Hedge'. And I nearly came home. I saw the door up ahead. But I was not alone.

She took me. She took me and chained me up with iron. She was a slaver, and she enslaved me. I don't know why. I don't know if she acted out of free choice, and I know many did not. But that is what she was. And if I die, then I need someone to know that."

We're sitting, cross legged, on the ground in between a coconut shy and a lucky dip. The ground is damp and soft and I am going to have mud all across my arse when I stand up. My companion is watching me, with mismatched eyes. One eye is dull and dead. The other is burning and I'm more than a little afraid.

His eyes don't leave my face. I don't know this man. I met him in a goblin market. That's all.

"Are you lying to me?" he says.

I don't want to have this conversation. I really don't. It isn't fair. It isn't fair on her, and it isn't fair on me. I don't want to be the one crying out about someone else's past, someone else's secrets. I'm afraid of not being believed, of being told I'm a lying little shit for saying it. I'm afraid that she's got free, got clean, and now I'm bringing all her crap back to curse her.

I shake my head, nervous and trying not to shake. It's been a bad day.

"No," I say. "I'm not."

"Because if you are..."

"...I'm not. I'm not lying."

I don't want to be the person who spills another's secrets to a cold eyed man with a sword. But I can't be the person who lets her, the woman made of spindrift who hurts and who kills, go free and let it all be forgotten. Shit, there has to be something in the Quran about this. I guess I zoned out when Dad tried talking to me about this. I was probably thinking about nail varnish or something useful like that. Who knew that nail varnish gives you no viable moral framework to make big decisions in?

I stand up, brushing down my skirt, nervous now.

He - Jack, his name is Jack - stands up as well, looking a little confused. I don't know if I should have told him this story. I rub at the iron scars on my wrists. They are still there, after all these years.

"I...I have to go."

The world is changing and I don't know what I'm doing. I remember my grandmother clicking at the back of her throat. What was that saying she liked? 'A known mistake is better than an unknown truth.'

Yeah, it doesn't really sound like the kind of advice an elderly Iraqi lady would give and I'm not sure she entirely believed it. Or maybe she was just unconvinced that there were any unknown truths to be found in the pub, or in the back pockets of teenage boys. Either way, she said it. She meant it. That means I'm doing the right thing, right?

God knows. And bloody hell, I'm shivering. I repeat that saying in my head over and over again as I walk away.