Mismatched Read online

  Mismatched

  by Lydia Sharp

  Copyright © Lydia Sharp, 2013

  All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher.

  This e-book is a work of fiction. While references may be made to actual places or events, the names, characters, incidents, and locations within are from the author’s imagination and are not a resemblance to actual living or dead persons, businesses, or events. Any similarity is coincidental.

  Musa Publishing

  633 Edgewood Ave

  Lancaster, OH 43130

  www.MusaPublishing.com

  Issued by Musa Publishing, May 2013

  This e-book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution via any means is illegal and a violation of International Copyright Law, subject to criminal prosecution and upon conviction, fines and/or imprisonment. No part of this e-book can be reproduced or sold by any person or business without the express permission of the publisher.

  ISBN: 978-1-61937-635-9

  Head Editor: Elizabeth Silver

  Editor: J. Lannan

  Artist: Kelly Shorten

  Line Editor: Helen Hardt

  Interior Book Design: Cera Smith

  for those who suffer

  I am not afraid. I’ve made the right choice. The heart-stone doesn’t lie.

  My domed tent flickers with firelight—balmy, despite the bitter chill-winds outside. The interior walls are too bland, but I have no time for decorating now. I’m crowded by busy hands. First, the elder-women scrubbed me. Then they shaved me, scraping slick blades over every bit of flesh, even my head. I understand the reasoning. This is my birth into a new phase of life. I must be cleansed from top to bottom and start fresh. But before today my hair has never been cut. I used to find joy in creating artful twists with my smooth auburn locks. Their absence has exposed a sickly pale, bumpy sphere. The girl in the reflecting glass is not me.

  I fear my hair will never grow back and my appearance will not appeal to my life-match. Mother assures me that is just my nerves talking. I’m young and healthy and strong, she says, and a fine artist. Any Umet’nik man would be lucky to bond with me as his life-match.

  This emotional pain is temporary. As is the physical pain ahead of me.

  The elder-women rub oil into my skin. It has a base made from C’vet flower petals and roots, the roots for their calming effect and the petals for their sugar-sweet scent. I close my eyes and think not of my nonexistent hair or the intensity of my upcoming ceremony or who my life-match is or when we will realize our heart-stones burn for each other. Instead I focus on the massaging hands and allow the oil to relax me. Colors swirl in my mind, blues and violets and greens…inspiration for a new painting. My heart-stone burns inside me, flaring a steady, comforting heat on the left side of my lower abdomen. A reminder I was born to create masterful artwork.

  I’ve made the right choice. The heart-stone doesn’t lie.

  Mother binds a strip of thick, opaque cloth over my breasts, fastens it tight on my back, and ties a cord around my waist. A single flap of the same type of cloth hangs over my bottom and another hangs over my front. The sides of both my hips are exposed, two of the ten areas that will be marked.

  The rest of me remains unclothed for the ceremony. Since my birthday falls in the dead of winter I am allowed a blanket for the walk from my tent to the marking circle, but I still have to do so barefoot. Traditions are only allowed to bend so far.

  The elder-women pronounce me ready and make their exit, twittering like a flock of P’tic birds. They leave me alone with Mother for our final moments as parent and child. After tonight, I will be an adult in the eyes of the clan. I will no longer be able to rely on Mother to care for my needs.

  I brush my thumb-tip over the marking scar on her forehead. Time and wear have wrinkled the P’tic feather design, softened the ridges. She swaddles me with a blanket and kisses the top of my head. My skin is hyper-aware from all the preparations. It prickles with chill-bumps as I soak up the warmth of her embrace and inhale the scent of her C’vet flower perfume. It reminds me of carefree late-summer days as a child.

  “Your brother will not be there,” she says. “But he wanted me to assure you that you’re in his thoughts.”

  I would rather see his face in the crowd, but I understand why he chose not to attend. He cannot watch me flinch and groan, no matter how beautiful the marks will be later. Mother, however, has no choice. As a marked and matched woman she is required to attend, but as my mother she must also relinquish her parental guardianship.

  Drummers far outside the tent punch a marching rhythm to my ears. “It’s time,” Mother says. “Remember what I’ve taught you, and focus on your breathing.”

  She picks up my marking iron and leads me outside. The cold air nips at my cheeks. The snow-covered ground bites the freshly scrubbed, tender soles of my feet. I hold my head high and look straight ahead, beyond the line of drummers, at the raging fire of the marking circle and the crowd surrounding it. All the women of age—twenty years or older, already marked, and most of them already matched—are required to attend.

  One of the women pushes through the crowd for a better look. Even at a distance, I’m able to discern her dark eyes peering out from beneath a fur-trimmed hood. A thick braid of hair, black as night, spills from the hood’s opening by her neck and trails down the curves of her chest like a Rysh’ka viper descending from a tree. Her forehead appears free of marks. If she is younger than twenty it cannot be by much. My chest tightens, thinking about her beautiful hair getting shaved soon.

  But I don’t even know her. I’m grieving over my own bald head.

  Unlike the others, her expression is more of concern than curiosity or anticipation. Calm spreads through me, steady as the drumbeats driving me forward. I want to show her there is nothing to fear. I hold her gaze, like a rope that keeps a boat from drifting away from the dock, but then she is bumped out of view by a couple of inquisitive young girls.

  There are men present, too. They are not required to attend the marking ceremonies of women, especially if they are marked but unmatched. We are free to begin our life-match search once we have been marked, and there have been rare instances of heart-stone bonds occurring on the very night of a marking ceremony. Not in public at the marking circle, but later. I secretly hope my life-match approaches me after the ceremony.

  I do not wish to live alone, not even for one night.

  As I draw closer to the bonfire, the smell of smoke stings my nostrils. Our clan leader, Vod’ya, gestures for the drummers to cease. The sudden silence is palpable. I search for the rhythmic swish of waves crashing on rocky shores, a pacifying sound I have always been able to find during quiet. But it is washed away by the constant thrum of blood in my ears. I stand before Vod’ya, still covered by the blanket. She is the oldest of the elder-women. Even her lips have been creviced with age. The nearby flames cast shadows on her features, making her appear less kind than I know her to be.

  She was there for my birth. She is here for my marking. She will be present at my life-match sealing. She has only ever wished what is best for me.

  The bottoms of my feet are numb, but I am otherwise warm. My heart-stone is pumping extra heat through me and I don’t know why. Because I’m eager to begin the life it wants for me? Or something else?

  Vod’ya removes my blanket. Icy air attacks my exposed flesh. Shivers seize me. My whole body shudders. Every muscle within me aches as it battles the chill.

  Breathe…breathe…breathe…

  Vod’ya’s ceremon
y speech feels unending. It departs our island in winter, crosses the ocean, and returns in summer—she is still not finished. I can’t concentrate on her words.

  More heat. Stronger. The snow beneath my feet has been reduced to puddles. Steam rises from my dampened skin. Everything blurs. Sights and sounds and smells twist together. All I can do is breathe.

  Breathe…breathe…breathe…

  Mother speaks next, but her voice is slurred in this mental haze. When she falls silent again I know she has given up her guardianship. I am my own person now. Vod’ya takes my chin in her calloused hand and forces me to look directly into her cloud-grey eyes. I’ve practiced the vow so many times before tonight that it requires no thought to direct it from mind to throat.

  “I, Liu’bimec, daughter of Nego’valec, do hereby vow my life to the Umet’nik clan, and shall, from this day forward, dedicate my mind and body to the creation of art in its finest form. I have been guided by my heart-stone and willingly submit to its desires. For the prosperity of our clan. For the prosperity of our island.”

  Mother hands Vod’ya my marking iron. I provided the design for the iron-workers myself as a way of proving my devotion to the craft. The mark is mine alone, a circle of P’tic feathers surrounding a C’vet flower in full bloom. The feathers are a tribute to Mother’s mark, and the C’vet flower is a symbol of freedom—my freedom to live the life I have chosen. The peaks of its wide, oblong petals reach toward the limitless power of the sun.

  Two of Vod’ya’s guards station on either side of me and hold my wrists tight against their chests. Another kneels behind me and holds my knees together. Vod’ya heats the marking iron and then pulls it from the fire. The end is red-hot. I cannot look at it without my eyes burning. I tilt my head back and stare straight up at the night sky. Wisps of smoke and glowing embers rise above me, seeming to touch the stars. Maybe if I don’t see it coming, then—

  Pain sears my right arm, just below the shoulder, followed by a growing nausea. I try to ignore the sizzle of skin and the scent of burning flesh, clench my teeth and just breathe.

  Left arm…breathe…

  Right hip…breathe…

  Left hip…scream!

  My heart-stone explodes with pain. Flashes of white. My body wrenches to one side, but the men hold me tighter. Even as the marking iron moves next to strike the backs of my hands, tops of my feet, back of my neck, and at last my forehead, my heart-stone continues to blaze in agony.

  I scream in tandem with its pain until my voice disappears and I’m so weak the guards are no longer needed to hold me in place. They lower me in a crumpled heap at Vod’ya’s feet. She says my life-match must be close for such a volatile reaction to the mark over the side of my left hip. My heart-stone is unusually sensitive.

  Vod’ya dismisses the women and girls and asks the guards to form a human fence around me. She commands every unmatched man present for the ceremony to step into the private circle, one at a time. My whole body trembles, but it is only after-shocks of the unexpected trauma. None of the men induce a heart-stone bond.

  Vod’ya declares it an overreaction on my part. I was too nervous over the ceremony, she says, but I’ve never heard of someone’s heart-stone boiling over from nerves. No, something external caused this. Either Vod’ya doesn’t know the answer or she sees fit not to tell me. For my own good, I assume.

  Perhaps the danger has passed, whatever it was.

  The elder-women guide me back to my tent. I lie on my rag-mattress while they apply salve to my marks, bandage them, and order me to rest. One of the women says I have the most elegant marks she has ever seen. I want to thank her, but exhaustion renders me silent. In another moment they are gone.

  For the first time in my life I’m completely alone.

  “Liu?”

  The voice belongs to Bre’art, my brother, but I can’t respond. My throat is pasty and my eyelids heavy as boulders. The last time I felt like this was the morning after Mother allowed my first taste of Klud’byr wine.

  Bre places a hand over my heart-stone. Heat prickles my skin where his palm touches. As my only full-blooded kin, Bre has the closest connection to my heart-stone. Until I bond with my life-match, he is the one person who can accurately assess my well-being. Even better than the physicians of the Drav’nik clan.

  “She’s all right,” he says. “Let her rest.”

  “But she needs to eat—”

  “She’s all right,” he repeats. “And this worry in the air will do her no good. Please leave. All of you. Let her have peace in her own tent.”

  The other voice was female but not Mother’s. It has to be Se’stra, my brother’s wife, and the others he referred to are their children. As their matron, Se’stra is forbidden to separate from them during routine daily activities until they begin formal schooling the year of their twelfth summer. At that time they will receive teachings from clan authorities around the entire island. Without such eclectic guidance a heart-stone’s desire can be confused, or misinterpreted.

  Shuffling feet make their exit, but I still sense Bre’s presence. As a bonded pair he and Se’stra cannot put extreme distance between them, but they can part to attend to separate duties. Our clan territories were designed to be just large enough that each half of a bonded pair can stand on opposite ends and not suffer for it. Any farther, though, and the resulting heart-stone agony would cripple them both. Kill them, if prolonged.

  A bond is for life.

  “I don’t know what is ailing you,” Bre says, “but I’m sure you can fight it. You have always been strong, even when weak.”

  My insecurity and fear of the unknown silently argue with his statement.

  It is biologically impossible to bond before the age of twenty, just as it is biologically impossible to breathe through your ears, and no one has ever bonded with someone not of their clan. That is the way of the heart-stone. And the heart-stone doesn’t lie.

  My scalp and other areas itch from the regrowth of my hair. Eager to get me started on my life-match search, Se’stra has already arranged for someone to meet me in private. His name is Snu’bec, and I can’t help but snicker when she tells me this.

  “Why is that funny?” she says, wrapping an embroidered P’tic-blue sash over the waist of my plain shift.

  “Together we are Liu and Snu. That’s absurd.”

  “Is it? Your brother and I are Bre and Se, are we not? There may be more meaning to your names than a silly rhyme.”

  I cannot refute her logic.

  She pats my neck with C’vet-perfumed oil, a recent gift from Mother. I tug down a cap over my spiky head. My hair is growing back, but I look like a boy. Se’stra offers me a few words of advice. Nothing too detailed, though, with the young ones present.

  Relax. Breathe deeply. Trust your heart-stone to guide you.

  Se’stra leaves, followed by her six children. I hope to have at least that many by the time I am my brother’s age. Tonight I may be creating my first…the thought shouldn’t terrify me so, but first-bonding incapacitates you. It not only opens the way for procreation but also burns an indelible new mark on each person, which is later used as proof for the sealing ceremony. It has to hurt.

  But Mother told me I have nothing to fear. Heart-stone bonding can make you forget yourself and everything around you for those precious few moments, but it is more pleasure than pain. I believe this. Mother has never steered me wrong before.

  The flap of my tent opens and a tall, well-muscled man steps in. I freeze. He is handsome, with eyes as pure blue as the surrounding ocean, and spikes of hair blond as sand. His forehead marking healed clean and smooth—the arched, fluffy tail of a Kun’du surrounded by thorny vines. It is a symbol of courage. The same pattern has been sewn into his tunic sleeves. He is a fine artist.

  He introduces himself, smiling boyishly as he steps closer. My heart beats hard in my chest, nervous with anticipation, but my heart-stone…my heart-stone is as frozen as the rest of me. Perhaps we aren’t close
enough.

  I step right up to him, driven by selfish desire, hungry for companionship. He lifts a hand and laces his fingers with mine. His skin still holds the chill from outside. I shudder. His other hand presses against my lower back, nudging our bodies closer. There is nothing but fabric between our skins.

  And still, no heat. He isn’t my match.

  Realization melts over his face. Embarrassed, we push away from each other and I wrap my arms around myself. This emptiness within feels like the breath of Winter herself.

  I apologize and ask him to leave. He offers a smile laced with regret, then obliges.

  There are plenty of other available men, Mother would say, but it is no comfort. I cry until my throat is swollen and raw, my eyes puffy and stinging with salt. I’ve forgotten what it is like to fall asleep without tears.

  Winter white melts into the muddy floods of spring, and persistent showers give way to summer’s heat. My hair is still short, but long enough that I can fasten wildflowers into it and appear more feminine than I feel.

  Still no life-match. The only thing men have to offer me are looks of pity.

  Girls I grew up with proudly display their rounded bellies. They sit in circles and discuss things I fear I will never experience. Things like birthing and breast-feeding and how to please their men while in this awkward physical state. At the island’s Center Market they trade their sketches and figurines with the other clans in exchange for carrying pouches, cradles, and stackable blocks.

  If not for my own craft, my life would have no purpose. I spend my days as lonesome as my nights, on the seashore, immersed in painting how I imagine the life beneath the waves. Full of wild vegetation and fantastical creatures. Some beautiful, some terrifying.

  It is good work, like no other’s. Trade-worthy. I shouldn’t feel so inadequate.

  But I’ve studied our Book of Lineage. If you are still unmatched on the first anniversary of your marking ceremony, you are banished from the island. It is assumed that you were meant to be with another clan or live as a solitary traveler. You may leave the clan you were born into, if that is what your heart-stone desires. This is not uncommon. But if you do not leave, and you were meant to, it is a disgrace to all clans. You did not let your heart-stone guide you to the life it wants you to live.