Page 21 of Awariye

I chuckled at him telling a bard what to say. If anyone were in control of one's words, I'd say my profession ranked among the top of such people.

"What I remember is hazy and dreamlike because I was so young," I began. "But what I can piece together is we likely fell upon hard times financially, and then there was a plague, maybe the yellow fever outbreak that swept through Bavaria twenty years ago."

Igor's eyes widened as he remembered that dark time, his breath stilling. He nodded for me to continue.

I fidgeted a bit and he adjusted to my movements. Settling once again into a comfortable position, I told him about the rest of my childhood. "I remember being kept alone and told to stay outside, not to go in certain rooms wherever we were living at the time. That's why I think it was a contagious disease. My father must have passed because I remember my mother crying all the time, and then the group disbanded, and we went our separate ways. I can still hear his rich voice laughing and calling for me.”

"Did he name you?" asked Igor.

I giggled. "No, actually, I found my own name from among our warmup exercises, and my parents let me keep it. You know how singers go through the vowels, scales, and intervals?"

Igor's half-smile and the mischief in his eyes thrilled me. "No, what?"

I cleared my throat again and tried to sing, though the conditions weren't optimal, and it came out a bit croaky.

"A-wa-ri-yeeee, Aaa-waa-rii-yeee!"

Igor squeezed his eyes shut and shook with laughter. "Your name is the warmup exercises?"

I hooted. "Yes! My parents surely named me something else, but then I began singing my own name and it stuck."

Igor's mirth finally bubbled up and out of him and we laughed together.

The happy moment ended, and I tried to think of a way to tie the sad part of my story back in without letting the grief from such memories wrap itself around us.

"After that, Mama and I were on our own. I remember waiting so often in closets and dark rooms, with Mama promising she’d come back, but I had to sit there quietly. I wonder now whether she was forced to prostitute herself."

"Oh nein," said Igor in sympathy.

I nodded. "There was a brief period in which we lived at a convent and things finally stabilized, but as I grew older they wouldn't let me stay. Then the last memory I have of my mother is in front of the Diana Monastery in Helvetica, of her leaning down, crying and telling me to sing to the monks until they let me in.

For years I dreamed that she left me there in order to find a rich husband, so she could one day come back for me and we'd all get to live together. I even tracked down the convent to see whether she’d become a nun, but she wasn’t there, and the nuns didn’t remember us. Eventually I came to understand that it likely was a much sadder fate for her. She could have sold herself into slavery out of sheer desperation; she may not even be alive right now. The Diana Monastery taught me to sing for the gods, but for the rest of this lifetime I will also sing for her, and for my father and those in our theatre group, in gratitude for them loving and nurturing me."

Igor swallowed, carding his fingers through my hair, combing it out of my eyes.

"Your voice is so pretty, Awariye," said Igor. "Why were you in such a state when you arrived here? The doctor asked me to stay with you to balance your body temperature, and Ingeborg suggested I share my life force with you. You could have died."

I reached for his hand that was stroking my arm and twined our fingers together. "I’ve told you about the nodes that grow on one's vocal cords when they are taxed too much for too long. In the mild cases it merely causes pain, but it only gets worse, and in the severe cases, a person can lose their voice completely. I found in documents at the Monastery library that centuries ago they used to have a surgery that could sometimes fix it, but nowadays I would never risk such a procedure. Maybe the people inside the Vienna city walls have access to such technology and hygienic standards, but who knows."

"And you strained your voice?"

"Ja. I started to notice when I left the Monastery and began working as a traveling bard. Singing over a boisterous crowd, loudly enough to garner their attention, is a massive burden on one's voice, and I was coming into it after a childhood of singing to survive. I've been trying to save my voice for when I get the chance to sing to a potential patron. But that meant I was running low on proper meals, and when I miscalculated on being able to meet up with a friend who might share a room and some meals with me, I wound up in the state you met me in."

Igor nodded slowly, processing that. "From now on, if your work gets thin again, or whenever you want to, loop back to the capital and come find me. I am only living in the castle right now for the doctor to see my shoulder; usually I rent a room in town. Ulbrecht gives his warriors a stipend that I will gladly share with you, for your company and friendship if nothing else. And if you want to, I'll gladly share my bed with you."

"I have my pride," I protested, though it sounded weak, and I fought off a wave of shame.

"Nein," Igor tossed back. "You are not a beggar, I know. You are a friend—or a lover, if you want it. I do. But if you don't want me in this bed anymore, I will go back to the lodging house in town. I shared my life force with you, and now you look so much better. But you owe me nothing, Awariye."

In my tired state I struggled to follow his jumps in topic. "I want you to stay in my bed, Igor. As a friend or a lover, like you said. I want to get to know you better, and I like having you here with me."

He finally met my eyes again, his soft blue-gray irises kind and hopeful.

"I will stay with you," he said, kissing my cheek and making me close my eyes, "as long as you will have me."

"Stay then," I commanded, though it sounded more like a plea. "I want you to stay."

Then sleep took me, and as he held me close, I dropped away.

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