She didn’t know how long she slept for. It took all of her strength not to lose consciousness before she reached the bathhouse, and she nearly threw up from the pain as she limped through the front yard. Fleeting thoughts of returning to safety comforted her as she forced herself to keep walking, and as she limped through the quiet bathhouse. The sun was just breaking the sky overhead, casting the entire bathhouse in an eerie twilight. In a daze from the pain, she dropped the pouch in front of Ayesha’s room, and all but fainted into her bed in the tiny room assigned to her on the second floor.
She hadn’t meant to fall asleep. In fact, all logic told her that she needed to clean and dress the wound. But the loss of blood had begun to affect her rationality and caving into the exhaustion had never felt so appealing. Her dreams were a lucid mix of colors and darkness, and when she awoke, her eyes opened to the sight of the wooden boards that lined the ceiling overhead.
For a brief moment, it felt as if last night had just been a lucid nightmare. Her room looked normal, the silent tranquility of the morning sun seeping through the window shutters to warm the small quarters she spent most of her days in. The light cast shade on the pile of books that literred the corners of her bedroom, evidence of her never-ending quest to teach herself how to read. Her dholki drum was perched next to the one window in her room, underneath a small herb garden she had growing on the windowsill. Clothes littered the red rug that stretched across her room, covering the hardwood floor and her emerald blue janemaaz was slung by the only chest of drawers in the room. Under the drawer, beneath the floorboards, was a small box filled with an assortment of valuables; necklaces, gold, and silver nuggets that she planned on using to find a home outside of the bathhouse one day. There were also a pack of cigarettes she kept in there, but only for the most stressful of times. It was a habit she was trying to kick.
She sat up groggily, and it was when she sat up that her eyes fell upon the bloody sheets.
Her hands immediately went to her stomach, and she held her hand over the throbbing pain. Her body was drenched in sweat, and she could feel her heart racing.
Everything that could have gone wrong last night, did go wrong.
She steadied her breath and looked down at her blood-soaked kameez. Groaning, she forced herself to sit up, wincing at the pain in her abdomen. Holding her breath, she peeled up the kameez to gauge the extent of the wound.
She froze at the sight.
It was impossible.
Lira looked around at the room, at the bloody fingerprints on the door handle, the blood spatter on the floor and the soaked sheets. Proof of her wound was everywhere; on the incense holder by the window, on the handles of the shutters she had attempted to shut upon coming home, and on the red carpet that lay at her feet.
Her mind flashed back to what had happened last night. The dagger had pierced through her skin and into her abdomen, as easily as a knife sliced through butter. The steel had pushed through the muscles like a hot flash, the only indication of blood penetrating skin being the sharp, unimaginable, pain that began to throb in her belly as slippery blood immediately began to ooze out as the person withdrew the dagger.
She hadn’t imagined it. She could remember the shock, the gasp as the dagger had been withdrawn, and the wet, hot sensation of blood on her hands.
A knock on the door forced her out of her rapture. “One moment,” she shakily called out, and ran a hand over the undamaged skin.
There was no wound. In fact, there was no blood on her skin at all.
The pounding on the door fastened, and Lira quickly sat up and pulled the sheets off her bed to stow them in the closet. Pulling the rug over the blood on the wood floors, she pulled a chador over her torn kameez and opened the door.
“Oh, thank Allah,” Maryam rushed in and hugged Lira tightly. “We all stayed up till the early hours of the morning for you to return. I couldn’t sleep. How did you manage it? Are you hurt? Did anyone see you?” Maryam pulled back and steadied her palm on Lira’s face, “Y’Allah, Lira. You look like hell. Are you okay?”
“I’m f-fine,” Lira couldn’t explain what had happened to her, and didn’t even know how to explain it to herself. All that she knew with absolute certainty was that what she had done to get free was bad, and that no-one could know of it. Maryam was searching her face, her brown eyes wide with concern. “Tell me, how is Ayesha?”
“She’s fine, she’s more than fine,” Maryam smiled, “the penicillin you found, kava root… she’s actually awake, the fever has broken, and she’s in good spirits. She had a cup of chai this morning. There’s only so much eucalyptus can do to heal the scars, but… never mind that. What happened to you? You look like you saw a ghost.”
“I had to outrun some guards, I suppose I’m still shaken,” she lied. She didn’t want to share the events of last night just yet. She wasn’t even sure what to believe, and what was a dream. The last thing she wanted was for Maryam to think that she’d lost her mind. “Give me a few moments,” Lira said.
Maryam paused at the sound of her voice. “I’ve known you since you were four. Cut the bullshit. What happened last night?”
“Let me bathe, and I’ll meet you in the kitchens,” Lira’s voice caught in her throat, “I promise.”
It was clear that Maryam didn’t want to go, but she caved under the weight of Lira’s words. She nodded despite the concern in her eyes. “Ok.”
Lira shut the door behind Maryam and rested her forehead against the door. She felt like she had been through hell and back and wasn’t quite sure how she had survived.
Her body sunk to the floor and she sat with her back against the door, closing her eyes to steady her breath. The morning sun was seeping through the wooden lattice covering her window, warming her small bedroom enclave with the soothing light. Incense, lit at Maryam’s window next door, was traipsing into her room and comforting her with its familiar scent. She could hear the sound of the birds chirping in the tree branches in the gardens, and the distant chattering of the busy Islamabad streets. The chali-wala always strolled through the streets in the morning, signalling the arrival of his wagon of corn by blowing a soft horn as he wandered through the streets. The familiarity of the noise brought her slight comfort.
Lira opened her eyes and examined her stomach again, running her fingers over the place where she thought the wound would be.
There was nothing there.
But how? There was blood on her clothes and on the sheets to prove that the skin had been pierced. It didn’t make sense.
Double and triple checking, Lira crawled over to the rug and rolled it up. Sure enough, bloody spatter smeared the wood floors, proving to her that she hadn’t imagined it.
She had never believed in black magic, but childhood stories of necromancers brewing poisons to cast curses on enemies floated through her head.
She cast the thoughts aside immediately. She wasn’t one to believe in nonsense. There had to be a practical explanation for this, as there was for everything else in the world. The ache that she had felt in her stomach when she’d awoken had dissipated to a mere tinge, so slight that she wondered if the pain was even psychosomatic.
Compartmentalizing everything that had happened in the past twelve hours – the idrisi, the escape, the wound - away into a tiny box in her head, she changed the clothes.
The sun was already out, the sky a deep blue and completely clear of any wisps of clouds. Nearly monsoon season, the heat would only hold off for a few short hours in the morning before pulling the city of Islamabad into its cocoon by noon. Feeling slightly off, and clammy, Lira waved her chador to generate a breeze as she headed outside.
She found Maryam in the courtyard where Ayesha was lying flat on a charpai, an assortment of blankets and pillows cushioning her body. Her heart sank at the sight of the girl; half her face was covered in a series of tightly wrapped bandages, which ran down her her left shoulder and stopped at her wrist. The bandages were wrapped firmly around her skin, some areas giving way to pink blood that was seeping from Ayesha’s skin.
The little girl was holding a small cup of chai in her right hand, Khadija helping her lift it to her mouth to sip. Apa was nowhere to be seen. In her stead were a few of the older girls, including Rida, and Khadija.
As Ayesha’s eyes settled on Lira, her face lit up. “Lira!” Her voice was scratchy, but the joy shimmered through regardless. “I can’t believe what you did for me!” Her voice was filled with awe.
“Please don’t learn from her bad behaviour,” Rida added as Lira sat down by Maryam. “She shouldn’t have stolen from the palace.”
“How are you, Ayesha?” Lira asked at once. The young girl looked so frail on the charpai, her brown skin paler than normal and the skin under her eyes shallow from what must have been a horrid twelve hours of pain. The one eye free of bandages was looking at her earnestly, with nothing but curiosity.
“How’d you do it?” Ayesha asked before Khadija cut her off.
“She shouldn’t be speaking yet; she’s supposed to be resting.” Khadija gave Ayesha a light squeeze on the bare shoulder, “The ointment you found with the penicillin has eased the pain and the kava will soften the sight of the scars, but she still needs rest to recover.”
“You’ll be ready to work again in no time,” Lira winked. Her body felt heavy, but the sight of Ayesha up and talking made her feel a little lighter. “Enjoy this time off while it lasts.”
“I keep telling her that she shouldn’t feel sad, it could have been worse,” Maryam was subconsciously wringing her dupatta in her hands, her eyes focused on Ayesha. “She should be thankful the acid only got half of her.”
“Of course,” Khadija added, “And God knows I’m going to poison those men if I ever see them again.”
“Just focus on getting better,” Lira said as she held Ayesha’s hand. Focusing on the bright side of things was the only way people like them got through life. Otherwise, the bleakness of life would bury them with its heaviness. “We’ll find some mangoes for you when we go to the bazaar.”
Ayesha smiled, and Lira could tell that she was genuinely happy, unbothered by the scars that burned under the bandages. “Mango lassi?”
Khadija snorted, “We’ll start at mangoes, maybe we’ll do the lassis.”
Ayesha’s gaze was steadfast. “Mango lassis with salted almonds.”
“Look at how she’s learned from you,” Khadija tsk’d, “Even while she’s suffering, she’s making deals and bargaining.”
“How did you do it?” Maryam changed the conversation, her eyes eager. “Osman always tells me how many guards are on patrol. How did you get past them?”
Lira took a deep breath, and then began to tell the story - fabricating most of it. She wanted Ayesha to take her mind off of her wounds, and she knew that she wouldn’t be able to get away from Maryam without explaining some of what had happened. The last thing she wanted everybody to know, however, was that she’d spent an entire night in the palace jail, and had set an idrisi free. The consequences of last night’s actions were not ones that she was ready to think about, let alone face.
So she told a story muddled with lies, explaining her hours-long absence by having to hide out in the gardens until the doctors at the apothecary switched shifts. She added some details about conversations she had overheard, and how she had managed to stay hidden.
They stayed outside in the front courtyard for a few hours, until a pang of hunger signalled to Lira that she needed to get some food inside of her. The twinges of pain that she had felt in her stomach had subsided, giving way to a ravenous appetite. “I’m going to make a paratha for myself. Do you want one, Ayesha?”
Maryam perked at the words. “Make one for me.”
“I didn’t ask you. You can make one for yourself.”
“Uff, you’re back to being an ungrateful, selfish woman.”
“This is my cue to leave.” Lira rolled her eyes, and left for the kitchen.
She had only reached the bathhouse doors when Maryam caught up with her. “I know you’re hiding something.”
Lira ignored her, and headed down the quiet bathhouse halls for the kitchen. “Maryam - I’ve had a long night.”
Maryam persisted. “I can read you like a book. I know when you’re telling a bald-faced lie.”
Lira stopped just short of the kitchen doors, and stopped to turn to Maryam. “It’s better if I keep it to myself.”
“Since when have you ever kept anything to yourself?!”
“I don’t want to get you involved.”
“Why?!”
“I did something bad, alright?” Lira snapped, exasperated. She lowered her voice to make sure nobody heard. Although the bathhouse was quiet at this time of day, you never knew who was listening around the corner. “Something worse than simply stealing from the apothecary. The less you know, the safer you’ll be.”
The two were interrupted by Apa’s voice coming from across the hallway, bellowing for their attention. The bathhouse matriarch was storming down the hallway, with a rolled parchment paper in hand. Her chador was loosely wrapped around her head and shoulders, the fabric billowing out from behind her as she walked. “Just ridiculous,” she was mumbling as she walked by them, “As if I have time for nonsense like this. It’s not as if I’m running an entire bathhouse by myself, with no help from anybody else under my roof.”
“What’s wrong?” Maryam asked, “anything you need help with, Apa?”
“You can help by telling the palace guards to leave us alone!” Apa whirled on them, her cheeks pink with frustration. “I have a sick child, dozens of mouths to feed, four floors of a house to keep clean day in and day out. They have no regard for the working class, and no respect for the impact they…”
“What happened?” This sounded more serious than Lira first assumed. Apa was usually quick to descend into hysterics, over-exaggerating the tiniest inconveniences that happened to her.
“They’ve ordered a shutdown of our bathhouse and an interrogation of everyone in our bathhouse, tonight. There’s two of those horrible guards standing outside our gates, right now. To make sure nobody enters or leaves. As if we don’t have money to make? Do they think we feed ourselves by money grown on trees? We can’t -.”
“Interrogation?” Lira interrupted, “what for?”
“Somebody escaped the jails last night. For some reason, they believe they may have come here.” Apa stopped to hold a hand to her head, “I feel a headache coming. I’m too old for this. Do you know how bad this will look? Having the royal army come here to interrogate us? We’re going to lose so much money. Nobody will come here after the army gets involved.”
Lira’s tongue had gone dry hearing the words coming out Apa’s mouth. The sudden hunger she had felt had immediately dissipated, replaced by looming dread. “Are you sure that’s what they said? Did they say what this person looked like? Whether it was a man or a woman?”
Both Apa and Maryam looked at Lira as she spoke, silence descending on the hallway. Sudden knowing flashed in Apa’s eyes, and anger flitted across the woman’s face like lightning.
And just like that, the silence broke, “Silly woman,” Apa said through grunts as she grabbed Lira’s ear and pulled it down, eliciting a yell from Lira. “What have you done!?”