Author's Note:
Dear readers, ok, ok, I know it's been a whileit did take time to get words out againsigh. But well, in this chapter hmm the plot thickens. More surprises in store, and they'll slowly peel away as the chapters roll in. Enjoy! Thank you so much for reading, all of you, especially those who bothered with reviews. Rejoice - exams are over - so no more excuses I suppose! (barring interference from RL: Ugh)
I beg your pardon for using bad Romany phrases.
Chapter 7: "Sorrow Songs"
Evelyn Carnahan wondered about the fighting that she left behind but the pressure of Severige's hand on hers was too hard to ignore, his outpouring of predatory instinct too pure to disregard.
"Come," He had urged in a whisper, beckoning her towards a nondescript door that led out to the other side of town, quieter, unexplored at this time of the day.
There was an air about him that tingled her senses. His nearness was disconcerting, overwhelming; each time he turned his eyes in her direction it was as if he visually forbade the intake of breath of every creature under heaven to stand unchanged in his viridian gaze, unmediated under open sun or in shade.
Just then another hand grabbed hers. Its grip was tenacious, tentacle-like, aging fingers gnarled and demonically ugly, precise and ancient scars lining the tops of each fingertip. She traced the source of the touch, eyes roving quickly upwards.
Lyanka. She had no last name, the nomad that many believed her to be, who made her home where she pleased, leaving no traces of herself when she left a place.
The woman whom Evelyn had known the last time she was in Egypt, so old that she gained a reputation as an ageless deity, whom 'they' claimed as an adroit practitioner of the black arts and the religiously forbidden, rewarded for such by the unknown length of her days yet also cursed by the very same arts she practiced that made her age like a witch. Popular legends surrounded her like wild shrubbery, that she had raised the dead to life calling upon the power of the Egyptian gods, that she had learnt her gypsy arts from the far east of the Continent before journeying by foot to Egypt in the past century, generating a wary distance and a respectable reverence from all who met her. She was strange and best avoided like the plague, commanding the Detlene, the wandering spirits of the Stillborns after you at leisure, unless one needed their fortune told with the greatest urgency.
She gave a small smile, but Evelyn Carnahan could not be sure she was actually doing so, unless one classified the almost grotesque twist of the mouth to expose teeth that were of different lengths and varying shades of yellow.
Severige's face was a picture of mild interest as they halted in the middle of the dirt road.
"Lyanka!" She cried out in surprise, smiling widely at the gypsy whom she thought merely craved a wave of recognition from her.
But it was not a pleasant call, as it seemed, judging from the stern look on the old woman's face. And then she made a simple gesture, a violent swing of her right arm to the side twice, and then thrice, warningly.
"Bolde tut, kako, kako. Tshi." Turn away, turn, please. Do not.
It was not a language that fell strangely on her ears yet it required no knowledge of foreign tongues to interpret Lyanka's frantic gesture as an admonition of sorts. The pressure of Severige's hand on hers had increased slightly; he already felt like family - no, he was family, she corrected herself, as long as she kept her focus on his eyes and his form. But she had yet to see his face, which she hoped to be a sight that did not disappoint.
Yet it was difficult to shrug off the discomfort that had suddenly presented itself, superficial as she had tried to call it, to dismiss it as a passing perception.
Lyanka's diminishing form was tonally no softer however; it was as if she feared something, afraid that Evelyn Carnahan had not caught her meaning, vociferating out several sentences this time in Romany, repeating them in Arabic, in poor English, the torrential jumble of words this time producing an abominable, an undesirable reaction that rolled out therein when she caught its meaning.
You will sing sorrow songs; it will find you
Sorrow songs, sorrow songs
What?
Rikono! Lyanka spat, directing the venomous expletive towards Severige even as they rapidly walked away, her hand tightly held in his, her head turned back towards the irate gypsy. You dog, she had called Severige. Had she known the sacrilegious and the profanity of such implications?
His eyes had darkened into the green of the sea that reflected an imminent storm, brows rigid and unyielding in a fierce scowl, and she imagined his tight jaw pulsing with a great pounding vein, yet he persistently said nothing to her.
They crossed the dirt path into yet another street, before he ushered her into an old, nondescript car. He relaxed his hold on her, the tension substantially flowing out of him when he slumped slightly over the wheel.
"The woman offends me. Beyond belief." Severige told her quietly. "Forgive the silence. I did not know how to react and chose instead silence until the anger abated."
Could admiration be developed in such a short space of time, Evelyn wondered.
"Then you could not possibly have better timing since you had spared words painful on a lady's ear," She remarked lightly, "A lacking quality in many gentlemen indeed!"
Severige inhaled slowly and grinned, pulling off his veil, revealing his looks that made Evelyn Carnahan wish they had no blood relation. "Then a highly qualified gentleman I am. I beg your pardon once again. It is not my usual behaviour among family members as such."
He was so classically handsome, fairer than most Egyptians, the aquiline sides of his face and the greenish hue of his eyes lending him a sharpness and an aristocratic air that made most people mistake him for a Westerner than an Arab.
The car was started, and he drove for a short distance before they stopped.
"We have to walk a bit more, if you don't mind."
She did not understand such secrecy, neither could she assimilate the implications of it all, lulled into a sense of security by the charms of one who called himself family.
"Please, come in," He urged, looking surreptitiously around before disappearing through a doorway in a smarmy part of Cairo that she knew existed yet had never dared venture into.
It was entirely too dark, the whole place; half-expecting scampering rodents that savagely gnawed at all that barely lived, yet the brevity of the sharp Cairo light that illuminated a room when the door opened and closed threw light on a dwelling so opulently furnished, boasting so greatly in its plentitude that it stood in stark contrast to and put to shame the dearth conditions of the street outside.
"Old mum?" There was an uncertainty in that dear voice, as if her name were a mouthful.
Jonathan. Evelyn Carnahan had never been so joyous at the sight of him; the face of a beloved rascal brother nearly moving her to tears, rushing into his arms ignoring the bewilderment on his face.
"I have many questions, Jon! About the morning, the time that I took to get here -"
"Shh, Evy, hold there a bit," he whispered. "We are not alone. There are pairs of eyes that are currently rudely staring at the supposed overt English display of affection, even if it's a pure unromantic embrace between siblings."
"What?" She pulled back in confusion, catching sight of several gazes that were either amused or critical.
"Evelyn," Severige approached warmly. "As happy as you are to see your brother, please allow me some introductions. My sister and also your mother's cousin, Najya Savita Mahadeva, our immediate family." He gestured grandly with his hand.
They were beautiful people, Evelyn thought, with their fairer colouring and their piercing gazes, coming to face with relatives whom she did not know existed and now appeared to be the closest to her in the space of a day. Perhaps - grand-uncle Sayyed...
"Our younger cousin, the little Suhail, her brother Javad and his wife, Mahasti"
The introductions passed in a blur, the names quickly forgotten as they were introduced.
"Jonathan and I dare not presumeour trunks are after all in the hotel still, and we can't possibly-" She started out slowly, unsure.
"We do not take no for an answer." Najya Mahadeva insisted, smiling with the same wide smile as her brother did. "There is food for you - vegetables and fruits, or meats even; you may even spend the night here before you return to the hotel tomorrow or whenever you wish to."
"Old mum, we shall not refuse our hostess' hospitality, don't you agree?" Her brother looked at her archly, daring her counterargument.
"No argument from me, Jon." How could she not cave in when such an offer was so irresistible?
"Just how did you meet Najya again?" Evelyn Carnahan lounged luxuriously in the bath prepared for her, yelling out her question those who had ears to hear them.
"Ah, met her once again on the streets," her brother called out from the other side of the room, his voice somewhat unclear. "Do you realise just how decadent that sounds? I met her on the streets - not as if we were engaged in any improper..." he groped for a word, "um...enterprises."
"I shall not ask what you normally do on the streets, Jon." She replied dryly.
"I'm not all women and booze, Evy my love."
"Seriously, Jon."
"Aww, old mum! Where's your faith in me? Waitthese fruits are good! Have you wondered where they've bought all their culinary supplies? It's lavish enough to live the life of some Turkish Sultan -"
"It's for both of us, Jon. Please leave a portion of everything so I might, too, briefly experience that same decadence you are now savouring - O lords!" She stepped out of the bath. "A silk robe! They really know the meaning, nay, they live the definition of hospitality!"
"Get used to it Evy, we're now all family."
"Unashamed, aren't you?"
"I'd say you deserve it, after the fray in the Museum with Ardeth Bay; think of it as reward for all that week of waiting. Now that doesn't sound a mite bit too bad anymore, does it?"
"That was a clever reply, Jon. Unfortunately I think I will have to agree with you. It does seem well enough a payback to enjoy." She sighed.
"Why that sigh, sis?"
"Don't you find it odd that we are suddenly reconciled to family after a week?"
"Odd?"
"You know, we've been without relatives for so long, only to find that we've suddenly got a maternal side that we've so conveniently forgotten about, how you meet people, I meet others, and we're suddenly reunited"
"I'd call it a coincidence. A lucky one, for that matter," he affirmed.
"Have you been here before, Jon?" It was somewhat confusing to her, nonetheless.
"No, why?"
"What did Najya tell you when you met her today? Why don't you tell me a more detailed version? Starting from the time we both left the hotel, to the time you went into -"
"There's really nothing much to tell, sis. I'd be offended if you insinuated that I have some secret liaison somewhere, but well, my point is, that -"
"'Twas an entirely innocent question, my darling brother. Cairo is not a small place, and with the throngs of people who mill about, what is the probability of us meeting in the same house somewhere in a part of town we hardly venture into?"
"Evy, sometimes the amount of distrust that surfaces from you amazes me." Jonathan clucked his tongue in mock disapproval. "Maybe it is kinder if you told me now that one of us were indeed adopted; I promise no blame, a split of property down half exactly, a sense of relief and resignation on my tail."
"Alright Jon, you were the one. Forgive me for not revealing it earlier because I wished to spare your feelings."
"What?"
"The adopted one."
"Such a deadpan answer masks a terrible side that can only be found in you, Evy."
"I wouldn't speak too fast."
"I wouldn't speak too fast at all, Evy." He murmured his reply, the repeat of what she said, yet she knew he was no longer referring to the light-hearted banter.
"What happens tomorrow?"
"We take them up on their offer." He said simply.
"No, Jon. Seriously, once again."
"I meant that. A day at a time, or a night at a time." He replied cryptically, offering her fruit on a silver platter.