Page 13 of Do Not Awaken Love (The Moroccan Empire #3)
I do the best I can. I ask, with gestures, for what I need.
Maadah brings me strips of cloth, that my leg may be tightly bound, alongside a few short pieces of wood.
With her help, and Aisha’s, we bind my leg as tightly and straight as possible.
They cut away my ripped silken apparel and to my relief I am given a plain loose robe in a faded green, which is far too big for me and therefore falls comfortably over my awkwardly straight leg.
I know that I must drink the root of cornflower, but I do not know how to ask for it.
I make gestures to ask for writing implements.
It takes a day before Aisha can lay her hands on ink and a sheet of something which I think is vellum at first, although it is not quite like it.
At any rate, I can draw on it and I do my best to draw a cornflower, indicating that the petals should be blue by touching Maadah’s robe, which is of a similar colour.
I draw the little dangling purple flowers of comfrey also, known as knitbone, for its ability to do just that.
Aisha nods at this, and takes away my drawing, I think she goes to the market with it to show to a seller of such remedies and sure enough returns with roots and leaves which I recognise.
I embrace her as best I can, so grateful am I for her help.
I drink the cornflower root daily, wrap comfrey around my leg and meanwhile Maadah smears some kind of mixture on my face, which eases the burns.
I try to smell it, to find out what is in it, but I am not sure I recognise all the ingredients, some of them may be local to here.
After several days Maadah nods approvingly at my face and tries to show me the progress of my burns in the mirror, but I only shake my head and look away.
It is vanity to be more concerned with my face than with my ability to walk in the future.
I am a bride of Christ, and Christ looks only at our hearts.
He does not concern Himself with a woman’s good looks or otherwise.
Time passes. I live all of my life in the kitchen.
Early on, we find a way that I may relieve myself, with much pain and difficulty, but Maadah and Aisha do not shy away from such crude matters, only helping me when needed and disposing of my bodily waste without comment.
A corner of the kitchen becomes mine; they place a sack stuffed with straw under me and give me a blanket to lie under at night.
I know that my legs will grow wasted if I do not use them, so I try to move a little each day, even from my sitting position, half-crawling across the kitchen floor, folding and straightening the good leg.
I try to make myself useful. I peel and chop vegetables, butcher meats, grind spices and herbs for the meals.
I learn one dish after another, until Maadah nods and smiles at my efforts in making them myself, without her input.
I learn to roll tiny grains until they are made into something called couscous , to be buttered and salted, then topped with the thick stews they like to eat here.
Once or twice, I suggest, by pointing, a different spice or herb and Maadah nods, acknowledging that my choices are good.
By night, I sleep by the last embers of the fire, wrapped in my blanket, and wake to find a little basin of water and a cloth laid out for me by Aisha so that I may keep myself clean.
I do not see my master, for which I am grateful.
Day by day I learn new words, now that I can hear Aisha’s chatter and Maadah’s responses all day, alongside the other women who visit the kitchen.
I begin by pointing to each herb and spice, for I know what they are, and to know their name in this new language is a comfort to me.
Then I point to other things: the fire, the wood, a pot, water.
Slowly, slowly, my leg heals, slowly, slowly, I learn to speak.
Finally, the day comes when I can stand, leaning heavily on two sturdy sticks Aisha has found and brought to me.
I look down. My work was not perfect; the leg is twisted.
I will always limp. But I am standing, I am walking again, and I give thanks for this, grateful that God has not entirely deserted me, even here.
I work harder to learn the language. Aisha laughs at me when I speak, for she says my accent makes their words sound strange, but at least I begin to understand those around me and make myself understood in turn.
Once I can ask questions and comprehend the answers to some degree an endless stream of them falls from my lips.
I ask about the city, about the country, about our master.
“We sit on the trade routes,” she explains, “that is what has brought the Master riches.”
“What does the Master trade in?”
She makes a face, as she always does when he is mentioned. “Gold,” she says curtly. “He trades with the Dark Kingdoms, to the south. He used to trade in slaves, but then he found that gold was easier. Gold does not die if you mistreat it,” she adds.
I nod. This makes sense of our master’s riches: the silk robes, the dark-skinned and heavily armed bodyguards he surrounds himself with on his journeys, this large and elegant house.
“Caravans come and go from Aghmat all the time,” she tells me. “They are vast, you will have seen them on your journey here.”
I nod. Traders can have more than a hundred camels, I have learnt.
The caravans go on and on into the distance, and because they all follow the same trade routes, one caravan will often join in close with another, for there is safety in numbers, from bandits and other dangers.
When crossing the deserts, there is the danger of getting lost and so many of the caravans follow one another.
“What other traders are there?” I ask.
“Oh, all kinds. Cloth: wool and linen of course, but also silks, and those that have been decorated are worth a great deal, the merchants who trade in them are rich. The cloth destined for the nobles will have been decorated with embroidery, or silver – they like to put little silver discs on some clothes, or twisted threads of gold. And there is jewellery of course, made with silver, or gold. Some of it is very fine, it is embedded with pearls or precious gems and woods. Have you seen ebony? It is black as night, black like a coal. And prized, of course.”
I continue my work, but Aisha has sat back on her heels, with a dreamy expression on her face.
“Imagine being a queen,” she says, a faraway smile on her face.
“Imagine sitting on a throne while the best merchants bring you their wares. You could choose any jewellery you wanted; you could have glass cups and the best rose perfume. You wouldn’t just chew on a stick of sugarcane, or peel an orange yourself, you’d have cooks, to make all kinds of delicacies and sweetmeats.
” She puffs out her cheeks and blows out a sigh.
“Well, I suppose I can dream of such a day,” she adds, laughing.
“There is no chance Maadah will make such things for us; she’s a good cook but not fancy. ”
“Are there many traders in spices?” I ask. “And in the ingredients for healing?”
“There are plenty,” she says. “Although some seem a little frightening.”
“Frightening?”
“Such things they have! Skulls from snakes and creatures pickled in jars, as though they were radishes. And teeth, so many teeth! They pull them right out of your head, if they hurt.”
I nod, my tongue creeping over my own teeth, which thankfully I still have all of.
Sister Rosa was always insistent on cleaning them with salt and a little stick, although she also kept a good supply of cloves for toothache and had a sturdy pair of pliers for pulling out any teeth that had gone rotten.
Her own teeth were healthier than most, so I followed her example.
“Why am I called Kamra?” I ask her. “What does it mean?”
“Moon,” she says.
“Why did the Master call me that?” I ask. “He could have called me anything.”
She looks awkward. “It is just a name,” she says.
“But why that name?” I persist.
She gestures vaguely towards me, at my head. “He said your head was like the moon,” she half mutters.
I frown and then think about what she has said.
My clean-shaven scalp, when he first saw me, the skin on my head whiter than white from the many years’ protection from the sun, the lack of hair.
It is a cruel nickname then, a name he chose to refer to the distinctive thing about me.
The name was both accurate and intended as a jest, a jeering.
My white scalp earned me the name of moon.
I think for a moment of telling Aisha what my real name is, or at least one of them, but then I think that this name is good enough.
It is a reminder of who I really am, that my scalp should have remained shaven, it has something of my past to it and is easy enough to pronounce, amidst these other words that I find so difficult.
So, I remain Kamra, not challenging the name.
“Why did he buy me? He obviously did not think me beautiful. And there were beautiful women on the slave block, he could have bought them.” I think of Catalina.
Aisha sits back on her heels from scrubbing the tiled floor. “The Master often brings women home from his travels,” she says. “He likes them to look different.”
“Different?”
“Different colours, different sizes, different ages. He says he likes variety,” she adds, grimacing. “He has had many women in the rooms upstairs,” she adds. “Old women, girls not yet past childhood, even one or two men.”