Under the Willow Root

Chapter 28

"True freedom is impossible without a mind made free by discipline."--Mortimer J. Adler

"Don't sleep," I murmur. "Can't."

I'm not so worried about falling asleep. I'm much more concerned about passing out. I've never been this badly hurt before, and certainly no one has hurt me like this on purpose. I don't count Pouter messing up my face. That was about food--hurting me was an added bonus. It was nothing like Cimari's gleeful pummeling of my unresisting body. The malice behind her attack is almost more disturbing than the physical pain.

Cimari's face, warped with cruelty, flashes before my eyes. I try to think of something--anything--else. I wonder if this is how Baba Nadia felt when she had her accident. She was probably in much more pain with a broken leg and a broken arm. I can't imagine how it must have felt, knowing that she would never dance again. I always thought it was that knowledge that killed her in the end. Once she was in the hospital, it was like she didn't even try to get better.

A tear slips down my cheek and into my split lip, making it sting. I close my eyes. I miss her so much. My grandmother was the only family I ever knew and it never occurred to me that I would need anyone else. But now she's gone, and I need her more than ever. I sag against the tunnel wall, struggling to breathe. My throat is tight, both from grief and fear for my broken ribs. I can't cry. I can't. It will kill me.

"Gori, gori, moya zvezda,

Zvezda lyubvi, privetnaya!

Ty u menya odna zavetnaya,

Drugoy ne budet nikogda..."

Through the stuffy feeling and ringing in my ears, I hear a familiar tune with familiar words. Shine, my star, my cherished one, my only love. The words flood me with both remembered pain and fresh longing for my grandmother.

"Babulya?" I whisper. I look around, blinking against the dark spots dancing before my eyes. "Baba Nadia, help...Baba Nadia?"

"Umru li ya, ty nad mogiloyu,

Gori, siyay, moya zvezda."

And if I die, my star, shine on over my grave.

"Baba Nadia," I sigh. I know she's here with me, though I can't see her.

"Sasha," she whispers in my ear. "Chin up, kotik. Keep going."

I can't. I shake uncontrollably, pain shooting through my body like knives. It makes me cry, which makes me shake more, which makes the knives dig deeper and twist. It's a cycle I can't break, and it's unbearable. I want it to stop. I want to die.

And why shouldn't I? How can anyone expect me to keep going when I have no where to go? Maybe the Temple will help, maybe they won't. But even if they do, what then? I have no one but Sadra in a world that doesn't even acknowledge me as a real person. It's just us. Two girls, literally against the world? It's just...idiotic. It's too hard, I don't want to do it. This delusion, this dream, this life, whatever it is--I don't want it. I want it to end now.

"One step, Sashka," Baba Nadia says. "Just one, for now."

"I want to go with you," I argue weakly.

"Not yet, kitten."

"Okay...okay. One step."

I push myself off the cavern wall, biting my lip so hard it bleeds. I need to focus. I move slowly toward the cavern entrance to wait for the sun to rise. Already I can see some people, mostly thralls, moving around in the pre-dawn light. With a jolt, I recognize the group Dove and I always joined heading for the slaves' baths. It wakes me up a little bit, enough so that I can wonder at the fact that I'm not among them.